Hugh Mackenzie
Huntsville Doppler
It has been quite a month, both in terms of Canadian politics and world events. In Canada there has been much celebration over the election of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and he has been treated as some sort of a rock star at the various international events he has recently attended. Trudeaumania all over again! But at some point, the lights dim, the selfies become less important, the love affair with the media cools and in the cold light of dawn, tough decisions have to be faced.
In Canada, our political system encourages opposition. Accountability and critical comment are an important part of the democratic structure. When governments change, no matter the honeymoon, the critical become the criticized. It may take the media a while to catch up, but that is the way it works.
And so, while many Canadians continue to bask in the wake of Sunny Days and a new government, let’s step back and look at some of the cracks that are already appearing in the early days of Camelot.
During the election campaign, the Liberal Party, quite correctly treated the environment and climate change as a major priority. They dined out on it with many promises and in part, it helped them to be elected. Yet within days of gaining power, the Trudeau Government authorized the City of Montreal to dump eight billion litres of raw, untreated sewage into the St. Lawrence River. That river is an international waterway and some environmental critics have said that this dump was comparable, in terms of potential damage, to the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. In addition, it was disgusting, with pictures of used condoms and other unspeakable debris floating in what was once a majestic river.
There is no doubt that the sewage system in Montreal was and still is in crisis. That is because municipal officials, over a number of years, had ignored the problem. They should be held accountable for that, not rewarded by being allowed to pollute our environment. Apologists will say that the Trudeau Government had no choice. I harken back to those famous words uttered by Brian Mulroney in a debate with John Turner: “You had a choice, sir, you could have said no!” At least the oil spill in the Gulf was an accident. The Montreal dump was intentional. If the environment is really such a top priority for his government, Mr. Trudeau could simply have said “NO” and had his government work with the City of Montreal to find another solution to their sewage neglect. So much for environmental integrity.
Gender equality in Cabinet was another election promise made by Justin Trudeau. In appearance, it is a promise kept. In substance, it is a farce. It is accurate to say that the Prime Minister appointed an equal number of women and men to his Cabinet, but the equality stops there. While they may all have a seat at the cabinet table, they are not equal. No matter how you cut it, five women are junior ministers, who report to other ministers and are without departments of their own. Further, the two primary Cabinet Committees, where the most serious decisions affecting Canadians are hammered out, are dominated by men. This is not gender equality, this is window dressing and no one, especially women, should be fooled by it.
And then there is the issue of Her Majesty the Queen. Within days of every single member of Cabinet, including the Prime Minister, swearing an oath of loyalty to Queen Elizabeth, her portrait was unceremoniously removed from a place of honour in the Foreign Affairs building, a landmark in Ottawa. Now I know that there are mixed feelings about the monarchy in Canada, especially in Quebec. But to me, this was done with unseemly haste and hopefully with little thought. The new Minister of Foreign Affairs, or whatever they call it now, himself a Quebecer, removed the Queen’s portrait in one of his first moves, and replaced it with art that was previously hung there, by a Quebec artist. Under these circumstances, one cannot help but wonder what the message is here and to whom it is directed. Quebec?
Finally, during the election campaign, Justin Trudeau promised Canadians he would listen to them. His position was clear. In his view, Prime Minister Harper did not listen to Canadians but he would.
Prime Minister Trudeau has promised to bring 25,000 refugees, from the war torn Middle East to Canada. Most Canadians, including this one, agree with that goal. It is the right thing to do. However, Mr. Trudeau has also pledged to complete this transition by the end of next month and in light of events in Paris and elsewhere since the election, many Canadians have become cautious about that. ISIS has boasted about using the refugee surge to infiltrate terrorists into western countries. There is no doubt that countries including Canada are under threat.
If the Prime Minister really wants to listen to Canadians, he should read the polls that have been taken in the last week or so. It clearly shows that Canadians now want to balance compassion with caution. They want the refugees here as quickly as possible but they also want assurances that their safety is not compromised. That is why the majority of Canadians along with almost every professional involved in the immigration process are in favour of Mr. Trudeau pushing back his self-imposed deadline of December 31st. There is no shame in doing so. Circumstances have changed since the election. The question now is whether the Prime Minister will do what he said he would do and listen to Canadians, or will he just play ‘Father Knows Best’ and push ahead, simply because he can? It is a moment of truth.
AND A WORD ABOUT RACISM
In a world that is changing and under constant threat, it is one thing to be cautious and concerned about security. It is quite another thing to be racist and to paint people who don’t deserve it with the same brush that we paint people who do. Attacks on people in Toronto, simply because they are Muslim are unacceptable. Destruction of a Mosque in Peterborough as revenge for other people’s actions is not the Canadian way. And ludicrous suggestions from the Trumps of this world to track all Muslims on a database are reminiscent of the worst of times past. It has been sad to see signs of racism here and abroad, raise its ugly head in recent weeks. There is no excuse for it. It should not be tolerated. The bad guys win when we do.
Hugh Mackenzie
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Karen Cassin, when I first started to read your post I was thinking you were using sarcasm, but that wasn’t the case, is it ?
I would think the world in general must be shaking their heads at Canada’s new leader, granted his fixation on himself and selfies is laughable and amusing to say the least, but not portraying much dignity from a head of state.
As far as respecting the press, maybe, but he also avoids answering questions like Wynne, perhaps that is because he is new and really hasn’t given issues much thought, or someone hasn’t instructed him what to say.
Regarding the refugee situation, two additional months, that is such a long time, I personally doubt it had anything to do with what an overwhelming part of the population wanted and more to do with the time line was just too short to handle what he committed to in the election campaign.
I am very happy to see someone can’t wait to see what he is going to next, personally I and the people around me are quite worried with what he will do next. So far our new P.M. seems exceptionally good at spending money, like his mentor Ms. Wynne, and has shown an exceptional ability to raise our cost of living with the new carbon tax which is exactly what it is, another new tax.
Anyone that would agree to dumping millions of litres of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence River surely can’t be a champion of the environment but rather someone who makes knee jerk reactions without putting thought into what the world will think of our country and government.
If the new P.M. was correct with his statement “the budget will balance itself” we are in for good times, if not we are headed for a disaster, something like when his dad came into power, Canada had a very large surplus, when he left we had a huge deficit.
I am glad you are so happy with the new P.M., 60% of us didn’t vote for him, and many that did are having second thoughts, but time will tell.
The Cons ad about him not being ready appears to have been optimistic, it should have said just not capable.
As Ms. Wynne has proven in Ontario, budgets don’t balance themselves, and when you sell off part of Ontario Hydro and put the money that was to go toward infrastructure toward making it appear they have cut spending that’s just wrong.
Canada is bleeding jobs in Alberta due to oil prices, in Ontario it’s due to hydro rates in the manufacturing industry, the new Carbon Tax should pretty well finish the economy off. Everyone can’t have a high paying jobs, but low paying jobs don’t drive the economy, they pay little in taxes and still qualify for some hand outs, which is fine, but with oil prices being what they are and higher paying manufacturing jobs leaving Ontario due to electricity rates being the highest in North America it might be a good idea to stay out of debt instead of going deeper in debt.
Unless of course budgets really do balance themselves and there is a Santa Claus.
I am enjoying watching Trudeau, slowly and with care, deliver on his campaign promises. He is already changing the global view of Canada on the world stage, has unmuzzled scientists and cabinet ministers, is discussing a National strategy on climate change with provincial premiers and is encouraging his cabinet to respect the Press. He has done all of this in a very short time. He has listened to Canadians and delayed bringing all of the 25,000 refugees here by the end of December to ensure that they are properly vetted with a number of security checks. I can’t wait to see what he does once he finishes fixing everything that Harper did to make this country into one that we didn’t recognize anymore.
Thank you for taking the time to respond to Hugh’s tirade. Yes we are used to opposition in Canada but we have become so entrenched in our political ideology that some oppose for the sake of opposing. Hugh is nothing if not Conservative.
I can only echo Mr. Boyes’ comments. While unfortunate, the sewage dump represented < 0.01% of the receiving body. I cannot see another more acceptable solution: simply let it overflow, and affect air quality as well.
Regarding the environment, the Trudeau government has already done more than the Harper government did in its long tenure. In fact, Mr. Harper continued to deny the existence of global warming right up to his most welcome defeat.
With respect to the Syrian refugees, we had assurances that they were being processed diligently security-wise initially: in the wake of the Paris disaster, this security process has been increased many fold. It is most interesting to note that Canada traditionally welcomes approximately 250,000 refugees a year; and that not one has ever been involved in terrorist activities.
Perhaps, in the future, when you feature an op-ed piece from a staunch Tory like Mr. Mackenzie, you could include an opposing point of view from a knowledgeable Liberal. That is, unless "The Doppler" is already declaring its political partiality in a blatant attempt to curry favour with the majority of its viewers/readers.
/readers.
I would have to say that this is an irrisistable opportunity to comment and that Holland and and Davis have only added to this.
I’ll content myself with a comment on the decision to approve the Montreal sewage dumping of 8 billion liters of the stuff into the St Lawrence. I have little doubt that all the visable junk was suitably disappeared at large public
expense if it clung to any rock along the shore and that the affected communities along the down stream shores added a bit of extra chlorine to their drinking water intake. Such is life. A moving water body the size of the St Lawrence would dilute and otherwise deal with a one time event such as this with ease. Not that it is a desireable thing to do but there it is.
The fact is that if Montreal’s big sewage dump had been prohibited by the Feds there would have to have been a huge Federal contribution to some very costly alternative peoject if in fact an alternative were available. The production of sewage in a large city is inexorable and if you are in a hole downstream trying to build an improvement to the system, sewage pouring onto your head can be tres inconvenient. So a temporary diversion was required. It had to go down hill and the river was at the bottom.
( things being what they are, I have no doubt that the Feds ( you and I ) contributed handsomely as it was. Merci bien! ).
While it may seem surprising, there must have been a cost/benifit analysis done and the dumping was judged to be the best alternative…..by both (liberal) levels of government.
This seems to me to be a good thing.
The media have admitedly had some distractions recently but they have whistled past this major environmental issue with oplomb. No beluga whales rolling belly-up at the Sageunay that I have read about. Can’t help wondering how it would have been handled if two conservative governments had been involved. We can expect much more of this sort of reporting in the future.
With respect to Hugh’s contention that things have changed since the election I would assert that they have, but only in so far as the public and the media have lately become focused on the realities of the world. This is to say that with the Paris attrocities certain realities have become inescapable and have caused much soul searching and challenging of entrenched, idealistic , hugely dilusionional and complacent public attitudes.
Canadians must now confront realities which most have chosen to ignore and must now, along with Europeans, deal with life-style threatening chalenges. If these are not handled well our children and certainly our grandchildren will pay a heavy price. I fear most Canadians, especialy in small-town Canada, have no idea how costly it will be.
Jim Boyes
Hugh your comments are well researched and spot on. When first forming a government it is important to put the best prepared and knowledgeable people in the most important Cabinet Positions regardless of gender. The real indicator of his gender equality promise will come with his first Cabinet shuffle. Will the junior ministers receive proper instruction and opportunities to hone their skills preparing them for promotion. Let’s hope this happens.
Our new government was elected after promising to solve a long list of difficult problems. We now have a group of very bright and enthusiastic young people in charge that are tripping over themselves trying to get everything done in the first month. No-one expects them to do that, especially when circumstances change dramatically as they have done. Hopefully they will learn that enthusiasm by itself is not enough.
In addition to Hugh’s list, rookie transport minister Marc Garneau scrapped the proposal to extend the Toronto Island airport before hearing the $4 million consultant’s report commissioned by Toronto City Council. And he imposed a moratorium on west coast oil tankers ignoring the report of the National Energy Board’s distinguished scientists and business people. Those may very well be the right decisions. But what happened to the promise to listen to Canadians and to make decisions based on facts and science? Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan is emerging as one of the more sensible Ministers. He says he is not ruling out the F-35 jet fighter program until he sees more information.