[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Jacob]

Something I don't understand about this latest bout of Canadian fecklessness--how are all these truckers getting away with not running their trucks for their jobs? The vast majority of truck drivers in America at least are no longer owner-operators but instead work for a large company and the trucks don't belong to them. Wouldn't these people in theory be liable for criminal charges for stealing a company truck, not to mention being dismissed for idling the truck in a city for weeks instead of driving?

The vast vast majority of truckers are working.

This group is organized by non-trucker tea-party types who are raking in millions from online funding due to massive support from American rightists via online funding cites (Ted Cruz is championing them, Fox News and Tucker Carlson are talking them up). Some of those millions are being used to fund the occupation.

As to why the police is not dealing with them a little more decisively is something many Canadians are also asking. There's no shortage of excuses, but it's quite concerning.

[viper37]

He's not alone.  But I do not know how widespread it is.  I just know lots of people amongst Quebec's Conservatives feel that way.  If BB was here, he could tell us the mood at the other side of the country, among the moderates like him.

Like I said, it's wait and see.  The leadership race ain't even started.

I don't know if I'd call BB a moderate; I have him on the right wing of the party. IIRC, he did say that O'Toole was "Liberal Light", f. ex.

Still, he's sensible and well-intentioned and respects the rule of law... so I guess maybe that makes him a moderate now? I don't know how he'd feel about that label.

He does not wish to impose his religious views on others.  That makes him a moderate, and not part of the right wing fringe nuts that wants everyone to follow their vision of what religion should be.

[viper37]

It was quite the White Supremacist coming out, gotta say.

Link me.

[viper37]

As to why the police is not dealing with them a little more decisively is something many Canadians are also asking. There's no shortage of excuses, but it's quite concerning.

As I've said many, many, many times before, the Ottawa Police will not intervene until someone from the Federal government gives the go.

Towers won't tow their clients, Ottawa police has tried to be some kind of peace agency after suffering some scandals of profiling, so they had no idea what was coming to them, they are ill equipped to deal with a massive protest, Ford does not want to send the OPP to Ottawa, who's only nominally part of Ontario, unlike Toronto, the economic&financial center of the province, hence why the truckers weren't allowed in the city for long.  The Libs don't want to be seen as the bad guys in a riot that will degenerate when there are kids on place.

If the government you guys voted for decided the occupation is over, it would be, and the Ottawa police would move all in with the RCMP.

When in doubt, blame the Libs.

[crazy canuck]

If BB was here, he could tell us the mood at the other side of the country, among the moderates like him.

You have me wondering whether you view him as moderate relative to your own politics or relative to where you view where the Conservative party is now.

[Jacob]

So a thing that non-Liberals have said about Trudeau - and now this Quebec Liberal MP has said it as well - is that his policies are "divisive". Can someone outline what the argument is? Requiring proof of vaccine for entering Canada, or is there something else?

[Oexmelin]

Oex, most truck drivers in Canada are owner operators.

I am slightly skeptical of that claim, because that wasn't the case when my dad was a truck driver - unless the landscape has changed considerably (Statscan had 128k salaried truck drivers vs 54k owner-operators in 2010).

My anecdotal point was, amongst all the truck drivers I met while riding with my father, the owner-operators tended to skew libertarian in the political views - which you get to know fairly quickly, because they also were not shy about their political views...

[crazy canuck]

So a thing that non-Liberals have said about Trudeau - and now this Quebec Liberal MP has said it as well - is that his policies are "divisive". Can someone outline what the argument is? Requiring proof of vaccine for entering Canada, or is there something else?

The non nutter argument is that Trudeau should not have made vaccination a political issue during the last election.  That is the view of a lot of medical health professionals.  He made not masking and not getting vaccinated a political choice which is counterproductive.

[crazy canuck]

Oex, most truck drivers in Canada are owner operators.

I am slightly skeptical of that claim, because that wasn't the case when my dad was a truck driver - unless the landscape has changed considerably (Statscan had 128k salaried truck drivers vs 54k owner-operators in 2010).

My anecdotal point was, amongst all the truck drivers I met while riding with my father, the owner-operators tended to skew libertarian in the political views - which you get to know fairly quickly, because they also were not shy about their political views...

I and my partners represent most of the trucking industry in BC, so I am speaking from experience 

90% of my clients are Sikh.  So I doubt they are the profile you have in mind.

The statscan numbers are a bit misleading.  As an owner operator, they also employ themselves through their own company.  So they pay themselves a wage up to a certain tax amount, write that wage off, and collect profits from the contracting company which they disburse as dividend income (after writing off all other operating costs of course).

[Oexmelin]

I and my partners represent most of the trucking industry in BC, so I am speaking from experience 

90% of my clients are Sikh.  So I doubt they are the profile you have in mind.

Do you have a sense for what account for the change between a majority of employed to a majority of owner-operator?
(For reference: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=2310022801)

No, the Sikh drivers are not the people I had in mind. The many Sikh I met with my dad were always way more keen to talk about their family than their guns

[crazy canuck]

Yeah, a typical owner-operator will have more then one driver.  Often father and children or other relatives.  Very rarely someone outside the family.

Each driver is paid a modest wage, and so they will all show up in the salaried numbers.  As stated above, the rest is disbursed through reimbursement of expenses (which is not taxed and some creativity is exercised here) as well as dividends. 

There are of course also direct employees of the trucking companies but those (at least for freight carriers) are the exception, not the rule).

So I am not surprised to see the stat that wage earners are greater in number.  But that doesn't tell you much about how the industry is actually structured.

[crazy canuck]

Coincidentally here is a story from the CBC involving trucking companies who have trucks with their logos involved in the protest.  Those trucking companies are at pains to explain that the trucks are not theirs but owned by owner operators.  That is a common practice.  A lot of times when you see the logo of a freight carrier on the truck it really means the truck is owned by a dependent owner operator contractor.

The one company interviewed in the piece who does directly employ the driver is American.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/truck-drivers-companies-ottawa-convoy-protest-1.6343705

[Grey Fox]

It was quite the White Supremacist coming out, gotta say.

Link me.

https://twitter.com/JoelLightbound?s=20

[viper37]

If BB was here, he could tell us the mood at the other side of the country, among the moderates like him.

You have me wondering whether you view him as moderate relative to your own politics or relative to where you view where the Conservative party is now.

compared to where the Reform Party was.  Moderate to where many ex-Reformers want their party to be: a pro-Christian extremist party.

[viper37]

The non nutter argument is that Trudeau should not have made vaccination a political issue during the last election.  That is the view of a lot of medical health professionals.  He made not masking and not getting vaccinated a political choice which is counterproductive.

He also said the Liberal party should increase health transfers to the provinces.  That won't make him popular in some circles.