Joe Oliver announced cuts to EI premiums for small businesses yesterday – but it’s not quite as easy as it sounds. It’s actually more of a tax credit only on the employer side, and only for two years, which Oliver insists is not a sign of worry, but “confidence” that they’re on the right path. Um, okay. Economist Stephen Gordon, meanwhile, shows that this kind of tax credit is actually more counterproductive because it encourages these businesses to stay small for tax reasons, and that by not actually cutting payroll taxes, they are not actually creating the right conditions for all small businesses to hire.
Tag Archives: Fiscal Austerity
Roundup: A drunken intrusion, NBD
In a bizarre twist, a nineteen year-old has come forward as the intruder in Justin Trudeau’s home, and claimed that it was all a drunken mistake – that he was trying to find his friend’s place with similar entry instructions, and that when he realized he was in the wrong place he briefly considered stealing the knives and some electronics in the kitchen before changing his mind and writing the note, intending it as an apology. And because he was drunk and didn’t mean any harm, the police have opted not to lay charges, but rather issue him a formal caution – because apparently drunkenness excuses trespassing, and the vaguely threatening note on a row of butcher knives.
Roundup: Another NDP MP walks out
NDP MP Sana Hassainia has quit the party and will sit as an independent, unhappy with Mulcair’s leadership and his position on the Israel-Palestinian conflict. She alleged that because she supported Brian Topp in the leadership, she was punished for it by being removed from a committee and being moved to the nosebleed seats. In response, the party slammed her attendance record without mentioning that she has given birth twice since being elected – while Hassainia said that they weren’t very accommodating to her needs as a new mother while crowing about how progressive they are with all of those young mothers and soon-to-be young mothers in their caucus. She hasn’t decided if she’ll run again in 2015. But given the party’s attempt to throw her under the bus, this tweet pretty much says it all:
https://twitter.com/mikepmoffatt/status/502166443845513216
Roundup: “Emergency” finance committee meeting
NDP MPs have forced an emergency recall of the Commons finance committee in order to discuss the issue of CRA’s “aggressive” audits of charities. It’s slated to be behind closed doors, so we’ll see what comes of it, but the NDP’s revenue critic, Murray Rankin, says that the committee can provide a “safe space” for these charities to air their grievances about the costly and time consuming processes that they’re being subjected to. I’m not really sure what it will accomplish however, since the CRA is not going to say that they’re taking political direction for these audits, and the government is just going to say “they’re arm’s length, we don’t give them direction,” and the charities will moan about how hard done they are by the whole process. I’m honestly not sure how edifying such a process going to be, assuming that the Conservative MPs on the committee sign on to holding said hearings (which is doubtful). It’s also worth noting that the NDP made this recall notice while the Liberals are holding their summer caucus retreat in Edmonton, which they knew was taking place at the same time, leading one to wonder whether someone was trying to be cute about the whole thing rather than being respectful of another party’s processes and calling the meeting for another date.
Roundup: Another hit of distraction sauce
The NDP are set to crack open that bottle of distraction sauce as the Board of Internal Economy sits today to discuss the issue of “satellite offices.” The distraction – that they want the meeting open to the public (so that they can showboat and obstruct, like they did when Thomas Mulcair went before the Procedure and House Affairs Committee while calling it “transparency”) and when their wish is denied, they can rail to the media about how terrible the state of affairs is, and how it’s all a conviction by a “kangaroo court” that’s all just partisans being mean to them because they’re just so awesome, and all of that. The goal, of course, is to try and lose the substance of the story around their satellite offices amidst all of the other noise that they’re generating around it. Because that’s how you maturely handle a misspending issue in Canadian politics.
Roundup: Adams withdraws
The announcement came at 10 PM on the Friday before a long weekend – in other words, trying to bury it. That announcement? That Conservative MP Eve Adams is bowing out of the Oakville North–Burlington nomination race in order to “focus on her health,” as she hasn’t been following her doctor’s orders about slowing down to focus on recovering from the concussion she received earlier in the year. Or at least, that’s the official excuse, but one has to wonder if it was because she found out that she was about to be disqualified after the shenanigans that she and her opponent accused one another of in the acrimonious nomination race. No word if she plans to run in her current riding (where speculation was she didn’t want to run again because she would be back up against a popular former Liberal MP who wouldn’t be impeded by the Orange Wave this time), or if this is her quietly bowing out of federal politics after 2015 entirely.
Roundup: An apology owed
The International Commission of Jurists has looked over the dispute between Stephen Harper and Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin around accusations that she was “lobbying” against the appointment of Justice Nadon. The ICJ declared that McLachlin did nothing wrong – and that Harper owes her an apology. In response, the PMO responded that they saw the response and “noted it.” At least it wasn’t yet another angry denunciation of “activist” judges protecting their own, or some other nonsense. Meanwhile, the Canadian Bar Association has responded to all of those Conservative MPs whinging that the courts are doing an “end run around democracy” by reminding them that the courts are an essential part of our democratic system, ensuring that rights are respected and that laws are applied properly. Not that it will soothe the sting being felt by sore losers, which is really what those complaints are all about.
Roundup: Goguen makes everything worse
The first of the witnesses with the prostitution bill appeared before the Commons justice committee in its special summer session yesterday, starting with Peter MacKay, who admitted that they got no outside legal advice as to the bill’s constitutionality, and everything has a chance of being sent before the Supreme Court, so he’s just shrugging it all off. Um, okay. Way to go doing the responsible thing in crafting sound laws that will pass constitutional muster, and all of that, guys. Well done. As for MacKay’s assertion that yes, the intent is to criminalize prostitution, the bill pretty much goes about doing that in the most backward and arbitrary way possible rather than just outright criminalizing it, thus setting it up for yet another defeat by the Supreme Court. Oh, but don’t forget – we’re on a deadline of mid-December, so MPs need to hurry it up. And amidst all of the other testimony around the bill, both for and against, Robert Goguen, the parliamentary secretary, decided to be clever at one point and ask one of the government-friendly witnesses, who had been trafficked into prostitution from Hungary, whether the police bursting in while she was being gang-raped would violate her freedom of expression, since someone said that the bill contravenes that Charter right. And then the nation’s collective heads exploded. Apparently Goguen confuses prostitution with rape (it’s not), trafficking with prostitution (they are not the same and trafficking remains illegal), and because sections around communication and advertising have anything to do with the illegality of rape? It’s so stunningly brain dead that it defies logic how he possibly thought he could have been scoring any points with it. Manitoba’s Attorney General thinks that the Nordic Model is great, but the current bill has problems and he doesn’t want to see any sex workers criminalised, not that criminalising their clients actually makes them any safer since it drives them underground regardless.
Roundup: Four by-elections today
It’s by-election day in four ridings across the country – two in Alberta and two in Toronto. Despite the usual lazy story ledes about how this is somehow yet another “test” for Trudeau, it would seem to me that this is more of a test for Mulcair with the two Toronto ridings, as to whether or not he can hold the one seat he had there or make gains with the other, while in Alberta, it’ll be a test as to how much Harper can retain his own base – something he has had trouble with in the past few by-elections, whether in Calgary Centre or Brandon–Souris, where significant leads were lost and their wins were narrow and marginal compared to resurgent Liberals who had not had traction in those regions in decades. And Fort McMurray will be a very interesting race to watch, not only because of the amount of attention that Trudeau in particular paid to the region, but because of the deep unhappiness with the industry there to the changes to the Temporary Foreign Workers programme, which they rely on heavily because of an overheated market with no labour available. That may be the biggest upset if they decide to punish Harper at the ballot box. All of which is a far more interesting lede than whether the Liberals are being “tested” once more.
Roundup: Clarity for First Nations titles
The Supreme Court has given a unanimous ruling granting a title claim to the Tsilhqot’in First Nation in BC, over a large area of land in the south central part of the province, ending a 25-year court battle over forestry claims and a 150-year dispute between that First Nation and the Crown. Because most of BC’s First Nations don’t have treaties yet with the government, this ruling impacts them in particular, and will make sure that the government has a greater role to play in fulfilling its consultative duties to First Nations as more resource and pipeline projects come up. The ruling also declares that provincial governments have regulatory authority over land obtained by First Nations people through court cases or land claim negotiations. While the ruling has been said to give clarity to negotiations, it also raises the possibility that some First Nations will abandon their negotiations with the government in favour of turning to the courts to establish title or land claims, which should be a red flag seeing as treaty negotiation is a Crown prerogative, and we should be careful about delegating it to the courts. Terry Glavin gives the backstory to the whole dispute dating back to 1864 here.