Tag Archives: Parliamentary Budget Officer

Roundup: Resurrecting sham “elections”

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As part of his ongoing fit of pique against the federal government, Alberta premier Jason Kenney has decided to revive one spectacular bit of political bullshit theatre that some of us had hoped was now dead and buried – the sordid practice of Alberta’s “consultative elections” for senators. The whole notion is unconstitutional, and while the Supreme Court didn’t explicitly rule against the provinces setting up their own “elections” as part of the Senate reference, it was certainly implicitly in there, both in the notion that a consultative “election” creates an expectation of legitimacy, but the logic behind it was also completely blasted during the hearing, when Justice Thomas Cromwell asked if a consultative election is fine, why not a consultative auction? Not to mention that the entire election process in past elections has been little more than the electoral equivalent of a show trial – a sham that resembles electoral democracy but is simply designed to return only candidates from a certain party to then form an illegitimate demand that they be appointed. Kenney’s attempt to say that this gives them “accountability” is ludicrous on its face because they don’t face re-election, so there is no actual accountability that can be exercised. The whole farcical exercise has more in common with the sham elections held in communist countries than it does with the actual electoral practices in the rest of Canada, and the fact that Kenney is looking to resurrect this demented kabuki is just more of his campaign of snake oil and lies whose only point is to keep stoking the irrational anger of Albertans and hoping that it won’t blow up in his face. It inevitably will, however, and the whole country will pay the price for Kenney’s arrogance in believing he can manage the monster he created.

In other news of Kenney’s political bullshit theatre, his piece by Chris Turner dismantles the whole raison d’être of Kenney’s so-called “war room,” by pointing to the literal conspiracy theories that underpin the whole thing, and the mythology that Kenney is trying to spin around why capital has left Alberta’s energy sector. And it’s complete myth, but it gets repeated uncritically constantly, and it goes unchallenged by the media, and yet Kenney is creating this $30 million spin machine to further reinforce this mythology and conspiracy theorism, because again, it feeds the anger of his base, telling them that it’s not the fault of the world price of oil that their fortunes have changed, but rather that it’s the sinister forces of dark foreign money that is really behind it all. Without putting too fine of a point on it, this is the kind of thing that fuels the kinds of populist movements that breed fascists. But Kenney doesn’t care, because he thinks he can control it.

Meanwhile, Kenney has suddenly changed his story about the incident where he handed out earplugs during that debate in the Alberta legislature, and it’s gone from it being “light-hearted morale-boosting” to “one of my MLAs has tinnitus and was being shouted at,” which the video clearly didn’t show, and it’s just one more example of Kenney’s smile-and-lie show that he puts on for media interviews, and you can’t help but feel sorry for the interviewers because trying to disentangle his egregious lies is a Sisyphean task.

https://twitter.com/EmmaLGraney/status/1142194069902364680

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Roundup: A real climate sham

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Andrew Scheer unveiled his long-awaited environmental plan yesterday, citing that it was a “real plan” because it was longer than the other parties’…but that was about it. After he listed a bunch of lies about the current Liberal plan, Scheer kept saying that carbon pricing didn’t do anything, which is both factually incorrect (as proven by peer-reviewed work), but it also completely ignores that the current plan hasn’t had a chance to sufficiently bend the curve. By removing carbon pricing from the market and instead forcing companies who exceed their emissions to caps, it is actually even less of a market-based plan than the Liberals’ plan, and there are no specifics in how any of it would work. Promising technological solutions without price signals to spur their development is just like counting on magic to lower emissions. It’s also like Scheer’s complete lie that this plan won’t cost Canadians – it will cost them, but those costs will be passed onto them and hidden, whereas the carbon price is transparent so that people can make better choices. Scheer also claims that his plan would have the best chance of meeting the Paris targets – without actually having targets, or articulating how they would be achieved. It’s replete with a bunch of boutique tax credits that are inefficient, and is generally a bunch of language that does very little. How he claims this is a “real plan” is somewhat of a farce.

And then there’s the global component, where Scheer says that Canada should be lowering global emissions by exporting “cleaner” Canadian energy like LNG – err, except that would grow Canadian emissions, and yet he wants us to get credits for those exports. And he says that China should use Canadian carbon capture and storage technology – except it’s hugely expensive, and is not really feasible unless you’re pricing carbon (not to mention that if the storage is not done properly, it can simply all be for naught). And Canada still has some of the highest per-capita emissions, which Scheer conveniently ignores in his arguments.

Amidst this, Scheer’s apologists are saying “it’s good that they’re admitting that climate change is real!” or “Look at how far the Conservatives have come since 2008!” Except that’s all spin. They can say they believe in climate change, but they also say that Canada’s contribution is so small that we shouldn’t do anything about it. Scheer and others tried to burnish themselves with the environmental reputations of previous conservative governments, except the old Conservative party is dead, and the current one is engaging in some egregious political necrophilia to cover for their own weakness. That those apologists could say these things with a straight face on television is astounding.

https://twitter.com/robert_hiltz/status/1141470545130729473

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Roundup: TMX is go

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It wasn’t unexpected that the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion was given the green-light by the government, with assurances that there would be construction this season – but there are still details to come. More accommodations were made as part of their Indigenous consultations, and it sounds like there may be more details to be ironed out, particularly around one First Nation who is concerned about the pipeline traversing their aquifer. More than anything, however, Trudeau made it clear that any profits from this pipeline – which could be $500 million per year – would go toward clean energy projects. (It also needs to be said that Trudeau came and faced the media for this announcement – something Harper never did with Northern Gateway).

https://twitter.com/andrew_leach/status/1141060718743048192

None of this was good enough for Trudeau’s critics, however – Andrew Scheer made up a bunch of nonsense about how the government failed to get the project moving until now, Jagmeet Singh flailed about how this was contrary to climate goals, and Elizabeth May was in high dudgeon about how this made a mockery of all other climate actions (never mind the fact that oil would flow by rail without this pipeline, and this actually reduces emissions overall – crazy, but true). John Horgan promised to keep fighting the pipeline, while Jason Kenney promised to keep fighting every other environmental measure.

And then the hot takes – Aaron Wherry enumerates why this pipeline is the compromise that it is. Chantal Hébert doesn’t think that this approval will be the political problem that some think it will be. Jody Wilson-Raybould isn’t a fan of the approval, for what it’s worth. Don Braid waxes about how this entrenches the view of Alberta as a “resource bucket to pay for national dreams.” (Erm, isn’t that exactly what Kenney and company keep selling?)

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QP: In the shadow of the Raptors parade

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With all three main party leaders at the Raptors parade in Toronto, Trudeau eventually addressing that crowd, it was up to Candice Bergen to lead off today, and she complained that the government just didn’t want to build any pipelines, even though they are due to approve the Trans Mountain expansion in just days. Amarjeet Sohi responded that they have ensured that pipelines are being built, and that they have concluded their consultations on TMX. Bergen demanded a date for when the TMX would begin construction, and Sohi dodged with a reminder that the Conservatives didn’t get any pipelines built to non-US markets. Bergen gave it another go, and Sohi reminded her that they had undertaken meaningful consultation. Gérard Deltell took over in French, lamenting that the Liberals wanted to kill the energy sector, to which Sohi found it regrettable that the Conservatives didn’t have any confidence in the sector. Deltell demanded a start date for TMX construction, and Sohi replied that Conservative actions didn’t demonstrate their own support of the project. Peter Julian was up next for the NDP, and he railed that there was no business case for TMX, and Sohi replied that the NDP didn’t understand the economy or the environment. Pierre-Luc Dusseault repeated the question in French, to which Sohi reminded him there is a diversity of opinion among First Nations along the route. Dusseault then demanded a wealth tax, per the NDP’s new policy platform, to which Bill Morneau reminded him of their Middle Class™ tax cuts and how the average family is now $2000 per year better off than under the previous government. Julian repeated the demand in English, and got much the same response.

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Roundup: Disingenuous threats to national unity

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As bullshit political theatre goes, Jason Kenney continues to exercise it to its fullest as he released an “urgent letter” to the federal government yesterday, co-signed by five other premiers (four of them conservative, one of them without ostensible party affiliation) to demand that both bills C-48 and C-69 be withdrawn, and warns of consequences to “national unity” if they are not. And it’s a bit galling to play the national unity card, considering that it’s both groundless and petulant – like a tantrum where a child threatens to hold his breath until he turns blue to teach his parents “a lesson.”

Nobody is going to pretend that these are perfect bills, but for the purposes of what is being argued, neither can do the harm that Kenney and his allies are claiming. For example, C-48 will not landlock their resources, and there has been expert testimony to say that it would have a negligible impact on the oil and gas sector because there are no pipelines along that route, nor are there any planned (thanks in large part to how badly the Conservatives botched the Indigenous consultations on the Northern Gateway project). And C-69 is not going to make major infrastructure projects impossible – if anything, it would have a better chance of streamlining environmental assessments by ensuring clearer lines and better scoping of those assessments, so that there can be more focused work with the assessments. But the status quo is simply a path of more litigation because the current system is badly flawed. The branding it as the “no more pipelines bill” is and always has been disingenuous and an outright lie, but that’s what this all boils down to.

Kenney and company have lied repeatedly about the current government’s environmental programme – abetted by the fact that this government can’t communicate their way out of a wet paper bag, and they somehow refuse to call Kenney, Scheer, and company, on their bullshit. And given that Kenney managed to win an election by whipping his electorate into a state of irrational anger with a diet of lies and snake oil – anger that won’t abate now that he’s in charge – the attempt to export that technique to the rest of Canada is dangerous, but they don’t seem to care. That is the real threat to national unity, and it’s Kenny and company who are stirring it up, and they should be called out for it.

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Roundup: Incoming amendments

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There are a tonne of amendments coming out in committees in the Senate, and there are likely going to be some fairly major developments and debates on these in the coming days – particularly once the House of Commons starts debating (and ultimately rejecting) a number of them. One of the more unexpected ones for me were the fairly major amendments to the solitary confinement bill. I was fully expecting the committee to recommend the bill not proceed because the courts had already found the bill unconstitutional and the committee was on the road to deeming it unsalvageable. Apparently, they’re going to make amendments instead, so we’ll see where this goes, because they have at least two court decisions on their side already.

The legal and constitutional affairs committee has also amended the Criminal Code revamp bill to ensure that there are tougher sentences for those who perpetrate domestic violence against Indigenous women. The problem? Well, most of those perpetrators are Indigenous men, and there is already a problem with over-incarceration, so this is going to be a tough needle to thread (but we’ll see how they attempt to do so.

Meanwhile, it looks like that major revamp of C-69 – the environmental assessment bill – was left intact at report stage on a vote on division, which means that they didn’t hold a standing vote, but were simply acknowledging that the vote was not unanimous. It’s a bit…suspect that they chose to go this route, considering how many of these amendments essentially gut the bill (and were indeed written by oil and gas company lobbyists, which totally isn’t problematic at all). But what is ultimately happening here is that these senators – and Senator Peter Harder in particular – are going to send this to the House of Commons so that they can reject them, and then send it back to the Senate where they will ultimately pass it after some minor theatrics, because of the will of the elected house, and so on. It’s not exactly the bravest route, and for the opposition in the Senate, it forces Trudeau to wear the decision more directly. There may yet be senators who will try to move amendments or delete some at third reading, but given Harder’s stance, I think the strong impetus will be for them to get the Commons to make the defeats so as to protect their own backsides from the wrath of Jason Kenney and others.

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Roundup: An economic vision without an economic case

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Andrew Scheer gave the second of his policy keynote speeches yesterday, this one on his economic vision, and as could be expected, it was full of hyperbolic declarations about the size of the deficit (it’s tiny in comparison to our GDP), and the state of Canadian household finances (which have been growing). He promised that any new spending programmes would have to be paid for out of government “savings,” and in his pledge to balance the budget in two years, that would mean cuts. Of course, Conservative mouthpieces say this is easily enough achieved because they did it before (forgetting of course that the previous government had a habit of booking savings that were never going to be achieved for the sake of getting to a paper balance, like Shared Services Canada, or the Phoenix Pay System). The Liberals, incidentally, were quick to put out Bill Morneau to put a price tag on those cuts and warn that they would come out of families, and with the spectre of seeing what Doug Ford is doing to those families in Ontario, well, it’ll make things harder for Scheer.

The part that everyone talked about, however, was his grand vision of an “energy corridor” across the country where pipeline projects would magically cross the country with buy-in from Indigenous communities and everyone would be happy and prosperous, and we would have energy security and would never had to import oil from Saudi Arabia ever again. The problem with this fantasy picture, however, is largely economics. Even if Energy East were to get built, by some miracle, it would not have an economic case given that it wouldn’t be used for domestic oil in the eastern provinces as it would be far more expensive than the oil they’re importing. In fact, Energy East did not make it off the drawing board because there was no economic case – it wasn’t because there was opposition in Quebec (which has already achieved some kind of mythical status), but because there was no economic rationale for the company given that Keystone XL was back on the table. Scheer’s promise (other than the fantasy of it even happening) is that Alberta will either have to take a huge discount per barrel of oil, or oil prices in the eastern provinces start taking a major jump because they’re paying a lot more for it, and upgrade it from heavy petroleum and refine it (in refineries that would have to have been refitted, likely with yet more taxpayer subsidies). But since when should logic or basic economics be part of an “economic vision”? That would be silly.

Chris Selley offers a critique of Scheer’s rhetoric, but finds it more astonishing that it’s the Liberals’ own self-inflicted damage that is putting Scheer in a position where he has a reasonable shot of winning.

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Roundup: Kenney’s a federalist, but…

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Jason Kenney made his triumphant return to Ottawa yesterday, now bearing the title of premier of Alberta, and he went before a Senate committee to a) bluster, and b) warn that if he didn’t get his way that separatist sentiment would rise in Alberta, even though he insisted that he’s a federalist, but this was somehow beyond his control. Erm, except an actual federalist wouldn’t give oxygen to these swivel-eyed loons, nor would someone who was actually concerned about the state of the federation feed them a diet of lies and snake oil to keep them angry for the sake of electoral gain.

Part of Kenney’s bluster was his threatening to launch court challenges against Bill C-69 if it gets passed in its current form, because he claims it intrudes on provincial jurisdiction – but he’s also said a lot of bogus things about the constitutionality of his promises (up to and including his threat about holding a referendum on equalisation, which he is also now equivocating on in the media), so I’m not sure he’s got a lot of credibility to spare in this legal analysis. But these kinds of threats also put me in mind a certain sense of contagion with the court cases around the carbon tax, and according to one environmental lawyer that I interviewed recently for an upcoming article, there is a sense that the provinces are trying to lay out markers in the area of shared jurisdiction, and this may be more of that – provinces trying to grab more power for their own sake.

The thing that really bothers me about Kenney’s “I’m a federalist, but…” line is that he doesn’t seem to care how dangerous it is, and how very antithetical it runs to his so-called “open for business” shtick. Do you know what drives away business investment (beyond destroying certainty by promising to tear up the environmental regime that they were partners in developing and increasing the political risk by constantly threatening lawsuits)? Separatist sentiment. Ask Quebec what it did for them, when all of those national headquarters fled Montreal for Toronto (remember when Montreal used to be the financial capital of Canada?) and their housing market plummeted? Yeah, not sure that’s something that Kenney should be trying to repeat, even if he’s using it as a threat. Beyond that, he can’t just say “I’m a federalist, but…” and not take some responsibility for the anger he’s stoked knowing full well that he can’t deliver on those promises, which will just cause that anger to fester. I know some people are trying to claim that he’s simply trying to channel that separatist sentiment into more harmless paths, but he’s courted it rather than smacked it down. “I’m a federalist, but…” just winks to them, and it’s beyond irresponsible.

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Roundup: Undaunted by the facts

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The Parliamentary Budget Officer issued a report yesterday that confirmed what the federal government has been saying – that yes indeed, because the federal carbon price backstop is legislated that 90 percent of proceeds must be returned to individual households, that the vast majority of Canadians will be better off as a result, and yes, this includes both direct and indirect costs, and he did a whole analysis based on input and output-based pricing, and confirmed it all with StatsCan data. The federal government might as well have said “I told you so.” But did this force a mea culpa from the Conservatives that perhaps they were wrong about the whole thing? Nope. Instead, both Andrew Scheer and Ed Fast, his environment critic, issued released that cherry picked a couple of pieces from the report, divorced of proper context, to say that it “proved” their false narrative about said price. Because of course they did. And did we see any fact checking about their statements? Not anywhere that I could see. Which is your preview of the coming election – that fact-free shitposts will continue to spin lies, and they will largely get away with it, even after they’ve been debunked.

Meanwhile, the Globe and Mail reports that Andrew Scheer and several of his campaign team were meeting up with oil and gas executives to help plot the demise of the Liberals in the coming election. And before you get any ideas about this being old boys with cigars in backrooms, it should be noted that these were executives from fairly junior companies and not the big players, who do support carbon pricing (for which Jason Kenney wants to go to war with them). (As an aside, one of these junior company executives is a fairly robust troll on Twitter, so that should give you a taste of what this was about). Much like Kenney’s rhetoric, the players at this conference discussed using litigation as a tool to fight their critics, but one has to wonder how they possibly think this is going to appeal to the centrist voters they need in key battlegrounds like the 905 belt around Toronto, let alone to have any hope of winning seats in Quebec. You would think that a meeting like this just confirms for Canadians the caricatures that they have about the energy industry and its lobbyists, and doesn’t really engender sympathy for the pain that the industry is feeling at present. But maybe I’m just missing something.

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Roundup: An important first report

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While everyone was focused on Jane Philpott’s attempt to claim that the provisions in the garbage Reform Act weren’t met as it regards her expulsion from caucus, a much more important event was taking place, which was the release of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians’ first public report. This is the first time that Canada has seen any kind of public oversight into our national security and intelligence services, and it was important to see. One of the things that they focused in on was the oversight of military intelligence operations, for which the military thanked them for their suggestions on improving governance, but balked at the proposal for a legislative framework.

Nevertheless, the expert in this stuff is Stephanie Carvin, so I will turn over the reactions to her (full thread starts here):

https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1115716056247676929

https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1115717071185301504

https://twitter.com/StephanieCarvin/status/1115717072657502210

https://twitter.com/PhilippeLagasse/status/1115678714291871746

https://twitter.com/PhilippeLagasse/status/1115683292928299008

https://twitter.com/PhilippeLagasse/status/1115688317452935168

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