With the United Nations poised to announce whether the vote on non-permanent Security Council seats will go ahead as scheduled in June, Canada is doubling down on its bid for a seat — and adjusting its pitch to take the COVID-19 crisis into account.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s week-long trip in February to woo African countries for their votes is now a distant memory, as is his cancelled plan to attend the CARICOM summit in Barbados that same month. But the pandemic and the subsequent global economic shutdown have not slowed down Canada’s efforts to secure a seat at the UN table.
The bid instead has been redirected toward organizing or chairing virtual global conferences the Trudeau government sees as demonstrating Canada’s global leadership in a way that could win more votes.
“The best campaign is when we don’t need to campaign, when we just show our leadership, that this is the type of voice that you would want at the Security Council,” Foreign Affairs Minister François-Philippe Champagne told CBC News.
A close contest
Canada is in a tight fight with Norway and Ireland for the two non-permanent seats out of 10 on the 15-member council that are reserved for Western countries.
Most experts think Norway has a lock on one of those seats, leaving Ireland and Canada to duke it out for the other one (even though Canada entered the race late).
But the Liberal government now sees an opportunity. Champagne said he believes Canada’s international standing has grown in 2020, and not only because of its response to the pandemic. The minister also is banking on a boosted profile because of Canada’s role in coordinating efforts to investigate the destruction of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, which was shot down over Iran in January, killing all 176 passengers and crew.
Champagne points to the fact Canada is a member of both the G7 and G20, unlike its competitors, and argues that status allows the government to bring other leaders together and “amplify the voice of other nations” that are more vulnerable in the current health crisis.
And the pandemic itself also could cut the cost of Canada’s campaign for a Security Council seat, which already has set the government back $2 million.
“We do a lot of things virtually these days, so it allows us to reach more people without having to go very far,” Champagne said.
Critics were questioning the Trudeau government’s Security Council campaign even before the global pandemic upended government agendas around the world. Now, the government is saying Canada needs to be at the big table to have a say in how the world recovers from the pandemic — even though the Security Council has been relatively silent on the crisis to date.
It’s still a long shot
“It’s also in our very selfish national interests that the recovery in other parts of the world is as strong as possible,” said Canada’s Ambassador to the United Nations Marc-André Blanchard, who has been working behind the scenes on the campaign.
“This is a table where the entire world wants to be, because when you’re around that table you’re more influential and you’re more relevant.”
Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations Marc-André Blanchard looks on as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (not pictured) takes part in a Q&A session at Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar, Senegal Feb. 13, 2020. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)
Still, the factors that made Canada’s bid look like a long shot before the pandemic arrived are still in play: a faltering peacekeeping commitment and relatively low foreign aid commitments.
“Ireland has been peacekeeping since 1958. It’s never stopped,” said Stephen Lewis, a former Canadian ambassador to the UN who is closely following the race.
“Our failure on that front is our most serious Achilles heel in seeking the seat.”
The pandemic has allowed Canada to boost its presence on the international stage. Trudeau participated Monday in an online pledging conference to raise funds for vaccine development, spearheaded by the European Union. While Norway’s Prime Minister Erna Solberg pledged more than $1 billion US for vaccine development and eventual distribution, Trudeau pointed to $850 million Cdn Canada already had committed to accelerated vaccine development.
That $850 million includes $74 million that’s part of the $159.5 million foreign aid package Canada’s international development minister announced in April. Ottawa says it’s only a beginning.
“This takes a global effort,” Trudeau said Monday at his daily briefing. “There will be more to come as the world grapples with this pandemic.”
Rhetoric vs. reality
Still, Lewis said Canada’s international funding commitment maintains the same level of aid Canada has always offered, and the Liberal government needs to work harder to match its “rhetoric with performance,” particularly when it comes to the pandemic.
Canada gives about 0.26 per cent of its GDP in foreign aid. Norway, the world’s most generous donor, gives 1 per cent of its GDP.
The old way of winning a Security Council seat — having the prime minister or other high-profile ministers show up in foreign capitals to schmooze — is “a bit of a sham,” said Lewis. The vote is a secret ballot and the ambassadors who cast the votes don’t always follow orders from the top.
Lewis said the popularity of Canada’s ambassador could tip the scales, however.
“Marc-André Blanchard is the real key to this [campaign],” he said. “He’s really first-rate and that does not happen often.”
Global Affairs Canada is campaigning as though the vote will go ahead on June 17, but there is pressure from some nations to postpone it until the fall, given the logistics involved in having 193 representatives of member states vote online.
CALGARY – MEG Energy says it earned $167 million in its third quarter, down from $249 million during the same quarter last year.
The company says revenues for the quarter were $1.27 billion, down from $1.44 billion during the third quarter of 2023.
Diluted earnings per share were 62 cents, down from 86 cents a year earlier.
MEG Energy says it successfully completed its debt reduction strategy, reducing its net debt to US$478 million by the end of September, down from US$634 million during the prior quarter.
President and CEO Darlene Gates said moving forward all the company’s free cash flow will be returned to shareholders through expanded share buybacks and a quarterly base dividend.
The company says its capital expenditures for the quarter increased to $141 million from $83 million a year earlier, mainly due to higher planned field development activity, as well as moderate capacity growth projects.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
Premier David Eby is proposing an all-party committee investigate mistakes made during the British Columbia election vote tally, including an uncounted ballot box and unreported votes in three-quarters of the province’s 93 ridings.
The proposal comes after B.C.’s chief electoral officer blamed extreme weather, long working hours and a new voting system for human errors behind the mistakes in last month’s count, though none were large enough to change the initial results.
Anton Boegman says the agency is already investigating the mistakes to “identify key lessons learned” to improve training, change processes or make recommendations for legislative change.
He says the uncounted ballot box containing about 861 votes in Prince George-Mackenzie was never lost, and was always securely in the custody of election officials.
Boegman says a failure in five districts to properly report a small number of out-of-district votes, meanwhile, rippled through to the counts in 69 ridings.
Eby says the NDP will propose that a committee examine the systems used and steps taken by Elections BC, then recommend improvements in future elections.
“I look forward to working with all MLAs to uphold our shared commitment to free and fair elections, the foundation of our democracy,” he said in a statement Tuesday, after a news conference by Boegman.
Boegman said if an independent review does occur, “Elections BC will, of course, fully participate in that process.”
He said the mistakes came to light when a “discrepancy” of 14 votes was noticed in the riding of Surrey-Guildford, spurring a review that increased the number of unreported votes there to 28.
Surrey-Guildford was the closest race in the election and the NDP victory there gave Eby a one-seat majority. The discovery reduced the NDP’s victory margin from 27 to 21, pending the outcome of a judicial review that was previously triggered because the race was so close.
The mistakes in Surrey-Guildford resulted in a provincewide audit that found the other errors, Boegman said.
“These mistakes were a result of human error. Our elections rely on the work of over 17,000 election officials from communities across the province,” he said.
“Election officials were working 14 hours or more on voting days and on final voting day in particular faced extremely challenging weather conditions in many parts of the province.
“These conditions likely contributed to these mistakes,” he said.
B.C.’s “vote anywhere” model also played a role in the errors, said Boegman, who said he had issued an order to correct the results in the affected ridings.
Boegman said the uncounted Prince George-Mackenzie ballot box was used on the first day of advance voting. Election officials later discovered a vote hadn’t been tabulated, so they retabulated the ballots but mistakenly omitted the box of first-day votes, only including ballots from the second day.
Boegman said the issues discovered in the provincewide audit will be “fully documented” in his report to the legislature on the provincial election, the first held using electronic tabulators.
He said he was confident election officials found all “anomalies.”
B.C. Conservative Party Leader John Rustad had said on Monday that the errors were “an unprecedented failure by the very institution responsible for ensuring the fairness and accuracy of our elections.”
Rustad said he was not disputing the outcomes as judicial recounts continue, but said “it’s clear that mistakes like these severely undermine public trust in our electoral process.”
Rustad called for an “independent review” to make sure the errors never happen again.
Boegman, who said the election required fewer than half the number of workers under the old paper-based system, said results for the election would be returned in 90 of the province’s 93 ridings on Tuesday.
Full judicial recounts will be held in Surrey-Guildford and Kelowna-Centre, while a partial recount of the uncounted box will take place in Prince George-Mackenzie.
Boegman said out-of-district voting had been a part of B.C.’s elections for many decades, and explained how thousands of voters utilized the province’s vote-by-phone system, calling it a “very secure model” for people with disabilities.
“I think this is a unique and very important part of our elections, providing accessibility to British Columbians,” he said. “They have unparalleled access to the ballot box that is not found in other jurisdictions in Canada.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
WINNIPEG – A public memorial honouring former judge, senator and chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission into residential schools, Murray Sinclair, is set to take place in Winnipeg on Sunday.
The event, which is being organized by the federal and Manitoba governments, will be at Canada Life Centre, home of the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets.
Sinclair died Monday in a Winnipeg hospital at the age of 73.
A teepee and a sacred fire were set up outside the Manitoba legislature for people to pay their respects hours after news of his death became public. The province has said it will remain open to the public until Sinclair’s funeral.
Sinclair’s family continues to invite people to visit the sacred fire and offer tobacco.
The family thanked the public for sharing words of love and support as tributes poured in this week.
“The significance of Mazina Giizhik’s (the One Who Speaks of Pictures in the Sky) impact and reach cannot be overstated,” the family said in a statement on Tuesday, noting Sinclair’s traditional Anishinaabe name.
“He touched many lives and impacted thousands of people.”
They encourage the public to celebrate his life and journey home.
A visitation for extended family, friends and community is also scheduled to take place Wednesday morning.
Leaders from across Canada shared their memories of Sinclair.
Premier Wab Kinew called Sinclair one of the key architects of the era of reconciliation.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Sinclair was a teacher, a guide and a friend who helped the country navigate tough realities.
Sinclair was the first Indigenous judge in Manitoba — the second in Canada.
He served as co-chair of the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry of Manitoba to examine whether the justice system was failing Indigenous people after the murder of Helen Betty Osborne and the police shooting death of First Nations leader J.J. Harper.
In leading the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, he participated in hundreds of hearings across Canada and heard testimony from thousands of residential school survivors.
The commissioners released their widely influential final report in 2015, which described what took place at the institutions as cultural genocide and included 94 calls to action.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
