This column is an opinion from journalist and political commentator Jen Gerson.
Over the course of the Federal Election campaign, CBC Calgary will be offering a variety of opinion pieces from different individuals with a wide spectrum of views. Links to these various opinion pieces will be put in each article.
It’s rare that I snap so early into an election.
But on the night before the writ was written up, I saw the tweet: a one-time payment of $500 to be delivered to seniors over the age of 75 this week.
We’ve spent the last 18 months shutting down our entire society to prevent the spread of a virus that is overwhelmingly a danger to the elderly population — that is, we imposed an extraordinary financial and psychological burden on young adults and children, those least at risk of harm from that virus. But sure, yeah. Let’s give the wealthiest demographic in the country, and the one most likely to vote, a one-time cheque in the first week of an election.
Look, no party is above greasing a desirable voting demographic — and here, I can mention the Conservatives’ love of boutique tax credits for balance — but actual cheques in the mail on week one of the writ period?
I realize that back in the halcyon days of 2015, Canada’s Twilight fans were within their rights to vote for the “hot one” for prime minister, but it’s time to start waking the hell up. We are in a pivotal moment.
Look around.
The pandemic has traumatized a sizeable chunk of the population, and left us with an uncertain fiscal situation. Half the west is literally on fire, or choking on smoke, or facing an historic drought. No one can be confident that the cost of basic goods will remain sustainably low. An entire generation is priced out of the “good house and good job in return for hard work” social contract.
Meanwhile, our much self-proclaimed moral authority on the world stage is collapsing.
And yet this utterly cynical election is already feeling like the ones before it; with petty, micro-targeted incentives to high value, persuadable voters, focus-grouped one-liners. It’s politics deployed as Twitter and TikTok meme warfare.
A game of, whose leader can look “hotter” on the policy brochure?
Points are awarded to the NDP and the CPC especially for putting forward a real and detailed set of policy prescriptions in their platforms, and doing it right off the mark.
The CPC’s platform, in particular, is real and substantive — although God help you if you think the billions we are incurring in deficit might, eventually, become a problem. No party seems to agree.
None of these parties are convincing me that they have a grasp of the depth of the problems we’re facing, both as a nation and a broader international bloc.
Let’s start abroad.
Global reputation in tatters
No one can pull their eyes away from Afghanistan, nor ignore the scenes of desperate Afghans clinging to U.S. military aircraft as the hegemon pulls out, leaving the people to their fate.
Afghans chase U.S. air force plane in desperate attempt to escape country
2 days ago
Thousands of people are trying to flee Afghanistan as the Taliban strengthens its grip on the country. Some people chased a U.S. air force plane down the tarmac, while others tried to force their way onto planes at the Kabul airport. 0:38
In Canada, it was recently announced that we had airlifted 34 embassy staff and CAF officers and 800 Afghans. Meanwhile, thousands of locals who worked with us during the 20-year war on terror may be massacred by the invading Taliban because we couldn’t be bothered to move faster with a more rational paperwork process in a country collapsing in real time.
Then there is the residential school tragedy, which played to horror headlines around the world and has pummeled our self-advertised international reputation as a bastion of respect, diversity and compassion.
And that’s before we delve into our domestic problems — which, if we’re honest, is all the electorate cares about.
Domestic distress
It’s not like we have a long-term plan that I’m aware of for COVID, for either the economic or social consequences.
It’s like we are making it up as we go along, and hoping it all works out. What happens when all that government money stops flowing to businesses and individuals who have been pummeled by economic gut punches?
Our federal government failed to secure the border in the midst of a global pandemic, its useless quarantine hotels failed to prevent variants into the country and the auditor general has already condemned this government’s performance on early detection.
I will grant Trudeau all due credit for acquiring vaccines in time to salvage summer, but in parts of the country, our kids are facing the possibility of a second year without school. And no one seems to be coming up with a plausible plan to mitigate the damage we’re doing to an entire generation of children to placate our terror of COVID-19, justified or otherwise.
And then there are the fires, when I wake up to orange skies and falling ash, again.
Fires burn in B.C.’s interior on Aug. 13, 2021. (B.C. Wildfire Service/Twitter)
For much of the west, what’s not on fire is blowing over the rest of us. And what’s not burned is baked by the heat.
Most of this country’s breadbasket is facing a drought that looks set to be among the country’s worst in history. Farmers are already warning about a spike in food prices.
And on the idea of buying: is anyone prepared for food prices to spike? Or can we just add the grocery bill to the credit card debt of a generation that can’t afford to buy a house and can barely manage childcare?
Farmers are already warning about a spike in food prices because of a drought that looks set to be among the country’s worst in history. (Jaison Empson/CBC)
Let’s see, what else? Oh, how about the $100 billion deficit, and the spending rate that the PBO last year stated was unsustainable. I guess we’ll just print more money to pay that off and hope we don’t head into an inflation spiral or go bankrupt.
There is a generation born in the dawn of Sept. 11, now coming of age. Many will be eligible to vote for the first time this election.
What future can this country — a self-described genocidal nation state — offer them? Can they be confident that in, say, 2025, Canada will be more prosperous and more free than it was in 2019?
The need to do better
Fear and anger are like the silent ocean currents that drive up land temperatures and trap dry air on land. If you miss these feelings, you’ll mistake calm waters on the surface for the deep climate below.
The future feels uncertain and unstable, and it’s hard to avoid the sense that we’re all managing decline — reading the will and settling the final accounts of a golden age.
And I can’t help but avoid the sense that none of our politicians is taking the future seriously. I’m not looking for some fantasy narrative of the greatness of Canada, but rather some confidence that any of these leaders understand the severity of our moment.
The emergencies aren’t going to stop coming, guys. There will be another wave of the pandemic in a population already traumatized and exhausted. And we’re going to get into geopolitical movements that the great powers would not have dared to contemplate if the west were stronger. (I’m looking at you, Taiwan.)
Crises are going to compound on one another. There will be no slowing down, no period of rest between catastrophes. And as each problem hits, we are losing material and moral capacity to deal with it as we stumble, punch-drunk, into whatever the next phase of history is going to be.
I don’t bet against liberal democracy in the long run. But the “long run” can be very long indeed, and we’re going to need our politics to be much, much better than this.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
