Roundup: Begrudging a day off

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There was a good piece in Policy Options yesterday from Jennifer Ditchburn which talked about the problem of “vacation shaming” politicians, in light of Justin Trudeau making his first public statements about the Aaron Driver case almost a week after it happened, as part of Trudeau’s Atlantic Canada tour. There is a problem with expecting the PM to be on call for cameras at a moment’s notice, as the Conservatives certainly seem to be demanding, decrying his absence when bad economic numbers came down a few weeks ago, or when the Driver incident happened. But relevant, competent ministers stood up when those things happened, and it’s not like the Prime Minister could have said or done anything that would have added to the situation other than to be the face of it, when he’s made it clear that his is a government by cabinet, and that means that the responsible ministers get to be the ones that get in front of the cameras when things in their bailiwick happen, and guess what – they did.

Ditchburn also makes the very apt points that for everyone who says that they want better work-life balance, especially for MPs, demanding that they be every present fro the media goes counter to that desire, particularly when we badmouth them for being open about taking a day or a week off. The wailing and gnashing of teeth over the day off he took during the visit to Japan was outsized and ridiculous, and we’re seeing much the same thing here, compounded with the beating of breasts over the international coverage that people catching a glimpse of said PM with his shirt off. It’s excessive and it’s only fouling the well. Politics is close to being a 24/7 job as it is, and that can be a problem for all sorts of reasons (high divorce rate among politicians being a chief one), and it becomes just one more outlet for cheap outrage when we demand that our politicians now must forgo vacations, as well as forgo the bulk of their salary, pensions and benefits, and expenditures, as so many clueless wannabe pundits will declare over social media. Let’s grow up about our expectations and not begrudge them a vacation or a day off. We’re better than that.

Good reads:

  • Liberal MP Mauril Bélanger passed away from ALS last night. His bill to change the national anthem’s lyrics is to be debated in the Senate in the fall. (The Ottawa Citizen has a photo retrospective here).
  • A Federal Court judge has ruled that a decision to revoke an airport worker’s security clearance without telling her why was unreasonable.
  • Police are asking the government for a law to compel people to turn over their passwords with a judge’s order.
  • Ralph Goodale got it wrong when he said that nobody in immigration detention had written to him. I wrote more on CBSA’s accountability problem here (paywalled).
  • Goodale also said that consultations on changing Bill C-51 will likely start soon, while Trudeau reinforced the message that civil liberties must balance security.
  • The government has formally apologised for the forced relocation of the Sayisi Dene in Manitoba, and now Indigenous groups want an apology for the “Sixties Scoop.”
  • Unions are saying that the governement’s deadline to fix the Phoenix pay debacle is unrealistic.
  • The move to consolidate the government’s websites to a single portal is putting a lot of our information onto American servers.
  • Brad Trost has launched his social conservative-themed leadership campaign…but is in Mongolia so won’t answer questions.
  • Kady O’Malley updates the list of conflict of interest declarations given by ministers and their staff.
  • Trevor Tombe makes the case against sugar taxes.
  • Susan Delacourt posits that if Elizabeth May crosses the floor to any party, it would likely be the Liberals.
  • My Loonie Politics column warns the government against ignoring the constitutional principle of federalism with the upcoming Supreme Court appointment.

Odds and ends:

Maclean’s talks to Mark Critch about his shirtless photobomb of Trudeau.