With the serious lack of talent on the Conservative backbenches, you really do wonder if Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney’s backup is the answer. The only thing we know for sure is that this guy cannot do the job. With Blaney responsible for public safety in Canada, we get the feeling we are in danger of being murdered in our beds.
The surprise for people about the Public Safety Minister is that he is a Quebec-trained civil engineer and has a reputation as an environmentalist. He did a quiet and responsible job as Minister of Veteran’s Affairs for two years before moving to Public Safety. In this portfolio since July 2013, he seems to have reached his level of incompetence.
And it is not his difficulty in explaining himself in English. Like former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, he has just as much trouble explaining himself in either of Canada’s official languages. Or maybe he is just deaf to questions.
Tom Clark got nowhere with him on Clark’s public Affairs program The West Block on Sunday. He tried to get Blaney to explain if the RCM Police and the Security Intelligence people were going to have the funds to support their new powers under Mr. Harper’s proposed new security act. Blaney kept ignoring the question. Obviously Mr. Harper has not told him the answer to that one. That is if there is an answer.
More than anything else, the lack of an answer as to how the government intends to fund the new powers for the federal police and security agency show what a sham the act will be. Without the increased personnel and the technical resources required, little will happen in regards to stopping home grown terrorists threats.
But you can count on a great deal of government advertising over the coming year extolling the new security act. The act is probably going to be challenged in any event by civil rights activists. It will be after the fact though as and Mr. Harper only needs the impression he is doing something about the problem until the likely October federal election. If he cannot win on his handling of Canada’s severely damaged economy, he wants to look tough on terrorists and trouble makers.
In a related story out of Montreal, Mr. Harper seems to be getting some less than wise assistance from Montreal’s mayor. The mayor is trying to stop the use of a local store front in which a Muslim iman says he wishes to preach radical religious subjects. It seems it would be better to have a simple sign placed outside the madrasa advising people entering in English, French and Arabic that it is under surveillance by Canadian security services and people entering could be subjected to abuse of their civil rights, restrictions on flying and periodic arrest and imprisonment for potentially believing what they learned therein.
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Copyright 2015 © Peter Lowry
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