QP: Deliberately mischaracterizing the vaccine plans

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While both the prime minister and finance minister were in town and preparing for the fiscal update, neither were present for QP. Gérard Deltell led off, noting that the fiscal update was coming, but that no economic plan would be worth anything without a vaccine plan. Patty Hajdu responded that they have the best vaccine portfolio and that a fourth candidate has begun its regulatory approval process. Deltell then insisted that the government was too invested in the CanSino candidate and was late in other vaccine candidates, to which Navdeep Bains insisted that they supported Canadian vaccine candidates as part of their plan. Deltell then mischaracterised international vaccine plans to insist that Canada was behind, which Hajdu disputed. Peter Kent took over in English and worried about the plan for economic recovery, to which Sean Fraser reminded him that the federal government made the choice to incur the costs of courses rather than putting it on the backs of people. Kent then worried about the deficit — because apparently it’s still 1995 — and Fraser directed him to the statements by the head of the IMF around what Canada has done. Alain Therrien led for the Bloc and he demanded the vaccine plan, to which Hajdu repeated her lines about the portfolio and the fourth candidate seeking approval. On the follow-up, Hajdu read a statement in French about the doses acquired and working with partners. Jagmeet Singh was up next for the NDP, and in French, he regaled the House with the tale of a woman in Gatineau who works three jobs and needs a vaccine, for which Hajdu repeated her usual lines about the portfolio and the regulatory process. Singh switched to English to make the same demand for the plan, and Hajdu reminded him that provinces have the expertise on this.

Round two, and Michelle Rempel Garner demanded to know when workers at a particular care centre would get vaccines — which sounds like a question for the province (Hajdu: We are going to work with the provinces; Strong leadership by health ministers and premiers is helping to prevent the spread of the pandemic), and Pierre Paul-Hus worried that not enough people would be vaccinated by September (Hajdu: We have been working on a plan in partnership with the provinces), and he raised the failed CanSino project again (Bains: We have invested in domestic production). Mario Simard demanded support for his private member’s bill (Rodriguez: He’s trying to give the impression that the federal government is the bad guy at war with Quebec, but there are no fights to pick), and Monique Pauzé demanded that the federal government respect Quebec’s environmental standards (Rodriguez: We work closely with the province on the environment), and Marilène Gill worried that seniors who can’t file their taxes won’t get their supports (Schulte: We are ensuring vulnerable seniors will continue to get their supports, but they should file their taxes as soon as possible). James Bezan demanded the vaccination plan (Hajdu: We are grateful for the integrated support of the armed forces), and Rosemarie Falk misled people about the vaccination plan (Hajdu: You are misleading people). Matthew Green demanded a wealth tax (Lebouthillier: We have invested historic amounts in fighting tax evasion), and Alexandre Boulerice worried about cuts to pay down the deficit, before pitching an excess profits tax (Fraser: We will continue to support Canadian households, and if you want to tax the wealthy, why did you vote against our tax increases on the one percent?)

Round three saw questions on the assisted dying bill (Lametti: We consulted 300,000 Canadians and struck a balance), the use of tear gas against peaceful protesters in India (Champagne: We are concerned about the violence we’ve seen, and have made representations at senior levels), the UK trade agreement (Ng: Our officials are working hard to get the legal text finalised so that we can provide it to committee), a national number for suicide prevention (Hajdu: I want to work with you on this, and we need a time to sit down and talk about it), demanding a modernised Official Languages Act (Joly: This is just a transparent attempt from your party to poach votes from the Bloc), fast enrolment for transporting dangerous goods over the border (Garneau: We will look at that but we have been trying to do everything we can to keep trucks moving over the border), rural broadband (Monsef: There has been a call for applications, and we are reviewing and assessing proposals in days), old survey maps around rural broadband (Monsef: We have updated them and the old model is gone), delays with CRA calls (Lebouthillier: All CRA personnel are working from home because of the pandemic), childcare funding (Hussen: We spent a record amount of money and are working with the provinces), and the Paris agreement on climate change (Wilkinson: We have made clear that our plan to exceed our targets will come soon).

Overall, the day was not terribly exciting, but we are seeing an increasing effort on the part of the conservatives to deliberately mislead people on what has been said about the vaccine rollout plan, in particular the notion that the majority of Canadians could be immunized by September. By playing it as though saying “Canadians won’t be vaccinated until September,” it gives the notion that nobody is getting vaccines until then, which is false and frankly inflammatory. We did see that Patty Hajdu did call out some of the misinformation, but she spent too much time repeating her same happy-clappy talking points about the vaccine portfolio rather than pushing back against some of this misinformation that is being promulgated for the sake of collecting clips that will be distributed over social media in the form of shitposts. The fact that a number of MPs were doing this same tactic shows that this is a coordinated effort by the party. Another example of social media clip-gathering were the pair of identical questions on the situation with protesters in India, where François-Philippe Champagne gave a substantive response, only to get the same question again from a second MP – because the Conservatives needed to have clips of two of their Indo-Canadian MPs asking the same thing for the sake of diaspora community votes. It was transparent, and tiresome.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Patrick Weiler for a dark blue suit and tie with a light blue shirt, and to Anju Dhillon for a yellow-gold kurti tunic with fuchsia trim and embroidery, along with a fuchsia shawl with gold embroidery. Style citations go out to Patty Hajdu for a black top with beaded pink flowers under a black sweater, and to John Williamson for a dark grey suit with a purple gingham shirt and navy tie. Dishonourable mention goes out to Jag Sahota for a lemon yellow jacket with a black top and slacks. 

3 thoughts on “QP: Deliberately mischaracterizing the vaccine plans”

  1. I notice that the Cons took this day to release their long-awaited plan for renewable energy: 100% recycled, regurgitated bovine excrement. I wouldn’t expect anything less.

  3. Seen on Twitter:
    Every time a Conservative asks about Liberal vaccine scheduling so the economy can recover, the media should ask Conservatives about how they intend to convince the vaccine-denialists in their own party (40%) to agree to get themselves vaccinated, so the economy can recover.

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