Tag Archives: Dean Del Mastro

Roundup: Selecting a window dressing panel

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The government has announced the selection panel for recommending the next Justice of the Supreme Court, comprised of three Conservatives, one NDP and one Liberal MP, and as it was pointed out, three lawyers, a PhD in sociology, and a farmer. The judge will have to be from Quebec, as that is the vacancy on the Court. Of course, this whole process is really just window dressing anyway as ultimately this is and always has been a crown prerogative of the Prime Minister anyway.

There are rumours that the government wants to create a permanent secretariat in Public Works to deal with military procurement issues, which everyone else seems to agree is just adding layers of needless bureaucracy without actually solving any of the problems. Meanwhile, the report on the F-35 procurement disaster is overdue according to the government’s timetable, and Public Works has had to put out yet another tender for an independent auditor. Because it never ends.

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Roundup: Christy Clark walks out

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And that was the third and final day of the Council of the Federation meeting in Halifax, and it too had its share of drama as BC Premier Christy Clark walked out on the discussions on a national energy strategy until her concerns over the Northern Gateway Pipeline were addressed. While BC MPs gave a fairly mixed reaction to Clark’s move, the other premiers seemed fairly non-plussed with the attitude that it’s a big country, and they can go ahead without them. And then they all went back to complaining about health transfers. Meanwhile, a portion of an existing Enbridge pipeline in Ontario was approved to have its flow reversed, which could be an early step in bringing more western crude to eastern refineries – assuming that the pipeline can carry heavy crude and has enough capacity to make it worthwhile.

Here’s a look at five past and current interprovincial disputes.

In the Paul Calandra fundraising news, it seems that the chairman of the proposed radio station vying for the licence was encouraged to attend the fundraiser and make a donation. Yeah, that should have raised a flag.

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Roundup: Redford vs Clark

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The brewing battle between premiers Christy Clark and Alison Redford went up a notch yesterday as Clark fired back at Redford’s suggestion that her demands for a portion of the royalties meant rewriting Confederation. Clark, not unsurprisingly, called Reford’s comments “silly” and unreasonable to suggested that she was trying to destroy Confederation. Clark’s point is that BC is taking a disproportionate share of the risk with regards to the length of the pipeline and the marine consequences, but isn’t guaranteed an adequate proportion of the revenues. She also steadfastly says that she is neither supporting nor objecting to the pipeline at this point considering that the environmental review process remains incomplete. On a side note, here’s a look at how the upcoming elections in BC and Quebec may play out at the Council of the Federation Meeting that starts today.

The head of Peter Penashue’s campaign says he’s sorry for exceeding the limits and for his lax bookkeeping. Well, so long as he’s sorry, that makes everything better, right? (Todd Russell, the former MP, who lost by a mere 79 votes, doesn’t plan to challenge the results given the recommendations, for the record). Meanwhile, Elections Canada was not interested in offering Dean Del Mastro “immunity” in exchange for more information about the funding irregularities.

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Roundup: Countdown to the Supreme Court hearing

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In advance of Tuesday’s Supreme Court hearing, Elections Canada has some new evidence that could cast doubt on some of the ballots that were nullified in the lower court decision. This is one of those rare moments when the Supreme Court will consider new evidence rather than just the factums presented before them.

The question of what to do with Dean Del Mastro continued to play out yesterday as the Liberals tried to get the Ethics committee to reconvene to hear from him, while the NDP decided to quash that idea (apparently it’s too much of a circus for the likes of serial name-caller Charlie Angus), but they instead want Rob Nicholson to refer the case to the Director of Public Prosecutions – even though it’s not actually his job to investigate things. But hey, details, right?

Here are three things that Julian Fantino needs to know about CIDA as he takes over the portfolio. Fantino, meanwhile, gives a bit of a slap to his predecessor when he pledges to bring “fiscal discipline” to the department.

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Roundup: No prorogation until the “mid-term”

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In case you were wondering, Stephen Harper has ruled out a prorogation anytime in the near future, but hints that there would be a more extensive cabinet shuffle and new Speech From the Throne in the “mid-term” as they re-jig their longer-term agenda. (Full interview here). All of this media speculation he’s quashing – all that’s left to speculate on is who will fill those six vacant and soon-to-be-vacant Senate seats. Meanwhile, Susan Delacourt wonders if Bev Oda was tricked into resigning if she supposedly got tipped off that she was being shuffled out, and yet Harper said he’s not planning any major shuffles. It does make you think.

Speaking of Oda, it seems that all of her old limousine invoices mysteriously turned up the day after she resigned – even though days ago media outlets were told that those documents didn’t exist. I’m sure the Information Commissioner will be very interested in how that happened.

Failed refugee claimants are being offered $2000 worth of assistance and a one-way plane ticket if they voluntarily return to their country of origin. Some refugee lawyers say it’s humane and voluntary, while others worry it’s a bribe for them to walk away from their legal rights. Apparently this saves taxpayers money because it means CBSA doesn’t have to chase them down for deportation, so everyone (except genuine refugee whose claims have been unfairly denied and who are in danger if they return to their country of origin) wins, right?

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Roundup: A wee little cabinet shuffle

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Stephen Harper surprised everyone yesterday with a wee little cabinet shuffle – Julian Fantino is going to CIDA in Oda’s place, and Bernard Valcourt gets the associate deputy minister position for defence while retaining his ACOA portfolio and the Francophonie.  Fantino is an…interesting choice, considering he’s spent his career being the guy who as getting tough on crime and now he’s being the face of Canada’s compassion and aid. As for Valcourt, he’s a Mulroney-era veteran who is moving a up the ladder a little bit, but considering how marginalised the military procurement file has become in the advent of the era of the procurement secretariat, it makes one wonder why they bothered to retain the portfolio. Also, interesting that Peter MacKay and John Duncan are staying put despite major gaffes of their own, and more evidence that Harper will refuse to make changes in order to avoid admitting that he made a mistake with his choices.

The government is tightening temporary foreign worker rules so that it will exclude exotic dancers, escorts and people who work in massage parlours, as they’re more “vulnerable to exploitation.” Of course, one suspects that this will just drive this all that much further underground and rather than have people documented so that they have access to some kind of assistance if they are being exploited, they’ll just be classified as “hostesses” or “servers” (provided they take a drink order) and it won’t actually have an effect on exploitation of human trafficking (assuming of course that we’re not just conflating human trafficking with the sex trade, as they are not the same thing).

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Roundup: Kenney versus the provinces

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As the provinces line up to denounce the government move to cut off certain health benefits to certain refugees, Jason Kenney continues to argue that they’re wrong. Never mind that he’s creating arbitrary inequalities that will be subject to court challenges, or that his pandering to a populist base ignores the fact that these refugees can’t have the same care as other Canadians because they’re not allowed to work, and thus can’t earn the money necessary for the care they require.

Here are six things that will change on July 1st as new laws come into effect.

Even though the bill on taking wine across provincial borders has now received royal assent, a myriad of provincial laws and regulations still makes this a fraught proposition. (Lowering interprovincial trade barriers – a government priority since 1867!)

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Roundup: Final vote on C-38 due today

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At 5:30 tonight, the Senate will vote on third reading of both C-38 and C-25 – the copyright reform bill, and one can imagine that royal assent will immediately follow. With those two bills out of the way, they’ll rise for the summer.

A new cross-border privacy deal has been signed that will allow Americans to share Canadian entry data with other countries without notification. The Privacy Commissioner is reading over the agreement, and I look forward to some fairly stinging “suggestions for improvement.”

A group of federal public servants got into some trouble for wearing “Harper hates me” buttons at the office. Public servants engaging in overt partisan politics is a very bad sign, and is detrimental to the continued functioning of our system of governance.

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Roundup: Rumours with dubious evidence

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The Senate is ensuring that three contentious bills get passed before it rises for the summer, fuelling rumours that Harper is planning to prorogue Parliament in the fall and start a new session. The problem with this “evidence” for that theory is that the three bills in question have some external timelines – the budget implementation for obvious reasons (and the Senate traditionally sits until such a bill gets passed regularly, despite this particular bill’s particular circumstances), the refugee reform bill has a deadline of June 30th unless the previously passed refugee reform bill comes into force, which the government is trying to supersede, and the copyright reform bill is at the centre of our negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As far as theories go, the evidence doesn’t actually fit. Nice try, though.

The Military Police Complaints Commission report into the Afghan detainee issue was finally released yesterday, and it absolves the military police of wrongdoing. That said, it was very limited in scope, and it had to devote an entire chapter to the government stonewalling of information and it raised the spectre of the Somalia Inquiry along the way (bonus 1994 CBC video here with Young Stephen Harper again contradicting Prime Minister Stephen Harper).

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Roundup: Secret meeting with Mulroney

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With a need to bolster his public image in Quebec, and the real sense of how much trouble he could be in should the PQ get elected in the province, Harper apparently had a secret meeting with Brian Mulroney last week for advice. (I’m still trying to figure out when that might have happened, given that Harper’s been a pretty busy PM of late, between international travel and vote-a-thons in the Commons). Nevertheless, necessity can make for strange bedfellows. Paul Wells dissects what it all means here.

The Rio+20 summit has ended with little in the way of agreed upon targets or timelines. Peter Kent says it’s a good thing, and that big conferences like that end up being counter-productive, and that binding targets are “inappropriate” and “unrealistic.”

Despite the requests to waive solicitor-client privilege in the investigation of a soldier’s suicide, Peter MacKay says no.

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