Tag Archives: Immigration

Roundup: On MPs’ sanctimony

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My patience for self-aggrandising bullshit is at an all-time low, so you can image just how hard my eyes rolled when I heard that Justin Trudeau was telling a school group that was touring Parliament that his side is “serious and respectful” and the other guys like to shout, and how it was because when a there isn’t a lot that they can go after the government on, they make noise instead. Trudeau’s capacity for sanctimony is practically legendary, but this was gilding the lily more than a little. Now, I will grant you that since he’s been in charge, the Liberals have been far better behaved in QP than they used to be, and the clapping ban has lowered the level of din in the chamber by a great deal (though said ban is not always honoured). And yes, the Conservatives do yell and heckle a lot, but some of it is deserved when you have ministers or parliamentary secretaries who read non sequitur talking points rather than doing something that resembles answering a question. (They also yell and heckle to be childish and disruptive as well, but it bears pointing out that it’s not entirely undeserved). It’s also cheap theatre, and there is a time and a place for that in politics, and if we didn’t have it during QP, then I daresay that there might be an outbreak of narcolepsy on the Hill. But as with anything, it should be done judiciously and cleverly, and that’s not something that these guys are any good at, and so we return to the sounds of jeering, hooting baboons no more days than not, but that’s no excuse for sanctimony. There are no saints in that chamber.

With that in mind, my tolerance for the whinging and crying foul over the removal of Leona Alleslev as chair of the NATO Parliamentary Association is also mighty thin, for the sheer fact that when she crossed the floor, she wouldn’t be able to chair a parliamentary association. The way these things work is that a government MP chairs, and an opposition MP vice-chairs, and lo, the Conservatives already had a vice-chair on said association. Her removal was not retaliation, but it is a consequence. Now, there are definite questions that can be asked about the timing of said removal – two weeks before a NATO meeting that she has worked toward, and weeks after she crossed the floor (but I don’t know how often this association meets, so this may have been the first opportunity) – but that is far different from the caterwauling from the Conservatives about how the “supposedly feminist” prime minister was being mean to a woman and a veteran. (As an aside, could we please stop with this policing of the PM’s feminism? 99 percent of attacks attached to said policing have nothing to do with feminism). This attempt to claim the moral high ground is exasperating.

To add to all of this, the meeting where the removal happened was met with a bunch of disruptive, juvenile behaviour by Conservative MPs and staffers that included butchered singing, and *gasp!* drinking! Oh noes! Nobody behaved admirably in this situation, and nobody has any high ground to claim, so maybe we should all behave like adults around this.

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QP: StatsCan surveillance?

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Justin Trudeau was again in Question Period today, while Andrew Scheer was off to Queen’s Park to meet with Doug Ford, sans media availability. That left Lisa Raitt to lead off, worrying about the Statistics Canada plan to access financial information for their purposes. Trudeau took up a script to read that the data was anonymised and that it was for statistical purposes only, and that they were working with the Privacy Commissioner. Raitt equated this to another issue related to a credit monitoring agency being asked to turn over data. Trudeau took up a second script to read about the sins of the Conservatives when it comes to StatsCan, and assured her that privacy was being protected. Raitt pressed, and Trudeau snarked that the Conservatives remained the party of Stephen Harper. Alain Rayes took over in French, got the same scripted reply, and on a follow-up, Trudeau dropped the script to make the Harper digs. Guy Caron was up next for the NDP, and he asked about the lack of CRA’s progress in going after anyone from the Panama Papers. Trudeau read a script about CRA doing a great job. Caron raised the court case regarding charities before doubling back to lack of progress, and Trudeau dropped the script this time to praise the investment his government made in CRA to recover evaded taxes. Peter Julian took over in English, with added invective, and Trudeau read the English version of his script, and for his final question, Julian demanded by-elections be called, and Trudeau picked up another script to read more about the CRA.

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Roundup: Dissent without disloyalty

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Yesterday on Power & Politics, we saw something that is far too rare in Canadian politics, but should be the norm. In response to the government signing on the US’ recent initiative at the UN to basically renew the “war on drugs,” Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith went on the show to publicly disagree with his party and the government that his party forms, and more to the point, we didn’t see anyone clutching their pearls about this, or higher-ups in the party make threats. Shocking, I know.

The civics refresher here is that all MPs are supposed to hold government to account, whether they’re in the opposition or in the government’s backbench. Holding the government to account is the very raison d’etre of Parliament, but you wouldn’t know it given how many government backbenchers think it’s their job to be cheerleaders, to give unquestioning support, and possibly to suck up in the hopes of a Cabinet posting or parliamentary secretary position. I also know that this isn’t quite as true behind the caucus room door, but we see very little dissent in public. We see even less dissent in other parties – the NDP enforce solidarity and uniformity in all positions, and have been known to punish MPs who step out of line, while we’ve seen the amount of tolerance that the Conservatives have for dissenting opinions with Maxime Bernier’s post-leadership experiences (though I will grant you, there is still some diversity of thought in there, but it’s rarely expressed publicly). And while I don’t praise Justin Trudeau for many things, I will say his openness to dissenting voices is unquestioningly a good thing in Parliament.

And this brings me back to Leona Alleslev’s defection to the Conservatives last week, and the statements she made about how she didn’t think she could openly criticize the government and not be perceived as disloyal. This is one of those statements of hers that I called bullshit on at the time, and I will call bullshit on it doubly today given this latest incident where Erskine-Smith broke ranks and nobody is calling him disloyal for it. He’s doing the job he’s supposed to do, and which not enough MPs take seriously (and this is also because the lack of proper civics education and training for MPs when they’re elected). I’d like to see him setting an example that others will hopefully follow.

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Roundup: Carbon backstop bolstered

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News of the forthcoming report on the benefits of carbon taxes (and the associated rebates) to individual Canadians has been ricocheting through the Hill, from Liberals cheering on its results – found to be bulletproofed by the fact that they come from Stephen Harper’s former policy director – to Conservatives who are trying to insist that it’s really all a scam, and that these rebate cheques will never actually appear because they want to preserve the narrative that it’s all one big tax grab to pay for Trudeau’s “out of control” spending, and so on. But as economist Kevin Milligan points out, it’s going to be pretty tough for them to ignore

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It’s almost like the federal government had this in mind when they gave provinces the directive to design carbon pricing programmes that fit their local economies, with the federal backstop being in place if they chose not to. And has been pointed out, it’s going to be hard to run against the programme if people are getting cheques in the mail from the federal government.

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QP: Not misleading, just misinformed

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On a cooler and less humid day in the nation’s capital, things proceeded apace in the House of Commons, and there was far less drama to start off the day. Andrew Scheer led off, mini lectern on desk, demanding to know why the counter-tariffs the government collected haven’t been funnelled directly to business that have been affected by the US tariffs. Justin Trudeau responded that the government was supporting affected industries, but also things like innovation. Scheer then started on his “failure” talking points with regards to the Trans Mountain pipeline, to which Trudeau shot back about the ten years of failure from the previous government, particularly around respecting First Nations. Scheer switched to English to ask again, and Trudeau insisted that growing the economy and respecting both the environment and Indigenous communities went hand in hand. Scheer railed about pipelines line Energy East not getting built, and Trudeau stepped up his rhetoric about not respecting First Nations. Scheer then spun a bunch of nonsense about carbon taxes, and Trudeau didn’t correct Scheer’s mischaracterisation, but responded with some platitudes about paying for pollution. Guy Caron was up next to lead for the NDP, and concern trolled about the effect on Supply Management with TPP, to which Trudeau insisted they were keeping the system intact. After another round of the same, Tracey Ramsey repeated the questions in English, and got much the same response from Trudeau, who added that they got better a better deal than the Conservatives did. On another round of the same, Trudeau insisted that the NDP didn’t want any trade deals, and the Conservatives would sign anything, but he would only sign a good deal, and that included NAFTA.

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Roundup: NAFTA theatrics

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Yesterday was big for NAFTA news, as the Americans and Mexicans resolved their bilateral differences, particularly around autos, and made progress on getting concessions on the American demands for a sunset clause. But, true to form, US President Donald Trump started spouting a bunch of nonsense about how Canada was on the sidelines, and if we didn’t accept a deal by Friday, he’d slap tariffs on our autos, and so on. The problem there – that he has no congressional authority to conclude a bilateral agreement without us (and indeed, outgoing Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto kept saying that they were waiting for Canada to rejoin negotiations), so it’s a lot of bluster. Nevertheless, Chrystia Freeland cut short her diplomatic trip to Europe and is headed for Washington today, and trilateral talks will resume, and there’s likely to be a heavy focus on dairy as Trump has become fixated on it. This all having been said, have the Conservatives been pleased by the progress made? Funny you should ask.

First of all, the language in both is that it includes Trudeau’s name and the word “failure,” which is their narrative-building exercise (and Hamish Marshall can give them a cookie for sticking to it). But more importantly, as Kevin Carmichael notes, the Conservatives have been backing the government’s strategy to date on this. Of course, Andrew Scheer made a big deal during his big speech on Friday to insist that the Conservatives were going to be the adults in the room on foreign policy (which is risible considering the bulk of their record), but it also defies the reality of the situation. Even John Baird called bullshit on this line of reasoning – there was no reason for Canada to be part of those particular discussions, and this hasn’t really put us in a weakened position, and for all of the Conservatives’ sniggering about the labour chapter that Freeland has been advocating, wages were a big part of this deal that was struck with Mexico. (It’s also adorable that Erin O’Toole tries to make out that the Liberal strategy is all about domestic political posturing, which is exactly what he’s engaging in with his press release).

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In the meantime, industry players in Canada are looking for more details, while Philippe Couillard is vowing not to accept any compromises that will affect Supply Management, so that could be fun while the Quebec election rolls along.

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Roundup: Playing fast and loose with pluralism

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Another day, another eruption from Maxime Bernier, this time in advance of his party’s announcement on immigration policy, intimating that suddenly they’re interested in it now that he’s brought it up. Not actually true – rather than talk about restricting immigration levels or diversity, Michelle Rempel gave a litany of issues that the party wants to have consultations on over the coming months, some of them quite legitimate (others, less so), but in the end, Rempel noted that Bernier had not once come to talk to her about immigration issues, and that he needs to decide if he’s supporting Scheer, or if he wants to let Trudeau win again.

Amidst all of this, Ralph Goodale put an essay up on his website about some of the racist history of his province, particularly the political influence that the KKK once held, and warned about those who are playing fast and loose with pluralism in this country – which is something that I think needs to be called out, because while Rempel does have some legitimate criticisms about how this government has handled the immigration and refugee files (and it needs to be stressed that these are separate and should not be conflated), she also has a huge habit about concern trolling and then shouting that the government is undermining support for pluralism, which she is very much doing by lighting her hair on fire and declaring a crisis where one doesn’t actually exist. And when she offers cover to public racists by trying to frame their stunts as “asking a question about the budget” (which it absolutely was not), she too contributes to undermining support for pluralism – the very thing she says she’s trying to avoid. Add to that, by not explicitly condemning Maxime Bernier’s winking to white nationalists – winking that they’re picking up and amplifying – she’s further undermining the very cause she claims she’s trying to shore up.

Meanwhile, Chantal Hébert tries to divine what Maxime Bernier’s endgame is, while Andrew Coyne warns against the Conservatives using fear-mongering and soft-pedalling racists to try and score points on the immigration file. Matt Gurney sees the real crisis as falling support for immigration (if we can believe a single poll), which is exacerbated by perceived government incompetence on the file – and we can’t deny that this government’s perennial inability to communicate their way out of a wet paper bag is part of the problem.

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Roundup: Scheer plans another ego trip

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Andrew Scheer has declared that in October, he and a group of MPs will head to India. While it’s not uncommon for opposition MPs to do a bit of foreign travel, particularly if they’re on some kind of committee or parliamentary friendship group, it’s a little more uncommon for them to go as the Official Opposition in any capacity (Washington DC excepted). But Scheer? He’s decided that his trip to India will be to “repair” the relationship with that country after the “disastrous” trip that Justin Trudeau made earlier this year.

Let’s unpack this a bit more. Scheer has zero diplomatic standing to do absolutely anything on behalf of the government of Canada. Add to that, I’m trying to figure out just what “damage” Scheer hopes to repair, because the only real “disaster” from Trudeau’s visit was related to Jaspal Atwal showing up at that event, which wound up being hugely overblown considering that India had allowed him back into the country and considered him rehabilitated from his former extremist views. The fact that Trudeau wore some expensive Indian clothes? The thing that people continue to underestimate/forget/ignore is that he was doing it to speak to a certain demographic in India which responds to these kinds of gestures – even if the upper-class voices that dominate their international press don’t. Trudeau didn’t lose points with that middle-class voter base in India (or the Indo-Canadian diaspora) – but that message was lost on the white press covering the trip, and given how the Conservatives reacted back in Canada (going so far as to use the insulting term of “costume,” which earned them a stinging rebuke from Liberal backbencher Ruby Sahota), they were tone-deaf to the whole thing. Was Trudeau snubbed my Modi? Not at all, and just because Modi didn’t greet him at the airport is not a snub considering that a) Canada doesn’t rank that high on his list of priorities, and b) we were greeted by an agriculture minister, who does have dealings with Canada. And on that subject, the fact that Trudeau wasn’t able to make progress on the tariffs that India imposed on pulse imports was not a “failure,” given that those tariffs were imposed for domestic political reasons (low prices due to a global supply glut, pandering to rural voters, and the fact that there has been a suicide crisis among Indian farmers for years now), and those tariffs hurt Australia more than they do Canada. But please, tell us again how those were done in retaliation for the trip. Meanwhile, Trudeau made several investment announcements and did have successful meetings with civil society groups in India. So again, I ask – what “damage” is there for Scheer to supposedly repair (for which he has zero authority to do anything about)?

We’ve seen this kind of self-aggrandisement from Scheer before with his trip to the UK to supposedly have talks about post-Brexit trade agreements, never mind that a) he’s not the government and can’t commit to anything, b) Trudeau and Theresa May already agreed to those talks once Brexit happens – because the UK legally can’t hold any talks until then, and c) he totally sold the trip with that photo of him at a red phone booth. So you’ll forgive my scepticism about this planned India trip, because it sounds dubious at best.

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Roundup: Giving succour to racists to own the libs

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That heckler the PM had an encounter with late last week turned into a big Thing today as it was revealed that she was a member of far-right and anti-Islamic and anti-immigrant groups in Quebec, and that her heckles were a set-up that Trudeau walked into. Trudeau himself offered no apologies for his response, but wouldn’t you know it – the Conservatives have decided to go to bat for this woman.

No, seriously. “Asking a question about the budget.” That was not “asking a question about the budget.” The translation of her (shouted) question was “I want to know when you are going to refund the $146 million we paid for your illegal immigrants.” That’s not a polite policy difference about interprovincial politics, as so many other conservatives have tried to intimate, that her question was the same one asked by three different provincial governments. It was followed up by her asking if Trudeau was tolerant of “Québécois de souche,” which some people translate as “old stock Quebeckers,” but that lacks the racially-charged nuance of the phrase, which some have likened to the “Quebec-speak variant of Master Race.” Add her “question about the budget” to this racially-charged phrase shows that she’s not concerned about the budget – she believes that these asylum seekers are stealing from Quebec. But, you know, it was “a question about the budget.” But wait – it gets better.

Andrew Scheer decided to weigh in and, ignoring all of what happened and the context, and the woman’s racially-charged language, Scheer attacked Trudeau for “name-calling” and “demonizing” people who are critical of him. Trudeau calling an avowed racist, with a history of public racism, a racist, is apparently “a vile [personal] insult” because he’s afraid of “legitimate criticism.” So yeah – way to go for offering succor to racists and white nationalists to “own the libs.” And while this woman’s apologists go on about how Trudeau “inflamed the situation” rather than answering her question – as though it was asked in good faith (it wasn’t) and wasn’t going to be immediately followed up with her racist remarks (which it was inevitably, given that this was demonstrably a set-up), you have to wonder just how wilfully blind Scheer and company will be in order to try and make Trudeau out to be the real monster.

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Meanwhile, John Ivison says that confrontations like these are political gold for Trudeau because he can run against the image of a xenophobic Conservative party, which plays well to a certain segment of the population, while Chris Selley says that Trudeau needs to be careful when calling out intolerance because of his party’s own obnoxious tendencies.

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Roundup: Those pesky gasoline prices

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While avoiding condemning Maxime Bernier’s choice of language and engagement (moving from just winking at white nationalists to now trying to delegitimize the media), Andrew Scheer has resumed his practice of shitposting misleading statistics memes over Twitter, and yesterday it was in relation to gasoline prices. Yes, Statistics Canada reported that the inflation rate in June was 3.0 percent, which is the Bank of Canada’s upper bound for their target, and yes, it was fuelled in part by gasoline prices. (Core inflation, stripped of volatile factors like gasoline, remains closer to the 2.0 percent target, so it’s not really anything to worry about). But why would those gasoline prices be higher? Hmm…

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That’s right – the world price of oil has increased over the past year after its recovery from the price collapse nearly two years ago, and that’s an unambiguous good thing for provinces like Alberta, who rely on oil prices being on the higher side for their economies. Trying to cast this as a carbon tax issue – and that oh noes, carbon taxes will make this even worse – is a bit disingenuous considering how small of a fraction of the price that entails.

Meanwhile, with a number of voices (Jason Kenney and Scheer among them) calling for the revival of Energy East in light of the Saudi Arabia spat, energy economist Andrew Leach crunched the numbers on the economic case for that pipeline. Short version: there is no economic case. Stop trying to pretend there is one or blaming Justin Trudeau for its demise.

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