While Justin Trudeau was not present today, just off of a plane from France, Singapore and Papua New Guinea. That said, Andrew Scheer was not present today either, for whatever reason. Alain Rayes led off, worried that the budget would not balance in 2019. Bill Morneau responded with a question of his own — where are we now? He went on to extol the low unemployment rates and the investments to grow the economy. Rayes repeated the question, and Morneau responded that the Conservatives only wanted to make cuts while the Liberal approach was working for growth. Rayes concerned trolled that the budget was “collapsing” under the weight of deficits, but Morneau retorted with the Conservative record of debts and low growth, while they have turned the growth rate around. Candice Bergen took over to ask again in English, railing that the Liberals were irresponsible, to which Morneau repeated his pabulum points in English about low unemployment and high growth. Bergen tried one last time, and Morneau noted the reduction in small business taxes and the lowest level of debt-to-GDP in the G7. Guy Caron was up next for the NDP, and he worried about the pressure to cut corporate taxes to follow the US example. Morneau said that it was necessary to strike a balance to ensure tax fairness and competitiveness, and that was the approach they were taking. Caron worried about corporate “dead money,” and Morneau reiterated his points about striking the right balance. Peter Julian worried about record levels of personal debt and demanded that they end “corporate giveaways,” to which Morneau assured him that they were investing in Canadians by means like the Canada Child Benefit. Julian demanded investments in pharmacare, to which Ginette Petitpas Taylor recited the implementation on the consultations that would produce a report in the spring.
Tag Archives: Budget 2018
Roundup: Fiscal update spin incoming
This week is the federal government’s autumn fiscal update, and we’ve already seen a pre-emptive push by the Conservatives to try and set a narrative about the government’s deficit. Andrew Scheer took time out yesterday to hold a press conference to say that he plans to force a vote that would demand that the government set a date for a balanced budget. And yes, the shitposts over social media have already begun.
Reminder: There was a $70 billion hole in GDP when the Liberals took over thanks in part to the brief recession and oil price crash. https://t.co/TkQF0frRoN
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) November 18, 2018
So, a few things to keep in mind this week about the narratives that will be spun:
- The Conservatives will insist that they left the Liberals with a surplus and a “strong economy.” That’s not entirely true – the “surplus” was on paper and it included a lot of “savings” that the Conservatives falsely booked that never came to pass (e.g. Shared Services Canada, Phoenix). The Liberals will also point to stagnant growth rates.
- There was a $70 billion hole between the fiscal situation that the Liberals found themselves in compared to the 2015 budget the Conservatives ran the election on. This would have been there regardless of who won the election. The Liberals had a choice to make – honour their spending promises, or honour their promise to balance the budget. They chose the former, and their spending has been largely in line with what was promised.
- There is no debt crisis looming. The debt-to-GDP ratio is declining, and is the best in the Western world. Government debt is not like credit card debt, so equating the two in shitposts like Scheer does only serves to sow confusion and is a dishonest attempt to look like the government is “bankrupt.” Also remember that much of the deficit spending under this government has been at a time when interest rates were at historic lows, which is not credit card interest rates.
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1064271285511811072
1) A declining debt-to-GDP ratio doesn’t necessarily mean higher taxes tomorrow.
2) Government debt is not credit card debt. Trying to equate them is disingenuous.
3) He inherited books in $70 billion worse shape than advertised.Could we discuss finances using facts? https://t.co/txnFh53xcT
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) November 19, 2018
I am an economist and I know both that sovereign debt is nothing like an unpaid credit card bill and credit card debt doesn't pass through an estate to heirs in Canada. But, while we're on the subject, would you describe the debt increase of 2008-2014 as intergenerational theft? https://t.co/5utQ1ZJttz
— Andrew Leach (@andrew_leach) November 19, 2018
You can also expect a bunch of calls this week to cut corporate taxes like they did in the US, citing competitiveness, but again, there are things to remember about those US tax cuts – namely that their deficit is currently around $1 trillion, that those cuts are the economic equivalent of a sugar rush for which there are few long-term gains being made, and most of those cuts resulted in larger corporate dividends and share buy-backs rather than re-investment in companies or workforces. There’s a reason why Bill Morneau hasn’t jumped on this, and we’ll see what his response will be.
Roundup: Endorsing the Brexitshambles
In case you haven’t been paying attention, Britain is currently in a state of utter omnishambles as they try to deal with Brexit. A potential deal that was reached resulted in Cabinet resignations, and some very real threats not only to Theresa May remaining as PM, but possibly toppling the government as a whole. It’s lunacy over there right now. Back here in Canada, Andrew Scheer has decided that this was the right time to reiterate his support for Brexit. Because “sovereignty.”
As much as I would like Iannucci to write a Brexit season of “The Thick of It,” I’m not sure anything could top what is going on currently. https://t.co/MPffCweFRH
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) November 15, 2018
While Scheer can bang on about how much control the UK gave up to the EU, and repeating falsehoods like the canard about the EU having regulations around the curvature of bananas, he both ignores that the EU has created a peace that has been unknown in Europe for centuries, and the fact that much of the Brexit campaign was fuelled by straight-up xenophobia. It’s this latter aspect that is particularly relevant because it’s part of a pattern we’re seeing with Conservatives, as John Geddes pointed out a couple of months ago – that they have this inability to orient themselves in a plausible way with the current nationalist populist trends in conservatism globally. Add to that, there is this naïve notion that they can somehow play with just enough extremism without it going into outright xenophobia or racism (and we’re especially seeing this playout with Maxime Bernier who blows the xenophobia tuba and then acts bewildered that white nationalists start showing up in his new party). But you can’t play with “just enough” extremism, because you can’t actually contain it. And when you wink about things enough times, you can’t act shocked and surprised when your adherents spell out what you were saying – like that post from a riding association Facebook account that posted Harjit Sajjan’s photo with the tagline “this is what happens when you have a Cabinet based on affirmative action.” They’ve only stated repeatedly that ministers in the Liberal cabinet are only there to fill quotas (whereas everyone in the Conservative Cabinet was there “on merit,”) but the moment someone puts Sajjan’s face next to that, well no, that’s totally not what they meant at all. Sure, Jan. And that’s why you can’t actually claim that Brexit is all about “sovereignty,” because it absolutely wasn’t. You can’t divorce the inflated sovereignty concern trolling from the xenophobia – it’s the same mentality as trying to assert that you can use “just enough” extremism for your political ends, but not go all the way.
Meanwhile, Andrew Coyne remains boggled by Scheer’s continued endorsement of Brexit, and wonders if he’s trying to appropriate some of its populist nationalism (the aforementioned “just enough” extremism).
Roundup: A diminishing vision of a regulator
The Supreme Court of Canada returned their reference decision on the constitutionality of the proposed national securities regulator yesterday, and it was a unanimous green light – because this is a voluntary system, it’s constitutional. You may recall that a previous attempt to create such a national regulator to be imposed by the federal government was found to be unconstitutional, and lo, it didn’t happen. When the previous Conservative government constructed this new voluntary model, Quebec appealed to the SCC, and as we can see, didn’t win the day. And even with this decision, Quebec still says they’re still going to stick with their provincial regulator, thank you very much, and that’s that.
There are a few things to think about in this decision, and in the system as it’s being designed. One of them is that part of the mechanism that makes it acceptable to the Supreme Court is that the regulatory authority is being delegated to a council of ministers, but that may come with more challenges. Because the wait for this decision essentially stalled the work of the new regulatory body, it remains to be seen as to how long it will take to get the new system up and running.
While Andrew Coyne makes the point that this system really makes no sense because it’s not able to deal with the issue of systemic risk, it may be worse than that. I wrote about this proposal for Law Times back in the spring, and even proponents of the national regulator had started to sour on the concept because the proposed system as it was being built essentially let provinces maintain their own particular carve-outs, which increases the complexity and reduces the uniformity of the system across the country. Even more alarming, according to one lawyer I spoke with, is the fact that this sets up a system that is unaccountable, that makes up and enforces its own rules and is self-funding, which seems to go against most good governance norms. So we’ll see where this goes, but the final result certainly looks to be far less than what was initially promised.
Roundup: Sexts and extortion
Conservative MP Tony Clement has resigned from Conservative shadow cabinet and his parliamentary duties (but not from caucus) after he was victim to an attempted extortion after sharing “sexually explicit images and video” with someone.
Tony Clement resigns from shadow cabinet following what he calls an extortion attempt. #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/F1CkO2gwnC
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) November 7, 2018
https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1059976854415659008
https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1059982799095050240
https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1059986660748812288
Some observations:
- Clement is part of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, which is of the highest security classification. Being a target for blackmail on that is a Very Big Deal, and can’t be excused by those who don’t want to be involved in any kind of shaming for sexting. Clement apparently notified PCO about this a few days ago, so this is serious in how it affects his role with NSICOP, and now they will need to find a new member to fill that vacancy.
- This is likely to get bigger. Already a number of women are coming forward over social media about his creepy behaviour on Instagram and this kind of thing has apparently happened before (sans extortion attempt).
- The Conservatives can stop being so smug about the fact that they haven’t had to boot anyone from caucus for being sexually inappropriate. Clement is still in caucus for the moment, but we’ll see how this grows in the next few days.
- Clement says that he’ll be “seeking treatment,” which is the really gross part here, because it employs the language of trying to medicalise sexual harassment or inappropriate behaviour. And when you try to medicalise it, you try to diminish personal responsibility – as this Tracey Ullman sketch so amply demonstrates.
Roundup: A StatsCan privacy check
While the ongoing issue of Statistics Canada looking for financial transaction data continues, the actual privacy practices in the institution aren’t being adequately explained to Canadians – and they certainly aren’t being represented accurately by the opposition. So with that in mind, here’s professor Jennifer Robson to explain just what she has to go through in order to access data for her research at StatsCan, in order to give you a better sense about how seriously they take this kind of thing.
I know some folks worry about being reverse-ID’d by unscrupulous users, as the fmr Privacy-Commish vociferously argued on my radio this AM. Privacy worries are real & shouldn’t be dismissed.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
I also get screened for security risk, finger-printed, photographed and sign a legally binding agreement on how I’ll use the data. I need to swipe in & out each time I go in the data centre or leave to get coffee. Each log-in is recorded.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
I can’t have a tablet, computer or my cell (no, not even to listen to music) in the data centre. No paper (except green paper I’m issued and have to keep locked on site). None of the computers connect to the web. None allow external drives/sticks.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
I also can’t send anything to myself in the data centre except via Stats Can who vets it to make sure no malicious content comes in. It is a sealed system.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
For example: ING Direct makes account data available to researchers through the Think Forward Initiative https://t.co/fDJEJjnoGP
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
But, is it in the public interest to let banks continue to decide, alone, if/how/when de-identified can be used for research? Is it in public interest for regulators & policymakers to be at major info asymetry? These are important debates.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
I do hope privacy experts/advocates will look carefully at data handling practices at Stat Can.And I hope Stat Can might do a better job of explaining (concretely) what they do to protect Canadians’ private data.
— Dr. J Robson (@JenniferRobson8) November 6, 2018
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1059641954021990400
This is why the complaints that the data won’t be secure as it’s being anonymized is pretty specious, and the pearl-clutching that StatsCan would have a person’s SIN is also overblown considering that they already have it – they matched up people’s tax returns with their census forms to ensure that they had accurate data regarding household incomes, and lo, nobody made a peep about that when it happened. Again, this overblown rhetoric around what is being planned about this financial transaction data is not only risible, but it’s actively mendacious (particularly when Conservative MPs keep saying things like this is a project by the Liberal Party or by Justin Trudeau himself). And yes, StatsCan has done a woeful job as to explaining what it needs these data for, and this government is largely too inept to communicate any of that information either. And yet here we are.
Meanwhile, Andrew Coyne points out that while the Conservatives have been spending years attacking StatsCan, the real privacy threat comes from the unregulated use of personal information by political parties, not the country’s statistical agency.
Roundup: Proposing a debate commissioner
Yesterday the government unveiled their plan to establish an election debate commissioner, who would set about coordinating leaders’ debates during the next election, along with proposed around which party leaders could participate – rules that would give Elizabeth May an in, but could exclude Maxime Bernier unless he gets an awful lot of candidates in place, and his polling numbers start to rise. The proposed Commissioner is to be former Governor General, His Excellency the Rt. Hon. David Johnston, who is a choice that nobody is going to want to dispute.
Historically, Reform would have been eligible in 1993 because it met 1) and 3) but the Bloc would not have been, as they had no MP elected as a Bloc candidate (Duceppe was officially an independent when elected in 1990) and did not meet 2).
— Éric Grenier (@EricGrenierTW) October 30, 2018
Should note that the criteria for 1) stipulates that the MP is elected under that party's banner, so excludes floor-crossers.
— Éric Grenier (@EricGrenierTW) October 30, 2018
Of course, that hasn’t eliminating the grumbling and complaints. The NDP are complaining that they weren’t consulted before Johnston was nominated (not that they’re complaining it’s him), and the Conservatives are calling this a giant affront to democracy and add this onto their pile of complaints that Justin Trudeau is trying to rig the election in his favour. (Not sure how this does that, and it seems pretty cheeky to make these claims when their own unilateral changes to election rules in the previous parliament were panned by pretty much everyone). And Elizabeth May is overjoyed because the proposed rules would include her. Of course, Johnston still needs to be approved by Parliament, and he will appear before the Procedure and House Affairs Committee, but all of this having been said and done, there remain questions as to why this is all necessary. Gould went around saying that this was because Harper didn’t want to do debates in 2015, except that he did debates – he simply didn’t want to do the same “consortium” debates that are usually done and decided by the TV broadcasters, and he most certainly didn’t want to have anything to do with the CBC. The key point they seem to be making is that the 2015 formats saw far fewer viewers than the consortium debates typically attract, for what it’s worth. Is this a reason to implement a new system, that neither compels leaders to participate or broadcasters to air? Maybe, and people will point to the debate commission in the United States.
https://twitter.com/InklessPW/status/1057344603861397506
To that end, here’s Chris Selley asking some of those very questions, looking at some of the problematic behaviour from broadcasters in response to the changed formats from the 2015 debates, and offering some suggestions as to how this all could be avoided.
Roundup: Not the right by-election
Justin Trudeau called a by-election yesterday – but only in the riding of Leeds-Grenville-Thousand Islands, and not Burnaby South, where Jagmeet Singh has declared that he wants to run – and now the NDP are sniping about it, calling it “petty and manipulative,” and even more curiously, griping that Canadians from that riding are being deprived of representation.
By-election called for Leeds–Grenville–Thousand Islands for December 3rd. pic.twitter.com/zmlHwY3Ahm
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) October 28, 2018
A couple of things: First of all, Singh has had several opportunities to run for a seat before now, and has turned them all down. The fact that he has suddenly realised that his being “comfortable” with not having a seat until his poll numbers started plunging doesn’t mean that the Liberals have an obligation to get him in the House as soon as possible – he already made it clear it wasn’t a priority. As well, it they were so concerned about a lack of representation, they should have said something to their MP who vacated the seat in the first place – and not only that, who waited until the last minute to vacate it after spending the summer campaigning for another job. Likewise with Thomas Mulcair in Outremont and now Sheila Malcolmson in Nanaimo – they chose to leave before the current parliament expired.
Add to that, the time to call this particular by-election was running out, and with the other current openings, Trudeau may be waiting on Malcolmson to give a date as to when she officially plans to leave her seat, and for Liberal MP Nicola Di Iorio to officially vacate his own seat in Montreal (given that he suddenly started having second thoughts after declaring he was going to resign) before Trudeau calls the other by-elections, so that they can “cluster” the by-elections in those regions. I’m not convinced that there’s a crisis here. Singh made his bed, and now he gets to lay in it.
The NDP leader, Jagmeet Singh, is the party’s candidate in that riding. /2
— Andrew Coyne 🇺🇦🇮🇱🇬🇪🇲🇩 (@acoyne) October 29, 2018
There is a distinct chance he could lose in Burnaby South. /4
— Andrew Coyne 🇺🇦🇮🇱🇬🇪🇲🇩 (@acoyne) October 29, 2018
Return to 1. /6
— Andrew Coyne 🇺🇦🇮🇱🇬🇪🇲🇩 (@acoyne) October 29, 2018
Roundup: Dredging up deficit panic
We’ve seen a return of questions in the past few days about the federal deficit – while the Public Accounts have shown that it was a little smaller than projected, it’s still there. The Conservatives hope to make hay over this in the next election, and as part of his “one year to go” speech over the weekend, Andrew Scheer repeated the lines that Stephen Harper mockingly performed over the election about how the Liberals promised just a “tiny little deficit” and well, it doesn’t look like they’ll make balance next year like they initially promised. Mind you, Scheer and his crew also ignores the fact that the Liberals were handed a $70 billion hole in GDP when they took over, so their spending promises are pretty much in line with their promises, but they made the choice to simply borrow to make up the difference – and yes, governing is about choices. Kind of like how the Conservatives chose to underfund a number of major projects in order to achieve the illusion of a balanced budget, that the Liberals had to then pick up the pieces on (Phoenix, Shared Services), and that’s also part of why they’re in the red. But you know – details.
In light of all of this fear-mongering, Kevin Milligan does the math on deficits, and well, it’s not quite the doom we’ve been thinking, as the debate remains trapped in the nineties and isn’t catching up to current realities.
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053691438829985794
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053692158564163585
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053694039445274624
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053695340774223872
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053696086911541249
https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1053697398403358721
Meanwhile, Andrew Coyne worries about the deficits, with the recall about how the not-so-big deficits of the seventies suddenly metastasized out of control in the eighties, but he doesn’t math out his fears either.
QP: Trying to lay an obvious trap
Following statements marking the two fallen soldiers who were killed by terrorists on Canadian soil four years ago, Andrew Scheer led off in French, mini-lectern on desk, reading a demand to deal with returnees from groups like ISIS, and that included demanding support for their opposition motion. Justin Trudeau responded with a statement of support for the police and intelligence services who are looking to bring these people to justice, and that they would support their motion. Scheer switched to English to repeat the demand, saying the government hasn’t done enough, and Trudeau reiterated the response in English. Scheer switched to the Mark Norman case, demanding the records from PMO be released to Norman’s defence, and Trudeau said that he wouldn’t comment on the case as it’s before the courts. Scheer insisted that he didn’t want comment on the case, but wanted to know if he would release the documents, to which Trudeau said that there were all kinds of other things they could ask about but they were fixated on this court case he couldn’t comment on. Scheer took Trudeau up on the invitation to ask about the New NAFTA, and wondered about caps on dairy exports to third countries, but Trudeau simply praised Supply Management and didn’t answer. Guy Caron was up next for the NDP, lamenting that Canada could not meet their GHG targets, to which Trudeau accused the opposition of refusing to accept that the economy and the environment to together. Caron changed to French, and railed about the purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline, and Trudeau listed investments in environmental protection that they’ve made, and insisted that they would meet their GHG targets. Hélène Laverdière demanded that arms to Saudi Arabia be halted, to which Trudeau picked up a script to read his condemnation for the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, and said that they were working closely with G7 allies. Laverdière switched to English to repeat the demand, and Trudeau read his English version of the script, with new paragraphs on strengthening export permit reviews.