Tag Archives: India

Roundup: Trying to escape child care obligations

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Some Alberta daycare operators are starting “rolling closures” to protest the new funding regime that goes along with the $10/day early learning and child care programme, saying that they’re not getting enough to make ends meet. This is 100 percent a provincial problem—they signed onto the agreement with the federal government, knowing what the funding agreement was and that they had obligations for provincial funding, and that included increasing the wages of the people who work in the sector (because there’s no excuse for it being so low, particularly as there is a gendered element to it).

So what’s Danielle Smith’s response? Aside from denigrating the operators doing these rolling closures, she is trying to blame the federal government, claiming that their spending caused inflation to rise, which is what is making these operators face problems. Which is, of course, bullshit. Federal spending has nothing to do with the rise in inflation (as the Bank of Canada has stated many times over), and even more to the point, this child care programme has been disinflationary (at least for the early years, before the base-year effect kicks in, meaning it’ll be a one-time drop in inflation). Nevertheless, because she’s blaming the federal government, she wants to shake them down for more money, because that’s what provinces do every single time. Thus far, federal ministers are holding firm and pointing out that provinces knew what they signed onto, but legacy media, of course, is once again trying to make this a federal problem.

And this keeps happening. We never hold provinces of the premiers to account for anything. Another good example is social housing—as former minister Sheila Copps pointed out, back in the eighties, the provinces insisted that the federal government get out of housing because it was provincial jurisdiction, and just give them the money, and they knew best how to spend it. And happens every single time, they spend the federal money on other things, and then blame the federal government once things reach a crisis because of their under-spending. Same with healthcare. Because we are allergic to holding premiers to account in this country, and that’s a very real problem.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russia is refusing to turn over any of the purported POW bodies from that downed plane, because it totally isn’t a psy-op. The head of Ukrainian military intelligence says that he expects the Russian offensive on the eastern front to fizzle out by early spring, by which point they should be exhausted. Lviv in western Ukraine has become the first city to remove all of its Soviet-era monuments.

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Roundup: The crybully edit

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Because yes, everything is that stupid, the Conservatives are crying that Justin Trudeau is racist because in his speech to caucus, he referred to Conservative candidate Jamil Jivani as a “twofer,” and then immediately says that it’s because Jivani is an “insider and an ideologue,” and went on to talk about how he’s a parachute candidate in the Durham by-election. Not sure why this was a topic in said speech to caucus, but it was.

Jivani then edited the video and just used the part where Trudeau referred to him as the “twofer,” said he didn’t know what that was supposed to mean—even though he deliberately edited out the part where Trudeau spelled it out—and then recited the Pierre Poilievre slogan checklist. Partisans posted a purported definition of “twofer” as a person from an underprivileged background who can fulfil two quotas or appeal to two political constituencies—a definition I have never heard in my life—and started screaming racism, and revived the whole Blackface thing, because of course they did.

The point here is that this is yet another example of the very same Conservatives who mock the “snowflakes” on the left who need their trigger warnings, and trying to play crybully at the very same time. They did it to me when I said that a joke was lame, and tried to insist that I threatened to shoot one of their MPs (which they know full well is not what I said). They are so quick to play the victim because they think that it works for “the left,” and so therefore it should work for them equally, which is dumb, and completely doesn’t get the point that people on the left make about oppressive language, or structural racism, or what have you. They make this big song and dance about how censorious the “left” is (and yeah, some of them are), but then immediately try to replicate it while at the same time try and insist that they’re the ones who are all about free speech and so on. It’s childish, it’s dishonest, and when they have to edit video and lie to try and make their crybully point, it’s even more obnoxious.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russians continue to insist that Ukraine shot down that plane that allegedly contained POWs, but won’t provide evidence or access to the crash site (making it even more likely that this is an info op). There is also word that president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has invited Xi Jinping to the forthcoming peace talks in Switzerland.

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Roundup: A singular call for a leadership review

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As the Liberals’ caucus retreat got underway in Ottawa (immediately after the Cabinet retreat), things got off to another rocky start as Liberal backbencher Ken McDonald told Radio-Canada that he thinks there should be a leadership review in the party ahead of the next election, and lo, the media leapt all over that story, and the rest of caucus spent the day insisting that no, they’re happy with Trudeau (though one anonymous Liberal praised McDonald’s bravery in bringing this up). The problem with this proposal? The party’s constitution has no mechanism for this.

The new constitution, which was adopted after the Liberals formed government, only has one avenue for a leadership review, which is that one is to be held if they lose an election. And fair enough—that’s really the only time they could hold one, because it essentially means running an entire leadership contest but with only the leader canvassing sign-ups and votes (because they no longer have paid memberships), and his or her opponents trying to organise a no vote. There is no way a sitting prime minister has the time or capacity to do this while running the country, and it’s one more reason why the way we run leadership contests is made to obscure accountability. It also guarantees that bellyachers like McDonald can’t get their wish because frankly there is no capacity for this to happen while they are governing.

This all points to reasons why we need get back to the system of caucus appointing and disposing of leaders. It restores accountability because the leaders are once again afraid of their own members, and must be more responsive to their concerns rather than doing things like threatening to withhold the signature from their nomination papers if they don’t toe the line. It also precludes these mini-leadership contests as a “leadership review” (where past examples such as Jeremy Corbyn and Greg Selinger were not great examples of the membership being able to get rid of problematic leaders). It would make for one quick vote and being able to put the matter to bed rather than this interminable grousing that we’re seeing now, and an immediate replacement of a leader rather than a months-long leadership race that includes egomaniacs who have never won a seat, let alone have any idea how politics works. But people who don’t know how the system works insists that this is somehow “anti-democratic” (which is bullshit), and so this bastardised status quo continues to make our system worse.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Ukraine shot down 11 out of 14 Russian drones targeting the southern part of the country in the early hours of Thursday morning. A Russian military plane crashed, and they claimed it contained 65 prisoners of war headed for a swap and that Ukrainian forces downed the plane, but couldn’t produce proof; Ukraine didn’t confirm or deny this, but made it clear that if Russia was transporting POWs this way without notice it was unacceptable.

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Roundup: NSIRA spanks Global Affair’s intelligence program

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A long-delayed public release of NSIRA’s report into the activities of the Global Security Reporting Program—the “intelligence” arm of Global Affairs, which has diplomats openly engaging with persons of interest abroad—was finally released, and it’s making some waves. In particular, for a programme that isn’t actual covert intelligence gathering has some governance problems, with a lack of coherent policies or training that has led to some lines being blurred, which can make some countries believe this is an actual foreign intelligence service (it’s not, and we don’t have one).

So, with this in mind, here are four threads from some very reputable sources. Stephanie Carvin walks through the report, and breaks down its components, as well as the government’s responses.

https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1737569161042096138

Jessica Davis has a shorter walkthrough (with paragraph numbers!) about her own concerns about what she reads in it.

Leah West has a few legal observations about the report.

And Thomas Juneau gives a much more generous read, and places some of the GSRP’s work into better context.

Ukraine Dispatch:

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed journalists’ questions about whether Ukraine is losing the war, but acknowledges challenges of being in a country under siege. Ukraine’s forces appear to be moving to a more defensive posture, likely because of the artillery shortage.

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QP: Out not with a bang, but with an [insert farm name here]

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The prime minister was on his way to Vancouver and his deputy was meeting with her provincial counterparts. Jagmeet Singh was again absent because his wife just had a baby, while the Bloc leader was also elsewhere. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and worried about household debt servicing and blamed federal deficits for it—which is a huge reach. Anita Anand accused him of talking down the economy and read some good news statistics, saying that these results don’t come from slogans. Poilievre countered with other statistics that sounded less healthy, and blamed it on deficits. François-Philippe Champagne wanted it put on the record that Canada is third in the world for attracting foreign investment. Poilievre switched to English to raise the mushroom farm in his riding’s carbon price bill, demanding answers on what they should do about it. Steven Guilbeault got up to talk about being at COP28 in Dubai to ensure there is a future. Poilievre insisted this was “high-flying hypocrisy” and again demanded answers on this farm’s carbon price bill. Seamus O’Regan got up to intone about hypocrisy, and linked Poilievre’s dismissal of Ukraine to Neville Chamberlain. Poilievre gave a rambling statement about detonator going to Russian and Iranian agents operating in Canada. Gould said that he doth protest too much, and called on Conservatives to stand up to their leader to vote for Ukraine.

Claude DeBellefeuille led for the Bloc, and she wanted the government to just send money to Quebec for dental care rather than their federal programme. Mark Holland said this was about a national country that would help nine million people across the country. DeBellefeuille repeated her demand to transfer the money, and Holland reiterate his same point.

Rachel Blaney rose for the NDP and accused the government of not standing up to grocery CEOs, and Champagne insisted that he did stand up to them when he summoned them to his office. Alistair MacGregor gave his own version of the same, and Champagne insisted he always fights for Canadians.

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Roundup: Fergus at the NDP’s mercy

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It looks like Speaker Greg Fergus may last another day, as the word from the NDP is that they’re going to demand a fine and another apology to the House of Commons for his lapse in judgment over that video he recorded, though I have to wonder what they think a fine is going to accomplish. That report from the Procedure and House Affairs Committee will be tabled in the Commons by Thursday, so we’ll see if there’s any kind of vote or concurrence debate at that point. And there may yet be, as Andrew Scheer is promising that he’s going to move a vote of non-confidence in the Speaker, possibly in the hopes that he can shake enough NDP MPs loose to oust Fergus. As for the Bloc, Yves-François Blanchet said that perhaps it’s time for a woman in the position, as though Alexandra Mendès hasn’t been there as Assistant Deputy Speaker the whole time, and has twice now run for the position and not gotten enough votes for it.

On the subject of the Speaker, Carleton University’s Philippe Lagassé made some comments to the Hill Times about the fact that we do treat the neutrality of the Speaker in Canada as much more of an illusion than Westminster does. He also suggests we start adopting more Westminster practices like the Speaker running for re-election as an independent, and that past Speakers be appointed to the Lords/Senate where they can continue to serve in less partisan roles, rather than having them rejoin the party ranks (and absolutely not have them run for party leader, Andrew Scheer).

Ukraine Dispatch:

An overnight missile attack on Kyiv has resulted in 45 injuries, while nearly 600 shells and rockets rained down on the southern part of the country amidst a major cyberattack on the country’s largest telecom provider. A US intelligence report estimates that Russia has suffered 315,000 casualties, which is about 90 percent of the forces it began the conflict with. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to Washington DC doesn’t appear to have swayed too many Republicans, while he continued to insist that asking to give Russia land concessions was insane because it meant abandoning families and children to terrorists.

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Roundup: Scott Moe takes another illegal step

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Not satisfied with his plan to break federal laws in not remitting the carbon levy for natural gas, Scott Moe decided that he was going to ramp it up by also not collecting it for electric heating, which is going to be a neat trick when it comes to trying to disaggregating it from regular electricity use. He says they’re going to find out how many homes us it and reduce the levy collection by a formula that approximates what it might be, but it’s still ridiculous and is just more of this very bad trend of premiers who think that they can just get away with violating federal law if they feel like it. But it’s not him that’ll be exposed by this—it’s the CEO and board of SaskPower, just like with SaskEnergy, and they’re the ones exposed to criminal liability for breaking federal law, not Moe, and that should be of concern to anyone in these positions.

Of course, it bears repeating that it’s not the carbon price driving up these costs, really—it’s the utility provider. But that won’t stop Moe and the federal Conservatives from lying about the size and effect of carbon prices as a distraction (or legacy media from not calling it out).

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russian missiles struck three towns in Eastern Ukraine—Pokrovsk, Novohrodivka, and Myronhrad, killing two and wounding ten. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited troops on the northeast frontlines, and called for the faster construction of fortifications in key areas under threat from Russian forces.

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QP: Self-contradicting economic demands

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The prime minister was off in Toronto making housing announcements, and his deputy was on the West Coast for her own announcement. Most of the other leaders were also absent, but not Pierre Poilievre. He led off in French, as he so often does, and he accused the prime minister of replacing the joy of Christmas with poverty, according to Operation Santa Claus letters, and he blamed deficit spending. Anita Anand praised the Canada Child Benefit for lifting families out of poverty, and encouraged the Conservatives to vote for their bill to “stabilise grocery prices” (well, indirectly anyway). Poilievre then called the government hypocrites at for how much they fly, to which François-Philippe Champagne said that people can see who the real hypocrisy are because the opposition leader only opposes investment in the green economy. Poilievre switched to English to decry “stagflation” in the last quarter, blaming high deficits, taxes, and red tape, while the American economy was roaring. Anand wanted to remind everyone that they have an economic plan, and recited good news economic talking points to prove their plan was working. Poilievre returned to the accusation of hypocrisy for how much the environment minister has flown before demanding that they cut the carbon price, for which Champagne patted himself on the back for attracting foreign investment in the green economy. Poilievre then raised the court challenge from Ontario First Nations about the carbon price. Patty Hajdu noted that these nations are independent, decried the Conservatives’ colonial attitudes, and listed the investments they have made to those communities.

Alain Therrien led for the Bloc, and demanded the federal government transfer $460 million to Quebec for asylum seekers, insisting they were solely a federal problem (which is not true—they are only federal once their claims re accepted). Don Vandal said that asylum seekers are a shared jurisdiction and they continue to converse with the province. Therrien made another demand, and this time Pablo Rodriguez says there is no fight, just that the Bloc is trying to pick one.

Jagmeet Singh appeared by video, and worried about the revelations from the US about assassination plots from India. Dominic LeBlanc said that the RCMP and policing partners across the country are taking this seriously, and cooperating with American law enforcement. Singh switch to French to repeat the concerns from Operation Santa Claus in Quebec, to which Anand plugged the bill they tabled to help build the economy.

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Roundup: Google signs a deal to avoid transparency

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With days to go before the Online News Act would start applying, Google has come to an agreement that sees it pay $100 million per year into a fund, rather than to have individual deals with news outlets. This is one of the things that seems to escape most of the critics of the Act—this was about ensuring that the deals that Google and Facebook were already signing with news outlets were subject to transparency and had an arbitrator—the CRTC—at the ready in the case of disputes. This was never a “link tax” or some such nonsense, it was about putting structure into the same deals that were already being made, and it was the transparency that they objected to. This deal ensures that they are not subjected to that transparency, because it’s one lump sum, which is the real takeaway from this deal.

Of course, none of this fixes the underlying problem with is the domination of the ad tech space where Google and Facebook control all aspects of it and are siphoning money at each stage, which is why they have starved news outlets of advertising revenues. Of course, nobody wants to talk about that aspect. To deal with this, there still needs to be stronger anti-trust action, particularly in the US, but this deal is a start, nevertheless.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russians claimed that they launched missiles from their Black Sea fleet against “military targets,” but nothing has been verified. Ukraine’s foreign minister says that the EU has delivered about 300,000 of its promised munitions shells so far.

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Roundup: Clawing back disability benefits

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Because the provinces continue to be the absolute worst level of government in the country, we see from the briefing binder of Ontario’s social services minister that the province is looking at ways to “mitigate costs” by clawing back provincial disability support payments once the federal Canadian Disability Benefit gets underway. As you might have guessed, this is entirely the outcome that the federal government has been trying to avoid, and why Carla Qualtrough spent months trying to negotiate with provinces in the lead-up to the framework legislation being passed.

This happened a lot during the height of the pandemic, when certain provinces like Alberta and Saskatchewan clawed back any kind of social supports when people accessed CERB, because of course they did. It’s kind of perverse the way that provinces are in the business of literally legislating poverty for vulnerable groups like people with disabilities who generally cannot work (which I should point out is not the same as the programme in the US, where “disability” tends to have a different connotation than in Canada). There is a kind of meanness to it that goes beyond the judgmental protestant work ethic that this seems to stem from.

We’ll see what kinds of safeguards the federal government tries to build into the system as the regulations for these payments—which they point out are intended as an income supplement and not a replacement programme—are rolled out (eventually). But because of the division of powers, there may not be any legislative or regulatory mechanism they could use to protect these payments from clawbacks, and it may rely on negotiations and signed agreements, which is probably easier said than done (particularly as many of these premiers are the absolute worst).

Ukraine Dispatch:

Five people were wounded as part of the largest attack on Kyiv since the start of the war, timed for the commemoration of the Holodomor. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told an international food security conference that Ukraine needs more air defences in order to protect its grain exports, as Russia has been targeting them in recent months.

https://twitter.com/defencehq/status/1728719618317910451

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