The House of Commons has risen for the summer, with four priority bills having made it to the Senate – including the budget implementation bill – but the rest of their “priority” bills languishing on the Order Paper. And the main party leaders spent the day sniping at one another in their respective press conferences, not necessarily telling the whole truth of the situation along the way, because that’s the way this particular game gets played.

It’s also that magical time of year when Hill reporters realise that the Senate exists and doesn’t operate in the same way that the House of Commons does, and we go through the ritual song and dance of worrying that bills won’t get passed before the Senate rises for the summer, and some usual tough talk by certain senators that they won’t be pushed around and they won’t fast track bills, until they do. We go through this every June, and every June, they push through these bills to ensure that they get royal assent before they leave for the summer. And no, the Senate’s calendar is not as fixed as that as the House of Commons, and yes, they do frequently sit later in order to get these bills passed. There is also the annual ritual of the government leader insisting that they really shouldn’t amend these bills because that would mean recalling the House of Commons, and that costs x-number of dollars per day and that’s apparently a bad thing for democracy (no, I don’t get the logic either), and with the constant speculation of an election, we’ll get additional concerns that they really can’t amend these bills because of that fact, and after some requisite chest-thumping, most senators will back down and pass the bills unamended. Yes, this happens every year, and it might behove these Hill reporters to remember this every year.

There is, of course, a more alarming aspect of what has transpired in this particular year, which is that several House of Commons committees didn’t do any scrutiny of the Estimates for the departments they are responsible for overseeing, and this is absolutely bloody alarming. This is the whole gods damned point of Parliament, and because they were wrapped up in their procedural warfare, that fundamental job didn’t get done. (And because of rules written in the sixties, Estimates that aren’t signed off on are deemed adopted, which is another outrage that they have not corrected). This should never have been the state of affairs – and I will note that some of those committee chairs offered additional sittings to ensure this scrutiny happened, but the MPs on those committees didn’t agree to it, which is an absolute outrage. That is your number one job as an MP, ahead of all other considerations, and you blew it because you were too busy grandstanding and/or protecting ministers who should have fallen on their swords, and we have further undermined our parliament as a result. Slow clap, MPs – stellar job.

Good reads:

• An announcement is expected today about the discovery of hundreds of more unmarked graves at a former residential school in Saskatchewan.
• Marc Garneau will be headed to Israel and the West Bank to advance the cause of a two-state solution.
• Mark Miller acknowledges that the lack of housing contributed to the outbreak in Kashechewan, and is trying to accelerate the process of relocating the community.
• The government asked the Federal Court to prohibit disclosure of the classified documents related to the firing of the two scientists from the Winnipeg Lab.
• The government tabled their new bill to combat online hate speech, right before the Commons rose for the summer.
• An army reservist hired by the military to serve as an assistant to Harjit Sajjan was suspended from the Vancouver police for an inappropriate relationship.
• One of the fired scientists from the National Microbiology Lab is listed as a co-inventor on two Chinese patents (which could explain the firings).
• The NCC’s board seems to have woken up that the ongoing state of 24 Sussex is a blight on them as the organisation charged with maintaining it.
• A class action lawsuit alleging RCMP abuse of Indigenous people in the North has now been certified. (Expect this to mean negotiation with the government).
• The forensic report on the downing of Flight PS752 finds no evidence the missile strikes were premeditated, but also noted that Iran’s version doesn’t stand up.
• In a speech, Erin O’Toole said he would recommit to reconciliation with Indigenous people, but also decried that “cancel culture” was targeting Canada Day.
• Robert Hiltz calls for the Competition Bureau’s secrecy mandate to be dropped, and to have their budget strengthened, as a means of keeping corporations in check.
• My Xtra column looks at Bill S-203, which would essentially create a surveillance state to track people’s online consumption of porn in order to “protect children.”

Odds and ends:

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