There is some movement on legislation in the Senate, with the amended fisheries bill heading back to the Commons, as is Bill C-69 on environmental assessments. This bill was passed on division (meaning no standing vote) and will let the government reject all of those amendments made at committee that were essentially written by oil and gas lobbyists, which nobody had the intestinal fortitude to want to actually debate, preferring the tactic championed by the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Peter Harder, to let someone else do the heavy lifting. That way the government can defeat the bulk of those amendments in the Commons on a whipped vote, and then Harder can say “the elected Chamber has spoken” while patting himself on the back for the amendments that did pass – likely only the ones the government itself proposed.

The bigger drama is being reserved for C-48, the tanker ban bill, as the whole Senate voted to overturn the committee report that recommended it not go forward, which was pretty much how I expected it to go. Given the torqued, partisan report that emerged, the talk about the committee being dysfunctional are ringing pretty true, but I’m not going to blame the Conservatives for that because the Independents aren’t stepping up. The likely next steps for this bill are for amendments to be debated at third reading, the bulk of which are likely to be defeated, and then the Conservatives will play procedural games with the debate so that Harder is forced to invoke time allocation on a final vote for it, because the Conservatives have set up that situation for him.

Meanwhile, there has been a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth about the UNDRIP bill, particularly that the Senate didn’t vote to give the Aboriginal People’s committee permission to meet while the Chamber was sitting in order to discuss it – which isn’t actually a sinister plot. The Senate is set up so that the Chamber meets for only a few hours in the day and that committees don’t meet then, which also has major logistical considerations – they don’t have enough staff or interpreters to cover both, unlike the House of Commons. And to illustrate that, this thread by Chris Reed explains some of the procedural considerations of what happened. But also remember that in the midst of the Senate’s Order Paper crisis, nobody wants to take any responsibility and are content to blame the Conservatives for being “partisan.” They’re not the problem here.

Good reads:

• Justin Trudeau was with veterans on the beaches of Normandy yesterday for D-Day commemorations.
• Trudeau also stated that he’s worried about other trade actions the Chinese will take against Canada, and that he hopes to meet President Xi at the upcoming G20.
• Brian Mulroney thinks that Trudeau should send a delegation led by Jean Chrétien to China to sort out the whole situation and free the two detained Canadians.
• Trudeau also said that he has confidence in the RCMP to investigate extremist travellers who joined ISIS, so that they can face charges in Canada.
• Marie-Claude Bibeau says that the details for compensation for the Supply Management sector will be revealed by the end of the month.
• Karina Gould is trying to shame Twitter into signing onto the government’s Declaration of Election Integrity.
• The government is providing funding for groups helping visible minority immigrant and refugee women to find and keep jobs.
• The government agreed to backbench amendments on the housing portions of the budget implementation bill.
• Elections Canada plans to hire thirteen social media “influencers” to encourage young people to vote in the next election – but not to share partisan views.
• A UN Special Rapporteur says that Indigenous communities are on the front lines of dealing with toxic waste, and Grassy Narrows is a prime example.
• Andrew Scheer missed out on the D-Day commemorations because his brother-in-law and mother-in-law were getting honorary degrees.
• The Conservative ad buy during the Raptors playoffs demonstrate that they have cash to burn, and they’re targeting the suburbs around Toronto.
• NDP MP David Christopherson is taking one last blowout over his anger regarding the issue of the Auditor General’s budget.
• Chantal Hébert explores the depths of how Doug Ford’s unpopularity can impact Andrew Scheer on the campaign trail.
• Chris Selley sees nothing but doom with the Elections Canada hiring “influencers.”

Odds and ends:

Colby Cosh writes about the unique challenges facing the Canadian paratroopers on D-Day that are usually overlooked in the stories of storming the beaches.

Want more Routine Proceedings? Become a patron and get exclusive new content.