Tag Archives: Nominations

Roundup: An apology on the second attempt

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It was prime minister Justin Trudeau’s first presser since the WE Imbroglio blew up over the revelations of his family being paid speakers for the charity, and there was a definite note of contrition this time. After hinting that the government would extend the wage subsidy until December with details coming later in the week, a mention of his call earlier in the morning with Donald Trump that touched on tariffs, Black Lives Matter, and China, and a promise on further updates on the Safe Restart Plan with the provinces to come later in the week, Trudeau turned to his mea culpa on the Imbroglio. “I made a mistake in not recusing myself from discussions, and I’m sincerely sorry about not having done that,” Trudeau said. He praised how the government got creative with designing programmes during the pandemic, and how they had worked with a range of partners to make it happen, but he was sorry that he didn’t remove himself from the discussions with WE, and that he was frustrated that youth would have to wait longer to do their party to serve because of the mistakes he made. (I would argue that WE’s plans raised a lot of red flags too, for what it’s worth). When asked if he would appear before committee to discuss what happened, Trudeau was non-committal, but in a hung parliament, he doesn’t have the votes to shield himself this time.

During the Q&A, he said that he pointed out to Trump about the disruptions to the aluminium supply chains and hoped that they wouldn’t see tariffs that would only slow down the economic recovery; he also mentioned that there were ongoing discussions around the border, but the rest of the time was spent reiterating, over and over, that he didn’t have the details on what his family members had been paid by WE and that he should have, and that he did seem to have some reflection that he needed to be careful on this file because of his past activity with the charity but that he didn’t go far enough and should have removed himself entirely from the conversation. Later in the day, Bill Morneau sent out his own apology for his own failure to recuse himself given his daughters’ activities with WE.

For what it’s worth, there seems to be some kind of learning curve because it only took the second try for Trudeau to give an apology rather than stick to talking points aimed at deflection until the conclusion of the Ethics Commissioner’s report, at which point there would be either an apology or admission of some kind of wrongdoing and a promise to do better next time. This time, we managed to skip weeks of such failed damage control, so that’s something, I guess.

Meanwhile, Susan Delacourt finds herself wanting when it comes to Trudeau’s explanation for how the whole thing went down, and hopes that he’s saving it for his discussion with the Ethics Commissioner. Matt Gurney gives credit where credit is due for Trudeau learning enough to make a rapid admission and apology rather than dragging things out for months. Paul Wells is unimpressed with the apology and wants a full accounting of what happened, particularly as it is increasingly evident that things were wrong with the WE contract outside of the apparent conflict of interest, and how those decisions were made need to be aired.

Good reads:

  • Ruh-roh! It looks like the federal government wasn’t enforcing the rules around temporary foreign workers, which allowed outbreaks to occur on farms.
  • Here is some number-crunching on the PM’s daily pressers in the first phase of the pandemic and lockdown, including on his choice of verbs and phrases.
  • The RCMP have charged a Quebec man with calling for Justin Trudeau’s death and the eradication of Muslims.
  • Former Liberal MPs who lost their seats in the last election are waiting to hear about nomination contests so they can be ready to run again.
  • Leona Alleslev has resigned as deputy leader of the Conservatives to more vocally back Peter MacKay, who says that no promises were made for her support.
  • Maclean’s has a profile of Conservative leadership candidate Leslyn Lewis.
  • Jason Kenney is accusing the federal government of preventing Apple from fixing the province’s contact tracing app, which requires iPhones to be unlocked to work.
  • Kady O’Malley’s Process Nerd column looks at the options for calling prime minister Trudeau to committee to testify on the WE Imbroglio.
  • Heather Scoffield is frustrated by the vague answers being given on the extension and amendments to the wage subsidy programme.
  • Colby Cosh recounts how Alberta has abolished its last vestiges of prohibition, by allowing liquor sales in Mormon-centric towns that were still “dry.”

Odds and ends:

For the CBA’s National Magazine, I wrote about Friday’s Supreme Court decision on genetic privacy, and what the broader implications of the ruling are.

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Roundup: Questions on a dubious nomination

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For the second time in what could very well be the start of a series of media events that look suspiciously like campaign stops, prime minister Justin Trudeau was at a café and bistro in Chelsea, Quebec, near Ottawa, to tout the wage subsidy – a programme whose uptake has been hampered by the poor timing of its rollout by the government. He made a minor announcement about $15.8 million for youth green jobs in the natural resources sector, recounted his call with the premiers the night before during which his offer of $14 billion remained on the table for their safe reopening plans, and then capped it off with a plea for people to follow public health guidelines for Father’s Day.

It was during the Q&A that he expressed his “disappointment” with China over the decision to lay espionage charges against the Two Michaels being held as virtual hostages in retaliation for the arrest of Meng Wanzhou on an extradition warrant. Trudeau insisted that he continued to advocate for their release and that stuff was happening behind the scenes, but he didn’t elaborate further. He also was badgered repeatedly about the revelation that his former MP, Marwan Tabbara, was the subject of at least one sexual harassment investigation where claims were substantiated. Trudeau would only say that he was aware of the investigations and that they have a rigorous process in place where outside professionals are brought in to deal with situations when they arise, but that he couldn’t say anything more because said process was also deeply confidential by nature.

While everyone one social media spent the whole day going “I guess zero tolerance doesn’t mean zero tolerance,” ignoring the fact that it’s actually a poor idea to turf everyone at the first sign of trouble (seriously – this recent practice of kicking people out of caucus is inherently destructive and also prevents future use of social controls to keep these MPs and senators in line). I suspect that Trudeau realized that a performative “zero tolerance” policy was more trouble than it was worth and he ensured there was some nuance in how the policy was applied, and this was a case thereof, but now he also has to endure the taunts of “hypocrite!” as his explanations for the apparent change of position remain non-existent in the face of repeated questions. That said, the fact that it appears that Tabbara’s nomination took some six months to be decided upon by the green-light committee is pretty suspicious, and I would suspect they were weighing considerations, such as how much of a fundraiser he is for the party in addition to his being an incumbent. (Remember that protected nominations are antithetical to how our system is supposed to work, and that it’s proven that parties have been manipulating their nomination processes to the detriment of democracy). It would be great if Trudeau could be more frank or candid about things like Tabbara’s nomination and why he was green-lit again when the party clearly had no problem ousting other sitting MPs with little explanation (though in the case of Eva Nassif, it sounds like she was trying to meddle in other nominations for her own ends, if The Hill Times’ sources were to be believed). Then again, the party also somehow managed to be behind on getting all of their nominations in place in advance of the election when they had four gods damned years to do so, so I’m not sure what to suggest other than perhaps Trudeau’s decision to centralize yet more of his party’s power in his office as leader is going to come around bite him in the ass.

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Roundup: A bridge loan, not a bailout

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It was a bit of a staggered rollout of the message of the day, starting with Bill Morneau and Navdeep Bains in Toronto to announce the creation of the Large Employer Emergency Financing Facility (LEEFF), which is designed to give large employers temporary bridge financing if they can’t get it by other means, but that comes with a great many strings attached, such as ensuring that jobs and collective agreements are maintained, that climate change plans are not affected, and that there are limits to executive compensation, share buybacks, dividends, and on top of that, these companies will need to disclose their financial structures to ensure that they’re not avoiding taxes with offshore banks or shelters.

Justin Trudeau was up shortly thereafter for his daily presser, noting the start of National Nursing Week, before he spoke about enhanced measures for medium-sized businesses, and then reiterated the messages around the LEEFF, citing that these were bridge loans and not bail-outs, and that the government was only to be a lender of last resort. When asked whether this was some kind of attack on oil companies with the focus on environmental plans, Trudeau insisted that many of them had net-zero-by-2050 plans, so this condition should not have been more onerous on them – but that didn’t stop the usual suspects from complaining that this wasn’t the kind of help that the energy sector was looking for.

During the ministerial presser, Chrystia Freeland said that they working with the US to deal with the inevitable increase in cross-border traffic as economies started re-opening, as premiers express reservations around the possibility of visitors once again coming to Canada.

Meanwhile, here’s economist Kevin Milligan on the path of the labour market and the economy, that’s worth thinking about.

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1259641163989970945

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1259641908436930560

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https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/1259644740460404736

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Roundup: Unveiling the help for students

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Prime minister Justin Trudeau arrived at his daily presser with big news – the long-awaited relief package for students, totalling some $9 billion in new emergency measures, starting with the Canada Emergency Student Benefit that provides between $1250 and $1750 per student between May and August (being the period when they would ordinarily be out of school). This would be augmented by additional grants next year on top of loan repayment deferrals. As well, the government would be creating a number of placements for students in needed areas, as well as a Canada Student Service Grant between $1000 and $5000 for those students who volunteer with essential services during these pandemic times – on top of additional funding for the next academic year, and specific pots of money for Indigenous students. During the Q&A and the subsequent ministerial presser, there were questions on repatriations (most especially from India), as well as on what’s happening with prisons as they face the pandemic (and here is a good thread from Justin Ling, who brought the receipts as to why this matters) – made especially important because even the Correctional Investigator can’t get proper figures about what is going on. This gets complicated when you have tough-on-crime politicians making hay about needed decarceration during a crisis like this. Trudeau also gave a rare moment of candour when he stated in response to a question that universal benefits are actually more complicated than they seem, which was why they went with the CERB (but it only took him three tries to actually say it – something I’ve been pointing out for a while).

And then the requests came. Quebec’s premier asked for an additional 1000 soldiers to help cover off in long-term care facilities as the death toll continues to climb, particularly around Montreal. (Here’s a thread that explains some of what is going on, particularly as transmission from long-term-care facility to hospitals is an added problem). Around the same time, Doug Ford also asked for military assistance with five facilities in Ontario (but wouldn’t say which ones). But throughout this, we keep seeing the PM and other ministers being asked if the federal government needs to somehow “take over” the long-term care file, which I think is a bit boggling because there’s no actual mechanism for them to do that. Provincial powers aren’t delegated by the federal government – back during Confederation, they were divvied up between the provinces and the federal government, and in many cases, the provinces were given those powers because they are closer to the people. Yes, there is a federal role in healthcare (beyond simple dollars), which has a lot to do with regulation and the approval of drugs and medical devices, which avoids the duplication of every province needing to do their own. I’m not sure how exactly they should assume control of these facilities – especially because provinces do not take well to having their funding allocations come with strings or reporting requirements. Seriously – previous governments have tried, and it doesn’t go well. Yes, we’re going to need to have a reckoning in this country about the whole issue of long-term care, but that reckoning can’t simply be having Ottawa assume control. I mean, not unless they want to amend the Constitution (and good luck with that).

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Roundup: Party positions and individual agency

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The weaponization of private members’ business continues unabated in Parliament, as the Conservatives put out an attack yesterday that claims that the Liberals want to “legalize” hard drugs because maverick backbencher Nathaniel Erskine-Smith tabled a private members’ bill that calls on the decriminalization of small personal amounts in order to better treat addiction as a public health issue and to not criminalize people with addictions – something that has worked in some countries. The lie, of course, is both in claiming that this was official government policy, and that it was calling for legalization – because who cares about truth or facts when there is fear to be mongered?

The bigger problem here? What it does to how private members’ business is treated in the House of Commons, and more to the point, there is a very big potential for this to blow up in Scheer’s face because of Cathay Wagantall’s sex-selective abortion bill currently on the Order Paper. And yes, let’s not be obtuse about this – the media feeds this particular weaponization, both in how they made this kind of abortion bill an Issue during the election, and how we both demand that MPs be both independent and yet castigate the leader for “losing control” when any MP shows any glimmer of independence. (And for the record, Scheer has not said anything about Wagantall’s bill, other than to have his spokesperson say that he “discouraged” such bills).

I know that everyone is going to be cute about these bills, and how if they get tabled the party “must” support the position because everything is so centrally controlled, and so on, but this is part of what poisons the system. Insisting that everyone be marching in lockstep from other parties ensures that the same insistence is made about your own party, and it removes any agency from MPs. They’re MPs, not gods damned battle droids. If we want drones to simply read speeches into the record and vote according the leader’s office, then why do we even bother with MPs? Why bother with parliament at all? The Conservatives’ release is embarrassing, and they should be ashamed of themselves for it (which of course would imply that they’re capable of shame, but I have my doubts about that one too).

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Roundup: Concern trolling and dual citizenship

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It was a quieter day on the campaign, and Justin Trudeau remained in Montreal to just hold a media availability rather than make any new announcements, and he reiterated the point from the debate on Wednesday that if his government would look to improve the medical assistance in dying legislation per the Quebec court decision. He also again defended using two campaign planes by pointing to the use of carbon offsets (never mind that this is a clear case of concern trolling by those who don’t actually care about climate change).

Andrew Scheer was in Kingsclear, New Brunswick, to promise an expansion of the volunteer firefighters tax credit (or “volunteer heroes,” as their press release stated because it was apparently written by a nine-year-old). He also finally stopped dancing around the abortion question to state – again – that he is personally “pro-life” but wouldn’t re-open the debate. Shortly thereafter, the story broke that Scheer holds dual-citizenship with the US, and within an hour stated that he had already started the process of revocation, but it remains exceedingly curious given that Scheer personally questioned Michëlle Jean’s dual-citizenship before she became Governor General, and the Conservative attacks on Stéphane Dion and Thomas Mulcair about their own dual-citizenships. Scheer also stated that he had never been asked about it which was why he never talked about it, which is unconvincing at best.

Jagmeet Singh headed to Toronto to hold another media availability to reiterate his same platform proposals.

And just to put another giant bomb in the election, a potential strike by school support workers could shutter schools in major school districts in Ontario by Monday, which could send the Ford government scrambling, and further cause blowback against Scheer as the lines between federal and provincial governments continue to blur.

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Roundup: A corridor to nowhere

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While the Liberals took the day off of the campaign, Andrew Scheer headed to Edmonton to campaign alongside Jason Kenney in Amarjeet Sohi’s riding, where Scheer reiterated his previously announced vision for a “trans-national energy corridor” which he imagines would create a right-of-way for all manner of pipelines across the country and they wouldn’t need to do additional environmental assessments on those projects or have jurisdictional challenges, or anything of the sort. Erm, except it’s going to involve expropriating a lot of land from private landowners (which is expensive and contrary to what Conservatives claim to stand for), and it will be long, complex, and expensive negotiations with the various First Nations and Inuit along those lands, because you can be assured that they will be asserting rights title over that territory. (For more, I wrote a column on this when the subject was first broached in May). It’s nice in theory, but practically has little chance of getting anywhere off the ground.

On the topic of Scheer, the Globe and Mail found that while he says that he was an “insurance broker” for six months in Saskatchewan as his private sector experience, he was never licenced and didn’t actually work as a broker. So that’s something.

Jagmeet Singh, meanwhile, was in Burnaby, BC, to promise $30 million in federal funds to reduce the cost of BC ferries. It’s worth noting that this was five days straight of campaigning in the vicinity of his riding, which could easily be interpreted as a sign that he’s worried about saving the seats he has in the area.

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Roundup: Trying to draw in the Supreme Court

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If this election could get any stupider, it did yesterday. Justin Trudeau started the day off in Sudbury, and after arriving by canoe, he promised not only to further expand the areas of land and waters that are protected areas as part of ongoing roll-out of green policies in advance of today’s “climate strike” rally, Trudeau also promised an expansion of the “learn to camp” programme, including bursaries of up to $2000 for low-income families. As someone who hates camping, this is borderline offensive – but it’s also one of the whitest of white people policies in the book. (Seriously – ask a person of colour how they feel about camping). I get that the idea is that it promotes connecting people with nature and the importance of conservation, but this was probably one of the dumbest campaign promises to date.

Andrew Scheer was not much better. From Trudeau’s riding of Papineau in Montréal, Scheer tapped into the Trumpian “Lock Her Up!” mentality by promising not only a judicial inquiry into the Double-Hyphen Affair, but also to pass a cartoonishly named No More Cover-Ups Act, which would empower the RCMP to go directly to the Supreme Court of Canada for access to Cabinet documents – all of it predicated on the lie that the RCMP are investigating the PMO (they’re not) and that they can’t get access to documents (because the Clerk of the Privy Council said no to a fishing expedition). It’s all very gross and unseemly. Not only do we not demand that the police investigate our political rivals (this isn’t a banana republic, and if the Liberals lose, then they will have faced political consequences for the Affair), but politicising judicial inquiries is a Very Bad Thing. Dragging the Supreme Court into one’s political vendettas is even worse (and I have a column on that very topic coming out later today about that very issue).

As for Jagmeet Singh, he was in Campbell River, BC to reiterate his promise to build half a million housing units, but to also flesh out his promise for income supports of up to $5000 per year for low-income renters. But again, this is provincial jurisdiction so the rental income supports will have to be a carefully designed policy, while he has yet to explain how he’ll rapidly build all of this social housing when the cities where it’s most needed are very tight labour markets, which means there likely aren’t enough construction workers to do the job, and that will drive up the costs of building these units by a lot. (Singh also completely mischaracterised the output-based system on carbon pricing as part of his trying to downplay the current government’s record, because he’s doing politics differently).

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Roundup: Duelling policies degenerating to stupidity

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It was a day when the competing pledges went a bit…dumb, as the two main parties put out competing policies on the same issue, this time being energy efficiency home renovations. Andrew Scheer was out first in Jonquiere, Quebec, where he fleshed out the previously promised tax credit for said renovations. As a way of reducing GHGs, there is very little bang to be had for the bucks being expended on it, and when pressed by a CBC reporter, Scheer couldn’t give any answers in terms of megatonnes of carbon emissions reductions that need to happen for the Paris targets to be reached (which he still mouths that he’s interested in). Add in the fact that he’s promising to cut the HST on home heating is a signal for people to use more fuel (prices are incentives, remember), so the tax credit pays for people to cut back, which makes no economic sense. (But this is a right-flavoured populist party, so don’t expect market solutions any longer). Above all, the plan is simply to let people who are wealthy enough to own houses and pay for the renovations simply add value to said homes at the taxpayer’s expense, which puts a lie to the narratives about “affordability.”

Shortly thereafter, Justin Trudeau was in Port Coquitlam, BC, to showcase their green energy retrofit programme, which involves interest-free loans, free energy audits, cash incentives and grants, and would also be eligible for renters and landlords as opposed to just landlords. One of the more expensive elements of Trudeau’s pledge was for national flood insurance and enhanced EI benefits for natural disasters, which he says still need to be devised – but flood insurance is going to be costly. The Conservatives then attacked this plan by saying that people can’t necessarily afford the loans…but their plan requires people to pay for the renovations up front in order to get the tax credit, so it makes no sense. It’s starting to feel like we’re living through the stupidest election yet.

https://twitter.com/EmmMacfarlane/status/1177041128991932417

Jagmeet Singh was in Burnaby to promise that he would bolster the RCMP’s efforts to combat money laundering as a way to make housing more affordable, particularly in British Columbia, plus a 15 percent foreign buyer’s tax on properties.

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Roundup: Sweetening the newborn benefits

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It was another day of promises to families with young children, of course, and Justin Trudeau was out first this morning from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, to promise a more comprehensive package of benefits for the families of newborns – additional Canada Child Benefit payments, making maternity benefits actually tax free by removing the taxation at source as opposed to a non-refundable tax credit, and additional weeks of parental leave for adoptive parents. While most of the media stories didn’t really touch on it, the enhanced CCB payouts in the first month of a child’s life is approaching a basic minimum income for parents, as it doesn’t rely on EI benefits (which don’t apply for those who are self-employed or who weren’t working). While there are still a few questions about implementation (explained in this thread by Lindsay Tedds), most seem to agree that the Liberal plan is far more useful to parents than the one the Conservatives announced earlier.

Andrew Scheer was in Winnipeg, where he announced a promise to enhance the Registered Education Savings Plan benefits for those in lower income brackets, but it remains a fact that this is another promise that disproportionately benefits wealthier households, and does nothing for those who can’t afford to contribute to these RESPs. (Here’s a thread from Jennifer Robson on the efficacy of RESPs for low-income Canadians). Scheer also accused Trudeau of stealing his parental benefits idea and that he voted against it before and announced it now – but the Liberal plan is very different from the one Scheer proposed. (Here’s another thread from Robson comparing the Conservative and Liberal promises). Scheer also accused the Liberals of not being transparent about the costs of their promises, but Trudeau had already stated that a PBO-costing of them would becoming out once the whole platform is announced (which may provide a more holistic picture of their promises rather than them coming out piecemeal like the Conservatives are doing).

For Jagmeet Singh, he was in Ottawa to re-announce his party’s promise to build half a million new affordable housing units – but wouldn’t say how they would do it, which is kind of a big deal because the places where affordable housing is most acute are areas with either full employment or labour shortages, which is kind of a big deal if they want to get it built affordably.

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