From Brussels, Stephen Harper signed the draft Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, opening up agricultural and automotive markets while eliminating almost all tariffs, though a couple of trade-offs will mean pharmaceuticals will get two added years of patent protection. The agreement will spend the next couple of years being ratified by both the various provinces in Canada and the member countries of the EU. The full text isn’t available yet either, but so far the notes are positive – even from the opposition parties including the NDP (though their language was much more cautious than the Liberals’). CBC has some numbers of what this affects, PostMedia looks at potential winners and losers, while Maclean’s Econowatch has ten things to know about it. Maclean’s also has a look at how Jean Charest got the ball rolling on the agreement. Paul Wells notes that this really is a big win for Harper, and will probably be what he becomes known for once he leaves office. John Geddes is reminded of the portents of doom that the Canadian wine industry faced with the original free trade deal with the US – which turned out to be false – and instead heralded an upturn for the industry as they took the need to compete more seriously and got rid of their crappy vines in favour of top hybrids, which is a lesson to the whinging dairy industry. Andrew Coyne says that consumers will be the ultimate winners of CETA.
Tag Archives: Supreme Court
QP: Back to form
The first Question Period of the new session, and the Prime Minister was absent, jetting off to Brussels to conclude the trade agreement with the EU. After a round of Members’ Statements which were pretty much bog standard for the rhetorical levels we’ve come to expect in the current parliament, Thomas Mulcair returned to true form — reading from a mini-lectern. But rather than beginning with questions on the ClusterDuff, Mulcair started with a calm and controlled question on missing and murdered Aboriginal women. Peter MacKay, acting as the designated back-up PM du jour, assured him that they were taking the measures seriously. Mulcair then turned to the issue of “corruption” in the prime minister’s office, and accused him of hiding on the other side of the Atlantic. Pierre Poilivre responded and extolled the virtues of the Canada-EU trade deal. After another round of the same, Mulcair turned to the closure of Veterans Affairs service centres, for which Parm Gill insisted that they drive to meet veterans at a place of their choosing rather than forcing them to drive to designated locations. Mulcair then moved onto the issue of cyberbullying, and demanded that they pass Robert Chisholm’s bill at all states unanimously. (Proof right there as to why we need the Senate to do the scrutiny that MPs seem to want to avoid). MacKay assured him that a bill would come in due course. For his turn, Justin Trudeau asked why there was no mention of transparency or accountability in the Throne Speech. Poilievre assured him that once the Supreme Court provided then with a “legal reference manual,” they would reform the Senate. Trudeau then pointed out the government’s abysmal economic record, which Poilievre laughed off. For his last question, Trudeau asked why the government would not put in place a new system for MPs’ expenses reporting. John Duncan said that until a new system was agreed to, Conservative MPs would do it on their own accord.
Roundup: More challenges to Justice Nadon’s appointment
The Quebec bar association is now demanding that the issue of Justice Marc Nadon’s eligibility to sit on the Supreme Court as a Quebec judge be sent directly to the Supreme Court to have a swift ruling, seeing as the usual process of litigation could take some five years to work its way through. Because hey, let’s politicise this appointment even further, and set a potentially dangerous precedent for these kinds of challenges. Of course, given that this issue was foreseen (witness the legal opinion it came with), the Prime Minister could have actually avoided it all by appointing a different candidate instead.
Roundup: Industrial espionage…or not
The Guardian writes that the Communications Security Establishment was involved in secret briefings to energy corporations, ostensibly to discuss threats to energy infrastructure, and they are tying this into the allegations that CSE was conducting industrial espionage on mining and energy in Brazil – even though the documents don’t show that. CSE did confirm that they meet with industry, but said that it has to do with protecting them against things like cyber-threats. There are even public records of such kinds of meetings here. It should also be noted that Canadian energy companies do have operations in countries like Cote d’Ivoire and Nigeria, which have had problems with stability and there would be threats to our operations and workers there. These facts weren’t enough to dissuade Thomas Mulcair, who said that there was “clear evidence” of industrial espionage, though that would be news to anyone else. The CBC’s Julie Van Dusen tried to get answers from the head of CSE in a walking scrum yesterday, but he wasn’t deviating from his talking points. (And kudos to the camera operator who filmed said walking scrum while walking backwards at high speed). James Fitz-Morris has a possible explanation for why Canada might be spying on Brazil’s energy officials.
Roundup: Yet another Duffy revelation
Oh, Mike Duffy. As soon as RCMP investigators started digging through his financial records, something else caught their eye – some $65,000 paid out to one of Duffy’s friends as a consultant for which the friend admits to doing little or no work. (Insert all of the wise-asses of the world joking about how that’s all a Senator does – and those wise-asses would be wrong, but I digress). But more curious is that the money that was paid out seems to also have vanished, because that friend is also on disability and couldn’t take the money without losing his benefits, and his wife and son, listed as president and director of his company, aren’t talking. Add to all of this is the look into Patrick Brazeau’s housing claims, for which his Gatineau neighbours thought he worked from home because he was there so often. They’re also investigating his tax filings, as he listed his address on his former father-in-law’s reserve even though he didn’t live there. Kady O’Malley’s search through the court affidavits and comparing them to the timeline turns up what she thinks may be references to those emails being turned over to the RCMP along with some redacted diaries.
Roundup: Evidence for Ambrose
On Power & Politics on Friday, Rona Ambrose asserted that there was “no evidence” that heroin-based therapy is effective for those heroin addicts for whom other treatments have proven ineffective. She repeated this several times. She was wrong, and Aaron Wherry points out why.
Thomas Mulcair went out of his way to repeat that he would not raise personal income taxes on the wealthy as part of his next campaign, despite that being one of the things that his star candidate, Linda McQuaig, continues to espouse. Because apparently people don’t pay for corporate tax increases either. Mulcair is also planning to unveil a new pan-Canadian energy policy sometime later in the fall.
Roundup: Forget the science of treating addiction, drugs are bad!
Rona Ambrose held a press conference yesterday to say that the government would be closing the “loopholes” in the Special Access Programme so that illicit drugs can no longer be prescribed for clinical purposes – never mind that the whole point of the programme that the injectable heroin was being prescribed in was because none of the other replacements worked, and that it was the safest and most effective way to preserve the health of the patient while getting them off the drug in a controlled manner. But hey, when did science matter over the ideological concerns that “drugs are bad”? Aaron Wherry talks to BC’s provincial health officer about the scientifically proven heroin-assisted treatment.
Roundup: The judge and his hockey pedigree
Justice Marc Nadon appeared before MPs yesterday afternoon as part of the meet-and-greet exercise that serves as a not-really-confirmation-hearing as part of the consultation process for judicial nominees that the government put into place. In a series of softball questions – which are all that are allowed – we learned a bit about Nadon, which seemed to be a lot about hockey. Apparently we now need to establish someone’s hockey pedigree before we can appoint them to a major office, if His Excellency David Johnston, Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz and Justice Nadon are anything to go by. Also, Nadon claims to have been “drafted” by the Detroit Red Wings when he was 14, though there is no record of this, and makes one wonder if he chose the wrong word, or if he remembers things a little more glorified than they really were. Regardless, any attempt to get an insight into his judicial thinking was rebuffed, so we were left with another round of questions that would have only been improved if one MP had bothered to ask Nadon which Spice Girl he would be if he could be a Spice Girl. (Incidentally, those demanding that MPs have a more active role in the final decision should also remember that in our system of Responsible Government, the accountability for appointments rests with the PM so that he can be held to account – either at the ballot box or by maintaining the confidence of the House – as giving MPs that power would muddy the accountability). Over at CTV, there is a clip of law professor Carissima Mathen explaining her reservations about the way the government has been making their Supreme Court appointments. Irwin Cotler, who began the process of opening up the Supreme Court nomination process to outside scrutiny, writes about the problems with this particular appointment process – especially the timelines laid out by the government.
Roundup: Another Conservative Senator under suspicion
Conservative Senator Carolyn Stewart Olsen has apparently also been found to have improperly charged per diems for time spent in Ottawa when the Senate wasn’t sitting at one point and promised to repay the amounts – only to come out a few hours later and insist that the amounts were reviewed by Senate Finance and found to be in order. So why say that she was going to repay them and then not? And how can she believe that this isn’t hurting the Senate’s reputation any further if she’s not coming up with a proper justification as to why those per diems should have been charged – especially if she’s on the steering committee of the Internal Economy Committee, which adds another layer of distrust to the issue. I guess we’ll see if her tune changes in the next day or two.
Roundup: Canada’s newest Supreme Court justice
Stephen Harper has nominated Federal Court Justice Marc Nadon as the newest member of the Supreme Court of Canada. This appointment solidifies the current gender imbalance on the bench, and there are questions as to whether it is really appropriate that Nadon, as a Federal Court justice, really should be a Quebec appointee considering that he is not currently a member of the Quebec Bar. There have been other concerns raised that while Nadon is an expert in maritime law, there is little call for such expertise on the Supreme Court, while there is a need for more expertise in administrative law. Add to that, the ad hoc committee of MPs set to quiz Nadon on his appointment was given a mere 48 hours to prepare (though most of those MPs would have been involved with the short-list selection process, so they would be familiar with his file, but there are yet more concerns that MPs who weren’t involved in that process should be the ones involved). It was also noted that Nadon was a dissenting opinion with regard to the Omar Khadr case with regards to attempts to order the government to have him repatriated, and the Supreme Court later agreed with him – for what it’s worth.