Not that it’s a big surprise, but Senator Patrick Brazeau has vowed to fight the order that he repay those living expense in the wake of that Senate audit. While he does have a point that he was cooperative and that he met all four residency requirements, unlike the other two Senators, but that doesn’t change the fact that he spent a mere ten percent of the time. Government leader in the Senate has threatened that if Senator Brazeau and Harb don’t repay their expenses – with interest – immediately, the Senate will garnish their wages, which they can do. It’s also not clear with which court they can try to challenge these audit results and the orders that the Senate itself will be voting to enforce, seeing as Parliament is actually the highest court in the land. Meanwhile, Charlie Angus wants the legal opinion that LeBreton solicited regarding Senator Mike Duffy’s eligibility to sit in the Senate based on his residency – which told LeBreton that everything was fine – made public. (As an aside, one does wonder just how many legal opinions on the Commons side are made public.) LeBreton replied that Duffy owns property and maintains a residence in the province he represents, so case closed. Ah, but perhaps not, as it was revealed last night that that there appears to have been a deal struck between Harper’s chief of staff to help Duffy with his repayment two days before he announced it, and while the PM’s spokesperson has said on the record that no taxpayer funds were used, that likely means party funds. I suppose the party may consider it fair compensation after Duffy did all of that fundraising for them, but yeah, this is totally not helping his case any more than Brazeau and Harb’s fight is helping their own. But seriously, the rest of you – the behaviour of three individual Senators is not actually indicative of the institution as a whole, and shouldn’t undo the good work that the other hundred Senators are actually doing, within the rules. The Senate’s strength as an institution is stronger than the damage caused by a couple of bad apples, and people need to be reminded of that.
Tag Archives: Labrador
Roundup: A Liberal win in Labrador
The people of Labrador have spoken, and by a rather large margin have decided that Liberal Yvonne Jones should represent them in the House of Commons, rather than forgiving Peter Penashue and giving him another chance. The wisdom on the ground is that this was entirely a local race and had almost nothing to do with the national scene, Justin Trudeau’s leadership and whatnot. Penashue said he accomplished more in two years than any other MP anywhere, which is the kind of hyperbole we’ve come to expect from the guy who apparently did ALL THE THINGS for Labrador, and hence this defeat will be Labrador’s loss. The Conservative Party also issued a graceless statement which nevertheless tried to turn it into some kind of indictment of Trudeau’s leadership, claiming they lost twenty points since his leadership win (though no one has seemed to find any polls which had them over seventy percent), and claiming that majority governments don’t normally win by-elections (which is also not exactly true, considering how many they’ve won to date). Jones’ win means this is the first time that the Liberals have increased their seat count at the ballot box in over a decade (the only other time they’ve increased their count, of course, being when Lise St-Denis defected from the NDP).
Roundup: The RCMP take a look
The RCMP has confirmed that they are looking into those Senate audits to see if criminal charges are warranted, which Liberal Senate leader James Cowan is encouraged about, as he wants to ensure that due process is being followed. Cowan also noted on CTV’s Question Period that one particular sentence was missing from Senator Mike Duffy’s audit – that the Internal Economy committee said that the guidelines were perfectly clear and that the language was “unambiguous” in Senators Mac Harb and Patrick Brazeau’s reports, but somehow not in Duffy’s. In other words, it looks like Senator Tkachuk – who heads the Internal Economy committee – is protecting Duffy, as in two cases they said the very same forms and guidelines were clear and unambiguous. Curious indeed.
Roundup: From omnibus to minibus
At long last, the budget implementation bill was tabled yesterday, and at around 125 pages, it’s far less of the omnibus bills that the government was so fond of last year. Not that it’s too unexpected, given that the budget itself was a pretty thin document, and so Flaherty’s joke is that this one is a “minibus.” It does have a number of measures including the tariff changes, the attempt to revive the National Securities Regulator, integrating CIDA into Foreign Affairs, and taking things like Winterlude and Canada Day back from the National Capital Commission.
Roundup: Everything’s coming up Vic Toews
Vic Toews is all over the news right now, and quite possibly all over Question Period later today. Yesterday morning Toews was on The West Block and basically said that the RCMP “communications protocol” was put into place so that he doesn’t get ambushed by opposition questions in the House after the parliamentarians who had those meetings bring up things they discussed. Aww, muffin! Access to information documents also show that Toews tried to limit the RCMP’s apology to the families of victims of serial killer Robert Pickton. The RCMP ended up rejecting said revisions, saying they came in too late, but it appears to be a case of overreach, and likely an attempt to forestall any attempts of legal action that an admission that the RCMP could have done more to stop Pickton is likely to generate.
Roundup: Mulcair sees a conspiracy
After allegations were made that the Supreme Court of Canada somehow intervened during the patriation of the Constitution, the Court’s investigation has turned up no documents to suggest that this is the case. Not that there was anything that they could really be expected to find – phone records from 1982? And every justice on the bench at that time is now deceased, so it’s not like they could ask any of them. This, however, is not good enough for either the PQ government in Quebec, nor Thomas Mulcair, who seems to think that the Supreme Court is somehow covering something up. No, really, though one is left to wonder how much of this is yet another attempt to pander to nationalists in Quebec. And thus we can add another institution that Mulcair has “respect” for – the Senate, the Crown and now the Supreme Court. So much respect…
Roundup: The ruling is enough
It seems that in the wake of the Speaker’s ruling on members’ statements, the restless Conservative backbenches have backed off of their support of the Liberal opposition day motion on making Members’ Statements alphabetical in distribution. The feeling seems to be that the Speaker’s advice that if they want to stand up and be heard, that it was enough for them. Um, okay. We’ll see if that actually happens, especially considering that the delicate balance of party allotments are also in play during both Members’ Statements and Question Period in general, but it seems to me that this becomes a case of everyone being contended with half-measures, rather than any genuine reform. Sure, Warawa might have been surprised to learn that the lists are mere suggestions for the Speaker, but that doesn’t mean that MPs – or Canadians – should be satisfied by this ruling. Rather, it should be the springboard to the restoration of our Parliament to the way it should act – without lists or scripts, where MPs are engaged in the debates, actively participating, capable of delivering actual back-and-forth exchanges with spontaneity and class, rather than the dull recitations into the record that we’re now seeing.
QP: Tariffs versus carbon taxes
After yesterday’s QP excitement dropped off the news cycle because of the Boston bombings, the dynamic in the Chamber was different today, not only because Harper was off in London for tomorrow’s funeral of Baroness Thatcher, but that sense of anticipation was gone. After a couple of statements on the Boston marathon bombings, QP began with Mulcair reading a statement on the bombing and request for an update on consular assistance. James Moore, the designated back up PM du jour, gave the statement on behalf of the government and called out the “cowards” responsible. Mulcair then went onto his four questions on the Temporary Foreign Workers Programme, his tone still calm and measured, while Moore assured him that they would be investigating, and by the way, your own MPs keep asking for temporary foreign worker approvals for their ridings. Justin Trudeau was up next, and brought up the increased tariffs in the budget, which would impact the middle class. Moore reminded him that Trudeau first ran on the basis of the carbon tax known as the Green Shift. Trudeau’s performance was a little shakier today, referring to his notes on his desk more than he did yesterday, though by no means was it a Mulcair-esque reading-from-the-mini-lectern kind of performance.
Roundup: In the wake of a leadership and a convention
And so, it is done. Justin Trudeau has won the Liberal leadership, and lo, the party is reborn. Or something like that. To be fair, the fact that he won with some 80 percent of the vote share on the first count is quite remarkable, and Trudeau made a very important – and forceful – point during his speech that the era of the “hyphenated” Liberal – be they Chrétien-Liberals, Martin-Liberals, Turner-Liberals, or what have you – ends here and now. And considering that his leadership team was of a new generation that eschewed those former battles, it does send a strong signal that it’s the case, and perhaps the party will stop fighting with itself for a change. Perhaps. Meanwhile, the Conservatives wasted no time at all in putting out a congratulatory statement with a little dig about his experience in it. I write about what his election by means of the “supporter” category means from a civic literacy and accountability perspective. Leslie MacKinnon looks at how Trudeau became leader from what was an unlikely start. Michael Den Tandt wonders if Trudeau’s popularity may be his undoing, with the dangers of peaking early and not engaging the party’s veterans and loyal core support. John Ivison looks at the belief that Trudeau can single-handedly resurrect the party. John Geddes takes note of three key themes from the speech, and what they may portend for the future of the party.
Roundup: Assessing Mulcair’s QP performance
PostMedia takes a look at Thomas Mulcair’s QP performance, and the kinds of topics that he ends to cover – in particular, that he tries to focus more on economic issues than shying away from them. That said, I’m not sure that “Why won’t the government adopt the NDP’s plan” is really a question on the economy… Included in the analysis is a critique that Mulcair doesn’t seem to have grasped the way that the Liberals could set the agenda for days while they were the Official Opposition through careful use of QP, which the NDP haven’t been able to master. Indeed, they haven’t quite mastered actual debate as they simply give the same question to several MPs in both official languages, as though there wasn’t a response given that could embarrass them down the line when they asked the very same question again and again. Also, nowhere is it mentioned that he continues to read his questions from his miniature lectern on a daily basis.