Toronto lawyer Rocco Galati, of the Nadon case fame, is going ahead with his challenge of the government’s citizenship bill, but it’s a nightmare of a challenge because it’s based on a completely wrong-headed understanding of the way our system of responsible government works. Galati names the Governor General in the suit, saying that signing the bill into law went beyond his constitutional mandate. The problem is, of course, is that ours is not a system where the GG can refuse royal assent unless it’s a measure that is so egregious that he or she is willing to risk a constitutional crisis. Responsible Government is all about the Crown acting on the advice of government, and by granting royal assent, it does several things: it grants authority to the new law in the name of the Sovereign; it represents the people agreeing to live under the rule of law; and the Queen as the embodiment of the state, emphasises that we all live equally under the law. Galati argues that provisions of the bill are unconstitutional, but remember that it is still within the authority of the courts to strike down a law – that come under the powers of the Crown as the font of justice, whereas royal assent is a function of the Crown-in-Parliament. Galati seems eager to mix the two and would have the GG get legal opinions before any bill is signed into law – a complete distortion of our system of government and the separation of powers that exists between the Courts and Parliament. That Galati had tried to get the courts to block royal assent before it even happened is a further sign that he not only doesn’t understand the system, but is wilfully trying to undermine it regardless of the dangers or consequences of such moves. Only madness lies down the path Galati is trying to tread, but because he has no legal merit for the ruling, it won’t get very far, fortunately.

Protesters interrupted Jason Kenney’s news conference in Toronto on changes to the Temporary Foreign Worker Programme – because that’s helpful to everyone. Kenney says that changes to the live-in caregiver programme will be coming in the fall because the programme has been morphed into an extended family reunification programme, which causes more delays in processing applications, while the new higher fees as part of the TFW changes will impact live-in caregiver applications. Meanwhile, analysis of those letters Kenney received dating back to 2006 complaining about the programme came largely from Conservative MPs, both arguing for more permits and to warn against abuses. This distribution isn’t all that surprising given that the Conservatives hold most of the seats in Alberta and Saskatchewan, where there is higher need for those workers.

At press conference in Quebec, Stephen Harper was asked about the Mohamed Fahmy case, and he said that Egypt was “very aware” of Canada’s concerns, and that they were offering what consular assistance they could. That said, Harper still didn’t use any strong language of condemning the lack of due process in Fahmy’s conviction, unlike some of his counterparts around the globe.

Despite being the last unarmed guards on the Hill, it looks like Senate security will finally start being issued firearms. It seems that they haven’t been armed thus far because Senators have largely been considered low-priority targets. Historically speaking, the Senate has a separate security force from the Commons because there has always been the possibility of a physical confrontation between the two chambers, and they didn’t want the Commons Speaker to be in charge of the guards in the event that it happened.

Data shows that the rate of deforestation in Alberta is worst on the slopes of the Rockies, and not in areas of oilsands exploitation. Which isn’t actually that much of a surprise because much of the oilsands areas are peat bog and muskeg as opposed to forest (which is why those sites will also never be properly remediated, since you can’t restore peat bog).

Day three of the Dean Del Mastro trial, and the Crown asserts that Del Mastro wanted cheques backdated to before the writ period, since he was getting close to his legal spending limit. And it just looks worse and worse for Del Mastro. If convicted, both he and his official agent face a year in jail plus a $1000 fine.

Conservative MP Mark Adler remains in the news as we find that his dealings with a convicted money launderer over an alleged loan saw him being pressured by Nigel Wright to settle the matter out of court – not that we know what the terms of that settlement were. What is extra interesting is that this was a month before Wright also tried to pressure Mike Duffy to settle his expense issues, and we know how that ended.

The Senate’s investigation into Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu’s conduct around his staffer/on-again-off-again girlfriend has been completed, and he has been cited as breaching two aspects of the conflict of interest code. Because the breaches were done in good faith, however, and not an attempt to deliberately subvert the rules, it seems that there won’t really be much in the way of punishment other than the public embarrassment of it all.

Kady O’Malley parses Conservative reaction to the announcement that Michael Ignatieff is returning to Harvard full-time, and notes it also indicates a frustration among the party that they haven’t been able to reframe Justin Trudeau in the same way that they did Ignatieff.

And this piece in The Diplomat shows the value of monarchies, and why there should be more of them, not fewer. I couldn’t agree more. Mentioned in the piece is how restoring the monarchy in Afghanistan could have helped to stabilize that country earlier on in the post-Taliban era – something that people I’ve spoken to who’ve done development work there have agreed with. Sadly, the Americans, with their anti-monarchical views, have been responsible for shaping the institutions in countries like Afghanistan, and we’ve seen how poor those results have been.