The information the Conservatives leaked to David Cochrane Tuesday on the budget update confirmed the extent to which they are actually the ones who have been running the finance department as if it was a ministry of magic. The cash deficit this year …
Continue readingTag: Budget 2015
Alberta Politics: Rachel Notley sticks to her fiscal guns at ‘state of the province speech’ to Edmonton Chamber of Commerce
PHOTO: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley addressing the Alberta Chamber of Commerce yesterday. Alberta NDP Premier Rachel Notley yesterday continued a tradition of “state of the province speeches” to chamber of commerce audiences long beloved by the province’s Progressive Conservative premiers. PC premier Jim Prentice gave the last one to the
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: A Dangerous Change In Law
In his latest abuse of the legislative processes, Harper has slide a particularly slimy bit into the 2015 budget implementation bill: The Harper government moved to retroactively rewrite Canada’s access to information law in order to prevent possible criminal charges against the RCMP, The Canadian Press has learned. An
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: A Dangerous Change In Law
In his latest abuse of the legislative processes, Harper has slide a particularly slimy bit into the 2015 budget implementation bill: The Harper government moved to retroactively rewrite Canada’s access to information law in order to prevent possible criminal charges against the RCMP, The Canadian Press has learned. An
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: A Dangerous Change In Law
The Harper government moved to retroactively rewrite Canada’s access to information law in order to prevent possible criminal charges against the RCMP, The Canadian Press has learned.
An unheralded change buried in last week’s 167-page omnibus budget bill exempted all records from the defunct long-gun registry, and also any “request, complaint, investigation, application, judicial review, appeal or other proceeding under the Access to Information Act or the Privacy Act,” related to those old records.
The unprecedented, retroactive changes — access-to-information experts liken them to erasing the national memory — are even more odd because they are backdated to the day the Conservatives introduced legislation to kill the gun registry, not to when the bill received royal assent.
The date effectively alters history to make an old government bill come into force months before it was actually passed by Parliament.
Oh, but this gets better. It turns out that this is intended to squelch an ongoing investigation by a parliamentary officer – the Information Officer, Suzanne Legault.
In an interview airing later Thursday on CBC News Network’s Power & Politics, Legault expanded on the ramifications of passing these amendments.
“What this does is that it erases the right of the requester to have ever made this request. It erases the right of the requester to have ever complained to my office. It erases all of the investigative powers that I have used during this investigation. And it erases the referral that I have made to the attorney general of Canada. And it erases the recommendations I have made to the minister.
“What these provisions do is they actually erase any potential administrative, civil or criminal liability for any actors involved throughout the investigation and in the destruction of those records in contravention to the Access to Information Act.”
Creating retroactive legislation in Canada that reaches back years in time is unusual, although technically legal as long as it isn’t a criminal code change.
“An argument has been made that there are elements in the information act, the Access to Information Act, that contradict something in that other piece of legislation. At best that is a loophole,” he said at an event in Windsor, Ont.
“I’m not sure there really is a contradiction, but to be perfectly clear, the government is clarifying the information act to make sure it is in full conformity with Parliament’s already expressed wishes on the long-gun registry that the RCMP has executed as they were required to do according to the law.”
The RCMP also rebuffed Legault’s accusations, saying it did nothing wrong.
“The RCMP disputes the OIC’s (Office of the Information Commissioner’s) view that it denied a right of access under the Access to Information Act by destroying records that were responsive to the request,” Sgt. Harold Pfleiderer said in a statement. ( CBC )
However, in this case, it is quite clear that Harper is trying to squelch an investigation into possibly illegal actions of the RCMP and other government officials with respect to the Long Gun Registry data. So, even if this legislation is technically “legal”, it doesn’t mean it is right. No government should be using legislative fiat to make its indiscretions “disappear”.
The Sir Robert Bond Papers: When is a cut not a cut? #nlpoli
A couple of years ago, the province’s auditor general noted that a Crown agency responsible for developing an integrated health information system was paying salaries to its employees that were way outside provincial government guidelines. The Telegram reported last fall that the problem was still unresolved 18 months after the
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Fourth Party #nlpoli
A Telegram editorial on Wednesday contained a curious comment. The subject was news that broke this week about the provincial government;s energy corporation. Two senior corporate officials are refusing to testify in a court case in Quebec over contending interpretations of the 1969 power contract between Churchill Falls (Labrador) Corporation
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Austerity #nlpoli
All this talk of austerity, gutting the public service…. Then you look at the salary costs, from the provincial budget. There’s something that just doesn’t add up. -srbp-
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Red and the Black: budgets and politics #nlpoli
The annual budget is probably the most political document of any government in a Westminster style parliament like ours. At its simplest and most obvious level the budget is the formal statement of a government’s priorities. Once approved by 1the legislature, it gives government the legal authority to spend money.
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Stephen Harper and the Great Turkey Budget
Gosh. What a difference a day makes. The other day I was lamenting that an Abacus poll seemed to suggest that enough Canadians had liked the Con's porky budget so much they had given given Stephen Harper a big boost.But now an EKOS poll suggests that while nobody is complaining
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Conservatives stay the debt-building course #nlpoli
Budget 2015 offered absolutely no surprises. On major areas the Conservatives continued their policy of spending more than the provincial treasury can afford. That’s been their trade-mark since 2003 and it became etched in stone in 2009. As SRBP forecast a couple of weeks ago, the Conservatives raised a modest
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Budget 2015: A tale of austerity past, present and future
Cross-posted from my blog. I’ve been banging the drum of “slow-motion austerity” for a while and little in the 2015 federal budget suggests any change from the pattern of death by a thousand cuts. This budget is another is a series of unspectacular austerity budgets. Taken together, however, the cuts
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Canada’s copyright term extension for sound recordings taxes public, enriches record labels
The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Jeremy Malcolm explains why Harper’s new plan to extend copyright terms for sound recordings is “thoroughly misguided” The post Canada’s copyright term extension for sound recordings taxes public, enriches record labels appeared first on The Canadian Progressive.
Continue readingScott's DiaTribes: Inconvenient comments from Conservatives on Budgets
Inconvenient comment #1: Inconvenient Comment #2: Former Conservative Finance Minister – the late Jim Flaherty – ruled out dipping into contingency fund last year to balance the books: Flaherty told CBC News it would be “imprudent” to
Continue readingPolitical Eh-conomy: Budget 2015: A tale of austerity past, present and future
I’ve been banging the drum of “slow-motion austerity” for a while and little in the 2015 federal budget suggests any change from the pattern of death by a thousand cuts. This budget is another is a series of unspectacular austerity budgets. Taken together, however, the cuts rapidly add up and
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Stephen Harper’s Totally Disastrous Budget Launch
It was a frightening sight, and for a moment I thought Stephen Harper had finally gone off the deep end.For there he was, on the day when he was supposed to be celebrating the launch of his new budget, screaming at the opposition, waving his arms around wildly, trying to
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Joe Oliver’s Monstrous Assault on the Future
It is without a doubt one of the most irresponsible statements I have ever heard, and it comes courtesy of the old Con zombie Joe Oliver.Who not content with delivering a smoke and mirrors budget worthy of a Con artist as I pointed out yesterday.A so called balanced budget which
Continue readingMontreal Simon: The Harper Regime and the Con Artist Budget
It won't happen of course, not in this corrupted Harperland, where decency goes to die.But if there was any justice, Boss Harper, Oily Joe Oliver, and the rest of the Con mob would be in a police lineup. Preparing to be charged with crimes against democracy and electoral fraud.For conspiring to bribe
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Joe Oliver and the Ghastly Cinderella Budget Show
Well let's put it this way, his PMO handlers did their best to turn it into a glamorous photo-op, but it wasn't exactly Cinderella slipping on her dainty glass slipper.And it wasn't pretty.It was just Ol' Joe Oliver, pulling on his new pair of Made in America, New Balance running shoes
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Prentice Drops the “E” Word on Day One
Extremist: /ɛkˈstriːmɪst/ noun, chiefly derogatory: A person who holds extreme political or religious views, especially one who advocates illegal, violent or other extreme action—Oxford dictionary Hysterical rhetoric Of all the bonehead things Premier Prentice could have said in his campaign kick-off speech, warning Albertans to beware of “extreme ideas or
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