Tag Archives: Bullying

Roundup: Exit McGuinty

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The shocking news last night was that Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty resigned suddenly – and prorogued the Legislature to let the dust settle. His party was facing contempt proceedings, and prorogation collapses them, but he did just resign, which is the ultimate accountability measure. Meanwhile, a team has been assembling to try to encourage him to run for federal leader for a while – not that it’s likely to happen. Here is reaction from Stephen Harper and Bob Rae. Paul Wells looks back at McGuinty’s career, and the situation his party now finds itself in.

Incidentally, I’m really not that outraged about this prorogation, possibly because I actually know what a prorogation means, and I’m not of the belief that it’s illegitimate for a government to exercise its Crown powers. He wasn’t facing a confidence motion, and it was well within his right as premier to do so – especially to allow time for the dust to settle from his resignation. I’m a little less keen if he plans to keep it prorogued until after his party’s leadership contest, but they’re planning on a quick one, so I wouldn’t expect it to be out for six months. And if anyone can tell me what exactly the piling on by opposition parties would contribute at this point when the premier has already taken that ultimate step and resigned, well, be my guest.

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QP: Not biting on the resignation demands

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With Harper heading home from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Bob Rae away elsewhere, it was up to Thomas Mulcair to be the sole leader in the leader’s round of questions. He began QP by reading a trio of questions on the tainted beef issue, his third question including a demand that Gerry Ritz resign. Ritz was up to speak each time – rather than another back-up PM du jour – but spoke about taking food safety seriously and science-based decision, but wouldn’t take the bait on the resignation demand. Malcolm Allen was up next to say that there aren’t enough meat inspectors in the system, to which Ritz replied that the Union said there were. Marc Garneau was up for the Liberals, first asking a pair of questions on reassurances around food safety, to which Ritz took the classy move of blaming previous Liberal cuts for the problems and to tout their government’s “reinvestments” in food safety. For his last question, Garneau asked about the issue of bullying, to which Rob Nicholson replied that the government was taking action, there were two Parliamentary committees studying the issue, as well as funding for RCMP and cyber-tips hotlines.

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Roundup: Beginning the bullying debate

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MPs will be debating an NDP private members’ motion on creating a committee to develop a national strategy to prevent bullying.

A justice department study shows that gun crime costs the country $3.1 billion per year. The study authors did note, however, that the problems are complex and that a costing analysis is not a substitute for policy formulation.

The government has consistently said it’s a myth that the free trade deal with Europe would increase drug prices in Canada, but as it turns out, their own analysis has said that one of the three contested sections could increase drug prices in Canada by up to $2 billion per year. But nothing has been decided, they continue to insist.

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