Federal Government & Politics II

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by casper

The Liberals should just go ahead and pass it. Screw the conservatives, when they come in they can be the ones to cut it back in a years time.

The Liberals are the ones acting with fiscal restraint. Interesting.

What is the precedent here? The majority of our elected representatives voted for this. Not recommending it doesn't feel too democratic. Worse than proroguing IMO.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

On infrastructure I think it will be a freeze for awhile to re-evaluate and as TrueNorth says to "motivate" cities to build housing. That is actually a brilliant strategy as we know city "gatekeepers" are a small part of the problem and local voters are strongly supportive of such measures. When the cities don't play ball he can withdraw transit and other funding. Save a fortune and then when housing isn't fixed claim the cities obstructed him.
Brilliant but as dishonest as anything we have seen from Truduea.

Transit funding is like $2-3B per year. It's not some huge savings that you imagine. And the flip side of not funding transit properly is massive productivity losses. The GTA alone has estimates of productivity losses due to congestion that exceed the national funding on transit. But also, it's a political risk. One of the things that Ontario Conservatives are getting credit for right now is delivering transit.

Finally, I am not sure how cutting transit necessarily motivates more homes. Take Ottawa where we live. What zoning changes do you think the city would trade for funding Stage 3? I think it's a lot more likely in Ottawa's case, they simply refuse to build anything and live with less transit funding. There's quite a few places that can play out. I don't actually $2-3B nationally is enough to buy leverage.

On other infrastructure funding, it's even more of a stretch. Don't pay for a water treatment plant and there's definitely going to be no way to expand housing.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

What is the president here? The majority of our elected representatives voted for this. Not recommending it doesn't feel too democratic. Worse than proroguing IMO.

It does seem weird to me that a majority of Parliament can pass something and not expect it to be implemented. Isn't the whole point of a minority Parliament that they can occasionally overrule the government? I would think the government has an obligation to enact the will of Parliament here. Good or bad policy.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

It does seem weird to me that a majority of Parliament can pass something and not expect it to be implemented. Isn't the whole point of a minority Parliament that they can occasionally overrule the government? I would think the government has an obligation to enact the will of Parliament here. Good or bad policy.

Only the Crown (in practice a Minister) can initiate public expenditure. A bill that appropriates funds has to come from the government.

The Bloc motion was asking for the government to give the bill a royal recommendation.

That the House call upon the government to take the necessary steps to ensure that a royal recommendation is granted as soon as possible to Bill C-319, An Act to amend the Old Age Security Act (amount of full pension)

It is actually a constitutional requirement

54 It shall not be lawful for the House of Commons to adopt or pass any Vote, Resolution, Address, or Bill, for the Appropriation of any Part of the Public Revenue, or of any Tax or Impost, to any Purpose that has not been first recommended to that House by Message of the Governor General in the Session in which such Vote, Resolution, Address, or Bill is proposed.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Transit funding is like $2-3B per year. It's not some huge savings that you imagine. And the flip side of not funding transit properly is massive productivity losses. The GTA alone has estimates of productivity losses due to congestion that exceed the national funding on transit. But also, it's a political risk. One of the things that Ontario Conservatives are getting credit for right now is delivering transit.

Finally, I am not sure how cutting transit necessarily motivates more homes. Take Ottawa where we live. What zoning changes do you think the city would trade for funding Stage 3? I think it's a lot more likely in Ottawa's case, they simply refuse to build anything and live with less transit funding. There's quite a few places that can play out. I don't actually $2-3B nationally is enough to buy leverage.

On other infrastructure funding, it's even more of a stretch. Don't pay for a water treatment plant and there's definitely going to be no way to expand housing.

Yes I am not saying it's good policy but there are savings to be had. I think the Liberals spent a lot more than $27 B on transit over the last 9 years no? A lot is one off but does add up.

I also agree it doesn't motivate more home building and I think probably we are in a natural lull period for cities requesting transit projects as the impact of Covid works it's way through budgets though that might be my skewed view from Ottawa.

Bottom line I think we are in for a period of unprecedented austerity and it will be an excuse for at least part of that. Polievre would probably cut a lot of spending whenever he came to power but even centre left voters and economists probably admit some cuts are needed at this point so he is going to go all in on that. With tipping into recession which seems to be arriving anyway the only constraint.

[1overcosc]

I'm heartened to see that quite a few of the Conservative commentators I follow on social media (like Sean Speer & Sabrina Maddeaux) have come out against the idea of raising OAS.

[Build.It]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

I'm heartened to see that quite a few of the Conservative commentators I follow on social media (like Sean Speer & Sabrina Maddeaux) have come out against the idea of raising OAS.

And they are right, but this isn't going to sway anyone to not vote conservative. Most people aren't even paying attention to politics atm, so this is going to fly under the radar for most people.

However Poilievre and the BQ guy can now go to old folks homes and tell them how the evil Liberals didn't want to increase their OAS. This was a trap set by the BQ and the Liberals fell for it.

We are so very close to an election. I can smell it.

As soon as the Liberals drop below the BQ and NDP in seat projections I think it will be enough for them to vote non-confidence.

[Build.It]

The Quebec polls paint a clearer picture of what is actually going on. This vote was to win over the elderly vote in Quebec - the last LPC holdout.

Top is Quebec popular vote polling.
Bottom is Quebec seat projection polling.

Of the 61 total seats the LPC is projected to win, 21 of them are in Quebec. However the LPC is statistically tied with the CPC in the popular vote, and therefore they are extremely vulnerable to lose a ton of seats in Quebec with even the slightest change in popular vote. The OAS bill was tabled at this time for that exact reason. The LPC losing even a few % points to the Conservatives means the Bloq could sweep almost the entire province.

My guess is the BQ and CPC went in on this together. These sneaky fuckers did this on purpose.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Yes I am not saying it's good policy but there are savings to be had. I think the Liberals spent a lot more than $27 B on transit over the last 9 years no? A lot is one off but does add up.

I also agree it doesn't motivate more home building and I think probably we are in a natural lull period for cities requesting transit projects as the impact of Covid works it's way through budgets though that might be my skewed view from Ottawa.

Bottom line I think we are in for a period of unprecedented austerity and it will be an excuse for at least part of that. Polievre would probably cut a lot of spending whenever he came to power but even centre left voters and economists probably admit some cuts are needed at this point so he is going to go all in on that. With tipping into recession which seems to be arriving anyway the only constraint.

I think you are making infrastructure austerity a bigger thing than it actually is.

Remember that infrastructure is one thing that traditional conservatives typically actually support as it is something that they see government having an important role in.

It's why Ford's provincial government is spending far more on infrastructure (FAR more) than the previous liberal government did.

Conservative ideology is that the market will drive productivity gains and QoL improvements, and government's role is to support that by getting "out of the way" of the free market and through other measures. Infrastructure supports productivity gains, and therefor is favored.

When you look back through Federal (and provincial!) governments, it's actually been the liberal parties which typically are more prone to austerity in infrastructure. They prioritize social spending first most often, and are happy to let infrastructure spending stay flat or decline to enable that. The Wynne / McGuinty Liberals were emblematic of that - they promised big on infrastructure spending but trickled the actual dollar spending out to support social spending programs instead.

The current Federal Liberals have ramped up infrastructure spending in a major way, particularly on public transit compared to the Harper government, but Harper had increased spending over the previous Liberal government too - including planning of major federal infrastructure projects like the Gordie Howe and Champlain Bridges.

What I do expect to see from a PP government is a shift of infrastructure spending back to roads. The Federal Liberals have given exceedingly little money to roads projects through their term beyond continuing projects already underway from the Harper government. I also don't expect him to significantly increase the "infrastructure pie" to support this, so wouldn't be surprised if overall spending on transit shrinks. We will also no longer see things like federal active transportation budgets, etc.

A large federal contribution to the 413? Absolutely. A large federal contribution to Ottawa LRT phase 3? maybe less so.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

I think you are making infrastructure austerity a bigger thing than it actually is.

Remember that infrastructure is one thing that traditional conservatives typically actually support as it is something that they see government having an important role in.

It's why Ford's provincial government is spending far more on infrastructure (FAR more) than the previous liberal government did.

Conservative ideology is that the market will drive productivity gains and QoL improvements, and government's role is to support that by getting "out of the way" of the free market and through other measures. Infrastructure supports productivity gains, and therefor is favored.

When you look back through Federal (and provincial!) governments, it's actually been the liberal parties which typically are more prone to austerity in infrastructure. They prioritize social spending first most often, and are happy to let infrastructure spending stay flat or decline to enable that. The Wynne / McGuinty Liberals were emblematic of that - they promised big on infrastructure spending but trickled the actual dollar spending out to support social spending programs instead.

The current Federal Liberals have ramped up infrastructure spending in a major way, particularly on public transit compared to the Harper government, but Harper had increased spending over the previous Liberal government too - including planning of major federal infrastructure projects like the Gordie Howe and Champlain Bridges.

What I do expect to see from a PP government is a shift of infrastructure spending back to roads. The Federal Liberals have given exceedingly little money to roads projects through their term beyond continuing projects already underway from the Harper government. I also don't expect him to significantly increase the "infrastructure pie" to support this, so wouldn't be surprised if overall spending on transit shrinks. We will also no longer see things like federal active transportation budgets, etc.

A large federal contribution to the 413? Absolutely. A large federal contribution to Ottawa LRT phase 3? maybe less so.

A lot of good points here. Social spending for sure will be cut more but the whole thretaening cities thing seems too convenient to be accidental.
It would be interesting if they could get together build 413, 401 tunnel or alternative and open up some of the Greenbelt ina fair and transparent manner this time with value capture and actually see housing availbailty increase. Unlikely but not impossible

[1overcosc]

For all the talk about PP is "not getting through in Quebec" it should be noted that those projections - 13 seats and 24% of the vote - would be the best ever result for the modern CPC in Quebec.

[ssiguy]

A very good post insertnamehere.

The days of right leaning parties being anti-transit as exemplified by the Conservatives in Alberta & Ontario and PP will follow their lead.

PP knows that the difference between a minority & majority relies on getting a lot of key suburban ridings which were once the domain of the Liberals. He will not throw those key votes up in the air.

Another key change in the last 20 years is that one of the strongest proponents of transit funding has come from the business community. They are feeling the financial consequences of grinding traffic hurting their productivity and having their workers being late or not even being able to get them at all as their commute has simply become too long.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

I think you are making infrastructure austerity a bigger thing than it actually is.

YOWetal is all about "austerity for thee, but not for me.". That's why he whines about CCB every chance he gets (no kids) and supports transit funding cuts (doesn't use transit), but is very grudging on OAS.

Personally, I say OAS and CCB should have the exact same clawback thresholds. Why should seniors be called more than kids? Heck, should have the same payments too. If we had that principle, we'd be a lot more judicious on who qualified for both programs and how much they got. Pretty ridiculous that CCB starts getting clawed back at $37k and OAS only starts being clawed back at $91k. Nothing says more about our relative value of kids than that.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

Conservative ideology is that the market will drive productivity gains and QoL improvements, and government's role is to support that by getting "out of the way" of the free market and through other measures. Infrastructure supports productivity gains, and therefor is favored.

Yeah. But PP isn't much of a traditional conservative though. He's a career politician from the Reform wing.

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

When you look back through Federal (and provincial!) governments, it's actually been the liberal parties which typically are more prone to austerity in infrastructure. They prioritize social spending first most often, and are happy to let infrastructure spending stay flat or decline to enable that. The Wynne / McGuinty Liberals were emblematic of that - they promised big on infrastructure spending but trickled the actual dollar spending out to support social spending programs instead.

Good point. Exactly what the Federal Liberals have done. Probably because a substantial part of their backroom came from the Wynne/McGuinty crew.

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

The current Federal Liberals have ramped up infrastructure spending in a major way, particularly on public transit compared to the Harper government, but Harper had increased spending over the previous Liberal government too - including planning of major federal infrastructure projects like the Gordie Howe and Champlain Bridges.

I worked it out before. The increase from Harper to Trudeau wasn't that substantial. For most of the last decade it was a few hundred million more annually. And now we're going to $3B/yr. Add in inflation and population growth and it's not at all clear the real increase is very substantial.

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

What I do expect to see from a PP government is a shift of infrastructure spending back to roads. The Federal Liberals have given exceedingly little money to roads projects through their term beyond continuing projects already underway from the Harper government. I also don't expect him to significantly increase the "infrastructure pie" to support this, so wouldn't be surprised if overall spending on transit shrinks. We will also no longer see things like federal active transportation budgets, etc.

The Liberals did actually fund some road projects. They even backpedalled hard on Guilbault's comments. It's actually too bad. This was actually a reasonably principled thing to do. Why should the feds fund infrastructure that massively enables sprawl and creates massive maintenance liabilities for municipalities that they will then demand more funds to service. All for something the provinces and municipalities would do anyway. Transit is seen as optional. Roads are not. Conversely, the Liberals absolutely sucked on active transport infrastructure.

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

A large federal contribution to the 413? Absolutely. A large federal contribution to Ottawa LRT phase 3? maybe less so.

Would be ironic if the Prime Minister Poilievre denies funding for a major infrastructure project that benefits the riding represented by MP Poilievre. Ottawa will continue the tradition of electing leaders who do nothing for their own ridings. Like McGuinty.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

What is the precedent here? The majority of our elected representatives voted for this. Not recommending it doesn't feel too democratic. Worse than proroguing IMO.

The precedent would be that such motions are not binding.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

YOWetal is all about "austerity for thee, but not for me.". That's why he whines about CCB every chance he gets (no kids) and supports transit funding cuts (doesn't use transit), but is very grudging on OAS.

Personally, I say OAS and CCB should have the exact same clawback thresholds. Why should seniors be called more than kids? Heck, should have the same payments too. If we had that principle, we'd be a lot more judicious on who qualified for both programs and how much they got. Pretty ridiculous that CCB starts getting clawed back at $37k and OAS only starts being clawed back at $91k. Nothing says more about our relative value of kids than that.

Nah bruh you have me all wrong profile. I'm for transit expansion just not all day busses to every distant exurban granny. Rapid Transit sure.

As for OAS you are wrong and frankly I think we should phase it out over next 10 years though that is also genereationally unfair. My point on OAS is it's politically difficult to cut. CCB probably is too but old people pay more attention to these things and don't percieve any benefit from the economic renaissance that supposedly will come from balancing budget. There is also a lot less dincentive to work in OAS.

[casper]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

What is the precedent here? The majority of our elected representatives voted for this. Not recommending it doesn't feel too democratic. Worse than proroguing IMO.

I said, the Liberals should pass the bill. Let the conservative have what they have asked for and then when the conservatives are in power they can take the heat for clawing it all back.

That is perfectly consistent with democratic values. The Liberals can go on to say they may disagree but are going along with the majority of parliament.

[casper]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Nah bruh you have me all wrong profile. I'm for transit expansion just not all day busses to every distant exurban granny. Rapid Transit sure.

As for OAS you are wrong and frankly I think we should phase it out over next 10 years though that is also genereationally unfair. My point on OAS is it's politically difficult to cut. CCB probably is too but old people pay more attention to these things and don't percieve any benefit from the economic renaissance that supposedly will come from balancing budget. There is also a lot less dincentive to work in OAS.

I think we should de-index OAS, let inflation do the work after that. While at the same time we increase the GIS. GIS is significantly clawed back for those that don't need it.

[whatnext]

It's not just "students" flooding into Canada:

Canada is sleepwalking into a refugee crisis. We need to act now
Robyn Urback
Published Yesterday
For Subscribers

....It’s too late to fix the immigration disaster the Liberal government created (and yes, it’s one created amid warnings about housing pressures, about eroding public confidence in our vetting system, and about undermining the objectives of certain immigration streams. But the government can and should act to get ahead of the next phase of Canada’s immigration debacle.

It is plainly obvious that Canada is spiralling toward a full-blown refugee crisis. There are clear signs: the number of refugee claims by people arriving at airports exploded in recent years thanks to the government’s 2016 decision to waive the visa requirement for travellers from Mexico (which was reinstated earlier this year), along with the decision to scrap the requirement that travellers from certain regions have return tickets before arriving. In 2023, 41,350 asylum claims were made at air ports of entry; in 2016 that figure was 3,040 – an increase of over 1,200 per cent. In 2023, 25,236 Mexican nationals claimed asylum in Canada, compared with just 250 in 2016. As of June, 2024, there are 29,146 claims from Mexican nationals still waiting to be heard....

....But it’s not just at airports. Immigration Minister Marc Miller noted in a Global News interview last month that his department is observing an “alarming trend” of international students claiming asylum once in Canada: nearly 13,000 so far this year, according to data from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. It was a predictable response to the government’s sudden about-face on student visas; until this year, the government’s own literature and advertising implored would-be students to “Study, Explore, Work, and Stay.”....(bold mine)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opin...ed-to-act-now/

[P'tit Renard]

Originally Posted by whatnext

It is plainly obvious that Canada is spiralling toward a full-blown refugee crisis. There are clear signs: the number of refugee claims by people arriving at airports exploded in recent years thanks to the government’s 2016 decision to waive the visa requirement for travellers from Mexico (which was reinstated earlier this year), along with the decision to scrap the requirement that travellers from certain regions have return tickets before arriving. In 2023, 41,350 asylum claims were made at air ports of entry; in 2016 that figure was 3,040 – an increase of over 1,200 per cent. In 2023, 25,236 Mexican nationals claimed asylum in Canada, compared with just 250 in 2016. As of June, 2024, there are 29,146 claims from Mexican nationals still waiting to be heard....

Full data set here (to June 2024): https://www.irb-cisr.gc.ca/en/statis...DStat2024.aspx

India and Bangledash together have more than 30K pending cases.