As Mondays are the new Fridays, there were no major leaders in the Commons for QP, leaving the more unusual choice of Hélène Laverdière to lead off, asking about the humanitarian assistance for Nepal, and asked if the government would match donations as they have done with disasters past. Christian Paradis assured her that there was, and noted the $5 million fund they just announced. Megan Leslie was up next, and asked for a further update on assistance being provided to Canadians in the region. Paradis repeated his previous response, but didn’t tough on the actual questions. Leslie then turned to the budget, and the lack of action for climate change therein. Pierre Poilievre insisted that the NDP considered anyone making less than $60,000 per year are wealthy. Nathan Cullen then asked about tax breaks for the wealthy, to which Poilievre repeated the same answer. Cullen gave a rambling repeat of the question, and got the same answer. David McGuinty led off for the Liberals, asking about partisan advertising — not coincidentally, the subject of his opposition day motion. Poilievre insisted that they were informant families of tax decreases and benefits available to them. McGuinty pressed, wanting all government ads to be submitted to a third-party vetting. Poilievre instead plugged the benefits to parents who were not yet signed up to them. McGuinty then moved onto the lack of job creation figures from the budget, but this time Kevin Sorenson stood up to deliver the good news talking points on all the jobs the government allegedly created.
Tag Archives: Terrorism
Roundup: Enbridge and the Duffy pathology
Over in the Ottawa Citizen, David Reevely has a wonderful little piece about the ways in which Mike Duffy conducted himself as a Senator – and that was to basically farm out work to friends, including a $7000 speech about “Why I am a Conservative.” Apparently a former journalist writing about his own political convictions was too much work, and so he fobbed it off on someone else, on the taxpayer’s dime. Reevely is right to point out an emptiness to the way that Duffy treated the job, but it misses another aspect to the pathology – that Duffy wanted to be a player. Certainly by spreading the largess around to those who he thought would be impressed by it is indicative of that. We’re seeing more of this desire to be a player as more things come out of his diaries, and one of the most eyebrow-raising examples were his meetings with Enbridge. As it happens, those meetings were unsolicited. Duffy was trying to ingratiate himself and so he made busywork about trying to get some action on the Keystone XL pipeline, having conversations that weren’t reported to the Lobbying Registry, and then reporting them to the PMO. Apparently it got to the point where Enbridge officials themselves complained to the PMO about it, in the hopes that they could call Duffy off. And really, there was no point to Duffy’s efforts – the PMO was onside with the pipeline, and Enbridge has had no issues with reporting their meetings. Oh, but Duffy wanted to be a player, to show that he mattered in the corridors of power – the reason why he’d been begging for an appointment to the Senate for decades, from successive prime ministers, both Liberal and Conservative, who had no time for him. The NDP, incidentally, want those Enbridge meetings investigated, but I’m not sure it’s really necessary because it certainly appears that there is nothing to investigate other than Duffy’s inflated sense of self, and while the NDP may think that it’s some kind of smoking gun on Harper, it’s far more about Duffy’s ego than it was about corruption from the centre.
Roundup: The Privacy Commissioner finally has his say
Bill C-51 is now getting its review in the Senate, hearing from someone that the Commons didn’t – the Privacy Commissioner. What they got was an earful – there are some big problems with the information sharing provisions in the bill that would allow large amounts of personal information to be collected and shared between departments with little justification, and that his office would be swamped with work because of it. He’s also calling for oversight – like everyone else – and for the ability for different watchdogs to communicate with one another and coordinate their investigations in order to get a better picture of what these organisations are doing as they work together but their oversight remains siloed. Those other oversight bodies – SIRC and the CSE Commissioner – had much the same concerns when it comes to the ability to work together, and just keeping pace with the increasing scope and scale of operations. But will any of this have an effect? Maybe, as there are some Conservative senators who are concerned about these kinds of things and who may push back. But the government may bully through, and said senators may decide that this isn’t the hill they want to die on (which does happen), and they’ll let it go through. Suffice to say, the issue has not gone away.
Roundup: Not expecting many budget surprises
It’s Budget Day – err, I mean Economic Action Plan 2015™ Day, and all of the big stuff has pretty much leaked already – because apparently there are no penalties for this kind of thing anymore when that it used to be a serious issue that was investigated by the RCMP. Suffice to say, Joe Oliver promises it’ll be balanced (and got some New Balance shoes as the most dad joke of Budget Day gimmicks ever), and we hear there will be things like some more money for security agencies, and more compassionate caregiver leave (but that’s coming out of the EI fund, which is already artificially high and being used to pay down the deficit), and they keep hinting about raising the limit on TFSA, and finally giving that adult fitness tax credit. And then there’s the fact that the government has been putting out all kinds of advertising to ensure that people don’t forget to sign up for the new child benefits – after all, they want to ensure that they’re in people’s bank accounts before the election so that they can warn that those awful Liberals (and NDP) will take them away. So there’s that. I guess I’ll see you after the lock-up with the rest of the details.
The comms genius in Oliver's office who thought "New Balance" was clever should probably rethink some life choices. pic.twitter.com/KozgCIQ7I6
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) April 20, 2015
QP: Wait for tomorrow’s budget
The first day back from the Easter break, and the day before the budget, and attendance was pretty depressed, and none of the major leaders were present. Megan Leslie led off, demanding the government table a budget that helps families. Kevin Sorensen said she’d have to wait for tomorrow to get the details, but they were going to fulfil their provinces including tax breaks for families. Leslie insisted regular Canadians would face cuts, but Sorenson was not deterred from his good news talking points. Leslie then changed topics to the constitutionality of Mike Duffy’s Senate appointment, to which Paul Calandra reminded the NDP of their satellite offices and demanded they repay them. Peter Julian repeated the question in French, got much the same response, and for his final question, Peter Julian decried cuts to marine safety as demonstrated by the fuel leak in English Bay. Lisa Raitt responded by commending the Coast Guard on their actions, and reminded them that the ship transiting Canadian waters who is solely responsible for their pollution. Scott Brison led for the Liberals, decrying the planned balanced budget legislation, and asked the government to make the law retroactive to repay the five percent penalty for the years that we weren’t in recession. Sorenson praised balanced budgets, and didn’t take Brison’s bait. Brison then decried the doubling of the TFSA limit as helping only the wealthy, and Sorenson responded with some non sequitur past quote of Brison. Brison wanted more help for students instead of advertising (Poilievre: You would raise taxes on students).
QP: Easter season Friday-on-a-Thursday
With it being an early end to the week in advance of Easter long weekend and a two-week constituency break, QP was held at the usual Friday time slot of 11 am. And while it was on a Friday schedule, there was better than usual Friday attendance, including one major leader — Thomas Mulcair. Mulcair led off by reading a rambling question about balancing the budget on the backs of the middle class. Andres Saxton responded by reading some talking points about the family tax cuts, and warned that the opposition would take them away. Mulcair made some digs about Senator Nancy Ruth, to which Candice Bergen responded with some non sequitur talking points about those same family tax cuts. Mulcair then read some concerns about the Future Shop job losses, and Pierre Poilievre got a turn about those same talking points. Charlie Angus then got up to ask an out of bounds question about Senate travel — which earned him a warning from the Speaker after the fact, to which Paul Calandra reminded the House about their satellite office spending, and then they had another go around of the same. Marc Garneau led off for the Liberals, demanding infrastructure spending, to which Poilievre gave the same response. Scott Brison took another go of it in English, and Candice Bergen got another turn to deliver the approved lines. Brison then noted the amount of government advertising dollars that could go toward creating summer jobs, but Pierre Poilievre delivered a tired “forty million dollars” line before returning to the family tax cut talking points.
QP: A laundry lists of non sequiturs
Caucus Day, and the only other day of the week when we can expect all party leaders to show up — because they’re showing how much Parliament matters. Thomas Mulcair led off, asking where the budget was, to which Stephen Harper read off a laundry list of measures they have already brought forward. Mulcair noted job losses, to which Harper decried NDP tax hikes. Mulcair brought up the Governor of the Bank of Canada’s statement about the state of the economy being “atrocious,” but Harper kept up his same line of answers. Mulcair noted that the costs of our military missions being classified in budget documents, but Harper ignored it and touted their family tax cuts. Mulcair then brought up Jason Kenney’s misleading statements about smart bombs, and Harper again claimed the NDP would take away the family tax cuts, before decrying how awful ISIS is. Justin Trudeau was up next, and noted unemployment figures and demanded a real plan. Harper responded by claiming that the Liberals would also take away the family tax credits. Trudeau gave a jab about spending taxpayer dollars for benefit gain, to which Harper gave a bog standard “$40 million dollars” response before he again claimed the Liberals would take away programmes from Canadians. For his final question, Trudeau asked about partisan advertising, before making a dig another the absent Liberal party platform.
Roundup: Lunney and his martyrdom
Surprising news on Parliament Hill yesterday was that Conservative MP James Lunney decided he’s going to quit caucus and sit as an independent because his freedom of religion is being suppressed at the senior levels, citing the group of Christian “leaders” who held a press conference on Parliament Hill last week to decry that they are being denied professional and economic opportunity in law, medicine and academia. What that tends to be code for is the fact that they don’t like the that Law Societies around the country don’t want to accredit Trinity Western University’s law school for its homophobic code of conduct, that doctors have to refer people for birth control, and one presumes with academia it’s about things like creationism or “intelligent design.” Lunney went so far in his press release to bemoan the social media firestorm when he defended an Ontario PC MPP who felt that schools should teach creationism. Lunney himself has questioned the science of climate change and given credence to discredited theories like vaccines being linked to autism. And while he has already announced that he won’t run again, what I find most disconcerting is that Lunney is martyring himself for this supposed cause of religious freedom when it’s not that at all. While the Ottawa Citizen editorial put it best, that religious freedom is about not having the state tell you what to believe, it also makes the point that it doesn’t mean your beliefs can’t be questioned or even mocked or satirized. What is most problematic is that this false notion of religious freedom that Lunney and the Charles McVety crowd was moaning about last week is the very same justification for those blatantly anti-gay laws being passed in places like Indiana, where “freedom of religion” is being used as the statutory means to discriminate against gays and lesbians. And in fact, it’s insulting to those who are actually suffering from religious prosecution. I’m not saying they have the numbers here to try and agitate for those kinds of laws, and it would never pass the Charter test regardless, but that mentality remains alarming.
anyone saying that Christians are oppressed in Canada doesn ot know what oppression is/means. @journo_dale @EmmMacfarlane
— Steve Saideman (@smsaideman) March 31, 2015
QP: Concern over a slight shrinking in GDP
It being Tuesday, the leaders were all present and ready to go, because apparently it only counts two days a week now. Thomas Mulcair led off, asking about the new numbers from StatsCan that showed that GDP shrank ever so slightly last month. Stephen Harper touted his family tax cut legislation instead. Mulcair demanded a budget, but Harper demurred. Mulcair decried “all of the eggs” in the oil basket — actually not true — and continued his demand for a budget, but Harper kept insisting that they are continuing their Economic Action Plan™ and that it was working. Mulcair then moved onto this morning’s PBO report that said that families with older kids and those without kids in childcare will be getting more benefits than those with kids in childcare. Harper first insisted that the NDP wanted to raise taxes, and then insisted that all families would get an increase in after-tax benefits. Mulcair decried those families with kids in childcare being punished, but Harper repeated his answer. Justin Trudeau was up next, and he returned to the reports of negative growth in three months of the past six, and wondered when the government would come up with a plan to get the economy moving. Harper responded with a laundry list of their recent announcements, and insisted that the Liberals only wanted to raise taxes. Trudeau noted that giving a tax break to the rich wouldn’t help, but Harper insisted that forecasts still showed growth, and wanted support for their family tax break bill. Trudeau asked again in French, and Harper repeated his answer in French.
Roundup: Kenney’s fading credibility
It was no surprised that the motion to support the Iraq mission passed, but what was perhaps unexpected was the bit of verbal sparring between Jason Kenney and Justin Trudeau, and the issue of Kenney’s credibility came up. It has come up several times, having been called out repeatedly by journalists for posting misleading photos on his Twitter account, or his statements that were not true about things like Russian planes buzzing our frigate in the Black Sea, but this weekend, things got even more escalated when the Chief of Defence Staff had to come out and make a statement to both back up and correct the record with regards to Kenney’s statements about how Canada and the US were the only countries engaged in Syria and Iraq using precision bombs. That’s blatantly not true, and General Lawson had to use some careful language to not embarrass his minister but at the same time correct the record, and Kenney treated it as though Lawson backed up his statement – which he didn’t. And Trudeau used that during the question-and-answer portion of his speech on the Iraq motion, that the minister doesn’t have the credibility behind his words when it comes to the motion to extend the mission and the Liberals can’t trust him as a result. Will that be enough political cover for Trudeau given the disgruntled members of his own party who would see us join the mission? I guess we’ll wait and see. Meanwhile, the government’s fudging on the reality of our combat operations is a sign that Canadians really don’t have the stomach for another war.