The Montreal debate: Unity through alienation
The Montreal debate was pretty much a wash when it came to substantive policy. While the topic was “Building a strong, united Canada,” the answers to the issue were left…
Dale Smith
The deluge of complaints
On the Robocon front today, Elections Canada has confirmed that they have received over 31,000 contacts regarding these kinds of calls in the last election. Expect this investigation to start…
Reviewing the tapes
Today’s Robocon update is that the Conservatives will be reviewing the tapes out of the Responsive Marketing Group (RMG) call centre during the election before they turn them over to…
QP: From accusation to misdirection
The intent may have been to push back against the Liberals, but the Conservatives’ ham-fisted approach is more likely to blow up in their own faces – or not, considering…
Intimidation and false pretences
While the Robocon investigation expands form Guelph to the call centre in Thunder Bay, there is a setback on another front. Elections Canada has told Joe Volpe that they can’t…
QP: Accusations of a smear campaign
The Conservatives moved into full-blown attack mode on the Robocon front in today’s QP, completely abandoning the more contrite tone they struck earlier in the week. Turmel began by asking…
The poutine connection
Today in Robocon revelations, court documents show a number of calls between the Conservative campaign office in Guelph with RackNine – the company that did the robo-calling – despite the…
QP: Look at your own robo-call tactics
With more Robocon revelations continuing to pour out in the media, it was a chance to see if the NDP could actually carry the ball that they dropped yesterday when…
Robo-call revelations blowing up
Hold your guns, everyone! Peter MacKay insists that the robo-calls were an “isolated incident” and that the guilty party has already been caught, so no need to go further. And…
QP: Robo-calls rule the day
There was a sense of definite frisson in the House for a Monday, which often tend to be sleepy. Harper was present (unusual for a Monday), and the press gallery…
More robo-call claims
The “Robocon Scandal,” as it is now being dubbed, is going to blow right up in the Commons today, as MPs return from a constituency week. Of course, now some…
A much feistier debate in Winnipeg
Today’s NDP debate, brought to from Winnipeg, Manitoba, was under the rather vague theme of “connecting people and the regions.” Judging from the questions asked, it was more of a…
More than just robo-calls
The investigation into the robo-calling has expanded into other harassing phone calls that happened during the election, which targeted at least 14 different Liberal ridings. (The Toronto Star, mind you,…
The robo-call fallout
And so the fall-out from the robo-call revelations has dominated the media cycle. The Conservatives deny any wrongdoing. NDP MP Pat Martin is staying true to form and calling it…
Tracking down the robo-calls
An investigation by Elections Canada has tracked the robo-calls harassing Liberal voters in Guelph during the last election to an Edmonton company with Conservative ties. But remember that the party…
The membership numbers are in
The NDP membership numbers are now final in the lead-up to the leadership vote, and they have some 128,351 paid-up memberships going into the vote. While these may be record…
Tinkering with the Standing Orders
MPs are going to be looking at the Standing Orders to see if things need to change with regards to time allocation, committees going in camera, and changes to Question…
Reading the bill first
It seems that Vic Toews couldn’t even be bothered to read his own Lawful Access bill after he expressed surprise at some of the contents pointed out to him in…
Arbitrary powers and gag orders
The Lawful Access bill is headed directly to a special legislative committee before it even gets Second Reading, which means that amendments can be pretty broad and far-reaching. As for…
Paying for privacy invasions
What’s that? Telecoms and ISPs will have to spend lots of money to create spy infrastructure and backdoors for police as part of the Lawful Access bill, and those costs…