Wednesday Evening Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Andre Picard writes about the unjustifiable limitations and inconsistencies in Canada's health care system:

Break your leg and the X-ray and cast will be covered, but you will need to pay for the crutches. Break your jaw and it will be wired at no cost; break your teeth and you will pay the dentist. Get cancer treatment at the hospital and there will be no charge; take the same oncology medication at home and you will pay dearly. Suffer from severe depression and your hospitalization will be covered, but psychological care and medications will not be covered by public insurance after you’re released. If you have diabetes and live in Quebec, many more of your drugs and supplies will be covered than in neighbouring New Brunswick. Need trauma care while visiting another province, and you could get stiffed with a big air ambulance bill. Live out your final days in a hospital and the state will pick up the tab, but do so in a nursing home and you will pay.

The list of inconsistencies and absurdities is a long one. Coverage often depends on where you live, where you work, your age – but more than anything, public coverage is limited by historical accident.
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The inconsistent coverage of mental health care (and psychological services in particular), home care and prescription drugs has been the subject of much debate, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

If we are going to have a semblance of a national health system across 13 provinces and territories – without forgetting the large federal health system – it’s important to have equitable (not equal) access for all Canadians. Yet, the variations in coverage between jurisdictions have never been more pronounced.

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Medicare cannot provide all care to all people at all times. We need to make tough choices on what is, and isn’t, in the medicare basket of services. We need to eliminate obsolete and wasteful practices, and embrace only new ones that are cost-effective.

We have the tools to do so. But good evidence isn’t enough. As the report notes, we need to “translate the language of science and evaluation into the language of decisions and public policy.”

- Jocelyn Timperley explores the long-term economic benefits of fighting climate change now, rather than having to answer for its effects later. And Merran Smith discusses the obvious risks of being left behind in a global transition to clean energy.

- Tammy Robert examines the Saskatchewan public's widespread recognition of the problem of climate change and willingness to help fight it - no matter how obstinately Scott Moe and the Saskatchewan Party try to stand in the way. And Jennifer Quesnel takes a look at the modest effect of an Alberta-style carbon tax even before accounting for rebates and investments from the new public revenue.

- Finally, Tom Parkin weighs in on the mirror-image cynicism of Doug Ford and Kathleen Wynne in Ontario's election campaign. And Donald Savoie discusses how Justin Trudeau is either taking Atlantic Canada for granted, or abandoning it altogether.

Shady dealings

A few notes on the equalization announcement yesterday by the federal and Nova Scotia Cons.

First, it's far from clear that the ultimate deal reflects any more generous offer by the federal government in order to get a deal done. Indeed, it was reported earlier this year that the federal offer at that time similarly contained no explicit downside while potentially offering an additional billion dollars over the life of the deal - double what the new deal apparently includes.

All along, the question was whether the federal government would actually stick to the deal offered by Harper. And from this angle, it still looks like MacDonald got the answer right the first time.

So what changed since the earlier offer? Obviously the federal Cons haven't done anything much to earn any additional trust in the meantime. But it seems entirely possible that MacDonald bought into the conventional wisdom (however flawed it may be) that with the Libs floundering, Harper's Cons will stay in power for some time to come - meaning that there was little prospect of a new federal government either offering a better deal, or overturning one agreed to by Harper.

Meanwhile, MacDonald likely recognized as well that the federal bargaining position wasn't about to change in his favour as long as Harper stayed in power. After all, the lone Con MP principled enough to stand up for his province had already been expelled, meaning that there was virtually no risk of in-caucus strife over the lack of a deal. Since Harper was obviously willing to pay the price in Nova Scotia seats for failing to keep the federal bargain before, there wasn't much reason to think that would change. And unlike Lorne Calvert, MacDonald hadn't shown any particular willingness to test the legal merits of his position.

As a result, MacDonald may have decided to simply take the best deal he could get on paper now in the hope that Harper (or a subsequent PM) would live up to it.

Based on the fact that the deal doesn't seem different from the previous federal offer, it's hard to give Harper much credit or blame for the fact that the deal happened. But the timing of the announcement has his fingerprints all over it.

In Atlantic Canada, the announcement figures to stop some of the bleeding following Danny Williams' successful anti-Harper campaign in Newfoundland and Labrador. (Though I have serious doubts that it'll actually improve the Cons' fortunes in Nova Scotia as some seem to think.)

And with a Saskatchewan election known to be in the cards, the deal also provides a signal to Brad Wall that Harper would very much like him to abandon any critical talk about the federal government in favour of a "Stephen Is My Sugar Daddy" strategy. Though I remain far from convinced that the result will be anything other than a backlash against both Wall and Harper.

What remains to be seen is whether MacDonald and Harper have calculated correctly in agreeing to the deal how and when they did. And it seems entirely possible that both minority governments will later regret their efforts to temporarily improve their standing now.

Political Sabermetrics II: Notes on Atlantic Canada

With the political scene quieting down for the summer, I'll be taking the opportunity to significantly bulk up my political sabermetrics series (with a little help from Elections Canada's financing database). For now, I'm only at the point of assembling the data needed for a more thorough analysis...but there are at least a few points worth noting based on the data from Atlantic Canada that I've put together so far.

- First, in what's both a cautionary note for the series generally and an important issue on its own, it seems that a surprising amount of candidate information isn't available on the Elections Canada reporting site. At least in the database I've worked from so far, data from the 2006 election is only available for roughly 1/2 to 2/3 of all candidates in each province I've looked at - which will leave plenty of holes in any attempt to connect funding to electoral results. And the issue doesn't seem to be one related to particular parties or candidate types: the missing information includes that from six sitting MPs representing all three national parties with a current place in Parliament. While some data may be missing, though, there's still more than enough to make for some interesting discussion.

- For example, the Atlantic award for Biggest Waste of Money goes to the Christian Heritage Party's Baird Judson, who managed to spend $5,346.77 in the Charlottetown riding to win a grand total of 97 votes. Despite his spending far more money than most small-party candidates, Judson's vote total was half the total of the Marijuana Party candidate in the riding, and indeed was the third-lowest of any candidate in the Atlantic provinces. The lowest vote total was that of Marxist-Leninist Charles Spurr in Dartmouth-Cole Harbour (56), with Labrador Green candidate Gail Zwicker not far behind at 82.

- But what about the Biggest Waste of Money, Substantial Political Party Division? Look no further than the Cons' Paul Francis, whose expenditures of 59,102.04 were the highest in Sackville-Eastern Shore. For that investment, Francis finished a distant third behind the NDP's Peter Stoffer (who cruised to victory with over 52% of the vote), as well as a Lib candidate who spent half as much as Francis.

- Leaving money out of the equation for a moment, the Greens did surprisingly poorly in terms of votes for a region where they seem to expect to elect their first-ever MP in the next general election. Despite the NDP's relatively weak presence in Newfoundland-Labrador and Prince Edward Island, the Greens didn't manage to beat out the NDP in a single Atlantic riding. And in two ridings, they dropped down to fifth place - falling behind the Christian Heritage Party's James Hnatiuk in South Shore-St. Margaret's, and independent Danny Gay in Miramichi.

- Meanwhile, the Greens' primary target riding looks to include one of the largest "could've beens" in the region. It's been often noted that the NDP's Alexis MacDonald finished a strong second behind Peter MacKay - but much less often discussed that MacDonald's campaign spent only $28,582.28, significantly less than a number of other NDP candidates who wound up with far less votes. I'll be hoping to learn more about the relationship between spending and political success as the series progresses, but it seems entirely possible that if MacDonald's campaign hadn't been outspent 2-to-1 by the Cons, MacKay wouldn't even be in Parliament to be considered Elizabeth May's preferred target.

- Finally, if you're looking for an incumbent who received a disturbingly easy ride, look no further than Con Greg Thompson in New Brunswick Southwest. Thompson only had to spend $32,170.17 to coast to victory with 54% of the vote - presumably thanks in large part to the fact that he faced both the worst-funded Lib in the whole region (Stan Smith at $21,541.46), and the worst-funded Dipper in the province (Andrew Graham at $3,438.46). This may offer an opportunity for any smaller party to win a disproportionate share of the vote by putting resources into a neglected riding - or it could be an aberration that other parties will make up for next time Canada goes to the polls.

There's plenty more to deal with even in the Atlantic region - and probably all the more to be discovered in the numbers across the country. And hopefully we'll be able to figure out both how political parties have chosen to spend their money in the past, and how they can do better with it in the future.