Author Archives: Dale

About Dale

Journalist in the Canadian Parliamentary Press Gallery

QP: Tax credits vs carbon taxes

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While Justin Trudeau was away in Toronto, Andrew Scheer was absent once again (despite having been in Ottawa for the National Prayer Breakfast), leaving it to Lisa Raitt to lead off, worrying that Atlantic Canadians haven’t had a real wage increase which would be made worse by a carbon tax. Catherine McKenna reminded her that climate change impacts will make things worse and more expensive, and wondered why the other party didn’t have a plan. Raitt concerned trolls that high fuel prices would mean people can’t make choices to walk, to which McKenna turned the concern around to point to the children in the Gallery and the world they will inherit. Raitt demanded the government support their Supply Day motion about not imposing carbon taxes, and McKenna reminded her of the costs of climate change, and the trillion dollar clean energy opportunity. Alain Rayes then raised in French all of the tax credits that the government cancelled to decry the imposition of a carbon tax, to which McKenna again asked what the Conservative plan was. After another round of the same, Guy Caron was up next for the NDP, raising the changed candidate for the new Chef Electoral Officer, to which Brison reminded him that they should respect the privacy of those who engage in the appointment process. Caron asked again in English, to which Brison reiterate his admonishing. Hélène Laverdière was up next to raise the federal report on use of Canadian LAVs in Saudi Arabia, questioning its veracity. François-Philippe Champagne reminded her that they are passing legislation to strengthen control of arms abroad. Laverdière quipped that the bill has holes in it, and then reiterated the question in English before calling on the government to suspend arms exports to Saudi Arabia. Champagne reiterated his remarks about the bill, thanking MPs for their input.

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Roundup: Woe be the social conservatives

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Oh, the poor social conservatives, always being played by mainstream conservative parties, both federal and provincial, for the sake of their votes at leadership conventions only to be dumped when the going gets tough. We have two provincial examples to now add to the list, for what it’s worth. In Ontario last weekend, Progressive Conservative leader dumped former leadership rival Tanya Granic Allen as a candidate after comments she made about same-sex marriage came to light, and everyone was shocked! Shocked!That the woman whose entire leadership campaign was the disingenuous fear that Ontario’s new sex-ed curriculum was going to indoctrinate children to anal sex was going to be a problematic homophobic candidate. But hey, Ford used her second-choice votes to get himself over the top for the leadership and let her run for a nomination and win, despite everyone knowing that she not only made homophobic comments, but also disparaging comments about Muslims, and it was okay until the weekend before the writ-drop. How terribly cynical. Chris Selley walks us through that particular bit of theatre that abuses social conservatives’ trust, while Martin Patriquin notes that while her ouster makes Ford look more centrist, Granic Allen’s replacement is far more of a credible threat to Liberals, for what it’s worth.

Meanwhile in Alberta, Jason Kenney is now twisting himself in a pretzel to defend the social conservative policies adopted at the UCP convention over the weekend, coming up with bogus equivocations about the anti-GSA resolution being “poorly worded,” or how the policy around “invasive medical procedures” had its roots in a minor getting a “controversial vaccine” and totally has nothing to do with abortion, no sir. Jen Gerson notes that this is the chickens coming home to roost after Kenney so deliberately courted these social conservatives and made this “grassroots guarantee” about them making the policies – only for that pledge to vanish down the memory hole, and him insisting that platforms aren’t made by committees and how it’s his pen that will translate it all, and you can take his assurances that they won’t out LGBT kids “to the bank.” (I personally wouldn’t cash that cheque, but I may be biased, being gay and all).

The common lesson here? That conservatives both federally and provincially are quick to insist “big blue tent” to draw in the social conservatives and the Red Tories but are quick to disappoint both in pursuit of populist measures that they hope will get them votes. It’s not about being centrist, because if that were the goal, you’d see way more Red Tory appeals than we do (and in fact, if the last federal leadership convention was any indication, Red Tories like Michael Chong were often derided as Liberals and traitors to the cause). It’s more about the cult of personality around the chosen leader, and policy is almost an afterthought, and those identifiable groups within the big tent are just fodder to get that leader into place. It’s a sad state of affairs for political parties, and these latest examples are just more proof of that.

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QP: Sob stories about carbon taxes

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While the PM was present today, following a meeting with the Prince of Monaco, Andrew Scheer was absent, yet again. Alain Rayes led off, listing off a torqued and misleading litany of supposed ills of carbon taxation — numbers that did not reflect reality — to which a Justin Trudeau noted that while the previous government didn’t take action, his government would do so. Rayes railed on about cancelled tax credits before trying to wedge it into another carbon tax question, and Trudeau reiterated his answer. Pierre Poilievre took over, accusing the Pm of having lived “most of his life” in government-owned mansions and of living in the lap of luxury while raising taxes on everyone, but his mention of BC in his preamble set Trudeau off on an explanation of how BC’s decade-old carbon tax has led to economic growth and lower emissions. Poilievre gave another list of disingenuous accusations, and Trudeau noted that everting in that was wrong before launching into a well-worn list of things his government accomplished. They went another round of the very same before Guy Caron got up for the NDP, railing about tax havens and the registration of corporations in Canada. Trudeau took up a script to read that they had international treaties to share data with partners, and that they reached agreements with provincial and territorial governments to have transparency on who own corporations. Caron asked again in English, got the same answer, and then Tracey Ramsey railed about secret negotiations around NAFTA. Trudeau noted that an agreement in principle was about the broad strokes being agreed to so that they could move forward to a legal scrub. Karine Trudel asked the same in French, but got a much blander response about trade.

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Roundup: Kenney gets some policy resolutions

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Alberta’s United Conservative Party held their foundational policy convention in Red Deer this last weekend, featuring plenty of cameo appearance by federal Conservatives including Andrew Scheer, and you can bet that Justin Trudeau was a favoured target (along with the premier, Rachel Notley, of course). Jason Kenney vowed to make an enemy of the “green left,” to the point where he was vowing to fight things that are areas of federal jurisdiction, which is funny considering that he’s been baying at the moon about the federal government apparently not asserting their jurisdiction vigorously enough when it comes to pipelines getting built. Funny how that happens.

There was an interesting digression into conservative feminism as part of the weekend’s narratives, with an airing of grievances against the particular brand of feminism that Justin Trudeau preaches, and the allegations that it means that Trudeau is dictating their values to them (particularly when it comes to issues like abortion, where Trudeau follows the logic that women should have agency over their own bodies – shockingly). Rona Ambrose announced that she is leading a new non-profit group to help women get involved in the UCP, through fundraising, mentorship, logistics, and networking – things that are not seen as tokenism or quotas. Heather Forsyth, former minister under Ralph Klein and interim leader of the Wildrose Party, was less than impressed, referring to talk of barriers facing women in politics as “socialist crap.” Of course, Dr. Cristina Stasia reminded her that socialism has long been sexist and hostile to women in politics as it’s seen as a “man’s role.” So there’s that.

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A number of social conservative issues came up at the convention, and despite sitting MLAs encouraging the grassroots members to vote against them – things like requiring parents be told if their children attend a Gay-Straight Alliance meeting at school, or having parents sign-off on “medically invasive procedures” for minors (read: abortions), which the grassroots crackpots insist were about “parental rights.” Sure, Jan. And Kenney outright said afterward that he’ll take these under advisement but won’t be held to them, saying that they’re “poorly worded” and the like. Because he wants to win and not be another “Lake of fire” party like Wildrose was, which cost them at least one election. However, Kenney has courted enough social conservatives and empowered them enough that they decisively won several policy votes meaning that they’ll be difficult to ignore, no matter how hard he tries to play down those resolutions when it comes time to draft his election platform, given that he conspicuously stayed out of the policy development process in order to give members a freer hand. It’ll be an even bigger problem for him to ignore them now.

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Roundup: Questions about Scheer’s assertions

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Andrew Scheer went to Calgary yesterday to talk to that city’s Chamber of Commerce and said a few things that I feel should probably stand a bit of questioning. Like the fact that he thinks it’s a “red flag” to use taxpayer funds to backstop the Trans Mountain expansion pipeline. And it’s fair that there’s scepticism about governments essentially subsidizing private business, but it’s his assertion that “governments investing tax dollars in energy projects is not the optimal solution.” Sure, it’s not optimal, but it’s complete and total historical revisionism to suggestion that this is somehow new or novel. Given the ways that governments, both federal and provincial, have de facto subsidized the development of the oilsands with generous royalty breaks and other tax incentives has been sinking a hell of a lot of taxpayer dollars into energy projects. And yes, there was a whole national crisis that had a hand in bringing down a federal government around the government sinking money into a cross-country pipeline.

But the other statement that Scheer makes that I find a bit puzzling is this continued insistence that somehow provinces were forced to “take matters into their own hands” over the Trans Mountain issue because the federal government showed a lack of leadership. And I’m still trying to figure out how this works. For starters, which provinces is he referring to? BC, which took it upon themselves to challenge federal jurisdiction in a naked attempt to appease a coalition partner? Or Alberta, who escalated tactics on the basis of a press release? “They should use all of the tools at their disposal,” Scheer insists of the federal government, and yet I’m not sure what exactly they were supposed to do. They already have jurisdiction – trying to re-assert it would imply that there was a question when there isn’t one, and creating doubt would embolden opponents. There wasn’t anything to challenge in the courts because BC had only put out a press release, and nobody even had a clue about what specific questions BC was raising until they filed their court reference this past week. How would going half-cocked have helped matters? But demanding they “use all the tools” sounds an awful lot like hand-wavey nonsense that serves to only invoke the politician’s syllogism than it does to suggest meaningful action. Kinder Morgan, meanwhile, has used this exercise in threatening to pull out in order to exact political leverage (and the fact that a private company is attempting to blackmail governments is not a good look), but there remain questions outside of all of this as to their own obligations to fulfil the conditions imposed on them by the National Energy Board for continued approval of the project. That can’t be glossed over.

I’m also curious what else he thinks the federal government should have done to silence BC’s objections, considering that he’s also supporting the Saskatchewan government’s attempt to push back against the imposition of the federal carbon backstop price. Is his position that federal governments should bigfoot provinces to get pipelines, but that they don’t dare interfere in areas of shared jurisdiction like the environment? That’s an interesting needle to thread, and somehow, I doubt we’ll see him attempting to do so anytime soon.

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Roundup: Erin Weir’s apostasy

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First thing Thursday morning, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh took to the microphone in the Foyer, caucus behind him, to announce that he had expelled Erin Weir from caucus following the conclusion of the investigation into harassment allegations. And to be clear, he wasn’t kicked out because of the conclusions, given that Weir agreed to anti-harassment training and conciliation with his accusers – rather, it was because he had the temerity to go to the media to respond to the leaked allegations made to him without getting the permission of the leader’s office. And then the other MPs told reporters that Weir “expelled himself” by doing so, because it meant there was no trust in that relationship. So…wow.

To be clear, we don’t have much in the way of details about the allegations that were sustained in the report, but we have Weir’s word for them, and the clues that Singh dropped. That the former senior staffer in Mulcair’s office leaked to the CBC forced Weir’s hand in responding (which he says he asked Singh’s office, and they never responded to him), and this was the basis of the policy dispute on the floor of the Saskatchewan NDP convention where that staffer threw her weight around, and then accused him of harassment. As for the three “sustained” incidents of sexual harassment, Singh said it was because Weir failed to read “non-verbal cues” but that when he was told his advances were unwarranted, he ceased. Weir says that he was told over the course of the investigation that it was essentially because he’s a “close talker” and failed to realize that it made some people uncomfortable, but he has no idea who his accusers were, and says that after the initial complaint about him that the party essentially put out a “call for proposals” from staff to see if there were any complaints, which does seem a bit suspicious. It also seems like there is a giant inflation in terms of what constitutes harassment and sexual harassment, particularly coming from an MP who is a bit socially awkward.

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Weir contends that he will sit as an independent for now, hoping that Singh will see reason, but given how the ranks have closed around him in a way they didn’t when David Christopherson got punished for breaking ranks on a vote suggests that Weir is now guilty of some form of apostasy, particularly that he had the temerity to defend himself in public when his accuser apparently leaked to the media to get ahead of the report when the leader’s office would have had him be humiliated publicly while he waited for permission to respond, which reinforces this notion that there can be cult-like behaviour in the party. Meanwhile, Don Martin suggests that the outcome of this mess suggests that this became a witch hunt, while John Ivison contends that this whole affair is not reflecting well on Singh, who continues to flounder as party leader. At Issue also took a look, and notes the rumours circulating that the party was looking for an excuse to boot Weir for whatever the reason.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau says they will not delay implementing legal cannabis, but that will still likely mean a September rollout, and that legalization is a “process.”
  • Scandal! The Trudeau family’s meals are prepared at 24 Sussex and then sent to Rideau Cottage by messenger! (Seriously? This is what we’re worrying about?)
  • The federal government will intervene in the BC Court of Appeal reference on pipelines. This is standard since their jurisdiction is up for question.
  • Bill Morneau says they’ll have a better handle on the costs to households from carbon pricing in September when all provinces have submitted their plans.
  • An audit shows that the programme to help veterans transition to civilian jobs was next to useless. The government has since switched to a different system.
  • Scott Brison isn’t looking to budge from his $7 billion fund in the Estimates to get programmes moving, while the real problem remains the sclerotic bureaucracy.
  • The government used their majority to reject nine of nineteen Senate amendments to the transport bill. Now we’ll watch senators huff and puff before passing it.
  • The Commons privacy committee is ordering Cambridge Analytica to preserve vital data in advance of investigation, given news of their bankruptcy proceedings.
  • The military is being accused of “brass bulge” as upper ranks are growing faster than the regular forces are.
  • In case you were curious, it turns out that part of why the parliamentary lawn is being dug up is because they have to replace the drainage pipes below it.
  • While the Supreme Court of Canada upheld his influence peddling conviction, Bruce Carson is likely to avoid jail time.
  • NDP MP Kennedy Stewart is considering a run for Vancouver mayor.
  • Here’s a good profile of Doug Ford, and what the experience of working with him on Toronto City Council was like.
  • The Canadian Press’ Baloney Meter™ tests the Conservative claim that they cut emissions without cutting taxes. (Ron Howard’s voice: “They didn’t.”)
  • Colby Cosh contends that our system worked in keeping outsider Kevin O’Leary away from political leadership (but that Doug Ford was a perfect storm).

Odds and ends:

A documentary crew is looking to film the Senate’s third reading speeches and vote on the bill to end whale and dolphin captivity.

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QP: The sexist carbon tax

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Following meetings with the prime minister of Portugal, Justin Trudeau was in Question Period, while Andrew Scheer was absent yet again. Lisa Raitt led off, worrying about the high price of gasoline in BC, which was being “compounded” by the carbon tax. Trudeau reminded her that BC has had a price on pollution for over ten years, and that carbon pricing allows people to make better choices. Raitt went for incredulous, raising the story that Trudeau has meals prepared at 24 Sussex and messengered to Rideau Cottage, to which Trudeau noted that the Conservatives were only interested in political attacks but not action on the environment. Gérard Deltell took over in French, noting that GHG emissions went down under ten Conservatives without a carbon tax — once again, omitting that it was because Ontario shuttered their coal-fired plants and the economic downturn, rather than anything that the then-Conservative government did. Trudeau reiterated that the Conservatives have no plan so they attack. Deltell asked again, and got the same answer. Raitt got back up, mentioned that the question was originally written by Gord Brown and had planned to ask it later in the week, and raised the issue of compensation for thalidomide survivors. Trudeau picked up a script to first give condolences for Brown’s death, and then added that they would have an announcement for those survivors soon. Guy Caron led off for the NDP, raising the problem of web giants creating the demise of advertising in newspapers which impacted press freedom. Trudeau took up another script to read about their support for a free press on World Press Freedom Day. Caron asked again in English, demanding those web giants be taxed, and Trudeau, sans script, reiterated his response and added that they are supporting local media via transition funding and CBC. Matthew Dubé worried about attempting to apply the Safe Third Country Agreement to the entire border, to which Trudeau said that they apply all of the rules and laws including our international obligations. Jenny Kwan asked the same in English, and got much the same answer with a slight admonishment that they were trying to create fear and conspiracy.

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Roundup: Another cry for technocracy

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After Ontario’s Financial Accountability Office weighed in on the government’s figures in advance of the election, he too finds that the province’s deficit is probably bigger than reported, as will its debt figures be. The accounting dispute between the government and its Auditor General remains in the air, while there are doubts being raised as to whether there are really surpluses in the pension funds in a meaningful sense. And it’s all done Andrew Coyne’s head in, because now he thinks that it’s time to simply take away any financial reporting away from a government, and turn it all over to a neutral, arm’s length, third-party body because the alternative is to let governments and other political parties spin and manipulate about what’s in the books. In his estimation, Auditors-General and Parliamentary Budget Officers/Fiscal Accountability Officers are of little use because their reports and opinions are not binding, who can pretend that they’re related to matters of opinion and accounting disputes, while opposition parties aren’t doing the job of accountability because they use the same torqued figures for their own purposes.

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But I think that Coyne is completely off the mark here, because he places too much faith in the words of the current watchdogs. We’ve seen examples where the Auditor General has been wrong – the Senate audit being a prime example where he was out of his depth, based a number of findings on opinion that were later overturned by a former Supreme Court of Canada justice hired to adjudicate the findings, and further legal analysis of his findings poked yet more holes in his analysis. We also see numerous examples of where the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s methodology is suspect (to say the least), but we rarely see these challenge being made public in the media because the media takes the words of these watchdogs as gospel, which should be alarming to anyone who engages in the slightest bit of critical thinking. To turn even more of our government’s fiscal processes over to yet another unaccountable technocratic body strikes fear into my heart because the people we keep demanding we turn this power over to are not infallible, and there are no ways for us to hold them to account – especially if the media refuses to do so responsibly either.

So while I can sympathise with Coyne’s frustration – and the situation in Ontario is particularly egregious, with all three parties guilty of playing along – the answer is never technocracy. We may get the governments that we deserve, but that also means that we, the voting public, need to do a better job of doing our own due diligence and demanding better, and we’re not – we’re just shrugging our way toward oblivion, which is part of the problem.

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Tributes for Gord Brown

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Question Period was cancelled today upon news that Conservative MP Gord Brown had died of a heart attack in his office earlier in the morning. MPs assembled in the House of Commons as they usually do, but rather than members’ statements, Conservative leader Andrew Scheer stood to pay tribute to Brown.

Scheer noted that he and Brown were both elected in 2004, and were both long-time volunteers going back to the PC Youth in Ontario. At the start of the current parliament, Brown was appointed whip by interim leader Rona Ambrose, while Scheer had been named House Leader, and they shared the same suite of offices. After Brown’s staff got him a bull whip as a joke, Scheer would often hear Brown crack it.

“I was always worried he was going to hurt himself,” Scheer quipped.

Scheer noted that as whip, Brown wanted to ensure that members of caucus supported one another on a personal level and not just a professional one. He also noted that while the wanted Brown at an event last week, Brown didn’t make it because he had a date night scheduled with his wife, Claudine, which he intended to keep, and Scheer said that now, he was glad that Brown made that choice. Scheer noted that Brown’s love of hockey, and that he was captain of their caucus hockey team, and also mentioned Brown’s recent work on behalf of Thalidomide survivors.

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Roundup: Detailed spending or slush fund?

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The Parliamentary Budget Officer weighed in yesterday on the government’s desire to create a $7 billion fund as part of the Estimates to get a jump start on budget promises before those spending plans can be finalized with departments and voted on in the Supplementary Estimates later in the year. The verdict? That enabling this would make it more difficult for MPs to do their duty of controlling government spending, because in their estimation, nothing obliges the government to spend that $7 billion on what is outlined in the budget annex. Government officials (on background) dispute this because they say that if they were to spend it on something other than what is laid out in the budget annex that it would constitute an unauthorized use of public funds.

“See! It’s a slush fund!” The Conservatives immediately cried and gave their little song and dance about how it’ll mean the Liberals can spend it willy-nilly on anything they want. And perhaps they should know – after all, they created a $3 billion “emergency fund” to deal with the 2008 financial crisis and wound up spending it on things like the gazebos in Tony Clement’s riding for the G8/G20 meeting when those funds were supposed to be used for border infrastructure. So is this the voice of experience talking? Good luck getting them to admit it. The NDP line, meanwhile, is that this is the Liberals trying to “suppress Parliament,” which I think you’ll have a hard time trying to find evidence for given how few actual strongarm tactics they’ve managed to engage in so far (a couple of ham-fisted moves that they’ve had to walk back from aside).

While on the one hand, I think the PBO has a point, on the other hand, it’s not a $7 billion black box, and the spending is outlined in the budget, and they can be held to account for it, which is also Parliament’s role. And given that the Estimates are basically unreadable currently and the fact that most MPs don’t pay the slightest bit of attention to them, the cynic in me wonders why they really care (other than it’s a convenient bludgeon to bash the government with). After all, I’ve watched enough times when the Commons has passed the Estimates at all stages with no actual debate or scrutiny on several occasions, leaving the actual hard work up to the Senate. Add to that, watching the Conservatives on their vote-a-thon vote against line items in the Estimates that they probably shouldn’t have shows how little attention they actually pay to the process and the contents. So would this $7 billion fund matter in the long run? Probably not. If nothing else, it’s more impetus for why we need to fix the Estimates process, to realign it with the budget and the Public Accounts, and ensure that they’re readable once again. And until that happens, I find myself having a hard time caring about this item given that there has been an attempt at due diligence that is otherwise so often lacking.

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