Child Poverty in Canada
Tuesday was the 20th anniversary of Canada’s parliament passing a resolution to end child poverty by the year 2000. All members of parliament at the time voted in favour of the resolution, but here we are twenty years later and the goal was not achieved. In fact, successive governments (and opposition MPs too) have done pathetically little to end child poverty. What seemed like a great idea at the time has become an embarrassing failure. I think the problem lies in parlamentarians’ failure to do something very simple that was once told to me: “Plan your work. Work your plan.” Parliamentarians certainly had a great goal, and gave themselves a reasonable time-frame, but they didn’t have a plan to follow. It’s time for Canada to accept its failure and start looking at how we can succeed on this issue. We should be looking at what other nations have done to eliminate child poverty and devising our own plan using what worked best for those nations.
Ed Broadbent, the man who came up with the end child poverty resolution in the first place, has an idea. It sounds good to me. At the very least, it would be a good start.
Conservative Candidate Silenced
Once again, Stephen Harper has slapped the PMO muzzle onto a fellow Conservative. This time it was the Conservative candidate in the New Westminster-Coquitlam by-election. I guess it’s ok to share Harper’s views on destroying Canada’s medical care system, you’re just not supposed to talk about them in public. He’s saving that descussion for when he gets his majority.
Reality check: Harper scrambling to hide candidate’s support for health privatization
Fri 06 Nov 2009With only days until voters make their choice in the New Westminster-Coquitlam by-election, Stephen Harper is trying to hide his candidate’s comments in favour of private health care.
Speaking on local radio, Diana Dilworth expressed her willingness to allow more private medical care as an option for health reform:
“There’s a lot of different things that we could consider. And certainly private medical care is one of those options.” – Conservative candidate Diana Dilworth, CKNW’s “The Christy Clark Show,” 26 October 2009
Since she made her statement, Dilworth has all but disappeared.
“Over the next few days, I learned that with the exception of a tightly structured appearance on CKNW’s Christy Clark Show, Dilworth has yet to participate in any all-candidates’ debate. A New Westminster community group called Tenth to the Fraser abandoned plans for a debate after Dilworth declined to participate.” – The Tyee.ca, “The Curious Case of the Missing Tory,” 5 November 2009
If Stephen Harper disagrees with his candidate on private health care, why doesn’t he just say so instead of hiding her from voters?
Perhaps it’s because he doesn’t.
Tags: by-election, Diana Dilworth, health reform, healthcare, medicare, mujzzle, New Westminster-Coquitlam, PMO, privatization, Stephen Harper
Political favours influencing H1N1 vaccine
Stephen Harper has long campaigned on a promise to end Liberal political patronage in Ottawa. That’s why many Canadians were surprised when he appointed 18 CPC friendly senators at a time when he didn’t have the confidence of the House of Commons. It’s now been revealed that senators are costing taxpayers almost 220 per cent more for expenses while working less and less.
And as if political patronage when it comes to the Senate wasn’t disturbing enough, it turns out political patronage has played a role in the distribution, or lack thereof, of lifesaving H1N1 vaccines.
Stephen Harper proves once again: Liberal, Tory, same old story.
Tags: Conservative, H1N1, Liberal, patronage, senate, Stephen Harper, Tory, vaccine
NDP the balanced budget party?
New Democratic governments have the best record when it comes to balancing their budgets and staying out of deficit. Even the Conservative federal government agrees.
Tags: balanced budgets, deficit, economy, government, NDP, New Democrats, surplus
Tory Logos Everywhere
First came the release of Canada’s 2010 Olympic uniforms, and outrage that one of the designs supposedly looks like the Conservative Party of Canada logo. Honestly, I have to disagree with my fellow New Democrats. It just doesn’t look close enough to the Conservative logo to make me concerned. It just looks like hyper-partisanship fueled false outrage to me. I doubt the average Canadian is going to see a link. If some of the people who are making the accusations came forward with some proof that the CPC actually had a hand in influencing the designs I’d certainly be willing to change my mind.
Don’t get me wrong, I personally believe the HBC has botched the uniforms for our athletes ever since they won the contract for them. I’m not a big fan of the designs this time around. A couple of the designs I’ve seen featured in the Kelowna Bay are actually pretty nice, and I wouldn’t mind having a nice shirt with one of those logos. Too bad they’re so ridiculously high priced, and probably made in China. Some of the other designs, however, just look ridiculous to me. Our athletes were way better served when their outfits were designed by Roots. At least this time around they look better than the disaster HBC came up with for the Beijing Olympics.
Next, we have Conservative logos on cheques from the federal government. Conservative MPs all across the country were caught handing out taxpayer dollars and slapping that dirty little party emblem on them. And when I say all across the country, I mean in Conservative ridings across the country, because god knows Stephen Harper hasn’t stuck to a single campaign promise yet, especially one regarding ethics or patronage. At least one Conservative MP, Gerald Keddy, claimed he didn’t notice the giant party logo or his own signature on the ceremonial cheque he was handing out in front of the cameras. Is he fucking blind? Somebody better get Gerald some new glasses!
Keddy even defended his actions saying he was just doing his job, he “never gave it another thought”, and he “Would absolutely do it again.” At least that’s what he was saying until Stephen Harper slapped a muzzle on him. The next day he was claiming it was all a big mistake and “It was certainly inappropriate and not something I would do again.”
How stupid do the Conservatives think Canadians are? There’s no way someone could accidentally slap a logo that big on a cheque without noticing. They’re only sorry they got caught in the act.
Tags: cheques, Conser, Conservative Party of Canada, Conservatives, CPC, Gerald Keddy, HBC, Hudson's Bay Company, NDP, New Democrats, Olympics, patronage, Roots, Stephen Harper, stimulus, taxpayer dollars, The Bay, uniforms
Provincial Liberals and federal Tories doing the tango
I found this excellently written column by Denise Savoie via her Faceboook page. She points out some very interesting things about the incomming B.C. HST. Some I already knew about, some I didn’t.
B.C. Tories try to duck furor over HST
Consumers, not corporations, pay for this piece of incoherent policyBy Denise Savoie, Special to Times Colonist October 6, 2009
Few things can rally citizens together like taxes. As voter cynicism rises and turnout plummets, I’ve been wondering what it would take to engage Canadians actively in the political process.
Last weekend, as I spoke to one of 19 cross-province rallies against the proposed harmonized sales tax, I found a unique group of people. Some told me they have never been to a political rally, and most likely had never attended one on the same issue with each other — yet there they were together, galvanized into collective action. It was remarkable.
However, as I said to this group of several hundred Victorians behind the legislature on Saturday, don’t expend all of your anger on Premier Gordon Campbell.
This HST dance is a tango, and Campbell’s partner from Ottawa is clearly the lead.
For all the times Prime Minister Stephen Harper has awkwardly claimed to loathe all forms of taxation, his federal Conservative government is awfully fond of the HST.
Their 2009 budget, backed by the federal Liberals, insisted on harmonization. On page 166, it specifically mentioned B.C. as one of its targets.
Then the feds offered a staggering $1.6 billion to the B.C. Liberals to make the HST happen, and they got stingy when the province tried negotiating any limited exemptions.
Yet our province’s Conservative MPs have run for the hills on the HST, saying it wasn’t their idea. The local Liberal MP has become suddenly opposed after having supported the budget, and after Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff committed to keeping the HST if he wins the next election.
I enjoyed the recent week-long HST coverage in the Times Colonist that included the critical federal angle, but two critical points were missed.
First, besides the obvious injustice of shifting tax from big business to the consumer as verified by a recent TD Bank analysis, the HST represents sloppy, incoherent public policy. Just last week, the House of Commons approved a new home renovation tax credit that the government deemed so important as to risk a fall election over it. But the HST would negate any benefit derived from the credit by adding tax on renovations.
Second, the HST isn’t really about tax hikes. I accept both Harper’s and Campbell’s assertions that they strongly dislike, as they put it, taking money out of the pockets of the everyday citizen.
However, given an opportunity to cut taxes for their pals in big business, all other principles are secondary. It then becomes an issue of who has to pay for those tax cuts.
Over the past decade, we Canadians have had to pay for huge corporate tax cuts by suffering through huge cuts to social services, health care, education, and now arts funding, health research, community grants and parents’ councils.
With the HST, we are now paying for corporate tax cuts by paying more at the till — for basic needs like food and vitamins, bicycles, haircuts, funerals, and even taking your pet to the vet.
Campbell and Harper will argue that businesses will pass their $1.9-billion tax savings on to consumers, but of course he offers no guarantees, and past experience shows the exact opposite.
It is the perfect tango for two governments — in Victoria and in Ottawa — that want tax relief for big business even it means hiking taxes on the rest of us.
The HST fight is thus the latest chapter in the growing economic gap between the very rich and the rest of us in Canada.
By allowing these measures to go through without at least mitigating the impacts on Canadians who are already struggling, we allow that gap to grow again.
Let’s not let it happen this time.
Denise Savoie is the NDP MP for Victoria.
© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist
If you’re a British Columbian opposed to the HST I encourage you to write not only to your Liberal MLAs, but also your Conservative MPs. Ask them why they want to shift such a huge tax burden from businesses to the middle class.
Tags: B.C. Liberals, British Columbia, Conservative Party of Canada, Denise Savoie, Harmonized Sales Tax, HST, NDP, taxes
RMR: Slap Chop
Another great clip from Rick Mercer.
No election means consequences for everyone
Rick Mercer does it again.
Tags: EI, election, Jack Layton, Liberals, NDP, Rick Mercer, Rick Mercer Report, RMR
Prime Minister attends “elitist” gala.
Most Canadians who are interested in politics will remember that Stephen Harper defended his government’s cuts to arts and culture by saying that “ordinary people” don’t care about the arts. He slammed arts galas, saying they were events where rich artists gathered to whine about their grants. As it turns out, Stephen Harper is all for arts galas when he can use them for political stunts that portray him as a down-to-earth regular Canadian. Don’t be fooled by those who are pushing this as a “surprise” or an “impromptu” performance. This was planned well in advance. Not surprisingly, the mainstream media are lapping this up and pushing it as surprising and impromptu.
You may be interested in checking out A Creative Revolution‘s pop up video edition.
Tags: arts, friends, galas, mainstream media, music, political stunts, singing, Stephen Harper, The Beatles
Taliban Stanley?
General Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, is openly supporting reintegrating the Taliban with the rest of Afghan society. His plans apparently include giving jobs to the Taliban, since he believes that 50 to 80 percent of them would give up fighting if they were employed.
I wonder if those who labelled Jack Layton “Taliban Jack”, for his suggestions that we negotiate with these thugs, will now attack the general in the same way.
