Roundup: Back to the constituencies

Posted on by

At long last, the children—and by “children,” I mean MPs—have gone home for the summer. Finally. Not before there wasn’t another last-ditch effort by Conservatives to try and demand more committee hearings over the summer, because they need clips for their socials, after all. I also find it particularly strange that the Conservatives have been phrasing their condemnations that the other parties want to go back to their ridings to “vacation” for the summer, because normally MPs are extremely precious about the fact that this is not a break because they have sO mUcH wOrK tO dO in their constituencies and that if they had their druthers they’d do even more work in their constituencies and less in Ottawa, so this feels like the Conservatives making a tacit admission that they don’t do work in their constituencies. (I know they’re not, but this is what happens when you make dumb arguments to score points).

This being said, MPs are absolutely behaving like children over all of this, and they all need a gods damned time out, not that I expect things to get much better in the fall because the incentives for this kind of behaviour remain—it’s all about getting clicks and engagement on their socials, and acting like children gets them that, apparently. It’s too bad the incentives aren’t there for them to act like adults, but the world has gone stupid.

Ukraine Dispatch

Russians resumed air attacks on Ukrainian power facilities. (Timeline of such attacks here). The fire at the oil terminal in southern Rostov burned for a second day after Ukraine’s drone strike. Here’s a look at how Russian glide bombs have accelerated the time it takes for them to destroy front-line settlements in Ukraine.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1803342727267885346

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau is planning on a public apology to First Nations families for child welfare discrimination, as part of the settlement agreement.
  • NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg is visiting Ottawa, and said that while he was encouraged by progress on defence spending, more progress is needed.
  • The federal government has listed the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist entity (in spite of not having the resources or expertise to enforce it).
  • Steven Guilbeault says he’s moving ahead with plans to impose federal protections for woodland caribou because Quebec has not delivered its promised plan.
  • Mark Holland is theatrically calling on the Senate to pass the pharmacare bill as soon as possible so that he can begin negotiations with provinces.
  • Diane Lebouthillier has pushed off the full implementation of the closure of open-net salmon farms in favour of closed containment systems until 2029.
  • Elections Canada is talking to parties about how to better secure nomination processes without them coming in to administer them (which they shouldn’t).
  • Google’s decision to have the Canadian Journalism Collective could create some drama because of how the Collective is set up.
  • Most of the washrooms in the renovated Centre Block and Welcome Centre will be gender-neutral (and you can expect meltdowns about that).
  • Ten House of Commons committees didn’t even bother to scrutinise the estimates for their areas of responsibility, and I cannot even. (I’ll write more on this later).
  • Liberal MP Wayne Long is speaking out against his government’s decision to close down open-net salmon farms in BC’s coastal waters (in spite of the delay).
  • Yves-François Blanchet says he’s not in a rush to read the classified NSICOP report, but his deadline for doing so is the next election.
  • John Michael McGrath talks to a pair of economists who are arguing that our productivity measures are out of whack because the oilsands distorts the figures.
  • Economist Kevin Milligan defends the capital gains changes and points out that leaving the rates unequal won’t do anything for productivity.
  • Susan Delacourt parses some of Trudeau’s remarks on Power & Politics earlier in the week, particularly about his desire to stay on the job in spite of poll numbers.

Odds and ends:

Want more Routine Proceedings? Become a patron and get exclusive new content.