The Liberals have big questions about the NDP’s “branch office” in Montreal, which they claim is totally for coordinating parliamentary work and is totally not doing any partisan work – really! Note that the NDP complained when the Bloc had an office set up in Montreal paid for out of Parliamentary funds, but when they do it, it’s not problem. What I find intensely curious about the whole affair is not only the way in which several of these staffers have dual titles, and that a number of them are labelled as “outreach.” The thing that I finds a little disturbing is the way that this points to a concerning level of central control when it comes to their MPs and staff, far and above the particular level of centralisation they already have with staffers on the Hill. Suffice to say, it all does look a bit suspicious.
Author Archives: Dale
Roundup: Condemning an illegitimate referendum
As expected, Stephen Harper has denounced the “referendum” in Crimea, and said that it would lead to further isolation for Vladimir Putin. Said vote, which was done on ten days notice, with no voters list, and with the only options of seceding from Ukraine or seceding from Ukraine and joining Russia, is said to have a result of 95 percent in favour of joining Russia, but given that it’s illegitimate and dubious at best when conducted under what amounts to military occupation, it’s only real use will be for Putin to legitimise his occupation of the region. (Incidentally, Justin Trudeau tweeted that the government did the right thing to condemn the vote; Thomas Mulcair tweeted a photo of himself pouring beers for St. Patrick’s Day).
Roundup: No ruling on “reasonable”
A Federal Court judge has declined to rule on whether a three-year delay in an Access to Information request is “reasonable” under the legislation, saying that it’s Parliament’s decision to make, not hers. This could make the Information Commissioner’s job much more difficult, if she doesn’t have a proper definition of what constitutes a reasonable delay to go by.
Roundup: Denying a green light
Drama in the Liberal ranks in preparation for a by-election in Trinity Spadina, as the nomination front-runner was apparently refused a green light from the Ontario Campaign Co-Chair because Christine Innes and her husband, former MP and junior minister Tony Ianno were accused of intimidating and bullying volunteers. Apparently they were telling these volunteers that their futures in the party would be over if they were on the “wrong side” of a nomination battle, meaning the future riding redistribution and their support for Chrystia Freeland. Innes put out a statement alleging backroom strong-arm tactics and that she refused to be “assigned” a riding to run in, which went against the promise of open nominations. The party responded that it was a request to keep candidates focused on the by-election, and not future nomination battles against incumbent MPs, which sounds like what the intimidation was about. As the battle waged over Twitter, the partisan concern trolling from all sides got cute, but the accusations of sexism because she was denied the green light over the actions of her husband do seem a bit over the top.
Roundup: Exiting Afghanistan
The Canadian Army lowered the flag for the last time in Afghanistan, as our troops officially pull out of that country after our longest military engagement ever. Not that the job is really done, but we’re now turning it over to domestic security forces, as nascent as they are. Our ambassador says that Canada will remain engaged in the country and will help to rebuild their economy, and in particular their resource sector.
Roundup: Sticking to the sidelines
A number of Quebec senators are also shying away from getting involved in the provincial election there, though some are saying that they will play whatever roles they can along the sidelines. The mayors of a number of smaller towns in the rest of Canada are alarmed that their local newspapers are owned by QMI, which in turn is owned by Pierre-Karl Péladeau, especially considering just how concentrated his ownership of that media is. Michael Den Tandt notes that Pauline Marois has been articulating Jacques Parizeau’s vision, where it was “money and the ethnic vote” that lost them the last referendum, and that Marois is sidelining those ethnic minorities with her values charter and trying to bring money on her side with Péladeau. Economist Stephen Gordon writes about the desirability of a monetary union with an independent Quebec, and how Quebec’s debt load would make it a risky proposition for them. Marois tried to insist that it would be “borderless” and would welcome Canadian tourists. No worries, see!
Roundup: Ignoring previous suggestions
Our Officers of Parliament are saying that Mark Adler’s “witch-hunt” bill to ensure that they don’t have partisan pasts rings hollow considering that they jointly sent suggestions to the Commons about making their offices more transparent in the wake of the Christiane Ouimet affair, and nobody followed up on that. Of course they didn’t, as there wasn’t any partisan advantage to it.
Roundup: PKP goes to the PQ
All tongues were wagging, not only in Quebec but across the rest of the country as Pierre-Karl Péladeau, head of Videotron (owner of QMI and the Sun Media chain) and Hydro-Québec, was recruited as a candidate to run for the Parti Québécois, no matter that he categorically denied having any intention to run a few weeks previous. Péladeau says that he’s resigned from all of his holdings, but that his stock will go into a “blind trust” – which would mean that it’s not really a blind trust, because you don’t know what stocks are in a blind trust. At least one Quebec union is unimpressed given their history of clashes with Péladeau, and well, the unions tend to like the PQ. So there’s that. Here is Maclean’s profile of Péladeau. Martin Patriquin writes that in the short term, at least, he’s a win for the PQ, while Michael Den Tandt wonders about how this will play out with the Sun chain, and the “so Canadian it hurts” SunTV crowd, now that their majority shareholder is dedicated to the break-up of the country.
Roundup: Reading his own report wrong
Harry Neufeld, former chief electoral officer of BC and author of a report on voter irregularities in the last federal election wants it to be made clear that said report didn’t say there was fraud. Pierre Poilievre, who likes to cite that report, decided to double down and actually say that Neufeld was reading his own report wrong. No, seriously. Neufeld, incidentally, says that many of the incidents of “fraud” that people insist happen are urban myths that have been repeated so often that people start to believe them without actually witnessing it happen. Andrew Coyne shreds the Fair Elections Act and quite correctly points out that while there are a few good points in the bill, the closer one looks at it, the worse it gets and becomes untenable.
Roundup: Mayrand’s concerns laid out
After a bout of procedural shenanigans and two separate time allocation votes in the Commons, Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand spoke to the Commons Procedure and House Affairs committee, giving his assessment of the Fair Elections Act. He has a couple of major concerns – the lack of powers to compel testimony, the loss of the vouching system and the likelihood that it will disenfranchise voters, and inadequate paperwork filed by candidates who get their refunds nevertheless. He spoke about the privacy concerns over turning over the lists of who actually voted over to the parties, who have zero legislated privacy safeguards, and said that the fears of voter information cards to commit fraud is a lot of sound and fury over nothing as most of the errors recorded were procedural and not substantive. In case you couldn’t guess, Pierre Poilieve shrugged off most of the whole appearance, and tried to claim that Mayrand made a number of factual errors.