Category Archives: Politics

May 06 2015
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Government, Politics

In praise of laziness

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Cathy Rogers, MLA for Moncton and the province’s social development minister, is exactly right when she says, in so many words, that hiking the provincial portion of the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) is the easy way out of New Brunswick’s fiscal fiasco and economic swamp.

So what’s wrong with that?

Why must we endlessly review our options through the nearly Calvinist lens of public sacrifice (do better, be better, go forth and die in penury and virtue), rather than embrace the rather obvious, less dramatic proposition that a two-percentage point hike in the HST – boring though it may be – would, in four years, help balance the budget and send our international creditors into a well-deserved, deep and abiding slumber.

Ms. Rogers, by contrast, would rather we first figure out how to run ourselves as a proper citizenry than pay the bills. As for the HST, she says, “it’s like asking for a bigger allowance without first learning how to manage our allowance better.” Calling it a “quick fix” and a “lazy way to find a solution”, the minister would rather we put our shoulders to the wheel just as the wheels fall off the semi-tractor trailer that is the rusting, heaving, wheezing truck of state.

Of course, she’s not the only one in this Liberal cabinet who’s willing to stand in the middle of the road, proclaiming loudly, only then to skirt to the curb, squeaking quietly.

There’s also Donald Arseneault, Minister of Energy and Mines, who thinks that a year-long examination into things we already know about shale-gas development in the province is a profoundly responsible use of public money and time, (though he has allowed in his quieter moments that just such an exercise might actually hurt New Brunswick’s economic prospects).

Ms. Rogers’ conundrum is, however, particularly perplexing. On the one hand, she declares that she is opposed to raising the HST today, but is willing to consider the prospect a year from now. Meanwhile, so-called “wealthy seniors” should be prepared to pay more for their nursing home costs to. . .you know. . .help balance the books before the government musters the political courage to do the smart thing: boost consumption taxes for everyone on discretionary items (not food, not fuel oil, not shelter, not kids’ clothing or daycare).

Still, who are these “wealthy seniors” of whom she speaks?

“We know that based on income 87 per cent of seniors cannot afford the daily cap (of $113 a day),” the Saint John Telegraph-Journal quoted her saying last week. “We can take something from this, but not everything. It is an indicator. We have to wait until we get more data to get more details on liquid assets.”

And while we wait for “more data”, New Brunswick’s new, wholly invented, politically contrived demographic – the wealthy senior – lives in fear of a government that has not yet determined who or how best to bilk him.

Nice work, if you can get it.

Always trust Government of every ideological stripe to render the straightforward, complicated; the clear, obfuscated; the fair, inequitable.

It’s called spin and it stinks.

More than this, it depends, for its effectiveness, on enormous amounts of energy, busy work and low cunning. In other words, it’s the opposite of “lazy”.

Somehow, in this universe, the sin of lassitude means telling the evident truth, doing the obviously right thing without breaking a sweat, and smiling easily without ever worrying about night terrors.

If these are my choices, I’ll take lazy man’s way out every day of the political week.

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May 05 2015
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Democracy, Politics

What’s in a Tory name?

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Dear youth caucus of the New Brunswick Progressive Conservative Party: I heartily endorse your proposal to drop the word, “Progressive” from your title.

Henceforth, you and your fellow travellers ought to be known properly by those principles you truly espouse. As one of your own explained to the CBC recently, the time has come for change and history is a slave driver.

“A group of young Tories are looking to remove the word ‘Progressive’ from the party’s name at the upcoming annual general meeting,” Mother Corp. reports. “Adam Pottle, a youth executive member of the Progressive Conservative Party of New Brunswick, says the name change is long overdue.

“Pottle said dropping ‘Progressive’ would better reflect reality. ‘The PCs are a bit more to the right end of the spectrum than every other party in New Brunswick and we just felt the word progressive no longer really matched our party,’ he said. Members of the Progressive Conservative Party will vote on the idea on May 23 at the annual general meeting that is being held in Fredericton.”

What’s more, “Pottle said the name change will connect the party to its past. ‘Honestly, we’ve been thinking about it for a while, a few of us. We wanted to bring the party more in line with history – before the early ‘30s, it was just known as the Conservative Party – and also to bring us more in line with our federal counterparts,’ Pottle said.”

As the CBC piece explained, “The federal Conservative Party was formed in 2003 when the Progressive Conservatives merged with the Canadian Alliance. The term ‘progressive’ was not added to the new party’s name.”

Heaven only knows what might have transpired had it been retained.

We might, for one thing, employ a civil service that’s not afraid of its own shadow, not looking for enemies and spooks behind every corner of its ever-shrinking cubicles.

We might, for another, enjoy a political culture that encourages open and honest debate, instead of one that shuts doors and windows as soon as the aroma of principled dissent subsumes that of microwaved popcorn at high noon.

We might also remember, if not always revere, the actions of men like Robert Stanfield, Brian Mulroney and Richard Hatfield, of women like Pat Carney, Flora MacDonald and Barbara McDougall. In their own progressive ways, these “PCs” changed the country without letting the country turn them into simulacra of Liberal presumption and entitlement.

But, sure, youngsters, go ahead. Reinvent yourselves. Recuse yourselves. Be all that you can be. Just don’t kid yourselves about the influence your re-branding efforts exert.

The Conservative Party you seek to emulate – seek to join – gives less than a nanosecond of time to anyone outside the inner circle of Canadian politics. (Frankly, they way things are going, neither do the federal Grits).

In any case, yours is not the Reform party; yours is the Establishment party. And it really doesn’t like party crashers from the youth wing stumbling into its dessert bars and piano soirees long past their bedtime.

A Wiki entry stipulates that Progressive-Conservatism in Canada had a bonafide lifespan. “The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada (1942–2003) was a Canadian federal political party with a centre-right stance on economic issues and, after the 1970s, a centrist stance on social issues,” it says.

Now comes your better times in this fair province, if you can trump your elders. On this score, be as bold as youth demands.

Call yourselves the “Regressive Conservative Party of New Brunswick”.

Dudes, you can hardly go wrong.

True that.

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Apr 29 2015
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Municipal Affairs, Politics

Downtown events centre as political football

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Condescension, thy name is Brian Gallant.

With breathtaking gall, the premier of New Brunswick delivered a message to Moncton last week from the river-soaked banks of Freddy Beach where, apparently, rising flood waters cannot stem the tide of execrable political rhetoric.

In a commentary published by The Moncton Times & Transcript, Mr. Gallant intoned, “Much has been said about the Moncton Downtown Centre. . .To create jobs and have strong social programs we must invest our money strategically. . .This principle is an important one that requires us as a government to do our due diligence when making decisions. This includes the decision on whether or not to financially support the Moncton Downtown Centre. . .It isn’t responsible to rush into a $107-million project.”

Furthermore, the premier noted, “I have personally met with Downtown Moncton Centreville Inc., and a number of our caucus members have spoken and met with mayors and city councillors numerous times to discuss the project. The provincial government’s Jobs Board also met with approximately 15 Greater Moncton business leaders and municipal councillors. . .The decision will not be made based on a marketing and lobbying campaign aimed at putting pressure on us to ‘hurry up’.”

What workmanlike spin. What politics as usual. What utter tripe.

To be clear, much has not only been “said about the Moncton Downtown Centre”; much has already been done. For years, successive economic impact studies and public opinion surveys have shown, definitively, that not only would such a facility be inspirational – it would be a generator of economic benefits on orders of magnitude that far exceed its design and construction costs.

How, then, is anyone “rushing into” the project or putting pressure on the Province to “hurry up” after more than a decade of disgraceful, official foot-dragging (albeit by previous Grit and Tory administrations)? At most, Monctonians simply want government types, for once, to evacuate their bureaucratic bowels or get off the thrones they so dearly cherish.

What’s more, if, as Mr. Gallant warrants, he has personally met with leading proponents of the events centre, how, then, do we accept the implication of his argument that he is somehow being pressed into service without sufficient information to make a “responsible” decision on behalf of all taxpayers in New Brunswick?

Shall we convene yet another panel to investigate?

The premier wants solid information to justify a thumbs up or a thumbs down. And yet, he has it. He must know he has it because one member of his worthy Jobs Board, the freshly minted senior economist of the province, David Campbell, literally wrote the book on Moncton’s mythological downtown events centre.

Specifically, in 2013, Mr. Campbell – an independent economic development consultant at the time – had this to say to the Hub City’s council: A new centre will annually “attract between 317,000 and 396,000 people. . .generating between $12 and $15 million in spending.” In the process, he declared, it will “support retail, food service, accommodation and other services in the downtown,” where it “should also support residential growth.” In fact, the urban core “generates nearly 11.5 times as much property tax revenue, compared to the rest of Moncton, on a per hectare basis.” What’s more, “the cost to service the downtown is much lower compared to many other neighbourhoods and commercial areas around the city.”

Any more questions for the jury? Only one, perhaps.

Why does Mr. Gallant conclude his commentary with a partisan attack on local Conservative Member of Parliament Robert Goguen, who’s done nothing (and I mean absolutely nothing) to advance or retard the event centre’s cause?

Answer: Because that, friends, is what hauteur tends to do in the aromatic springtime of a premier’s ever-shortening life.

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Apr 27 2015
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Military, Politics

Chilly relations in a cold country

We could sell the snow. There's plenty of that

One of the Harper government’s fondest conceits is Canada’s sovereign claim over the Arctic – or, least, that portion of it perched just above our heads. Now, it seems, a goodly number of the prime minister’s fellow citizens aren’t quite so sure.

According to a  piece, reporting on the latest Ekos Research Associates opinion survey on the matter, “support among Canadians is collapsing for Ottawa’s long-standing but dubious claim that the Northwest Passage belongs to Canada.” In fact, “Less than half of Canadians – 45 per cent – still believe the Northwest Passage is ‘within Canadian waters,’ a dramatic drop from the 74 per cent who held that view only five years ago.”

I’d like to think that our latent lack of interest in this cold country has something to do with an abiding resentment of Old Man Winter over the past few, unreasonably rough seasons. But, as the Globe writer speculates, it may have more to do with the fact that the Canadian government truly stands alone in the international community when it insists it owns the Northwest Passage – a fact which might becoming a source of some embarrassment.

In any event, said Frank Graves, president of Ekos, in an interview with the Globe, “It doesn’t help the case that whatever the legal complexities, the vast array of [international] public opinion is offside.”

Public opinion notwithstanding, of course, it seems that nothing will cool the federal Tory enthusiasm for all things Arctic. Only two weeks ago, for example, the Department of Defence issued a news release entitled, “Harper Government re-affirms Canada’s Arctic sovereignty with Operation NUNALIVUT 2015.”

The presser went on to assert, “The Honourable Julian Fantino, Associate Minister of National Defence, today visited Operation NUNALIVUT 2015, one of the Canadian Armed Forces’ (CAF) premier High Arctic military exercises, to highlight the Harper Government’s commitment to protecting Canada’s northern borders. Minister Fantino met with Canadian Armed Forces personnel, who demonstrate Canada’s readiness and ability to operate in the challenging Arctic environment to counter any threat to Canada’s Arctic Sovereignty.

“The large scale military exercise brings together Canadian Armed Forces members from the Third Battalion Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (3 PPCLI), the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), the Royal Canadian Air Force, and Canadian Rangers. During his trip, Minister Fantino will also visit the headquarters of the Joint Task Force (North), as well as the 1 Canadian Rangers Patrol Group, in addition to visiting the ice dive site of the HMS Erebus.”

As for Mr. Fantino, he appeared delighted to dish the chest-thumping propaganda with the best of them: “Seeing the remarkable men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces – including our Canadian Rangers – operate in Canada’s high Arctic has been an honour. Our Government has never been more committed to our CAF personnel and we will continue to support them as they protect our northern borders and assert our sovereignty in the region.”

I’ve never quite understood the ferocity of the Harper government’s claims on the Arctic. Clearly, global warming, which is affecting northern climes more dramatically than other places on Earth, is opening up the region for increased shipping and oil and gas exploration. But, this should be reason for caution and circumspection, not jingoistic belligerence.

Besides, if the greatest threat is posed by Russia, what are Canada’s tin-pot armed forces supposed to do against that nation’s nuclear powered submarines and ice breakers? “The Obama administration has been very clear that Arctic co-operation must continue,” Michael Byers, a professor of international affairs at the University of British Columbia, told the CBC last week.

Good luck with that.

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Apr 08 2015
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Economy, Government, Politics

How hawks and doves circle

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The move was as much symbolic as practical. How better to prove to Canadians that the federal, Tory regime is on the right, fiscally hawkish course than by selling its last, remaining stock in the giant auto company it bailed out when it was on a far more fiscally dovish flight path?

With that, Finance Minister Joe Oliver proclaimed the end of an era this week, authorizing his government’s divestiture of 73 million common shares in General Motors to Goldman, Sachs & Co. “We have eliminated a market exposure for Canadian taxpayers and returned GM to private-sector ownership, having supported its continued contribution to the Canadian economy,” he declared in a statement.

What a difference eight years makes to the leadership sensibilities of the governing classes. We may recall the bad, old days of global, financial collapse in 2008 and the Great Recession that followed, when the still tender-footed Harper majority was, like the normally counterpoised Obama administration, committed to economic stimulus not austerity, spending rather than restraint.

At that time, allowing the big automakers, GM and Chrysler, to fail was unthinkable on either side of the 49th parallel. Indeed, less than a year after Parliament Hill and Queen’s Park banded together to drop a combined $14 billion on the crippled manufacturers, then-federal Industry Minister Tony Clement declared, “This was not a decision we took lightly. But, at the end of the day, we knew that if we did not participate, what was at risk was not just the (direct) jobs but all the other parts manufacturers and other industries that go into having an auto sector in this country, and that has been estimated to be over 400,000 jobs that were at risk.”

He was probably, if frustratingly, correct. Now, it appears, the nation’s economy has recovered well enough to justify liquidating the government’s auto assets (reportedly worth about $3.5 billion) just in time to balance the budget later this month, roughly half-a-year before the next general election.

All of which may only prove that hawks and doves really can occupy the same airspace, depending on which way the political wind blows.

Still, the larger issue that concerns many economists in this country is whether a hell-bent rush to book a balance in the public accounts, come what may, is rational (or even possible) in the medium-to-longterm. The GM cash-out may not be, technically, a windfall, but something about it feels awfully like found money (“Don’t worry, Mabel, we’re saved from perdition; I just found Uncle Harry’s collection of gold nuggets buried in a coffee can down by the river).

Meanwhile, storm clouds are once again gathering in the broader economy – which is expected to grow only fractionally over the next quarter – a point that Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz made clear in an interview with The Financial Times last week. “When the oil shock came, it was clear we would no longer be able to close the output gap by 2016, but by 2017,” he was reported to have said.

“Since we had some firepower, we took some insurance and cut rates. . .The first quarter of 2015 will look atrocious, because the oil shock is a big deal for us. . .

In theory lower oil prices mean (putting) more money in consumers’ pockets, but. . .if an oil company cancels (an investment) project, laying off a worker, that guy will not have the money to buy a new pickup truck.”

A balanced budget is a desirable objective for any lawmaker, but not when there are girders in the economy to support – and certainly not when all such book entries are manufactured for more symbolic than practical reasons.

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Apr 03 2015
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Education, Politics, Society

No teen left behind

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Out of the goodness of its vote-conscious heart, the federal Conservative government has made child care a sturdy plank in its election platform this year. Noting that mum and dad are the “real experts” in raising a rug rat, the Tories have enhanced the Universal Child Care Benefit and Child Care Expense Deduction in 2015.

But what, in fact, does this mean?

In a report, released on Wednesday, Parliamentary Budget Officer Jean-Denis Frechette, explains that “the value of child care benefits grew from $0.6 billion in 2004-2005 to approximately $3.3 billion in 2013- 2014. This amounted to three-fifths (59 per cent) of what Canadian families were spending on child care in 2013-2014.”

What’s more, he added, “Families with young children (less than 13 years of age) spending money on child care received two-thirds (66 per cent) of these benefits. The remaining 34 per cent was distributed to families with no child care expenses and families with older children. As a share of households’ aggregate child care expenses, federal benefits represented roughly 42 per cent and 247 per cent, respectively.”

Now, Mr. Frechette finds, following the government’s so-called improvements to the programs, “if Parliament approves. . .PBO estimates the fiscal impact of federal child care policies will increase to roughly $7.7 billion from the 2013-2014 value of $3.3 billion. By 2017-2018, it will grow to roughly $7.9 billion.”

Fair enough, perhaps. But here’s the kicker, says the PBO:

“These proposals would also change the allocation of benefits. In 2015, 49 per cent of these benefits would go to families with child care expenses and young children, and the remaining 51 per cent to families with no child care expenses and families with older children. Since families with young children spend more on child care, their share will only cover 67 per cent of the amount they will spend on child care. Conversely, benefits that families with older children will receive from the government in 2015-2016 will represent nearly eight times the amount they will spend on child care.”

So, while millions of Canadian families that might legitimately need some federal help to defray the costs of raising their pre-adolescents, millions more that don’t are getting a free ride on the taxpayers’ dime.

This, of course, makes perfect sense – but only in an election year. Under any other circumstance it’s a travesty of sound, sensitive and useful public policy.

None of which actually addresses the larger issue, which is: In what sober version of reality do the benefit and expense deduction, which transfer, at most, a couple of thousand dollars a year, per kid, to families’ household budgets, constitute rational social policy when the annual cost of effective, professionally delivered child care can, and does, runs 14 or 15 times the current federal contribution?

Seven or eight billion dollars would go a long way towards inaugurating a universal system of affordable (to families) early childhood education and pre-school programs. It’s certainly not brain surgery. No one is asking the feds to reinvent the wheel. Apart from the United States, effective models of this sort of thinking exist productively and happily across the developed world – even here in Canada, where Quebec’s $9-dollar-a-day child-care system has both enhanced educational outcomes and reduced systemic rates of poverty in that province. The more kids enrolled in such programs, the more mums and dads provide for their families’ material needs.

Of course, that’s a hard sell, especially as political campaigners begin to beat the drums loudly.

After all, 14-year-old junior needs his Xbox.

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Apr 03 2015
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Economy, Politics

Soaking the rich

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In a sense, a province’s budget is less a definitive statement of a particular government’s approach to number-crunching than a metaphor for society’s broader tolerances and expectations. That’s why these annual exercises always manage the simultaneous tricks of going too far and not quite far enough.

So it is with the Gallant government’s first budget, released Tuesday, a scattershot of spending and revenue decisions all putatively designed to address New Brunswick’s fiscal morass; just not right away, or in any aggressively uncomfortable manner, thank you very much. Indeed, emerge from its pages with a reasonable sense of the Liberal government’s vision for the province: Go ahead, I dare you.

To be fair, we do know a few things that, before this week, we may not have fully appreciated. We know, for example, that the department of finance likes building “rainy-day” funds almost as much as it does picking the pockets of the well-heeled. We know that the Grits – who deploy a rhetorical arsenal that brims with bon mots about “fairness” – only really expect rich, older folks to pony up to the plate (at least for the time being; next year, we are told, will be whole new ball game). And we know that, despite these and other measures, an estimated $477 million deficit in 2015-16 is just about as bad as it gets (though, not quite), even while the province’s long-term debt balloons to $12.6 billion.

“It would be easy to avoid making difficult decisions and leave the problems we face to the next generation,” Finance Minister Roger Melanson told the Assembly. “We are not going to do that. Our government was elected to lead and this means making difficult and sometimes even unpopular decisions.”

That, presumably, is why, anyone who earns between $150,000 and $250,000 a year in New Brunswick will now pay 21 per cent provincial portion of income tax (those earning more than $250,000 will face 25.75 per cent), up from about 18 per cent.

As the Saint John Telegraph-Journal reported, “Seniors who have managed to accumulate liquid financial assets will see those included in calculations of how much they must pay for long-term care in places like nursing homes. . .On the plus side, the Liberal government is establishing a New Brunswick Seniors Home Renovation Tax Credit. It will give seniors a tax break on home renovations. ‘We want our seniors to be able to stay in their own homes as long as they can,’ Melanson said.”

All of which is code for: Stop cluttering the province’s increasingly costly hospital wards and emergency wings. And that’s a message even the geriatric and infirm among us can get behind.

Fundamentally, though, the most these tax increases are expected to raise annually is $30 million, a comparatively paltry sum when you consider the obvious alternative: a modest hike in the HST. In fact, a one-percentage-point boost in this consumption tax would generate about $126 million. It would also be cheaper to manage and easier to collect than income taxes. Moreover, when properly executed, with due regard for the impoverished and working poor, it’s far fairer than any current brand of income tax. 

Of course, few governments arguing the affirmative in this country have ever won that particular debate. For their part, Mr. Gallant and Mr. Melanson are clearly not ready to test these tolerances and expectations in New Brunswick

Still, that’s the wonderful thing about a provincial budget. Every 364 days, or so, we all get another crack at going too far or not quite far enough in our public and private economies.

Apr 01 2015
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Economy, Government, Politics

Follow the bouncing budgetary balls

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As the Government of Canada coordinates the release of its signature piece of election-year propaganda, the federal budget, provincial finance ministers are scrambling to contain the public relations disasters that are their own annual spending plans.

Rarely in the nation’s history have the fiscal conditions of the regional partners in Confederation contrasted so sharply with that of the national one – a circumstance that does little to inform Canadians about the true state of the union they occupy.

Yesterday, New Brunswick’s fine, young Liberal government brought down its first budget since assuming office last fall, becoming the latest in a string of provinces (Quebec, Saskatchewan, Alberta) to swallow its bitter medicine in one, quick gulp.

Oh to be in British Columbia in the springtime. That province is doing so well these days, it managed to double its forecast budget surplus of more than $400 million in fiscal 2014-15 to nearly a billion bucks ($879 million).

The same cannot be said for Alberta, which has just posted a deficit of $5 billion, despite having raised $1.5 billion in new taxes. According to a CBC report, “The reaction . . .is mixed: relieved that there was no increase in the corporate tax rate, and concern that Albertans will have less disposable income in a time when the economy is weak.”

In Quebec, the preoccupation is with runaway debt. That province’s 2015-16, $100-billion budget is freckled with nips and tucks in almost every department, but especially in the big-ticket portfolios of health care, education and social services. “We are making reforms, we are doing things differently,” the province’s Treasury Board chairman Martin Coiteux told the CBC. “It’s not that we are reducing services. We are looking at ways to live within a budget envelope which is relatively smaller than what we would like, but this is this the required step to rebuild our room to manoeuvre.”

  And, according to a report by The Canadian Press last month, “The Saskatchewan government has brought forward a budget that attempts to put the brakes on spending increases and peels back tax incentives for middle-class families, graduates and the potash industry. . .A global oil downturn is putting the squeeze on the province’s bottom line, but Finance Minister Ken Krawetz noted that there are no new personal income taxes or fee increases.”

Now, stroll down the banks of the Rideau Canal, Blackberry on full news-alert mode from the nation’s capital, and you’ll observe that the fiscal backstory appears altogether different. Canadians aren’t mired in debt. Nay, it’s quite the contrary. Our supremely responsible, circumspect and economically gifted federal government is preparing to bring down a (nearly) balanced budget with about $4.5 billion in goodies for individual voters.

Indeed, from places like New Brunswick, Alberta and Saskatchewan, where the stern warnings of penurious governments bear almost no resemblance to the rosy messaging wafting through Ottawa’s halls of privilege and power, following the bouncing ball from provincial script to federal talking point can give a guy whiplash.

Still, there’s some reason to think that many of the differences between national and provincial bean-counters are illusory. After all, only one pot of sovereign money is  spilled or filled in this country, as circumstances require. What one branch of government giveth, another taketh away just as keenly. The Bank of Montreal has already noted as much in a recent report. As BMO economist Robert Kavcic told the CBC “most of what Ottawa will be returning to one taxpayer’s pocket, the provinces will take out of the other.”

So much, then, for a vote-friendly federal budget.

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Mar 23 2015
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Idiocracy, Politics

Runaway foot-in-mouth disease

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And they all fall down, right on cue.

Nowadays, it seems, a hard-working, right-wing politician just can’t get his mojo on without, first, publicly blurting nonsense that offends a large number of Canadians and, second, immediately apologizing on social media.

I give you Exhibit A:

A couple of weeks ago, New Brunswick Tory MP, John Williamson told a friendly crowd in Ottawa, “(In) my part of the country, I deal with temporary foreign workers and the interaction with employment insurance, and it makes no sense from my point of view – I’m going to put this in terms of colour, but it’s not meant to be about race – it makes no sense to pay ‘whities‘ to stay at home while we bring in brown people to work in these jobs. . .When I have 10 to 12 per cent unemployment rates in my province, I’m not going to abide by a policy that encourages people to stay home and collect an EI cheque and bring people from overseas to fill these jobs.”

In less time than it takes to kick oneself in that part of the body one tends to use for sitting, Mr. Williamson was issuing mea culpas to anyone who would listen. “Today I used offensive and inappropriate language regarding the Temporary Foreign Workers Program,” he tweeted. “For this I apologize unreservedly.”

To Saint John Telegraph-Journal reporter Chris Morris, he went further. “I don’t think there is any explanation for the words I used, which is why I unreservedly apologized,” he said. “This is the worst mistake I’ve made as an elected member and also over my 20 years of writing and commenting on public policy. . .I am deeply disappointed in myself.”

I give you Exhibit B:

Last week, in light of a Federal Court judge’s decision to allow women to wear face-covering niqabs when they take their oath of Canadian citizenship, Ontario Tory MP Larry Miller told a radio talk-show host, “I don’t know what the heck our justice people. . .that isn’t right. Frankly, if you’re not willing to show your face in a ceremony that you’re joining the best country in the world, then frankly, if you don’t like that or don’t want to do that, stay the hell where you came from, and I think most Canadians feel the same.”

Faster than a speeding bullet slicing through the thin rhetoric of intolerance, Mr. Miller pivoted and was suddenly sorry. . .eh?    

According to a CBC item, posted online last week, “In a statement issued Tuesday morning, Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound MP Larry Miller said that he stands by his views that those who wish to be sworn in as citizens should uncover their face. ‘However, I apologize for and retract my comments that went beyond this,’ he said.”

The CBC report added, “According to a post on the Broadbent Institute-affiliated blog Press Progress, Miller – who was once described by National Post columnist John Ivison as ‘the voice in [Prime Minister Stephen] Harper’s ear” – made the comments during an open-line talk show on local radio station CFOS on Monday.”

Kevin Menard with Citizenship and Immigration apparently emailed the public broadcaster that “These comments do not reflect the position of the government.”

Perhaps not. But, something’s going on here, and it’s not entirely due to backbenchers flapping their gums and freelancing their views unbeknownst to the Prime Minister and his people.

This is, after all, an election year, and no party in this country understands its support structures and voter base better than the Tories, where the politically incorrect take on hot-button issues is not always the politically unwise course of action. 

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Mar 20 2015
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Politics

Charity, is thy name propaganda?

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The abbreviated phrase, “pot-kettle-black”, suddenly comes to mind upon learning that a charity with affiliations to high-profile Conservatives is sending mixed messages to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) about its political proclivities.

In an intrepid piece of reporting this week, Globe and Mail reporter Bill Curry revealed that, “A review of Tribute to Liberty’s official filings with the CRA reveals a clear intention to engage in political activity. When asked if it planned to engage in political activities, it answered ‘Yes’ in its 2009 application for charitable status. It said this would involve contacting MPs and senators to gain their support for (a project to build an edifice commemorating so-called victims of communism).”

Meanwhile, Curry notes that “in the five years that followed, the charity answered ‘No’ each time it was asked by the CRA in annual reporting forms whether it conducted political activity.”

Why does any of this matter? If the report holds true, the misdemeanor has to do with forked tongues and the preservation of said organs in the halls of federal influence.

We shan’t forget that since 2012, Canadian charities – especially those that are decidedly cool to Tory social policies – have come under increasing scrutiny by the tax man for their various propensities to agitate for political change in this country.

As Curry points out, “the 2012 Conservative budget set aside $8-million for CRA audits to determine whether (charities) are following rules regarding political activity. The CRA has not published a list of the 60 charities it has identified for auditing. However, some of the groups that said they were audited were critical of government policy. The CRA has rejected suggestions the selection was politically motivated.”

Still, Tribute to Liberty reportedly maintains fairly compelling ties to certain high-ranking Tories. Not only that, the organization’s website boasts fulsome quotes from national leaders of every ideological stripe.

Here’s NDP honcho, Thomas Mulcair on the subject of freedom: “Dear Friends: I am pleased to extend support to Tribute to Liberty as you realize your vision for a permanent memorial in Ottawa recognizing the victims of communism. This monument will recognize those who were silenced by tyranny and pay tribute to the incredible strength and determination of those who fought for change.”

Here’s Justin Trudeau: “We, as Canadians, must never forget the pain and suffering entire generations endured under Communist rule, and it is important that we remember the lives of its untold victims.”

Here’s Elizabeth May of the Green Party: “We can be proud, as Canadians, that we opposed totalitarian communism and have provided a land of refuge for so many of those who fled its terrors.”

And, of course, here’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper: “Canada has long been a beacon of hope and freedom for those escaping tyranny and oppression.”

All of which raises the question: How is any of this not political?

In fact, this may be the only instance in recent history when all political parties in this country have agreed, and all various polemics have aligned as the universe intends.

In its own defence, Tribute to Liberty claims that it has deliberately avoided archly political activities since 2009. But when the raison d’etre of an entire organization is nothing but political, how many hairs must be split before the emperor wears no wig?

In fact, I’m all for Tribute to Liberty’s mission. Memorializing those who suffered under the yoke authoritarianism is a decidedly virtuous, Canadian thing to do.

But, should we not, then, raise the injunction against vocal agitation on all politically minded charities?

If only for democracy’s sake.

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