QP: The broken record of the Norman files

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On cannabis legalisation day, as all the media was focused on line-ups at pot shops, the work of Parliament carried on. Andrew Scheer led off, curiously raising the court case of Vice Admiral Mark Norman and the refusal to turn over secret documents to his defence team. Justin Trudeau said that this was before the courts, and would comment no further. Scheer tried again in English, and Trudeau reiterated his response. Scheer demanded the documents be released, not a comment, and Trudeau repeated his responses, and they went yet again, and again. Guy Caron was up next, and wanted criminal records for pot possession to be expunged rather than pardoned, and Trudeau gave a speech about how prohibition didn’t work and why legalisation and regulation was a better path — but he didn’t answer the question. Caron switched to French to ask the same again, and this time, Trudeau said their plan was for rapid pardons. Matthew Dubé picked up on the same demand for expungements, and Trudeau spelled out that these were different than the LGBT expungements because those laws were an instrument of discrimination. Dubé returned in English by saying the war on drugs is racist, and Trudeau said they recognised that fact, but insisted that the pardons would be free and fast.

Round two, and Candice Bergen, Pierre Paul-Hus, and Mark Strahl returns to the Mark Norman questions with the insinuation that he was hiding something (Trudeau: I can’t comment). Linda Duncan and Alexandre Boulerice demanded deeper GHG reduction targets (Trudeau: We are putting a price on solution and our pan-Canadian framework that will meet our targets). Richard Martel and James Bezan return I d to the Mark Norman questions (Trudeau: I can’t comment). Niki Ashton asked about Indigenous services refusing a flight for an Indigenous man  who died in transit on a bus for medical treatment (Trudeau, with script: The department is looking into the matter, and it affirms the need to reform service delivery), and Jenny Kwan delivered a sermon about systemic racism in Canada (Trudeau: We have more work to do, but we will focus on bringing Indigenous people into empowerment and full partnership).

Round three saw yet more questions on Mark Norman, including from Andrew Scheer (Trudeau: Once again, I can’t answer this), pilot fatigue rules (Trudeau: We are reviewing the air pilot rules, and will have more to say soon), credit card merchant fees (Trudeau: Yay small businesses), ending weapon sales to Saudi Arabia (Trudeau, with script: We are troubled by the disappearance of Mr. Khashoggi and are calling for a credible investigation and support the joint statement from France, the UK and Germany), Quebec not being ready for cannabis legalisation (Trudeau: We gave them seventeen weeks, and they knew this was coming for three years).

Overall, it was an incredibly repetitive day as the Conservatives used every single one of their slots to ask about this Mark Norman issue, and to caterwaul about releasing the documents, but they did it in a very particular way, either demanding they be released outright, or trying to shame the government by insisting that this was denying Norman’s right to a fair trial. Never mind that one could argue that there could be some kind of deal worked out that secret documents could be provided to a security-cleared court officer to examine to see if there was any relevance in the materials, or some other arrangement to ensure that these documents (which not only contain Cabinet secrets but likely also commercially sensitive information) can be used by the defence team in a protected way, but none of this nuance was on offer today – just a demand to turn over the documents. There are a couple of political angles here – one of them is to get the repetitive clips of Trudeau not answering so that they can build the narrative that the government is trying to hide something, much as Scheer telegraphed with his tweet just before QP started, saying “they’re now withholding documents that would shed light on a high profile Minister’s interference in a multi-million dollar government contract.” Brison denied any interference in QP in days past, instead poking at the fact that this was about a sole-source contract that the previous government entered into just before the election, but the Conservatives are content with innuendo as a cudgel that can be used to their benefit. Add to that, when Trudeau at one point said that he wasn’t going to answer the question no matter how many times it was asked, and why wouldn’t the Conservatives ask about anything else (before saying that they had run out of things to talk about), then the Conservatives all took to Twitter to decry about how terrible it was that Trudeau was now telling them what kinds of questions they could ask. This kind of gamesmanship is really tiresome, but that’s where we are.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Blake Richards for a tailored dark grey suit with a light blue shirt and a dark purple tie, and to Candice Bergen for a short-sleeved grey dress with a check pattern and black panels on the sides. Style citations go out to Judy Sgro for a bright orange jacket with an cream and floral patterned top with black slacks, and for Colin Carrie for a taupe and black windowpane suit with a white shirt, black slacks and a black tie. Dishonourable mentions go out Deb Schulte and Brenda Shanahan for each wearing a yellow jacket with black tops and slacks — the only difference being the shade of yellow on each jacket.