Roundup: May’s problematic proposals

Green Party leader Elizabeth May decided to weigh in on the Standing Orders debate yesterday with a proposal paper of her own, considering Government House Leader Bardish Chagger’s proposal to have been an earnest trial balloon that has now blown up in her face and in need of moving on. May’s didn’t object to some of Chagger’s proposals, but came up with a few of her own, some of which are of dubious merit.

To start off with, however, May lards her paper up with a bunch of constitutional canards, such as the fact that political parties don’t appear in the constitution. If you hear the sound of my head banging on the desk, it’s because May is privileging the written Constitution Act as opposed to the unwritten constitutional conventions which are just as valid and just as important to our system of government, and are in fact foundational because that’s how our system of Responsible Government is expressed, and parties are foundational to that system. Just because they don’t appear in writing doesn’t mean they’re absent from our constitutional framework – they are fundamental to it, and May (and the scholars she cites) are simply obtuse to not recognise that fact. May then insists that the Westminster system has been distorted by parties gaining power and with presidential leaders, but rather than actually diagnosing where the problem is – the bastardized way in which we conduct leadership contests – she instead retreats to her usual hobbyhorse of the electoral system, which would not in fact solve any of the problems she identifies.

But if you make it past her civically illiterate pap, she digs into the suggestions with the most notable one being that she wants more concentrated sittings – five-and-a-half days a week for three to four weeks at a stretch, then three to four weeks back in the riding, insisting that this is also better from an emission standpoint since MPs would be travelling less. But where her logic here falls apart is saying that given this would stress families more that making it more attractive for families to relocate to Ottawa might be a consideration – but unless the families go back-and-forth on the three-to-four week rotations, being even more disruptive to children’s schools – then there is simply falls apart on the face of it. She also proposes that staffers be given compensatory time off instead of overtime, which seems far more unfair to these staffers considering that the work doesn’t stop when MPs are back in their ridings, and you’re forcing people (many of them younger) to work even more than they already do with less time off as a bit cruel.

May also proposes that a UK-style Fixed-term Parliaments Act be adopted, which officially makes her wilfully blind to the problems that it’s causing to Westminster’s operations, and the fact that it reduces the ability to hold a government to account because it requires a two-thirds vote to call an early election beyond a non-confidence vote with a simple majority. I get that she wants this to force parties to come to different coalition arrangements, but when accountability suffers, that’s a huge problem. But as with most of her suggestions for “improvement,” May is more concerned with her own partisan intransigence than she is with actual Westminster democracy, which is why I find her entire paper to be of dubious merit.

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Roundup: Sweeping, questionable changes

The House and Senate have both risen for the summer, but as they did, Jason Kenney and Chris Alexander unveiled their massive overhaul of the Temporary Foreign Workers Programme. It proposes to try and make the programme harder to use, with ever-diminishing caps on the number of workers (who were a fraction of one percent of the total workforce in the country, incidentally) with the aim of getting more unemployed Canadians, as well as Aboriginals, new immigrants and people with disabilities into these low-wage jobs. But Kenney seemed tone deaf to some of the massive labour challenges in Alberta, to demographic issues, to incentivising labour mobility, to the problems of aging populations in rural regions that are depopulating, but most especially to the attitude change that needs to happen if they think that university graduates will think that low-wage jobs in the food service industry or even higher-wage jobs in processing jobs like meat packing are going to be the answer to their labour shortages. The NDP condemned the changes without actually reading them, and all of their objections were addressed, not that it mattered. The Liberals made some pretty salient comments about the implausible changes to inspections and the giant loophole going unaddressed through the youth labour exchange programme. The restaurant and small business associations are really unhappy with the changes, which hamstring their ability to find workers in tough markets. John Geddes starts picking out the flaws in Kenney’s case, including demographics and the notion that it’s likely that non-Canadians made for cheaper and more reliable hires. Andrew Coyne says that the changes are simply bad policy, which punishes the service sector where a government goes out of its way to prevent a manufacturing job from offshoring. Coyne notes that if Canadians don’t want to take these jobs, then they shouldn’t be artificially shoehorned into them, but rather to spend their efforts creating value elsewhere in the economy while those who do want those jobs should be made to be Canadians by using the TFW programme as a pathway to citizenship.

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QP: The Commissioner’s conflicts

Things got off to an unusual start, as the Commons immediately descended into Committee of the Whole, and Olympic and Paralympic athletes were invited into the Chamber for the MPs to congratulate them on their performances at Sochi. It was too bad that this couldn’t have taken place while the Prime Minister was here. And there were so many selfies taken by MPs. When QP did begin, Thomas Mulcair asked about the recommendations put forward by the veterans affairs committee about changing the system for the better. Peter MacKay thanked the committee for the report, and pledged the government’s continued support for veterans. Mulcair wondered what he meant by “deal with the recommendations,” to which MacKay snapped back that “It means we act on them.” Mulcair brought up that veteran’s wife who has been asking for support and training for spouses, to which MacKay thanked her and her spouse, and noted the improved benefits for veterans in eight budgets that the NDP voted against. Mulcair changed topics, and noted the places where the nominee for privacy commissioner would need to recuse himself for a conflict. Tony Clement noted Therrien’s thirty years of service, and noted that the commissioner has an office that can act in his stead. Mulcair pointed out that the Official Opposition didn’t agree to the nomination, and that the conflicts pointed out why Therrien couldn’t become the commissioner. Clement said that Mulcair’s attempts to drag Therrien’s name in the mud were shameful. Justin Trudeau was up for the Liberals — two days in a row this week! — and asked about the process for the next Supreme Court vacancy. Peter MacKay said that they intend to consult widely, but were concerned about the leaks in the previous process and that they would proceed with caution. Trudeau moved on, and pointed out that next year, there would be more temporary foreign workers accepted than permanent residents. Chris Alexander insisted that they got rid of backlogs and had increased the number of immigrants. Trudeau shot back that as a percentage of the population, the number of immigrants was down, but Chris Alexander tried to correct Trudeau and took several swipes at their record.

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Roundup: Sticking to the sidelines

A number of Quebec senators are also shying away from getting involved in the provincial election there, though some are saying that they will play whatever roles they can along the sidelines. The mayors of a number of smaller towns in the rest of Canada are alarmed that their local newspapers are owned by QMI, which in turn is owned by Pierre-Karl Péladeau, especially considering just how concentrated his ownership of that media is. Michael Den Tandt notes that Pauline Marois has been articulating Jacques Parizeau’s vision, where it was “money and the ethnic vote” that lost them the last referendum, and that Marois is sidelining those ethnic minorities with her values charter and trying to bring money on her side with Péladeau. Economist Stephen Gordon writes about the desirability of a monetary union with an independent Quebec, and how Quebec’s debt load would make it a risky proposition for them. Marois tried to insist that it would be “borderless” and would welcome Canadian tourists. No worries, see!

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QP: Fantino not going anywhere

It was a busy news day, with the Fair Elections Act tabled and charges laid against both Senator Patrick Brazeau and former senator Mac Harb. It was a question of which would happen first — denunciations of the bill, or attempting to make a Mac Harb question sound like government business. When QP got underway, Thomas Mulcair first demanded the resignation of Julian Fantino, not that Stephen Harper was going to bite on that one. When he insisted that the veterans service centres be restored, Harper insisted that they had increased services, not cuts. Mulcair moved onto the issue of CSE’s monitoring of airport WiFi and asked who authorised it, Harper assured him that CSE acted within the law. Justin Trudeau was up next, and brought up the elections bill and called it an attack on Elections Canada. Harper insisted that this was simply about ensuring proper independence of the Commissioner of Elections. When Trudeau brought up Elections Canada’s request to have the powers to compel testimony, Harper retreated to the same talking points.

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Roundup: Poilievre’s questionable moves

Being released today is the new election reform act brought forward by the government which promises to reshape Elections Canada. And yes, the opposition is nervous. Already there are questions as to why Pierre Poilievre was selective in his answers to the House yesterday during QP when he said that he had met with the Chief Electoral Officer about the bill. That meeting, however, was before it was drafted, and not about the actual provision or language of the bill, which is kind of a big deal. One of the big questions about the bill is the provision that the new Commissioner of Elections be appointed by the Director of Public Prosecutions rather than the Chief Electoral Officer, and how that will affect his or her independence. Oh, and the most egregious part? That Poilievre is having his press conference to announce the bill before the technical briefing for reporters takes place. You know, so they won’t have time to read it or understand it before asking questions. Because that’s not a cynical move designed to frustrate the media and keep things as opaque as possible.

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QP: Sedate questions sans Fantino

Monday in the House, and the benches slowly filled up before QP was about to get started, but Elizabeth May was the only leader present. As well, it was Deputy Speaker Joe Comartin in the Chair, and the Wooden Mace on the table. That left it up to Megan Leslie to lead off for the NDP, wondering about Julian Fantino’s union-bashing rather than supporting veterans. Parm Gill, Fantino’s parliamentary secretary, insisted that veterans would be better off with the new system as there would be more home delivery of service. Leslie moved onto the topic of CSE using airport Wifi to track travellers, to which Rob Nicholson repeated the talking point that the CSE Commissioner found their activities to be within the law. Jack Harris repeated the same again in English, not that he got a different answer. For the Liberals, Wayne Easter carried on with the questions of CSE’s activities, but Nicholson’s answers didn’t change. When Easter brought up the Commissioner’s report in which he stated that some of the activities may have been directed at Canadians in contravention of the law, Nicholson’s answers didn’t budge from their script. Marc Garneau have one last attempt at the question in French, but Nicholson insisted that CSE was in the business of protecting Canadians, and that should have the support of the Liberals.

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Roundup: One Keystone XL hurdle cleared

The US State Department’s report on the Keystone XL pipeline has been released, and they have determined that it won’t have any significant impact on greenhouse gas emissions, and also gave figures for what would happen if all of that oil were to be transported by rail, which would mean not only more emissions, but also more injuries and fatalities. Energy economist Andrew Leach parses what’s in the report here. Luisa Ch. Savage details the reception in Washington DC to the report and among environmentalists, who continue to remain opposed. Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall thinks the report is a cause for optimism that the pipeline will eventually happen.

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Roundup: Overselling change, reaffirming identity

In more reaction to Justin Trudeau’s senate move – which the Liberals are totally overselling in both chambers, incidentally – we hear from Senator Anne Cools, the Dean of the Senate, who fears that it may be unwise and that it doesn’t speak highly of Trudeau’s sense of loyalty. Conservative MP John Williamson says boneheaded things like we should choose senators out of the phone book. Senator Terry Mercer says that while he may no longer be in national caucus, nobody is going to stop him from being a party activist, either at the provincial or federal level. Mercer and fellow Senate Liberal Céline Hervieux-Payette were on Power & Politics, where Mercer said the important change is that there will no longer be whipped votes (but the role of the Whip is organisational), and it’s obvious that Evan Solomon needs to brush up on the constitution (hint: the Senate’s legitimacy is conferred by the constitution). A few other senators are pushing back a little against the move, and the Conservatives in the Senate are now questioning funds to the opposition. A few months ago, Stéphane Dion dismissed the very idea of an appointments commission as elitist and watered down the Prime Minister’s accountability – and he’s entirely right. Laura Payton explains the caucus mechanics and why they’re important. Bruce Hicks gives some history about the kinds of appointments that Sir John A Macdonald promised when the Senate was created.

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Roundup: Strahl, Enbridge, and no broken rules

In regards to the hysteria around Chuck Strahl consulting on behalf of Enbridge in BC, it seems that Enbridge has been a client of his since 2011 – at least, with regards to any activities on the provincial level. He’s also registered in Alberta to lobby for a First Nations energy that is drilling for oil on its territory with a Chinese-financed company. Can’t you just see all of the conspiracy theories churning? But as Kady O’Malley points out, because the chairmanship of SIRC is considered a part-time gig (as they meet less than a dozen times per year), he’s exempt from many of the restrictions in the Conflict of Interest Act, and Strahl also has stated that he’s not hearing any CSIS cases that involve Enbridge or any of his other clients, there’s no real conflict there.

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