Tag Archives: Public Service

Roundup: Another NDP MP walks out

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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

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Roundup: Parsing the bribery charge

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Mike Duffy says that he looks forward to his day in court, and wants it sooner rather than later. Considering that the court system is a little jammed, that may not happen sooner. In the aftermath of the charges, Kady O’Malley delves further into the reasons why Nigel Wright wasn’t charged with bribery even if Duffy was charged for accepting said bribe (hint: proving the intention of “corruptly” makes it a high bar for prosecutors), as well as the rules around sitting parliamentarians testifying before the courts. Stephen Maher looks at those charges relating to what Duffy was charging the Senate for partisan activity and wonders what the party knew about those expenses.

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Roundup: Hostile witnesses

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Kady O’Malley looks at how sex workers were treated as hostile witnesses at the Justice Committee, in particular by Conservative MP Stella Ambler – who, it should be noted, isn’t even a regular member of that committee. Any of their experiences in which they stated that they weren’t victims were often dismissed or challenged as being somehow untrue, which is unfortunate but not surprising given that the government has a narrative around this bill that they intend to push.

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Roundup: Conflating sex work with trafficking

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The hearings into the prostitution bill wrapped up yesterday, and clause-by-clause consideration of the bill, along with amendments, will take place on Tuesday. Yesterday’s testimony included warnings not to confuse prostitution with human trafficking, which are different and human trafficking already has laws in place to combat it (though there have not yet been many charges). Of course, Conservative MP and booster of the bill, Joy Smith, says that the two are “symbiotically linked,” but again, separate regimes – just like talking about child sexual exploitation has nothing to do with adult sex work, and is a separate provision in the Criminal Code. Amongst the other nonsense that Smith went on Power & Politics to talk about included her assertion that maybe there are “one or two or three” sex workers who do it willingly, despite that being in complete contravention to testimony heard. It just didn’t fit with her established narrative, and as she often does, she rejects it outright. Surprisingly, a group of Anglican clergy have come out against the bill because of the effect it will have on those sex workers when it forces the trade further underground. And then, once the hearings wrapped, Conservative MP Stella Ambler sent out this gem, which pretty much shows you her belief that there is apparently only one side to this whole debate:

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Roundup: Defending Goguen, unbelievably

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The former trafficked prostitute that Robert Goguen asked that braindead question to the other day at committee was out defending him and his awful, aren’t-I-clever straw man of a question to the press, saying that she refused to let him apologise, and accused the media of basically inventing a controversy. It’s utterly unbelievable. Meanwhile, one of the architects of the Sweden’s “Nordic model” has said that the proposed Canadian law won’t stand up to the Charter, in particular because of the portions that still criminalise the sex workers, such as if they are working at a place where children could be present. (And on a side note, there are no credible studies that show there to be a real decline in prostitution in Sweden, as the figures that show a decline are mostly police stats, which don’t capture how it’s been pushed further underground). Here’s a look at seven of the voices we’ve heard so far in the prostitution bill hearings at the Commons justice committee, from all ends of the spectrum. Of course, there has been plenty of testimony from women who have been victimized terribly, but little of it seems relevant to the bill because what they suffered is already illegal and not actually the scope of what the bill is supposed to be achieving, thus further muddying the waters.

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Roundup: Goguen makes everything worse

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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.

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Roundup: Different lessons before the by-election

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Not that Parliament has risen for the summer, the leaders can begin their summer tours in earnest, without having to take those inconvenient breaks to show up for the odd Question Period or a vote here or there. Because you know, they’re meeting with “real Canadians” as opposed to doing their actual jobs. And with by-elections happening a week away, both Trudeau and Mulcair are in Toronto today to campaign there, both of them drawing different lessons from the Ontario election, while the people who study these sorts of things aren’t necessarily sure that voters are committed to the same parties provincially and federally, and that they may be making a different calculation electorally.

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Roundup: Standby for evening sittings

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Government House Leader Peter Van Loan is calling for evening sittings for the remainder of the spring sitting of the Commons, in order to get stuff done. Here’s a list of five bills that the government is looking to get through before they rise for the summer. And you can bet that the late nights will make MPs all that much crankier as the last stretch before summer grinds along. Get ready for silly season, ladies and gentlemen.

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QP: We’re taking action without a commission

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Somewhat amazing for a Monday in this session, there actually was a major leader in the House. Almost unbelievable, I know. Thomas Mulcair led off by asking about the UN special rapporteur on indigenous people’s report on Canada’s Aboriginals, and demanded a public inquiry on missing and murdered Aboriginal women. Peter MacKay responded and touted all of the measures they’ve taken like renewing funding for the Aboriginal justice strategy. Mulcair moved on, and demanded powers to compel testimony for the Elections Commissioner, citing that the Conservative party lawyer gave false information to Elections Canada. Pierre Poilievre insisted that his party was cleared of any wrongdoing, and a second round of those questions — which was more party business than government business — got a similar response. Mulcair then moved on to a small business hiring tax credit, to which Joe Oliver read some good news talking points about job creation. Mulcair noted that unemployment was higher in Toronto than the national average, and decried temporary foreign workers. Jason Kenney insisted that they were cracking down on those who abused the programme. John McCallum was up for the Liberals, and thrice denounced the problems with the government’s Job Bank, and Kenney defended the system, calling it a useful platform.

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Roundup: Calling four out of five by-elections

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Stephen Harper has made the call – four by-elections will be held on June 30th, two in Alberta and two in Ontario. The fifth vacant riding, Whitby–Oshawa, former riding of Jim Flaherty, will remain open for the time being. That means that Fort McMurray–Athabasca and Macleod in Alberta, and Trinity–Spadina and Scarborough–Agincourt in the Greater Toronto Area are now officially in play. It also means that the two GTA ridings will be contesting the by-election in the middle of both a provincial and municipal election. It has also been suggested by the cynical among us that Harper intended to drive down voter participation by holding the by-elections the day before Canada Day. It remains to be seen in some of the more hotly contested ridings, and Justin Trudeau has spent the weekend in both Northern Alberta and Okotoks because of the two by-elections, hoping for a Liberal breakthrough in that province.

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