Justin Trudeau

Thursday October 18, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday October 18, 2018

Liberal government to waive fee, waiting time for pot pardons

The Liberal government will waive the fee and waiting period for Canadians seeking a pardon for a past conviction for simple pot possession.

March 7, 2013

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale announced today that the government intends to table legislation to expedite the pardon process for those with a criminal record for pot.

The fee for normal record suspensions is $631. The waiting period to apply is usually five years for a summary offence or 10 years for an indictable offence.

Goodale said it will “shed the burden and stigma” and break down barriers to jobs, education, housing or volunteer work.

But he could not give a timeframe for when someone could apply and obtain a pardon, noting that the “critical point” is getting the legislation tabled and passed in Parliament.

September 28, 2012

He said legalization represents a “fundamental transformation” of a legal regime that’s been in place for over a century.

“That is not a singular event. That is a process,” he said.

A record suspension does not erase the fact that you were convicted of a crime, but keeps the record separate and apart from other criminal records.

The NDP is calling for the expungement of criminal records, which would erase the criminal conviction entirely.

NDP Justice critic Murray Rankin called the pardon plan a “half-baked measure” that won’t remove the existing barriers the criminal record presents for travel, housing or volunteering. People who are asked on a form if they have a criminal conviction will still be required to answer “yes.”

“If you call that an expungement, then you will completely solve the problem that I think will, continue to exist,” he said.

Goodale said the government did not adopt that approach, because it is for cases where there has been a “profound historical injustice,” such as when a charter right was violated. (Source: CBC)  

 

Saturday October 6, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday October 6, 2018

Canada’s fight against climate change is at risk

With Manitoba’s reversal this week of its plan to impose a carbon tax, it’s clear the federal government’s overall climate plan is in jeopardy. But that’s only part of the story.

Why did Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister ditch years of work to join with other conservatives like Doug Ford and Jason Kenney? Winnipeg Free Press columnist Don Lett puts it this way:

October 25, 2013

‘When you boil it all down, you have this: a premier with a penchant for erratic behaviour who willingly trashes two years of hard work by his own government, with the full knowledge he cannot stop a carbon tax from being implemented and will get all the money anyway.’

In this, Pallister is in good company. Doug Ford killed a working, revenue-generating cap-and-trade plan. Jason Kenney is against a carbon tax even though prominent conservatives, Preston Manning being one, support it. Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe attacks carbon pricing at every opportunity. Ford and Moe are committed to fighting the tax in court, even though legal experts agree the federal government has the right to impose it. Ford is prepared to waste $30 million on an unwinnable fight.

All taxes are unpopular. And it’s always good optics for provincial premiers to be seen as fighting Ottawa.

May 29, 2008

But there’s method in this madness. The premiers know, almost certainly, they can’t win a legal fight. But by pulling out and blaming Ottawa, they get the optics they want. And, they get the revenue from that nasty tax, because the government has pledged that all carbon tax revenue collected will be returned to the provinces it was collected from. Brilliant?

Maybe not. This strategy doesn’t work nearly as well if the Trudeau government imposes the tax and sends the cheques, probably through Revenue Canada, directly back to Canadian citizens, effectively cutting out the provinces. Trudeau takes the bold but necessary step of fighting climate change, but returns a tangible benefit to Canadian taxpayers. Continued: Hamilton Spectator Editorial) 

 

Wednesday October 3, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday October 3, 2018

A historic vote in Quebec for every party, a tougher provincial puzzle for Trudeau

Everyone made history Monday in Quebec.

May 8, 2018

For the first time in Quebec’s history, the Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ), led by François Legault, won power taking a commanding 74 seats in the 125-seat national assembly.

The 12-year-old left-leaning separatist Quebec Solidaire hit historic highs in seats won — 10 — and in popular vote — 16 per cent. The party is also no longer confined to downtown Montreal but planted its first flags in Quebec City.

The other two parties made the kind of history one tries to avoid.

The Liberal Party of Quebec, with just under 25 per cent of the popular vote, has never fared worse in a general election since its creation at Confederation. Same thing with the Parti Quebecois: worst showing since its creation in 1970.

March 4, 2016

Quebec’s history-making election, though, followed a trend: yet another Liberal majority government in a provincial capital finds itself on the outs.

This trend is significant beyond Quebec’s borders and could impair the ability of the Liberal government in Ottawa to get as much done as it might wish on its domestic agenda in the final year of its mandate.

When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau convened his first First Ministers’ meeting, he would have looked around the room and seen many allies. Canada’s biggest provinces were all led by Liberals all of whom were leading majority governments: B.C.’s Christy Clark (Liberal in name, at least), Ontario’s Kathleen Wynne, Quebec’s Phillippe Couillard. Atlantic Canada’s four premiers were all Liberals and they, too, commanded majorities. If stuff was going to get done and done quickly, then all was in place.

August 8, 2014

But at his next meeting with the premiers, perhaps his final such meeting before he himself must face the electorate next fall, Trudeau will see quite a different crowd. Clark, of course, was replaced by a New Democrat in British Columbia who is hostile at worst and cool at best to Trudeau’s agenda while Wynne, Couillard and New Brunswick’s Brian Gallant (one assumes) have or will soon be replaced by right-of-centre premiers hostile to some of Trudeau’s core policies.

Two of those new premiers, Ontario’s Doug Ford and, now, Quebec’s Francois Legault’s have solid secure majorities. (Continued: Global News) 

 

Tuesday October 2, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday October 2, 2018

President Trump creates crises, then claims credit for solving them

September 5, 2018

President Trump’s specialty is to create crises and then claim credit for solving them. Last year, for example, he ratcheted up the rhetoric against Kim Jong Un — a.k.a. “Little Rocket Man” — threatening to rain “fire and fury” on North Korea. Trump now claims he and Kim “fell in love” after Kim sent him “beautiful letters,” and that, were it not for this bromance, “you’d be in a war” and “millions of people would have been killed.” In reality, no one thought a second Korean War was likely before Trump took office. That only became a serious risk because of his unhinged rhetoric.

Trump has applied this same template to the North

August 28, 2018

American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which he spent years lambasting as “the worst trade deal ever approved.” According to Bob Woodward’s book “Fear: Trump in the White House,” Trump was on the verge of pulling out of NAFTA in April 2017, and had to be talked back from the brink by senior aides. He grudgingly remained in the deal while launching high-pressure negotiations to rework it.

Lo and behold, just ahead of a U.S.-imposed deadline on Sunday night, the United States, Mexico and Canada agreed on a revamped NAFTA. Trump triumphantly proclaimed on Twitter that this was a “wonderful new Trade Deal,” “historic,” and “a great deal for all three countries.” “NAFTA is dead,” said White House trade adviser Peter Navarro. Long live the new United States-Canada-Mexico Agreement (USMCA).

June 13, 2018

In fact, the biggest change is the name of the trade deal, and it is not an improvement. Just try saying “USMCA.” It does not roll off the tongue the way “NAFTA” did. As for the substance, my Council on Foreign Relations colleague Benn Steil rightly describes the new agreement as “little more than margin edits.”

Trump’s biggest victory was in opening up slightly more of the Canadian dairy market for U.S. exports. This has long been an obsession for him. He complained in June: “Canada charges the U.S. a 270% tariff on Dairy Products! They didn’t tell you that, did they? Not fair to our farmers.” Trump was right about the Canadian tariffs. What he didn’t mention is that the United States still ran a $474 million dairy surplus last year, with U.S. farmers selling five times more dairy goods to Canada than U.S. consumers bought from Canada. In any case, milk products represent just 0.06 percent of U.S.-Canada trade, 99 percent of which was already tariff-free. (Source: Washington Post) 

 

Tuesday September 18, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday September 18, 2018

Trudeau’s to-do list just got bigger

If stalled pipelines and deadlocked trade talks have given Justin Trudeau a pounding head, he should brace himself — and Canada — for an absolute economic migraine.

March 24, 2016

Two sobering new reports warn that, unless Canadian governments take fast, aggressive action, this country’s economy will be hammered by a one-two combination of recently lowered American taxes and a sharp decline in business investment.

This is bad news for Canadians and comes at a sensitive time for our economy, as well as the prime minister.

Parliament resumes sitting this week and with the next federal election barely a year away the Liberals are working overtime to persuade everyone these are sunny days, economically speaking.

August 28, 2018

But the free-trade deal with the United States and Mexico, which has sustained millions of Canadian jobs and enriched the Canadian economy for decades, could collapse at any moment.

Meanwhile, Ottawa’s plan to expand the Trans Mountain Pipeline — which it bought for $4.5 billion in taxpayers’ money — is going nowhere.

Now more storm clouds darken our horizon. A new report commissioned by the Business Council of Canada concludes the latest tax cuts in the United States could devastate Canada’s economy.

How bad could it get? The report suggests the damage could exceed the economic harm that would be caused by the end of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

May 18, 2018

years, businesses in Canada benefited from a corporate-tax advantage. That suddenly ended last December when the U.S. Congress passed tax reforms that slashed the federal corporate tax rate to 21 per cent from 35 per cent.

The report warns America’s tax cuts could cost Canada up to 635,000 jobs and reduce its annual gross domestic product by $85 billion — the equivalent of nearly five per cent of our economy. As governments could lose up to $20 billion a year in tax revenues, almost everyone in Canada would suffer.

The challenge to our economy from these tax cuts becomes even more serious when placed in the context of a growing reluctance to invest in Canada. A report released last week by the C.D. Howe Institute called weak capital spending a “threat to Canada’s future prosperity.”

October 19, 2017

Echoing the think-tank’s fears, the chief executive officer of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Victor Dodig, last week cited falling levels of foreign investment in Canada as he called on the country to set clearer rules to boost investor confidence.

Evidence from Statistics Canada gives credence to these concerns. In 2017, foreign direct investment in Canada declined for the third year in a row, dropping by a whopping 26 per cent.

It would be a mistake to consider any of these economic challenges in isolation. The failure to build a pipeline to carry Alberta’s oil to an ocean port where it can be sold for a higher price is surely convincing foreign investors to avoid Canada the way they would a patch of poison ivy.

September 21, 2016

Likewise, lowered American tax rates make that country a more desirable place to invest — once again to Canada’s disadvantage.

So far, Trudeau’s Liberals have dithered in their response to the U.S. tax cuts and investor flight. That vacillation must end.

In his economic update this fall, federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau should offer concrete ways to improve this country’s ability to compete and make it more attractive for investment.

That may or may not bring corporate tax cuts and changes to regulations. It must translate into meaningful action. (Source: Hamilton Spectator Editorial)