QP: Politicizing October 7th

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A new week in Parliament, and the prime minister was absent, but his deputy was present, and most of the other leaders stayed away as well. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and he rattled off slogans before raising the privilege issue, listing off the conflicts of interest at SDTC and demanding the government turn over documents. Karina Gould said that this wasn’t true, that the matter has been referred to the committee for study, and it was up to the Conservatives to send it there. Poilievre switched to English to rattle off his slogans again, and to once again demand the government turn over the SDTC documents. Gould repeated that everything was false, that the motion was to send the matter to committee, which the Conservative don’t want to do that because they would know that they are trying to violate Charter rights with this production order. Poilievre mocked the notion that people will lose Charter rights if police get evidence (erm, you know what illegal search and seizure is, right?) and demanded the documents. Gould reiterated that this was demonstrably false and that the motion was to go to the committee, and the Conservatives were blocking that. Poilievre then turned to the October 7th commemoration, denounced antisemitic chants, and demanded the government to the same. Mélanie Joly read the names of Canadians killed in the attack, and read some remarks about the hostages. Poilievre reiterated the point about the chants, and demanded a denunciation again. Arif Virani then got up to say that their solidarity is with Jews in Israel and Canada, and that they stand up against acts against hatred in this country.

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and demanded the royal recommendation for their OAS bill. Steve MacKinnon noted that he met with seniors over the weekend, and listed the measures for seniors the Bloc voted against. Therrien dismissed the “procedural issues” at the heart of the matter (my dude, democracy IS procedure), and this time Lawrence MacAulay noted their support for Supply Management and that they encourage the Senate to move on that bill.

Peter Julian rose for the NDP, and in French, decried rising rents, as though that were a federal jurisdiction. Jean-Yves Duclos said that they were right to oppose the Conservatives, trotted out the six housing units myth, and denounced Poilievre calling social housing “Soviet.” Blake Desjarlais got up to decry that the government broke housing promises to Indigenous people. Duclos noted that they have been building tens of thousand of units for Indigenous people. 

Round two, and Poilievre got back up to again demand the foreign affairs minister denounce the antisemitic chants, and claimed she wouldn’t because of her leadership ambitions (Joly: We are all opposed to antisemitism and you should apologise; Virani: We deserve to do better than to protest at daycares and synagogues, and we all need to oppose antisemitism), Michael Barrett got up to recite some slogans before demanding SDTC documents be turned over to the RCMP (Gould: That is clearly false, and this needs to go to committee, and you are obstructing your own obstruction; Virani: If there were a criminal prosecution, police would get a warrant from a judge, and you don’t care about police independence, much like authoritarian regimes), and Gérard Deltell made the demand for the documents in French (Champagne: Only Conservatives could manage to filibuster their own motion, and we took action on the Fund; There were four independent reports, and the RCMP Commissioner said that they had access to all of those documents).

Yves Perron spun a conspiracy theory about the senators holding up the Supply Management bill (Bibeau: We all support Supply Management, but the Senate is independent; Duclos: Same question, same answer).

Frank Caputo demanded the documents be turned over (Virani: As a former Crown prosecutor, you know how criminal processes works including how to get a warrant and not direct the police; There is a qualitative difference between providing documents for the purposes of Parliament, and providing documents for the purposes of prosecution, and you used to practice in this area), and Kelly Block read more slogans to demand the documents (Champagne: You are blocking your own motion).

Laurel Collins accused the government of caving to the interests of big oil (Guilbeault: Here is a quote from your colleague about why you favoured pricing carbon, and it’s too bad you don’t seem to be progressive or environmentalists anymore), and Leah Gazan demanded the government somehow stop Danielle Smith from leasing hospitals to private operators (Holland: Making access to abortion access essential is what we believe in, and we want to ensure every woman gets the support she needs).

Round three saw more questions on the allegations around Randy Boissonnault’s former company (Gould: Witnesses need to share information asked of them at committee), whistleblowers in the civil service (Anand: My office is working with the commissioner’s office to ensure he has the resources he needs), lies about the carbon levy causing food insecurity (Holland: Dental care is helping families and you want to cancel that; What’s also back at measles because of anti-vaxxers, and if you cared about food insecurity, you would support a school food programme; Duclos: Your leader’s only solution is to cut programmes people need; Sudds: We have made historic investments like the Canada Child Benefit to help families), a ship being broken in a high-tide zone (Kelloway: There is a provincial responsibility here, and we are upholding our end but we need the province to do the same), and antisemitism (Virani: To help combat this we need to pass the online harms bill, so people can’t be radicalised online). 

Overall, it was not a great day as Pierre Poilievre chose to politicise the October 7th commemoration off the top, particularly as he singled out Joly in a way that was not only unparliamentary, but made an unnecessarily personal attack out of such tragedy. I know the Conservatives are trying to play the “We’re the Jewish community’s only friends” bullshit, which is particularly laughable considering how much their party trades in antisemitic conspiracy theories on the regular (and nobody is ever punished when they engage in them), but it’s really unnecessary for it to play out like it did, and for the Speaker not to call him to order on it.

Otherwise, there wasn’t much else to recommend the day, from the constant questions on the privilege motion (and good on Arif Virani for calling out Frank Caputo as a former Crown prosecutor who should know what the Charter rights around unreasonable search and seizure involve), to the usual lies about the carbon levy and food prices, where once again the government didn’t call out the disinformation and lies for what they were, but simply responded with their usual happy-clappy pabulum about their programmes instead and letting the lies to fester on the record where people will think that they’re true because they’re not being challenged or called out. And you wonder why so many people think this government is maliciously crashing the economy or letting people go hungry. Honestly. 

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Laila Goodridge for a medium-blue dress under a navy jacket, and to Jean-Denis Garon for a tailored grey suit with a subtle grid pattern with a white shirt and a dark purple tie. Style citations go out to Charlie Angus for a burgundy jacket with a white shirt, black tie, and black slacks, and to Brenda Shanahan for a faded multicoloured collared top under a very seventies brown sleeveless jacket.

2 thoughts on “QP: Politicizing October 7th”

  2. These politicians of all stripes will say anything to get votes and money. Not one word about the tens of thousands killed by Israel in the last year alone.

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