Well, that was…interesting. After Senator Carignan, the leader of the government in the Senate, spent over an hour laying out the case against Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau, and after a couple of other Senators from all sides expressed their reservations about this move and the lack of due process – let alone the setting of dubious precedents – the real bombshell dropped. Senator Duffy got up to speak to his defence, and he took the scorched earth approach, crying that he didn’t want to go along with this conspiracy “foisted” upon him, that he should have said no, that his livelihood was threatened, and that it all led back to Harper and the Senate leadership. If anything, it made it harder for Harper’s version of events to stand up to scrutiny, which the NDP spent the evening gleefully putting press release after press release about. It’s also going to make QP later today to be quite the show. Of course, what Duffy neglected to mention was his own wrongdoing. He protested that he hadn’t done anything wrong – which is not the case. Both the Deloitte audit and the subsequent RCMP investigation have shown that his residence is not, in fact, PEI, and that’s a constitutional requirement, no matter what LeBreton or Wright told him. A retired constitutional law professor from PEI says that Duffy never actually met the residency criteria, given that when the constitution says a Senator “shall be a resident of the province for which he is appointed,” and that shall means “must” in legal terms, Duffy’s qualification never was valid to begin with, which is how this whole sordid affair got started in the first place. While Duffy may be trying to play the victim, he is still under investigation, no matter that the cover-up has now become worse than the alleged crimes. The same with Brazeau, though there wasn’t really much cover-up there. We shouldn’t forget that, no matter the speeches they gave.
Rob Walsh, the former Commons law clerk, gives his particular take on the affair, and finds a hard time finding criminal intent with Duffy’s expense claims given his attempt to get clearance for those housing claims. Senator George Baker, a former provincial legislative law clerk, says that he worries that the Senate proceedings would count as a judicial proceeding (seeing as Parliament is the highest law in the land), and interfere with the ongoing police investigation because of the double jeopardy principle. Senator Anne Cools – who is a policy wonk of the highest order (despite all else) – has her concerns about these proceedings, as they relate to natural justice. As it stands, the suspension votes will be free votes on both sides of the Senate, but Liberal Senate leader James Cowan has proposed to set up a special committee to further study the issue and give those senators their due process – and would also give a forum for the other players in this whole affair to come before that committee and testify under oath. Indeed, Michael Den Tandt talks about the need to hear from those players under oath in order to get the truth out in the open once and for all. Independent MP Brent Rathgeber details his unease with the suspension motions and the lack of due process here. For your reference, here is the cast of characters in the whole affair, and the updated timeline.
Because dirty laundry of the Senate is being aired, a former staffer for Liberal Senator Colin Kenny is complaining that she spent “half her time” on his personal business, like sorting out his finances (because he paid for Senate travel on the same card as his personal expenses), or scheduling personal appointments for his doctor or personal trainer (because the person familiar with his Senate business schedule wouldn’t be the best person to know that schedule). While I don’t deny that the bit about his online clothes shopping was questionable, I do find the claim that it was “half her time” to be questionable – especially as it takes a person less than twenty minutes per month to pay all of the bills she listed. I also find it wildly inappropriate to compare this in any way to the actions of former Senator Raymond Lavigne, even though some journalists are already saying it.
In terms of the ongoing mess with the appointment of Justice Nadon to the Supreme Court, the government finally referred the matter to the Supreme Court itself, as well as announced that it was including declaratory provisions as part of their omnibus budget legislation that would impose a legal definition on the Supreme Court Act that would clarify the criteria for Nadon’s appointment in advance of further clarifications to the Act itself. The fact that the provisions are being included in the budget legislation is likely for the sake of expediency, given the way this government likes to operate. Meanwhile, opposition MPs are tabling Order Paper questions on the appointment.
Speaking of that omnibus budget legislation, this one weighs in around 300ish pages, and also includes provisions that will curtail the rights of public servants to strike if they’re “essential workers,” which the government gets to determine who those workers are. A case about this very same kind of legislation from Saskatchewan is currently headed to the Supreme Court, where they have agreed to hear the case.
The government’s inability to turn over records related to a residential school’s abuses for privacy reasons has NDP Charlie Angus accusing the government of being “on the side of the paedophiles.” Classy.
The government has released its proposed First Nations Education Act for consultation, and we’ll see if it is indeed as paternalistic or top-down as chiefs had feared.
TD economists have produced a report that shows that the narrative of “jobs without people and people without jobs” and the great “skills mismatch” is largely a myth, that the shortages are largely localised and not on a massive scale, and that there is little fear of an actual “lost generation” even though youth unemployment is currently elevated. It seems to me that I’ve read this from other economists as well, but hey, let’s not spoil a good government narrative.
In other economics news, Kevin Milligan writes about PEI’s plan to increase CPP to help those who aren’t saving more for retirement, and the pitfalls of such a plan when applied to lower-income earners as opposed to middle and upper-income earners. Stephen Gordon shows that our labour market is actually in pretty good shape, and much closer to “normal” than either the US or UK. Andrew Leach looks at whether or not the Enbridge Line 9 reversal would really be beneficial for those Quebec refineries (hint: Enbridge is almost certainly exaggerating the savings).
The BC Civil Liberties Association and OpenMedia plan to launch a lawsuit against the CSE for illegally spying on Canadians – though I’m not sure how they’d actually prove that considering the secrecy in CSE’s work.
The Canadian Heraldic Authority has unveiled a new personal flag for the Princess Royal for use in Canada. Princess Anne will be in Kingston this week as part of her duties as Colonel-in-Chief of several Canadian Forces branches and regiments.
And here’s John Baird’s reaction to an off-camera crash at a CETA presser. It’s priceless.