Good job Michael Ignatieff

Needless to say I am thankful that the election threat has been averted but I still want to take issue with past Conservative characterizations of the previous Liberal proposal to reform Employment Insurance. Tories classified the Liberal suggestion as a “socialist scheme” but that is something I would take issue with. I know of a previous Conservative government who enriched Unemployment Insurance – the government of John Diefenbaker who extended unemployment insurance benefits due to rising unemployment around 1958. The book I have says the Diefenbaker government extended unemployment insurance benefits by 6 weeks, which is longer than the , which is longer than the 5 week extension the current Tories brought forward. My point is that Tories have enriched Employment Insurance before and could do so again and the fact that Tories have enriched unemployment insurance shows that EI enrichment is not a socialist scheme. Sure Diefenbaker was largely a Red Tory. But even Harper’s blue Toryism doesn’t prevent him from supporting farm subsidies due to his farmer base of support still desiring farm subsidies. The Conservatives have actually offered some enrichment of farm subsidies so why is enriching Employment Insurance a “socialist scheme”? And in regards to the EI deal that has been reached by Ignatieff and Harper, I disagree with the negative characterizations of it that I’m seeing in the media, especially from the National Post. National Post columnists in particular are painting Ignatieff in a very negative light with regard to this deal with Harper on EI. They say he caved in from the conditions he set on Monday morning. Nothing could be farther from the truth. At his Monday morning press conference Ignatieff made it clear that his conditions for supporting the government were not rigid demands. He said at that Monday morning press conference that he was flexible and reasonable. He demanded answers from the government on how it would get out of deficit, how it would handle the isotope crisis, how much infrastructure money has actually been spent, and what plans the government has to reform Employment Insurance. Contrary to what is implied in the negative columns about Ignatieff, Ignatieff never made it a condition that Employment Insurance reform be passed into law this week. He only asked what the governments plans to reform EI were. Contrary to what is said in the negative columns about Ignatieff, Ignatieff got all 4 of his conditions met. The government released more information about how it planned to get out of deficit. Ignatieff may also have been given more information about this in his private meetings with Harper. The government agreed to give written information about what it planned to do about the isotope crisis. That is the second condition met. Harper told Ignatieff his plans for Employment Insurance reform, which was his plan to give the self-employed access to EI. Ignatieff and Harper agreed to strike a blue-ribbon panel to study both how to implement access to EI for the self-employed and how to make other improvements to EI. The combination of those things is Ignatieff’s third condition being met. The only condition that is unclear whether it has been met is the condition that the government make it clearer how much infrastructure money has actually been spent. But I think it likely that Harper gave Ignatieff information on this during their meetings which would mean that all four conditions were met and Ignatieff did NOT back down as indicated in the many negative columns written about Ignatieff.

Congratulations to the Nova Scotia NDP!

I want to congratulate the Nova Scotia NDP on winning a substantial majority government on June 9. I am pleased that the Liberal Party came in second place in the popular vote and that the governing Tories actually fell to third place in the popular vote. I’m glad the Tories in Nova Scotia were routed. I’m also glad that the Liberal Party will form the Official Opposition and I congratulate Kelly Regan, wife of Halifax West Liberal MP Geoff Regan for wining a seat for the Liberals in Bedford-Birch Cove against the incumbent Tory MLA. I also congratulate Liberal Andrew Younger for his victory in Dartmouth East against an NDP incumbent. The Liberals did great under the circumstances so congratulations to both the N.S. NDP and the N.S. Liberals!

The economy

Stephen Harper recently indicated that the economy was on the mend because the economy contracted by about 5.4% instead of by about 6.5% as predicted. It’s certainly possible the economy may be improving but is it really accurate to say the economy is on the mend simply because it didn’t contract by quite as much as projected? Projections and estimations have tendency to be off by some margin of error. Maybe the economy is improving but an economic contraction of over 5% is quite serious and not something to celebrate.

Swine flu

In recent weeks I have been preoccupied by exams and studying. I didn’t notice that the swine flu epidemic had gotten way worse. Tens of thousands of people infected (some people think it could be hundreds of thousands). Multiple children have died of swine flu in the United States. My heart goes out to all the families of the children and adults who have died of swine flu worldwide. I didn’t realize how severe this epidemic was. I’m so sorry.

Smiths Falls water bottle plant

The other day in the Kingston Whig standard there was an article about the plans for a water bottle company to take over the empty building where the Hershey Chocolate Factory used to be in Smiths Falls, Ontario. The Council of Canadians has objected to this on the basis that bottled water is bad for the environment due to polluting trucks and due to the fact that water bottles end up in landfills. I do not agree with the Council of Canadians assessment. Water is good for you and bottled water is the only way to drink water on the go. Also, so long as water bottles are recycled they are not a problem. As far as trucks are concerned, that is something we need to work on long term. But by all means open a water bottle factory in Smiths Falls.

It seems odd the NDP keeps getting scandals recently

It does seem odd that the NDP in recent days has been beset by scandals. First there were union donations in Nova Scotia in the middle of an election campaign. The reason they are considered improper is because the umbrella union organization appeared to use its subdivisions to give more than the new legal donation limit. The NDP has done nothing wrong, however. They immediately returned the donations as soon as they realized there was a problem. The NDP's opponents have called for an RCMP investigation but I disagree. Not every little thing should warrant an RCMP investigation. The governing Manitoba NDP also saw an old scandal resurface over the use of union volunteers in the 1999 Manitoba election to do with election expense claims. Some former NDP worker has come out with the allegation that this mishap was done purposefully. The NDP's response has been that it what they did was thought to be a legal practice at the time and it was only later ruled illegal and the situation was dealt with at this time and there is nothing new here. I'll take the Manitoba NDP's word on this. Although this former NDP worker has called for a public inquiry, there can't be a public enquiry for every single scandal. That would be going too far. Sometimes inquiries and investgations are warranted, but there are times when we should just let things be. Another odd thing is that both these scandals are related to unions. Unions mostly support the NDP in Canada. This was also true at the federal level until union political party donations were completely banned. In most provinces that have an NDP local labour unions almost exclusively support the local NDP. An exception to this is in Ontario. In Ontario, lingering bitterness over the Bob Rae years makes unions in Ontario split their support between the provincial Liberals and the provincial NDP. This held true even during the 2007 Ontario election when Rae had already openly become a Liberal. Rae's effects on the Ontario NDP have long outlasted Rae's time as a member of the NDP. In my view it needs to be firmly established what it is and is not legal for unions to do when it comes to helping political parties so that we don't get scandals like the ones in Manitoba and Nova Scotia.

St. Paul’s by-election

It is now not a matter of if there will be a provincial St. Paul’s by-election, but when. Michael Bryant is quitting politics and will take a newly created job with the City of Toronto. Unlike current federal vacancies where we don’t know whether there will be a by-election because we don’t know when the government will fall, provincially there is a majority government and a by-election is thus guaranteed because there are over two years left in the mandate. I’m not sure of any possible Tory or NDP candidates for the by-election. But one possible Liberal candidate is St. Paul’s public school trustee Josh Matlow. He ran against Ernie Eves in his by-election in 2002 and did quite well, way better than the 1999 result in Dufferin-Peel-Wellington-Grey. I wonder if he’d go for it. Another remotely possible candidate is federal St. Paul’s MP Carolyn Bennett. She ran for the provincial Liberals in 1995 in the St. Paul’s predecessor St. Andrew-St. Patrick. The problem with this idea is that it would be a messy situation because it would create a possible federal by-election in St. Paul’s as well as the provincial by-election. Bennett might also face questions about the federal MP’s pension she would collect while also collecting an MPP salary. Bennett is very unlikely to run. I am a bit concerned about this by-election because the McGuinty government has never had to defend a Toronto seat in a by-election where the Tories got over 25% of the vote. The Tories got about 26% of the vote in St. Paul’s in the last provincial election. The Toronto Star article I read said Bryant would return to electoral politics if McGuinty ever retired as party leader. Of course by then Bryant would not have his seat but one must cross that bridge when one comes to it. I wish Bryant well in his new job.

Goodbye John Tory

I would like to say that I’m sorry that John Tory was humiliated in the Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock by-election. Tory was always very moderate for a Tory and while I always disagreed with him on the overall direction of Ontario, I always appreciated his support for same-sex marriage. Thus I extend to Tory my political condolences. At the same time I am pleased a Liberal won the by-election. Congratulations to Rick Johnson. He, just like Kathleen Wynne before him, proved to John Tory that his Liberal opponent is no pushover. It is unfortunately disturbing that the Ontario PCs are likely to now take a hard shift to the far right because hardcore Conservative Tim Hudak is the frontrunner for the PC leadership. Ontario does not need to go down that road again. Another possible contender for the PC leadership is apparently federal Public Safety minister Peter Van Loan. The issue with a Van Loan run is that he does not have a seat in the Ontario legislature and many Ontario Tories have expressed a desire that their next leader already have a seat in the Ontario legislature. If Van Loan ran and won he would have to convince the holder of his seat in the provincial legislature, Julia Munro, to step aside, something she was unwilling to do for John Tory despite the fact that Tory’s cottage is in her riding. If Van Loan ran, he would not have to resign his seat unless he won the leadership. However protocol would dictate that he would have to resign as a cabinet minister as soon as he entered the provincial leadership race. Then if he didn’t win the leadership he’d have to hope that Harper would be willing to take him back into cabinet.

Strangely enough, Peterborough Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro was approached by some provincial Tories to run for the leadership. He declined. Even if Del Mastro may have been a good leader, Del Mastro himself expressed the view that the next leader should already have a seat in the Ontario legislature. Del Mastro does not have a seat in the Ontario legislature so that would have worked against him if he had run. Also if Del Mastro had run and won, he would have found himself completely seatless. This is because the provincial riding of Peterborough represented at the Ontario legislature is held by the Liberals. Not only this, but all provincial seats adjacent to the Peterborough riding are also held by the Liberals (this includes the Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock riding John Tory just lost). The closest provincial riding to Peterborough held by the PCs is the Durham riding. Thus in the hypothetical situation of Dean Del Mastro running for and winning the Ontario PC leadership, he might have to convince Durham MPP John O’Toole to step aside to allow him to run in a provincial by-election. Considering that O’Toole might not be willing to do so means it is a good thing for Del Mastro that he is not running for the PC leadership. Del Mastro’s only possible incentive for moving to the Ontario legislature is that once a member of the Ontario legislature, his job would be more secure than is his job in the House of Commons. This is because the Ontario legislature has a stable majority government slated to last until September 2011 whereas the federal House of Commons has a much less stable minority government that pundits believe will only last so long. However, considering the likely uphill battle Del Mastro would have faced against frontrunner Tim Hudak it probably would not have been worth it for Del Mastro to run for the PC leadership.

In an article in the Globe and Mail, there is this strange tidbit:

“Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, who hails from Calgary, may also be wooed by provincial Tories anxious to gain access to his contacts in ethnic communities in the Toronto area. He was invited to speak at the provincial party's convention last month, where he joked about having been made an "honorary" Ontarian.”

I assume the article didn’t mean that the Ontario PCs may woo Jason Kenney to run for the Ontario PC leadership. Although Kenney may well be an “honorary Ontarian” and although Kenney lives a significant part of the year in Ontario due to his job as an MP, Kenney actually running for the Ontario PC leadership would be too much of a parachute. The article may have been referring to Ontario PC leadership contenders seeking Kenney’s endorsement or may have been referring to the provincial party asking Kenney to use his contacts with Toronto ethnic communities to establish contacts for the Ontario PC party with those same ethnic communities. Kenney actually running for the Ontario PC leadership seems way too “out there” to be possible.

Former Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock MPP Laurie Scott was originally planning to run in her old riding again in 2011. She may well still do so despite there now being a Liberal incumbent in her riding. Even if she didn’t run Rick Johnson would face a tough fight to retain his seat but I’m hoping he fights that fight valiantly and I wish him good luck in the legislature.