The Public Health Agency claims 20 times more Canadians would have died in the pandemic than in World War Two if not for lockdowns and vaccine mandates. The claim is detailed in briefing notes and a “what could have happened” study self-published by the Agency: “Do we have data?”
Demonstrators attending an anti-discrimination rally on Parliament Hill played the Chinese People’s Liberation Army anthem, says a pro-democracy China media monitor. The anthem pledged allegiance to “Mao Zedong’s flag.”
Homeowners with variable rate mortgages are cutting household budgets and moonlighting in second jobs, says a Bank of Canada Survey Of Consumer Expectations. “Many low income households are already buying only necessities, leaving little room for further cuts to their spending,” wrote researchers.
Blacklock’s pauses to wish all friends and subscribers a happy observance of 156 years of Confederation. We’re back tomorrow — The Editor
Join the celebration
this Canada Day.
Do the little things
that make a difference.
A flag in hand;
a pin to the collar;
a red-and-white cap
visible from a distance.
Symbols of unity and independence;
all made in China.
By Shai Ben-Shalom
Parliament is all we’ve got. Not media or military, not cabinet or courts, not public service executives or the diplomatic corps. Only Parliament stands between us and the wolves, yet it goes unrecognized and unloved. “Dissatisfaction with Parliament is not new,” writes Jonathan Malloy. “We need to step back and consider the matter more carefully,” he adds. Yes, exactly.
Professor Malloy skilfully documents the myths of Parliament. There are many. One is that MPs are helpless, broken automatons with failed marriages who are reduced to jellyfish by mean tweets. Wrong. Many “flourish in the position,” he writes.
“Long-standing parliamentarians can exhibit an almost effortlessness in the job, fielding travel, constituent queries, parliamentary questions and a myriad of other demands with a cool equanimity,” writes Malloy. “There can be a certain world-weary resignation to such characters but also sophistication and wisdom.”
Another myth is that MPs’ influence is ever dwindling and reduced to nothingness. Wrong. Professor Malloy documents the Conservative caucus ouster of Erin O’Toole as Leader of the Opposition, “a striking change and possibly important shift in Canadian party dynamics” under provisions of the Reform Act.
There is a myth that MPs are Mother’s Little Helpers and Parliament must be a place of quiet consensus, not merely a squawk box. So wrong. “Scrutiny is the traditional heart of Parliament,” writes Malloy.
“The medieval origins of Parliament had little to do with coming up with ideas itself,” explains The Paradox Of Parliament. “Rather it focused on scrutinizing the ideas and actions of the state, voicing grievances, and holding the government to account. The great moments of English constitutional history involve establishing Parliament’s power of approval over government actions, and scrutiny of those actions.”
Professor Malloy is a thoughtful correspondent. Paradox Of Parliament is excellent. He chronicles our only elected national institution in all its grief and glory, plainly, without apology or censure. He leaves the impression he loves the place.
Take scrutiny: “Scrutiny is thus about examining government actions, not initiating the actions themselves,” writes Malloy. “And it is most importantly – though by no means exclusively – about money.”
“Scrutiny is also deeply political and it serves little purpose to deny or ignore this,” he writes. “MPs are not disinterested evaluators. They are human and ambitious – for their ideals, for their parties and for themselves.”
“For the opposition the purpose of scrutiny is always to nail the government to the wall, to embarrass and humiliate it, in the hope of electoral gain and replacing the government or at least surpassing the other opposition parties. For the government it is to defend its actions and to deflect and dilute criticism, and ideally squelch it entirely. For individual MPs on both sides, it is to build profiles and careers.”
This is as crisp a depiction of Parliament as you will never read. No “buts,” no “ifs.”
Paradox Of Parliament is penetrating and good-humoured. Malloy calls our chamber of 338 delegates a “boiling pot of regional grievances” where MPs are less orderly than in Britain, but less rowdy than Australia “with ejection of members a regular occurrence.” It is all ours, 100 percent Canadian. It’s all we’ve got.
By Holly Doan
The Paradox of Parliament, by Jonathan Malloy; University of Toronto Press; 304 pages; ISBN 9781-4875-50882; $45.95
The Canada Revenue Agency confirms it fired an undisclosed number of employees for discussing individual taxpayers’ financial information in a Facebook chat. Two thirds of the Agency’s 47,000 employees have access to electronic tax files, by official estimate: “Employees were disciplined up to and including termination.”
Google Canada yesterday joined Facebook in confirming it will halt all links to Canadian news content in protest over cabinet’s Bill C-18 the Online News Act. The announcement came only days after Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez said the Canadian market was too “important to them” to retaliate: ‘You have to understand they make a lot of money in Canada.’
A $133,822 grant application by anti-Semitic activist Laith Marouf raised “no flags” at the Department of Canadian Heritage since paperwork was submitted in his wife’s name, records show. MPs protested funding for Marouf after he was banned from Twitter for fantasizing about shooting Jews: “If the individual’s views had been discovered the project would not have been funded.”
Federal grain workers were not entitled to a day off with pay when the Queen died, a labour arbitrator has ruled. The Prime Minister’s declaration of a National Day of Mourning last September 19 generally benefited only public employees: “There is no federal or provincial legislation which recognizes the Day of Mourning as a holiday.”
A Québec court has fined a homeowner $200 for cussing police with a common vulgarity. Other tribunals have concluded the f-word does not have the same raw connotation in French as in English: “He put forward an explanation, namely that he was not insulting the police but rather he was pointing out the lack of service rendered by the police.”
Inflation has overtaken the Canada Food Guide, says the federal department responsible for benchmark guidance on healthy eating. Less than a third of Canadians can afford minimum daily servings of fruit and vegetables, it said: “The Food Guide was released prior to the recent rising cost of food due to inflation and does not currently acknowledge the growing issues of food availability and affordability.”
Michael Wernick, former chief clerk of the federal public service, yesterday joined a Liberal-affiliated think tank. Wernick abruptly resigned in 2019 following disclosures of cabinet’s failed attempt to quash a criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin Group Inc.: “I worry about the reputations of honourable people who have served their country being besmirched.”
A quarter million federal employees working from home may have been eligible for tax credits at $400 to $500 each, says the Canada Revenue Agency. It did not estimate the cost of “home office expense” credits: “Can you tell us what the cost ramifications are to the treasury?”
Cabinet approved millions in climate subsidies to one of Canada’s most profitable corporations, records show. Canadian National Railways Company received the $4.4 million subsidy last November 28 to install electric charging stations: “Our overall estimate for public charging infrastructure needs across Canada would represent a total investment of approximately $20 billion.”
