Tag Archives: RMCP

QP: The Bank of Canada disputes the narrative

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The prime minister was present today, while his deputy was not, but all other leaders were. After a couple of standing ovations for Yvonne Jones for her return to the Commons from cancer treatment, things got underway.

Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and worried about the number of RCMP investigations into foreign interference, and that the former national security advisor was aware of this, before demanding a “genuine” public inquiry. Justin Trudeau said that he tasked Dominic LeBlanc with the task of next steps. Poilievre switched to English to recite his usual illiterate nonsense around deficits and inflation, to which Trudeau quoted the Governor of the Bank of Canada who said that government spending was not standing in the way of taming inflation. Poilievre haltingly tried to return to misquoting Freeland on deficits and inflation, and Trudeau insisted that the budget was responsible and fiscally sound, before reminding him of our enviable economic position. Poilievre then misdiagnosed why housing costs doubled, and this time, Trudeau took up a script to accuse Poilievre of standing in the way of action on housing and looking only to pick fights with mayors rather than doing something about housing. Poilievre returned to French to repeat the same accusation, and Trudeau read a list of measures they are taking on housing.

Yves-François Blanchet led for the Bloc, and he demanded public inquiry once again. Trudeau thanked him for submitting prospective candidates to lead said inquiry, and insisted this was too important for partisanship. Blanchet demanded that there be an inquiry and that its leader must be independent of government, and before the end of the sitting. Trudeau agree that they need to move forward quickly, but lamented how toxic this has become.

Jagmeet Singh rose for the NDP, and in French, he recounted working three jobs in university to make ends meet, and lamented the state of student housing. Trudeau insisted that they have been investing in housing for many years, including programmes to build more, as well as supports for students. Singh witched to English to recount the CBC of the state of student housing in Windsor, and demanded “concrete steps” for the cost of rent for students—which is provincial jurisdictions. Trudeau patted himself on the back for investments made so far.

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Roundup: Trying to measure independence

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As Senators have made their way back home for the summer, we’re having another round of them poking each other, like kids in the backseat of the car on a long trip, over just who are the “real independents” in the Senate. It’s getting a bit tiresome, especially with the Conservatives insisting that they’re the only ones because they vote against the government more often. The problem is that it’s a fairly flawed metric because they’re the Official Opposition and are supposed to vote against the government on a consistent basis. That doesn’t make them independent – it makes them the opposition.

The big problem with the metric about voting as a measure of independence ignores the broader procedural issues. If the government could really command the votes of its new independent appointees, then bills would be making it through the Senate a lot faster, and they’re not. The logistics of getting legislation through the chamber when you don’t have a whip who is organizing votes is one of the measures by which you can tell that these senators are more independent than the Conservatives in the Senate give them credit for. While the Conservatives, Senate Liberals and Independent Senators Group are getting better at organizing themselves in trying to come up with plans around who will be debating what bills when, the fact that the Government Leader in the Senate – err, “government representative,” Senator Peter Harder, refuses to negotiate with those groups to prioritize some bills over others, has been part of the reason why some bills went off the rails and took forever to pass. If he did negotiate, or could command votes to ensure that bills could be pushed through when needed, I would buy the argument that these senators aren’t really independent. The fact that there is this lack of coherence in moving legislation is one of the markers in the column of greater independence. This is also where the argument about the need for an Official Opposition kicks in.

While the dichotomy of strict Government/Opposition in the Senate has been upended with the new group of Independents, ending the duopoly of power dynamics that contributed to some of the institutional malaise around the rules, I will maintain that an Official Opposition remains important because it’s important to have some focus and coherence when it comes to holding the government to account. Simply relying on loose fish to offer piecemeal opinion on individual pieces of legislation or issues risks diluting the effectiveness of opposition, and it also means that there is less ideological scrutiny of a government’s agenda, which is also important. Partisanship is not necessarily a bad thing, and the Senate has traditionally been a less partisan place because there was no need for electioneering within its ranks. Trying to make it non-partisan will not make it better, but will make it less effective at what it does.

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