It was another day of promises to families with young children, of course, and Justin Trudeau was out first this morning from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, to promise a more comprehensive package of benefits for the families of newborns – additional Canada Child Benefit payments, making maternity benefits actually tax free by removing the taxation at source as opposed to a non-refundable tax credit, and additional weeks of parental leave for adoptive parents. While most of the media stories didn’t really touch on it, the enhanced CCB payouts in the first month of a child’s life is approaching a basic minimum income for parents, as it doesn’t rely on EI benefits (which don’t apply for those who are self-employed or who weren’t working). While there are still a few questions about implementation (explained in this thread by Lindsay Tedds), most seem to agree that the Liberal plan is far more useful to parents than the one the Conservatives announced earlier.

Andrew Scheer was in Winnipeg, where he announced a promise to enhance the Registered Education Savings Plan benefits for those in lower income brackets, but it remains a fact that this is another promise that disproportionately benefits wealthier households, and does nothing for those who can’t afford to contribute to these RESPs. (Here’s a thread from Jennifer Robson on the efficacy of RESPs for low-income Canadians). Scheer also accused Trudeau of stealing his parental benefits idea and that he voted against it before and announced it now – but the Liberal plan is very different from the one Scheer proposed. (Here’s another thread from Robson comparing the Conservative and Liberal promises). Scheer also accused the Liberals of not being transparent about the costs of their promises, but Trudeau had already stated that a PBO-costing of them would becoming out once the whole platform is announced (which may provide a more holistic picture of their promises rather than them coming out piecemeal like the Conservatives are doing).

In response to the Conservative policy, the Liberal war room pointed to research prepared by Statistics Canada that suggests the program disproportionately benefits wealthier families. https://t.co/urY3e8SA6r

— J.P. Tasker (@JPTasker) September 17, 2019

For Jagmeet Singh, he was in Ottawa to re-announce his party’s promise to build half a million new affordable housing units – but wouldn’t say how they would do it, which is kind of a big deal because the places where affordable housing is most acute are areas with either full employment or labour shortages, which is kind of a big deal if they want to get it built affordably.

Other election stories:

• Here’s a bigger overview of the first week of the campaign.
• The Liberals’ claims about their record on childcare aren’t quite what they say.
• Here’s a bit more of a look into the Conservatives’ proposed “universal” tax cut.
• Here’s a look at the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s work to cost campaign proposals (but not full platforms) during the election.
• Because her name keeps coming up, here’s a reminder about who Faith Goldy is, and why she’s persona non grata in Canadian politics.
• The Liberals aren’t dumping a candidate that the Conservatives accuse of promoting 9/11 conspiracy theories.
• The Conservatives tweeted that the RCMP was officially investigating Justin Trudeau over SNC-Lavalin – which they aren’t, and they had to delete said tweet.
• A Conservative candidate was circulating a fake meme that claimed Rick Mercer was telling people to vote Conservative. He wasn’t, and the campaign deleted it.
• Jagmeet Singh is asking the Leaders’ Debate Commission to rethink their invitation to Maxime Bernier.
• It turns out that Elizabeth May invoking Dunkirk in her platform is a bad reading of history, and is more reliant on Hollywood than fact.

Good reads:

• The RCMP gave a few more details on the arrest of their intelligence director.
• The final numbers for the 2018-19 fiscal year are out, and the deficit was nearly $1 billion below projection.
• Here’s a longread about the crisis of domestic violence and femicide in Canada, and the fact that it’s not an election issue.
• Here’s a look at the pointlessness of Alberta’s Red Tape Reduction Ministry.
• Kady O’Malley’s Process Nerd column looks at what Elections Canada is empowered to do to fight disinformation.
• Heather Scoffield warns that the various platforms haven’t been putting out macro-level costing of promises, when there are dark fiscal clouds on the horizon.
• Max Fawcett digs into how Jason Kenney has adopted Ezra Levant’s “ethical oil” sales pitch wholesale, ignoring the problems with the case it presents.
• My column calls out certain liars on the campaign trail who nevertheless are asking the voting public for their trust.

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