Federal Politics – Page 124

Wandering in the wilderness with the NDP.

March 17, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Leader Thomas Mulcair is hardly the only New Democrat with something to prove at the party’s Edmonton Convention April 9 to 10. Sure, he needs to justify his leadership but the real question is where Canada’s New Democratic Party is headed? It is obviously not the direction that Mulcair chose for the last federal election.

The party’s problem is that it has absolutely no idea where it should go. It has tried socialist leaders, unionist leaders, populist leaders and more recently opportunist leaders. And what success has been had? While there have been some briefly successful provincial leaders, there has been little encouragement federally—except for the brief surge that was called the Orange Wave.

The Orange Wave was not orchestrated by the NDP. It served to ensure a Conservative majority in the 2011 election. It was an opportunity for Stephen Harper to ward off the Liberal Party. If the Conservatives could not win in Quebec, Harper certainly did not want it to go to the Liberals. And it worked.

But losing Jack Layton was not the game plan. And why did Stephen Harper order an unprecedented state funeral for the Leader of the Opposition? He was trying to seal the fate of the now third-place Liberal Party.

The problem for the NDP was the “safe” choice of Thomas Mulcair to replace Layton. Mulcair’s experience was as a civil servant and as a cabinet minister with a right-of-centre Liberal government in Quebec. Why this background would prepare him to lead the federal NDP was not really clear to us observers.

While Mulcair made a name for himself as opposition leader in prosecuting the Harper Conservatives in the House of Commons, it was his failure in the 2015 election that surprised his party. The NDP were blind-sided when Mulcair took a position to the right of Trudeau’s Liberals. The Liberals were the risk takers, the social activists and the progressives and moved from a third place party to a majority government.

And where does that leave Mulcair and his New Democrats? Does the socialist caucus of the NDP take over? Does the party turn to someone such as MP Nathan Cullen from British Columbia and say “Show us a plan for the future of the party”?

There can be a role for the party as the conscience of parliament. There is also a role that it could play as the conscience of the Liberal Party. Either is important.

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Time for a guaranteed income for Canadians.

March 16, 2016 by Peter Lowry

It is surprising how often the suggestion for a guaranteed annual income system for Canada comes up. While scoffed at by the political right wing, they need to realize how much money it would save.

Liberals and left of centre parties have long been advocates of this major change. An annual guarantee would eliminate the myriad safety net type programs that we have built to help individuals. You could start by taking Unemployment Insurance off the table once and for all and save the vast amounts it takes to collect, administer and dole out. It could also change the Canada Pension Plan in its present form, as well as eliminate the mix of programs to support the young, the ill, the infirm, the challenged, and the old in our society. And we do not need to do it just because it is the humane thing to do. A guaranteed income covers the gaps between programs and nobody falls down the cracks.

The very real pressure would be on society to produce the national income to sustain the program at optimum levels. The challenge to businesses both large and small would be to make work attractive and rewarding. Some people would be able to devote a lifetime to learning, to the arts and to what today are considered hobbies. Volunteerism would become a larger stratum of society as people choose to devote their time to helping others. And there is really no end to what people can do and the incentives would become more flexible to ensure balance and progress.

Much of the pressure would come off society as the guaranteed income program became more self regulating and adjustable to meet social needs. The role of government would become more future oriented to build infrastructure needed for emerging social needs.

One of the side benefits of a guaranteed annual income would be the ability of Canadians to return to the concept of self-reporting of their annual tax return. As things stand today, our tax system is so hopelessly mired in complex credits, exceptions, rulings, and interpretations that the idea of an individual doing their own income tax calculations is becoming a more remote possibility. Even the experts are plugging the basic numbers into expensive computer programs and hoping the calculations are close to right.

Parliamentarians from both House and Senate are today speaking out in favour of at least studying the concept of a guaranteed annual income. It is time that a forward thinking government paid attention.

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Choosing a new leader for Canada’s Tories.

March 14, 2016 by Peter Lowry

The date has been set: May 27, 2017. That is when the Conservative Party of Canada chooses a replacement for former leader Stephen Harper and Acting Leader Rona Ambrose. Looking for an abbreviation to use on the calendar, we call it ConCon.

We have no idea where ConCon will be held or what form it will take but the far more serious question is where the Conservatives will find their party’s saviour? And even if you find this paragon, where will the candidate find the $5 million that the party is allowing candidates to spend? You can be sure that the winning candidate will need to spend most of that to run an effective national campaign.

And the bad news for political newcomers such as Kevin O’Leary is that you are not allowed to spend your own money. No Donald Trump need apply. With individual donation levels supposedly capped at $1500, it takes time to find enough people to contribute up to $5 million.

Political observer and commentator Chantal Hébert thinks that front runners such as Peter MacKay and Jason Kenney would leave little behind when they suck up the low-lying fruit of potential Conservative donations. Mind you there is no telling how deep those pockets are if some interesting newcomers emerge.

And frankly Peter MacKay and Jason Kenney are yesterday’s Conservatives and they have little more than name recognition going for them at this time. Peter MacKay is forever the guy who handed Reform’s Stephen Harper the Conservative Party. And Calgary’s Jason Kenney always leaves people with more questions than answers

But it is the spectre of Stephen Harper—the Hair—that will hang over Canadian conservatism for years to come. Harper’s cold and demanding style bruised too many Conservatives over the years. No smart candidate for the leadership will invoke his name in seeking to succeed him.

What the party needs most is not a new saviour but a new and realistic approach to Canadian politics. While Harper might have been successful for a while tapping into the demographics of greed and intolerance, he built up a resistance to his style that ultimately swept him from office.

It is most unlikely that the ultimate winner at ConCon in May 2017 is even one of the possible candidates currently being considered. The one thing most likely is that the 2019 federal election will be a recycling of Justin Trudeau’s Liberals and then 2023 will be the next chance for Conservatives.

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Waiting for Minister Monsef.

March 13, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Canadians have heard from the Conservatives and more recently the New Democrats about electoral reform. Voters are getting the impression that the Conservatives are vigorously opposed and the New Democrats very much in favour. Yet we seem to be hearing more from Liberal House Leader Dominic LeBlanc about this government initiative than the minister responsible. The problem is that Elections Canada cannot handle any changes for the next election unless they are passed into law before May 2017. That is very little time to explore possible changes, frame a new law and have it passed by House and Senate.

Democratic Institutions Minister Maryam Monsef has said she will announce the committee of the House this month. If that committee expects to hear from Canadians about possible reforms, time is short.

And this is because of Justin Trudeau’s reckless promise during the last election that it will be the last one under First-Past-the-Post (FPTP) rules. With no real consideration of alternative systems of voting, Trudeau was sticking his head in a noose.

The Liberal Leader was obviously enamoured with the idea of preferential voting. That is a form of voting that gives a thin veneer of credibility to the concept of majority choice. It allows the voter to list candidate choices as 1, 2 or 3 etcetera until they have stated their preference in order for all. To count the vote you eliminate enough losers so that the first candidate with the most second, third or fourth choice selections to reach a majority of the votes is the winner.

What is disquieting for the opposition parties in parliament is this preferential system would have likely produced more than 250 seats in the 338-seat parliament for the ruling Liberals in the 2015 election. As it is, they won a 184-seat majority with 40 per cent of the vote under FPTP.

The New Democrats and other small parties have their hopes set on proportional representation whereby they would get roughly the same number of seats as their percentage of the popular vote. Under proportional representation, the New Democrats would have had the right to about 65 seats and have had the balance of power between the Liberals 130 or so seats and the Conservatives with about 95 seats. (These figures are approximate due to rounding and an unknown cut-off point for parties with a small number of votes.)

The New Democrats are so eager to see proportional representation in place that they are proposing an elitist citizens’ group—including “representation from historically under-represented groups”—to work along with the parliamentary committee. That would probably end up with the same mixed member proportional system proposed by the lottery winners who looked at voting systems in Ontario. The Ontario referendum defeated that proposal by about two to one. That would also be the likely opinion across Canada if anyone cares to check.

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“Stoop and Scoop” on the White House lawn.

March 10, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Canadians visiting the White House in Washington need to remember to never piss on the president’s rug and carry a plastic bag in your pocket for your errors in protocol on the White House lawn. While we most often criticize the Americans for their brashness in business and international relations, it is really Canadians who need the most help in getting things right. And we seem to forget our manners most frequently with our wayward American friends and neighbours.

It was never just President Richard Nixon that complained about Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Trudeau Senior could annoy friends and foes alike in his travels. President Lyndon Johnson had every reason to take Prime Minister Lester Pearson to the White House woodshed over his public speech in the United States about Vietnam. Despite the many contributions Canada made behind the scenes to the Vietnam War effort, Pearson’s public criticism of Johnson was simply bad manners.

And speaking of bad manners, Prime Minister Stephen Harper lowered the temperature of relations with the Obama administration considerably with his complaints to American business audiences about the delays in approving the Keystone XL pipeline. You could tell that President Obama enjoyed putting the cap on Keystone after Harper was defeated by Justin Trudeau’s Liberals.

But we should not assume that everything is sweetness and light between Canada and the U.S.A. with the change of regime. Justin must have been taking a crash course in international relations since last October but he has a long way to go. With Obama in a lame-duck position with his last year in the White House, Trudeau would be best to settle for short-term objectives.

While both the American and Canadian news media will gush over the entire event in Washington as though it is the two leaders’ first date, it is not all that important. It will be a one-day of amnesty between the American news media and the administration and President Obama will feel grateful for that. For Justin and Sophie, it will be an event of confusing protocols, inane conversation, with inedible food on outrageously expensive dishes and with cutlery that the White House staff count carefully before and afterwards.

If Obama was really friendly with the two Canadians, he and the wife would take them out for some decent food afterwards. There really are some darn good restaurants in the Washington D.C. area.

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The skinny on Bell Canada’s skinny basic.

March 9, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Bell Canada has given the finger to the Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). And while the finger is in the erect position it is also providing a free pseudo colonoscopy for those customers who want cheaper television service. The $25 skinny basic television package from Bell Canada is a travesty.

This ridiculous skinny basic offer offers Ontario households 26 channels—one of which is audio only and in French. To an English language household, you hardly expect that ten of the television channels being in French would be of paramount interest. There is no denying the importance of French but when less than 10 per cent of Ontario households speak French, there should be some common sense used.

What is particularly galling in this mix of channels is that the three major American television networks that have long been grandfathered into Canadian television services are missing. Since television antennas started to grow like weeds on southern Ontario roof tops back in the 1950s, we have had easy access to ABC, CBS and NBC. Maybe Bell has decided to be jingoistic now that the company owns CTV.

As typical Bell Canada customers, we called Rogers Cable to find out if that company is offering a better deal. Rogers at least recognizes that Canadians have an inalienable right to watch American television. By the time we had worked through the bluster of the cable sales person, we figured we could get a fairly decent offer of high speed Internet and a minimum TV package for less than $100 per month. That beats the current Bell offering that is costing us $125 per month and has been increasing regularly.

Mind you, it will be interesting to see how CRTC head Jean Pierre Blais handles this “screw you” from Bell Canada. If the Bell executives had thought this situation through to its logical conclusion they might realize that Blais is not the church mouse that they think he is. He has a responsibility through the government to Canadians to look after the interests of Canadian consumers. He makes a better friend than an enemy.

As for this household’s current predicament, we have been there before. We are going to have to pick our time to lower the boom on Bell. The last time we told Bell that we no longer wanted their service, equipment and rapacious pricing, the company harassed the household for the next two years to pay trumped up cancellation charges.

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From Wonderful Wednesdays to Freedom Fridays.

March 8, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Toronto Star reporter Susan Delacourt wrote a column recently on the changing work hours of our federal parliamentarians. It seems they are finally recognizing that spending any part of Friday in Ottawa is largely a waste of time. Many MPs used to be part of what was called the Tuesday to Thursday club and they are being proved right. Our MPs have a responsibility to their electoral districts as well as their duties in the House of Commons and on committees. The conscientious members who used to try to live up to these dual responsibilities despite being in Ottawa many weeks from Monday to Friday often burned themselves out meeting them.

Not all of them. For some MPs their time in Ottawa was also fun time while their spouse did the best they could keeping the household going back home. At one time back in the 1900s there were parliamentary cocktail parties for party MPs and staff hosted by a cabinet member each Wednesday. They were called Wonderful Wednesdays and if you could not make a hook-up there, you were not trying.

But there are now Freedom Fridays. An extra day at home will never save horny MPs from straying but it sure reduces the tensions for many. Not that Justin Trudeau is supposed to be some sort of a den mother. When he bounced two Liberal MPs from his caucus for what might have been inappropriate behaviour with two NDP MPs, we were unsure if it was the behaviour or the fact the ladies involved were New Democrats.

Back when Justin’s father was prime minister, Pierre Trudeau asked what could be done about a certain MP who was gaining notoriety in the gay bars in town. The advice was as long as it was men old enough for bars that were of interest it was nobody’s business.

The important objective of Freedom Fridays is the ongoing availability of an MP to deal with matters for their constituents. While the MP is authorized to have staff in their electoral districts to assist in serving voters’ needs, it is the MP who is expected to provide leadership in providing the service. Where MPs leave this work to staff, the staff tend to become highly partisan in their dealings with the public. This is not the objective.

The measure of a member of parliament should be a combination of the contribution made in the House of Commons and effectiveness in reporting back to their electoral district. It is very important to be a somebody in both places.

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Positioning the Liberal Party.

March 7, 2016 by Peter Lowry

It is nothing unusual today when the Prime Minister sends you a note, calling you by your first name, and asking for your help. What is unusual is the e-mail is not a plea for money but asks you to send ideas to help fix the Liberal Party’s constitution. And after searching out and reading the party’s constitution, you can only agree. It needs fixing.

The party needs to start with the preamble. It is much too long and rambling. It needs to be reduced to less than 25 words.

It also needs to better define its role as a party. The party is the sum of the membership of all the party organizations in the electoral districts across Canada along with the parliamentary wing of elected members and senators, led by the party leader who is elected by the party as a whole. The party may also have affiliated associations in provinces and territories which should support and follow the principles of the Liberal Party of Canada.

And it is the party that must determine if an individual is qualified to run as a Liberal candidate. At the same time, it must be the electoral district that chooses from among the qualified candidates and there must be an appeal process if a candidate has not been approved within reasonable time.

Policy must become more of a continuing process of the party. On-going study groups, policy meetings and dialogue with the parliamentary wing need to become routine for the party. Members of the parliamentary wing should also be ready to travel to electoral districts not held by the party to provide party members with policy updates and reports on parliamentary activities.

The objective is to create an on-going presence of the party in every electoral district. Fund-raising, membership drives, policy discussion and fellowship are all basic to an active and successful party association. The stronger the electoral district associations across Canada, the better the party will do in turning out the Liberal vote in elections.

But it is essential to recognize that the lead entity is the party. Leaders and parliamentarians are like the blowing snows of Canadian winters. They pass. It is the party that must provide the continuity of principles, protect the rights of Canadians, the development of liberal policies and the constant strengthening of the party organization. It is the essential truth of liberalism that must be furthered.

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PM’s Job: Making the tough calls.

March 4, 2016 by Peter Lowry

Sorry Prime Minister, the honeymoon is over. It is time to decide whom to please and whom you are going to piss off. And you can hardly please both the pipeline people who want to push tar sands’ bitumen to our ocean shores and those who care about our planet. Look at what sucking up to the pipeline people got Stephen Harper. His name is being scraped from the doors to history’s honours. He has become a nonentity overnight. You defeated him. Why would you now want to make the same mistakes?

Harper harpooned us with the European nations because of his anti-environmental stands. He was seemingly uncaring when he annoyed both President Obama of the United States and Vladimir Putin of Russia. He preferred making war to love. He ignored Canada’s provincial leaders and our First Nations. He showed that he cared nothing for our world’s fragile environment.

And Canadians saw you, Mr. Trudeau, were different. They gave you their trust. They raised you from a third party nobody to Prime Minister in one election. You have to be faithful to them.

But you can hardly keep the faith by standing up in Vancouver and saying to environmentalists “The choice between pipelines and wind turbines is a false one.” You cannot have it both ways.

And now the provinces are defying you to price carbon emission. The provinces are seeing profit in taxes in carbon pricing and Cap and Trade. They will fight for control as long as there is money involved. A week or six months from now, the provinces just want the money.

But the real fight is to curb carbon emissions in Canada and around the world. Canada must be a leader, not an equivocator. Leave the bitumen in the ground for a time when our planet is dying and the pollution will not matter. The energy will be needed to take our progeny to other worlds.

Mr. Trudeau, you took a large delegation to the Paris Conference shortly after you were elected Prime Minister. You talked the talk and walked the walk but just how much was rhetoric and how much was commitment? You and your ministers and the provincial leaders who joined you made a commitment to the world. Canadians expect you to live up to that commitment.

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We have heard from our MP.

March 3, 2016 by Peter Lowry

It was cruel in a way. The uncaring Conservatives of Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte sent a boy to Ottawa. They threw him to the wolves. He was unprepared and unknowing. He was hardly ready for the task.

But he has been heard from. He has found his way to Ottawa from the backwaters of our electoral district. He has written. He has found work. He tells us in a taxpayer-paid mailing that “We need a referendum.”

It seems that the Conservative Caucus in our nation’s capitol has decided that the Liberals are wrong to suggest that there is no need for a referendum over the question of changing how Canadians vote for their members of parliament. The Conservatives are taking the stand that the only way is to allow the voters to decide. It sounds democratic.

And this Liberal agrees. It is because we do not really need to change how we vote.

The facts are that we have a method of electing MPs that, while obviously not perfect, is much better than any alternatives we have heard about. The only change we would suggest is that if no candidate has a majority of the votes, we have another vote between the top two contenders. A run-off election can ensure the winner is the choice of a majority of the riding constituents. That seems to be the only real problem with first-past-the-post voting. And it would hardly need a referendum to implement.

All that this solution requires is Internet voting. Internet voting is easy and inexpensive to implement. You can vote from work, home, your local library or convenient voting places. Some safeguards are needed but they are easy to include.

This is much preferred to the suggestion of preferential voting that asks voters to mark the candidates on the basis of first, second and third choice. This is a system that also attempts to seek a majority selection. The difference is that it does not allow voters to rethink their ballot choice. In effect, the losers become the choosers. When the selection comes down to the top two contestants, you need to have the opportunity to reconsider your choice. That is the democratic answer.

And after the recount we had in this riding when the Conservative was elected over much more able and suitable candidates, we can only agree that first-past-the-post needs fixing. If we only make sure the winner has a majority of the votes, there is no need for a referendum. If we make a material change to some form of proportional or preferential voting, then a referendum would be necessary.

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