Roundup: Trying to escape child care obligations

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Some Alberta daycare operators are starting “rolling closures” to protest the new funding regime that goes along with the $10/day early learning and child care programme, saying that they’re not getting enough to make ends meet. This is 100 percent a provincial problem—they signed onto the agreement with the federal government, knowing what the funding agreement was and that they had obligations for provincial funding, and that included increasing the wages of the people who work in the sector (because there’s no excuse for it being so low, particularly as there is a gendered element to it).

So what’s Danielle Smith’s response? Aside from denigrating the operators doing these rolling closures, she is trying to blame the federal government, claiming that their spending caused inflation to rise, which is what is making these operators face problems. Which is, of course, bullshit. Federal spending has nothing to do with the rise in inflation (as the Bank of Canada has stated many times over), and even more to the point, this child care programme has been disinflationary (at least for the early years, before the base-year effect kicks in, meaning it’ll be a one-time drop in inflation). Nevertheless, because she’s blaming the federal government, she wants to shake them down for more money, because that’s what provinces do every single time. Thus far, federal ministers are holding firm and pointing out that provinces knew what they signed onto, but legacy media, of course, is once again trying to make this a federal problem.

And this keeps happening. We never hold provinces of the premiers to account for anything. Another good example is social housing—as former minister Sheila Copps pointed out, back in the eighties, the provinces insisted that the federal government get out of housing because it was provincial jurisdiction, and just give them the money, and they knew best how to spend it. And happens every single time, they spend the federal money on other things, and then blame the federal government once things reach a crisis because of their under-spending. Same with healthcare. Because we are allergic to holding premiers to account in this country, and that’s a very real problem.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russia is refusing to turn over any of the purported POW bodies from that downed plane, because it totally isn’t a psy-op. The head of Ukrainian military intelligence says that he expects the Russian offensive on the eastern front to fizzle out by early spring, by which point they should be exhausted. Lviv in western Ukraine has become the first city to remove all of its Soviet-era monuments.

Good reads:

  • François-Philippe Champagne says that he’s “working the phones” to court new grocery players to come into the Canadian market.
  • Ahmed Hussen announced another $40 million in aid for Gaza, going through other trusted international partners while funding for UNRWA is frozen.
  • The majority of provinces wrote to the federal government to demand an “indefinite pause” on expanding MAiD, because they want the courts to drag them into it.
  • Global Affairs is investigating a malicious cyberattack after one of the VPNs it uses for remote work was compromised for over a month.
  • The foreign interference inquiry heard from professors warning about the government’s tendency to secrecy over transparency.
  • Conservatives have written to the inquiry commission asking that a focus on Iran be part of the examination, while Sikh groups are seeking standing at the inquiry.
  • The Federal Court has once again chastised CSIS of their failure to live up to their obligations around judicial warrants.
  • Speaker Fergus has ruled that the latest budget implementation bill is omnibus (obviously), and is splitting it up into nine separate votes.
  • The Commons voted down the Conservatives’ attempt to have Fergus removed.
  • At the Ethics committee, the interim Ethics Commissioner said that the prime minister’s vacation was just fine, and the Conservatives pretended otherwise.
  • CBC president Catherine Tait was at Heritage committee, and didn’t say she would refuse a bonus if the board awarded one to her.
  • James McLeod recounts the chapter in Newfoundland’s history when they gave up democracy, and why we should fight the allure of a “rest from party politics.”
  • My column points to the recent discussion around Question Period being a “stage” or a “performance studio,” and how that has damaged our democracy.

Odds and Ends:

https://twitter.com/ggcanada/status/1752384594882769276?s=61&t=4O6SQCF5wrew4NVRdnuzfA

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