The opposition is crying foul over the government’s 556-page budget implementation bill and moaning that it breaks the promise about omnibus bills. It’s not an unfair point, but one that requires a bit of nuance. For one, the government never promised that they would never table an omnibus bill – only that their omnibus bills would not be abusive, and yes, there is a difference. Omnibus bills can be useful tools, particularly if it’s regarding matters that would have a number of coordinated amendments to the same existing statute. That way, you don’t have six different bill all amending the same piece of legislation (like the Criminal Code, for example, or the Income Tax Act, if it’s a budget bill), possibly causing pile-ups of amendments to some of the same sections of the bill. The overriding criteria for it not to be abusive, however, is that it should all touch on the same subject matter. The abusive bills of the previous government didn’t do that, and they stuffed everything into it, including a number of unrelated measures (like environmental legislation) into budget bills in order to get them passed expeditiously – a technique they started during the minority years, so that they could huff and puff about confidence measures and not sending Canadians to the polls too soon; they simply carried on the technique once they had a majority.

Does this current budget implementation bill reach that level of being abusive? Not that I can see. Glancing through the bill, the only section that raises a possible eyebrow is the section within that creates the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act – the carbon tax legislation. Should it be separated? Well, it does have to do with fiscal measures as it deals with the federal carbon price backstop (which yes, is a carbon tax for those provinces who refuse to implement one), as opposed to, say, environmental assessments. And the government has pointed out that they have circulated draft legislation prior to this, so it’s not coming out of the blue or as a complete surprise stuffed into the bill along with a number of other surprises. But, if the opposition wants to challenge it, the Speaker has the power to split the bill if they can make their case convincingly enough. The other issue is that the government hasn’t pre-declared a timetable for when they want this to be passed, but it will likely mean some marathon committee time. Let’s just hope that the opposition doesn’t demand days and days of useless Second Reading “debate” first, which would eat into the committee time, because that’s where a bill like this should spend its time.

Good reads:

• Justin Trudeau stated that he was “disappointed” by the Pope’s refusal to apologize for residential schools and said he would continue to work at it.
• Senator Murray Sinclair discusses how the Pope’s refusal impacts Indigenous Canadians, as well as their critics who felt survivors were lying.
• The US trade representative says he’s now optimistic about a new NAFTA deal, but Canada’s chief negotiator says there’s still plenty of work to do.
• While Quebec plans to tax Netflix, the federal finance department already explored those options before Netflix struck a production deal with the government.
• Mélanie Joly unveiled the government’s $500 million-over-five-years plan to bolster official language minority communities.
• Religious groups have not managed to change Patty Hajdu’s mind about the job grant form attestation, despite reassurances about it being about activities.
• Ginette Petitpas Taylor says senators haven’t seen their marijuana education ads because they’re not aimed at them and are displayed on social media platforms.
• Dominic LeBlanc announced new measures to help protect endangered right whales, which includes a lower speed limit for ships and new fishing rules.
• Canada is rethinking the plan to arm Kurds in Iraq, and those weapons may now go to the Iraqi government, or to NATO training missions.
• Carla Qualtrough blames the Conservatives for abandoning the backpay function of the Phoenix pay system, which has exacerbated its problems.
• IBM executives were at a Senate committee to discuss Phoenix, their warnings, and being told they had to go live as compensation advisors had been fired.
• There remain questions as to whether the West Block will be ready for the House of Commons to move in before the fall sitting begins.
• It looks like Senator Peter Harder managed to head off a Conservative attempt to use their senators  to have Daniel Jean called to committee.
• It’s back to praise for Jagmeet Singh by his caucus after he reinstated David Christopherson’s committee assignment. More caucus leaks here.
• Here is your look at the Ontario budget, as well as Paul Wells’ trenchant observations.
• Chantal Hébert makes her comparisons with the Ontario and Quebec budgets.
• Vicky Mochama writes about what systemic racism is and is not, as the government pledges money in the budget to study it.

Odds and ends:

The Quebec City mosque shooter has plead guilty to all charges.

Programming Note: I’m taking the long weekend off from blogging (but not from other work, unfortunately, meaning I won’t actually get a weekend. Life of a freelancer). See you Tuesday!

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