Tag Archives: Immigration

Roundup: The UCP can’t even get capitalism right

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The Alberta government’s plan to move ahead with RStar—a particularly boneheaded scheme by which oil companies can keep a portion of their royalties to clean up orphan or abandoned wells which they already have a legal obligation to do, is getting pushback from some fairly surprising sources, like those tree huggers at Scotiabank, who point out that this kind of a programme goes against fundamental capitalist principles. It’s also indicative out outright corruption, because premier Danielle Smith was lobbying on behalf of certain companies for this kind of subsidy before she got elected. This whole thing is just a giant flashing red flag of what is wrong with Alberta politics.

 

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 352:

As Russian forces continue their assault in the Donbas region, there are concerns that SpaceX has started limiting use of Starlink satellites for use by Ukraine’s military to control drones (which are mainly used for reconnaissance). Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy was in Brussels to both look for more aid and to plead for EU membership, even though that process can take a decade. He also said that Ukraine intercepted Russian plans to destroy Moldova, which Moldovan intelligence confirmed, a plan that mirrored what Russia had planned for Ukraine.

https://twitter.com/vonderleyen/status/1623609001580560384

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Roundup: The big health summit is today

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Today is the day, where the prime minster is meeting with the provincial and territorial premiers to lay out the future of health transfers, and from the sounds if it, it’s not a negotiation. The Senior Liberal Sources™ are pointing to a ten-year deal with an expansion to the main Canada Health Transfer, as well as individual deals with provinces that focus on their priorities, and yes, there will be strings attached to that money. Trudeau is framing this conversation in a way that talks a lot about data, but the more unspoken part of that is the fact that the point of that data is so that there can be outcomes that can be compared across jurisdictions, and not have it in a format where it takes six months or a year for researchers to compile the data in a way that’s usable, because each province reports their data differently. People often don’t realise that it’s one of the reasons why we have such poor statistical data in this country, which is because provinces (who are responsible for vital statistics) don’t report in a way that is consistent, and it takes StatsCan or other agencies like CIHI time to make the data work.

The other reason for strings, of course, is that provinces have a demonstrated history of not using health transfers on their healthcare systems. For the decade that health transfers rose at six percent annually, health spending in most provinces rose by somewhere around 2.2 percent annually, meaning a lot of that money got spent elsewhere. Andrew Coyne tweeted data going back 20 years, and it’s very noticeable the gap between what the federal government sent to provinces for healthcare, and what actually got spent on it. Given how much additional pandemic spending went directly to provinces’ bottom lines during the pandemic, there is no longer an appetite for this to continue, which is why strings are not only important, but need to be in place, and it looks like the premiers have finally run out of room in the court of public opinion to operate otherwise.

https://twitter.com/acoyne/status/1622760959977656321

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 349:

Russian forces have been keeping up the pressure in the eastern part of Ukraine while they prepare for a new offensive, likely around the anniversary of the start of the invasion, and there are worries they could be putting that pressure in Donetsk so that they can launch a surprise attack in the south. As well, there has been shelling around Zaporizhzhia.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau says that Canada is ready to assist allies with aid they need around the earthquake in Türkiye and Syria.
  • François-Philippe Champagne and Pablo Rodriguez gave the new chair of the CRTC her marching orders in a public letter.
  • Marco Mendicino says that any foreign agent registry will need the buy-in from cultural communities in Canada lest it turn into a tool of stigmatisation.
  • As part of the government’s Ocean Protection Plan, there is investment in deep sea research; coastal First Nations chiefs have endorsed the marine protected area plan.
  • Canada is expanding its temporary work permit programme for Hong Kong residents.
  • The deputy minister of Public Services and Procurement says that McKinsey’s global record isn’t enough to disqualify it from Canadian government contracts.
  • The new Indigenous languages commissioner says he hopes to have his office fully operational by summer.
  • A labour tribunal has found that Parliament hasn’t been protecting the health and safety of its translation staff. Gosh, you think?
  • A man has been arrested for making death threats against the Liberal MP for Kichener—Conestoga, Tim Louis.
  • Former Liberal MP Raj Grewal wants the breach of trust charges laid against him during his time in office dismissed for lack of evidence.
  • The Conservatives are calling on the Auditor General to probe the McKinsey contracts, for no reason other than they’re building a conspiracy theory.
  • All opposition parties are peformatively demanding answers from the government about the Chinese “spy balloon.”
  • Quebec’s immigration minister is freaking out after reports that New York City is providing free bus tickets to asylum seekers trying to reach Roxham Road.
  • Matt Gurney explains why the gun control changes were an impossibility and a trap of the Liberals’ own making, which is why they had to walk them back.
  • Colin Horgan notes the Conservatives building conspiracy theories and trying to use the Unreal in order to tap into dark impulses in voters, as QAnon has done.

Odds and ends:

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QP: Crossing a line around MAiD access allegations

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The prime minister was allegedly in town, but didn’t show up for QP today, while his deputy was out of town, and most of the other leaders were absent as well, save Pierre Poilievre. And he led off QP in French, worrying about how much mortgage costs have risen, rent increases, and blaming this on “inflationist policies” of the government (which is completely contrary to economic data). Pascale St-Onge, who is apparently now the designated French responder during the leaders’ round when Trudeau is away, gave the back-patting that Canadians know the government is there for them when times are tough. Poilievre switched to English to repeat the same question, demanding that the prime minister take responsibility for pricing working-class youth out of a home. Ahmed Hussen praised their measures such as the rent-to-own programme, the tax-free savings account for first-time buyers, and that the Conservatives voted against these kinds of measures. Poilievre insisted that they voted against inflationary policies, and complained about how much housing prices have gone up in markets like Toronto, demanding the federal government take responsibility for this failure (never mind that these are clearly municipality and provincial responsibilities). Randy Boissonnault reminded him that mothers who took CERB and parents who take their kids to the dentist don’t create inflation, and that the Conservatives dealt in nonsense economics. Poilievre insisted that the government created that inflation, and blamed government spending for inflating the housing market (which is lunacy), and Hussen got back up to demand that Poilievre take responsibility for voting against housing supports. Poilievre took on a tone of faux gravitas and drew a specious link between people at food banks and asking for Medical Assistance in Dying because poverty has them depressed, and accused the government of being more in favour of them accessing MAiD for depression rather than helping them (which is frankly outrageous, particularly since the expansion of MAiD for mental illness is explicitly not about simple depression, no matter what its opponents will falsely claim). Carolyn Bennett tried to dispute this and point out that the eligibility criteria screens out suicidal behaviour, but she was shouted down and the Speaker didn’t allow her to start again from the top.

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc and demanded the resignation of Amira Elghawaby, because of course he did. Hussen read that she already clarified and apologised for her past comments and invited Therrien to read that statement. Therrien insisted that the position itself was a problem and that it was only about demonising Quebec, and demanded the position be abolished. Hussen got up to talk about his attending the memorial for the Quebec City mosque shooting and how many people attended it, before reiterating that she already clarified and apologised for her past comments.

Alexandre Boulerice rose for the Bloc, and he yelled about use of consultants as privatisation and decried that they were being too cheap with public servants at the bargaining table. Mona Fortier recited some pabulum about good jobs for Canadians. Gord Johns read the English version of the same question with added sanctimony, wanting a full investigation into government outsourcing. Helena Jaczek said that she looked forward to answering their questions at committee. 

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Roundup: Say no to a Consultant Commissioner

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Because a lot of people continue to be wringing their hands over government contracts to outside consultants, we’re starting to hear a few…less than stellar ideas. One of them came from Paul Wells yesterday, while on the CBC’s Front Burner podcast (Wells’ portion starts at 20:46). While there is some good context from Carleton University professor Amanda Clarke on the size of the problem (thread here), Wells is wrong about two particular portions, and he would have avoided this had he listened to my conversation with professor Jennifer Robson on my YouTube channel last week.

The first is the notion that when these consultants’ job is done, nobody is accountable for the work because most of their agreements mean that it can’t be subject to Access to Information rules, which is wrong. Fundamentally the minister is accountable no matter what. It wouldn’t matter if the work was done by outside consultants or the civil servants in the department, the minister remains responsible, and people seem to be forgetting this in their rush to condemn the consultants. The other part where he’s wrong is his idea to create a “consultant commissioner of Parliament” or other such independent officer.

No. Absolutely not.

We already have way too many gods damned independent officers of parliament, who are unaccountable, and to whom MPs have completely abandoned their constitutional responsibilities of oversight. Sure, the media and the opposition want someone independent they can quote on command to say mean things about the government, but that winds up just creating more bureaucracy, and doesn’t help the overall situation, especially as it drags us further down the road to technocracy rather than parliamentary oversight. The absolute last thing we need are more independent officers, and I wish to gods people would stop proposing them.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 335:

Russian forces have continued to pound the Donetsk region in the country’s east. Russians are also claiming Ukrainians are storing Western weapons in the country’s nuclear power plants, but have provided no proof. Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is promising personnel changes at both senior and lower levels after high-profile graft allegations, as part of the country’s attempt to clean up its corruption problem.

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Roundup: New Zealand’s leadership selection

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New Zealand is about to have a new prime minister, and lo, it was a process that took a single day. Yes, it was an acclamation where only one person put his name forward (“to avoid disunity,”), but that is less of an issue because New Zealand is one of the last remaining parliaments where it’s decided by a vote held within the caucus among the MPs—the way that Westminster parliaments are supposed to work. And of course, it’s completely alien to how things have devolved in this country.

The quasi-American pseudo-presidential primary system that we’ve adopted in this country is corrosive to politics. It has hollowed out the political parties, and pretty much killed grassroots riding associations, because they no longer matter to the party. Memberships—paid or unpaid (as is the latest craze)—is about leadership selection, not sticking around to do the hard policy work, because the parties have centralized that and justify it using Big Data. It’s all about populating databases rather than ensuring you have a base of engaged partisans who act as a link between the community and the caucus in Parliament. The leader then turns the party into a personality cult while they wield almost absolute power because there are almost no checks on that remaining. At least with caucus selection, there is a direct line of accountability so that the caucus that chose the leader can remove said leader as well, which is one of the most important considerations.

Suffice to say, while one might have preferred that they at least had a vote between two candidates for the job, the fact that they have retained caucus selection is important, and Canada needs to return to the same system if we are to have any hope of fixing the damage to our system.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 332:

Russian forces claim that they took control of the town of Klishchiivka, south of Bakhmut, which their mercenaries claimed to have taken already. And they’re still claiming they’ve taken Soledar, which Ukraine disputes. Meanwhile, the NATO meeting in Ramstein, Germany, ended without an agreement on sending Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, as Germany is the holdout and needs to authorize the use of their technology.

https://twitter.com/oleksiireznikov/status/1616506280876642317

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Roundup: The bullshit narrative around the just transition “memo”

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Because Alberta politics is plumbing the depths of utter stupidity, there has been a multi-day freak out over the federal government’s supposed “just transition” plan (and yes, the federal ministers say they don’t like the term and prefer “sustainable jobs,” but the term is internationally recognised from the Paris Agreement and from similar American initiatives). Earlier in the week, there were a couple of credulous columns about a supposed “leak” of a federal memo talking about 2.7 million energy jobs being imperilled, or due to be transitioned, or some such nonsense.

And it was a completely bullshit story—there was no leak. There was no memo. There were selective quotes taken out of context and then torqued some more that came from a publicly available briefing package prepared for the minister of natural resources prior to a committee hearing back in June. And it doesn’t say 2.7 million jobs will be “transitioned”—it says that’s the size of the energy sector, and that there could be “significant labour market disruptions” given the transition of the industry due to global forces.

And while Danielle Smith was caught out on this lie, it not only hasn’t stopped her from having a public meltdown about it, but Rachel Notley decided to get in on the action, because it’s pre-election season, so that means out-bidding, and trying to distance herself from Trudeau—never mind that her own climate plan when she was in government included “just transition” language for coal workers. It’s all so bloody stupid, and we’re all dumber for watching it play out. I’m going to especially call out Power & Politics for adopting Smith’s mendacious framing of this supposed memo, and for both-sidesing it on their website rather than fact-checking Smith’s claims against the actual bloody document. This shouldn’t be that hard. Stop giving these lying liars the credibility they’re looking for. Call them out for what they are.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 329:

The search for survivors has been called off at the site of the bombed apartment building in Dnipro, with the death toll sitting at 45 including six children. Meanwhile, Germany looks willing to approve the transfer of Leopard 2 tanks from allied countries to Ukraine in the next few days (and a few may come from Canada if that’s the case). Ukrainian officials are also saying they are still fighting in Soledar, and that it has not completely fallen to the Russians or their mercenaries.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1615314617374212097

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Roundup: Encouraging noises on health transfers

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There seems to be a noticeable shift in tone coming from several premiers when it comes to the federal government’s demands that there be more strings attached to future federal health care transfers, and that they seem to be realizing that their time-old tactics of simply blaming the federal government isn’t working as well as it used to. In part, I think that Justin Trudeau has stepped up his game on communication around this issue more than he usually does, and made effective use of his round of year-end interviews on this file, and showed that he was willing to give them more money, but that there needs to be changes rather than putting money into a broken system that won’t get meaningful results. I also think that shit is getting real for the premiers as we are now seeing an increasing number of deaths in ERs that should have been preventable, and that the patience of the population when it comes to children’s hospitals in particular is now gone, and they are being forced to wear it more than they would normally have had to in the past.

So, this sounds like an increased willingness to rebrand federal strings as “shared priorities,” and that’s a climbdown that premiers seem to be increasingly willing to live with. But then again, I wouldn’t trust all of the premiers, and in particular Doug Ford, whose math about new beds is false advertising, and who is hilariously claiming that new private surgery clinics won’t cannibalise hospital staff or resources, because of course they will. That’s the whole gods damned point. His “safeguards” will be as effective as toddler gates whose latches can be figured out and overcome within seconds. So, while it’s good to hear the shift in tone, I wouldn’t count any unhatched chickens just yet.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 325:

Russians are once again claiming that they are now in control of the remains of Soledar, but the Ukrainians continue to say their units are still there and still fighting.

https://twitter.com/bachyns/status/1613939963237732365

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Roundup: Summoning Sunwing and VIA to committee

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The chair of the Commons transport committee says he is looking to call a meeting shortly in order to summon the heads of airlines like Sunwing and of VIA Rail to get them to explain how they handled the travel chaos over the holidays. Which is all well and good, even if it’s more about a public expression of anger and accountability. The wrinkle here is that the Conservatives also want the minister to be summoned to explain why he didn’t “fix the system.”

Sigh.

Aside from the risible press release that the Conservative transport critic, Mark Strahl, put out over the holidays that essentially blamed Justin Trudeau for the weather, we have to remember that the government has very few levers at their disposal here. They don’t run the airlines, and while VIA Rail is a Crown Corporation, it is operated at arm’s length from the government specifically so that they can’t tell them what to do. (The minister can select the board of directors and give general policy directives, like they are doing with the pursuit of high-frequency rail, but he cannot direct operations). We all watched over the summer as airport operators conveniently blamed the ArriveCan app for their failures to do things like hire enough ground crews, or airlines blaming the app for their decisions to schedule flights that didn’t have flight crews, and that credulous media organisations lapped it up without calling them on their bullshit, and lo, nothing actually got fixed (which, again, the minister cannot direct because those are private companies), so when these problems persisted and were amplified by the inclement weather over the holidays, they can no longer blame ArriveCan or anything the federal government has or has not done. They should face some actual accountability for their failures, rather than just have the opposition parties repeat their bullshit to try and pin the problems on the government.

Of course, the government could and should do something about the Canadian Transportation Agency, like shaking up its membership so that it’s no longer subject to capture by the industry, or giving it additional resources to deal with the backlog of complaints, or strengthening its governing structure, or any number of other things that could hold industry to account. That would be a better use of their time than having Strahl give a performance for the cameras at committee, where he can invent new constituents like “Briane” to give fictitious sob stories about, but this government has shown little interest in doing that work. Perhaps the committee could expend some of their time and resources to provide that pressure?

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 315:

Russia says that 89 service members were killed in the Ukrainian attack on a position in occupied Donetsk region, and cited the unauthorised use of mobile phones from their soldiers that allowed their location to be determined. (They also claim they retaliated and killed 200 Ukrainian soldiers and four HIMARS launchers, to which Ukraine says two people were injured in an attack on a hockey arena in the area attacked). There is also talk that the increasing use of drones in this conflict could bring about the dawn of the “killer robot” as they become more autonomous.

https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1610371348874031104

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QP: Mary Ng will only apologise twice

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The prime minister was present today, while his deputy was off in Paris. Shortly before things got underway, the Ethics Commissioner released his report on a contract Mary Ng’s office awarded to a friend of hers, so that was also going to come up. All of the other leaders were present today, save Elizabeth May, for what it’s worth. After a statement about the passing of Jim Carr, Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and he first offered condolences to Carr’s family and to the Liberal caucus for their loss. With that out of the way, he asked about the list of soon-to-be banned hunting rifles and wanted more work on fighting criminals instead. Justin Trudeau thanked Poilievre for his thoughts about Carr, and said a few nice words about Carr’s legacy in both French and in English. Poilievre switched to English to repeat the question about “Grandpa Joe’s hunting rifle in Cape Breton” versus criminals, and this time, Trudeau insisted that Canadians are united about keeping communities safer from assault weapons, but they needed to ensure the ban stays in place, which is why they were moving ahead with their legislation but they would continue to consult to ensure they are capturing the right weapons. Poilievre raised the concerns of his backbench MPs about those weapons, and tried to insist this was a big plot against hunters. Trudeau dismissed this as misinformation and said they were going to continue to consult on the list because they were not interested in hunters, but the Conservatives only wanted to make assault weapons legal again. Poilievre then changed topics to story about immigration case files assigned to employees who are no longer there, to which Trudeau read some pabulum lines about modernising the system and resolving the “technical issues.” Poilievre changed topics again to the Ethics Commissioner’s finding that Mary Ng violated the rules in giving a contract to a friend, which he tried to tie to other previous scandals. Trudeau instead countered with some crowing about last night’s by-election victory in Mississauga—Lakeshore and how Canadians rejected Poilievre instead.

Yves-François Blanchet led for the Bloc, and after giving condolence about Jim  he concern trolled about immigration levels in Quebec before raising the story about the case files going to phantom employees before demanding that Quebec be given full control over its immigration system. Trudeau said that Quebec has the capacity to take more immigrants and they are there to help them with it. Blanchet insisted that Roxham Road-arriving asylum claimants were difficult to integrate and demanded more control over the system. Trudeau reiterated that they did not set a target for Quebec and they were there to work with the province.

Jagmeet Singh rose for the NDP, and in French, demanded the government do something about the paediatric health crisis in the country. Trudeau said that they realise there is a crisis, but they are not going to send a blank cheque like the NDP wants and will ensure they get outcomes. Singh repeated his demand to “find solutions” in English, and Trudeau repeated his response.

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Roundup: The passing of Jim Carr

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Just before Question Period was about to start yesterday, the news broke that Liberal MP Jim Carr, who had been dealing with cancer for the past three years, had died. Proceedings were cancelled for the day, and tributes have been pouring in.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 293:

It appears that Russia has burned through so much ammunition that they are now using decade-old stockpiles with high failure rates. Ukrainian forces say they have repelled Russian advances against four settlements in eastern Donetsk, and on eight settlements in Luhansk. Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy met virtually with G7 leaders about the need for modern tanks, artillery, shells, and natural gas to help their situation.

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