Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Stuart Trew fleshes out the Cons' new(-ly explicit) Corporate Cronies Action Plan - and it goes even further in entrenching corporate control over policy than one might have expected at first glance:

- The makeup of the advisory panel that consulted with Trade Minister Fast skews the new Action Plan in favour energy- and water-intensive agricultural export sectors, multinational business represented by the CCCE, and the energy sector. There was no worker representation on the advisory committee. And the involvement of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business is arguably more of a cover for Harper than a sign that Canada's trade policy is designed to help small- and medium-sized companies the most. The Action Plan says SMEs are the "backbone" of the Canadian economy and yet only 41,000 of 1.09 million companies are engaged in external trade. That is a very domestically oriented backbone.

- This corporate advisory committee will become, under the Action Plan, a permanent "advisory council" that "will include two standing subcommittees, one on emerging markets and the other on established markets. Comprising business and industry leaders, experts in international business and key representatives from the SME community, the subcommittees will bring together the voices of all businesses, big and small. They will provide strategic insight, advice and real-world perspectives on how to keep the market access plans relevant to Canadian business needs." Will the meetings be private, like Minister Flaherty's corporate summer retreats in Wakefield? The advisory council meetings were (see below).

- The government-business merger will work both ways. The Harper government will place "embedded Government of Canada personnel within key industry associations in order to gain better insight into sectoral needs and ensure these are reflected in services provided." Why spend money to hire a lobbyist in Ottawa when you can have the government spending the public's money to attending your meetings?

- Meanwhile, CBC reports that the Cons are breaking yet another promise to regulate oil-sector greenhouse gas emissions. And the most they've learned after constantly scrapping their promised timelines is not to bother offering any more commitments.

- David Climenhaga writes that Alison Redford's PCs are attacking precisely the voters who allowed them to hold onto power by imposing draconian wage freezes on public-sector workers. But I'm not sure it's fair to be surprised that an anti-social party is imposing anti-social policy - and indeed the more important lesson may be one about the dangers of settling for a "lesser of the evils" government which will gleefully turn against workers when it sees an opportunity to do so.

- The Star again laments Canada's utter failure to live up to its 1989 commitment to end child poverty, while Carol Goar similarly criticizes the right's attacks on unemployment benefits. And Tim Harford recognizes the case for a guaranteed annual income - which would go a long way toward ending poverty in general.

- Finally, Keith Reynolds discusses what happens when P3s and offshore tax avoidance intersect - with a B.C. hospital serving as a clear example:

Partnerships BC considers the taxes paid by the private P3 partner when it is deciding whether or not to choose the public-private partnership method of project development. Partnerships BC claims these private sector taxes as an advantage of P3s, but what happens if the project is moved to a tax haven and taxes paid decline dramatically?
...
So how is B.C. reacting to this? What are they doing about the possibility the tax revenues they projected from P3s are disappearing into tax havens like Luxembourg? As it turns out, absolutely nothing. An earlier blog post found the Ministry of Finance in response to a Freedom of Information request asking about the impact of tax havens and P3s said "although a thorough search was conducted, no responsive records were located. Your file is now closed."

Partnerships BC provided 75 pages of material in response to the same request. None of it dealt with the tax impact to government if a project moved to a tax haven.

Now one more B.C. public-private partnership has seen its ownership move to Luxembourg. What is the cost to taxpayers? Nobody knows and the results from FOI requests suggest the government isn't looking.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content for your Friday reading.

- Michael Harris tears into the Harper Cons for their compulsive dishonesty:

Everything in the Westminster model under which we are supposed to operate depends on information, debate and verification — all of which are missing in ‘Harperland’, to use Lawrence Martin’s ringing coinage. Also missing is that high bar of behaviour known as being an “Honourable Gentleman”.

One of the few federal bureaucrats who stood up to Harper’s cult-conservatism was the lately-departed chief of the PBO, Kevin Page. He regularly challenged the phoney books and unsupported policy of this catch-us-if-you-can government — and oh, how they came to hate him for it.

Stephen Harper, Peter MacKay and countless party bobbleheads who BS for a living on TV were caught dead to rights falsifying the cost of the F-35 fighter jet — once by Page, and then again by the auditors at KPMG.

Their response? Lie some more. The Tories crowed that the KPMG audit ‘vindicated’ their numbers. Yes, just as a conviction for violating the Elections Act was a ‘victory.’ Just as another judge confirming that there was fraud in the last federal election was “vindication”, even though the judge also said the culprit likely used the Conservative Party of Canada’s own database to perpetrate that fraud. Two plus two is five.

...
And here is what sits behind all the sneakiness, lies, and prevarications. Stephen Harper wants to deconstruct the country as we know it much faster than he is able to persuade Canadians to follow him. So he has to control information, stifle politicians and the press, and reduce the national debate to the hollow dictates and studied evasions coming out of the PMO. He can’t reveal his intentions because if he did, he would not be electable.

- Meanwhile, Peter O'Neil reports that the Cons have officially shed any of their past claims to be interested in grassroots democracy, as they plan to fight Kennedy Stewart's online petition proposal tooth and nail rather than allowing for even the slightest direct citizen involvement in shaping parliamentary debates. 

- Nathan Vanderklippe reports on the devastating Apache contaminated water spill in northern Alberta. Mike Hudema details the Redford government's attempt to cover up the spill, while the Star-Phoenix rightly notes that the lies and cover-ups that have become standard operating procedure for both the oil industry and its pet governments offer nothing but reason for suspicion about the health and safety implications of new projects.

- While plenty of others have already made the case to integrate prescription drugs into the set of services covered by our universal health care system, it's a noteworthy step that even the C.D. Howe Institute is now on board. 

- Finally, Dean Baker takes a close look at the U.S.' Social Security as a case in point signalling the futility of means-testing social programs:

Of course you could start the phase out a higher income level (like $50,000 per person) and have it at a more reasonable rate (e.g. 10-20 percent), but then you find that you don't save the program much money. In our paper we found that the savings, net of tax, for a 20 percent phase out starting at person incomes of $40,000 would save around 3 percent of benefits. If it was started at a person income of $100k it would save around 0.6 percent of benefits. These numbers give a much more realistic idea of how much can be saved with means-testing. See how much fun math can be?

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Linda McQuaig discusses Stephen Harper's class war:

Canadians don’t like Harper’s anti-worker agenda — when they notice it. That’s why there’s been such a public outcry since the temporary foreign worker program was exposed as a mechanism by which the Harper government has flooded the country with hundreds of thousands of cheap foreign workers, thereby suppressing Canadian wages in the interests of helping corporations.

Apart from this clumsy fiasco, the Harperites have been adroit at keeping their anti-worker bias under the radar. Instead, they’ve directed their attacks against unions, portraying them as undemocratic organizations run by “union bosses” who ignore the interests of ordinary workers.

It’s revealing that this harsh critique of unions largely comes from business think-tanks and conservative politicians — folks who aren’t generally known for championing workers’ rights but who apparently can’t sleep at night at the thought workers aren’t being well represented by the people they elect to run their unions.

Of course, the real reason Harper attacks unions is because they’ve been effective in promoting the interests of working people over the past century. By establishing norms for higher wages and benefits in the workplace, and by pushing governments to implement universal social programs, unions are largely the reason we have a middle class in this country.

- Meanwhile, Carol Goar laments that Ontario's Wynne Libs chose not to make a meaningful effort to cut down on poverty. And Dr. Dawg documents the federal Libs' latest attempt to be indistinguishable from the Harper Cons.

- In the latest in conservative transparency, Alison Redford is covering up her own government's pipeline safety report - presumably to avoid the possibility that its conclusions might get noticed in the review processes for new pipelines. Michael Harris discusses the Cons' strategy of blaming their own scandals on unnamed bureaucrats (who are of course prevented from defending themselves with the truth). And the Star finds that the federal government won't answer questions about $2.4 billion in consulting contracts - while contracts ranging up to nine figures seem to have bought the public little more than the contractor's silence:

(S)everal departments and agencies refused to say what services they bought as part of the roughly $700 million in taxpayer money they spent on management consulting.

Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC), in charge of delivering social programs and services, has billed more than $420 million since 2004.

One of the department’s most recognizable divisions, Service Canada, has spent another $129 million for management consulting — more than 70 per cent of which was given to a single recruitment company, according to the government’s contract records.

What consulting work was done for all that money? A spokeswoman with HRSDC refused to say.

The company, Quantum Management Services, was just as tight-lipped.

“I’m not going to answer your questions,” said Anne Cote, a vice-president in the company’s Ottawa office. 

- Fortunately, at least some individuals are working to shed lights on the increasingly-hidden operations of our state and corporate sectors. And Dennis Gruending highlights a few of the examples noted by the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression.

- Finally, Joe Bower discusses the effect of standardized testing in Alberta - which has enabled the Fraser Institute to take pot-shots at a school for student parents based on its failure to be sufficiently choosy in recruiting pupils.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content for your Friday reading.

- Zoe Williams questions when being poor became grounds for deliberate discrimination and ritual public humiliation (h/t to Mound of Sound):

What I cannot help noticing is a failure of normal human respect for the people at the bottom of the heap – Tuesday's ruling in favour of Cait Reilly and Jamieson Wilson has had its bones picked over for what it does or doesn't say about slavery, and yet the judges were clear: these people were treated dishonestly. They were treated as though, being unemployed, they could be parcelled about at the whim of the secretary of state.

A similar belief pervades the suggestion that those on benefits need to be ritually humiliated every time they go into a shop; or those on low wages, by dint of their low status, need to be monitored like criminals. Across the piece, having a low financial status is now elided, by politicians and by corporations, with being untrustworthy. 

- Meanwhile, Claire Davenport writes that gratuitous austerity is pushing an entire generation of European citizens toward economic ruin. And Yves Smith discusses how inequality has continued to grow since the 2008-2009 crash - with the top 1% taking massive income gains while the bottom 99% have actually lost ground.

- David Climenhaga points out that Alberta's latest budget only confirms what Stephen Harper, Brad Wall and other spokesflacks for the tar sands have tried to deny: both overdependence on resource royalties and a petrodollar have negative impacts for the province's finances. But Climenhaga is even more in point in recognizing how Alison Redford's "bitumen bubble" complaint seems calculated to distract Albertans from the massive social problems being blithely ignored - including the wealthiest city in Canada slashing school service for lack of funding, and refugee-camp conditions in the province's capital.

- Which isn't to say Alberta is alone in its utterly warped priorities: Simon Enoch writes about the City of Regina's obsession with costly P3 projects, while Brian Banks and Paul Gingrich observe that a Sask Party promise to address poverty has produced no substantive plan.

- Finally, Sid Ryan explains why the Cons are so determined to attack union finances:

In his decision, Rand explained that unions also need adequate resources in order to "redress the balance of what is called social justice." This is because, then as now, corporations have all the power in a workplace -- they can hire, fire, discipline and discharge any individual employee. Workers only have leverage if they work together and they should always have the right to do so.

This bargaining table principle applies equally to the halls of government. Concerned about Canada's growing inequality, individual workers recognize the need to work together to counteract well-heeled corporate lobbyists and convince politicians of every stripe to promote the livelihoods of working people and their families. For that reason, workers have increasingly given their unions a mandate to launch campaigns to defend public services, good jobs, the environment, and many other public priorities.

However, when it comes to influencing public policy, workers are again at a great disadvantage. In stark contrast to the paltry five per cent of election financing that came from unions between 2004 and 2011, corporate Canada contributed a whopping 40 percent of all election funds, including $26 million to the Conservative Party.

And what did Canada's corporate elite get in exchange for their generous support for the Harper government? Well, among other things, the passage of a new law allowing employers to pay migrant workers 15 per cent less than the going rate and another forcing employment insurance claimants to compete for lower wages.

It is no wonder that working people across the country are working together to stop Canada's race to the bottom. For every worker in Canada, the Rand Formula is the basis of their democratic rights and promotes fairness in their workplaces. As much as Tories may try to dress up their anti-worker policies as "freedom of choice," they are only offering Canadian workers one choice: lower wages.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Erika Shaker points out how Quebec's student protests are a natural and justified reaction to the policy choice to saddle young workers with debt:

(T)he effects of student debt are not exactly “character building”. Postponement of owning a home or starting a family. Fewer assets. Having to settle for temporary, insecure and part-time jobs that often become long-term while trying to pay off loans and living in your parent’s basement. Graduates are finding themselves taking jobs—any job—regardless of how well-suited it is, or whether they have a future in this line of work, or whether they want it…or just desperately need the paycheque.

Youth is a life stage characterized by economic dependence and this can be maintained or changed at the cultural and political level. But the collective impact of growing personal debt, cuts to public services, governments wedded to self-amputation, growing inequality, and a precarious labour market with a youth unemployment rate of more than 20% has extended this stage of dependence. It’s a one-two punch: governments are reinforcing the economic instability that restricts authentic choices for youth for longer periods of time, and media punditry blames youth for not being more economically independent.
...
(W)hen we vilify people for wanting something better than what they’re told is their lot in life, we condemn us all to social regression. We can only make gains when we are prepared to fight for improvements that we may never personally enjoy—but our kids will. Or our grandkids. Or someone else’s kids. Which is why the argument that “others have it worse, so what right do you have to complain?” is the ultimate red herring.

- Thomas Walkom rightly notes that Stephen Harper figures to use any new global economic downturn to do what he tried to do last time: slashing jobs and social programs even further at a time when economic growth is most needed. And Harper's refusal to answer questions about his plans only looks to confirm that expectation.

- Nanos is the latest pollster to confirm that the NDP and Thomas Mulcair are both still on the upswing as the debate over polluter-pay continues to play out - even as so many pundits have proclaimed that Mulcair would have no choice but to back down on any interest in environmental responsibility.

- Meanwhile, Don Lenihan raises one noteworthy question about the relationship between the federal and provincial governments: namely, is Harper even pretending that his role involves anything other than being a fully-owned subsidiary of the Alberta oil industry (leaving Alison Redford to play prime minister)?

- Finally, as much as I tend to disagree with Michael Taube on policy issues, I'll give him full credit for being a rare conservative willing to call for smarter and better-informed politics.

New column day

Here, expanding on this post as to the importance of a functioning federal system as a means of counterbalancing regional declines - and the forces working to limit anything of the sort in Canada.

For further reading...
- Frances Russell also laments the Harper firewall model based on the need for national-level planning and coordination.
- Pat Atkinson notes that Alison Redford's goal of a national energy strategy serves as an ideal case in point.
- Finally, the Florida vs. Spain comparison is drawn from here. And for some bonus Krugman...

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Yesterday's Alberta election certainly proved somewhat of a shocker - producing about the best possible result short of a minority scenario that would have allowed the NDP to exercise the balance of power, as the slightly-less-right party won even as its most notorious ideologue went down in flames. But I'd still think it's a wide open question as to whether the PCs will actually govern consistently with the wishes of the progressive voters who offered strategic support (as suggested by Sheila Pratt), or whether they'll instead veer right in order to win back some of the mass of Wildrose voters - meaning that even a majority government provides virtually no certainty as to what comes next.

- Keith Beardsley points out a massive opening for the NDP to make ethics and accountability into a decisive issue in the next federal election, while Lawrence Martin has some suggestions as to reach that result. Meanwhile, a new CROP poll shows the NDP with a commanding lead in Quebec.

- Brian Topp is back writing for the Globe and Mail online after the NDP's leadership campaign - and his take on the first phase of France's presidential election is well worth a read.

- Finally, Stephen Gordon breaks down the types of taxes collected by the OECD countries.

Compare and contrast

One Western premier has some perspective on what a provincial leader can expect to accomplish on the global stage:

She regretted, but didn't condemn, the Obama administration's decision to delay approval of the mega-project until after 2013. And she displayed refreshing humility about her own power to change minds in Washington.

"To presume that somehow the premier of Alberta could come into this city and absolutely change the course of an independent regulatory process that's conducted over six government departments is a little too rich for me," she said. A welcome show of honesty, after decades of various federal and provincial blowhards going south to wave their tiny fists.

Needless to say, Saskatchewan's premier is rather in the latter category.