The constant assertion that we are just around the corner from another election is tiresome, and yet it keeps rearing its head, sometimes in very novel ways. Yesterday, it was Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet telling a virtual meeting of Quebec municipalities that he believes an election is going to be called on August 16^th, in order to avoid a federal election interfering with municipal elections in Quebec this fall – assuming, of course, that the pandemic is largely under control by then.

No, seriously.

The logic of this assertion, however, does not hold. First of all, there would be no reason for the prime minister to go to the Governor General (assuming we have a new one installed by that point – otherwise, it would be to the Chief Justice in his role as Administrator, for which the optics are very bad), and request dissolution in the middle of August. Remember that we still have fixed election date legislation, and while it’s largely useless, it does create a situation of poor optics for prime ministers or premiers who pull the trigger early. Yes, we are in a hung parliament, so a confidence vote could be lost at any point, but the Commons won’t be sitting in August. In fact, it is not scheduled to be back until September 20^th, and I doubt we’re going to be having the same kinds of summer sittings like we did last year, where there was a sense of urgency, particularly around rapidly passing new pandemic spending measures. That is unlikely to be the case this summer given the place that we’re in with the pandemic. This means the government couldn’t even engineer its own defeat over the summer without a hell of a lot of effort, which seems tremendously unlikely given the circumstances. Given the poor optics of just requesting dissolution, this seems highly unlikely.

To add to this, Bill C-19 – which would allow Elections Canada to hold a safer election in the pandemic setting – only just got sent to committee this week in the Commons. Next week is a constituency week, so even if it did pass both committee and third reading the following week (unlikely), and passed the Senate the week after that (a better possibility given the speed at which they seem to be operating these days – not that it’s necessarily a good thing) then it still has a 90-day implementation period for those changes to take effect, so it wouldn’t reach that threshold until mid-September at the earliest. Again, this makes a call for an August 16^th dissolution unlikely, because Elections Canada couldn’t be prepared, and even if most of the country gets their second dose by the end of September, that both cuts it uncomfortably close for when an election would be held following an August 16^thdissolution, if at all given the need for more advanced voting days and so on.

Simply put, C-19 should have passed months ago in order to ensure there were proper safeguards in case something happens in this hung parliament, and a confidence vote didn’t go quite the right way. But nobody is suicidal enough to want an election right now, and that will continue to be case for much of the fall, until we can be sure that we’re out of the grip of the pandemic. Blanchet is spouting nonsense and should be called out as such.

Good reads:

• Major-General Dany Fortin has been removed from his role in coordinating vaccine deliveries, pending an investigation, which is allegedly sexual misconduct.
• Dr. Theresa Tam offered some preliminary guidance on what partially-vaccinated Canadians should be able to do this summer (subject to local public health rules).
• A new study shows that delaying the Pfizer second dose by twelve weeks can increase the antibody response dramatically.
• Since the border closure with India and Pakistan, fewer cases of COVID are arriving with passengers according to testing.
• Steven Guilbeault appeared at committee yesterday on Bill C-10, and we got some better explanation for the amendments that they’ve made so far.
• National Defence is still working on the regulations to implement the military victims’ bill of rights, two years after the enabling legislation passed.
• The military has replaced the head of personnel after he stepped aside for an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct several months ago.
• Apparently the number of registered lobbying interactions has increased over the pandemic – in part because they need to book Zoom calls.
• Emmett Macfarlane considers Quebec’s plan to unilaterally amend the Constitution to entrench their language rights, and finds it unlikely to be feasible.
• Heather Scoffield doesn’t see much broad thinking about how to better get vaccines to those who need it for a more equitable economic recovery.
• Paul Wells delves into the surveys of the Canadian Forces’ membership from the past few years, and finds the dissatisfaction predates the current crisis of leadership.
• Both Robert Hiltz and Matt Gurney take on Doug Ford’s brief emergence from hiding, and neither of them are pulling any punches as to his recent conduct.
• My weekend column looks at Ford’s desire to be Ontario’s “fun uncle,” which has resulted in an inability to actually do his job as he tries to offload his responsibilities.

Odds and ends:

Look, the blood/tissue donor ban is bad. But how does not being able to donate blood translate to $40,000 in damages or pain?
If there are actual damages to the queer community from the ban, then shouldn't any compensation go to the community, rather than one individual?

— Rob Salerno (@robsalerno) May 14, 2021

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