Tag Archives: Trade

Roundup: A refresher on the GG

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With a minority government likely in the offing – possibly Conservative, possibly Liberal – we’re seeing a spate of new articles about post-electoral scenarios and the role of the Governor General. While some of them get it more or less right, (my own offering a couple of weeks ago here), into the middle of this, Duff Conacher of Democracy Watch sticks his nose in and starts making trouble of his usual sort – deliberately misconstruing the system to his own ends. And then, unfortunately, As It Happens picked it up and ran with it without someone credible to counter it. Fortunately, Philippe Lagassé was already ahead of that game earlier yesterday morning, followed by a smackdown of Conacher later in the evening. I’ll leave you to it.

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Roundup: Refugee file hijinks

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The news of the day yesterday was the revelation that the PMO ordered a halt to government-sponsored Syrian refugee processing for several weeks in the spring so that they could review the programme. There are some serious concerns that they had access to the personal files of those refugees, and other concerns that they were trying to pick and choose which refugees they would accept in terms of religious or ethnic minorities – screening out some Muslim claimants, much as they admitted to doing earlier in the year when they insisted they were taking “the most vulnerable.” Harper came out mid-day to insist that political staffers didn’t take part in making any decisions, and that they didn’t change any results – but neither he nor Chris Alexander refuted the facts of the story. There are curious elements, such as why they had reason to suspect that the UNHCR – which this government has offloaded the responsibility for vetting refugee claimants onto – would not be forwarding the most vulnerable cases to them already (that’s what they do), and why the government had a Danish Christian group do the audit. What’s even more curious is that only government sponsored refugees had their files halted, but privately sponsored refugees – most of those by family members or church groups in Canada – were left untouched. If there were concerns about security, would they not also be affected? Apparently not. And then comes Bob Fife’s story – that the “right communities” the government was looking to ensure the refugees came from would be those that have connections in Canada that could be exploited for votes. It’s a cynical answer, but fits the pattern that we’ve grown accustomed to seeing over the past number of years of this government.

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Roundup: Free-ish trade deal with TPP

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So, the TPP got signed, in case you missed the entirety of the news cycle yesterday. The Supply Management system was almost entirely left intact, and what tiny bit of market access that TPP countries gained will be more than compensated to the dairy farmers with very generous subsidies, and thus the Dairy Cartel was sated. Also, the auto parts content rules were kept largely intact as well, not that Unifor seems to care, as they’re going full-on protectionist and crying doom. Harper of course was touting the deal, while the Liberals sounded broadly supportive but wanted more details plus a full discussion in parliament when it comes to enabling legislation. The NDP, however, are still warning doom and taking the tactic of “Nobody trusts Stephen Harper” and latched onto Unifor’s claims that 20,000 jobs were imperilled. So there’s that. Economist Trevor Tombe takes us through why the deal is good for the country, while Andrew Coyne laments the timidity of maintaining the barriers we did.

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Roundup: A potential TPP deal

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While signs that the election could become an ugly question of identity politics continue to circulate, the impending announcement of some resolution or other in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks could swing the election narrative yet again. While an announcement was supposed to have been made yesterday, it was held over until morning today, and we’ll see what becomes of it. Back in Canada, Harper has been talking up the deal, while Thomas Mulcair has taken to using the TPP as his new wedge. While trying to change the channel from the niqab issue, and his own rapidly softening poll numbers, Mulcair has become the born-again protectionist, declaring that Harper has no mandate to negotiate the deal (despite the fact that there is both precedent and it would still require parliamentary approval for enabling legislation), loudly decrying the impact on dairy farmers and auto parts manufacturers. The curious thing, however, is that two months ago he declared himself an enthusiastic supporter of the potential deal. The Liberals, meanwhile, are saying that they are supportive of free trade but won’t make any comments one way or the other about the TPP until they have more details – for which the NDP are castigating them for not taking a stand. Remember how at the Maclean’s debate, Mulcair was making a big deal about not wanting to take a stand on certain pipeline projects until he had a better environmental assessment? Suddenly waiting for more details is irresponsible. It gives me a headache.

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Roundup: Resurrecting the “barbaric” issue

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Not content to ratchet up the niqab issue alone, the Conservatives decided yesterday to go full-on culture war, and dredge up their Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices legislation from the previous parliament, and not only tout what it does (almost all of which is duplicative and unnecessarily antagonistic), but they added the promise of setting up a “tip line” for when people suspect these “barbaric cultural practices” like child brides, polygamy or female genital mutilation are taking place. Never mind that there’s already a tip line in place – it’s called 911 – it seems ripe for reporting on neighbours as a general xenophobic policy that ties up police resources that are already stretched thin. While the Twitter lit up with an attempt to turn the #BarbaricCulturalPractices into an exercise in sarcasm, there are more serious issues underlying the Conservatives’ use of the word. Back when the bill was being debated, Senator Mobina Jaffer, herself a Muslim woman and a lawyer, utterly dismantled the bill from its use of the loaded term “barbaric” to its hypocrisy in targeting polygamy by foreigners but not the community of Bountiful in BC, to the way in which it actually denies the protection of those who were forced into marriages, to the way in which the government improperly uses the defence of “provocation” to try and make a point about honour killings. It’s a masterful bit of legislative scrutiny that deserves to be read again in light of what the Conservatives are trotting out for electoral gain, and in order to put the whole issue into proper context. (That it also demonstrates the value of the work that senators can do its an added bonus).

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Roundup: TPP a Caretaker conundrum

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The Trans-Pacific Partnership talks are taking place right now, with the possibility that a deal could be struck with Canada while we’re in a writ period. The optics of this are a bit fraught, because if the government gets the deal signed, then they can crow about their prowess on the campaign trail, and how they’re signing deals to boost our economy. But the flip side of that coin is that a really big deal may be a kind of violation of the Caretaker Conventions that govern how an incumbent government operates during a writ period. Remember that we can never be without a government even when Parliament is dissolved – they just need to exercise restraint, and can’t implement major policy changes or make appointments during that period. This time around, however, the government released the Convention guidelines publicly while adding specific exemptions about negotiating trade deals. On the one hand, there is a certain amount of sense – do we really want to hold up the eleven other countries while we are in an extra-long election period? (Note that there seems to be a desire to conclude the deal before the American election gears up to full-on insanity mode). One of the arguments is that there should at least be some kind of consultation with opposition leaders if the negotiations continue during the writ period, and there are complaints that the TPP negotiations are unprecedented in their secrecy. What is not mentioned is that secrecy is deliberate considering how game changing this pact could be, particularly when it comes to weakening some of the tough subsidized markets in several member countries. And if you look at the reactions that rumours of deals around weakening Supply Management or auto parts content rules, and promises by other party leaders to maintain those protectionist policies, it’s hard not to see why they want to keep a lid on things until they’re finalised – particularly if the goal is actual trade liberalisation rather than just lip-service. It’s a delicate balance, and arguments can be made on both sides of the propriety of the government’s negotiations under the Caretaker Conventions. For example, Susan Delacourt argues the government is going beyond the Conventions. I’m not sure I have any answers, but I guess we’ll see what gets decided, and let the chips fall where they may.

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Roundup: A baffling public service pledge

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In a bid to win over the public service vote in the Ottawa region, the NDP have pledged a “code of conduct” for ministers and their staff, as well as an end to cuts to the public service, a Public Appointments Commission to end patronage appointments, a restoration of collective bargaining rights, and putting an end to contract staff. Oh, and an end to muzzling “scientists and other public service employees.” And that sends off my alarm bells because it’s a massive reorientation of the role of the public service. While the NDP thinks that they’re trying to remove the politicization around the public service that has been developing, empowering public servants to speak against the governments that they are supposed to serve is mind-boggling. The issue of just what we’re muzzling in terms of scientists was thoroughly hashed out a few months ago when Andrew Leach went against the countervailing wisdom and challenged the “white coat” privilege that these kinds of pronouncements assume, that it’s all a bunch of benevolent climate scientists who can’t speak about their work. What it ignores is that there are other kinds of scientists – like economists in the Department of Finance – for whom this is not even a consideration. Just because it’s politically convenient to think that we want these white coats to denounce the government’s environmental policies, does that mean it should be okay for government economists to denounce fiscal policy? Or government lawyers to denounce the government’s justice policies? (It’s also why their candidate, Emilie Taman was denied a leave to run – the Public Prosecution Service was created to remove the perception of political bias from Crown prosecutions, and having one of your prosecutors running for office defeats that purpose). Public Servants serve the Queen and carry out their duties in a neutral fashion. Making it easier for them to start denouncing the government is a mystifying promise. Also, the promise to bar temps is short-sighted and makes it harder for young people to get civil service jobs. Those temp jobs are often the best way to get one’s foot in the door in the public service and get some experience that can translate into a job, considering how byzantine and nigh-impossible the outside competition process is if one wasn’t lucky enough to get bridged in through a school programme. Conversely, getting new staff in a timely manner or for a specific project is also a ridiculous process for managers. Banning temps makes no actual sense.

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Roundup: Two senators are not enough

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After Thomas Mulcair indicated that he’d been approached by a couple of Senators who would be willing to help him pass his agenda, we now get a couple of names – Liberal Senator Larry Campbell, and Conservative Senator Nancy Ruth, though the latter isn’t talking about it (and personally I wonder why she would volunteer considering how shoddily she’s been treated by the NDP after she made that joke about camembert, and yes, it was a joke). But it’s not quite as cut-and-dried as Mulcair seemed to make it out to be. Campbell, in an interview with CBC, said he’d be willing to ensure that bills get due credit, but that’s not exactly putting oneself in the position of shepherding through an entire NDP agenda. I also have my doubts when Campbell says that the Senate doesn’t need a leader of the government and a leader of the opposition, largely because it clashes with our system of Responsible Government. The current framework allows for Senators to hold the government to account in the way that MPs can, by asking questions of a member of cabinet – nominally the leader of the government in the Senate, never mind the fact that Harper’s current leader is not in cabinet because he churlishly is trying to distance himself from the Senate. And one of the most underrated ways in which Senators perform this accountability is in the leader’s ability to take questions on notice and provide written responses. Losing this ability would be a blow to the Senate’s accountability function, which is a vital part of their role of Sober Second Thought. You need answers from government if you are to properly consider their legislative agenda, and losing that conduit is going to hamper that ability. Campbell and Senate Liberal whip Jim Munson also mused about making the Senate Speaker elected by the chamber, but I’m not sure how easily this can be accomplished considering that the Senate Speaker has duties beyond what the Commons Speaker does in terms of protocol and diplomatic duties, which is one of the reasons it’s a Governor-in-Council appointment. He or she is the “Queen’s man” (or woman as the case may be) for a reason, and there may be a lot of hoops to jump through in order to make that change. I’m not saying it’s not doable, but it may not be easily doable – particularly if you have an NDP prime minister who has no interest in doing anything for the Senate. Suffice to say, it’s not enough for Mulcair to use these couple of senators as an excuse to ignore his constitutional obligations.

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Roundup: Globe Debate debacle

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The big “economic debate” was last night, hosted by the Globe and Mail, and well, it wasn’t exactly edifying on any account. The moderator was also commenting, he rushed segments so the leaders were alternating between slow points and rushing through, and then there was the shouting and the non sequiturs. And what non sequiturs they were – I’m not sure what C-51 had to do with taxation, but Thomas Mulcair brought it up anyway. Truth be told, much of the “debate” was leaders trying to go down their talking point and catchphrase checklists. Alas. Kady O’Malley offers advice for future single-issue debates, while Drake Fenton gives an ode to the moderator’s bell/egg timer. Reaction from the Citizen’s pundit panel, Paul Wells, and Micheal Den Tandt.

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Roundup: Barton vs Alexander

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One of the great failings of our politics is the way that everything has devolved into talking points – and usually, they’re utterly moronic talking points that have little to do with the questions being posed to whichever MP is speaking, and sometimes those talking points are complete non sequiturs to the topic at hand. And it’s not just Conservative MPs who ape them either – the NDP are some of the worst at it, ever since the 2011 communications lockdown started, and there are fewer sights more painful than watching their young rookie MPs being sent into an interview armed only with two or three talking points and nothing more. And then there’s Chris Alexander – Oxford educated, former diplomat, and the most petulant communicator that the 41st parliament produced. With the topic of Syrian refugees top of mind, Alexander went on Power & Politics last night, and tried to spin, deflect, and otherwise obfuscate the topic at hand. And praise be, Rosemary Barton was having none of it, repeatedly calling Alexander on his evasions and when he tried to blame the show for not tackling the subject before then, well, she let him have it. And thank the gods, because it’s about time we see the hosts get tough with MPs rather than pussyfoot around them in the hopes that tough questions don’t offend them into boycotts. (BuzzFeed offers a recap here). I’ve argued before that Barton not only deserves to be the permanent host of the show once the election is over, but given her performance last night, I think she deserves a gods damned Canadian Screen Award.

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I’ll also say that the whole affair reminded me of this (faux) Jeremy Paxman interview from The Thick of It, and it fills me with hope that Barton is becoming Canada’s Paxman.

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