[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[crazy canuck]

Another own goal by the Libs appears to doom the viability of the national carbon tax. For those not following the story, the Libs exempted the tax from oil heating in the Maritimes.

Now all but two provinces want the same exemption for natural gas heating.

The only rational for the carve out is votes, um I mean concern about costs of home heating.  But that is the very purpose of the tax.

If the real concern is the cost of living there are other better mechanisms government has than to gut their main (only) policy to meaningfully address climate change.

[Josephus]

Another own goal by the Libs appears to doom the viability of the national carbon tax. For those not following the story, the Libs exempted the tax from oil heating in the Maritimes.

Is that correct? I thought it was not just in the Maritimes but everywhere there is a fuel charge. It's just that the Maritimes will be affected the most.

[crazy canuck]

Another own goal by the Libs appears to doom the viability of the national carbon tax. For those not following the story, the Libs exempted the tax from oil heating in the Maritimes.

Is that correct? I thought it was not just in the Maritimes but everywhere there is a fuel charge. It's just that the Maritimes will be affected the most.

I am not sure what your question is. Is it true that the liberals only carved out the maritime provinces from the carbon tax? Yes that is absolutely true.

Is it true that the premiers of all the provinces met to discuss healthcare but instead of the headline coming out of their meeting is that there is a call for the carbon tax carve out to be adopted for all provinces and for all heating heating fuels, including natural gas? Yes, that is absolutely true.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/gift/519974dc5e28f762a87fb14c1570523f4fb873adfcfcb945043907ccc3c41650/BHSX23LS5JB2NOAKQVYR576IKE/

[Josephus]

I think you are wrong, or I am misunderstanding,but I think the heating oil exemption applies to everyone who uses oil heating. It's just that in terms of numbers, only three per cent of Canadian households use heating oil, primarily in Atlantic Canada.

The only thing that does apply only to Atlantic Canadians is new incentives to help them switch from oil heating to electricity.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/climate/carbon-tax-home-heating-oil-1.7015480

and
https://ici.radio-canada.ca/rci/en/news/2022896/trudeau-no-fruther-carbon-tax-exemption

[crazy canuck]

So only Maritime residents use heating oil, the rest of the country is a rounding error  error, and you're quibbling over the fact that the liberals brought in an exemption for heating oil to appeal only to maritime voters? Again, what is your point? are you suggesting that the policy is in someway defensible?

They carved out the thing that is the most damaging to the environment in terms of heating homes, and they did it in order to buy votes in the Maritimes. This from a government that ran on a platform to tackle climate change.

This from a government who defended their carbon tax in the Supreme Court of Canada on the basis, that it was needed to tackle climate change.

The whole thing is a vast  hypocrisy.

[Josephus]

You've been very defensive of late CC. Hope all is well. 

I'm with you on agreeing this is hypocritical. News today says the Liberals will miss their green house emissions target

I was just clarifying your point. Anyone with oil heaters in Ontario will also get the tax removed. It does not only apply to the Maritimes, which is what you inferred.

[crazy canuck]

You've been very defensive of late CC. Hope all is well. 

I'm with you on agreeing this is hypocritical. News today says the Liberals will miss their green house emissions target

I was just clarifying your point. Anyone with oil heaters in Ontario will also get the tax removed. It does not only apply to the Maritimes, which is what you inferred.

The law prevents both the rich and the poor from sleeping under a bridge.

And of course, the law has an affect on only one group.

I was surprised to learn that the Maritimes still mainly keep their homes with oil. I suppose that is the power of the Irving family in the Maritimes.

Every political commentator refers to this as a car moat for the Maritimes, because the law has the most significant impact there and has negligible impact in the rest of the country.

If you read the article, I posted you will see that even the maritime premieres acknowledge that fact, and acknowledge that the law is unfair to the rest of the country. That is why they support the rest of the premiers' push* to have the exemption apply to all home heating fuels.

* with the exception of BC and Quebec

If the goal was to minimize the impact of the increase in price of home, heating on middle-class families then the federal government could have amended their statute to make it look more like the BC statute, which has a better mechanism for creating a revenue neutral tax, which returns proceeds. I have benefits to low income earners.

[Barrister]

All the homes in Yukon are heated by heating oil (well, except those heated by wood - those definitely existed).  I found it very odd to have this huge oil tank sitting in my basement.

[Grey Fox]

My childhood home, owned by my aunt, got rid of it's basement bound oil tank only this summer. Our city nor charges a tax Oil heating system and my aunt wasn't willing to pay it. (+ the insane rate of oil consumption they had)

[Barrister]

So you guys know my political motto has always been "right is right".

You'll also remember though that I voted NDP in the last election.

It was with regrets.  The current government has done some things I fully support.  They issued new directives on how Crown Prosecutors are supposed to deal with bail hearings for violent crimes that I fully agree with, just as one example.

But all in all I feel pretty comfortable with my vote.

One example has been how they're pushing for an Alberta Pension Plan, despite never mentioning it in the election.  But I think I've talked about that before.

Today it's Danielle Smith, our Premiere, who is set to share a stage in Calgary with... Tucker Carlson.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/smith-tucker-carlson-conversation-calgary-1.7021053

Hey Danielle - remember when Tucker Carlson said he was rooting for Russia in its war with Ukraine?  How well do you think that's going to play with the one in ten Albertans of Ukrainian heritage?  Plus all the others who think that Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine is a moral outrage and must be stopped?

And that's just to pick one of the many outrageous things Carlson has said.

I mean - I just don't get this.  Tucker Carlson may have been influential when he had his Fox show, but he's an absolute has-been these days.  Why go anywhere near him if you're the Premier of Alberta?

[PRC]

And I thought Jason Kenney was bad.  Danielle Smith is from another planet. 

The UCP has been fully taken over by the "Take Back Alberta" group, a band of radical libertarian idealogues and religious zealots.  The moderates have left the building.

The UCP AGM recently occurred, here are some of the resolutions and policy proposals they voted on: https://www.unitedconservative.ca/wp-content/uploads/Resolutions2023.pdf

They include...

Oppose all net zero efforts.

Require teachers, schools and school boards to obtain written consent of parents or guardians to change the name or pronouns of their children.

Eliminating so called DEI initiatives (diversity, equity and inclusion) in post-secondary institutions.

Protect an individual's right to informed consent decisions regarding their own body (read: say no to vaccines).

Ban post-secondary admissions based on race.

Prevent concerns about electoral fraud in Albertan elections by (at a minimum) banning, except by plebiscite, all use of any and all electronic machine for tabulation or counting of ballots for any provincial election.

Encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

Implement a school voucher system to ensure that education funding follows each student and enhances the vision of school choice. The school voucher should include the following fund sources calculated on a per student, school, and district basis.

Ensure that teachers, schools, school boards, and third parties providing services to kindergarten to Grade 12 schools do not provide access to materials of a sexual, racist, or abusive nature, including, but not limited to, books, handouts, online materials, and live events that are not part of the Alberta Program of Studies.

Not support the establishment of solar farms in the areas of the agricultural Canada Land Inventory (CLI) Class 1, 2, or 3 soils.

End provincial funding for supervised consumption sites.

Divide the roles and responsibilities of the Minister of Justice position into separate ministries of Attorney General and Solicitor General.

Repeal the no fault Insurance (also known as Direct Compensation for Property Damage) legislation in Alberta and return to torte-based (also known as at-fault based) insurance.

Require all regulatory professional associations and trade organizations to limit investigations of their members for complaints regarding professional conduct of their members to instances of activities that occur while 'on the job,' and limit the application of any Code of Conduct to professional activities and exclude personal affairs.

Protect inmates who were female at conception and are housed at correctional and remand centers for women operated by Alberta Correctional Services by refusing to house any inmate who was male at conception at said correctional and remand centers.

[Barrister]

And I thought Jason Kenney was bad.  Danielle Smith is from another planet. 

The UCP has been fully taken over by the "Take Back Alberta" group, a band of radical libertarian idealogues and religious zealots.  The moderates have left the building.

The UCP AGM recently occurred, here are some of the resolutions and policy proposals they voted on: https://www.unitedconservative.ca/wp-content/uploads/Resolutions2023.pdf

They include...

Oppose all net zero efforts.

Require teachers, schools and school boards to obtain written consent of parents or guardians to change the name or pronouns of their children.

Eliminating so called DEI initiatives (diversity, equity and inclusion) in post-secondary institutions.

Protect an individual's right to informed consent decisions regarding their own body (read: say no to vaccines).

Ban post-secondary admissions based on race.

Prevent concerns about electoral fraud in Albertan elections by (at a minimum) banning, except by plebiscite, all use of any and all electronic machine for tabulation or counting of ballots for any provincial election.

Encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

Implement a school voucher system to ensure that education funding follows each student and enhances the vision of school choice. The school voucher should include the following fund sources calculated on a per student, school, and district basis.

Ensure that teachers, schools, school boards, and third parties providing services to kindergarten to Grade 12 schools do not provide access to materials of a sexual, racist, or abusive nature, including, but not limited to, books, handouts, online materials, and live events that are not part of the Alberta Program of Studies.

Not support the establishment of solar farms in the areas of the agricultural Canada Land Inventory (CLI) Class 1, 2, or 3 soils.

End provincial funding for supervised consumption sites.

Divide the roles and responsibilities of the Minister of Justice position into separate ministries of Attorney General and Solicitor General.

Repeal the no fault Insurance (also known as Direct Compensation for Property Damage) legislation in Alberta and return to torte-based (also known as at-fault based) insurance.

Require all regulatory professional associations and trade organizations to limit investigations of their members for complaints regarding professional conduct of their members to instances of activities that occur while 'on the job,' and limit the application of any Code of Conduct to professional activities and exclude personal affairs.

Protect inmates who were female at conception and are housed at correctional and remand centers for women operated by Alberta Correctional Services by refusing to house any inmate who was male at conception at said correctional and remand centers.

[Barrister]

And I thought Jason Kenney was bad.  Danielle Smith is from another planet. 

The UCP has been fully taken over by the "Take Back Alberta" group, a band of radical libertarian idealogues and religious zealots.  The moderates have left the building.

The UCP AGM recently occurred, here are some of the resolutions and policy proposals they voted on: https://www.unitedconservative.ca/wp-content/uploads/Resolutions2023.pdf

They include...

Oppose all net zero efforts.

Require teachers, schools and school boards to obtain written consent of parents or guardians to change the name or pronouns of their children.

Eliminating so called DEI initiatives (diversity, equity and inclusion) in post-secondary institutions.

Protect an individual's right to informed consent decisions regarding their own body (read: say no to vaccines).

Ban post-secondary admissions based on race.

Prevent concerns about electoral fraud in Albertan elections by (at a minimum) banning, except by plebiscite, all use of any and all electronic machine for tabulation or counting of ballots for any provincial election.

Encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

Implement a school voucher system to ensure that education funding follows each student and enhances the vision of school choice. The school voucher should include the following fund sources calculated on a per student, school, and district basis.

Ensure that teachers, schools, school boards, and third parties providing services to kindergarten to Grade 12 schools do not provide access to materials of a sexual, racist, or abusive nature, including, but not limited to, books, handouts, online materials, and live events that are not part of the Alberta Program of Studies.

Not support the establishment of solar farms in the areas of the agricultural Canada Land Inventory (CLI) Class 1, 2, or 3 soils.

End provincial funding for supervised consumption sites.

Divide the roles and responsibilities of the Minister of Justice position into separate ministries of Attorney General and Solicitor General.

Repeal the no fault Insurance (also known as Direct Compensation for Property Damage) legislation in Alberta and return to torte-based (also known as at-fault based) insurance.

Require all regulatory professional associations and trade organizations to limit investigations of their members for complaints regarding professional conduct of their members to instances of activities that occur while 'on the job,' and limit the application of any Code of Conduct to professional activities and exclude personal affairs.

Protect inmates who were female at conception and are housed at correctional and remand centers for women operated by Alberta Correctional Services by refusing to house any inmate who was male at conception at said correctional and remand centers.

So I'm going to say it - Jason Kenney was, on balance, a good Premier.  He was dealt a really tough hand with Covid.  He took power in 2019 and thus his reign was largely defined by how he dealt with the pandemic.  He wasn't perfect (who can forget the "best summer ever" in 2021, which promptly turned into another round of lockdowns in the fall), but he was legitimately trying to balance both public health concerns with economic and personal liberty concerns.

The UCP AGM deserved much of the negative publicity it garnered, but I'm curious about some of the negative resolutions you posted.  In no particular order:

-banning race-based university admissions is perfectly defensible.  Even if you want to have a diverse campus, look at the personal backgrounds of your incoming students, not just the colour of their skin

-the school voucher system, which is also defensible, was the one resolution that failed to pass

-supervised consumption sites have lots of issues

-separating the roles of SolGen and Attorney General is ABSOLUTELY fine, and is historically what has happened.  The government's role in both policing, and prosecuting, should be separate

-Professional societies - this has also been an issue where (usually it's lawyers) say something political, outside of their role as a lawyer, and someone files a complaint to the Law Society.  I remember this with Ezra Levant, with whom I had many issues with.  But anyways, after being called to the bar in 2000 he ceased practicing in 2003 to focus on journalism and politics and went to a non-practicing status.  Despite that he received 26 separate complaints to the Law Society.  He successfully defended 24 of them but eventually agreed to resign because the burden of defending all these complaints was too high.

-last time I looked into it transgendered women inmates are not housed with natal females.  But neither are they housed with natal males either - they find some kind of third option to protect everyone's safety (including that of the trans woman)

[Valmy]

Trans people are just really really dangerous. Out there. Existing and stuff.

Sure grown ass women can be housed with murderers and psychopaths, but so long as none of those murderers or psychopaths are trans everybody will be safe.

Good thing we have few natal female posters on this board. The trans posters we have put them in enormous danger.

[Grey Fox]

Inmates will lie and have lied about being trans to gain a perceived advantage.

There is a place and a need for separation between pre-puberty transitioned people and post-puberty transitioned people in some sphere of society.

Encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

I like this idea enshrined between all the SoCon regressive MAGA loving ideas.