Tag Archives: Asbestos

Roundup: Changing the accounting rules

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There were some fairly big changes announced yesterday, but the way in which it was reported was interesting if you compared coverage. For example, The Canadian Press led with the headline of a $19-billion federal deficit last year, but didn’t explain until the fifth paragraph that the accounting rules had changed, and described it as “confusing matters,” and then engaged in both-sidesism to have the Conservatives rail about the size of the deficit rather than really explain what the changes meant. The Financial Post mentioned the changes in the second paragraph, but focused on the size of the deficit. It was the CBC’s coverage that spent the full story focused on the accounting rules changes and what they mean, and how that affects the reporting of the figures, which has a lot to do with unfunded pension liabilities that are now being put on the books in a transparent manner that the Auditor General has been calling for, for years now. Context like this is important, and it’s disappointing to see it obscured because writing about the deficit figures is sexier without explaining what they mean, so well done there. You’re really serving your readers.

As with any of these stories, however, the best commentary came from some of the best economists on Twitter, who put it all into context. The full Kevin Milligan thread explaining it all is here, but I’ll post some select highlights.

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053342629574828032

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053346059693346816

He also busted the myths about the deficit spending by pointing to the $70 billion hole in GDP that the Liberals were left with when they took office, in part because of the oil downturn and technical recession that the Conservative narrative keeps ignoring.

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053393949417586688

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053395164318752768

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053403984411582464

Also, Mike Moffatt points out the significance of those accounting rules around pension liabilities on the reporting of the books.

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1053342822017982465

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053354656384962560

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Roundup: Getting the TPP to the finish line

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The bill to enact the Trans Pacific Partnership has passed the House of Commons and arrived in the Senate, and the race is on for its swift passage, as there is a desire for Canada to be among one of the first six countries to ratify the deal (currently three others have ratified). In the Commons, the NDP were the prime opponents to the deal, but they’re not a force in the Senate. The Conservatives in the Senate are just as keen on its swift passage as their Commons counterparts were – and they tried on more than one occasion to pass the bill at all stages without debate (because hey, who needs to do the job of scrutinising bills and holding government to account?)

While we can expect a bit more scrutiny in the Senate, I have to wonder where any delays will come from. When it comes to the Independents, one of their own are sponsoring the bill, so he will likely lead a push within that caucus in the way of organising briefings and trying to muster votes, so it would largely be an issue of whether any of them want some particular extended study on issues in the bill. The Senate Liberals tend to be free-traders, but they will want to insist on some scrutiny, as is their forte – they can often be counted on to do some of the heavy lifting that MPs are unwilling to do. So while I don’t expect them to hold up the bill, I would expect them to do their due diligence, which means it won’t sail right through, though I wouldn’t expect it to take long.

So where would I expect any delays to happen with this bill? With the Leader of the Government in the Senate’s office, given his reluctance to do any negotiation of timelines for bill passage. If there’s to be any delays, I personally would expect them to come from bottlenecks of other bills that are languishing because they can’t manage to get them passed at a reasonable pace because nobody wants to do the actual negotiation of timelines. Delays will come from incompetence, rather than malice. We’ll have to see how severe it will be, but that seems to be the state of things in the Senate these days.

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QP: More Mark Norman insinuations

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While Justin Trudeau was in town but not in Question Period, Andrew Scheer was also away for reasons undisclosed. Candice Bergen led off on the Vice-Admiral Mark Norman issue again, demanding that the government turn over recordings of Cabinet meetings where shipbuilding contracts were discussed. Ralph Goodale got up to respond by reminding her that this is before the courts and they can’t discuss it. Bergen raised the spectre that the government was destroying records because of the Ontario Liberals did in relation to the gas plants scandal. Goodale reminded her of the Standing Orders that state that matters before the courts can’t be discussed. Bergen tried again on the same insinuations, and Goodale said that the government follows the law. Gérard Deltell got up to try again in French, and Goodale reminded him about the independence of the courts. Deltell reminded him that Paul Martin released records for the sponsorship scandal, and Goodale cautioned him that commentary like that was not permitted. Guy Caron was up next for the NDP, demanding expungements instead of pardons for former simple possession convictions. Goodale reminded him that the old system didn’t work which was why they changed it, and that they were putting in a new expedited process for those pardons. Caron asked again in French, and Caron reminded him that the expungements for when the law itself was discriminatory such as when it criminalised people for being gay. Hélène Laverdière got up next, and asked the government to apply the Magnitsky Act on Saudi officials responsible for the disappearance and possible death of Jamal Khashoggi. Chrystia Freeland assured her that they were working with partners to call for answers, but when Laverdière asked again in English, bringing up our arms sales, and Freeland gave a more pointed response about the G7 foreign minister’s statement that she led.

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Roundup: Stuck on the Norman questions

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Yesterday’s somewhat bizarre Question Period, with the Conservatives focusing on a single question around Vice Admiral Mark Norman, certainly got the attention of media outlets, but it wasn’t all positive news, given how they it was also pointed out how they were lacking in any kind of prosecutorial style or killer instinct around it. It was just repetitive. Many of the points they made also didn’t seem to land – such as saying the PM had already “tried and convicted” Norman when he remarked that the courts would sort it out before Norman had even been charged – something that they are trying to use to insinuate that the whole affair is politically motivated.

As a reminder, Norman’s lawyers are looking for records from PMO, PCP, DND, the Department of Public Services and Procurement Canada, the Department of Justice, the Treasury Board, and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, and that the documents being demanded include cabinet minutes, briefing materials and memos, and some ask for all forms of communication including emails and Blackberry messages. Those have all been deemed Cabinet confidence, which the Canada Evidence Actallows government to keep secret – the danger there, however, being that the court could decide that if the government doesn’t turn them over that the trial isn’t a fair one, and they could dismiss the case. As I remarked in my QP recap, I think the possibilities exist that some form of access could be negotiated that could mean a court-appointed officer could examine them to determine what is relevant as they do in cases of national security-related secrecy (like terrorism trials or people being held on security certificates), because the laundry list being demanded by Norman’s defence could very well be a fishing expedition and they want as broad a swath as possible to try and find something, anything, of use. (It’s also likely that the information is not only Cabinet confidence, but also commercially sensitive, which adds new layers of complication).

The other interesting fact that is still playing out is the fact that another public servant has been named as an alleged leaker, but he has yet to be charged, and this fact is making the Conservative suspicious that this is making Norman out to be a political scapegoat. Or rather, that’s the claim they’re making as they put on their dog and pony show about trying to make this into some kind of a cover-up, but we have nothing to point to this one way or another – just innuendo, which is enough to make political hay out of.

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QP: A digression to the LRT

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With the G7 meeting ramping up in Quebec City and Charlevoix, Quebec, Justin Trudeau was away from QP, and so was Andrew Scheer, as has been his wont lately. Candice Bergen led off, reading the same questions about the government not immediately imposing retaliatory tariffs on the US. Marc Garneau read that it was essential that they get this right, so they had a few days to respond. Bergen demanded that all tariffs collected by these retaliatory measures went to those impacted, and Garneau relied with the same assurances that they were there to defend steel and aluminium workers. Bergen switched topics to TPP ratification, and this time Mélanie Joly said that they had worked hard to improve the bill and it would be tabled shortly. Gérard Deltell reiterated the question in French, and got the same response in French. Deltell then repeated the earlier question about using whatever tariffs were collected to support affected workers, and Garneau reiterated earlier response in French. Guy Caron led off for the NDP, railing that fossil fuel subsidies weren’t being eliminated, among other sins, and Catherine McKenna responded with plans to implement a plastics charter at the G7 meeting. Caron demanded funding for green jobs rather than fund a pipeline, and McKenna insisted that they have stood up for the environment while growing the economy. Rachel Blaney reiterate the question in English, and McKenna listed the measures that they have taken — pricing carbon, phasing out coal, investing in public transportation and clean tech. Another round of the same yielded the same response.

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Roundup: Turning down the committee

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It was pretty much as expected. The Commons ethics committee met yesterday and the opposition MPs assembled pleaded with the Liberal majority on the committee to think of the children – err, I mean, think about the meaning of holding the government to account when it came to the demand to call for the PM to appear to answer questions about the Ethics Commissioner’s findings regarding his vacation to the Aga Khan’s island. I will grant that the Liberals could have insisted that they go in camera for this, but didn’t. Rather, they simply said that, having read the report, and taking into account that the PM had apologised, answered questions in the media, and would be answering questions in QP on this topic, that it was enough. And so the motion was defeated 6-3, which surprised no one.

From the arguments presented, there is a little more that we could dig into. For example, Nathan Cullen said he wanted the PM’s suggestions on how to improve the rules – but if he cared about those, he would have taken the many suggestions that Mary Dawson has been making over the past decade and implemented those, but he, nor his party, nor any parliamentarian, has been keen to do that. And his worrying that the PM is ultimately accountable to parliament is true, but that ultimately means that if Cullen is so concerned, he can move a motion of non-confidence in the PM on the NDP’s next Supply Day and try to convince the Liberal ranks of the merits of his argument. As for the Conservatives, they seemed far more interested in seeing some grovelling the PM, and demanding that he repay the full cost of the trip (which would include the Challenger and security costs), never mind that during the Harper era, his “reimbursement” for his own private trips was supposed to be at economy fares, but nobody could find fares as low as the ones he was repaying (and there were several incidents of party stalwarts getting subsidized airfare improperly). And that whole incident nearly six years ago when they wanted Harper to appear to answer questions on the ClusterDuff Affair? Well, that was then and this is now, and Trudeau promised to be more open and transparent. (Err, remember when Stephen Harper rode into office on the white horse of accountability and transparency? Yeah, me neither).

And while opposition staffers chirp at my on the Twitter Machine about how it’s the role of MPs to hold the government to account – true – and that a committee setting is less theatrical than QP – not true – I will reiterate that the point of this exercise is not actually about accountability, but rather about gathering media clips under the protection of parliamentary privilege. If you think there would be sober questions asked, and that this would be a serious exercise in accountability, then you’re sorely mistaken. It remains a political calculus, and Trudeau has determined that it’s not worth it to spend an hour having the most torqued accusations hurled at him in the hopes that something sticks, and hoping for that “gold” clip that they can share around social media. If we’re going to lament the lack of accountability, then everyone needs to take a share of responsibility there – not just the PM.

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Roundup: For fear of Mary Dawson

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It was a day of juvenile finger-pointing as the big headline from the Globe and Mail was that the Ethics Commissioner said that she plans to speak to Justin Trudeau and Bill Blair about allegations that certain fundraisers may have breached conflict of interest laws, based entirely on innuendo from the Globe (which then gets repeated in Question Period, and that gets written up, and when the Globe adds another new piece of unproven innuendo the next morning, the cycle starts over again). Trudeau’s response? Bring it on – I’ve done nothing wrong.

So where are we? Because I’m not sure at this point. Do we insist that the PM and ministers no longer fundraise? Because that’s happening is that the party is capitalising on their “celebrity” for higher-level fundraisers, which is basic economics. They’re more in demand, so you send them to the higher-priced fundraisers. Should they be disallowed because someone would try to talk to them about their particular hobby-horses? As though they wouldn’t if they met them in the grocery store or on the street? Because I’m not sure that it’s actually lobbying activity, despite the label that has been slapped onto it by the bulk of the media and the opposition, looking to score some points on this. Does this mean that the whole of cabinet should be encased in these bubbles where nobody can talk to them? If the fear is that they get “exclusive” access, the government is quick to point out that they’ve accused of consulting too much and that there are plenty of other opportunities. If the worry is that it’s because they’re rich that they get access, again I’m not seeing the issue because you’re not buying influence for $1500. “Oh, you’re buying good feeling and they’ll think to pick up the phone and call you the next time something comes up” is the latest excuse I’ve heard, and I rolled my eyes so hard that it almost hurt. Honestly? Especially with the accusations that they’re buying the influence of “good feelings” donating to the Trudeau Foundation, which the PM severed his connections to and which provides scholarships? And if the charge is that because many of these rich business people are of Chinese descent, again, I’m not actually seeing any real issue here. They accuse one businessman of donating who had interests in canola that the Chinese government restricting and then Trudeau got it resolved. Conspiracy! Err, except that was the concern of every single gods damned canola farmer in this country so singling out one Chinese-Canadian starts to smack of veiled racist sentiment.

Once again, I’m waiting for someone to show me where there’s smoke, let alone fire. I mean, other than that sickening smell of people who’ve lit their own hair on fire over this. And I would be willing to bet that Mary Dawson is going to shrug and say “they haven’t broken any rules, but I want you to turn over more power to me” like she does all the time.

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Roundup: A catalogue of ineptitude

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Over in the weekend Ottawa Citizen, our good friend Kady O’Malley has a comprehensive breakdown of everything that went wrong with the electoral reform committee, and it’s pretty stunning once it’s all laid out before you. It starts with the Liberals’ relenting to allow the makeup of the committee to be more *cough* “proportional” than the traditional make-up of a parliamentary committee (which was not actually proportional, but merely gamed by the NDP to give the appearance of proportionality, and the Liberals relented for what I’m guessing was good faith). From there, it moves to the Liberals putting all newbies on the committee (with the exception of the chair) who didn’t have a clue what they were doing, and their lack of experience, combined with the fact that they no longer had a majority (despite having a parliamentary majority) meant that the opposition party gamed the witness selection in such a way that it meant they were able to self-select witnesses to get the outcome they wanted – namely 88 percent of witnesses preferring proportional systems, and furthermore, because they had motivated followings for their public consultations, it allowed them to self-select their famed 87 percent in favour of proportional systems and a further 90 percent in favour of a referendum. And almost nary was there a voice for ranked ballots. (Also a nitpick: ranked ballots have little to do with the proportionality that people keep trying to force the system into, nor are they about gaming the system in favour of centrist parties like the Liberals. Rather, ranked ballots are designed to eliminate strategic voting, ensure that there is a “clear winner” with a simple majority once you redistribute votes, and to make campaigning “nicer” because you are also looking for second-place votes. Experience from Australia shows that it has not favoured centrist governments).

In other words, this whole exercise was flawed from the start, in large part because the Liberal government was so inept at handling it. In fact, this cannot be understated, and they are continuing to be completely inept at handling the fallout of the broken process that they allowed themselves to be bullied into (lest they face charges of trying to game the system – thus allowing the other parties to game it for them), and rather than either admitting that this went off the rails (because it did) and that it was a stupid promise to have made in the first place (because it was) and trying to either be honest about cutting their losses, they’re dragging it out in order to find a more legitimate way to either punt this into the future, or declare that no consensus can be found (which there won’t be) and trying to kill it that way. But in the meantime, the daily howls out outrage of the opposition because of the way that they have completely bungled not only the committee response (and let’s face it – the report’s recommendations were hot garbage) and the further rollout of their MyDemocracy survey without adequately explaining it has meant that this continues to turn into an outrageous farce. I’m not necessarily going to lay this all at the feet of the minister, or call for her resignation, but this is one particular file where the government has been so clueless and amateurish that the need to pull out of the tailspin that they find themselves in, take their lumps, and then smother this in the crib. Enough is enough.

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QP: A strategic blunder in questioning

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Tuesday, and with the Auditor General’s report now on the table, there promised to be more than a few questions about some of his scathing findings. Rona Ambrose was ready, mini-lectern on desk, she read a question about Trudeau telling resource sector workers to “wait it out,” and concern trolled about a national carbon tax plan — you know, one that doesn’t exist. Trudeau reminded her that her government made things worse for Albertans after ten years in power. Ambrose asked again in French, and Trudeau told her that a responsible economy meant being responsible about the environment. Ambrose then called the bill repealing those anti-union bills “payback,” to which Trudeau reminded her that their first piece of legislation was actually lowering taxes. Gérard Deltell took over, asking again in French, to which Trudeau insisted that they rectified the situation when they learned about the illegal donations. Deltell took a swipe at unions, but Trudeau shrugged it off. David Christopherson led off for the NDP, demanding that they fix the items highlighted in the Auditor General’s report. Trudeau said that they were alarmed and were working to repair the damage of the last government. Christopherson demanded proof of commitment, and Trudeau insisted that unlike the previous government, they did more than just make announcements. Brigitte Sansoucy took over to ask again in French, particularly around the Social Security Tribunal, to which Jean-Yves Duclos let her know that he met with the AG and he would do everything in his power to fix the situation. Sansoucy raised the AG report on export controls, to which Ralph Goodale insisted that they intend to follow his advice and that they were implementing an action plan.

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QP: No current vacancy

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The days on the calendar running down, but crankiness among members ramping up, all of the leaders were present in the Commons, which was a little unexpected. Thomas Mulcair led off, asking about Quebec Supreme Court justice appointments and the possible attempt to use a backdoor to put Justice Mainville on the bench. Stephen Harper insisted that this was nothing to do with the Supreme Court, but about putting a good judge on the “supreme court” of Quebec. Mulcair pressed about whether the intent was to elevate Justice Mainville to the SCC, to which Harper reminded him that there was no current vacancy, nor a process to select a new one once a vacancy does become available. Mulcair then accused Harper of starting a war with the Supreme Court, but Harper mocked him for trying to launch into another conspiracy theory. Mulcair moved topics, and demanded that the Northern Gateway pipeline be turned town, to which Harper said that the NDP were against all resource development while they underwent environmental assessments and went through a rigorous assessment process. Mulcair listed the opposition to the pipeline, but Harper dismissed their opposition as ideological. Justin Trudeau carried on that line of questioning and pointed out the impacts a spill would have on that coastline, to which Harper accused the Liberals of holding a “deep hostility” toward the energy sector (really? Given their it boosterism for Keystone XL?) and insisted that they had a rigorous process.

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