Tag Archives: Euthanasia

Roundup: A baffling way to fast-track a bill

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The House of Commons began their fast-tracked debate on Bill C-39 yesterday, which is the bill to delay the onset of making mental disorder the sole criteria for accessing Medical Assistance in Dying, but even before debate got started, the government moved their motion to fast-track it in the most unusual and frankly unserious way possible. The motion extends sittings to midnight Monday and Wednesday (they sat until about 10:30 last night), all in the service of second reading debate. At midnight or collapse of debate on Wednesday, the bill is deemed to have been adopted at second reading, deemed to have been send to committee of the whole, deemed adopted and reported back, deemed to be adopted at third reading, and sent off to the Senate. The same motion also authorized the justice committee to sit as long as they need to today to consider the bill, and to be given priority of resources (i.e. interpreters) from any other committee for their study. But they don’t actually report back to the Commons (remember it is deemed to have gone to committee of the whole), so I’m not sure what the point of the exercise is.

Procedurally, this is bonkers, and furthermore, it just exacerbates the fact that we have a completely broken understanding of what second reading debate is supposed to be in this country. It’s where you debate the overall purpose of the bill, and it should last a single afternoon, with a handful speeches and some debate, and then be sent off to committee where they can do the real work. But instead, our Parliament has decided that second reading debate needs days upon days of canned speeches—particularly on a bill like this where everyone can stand up and say how “deeply personal” the issue is, and where a large number of Conservatives in particular can decry it and repeat a bunch of false assertions and misinformation about what this is supposed to be about. None of how they went about this makes any sense (and I remind you that the bill is one line). If all of the parties decided to fast-track this, there should have been a single speech from each party, and then to send it to committee for actual consideration today, so it can be sent back on Wednesday for final consideration. They didn’t need to contort themselves in this way in order to give everyone speaking time (like they did with the interminable speeches for the invocation of the Emergencies Act).

Once again, this is another signal of how unserious our Parliament is, and that it has devolved into little more than an exercise in reading canned speeches into the record. Nobody is actually being served by this, and our MPs need to grow up and start actually engaging with the material before them.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 356:

Bakhmut and its suburbs are being subjected to heavy shelling as Russia’s new offensive has begun, and Ukraine says that they have fortified their positions in the area. Russians have also struck in Kharkiv, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia regions, and have been fortifying their own positions in the south of the country. Meanwhile, the Secretary-General of NATO warned that Ukraine is using ammunition faster than allies can provide it, and is trying to put pressure on Western defence industries to ramp up production as Russia is with its own industries.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1625178486926196740

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Roundup: Four balloons and counting

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Apparently Chinese balloons are all the rage right now, as Justin Trudeau ordered NORAD defences to shoot down a balloon over Yukon (and recover operations are now ongoing), and now another “object” has been shot down over Lake Huron in coordination with continental defences. Yes, an American F-22 did the job, but it sounds like that was because it was closer launching from Alaska, whereas our CF-18s launched from Cold Lake, which is much further south (though some have said the F-22 can fly higher than a CF-18, but that doesn’t sound like the reason). This makes a total of four likely balloons being shot down in North American airspace in the past several days. From what I’ve been given to understand, much of the NORAD systems have been calibrated for planes and missiles, so many of these balloons may not have been noticed, but now that we’re noticing them, well, we’re really noticing a lot of them, and shooting them down sends a message to China—assuming that these are theirs, because that is still an open question.

https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1624886714257879040

If nothing else, this has been a teaching moment about NORAD, because some people don’t seem to understand how it operates.

There are plenty of questions as to why balloons, and the fact that they may have gone undetected by NORAD systems may be a clue, but it’s been a whole weekend of this.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 355:

Russian forces spent the weekend shelling the eastern part of the country, and in particular Nikopol and Kharkiv, but it also looks like they are having a hard time getting their planned new offensive off the ground. President Volodymyr Zelenzkyy has praised the country’s efforts in restoring their electrical grid after repeated Russian attacks, but says it’s too early to declare victory just yet. Meanwhile, here is a look at Ukraine’s cultural diplomacy, and their calls for cultural sanctions against Russia, which would include banning their athletes from the Olympic Games.

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Roundup: The UCP can’t even get capitalism right

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The Alberta government’s plan to move ahead with RStar—a particularly boneheaded scheme by which oil companies can keep a portion of their royalties to clean up orphan or abandoned wells which they already have a legal obligation to do, is getting pushback from some fairly surprising sources, like those tree huggers at Scotiabank, who point out that this kind of a programme goes against fundamental capitalist principles. It’s also indicative out outright corruption, because premier Danielle Smith was lobbying on behalf of certain companies for this kind of subsidy before she got elected. This whole thing is just a giant flashing red flag of what is wrong with Alberta politics.

 

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 352:

As Russian forces continue their assault in the Donbas region, there are concerns that SpaceX has started limiting use of Starlink satellites for use by Ukraine’s military to control drones (which are mainly used for reconnaissance). Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy was in Brussels to both look for more aid and to plead for EU membership, even though that process can take a decade. He also said that Ukraine intercepted Russian plans to destroy Moldova, which Moldovan intelligence confirmed, a plan that mirrored what Russia had planned for Ukraine.

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Roundup: It’s like the market is deciding

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There remains a lot of insistence that Canada should be exporting more LNG, and confusion as to why we’re not. And lo, there are a bunch of market forces at work, as fully permitted projects are not getting underway. Justin Trudeau’s remarks about there not being a business case turns out to actually be true. Funny how that works.

 

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 345:

Russia hit more apartment buildings in Kramatorsk in overnight bombings, while they try and encircle Bakhmut in the East. Meanwhile, the UK is saying no to providing fighter jets to Ukraine because they say that training the pilots takes three years (and yeah, I can see that, not to mention the maintenance on them is hideously time-consuming). Ukraine is also restarting repairs to some of its power plants, which is relieving the electricity shortages brought on by attacks.

https://twitter.com/zelenskyyua/status/1621193898948182021

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QP: Crossing a line around MAiD access allegations

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The prime minister was allegedly in town, but didn’t show up for QP today, while his deputy was out of town, and most of the other leaders were absent as well, save Pierre Poilievre. And he led off QP in French, worrying about how much mortgage costs have risen, rent increases, and blaming this on “inflationist policies” of the government (which is completely contrary to economic data). Pascale St-Onge, who is apparently now the designated French responder during the leaders’ round when Trudeau is away, gave the back-patting that Canadians know the government is there for them when times are tough. Poilievre switched to English to repeat the same question, demanding that the prime minister take responsibility for pricing working-class youth out of a home. Ahmed Hussen praised their measures such as the rent-to-own programme, the tax-free savings account for first-time buyers, and that the Conservatives voted against these kinds of measures. Poilievre insisted that they voted against inflationary policies, and complained about how much housing prices have gone up in markets like Toronto, demanding the federal government take responsibility for this failure (never mind that these are clearly municipality and provincial responsibilities). Randy Boissonnault reminded him that mothers who took CERB and parents who take their kids to the dentist don’t create inflation, and that the Conservatives dealt in nonsense economics. Poilievre insisted that the government created that inflation, and blamed government spending for inflating the housing market (which is lunacy), and Hussen got back up to demand that Poilievre take responsibility for voting against housing supports. Poilievre took on a tone of faux gravitas and drew a specious link between people at food banks and asking for Medical Assistance in Dying because poverty has them depressed, and accused the government of being more in favour of them accessing MAiD for depression rather than helping them (which is frankly outrageous, particularly since the expansion of MAiD for mental illness is explicitly not about simple depression, no matter what its opponents will falsely claim). Carolyn Bennett tried to dispute this and point out that the eligibility criteria screens out suicidal behaviour, but she was shouted down and the Speaker didn’t allow her to start again from the top.

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc and demanded the resignation of Amira Elghawaby, because of course he did. Hussen read that she already clarified and apologised for her past comments and invited Therrien to read that statement. Therrien insisted that the position itself was a problem and that it was only about demonising Quebec, and demanded the position be abolished. Hussen got up to talk about his attending the memorial for the Quebec City mosque shooting and how many people attended it, before reiterating that she already clarified and apologised for her past comments.

Alexandre Boulerice rose for the Bloc, and he yelled about use of consultants as privatisation and decried that they were being too cheap with public servants at the bargaining table. Mona Fortier recited some pabulum about good jobs for Canadians. Gord Johns read the English version of the same question with added sanctimony, wanting a full investigation into government outsourcing. Helena Jaczek said that she looked forward to answering their questions at committee. 

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Roundup: Barton deflates his critics

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I’m sure that in the minds of MPs, yesterday’s meeting of the Government Operations committee was going to be the high point of the calendar. Dominic Barton was coming to testify, and boy, were they going to blow open the case about how McKinsey got so many contracts with the federal government, or about what Barton knew about the Perdue Pharma scandal, and if they were really good, they could draw some kind of line between Perdue, Barton, Justin Trudeau, and the opioid crisis, and then dine out for weeks on the clips.

It really didn’t turn out that way. I mean, sure, opposition MPs were showboating for all they were worth, whether it was Stephanie Kusie being obnoxious, Garnett Genuis trying to pick fights, or Gord Johns’ unctuous sanctimony. Yves-François Blanchet personally turned up to try and get answers about what McKinsey allegedly told the government about immigration levels. But all of it was pretty much for naught.

Barton largely shut down most of their lines of attack. No, he’s not a close personal friend of the prime minister—they don’t go to dinner, he doesn’t have his personal phone number, they don’t hang out. There was no personal relationship so it didn’t win McKinsey any government contracts, and he wasn’t involved in any of those contracts regardless because he had been in Asia since 1996. He also denied knowing what McKinsey was doing with Perdue Pharma, because it wasn’t his area of responsibility, and he asked several times if they understood how a company like McKinsey operates. Really, he was asked to serve his country, and he did because he wanted to give back, is how he tells it. He also made the point that the civil service’s human resources systems are week, and need to be revamped with better training for civil servants if they want to cut down on the reliance on outside consultants, and he’s absolutely right about that (and yes, I have talked to people who study these things about that).

In all, it was just another example of how our Commons committees are largely dysfunctional and are nothing but theatre that we were unfortunate enough to be subjected to for two solid hours of bullshit. Because our Parliament is such a serious institution these days.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 344:

Russian forces shelled Bakhmut and ten towns and villages surrounding it, as they continue their advance on the strategically important city. (There are a couple of accounts of life in Bakhmut currently, here and here). As well, they destroyed an apartment building in Kramatorsk, because you know, they’re totally not targeting civilians. Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s crackdown on graft continues, with a raid carried out at the Tax Office and the home of a former interior minister.

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Roundup: Summoning Sunwing and VIA to committee

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The chair of the Commons transport committee says he is looking to call a meeting shortly in order to summon the heads of airlines like Sunwing and of VIA Rail to get them to explain how they handled the travel chaos over the holidays. Which is all well and good, even if it’s more about a public expression of anger and accountability. The wrinkle here is that the Conservatives also want the minister to be summoned to explain why he didn’t “fix the system.”

Sigh.

Aside from the risible press release that the Conservative transport critic, Mark Strahl, put out over the holidays that essentially blamed Justin Trudeau for the weather, we have to remember that the government has very few levers at their disposal here. They don’t run the airlines, and while VIA Rail is a Crown Corporation, it is operated at arm’s length from the government specifically so that they can’t tell them what to do. (The minister can select the board of directors and give general policy directives, like they are doing with the pursuit of high-frequency rail, but he cannot direct operations). We all watched over the summer as airport operators conveniently blamed the ArriveCan app for their failures to do things like hire enough ground crews, or airlines blaming the app for their decisions to schedule flights that didn’t have flight crews, and that credulous media organisations lapped it up without calling them on their bullshit, and lo, nothing actually got fixed (which, again, the minister cannot direct because those are private companies), so when these problems persisted and were amplified by the inclement weather over the holidays, they can no longer blame ArriveCan or anything the federal government has or has not done. They should face some actual accountability for their failures, rather than just have the opposition parties repeat their bullshit to try and pin the problems on the government.

Of course, the government could and should do something about the Canadian Transportation Agency, like shaking up its membership so that it’s no longer subject to capture by the industry, or giving it additional resources to deal with the backlog of complaints, or strengthening its governing structure, or any number of other things that could hold industry to account. That would be a better use of their time than having Strahl give a performance for the cameras at committee, where he can invent new constituents like “Briane” to give fictitious sob stories about, but this government has shown little interest in doing that work. Perhaps the committee could expend some of their time and resources to provide that pressure?

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 315:

Russia says that 89 service members were killed in the Ukrainian attack on a position in occupied Donetsk region, and cited the unauthorised use of mobile phones from their soldiers that allowed their location to be determined. (They also claim they retaliated and killed 200 Ukrainian soldiers and four HIMARS launchers, to which Ukraine says two people were injured in an attack on a hockey arena in the area attacked). There is also talk that the increasing use of drones in this conflict could bring about the dawn of the “killer robot” as they become more autonomous.

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Roundup: That’s not what the Canada Health Act means

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As much as I have some residual shreds of optimism that some people are starting to wake up to what is going on with the collapse of our healthcare system and are finally starting to apportion blame where it belongs—namely the provincial premiers—that doesn’t extend to everyone. And lo, there are still far too many members of the pundit class in this country, including its newest inductee, who refuse to get the memo, and who misconstrue the system in order to pin the problems on Justin Trudeau. To add to that, my reply feed is inundated with people who believe the disinformation that Trudeau has either cut or withheld half of the funding for provinces, which bears absolutely no resemblance to what is happening in reality.

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603795671760486411

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603796262276550657

And do not start handwaving about the Canada Health Act, because you can pretty much guarantee that it doesn’t mean what you think it means.

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603804047282151424

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603805458699259904

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603805932995182592

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1603806417819168768

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 297:

Russia launched a major missile offensive against Ukraine, whose forces intercepted some 60 of the 76 missiles fired at them. That further damaged critical infrastructure in places like Kyiv, Kharkiv, Kryvhi Rih, and Zaporhizhzhia. This of course strained electrical grids even further, as each subsequent attack strains the system even further, making it harder to recover from each attack.

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Roundup: Delaying the expansion of MAiD?

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The day after the House of Commons rose for the winter break, David Lametti and Carolyn Bennett announced that they would be moving to delay the implementation of the expansion of medical assistance in dying for those who suffer solely from a mental disorder, or for mature minors with terminal conditions. The problem? The expansion date is already legislated, so they will need to pass legislation when they return at the end of January in order to make that happen, and they haven’t released any details to opposition parties about what kind of delay they’re talking about.

There are a lot of problems with this announcement. While I won’t repeat most of what I wrote in this column last week, part of the problem is that this perpetuates an unfairness for those who have an untreatable mental disorder but also have another comorbidity who can apply for MAiD while those who don’t have the comorbidity can’t, and in the process, it continues to stigmatise mental illness. That’s why the delay also goes against the Supreme Court of Canada’s finding of unconstitutionality. Meanwhile, everyone who says “mental health is health” but is pulling for this delay is making a hypocrite of themselves because you’re proving that it’s something separate. Additionally, you can’t just say the federal government shouldn’t go ahead with the expansion until more supports are offered because they cannot legislate those supports. Those have to come from the provinces, who are not bound to any federal timetable, and while yes, the federal government is negotiating a dedicated mental health transfer to the provinces, we are back to the problem of negotiating outcomes into that agreement and provinces balking at strings. We can’t divorce the fact that most of the objections to this are either socially conservatives in nature that oppose all forms of MAiD in principle, or it’s from people squeamish about mental illness and who are further perpetuating stigmatisation. I have little doubt that this is going to turn into a meltdown in February once MPs are back, and it’s going to be extremely hard on the system.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 296:

Russian forces are pounding the Donetsk region. Russia has been threatening “consequences” if the US does deliver a Patriot anti-missile system to Ukraine, without spelling out what those are, but part of the problem with America transferring the systems is that they take some 90 personnel to operate and training which they can’t provide on the ground.

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Roundup: Not recognizing one of our most important events

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Yesterday was Statute of Westminster Day, but you wouldn’t actually know it given how little attention it receives. My Apple calendar does mark the occasion, but how many people understand its significance? And they should, because it was probably the most significant development in our country’s constitutional history—arguably more significant than confederation itself, or of patriation in 1982. Why? Because the Statute of Westminster in 1931 was the creation of the Crown of Canada, as a separate and distinct entity from the Crown of the United Kingdom.

https://twitter.com/Canadian_Crown/status/1601987723476275202

This matters because it gave us control of our own foreign policy, and domestically, it centred the Governor General as taking advice only from the Canadian prime minister, no longer reporting to the UK’s foreign office like they used to do. There are fewer developments that are more important in how we have been able to operate independently as a sovereign country with our own sovereign at the head. So how did the various political parties mark the occasion, particularly in a year where the Crown of Canada has been in focus because of the transition to the new King?

Only the Conservatives put out a statement, and it didn’t even mention the Crown of Canada. So, that’s where we are. One of our most important constitutional developments as a country, left by the wayside. It’s a sad indictment of our history and civics knowledge that this happens year after year.

Ukraine Dispatch, Day 292:

Odessa is mostly in the dark after Russian attacks, and it could take a month to restore their power grid. As the battle in the eastern part of the country grinds on, the city of Bakhmut is essentially destroyed. And a month after being liberated, Kherson is still in the process of clearing the booby-traps Russian forces laid for civilians in the area.

https://twitter.com/strategywoman/status/1602012251543982080

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