Roundup: A dubious plan for the next pandemic

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Erin O’Toole unveiled his party’s pandemic preparedness plan yesterday, and it was very curious indeed. His framing was a lot of revisionist history about border closures, and some outright fabrications about supposed contracts that went to people with close connections to the Liberals, which has not been shown anywhere other than the fevered imaginations of what happened around the WE contract, and the bullshit story they concocted around Baylis Medical. More than this, however, a number of things that O’Toole was critical of were things that dated back to the Conservatives’ watch – including changes to the management structure of the Public Health Agency of Canada.

The fact that O’Toole is saying he would essentially undo changes the government he was a part of made – without acknowledging that they made the detrimental changes in the first place – is quite something. The fact that they’re going on about the pandemic stockpile without acknowledging that its management failed under their watch, going back to at least 2010 – and we have an Auditor General’s Report that confirms this – is not unsurprising. Other aspects seem to be dubious at best, such as doing something about pharmaceutical patents and doing away with PMPRB (Patented Medicines Price Review Board) regulations in order to appease these companies in the hopes that they will do more research and manufacturing here seems both unwise at best, and will mean higher drug prices for Canadians going forward.

There were some other things buried in there, not the least of which were contradictions around raising tariffs on PPE in order to ensure they are manufactured domestically, while also trying to “secure the North American supply chain” to reduce reliance on imports – but imports from the US and Mexico are still imports. There were also a number of jabs at China in the document, some of which will limit our ability to have international cooperation around research of emerging viruses, and he managed to wedge in the current drama around the National Microbiology Lab firings into his piece as well. The problem of course is that a lot of this sounds like it makes sense on the surface, but the moment you start reading their backgrounder (which doesn’t appear to be online – just emailed to reporters) and scratching beneath the surface, the more apparent it is that a lot of this is hot-air, blame-shifting, and disingenuous rhetoric masquerading as a plan.

Good reads:

  • The Senate rose last night for the summer, passing the budget and the climate accountability bill, but leaving the conversion therapy ban and C-10 to languish.
  • It appears that we won’t be getting any of the ten million Johnson & Johnson doses that we’ve contracted for, but no word yet on what will become of them.
  • The government moved up its timeline so that all new cars and light-duty trucks sold by 2035 will need to be zero-emission.
  • The Acting Chief of Defence Staff is letting the head of the navy remain on the job after the golf game with General Vance in the hopes that he will “redeem himself.”
  • A hijab-wearing former CSIS employee details the kinds of discrimination she faced on the job, which does not inspire trust in the organization in dealing with Muslims.
  • The Chief Electoral Officer says that an election could still be held safely in current conditions, even if Bill C-19 didn’t pass (thanks to procedural shenanigans).
  • The PBO says that the proposed gun buyback programme could cost $756 million, whereas the government estimated $225 million.
  • There are concerns about the upcoming election for the new AFN national chief given connectivity issues, and the Bennett/Wilson-Raybould drama is coming up.
  • A delegation of Indigenous leaders have secured a visit with the Pope at the end of December to formally request an apology for their role in residential schools.
  • Erin O’Toole, still unable to read the room, says Canada Day should be a way to “recommit” to reconciliation, but only means finding more grave sites.
  • Annamie Paul said the ultimatum about disavowing her former advisor’s comments had been lifted, until the federal council said no, it’s still on, so that’s exciting.
  • Kady O’Malley’s Process Nerd column looks at what the next steps are in the demand for those PHAC documents, and how it could turn out in Federal Court.
  • Heather Scoffield delves into the need to rethink how we conceive of achieving economic growth post-pandemic to avoid some of the problems exposed during it.
  • My column looks over the military ombudsman’s position paper demanding more independence, and finds an inherent flaw in part of his logic.

Odds and ends:

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1409939572776185857

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3 thoughts on “Roundup: A dubious plan for the next pandemic”

  1. The Tory stock and trade is revisionism, forget the past and its facts, particularly when you held power and invent lies to cover up your lack of cogent policies then and now. Couple this with personal attacks and O’Toole and his miscreants think they have a winning combo. Not!
    Mark Strahl got kudos from his minions for being the nicest MP to “work” for. Boy, have they got him sucked in. Ask a person on the street in Chilliwack and they will tell you that this fellow is the most useless representative ever sent to the HOC unless of course they happen to be a conservative, evangelical, anti gay, and believe that every problem is Trudeau’s fault.

  2. Cons are Republicans who want Canada to have price-gouging for-profit healthcare. In the aftermath of a pandemic this is the absolute worst thing anyone could ever bring to the table, but surprise surprise, there you have it.

    As for the two bills on life support in the Senate, I still hope the Liberals get their majority back so they can pick up where they left off and push them through without opposition obstruction. I’m so sick and tired of the “free speech” canard being used by bad faith anything-goes stale pale male libertarian cranks like Geist and Peterson to invoke the spectre of Orwellian totalitarianism (and yes, C-6 was being fearmongered by transphobes, in much the same way Geist turned C-10 into the new C-16 circa 2017). Funny how Cons claim to be “cultural nationalists” except when it comes to protecting Quebec from American junk or Canada itself from GOP bigotry.

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