Ujjal Dosanjh

I was just watching on the internet the interview that Vancouver South Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh did with Stephen Colbert. Everyone should see the really funny part where Colbert and Dosanjh sing the Canadian National Anthem to the tune of the American National Anthem. I also love how Dosanjh responded to Colbert’s scenario: a gun is to your head and therefore you must choose to scrap either Canadian medicare or Canadian same-sex marriage, which do you choose to eliminate? Dosanjh’s answer: neither. Dosanjh also appeared on CNN to defend Canada’s public health care system from Republican attacks during the United States’ health care debate. The CNN host did not realize that it was taxes that paid for Canadian medicare and surprisingly thought that Canadian employers were somehow involved in providing Canadian medicare before Dosanjh set him straight. The host also got a viewer caller question about whether medicare is provided in Canada to illegal immigrants. Dosanjh did not directly address the question about whether care is provided to people who are in Canada illegally but stated more generally that anyone visiting Canada from abroad who has a medical emergency will be treated immediately without upfront payment even though as non-Canadian residents they obviously would not have a health card. Dosanjh said that in such cases the government sometimes tries to collect bills for this care later. Dosanjh is great handling these interviews and I’m very glad we got him from the NDP. I think he was also a good Minister of Health during his year in Paul Martin’s cabinet.

Bob Rae's fond memories

What is going on here? A cow, a female cow, attacking a woman unprovoked? Cows are supposed to be docile. What happened? It is a good thing her grandson could drive a tractor and he got her the quick medical attention she needed. I always figured a cow might kick you if you try and ride her, but to engage in a prolonged attack for no reason? What is wrong with this cow?

Source for this crazy cow story:

http://www.theprovince.com/Alberta+woman+lucky+alive+after+attack/3075170/story.html


On to politics. Bob Rae is reminiscing about the events that happened 25 years ago this month when he negotiated the pact with the Ontario Liberals that toppled Frank Miller’s government. The Lieutenant Governor, John Aird, allowed the Liberal party to form a minority government because the NDP had reached an accord with the Liberals that in other countries such as New Zealand would now be called a “confidence and supply accord”. In other words, the NDP agreed to support the Liberals on matters of confidence and supply in exchange for the Liberals implementing several key NDP policies. As any studier of Ontario politics knows, it was the Liberals who were given credit for these left-leaning policies and the Liberals were given a huge majority government in the 1987 election that was called after the two year accord had expired. It is Bob Rae’s dream to bring such a similar accord to the federal government. Rae was one of the strongest backers of Stephane Dion’s aborted coalition accord with the NDP and Bloc Quebecois. The problem is English Canadians reacted so negatively to the Bloc’s involvement in the coalition and it is almost completely mathematically impossible for the Liberals and NDP alone to obtain a majority of seats. So as much as many people want such a coalition government it is very difficult. They couldn’t even convince Michaëlle Jean to allow the coalition. How would Rae and other coalition supporters get the next Governor General who may have strong Conservative ties, to allow such a similar proposed coalition in future?

Confrontational Tories

I am unhappy that the Tories are now prohibiting their staffers from testifying in committees. Doing so in essence goes against House of Commons rules and it creates needless additional conflict. It also prevents committees from getting to the bottom of important questions and is just the same old Tory excessive secrecy that Canadians have noticed but many of whom are not paying enough attention to.

UK election outcome

The United Kingdom recently saw a change in government. It has seen an unprecedented formal coalition government between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. It is quite amazing they have been able to form this coalition considering that the two parties disagree ideologically on many different issues. One of the early government policies has been a civil liberties policy, including the scrapping of Labour's plans for a national ID card. I agree with the general thrust of this new government’s civil libertarian policies. One Conservative policy I do not agree with that the Liberal Democrats were reluctantly forced to agree to as part of the coalition agreement is the redrawing of every House of Commons seat in the whole country. The Tories want the Commons shrunk to under 600 members. I do not agree with this shrinkage when in fact the Commons has had over 600 members since at least 1950. This policy may be a ploy by the Tories to redraw constituencies to favour the Tories more than the current boundaries, which are said to favour Labour. Hence how Labour got 35% of the votes in 2005 and 55% of the seats and how in 2005 Labour had fewer votes in England than the Tories but way more seats in England than the Tories. A purported reason to reduce the number of constituencies is to save money. But given that the Tories and Liberal Democrats have agreed to a fix term five year parliament, any such saving of money would not kick in until 2015. Nevertheless, hopefully with the Liberal Democrats as part of the government they will keep a check on the Tories so that they do not gerrymander the constituencies in the Tories favour too much. Furthermore, hopefully the Liberal Democrats will keep a check on the Tories more ideological agenda, if and where such ideological agenda exists.

McGuinty and the HST

One might wonder why Dalton McGuinty, who seems adept at trying political self-preservation, would implement the unpopular HST. I think it must be because he believes it will create jobs by the time of the next election and he can point to the HST being tax neutral. On the related question of why the HST is so much more unpopular in BC than Ontario I would guess it is because in BC the HST is not at all tax neutral because all of the federal exemptions are being applied to fuel so that the HST will not be charged on top of BC’s carbon tax.

Audits and private members bill

I cannot help but take MPs sides on this dispute on parliamentary expenses. I see it the way Chantal Hebert recently put it, MPs don’t want to be lynched by the media for their expenses. As NDP MP Yvon Godin put it, “Who is she to tell me the value of the money that I will spend”. I think MPs fear such an audit would not treat them fairly and end many political careers due to sensationalism. It is for this reason that I believe an alternative to an audit by the auditor general ought to be found to uphold accountability of the House of Commons internal economy.

Ontario Liberal backbench MPP Mario Sergio introduced a sweeping private members bill to amend the City of Toronto Act into the Ontario legislature on Thursday. I strongly disagree with the bill and it is unlikely to pass because it goes foursquare against the government’s policy on the City of Toronto. The bill would make sweeping changes. It would limit the total number of wards to the city to 31 from the current 44. This goes against current government policy of allowing the City of Toronto to draw its own wards in a way it sees fit. It would impose greater outside financial control over the City of Toronto through some new board created by this bill and presumably appointed by the province. This goes against current government policy of allowing the City of Toronto greater financial control of itself. It also imposes a term limit of two consecutive terms on all Toronto City Councilors. This is very much not a government policy and it would be wrong to impose term limits on the City of Toronto and only the City of Toronto while leaving other municipalities in Ontario without term limits. I oppose term limits. However, term limits are something Toronto mayoral candidate Rocco Rossi has in his platform. But to impose term limits on the City of Toronto without even a request from the City of Toronto to do so would be wrong. I am unsure of Sergio’s motivation for introducing this bill but I am strongly opposed to it.