Tag Archives: Refugees

Roundup: Independence and admissions of political ignorance

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Somewhat unexpectedly, Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott each announced that they would be running as independents in the next election, eschewing the Green Party (even after Elizabeth May said that she would even step aside as leader if Wilson-Raybould was interested in the job). Both of them made speeches that were variations of the same theme – that they want to “do politics differently,” that they were tired of parties, and wanted “non-partisan” ideas and to do things by “consensus” – all of which betrayed an ongoing naiveté and lack of understanding about Responsible Government and Westminster parliaments. Talking about “cooperation” and “non-partisan” ideas, or “consensus” sounds good, but it doesn’t understand how things actually get done. Partisanship when done properly (as in, not devolved into tribalism) is about having competing ideas – which is a good thing. Add to that, “consensus” may work in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut where you have small assemblies and a cultural predisposition to it, but it’s not the same in the House of Commons with 338 MPs – not to mention that consensus demolishes the ability to hold governments to account. When everyone is responsible, then no one is accountable. And sure, the pair might decry that there is “too much power in the centre,” but I’ve said time and again that the cause and solution of centralised power in our parliament is about the way in which we choose leaders, and done in a way that gives them an imaginary “democratic mandate” that they then abuse. Having more independent MPs won’t change that – assuming that they can get re-elected on their own. (Celina Caesar-Chavannes, incidentally, said that their speeches were “inspiring” and she too is now considering running again as an independent after previously saying she planned to bow out of elected political life).

In hot takes, Andrew MacDougall assesses what kind of stars would need to line up for either Philpott or Wilson-Raybould to win as independents, with Éric Grenier crunching the numbers of past independent MP victories. Chantal Hébert considers the long-game implications for the decision to run as independents, and how it lines them up for future moves or influence if the next election results in a hung parliament. Paul Wells looks to both history and Jerry Macguire to look at the lessons that this whole quixotic independent run amounts to, and how the lessons for other MPs may just be the opposite of what Philpott and Wilson-Raybould intend.

Meanwhile in Alberta, the UCP’s House Leader wants to ban floor-crossing in the legislature, which is complete patent nonsense and an affront to our Westminster system of government. Our system is predicated on how we elect individual MPs/MLAs as individuals, not as party ciphers – no matter what your calculus is in the voting booth. That’s why we don’t elect party lists or the likes. If the UCP can’t understand that, for as much as they like to talk a big game about respecting democracy and traditions, then it shows how craven they really are. All this move does is demonstrate that they view their own party members to be drones for the leader, at which point you may as well replace them all with battle droids and be done with it.

A reminder to Philpott, Wilson-Raybould, and Nixon – all of you may want to read my book in order to get a proper grasp of how Westminster democracies actually work.

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Roundup: A six-point sham

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Over the weekend, Andrew Scheer went to Calgary to further outline his “economic vision,” which included a short-term six-party plan which…does nothing about the economy. Those six parts are to scrap the federal carbon price, repeal Bill C-69, repeal Bill C-48 and end any tanker ban in northern BC, establish timelines for project approvals, end the “foreign interference” in project approvals, and invoke the constitutional authority to build major projects. Do you see a pattern here?

To be clear, these six proposals are all, well, hot air. Ending the federal carbon price won’t get energy projects built – most oil and gas companies are in favour of it. Repealing Bill C-69 won’t help because the 2012 environmental assessment legislation the Conservatives put into place just wound up in litigation, and that will continue if he reverts to it. Ending the tanker ban won’t have any measurable impact because there are no pipelines in the area, no plans for any, and if he thinks he can revive Northern Gateway then he didn’t pay attention to the reasons why the Federal Court revoked its approval. Establishing timelines for approvals? Again, nice in theory, but without a framework behind it (like Bill C-69 would ostensibly provide), it will likely mean yet more litigation. That “foreign interference” in project approvals is largely the conspiracy theories that the conservative movement is clinging to (ignoring the foreign funds that go into their own thinktanks like the Fraser Institute). And that “constitutional authority” is not a magic wand, and would only sow confusion because any project that crosses a provincial boundary is already a federally regulated project, so there’s nothing to invoke. So Scheer’s “six point plan” should perhaps better be called a “six point sham.”

Meanwhile, here’s some further analysis of Scheer’s decision to back away from his pledge to eliminate the deficit in two years, whether it’s because of Liberal warnings of austerity, the unpopularity of Doug Ford’s cuts playing out in Ontario, or the desire to try and deprive the Liberals of their talking points. But it does also take the wind out of Scheer’s own rhetoric about the evils of deficits, particularly those that are small and sustainable like the ones we’re seeing right now.

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1131728209018380288

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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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Roundup: The Norman trial collapses

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As expected, Crown prosecutors announced yesterday that they were staying the breach of trust charges that had been laid against Vice Admiral Mark Norman regarding the leaks of cabinet confidences related to a shipbuilding project, and people who don’t pay attention to details decided that the timing was suspicious and spun a number of conspiracy theories, many of them around the fact that Andrew Leslie was due to “testify against” the government. (Reality check: Leslie agreed to be a character witness for Norman months ago, and PMO was fully aware and there were no indications that they tried to dissuade him from doing so). With that out of the way, Norman made a statement about bias and presumption of guilt by senior levels of government, and his lawyer, the formidable Marie Henein, threw shade at PMO – stating that while the prosecutors acted independently, she felt PMO was withholding documents for far too long in the process – and the suggestion is that some of the Harper-era documents were what eventually exonerated him (though the Crown attorneys said there was no one piece of evidence that was responsible). As this was happening, Harjit Sajjan announced on his way into caucus that the government would pay Norman’s legal expenses. Norman later met with the Chief of Defence Staff, General Jonathan Vance, who said that with this out of the way, that Norman would be returning to duty soon, though we’ll see if it will be back as vice-chief of defence staff, as the role has since been filled by someone else. There are lingering questions – lots of them – about what happened here, but there aren’t likely to be many answers anytime soon given that the trial for the bureaucrat also charged with leaking information is coming up.

And great Cyllenian Hermes, were there a lot of hot takes on the end of the Norman trial today. Christie Blatchford described Norman’s ordeal, while Andrew Coyne has so many questions. Susan Delacourt and Matt Gurney both point out that this could remove one controversy from Justin Trudeau’s plate before the election, but both point to the lasting reputational damage that this has helped to inflict on Trudeau.

I have a few comments of my own that nobody seems to have brought up – one of them is to point out that the RCMP unit that investigated the leak was apparently the same one who investigated Senator Mike Duffy, and so ballsed up that investigation that we all know how it ended. Perhaps we should question whether this investigative unit is very good at their jobs. The other thing that bothers me in this whole affair was less about the leak than it was about what appears to be a high-ranking military official who balked when Scott Brison, the Treasury Board president, put the process on pause so that they could examine the sole-source contract granted by the previous government (as is the official version of events). Remember that this contract was granted after the House of Commons rose for the summer (and before the election call), and when Senators raised it while they still sat, the government offered no clarity or details, so there was no proper scrutiny at the time. That matters. But whether Brison paused the process to examine it, or to possibly open it for tender, it shouldn’t have been for Norman to work his contacts to try and pressure the government to resume the process (as is the allegation), because that undermines the civilian control of our military. Nobody is talking about his angle, which I think needs a better airing in all of this.

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QP: The Mark Norman conspiracy theories get airtime

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While Justin Trudeau was in town, he was not in QP today for some reason, while every other leader was. That also meant no proto-PMQs today, so take that for what you will. Andrew Scheer led off, wondering why anyone who says no to the prime minister winds up with a target on his back. David Lametti knew exactly what this referred to — the stay of prosecution in the Mark Norman case — and stated that the Public Prosecution Service made its own decisions to prosecute and stay the proceedings. Scheer spun a wild conspiracy theory and wondered what was so damaging in the documents, while Lametti assured him that all documents were disclosed and the Public Prosecution Service was independent. Scheer switched to French to accuse the government of scapegoating Norman, and Lametti repeated his assurances in French. Scheer switched to English to say it was too bad that Trudeau didn’t have the fortitude to answer the questions himself, and Lametti repeated his response in French. Scheer repeated that Trudeau didn’t have the backbone or fortitude to answer for this, and accused them of trying to interfere in the case. Lametti kept up his response in French to assure him that there was no role for the Privy Council in this affair. Jagmeet Singh was up next, and he worried about the loss of biodiversity and the apparent lack of action. Catherine McKenna assured him that they were engaged, not only domestically by protecting more areas, but also internationally. Singh switched to French to lament the plan to go ahead with Trans Mountain, to which Patty Hajdu assured him that they were carrying forward with meaningful Indigenous consultations. Singh then raised the Norman trial, alleging PMO interference, and Lametti repeated that the government played no role in the prosecution. Singh repeated the allegation in English and demanded an independent investigation into the matter. Lametti repeated that there was no interference, and that the Director of Public Prosecutions stated so herself.

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Roundup: Green wins, and the AG’s report

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After the Green Party won their second seat in Monday night’s by-election in Nanaimo–Ladysmith, it was inevitable that we would be subjected to a litany of hot takes about what this means for the upcoming federal election, most of which I’m not going to bother reading because frankly, I’m not sure it means anything at all. The Greens have been doing well provincially on Vancouver Island, where this riding is, and more than that, this particular candidate was once an NDP candidate who was booted from the party (apparently for views about Israel), and when the Greens picked him up, he won for them, while the NDP vote collapsed. Add to that, Green wins in BC, New Brunswick and PEI were also predicated by incumbent governments who had been in place for a long time (well, in New Brunswick, it was a constant PC/Liberal swap), and that’s not necessarily the case federally. While Justin Trudeau and Jagmeet Singh tried to spin this as “proof” that Canadians care about the environment (for which both will try to tout their party policies on the same) we can’t forget that Canadians want to do something about the environment in the same way that they want a pony – it’s a nice idea that nobody has any intention of following up on because it’s a lot of effort and mess. This has been proven time and again. I would also caution against the notion that this means that “progressive” votes are up for grabs, because the Greens, well, aren’t all that progressive. If you read their platform, it’s really quite socially conservative, and they had whole sections essentially written by “Men’s Rights Activists” because they have little to no adult supervision in their policy development process. So any hot takes you’re going to read about the by-election are probably going to be full of hot air (quite possibly this one as well).

https://twitter.com/robert_hiltz/status/1125798043905818624

Auditor General’s Report

The big news out of the Auditor General’s report was of course the backlog that the Immigration and Refugee Board faces regarding asylum claimants in Canada. The Conservatives, naturally, have jumped on this to “prove” that the current government has somehow broken the system, but every single expert that was cited over the day yesterday said that the Liberals inherited a system that was already broken (some went so far as to say that the Conservatives deliberately broke it in order to force a crisis that would allow them to adopt more draconian measures – though those backfired in a spectacular way, worsening the backlog), and that they have taken steps to increase the IRB’s resources. I wrote about some of these issues a while ago, and the IRB was starting to streamline some of their processes and start making use of technology like email (no, seriously) that cut down on some of the bureaucracy they were mired in – but as with anything, these kinds of changes take time to implement and have an effect. But expect the narrative of the “broken” system to continue in the run up to the election. Meanwhile, here are the other reports:

  • Half of Canadians who call a government call centre can’t get through, which is blamed on technology that was allowed to go obsolete
  • The RCMP are still not adequately prepared to deal with active shooter situations.
  • Our tax system hasn’t kept up with e-commerce and needs modernization
  • The mechanism to prevent governments from doing partisan advertising has little documentation and rigour.

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QP: The Auditor General’s report on the IRB gets play

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While Andrew Scheer was off in Montreal to give a foreign policy speech, Justin Trudeau was present — as was a beaming Elizabeth May. Lisa Raitt led off, asking about the planned loss of jobs for people with developmental disabilities at Library and Archives, and Trudeau read a script about the Accessibility Act, and at the end, Trudeau noted that the contract was extended. Raitt then moved onto the Auditor General’s report on the backlog in the immigration system, and Trudeau responded that the system had been broken the previous government and that his government had invested in it, cleared the legacy backlog, and were transforming the system. Raitt called the Roxham Road irregular border crossing an “express entry” system, and Trudeau called out her fear-mongering before noting that migration was up across the world and Canada is committed to a fair process. Pierre Paul-Hus repeated Raitt’s question in French, and Trudeau read the French version of his first response. Paul-Hus went with the angry follow-up, calling the system “broken,” and Trudeau repeated that in the face of fear and division, Canada was doing what it could. Jagmeet Singh was up next for the NDP, and in raising the recent report on the loss of biodiversity, he demanded the NDP’s environmental bill of rights be adopted. Trudeau stated that while the NDP were all talk, his government was taking action. Singh repeated the question in French, and Trudeau repeated his response. Singh then read about a catastrophic drug case in Ontario, demanding immediate action on pharmacare, and Trudeau read about the planned Canada Drug Agency in the budget. Singh repeated the question in English, and got a same response from Trudeau in English.

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QP: Why can’t you spend in Canada?

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On a lovely Tuesday afternoon, and all of the leaders were present for a change. Andrew Scheer led off, and he accused the prime minister of showing weakness in the face of China, to which Justin Trudeau assured him that diplomatic efforts were ongoing, and that they would have new measures for canola farmers in days. Scheer then demanded that the government pull out of the Asian infrastructure bank, to which Trudeau read a script about who all is involved in said bank, and about green and inclusive growth. Scheer repeated his demand, comparing it to pipeline development in Canada, and Trudeau extemporaneously reminded him that the previous government couldn’t get pipelines to new markets because they didn’t understand that they needed to get the buy-in of Indigenous communities. Scheer switched to French to demand the same pull out, and Trudeau read the French version of his script. Scheer then read a question about the CBC story on decade-old illegal donations from SNC-Lavalin, and Trudeau used a script to note that they made changes to increase transparency. Jagmeet Singh was up next for the NDP, and he invoked the name of Jack Layton to complain about corporate tax cuts before demanding the Loblaws contract be cancelled. Trudeau reminded him that the private sector has a role to play in fighting climate change. Singh repeated the question in French, and got much the same answer. Singh then raised the issue of annual flooding in Kasheshewan and demanded the promised relocation take place, and Trudeau took a script to remind him that the minister has met with the community and they have been working with them on the relocation, starting with building the necessary road. Singh repeated the question in English, and Trudeau reiterated his response that work was underway in partnership with the community. 

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Roundup: Kenney changes his tone

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In the wake of Jason Kenney’s win in the Alberta election, he took to the microphones yesterday to try and sound statesmanlike, immediately ratcheting down his rhetoric on a number of files including his “turn off the taps” pledge (which never made any business sense) and his demand that the Trans Mountain Expansion construction get underway – acknowledging realities that he never did on the campaign trail. Of course, he still plans to kill the province’s carbon tax (and lift their emissions cap) which sets up for constitutional battles that they are doomed to lose. As for Rachel Notley, she becomes yet another woman first minister who has failed to win a second election, keeping that established pattern going. And I would encourage you all to read Jen Gerson’s roundup of the whole election, and the lessons in the end – that you can’t hope to paint your opponents as bigots and win, and that you can’t run a campaign about lashing out against the world without consequences.

This having been said, a narrative started emerging over social media as soon as it became clear that Kenney was winning last night, which was conservatives across the country were insisting that the NDP’s campaign as solely “nasty” and full of “personal attacks” which was why they lost. Kenney himself, during his press conference yesterday, insisted that he had a “positive campaign” that the media somehow missed. I’m not sure what part of lies and snake oil promises are “positive,” nor am I convinced that pointing out racism, misogyny and homophobia/transphobia is a “personal attack.” In fact, it seems to point to this aggrieved sense that I’ve seen where the Conservatives in Ottawa will go to bat for avowed racists because their racism was being pointed out – that being called a racist is somehow worse than the actual racism being espoused. That’s a fairly troubling mindset, and yet we’re no doubt going to be seeing a lot more of it as Justin Trudeau makes a concerted effort to point out the winking and nudging to white nationalists that Andrew Scheer has engaged in.

And now the hot takes – because everyone’s got one. Colby Cosh points out that this really wasn’t the Lougheed vs Klein fight that some people portrayed, and that the broader climate fight is in the works. Stephen Maher advises that Trudeau abandon his “sunny ways” (more than he already has) and start bare-knuckle brawling, adding that if Kenney lets his social conservatives loose, that could work to Trudeau’s advantage. Andrew Coyne notes Kenney’s adoption of a statesman-like tone in victory following “campaign exuberance,” and that Trudeau would be in a tough spot to not approve Trans Mountain if Kenney repeals the province’s environmental plan. David Moscrop wonders if the trends in Alberta are changing and whether its conservatism will hold for Kenney’s benefit. Tristin Hopper makes the salient point that the increasingly uncompromising nature of the environmental movement hardened Albertans against the NDP.

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Roundup: A trio of justice issues

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There were three major law-related stories in the news yesterday, starting with the announcement that Supreme Court of Canada Justice Clement Gascon has opted to retire early, citing “personal and family reasons.” This was quickly followed by Justin Trudeau announcing that a replacement process would be launched, and would again be headed by Kim Campbell, while the Conservatives followed a few hours later with a demand that this process not go ahead until the leak from the previous process was investigated (though the Privacy Commissioner is already on that case). The thing to remember of course is that there is something of a deadline here, being the election, and it’s more than possible that the Conservatives want this delayed so that they have the possibility of naming the next judge if they should happen to form government in October. For what it’s worth.

The second story was that of the carbon tax reference at the Ontario Court of Appeal, which was live-streamed for the first time in its history. The province’s argument apparently is that if the federal government is allowed to impose a carbon tax, that they’ll start intruding into other areas of provincial jurisdiction, which is…dubious. And it sounds like the judges weren’t having much of that line of reasoning either.

https://twitter.com/cmathen/status/1117808109802663938

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1117809485395816451

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1117811576940060673

The third law story of the day was the revelation that the directive around civil litigation involving Indigenous people that Jody Wilson-Raybould instituted as one of her last acts as justice minister has been fiercely contested within the department because it many cases, it amounts to litigating badly and not actually getting the courts to resolve the legal questions that are at issue, which they argue doesn’t actually help reconciliation because you’re not dealing with underlying issues that require resolution. The piece also noted the frequent and direct political interference that Wilson-Raybould exerted on civil litigation (which she can do as Attorney General, unlike the arm’s length nature of criminal prosecutions), sometimes undermining the arguments that Crown attorneys were trying to advance in the middle of cases. It’s fascinating reading and yet more insight into what was going on with Wilson-Raybould in the lead up to her being shuffled.

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