Roundup: The premiers think we’re all stupid

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It is now day one-hundred-and-forty of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and Ukrainian forces are claiming to have hit a Russian ammunition depot near the captured city of Nova Kakhovka in the south. At the same time, Russians continue their attacks on the cities of Sloviansk and Toetsk in the Donetsk province, killing at least nine civilians. Here is a look at efforts to train Ukrainian soldiers and civilians in combat first aid. Over in Russia, the government is poised to enact legislation that can force companies to supply the military, including making employees work overtime, as the country tries to replenish its supplies after depleting them in the invasion thus far.

Closer to home, the Council of the Federation meeting ended, and lo, the premiers were unanimous in demanding that the federal government come to the table with them to, well, accept their demands to give them more money with no strings attached. Only they had both a wounded tone, which quickly switched to sanctimony when they were challenged, particularly about the pandemic spending that couldn’t be tracked. Some premiers, Tim Houston most especially, seem to think that we all have amnesia about 2004 to 2014, when the bulk of those six percent health transfer escalators were spent on other things. Saying that they all want improved outcomes is one thing, but the federal government isn’t stupid—they are well aware that provinces would be just fine with status quo that the federal government paid more for, and that they spent less on. That’s why they want conditions—so that provinces don’t pull this kind of thing once again. Premiers were also pretending that they had no idea what kinds of outcomes the federal government is looking to achieve, because most of the is in last year’s election platform. It’s not hard to find. And frankly, federal health minister Jean-Yves Duclos is right when he says that these outcomes should be agreed to at the ministerial level before the first ministers sit down to talk dollars, because you want to have a plan in place before you attach dollars to it, rather than the opposite, which John Horgan seems to think is how government should function. (You can find my thread as I was live-tweeting the closing press conference here).

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1546912224148688897

On a related note, The Canadian Press devoted several hundred words of wire copy yesterday to the fact that the promised $2 billion to clear up surgical backlogs hasn’t flowed yet…because the budget only received royal assent a couple of weeks ago. And that premiers are complaining they haven’t received the money yet. I mean, premiers know how a budget cycle works. This is not a news story—it’s not even a real process story. It’s complaining for the sake of complaining. The only piece of interest in the story was that the government tabled a bill about the spending commitment, then abandoned it in order to wrap the spending in their budget bill a couple of weeks later. This isn’t the first time they’ve done so, and it’s a really annoying habit that they have, but again, not actually a news story.

Good reads:

  • Sean Fraser says his department is prioritizing visa applications for attendees of the AIDS conference in Montreal (and may actually be living up to it for once).
  • Jean-Yves Duclos admits the timeline is tight, and they haven’t chosen a model yet for implementing dental care, but he insists they can meet the deadline.
  • The CRTC is demanding detailed answers from Rogers on the outage last week.
  • The possible VIA Rail strike appears to have been averted.
  • The Senate’s fisheries and oceans committee released a report calling on overhauling the implementation of Indigenous rights fisheries.
  • The industry committee plans to meet on Friday to discuss the Rogers outage, but rest assured this is mostly about MPs making sanctimonious pronouncements.
  • More documents have come to light showing Conservative leadership organizers being concerned about Patrick Brown’s past during the vetting process.
  • Patrick Brown’s campaign co-chair is endorsing Charest, but others have moved to the Poilievre camp.
  • The NDP seem to think the federal government should be procuring the safe supply of opioids for drug users, and not the provinces whose job it is.
  • Quebec is ordering federally-regulated businesses in the province to comply with its language laws, which the federal government plans to fight.
  • Heather Scoffield seems unimpressed by François-Philippe Champagne’s demands to the telecom industry about resiliency, and worries that will impact affordability.
  • Colby Cosh remarks on the gas turbine decision, the reflection of just how global our economic systems are, and the curiosity of which minister in Canada wears this.
  • My column worries that this government’s inability to communicate their way out of a wet paper bag can really counter the populist anger being stirred up.

Odds and ends:

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3 thoughts on “Roundup: The premiers think we’re all stupid”

  1. If the federal gov’t gives the provinces more health money hey need to get cast iron guarantees from the premiers, signed in blood and and with some nasty penalties built in. Oh’ and resident federal auditors in each provincial finance ministry.

  2. Nary a word about raising taxes at the provincial levels or using restraints to provide their people with good health care. Perhaps wealthy families should pay a premium for their care. Better than a universal fare or tax. Canadians through it all want to live like kings and queens without paying. Too many stories there if one thinks about it.

  3. Horgan is such a disappointment. He had a real opportunity to be the Tommy Douglas of the 21st century: an NDP premier who collaborated with a Liberal government in bringing about the most profound expansion of healthcare in Canada in fifty years. Instead, he decides to hitch his wagon to the wrong Douglas: Douglas Ford. And for Singh’s own federal branch of the party to continue to ignore jurisdiction except when convenient, thus giving “the resistance” et. al. a pass (perhaps because of a nominally-orange premier in the province where half their caucus, including the leader, sits, behaving like the blue Republicans to his east) is a disgrace to the legacy of the NDP. All this to assuage egos, exploit the public’s lack of civic awareness, and generally “own the Libs” (and a Trudeau at that). I’m glad Trudeau the younger isn’t being a “handwaiter to the provinces,” and I hope the feds continue to hold the line and still find some way to squeeze their ambitious policy goals out of this, because man, what a waste.

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