For his only media appearance of the Victoria Day long weekend, prime minister Justin Trudeau held his daily presser outside of Rideau Cottage, wearing a white and blue checked shirt unbuttoned at the collar under his usual blue blazer, and he started by first mentioning International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia, and then spoke about the support they have given to shelters for women escaping domestic violence. Trudeau also announced new money for the Canadian Red Cross, that the Canada Child Benefit would be once again increasing in July to keep indexed with inflation, that they were providing another $15 million for women entrepreneurs, and that the first Canadian clinical trials for a potential COVID-19 vaccine had been approved. During the Q&A, he was constantly peppered with demands to know whether the government would partially nationalize Air Canada in some fashion given the announced layoffs, but he remained non-committal citing that it was too early to make any kinds of decisions.
During the ministerial presser that followed, Ahmed Hussen announced funds for Black communities, while Maryam Monsef spoke about the “shadow pandemic” of domestic violence, and also modelled a hand signal that people could make on video chats to show that they need assistance but are unable to speak out loud about it.
And it’s Victoria Day long weekend, so there won’t be any other pressers until Tuesday (and we could all use the break). But don’t forget that while we do remember the first Queen of a united Canada, we are also celebrating the official birthday of the current Queen of Canada, so be sure to raise a glass to her Majesty on Monday.
Queen Victoria chose Ottawa as Canada’s capital city & gave Royal Assent to Canada’s Confederation in 1867. Her birthday has been celebrated as a holiday by Canadians since 1845. May 24, 2020 marks her 201st birthday. Enjoy the weekend! #cdncrown#cdnhist#cdnpoli#VictoriaDaypic.twitter.com/mbJcxdt4wL
— Canadian Crown 🇨🇦 (@Canadian_Crown) May 16, 2020
After a very welcome day off from daily pressers, prime minister Justin Trudeau was back at it on Sunday, in his weekend uniform – jeans, white shirt unbuttoned at the collar, and a blazer – but no sweater because it was actually nice out in Ottawa for a change. And while some weekend pressers are merely greatest hits packages, this one had a few substantive announcements – $240 million for online health and mental health tools that people can access, $175 million for a Canadian company doing promising research using COVID-19 antibodies; and launching a “national supply council” for dealing with personal protective equipment – more of which was elaborated upon in the ministerial presser that followed – and a reminder that enhanced Canada Child Benefit payments were on the way. During the Q&A, Trudeau also reiterated that the promised legislation that would allow municipalities to further restrict handguns in their jurisdictions would be coming once Parliament returned to normal.
Something that Trudeau and Dr. Theresa Tam were asked about in their respective pressers were the news that Health Canada had ordered a pause on those Spartan Bioscience portable testing kits because while the tests themselves worked, it turns out that the swabs didn’t go deep enough into the nasal cavity to get good samples, so they risked giving false negatives. That becomes a setback that some provinces – and remote communities in particular – will definitely feel because they had already ordered thousands of those kits as part of their plans.
Meanwhile, I see that Jason Kenney is back making noises that the federal government isn’t doing enough for the oil and gas sector, and brings up the auto sector bailout of 2008-09 as a comparison of “unfair treatment.” He should be careful what he wishes for – I’m not sure he’s advocating for the same thing at all.
The government of Alberta has the fiscal capacity to support the oil and gas industry if it wants to do so. It's choosing not to, and hoping that the feds will do something. That's a choice that the Premier could justify but, at least so far, he's chosen not to do so.
For his Saturday presser, Justin Trudeau was back to his weekend uniform – tieless, collar unbuttoned, under a sweater and blazer with jeans. He started off talking about last night’s virtual vigil for Nova Scotia, then recapped the programmes they launched during the week before talking about the $62.5 million the government would spend to help the fish and seafood processing industry cope with the pandemic, both in terms of capacity, protective equipment and ensuring more physical distancing in workspaces. During the Q&A, there was more talk of health transfers and this bizarre notion that somehow the federal government could put long-term care facilities “under the Canada Health Act” (erm, I don’t think the Act works the way you think it does, guys), Trudeau stated once again that he has no intention of interfering in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Let that sink in. No. Intention. So stop asking him to “take over” things like healthcare and rents. Provinces exist. Sections 91 and 92 of the Constitution Act, 1867 exist. These are real things and he can’t just wave a wand and suddenly take over. Jurisdiction doesn’t work like that. Stop asking. Trudeau also said that he was aware of the Correctional Investigator’s report on the state of federal prisons in this pandemic era, where anyone who is sick is being sent to solitary confinement (and potential human rights abuses), but he continued to claim that they were taking “strong measures.” The problem is that nobody can seem to show any evidence of said measures. (Trudeau mentioned there wouldn’t be any pressers today, so don’t look for one).
During the ministerial briefing, Dr. Theresa Tam also shot down this notion of herd immunity and “immunity passes” that keep being floated around after Chile is piloting them, in part because we simply don’t have enough information about the virus to know whether or not someone can be re-infected once they’ve had it, or how long any protection from anti-bodies may last, and herd immunity means to continually expose greater numbers to the infection, which could still overwhelm our health capacity, and no, younger people aren’t really less susceptible as has been suggested – they can still get very sick from it, even if the mortality rate is lower for younger people. It means there are no easy fixes to reopening the economy, as much as we may hope for one.
Andrew Scheer was out first this morning, saying that he was trying to get some kind of a deal with the government on how to bring parliament back next week as they are scheduled to, and that he wants in-person sittings of some variety to ensure ongoing accountability (and he’s right). But when asked about bringing his family on that flight when they weren’t planning on them being there (and apparently Senator Don Plett had to get a different flight because it was suddenly full with Scheer’s family), he brushed off said questions. He then spent the rest of the day raising “serious concerns” about the WHO and its recommendations (recall that Jason Kenney on Monday accused Dr. Theresa Tam of repeating talking points from the People’s Republic of China), because what the world needs right now is to hew to the Trumpian instincts to undermine international institutions.
Next up was prime minister Justin Trudeau for his daily presser, in which he announced that four planes full of N95 masks have arrived and are in the process of being validated and distributed, before he brought up $130 million of new funding for the northern territories, including more money for healthcare, for Nutrition North, for northern air carriers, and money for the CanNor development agency. He also noted that they were working to enhance the Canada Emergency Business Account programme and were looking into something about commercial rent (though that’s provincial jurisdiction, so not sure what the federal government could do). As if that weren’t enough, he also raised that they were strengthening some of the measures under the Quarantine Act, as well as boosting the capacity of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, particularly when it comes to ensuring there are more inspectors on the line. Oh, and he didn’t offer any apologies for his trip to Harrington Lake on the weekend, so there was also that. When asked about the issue of long-term care facilities (which is provincial jurisdiction), Trudeau did say they were working with the provinces to see about sending some additional funds to bolster salaries, so there’s also that.
Meanwhile, Vancouver’s city council tried to meet “virtually,” and here’s how that went down, in case anyone thinks it would actually go any better with 338 MPs in parliament.
after an argument over whether they should delay the meeting, kennedy stewart phoned back in before they officially adjourned
but stewart couldn't hear what anyone else was saying, so we had more delays
anyway maybe soon we'll hear about the city wanting $200 million
"Those fat cats at city hall want $200 million of YOUR taxpayer dollars to bail themselves out, but they can't even get a conference call to work. It's time to put all of them on mute" is a line I'm giving free of charge to any open line radio host out there
lots of people laughed about the toilet being flushed, kennedy stewart was not amused, half the councillors can't get on the conference call, but other than that things are going great
things are getting increasingly meta, as more councillors are asking if future meetings with the public should happen considering this meeting was such a gong show
kennedy stewart says "the problem with the technology this morning was completely on my end"
during this council motion debate on whether there should be public hearings right now, there's an amendment for a trial run to see if it works (during a meeting which is a test run for the new technology in itselfhttps://t.co/DRNgLjMwgO
meanwhile there was a debate on whether to have the march 5th virtual public hearing (assuming the trial run later this month) at 1pm or 6pm, council eventually voted 7-4 to keep it at 6pm
(ordinarily that would have been a very interesting philosophical debate, but you know)
Yesterday had no presser from prime minister Justin Trudeau, but did have a ministerial presser featuring Marie-Claude Bibeau and Deb Schulte. Bibeau laid out additional measures and funding for employers of temporary foreign workers in the agri-food sector so that they can properly quarantine those workers when they arrive, and eventually properly explained the measures taken with the arrivals that the Bloc lit their hair on fire about on Saturday (which the government could have done three days ago had they been more competent in their communications). Schulte spoke about the new federal guidelines for long-term care facilities, but because it’s provincial jurisdiction, they’re hoping the provinces implement said guidelines (but no, they don’t really have any levers to force them because of the constitutional division of powers).
Of course, all anyone could talk about today was the fact that Justin Trudeau *gasp* went to see his wife and kids at Harrington Lake (where they have been staying since Sophie Grégoire Trudeau’s recovery) over the weekend, which people claim is in contravention to public health dictates. Erm, except that’s not really true because Harrington Lake is an official residence that is 20 minutes outside of Gatineau. It’s a gods damned suburb where people live year-round. It’s not cottage country where you have small populations and poor public health services that people are attempting to flee to and exposing the locals when they raid the area store on the way up. That was the behaviour that Public Health was warning against, but hey, let’s try to play gotcha.
And then there was Andrew Scheer, who decided to bring his wife and kids with him back to Ottawa on the government jet sent to pick him up for the Saturday sitting. It was supposed to be Elizabeth May, Carla Qualtrough and Scheer, where they could each physically distance on the plane, but with Scheer bringing his family (to spend the rest of the current pandemic period at Stornoway rather than in Regina, where they had been) at the last minute, and May and Qualtrough opted not to be dicks about saying no. (May and Qualtrough were flown back to BC after Saturday, for the record). It may say something about Scheer’s particular sense of entitlement, and that perhaps he should have made arrangements clearer beforehand so perhaps a different plane could have been sent, but the accusations between partisan camps over this is about as mature as we’ve come to expect during a global pandemic.
For his Sunday presser, prime minister Justin Trudeau was once again in blue jeans and tie-less, and he spoke about how the CERB opens for applications today, and gave some rough timeline about when people can expect those benefits to start making their way to their accounts. He also said that Health Canada was looking for volunteers to help with things like contact tracing (and as for why these aren’t paid positions, I would imagine that the bureaucratic hoops to make that happen are simply too numerous to contemplate at the moment – federal hiring rules are complex). He also said that farms were looking for workers (given that there may be problems getting the temporary foreign workers that these farms depend on), and that the Canadian Forces were busy turning reserve forces into regulars. During the Q&A portion, he did talk about how he and his Cabinet were cognisant of their own potential for burnout during this crisis, as well as saying that civil servants were working to ensure that the CRA’s systems were not overloaded when the CERB portal opens, and he wouldn’t engage too much on speculation around the American president and his utterances around N95 masks.
During the presser that followed with Dr. Theresa Tam, she said that they were looking at ways to disinfect masks so that they can be reused several times in order to extend supplies, and asked that they not be thrown out.
A couple of hours later, we heard the address from the Queen on the current situation. While it was geared more toward the UK than to the Commonwealth, she did send a separate letter to Canada, which the Governor General posted to her site along with a message of her own.
Her Majesty The Queen addresses the UK and the Commonwealth in a special broadcast recorded at Windsor Castle. pic.twitter.com/HjO1uiV1Tm
Because it was a Saturday presser, prime minister Justin Trudeau appeared in jeans and without a tie, belying the more casual nature of the day at a time when days blend into one another. He had a couple of messages – that the government had invested another $40 million in shelters for women facing domestic violence (a particular consideration at a time when people are forced to stay home), and another $10 million for Indigenous women facing violence. He also pointed to $157 million in funds for the homeless, and that the communities where these funds were needed have been identified so funds were now flowing. On the subject of masks and medical devices, Trudeau stated that millions of more masks were expected in the next 48 hours (from the time of said announcement), and that the government had leased a warehouse in China to help coordinate the acquisition of these masks and supplies while they charter flights to carry them to Canada. Trudeau also noted that he would be speaking to his American counterpart in the coming days about the issue of masks and so on.
For her own presser, Dr. Theresa Tam reiterated yet again that these models that reporters keep demanding are not crystal balls, that they are not real numbers, that they aren’t predictions, and that they are highly sensitive to what is happening right now. But that hasn’t stopped the framing by reporters that these are hard data, and that they are indicative of anything in particular. And while here is an attempt to nuance the models Ontario released on Friday, but it’s one print article when TV reporters and headlines are framing it as disaster porn (and getting self-righteous about it).
Dr. Tam: “These models are not real numbers.” “These possibilities are highly sensitive to our actions.” #cdnpoli
For his daily presser, prime minister Justin Trudeau started off by saying that the government had signed an agreement with Amazon Canada – and not Canada Post – to manage the distribution of personal protective equipment to the provinces and territories when it is received by the federal government, but one imagines that this also involves warehousing and logistics than just simply delivery. He also announced $100 million being diverted to help meet food insecurity needs, through Food Banks Canada, as well as a variety of other breakfast clubs and other food organizations. He also mentioned his teleconference with the other premiers and their devotion to data sharing and projections, and that they were working to verify the latest figures that were being put online. During the Q&A, he confirmed that Canadian Forces – in the form of Rangers – have been dispatched to the Nunavik region of Northern Quebec, and addressed the news that the American president had ordered 3M to stop sending N95 masks to Canada and other Latin American countries (3M’s president pushed back citing humanitarian concerns and retaliation), and Trudeau stated that he has warned the Americans not to block access to needed supplies – particularly as Canada has many supplies and healthcare workers the Americans need, such as the 1000 nurses who live in Windsor but work in Detroit. It does highlight the need for more domestic production of these masks as competition for procurement gets more intense globally.
And then, Ontario released its modelling of some potential COVID-19 morbidity scenarios in the province, and the media went crazy. Despite the fact that this modelling is not data and that they are mere possible scenarios that are used for planning purposes, it was framed as “data” and in the language of how many people “will die,” as though this was mathematical certainty (though a handful said “could,” as though it were any better). And lo, all of the headlines used both this framing and sensationalism, they buried the new restrictions that are being imposed in Ontario as a result. And when some of the doctors that were being interviewed about these projections, and those doctors pushed back that this wasn’t data, self-righteous journalists threw tantrums about how this was information the public had a right to know, and so on.
Dr. Tam: “These models are not real data – they are projections for certain planning purposes. … They won’t tell us how long we need to maintain physical distancing.” #cdnpoli
“But don’t we have journalists who are trained to help us sort through stuff like this? You know, by calling experts who understand the data and can help us better understand?” [Actual quote from my reply column] Actual newspaper front page: https://t.co/Hpk8SYK8qs
But here’s the thing – part of this is a transparent attempt by Doug Ford to justify his further crackdowns, which I get. (Thread from Scott Reid here for context). But at the same time, there is no nuance to reporting of these models, they are incorrectly framed, and it’s throwing a lot of big numbers and timeframes out there without sufficient context. It’s not only disaster porn, but I fear that it will not actually have the desired effect of scaring people into compliance with lockdown measures. Instead, I am reminded of the aphorism that a single death is a tragedy, but a thousand deaths is a statistic – and numbers like these (the wild range of 3000 to 15,000) will have the real possibility of becoming a statistic in people’s minds, which may do more to undermine the whole reason why this modelling was released in the first place. And that worries me more than anything else.
As the impact of the pandemic starts to be really felt in Canada, there is a new kind of rhythm starting to take shape in Ottawa, which is essentially that we get our daily press conference with Justin Trudeau, followed by ministerial press conferences, one after the other, and along the way, the daily briefings and pressers from the different provinces creep up in there as well. Today’s Trudeau press conference outlined the agreement to close the Canada-US border to non-essential traffic, and to outline the broad strokes of the $82 billion in economic measures (when you include tax deferrals) designed to help the country cope with the pandemic. He also said that measures specific to the airline industry and oil and gas sector were coming later in the week, including significant measures to remediate orphan wells in Alberta, which means that the federal government has now assumed a chunk of the province’s environmental liabilities, and both the companies that left them and the province that didn’t properly regulate their remediation are going to be let off the hook, so slow clap for that one.
Morneau says they will announce a “significant” orphan well remediation fund in the coming days. So the federal government has just assumed the environmental liabilities of the oil and gas sector. #cdnpolipic.twitter.com/uox1A54lza
Other measures included in the package were a suspension of federal student loan repayments (made interest-free), and distinctions-based funds for Indigenous communities, along with additional funds for shelters and the homeless. Not everyone is happy with those measures – the small-business lobby says that the measures aren’t enough to stop layoffs because the wage subsidy is only ten percent, which they say isn’t big enough. And in case this weren’t all bad enough, the price that Canadian oil is going for fell to its lowest level ever. So that’s fun.
We also learned that negotiations are ongoing between the parties – and Chambers – to temporarily recall Parliament in order to pass spending measures that were announced yesterday, and that could happen as early as next week, because there is a forty-eight-hour window after the Speaker agrees to the request. Part of the issue is the negotiation around how many MPs to recall – quorum for the Commons is twenty, and fifteen for the Senate – because they want to ensure proportionality. Pablo Rodriguez stated that he also wants to ensure that it’s MPs who don’t have to travel by plane to get here, but Jagmeet Singh was on TV yesterday saying he’s ready to come back, which kind of defeats the purpose, especially if we’re trying to encourage Canadians not to travel.
[Maclean’s has updated their Q&A on symptoms and contacts on where to get help.]
Meanwhile, Heather Scoffield gets a personal perspective on the aid package announced today, while Kevin Carmichael weighs in on the debate around the package – whether it is preferable to favour speed and not precision – by finding that the details are a bit too finnicky, but also notes the “elasticity” of the aid, which can expand or contract as need be as it progresses. In this thread, the Parliamentary Budget Officer finds it not targeted enough (though I’m not sure that it’s his job to weigh in on policy decisions like this). Economist Lindsay Tedds also has some suggestions on how provincial governments can step up given that the federal aid package only goes so far.
Here’s a look behind-the-scenes of the discussions around closing the Canada-US border.
Two new test kits for COVID-19 have been approved for use in Canada, to hopefully speed up testing in provincial labs.
The IRB has suspended in-person refugee hearings for the time being, and CBSA has halted deportation orders.
Here’s a look into emergency federal procurement rules that can be activated to rapidly source things like medical equipment.
The Hill Timesgot a look into the deals made between parties and caucuses in both chambers to pass those four bills and to suspend Parliament.
CBC is suspending their local evening news broadcasts for a central CBC News Network broadcast (in place of Power & Politics), which may breach CRTC rules.
It looks like MPs have agreed on a subcommittee of MPs to help guide the Centre Block renovations, including a list of “do not touch” heritage spaces.
Jason Kenney introduced an aid package for Alberta given that the province is being hit not only with COVID-19, but also plummeting oil prices.
Colby Cosh offers a meditation on the nature of liberal democracy in times of crisis like the one we’re facing.
Susan Delacourt notes that the current pandemic means that the government has stopped talking about citizens as “taxpayers” and framing politics as transactions.
Odds and ends:
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It was a day yesterday, where COVID-19 was declared a pandemic, Justin Trudeau announced a $1 billion aid package to deal with the outbreak, Donald Trump announced travel restrictions from European countries, and the NBA suspended their season (if you care about such things). More and more events are being postponed or cancelled, and the markets have entered Bear Market territory.
(Note: Maclean’s has an updated COVID-19 Q&A here).
Yup. This is exactly why public health officials say that travel bans don’t work – people circumvent them and don’t alert public health authorities. https://t.co/EzkOBpNTJh
As for that $1 billion package the government announced, one of the missing pieces are measures for workers who can’t access EI or sick leave when they are forced to self-isolate, which the government says they’re working on. As for Parliament, it does indeed have a pandemic plan, but it’s still early when it comes to deciding what portions of it need to be activated, and that can include suspending the Chamber’s sittings, but that would require some kind of negotiation with the other parties as to when to pull that trigger, and its duration.
Meanwhile, Supriya Dwivedi worries that we aren’t warning people enough of the risk coming from the US, given how much of a gong show their healthcare system is. Susan Delacourt takes particular note of Trudeau’s language in asking Canadians to play their part to “flatten the curve” of the spread of the virus. Colby Cosh delves into some of the failure of the US’ centralized Centres for Disease Control in the early stage of the COVID-19 transmission. Heather Scoffield says that adequacy of Trudeau’s $1 billion COVID-19 package won’t last given the state of the economy.
