While the prime minster was off to conferences in New York, his deputy and most other leaders were similarly elsewhere. Pierre Poilievre, however, was present, and he led off in French, worrying about the cost of bureaucracy rising while the strike happening, but then accused the prime minister of going “on vacation” to New York with “fancy people,” and demanded the prime minister go back to work. Mona Fortier said that they were working hard at the negotiation table to get a fair and reasonable deal. Poilievre repeated the question and false assertion with added misleading bluster in English, and Fortier repeated her same response. Poilievre scoffed at Fortier’s efforts before demanding that the prime minister return to Ottawa to “do his job,” to which Randy Boissonnault called this “bluff and bluster” before praising the economic recovery and lifting people out of poverty. Poilievre scoffed once again at this, using his tired line that the government was telling people they’ve never had it so good, before pivoting to the Glendore bid for Teck Resources, and demanded the government block it. Jonathan Wilkinson said that there was no formal bid, and praised Teck as being headquartered in BC. Poilievre accused the government of shipping off jobs, before he demanded the government remove “gatekeepers” for projects like LNG and more hydro dams in Quebec, to which Wilkinson suggested that Poilievre should do his homework. 

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and raised testimony from senior Liberal party official Jeremy Broadhurst at committee on foreign funding in the election and not having time to replace Han Dong as a candidate, and accused the prime minister of misleading the House. Dominic LeBlanc suggested they wait for David Johnston to weigh in. Therrien insisted that the prime minster’s version couldn’t be true, but LeBlanc repeated his response.

Alexandre Boulerice rose for the Bloc, and he accused the prime minister of constantly being missing in action—got warned by the Deputy Speaker about it—and he restated his question to accuse the PM of doing nothing for two years and demanded he resolve the strike. Fortier insisted that they were at the table looking for creative solutions but would not give into unaffordable demands. Leah Gazan gave a somewhat confused question about the prime minister giving money to women’s institutions internationally but abandoning them at home, while phrasing this with the strike as well, and then accused him of fake feminism. Marci Ien pointed out that they gave emergency funds for shelters during the pandemic, and that she is currently negotiating with provinces on the plan to end gender-based violence.

Round two, and Melissa Lantsman gave an angry denunciation of the strike while the prime minister was jetting off (Gould: We support workers unlike the Conservatives), Jasraj Hallan mixed the “special kind of incompetence” talking points among an angry word salad (Boissonnault: You don’t want to talk about all the good things you’re going to vote against in the budget; Gould: We lifted people out of poverty while the Conservatives made it worse), and Gérard Deltell have his own talking points remix in French (Boissonnault: We will reach a deal that makes sense at the bargaining table, and yay our economic growth record).

Lantsman seems to think that an international conference in New York is a “vacation” for the prime minister. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) April 27, 2023

Mario Beaulieu decried the federal funding for English in Quebec versus French (Petitpas Taylor: Hooray our official languages action plan, and we’re not funding English but the vitality of English-speaking communities), and Denis Trudel read his own denunciation of the funding (Petitpas Taylor: We are doing everything we can to protect and promote French including in Quebec, but also protecting official language minority communities).

Shelby Kramp-Neuman blamed the federal government for rising rents and mortgage costs (Hussen: We have put into place like the Canada Housing Benefit, while you voted against it), Scott Aitchison gave his own denunciation of housing policy (Hussen: I’m happy to share more details about our strategy with you).

Jenny Kwan decried the revelation that Sajjan didn’t check his emails around the transit documents obtained by a Senator (Fraser: That was an extremely busy crisis situation, and when we found out about those inauthentic letters, we reached out to law enforcement), and Taylor Bachrach demanded a lack of action on tugboat safety recommendations (Alghabra: We are going to take action, and are currently examining our options).

Round three saw questions on Trudeau Foundation conspiracy theories (Lamoureux: The prime minister has not had any contact with the Foundation for a decade), the strike affecting consular services in Sudan (Joly: Consular services are not affected by the strike and we are assisting in Sudan), demands that the prime minister get involved in the strike negotiations (Fortier: We appreciate civil servants and we are still in negotiations), delays to having a plan to evacuate nationals from Sudan (Joly: Evacuating Canadian nationals is a priority, and the objective to help all those who are waiting for help), demands for bail reform (Lametti: We are proposing targeted amendments in concert with the provinces), the approval of the port of Vancouver (Alghabra: We have declared this in to be in the national interest and there are 370 conditions), the transit letters given to Afghans by a Senator (Fraser: The crisis situation was chaotic but we have managed to save thousands of Afghans), the impacts of inflation (Boissonnault: Perhaps you should vote in favour of our measures to help Canadians), carbon prices (Gould: We have supported Canadians since we took office), and charging Canadians for being airlifted from Sudan—which is standard practice (Joly: We have been working with allies to assist getting Canadians out).

Overall, it was quite the contrast between yesterday’s dynamism in the back-and-forth and the fairly rote recitation of scripts and memorised talking points today, which shows how unable the vast majority of our MPs are at when it comes to properly debating. The Conservatives and the NDP were very keen on denouncing the prime minister for attending international conferences in New York today rather than inappropriately involving himself in the civil service strike, or somehow otherwise directly influencing the economy or housing market (no, it doesn’t actually make sense because he doesn’t have a Green Lantern Ring), and post-Poilievre’s questions, were warned repeatedly by the Deputy Speaker that they can’t keep referring to the prime minister as being away because it’s against the rules. Some MPs were better at it than others, but it was clear that was the strategy of the day, and the Deputy Speaker wasn’t going to play ball. (I’m almost certain that had Speaker Rota been in the chair, the majority would have been allowed, because he’s that useless).

Otherwise, we continue to be in the situation where the Conservatives scrupulously avoid talking about the budget, the Liberals keep trying to pivot to their good news pabulum about it. The performative faux anger was on full display today, and it’s just so tiresome. Clip harvesting is such a waste of everyone’s time, and yet that’s what this has become.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Marci Ien for a crisp, collared white shirt under a black suit, and to George Chahal for a tailored navy suit over a white shirt and a dark pink tie. Style citations go out to Denis Trudel for a dark grey suit jacket over a shiny blue striped shirt and a lighter blue shiny tie, and to Julie Dabrusin for a dark scoop-necked top with red and white florals over black jeans. Dishonourable mention goes out to Brenda Shanahan for a yellow and black mottled top under a black leather jacket and black slacks, and to Cheryl Gallant for a mustard yellow dress with black piping under a black jacket.