Tag Archives: First Nations

Roundup: Incoming amendments

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There are a tonne of amendments coming out in committees in the Senate, and there are likely going to be some fairly major developments and debates on these in the coming days – particularly once the House of Commons starts debating (and ultimately rejecting) a number of them. One of the more unexpected ones for me were the fairly major amendments to the solitary confinement bill. I was fully expecting the committee to recommend the bill not proceed because the courts had already found the bill unconstitutional and the committee was on the road to deeming it unsalvageable. Apparently, they’re going to make amendments instead, so we’ll see where this goes, because they have at least two court decisions on their side already.

The legal and constitutional affairs committee has also amended the Criminal Code revamp bill to ensure that there are tougher sentences for those who perpetrate domestic violence against Indigenous women. The problem? Well, most of those perpetrators are Indigenous men, and there is already a problem with over-incarceration, so this is going to be a tough needle to thread (but we’ll see how they attempt to do so.

Meanwhile, it looks like that major revamp of C-69 – the environmental assessment bill – was left intact at report stage on a vote on division, which means that they didn’t hold a standing vote, but were simply acknowledging that the vote was not unanimous. It’s a bit…suspect that they chose to go this route, considering how many of these amendments essentially gut the bill (and were indeed written by oil and gas company lobbyists, which totally isn’t problematic at all). But what is ultimately happening here is that these senators – and Senator Peter Harder in particular – are going to send this to the House of Commons so that they can reject them, and then send it back to the Senate where they will ultimately pass it after some minor theatrics, because of the will of the elected house, and so on. It’s not exactly the bravest route, and for the opposition in the Senate, it forces Trudeau to wear the decision more directly. There may yet be senators who will try to move amendments or delete some at third reading, but given Harder’s stance, I think the strong impetus will be for them to get the Commons to make the defeats so as to protect their own backsides from the wrath of Jason Kenney and others.

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QP: Let’s not open Pandora’s Box

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While Justin Trudeau was across the street meeting with Grand Moff Tarkin — err, US vice-president Mike Pence, Andrew Scheer and Jagmeet Singh were both absent. Candice Bergen led off, and she accused the government of capitulating to the American demands in the New NAFTA, to which Marc Garneau mocked the Conservatives’ original advice to capitulate and then listed the things they achieved in it. Bergen claimed the government agreed to hidden quotas in the steel and aluminium agreement, and Garneau again chided that the Conservatives wanted capitulation instead of retaliatory tariffs that got results. Bergen said that Trudeau got a bad deal, and Garneau expounded on the importance of the deal and the Liberal record on jobs. Gérard Deltell took over in French to lament the deal, and Garneau reiterated his previous response on Conservative capitulation in French. Deltell then turned to the alleged deal that CRA signed with KPMG, to which Diane Lebouthillier listed off the measures that they took to combat tax evasion, but also stated that she asked the department to review their processes for entering into agreements in the name of transparency. Ruth Ellen Brosseau read off for the NDP, and she demanded the New NAFTA be reopened, to which Garneau stated that the NDP was asking to open up Pandora’s Box. Brosseau then wanted guarantees to women getting healthcare that they choose — meaning abortions — for which Ginette Petitpas Taylor assured her that the government did support a women’s choice to have an abortion. Tracey Ramsey took over in English to demand that the New NAFTA be reopened, and Garneau repeated the line about Pandora’s Box. Ramsey went a second round, and Garneau read about how important the deal was.

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Roundup: From a bad bill to a useless one

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Rona Ambrose’s judicial training bill looks like it may have some life left in it, as Independent Senator Pierre Dalphond himself a former judge, has started making deals and compromises to see the bill go ahead in an amended form. Working both with the bill’s Senate sponsor and one of its critics, Dalphond has come up with an amended version of the bill which should address most of its critics, and apparently got a procedural deal passed in the Senate as a whole, which gave instruction for the legal and constitutional affairs committee to hold a special session next week to deal with the bill, outside of the normal process where it would be dealing with government business (which is the whole reason the bill hasn’t gone anywhere – the committee is loaded with government bills, which Senate rules state needs to take precedence).

The amendments would ensure that a judicial appointee must commit to sexual assault law training as designed by the Canadian Judicial Council, and administered by the National Judicial Institute – moves that address many of the concerns around judicial independence (which likely would have rendered the bill unconstitutional), and would have created conflicts of interest where the bill as it stands would demand that future judges need to be trained by sexual assault survivors groups – the same groups that would normally be called upon to be expert witnesses in trials. This help to address other concerns about the bill, such as access for lawyers who aren’t in urban centres, or that requiring training before application would tip off coworkers to those lawyers that they were applying for a position on the bench. I remain curious what other objections the Canadian Judicial Council still has about the bill, but I guess we’ll find out next week when they will likely appear at the committee.

This all having been said, we need to remember that the Canadian Judicial Council has been seized with this issue for a few years now and has been ensuring that there is better training for judges, which is as it should be – the system is already working. That means that Ambrose’s bill is really, if amended, just another bit of feel-good legislation that MPs keep burdening the Order Paper with. (Note that as it stands, the bill is likely unconstitutional and actually a very bad bill despite its good intentions). And as with so many feel-good bills, it takes up all of the space in the media for little actual benefit, but that’s politics these days, unfortunately.

https://twitter.com/adamgoldenberg/status/1132389428910088192

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QP: Jerry Dias says hello

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Wednesday, caucus day, and the benches were full as all of the leaders were present for the day. Andrew Scheer led off in French, accusing Justin Trudeau of being the best thing that could have happened to Donald Trump, and called the New NAFTA a “historic humiliation.” Trudeau reminded him that the Conservatives first demanded capitulation, then praised the deal, and now they were all over the map. Scheer suggested, in English, that the steel and aluminium tariff deal contained a hidden quota, and Trudeau reiterated that the Conservatives had no consistent position. Scheer insisted that any better would have been the one that Trudeau got, and Trudeau reminded him that they couldn’t get other trade deals like CETA done while he did. Scheer then pivoted to the question of Unifor’s presence on the media bailout advisory committee, and Trudeau reminded him that the panel needed to hear not only from media owners but also the employees, while the Conservatives have a history of attacking labour. Scheer tried to carry on, and he rambled about spending limits, when Trudeau brought up the Conservatives’ changes to the Elections Act. Jagmeet Singh was up next for the NDP, and he demanded that the federal government join BC’s lawsuit against drug companies for the opioid crisis, and Trudeau took up a script to list actions the government has been taking. Singh tried again in French, and got the French version of the same script. Singh then demanded the government join US Democrats to fix the New NAFTA, and Trudeau took up a new script to read that the NDP criticised the deal in the House of Commons but privately praised it. Singh changed to English to accuse Trudeau of using misleading quotes, and Trudeau read some more quotes in response.

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Roundup: Harder tries to play hero again

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After hosting most of the Alberta senators to a lunch in Edmonton, Alberta premier Jason Kenney has written a letter to Senator Peter Harder, Leader of the Government in the Senate – err, “government representative,” to say that he and the leaders of the other two main parties in Alberta are willing to accept Bill C-69 if they keep it as amended by the committee. Those amendments, mind you, were largely all written by industry lobbyists, and gut much of what the bill was trying to accomplish, which was an overhaul of the environmental assessment process, because what’s on the books now (which is the process that Harper gutted in 2012) isn’t working and is only resulting in court challenges.

And Harder? Well, after his whip – err, “government liaison,” Senator Grant Mitchell, has been pushing for the bills to pass largely unamended, Harder says that he now wants to send this bill as amended back to the Commons, as well as the recommendation that Bill C-48 (the tanker ban) – though I’m not sure how that would happen given the de facto committee recommendation is that it not proceed – and let them decide whether or not to keep the amendments. Let the government deal with it – or rather, wear the decision for not accepting the amendments so that Kenney will turn his ire to Trudeau, and not the Senate. Because Harder is such a hero like that (while making up parts of his job description that don’t actually exist).

Meanwhile, former Senator Hugh Segal is taking to the pages of the Globe and Mail to warn the Senate against defeating C-48 because he says it would contradict the Salisbury Convention. *sigh* No. The Salisbury Convention doesn’t exist in Canada, no matter how many times Harder of luminaries like Segal bring it up. It’s contrary to the Constitution, we don’t have the same historical reasons for why Salisbury was adopted in the House of Lords, and it also goes against the whole notion of a more “independent” Senate. Nor is C-48 an election promise so far as anyone can gather, which is a trigger for Salisbury – if it existed (which it doesn’t in Canada). There are plenty of reasons why the Senate shouldn’t defeat C-48, but making up that it’s contrary to Salisbury isn’t one of them.

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Roundup: Alberta sends the wrong (price) signals

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It was Throne Speech day in Alberta, and sure enough, it contained an ambitious laundry list of upcoming legislation designed to undo much of what the NDP had put into place as a means of “restoring” the mythical Alberta Advantage. (Full speech here). Shortly thereafter, the promised Bill 1 to repeal the province’s carbon levy was introduced – pretty much guaranteeing that the federal carbon price will be imposed once the bill is enacted. It doesn’t repeal all of the carbon prices in the province, however – it merely shifts them to the largest polluters, which does nothing about the demand side of carbon consumption, and won’t shift consumer behaviours, nor will it do enough for those large emitters, because for all of Kenney’s talk about looking to protect the energy sector, he just shifted the bulk of the burden onto them. (It also won’t really help consumers because poorer households will be worse off now).

Meanwhile, here’s Andrew Leach to explain why Kenney’s repeal of the carbon price is handing a rhetorical victory to Ontario, and why the reliance on magical technology from the future to reduce emissions won’t happen if there aren’t proper price signals to spur its development.

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QP: The ascribing of dubious motives

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With Justin Trudeau in Paris, and Andrew Scheer outlining his “vision” for the economy, it was up to Candice Bergen to lead off today, and she led off with the news of the formal arrests of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, and called the prime minister a coward — and got censured for it — and demanded he do something for it. Mélanie Joly told her not to play games with their lives, and said that the minister was in touch with her counterparts and Canada’s international allies to secure their release. Bergen then pivoted to the Mark Norman case, compared his treatment to that of Omar Khadr, and demanded a personal apology by the prime minister. Diane Lebouthillier replied in French about the independence of the investigation and prosecution. Bergen said that Norman can’t tell his story because of military guidelines and demanded the government give him an exception, to which Lebouthillier responded that committees are independent, as were the others involved in the case. Pierre Paul-Hus accused Justin Trudeau of not respecting Quebec which was why they didn’t want that contract to go to the Davie Shipyard as it relates to the Norman case. Lebouthillier reminded him of the contracts that Davie has received. Paul-Hus accused the government of wanting to “destroy” Norman, and Lebouthillier reminded him again of the independence of the RCMP and public prosecutor. Peter Julian led off for the NDP, and demanded a public inquiry into money laundering, and Bill Blair noted that there were measures in the budget to combat it that the NDP voted against. Alexandre Boulerice tried again in French, got the same answer from Blair in English, before he railed about the climate emergency. Catherine McKenna stated that the government has a plan which protects jobs. Julian repeated the question in English, and got much the same response from McKenna.

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Roundup: A blow to the tanker ban bill

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The Senate’s transport committee voted last night to not proceed with Bill C-48, which bans tankers on BC’s northwest coast, but before anyone gets too excited, I would caution that it’s not the bill’s end. We just saw the Senate’s national security committee recommend changes to the gun control bill that would gut it, and those got overturned by the Senate as a whole, and I suspect we’ll see a repeat performance of that with this bill – but the Conservatives will put up a fight, and because this was one of the bills that they did not offer a final vote timeline in their agreement with the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Peter Harder, they will dare him to invoke time allocation on this. (I plan to write more about this in column form later).

In the meantime, Independent Senator Paula Simons was one of the deciding votes on this, and she explains it all over Twitter.

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QP: A course on how the court system works

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While Justin Trudeau was in Paris to sign the Christchurch Call on ending on online extremism, Andrew Scheer was present, and he led off with a level-headed question about the video of the RCMP interrogating an Indigenous sexual assault victim, and Ralph Goodale asserted that the video demonstrated technique at that were abhorrent and wrong, and that police needed to ensure that survivors were not re-victimised in the process. Scheer then pivoted to Mark Norman case and the disclosure of documents to the court, to which Bill Blair started that the government fulfilled its obligations and all decisions relating to them were done by public servants and the court and not the government. Scheer tried again highlighting the use of code words to evade Access to Information requests — a practice that long predates this incident — and got the same answer. Pierre Paul-Hus tried again in French, and Blair repeated himself again in English. Paul-Hus accused the prime minister of trying to destroy Norman, but Blair’s answer did not change. Jagmeet Singh was up next for the NDP, and moaned about Loblaws before demanding more action around climate change. Catherine McKenna asserted that there was indeed a climate emergency and they had a plan, but then highlighted Singh’s constantly shifting position on things like the LNG project in BC. Singh flailed, trying to connect climate change with stable work and jobs, and McKenna zeroed in on the ten thousand jobs related to the LNG project. Singh then changed topics to the Phoenix fiasco, and Carla Qualtrough noted their “laser focus” on the matter and it was being fixed with IBM as a partner. Singh tried again in French, and got much the same response. 

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Roundup: Surprising job numbers

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There were surprising economic numbers out yesterday – record job creation, and historic unemployment rate lows in Quebec, and nearing lows for youth unemployment. The government had obviously been preparing for the threshold of a million jobs created since they took office, because once it happened with this morning’s release, they were all over it, and everyone of them was pushing insufferable memes over their social media channels, and trying to wedge it into QP when they got bored of the Mark Norman scripts. And before you ask, no these jobs weren’t all in the public sector, but the majority were in the private sector and were full-time jobs, and were broad across different sectors that tested well, meaning that the data has less chance of being suspect as the month-over-month data can be.

This will set up a few different narratives as we careen toward the election – from the Liberals, it will be seen as proof that their plan for “investing in the middle class” is working, which will be key for their re-election message. While Andrew Scheer has attempted to claim that there was a jobs crisis in this country on several occasions – based in part on deliberately misconstruing StatsCan data – it’s never really stuck. Likewise, this pours a lot of cold water on the claims that the federal carbon price is a job-killer (though they would say that it remains too soon to tell). It also is on the road to completely disproving that said carbon price will drive the country into recession – in fact, it looks like the economy is picking back up steam after the slowdown related to the most recent oil price crash (which the Bank of Canada had always stated was due to temporary factors, though it spread a bit further than initially anticipated). That these job figures had other strong indicators like good wage growth in them, it bolsters the picture of that recovery, which should be back to solid growth by the time of the election. Of course, the Conservatives will try to point to the fact that the Americans are showing bigger job growth than we are, but it also bears reminding that they’ve juiced their economy with a trillion dollars in annual deficit spending, which puts Trudeau’s very small deficits in favourable comparison.

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1126925907908808704

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1126929298563244032

I’m not sure that this will undo all of the damage the Liberals have been doing to themselves, and they’re going to inevitably be arrogant in how they communicate this economic good news, but they can at least point to good numbers.

https://twitter.com/SkepticRod/status/1125431876670255104

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