Roundup: CBC’s baffling mandate talk

There are some pretty questionable narratives that circulate in Canadian media for a lot of very dubious reasons, and we had another winner yesterday, when Justin Trudeau was on Peter Mansbridge’s podcast. Bafflingly, he was asked if he needed to go through an election to get a “mandate” to implement his upcoming budget, and I cannot even.

I. Cannot. Even.

Trudeau – semi-correctly – noted that he does not because he already one.

This notion that we somehow have “mandates” in our system is completely divorced from reality. We don’t have mandates – governments operate on the basis of confidence. They are appointed by the Governor General based on their ability to maintain the confidence of the Chamber – they are not popularly elected. They do not need to solely operate on what was in the election, because a) events, dear boy, events, and b) they operate on the basis of confidence. If the legislature has a problem with the government’s agenda, they will let them know. It’s also incredibly difficult to claim a “mandate” in our electoral system given that we operate by plurality, and even more especially when we have a hung parliament. (More on this from Philippe Lagassé here).

https://twitter.com/LagassePhilippe/status/1374805012120014862

Even more to the point, why the gods damned CBC would write up 800 words on this interaction for a dynamic that does not exist in a Westminster parliamentary system like ours is boggling.

Continue reading

Roundup: A level of cynicism you need to reach for

The Conservatives spent their allotted Supply Day yesterday debating a non-binding motion that would demand the government produce a “data-driven” plan to end all lockdowns permanently – something that should more generously be referred to as shenanigans, but is perhaps better described as an act of deep cynicism that is designed to create false expectations, and make it look like the government is guilty of inaction when the demands being placed on them are largely outside of their jurisdiction.

https://twitter.com/kateheartfield/status/1374374821463687186

https://twitter.com/kateheartfield/status/1374375879959187459

Part of this cynicism is trying to blame the federal government for the lockdowns – or perhaps more appropriately mockdowns – that have occurred over the past year, when those are provincial decisions. Every few days in QP, we get a question prefaced with “lockdowns were supposed to be a temporary measure,” which then blames the federal government for something or other when it was the provinces who a) did not lock down properly, b) opened too early, and c) tried to play Goldilocks by thinking they could have a little bit of COVID in the community and everything would be fine, forgetting that it grows exponentially, and by not taking proper measures, things spiralled out of control. And it keeps happening – we never properly exited the second wave and we are already into the third because these premiers did not learn their lessons and were too concerned about letting people eat in restaurants and failing the marshmallow test rather than actually crushing the spread and allowing a more normal pace of business operations – much as Atlantic Canada managed to do.

Of course, it’s the Conservatives’ ideological brethren who are responsible for most of the disasters at the provincial level, meaning that they don’t want to criticize them. Rather, they are more invested in creating some kind of alternate reality where the federal government is making the calls (they’re not), and are dressing up their disregard for lives under the crocodile tears of “mental health,” when their loaded questions about re-opening the economy betray their true concerns. The realities of a pandemic, where people need to be paid to stay home in order to limit spread, have proven to be beyond their capacity to process, and they cannot deal with this reality – so they instead create an alternate one. Having the federal government produce a plan for re-opening at this point not only sets up false hope and unrealistic expectations, but it would simply allow people to feel like they have permission to start “cheating” on the rules the closer they get to any of the dates outlined in these plans, and it would set back progress even more than it’s been set back now by certain incompetent and immoral murderclowns who are running many of the provinces. With the new variants circulating in community spread, demanding a map for re-opening when we still don’t know what the landscape will look like is premature and frankly, foolhardy. But they don’t care – they’re just looking to score points by crying “The US and the UK have reopening plans but we don’t!” It makes it hard to treat them as a government-in-waiting if this is the casual disregard they have for human lives.

Continue reading

QP: Demanding a “data-driven” plan to re-open

On a beautiful Tuesday in the Nation’s Capital, the prime minister was indeed in the Chamber for QP, along with fourth other Liberals, which was a very pleasant change of pace. Erin O’Toole led off in person, script on mini-lectern, and he raised the fatigue over lockdowns and the spectre of opioid overdoses, and true to his party’s Supply Day motion, demanded a “data-driven” federal plan for re-opening the economy. Justin Trudeau noted that the federal government has always been there for Canadians and would continue to listen to the recommendations of experts on re-opening. O’Toole tried to wedge a mental health angle, and Trudeau insisted that they stuck to the advice of science, and poked that some Conservatives didn’t even believe in masks. O’Toole then falsely accused the federal government of making a political decision around second doses, before accusing the federal government of being late on everything, to which Trudeau pushed back, citing that the provinces make the decision around spacing vaccine doses. O’Toole then repeated his first question in French, got much the same response in French, and for his final question, O’Toole accused the country of trailing behind. Trudeau took the opportunity to say that while O’Toole wanted a plan for the economy, he still doesn’t believe that the environment and the economy go hand in hand.

Yves-François Blanchet rose to for the Bloc, and after raising the announcement on high-speed internet yesterday, demanded higher health transfers. Trudeau reminded him that they have given higher transfers to the provinces in the pandemic and they would discuss future transfers after it was over. Blanchet then raised the panic over a certain obnoxious blow hard professor’s “Quebec-bashing,” but this time, Trudeau didn’t bite and returned to talk about federal supports for provinces. 

Jagmeet Singh then rose for the NDP, and in French, demanded an apology for General Vance getting a raise after allegations were raised against him, and Trudeau spoke about the importance of independent investigations. Singh switched to English to demand the government support their Supply Day motion on taking profit out of long-term care, to which Trudeau reminded him that under the constitution, this is a provincial responsibility. 

Continue reading

QP: Bludgeoning about belief in climate change

It was heartening to see a few more bodies in the Chamber, but alas, there remained only a mere two Liberals — Mark Gerretsen and the designated front-bench babysitter, Catherine McKenna. Candice Bergen led off in person, and she spun a very dubious connection between continued lockdowns and federal actions or perceived lack thereof. Jonathan Wilkinson, surprisingly, answered and gave a brief speech about how climate change is real, in the wake of the Conservatives’ policy convention. Bergen then pivoted to the trials of the two Michaels, and demanded the government withdraw their participation in the Asian Infrastructure Bank, which Marc Garneau disputed, citing that these were a top priority, and thanked allies for appearing that the court houses in China in protest. Bergen railed that the government sent $40 million to the Asian Infrastructure Bank, and Garneau gave a stern warning to China about arbitrary detention. Gérard Deltell took over in French, and received pay increases given to General Vance after the allegations against him were raised, for which Harjit Sajjan stated that he doesn’t determine pay raises, but that it was done independently on the advice of the public service. Deltell tried again, and this time Sajjan raised testimony from Harper’s former chief of staff at the defence committee earlier in the day.

Alain Therrien rose for the Bloc, and demanded increased health transfers for the provinces, crocodile tears about the plight of nurses metaphorically streaming down his face, for which Patty Hajdu reminded him they are already giving increased transfers to the provinces. Therrien was not mollified, demanding increases, and in response, Hajdu listed assistance given to the provinces.

Jagmeet Singh then led for the NDP in person, and in French, he also raised Vance’s pay increase and demanded an apology, for which Sajjan repeated that he does not determine pay. Singh then switched to English to demand concrete action to end systemic racism in the RCMP, and Bill Blair gave his condolences to Colton Boushie’s family, and said that the Commissioner of the RCMP agreed to implement the recommendations of the report.

Continue reading

Roundup: The leader and the grassroots disagree on climate change

After Erin O’Toole’s big speech at the Conservative Party’s “virtual” convention, where he said that the party needed to change if they hoped to win enough seats to form government in the future, the party apparently felt otherwise on a number of policy resolutions. The big one that will be cited for weeks to come is the fact that on a resolution to declare that climate change is real that the party needs to act on it, the grassroots voted this down – predominantly with votes from Alberta and Saskatchewan, but also from the social conservatives. It seems that Campaign Life Coalition distributed a guide to delegates, wherein they equated “climate alarmism” as a tool to justify population control and abortion, so good luck having that rational debate.

But it almost doesn’t matter because O’Toole says climate change is real, and he’s going to do something about it. What exactly is unspecified, and he also intimated that the economy comes first, so that could mean doing as little as possible using the economic recovery as cover – but it won’t be a carbon price (which is ridiculous for a supposed fiscal conservative given that it’s a transparent market-based system that allows consumers to make better choices). But this has become what happens with our political parties now that we have made them solely leader-centric thanks to our presidential primary-style leadership contests. What the leader says goes in terms of policy and election platforms, so these grassroots policy conventions have largely become theatre with little resonance to how said leader operates because his or her word is what goes. The system shouldn’t work like this, but all parties now operate in this mode, but nobody wants to address the cause of it.

To that end, Chantal Hébert weaves together O’Toole’s weakness on promising a climate plan without a carbon price, and the upcoming Supreme Court decision on it, and how those two dynamics play together. Susan Delacourt takes the “virtual” convention to heart and posits that the Conservatives have created a virtual reality for themselves if they believe that denying climate change is what will set the tone for a campaign while their leader tries to shake them out of their complacency.

Continue reading

Roundup: The importance of our distinctions

There has been no shortage of columns on the future of the Canadian monarchy over the past few days – I’ve even contributed my own – and they are all over the map between “Our current system works” and “Barbados is going republican so why can’t we?” But one of the fundamental problems with many of these pieces is a fundamental lack of basic civics. Like, the most basic, which then gets even more compounded with wrong-headed expectations about what our other political actors should be doing. A huge example is the importance of keeping the ceremonial head of state functions away from the head of government functions, but this is failing to find as much traction these days, and that’s a problem.

https://twitter.com/LagassePhilippe/status/1372200793546366976

https://twitter.com/LagassePhilippe/status/1372202091712819200

https://twitter.com/LagassePhilippe/status/1372203588466978820

https://twitter.com/LagassePhilippe/status/1372205703843225607

I would dispute with Philippe a bit here in that people would get fussed about honours being handed out by prime ministers or ministers, particularly if it’s a PM that they disagree with. That’s one of the primary reasons why honours should be with the Queen via the Governor Genera/Lieutenant Governors, because it keeps it out of the hands of politicians and the whims of the government of the day. When you start turning honours over to politicians, bad things happen – recall the gong show that was the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee medals, where MPs and senators were given a number to hand out apiece, and some of them went to certain individuals that would never have been eligible for any other honours in this country.

But of course, as Dan Gardner points out, so much of this stems not only from our poor civics education, but the fact that we are so saturated with American pop culture and politics that so many in this country believe that we are analogous in so many ways. Hell, we have political parties in this country who simply swallow the positions of American politicos and just divide by 10, thinking that’s all it takes, like we’re not separate countries or anything. It’s a huge problem and not enough of us are pushing back against it. The Crown is a big part of what keeps us distinct, and we need to better appreciate that. I can say from personal experience that one of the comments I’ve received most about my book is that people read the chapter on the Crown and say that it finally makes sense to them because they’ve never learned it properly before. We have a problem and we need to solve it before more people think that the solution is to become Americans.

https://twitter.com/dgardner/status/1372205403782676486

Continue reading

Roundup: Pointing to the civilian culture too

The reckoning over the culture in the Canadian Forces that permits sexual misconduct continues to get an airing, and over the weekend, we saw another dimension to this reckoning be raised, which is that the culture of the civilian branch – the Department of National Defence – has many of these same cultural problems in part because a good portion of its staff are former military and came up in the same toxic culture in the Forces. One example of ways in which the Forces were trying to show women that they weren’t welcome was forcing them into co-ed showers in 1997, and how the people involved in those decisions are still in positions of authority today.

Also over the weekend, there was an interview with retired Lt-Gen. Christine Whitecross, who discussed her experiences with misconduct that she did not always pursue complaints about, but also her sense of optimism that more people reporting sexual misconduct in the ranks. Whitecross also let it be known that she did apply for the chief of defence staff position, but obviously did not get it (to the surprise of many). As well, the accused in one of the most high-profile cases of sexual assault in the military – the story of which wound up in Maclean’s and touched off the Deschamps report and Operation Honour – is going to plead guilty to the charges after all.

Amidst all of this, the current military ombudsman is now echoing previous calls to make his office fully independent and reporting to Parliament, rather than to the department and the minister, and I just can’t. The very last thing we need is one more unaccountable Independent Officer of Parliament, and yet they are proliferating like mad, and this is yet one more demand. Surely we can figure out some sort of mechanism to help them retain greater independence within the current structure, but we need to stop the proliferation of Officers of Parliament, before they completely overrun our system, reducing our MPs to battle droids who recite canned speeches and vote according to their whip’s instructions. And it’s not like we’re not seeing other Officers of Parliament going well beyond their job descriptions and turning themselves into media darlings, right? Oh, wait…

Continue reading

Roundup: Too-generous benefits?

I find myself a bit troubled by this notion that pandemic benefits have been “too generous,” even when people trot out statistics that show that some households got as much as $3000 more in supports like CERB over reported lost income in a three-month period, and some $2500 more in lower-income households. Partially why this rankles is because this is a gods damned global pandemic and we needed people to stay home rather than try to recklessly go to potentially unsafe workplaces where they could spread the virus. This notion that people needed to get back to work is one of the reasons why COVID infections and deaths were at much higher rates in other countries who had less generous supports, and I don’t think we should necessarily be apologising for this.

The other aspect of this that is unsettling is this notion that if these benefits continue that there will be a disincentive to work as the economy recovers, but again, if the economy is recovering and we are reaching a point of mass vaccination sufficient to actually have a re-opened economy, then these pandemic-specific programmes would be wound down, so it shouldn’t be a long-term consideration. More to the point, however, is that these pandemic supports were not really all that generous, and if people think it’s a disincentive to work, then maybe they should re-examine the wages that people are being paid – if they’re so low that CERB-level payments are a disincentive, then perhaps the job is the wage rate and not the benefits themselves. Businesses have continually lobbied to keep minimum wages artificially low, in spite of an increasing volume of evidence that higher minimum wage don’t actually cause businesses to close (and in fact, have the opposite effect). Perhaps governments should take that into account as we look to “build back better,” with more inclusive growth that should include higher wages for these workers, rather than returning to the failed “old normal” of grinding poverty.

Continue reading

Roundup: Pandora’s Box is open

With the agreement of all House Leaders in the Commons, MPs have finally done it and wrenched open the lid of Pandora’s Box (which is actually a jar) and have let loose evil into the world. That evil is their remote voting app, and Parliament will forever suffer for it.

Am I being a drama queen about this? Hardly. Because we’re already seeing the demands to make these hybrid sittings permanent. The Parliamentary Budget Officer was asked to report on “savings” of this set-up, and in spite of the increased IT and staff costs (and almost no mention of the human costs of the interpreters burning out and suffering cognitive injuries at a horrific rate), he figured that it would save about $6.2 million a year, mostly in travel costs, as well as some 2,972 metric tonnes of CO2 emissions. And the senator who commissioned the PBO report was so enthralled with the result that she wants to make hybrid sittings permanent, with the “bonus” that parliamentarians can spend more time in their “ridings” (erm, except senators don’t have ridings because they represent the whole province, Quebec’s senatorial districts notwithstanding).

What I have been warning about this whole time is that MPs would use the pandemic to normalise hybrid sittings and remote voting, because some of them – the Liberals especially – have been pushing for this for years with little success, and with the pandemic, they are not letting a good crisis go to waste. They know that once it’s over, they will contrive excuses to keep these “temporary” measures permanent, starting with the excuse that it’ll be beneficial for MPs on parental leave, and then it’ll be for those with work-life balance issues, and finally it will because they just have so many things going on in their ridings that they couldn’t possibly be in Ottawa – and now they have the added justification of cost savings and reduced GHG from flights. Parliament is facing de-population, and it will become like a homeroom that everyone attends once or twice a year, and that’s it.

The problem is that Parliament is a face-to-face institution. Some of the most important work that happens is actually on the margins of committee rooms, in the lobbies behind the Chambers, or in the corridors. Ministers can be button-holed by MPs in the Chamber waiting for votes, which is incredibly valuable. Relationships are built with stakeholders and witnesses who appear at committee, and that happens face-to-face. And more importantly, MPs need to actually be in the same room for collegiality to happen. When MPs stopped having dinner together in the Parliamentary Restaurant three nights a week after they ended evening sittings, collegiality plummeted and has never recovered. If MPs aren’t even in Ottawa with one another, they will be fully ensconced in partisan bubbles that make it easy to treat one another as the enemy rather than as fellow MPs who can play outraged in the Chamber and go for a drink together afterward (which is becoming rare enough as it is). This is antithetical to what Parliament is. And not enough of them are getting it, so they’re allowing this to go ahead full-steam ahead, and boasting about “modernisation,” and so on. It will kill Parliament, and not enough people will actually care, which is the worst part.

Continue reading

Roundup: More alike than unalike

The NDP decided that the bilateral meeting between Justin Trudeau and Joe Biden was the perfect time to take to shitposting about it, in the form of a juvenile mock-up of the agenda items, and making their remarks on them. Because this is where we’re at in this country – our two main opposition parties have decided that the online tactics of shitposting are definitely the way to win the hearts and minds of Canadian voters.

In the NDP’s case, this is not only about trolling Trudeau, but also Biden, because they have made a concerted effort to appeal to the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez/Bernie Sanders fanbase – consistent with their lifting their policy ideas wholesale, no matter whether or not they have any relevance in the Canadian context. This tends to involve a certain amount of trying to “win the Internet,” whether it’s with Jagmeet Singh adopting TikTok memes, or the culmination of this attempt to co-opt American Democrat cred when Singh and Ocasio-Cortez played Among Us over Twitch as part of a fundraiser. As a more centrist, compromise candidate, Biden is seen as a betrayal of the progressive wing of the Democrats, and you can bet that the Canadian New Democrats trying to appeal to them is going to cash in on that as much as possible.

None of this should be too surprising, however – the NDP have long-since abandoned any real sense of ideology for the sake of being left-flavoured populists, running after flavours of the week and pursuing policies that don’t actually make sense for their own purported principles (like their demand to cut the HST off of home heating, which would only disproportionately reward the wealthy). In this way, they have been more like the Conservatives than unalike for a while now, but with this full-on embrace of shitposting (as opposed to simply the mendacious omission of jurisdictional boundaries in their demands) just drives that point home.

Continue reading