Roundup: Another Longest Ballot initiative

Posted on by

The chuckleheads at the “Longest Ballot Committee” have struck again, this time with the by-election in LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, where they have ensured that there are 91 names on that ballot, which surpasses the number they have on the Toronto—St. Paul’s by-election ballot. And no, this is not Conservative skullduggery as many people like to suggest—this is the work of proportional representation fetishists who think that stunts like this will somehow convince the federal government to bow to their demands and institute PR, which isn’t going to happen. Why? Because we’ve been through this process before, and the hot garbage report that the parliamentary committee produced called on the government to invent a bespoke PR system whose main features were going to essentially be impossible to implement without massive constitutional change (because seats have provincial allocations and you can’t achieve a low Gallagher-index score with as few seats as many provinces have) or massively increasing the size of Parliament.

These stunts, however, are pretty much going to guarantee that electoral reform is coming in the form of increasing the thresholds for getting on the ballot, and restricting the kinds of nonsense that enabled these stunts, such as allowing a single person to be the official agent for the vast majority of these names. There is already an electoral reform bill in front of the Commons, which was intended to do things like allow for more early voting days and greater accessibility options, and that means it’s going to be very easy to add in an amendment that will help thwart these kinds of cockamamie tactics going forward. They haven’t helped their cause, and their self-righteous justifications for doing so have actually hurt themselves more than anything.

Ukraine Dispatch

The latest barrage of Russian missiles killed six people across two regions, which included another hotel being targeted. Ukrainian forces also noted that many of those missiles were shot down by their new F-16 fighters. While Ukrainian forces continue to advance in Kursk, Russian forces continue to press toward Pokrovsk because it is a strategic rail hub. Ukrainian drones have hit a Russian oil depot in their Rostov region, and started a fire. President Zelenskyy says that he will present a plan to Joe Biden to help pressure Russia into ending the war.

Good reads:

  • The final day of the Cabinet retreat focused largely on Canada-US issues, and ministers were briefed by ambassador Kirsten Hillman.
  • Here’s a deeper dive into the sentiments of Cabinet and senior advisors, and it’s pretty clear the strategy is to double down rather than make big changes.
  • Government House Leader Karina Gould is confident the Supply and Confidence agreement will hold the remainder of the scheduled parliament.
  • Leaks to the Star show that directions within ESDC told civil servants to streamline foreign worker applications by ignoring verifications around abusive employers.
  • Business lobbies and migrant workers’ rights groups are both unhappy with the planned reduction in temporary foreign workers (so that must be the sweet spot).
  • The Assembly of First Nations is delaying their vote on the child welfare reform package because of translation issues with documents.
  • It sounds like consul general Tom Clark will appear before the Government Operations committee next month (to be harangued for clips on social media).
  • Charlie Angus was harassed by a “Maple MAGA” enthusiast while on vacation.
  • Nova Scotia’s fisheries minister says that inadequate federal enforcement of the lobster fishery is emboldening organised crime in the sector.
  • Campaign Life Coalition is mailing anti-trans pamphlets to households in New Brunswick ahead of the provincial election.
  • Danielle Smith has started transferring control of certain hospitals away from Alberta Health Services to faith-based operators, putting certain service at risk.
  • My column wonders just what “change” the Liberals can offer if this is to be a “change election,” as the polls indicate Canadians are looking for.

Odds and ends:

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