A federal panel assigned months ago to combat anti-Semitism has convened one meeting to date with no agenda or work plan, a member said yesterday. Heritage Minister Marc Miller announced the panel last February with a “mission to foster social cohesion.”
The Army Cadet League, longest-running federal youth program in the nation, is petitioning MPs for millions in special funding on complaints of rising costs. Army and Air Cadets in a joint submission to Parliament said extra funding was needed for expenses from hall rentals to liability insurance: “The Cadet program is facing increasing financial pressures.”
The number of asylum claims in Canada has been halved since Parliament passed legislation granting cabinet new powers to suspend foreigners’ permits, data show. The Department of Immigration in a briefing note said it had rejected more claims since the law was changed: ‘While it is still too early to assess trends, we can confirm an increase in asylum claims that have been found ineligible.’
The Budget Office will undertake the first public review of new costs on the Gordie Howe International Bridge following toll concessions to the United States, an MP said yesterday. Cabinet to date has attempted to block any public scrutiny of concessions after the Prime Minister misrepresented terms: “Canadians deserve answers.”
Newly-declassified records show the military lifted a ban on gay recruits in part after overestimating by fourfold the number of LGBTQ members in the Canadian Armed Forces. Canada was among the first countries to announce recruitment of gay soldiers, sailors and air crew: “Upwards to 10 percent of the military could have homosexual orientation to some degree.”
Foreign agents have until October 3 to register with Foreign Influence Transparency Commissioner Anton Boegman under threat of $1 million fines. The long-promised initiative came into force yesterday: “Citizens need to see this work in action.”
The federal Green Party today opens a campaign to choose its sixth leader in seven years, a parliamentary record. Current leader MP Elizabeth May (Saanich-Gulf Islands B.C.), 72, confirmed her retirement after suffering a 2023 stroke and disastrous 2025 election: “I am so lucky to be alive.”
A long-promised national flood insurance program would see homeowners at greatest risk pay about $350 in surcharges under threat of being disqualified from disaster relief, according to Access To Information records. The finance department has been reviewing details of the program since 2020: “The premium threshold is currently envisioned as being set at $350.”
The Canada Revenue Agency “turns a blind eye to rich taxpayers and corporations” when it comes to audits, says in-house Agency research. Public skepticism followed a significant drop in the number of audits targeting wealthy tax filers: “Rich people have an easier time tax cheating than middle class Canadians.”
A Nunavut housing agency has applied for taxpayer financing to build the costliest rental properties in Canada, the equivalent of nearly $2.5 million per townhouse. The vast majority of territory residents live in public housing, Igluvut Corporation told MPs: “Nunavut continues to experience the most severe housing crisis in Canada.”
Canadians in federal focus groups questioned the value of cabinet’s signature inflation-fighting program, says Privy Council research. “More needed to be done,” said a pollsters’ report: “None felt this initiative would be effective in making groceries and other essentials more affordable.”
Canada should stop relying on the military as firefighters, says a Department of Public Safety briefing note. Cabinet has proposed creating its own version of the United States’ Federal Emergency Management Agency to handle wildfires: “Reduce pressure on the Canadian Armed Forces to enable them to remain focused on their core mission of defence.”
Blacklock’s pauses for the August bank holiday with warmest regards to subscribers. We wish you a safe, happy holiday. We’re back tomorrow — The Editor.
He is not yet the Minister,
nor the Deputy Minister,
or even the Assistant Deputy Minister.
He is the newly appointed
Associate Assistant Deputy Minister,
with a lengthy –
and no less challenging –
list of responsibilities.
One hopes
he will get an assistant.
(Editor’s note: Poet Shai Ben-Shalom, an Israeli-born biologist, examines current events in the Blacklock’s tradition each and every Sunday)
Politics are rough and failure is never celebrated. “I am not the only Conservative (or former Conservative) who believes that our party (or former party) has betrayed both its own best traditions and the Canadian people by practicing a quality of politics unworthy of the country,” writes former MP Tom McMillan. “Interviews and correspondence I conducted with a large number of my former cabinet colleagues and ministerial and political staff for this book revealed to me, in private, a shocking level of discontent with the party.”
McMillan’s memoirs are agonizing and intriguing at the same time. This is how teammates talk in the locker room after a championship loss. “I myself believe a once-great national institution is in ruins, or will be if the Conservative Party membership at large does not soon come to its senses,” writes McMillan.
“A broad swath of the party is progressive but went underground during the Stephen Harper leadership years,” he says. “They were intimidated to the point of paralysis by the power that the prime minister and his tight inner circle ruthlessly wielded over both the party and the government and, ultimately, the country. Many Tories just gave up.”
Not My Party: The Rise and Fall of Canadian Tories is part memoir, part score-settling. It reveals the emotional investment politicians make in their party and its methods. It details the glory of victory and despair of defeat. It is personal.
McMillan describes John Diefenbaker as mentally unhinged and Reformers as bigots. McMillan met Stephen Harper once, but says the ex-Calgary MP “corrupted what it means to be a Conservative.” McMillan is angry, not least of all with media. “The internet – such a force for good in many other ways – has rendered politics a murderous killing field for people’s reputations,” he writes.
“A lot of the scrutiny is unfair and unbalanced or just plain wrong,” says McMillan. “By the time offenders are exposed and taken to task – if that happens at all – the public, with the attention span of a hummingbird, has already flitted to the next hyped ‘BREAKING NEWS’ story, the next faux exposé, the next manufactured scandal, or whatever else is in line to feed the rapacious ratings beast. And the ‘news’ cycle continues. Perpetually.”
Politics are stressful and hard-bitten and sometimes venomous, and Not My Party bares it all. Very successful politicians typically keep these team secrets to themselves. Voters have their own troubles.
Consider Leslie Frost. As Ontario premier in the 1950s, Frost was so tyrannical he once went six months without calling a caucus meeting, and could cuss cabinet members like a WWI infantryman. Frost was a combat veteran. He knew how to bark orders.
Yet in public, Frost projected the warm image of a small-town Rotarian who served homemade sandwiches to reporters and campaign staff. “The Great Tranquilizer,” opponent called him.
“I come to you as Leslie Frost the man, with no trappings of office, just a servant of the people,” Frost said in his last campaign. He went out a winner.
By Holly Doan
Not My Party: The Rise and Fall of Canadian Tories, from Robert Stanfield to Stephen Harper, by Tom McMillan; Nimbus Publishing; 624 pages; ISBN 9781-7710-84239; $34.95
