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Montreal Gazette
13 hours ago
- Politics
- Montreal Gazette
Libman: Wait a minute — where did the time go?
I was blown away last weekend by reports that it's been 35 years since the 1990 Oka Crisis, the standoff that dominated our news cycle that summer. It's also hard to believe last Sunday marked the 40th anniversary of the Live Aid benefit concert for famine relief. The passage of time is something that I have been thinking about more and more of late, trying to make sense of it all. One can be sitting in a waiting room or stuck in traffic agonizing over how long every minute seems to take. On a long trip, moving from A to B, you can only wait patiently, like staring at an hourglass until your destination. Yet, oddly enough, when you look back in time, everything seems accelerated. I graduated from McGill 40 years ago this summer. It seems impossible that it's been that long as I remember so vividly many memories and specifics from those days. How daunting it is to project the same time frame — which doesn't seem so long ago — into the future and realize I'll be (hopefully!) over 100 years old, for heaven's sake. The sense of aging first hit me when I started to realize that police officers, or professional hockey players, say, could be younger than me — and later, even judges and the like. There are teachers I remember from high school who seemed like old men, yet were younger than I am now. When I became involved in politics and elected to the National Assembly in 1989, I was in my 20s without any political experience. Some commentators were condescending, with one in particular — my predecessor on this Opinion page actually — often gleefully referring to me as 'little Bobby.' (That wouldn't get past my editor today!) But by the time I ran for Stephen Harper's Conservatives in 2015, I was described as the older, experienced politician. For much of my work life, whether in provincial or municipal politics, the private sector or in the community, I always seemed to be the young guy. Then suddenly, I'm not sure when, there's that hinge moment where I am now seen as the vieux routier around the office. When looking in the rear-view mirror (or a regular mirror, for that matter) it's hard not to wonder how and when did this sneak up on you. We somehow end up on this Earth and before we know it, we have less time left than the time we've already spent. It's a crapshoot, of course, as none of us can know how long we will have. We can strive to be healthy and increase the odds of a longer life, but sadly we can't anticipate illness or other accidental circumstances beyond our control. Our time here is finite, and then our departure is infinite. It makes you question why we take certain things to heart and fight among ourselves about politics, for example. Forced language laws, immigration rules, constitutional debates and so on rarely alter social realities in significant ways. With the passage of time, societies evolve naturally. Attempts at social engineering breed conflict and diminish valuable individual relationships and quality of life as so much energy is sucked out of us. A few years ago, I attended an event of former MNAs and sat for dinner with some Parti Québécois hardliners who were very combative back then and used to make my skin crawl. Many of them are now elderly and frail. No one can escape Father Time. We talked about those exhausting debates and how many of the same battles are still being fought today. Given where we were now — discussing families, health and the passage of time — much of it seemed so insignificant in the larger scheme of things. Time is a precious resource that we too often take for granted. It's time we start using it more wisely. Robert Libman is an architect and planning consultant who has served as Equality Party leader and MNA, mayor of Côte-St-Luc and a member of the Montreal executive committee.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
John Ivison: Carney will have to cut the uncuttable — if he has the guts
Budgets in government tend to creep like mould, not ebb like the tide. Take the example of Indigenous occupational skills training. The Department of Employment and Social Development spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year funding Indigenous third parties who deliver the training. In 2017, the department was hauled over the coals by the auditor general because it did not collect data on performance indicators to demonstrate whether it was getting Indigenous people into stable employment. At a parliamentary committee, the deputy minister said attempts to reform the system had been resisted by Indigenous partners because any adjustment would see them lose funding, and the Liberal government was reluctant to risk the political fall-out from erstwhile allies. Consequently, the only solution was to allocate $100 million in new funding in the 2018 budget. 'In my experience, that is what it takes to get movement,' the deputy minister admitted. This trip down misery lane is illustrative of how difficult it is going to be for the Carney government to enact the program savings that the finance minister last week asked all cabinet ministers to identify. It is particularly apt because there are so many areas of program spending that have already been ringfenced as 'uncuttable' that Indigenous grants and contributions are likely to have a very large target painted on them. In the last year of Stephen Harper's Conservative government, the then Department of Indian and Northern Affairs was allocated $8 billion in the Main Estimates. This year the combined allocation for the departments of Indigenous Services and Crown-Indigenous Relations is $38 billion, more than the department of National Defence (and that doesn't include the $400 million for skills training administered by ESDC, or the billions being invested in the Indigenous housing strategy by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation). This is not to suggest the money is being misspent: there were many years of underfunding in areas like First Nations education. But when the government says it is going to try to save more than $150 billion in spending over the course of three years — and rules out reducing transfers to people or provinces, or on defence and security spending — there are only so many options left. 'I see storm clouds ahead on the Indigenous front,' said Michael Wernick, the Jarislowsky Chair in public sector management at the University of Ottawa, and a former clerk of the Privy Council. Spending down political capital with Indigenous groups and environmentalists might seem unlikely, but the government is already doing that with C-5, the recently passed major projects bill. Prime Minister Mark Carney is meeting First Nations leaders at a summit on Thursday and he will likely be lobbied heavily to move many of those grants and contributions from the 'cuttable' column into the 'uncuttable' one. In a Policy Options article Wernick wrote in 2021, and reposted this week, he said governments serious about program reviews have to 'go where the money is'; accept that any changes will be fiercely contested; and ask fundamental questions about whether certain activities should be funded at all. Wernick said in an interview with National Post this week that Carney's efforts at spending restraint will not be a 'one and done' exercise, but will more likely resemble then finance minister Paul Martin's multi-year efforts in the 1995 and 1996 budgets that brought runaway deficits under control. François-Philippe Champagne, the finance minister, indicated just such an approach in his letter to ministers that called on them to find savings of 7.5 per cent in the current year, 10 per cent next and 15 per cent in 2028–29. This goes far beyond the productivity efficiencies that were included in the Liberal election platform. But the need for more ambitious savings is apparent. Recent projections by the C.D. Howe Institute and by economist Trevor Tombe suggest the commitment to increase military spending to five per cent of GDP is likely to push deficits and debt to levels not seen outside the pandemic. Tombe's model sees annual deficits of over $150 billion by 2035. Wernick said the uncertainty surrounding the trade war with the U.S. means that fiscal forecasts are inherently unreliable. But he concedes 'the arithmetic is relentless' and has even proposed a specific defence and security tax that would see the GST increased by two points and the funds allocated directly to military spending. The public is onside with more expenditure on defence. A recent Abacus Data poll suggested two-thirds of Canadians back the Carney government's announcements of more military spending. But consumption-tax hikes in the current political climate are likely to prove as popular as taking a hatchet to Old Age Security payments. Carney risks becoming the man who fell to earth if these cuts are miscalculated. The prime minister does have a mandate to act, particularly if President Donald Trump follows through with his tariff threats. A similar sense of crisis gave Martin leeway he might not have had in less straitened circumstances. Over the course of three years, he reduced government spending by 19 per cent and reduced the federal headcount by 50,000 people. The budget was balanced within three years, the government's popularity rarely dipped below 50 per cent and the Liberals won the 1997 election. The public accepted the need for action and sensed the Liberals would enjoy cutting spending far less than the opposition Reform party would. The same logic applies for Carney. But in the mid-1990s, the government of prime minister Jean Chrétien was able to demonstrate progress each year in the form of reduced deficits. It is less clear how Carney will be able to claim victory. He has said the answer is faster growth and a balanced operating budget within three years. Yet, growth will be hard to achieve if trade with the United States falls (it has dropped for four consecutive months this year), while GDP growth will result in increases to defence spending and fiscal transfers, which are linked to the size of the economy. In addition, the definition of what constitutes 'operating,' as opposed to 'capital' spending (which Carney has tried to distinguish) is likely to muddy the picture. Voters likely don't need to see balanced budgets, if the Carney government can demonstrate it is making progress on its other priorities, such as using the public balance sheet to bring in investment for major projects, and, crucially, is able to convey that the public finances are under control. One way to do that would be to shrink the public service. A new report from the Parliamentary Budget Office shows that the federal public service increased by 30 per cent between 2015–16 and the last fiscal year. It has topped out at 445,000 full-time equivalent positions, with a slight reduction expected over the next few years due to attrition. Carney could chop a similar number that Martin did and still be left with a federal bureaucracy bigger than it was before the pandemic. The problem for the government is not that bending the curve on program spending will lead to a rusting, hollowed-out public sector. Program spending reached 16 per cent of GDP in the last fiscal year, compared to 13 per cent in 2014–15 ($480 billion versus $329 billion in 2025 dollars). The problem is that in the surreal economic milieu of Ottawa, the government and its provincial and Indigenous partners believe the only way to achieve lasting reform is to spend more money. It will take a skilful, determined and politically secure prime minister to change that mindset. jivison@ NP View: Mark Carney needs a chainsaw, not a scalpel Poilievre says Carney lied about conflicts after ethics disclosure reveals investment portfolio
New York Times
10-07-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Coal, the Lone Survivor of Canada's Parliamentary Cat Colony, Dies
Coal, the last surviving member of a colony of cats that thrived for decades outside Canada's Parliament and became popular with tourists, has died. He was believed to be 17. A Facebook page devoted to Coal said he had had an aggressive form of cancer that had spread to his lungs and received a veterinarian-administered death on Tuesday. Little is known about Coal's early life. But Danny Taurozzi, Coal's adoptive owner, said it appeared he had been left at the informal colony as a kitten. There, Coal joined as many as three dozen cats who lived in crude shelters vaguely resembling the neighboring Centre Block building of Parliament. Mr. Taurozzi was among a small group of volunteers who cleaned and maintained the shelters, in untamed bush behind a wrought-iron fence, just steps from the speaker's entrance to the House of Commons. When the cats were not sleeping, they would sometimes allow themselves to be petted, he said. The colony, which was also frequented by raccoons looking for a free meal, gradually became almost as large an attraction as the rest of Parliament Hill, and a mandatory stop for busloads of tourists. Mr. Taurozzi said that the Dalai Lama had been among the dignitaries who had paid a visit to the cats. Another visitor, he added, was Stephen Harper when he was Canada's prime minister. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Yahoo
27-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Former PM Harper says military spending can address Arctic infrastructure gap
OTTAWA — Former prime minister Stephen Harper said Friday the best way to build much-needed infrastructure in the Arctic is through military spending. Speaking in Iqaluit during his first visit to the North since leaving office, Harper said leveraging military spending can build roads and runways to create supply chains and lower the cost of living. "We need to have the full range of transportation and communications infrastructure ... quite frankly, the easiest way to develop those logistics is through military development," Harper said during a fireside chat at the Nunavut Arctic Sovereignty and Security Summit. He said military spending has long been a catalyst for building roads and airports in the North. Iqaluit is built around an 8,000-foot airport runway constructed by the U.S. military during the Second World War. "This is the biggest and most effective way to create the most basic, wide ranging infrastructure," Harper said. "And if we can do that and then build on that, that makes it then so much easier to bring in materials for construction, or economic development, or fly in food. Get things at a critical mass where prices can come down. Build housing more effectively." Canada recently committed to NATO's new military spending target of five per cent of GDP. Federal officials have spoken in recent years about linking northern infrastructure to defence spending Canada's defence strategy committed to building Northern Operational Support Hubs, which would involve upgrades to power and telecommunication infrastructure. Iqaluit was announced as one of the hub locations in March. Udlariak Hanson, a longtime Nunavut executive and vice-president of the mining company Baffinland, moderated the conversation with Harper. She said the terms "security" and "sovereignty" mean different things in the North than in southern Canada. "You're absolutely right," Harper said. "For people here, when you talk about security, they're talking about food security, about housing security, about energy security. I don't think southern Canadians generally understand that. "Quite frankly, when you talk about security in the north, what southern Canadians are going to hear is obviously Donald Trump talking about annexing Canada, and probably even more relevant to here is Donald Trump talking about annexing Greenland." Harper said the key is to "marry" the two definitions of sovereignty and security to build infrastructure that satisfies the social security needs of the North and broader national security concerns. Throughout the 45-minute chat, Harper avoided commenting on current government policy and reflected on how he approached the region while in office. "I think the most important thing we did here was the fact that I actually came here ... in one marquee tour that I took every year to the North, which really was I think effective longer-term in drawing sustained national attention to this part of the country," he said. "I think that is the most important thing for future prime ministers to continue to do, to come here and make sure Canadians understand that we have not done what is necessary to develop this part of the country. And when we talk about it as the great future hope of Canada, there is a lot more to be done to make that realized." He didn't comment on the recently-passed Bill C-5, which could lead to one or more of Nunavut's proposals for "projects of national interest" being fast-tracked. He did offer some advice for the Liberal government when prompted. "Try and take a broader long-term view," he said, recalling how eyes would roll in Ottawa when his government proposed building a port in Iqaluit, or the Canadian High-Arctic Research Station in Cambridge Bay, Nvt., or the highway to Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T. "And I always used to say, these are the things, the nation-building things are the things that people will remember," he said. "They're the things that will define your time in government. "Don't get hung up on the dollars today, or kind of the immediate needs. Think about what you're doing in terms of the bigger picture." This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 27, 2025. Nick Murray, The Canadian Press Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
CTV News
27-06-2025
- Business
- CTV News
Former PM Harper says military spending can address Arctic infrastructure gap
Former prime minister Stephen Harper delivers the keynote address at a conference on Wednesday, March 22, 2023 in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld OTTAWA — Former prime minister Stephen Harper says the best way to build much-needed infrastructure in the Arctic is through military spending. Speaking at an Arctic security conference in Iqaluit on Friday, Harper said leveraging military spending can build roads and runways to create supply chains and lower the cost of living. Canada has committed to NATO's new military spending target of five per cent of GDP and federal officials have spoken in recent years about linking northern infrastructure to defence spending. Harper said the threats Canada faces offer an opportunity to develop the region, much as the Second World War and the Cold War led to rapid development of northern infrastructure. Harper said this visit to Iqaluit is his first since leaving office. Harper prioritized northern development as prime minister and made annual trips to the region. This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 27, 2025 Nick Murray, The Canadian Press
