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Politics Briefing: Quebec announces a 'significant' financial penalty for residents who remain unvaccinated against COVID-19 – The Globe and Mail

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Hello,

Quebec is going to start imposing a “health care contribution” on adults who refuse to get vaccinated for COVID-19, the province’s Premier said Tuesday.

François Legault announced the measure as he spoke at a news conference on the resignation, this week, of Quebec’s high-profile Public Health Director, Horacio Arruda. The Premier said the cost will apply to Quebeckers who do not get a first dose.

Mr. Legault said his government is working through the legalities and logistics of the measure, which he described as a “health care contribution.”

“As to the amount, we want a significant amount. Fifty dollars or $100 is not significant, but we have yet to set an amount,” said the Premier.

Mr. Legault said Quebeckers are becoming exasperated with the 10 per cent of the population refusing to be vaccinated even though they have no medical issue to justify their decision.

“Right now , these people, they put a very important burden on our health care network, and I think it’s normal that the majority of the population is asking that there be a consequence,” he said.

He said the unvaccinated account for 50 per cent of the people in intensive care and they are putting an undue burden on health care.

Quebec is facing the consequences of a surge in COVID-19 cases linked to the more transmissible Omicron variant.

On Tuesday, Quebec reported 62 additional deaths linked to COVID-19, meaning 12,028 people have been killed by the novel coronavirus, the most among provinces and territories. Hospitalizations linked to the virus rose by 188 to 2,742.

Dr. Arruda’s replacement said it was too soon to comment on the health care contribution measure.

“I will let the exercise unfold,” said Luc Boileau, who has been president of the l’Institut national d’excellence en santé et services sociaux, which promotes clinical excellence and the efficient use of resources in the health and social services sector.

He added that he will wait to see if the science supports the measure, and that he has other more pressing concerns to consider.

In a resignation letter dated Monday, Dr. Arruda wrote that his office had offered public-health opinions and recommendations amid uncertainty and based on the best available knowledge and various expert opinions. However, he acknowledged there was a “certain erosion” in public support for health measures. There’s a story here on his exit.

“I think that he did excellent work for 22 months,” said Mr. Legault, adding he hoped Dr. Arruda would be available for advice after taking a rest.

This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter sign-up page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.

TODAY’S HEADLINES

WARNING FROM CANADA’S SPY AGENCY – For the first time, Canada’s spy agency is warning individual MPs and senators from all major parties about influence operations being carried out by China and other adversarial states. Story here.

HEALTH AGENCY DID NOT SEEK DATA ADVICE: PRIVACY COMMISSIONER – The Office of the Privacy Commissioner says the Public Health Agency of Canada did not seek its guidance before gathering location data from millions of mobile phones, which the agency has used to analyze travel patterns and inform its policy and messaging during the pandemic. Story here.

PRIME MINISTER AND PREMIERS HOLD TALKS – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Canada’s premiers spoke Monday about the federal government’s plan to distribute rapid tests and the possibility of additional military support for struggling health care systems, with leaders describing a productive meeting. Story here from CBC. The readout of the meeting from the Prime Minister’s Office is here.

TALKS LOOMING ON PEI POTATO DISPUTE – Canadian and U.S. officials are scheduled to meet this week to see if progress can be made to end a dispute that resulted in Canada suspending all shipments of potatoes to the United States from Prince Edward Island. Story here from CBC.

COVID-19 CASES RAISE ALARM AMONG MANITOBA FIRST NATIONS – A growing number of COVID-19 cases in Manitoba has First Nations in the province worried that the virus will overwhelm their communities, but one Grand Chief says military assistance is not necessary yet. Story here.

KENNEY DENOUCES HARASSMENT OF CALGARY MAYOR – Public officials, including Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, are condemning the actions of anti-vaccine protesters who targeted Mayor Jyoti Gondek’s home over the past weekend. Official estimates suggest 35 to 40 people assembled on the sidewalk and street adjacent to Ms. Gondek’s house, holding placards and chanting slogans. On social media, Mr. Kenney wrote, “This is just wrong.” Story here from The Calgary Herald.

THIS AND THAT

The House of Commons has adjourned until Jan. 31 at 11 a.m. ET.

CULTURAL SUMMIT POSTPONED – The Canadian Heritage Department has postponed a planned summit on challenges facing Canadian artists and cultural workers until public-health measures allow for face-to-face meetings. The gathering was scheduled for Jan. 31 until Feb. 1. “We will continue to stand together and hold the summit in person, as planned, as soon as the time is right and it is safe to do so,” Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez said in a statement. “At that time, we can all reflect on the post-COVID recovery and long-term competitiveness of Canada’s arts sector.”

ANGUS ON COBALT – NDP MP Charlie Angus has his eighth book coming out next month, and it deals with a subject close to home for the Timmins-James Bay member. Mr. Angus, an MP since 2004, is writing about the history of extracting the metal cobalt from the Northern Ontario town of Cobalt where he lives. It’s all covered in Cobalt: Cradle of the Demon Metals, Birth of a Mining Superpower, which is being published by House of Anansi. The 336-page work is about the metal that gives the town its name, and how it changed the trajectory of development in Ontario. Publishers Weekly, the international news website of book publishing and bookselling, calls Mr. Angus’s new book a “harrowing history [of] the damaging legacy of resource extraction in his country,” and an “immersive history.” In an e-mail exchange, Mr. Angus said he has been working on the new book since finishing his last book, Children of the Broken Treaty, in 2015. Asked how he finds the time for book projects, he wrote, “The fact is I am always working on research projects and historical digging. It’s how I balance out the intensity and weirdness of politics.”

TED BYFIELD REMEMBERED – Peter Shawn Taylor writes here on the life of influential Alberta Report publisher Ted Byfield, who gave voice to a nascent Reform party.

RICHARD PATTEN – Former Ottawa Centre MPP Richard Patten is remembered as an energetic community builder for his 15 years in the Ontario legislature. He died Dec. 30, at the age of 79. Obituary here from The Ottawa Citizen.

THE DECIBEL – On Tuesday’s edition of The Globe and Mail podcast, Caitlin Thompson, co-founder of Racquet and publisher of Racquet Magazine, a print quarterly on the culture of tennis, talks about the case of Serbian tennis star Novak Djokovic. The Australian Open granted him a medical exemption that would allow him to compete, but when he attempted to enter the country on Jan. 6, he was detained at the border. He was released on Monday, but his future at the tennis tournament remains uncertain. Ms. Thompson explains why Djokovic was detained, and what makes him such a polarizing figure in the tennis world, and why this may not be the end of the story. The Decibel is here.

PRIME MINISTER’S DAY

Private meetings in Ottawa. And the Prime Minister was scheduled to speak with the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

LEADERS

Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole delivered remarks at a Yarmouth, Bridgewater, and Annapolis Valley chambers of commerce event.

PUBLIC OPINION

LOCKDOWN SUPPORT – A new poll suggests a slim majority of Canadians support the latest round of lockdowns and other government-imposed restrictions as the Omicron variant continue to fuel an explosion in new COVID-19 infections. Story here.

OPINION

Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on how a government that misses Step One in transparency sparks a tizzy about `surveillance’: ”There is a high level of mistrust around government data collection, but most people probably give data on their movements to traffic-map apps such as Google Maps or Waze. PHAC had to get the data from a phone company. Anonymized data such as this is regularly used by economists and other academics to provide important insights. Governments, which have long formulated public policy by relying on assumptions about the impact of their measures, could presumably do a lot better if they could base choices on solid evidence drawn from real-world data. Surely there is a way to do that without raising the spectre of Big Brother watching us. But PHAC did not do it the right way. You would think that after a year of seeing simple health messages struggle against conspiracy theories about masks and vaccinations, the agency would get it.”

Thomas Mulcair (CTV News.ca) on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau starting to apply the French President Emmanuel Macron formula: “The contrast between Trudeau’s Health Minister and Conservative Leader O’Toole couldn’t be sharper. It also makes it abundantly clear that politics is still playing a key role in the management of what should exclusively be a health issue. [Health Minister Jean-Yves] Duclos is too smart and experienced not to know that obligatory vaccination is a non-starter. You’d have to be able to enforce it. With what resources? The Army? Duclos was simply redrawing the ideological line in the sand with their principal opponent. His subtext: We’re willing to do everything that we can to end this thing, O’Toole would make it worse.”

Sarath Peiris (Saskatoon StarPhoenix) on Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe steering the province into uncharted waters: “Trying to get through the COVID-19 pandemic with Premier Scott Moe is like finding yourself in a storm-tossed boat at night with a helmsman who refuses to heed navigation instruments as he relies instead on a buddy yelling out directions based on his “gut feel.” It didn’t take the Premier more than a few months after the pandemic’s 2020 arrival to decide that – evidence-based advice from doctors, epidemiologists and other experts be damned – he would forge ahead by focusing on those who touted prioritizing economic health above all.”

Got a news tip that you’d like us to look into? E-mail us at tips@globeandmail.com. Need to share documents securely? Reach out via SecureDrop

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New Brunswick Liberals ask Higgs to apologize for ‘joke’ about dead supporter

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FREDERICTON – New Brunswick‘s Progressive Conservative leader disrespected the province’s residents by presenting the death of a Liberal supporter as funny, the party said as it called for Blaine Higgs to apologize.

Higgs drew the party’s ire during remarks made at his Thursday campaign kickoff event in Quispamsis, N.B., held hours after he dissolved the legislature and officially triggered the campaign leading up to the Oct. 21 provincial election.

His speech to party faithful included a second-hand anecdote of a conversation that purportedly took place in 2014 between a party volunteer canvassing for votes and a newly minted supporter. At the time, Higgs was seeking re-election as the legislature member for the Quispamsis riding, which he has represented since 2010.

The conversation, the story went, began when the canvasser was leaving the home of a woman who had just voiced her intention to vote for Higgs.

“(The volunteer) said: ‘Thank you very much. That’s great.’ Then she started walking next door, and the lady said: ‘Oh, you don’t need to go there. She passed away a few weeks ago,'” Higgs said in his retelling of the story. “This campaigner — you know, very passionate individual — said: ‘I’m so sorry. Was she sick long? Or what happened? And the lady just said, ‘Oh, don’t feel too bad. She was a Liberal.'”

“I know that’s not an appropriate joke, but it was funny and it is true,” Higgs concluded.

Hannah Fulton Johnston, executive director of the New Brunswick Liberal Association, condemned Higgs’s anecdote in a statement issued on Friday in which she called the joke distasteful.

“The New Brunswick Liberal Association is calling on Blaine Higgs to apologize for this comment,” it reads.

“Making light of the death of any New Brunswicker is highly inappropriate for anyone and completely unacceptable for the premier of the province.”

Green Party Leader David Coon described the anecdote as disgusting and questioned whether the comment could be passed off as a joke.

“It’s a very dark comment,” he said on Friday.

Higgs, 70, has so far stuck to broadly populist messages as he seeks a third term as New Brunswick’s premier. His key issues so far have included bringing down the harmonized sales tax from 15 to 13 per cent and requiring teachers to get parental consent before they can use the preferred names and pronouns of young students in class.

When asked about the Liberals’ request for an apology, Progressive Conservative Party Executive Director Doug Williams shifted the focus back to past remarks from Liberal Leader Susan Holt and tried to draw a parallel between her and her unpopular federal counterpart.

“If Susan Holt is truly concerned about offensive comments, will she apologize for saying that concerns of parents about their children are ‘BS’? … Will she apologize for saying the Premier acts like a fascist?” the statement reads.

“The media have not paid any attention to these remarks, despite Progressive Conservatives raising them publicly. Just like Justin Trudeau, Susan Holt wants apologies for things that other people have done, and never wants to apologize for her own actions.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 21, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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John Rustad, political cast off to potential B.C. premier: ‘remarkable,’ he says

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VICTORIA – British Columbia Conservative Party Leader John Rustad was at a low point in his life two years ago, both personally and politically.

He was searching for a political home after being booted from the former B.C. Liberal Party caucus.

Rustad, 61, was also grieving back-to-back-to-back family losses and his own health had taken a downturn.

“Twenty-twenty-two was a very difficult year for my family,” said Rustad. “My father passed away in January. My father-in-law passed in February. I had shingles in April and then my mother passed in July.”

Then came August 2022 when Rustad was banished from the B.C. Liberal caucus, now BC United, for his social media support of an outspoken climate change critic.

Times have changed since then.

Rustad said he’s healthy, has had more time to get over the loss of loved ones, and today he’s leading the once marginal B.C. Conservative Party into an election campaign as a serious challenger to the two-term New Democrats led by David Eby.

In the 2020 election, the B.C. Conservatives received less than two per cent of the popular vote and didn’t win a seat, but are now considered contenders against the NDP.

Rustad said he underwent a period of deep introspection while sitting in the B.C. legislature as an Independent, before he was acclaimed as Leader of the B.C. Conservative Party in March 2023.

“I explored a number of options in the fall of 2022 after being kicked out, and what it came down to was the Conservatives were the vehicle that made the most sense,” he said. “I explored everything from retiring to switching to different levels of politics. I even had conversations with the old Social Credit Party, with the people who were in control of that party.”

Despite being in the political wilderness for decades, the opportunity to undertake a revival for the B.C. Conservative Party and give voters a new voice on the centre-right proved to make the most sense, Rustad said.

“I had no confidence that Kevin Falcon and the B.C. Liberals, now of course BC United Party, could win the next election,” he said.

“That got me thinking if the B.C. Liberals can’t do it and the vote is divided, then this problem could go all the way to 2028 and if we can’t win then it would be 2032 before we could get rid of the socialist hordes out of Victoria,” he said, referencing a slogan used by Social Credit leader WAC Bennett, who was provincial premier from 1952 to 1972.

Rustad, whose family has deep roots in B.C.’s forest industry that go back generations, comes across more as a bookworm than a lumberjack.

Born and raised in Prince George, B.C., Rustad said he’s been involved in the forest industry for much of his life.

“I’ve done everything in forestry from working in a mill to tree planting to timber supply analysis to forest development plans and everything in between,” he said. “I ran my own company from 1995 and I shut it down in 2002 when I started heading toward politics.”

Elected in 2005, Rustad’s Nechako Lakes riding in central B.C. includes the forest-industry dependent communities of Burns Lake, Vanderhoof, Houston and Fort St. James.

“Politics was never actually an ambition of mine,” Rustad said. “It was never a goal. But things were going so badly in the 1990s that by the year 2000, I actually talked about moving to Calgary with my wife because of the disastrous environment we had in B.C.”

He said he decided to stay, but “that left me with two choices, either live with it or get involved and try to change it. I discovered I actually enjoy politics, which was quite surprising to me.”

Rustad and his wife, Kim, live at Cluculz Lake, a small community 40 kilometres west of Prince George.

The couple has no children, with Rustad publicly acknowledging his wife’s earlier diagnosis of cervical cancer.

Rustad was a keynote speaker at a Reclaiming Canada conference in Victoria in May 2023, held “in recognition of the 2022 Freedom Convoy,” which conducted a series of protests and blockades against Canada’s COVID-19 restrictions.

In video of his speech posted online, he told the group he walked through a trucker protest and freedom rally in Vancouver.

“The party that I was part of at the time, which was the B.C. Liberal Party, said, ‘Don’t go anywhere near it. We can’t talk about it, we can’t support it. All it will do is cost us votes in the Lower Mainland.’ I looked at them and I thought that’s nuts.”

He said the event reminded him of the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.

“People were waving flags, they were proud of the country that they belong to, they were singing O Canada at the top of their lungs,” he said as his voice wavered with emotion.

“Good God, that to me is Canada, that is the real power of what we want to see in this province and this country,” he said to applause.

Prof. David Black, a political communications specialist at Greater Victoria’s Royal Roads University, said Rustad has played the lead role in the biggest political story of the year in B.C., the rise of the Conservatives and the demise of BC United.

Falcon surprisingly folded BC United’s election campaign last month, urging voters to support Rustad’s Conservatives to prevent a centre-right vote split and a likely NDP re-election.

“It’s not often that we can say that climate skepticism was the making of a politician’s rise, as it’s usually career destroying,” said Black.

But the opposite occurred, and Rustad, a Conservative from B.C.’s north with experience in the resource economy and Indigenous relations faces Eby, a socially concerned left-wing lawyer from Vancouver, said Black.

“In this sense, both Eby and Rustad are out of central casting as we think about B.C. politicians,” he said. “They personify and give voice to the political culture of the regions and political subcultures out of which they come.”

Andrew Weaver, a world-renowned climate scientist and former B.C. Green Party leader, said he spoke with Rustad in the lead-up to the campaign and discovered they have more in common that he previously thought.

“John Rustad’s views on climate are clearly not the same as mine,” said Weaver. “But the gaps there are not as great as some people may think.”

Rustad is a person who listens to views and gathers information before making decisions, said Weaver.

“Climate change is real,” Rustad said. “Man is having an impact on the climate. I just look at it and think taxing people into poverty can’t change the weather.”

He said he will continue to have talks with Weaver on issues of climate and resources.

Rustad said he expects to face NDP attacks during the campaign on his party’s plans to remove ideology from the classroom, scrap the carbon tax, support pipeline construction, oppose vaccine mandates and reallocate post-secondary education funding to promote training in medicine, engineering and skilled trades.

Eby recently said reproductive freedom issues will likely be raised during B.C.’s election campaign, suggesting Rustad’s Conservatives may not support current women’s access policies and programs.

“It’s fairly safe to say that he is at best ambivalent about reproductive freedom and at worst hostile to it — that women’s access to abortion, women’s access to free birth control, is on the ballot this election, just like it is in the United States,” said Eby.

Rustad said previously his party will not reopen the abortion debate, noting the federal government regulates the issue.

“I have no problem just standing for what I believe is right,” he said. “I have no problem just saying it like it is. You sleep well at night when you know you are standing for what you believe in.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 21, 2024.

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A look at British Columbia New Democratic Party Leader David Eby

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VANCOUVER – A look at British Columbia NDP Leader David Eby.

British Columbia NDP Leader David Eby is in his first election campaign as party leader and is looking to capture the NDP’s second consecutive majority victory on Oct. 19. Here are some highlights from his life and career.

Age: 48. Born July 21, 1976, in Kitchener, Ont.

Pre-politics: An award-winning human rights lawyer, who was the B.C. Civil Liberties Association executive director, an adjunct professor of law at the University of British Columbia, president of the HIV/AIDS Legal Network and served on the Vancouver Foundation’s Health and Social Development Committee.

Politics: Eby, the MLA for Vancouver-Point Grey, was first elected in 2013, defeating then-premier Christy Clark in the riding, forcing her to run in a byelection in Kelowna. He became leader of the party and premier in 2022, replacing former premier John Horgan who left office due to health issues.

Personal: Married to family physician Dr. Cailey Lynch. The family recently welcomed a third child, daughter Gwen.

Quote: “For me, I feel the extra weight of the significance of the election in terms of can we preserve what’s made us successful over the years of working together as a province.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 21, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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