Tag Archives: Federalism

Roundup: Getting a second opinion on the dominant narrative

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It was a day full of Canadian pundits pontificating about Indian politics around Justin Trudeau’s trip, whether it’s around his use of traditional garb, the “snubs” by Indian politicians, and then the issue with Jaspal Atwal being invited to that reception. While MP Randeep Sarai has taken responsibility for Atwal’s invitation, the dominant narrative was that someone in PMO had to have known who he was, or that they somehow overrode the kinds of screening that the RCMP or CSIS would have put in place for an event like this. That, of course, got blown out of the water when media actually talked to security sources who said that they had no capacity to vet the 700 or so people invited to this event, so there went that theory. And yes, the Atwal thing is bad, and according to an Indo-American journalist that I spoke to about this, that probably set back Indo-Canadian relations by years, so well done MP Sarai. “Senior government officials” are also now pushing the theory that “rogue elements” in India’s government facilitated this, possibly to embarrass Canada for being “soft” on Sikh separatist extremists, so we’ll see if that compounds any damage.

First of all, if you did not do so yesterday, please take the time to read Kevin Carmichael’s look at the trip, and in particular how pack journalism narratives have formed, but he makes very relevant points about the political dynamics and the regional politics of India that the Canadian media is completely ignoring. My Indo-American friend made a few other observations about the coverage that we’re seeing, which is that he’s not actually being treated poorly over there, and it’s more that certain politicians and business leaders don’t want to be associated with members of the Indian Cabinet, which is controversial in large swaths of Indian society. As for the focus on Trudeau’s wardrobe, most of it is coming from the intellectual, international elite of India, who resent outsiders exoticising India, but the fact that Trudeau is allegedly wearing Indo-Canadian designers will garner plenty of positive reaction. She also added that the inside joke is that Indians outside of India have terrible taste, and are over the top and garish, but it’s also related to their own class stratification. Even tweets coming from verified accounts means that they’re coming from the social elite of India, and that journalism and public intellectualism in India, especially in Delhi, is oriented to socialites. So what Trudeau is doing will play incredibly well with many aspects of the stratified society. As for the Atwal issue, there will likely be competing narratives in India between the bureaucratic incompetence that allowed him into the country in the first place, tempered with “gloating over how a first-world country screwed up.” Regardless, I’m glad I reached out to get a different perspective on how this trip is playing out, because I’m not confident in the image being put forward by the Canadian punditocracy.

Meanwhile, back in the Canadian media sphere, Éric Grenier notes that the trip is likely a defensive action to bolster Liberal support in Indo-Canadian-heavy ridings, especially to counter Jagmeet Singh’s arrival on the political scene. Murad Hemmadi notes that the international press seems to have gotten over its crush on Trudeau, while Paul Wells gives a not wholly underserved whacking at the Liberal government over their handling of this trip (though I do note that many of Wells’ points would handily fall into the groupthink that may not actually reflect what will play on the ground in India).

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Roundup: Lamenting the regional ministries

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Agriculture minister Lawrence MacAulay told his local paper that he’s not too concerned that the minister in charge of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency isn’t from the region, but that he’s a Central Canadian, but hey, he’s gotten results so it’s all good. And then people went insane because how dare the government not have a regional development minister from the region, ignoring that the policy of this government has been to eschew the tradition of regional ministers writ large, and that all regional development agencies all report to the same minister – the industry minister – rather than spreading it around to a number of ministers of state (and bloating the size of cabinet while you’re at it). And then from there comes the perennial outrage that we have regional representation at the cabinet level, which ignores that cabinet positions are not actually something that requires subject matter expertise, but that it’s a political position that is largely based on managerial competence, which is fine, particularly under a system of Responsible Government that the legislature can hold them to account for the performance of their duties. After all, they have the civil service to do the subject-matter expertise part for them, and it’s the job of ministers to make decisions that they can then be held to account for. But a few of the exchanges were at least worth noting.

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Most of those were all well and good, but this one from Candice Bergen caught my eye, because it actually highlights something that has largely been ignored.

While it may be a little overwrought, the point about centralizing power in the PMO is actually quite astute, and fits the pattern of centralization that Trudeau has been entirely underreported. Within the Liberal Party itself, Trudeau has convinced the party to abolish its regional powerbases and centralize it all within his own office under the guise of “modernization” and “being more responsive.” Once could very well argue that eliminating regional minister has a similar effect. That said, one could also argue that the purpose of regional minister was about pork-barrelling and doing the partisan work of securing votes from those very same regions for the government’s benefit, so their loss wouldn’t be too deeply felt in a move to make a system built to be more responsive to evidence than political consideration. Regardless, the propensity of this prime minister to consolidate power should not be underestimated, and this is something we should absolutely be keeping an eye on.

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Roundup: What free market mechanism?

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The Conservative reaction to the imposition of a federal minimum carbon price has been fascinating, in part because of just how counterfactual it would be to how an actual conservative party would behave. You would think that an actual small-c conservative party would believe in market principles and would think that imposing price incentives (the carbon price) would be great because it would force the market to innovate to reduce the costs associated, hence reducing the carbon emissions in the least onerous way possible with the costs being fully transparent.

But no. We don’t actually have a small-c conservative party in this country, we have right-flavoured populists who would rather rail about “taxes on everything” and give sad homilies about how hard done by the workers of this country are, and how carbon taxes are just letting millionaires claim tax credits on the backs of the ordinary people of this country. No, seriously – these are things that the Conservatives have said in QP. And Rona Ambrose then goes on TV and says that the government should be regulating major emitters in a way that won’t cost consumers (never mind that regulations are the most costly mechanism available and it simply hides the true costs). It’s mind-boggling.

And so we now have all but one leadership candidate railing about carbon taxes, and the only one who agrees with carbon pricing, Michael Chong, insists that this is the wrong way to do it, that it should be revenue neutral for the taxpayer (never mind that provinces could institute that if they want, but they are given the flexibility to do with as they choose). Meanwhile, Paul Wells takes a torch to Lisa Raitt’s overwrought homilies about the poor people suffering under carbon taxes, and applies a little math to the analysis, which doesn’t fare well for Raitt. Likewise, Andrew Coyne laments the lack of a serious discussion on carbon pricing as the cheapest and least onerous way to reduce emissions. But this is currently the state of conservative politics in this country.

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Roundup: Giorno joins the brigade

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Proponents of proportional representation are getting a bit of a boost across party lines as former Harper advisor Guy Giorno is adding his name to the so-called “Every Voter Counts Alliance” to push the government to adopt such a measure. (Note that the name of this group is hugely problematic because every vote already counts, and suggesting otherwise is tantamount to voter suppression). Giorno says the Conservatives shouldn’t be afraid that changing the system will mean that they will be permanently shut out of power (as is one of the arguments that proponents tout as a feature of the change), before launching into the usual talking points of “fairer” and “more democratic” which are a) complete bunk, and b) at a direct cost to the system of accountability that the existing First-Past-The-Post system is really good at achieving. Also, it’s a bit rich to hear the hyper-partisan Giorno talk about how wonderful it would be for PR-elected legislatures to require more co-operation, collegiality, working together” – all of which is ridiculous, since it simply changes the power calculus in order to keep coalitions cobbled together and giving smaller and more radical parties outsized influence to keep those coalitions together, while parties at the centre of governments can go for decades without being tossed out as they shuffle coalition partners around instead (again, a feature of our current system being the ability to throw the bums out, which PR does not do very well). Suffice to say, Giorno’s voice in the debate doesn’t actually change that the arguments are based on emotion and logical fallacies, and while he has different partisan credentials, it’s still a system that that nobody should be rushing into on the basis of emotion. Meanwhile, here’s Colby Cosh to demolish some of the arguments.

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Roundup: A troubling allegation

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There’s a rather disquieting story in the Huffington Post that quotes a couple of unnamed former Senate staffers, who point the finger at Senate Speaker Leo Housakos as the source of the leaks of the Auditor General’s report into senators’ expenses. And to be clear, in the past couple of weeks, I’ve heard similar tales being floated by someone else on the inside who witnessed it happen, and later witnessed Housakos deny it to other Senators. And indeed, Housakos was in the big chair when he found a prima facia breach of privilege when Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette raised the issue in the chamber, and with that finding, it went to the Senate’s rules committee to study the matter; that study was suspended when Parliament was dissolved, but it could be revived once the committee is reconstituted. That breach of privilege is a pretty big deal, and the fact that more than one person is now coming forward to say something is telling. This going public is also going to put pressure on Prime Minister Trudeau with regards to what he’s going to do with the question of appointing a new Senate Speaker. To be clear, this is a Prime Ministerial appointment because, unlike the Commons Speaker, the Senate Speaker is higher on the Order of Precedence as he or she fills a variety of additional diplomatic and protocol functions that the Commons Speaker does not, and is considered a representative of the Crown. If the current representative is not deemed to be trustworthy, and has indeed violated the privilege of Senators for his own ends, then it seems difficult to see how he can be trusted to stay in the post, and it may light a fire under Trudeau to do something about it, while the rest of the Senate remains in the dark about how they’re going to organise themselves as Trudeau drags his feet.

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Roundup: Resurrecting the “barbaric” issue

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Not content to ratchet up the niqab issue alone, the Conservatives decided yesterday to go full-on culture war, and dredge up their Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices legislation from the previous parliament, and not only tout what it does (almost all of which is duplicative and unnecessarily antagonistic), but they added the promise of setting up a “tip line” for when people suspect these “barbaric cultural practices” like child brides, polygamy or female genital mutilation are taking place. Never mind that there’s already a tip line in place – it’s called 911 – it seems ripe for reporting on neighbours as a general xenophobic policy that ties up police resources that are already stretched thin. While the Twitter lit up with an attempt to turn the #BarbaricCulturalPractices into an exercise in sarcasm, there are more serious issues underlying the Conservatives’ use of the word. Back when the bill was being debated, Senator Mobina Jaffer, herself a Muslim woman and a lawyer, utterly dismantled the bill from its use of the loaded term “barbaric” to its hypocrisy in targeting polygamy by foreigners but not the community of Bountiful in BC, to the way in which it actually denies the protection of those who were forced into marriages, to the way in which the government improperly uses the defence of “provocation” to try and make a point about honour killings. It’s a masterful bit of legislative scrutiny that deserves to be read again in light of what the Conservatives are trotting out for electoral gain, and in order to put the whole issue into proper context. (That it also demonstrates the value of the work that senators can do its an added bonus).

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Roundup: Justin Trudeau and the division of powers

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From the sounds of it, Justin Trudeau is apparently setting back the cause of federalism in Canada, as he is getting blamed for an increasing number of provincial woes. It’s been happening for a few weeks with some federal Conservatives like Parm Gill, who are agitating against the provincial Liberals’ new sex ed curriculum, but because Gill and others just refer to the programme as the Liberals’ – not specifying that it’s Kathleen Wynne’s government in Ontario – the implication is that they’re one and the same as Gill shills for federal votes on a provincial issue (that is being torqued by provincial Progressive Conservatives and others, one might add). Moving out east, Trudeau is being blamed for complicity in the provincial Liberals in Nova Scotia proposing to reform film and television tax credits in their provincial budget – apparently Trudeau not saying anything about that change, and a number of other provincial budgetary items, makes him complicit in the whole affair. (During his visit to Halifax yesterday, Trudeau did say he was supportive of arts and culture, but reminded them that he’s a Quebec MP and respects provincial jurisdictions). Yesterday took the cake, as the federal NDP put out a press release blasting Trudeau because the provincial Liberals in PEI remain, well, a little backward on the whole issue of funding abortions in that province. This isn’t the first time that the federal NDP have been trying to ride the provincial parties for their benefit, as they keep hauling out this study that shows that provincial NDP governments have better fiscal records than provincial Liberal or Conservative parties in order to somehow prove they’d be great economic managers – never mind that the various provincial parties are largely divorced from the federal ones (with a couple of minor exceptions in a couple of provinces) and that in many cases the only thing they share is a name, though the NDP like to claim that they’re all one party, federally and provincially. It also means that if you stretch that logic, that Thomas Mulcair is responsible for raising the HST in Manitoba, that province’s appalling state of child welfare cases, and the myriad of problems that the provincial NDP in Nova Scotia left behind when they were defeated (prompting the provincial Liberals to table the budget they just did). It’s actually pretty alarming that people don’t seem to understand the division of powers between the provinces and the federal government – particularly when it’s political parties fuelling this nonsense, and they really need to stop.

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QP: Avoiding the questions on contradictions

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Unlike yesterday, it was all leaders on deck in the Commons, which would hopefully make it a more exciting day. Thomas Mulcair led off, asking about ground forces targeting for air strikes in Iraq and how it is a combat role. Harper, in his first appearance of 2015, accused the NDP of not supporting the mission and noted his support for the mission — not actually an answer. Mulcair insisted that Harper misled the public — earning him a caution from the Speaker — and Harper insisted that the troops were executing the mission that they were given and good for them for shooting back. Mulcair gave a retort about the truth, then pivoted to the question of when they would see a budget. Harper stuck to the point about Canadians seeing need to fight ISIS. Mulcair noted his speech about plans to help the manufacturing sector, to which Harper praised his own plan for balanced budgets and low taxes, in contrast to the higher taxes the NDP would impose. Mulcair then accused the government of not responding when the Bank of Canada was in their decision to lower interest rates. Harper explained to him that the Bank of Canada’s policies are announced quarterly, while budgets are annual, not every month. Justin Trudeau was up next, and spelled out the government’s contradictions when it comes to “advise and assist” and “accompany” when it comes to the Iraq mission. Harper didn’t offer clarity, but battered the Liberals on their lack of support for the mission and praising the troops for firing back. Trudeau didn’t press, but switched to the size of the hole in the budget based on lower oil prices. Harper insisted that they would balance the budget, and even the PBO agreed. Trudeau wondered then why, if nothing had changed, why they would delay the budget. Harper insisted their plan was working, but again didn’t answer the question.

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Roundup: Expanding spending limits

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Shortly before Joe Oliver put a stake in the constant early election speculation by announcing an April budget, Pundit’s Guide posted a particularly adept analysis of measures in the Fair Elections Act that demonstrate that while there is a fixed election date and a minimum length for campaigns, there is no maximum length, meaning that the writs could drop earlier than six weeks before the election. What is new is that it would mean that the spending limits would be higher, because the new law allows the limit to stretch, whereas it used to be fixed, no matter if the campaign was six weeks or eight. Higher spending limits mean more for certain parties, more flush with cash than others, can spend on advertising and so on, and overall be used to both financially exhaust some parties, or to really backload their ad spending into the last two or three weeks and carpet bomb things in a very American fashion. She also noted that the federal Conservatives have no interest in stepping on a likely spring election in Alberta and the Ontario PC leadership contest. (See her on Power Play here). It’s certainly food for thought, and gives us one more thing to look at, to guess as to when the writs will drop for the October election rather than this pointless speculation about a spring election.

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Roundup: Onward, One Party State

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The One Party State known as Alberta has struck again, and consumed its own opposition. Floor-crossings to the government, the same government that has been in power for four decades, is a long-held tradition in that process, but never before has it been to this extent, in the history of confederation. Wildrose leader Danielle Smith resigned her position and took eight of her MLAs over the floor to join Premier Jim Prentice, and his revitalised Progressive Conservatives. The five remaining Wildrose MLAs will likely remain the official opposition (though there are rumours of another resignation on the way for health reasons), leaving five Liberal and four NDP MLAs to have some semblance of opposition, as shambolic as it is likely to be. Oh, and of those five Liberal MLAs, two of them will soon be jumping ship to run federally. So yeah – opposition? Who needs it? It’s amazing to witness this all-encompasing amorphous political culture in Alberta consume itself and its own best interests, and it’s galling to see Smith justify her decision as essentially declaring victory, that with Prentice in place there is a principled conservative at the helm that she can support, papering over some of the other inherent problems that were in her party, being the split between those who were able to be socially progressive as opposed to the regressive “Lake of Fire” crowd. Jen Gerson writes about Prentice setting himself up to be a generational premier, while Colby Cosh explores what it all means in the broader political culture of the province, and how the threat of falling oil prices may have pushed things forward.

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