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BY MIKE LAPOINTE

After nearly three weeks at the bargaining table, Canada’s

largest federal public service union reached a tentative agree-ment with the government late on July 9, securing both wage

increases and compensation for damages in connection to the problem-plagued Phoenix pay system.

The deal was struck nearly four months after strike votes

BY PALAK MANGAT

Canada’s statistics agency is working with an expert advisory

committee to better collect race-based data, but it is too early to say

whether it will hire more racialized on-the-ground statisticians and re-searchers to help, says one official.

Marc Lachance, acting direc-tor of health, justice, diversity, and populations with Statistics

Canada, acknowledged in an interview last week that while the country has made some strides in collecting Indigenous data, figures for some ethno-cultural groups are lagging.

“We have put in place a committee of experts that could specifically provide us guidance on—you know, we never really

BY ABBAS RANA

With the Liberals in majority territory in public opinion

polls, some Liberal MPs who lost the last election are eagerly awaiting the start of nomination contests that will give them a chance to reclaim their seats.

BY ABBAS RANA

The Conservative Party will once again put a 24/7 live

camera feed on the ballot holding area for its upcoming leadership contest, accessible to the pub-lic, as one of several measures

Ex-Liberal MPs running in next election eagerly await start of nomination process

Conservatives to put 24/7 live camera on ballot holding area for leadership election

PSAC reaches tentative deal with feds on Phoenix damages, wage increases

Too soon to say if StatsCan will bring in more racialized researchers, says official; ‘we’re just building those relationships’

Continued on page 16

Continued on page 15 Continued on page 29

Continued on page 14

News

News

News

News

THIRTY-FIRST YEAR, NO. 1744 Canada’s PolitiCs and Government newsPaPer MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 $5.00

Hill Climbers

p.5

Trudeau embroiled in third ethics scandalPrime Minister Justin Trudeau has broken the public trust: editorial, p. 8.

Special report: The Great Rebuilding, Part 2 p. 17

The price of everything, value of nothing Harris p. 10

49 days of racism LeMay p. 11Opposition pans feds' advertising p. 4 HOH

p.2

Globe and Mail veteran reporter Daniel Leblanc split his time last week

between digging into the government’s $343-billion deficit and announcing his resignation from the paper at which he spent more than two decades. “The news is trickling out… After nearly 22 years, I have resigned from the Globe and Mail. It was a pleasure, an honour and a great source of pride. My best work was always teamwork and I leave behind fantastic journalists, but the friendships are intact,” tweeted Mr. Leblanc on July 8, just hours before the government unveiled its deficit figures.

The seasoned political journalist got his start at the paper in August of 1998, shortly after a one-year internship at the Ottawa Citizen. His areas of focus have included cannabis, the RCMP, procure-ment, and Canada-Quebec relations—the latter of which could come in handy in his new role with Radio-Canada. “I will have more to say later, both on my career at the Globe and my new duties. For now, I let the dust settle. Thank you all for the kind words. Back to work!” added Mr. Leblanc, who had been working with Bill Curry at the time to help in the paper’s coverage of Ottawa’s fiscal “snapshot.” (Mr. Curry is, coincidentally, a former Hill Times reporter, who focuses on finance and federal policy at The Globe).

Moves at HuffPost CanadaThe Globe isn’t the only news outlet

that will see some changes within its ranks. On the afternoon of July 8, editor-in-chief Andree Lau announced her eight years at HuffPost Canada will be coming to an end. Like Mr. Leblanc, Ms. Lau is not leaving the field: she is moving to CBC News as its managing editor of digital news. The public broadcaster is not a foreign place to Ms. Lau, who jokingly tweeted: “I think it will be different from 1999 when I worked the overnight CBCNews.ca shifts.”

Ms. Lau has helped lead live broadcasts, longer-term projects, daily news, and guide overall newsroom strategy. She is a 13-year veteran of CBC News as a TV reporter, producer, editor, videojournalist, and web reporter, and hails from Vancouver. Ms. Lau also worked with CTV in the past and has been with HuffPost since 2012.

Goodale gets nod Longtime Liberal Hillite and expe-

rienced federal cabinet minister Ralph Goodale added another accolade to his resume last week, earning a nod from the Churchill Society for the Advancement of Parliamentary Democracy. The group named Mr. Goodale, who is currently serv-ing as a special advisor to the government in its response to the Flight PS752 take down near Tehran in January, the recipient of its annual award for excellence.

“It’s a privilege to receive this award from the Churchill Society to whom I extend my sincere thanks,” tweeted Mr. Goodale on July 7. Throughout his tenure, Mr. Goodale has held several ministerial portfolios including

agriculture and agri-food, natural resources, government House leader, public works, finance, and finally public safety. After his defeat in the 2019 election, his cabinet post was handed to Bill Blair, but he continues to hold the unique distinction of serving under both Trudeau prime ministers.

After first being elected in 1974 at the age of 24 for Assiniboia, he went on to lead the Saskatchewan Liberal party in 1981 and reached the provincial legislature in 1986 for two years, crossing paths with a young Jason Kenney, who was a staffer in his office. Ian MacDonald, editor and pub-lisher of Policy Magazine, congratulated the nine-term MP for the “well deserved” honour, jokingly adding “one of the great parliamentarians and House leaders of the modern era. And [long] suffering SK Riders fan!” Mr. MacDonald was a speech-writer for prime minister Brian Mulroney in 1985 to 1988.

Mr. Goodale, who also marked 46 years to the day last week since first be-ing elected in the July 1974 election, is the 37th recipient of the society’s award, which is usually presented at the group’s annual dinner in November. Because of the pandemic, it is looking at other ways to celebrate this year, noted a July 7 release.

More Progressive SenatorsThe Progressive Senate Group gained

another member last week in Senator Wan-da Thomas Bernard, who previously sat as an Independent. PSG leader Jane Cordy welcomed the new addition on July 8, say-ing on Twitter Sen. Bernard “has devoted her career to social justice, and brings with her an abundance of expertise in social work, racial justice and systemic change.” Sen. Bernard added she is “honoured” to join the group “and continue representing all Nova Scotians and Canadians of Afri-can Descent in the Senate.”

Appointed in 2016 by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the Senator has worked as a professor at Dalhousie University and a community activist before coming to Ottawa, and also founded the Nova Scotia branch of the Association of Black Social Workers in 1979. Her addition brings the count of PSG members to 10 now, after it recently grew from six to eight within one week in May. That month, the group welcomed Senators Patricia Bovey and Peter Harder to its ranks. Senator Pierre Dalphond also joined the group later that May.

Calls for free menstrual products pick up

Liberal MP Peter Fragiskatos showed his support for a petition calling on Ottawa to provide free menstrual products in the wash-rooms of all federally regulated workplaces last week. Linking to an online petition that garnered more than 1,200 signatures since opening up on July 7, the Ontario politician wrote it’s one “worth learning about and supporting. Kudos to @RachEttinger and many others for continuing to raise this very important issue so passionately and persua-sively.” Among the demands are that Ottawa provide free tampons and pads and “address menstrual equity at the national level by recommencing its work on this proposal.”

The feds had committed to the move in May 2019 when Patty Hajdu was labour minister. Ms. Hajdu said it was about equity, dignity, and removing the stigma women face “for something that happens to their body every month.” As noted by Postmedia at the time, it can take between 18 to 24 months to follow through on regulatory changes to the Canada Labour Code, but the pandemic has since taken hold of much of the govern-ment’s attention. In 2015 Ottawa ditched what has been coined the “tampon tax” when it announced it would no longer be collecting GST on sanitary products.

Politicos share summer readsLast week’s sweltering conditions might

have had you wondering if we’re really only just three weeks into the summer, but at least that means a lot more (physically distant) downtime to relax at the beach, patio, or living room with a good book. Conservative MP Eric Duncan shared his summer reads for the season, which include veteran Liberal operative Pat Sorbara‘s Let ’Em Howl: Lessons from a Life in Backroom Politics. The book, which made it onto The Hill Times’ Top 100 Best Books List last year, was launched last October and in Ottawa in March, and logs Ms. Sorbara’s love of byelections, among other things.

Others on Mr. Duncan’s docket include The Conservative Soul by British-born Ameri-can author Andrew Sullivan, and former British prime minister David Cameron‘s For the Record. Sarah Fischer, who ran in Don Valley North under the Conservative Party banner in the 2019 election but lost to Liberal Han Dong, listed Michael Pillsbury’s The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower as among her summer reads.

pmangat@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES2

by Palak Mangat

Heard on the Hill

Media shakeups in Ottawa and beyond: Globe bids adieu to Leblanc, HuffPo readies for new editor-in-chief

Nova Scotia Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard announced last week she has joined the Progressive Senate Group. Photograph courtesy of Wanda Thomas Bernard

Longtime Liberal MP Ralph Goodale, pictured in June 2019 at West Block, was awarded a recognition from the Churchill Society for the Advancement of Parliamentary Democracy last week. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Veteran Globe and Mail reporter Daniel Leblanc, shown at right in this 2005 file photograph with colleague Campbell Clark, is leaving the paper at which he has spent more than two decades. Mr. Leblanc is now headed to Radio-Canada. The Hill Times file photograph

HuffPost Canada’s editor-in-chief, Andree Lau, will be heading over to CBC News to manage its digital news. Photograph courtesy of Andree Lau’s Twitter

Liberal MP Peter Fragiskatos is among the MPs supporting a call for Ottawa to bring in free menstrual products in workplace washrooms. Photograph courtesy of Peter Fragiskatos’ Twitter

Conservative MP Eric Duncan shared three books on his summer reading list. Photograph courtesy of Eric Duncan’s Twitter

SPONSORED BY ECOJUSTICE

*ECOJUSTICE LAWYERS ARE COUNSEL TO KEEPERS OF THE WATER, KEEPERS OF THE ATHABASCA AND WEST ATHABASCA BIOREGIONAL SOCIETY IN THIS MATTER

We are writing as environmental, Indigenous, health, civil society and faith organizations from across Canada to ask you to require that the proposed expansion of

the Vista coal mine near Hinton, Alberta undergo an assessment under the Impact Assessment Act.

Vista is already one of the largest thermal coal mines in Canada. The proposed expansion could almost triple its capacity to mine coal: the world’s dirtiest fossil fuel that is responsible for half the world’s greenhouse gas emissions and an estimated 800,000 early deaths each year from air pollution.

Coalspur, the company behind the Vista mine, has not been straight with you or with the public. Last year, you declined to order an impact assessment based on the information that Coalspur provided. It has since come to light that they failed to disclose material facts about the size and scale of the mine. And it now appears that they have further expansion plans, with the company now saying publicly that they want to increase their annual production to 20 million tonnes of coal per year.

This new information warrants that you order a federal impact assessment. It is inevitable that expanding this massive coal mine will cause severe harm to the environment, the climate, human health and to Indigenous people. A federal impact assessment is the mechanism developed by your government to fully understand and limit the harm caused by major natural resource development projects like this.

The mine’s expansion will increase local water, air, and noise pollution and infringe on the rights of Indigenous Peoples, including local First Nations who use the land near the mine for traditional hunting, fishing, and gathering, and whose health will suffer from the further poisoning of their air, water and food. It

would also destroy the habitat of two endangered species of trout – potentially driving them to extinction.

In addition to these local impacts, the expansion will worsen the climate crisis by causing massive emissions of carbon pollution when the coal is shipped overseas and burned in power stations, mainly in Asia. Vista’s expansion plans would lead to 33 million tonnes of carbon emissions each year – that’s nearly as much pollution as from every car in Canada. Canada can’t ignore this pollution just because it happens overseas. In the Prime Minister’s own words:

“The atmosphere doesn’t care where carbon is emitted. It requires us to take action all around the world.”

As a founding member and co-chair of the “Powering Past Coal Alliance”, Canada has led global efforts to phase out thermal coal and made this a cornerstone of its climate plan. Canada has committed up to $275 million to the World Bank to help developing countries phase-out their dependence on traditional coal-fired power. The Vista mine expansion would undermine these efforts and harm Canada’s credibility as a climate leader in the run up to next year’s crucial climate conference in Glasgow. Canada can’t expect to be taken seriously in asking other countries to get off coal if we’re still willing to sell it to them.

We don’t have time to be hypocritical when it comes to phasing out the world’s dirtiest fossil fuel. We are in a climate crisis. The science tells us that, globally, we must halve emissions by 2030. Extracting and burning more coal, whether at home or abroad, is fundamentally incompatible with that goal. The COVID-19 recovery requires Canada to envisage a path towards a cleaner economy. Coal has no place in that future.

We are counting on you to make the right call this time by ordering a full federal assessment of the Vista coal project under the Impact Assessment Act.

350.org

Alberta Environmental Network

Alberta Wilderness Association

Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE)

Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society – Northern Alberta

Canadian Unitarians for Social Justice

CAN-Rac - Climate Action Network Canada

Castle-Crown Wilderness Association

Citizens’ Climate Lobby Canada

Climate Change Toronto

Climate Justice Saskatoon

ClimateFast

Creating Healthy and Sustainable Environments (CHASE)

Crooked Creek Conservancy Society of Athabasca

David Suzuki Foundation

Divest Waterloo

Eau Secours

Ecojustice*

Edmonton River Valley Conservation Coalition

Energy Mix Productions

Environmental Defence

Équiterre

Global Catholic Climate Movement - Canada

Grant Riverkeeper Labrador, Inc.

Greenpeace Canada

KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives

Keepers of the Athabasca

Keepers of the Water

Lac St Anne Métis

Laudato Si’ Animator

Leadnow

MiningWatch Canada

North American Native Plant Society

Notinto Sipiy Conservation Authority

Our Lady of Sion 

Protect Our Winters Canada

Shift: Action for Pension Wealth & Planet Health

Sisters of Providence of St. Vincent de Paul

Social Justice St. Joseph’s Parish - Salmon Arm

Southern Alberta Group for the Environment

Stand.earth

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace

Villa St. Joseph Ecology & Spirituality Centre

West Athabasca Bioregional Society

Wildsight

Women’s Healthy Environments Network

Youth Climate Lab

Dear Minister Wilkinson,

Signed,

4

BY MIKE LAPOINTE

Opposition MPs from the Con-servatives, the NDP and the

Bloc Québécois condemned the government’s spending plan for advertising related to the COV-ID-19 pandemic last week, follow-ing the allocation of an additional $48-million for the ad campaign in the most recent round of supplementary estimates.

The government has already spent tens of millions on commu-nications and marketing related to the pandemic.

During a June 16 Government Operations committee meet-ing, opposition MPs, including Conservative MP Kelly McCauley (Edmonton West, Alta.), NDP MP Matthew Green (Hamilton Centre, Ont.), and Bloc Québé-cois MP Xavier Barsalou-Duval (Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, Que.), grilled govern-ment officials on the additional funding.

Just over $48.5-million was added to the Privy Council Of-fice’s budget for “communications and marketing (COVID-19)” in the most recent round of supplemen-tary estimates, which were passed by Parliament on June 17.

“I think it’s garbage, I think it’s the government promoting itself,” said Mr. McCauley in an interview with The Hill Times on July 8.

“This has got to be the most reported story in my lifetime, [and] yet the government needs $120-million on top of provincial spending, on top of municipal spending, to tell you to keep six feet away from people,” said Mr. McCauley. “I think it’s a great exercise in self-promotion.”

Assistant secretary to the cabinet, communications and consultations with the Privy Council Office Ken MacKillop told the committee on June 16 that the “first bit” within the

money allocated in the estimates includes a $10-million exten-sion of the $30-million Public Health Agency campaign that’s currently underway. Another $12-million will be used for an extension of the $10-million Fi-nance Canada ad campaign, and $2.9-million will be used for the “PCO COVID communications response team.”

“The remainder of the funds, approximately $25 million, will be held to keep flexibility on com-munications; for instance if we have upcoming campaigns on a vaccine that becomes available,” said Mr. MacKillop.

Mr. McCauley also said he believes the government was violating the Treasury Board’s

rule on spending by setting aside $25-million “for future spending in case something comes up.”

“Under Treasury Board rules, that belongs in what’s called a vote 5, which is a contingency fund through Treasury Board, for unforeseen circumstances,” said Mr. McCauley.

“I think it’s a complete waste of taxpayers’ money,” said Mr. McCauley.

When asked by Liberal MP Francis Drouin (Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, Ont.) why Trea-sury Board uses vote 5 spending, or why a department would be forced to use vote 5 spending, Glenn Purves, assistant secretary, expenditure management sector with the Treasury Board said, “payments arise.”

“They’re urgent payments and they have to be made before the next supply cycle. Vote 5 is there to facilitate circumstances when these unforeseen expenditures that are often urgent and for important initiatives need to be made,” said Mr. Purves during the June 16 meeting. “The use of

vote 5 up to now—that’s in the online report—has all been for COVID-19 measures.”

Advertising campaign launched in late March 

The federal government launched the initial advertising campaign to the tune of $30-mil-lion in late March to raise aware-ness of COVID-19, including a video by Chief Public Health Officer Theresa Tam.

“COVID-19 is a serious public health threat. All Canadians must act now to reduce the spread,” said Ms. Tam in the video. “Avoid crowded places and practise social distancing. Avoid non-essential travel and stay home as

much as possible. Self-isolate if you may have been exposed to COVID-19. Stay connected with neighbours, friends and family.”

“When you take care of your-self, you take care of others,” said Ms. Tam.

Mr. Barsalou-Duval told The Hill Times that he was “very sur-prised” that the government still needs more money for COVID-19 advertising, and that they need more money than they needed before.

“At first, they had a budget of $30-million,” said Mr. Barsalou-Duval. “I don’t think we need any ads now, and I don’t understand why the budget should be bigger than it was before.”

Mr. Barsalou-Duval said there’s “clearly a lack of transpar-ency on how the money is used.”

“We don’t know where the money is going. The government is saying that this is also help-ing local media, but we don’t see it, and there’s also the fear that this money could not be spent in a good way, so clearly we need to have more transparency to

know where this money is going, and the government should be accountable for how they use this money,” said Mr. Barsalou-Duval.

“While we are in COVID-19, everyone understands that the government spends more to sustain the economy, but it’s not a reason for us not to watch out,” said Mr. Barsalou-Duval.

Mr. Green said he would “sub-mit that it’s crucial for us to have public messaging on this, but when you look at how the budget is ever-expanding, the questions that I had in particular was, where are they advertising, how are they advertising, and to what effectiveness?”

“Do you they have any kind of performance metrics from which they can gather evidence-based inputs to determine if they’re creating any kind of meaningful public health change?” said Mr. Green.

During the June 16 commit-tee meeting, Mr. MacKillop said, “we know that with the Public Health Agency of Canada, more than 80 per cent of that placement was in Canadian media,” with “16 per cent in print media, includ-ing dailies, weeklies, ethnic and Aboriginal newspapers.”

Mr. MacKillop also told the committee that the “recall rate on the advertising was 85 per cent,” which means that “when we go

out to research this after the fact, we can ask Canadians: ‘have you seen this ad?,’ and the recall rate is 85 per cent.”

“That compares to previous years at 34 per cent for govern-ment of Canada advertising—that’s roughly 34 per cent for the past two fiscal years—so we’re seeing that advertising being re-called very well. Of course, if you encounter advertising that doesn’t work quite as well, it gives you an opportunity to adjust your future campaigns,” said Mr. MacKillop.

Mr. Green also noted that he’s still unclear about where that click-through was happening and with whom it was happening.

“So my question was about whether or not the department used the stated gender-based analysis plus, which is something that’s in the mandate letters of the minister for public services, the minister of public health—and the plus is very important to me.”

“We recognize that COVID has had a disproportionate impact on racialized communities, on newcomer communities, so it was

important to try to determine if they had made a concerted effort to try to do outreach specifically in communities which might not be accessing mainstream media,” said Mr. Green. “And the fact that the person responsible, Mr. Ken MacKillop didn’t have a direct an-swer leads me to believe that they didn’t have an intentional policy directive to do that.”

“I think it’s important for Canadians to know, that with the order of magnitude of money that is going out the door at the federal level, it is incumbent that we continue to have checks and balances in place,” said Mr. Green. “Despite the fact that we’re in a crisis, or specifically because of it, now more than ever we need to ensure that there’s transparency and accountability in government contracting.”

‘No Treasury Board rules were violated’ 

According to Alain Belle-Isle, in media relations with the Treasury Board Secretariat, “as a central agency, [the Privy Council Office] is well positioned to coor-dinate the whole-of-government communications marketing effort in response to COVID-19, which has and will continue to include a number of departments and agen-cies throughout the government of Canada.”

“As part of the normal supple-mentary supply process, funds were allocated and approved by Parliament to support ongoing COVID-19 advertising campaigns, as listed in the recent Supple-mentary Estimates (A),” wrote Mr. Belle-Isle in a statement to The Hill Times on July 10. “No Trea-sury Board rules were violated in how funds were allocated.”

Regarding the Treasury Board’s vote 5 rule, Mr. Belle-Isle wrote “government contingen-cies were not used because these funding needs did not meet the required criteria of being urgent, unforeseen, and unmanageable before supply through regular mechanisms.”

“Additionally, the use of Privy Council Office vote 1a supports continued government spending oversight, requiring Parliamen-tary approval to allocate these funds to protect the health and safety of Canadians,” wrote Mr. Belle-Isle.

According to Pierre-Alain Bujold, spokesperson for the Privy Council Office, “a line-by-line breakdown of the campaign expenditures is not available at this time as the campaigns are ongoing.”

“The government of Canada issues an annual report on ad-vertising that details the various ad campaigns and expenditures,” wrote Mr. Bujold in a statement to The Hill Times on July 10.

“These efforts have and will continue to provide critical infor-mation to Canadians throughout the pandemic in four key ar-eas: public health information, financial support for individual, financial support for business and the economy and public safety and security information, includ-ing travel advice. The funds are planned to be spent in the 2020-2021 fiscal year ending on March 31, 2021,” wrote Mr. Bujold.

mlapointe@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Opposition MPs decry lack of transparency around government’s COVID-19 advertising spending

News

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Just over $48.5-million was added to the Privy Council Office’s budget for ‘communications and marketing (COVID-19)’ in the most recent round of supplementary estimates, which were passed by Parliament on June 17.

NDP MP Matthew Green, Bloc Québécois MP Xavier Barsalou-Duval, and Conservative MP Kelly McCauley. Mr. Barsalou-Duval says he was 'very surprised' that the government still needs more money for COVID-19 advertising, and that they need more money than they needed before. The Hill Times photographs by Andrew Meade, photograph courtesy of Facebook

Diversity, Youth, and Inclusion Minister Bardish Chagger has recently added a new member to her ministerial communications team, with Emelyana Titarenko having been hired as a special assistant for com-munications and issues management.

Ms. Titarenko officially began working for the minister on June 1.

A recent graduate of Mount Allison Uni-versity in Sackville, N.B., from which she received a bachelor’s degree in psychology with minors in biology and political sci-ence, Ms. Titarenko served on the school’s students’ union, including as president for the last year of her degree. At the same time, she spent the last two years up until May as a director with the Canadian Alli-ance of Student Associations, including as its director of equity, diversity, and inclu-sion.

In Ms. Chagger’s office, Ms. Titarenko will be reporting to director of communi-cations and issues management Danielle Keenan.

In more belated—but nonetheless perti-nent—news, Allen Alexandre is director of

parliamentary affairs and Quebec adviser to Ms. Chagger. Though as yet unreported, he took on that role back in late January.

Previously, Mr. Alexandre was working for Mary Ng as minister of small business and export promotion (she’s since added on the international trade portfolio), start-ing in September 2018 as a press secretary and issues manager. Before then, he was working for then-public safety minis-ter Ralph Goodale, starting as an issues manager for the Quebec region in early 2016. While in Mr. Goodale’s office, he also served as the then-minister’s liaison to the government’s Cross-Cultural Roundtable on Security advisory body, according to his LinkedIn profile.

In other political experience, Mr. Alexandre previously served as cam-paign manager to now former Liberal MP Richard Hébert during the 2017 byelection campaign in Lac-St-Jean, Que. Mr. Hébert ultimately won the seat, which had been vacated by former Conservative minister Denis Lebel, with roughly 38.6 per cent support, but he was defeated last fall by now Bloc Québécois MP Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe. During the 2015 election, Mr. Al-exandre was a Quebec field and mobiliza-tion lead for the national Liberal campaign.

Jamie Kippen is chief of staff to the minister, whose office also currently includes: Marilla McCargar, director of policy and cabinet affairs; Dilys Fernandes, policy adviser for youth and Atlantic regional affairs adviser; Riley Schnurr, policy adviser for inclusion and West and North regional affairs adviser; Myriam Djossou, executive assistant to Mr. Kip-pen and Ms. Chagger; and Humna Shaikh, regional affairs adviser for Ontario and assistant to the minister’s parliamentary secretary, Adam van Koeverden.

Over in Economic Development and Official Languages Mélanie Joly’s office, there are three more staff to note, including Mathée Warnett, who’s been hired on as a special assistant for executive operations.

Ms. Warnett previously worked in pro-vincial politics in Quebec and is a former assistant to the Liberal MNA for Hull, Que., Maryse Gaudreault.

Adam Lukofsky is a senior policy adviser for Quebec to Ms. Joly. He joined

the minister’s team on March 30 and tackles work related to the Canada Eco-nomic Development for the Regions of Quebec, one of the six regional economic development agencies under the minis-ter’s purview, in the Greater Montreal Region.

Prior to joining Ms. Joly’s office, Mr. Lukofsky had spent the last almost five years working as a specialist for real estate acquisition and municipal affairs for Rog-ers Communications. He also previously worked at Quebec’s national assembly as a political adviser to then-minister Kathleen Weil, starting during her time as justice minister and through to her post as minis-

ter of immigration and cultural communi-ties, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Mr. Lukofsky joins fellow senior policy advisers Richard Léger, who’s focused on the minister’s official languages file; Mi-chel Breau; and Kelsey MacDonald, who tackles economic development and tourism files. There’s also policy adviser and Que-bec regional affairs adviser Gabriel Cyr, West and North regional affairs adviser Galen Richardson, Atlantic regional affairs adviser Pavan Sapra, and Ontario regional adviser James Leask. Caroline Séguin is director of policy to Ms. Joly.

Also in March, Gabrielle LaBadie-John-son was hired on as executive assistant to Ms. Joly, moving over from National Rev-enue Minister Diane Lebouthillier’s office to take on the role.

Ms. LaBadie-Johnson had been working for Ms. Lebouthillier since the fall of 2016, starting out as a scheduling and administra-tive assistant to the minister and chief of staff and ending as a special assistant for operations. In between those roles, she also spent time as the revenue minister’s regional affairs adviser for Quebec and the Atlantic.

Daniel Lauzon is chief of staff to Ms. Joly.Also currently working in the minis-

ter’s office are: Sandra Aubé, director of parliamentary affairs; Jérémy Ghio, direc-tor of communications; Alexander Cohen, press secretary; Emma Kristensen, opera-tions manager; Philippe Lafrance, senior adviser; parliamentary affairs advisers Karine Aprahamian and Jessica La Forge; Catherine Mounier-Desrochers, legislative assistant; Alison Murphy, issues adviser; and Joshua Arless, manager of executive operations.

lryckewaert@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Mathée Warnett is a new special assistant to Economic Development Minister Mélanie Joly.

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

by Laura Ryckewaert

hill climbers

5

Ministers Chagger, Joly add to political staff teams

Diversity, Youth, and Inclusion Minister Bardish Chagger and Economic Development Minister Mélanie Joly have some new faces in their offices. The Hill Times photograph by Cynthia Münster and Andrew Meade

Emelyana Titarenko has joined Ms. Chagger’s ministerial office. Photograph courtesy of LinkedIn

Adam Lukofsky is a senior policy adviser for Quebec to Ms. Joly. Photograph courtesy of LinkedIn

Gabrielle Labadie-Johnson is Ms. Joly’s executive assistant. Photograph courtesy of LinkedIn

6

TORONTO—Even before the pandemic, increased inequality

in income and wealth between those at the top and those in the bottom 50 per cent had become a major challenge that had to be addressed. The pandemic threatens to make inequality an even bigger challenge.

Rebuilding the post-pandemic economy, then, must include both building a more productive econ-omy but also a fairer economy.

As the Organization for Co-operation and Development points out in its recent report, Employment Outlook 2020, CO-VID-19 is accentuating inequality in Canada—47 per cent of those in the lowest earnings quartile have stopped working, compared to just 14 per cent of those in the top quartile.

Moreover, only 15 per cent in the bottom quartile can work from the safety of their home compared to almost 50 per cent in the top earnings quartile. And as the report adds, between Febru-ary and April employment among temporary workers with tenure of one year or less declined by 30 per cent and by May youth employment had dropped by 33 per cent.

Looking at where the biggest gains in after-tax income from economic growth, along with the biggest gains in net wealth, have gone over the past 20-25 years, it will be no surprise to see that those at the top have been the big winners while those at the bottom have only marginally gained. But what are the actual numbers? While per capita GDP rose 64.3 per cent between 1982 and 2017, most of the gains went to those at the top.

To get a clearer picture on in-equality, I asked Statistics Cana-da, which responded by providing a vast array of data which gives a detailed picture of what has been

happening in Canada since the early 1980s, a long enough period to identify changing patterns or trends.

According to Statistics Canada, the after-tax income of those in the top 0.1 per cent grew by 97.8 per cent between 1982 and 2017, while the bottom 50 per cent saw their after-tax incomes rise by a much lower 21.8 per cent. Those in the 51-90th percentiles saw their after-tax income rise by just 15.3 per cent. In 1982, the top 0.1 per cent had average after-tax income 37 times the bottom 50 per cent; in 2017 it was 61 times the bottom 50 per cent.

The closer you were to the top, the greater your after-tax income growth between 1982 and 2017. The top one per cent saw their after-tax incomes rise 60.8 per cent, the top five per cent by 42.1 per cent, and the top 10 per cent by 35.1 per cent.

There’s some positive news. Over the past decade, the bottom 50 per cent have seen an improved rate of after-tax income gains, in part probably the result of changes in public policy, such as a more generous child benefit, increases in the guaranteed income supplement for seniors and increases in the minimum wage.

Likewise, the position of women in the workforce has im-proved—in pay and pensions—in part because women more than men have been pursuing jobs in the public sector, which provides more generous pay and benefits.

The bad news is that the position for male workers—from full-time jobs to pensions—has been declining.

Just as the gap in after-tax income between those at the top and those much further down has widened, so has the distribution of wealth. In 1999, the top quintile of Canadian families owned 45.1 per cent of the country’s net wealth, and the next quintile owned 22.6 per cent. By 2012, the top quintile owned 46.7 per cent and the next highest quintile another 23.1 per cent. For those in the bottom three quintiles their shares of net worth declined: for the bottom quintile, from five per cent to 3.9 per cent, for the second lowest quintile, from 10.9 per cent to 9.7 per cent, and for the middle quintile, from 16.4 per cent to 16.3 per cent.

The changing workplace is likely one factor in the growth in inequality. A Statistics Canada study on the changing character-istics of Canadian jobs from 1981 to 2018 found that the jobs held by Canadian employees in 2018 differed in many respects from those held by their counterparts in the early 1980s. There were proportionately fewer full-time or permanent jobs, fewer union-ized jobs and fewer employees covered by a Registered Pension Plan.

In 1981, 42 per cent of Cana-dian employees had a defined-benefits pension plan; by 2016, this had fallen to 25 per cent. In fact, only 37.5 per cent of employ-ees had any kind of registered

pension plan in 2016, compared to 44.6 per cent in 1981.

At the same time, the median hourly wage, after inflation, rose just 13 per cent between 1981 and 2018. One factor that could be affecting the level of workplace pay has been the decline in union membership. In 1981 some 37.6 per cent of employed Canadians 17-64 belonged to a union. By 2015 this had fallen to 29.0 per cent.

The consequences of poor economic gains for the bottom 50 per cent in particular go beyond economic insecurity. Healthy life expectancy is also affected. According to Statistics Canada, healthy life expectancy for a 25-year-old male in the bottom in-come quintile this decade was 41 years, compared to 52 years for those in the top quintile, a differ-ence of 11 years; for women the numbers were 42.5 years for the bottom quintile, rising to 56 years for the top quintile, a difference of 13.5 years.

We pay an economic cost with rising inequality. But we also pay a social cost, since rising inequal-ity can undermine trust in our institutions as a significant share of the population feels left behind, as well as widening the gap in health outcomes between those at the top and those nearer the bottom. Our post-pandemic chal-lenge is to build a better Canada, which means addressing the sources of inequality as well as the outcomes.

David Crane can be reached at crane@interlog.com.

The Hill Times

Opinion

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Economic recovery plan must help those at the bottom first

A sign alerting customers to the Lord Elgin Hotel’s closure hangs on the door in Ottawa on May. 5, 2020. The hotel was forced to shut its doors to customers in March as the COVID-19 pandemic began to devastate the travel and tourism industry. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Low earners have been hit the hardest during the COVID-19 recession, and were already being left behind by the richest in our economy. The government’s economic recovery plan should prioritize reducing income inequality.

David Crane

Canada & the 21st Century

A LETTERFROM

ONTARIOFARMERS

COVID-19 has changed all of our lives. And although Canada continues down the path of re-opening, the pandemicremains an ever-present threat to our health, our livelihoods, our communities and our domestic food supply.

As fruit and vegetable farmers, we are devastated by the recent deaths of three Ontario farm workers from COVID-19 and we are very concerned about the recent outbreaks that have affected our farms, our dedicated employeesand our ability to produce food for you.

Seasonal farm workers play an essential role on our fruit and vegetable farms. The federal government createdthe seasonal agricultural worker program (SAWP) in 1966 and many of us have been welcoming the same international workers for years (even generations). We care about their health and well-being and we are committed to doing everything possible to protect the health and safety of our employees.

Part of this is ensuring that farm workers are treated with respect and dignity, are paid fairly, have access to healthcare and benefits, and importantly, are safely housed. Our farms, and employee living and working conditions,continue to be regularly inspected by multiple agencies and government. Seasonal agricultural workers have thesame labour, human rights and social protections as all other Canadian workers.

As we learn more about recent outbreaks on local farms, our farmers and our sector are working to quickly remedyissues and prevent them from happening elsewhere. While we don’t have all the answers and know there mightbe more challenges ahead, what we have learned is that some recent outbreaks were associated with the use ofunregulated local recruitment agencies whose contract workers moved from farm to farm.

So, we are taking action.

• We are calling on all fruit and vegetable farmers to limit the movement of local temporary contract workers from one farm to another to reduce the risk of community spread. This also means separating local and international guest workers to decrease the risk of infection.

• We are helping to inform workers about available testing, and doing our part to make sure workers’ legal rights for job protection and income protection (e.g. WSIB) are respected if they have to go into isolation.

• We continue to work with all levels of government to provide COVID-19 health and safety training guidelines for farmers.

We look forward to working with government to ensure these unregulated agencies are held to the same ethicaland legal standards as the federal regulated seasonal agricultural worker program.

We all have a responsibility to do the best that we can to keep people safe during this pandemic and there is notolerance for employers who don’t follow the rules when it comes to public health and worker safety.

During these challenging times we must all work together to ensure the health and safety of our farmers and agricultural employees so that we can continue to ensure that locally grown fruits and vegetables are available toyou, our customers, year round.

We are proud of farm workers, we are proud to be Canadian farmers and we are proud to grow the food you eat.

Sincerely,Ontario’s 3,500 farm families who grow your fruits and vegetables

IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

TheHill_OFVGA_0720.qxp_Layout 1 2020-07-09 10:17 AM Page 1

8

The WE Charity scandal is just the latest example of high-ranking members of

the Liberal government disregarding ethical laws, or common-sense ethical guidelines.

The government awarded a contract for delivering $900-million worth of government benefits to the WE Charity without holding a competition. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau claimed that no other charity, not even the federal government itself, was capable of doing that job instead. However, a collection of experts in Canada’s charity sector inter-viewed by the CBC cast doubt on that claim.

Mr. Trudeau said it was the federal civil service, not himself or his advisers, who made the decision to award the contract to WE. Perhaps the high-ranking civil servants who were involved in that decision were un-aware of the Trudeau family’s lengthy history with the charity, and the obvious conflict of interest in doling out a sole-sourced con-tract in light of that relationship; more than $300,000 were paid to Mr. Trudeau’s immedi-ate family members by ME to WE, a for-profit organization aligned with the charity, Canadaland revealed last week. Mr. Trudeau has volunteered for the charity in the past, and his wife, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, is an “ambassador” for the charity.

Mr. Trudeau and his legion of “issues” advisers had an opportunity to make the decision-makers aware of that personal and financial relationship. Mr. Trudeau could have recused himself from the decision-making process entirely. They didn’t and he didn’t.

Federal Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion has begun an investigation into the scandal, the third time Mr. Trudeau has been investigated by the ethics watchdog. The first two investigations found that Mr. Trudeau had indeed broken federal ethics rules. The first, for accepting a helicopter ride while vacationing on the private island of the Aga Khan, another Trudeau friend who leads an

organization that has received sizable pay-outs from the government. The second, for pressuring his former justice minister, Jody Wilson-Raybould, to make sure that Mon-treal’s SNC-Lavalin could cut a deal to avoid a corruption prosecution.

It’s not just Mr. Trudeau who has disre-garded ethical rules and best practices. Bill Morneau also chose not to recuse himself from the cabinet decision on the WE Charity contract, even though one of his daughters works for the charity. He also saw no need to put his substantial business interests into a blind trust when he became the finance min-ister and gained economic influence rivalled by few in the country. François-Philippe Champagne chose not to move his mortgage with a state-run Chinese bank when he be-came foreign affairs minister, and the point-person for Canada’s feud with China.

None of these men saw need to adhere to common-sense ethical best practices or rules. None of their advisers pressed them to do so—or if they did, they were ignored.

The federal Liberals who run the govern-ment are sending an unmistakable message that ethical rules are for others to follow, that real or perceived conflicts of interest for the country’s caretakers are of no consequence. That sets a dangerous precedent, beyond any harms the indiscretions themselves may or may not cause.

For Mr. Trudeau, three strikes is enough. He has demonstrated that he can’t or won’t prioritize ethical boundaries. He has shown he is unwilling to come clean about his ethi-cal lapses—“the allegations in the Globe story this morning are false,” Mr. Trudeau famously said in the early days of the SNC-Lavalin scandal—until all doubt has been removed.When it comes to ethics, Mr. Trudeau and his government have broken the public trust, and it will be difficult to earn it back.

The Hill Times

If the U.S. expects Canada to incur the wrath of China regarding the current

extradition process for one of its citizens, Canada needs to insist the U.S. step back from the pipeline blockages that are im-pacting our prices and our ability to move “product.”

As for the lumber that the Chinese say is insect riddled—yes, insects do like to infest trees. And what of our compliance and quality control when exporting to China? Is it of a lower standard than that used for products that are still moving to the U.S. or elsewhere?

Our standard of oversight has been proven to be patchy and deeply problem-atic for long-term care in Canada, and other issues. So maybe China has good

reason to complain about our exports to them, the latest being our lumber.

Canada needs to grow up and take adult-like control of its governance, be it internal or external, and the above examples are but a few of shoddy gover-nance oversight.

If Canada has less than satisfac-tory standards for services delivered to Canadians, what of items it shifts in trade?

And why is Canada acting as the bag holder between two very powerful na-tions without extracting concessions to compensate for the collateral damage we are bound to suffer?

Bev Kennedy Fredericton, N.B.

President Trump has jokingly(?) said, “Slow the testing down please,” as

they were finding too many cases of COVID-19. This is a preposterous idea and dangerous, although it could find an application in other areas.

If, in November, the vote counters were to slow down or stop counting Trump votes, the world might be a better place.

Dennis FitzgeraldMelbourne, Australia

On Canada Day, while enjoying my morning coffee on the balcony, I

thought about how lucky we are to live here. There were no crowds ooh’ing and aah’ing at the fireworks on Parliament Hill this year, but I look forward to a few days of distance-visiting with family. I have a roof over my head, food in the fridge, and money in the bank. Yet I worry.

There are so many less fortunate. Those who live in poorer countries do not have the strong health system we have in Canada. Indeed, 64 nations spend more on their debt than on health care for their citizens. Canada needs to do more to ensure these nations have access to the same treatments and vaccines that we do in Canada. Our prime minister has said that the pandemic is not over until it is over everywhere, and we have stepped up on a number of fronts, but it is not enough.

For some reason, Canadians remain abysmally ignorant about the minimal Canadian foreign aid dollars we actu-ally spend. They seem to think a great amount of money is flowing daily to poorer countries. In terms of govern-ment COVID-19 spending, only 0.13 per cent has gone to aid. So, we are asking the government to increase this spend-ing to at least one per cent of the overall COVID cost.

There are Canadians who will say that charity begins at home, and that we have our own poor in Canada. I agree. And I hope they are donating to the food bank and local charities supporting low-income and at-risk kids. But Canada is one of the wealthiest countries in the world and we can do more, both at home and abroad.

Sherry Moran Ottawa, Ont.

WE Charity deal shows Liberals haven’t—and probably won’t—learn from past ethical transgressions Why is Canada acting as the

bag holder between two very powerful nations without extracting concessions?

Stop testing? Stop voting Trump

Canada can do more to help world’s poor

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9

OTTAWA—The Paris runway just featured virtual models.

The good news was that they looked a little heavier than usual because the camera has a ten-dency to add a few pounds. The bad news is that this may not be the only year for COVID haute couture.

With the unrelenting rise in Americans testing positive for the Coronavirus, we won’t be getting out of the COVID bubble any time soon. Masks have become a new

fashion statement in Canada, while in the United States, they have taken the place of guns in the geopolitical divide marking that country.

The only difference between gun lovers and the growing num-ber of anti-mask “freedom fight-ers” is that the latter cannot hide behind the constitution to defend their right to spread infection.

At the end of this COVID saga, Americans will have to look in the mirror and ask themselves why individual freedom is more important than collective safety in a pandemic.

One startling statistic should be all they need: as of last week, Americans suffered 24 per cent of global pandemic deaths with only four per cent of the world’s popu-lation. Why would a country as developed as the United States be unable to rally around a national pandemic strategy?

It may sound ridiculous, but President Donald Trump and his followers simply do not believe in collective responsibility. They are so enamoured of the notion that each American is responsible for his own Manifest Destiny, that they cannot fathom or support any measure that would restrict their individual choices. So, they ignore national health distanc-ing guidelines, reopen economies too soon, and refuse to even don a simple mask as a gesture of concern and protection.

Someone should tell Trump that the mask is not for him. It is to ensure that he does not spread

infected droplets to others. Why not use the mask as a tool in the fight to protect his citizens?

Instead, in our country, the wearing of masks has taken on a designer look. In his much-await-ed fiscal update, finance minister Bill Morneau traded in the usual shoes for a wine-coloured COVID mask, complete with an under-stated Canadian maple leaf em-broidered into the upper corner.

Many not-for profits are using masking as a fundraising op-portunity. Canadian Geographic partnered with Roots to launch a reusable face mask last week. Within hours, it became the hot-test selling item on their virtual store site.

As Canadians are becoming more comfortable with virtual journeys, their shopping habits are changing with them. Grocery chains have seen an unprec-edented hike in online purchases. While retail giants are falling like dominoes across the economic landscape, Canadians are spend-ing more online than ever before and there is no sign that trend will end in a post-COVID space. The

savings attributed to virtual versus in-person shopping are enormous. It is no surprise that the list of the world’s billionaires is topped by people who got into the internet world early, like Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jack Ma. The COVID crisis has actually encour-

aged many cyberspace luddites to start using their computers instead of their cars to go shopping. That change in consumer habits could have a long-term, positive impact on our environment, cutting down our transportation footprint, as people stop driving to do their shopping.

The same can be said for renewal of our neighbourhoods. With more Canadians COVID-ing outside, we are now using front porches in the way our grand-parents intended, as a gathering place to enjoy the community.

Travel habits will also change. With the southern border still closed, and most air travel relatively limited, Canadians are being encouraged to take stayca-tions by visiting sites within their own communities and provinces. That will not staunch the hemor-rhaging of the airline industry, but it may help those tourism providers on the ground by encouraging the rental of motels and campsites.

It will also have the added benefit of encouraging Canadians to get to know their own coun-try. You would be surprised how many of us have not been outside of our own province, preferring instead to vacation in warmer southern destinations or exotic European locations. I was at a cocktail party once with a well-travelled Montrealer, who knew every stop on the Paris subway line but had never taken his fam-ily to Toronto.

COVID-forced separation has also included a greater appre-ciation of the outdoors, because this is one place where we feel relatively safe. How ironic that a pandemic helps us rediscover Mother Nature!

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister.

The Hill Times

OAKVILLE, ONT.—A politi-cal consultant friend of mine

once told me what he loved most about his profession was playing the “game.”

In other words, what endeared him to politics wasn’t policy plat-forms or ideological dogmas or the analysis of issues, it was the rush he got from plotting cam-paign strategy or devising tactics or creating brands.

I know that sounds a little flippant, but a lot of people who work in politics think that way and so too, by the way, do lots of people who write about politics.

Indeed, many pundits, jour-nalists and columnists are either former political strategists themselves or they’re “armchair” political strategists.

So like my friend, it’s the game of politics they find fascinating.

And there’s nothing wrong with that, except if you concen-trate too much on this “inside baseball” aspect of politics, you sometimes risk losing sight of the bigger picture.

To see what I mean, let’s con-sider the recent discussion that’s

arisen over the emergence of the Wexit Canada Party, which aims to be Western Canada’s version of Quebec’s Bloc Québécois.

As one of the party’s founders, Peter Downing, put it, “Our politi-cal class has failed us and this is the reaction. This is the response and this is the natural conse-quences of poor political rep-resentation in Western Canada. Now we’re going to have good political representation.”

At any rate, the rise of this new party, which will run candi-dates in the next federal election, raises all sorts of important ques-tions: is Wexit good or bad for the West? What is the new party’s agenda? Does the party actually have any popular support?

Yet, none of that stuff seems to interest pundits, who would rather imagine how this new party will impact on Canada’s political balance of power.

And “imagine” is the right word, since, without any real evidence to back it up, they’re already creating a narrative sug-

gesting Wexit will be a force that could threaten Canada’s Conser-vative Party.

For instance, some media reports have indicated the Wexit movement has gained “traction” based on the fact that, in the days following the last federal election, it attracted hundreds of thousand of followers to its two Facebook pages.

The party also got a media boost when the 67 year old for-mer Reform Party MP, Jay Hill, came out of pasture to take over as party leader.

As Calgary Herald columnist, Lisa Corbella, ominously noted, this is “bad news” for Canadian federalists.

Meanwhile, Kory Teneycke , the former communications direc-tor for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, recently warned Wexit could lead to serious “vote split-ting.”

As he put in a column, we “might actually see a number of close seats in urban areas like Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Regina,

Calgary, Edmonton and Vancou-ver elect NDP and Liberal MPs due to the splitting of the right-of-centre vote.”

Surely all this makes the game seem more fun; yet, the reality might be more mundane.

Keep in mind, this same sort of theorizing and conjecturing emanated from pundits after Maxime Bernier bolted from the Conservative Party and formed his People’s Party.

The People’s Party too, we were told, might drastically sap away Tory votes; yet, at the end of the day, Bernier’s party basically fizzled.

Now, I’m not saying Wexit will be a similar flop. All I’m saying is Facebook metrics don’t really reflect a party’s true support; Hill—experienced politician though he may be—has not yet proven himself in this new arena, and while speculating about a new party is certainly interesting, it’s just that—speculation.

So before Conservatives panic about the rise of Wexit, I suggest they calmly keep the game in perspective.

Gerry Nicholls is a communi-cations consultant.

The Hill Times

Opinion

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Pandemic forcing big changes in Canada, not all of them bad

Wexit threat has yet to be proven

The COVID-19 crisis has actually encouraged many cyberspace luddites to start using their computers instead of their cars to go shopping.

The creation of Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party inspired similar words of alarm, but had little impact on the last election.

The rise in online shopping during the pandemic could cut down our transportation footprint and help the environment, writes Sheila Copps. Photograph courtesy of Pixabay

Gerry Nicholls

Post Partisan Pundit

Sheila Copps

Copps’ Corner

10

HALIFAX—The King of Quip once said that the cynic knows the price of ev-

erything and the value of nothing.Oscar Wilde could have been writing

about how some people are reacting to the staggering sums run up in Canada’s fight against COVID-19. The Trudeau government is on track to post a deficit of $343.2-billion, and Finance Minister Bill Morneau said that spending could go even higher. By the end of the fiscal year next March, the government could spend $469-billion more than it planned to when it last set spending targets in December, 2019.

Those are unimaginably huge numbers that have understandably raised more than a few eyebrows. Fitch Ratings, one of the Big Three U.S. credit rating agen-cies, downgraded the country’s rating from AAA to AA+. But Canada’s debt ceiling still enjoys a triple-A rating with Fitch, as does it short-term debt.

That hasn’t stopped elements of the political opposition from howling about irresponsible spending and a lack of gov-ernment transparency. Some people are legitimately terrified about the long-term impact on the economy, about rising deficit and debt numbers, and the country’s weak-ened fiscal position.

No one likes the prospect of a 10 per-cent unemployment rate that may linger on for years. No one likes to see borders closed, or airline routes cancelled, or no tourists. But part of the hue and cry over the raw costs of fighting the pandemic, dizzying as they are, is politics, plain and simple. And myopic politics at that.

Most of what some are calling a fiscal “bloodbath” has been spent on two pro-grams: the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), and the Canadian Emer-gency Wage Subsidy (CEWS). CERB is the program that gives $2,000 per month to Canadians who have lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic. CEWS gives belea-guered employers 75 percent of employee wage costs.

The government expects both programs to cost more than its original estimates. In the case of CERB, which has been ex-tended to October 4th, the costs have more than tripled from an original estimate of $25-billion. Not good, cause for concern, and a clear sign that tweaks for both subsi-dies are needed. Finance Minister Morneau has all but assured Canadians that those tweaks are imminent.

The trouble with critiquing Trudeau’s response to COVID-19 based strictly on the financial costs goes to the heart of Wilde’s witty observation. The Conservatives, and some business leaders, may know the price of fighting the pandemic, but not its value. They criticize Morneau for being foggy on the timing of reining in expenditures, and vigorously re-starting the economy, as if he is withholding information.

Guess what? Planning during an un-precedented pandemic is one part facts and nine parts grasping at straws. The nature of an emergency, let alone a catastrophic one, is that you learn on the job. You see the problems more clearly only by being immersed in, and sometimes, overwhelmed by them. That means you make mistakes and adjust. You have your good days, and

you have your bad ones. That’s why it’s so easy to criticize anyone in charge of an emergency that descends like an invisible avalanche.

There are a lot of bad days until the tide turns.

Minister Morneau doesn’t have all the answers because no one does. He doesn’t know how much more it will cost to fight COVID-19; whether the virus will mutate; how bad a second wave expected in the autumn might be; and whether a vaccine will be developed sooner than later. No government can responsibly shift its prior-ity from fighting the pandemic to economic recovery until more of these things are known. Patience, prudence, and science are the watchwords of the day. Not very sexy to be sure, but the wiser path.

The more people obsess about the sheer cost of these enormous emergency expen-ditures, made under extraordinary circum-stances, the greater the pressure will be on the government to re-open the economy while this deadly virus is abroad in the land, without a vaccine. In other words, before the country is ready.

They have tried that in the United States with a quack president who believes that the answer to COVID-19 is the stock market, an injection of bleach, and opening all the schools as infections surge in more than thirty states.

Places like Arizona, Texas, and Florida are reaping the benefits of following “Cadet Bone Spur” over the cliff of CO-VID Denial: exploding infection rates; hospital intensive care units approach-ing overload; and front line workers burnt out trying to keep their patients alive without either the protective gear or resources to do so. And even with all that, some of the governors still refuse to mandate something as simple as wearing a protective mask. Instead, they preach rugged individualism.

Other countries too have taken a course far different from the one chosen by the Trudeau government. Sweden opted to do next to nothing to fight COVID-19 and kept its economy open. There was never a lock-down. The Swedish government reasoned that once enough people were infected with the virus, a so-called “herd immunity” would be achieved.

Instead, Sweden ended up with a CO-VID-19 death rate worse than its Nordic neighbours. The final irony of the Swed-ish approach? In the end, there was no economic benefit from trying to pretend it could be business as usual in the middle of a pandemic.

Finally, there is the experience of Brazil, where President Bolsonaro seems obsessed with out-Trumping the president of the United States. Bolsonaro’s approach to fighting COVID-19 has been to compare it to a small cold and laugh it off. Bolso-naro’s gaudy show of denial and misplaced machismo included downing hydroxychlo-roquine on social media and urging Brazil-ians to follow his example.

Hydroxychloroquine is the same anti-malarial drug touted by Trump in March. Since then, it has been banned as a treat-ment for COVID-19 by the European Union, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. For all his bluster and bull, Bolsonaro him-self has caught the “small cold” and is now trying to recover from COVID-19. Mean-while, 1.7 million of his citizens are now infected and nearly 70,000 have died.

Bolsonaro, Trump, and governors in states like Texas and Florida knew the price of fighting the pandemic, and in defence of the market economy, decided not to pay it. So thousands of their citizens have—with their lives.

Canada has been far from perfect in its handling of the pandemic. Slow off the mark on testing, the virus got a foothold across the country, especially in Ontario and Quebec. The country was woefully short on medical equipment. As for long term care homes, elderly Canadians were shockingly exposed to the fatal virus, leaving this country with one of the worst death rates in the world amongst seniors.

But the Trudeau government has erred and corrected, learned and adjusted, ulti-mately realizing that no economy could be healthy or open without healthy citizens. Which is to say, Ottawa saw beyond the price of fighting COVID-19 to the absolute value of doing so.

As Wilde so keenly understood, some-times cynicism is part of the problem.

Michael Harris is an award-winning author and journalist.

The Hill Times

Opinion

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

The price of everything and the value of nothing The Trudeau government has made mistakes, learned, and adjusted while trying to ward off the COVID-19 pandemic. Other world leaders have stuck their heads in the sand, and their citizens have paid with their lives.

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government has already borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars to send to Canadians and businesses harmed by public lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic. No one knows how long the virus will remain a threat to public safety. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Michael Harris

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11

OTTAWA—It’s been 49 days since George Floyd died. It has

been forty-nine days of internation-al rally and protest, demands for change, system outrage at demands for change, and general confusion. On that day a Black Canadian was also assaulted by police in Laval.

It’s been 49 exhausting days for many Indigenous peoples, black Canadians and people of colour. To question the lived experience of others as if it’s an academic de-bate ignores the painful fact that Indigenous peoples and people of colour live through experiences of racism with emotions and perhaps trauma too. When one says “I doubt systemic racism”, one is also saying, “I don’t believe all these Indigenous people who say they didn’t receive equitable service or treatment.” So it’s our fault we are 10 times more likely to be arrested for “driving while brown” or shot for “walking down street while brown”?

It has been exhausting be-cause every instance of racism at stores, at the hands of police, on

the street, all rightfully covered in media, is somebody’s daughter or son or cousin.

It has been exhausting be-cause too many well-meaning leaders want to do research and investigate the allegations of racism. If instances of physical assault were documented in the hundreds in an organization or locale, one would not call for research, one would demand consequences now. So why do leaders want to do more research on systemic racism? Would you rather start doing something to fix it? Or not?

Shame. Shame on leaders who need more evidence before action. More research is an act of resistance to change, an act of resistance to enact equity for Indigenous peoples and people of colour.

This resistance to act against racism and systemic racism in Canada is astounding. The resistance to act here in our own backyard is stronger than the

resistance to act in the U.S.A. Police officers have been disci-plined and fired in the States due to their acts of police brutality. In Canada the crime seems to be to hold police officers and police leaders to account. It’s all too rare for people to face consequences for racism in this country.

Shame.Forty-nine years ago, the fed-

eral government withdrew “The White Paper,” a draft policy that attempted to address the “Indian problem.” Indigenous people were so marginalized in society they were considered to be “citizens minus,” according to UBC anthro-pologist Harry Hawthorn in his 1963 report titled A Survey of the Contemporary Indians of Canada: Economic, Political, Educational Needs and Policies.

The White Paper attempted to eliminate the “special” in the spe-cial relationship between Canada and Indians, and download all federal responsibility for Indians to provinces and territories. In

1971 the political weight of Indig-enous peoples contributed to a reversal on The White Paper.

Indigenous peoples have learned the ways of political ac-tion. Indigenous peoples will not put up with this continued refusal to admit there is racism.

About 490 years ago, Cartier travelled and met with First Na-tions in what is now Canada’s east coast through to Montreal. First Nations communities could share stories of their first contact in the 1530s, and how the early tenuous relationship soured into the era of “the Indian problem” in the 1800s.

Indigenous peoples remember the long history of failed rela-tionships and blatant and subtle acts of racism in an attempt to eliminate us.

Please consider that Indig-enous peoples have been living with racism, some of us dying due to racism, for a long time. What is new is that people want to know more, and that’s a good thing. But Indigenous peoples should not be asked to prove their pain. It’s exhausting.

Want to help? Believe the stories of racism, and act to chal-lenge racism when you see it.

Rose LeMay is Tlingit from the West Coast and the CEO of the Indigenous Reconciliation Group. She writes twice a month about Indigenous inclusion and recon-ciliation. In Tlingit worldview, the stories are the knowledge system, sometimes told through myth and sometimes contradicting the myths told by others. But always with at least some truth.

The Hill Times

Opinion

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Forty-nine days of racism in the news Calls for investigations into the existence of racism are akin to asking Indigenous people to prove they have suffered.

Thousands protested anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism and police violence on Parliament Hill on June 5. ‘It seems impossible to deny the systemic discrimination experienced by First Nations and Inuit peoples in relation to the public services investigated,’ retired Quebec Judge Jacques Viens said in his 2019 report on that province’s treatment of Indigenous people. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Rose LeMay

Stories, Myths, and Truths

12

Ottawa—It should come as no surprise to any Canadian that what our intelligence

agencies do on a daily basis is rarely, if ever, disclosed publicly. These are secret organiza-tions after all, and nothing is more sacred to the nation’s spies than the protection of their sources and methods. To cite the old WWII saw: “Loose lips sink ships”.

It’s well known that Canada belongs to a rather exclusive spook club, and has since the Second World War. It has the somewhat scary title of the “5 Eyes,” which refers to

the fact that a pact was agreed upon some 75 years ago by the leaders of the world’s five major anglophone countries to share intelligence. Those five were, and remain, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and the U.S.

The amount of intelligence, both raw and finished, which is passed back and forth is beyond description. Suffice to say it is a lot, including some very, very sensitive data. How do I know this? Simple: I worked at CSE (Communications Security Establish-ment, our signals intelligence, or SIGINT, agency) from 1983 to 2001, and then at CSIS from 2001 until my retirement from the civil service in 2015. Thirty-two years of exposure to some really cool stuff which, as the saying goes, I could tell you all about but then I’d have to kill you (just kidding!).

While Canada is a competent player in this alliance it is much smaller than two of the partners (the UK and U.S.), marginally larger than a third (Australia) and heaps big-ger than the fifth (New Zealand). Neverthe-less we receive much more than we contrib-ute. This is not a dig at our spies: it is simply a matter of fact.

It is thus clear that holding membership in such a spy cabal is a privilege. Canadian foreign, security, defence, and cyber policies and decisions derive much benefit from this arrangement and I am not certain that our actions would be, at least in theory, as good

as they are in the absence of this club.When I was in the business there were

always rumours of analogous agreements among other countries. They did not seem as important nor as massive as ours, of course, but they did tweak our curiosity. Information on the details was, surprise, surprise, hard to get.

Imagine my shock then to read in a recent edition of The Economist of the exis-tence of the “Maximator” agreement—named after a beer, apparently—between Denmark, Germany and Sweden (the Netherlands and France joined later) since 1976! The sharing seemed to revolve around SIGINT collection and codebreaking: very similar to what the 5 Eyes also did. I do not have a good sense as to their level of finished assessments passed around, a big part of our anglophone club.

It takes a lot for an intelligence organiza-tion to share with another. We are naturally skeptics at heart, trusting no one and bent on keeping our own secrets for our own ad-vantages. Nevertheless, during the Cold War, a few Western nations saw enough benefit in collaboration to keep at bay the elephant in the room: the Soviet Union and its allies. I would guess that counter terrorism provides a similar rationale these days.

As an aside, CSIS has the ability to enter into a sharing relationship with any country outside the traditional 5 Eyes under Section 17 of the CSIS Act. In this post 9/11 world we

have been forced to share intelligence with “partners” who are “not like us”, sometimes with dire consequences (see the Iacobucci Commission‘s findings on dealing with Syria for example).

Those working in Canadian intelligence go to the office every day with one goal and one goal only in mind: to produce the best intelligence possible to further Canada’s interests and keep Canadians safe. Anyone who maintains we can do this in a vacuum without allies is dreaming in technicolour. We have been very fortunate to have good allies, both traditional and new. I hope this continues.

Phil Gurski is the Director of the Security Program at the University of Ottawa and the author of five recent books on terrorism.

The Hill Times

Opinion

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

The first rule of spy club: you do not talk about spy clubIt makes sense for nations to share intelligence where they can.

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Shelly Bruce, a linguist and former intelligence analyst, leads Canada's codebreaking agency, the Communications Security Establishment. CSE, National Defence, and CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, are responsible for doing Canada's foreign intelligence work. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Phil Gurski

National Security

13

Pundits are wringing their hands over Canada’s frustrat-

ed bid for a temporary spot on the United Nations Security Council. But perhaps Canada was audi-tioning for the wrong role.

What if the undeniable but short-term prestige of a UNSC seat has kept critics from recog-nizing a greater, more important place for Canada on the global stage, at precisely the moment it’s most needed?

Climate change looms as an ever larger threat not only to the world’s economies, but to civiliza-tion as a whole. As a major fossil fuel producer and innovative leader in environmental steward-ship, Canada is uniquely poised to help usher in a new era of low-carbon energy, both through actions at home and by bringing other countries along through the UN and other international auspices.

Canada has been an especially influential leader on methane, a potent greenhouse gas with more than 80 times the 20-year warm-ing power of carbon dioxide. Cut-ting methane pollution from the oil and gas industry is our single fastest, most cost-effective oppor-tunity to slow the rate of warming right now, even as we continue to decarbonize the global energy system.

The Trudeau government ad-opted the world’s first nationwide

methane emission regulations in 2018. In April he dedicated $1.7-billion to keep oil and gas workers employed through the downturn by cleaning up the tens of thousands of orphaned and abandoned wells leaking methane and other pollution into the air and water. The plan also creates a $750-million fund to reduce meth-ane and other emissions from current oil and gas facilities.

Together, the measures are expected to create up to 10,000 jobs, according to the prime minister. The plan sends a clear signal that even in the midst of the COVID disaster, Canada will address both the immediate needs of a critical part of its economy and the longer term necessity to stabilize the climate.

While domestic action is cru-cial, potential to reshape climate history is even greater at the international level. This poten-tial first became evident in 2016, when Trudeau teamed up with the presidents of the United States and Mexico in an ambitious North American Climate, Clean Energy and Environment Partner-ship, under which the three coun-tries agreed to reduce oil and gas

methane emissions by between 40 and 45 per cent by 2025.

Unfortunately, many other countries have been slow to estab-lish oil and gas methane strategies of their own. That’s where Canada has a unique opportunity to exert transformational leadership.

Last year, the UN Environment Program, along with Environ-mental Defense Fund and others, launched the Global Methane Alli-ance (GMA), which brings together governments, financing institu-tions, NGOs, and industry to help countries increase their climate ambitions and develop concrete commitments to reduce methane emissions from oil and gas opera-tions as part of their overall green-house gas reduction targets under the Paris climate agreement.

These commitments will be a critical element in the success, or failure, of the international cli-mate talks scheduled for next fall.

Canada is the natural choice to lead the GMA, because it can speak with authority, experience, and credibility no other country can match. Its leadership is root-ed not in some vague “Canadian-

ness,” but in its actual expertise and ambition of a major energy producer working to transition to a cleaner future.

Becoming the leader that galvanizes international action to slash oil and gas methane pollu-tion is a singular opportunity for Canada to play to its strengths. It will have greater, more lasting impact than a short term stint on the Security Council, where Canada would be but one voice in a cacophony of others.

The climate math to achieve a net-zero emission future does not add up without methane. Achiev-ing the necessary global reduc-tions in time requires special leadership to help other countries to aim higher. Seizing this critical moment by leading the charge for the Global Methane Alliance will put Canada and its commit-ment to environmental progress squarely in the world’s spotlight for years to come.

Samuel Kotis is the associate vice-president for Global Energy at the New-York based Environ-mental Defense Fund.

The Hill Times

The Government of Canada should think twice about how

to respond to the Port of Vancou-ver’s campaign to secure federal economic stimulus monies for its expansion project at Roberts Bank in B.C.

For one thing, it is not envi-ronmentally friendly. The Port proposes to build a massive, arti-ficial Terminal island (RBT2, they call it), the size of 150 football fields, pushing out into the open ocean (the ecologically sensitive Salish Sea). The Government of Canada should not support economic stimulus projects that create unnecessary impacts on the environment, yet RBT2 comes loaded with high risk impacts on Indigenous fishing grounds, on migratory shorebirds, and on crabs, salmon and killer whales.

For another, the Port is basing its plans on dated and inaccurate projections. When the current

version of the project was first released in 2013, they claimed it would cost roughly $2.4-billion. The most recent estimates have the project pegged at $3.5-billion. And with the start of construction still two years off, costs could go over $4-billion—a whole lot of public money.

Another Port projection that has been way off is the anticipat-ed growth in container volumes. In January 2010, the Port said the number of containers on the West Coast would double over the next 10 years. But actual growth is more than a million containers shy of their projection. This is no rounding error. To put it into con-text, the gap between projection and actual is the entire current capacity of the Centerm con-tainer terminal in Port of Vancou-ver. And it’s a gap that may grow bigger once the impact of the global pandemic gets factored in.

Once you build an enor-mous and enormously expen-sive artificial Terminal island, it’s there, isn’t it? Even if the capacity growth you planned for never comes to pass. If RBT2 is permitted by (and funded by) the government, it will bring on a glut of capacity, all at once, creating an uncompetitive Port at huge financial and environ-mental risk.

Risking taxpayer dollars right now on a massive project like RBT2, with its inflating costs and unrealistic projections, is not wise. Public monies are much better utilized on public priorities, especially during this economic recovery when the Government of Canada should prioritize spend-ing on the health and economic security of Canadian families.

And why even consider spending public resources when the private sector is standing by

and ready to invest? Dubai Ports World, operator of terminals in Vancouver and Prince Rupert, is investing in an expansion of its terminals, and GCT Global Container Terminals, a Canadian operator with a history of suc-cessful incremental expansions under its belt, is hoping that its own proposal for a smart, phased, environmentally-conscious ex-pansion can get a fair review.

The Port of Vancouver argues that time is of the essence, but the softer growth numbers indicate there is time for reflection. When big infrastructure projects are being planned, it is important that the government take the time needed to make the right deci-sion.

Massive, inflexible megaproj-ects based on dated and inac-curate projections are not good economic stimulus propositions. Never mind shovel ready, they are simply not shovel worthy. Smarter, incremental, more envi-ronmentally sound infrastructure, where risk is borne by the private sector should be preferred not only by Canadians but by their government.

Roger Emsley is the director of Emsley Management and a resi-dent of the City of Delta, B.C.

The Hill Times

Opinion

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Samuel Kotis

Opinion

Roger Emsley

Opinion

Climate leadership is Canada’s best path to world stage

Think twice about shipping terminal at Roberts Bank

Canada could be a leading voice in next fall’s international climate talks, instead of one among many on the UN Security Council.

Massive, inflexible megaprojects based on dated and inaccurate projections are not good economic stimulus propositions.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised to set Canada on course to become a net-zero greenhouse gas emitter by 2050. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

14

were suspended by the union, and the public service’s performance was put in the national spotlight by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Public Service Alliance of Canada’s (PSAC) 70,000-mem-ber Program and Administrative Services (PA) group will get wage increases averaging 2.11 per cent per year retroactive to 2018. If the three year agreement is final-ized, members will also receive a $2,500 lump sum in compensation for Phoenix, rather than five days of cashable leave—an offer that was rejected by the union last year.

Collectively, the agreement would apply to close to 84,000 represented and unrepresented federal employees, according to the Treasury Board Secretariat.

“This tentative agreement recognizes the value and commit-

ment of our members to Canadi-ans,” said PSAC’s national presi-dent Chris Aylward in a statement to The Hill Times. “Avoiding any labour dispute provides sta-bility in the public service for mil-lions of Canadians who continue to rely on federal government support and services during this pandemic.”

“The strength and stability of the public sector will also play a key role in Canada’s economic recovery,” said Mr. Aylward. He noted that members will “finally be compensated for the Phoenix pay disaster” after four years of “stress, uncertainty, and financial hardships because their employer couldn’t pay them correctly or on time.”

The tentative agreement also includes new provisions for care-giver leave, extended parental leave, and up to 10 days of domes-tic violence leave.

PSAC initially resumed nego-tiations with the Treasury Board from June 23 to July 3. The nego-tiations continued into last week and concluded with the tentative agreement on July 9. PA members will soon be invited to participate in online ratification votes when the final text and full details of the tentative agreement are made available, according to the union.

The federal government reached agreements with 35 other public service groups in recent months, including with the Professional Institute of the Pub-lic Service of Canada (PIPSC), Canada’s second largest public service union.

In a press statement, Trea-sury Board President Jean-Yves Duclos (Quebec, Que.) said the tentative deal is “testament to our commitment to reaching fair and equitable agreements, mindful of today’s economic and fiscal context.”

In the days leading up to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pan-demic, however, PSAC was pre-paring for strike votes scheduled to begin on March 16. The union’s second largest group, the Union of Taxation Employees (UTE), was already engaged in strike votes that began on Feb. 17.

At the time, PSAC noted that the government had “yet to table wage increases that would ensure rises in the cost of living are met,” and that its “Phoenix compensa-tion proposal remains meagre and unequal across the public service.” The pay system had left thou-sands of public servants overpaid, underpaid, or not paid at all.

Strike votes were suspended March 13.

In a June 19 press release announcing that bargaining was scheduled to resume, Mr. Aylward said, “elsewhere in Canada, the need to provide stability and fair compensation to public service workers during this pandemic was recognized months ago.”

“Provinces, municipalities and large employers across the coun-try have been negotiating and settling contracts,” said Mr. Ayl-ward. “It’s high time the federal government did the same for their employees.”

Bargaining for a number of other PSAC groups, including for the Education and Library Science (EB) group, the Techni-cal Services (TC) group, and the Canada Revenue Agency (PSAC-UTE) is set to resume next week. Bargaining dates for the Opera-tional Services (SV) group will be announced in the weeks to come, according to the union.

‘Long term plan to stabilize the payroll system’ 

In the most recent round of supplementary estimates, passed by Parliament on June 17, the Department of Public Services and Procurement (PSPC) received slightly more than $203-million in funding allocated for the govern-ment’s problem-plagued Phoenix pay system.

During a June 16 meeting of the House of Commons’ Govern-ment Operations Committee, Les Linklater, associate deputy min-ister of PSPC, told the committee the government has a “long-term plan to stabilize the payroll system, including the salaries of public servants who have been hired to support our efforts.”

Mr. Linklater also told the committee that when the Phoenix pay system came into effect, the workforce stood at 550 people—a number that’s now increased to over 2,500.

According to the Public Service Pay Centre dashboard, as of June 24, there were 125,000 financial transactions beyond the

normal workload—down from 137,000 as of May 27.

As part of the agreement reached between PSAC and the government, members who have already submitted claims for out-of-pocket expenses and financial losses due to Phoenix should continue with the claims process according to the union, as the government continues to process claims as they are received.

Members who have suffered severe losses due to Phoenix, including major financial losses and longer-term impacts like ru-ined credit ratings, will be entitled to claim damages.

Earlier this year on March 6, the Treasury Board announced that software company SAP Can-ada had been chosen to work on a new human resources and pay system pilot project, almost nine months after the federal govern-ment announced there were three vendors in the running to replace Phoenix, including SAP, Ceridian, and Workday in June 2019.

‘There’s a COVID glow around how well the public service has performed’ 

According to professor An-drew Graham, who teaches at the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University, “there’s no question that there’s a COVID glow around how well the public service has performed, and in many respects, how the public service almost outperformed politicians’ expectations if those expectations were really clear in the first place.”

“There’s a goodwill sitting there, that I think, lubricates the process,” said Prof. Graham, who also worked as an assistant deputy minister in the federal government for 14 years.

That includes a shared mental-ity that “we’re still in the middle of it,” he said, referring to the pan-demic, and that the public service needs to be on board for the next wave or the next challenge.

“I really think that there would be few public union leaders who would be prepared to take on public ire of having an actual strike in this circumstance,” said Prof. Graham. “It would be dumb for a public sector union to go on strike in the middle of a pandem-ic, and it would be unbelievably unpopular and the government would have all the leverage to do whatever it wanted to do with them.”

Prof. Graham said that “one of the things that strikes me here is that the government has to have a real will and imperative to settle, and that will and imperative will be driven by several things.”

“We don’t need this now, we want to get this done in order to carry on with the management of the great unwinding of COVID later on, so we need them ready, we need them willing, we don’t need them on the picket line,” said Prof. Graham.

“I think the union has a vested interested in making sure it’s seen as a big player in this circumstance, and that it’s not inappropriately manipulating the situation to it’s advantage—espe-cially on the economic side.”

mlapointe@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

News

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

PSAC reaches tentative deal with feds on Phoenix damages, wage increases Members will soon be invited to participate in online ratification votes when the final text and full details of the tentative agreement are made available, according to the union.

Continued from page 1

PSAC national president Chris Aylward, left, who heads the largest federal public service union, says the tentative deal with the Treasury Board, overseen by Minister Jean-Yves Duclos, right, 'recognizes the value and commitment of our members to Canadians.' The Hill Times photographs by Andrew Meade

15

a party spokesperson says are intended to ensure the process is “transparent and fair.”

The party also had a webcam streaming the ballot holding area during the last leadership election in 2017. That contest finished with Andrew Scheer as the winner, and several of the losing cam-paigns complaining about irregu-larities in the election process.

“The party and the LEOC [Leadership Election Organization Committee] take the process and rules of this race very seriously, and we’ve continually updated all the campaigns on the measures in place to ensure a fair and transpar-ent leadership election, one that has Deloitte overseeing every aspect from ballot printing to processing and counting,” wrote Cory Hann, director of communications of the Conservative Party in an email to The Hill Times. “And even beyond that, there’s also measures like how campaigns will be able to scrutinize every ballot, and we will bring back our ballot vault public live stream that 24/7 monitors the scrutineer area, and the secure room where ballots are kept under lock and key.”

In 2017, where 14 candidates ran for the party’s top job, Andrew Scheer (Regina-Qu’Appelle), Sask.), now the outgoing leader, won on the 13thballot with a razor thin margin of 1.9 per cent of the votes. Right after the contest was over, supporters of the runner up, Max-ime Bernier, pressured the party to explain a discrepancy of more than 7,000 votes between two differ-ent lists showing ballots counted in the election, and why the party destroyed all the ballots right after the vote. Members of Kellie Leitch’s sixth-place campaign also ques-tioned whether the results of the election were audited by Deloitte, as claimed by the party headquarters. Former candidate Kevin O’Leary also alleged “widespread vote rig-ging” by rival campaigns that were using pre-paid credit cards to sign up what he called fake members. The party denied any wrongdoing and said that all proper procedures in place were followed.

Mr. Bernier’s dissatisfaction with the process was the starting point of the former MP’s decision to leave the Conservatives and

start his own People’s Party of Canada in 2018.

The Conservative Party is us-ing mail-in ballots for this year’s leadership election in order to avoid a large public gathering amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Four candidates are running for the party’s top job, including former cabinet minister Peter MacKay, Conservative MP and former cabinet minister Erin O’Toole (Durham, Ont.), rookie Conservative MP Derek Sloan, and Toronto lawyer Leslyn Lewis. The Party is using a ranked ballot system for the leadership elec-tion. All ridings are weighted equally in the contest, regardless of how many members they have.

The contest is expected to wrap up Aug. 21, the deadline for mail-in ballots. The party has started to mail ballots to party members, and the party must receive the completed ballots by 5 p.m. on Aug. 21. The party had about 170,000 members in Janu-ary, but candidates for the leader-ship have signed up thousands more supporters so they will be eligible to vote. The last date to sign up new members eligible to vote in the leadership contest was May 15. The party had not pub-licly announced the total number of members eligible to vote in the leadership election as of late last week.

Mr. Hann told The Hill Times that the party was still in the process of setting up the ballot processing centre. He said the party had briefed all the cam-paigns on the detailed plans for doing so. Mr. Hann said the ballot processing centre will be in a “fully secure location” in Ottawa with only “limited and controlled access, 24/7 video monitoring, and oversight of everything by Deloitte.” He said in an email that scrutineers from all campaigns would be present to monitor the whole ballot processing opera-tion. Mr. Hann said the party is

taking measures to ensure the fairness of the process and the privacy of the voters.

He also said that the bal-lot processing centre would be staffed by “vetted workers, and campaign scrutineers will be required to keep all information from ballots confidential.”

Former Conservative MP John Reynolds, who supported Mr. Ber-nier in the last leadership but now is supporting Mr. MacKay, said he was not satisfied with the party’s responses to the allegations of impropriety after the 2017 leader-ship election. He said he had not seen anything alarming about this year’s leadership election process so far, and said he has full confidence in the measures put in place by the party.

“There was great concern as you know at the last conven-tion and rightfully so,” said Mr. Reynolds, who is holding online campaign events for Mr. MacKay. “More ballots cast on the last day of the convention than there were people around. So, obviously, something went wrong there but you know, that’s life. But I believe this [current leadership election] system.”

Mr. Reynolds said that because of what happened at the last convention, all four leadership campaigns are watching the vot-ing process very closely.

“Last time, as you know, the auditors didn’t check every ballot and the ballots were destroyed immediately,” said Mr. Reynolds. “So there was no way to follow up. … And this time, there’s a lot more attention being paid to what’s happening.”

Fred DeLorey, campaign man-ager for the O’Toole campaign, confirmed that the party has com-municated with all campaigns on the voting process. He said his campaign submitted some ideas on how to further improve the process to the party, but did not say what they were.

“There’s always room for im-provement,” said Mr. Delorey.

Steve Outhouse, who is man-aging Ms. Lewis’s campaign, said so far the party’s measures to ensure the voting process is fair seem to be transparent. He said the Lewis campaign would speak out if its membership observed anything untoward.

“Our campaign’s focus is solely on identifying supporters, and getting them out to vote,” said Mr. Outhouse. “We will scrutinize every part of the balloting pro-cess, as will other campaigns, and if any irregularities are seen, we will not hesitate to speak out.”

Former Conservative MP Brad Trost, who ran in the 2017 leader-ship contest and came in fourth place, said that it’s not unusual to see dirty tricks and vote rigging in nomination and leadership elections. He said the contest is very close this time and all cam-paigns are watching the voting process, which will likely ensure a fair outcome.

“There’s always shenanigans in nomination races and leader-ship races,” said Mr. Trost who has endorsed and is unofficially advising Mr. Sloan and Ms. Lewis, the two social conservative can-didates. “I would say there’s no if, and, but, or maybe about it. Both the O’Toole and Mackay campaigns are highly suspicious of each other and they are going to be watching each other and party headquarters like a hawk. And that will keep out 99 per cent of any funny business that people may want to engage in.”

Jack Fonseca, director of political operations for the Campaign Life Coalition, a pro-life organization, expressed his reservations about the fairness of the leadership election process in an interview with The Hill Times. He blasted the party for disqualifying two social conserva-tive candidates, including Richard Decarie, a former Hill staffer, and

Jim Karahalios, a Cambridge, Ont. lawyer from the leadership contest. The Conservative Party never officially said why they had barred Mr. Decarie’s from seeking the party’s top job, but in January he made national headlines for saying in a CTV interview that being gay is a choice and that he was against same sex mar-riage and government funding of abortion services. A number of senior conservatives from both inside and outside of the caucus condemned these comments.

The Conservative Party also blocked Mr. Karahalios’ leader-ship bid after the O’Toole cam-paign filed a complaint saying the Toronto lawyer had made “racist Islamophobic remarks” against Walied Soliman, the chair of the former cabinet minister’s cam-paign. Mr. Karahalios took the Conservative Party’s decision to court, arguing that the decision was made by a subcommittee of LEOC which did not have the authority to make it. The court overturned the party’s deci-sion, but a day after that the 18 member LEOC decided to bar Mr. Karahalios again.

Mr. Fonseca said that the party should not have disqualified Mr. Decarie and Mr. Karahalios. The Campaign Life Coalition has en-dorsed Mr. Sloan and Ms. Lewis and has urged members to vote only for these two candidates, and not choose the remaining two as their third or fourth choice.

“They had no legitimate reason to disqualify them,” said Mr. Fonseca. “So if you’re will-ing to rig the ballot in terms of whose names appear on them, to get rid of the candidates that you don’t like, you’re totally capable of rigging the actual votes by discarding thousands of ballots that might have Leslyn Lewis or Derek Sloan as the number one on them,” he said.

arana@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Conservatives to put 24/7 live camera on ballot holding area for leadership election All four Conservative leadership campaigns are watching the voting process ‘like a hawk,’ to ensure nothing untoward happens in the leadership election vote, says former Conservative MP Brad Trost.

News

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

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The Conservative Party has started to mail ballots to all party members eligible to vote in the leadership election. Former Conservative cabinet minister Peter Mackay, left, and Conservative MP Erin O’Toole are running neck and neck in the leadership election. Lawyer Leslyn Lewis and Conservative MP Derek Sloan are also seeking the party’s top job. The Hill Times file photographs

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In interviews with The Hill Times, some former Liberal MPs said nominations for unheld rid-ings—those currently occupied by MPs from other parties—will likely start after the Liberal Par-ty’s biennial convention, which is scheduled to run between Nov.12 and Nov. 15 in Ottawa. They said the nominations contests were originally planned for March, but were delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The latest update that I’ve been able to get is that they may start looking around when our national convention is going to be, which is after Remembrance Day this year, so sort of mid-to-late November,” said former Liberal MP John Aldag, who represented the riding of Clover-dale-Langley City, B.C. from 2015-2019, but lost the last election to Conservative MP Tamara Jensen by a margin of 2.5 per cent of the vote. Ms. Jensen won 20,937 votes, Mr. Aldag 19,542, NDP candidate Rae Banwarie received 10,508 votes, and Green Party candidate Caelum Nutbrown garnered 3,572 votes.

In 2015, Mr. Aldag had carried the riding by a margin of 11 per cent of the vote over Conservative candidate Dean Drysdale. That year, Justin Trudeau’s (Papineau, Que.) Liberals won a majority government with 184 seats. They were reduced to a minority in 2019, ending up with 157 of the total 338 seats. The Conservatives won 121, the Bloc 32, the NDP 24, the Greens three, and one Inde-pendent MP was elected.

In a minority government, an election could happen at any time if the governing party loses a vote of confidence. In compari-son, under majority governments the dates of elections are fixed in advance.

In minority governments, political parties try to nominate their candidates sooner rather than later, given the inherent un-predictability of how long a gov-ernment will last. Early nomina-tions give nominated candidates more time to campaign, gain name recognition, raise funds, and develop contacts in commu-nities in their ridings. The average life of a minority government in Canada is 18 months.

Even after losing the last elec-tion, Mr. Aldag said he’s never discontinued his outreach with people living in the riding. He said he agrees with the party’s decision not to call nomination contests when the country is deal-ing with the COVID-19 pandemic, but he also said it’s always bet-ter if a politician can introduce themselves to voters as a party’s nominated candidate as early as

possible, rather than as someone who is seeking a nomination.

“I am planning on putting my name forward again, and I know it’d be a lot easier when we are able to start campaigning or getting out in public to actually be there as the candidate, as op-posed to the person seeking the nomination,” said Mr. Aldag.

“They were originally looking, pre-COVID, at having some of the nominations starting by the end

of March. COVID has changed all of that.”

National public opinion polls taken not long before the WE Charity scandal erupted last week suggested that the Liberals would win a majority government if an election were held at the time. The numbers suggested that Canadi-ans supported the way the Liberal government was managing the pandemic so far.

A Léger poll released last week suggested that if an elec-tion were to be called now, 39 per cent of Canadians would vote for the Liberal Party, 25 per cent Conservative Party, 20 per cent NDP, and five per cent for the Green Party.

The online poll of 1,517 Ca-nadians was conducted between July 3 and July 5, and had a margin of error of 2.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

This would mean a marked increase in popularity for the Lib-erals compared to before the pan-demic, when the Liberals and the Conservatives were in a statistical tie at 31 per cent and 32 per cent respectively, according to a Léger poll conducted on Jan. 22. The NDP support was at 19 per cent, and the Green Party at eight per cent.

It however remains to be seen if the WE Charity controversy will have any serious effect on the popularity of the Liberal Party. This is the first major ethics con-troversy that Mr. Trudeau has run into since the last federal election. During the last Parliament, his popularity was severely damaged by the SNC-Lavalin scandal and also his family and friends’ trip to the private Caribbean island of the Aga Khan, whose charity has received millions of dollars from the Canadian government.

The WE Charity controversy surrounds a now-cancelled, untendered $900-million contract to handle a student volunteer program that was handed to the charity. The Trudeau family is close to the WE Charity; Mr. Trudeau has volunteered for it in the past, his mother Marga-ret and brother Alexandre have received a total of about $300,000 over the years in speaking fees for WE Charity events, and his wife, Sophie Gregoire Trudeau, is an official ambassador for the charity and hosts a podcast for it. She received a $1,500 honorarium for hosting a WE Charity event in 2012.

Late Friday, Canadaland re-ported that Finance Minister Bill Morneau (Toronto Centre, Ont.) also did not recuse himself from cabinet approval of the WE Char-ity contract although two of his close family members have been directly involved with the charity, one as a contractual employee. The Conservatives have called on the RCMP to investigate the issue.

Mr. Trudeau has said the deci-sion to award the contract for the Canada Student Service Grant to the WE Charity was made by public servants, but it was also approved by the cabinet, and Mr. Trudeau did not recuse himself from that decision.

Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion is currently investigating the scandal.

The Conservative Party an-nounced its nomination rules for held ridings in April. A party spokesman told The Hill Times last week that nominations in unheld ridings will likely start for the Conservatives sometime after the party elects its new leader next month.

According to the Conserva-tive Party’s nomination rules for incumbent MPs, if an election were to be called between now and June 2021, all MPs would be acclaimed as party’s candidates automatically. If an election is held after June of next year, Con-servative MPs can still run unop-posed without going through the nomination process if they raise $15,000 by Dec. 31, 2020.

If any Conservative MP is not able to meet the threshold by that deadline, they would have to then raise $25,000 by April 30, 2021. If an MP is not able to meet either of the two deadlines, they will have to earn their nomination through the regular nomination process.

Those fundraising thresholds are relatively low, and all Con-servative MPs are expected to be acclaimed as party candidates for the next election.

Some Conservative sources told The Hill Times that the caucus had recommended that financial target as the only condi-tion for qualification to carry the party’s banner for the next election to the elected National

Ex-Liberal MPs running in next election eagerly await start of nomination process The Liberal Party is consulting MPs and grassroots members to determine rules for candidate nominations in held and unheld ridings for the next election, says spokesman Braeden Caley.

News

MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addressing the national Liberal caucus during the Jan. 23 winter caucus retreat. Recent polls showed the Liberals would win a majority government if an election were held at the time, but that was before the WE Charity scandal erupted last week. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Former Liberal MP Dan Ruimy, right, pictured with Liberal MP Ken Hardie. Mr. Ruimy lost the 2019 federal election but is planning on running in the next election. The Hill Times file photographs

The Great Rebuilding Part 2

A Special Report on Canada’s Economic Recovery

The Hill Times, July 13, 2020

In the next wave of economic recovery, ‘speed, scale, and simplicity’ need to make way for sustainability

Keep the new pedestrian spaces, COVID or not

Government must help businesses, not just households, to sustain economic recovery

p. 23

p. 20

p. 22

NDP calls for wealth tax bill ‘immediately’, PBO pegs revenue at $5.6-billion

p. 18

Aviation sector needs help to

join economic recovery

Post COVID-19: reopening our cities means restructuring

older adult care

The other side of Canada’s deficit coin

Time to take urban policy seriously

p. 27

p. 25

p. 26

p. 28

Remote working brings a new set

of challenges

p. 24

BY AIDAN CHAMANDY

NDP finance critic Peter Julian is calling on the federal government to imme-

diately introduce legislation to bring in a wealth tax, which a new report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer says could bring in $5.6-billion in new revenue.

Finance Minister Bill Morneau (Toronto Centre, Ont.) said on July 8 that the gov-ernment was on track to run a $343-billion deficit this year alone, as the government continues to borrow and spend to keep households and businesses afloat amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Both the federal Liberals and NPD have promised to levy new taxes on Canada’s

wealthiest residents. The NDP has called for a tax on the wealthiest one per cent of Canadians, while Mr. Morneau’s mandate letter from the prime minister instructs him

to introduce a new tax on luxury boats, cars, and personal aircraft, and to do an analysis to “ensure that wealthy Canadians do not benefit from unfair tax breaks.”

The governing Liberals were slow to introduce new legislation when the forty-third Parliament began, and the COVID-19 pandemic sidelined the legislative process in mid-March. The House is now in sum-mer recess.

“We need to start taking action on the revenue side, so that we can continue to maintain services and support through the pandemic, and look to enhance public in-vestments coming out of the pandemic,” Mr. Julian (New Westminster-Burnaby, B.C.) said in a July 10 interview.

On July 8 four non-profits released a statement of their own calling for a wealth tax.

“Canada should immediately bring in legislation to tax the extremely rich as a means to not only raise revenues, but curb worsening inequality,” read the statement signed by the Broadbent Institute, Canadi-ans for Tax Fairness, Resource Movement, and Leadnow.

The July 8 economic update showed a federal debt over $1-trillion and a deficit of $343-billion. It also showed that the federal debt-to-GDP ratio, which the Liberals have often touted as a key financial marker, is expected to rise to 49 per cent in fiscal year 2020-21, up from 31 per cent the year prior. GDP is expected to shrink by 6.8 per cent this year before rebounding by 5.5 per cent next year.

Mr. Julian asked the PBO to estimate the potential revenues from a one per cent tax on families with a net wealth over $20-million. Released July 8, the PBO estimated that 13,800 Canadian economic families would be subject to the tax, and it would net $5.6-billion in revenue in fiscal year 2020-21. Administering the program

NDP calls for wealth tax bill ‘immediately’, PBO pegs revenue at $5.6-billion The governing Liberals ‘will pay a heavy political price,’ if they don’t introduce a new wealth tax, said NDP finance critic Peter Julian.

18

The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

IF THE OFFSHORE RECOVERS, CANADA RECOVERS.We have a community of voices behind us.

Canada’s offshore industry produces some of the least carbon-intensive petroleum in the world.— Dr. Aaron Henry Natural Resources and Sustainable Growth, Canadian Chamber of Commerce

Founded from Hibernia funding, we’ve introduced over 6,000 girls & women from rural communities to STEM careers.— Mary Clarke

Executive Director, Esteem Women Inc.

Investing in our oil and gas industry is an investment in Canada’s supply chains.— Christian Buhagiar President and CEO, Supply Chain Canada

www.weareNLoffshore.ca/supportNL

Continued on page 27

NDP MP Peter Julian, left, and Leader Jagmeet Singh have again called for a tax on Canada's wealthiest residents, with the government expected to run a $343-billion deficit this year. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Essential to the EconomyServing exporters, importers, retailers, farmers and manufacturers, CN’s transportation services are integral to modern life, touching the lives of millions of people every day.

$250BWORTH OF GOODS TRANSPORTED

$2.9BCAPITAL INVESTMENTS (2020)

26,000RAILROADERS EMPLOYED

25%OF WHAT WE TRANSPORT IS EXPORTED

cn.ca

CN_Hill_Times_ad_07_07.indd 1CN_Hill_Times_ad_07_07.indd 1 2020/07/08 19:31:542020/07/08 19:31:54

The “great re-opening” of our economy has been accompa-

nied by an extraordinary burst of experimentation in the use of public space in Canadian cities. After automobile traffic evapo-rated during the lockdown, we noticed that our streets had lots of space for other modes of travel.

There was a double imperative for experimentation and change.

First, housebound citizens needed some exercise and gradually emerged to walk, run, cycle, or rollerblade. Unfortunately, walk-ing is difficult, because our side-walks are just not wide enough—they were squeezed down to a minimum of 1.2 metres in many places to create the maximum possible room for cars. Keeping a two-metre separation for safe social distancing is simply not possible, so walking needs to spill into the street, to join the cyclists.

The second push came from restaurants, cafes and pubs that wanted to re-open. The folly of indoor re-opening has been dem-onstrated in Texas and Florida, so expanded outdoor patios to serve customers safely are a better choice. These patios often require more public space outside the front door.

These two forces signalled an urgent need to rebalance public streets to focus on accommodat-ing people rather than cars. Auto-mobiles are remarkable personal mobility machines, probably the most important appliance developed in the first half of the twentieth century. Canadian planners spent the second half of the twentieth century trying, and failing, to adapt our cities to this disruptive technology.

Automobiles impose substan-tial environmental and social

equity issues. It is difficult to function in our vast suburban en-vironments if you are too old, too young or too poor to own and op-erate a car. In the denser central parts of the city, they also pose an urban design challenge, because automobiles require a great deal of space to be operated at speed and then parked. Almost all the space in public streets is devoted to moving and storing cars.

Some citizen activists pushed back against this trend before the coronavirus, using tactical urban-ism techniques to make temporary and small-scale changes to local streetscapes that demonstrate better use of public space. On Park(ing) Day, some activists feed the meters and transform curbside parking spots into pop-up cafes or mini-parks. In Hamilton, tactical urban-ists used paint and traffic cones to demonstrate that sidewalks could be improved, and intersections made safer near schools.

A few municipalities adopted these tactics, notably Halifax transforming its winter curbside parking into outdoor patios in summer. The coronavirus has pushed many Canadian mu-nicipalities to experiment with similar pop-up cafes this summer, which is a boon to our service sector and also to public life.

The next level of intervention is to close entire traffic lanes to

create more room for pedestrians, cyclists and transit. New York City was a frontrunner in these tactics under the visionary leadership of Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Janet Sadik-Kahn. They used tem-porary “pilot projects” to convert automobile traffic lanes in Times Square, with careful surveys of before and after conditions to demonstrate the value of newly created public spaces. Although critics predicted a Carmaged-don of congestion and downtown store closings, an amazing thing happened: traffic levels remained the same and retail sales in-creased. Pedestrians and cyclists take up much less space and spend more money than drivers.

Toronto used similar tech-niques in its controversial King Street pilot project and acclaimed transformation of Queen’s Quay West into a multiuse waterfront boulevard. The coronavirus pushed many other Canadian cities to ex-periment with converting a lane to wider sidewalks, cafes, and cycle lanes in downtown streets.

Completely closing an entire street to automobiles has long been a common tactic for low traffic periods, such as Sunday mornings. Bogota’s Cyclovia net-work is a global inspiration and the National Capital Commission has provided Sunday Bikeways on the Ottawa River Parkways since

the 1970s. These networks have expanded during the pandemic.

Of course, some roads are better candidates for closure than others. The Ottawa River parkways have pleasant waterfront views and offer the opportunity for long, uninterrupted walks and rides, which are a rarity in big cities. The NCC’s closure of the Queen Eliza-beth Driveway (QED) was particu-larly appropriate. It runs along the Rideau Canal, adjacent to denser downtown neighbourhoods in need of outdoor exercise. Fast-moving traffic is a menace on the Driveway, since its narrow lanes and tight curves were designed for cycling and “driving” a carriage in the pre-automobile era.

The NCC recently announced that the Driveway closure will continue to September. As work restrictions are gradually lifted in the meantime, we have a golden opportunity to assess whether these “temporary” urban interven-tions are worth retaining to in-crease more sustainable forms of transport and keep the improve-ments to our quality of life.

A traffic-free Queen Elizabeth Driveway may turn out to be a “keeper.”

David Gordon is a Professor and Former Director of Queen’s University’s School of Urban and Regional Planning.

The Hill Times

Keep the new pedestrian spaces, COVID or not

COVID showed us what’s possible when the roads aren’t clogged with cars. Let’s hang onto that when things get back to ‘normal.’

20

The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

David Gordon

Opinion

Ottawa’s Queen Elizabeth Driveway, ca. 1912 was designed to be enjoyed at slow speeds, so it is an ideal candidate to convert for walking, cycling and other forms of active transportation, writes David Gordon. Photograph courtesy of David Gordon and the Ottawa Improvement Commission

THE COMPLETE, THE COMPLETE, MADE IN CANADAMADE IN CANADA PROPELLER SHAFT SOLUTION PROPELLER SHAFT SOLUTION Thordon Bearings Inc., Dominis Engineering Ltd. and Patriot Forge Co., three world-class, family-owned and operated high-performance manufacturing businesses in Ontario, have joined forces as a consortium to provide fully integrated and complete vessel shaftline systems for Canada’s most important vessels included in Canada’s National Shipbuilding Strategy. These global industry leaders will provide the highest quality shaftline system to significantly improve operational performance, lower costs for Canada’s Navy and Coast Guard and create sustainable jobs in the critically important Canadian manufacturing sector.

For the past 30 years some of the most critical and core major ship equipment have been supplied from overseas. Now more than ever the times call for world quality, Canadian manufactured components for Canada’s ships; supporting high skilled, high tech, high paying jobs right here in Canada.

www.ThordonBearings.com/CISSpartners

What should the federal government be doing to

help the private sector sustain its recovery, rather than sustain its mere survival for another quarter or two?

Without a recovery of the business sector, there will be no ongoing growth in Canada.

Ensuring firms survive only to be swamped by too much accumulat-ed debt just postpones the stress on our financial system, govern-ment finances, and ultimately the recovery itself.

The key to recovery for busi-nesses is finding a mechanism to help firms deal with their excessive debt loads. Firms in Canada already entered the government-mandated shutdown of non-essential services with his-torically high levels of debt. High indebtedness is partly the result of years of tantalizingly low inter-est rates offered by central banks; even corporations with huge cash reserves like Apple issued bonds to take advantage of interest rates reaching lows that may never be repeated.

After the pandemic arrived in Canada, firms saw their revenues plunge. In some of the hardest-hit industries such as airlines, accommodation, food, recreation, auto dealers and personal ser-vices, revenues dropped by 65 per cent or more.

Meanwhile, even with ex-tensive layoffs, companies still have to pay some fixed costs such as property taxes, rent, mortgages and other debt, a skeleton headquarters staff, security, utilities, and so on. As

a result of the squeeze between a sudden drop in revenues and high fixed costs, even busi-nesses with a fundamentally good business model (such as dentists) assumed large levels of debt during the lockdown. This debt risks pushing many into insolvency.

Governments have traditional-ly adopted the so-called Bagehot rule as a guide for emergency lending to the private sector, which is to lend generously against good assets to solvent firms in order to assure that no taxpayer money is at risk. This treats the fundamental problem as a crisis of liquidity and not solvency. However, this approach has some serious flaws.

So far, governments have suc-cessfully kept loans flowing to businesses—bank loans jumped eight per cent between February and May—while sending money with no strings attached directly to households. While preventing a rash of business failures, the problem is that the high and ac-celerating indebtedness of firms at a time of declining revenues means many eventually will become insolvent. For example, delaying rent payments means that this expense will increase when the moratorium ends, with

no guarantee that revenues will return to pre-crisis levels.

The underlying stress on firms, especially small businesses, is why polls show over a quarter are uncertain they will survive the current crisis even with the current level of government aid. Despite such a major threat to the sustained recovery of jobs and in-come in Canada, this draws little interest from governments, which remain fixated on households. It will be a hollow victory indeed to help individuals survive the first stage of the crisis but then have their jobs disappear later this year or next.

The traditional Bagehot approach to lending during a financial crisis won’t work in the current downturn because corpo-rate debt has reached too high a level and because the unpredict-able course of both the pandemic and government’s response make it impossible to differentiate be-tween good and bad debt.

Jeremy Stein, chair of the Department of Economics at Harvard and a former Gover-nor of the US Federal Reserve Board, has argued that the federal government has to be prepared to take on some debt from firms to assure their ability to survive. To protect central bank indepen-

dence, it has to be government, and ultimately, taxpayers, who absorb these losses. So far, house-holds have been on the receiving end of the bulk of government largesse; indeed, a sharp jump in personal deposits at banks since February suggests, overall, more aid to households was provided than was necessary. It is now time for governments to step up and help firms directly.

The real risk in the huge increase of government transfers to households during the pan-demic is that government will soon test the limits of its bor-rowing capacity, as reflected in the recent downgrade of federal debt, even before a wave of busi-ness bankruptcies puts more demands on its resources. If the federal government is unable to help firms, then much of the short-term aid to individuals will have been wasted as people lose their jobs and return to govern-ment support. Then the demands on government may prove to be unsupportable, and our nascent economic recovery unsustainable.

Philip Cross is a senior fel-low at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and the former chief economic analyst at Statistics Canada.

The Hill Times

Government must help businesses, not just households, to sustain economic recovery

It will be a hollow victory to help individuals survive the first stage of the crisis, but then have their jobs disappear later this year or next.

Philip Cross

Opinion

22

The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a photo op at the Régimbal Awards and Promotions plant in Ottawa in June to promote the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, one of his government’s programs to help businesses during the COVID-19 crisis. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

When Finance Minister Bill Morneau provided Canadians with a fiscal

update July 8, he described how the federal government helped pull Canadians and busi-nesses back from the brink of financial insol-vency due to the country entering lockdown in response to COVID-19. Three principles, he said, were applied to all new programs: speed, scale, and simplicity.

Programs had to be implemented quickly, accessible to everyone, and easy to apply for. The government understood the conditions that needed to be met to ensure these efforts did what they needed to do—help Canadians manage financially in a time of emergency.

And yet, despite a $343-billion deficit and the second highest debt-to-GDP ratio in Canada’s history, even more spending will be required to help get the economy back on track. The need for recovery spending is not up for debate; how those funds will be spent, on the other hand, will be a hotly debated topic in the months ahead.

While leading companies are committing to net-zero emissions and calling for invest-ments to support the zero-emissions transi-tion, there are others who are committed to the status quo. If funding is allocated without sustainability in mind, especially in high-car-bon sectors, we could end up undermining vital climate change and equity goals.

Internationally, organizations such as the International Energy Association, more than 155 businesses, and countries such as Ger-many and the UK are calling for a green re-covery that will build a resilient, low-carbon economy that puts workers and well-being at the forefront.

Canada has signalled its interest in moving in this direction, and Morneau’s speech July 8 stated, “We need to invest in an economy that is greener and more diverse.”

But we need more than statements—we need a commitment.

If the federal government is truly dedicated to its promise of net-zero by 2050, and if it actu-ally wants to invest in a green economy, now is the time for Trudeau to commit to the princi-ples that will ensure this new wave of spending takes Canada in a sustainable direction.

A recent report by 14 environmental groups titled Green Strings: Principles and Conditions for Green Recovery from COVID-19 in Cana-da offers a framework for doing so. One of its key messages is that conditions must be ap-plied to all companies receiving funding. This would include requiring applicants to have effective and measurable plans to reach net zero emissions by 2050, disclose climate risk to shareholders, and ensure the financial support secures the labour force—either through exist-ing jobs or a fair transition to new jobs.

But conditions must be applied to government, too, to ensure they are allocating funding and developing programs and policies across all sec-tors in line with their commitments to a green recovery. With many invest-ments flowing through the provinces, provincial and territorial govern-ments also need to apply conditions to spending. Ottawa could encourage this as well; one example would be to tie provincial stimulus to the adop-tion of net-zero building codes, while supporting building retrofits across the country.

Funding should support enter-prises using innovative technology or providing tangible social benefits to communities, who could use the money to scale-up; it should not be

used to expand the development of large CO2 emitters via the expansion of oil, gas, or coal.

The forthcoming report from the Task Force for a Resilient Recovery, of which the International Institute for Sustainable Devel-opment is a founding member, will provide further specific policy proposals later this month.

Speed, scale, and simplicity were the right principles for this government to follow in the early days of the pandemic. But now we need new principles and conditions that will take this nation to a climate-safe future that puts the wellbeing of people and the planet first.

Vanessa Corkal is an energy policy analyst at the University of Ottawa’s International Institute for Sustainable Development.

The Hill Times

In the next wave of economic recovery, ‘speed, scale, and simplicity’ need to make way for sustainability Putting ‘green strings’ on government spending and subsidies should be a key part of Canada’s effort to fight climate change.

Vanessa Corkal

Opinion

A Rural Community in Need of Financial Services at the Post Office

Whaletown on Cortes Island in British Columbia was featured in Ruth Ozeki’s acclaimed novel A Tale for the Time Being. Its tiny Post Office,

the smallest free-standing post office in Canada, has served its community for over 70 years.

The residents of Whaletown would like their Post Office to increase its financial services. According to Postmaster Mary Clare Preston, “We lost our Credit Union a few years ago now… it is more than a two hour trip that includes a forty minute ferry ride to get to the nearest financial institution.”

In a recent poll, 67% of Whaletown residents voted for Canada Post to offer more financial services. An additional 33% voted in favour of having Canada Post partner with financial institutions. None were opposed. Whaletown wants financial services at their post office.

That possibility is now closer to reality because Canada Post has agreed to work with the Canadian Postmasters and Assistants Association, the union representing rural post office workers, to study and test financial services in several pilot projects.

The closure of institutions such as post offices and bank branches in rural communities eventually starves them of the resources they need to keep thriving. Consolidating postal and financial services would give a boost to both types of infrastructure, helping to maintain beautiful historic communities like Whaletown for generations to come.

A message from the Canadian Postmasters and Assistants Association.

acmpa.cacpaa.ca

Financial Services at Your Post Office

23

The Great Rebuilding IITHE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Hundreds gather on Parliament Hill to call the government to take action on climate change on May 3, 2019. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

“Presenteeism,” in general, refers to being physically present at work but

functionally absent. It results in suboptimal productivity.

The reasons vary. You are unwell; you have reason to be absent but you are at work because you have a deadline to meet, you have expectations to fulfill, you fear being “out of sight and out of mind,” your coworkers may doubt your commitment to work, you want to demonstrate your loyalty to your boss, and let your team know that you are strong. This is sickness presenteeism.

Or you are not sick at all, but you are not focused on your task; you have other things on your mind. Nevertheless, you are at work and people see you at work, but you are not exactly working. Presentee-ism occupies the grey area between total work engagement and total absence. If your job has enough latitude, you can hide your presenteeism, but its organizational costs are high, often higher than plain old absenteeism. All this matters when you work with people in a shared space in an organizational setting.

We now have a pandemic. We must practice social distancing. Remote working is the order of the day. Likely, it is here to stay. Recent polls tell us that only one in three will be back at the office on a regular basis after the pandemic, and one in five will permanently work from home. We still have deadlines to meet, expectations to fulfill, projects to complete, but there is no seeing eye—we are not directly visible ei-ther to our supervisor or to our coworkers.

If we are unwell, we can take time off to recover without social consequences. There is no need for sickness presenteeism. We can meet goals with redoubled effort upon recovery. But we may be afflicted by presenteeism of a different sort. It is easier to be distracted when there is no one to enforce social control. When we work from home, it is also a shared space, but those who share that space have different inter-ests. The challenge is how not to fall prey to presenteeism in remote work.

Work must be intrinsically interesting for us to be fully engaged. Many tasks con-stitute work and not all of them are equally interesting. The physical and social context of work often compensates for the irksome parts, allowing for spontaneous exchanges with coworkers that moderate the occa-sional tedium. Arrival and departure mark the beginning and end of the workday, while schedules and structure punctuate the order of work. The permeability of the workspace and shared organizational rituals tend to discourage presenteeism at “work”. In remote working, sickness pre-senteeism is less of an issue but one must create a working environment at home that is conducive to concentration.

In remote working, the nature of the work does not change, but everything else does. So, work-life balance becomes im-portant. We are used to a routine at work. For remote work to be productive one must have a routine. Introverts and extroverts react quite differently to remote work and their routines will reflect that. While the specifics vary, the essential components include space, structure, rhythm, schedule, interaction, reward, and discipline. It is good to have a dedicated space for remote working that does not double as a dining table during worktime. A work schedule that distributes various tasks through the day and aligned to our work rhythm for efficiency and creativity is a must.

We need structure that stabilizes the workday with start and finish times that suit our needs, with breaks to recharge, and lunch to reenergize. It is good to have a fixed time to have virtual meetings for

work related interaction, and to chat and share lighter moments. All of this creates the routine and preserves work-life balance. We also need to give ourselves little rewards for accomplishments dur-ing the day, and enforce discipline to respect the schedule we made for ourselves. We are social beings and prolonged isolation is not conducive to robust mental health. The breaks, if carefully planned, can contrib-ute to the enhancement of mental health. So does the ambience that envelops the workday and space. Perhaps all this will eliminate pre-senteeism in remote work.

Vishwanath Baba is a profes-sor of management at McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business.

The Hill Times

Remote working brings a new set of challenges Building structure into a remote working routine will help to ward off ‘presenteeism.’

24

The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Vishwanath Baba

Opinion

Paving the way for innovation and competitiveness in the Canadian plant protein sector

C anada has the opportunity to become a global agricultural powerhouse, which includes taking a leadership role in the production of plant-based products to meet growing global demand. To that end, the Agri-Food Economic Strategy Table set a goal of growing agriculture and agri-food exports to $85

billion by 2025, up from $64.6 billion in 2017, along with ambitious goals for increases in domestic sales.

Protein Industries Canada is committed to helping drive Canada toward these goals by working collaboratively across the industry and investing in projects that will transform the food processing sector in Canada, create jobs and stimulate local economies.

The key to delivering on this potential is attracting investment into innovative new technologies such as gene editing. These technologies will support the development of exciting new crop varieties and will benefit the economy, the environment, and consumers. A fundamental component of our nation’s competitiveness is ensuring an environment that fosters research and the commercialization of these technologies.

Over the course of our current mandate, Protein Industries Canada, along with our members, will invest more than $300 million to help revolutionize the Canadian agrifood sector including significant investments focused on plant breeding to improve Canada’s protein rich crops, such as canola. The research plan for increasing canola protein value is a first-of-its-kind using gene editing to improve protein quality and quantity. High protein canola meal will lead to new markets and create new economic benefits throughout the value chain.

Gene editing is critical to making innovations like this one a reality. Gene editing is a technology that works within a plant’s genome to make precise enhancements to the plant. The outcome of using gene editing is the same, safe results as conventional plant breeding, but the process is faster and more predictable. It is on the verge of revolutionizing agriculture around the world. But Canada may miss out.

Unfortunately, many of our major trading partners are outpacing Canada by providing regulatory clarity on gene editing and positioning themselves to capitalize on its potential while maintaining a high standard of safety. The United States Department of Agriculture recently recognized that the results of precision gene editing within the genome are indistinguishable from conventional plant breeding and confirmed that it would therefore not be subject to additional regulatory oversight. The regulatory certainty is already pulling investment out of Canada and giving the U.S. a significant head start.

The U.S. is not alone in recognizing the safety of gene editing. Countries including Australia, Argentina and Japan have made similar decisions. The lack of a clear and predictable regulatory system is limiting investment in Canada. We also run the risk that the investments we are making in new product developments may not make it to market. Or worse yet, they will make it to market in other countries and Canada will miss out on all the potential benefits.

We have too often seen Canada export its high-caliber intellectual property for the benefit of other countries. Keeping that intellectual property here in Canada will create growth for the primary producer and processing sectors, create new choices for consumers, and lead to jobs that stimulate our local economies.

To its credit, the Government of Canada has recognized the need to update regulations to consider new innovations like gene editing and the positive impact they can and should play in making Canadian agriculture a global powerhouse. Modernization of our regulatory system is a priority for the industry and government.

The Treasury Board’s regulatory roadmaps set a clear path forward for enabling this kind of growth in the sector, which included modernizing the regulatory system for plant breeding innovations. The work has largely been done. Now is the time to act so that Canada can begin to move into its rightful place as one of the world’s top producers of innovative, sustainable, and high-quality crops and plant-based ingredients.

Given the impact that COVID-19 has had on the Canadian economy, now more than ever, we must take the next steps to attract investment and innovation, to create jobs and opportunities in Canada. The investments made through the Innovation Supercluster Initiative was a significant first step, but we need the right regulatory environment so that we can enable the sector to attract safe, cutting-edge innovation to Canada.

Bill Greuel CEO, Protein Industries Canada

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Bill Greuel CEO, Protein Industries Canada

In remote working, the nature of the work does not change, but everything else does, writes Vishwanath Baba. Photograph by Junjira Konsang, courtesy of Pixabay

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected aging populations

in countries around the world, bringing to light many longstand-ing and severe challenges for older adult care sectors.

Both home care providers and long-term care facilities have found themselves ill-equipped to respond to the current emergency, leading to tragic consequences. Familial and informal caregiv-ers, who continue to supplement

and support our fragmented care system, have been reduced to little more than “non-essential” and thus removed from the circle of care during a time when older adults may need these people most. It is clear that reform is desperately needed.

As we begin to reopen our cit-ies and consider transformations post-COVID-19, governments must restructure older adult care. Given the LTC system appears in-creasingly overburdened and we know many older adults would prefer to remain at home, why not look to existing innovations in the home care sector and try to im-prove coordination and balance between home and long-term care? By doing so, we could allow older adults and their families

more autonomy in their care deci-sions, ultimately improving their quality-of-life and the delivery of older adult care.

First, we have to come to terms with the unique care needs of older adults, as they represent an increasingly large proportion of the global population. In Ontario alone, the number of adults age 65 or older is expected to almost dou-ble from 2.4 million in 2018 to 4.6 million by 2046. Within Ontario, older adults have been among the most vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic, a truth supported by many disturbing statistics: 16 per cent of all of Ontario’s 33,000+ cases have been residents of long-term care facilities, a population that also accounts for 64 per cent of the province’s 2,600 deaths. All told, roughly 1 in every 50 resi-dents in Ontario’s long-term care facilities have died of COVID-19. In Ontario 12,230 people aged 60 and over have tested positive for the virus, representing around 37 per cent of all cases. Compare that number to the around 12 per cent of all Ontarians that fit in this age group, and you can see the disproportion.

The pandemic has also ex-posed challenges in delivering care to this population through long-term care facilities. The terrible conditions inside some of these care homes have been discussed in national and inter-national media, and on May 19th, Ontario’s Minister of Long-Term Care, Merrilee Fullerton, announced that she would be launching an independent com-mission to investigate Ontario’s long-term care system in Septem-ber. The focus on long-term care homes has opened up an oppor-tunity for home care, where older adults continue to receive the support they need from informal caregivers and health care profes-sionals while staying in their own home. The question of why home care hasn’t been given enough attention during this crisis is puz-zling. Even for individuals who may not be good candidates to receive care at home, the ques-tion of what can be learned from home care delivery models is a valuable one and may illuminate how we can improve care in gen-eral for older adults.

A recent study by a team of researchers at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, in part-nership with the Reach Alliance, explored an innovative model of care called “consumer-directed” or “self-directed care” that pro-

vides care recipients with more control over the care being pro-vided to them. Self-direction re-fers to a growing trend in health care that provides people with more autonomy in deciding what care they need and how their needs should be met. The notion of self-direction highlights that it may be reasonable for a client to select a family member as one of their formal care providers and this family member should therefore be formally employed and compensated as such. Self-direction isn’t new to Ontario, it was introduced by the govern-ment in 2017 and dismantled soon thereafter by a coalition of for-profit and not-for-profit home care providers, citing concerns with increased bureaucratization, ultimately delaying care. Their concerns may have been valid, as older adults don’t need more hurdles to get through in order to access appropriate care, but it seems increasingly evident dur-ing this pandemic that familial and informal caregivers continue to be undervalued in our home and long-term care systems. We must learn to value the very important role they play in older adult care and begin to redesign our care systems to demonstrate this.

Home care isn’t right for everyone, and there will be those whose needs are best met by institutions like long-term care homes. But the tragedies of the pandemic have made it increas-ingly evident that these two systems cannot function without familial caregivers supporting their loved ones both at home and in institutional settings. As the sector responds to the crisis, and the conditions in Ontario evolve, researchers and policymakers must think about what can be done to better support older adult care moving forward. The need for reform is evident, and as more research into the home care sec-tor becomes available, there can be greater opportunities to learn from the strengths and weakness-es of the two delivery models. As cities reopen across Canada, let’s welcome the myriad of innova-tions developing in older adult care and ensure restructuring better values the important role of families and informal caregivers, for the benefit of all.

Anna Cooper Reed is a social worker and PhD student at the Institute of Health Policy, Man-agement and Evaluation at the University of Toronto.

The Hill Times

Post COVID-19: reopening our cities means restructuring older adult care Home care and informal care givers must be utilized and better supported in any re-think of Canada’s approach to caring for its oldest residents.

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The Great Rebuilding IITHE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Anna Cooper Reed

Opinion

Deb Schulte is Canada’s minister responsible for seniors. She told reporters in April that her mother-in-law and father-in-law were both in long-term care. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Liberal MP Marie-France Lalonde, a former retirement home operator and social worker, is one of several MPs who have called on the government to set national standards for long-term care in Canada. Photograph courtesy of Marie-France Lalonde

For every transaction in the economy, there is someone on

the other side: someone who is paying money always has some-one on the other side receiving it.

Last Wednesday’s economic and fiscal snapshot revealed a historic $343-billion deficit, 15 times higher than where the federal deficit stood at the end of last year. This came as no sur-

prise, given the scale of what was necessary to support Canadians during the initial phases of the COVID-19 crisis, which forced the shut down of our economy in order to protect public health.

The real question around deficits isn’t if they should occur, which they do for all sectors, even households. The question is: which sectors are on the benefit or surplus side of any deficit?

In the case of the national deficit, the flipside of that coin is this: government spending shifted substantial economic burden off of the shoulders of workers, students, families, seniors, and corporations at a time when they desperately needed the support.

Without help, households would have faced their own deficits as they lost jobs and in-comes plummeted, but everyday expenses remained. They would have withdrawn more from their savings, racked up credit card debt and drawn down lines of credit to pay for food and hous-ing. In the worst cases, more jobless Canadians would have turned to other sectors like the provinces for social assistance, or non-profits for things like food. Then it would have been

those sectors that would have shouldered deficits. Thankfully most of that desperation and deficit shifting was avoided because the federal government stepped up and the deficit cre-ated by COVID-19 appeared on federal books.

For households alone, CO-VID-19 emergency response funding reduced the deficit that Canadian households would have faced without federal support by a whopping $224-billion. The corporate sector was cushioned by $41-billion in spending.

Provinces and municipalities, which are in line to receive a pro-posed $15.9 billion support pack-age, were also spared a harsher financial blow.

Overall, the largest beneficia-ries of the federal deficit were those who’ve lost their jobs or their hours during the pandemic. This portion of the deficit encom-passes the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) but also the Employment Insurance (EI) benefits that will continue long after the CERB wraps up in Au-gust, as is presently the plan.

The second largest group ben-efiting from deficit spending were those at risk of losing their jobs,

but who were, instead, supported through various payroll supports such as the Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy as business rev-enues tanked.

As expected, austerity hawks are already making the rounds calling for spending cuts and privatization. That would be a mistake. What is often missing from the “deficit=bad” debate is the context that a deficit in one sector of the economy, like the federal government, always re-sults in a surplus of the same size in another sector—in this case, households and businesses when they needed it most.

The opposite is also true. Fed-eral surpluses achieved through public service and program cuts must force another sector into deficit by the same amount. When the federal and provincial govern-ments ran consistent surpluses during the 2000s, they did it at the expense of households. The fed-eral government reduced EI pay-ments and health care transfers, for example, in the mid-1990s. The direct effect was on households, which didn’t get as much support when laid off or sick. They made up that difference by digging into savings or taking on more

debt, resulting in massive deficits among households—deficits that households have been running since the early-2000s.

Given the uncertain trajectory of the pandemic in the months ahead, as well as historically high unemployment that is dispro-portionately impacting women, racialized, and low-wage work-ers, massive government spend-ing cuts would only make a bad situation worse. And importantly, if CERB or EI support were cut, it would shift the deficit from the federal government onto exactly those workers.

There will be a need for continued federal investments through the COVID-19 recovery and rebuilding period on things like universal affordable child care, public health care, and long-term income support moderniza-tion. Every one of those invest-ments will pay off for generations to come.

Spending cuts aren’t the only way to reduce deficits. Address-ing long-standing fiscal revenue issues through progressive tax reform measures, like wealth taxation, is not only a solution that most Canadians support, it would help Canada with its recov-ery and rebuilding efforts.

Government leadership in a time of unprecedented global cri-sis saved lives, and kept workers and businesses afloat by invest-ing in emergency programs that made public health the priority. This wasn’t just a one-time deal. The future of Canadians relies on steady government leadership in the months and years to come.

David Macdonald is senior econ-omist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives in Ottawa.

The Hill Times

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The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

David Macdonald

Opinion

Finance Minister Bill Morneau will guide the government’s plan to bring Canada out of the Covid-19 recession. The federal deficit is already on track to reach $343-billion this year. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Cutbacks to downsize Canada’s national debt would come on the backs of Canadian households.

The other side of Canada’s deficit coin

As the Northern Hemisphere countries move to gradu-

ally reopen their economies post lockdown, it is very apparent that consensus is lacking in the extent to which commercial air travel is being addressed.

We see new travel phenomena emerging such as bubbles, cor-ridors, and quarantine-free entry, all done in the spirit of minimizing the risk of COVID-19 infections from travellers originating or trav-elling through territories with high rates of confirmed cases.

Canada maintains a require-ment for visitors and Canadians

returning from international travel to self-isolate for 14 days after their arrival. Canada has also issued travel advisories to Canadians leaving Canada for international destinations to limit such travel for only essential pur-poses, warning that entry and exit conditions throughout the world are subject to potentially sudden change.

So who wants to risk air travel given this state of affairs? Thus, the dilemma facing the commer-cial aviation industry in Canada today. Airlines have boldly an-nounced a significant restart of both domestic and international flights for the latter half of the summer, anticipating a lessening of travel restrictions and a sub-sequent return of demand for air services. This increase in air ser-vice requires an intense amount of effort in getting both human and physical resources ready to operate. The ultimate validation of this effort will be whether pas-sengers do in fact purchase this increased service offering in light of the government’s continued advisories on limiting potential transmission occurrences. It remains a—hopefully—calculated risk by the airline industry that their increased service levels will attract sufficient traffic to improve their financial picture.

Given the economic and social value that the aviation industry brings to Canada and the indus-try’s valiant attempt to stimulate air travel, it is now more appro-priate than ever to consider the role of government policies on the

success or failure of this sector of the Canadian economy. We have observed national governments in the developed world take ex-traordinary steps to maintain the financial stability of their respec-tive aviation industries, from Germany to France to the United States of America. Canada has of-fered numerous financial lifelines to industry throughout the course of the COVID-19 public health emergency, a number of which the aviation industry has benefit-ted from. There remains, however, a further, and more urgent need for specific sectoral support for tourism and travel service organi-zations, including hotels, airports, and airlines who remain hard-hit by continuing government advice to avoid non-essential travel.

While Canadian airlines remain wary of government fund-ing and potential government involvement in their strategic choices, it remains the govern-ment’s obligation to oversee the

management of the current health emergency with unwavering focus on maximizing Canadians’ health.

The issues being debated about aviation sectoral support revolve primarily around the form of such support, whether as loans, grants, or other financial support mechanisms, and the conditions that such support would carry. Typical government support has to date been in the form of outright grants, term loans, funding with equity participation and in some cases funding with sustainabil-ity targets focusing on reduced energy consumption and reduced emission levels. Is there an appe-tite for such funding models?

When historians write the about the successes and failures of government actions during this pandemic, the Canadian aviation industry should be characterized as one that attracted govern-ment’s attention for financial support in the light of continued

government action to minimize the spread of the COVID-19 virus. If there is one segment of Canadi-an economic activity that is truly at the mercy of government poli-cies, aviation, and consequently tourism are prime candidates.

Much has been said about the dire straits being faced by avia-tion globally, and governments have taken the initiative to shore up the financial viability and the economic engine that aviation provides. Notwithstanding the relatively good financial situa-tion of Canadian carriers at the start of this pandemic’s impact on travel, the ongoing reduction in air travel demand will put most of Canada’s carriers at greater risk. Efforts to gain additional liquid-ity through public and private financial vehicles can only go so far. There is a limit to the ability of Canada’s aviation industry to increase their financial burden by weakening their balance sheets.

With the country undergoing phased restart of portions of the economy, one must not forget that aviation is a key underpinning of the Canadian economic engine. A failure to provide a level playing field for this industry to begin the long road to recovery will have long-term implications on how and when Canadians will once again feel better about our economic strength, and the future state of the Canadian aviation industry.

John Gradek is a Faculty Lecturer and Coordinator of the Global Aviation Leadership Pro-gram at McGill University.

The Hill Times

would cost an estimated $113-mil-lion, or about two per cent of the total projected tax revenue.

A few weeks before the July 8 report, another PBO report was released that offered new and more comprehensive data on the wealthiest families in Canada. The PBO created a database us-ing this new information, called the High-net-worth Family Data-base (HFD), that allows the office to “produce cost estimates and analysis of measures affecting Canadian families with wealth in the millions and billions of dollars.”

The PBO was forced to develop the new database after their election platform costing efforts were hampered by a lack of publicly available data on high-net-worth families. The HFD incorporates data from Statistics Canada’s Survey of Financial Security (SFS), the National

Balance Sheets Accounts, and Canadian Business magazine’s Richest People List. The PBO said they will use the new HFD data-base for similar analyses going forward.

Previously, the PBO had used SFS to analyze Canada’s wealthiest families. The June 17 PBO report showed that “Can-ada’s wealthiest families have significantly more wealth that recorded in the SFS.”

The SFS showed the top one per cent of Canadian families held 13.7 per cent of total wealth, whereas the HFD reported that number at 25.6 per cent. The report said the discrepancy is “likely due to sampling and non-sampling errors, especially higher survey non-response among high-net-worth families.”

The PBO measured family wealth in the report “in terms of marketable net worth: the amount of money left to a family if it liquidates all its financial and

non-financial assets and paid off all its liabilities.”

The report took into account the likely behavioural changes that would result from a wealth tax. The PBO assumed that wealthy families would manage to reduce their wealth by 35 per cent, based on adjusted findings from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service.

For Aaron Wurdrick, head of the Canadians Taxpayers Federation, the likely behavioural response would make a prospective wealth tax extremely hard to implement, and likely render it counterproductive.

“Its not a simple matter of, we’ll raise taxes on the rich and they’ll pay it. The rich have a lot of resources and they tend to use them to minimize their tax bur-den,” Mr. Wurdrick said. “Because they stand to lose a lot, even with a small increase in tax, they will spend a lot of money to avoid paying more tax. So you’re kind of chasing your tail.”

Mr. Wurdrick said he fears wealthy families would rearrange their finances to reduce their tax burden, resulting in an overall reduction of federal revenues.

“I’m less concerned about the impact on the rich themselves. They’re going to be fine whether or not they have to pay a little more tax. But I am concerned about what happens to the rest of us if we lose that revenue. Be-cause it’s a lot to make up. It only takes a few really rich people to rearrange their affairs or leave and that leaves a real big fiscal hole but the rest of us have to end up paying,” he said.

During Question Period on July 9, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh (Burnaby South, B.C.) asked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.) if the government would consider imposing a wealth tax similar to that which was outlined in the PBO report. Mr. Trudeau did not answer the question directly, but said “everyone must pay their fair share of taxes” and highlighted that the government raised taxes on wealthy Canadians when they were first elected in 2015.

Polls suggest that Canadians are largely supportive of Mr. Julian’s proposal for some kind of wealth tax. In May 2019, 67 per cent of Canadians supported or somewhat supported a wealth tax, according to an Abacus

study commissioned by the advo-cacy group North 99. In late May 2020, Abacus did another poll commissioned by the Broadbent Institute that found 75 per cent of Canadians support a wealth tax. The poll found majority sup-port in all parties, regions, and age groups. Just 13 per cent of Canadians said they oppose a wealth tax.

In May, Mr. Morneau told CBC News that the government is “not thinking about raising taxes.” Mr. Morneau doubled down on that comment in June, when he ap-peared on CTV’s Power Play and said raising taxes is “not on the table.”

Mr. Julian said the current state of federal finances coupled with the broad support for some kind of wealth tax presents a good opportunity to implement such a policy, but said he doesn’t expect the government to move on it.

“I think they have a lot of friends in high places that are saying ‘don’t do this,’” Mr. Julian said.

“If the Liberals aren’t prepared to look at” a wealth tax, he said, “at some point in the next year or two, there will be an election. This is a minority government,” he said. “I think they will pay a heavy political price.”

achamandy@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Aviation sector needs help to join economic recovery

NDP calls for wealth tax bill ‘immediately’, PBO pegs revenue at $5.6-billion

With all the flight and travel restrictions in place during COVID-19, the aviation industry is truly at the mercy of government policies.

27

The Great Rebuilding IITHE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

John Gradek

Opinion

‘The airlines have been hammered by this pandemic,’ Transport Minister Marc Garneau told a House of Commons committee in June, while defending his decision not to force the carriers to refund passengers for flights cancelled by the pandemic. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Continued from page 18

BY DR. KATE GRAHAM, DR. NEIL BRADFORD, & DR. GABRIEL EIDELMAN

Every good photographer knows that getting a clear

image requires choosing the right lens. The same can be said for good policy making: how we look at a problem or phenomena deter-mines how clearly we see it, and how effectively we can address it.

Take the COVID-19 pandemic. For the past 16 weeks, the rapid rise of global case and death counts have dominated head-lines around the world. Canada

reached the 100,000 case mark just one day short of the 100th day of the pandemic. Every day, the government of Canada releases an epidemiological summary of how the pandemic has pro-gressed, including data on how each province and territory has fared since the day before.

The problem with this is that it doesn’t give us a clear picture of how COVID-19 is affecting Canadians. A new report released by the Canadian Urban Institute, COVID Signpost 100, reveals the disproportionately urban nature of this crisis.

So far, the loss of life and the financial devastation associated with COVID-19 have been con-centrated in Canada’s cities. The largest 20 cities in Canada ac-count for 42 per cent of Canada’s population and yet have 67 per cent of total cases and 75 per cent of total deaths. People who live in cities report a more profound impact on their quality of life and personal financial situation.

More importantly, a look at how each city in Canada has fared reveals a high level of varia-tion. The case and death counts in Montréal, for example, are more than 25 times higher per capita than they are in Edmonton. In some cases, the variation between cities within the same province is greater than the variation be-tween neighbouring provinces.

The Signpost report, as well as neighbourhood-level data released by cities such as Toronto, reveals strong patterns in how COVID is disproportionately im-

pacting marginalized and racial-ized populations.

Unfortunately, Canada’s daily epidemiological summaries—as well as the vast majority of nationally collected and reported data in Canada—ignores the local scale, creating a form of insti-tutional blindness to the highly varied and localized ways that our nation experiences all man-ner of crises. This is a legacy of a federalism that prioritizes prov-inces, most of which are large and diverse enough that this scale of data reporting is of limited utility.

It is the Simpson’s paradox of Canadian federalism, hinder-ing our ability to meaningfully address the most pressing chal-lenges facing our nation.

With more than 82 per cent of Canadians now living in cit-ies, Canada is long overdue for a new era of multi-level urban governance. No level of govern-ment in Canada is equipped on its own to address the complexity

of challenges faced in our cities. Cities are crucial to both effective implementation of federal inter-ventions; and, federal-provincial agendas will require the front line policy innovations which are tailor-made in cities to address the varied dynamics of the chal-lenges they face.

The countries that have fared best during COVID-19 have been those with high-performing multi-level governance systems. As the OECD summarizes: “The most effective responses are coming from systems characterised by flexibility, where there is room to act ‘on the ground’ combined with effective leadership at the national level.”

It’s time for Canada to get on board. The federal government has committed to a “whole-of-government” approach to the crisis and recovery. But it isn’t priori-tizing the collection and report-ing of city-level data, and it has essentially ignored calls from city leaders for greater federal support.

An essential first step is the creation of a Canadian urban policy observatory, a “one-stop shop” for qualitative and quan-titative data on Canadian cities and city-regions, and the political systems which govern them.

A national urban policy obser-vatory would have several distinct benefits for federal policy makers. It would provide comprehensive data on the unique realities in each Canadian city and com-munity, bringing local challenges to the attention of federal and provincial governments to inform policy implementation; it would help direct resources toward cit-ies with the greatest needs by pro-viding current and comparable data on municipal fiscal pressures and revenue tools; it would pro-vide race and ethnic-based data, as well as neighbourhood level data where possible, facilitating the execution of equity seeking policy solutions; it would sup-port national economic recovery strategies based on analysis of local assets and regional resil-ience; and it would facilitate coordinated intergovernmental policy learning, and thus serve as a building block for greater inter-governmental dialogue on urban priorities across Canada.

Where we look determines what we see. In a nation as urban-ized and as diverse as Canada, we must use a cities lens if we want to really understand, and address, the challenges we face together.

The time for action is now.Dr. Kate Graham is director of

research at the Canadian Urban Institute, and teaches part-time in the Political Science depart-ments at Western University and Huron University College. She studies urban politics, local gov-ernment, and gender and politics. Dr. Neil Bradford is director of the Governance, Leadership, and Eth-ics Program at Huron University College at Western University. He studies urban and community development with a focus on multi-level governance. Dr. Ga-briel Eidelman is director of the Urban Policy Lab at the Univer-sity of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy and a contributing member of the Canadian Municipal Barometer research partnership.

The Hill Times

The loss of life and the financial devastation associated with COVID-19 have been concentrated in Canada’s cities, but the data is often reported in a way that makes us blind to this reality.

28

The Great Rebuilding IIMONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Montreal has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, while other Canadian cities have had far fewer cases. Photograph by Germán Poo-Caamaño, courtesy of Flickr

Time to take urban policy seriously

29

did a lot of work on the Black populations before, how do we do this?” said Mr. Lachance in a phone interview July 9.

In July 2019, the agency estab-lished the Centre for Indigenous Statistics and Partnerships, which consolidated “long-standing work-ing relationships” with commu-nities and organizations across the country into one centre. All research at the agency involving Indigenous people is “channeled through” this centre, which helps “provide relevant expertise and co-ordinate outreach to part-ners,” a July 6 statement from the agency read.

Included in the centre are 11 Indigenous liaison advisors, some of whom, according to Mr. La-chance, might work on reserves, and most of whom identify as Indigenous. The agency did not provide an exact breakdown, nor a dollar figure of cost, for these positions. The program began in the 1980s and positions are cur-rently funded through the centre, said StatsCan spokesperson Peter Frayne in a July 10 email. The

officers’ salaries and non-salary needs like travel are covered. “Funding may vary from year to year based on the level of activi-ties and engagement, but typi-cally peaks during the conduct of the census,” Mr. Frayne added.

They are stationed across the country and look after a particu-lar region, said Mr. Lachance. A StatsCan webpage lists advisors as covering Atlantic provinces, Manitoba, Inuit Nunangat, and others. “That program is prob-ably one of our most established programs to engage communities such as the Indigenous [one] on Indigenous data,” he said.

“Their role is very key, spe-cifically in ensuring there is trust with the data and a good rapport and relationship with StatsCan.” When the agency starts work for its census, for example, these officers act as ambassadors who promote it and in some cases seek permission to be able to go into communities, or at least notify Indigenous leadership about the agency’s intentions.

Mr. Lachance said it is too soon to say whether the agency will bring in Black community re-searchers to help it gather better race-based data.

“We’re working with experts right now. The plan is in the fall, we do more consultations with racialized communities, specifically to get their input on new approaches on how we can disseminate information” to those communities, he said.

Statistics Canada received $4.2-million over three years through the government’s anti-racism strategy last year. A por-tion of that funding was to allow the agency to set up an advisory committee on ethno-cultural and immigration statistics. That advisory committee will guide the body in setting up a “concep-tual framework on ethnocultural

diversity and inclusion as well as families of indicators to be able to track relevant ‘inclusion’ indica-tors over time,” according to a July 6 statement from the agency, which also said the committee had been formed and already met once, with another meeting slated for last week.

Mr. Lachance said it’s possible that the agency will create other “ambassador”-like roles for other racial groups, but he said “we haven’t made that decision yet, we’re just building those relationships.”

His comments come in the wake of an influx of public calls for better race-based data collec-tion. The COVID-19 pandemic has harmed Black people in the Unit-ed States at a greater rate than it has white people. Canada has not tracked pandemic outcomes by race or ethnic background.

To better understand the pan-demic’s disproportionate impact on some communities, the agency has already made a push to col-lect more disaggregated data. It has been releasing a series of voluntary questionnaires, which change about every two weeks, and tap into a range of topics like parenting during the pandemic and the impact faced by those liv-ing with disabilities.

“How we continue this rela-tionship depends on what the community needs and how we want to work closer with them,” said Mr. Lachance.

“We are accountable to Cana-dians about the data. The data is about what individuals are telling us about themselves, and they’re taking the time to answer the questionnaire and surveys.”

Some experts who spoke to The Hill Times this month noted that authorities and government institutions might face an uphill battle as they go about collecting race-based data, thanks in part to “longstanding disparities” in areas like housing, healthcare, and food insecurity in these communities.

Anna Banerji, a director of global and Indigenous health at

the University of Toronto’s faculty of medicine, noted in an earlier interview that “there’s a lot of information that’s out there that’s partially used or distorted in the usage, and there’s no underlying [questioning of] what are the con-tributors to this.” She noted that in some cases, data has been used to justify racism and discrimination, a fact that Public Safety Minister Bill Blair (Scarborough South-west, Ont.) also acknowledged this month.

Mr. Lachance said Statistics Canada’s researchers are well aware of this history.

“When we come to the analy-sis [stage], we need to ensure that the analysis that we do and analytical products [we put out] are sensitive to the perspectives of the communities,” he said, add-ing StatsCan consults national Indigenous organizations in creating or testing the Aboriginal Peoples Survey, which gathers figures to track the “social and economic conditions” of those liv-ing off reserve. Groups consulted include the Assembly of First Nations, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, and the Metis National Council, he said.

The agency said that in 2017, Indigenous people were hired as interviewers and guides during the collection period, and organi-zations promoted and reviewed the analytical findings of the Aboriginal Peoples Survey.

“This ensures that findings are presented in an appropriate manner and ultimately results in stories that are balanced and include essential contextual in-formation,” said a statement from the agency, which also noted that those interviewers and guides help to improve the reliance and quality of the analysis.

A lack of consultation has cre-ated barriers for Indigenous com-munities in the past, according to a January 2019 report prepared for Indigenous Services Canada and the AFN. In 2006, for exam-ple, the AFN withdrew its support

for the Aboriginal Peoples Survey over concerns that it infringed on their right to control and govern that information.

In 2019, Statistics Canada shared data on suicide among In-digenous populations, a sensitive topic, as part of an effort to en-gage communities about the data it is collecting, said Mr. Lachance.

“Usually, we can go ahead and just print the suicide rates, but without the proper context and proper process…that report can also have some unintended conse-quences, because it does provide sometimes a negative picture,” he said.

That report, shared in June 2019, comes with an introduction that references intergenerational trauma and the effects of coloni-zation and ongoing marginaliza-tion, specifically “the loss of land, traditional subsistence activities and control over living condi-tions” and a “suppression of belief systems.”

“We always feel that we’re accountable to our respondents, so the trust comes in different lev-els,” said Mr. Lachance. “It comes from the fact that the data that people provide us is confidential … and [in the assurance] of the quality and statistical rigour that we are bringing to the data,” he said.

Jeff Latimer, director general and strategic adviser for health data with Statistics Canada, told the House Health Committee last week that a lack of standards between provinces and territories, for instance, makes it difficult to get other data like figures around deaths in the country. Part of that is because some jurisdictions still rely on paper-based processes for death registrations, making it difficult for the agency to paint a complete national picture, as it relies on these authorities to filter up data to the federal government through the Public Health Agency of Canada.

pmangat@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Too soon to say if StatsCan will bring in more racialized researchers, says official; ‘we’re just building those relationships’ In July 2019, the agency established the Centre for Indigenous Statistics and Partnerships. It also employs 11 Indigenous liaison advisors to help it collect data on Indigenous people in Canada.

News

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Continued from page 1

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, pictured on May 1, is among those who have acknowledged that where race-based data has been available in years past, it has sometimes been used to ‘stigmatize minority and racialized populations.’ StatsCan has hired 11 Indigenous liaison officers, but an official says it is too soon to say if the agency will be bringing in more racialized researchers to beef up its efforts in race-based data collection. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

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MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020 | THE HILL TIMES

Council, the 20-member governing body of the party. The council accepted it without any amendment.

Conservative MPs told The Hill Times in April that the COVID-19 pandemic is the reason the threshold is so low. Canadians are facing daunting economic and health challenges, and fundraising is going to be a challenge for politicians for at least for the next year or so.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Liberal Party told The Hill Times last week that the party is still in the process of consulting MPs and rank and file members about the nomination rules for held and unheld rid-ings. He did not say when the nomination contests would start.

“Over the course of this year, we’ve been continuing to hear ideas from Liberal MPs, past candidates, EDAs, and registered Liberals across Canada on the best process to help elect even more Liberal MPs when-ever the next campaign eventually arrives,” wrote Braeden Caley, senior director of communications for the Liberal Party, in an email to The Hill Times. “We anticipate those consultations being finalized shortly, and we’ll have more to share about the new nominations process in due course.”

Liberal MP Dan Ruimy, who repre-sented the riding of Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge, B.C. from 2015 to 2019, but lost the election to Conservative MP Marc Dalton, said he is also planning on running in the next election, but does not know when the nomination contest will happen. Since the last election, Mr. Ruimy said, he has stayed in regular contact with people in the rid-ing. In his conversations with constituents, Mr. Ruimy said he always asks what they think about the government’s response to the pandemic, and so far he has received a positive feedback.

He said he’s not worried about when the nomination contests will happen, but wants to ensure that he’s ready whenever the contest is called.

“We don’t know when the next election is going to be: it could be two months from now, it could be two years from now,” said Mr. Ruimy. “So, I try not to worry about when that’s gonna happen. It’s more about making sure that I’m ready for whenever it happens.”

Mr. Ruimy won the 2015 election by a margin of only 2.4 percentage points. He won 17,673 votes, or 33.8 per cent of the total, com-

pared to Conservative candidate Mike Mur-ray, who won 16,373 votes, 31.4 per cent of the total. The NDP candidate Bob D’Eith received 15,450 votes, 29.6 percentage of the total; and the Green Party candidate Peter Tam won 2,202 votes, or 4.2 per cent of the total.

Mr. Ruimy lost the 2019 election by a margin of 6.5 per cent of the votes. In that election, Marc Dalton garnered 19,650 votes, 36.2 per cent of the total. Mr. Ruimy won 16,125 votes, for 29.7 per cent of the total, while the NDP’s Jack Mogk carried 12,958 votes or 23.9 per cent of the total, and the Green Party’s Ariane Jaschke won 4,33 votes, eight per cent of the total.

Former Liberal MP Gordie Hogg, who represented the British Columbia riding of South Surrey-White Rock from 2017 to 2019, but lost the last election, said that his decision to run in the next election will de-pend on when election is called. He said if the election is called in the next year or so, he would run. Otherwise, he might not run. A former provincial cabinet minister, Mr. Hogg, who holds a PhD, said he’s looking at some teaching opportunities at universities in British Columbia and other possibilities.

“I’ve been invited to do a number of things and participate in a number of boards in the community,” said Mr. Hogg. “So I’ve been waiting to make some deci-sions on that and certainly the pandemic has made it a little more difficult to make decisions around that.”

Mr. Hogg and other former MPs said early nominations would give more time to candidates to get ready for the election. They also agree that the health conse-quences of the pandemic are preventing the party from nominating candidates.

Mr. Hogg, a former provincial MLA, won the riding in a 2017 byelection by a margin of 5.3 per cent of the votes. He won 47.4 per cent of the vote, while second place Con-servative candidate Kerry-Lynne Findlay garnered 42.1 per cent of the vote. The third place NDP candidate Jonathan Silveira car-ried 4.8 per cent, and the Green candidate Larry Colero won 4.1 per cent of the vote.

In 2019, Ms. Findlay, a former Harper era cabinet minister, bested Mr. Hogg by a margin of 4.5 per cent of the votes. Ms. Findlay won 41.9 per cent of the votes, Mr. Hogg 37.4 per cent, NDP candidate Stephen Crozier 11.6 per cent, and the Green Party candidate Beverley Hobby won 7.7 per cent of the votes.

arana@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

Ex-Liberal MPs running in next election eagerly await start of nomination process

Continued from page 16

Liberal delegates at the Halifax biennial convention. Liberal MP John Aldag says it appears the nomination process will start after the party’s biennial convention in mid-November in Ottawa. The Hill Times photograph by Cynthia Munster

Feature

MONDAY, JULY 13House Not Sitting—The House has not

met regularly since mid-March, when it was suspended amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The regular summer recess was scheduled to begin on June 24, but MPs agreed to meet as a committee of the whole on July 8, and are scheduled to do so again on July 22, Aug. 12, and Aug. 26. The House is then scheduled to return in the fall on Mon-day, Sept. 21, for three straight weeks, as per the original House sitting calendar.

Senate Not Sitting—The Senate has adjourned until Sept. 22.

TUESDAY, JULY 14The Pearson Centre Webinar: Infra-

structure and Economic Recovery, Featuring Infrastructure Minister Catherine McKenna—Hosted by Pearson Centre president Andrew Cardozo, this event will happen on Tuesday, July 14, 2-3 p.m. EDT. Just as govern-ment investments have driven the economy through the COVID-19 pandemic, the scale, scope, and types of economic stimulus that will be included in Canada’s economic recovery will have immense impacts on Canada’s economic future. Canada’s Minister of Infrastructure and Communi-ties Catherine McKenna talks about how infrastructure can play a role in Canada’s economic recovery. Will Canada need a new Marshall Plan? And how can government centre recovery objectives with issues such as environmental sustainability and gender equity?

WEDNESDAY, JULY 15Cross Canada with Ambassador Cong

Peiwu—The Canada China Business Coun-cil hosts a webinar on policies to encourage investment in China and liberalize trade. The webinar is geared to all five of its Canadian chapters simultaneously, followed by a roundtable discussion with Cong Peiwu, China’s ambassador to Canada. Wednesday, July 15, from 11-11:45 a.m. Tickets are available for this Zoom webinar via Eventbrite.

Webinar: Impact of COVID-19 on Cancer Patients and their Ability to Receive Treatment—Hosted by the The Canadian Cancer Survivor Network. The COVID-19 pandemic has put cancer patients in the untenable situation of limiting access to essential cancer care, including tests, treatments and clinical trials, while at the same time having to worry about contract-ing COVID-19 in their immune-compro-mised condition. To assess the extent to which the disruption of cancer care caused by COVID-19 in Canada is impact-ing cancer patients and their caregivers, the Canadian Cancer Survivor Network (CCSN) engaged Leger, an independent market research agency, to conduct a national survey of more than 1,200 cancer patients and caregivers across the country. Join CCSN and Leger as we pres-ent the results of the COVID-19 & Cancer Care Disruption in Canada Survey.

THURSDAY, JULY 16Confronting Anti-Black Racism in

Corporate Canada—The Canadian Club of Toronto hosts a webinar on “Confronting Anti-Black Racism in Corporate Canada,” featuring retired Canadian senator Dr. Donald H. Oliver; Andria Barrett, CEO of the Diversity Agency and president of the Canadian Black Chamber of Commerce; Wes Hall, executive chairman and founder, Kingsdale Advisors and founder and chair, BlackNorth Initiative; Rola Dagher, president and CEO, Cisco Canada; and David Simmonds, senior vice-president, communications and public affairs, McKesson and president-elect, Canadian Club Toronto. Thursday, July 16, online only, from noon to 1 p.m. Register via canadianclub.org.

Webinar: Canada’s New Drug Pricing Rules, What Are the Implications for Cancer Patients?—Hosted by the The Canadian Cancer Survivor Network. New federal regulations governing the Patented Medi-cine Prices Review Board (PMPRB) and the regulation of drug prices will come into effect in six months’ time (on January 1, 2021). These changes have been very controversial. The PMPRB has just released its proposed guidelines to implement the new regulations and is now consulting on them with stakeholders and the public. Join CCSN and our presenters, Ryan Clarke from Advocacy Solutions and Wayne Critchley from Global Public Affairs, to learn more about the new drug pricing rules, the expected impact of the latest changes

and implications for cancer patients, and receive guidance to support the cancer community’s engagement at this stage of regulatory reform.

THURSDAY, JULY 23Mastering the Elements of Clear Political

Communication—Ryerson University hosts a webinar, “Cutting through the Noise: Mastering the Elements of Clear Political Communication,” featuring Alison Broddle, managing editor of digital content at the CBC; and Elamin Abdelmahmoud, news curation editor with BuzzFeed News and a columnist for CBC radio’s Q. Thursday,

July 23, from 3:30-5 p.m. Register for the Zoom event via Ryerson.

FRIDAY, JULY 31—SATURDAY, AUG. 8#CanadaPerforms at RBC Bluesfest

Drive-In—The National Arts Centre and RBC Bluesfest are pleased to announce they are coming together to present #CanadaPer-forms at RBC Bluesfest Drive-In, a summer weekend series of live concerts at the Place des Festivals Zibi site, by the Kitchissippi River (Ottawa River). Concert-goers, as small pods or families, will be encouraged to drive to the site and watch live concerts from their individual dedicated space. In

order to safely welcome back audiences to watch live concerts, the Drive-In series will offer a physical distancing experience that respects reopening measures and protocols. Canadians will also be able to watch online the live-streamed concerts. Concerts will take place on Friday, July 31, Saturday, Aug. 1, Friday, Aug. 7, and Saturday, Aug. 8. Tickets on sale now. For the details, including additional dates and performers, go to: canadaperforms.ottawabluesfest.ca/

FRIDAY, AUG. 21Conservative Party Leadership Contest—

The federal Conservative Party’s Leadership

Election Organizing Committee, also known as LEOC, announced on April 29 that Aug. 21 is the deadline for mail-in ballots, after the leadership was suspended on March 26 due to the global pandemic. The party says the winner will be announced once the ballots can be safely counted.

THURSDAY, OCT. 15PPF Testimonial Dinner and Awards—Join

us at the 33rd annual event to network and celebrate as the Public Policy Forum honours Canadians who have made their mark on policy and leadership. Anne McLellan and Senator Peter Harder will take their place among a cohort of other stellar Canadians who we’ve honoured over the last 33 years, people who have dedicated themselves to making Canada a better place through policy leadership and public service. The gala event will be held on Thursday, Oct. 15, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, 255 Front St. W., Toronto.

SATURDAY, OCT. 24Parliamentary Press Gallery Dinner—The

Parliamentary Press Gallery Dinner happens on Saturday, Oct. 24, in the Sir John A. Macdonald Building on Wellington Street in Ottawa.

FRIDAY, OCT. 30CJF Awards Celebrating 30 Years of

Excellence in Journalism—The Canadian Journalism Foundation Awards will be held on Oct. 30, 2020, at the Ritz-Carlton, Toronto, hosted by Rick Mercer, former host of The Rick Mercer Report. The CBC’s Anna Maria Tremonti will be honoured. Tables are $7,500 and tickets are $750. For more information on tables and sponsorship opportunities, contact Josh Gurfinkel at jgurfinkel@cjf-fjc.ca or 416-955-0394.

TUESDAY, NOV. 3 U.S. Presidential Election—The U.S.

presidential election is scheduled for Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2020. U.S. President Donald Trump is the Republican candidate and former vice-president Joe Biden is the presumptive Democratic candidate. The winner is scheduled to be inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2021.

THURSDAY, NOV. 12Liberal Party National Convention—The

Liberal Party of Canada announced the 2020 Liberal National Convention will be hosted in Ottawa, from Nov. 12-15. For more information, please contact: media@liberal.ca, 613-627-2384.

FRIDAY, NOV. 13Bridging Divides in Wake of a Global

Pandemic—The University of Victoria (UVic) and the Senate of Canada are bringing together change-makers at the Victoria Forum to help generate solutions to some of the world’s most divisive problems. The two-day virtual forum will be held Nov. 13-14 to examine issues that fall under the theme of “Bridging divides in the wake of a global pandemic.” The forum will draw on emerging trends and lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic through biweekly webinars. For more information or to regis-ter, visit www.victoriaforum.ca.

The Parliamentary Calendar is a free events listing. Send in your political, cultural, diplomatic, or governmental event in a paragraph with all the relevant details under the subject line ‘Parliamentary Cal-endar’ to news@hilltimes.com by Wednes-day at noon before the Monday paper or by Friday at noon for the Wednesday paper. We can’t guarantee inclusion of every event, but we will definitely do our best. Events can be updated daily online, too.

The Hill Times

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Events

THE HILL TIMES | MONDAY, JULY 13, 2020

Extra! Extra! Read the full Parliamentary Calendar

online

Chinese ambassador to take part in virtual

‘roundtable’ talk July 15Cong Peiwu, China's ambassador to Canada, will take part in a virtual roundtable discussion on July 15 organized by the Canada China Business Council. The two countries are in the midst of a diplomatic and trade feud triggered by Canada's detention of Chinese executive Meng Wanzhou over fraud charges in the United States. The Hill Times photograph by Sam Garcia

Infrastructure Minister Catherine McKenna will lay out the roll infrastructure can play in Canada’s economic recovery in a July 14 webinar, as the country grapples with a recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

Inside Ottawa includes:• Federal riding profiles • MP contact details, both Hill and constituency• House committee clerks and membership• Senators’ contact details and committee membership• Current photos in colour• Prime Minister’s Office and Privy Council Office staff contacts• Ministers’ offices staff contacts• Speaker’s office contacts• Committee charts with current photos• List of shadow cabinet and opposition critics• Key political, government and media contacts• Sitting calendar 2020• Renumeration• Session tip sheet

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