With Stephen Harper now in Germany as his European trip carries on, and with Thomas Mulcair in Winnipeg, the only leaders present were Justin Trudeau and Elizabeth May. Deputy leader David Christopherson led off by asking about the vouching provisions in the elections bill, to which Pierre Poilievre gave a soliloquy about voter irregularities. Christopherson brought up the robocall registry requirements, to which Poilievre said that the current requirement is zero, so the one year requirement was better. Christopherson moved onto the party fundraisers riding government jets, to which Paul Calandra insisted that the value of the flights were reimbursed, though he neglected to say that the rate of reimbursement was lower than that of an economy flight during a seat sale. Nycole Turmel asked the same again in French and got the same answer, and same with a boilerplate question about the elections bill. Justin Trudeau was up for the Liberals, and asked about cuts to climate change offices in Environment Canada. Leona Aglukkaq responded that they had cut projected emissions without a carbon tax, which basically meant nothing at all. Trudeau brought up the cuts to the Building Canada Fund, to which Peter Braid responded with a weak sauce “thousands of billions” quip before touting all of their infrastructure investments (neglecting to mention that those funds are back-end loaded).

Round two, and Jinny Sims and Sadia Groguhé brought up the Conservatives using Kijiji figures for skills data (Oliver: The lack of skilled workers is a problem in certain sectors), Guy Caron and Nathan Cullen asked about lapsed funds from last year’s budget (Oliver: I have no intention of doing detailed analyses today), and Alexandrine Latendresse and Craig Scott asked about the communications provisions in the elections bill (Poilievre: The advisory body will be made permanent). Chrystia Freeland asked about expanding the Canadian Pension Plan (Sorenson: Canadians don’t want higher payroll taxes), Francis Scarpaleggia asked about household debt (Oliver: We are closely monitoring the real estate market and will ensure stability), and Scott Brison called out Sorenson on his payroll tax quip when they raised EI premiums to “pad the books” (Oliver: Small business is a cornerstone of our economy!) Malcolm Allen asked about the grain bottleneck on the prairies (Ritz: We briefed you about the next steps with our legislation being tabled), and Hoang Mai asked about older rail cars being phased out (Raitt: The companies have pledged to stop using them and I was in Washington to meet about this issue).

Round three saw questions on CBSA getting telecom data without warrants (Blaney: These agencies are expected to follow the law), the lack of resources at Service Canada to respond to calls in benchmark times, cuts at Environment Canada, the imposition of language tests on spouses of immigrants, the legal challenge against US Steel, Department of Justice opinions related to the use of the Notwithstanding Clause, the truckers dispute at the Port of Vancouver, the Sherbrooke airport, and the closure of DFO libraries.

Overall, questions were egregious today in the alternation between French and English-speaking critics, asking the same questions and trying to make the same lame jokes in both official languages. It’s like there’s a complete tone-deafness that this isn’t actually debate but packaging clips for the evening news or YouTube. Scott Brison demonstrated how it should be done, when he called out a minister on his answer rather than sticking to a script. You know, what every MP should be doing instead of carrying on with this absurd puppet theatre. As well, it would be great if the Speaker could remind the government benches that there is a time in Routine Proceedings for ministers’ statements, and that backbench suck-up questions shouldn’t be used for such statements or announcements.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to James Bezan for a black suit with a light purple shirt and a deep purple tie and pocket square, and to Candice Bergen for a black dress with a tailored navy blazer. Style citations go out to Sadia Groghué for a green foliage patterned jacket with red and orange florals, and to Jonathan Genest-Jourdain for a loud grey windowpane patterned suit with a grey shirt and cream tie.