Roundup: Some long-awaited policy announcements

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The Liberals finally came out yesterday with a suite of policy announcements at the end of their caucus retreat, with a bunch of measures that some have been calling on for a while. Removing the GST on purpose-built rentals was actually an idea they ran on in 2015 then didn’t implement after further study (credit to Rachel Aiello for finding that), but have now gone ahead with in light of all of the calls to do so. As well, a number of people were treating the warnings to municipalities about not getting Housing Accelerator Fund dollars if they continued exclusionary zoning as though it were new, when it was part of the policy design in the 2021 platform all along.

One of the more interesting announcements was around upcoming changes to the Competition Act, but while Jagmeet Singh will take credit for it, the government has been consulting on this for over a year. The big news is the proposed elimination of the “efficiencies defence,” which would be a sea change in Canadian competition law.

There were also warnings to the grocery oligopolies that they have until Thanksgiving to stabilise prices (meaning return them to the headline rate of inflation), but I have a hard time seeing how this is going to work considering that the bulk of price increases are because of supply issue, such as yields being reduced for climate-related droughts or floods. Margins have been consistent throughout, so this policy is going to need a lot more finessing, and the price issues related to a lack of competition in the sector is going to be as difficult to fix as the supply issues. They also said they would extend the loan repayment period for CEBA loans after an outcry, btu extending the deadline for most means forgoing the partial forgiveness portion, meaning they will have more to repay.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian shelling killed a six-year-old boy in the village of Novodmytrivka in the southern Kherson region. Ukrainian forces have retaken the village of Andriivka in the east, as they continue to press on toward Bakhmut.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau will be headed to the UN General Assembly in New York next week to talk climate, Haiti, and supporting Ukraine.
  • Here are a few more details about the federal government’s guidelines around use of AI within the civil service.
  • A lawsuit alleges that the man who ran the quarantine hotel in Calgary during the height of the pandemic mishandled $16 million in federal funds.
  • An Ontario Superior Court judge says while he’s sympathetic, he won’t halt a CRA audit into a Muslim charity saying the courts shouldn’t intervene at this stage.
  • Pierre Poilievre is promising a private member’s bill with his housing plan—but it won’t be voteable, and it’s largely unserious that plays at the margins of the crisis.
  • Jagmeet Singh plans to advance a private member’s bill about updating the Competition Act, but the government’s bill is likely to supersede his.
  • Scott Moe says he’s prepared to use the Notwithstanding Clause to protect his school pronouns policy (because why not scapegoat vulnerable minorities?)
  • Jessica Davis makes the case for Canada to join the UK in listing the Wagner Group as a terrorist entity (and to fund investigators to back it up).
  • My Xtra column notes that Poilievre’s silence around the anti-trans motions passed at his party convention is tactical.

Odds and ends:

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1702464040037925163

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