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PM Justin Trudeau's Canada

TrickyRicky said:
Northern Light, I think your assessment of the budget is a good one. It’s Wynne’s Ontario all over again.

I also particularly like your comment on the tax code. I really dislike the ever increasing complexity and web of programming. Social engineering through the tax code versus simple programs administered through direct subsidy is anti-progressive. Low income citizens need simple direct programs. High income people don’t need higher taxes they need less credits, exemptions, and tax loopholes.
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My dad was an accountant and a bit of a records packrat. When I was clearing out his house, I found every income tax return he filed. The ones around 1950 were four pages, including the tax table. It was essentially how much did you make-what is income tax due from the table minus what you have already paid = balance due/credit. I think there was a small credit because my grandmother lived with them.
 
lenaitch said:
My dad was an accountant and a bit of a records packrat. When I was clearing out his house, I found every income tax return he filed. The ones around 1950 were four pages, including the tax table. It was essentially how much did you make-what is income tax due from the table minus what you have already paid = balance due/credit. I think there was a small credit because my grandmother lived with them.
Click to expand...
Your dad and my dad! My dad’s first return from 1945 was a half page. He went on to be a tax specialist.
 
The SNC Lavalin thing really isn’t going to make or break my vote. There are many other reasons why Libs will likely not get my vote. SNC thing isn’t even in my top 10.
 
I'm not sure which way I will go either. Both major parties pander to their base and promise us goodies purchased with our own money. Issues surrounding the CAF are important to me but are not on anybody's radar; never have and never will. So much of what has gone on recently is, as they say in the States, 'inside the Beltway'. My big issue with recent events is the impact on our democratic processes, particularly the concentration of power at the PMO level, in particular, partisan staffers. A professional public service is supposed to 'speak truth to power', and the Clerk of the Privy Council, as the head public servant, is the head 'truth-teller'. If he had concerns, his reporting relationship is to the PMO or the Cabinet collectively, not individual members. I don't see any party changing any of this and relinquishing control.

As an aside, I have been much entertained watching the Speaker of the British House of Commons. Although still a bit of a bear-pit, our House could take lessons.
 
lenaitch said:
As an aside, I have been much entertained watching the Speaker of the British House of Commons. Although still a bit of a bear-pit, our House could take lessons.
Click to expand...
Bercow is an interesting character, and highly effective. "Order!....Order!...I said Order..." He tossed the SNP leader some weeks back for not withdrawing an accurate but unallowed comment of "liar" to May. I watch in envy. As much as I'm not for letting the Libs off the hook on SNC-L, the spectacle of the Cons drowning out the Budget was childish at best. And Regan did nothing. He should have found the entire Con bench in contempt. Bercow certainly would have.

But back to Cdn politics, eh...

Didn't know the best forum to post this in, it straddles a number so will post it here: (And it's prophetic in how the Budget played out on this, note this is a week old)
'Pulling my hair out': Guelph MP says province playing politics with infrastructure funds
Longfield says province has skipped meetings, is holding back billions of dollars to spite federal government
NEWS Mar 15, 2019 by Graeme McNaughton Guelph Mercury

Missed meetings, unprepared staff and billions in much-needed infrastructure dollars being used as a political pawn — that is what Guelph MP Lloyd Longfield says he is growing frustrated with when it comes to the provincial government.
“We’ve been waiting for a year for the province to open up the infrastructure application stream,” Longfield tells the Mercury Tribune, adding that while there was a provincial election in that time, the new government under Premier Doug Ford has been in place since June.
“They’re not letting communities have access to funding that we’re providing the province. And it’s getting really frustrating.”

On Tuesday, the provincial government announced that the second phase of a joint federal-provincial municipal infrastructure program would be moving ahead.

The agreement for this phase of the program, which will see $30 billion in spending on major infrastructure projects over the next decade, was signed by the previous provincial government a year ago.

Longfield says that while the federal and provincial governments have met over the past year to sort out when this funding would be handed out, he says the province either came unprepared, or did not come at all.

“The provincial government, as many times as we met with them, either they don’t show up to meetings, or they don’t come prepared for the meetings, or they have other ways that they’re just not opening up the streams for infrastructure funding,” he says.

“We’re trying to get projects done in Guelph, and I’m pulling my hair out.”

Longfield adds that when the provincial staff did come to meetings, the reasons given for the infrastructure funding applications did not add up.

“’Oh were you asking for this? I don’t remember that? Oh, is that in a report? Did I have that report?’ ‘Yeah, you’ve had it for a year,’” Longfield says, referring to the type of discussions that these meetings would see.

The MP said that he initially wanted to wait and see if anything would come from the bilateral meetings, but said if nothing happened in March that he would speak up.

“How many more months? We’re going to have an election and we’re going to run out of time to get these projects done,” he says.

“And then we’re going to be losing a whole construction season. And here we are in March, and we need the summer projects for the construction season.”


Longfield says he believes the provincial government is running down the clock until after this fall’s scheduled federal election, which could potentially see the Liberals ousted from power.

“That’s the only explanation I can see,” he says.

“We’ve been pushing this hard since December. We’re talking weekly meetings and daily meetings on the telephone from the federal offices over the last couple of weeks.”

In an emailed statement to the Mercury Tribune, Brittany Allison, the press secretary for provincial Infrastructure Minister Monte McNaughton, said the delay was because the new provincial government wanted to take a closer look at the books when they came into power last year.

"The federal Liberals' cousins promised infrastructure with no plan to pay for it. That fact became clear when an independent financial commission of inquiry revealed that the Liberals left us with a $15 billion deficit," the statement reads.

"We took the time to get it right and make promises we could keep."

Allison adds that McNaughton "continues to have many great meetings with our federal partners, including traveling to Ottawa and participating in federal-provincial meetings."

While Tuesday saw the province’s announcement of more infrastructure funding, the only tranche open for applications thus far is for roads and bridges in rural and Indigenous communities.

At the announcement in Baden, McNaughton said the funding for the transit infrastructure will be announced in the coming days, with funding for green infrastructure and community, culture and recreation infrastructure coming later this year.

Longfield sent a letter to and met with Mayor Cam Guthrie Thursday morning, hoping to get him to also call out the province on opening up infrastructure funds.

Guthrie says that, as the chair of the Large Urban Mayors Caucus of Ontario, he has already done that.

“We had a united letter that represents all of the cities that are under LUMCO,” he says.

“We’re really looking for collaboration between the province and the federal government to get these funds rolling as quickly as possible.”

Guthrie says he is optimistic following McNaughton’s announcement on Tuesday that infrastructure dollars will be coming Guelph’s way in the near future.

“With the green and social culture and transit infrastructure, that will require the right seasons, the construction season, to put the shovels in the ground,” the mayor says.

“I’m really hopeful that those start to get announced as quickly as possible.”

While the list of projects that would be funded through this new round of funding would be subject to the city’s asset management plan, which lays out priorities for Guelph’s capital needs, and council discussions, Guthrie has a few items in mind that he would like to see get federal and provincial dollars.

“Anything to do with helping transit … is something that I would applaud,” he says.

“When it comes to green, I would love to invest in active transportation networks. I would love to tackle potentially more stormwater projects, anything that can help us with renewable energy.”

Another project the mayor says he would love to see government support for is the South End Community Centre, which could open as soon as 2021.

“I take a moment every week to polish my shovel in my office to get ready to put that in the ground for this,” he says.

In a written statement emailed to the Mercury Tribune, Guelph MPP and Ontario Green party leader Mike Schreiner said the provincial government needs to open up all of the infrastructure funding streams.

"It doesn’t matter which party is in power at which level, we owe it to citizens to set aside partisan politics to keep good projects moving," he says.

"The Ford government should open intake for funding of all infrastructure streams (transit, green, community culture and recreation) to avoid delaying much needed infrastructure projects in Guelph and across Ontario."

However, in her statement, Allison says the idea of launching one tranche at a time has wide support.

"We have met with dozen of delegations at AMO (Association of Municipalities of Ontario), ROMA (Rural Ontario Municipal Association), OGRA (Ontario Good Roads Association) and the same message has been raised, they support our strategy for launching this program one stream at a time."

— With files from the Waterloo Region Record
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https://www.guelphmercury.com/news-...e-playing-politics-with-infrastructure-funds/

Meantime, Guelph's right-of-centre Mayor is very pleased with the Lib Budget:

'Make our city better': Guelph mayor pleased with new infrastructure spending in federal budget
NEWS Mar 20, 2019 by Graeme McNaughton Guelph Mercury

https://www.guelphmercury.com/news-...ew-infrastructure-spending-in-federal-budget/

Ford is doing an excellent job in losing friends and making enemies.
 
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AlvinofDiaspar said:
Be careful what you wish for, given how bonkers their MPs have proven to be, especially of late.

AoD
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lol...End of May, and she'll be gone. I'm actually in envy too of how the parties are splintering. The Independent Party and the forming of alliance with the likes of the LibDems is a round-about way of achieving Prop-Rep without abandoning FPTP voting methods. I'm not a great fan of fractious representations as per many European nations and endless unstable minorities, but I am a fan of breaking up dysfunctional monoliths, and this is now happening in Westminster.

I continue to be a great fan of Bercow, because without a strong Speaker, Parliament descends into chaos.

Which reminds me, must check to see if May is still PM before I rush out the door.

Edit to Add: She's still crawling, but Grauniad has this featured by Maclean's Patriquin (I assume he's still with Big Mac, they've just been sold)

'He's not a bad person, but …' scandal-hit Justin Trudeau turns voters off
Justin Trudeau

In the Canadian prime minister’s Montreal base the Lavscam imbroglio has taken a toll on previously staunch support
Martin Patriquin in Montreal
Thu 21 Mar 2019 10.00 GMTLast modified on Thu 21 Mar 2019 15.02 GMT

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...rson-but-justin-trudeau-voters-lament-scandal
 
lenaitch said:
I'm not sure which way I will go either. Both major parties pander to their base and promise us goodies purchased with our own money. Issues surrounding the CAF are important to me but are not on anybody's radar; never have and never will. So much of what has gone on recently is, as they say in the States, 'inside the Beltway'. My big issue with recent events is the impact on our democratic processes, particularly the concentration of power at the PMO level, in particular, partisan staffers. A professional public service is supposed to 'speak truth to power', and the Clerk of the Privy Council, as the head public servant, is the head 'truth-teller'. If he had concerns, his reporting relationship is to the PMO or the Cabinet collectively, not individual members. I don't see any party changing any of this and relinquishing control.

As an aside, I have been much entertained watching the Speaker of the British House of Commons. Although still a bit of a bear-pit, our House could take lessons.
Click to expand...

ORDER!!! ORDER!!!!
 
Now back in Ottawa.......

Ms. Philpott stirs the pot! (she suggests there is important info not yet in the public domain vis a vis SNC)

www.macleans.ca

Jane Philpott: 'There's much more to the story that needs to be told' - Macleans.ca

In an exclusive interview with Paul Wells, the former Treasury Board president says: 'we actually owe it to Canadians as politicians to ensure that they have the truth.'
www.macleans.ca www.macleans.ca

Trudeau responds to this here:

www.ctvnews.ca

PM Trudeau on his meeting with Philpott

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reiterates that his decision to shuffle Jody Wilson-Rabyould had nothing to do with SNC-Lavalin.
www.ctvnews.ca www.ctvnews.ca
 
We were almost heading to an election.

The Liberals did not have enough members in the House for a confidence vote.
The speaker refused to follow the rules, and instead said that Liberals could vote based on their honour if they felt they were in the house on time.
Not so surprisingly, Liberals have no honour, so enough claimed to be in their seats in time to allow the government to survive.
https://twitter.com/x/status/1108825221962833922
 
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