Roundup: An unearned victory lap amidst the Court’s repudiation

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Yesterday morning, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the federal Impact Assessment Act is partly unconstitutional, and that the federal government was over-broad in the criteria they used to trigger a federal environmental assessment. Ironically, while Jason Kenney and the federal Conservatives liked to call the legislation the “No More Pipelines Bill,” the section that governs pipelines was found to be entirely constitutional, so it was fairly laughable as they started crowing over social media about their supposed victory. It might have helped if they had actually read it and not just the headlines.

The more important part of the decision, however, was the fact that while it did find part of the federal legislation ultra vires Parliament, it also explicitly repudiated the arguments that the Alberta government and the Alberta Court of Appeal were making, in claiming that the province somehow has interjurisdictional immunity for so-called “provincial” projects. That’s not true, and the Court said so, which means that when Danielle Smith and Pierre Poilievre were claiming that the Supreme Court “affirmed” that provinces have the exclusive right to develop their own resources, that’s wrong. It’s not what the Court said, and in fact they said the opposite of that. Alberta’s “victory” was a pretty hollow one because the Court affirmed the federal role in environmental assessments and that they can assess whatever they want once their ability to make said assessment is triggered—the only real issue was the criteria for the trigger, which needs to be narrowed. The federal government has pledged to do just that, and because this was a reference opinion by the Court and not a decision on legislation, it has not been struck down. In fact, because there don’t seem to be any projects under assessment that would be affected by the decision, it seems to show that the law is carrying on just fine, and that the amendment will be a fairly surgical tweak (and yes, I spoke to several legal experts to that effect yesterday).

Meanwhile, the reporting on the decision largely ignored this repudiation of the provincial argument. The Canadian Press, the National Post, and the Star all missed that point entirely in their reporting. Only the CBC caught it—in the main story it was given a brief mention amidst the egregious both-sidesing, but Jason Markusoff’s more nuanced analysis piece did get a little more into it, but again, it did not really point out that Kenney’s crowing over social media was for naught, and that Smith’s victory lap was not really deserved. (Smith later went on Power & Politics and lied about what projects that the Act supposedly impacted, such as the Teck Frontier mine—that project was assessed under the Harper-era regime, and was shelved because the price of oil couldn’t justify the project’s viability). It would be nice if we had more journalists actually talking to more experts than just one while they both-sides the ministers and Smith, because they would find that they missed a pretty significant part of the decision. (My own story that does precisely this analysis was delayed in publication, so it should be up on Monday).

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian forces pounded Avdiivka in the Donbas region for a fourth day in a row as they try to make gains in that area. Ukrainian authorities say that Russians have destroyed 300,000 tons of grain since they started attacking Ukrainian port cities in July (because they’re trying to weaponise hunger).

Good reads:

  • Mélanie Joly flew to Israel to meet with officials about evacuations and getting Canadians trapped in Gaza to safety.
  • The CRA has suspended the charitable status of a Muslim organisation after an audit found potential funding for a network that might include Hamas.
  • CSIS warned Inuit leaders to beware of covert foreign investment in the North as possible foreign interference, but wasn’t able to give specific warnings.
  • The Citizen has an interview with Speaker Greg Fergus.
  • Some delegates at the NDP convention are worrying that Jagmeet Singh isn’t able to translate electorally for the party.
  • In Manitoba, Wab Kinew is set to be sworn-in as premier on Wednesday.
  • The Alberta’s UCP will be debating a policy resolution around school pronouns at their coming policy convention (because why not lean into the moral panic?)
  • Dan Garner has a few trenchant words about learning from Hamas apologists.
  • Justin Ling argues for more transparency from government as a way of helping fight foreign interference or threats against our citizens.
  • Ling also has a long and thoughtful look at terrorism as Resistance, and whether it’s actually effective in achieving those aims.
  • My Xtra column tries to find out just what aid Canada is providing to Ukraine’s LGBTQ+ communities, and gets a vague and impenetrable response from GAC.
  • My weekend column calls out the calls to capitulate by News Media Canada following bullying from web giants like Google and Amazon.

Odds and ends:

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