Collective Bargaining Works When It Is Allowed to Proceed

Without going on strike the border crossing union managed to settle their labour dispute with the government. This despite all of the histrionics and gnashing of teeth by the Conservatives and their allies in the media, which now is pretty much the entire media.

Is it not amazing that the government and union managed to come to an agreement despite all of the noise? Not really. I have always disagreed with PSAC's adversarial first approach to negotiations. They seemed to have never learned the old adage about attracting more flies with honey. However, they like to follow their process and that strike vote was just part of that process.

I am not surprised by the government's role in this. As usual they just got on with the business at hand and quietly resolved the problem.

We can say that the crisis was averted accept that there was never going to be a crisis. This does point out the stupidity of the CPC and in another time that would have been pointed out by our news media. However, since they all hopped on the "sky is falling" bandwagon they cannot point out Conservative stupidity without shining a light on their own.

So this whole thing further proves that if collective bargaining is allowed to happen without the government giving itself, or one side in the case of collective bargaining between unions and private companies, an unfair advantage labour disputes are often settled without disruptive labour action.

The NSICOP Report

The NSICOP released a special report on foreign interference in Canadian politics and it was much more useful than the public inquiry that was completed earlier this year.

The public inquiry was not very useful because it did not follow the money. That is how we are going to find out just how badly compromised our politics is by foreign actors, both governmental and non-governmental. Instead we got a report that did not tell us much of anything useful.

The NSICOP report on the other hand flat out told us that more than a few parliamentarians were witting and unwitting helpers of foreign actors in influencing our politics. They did not go into details because to do so would break more than a few national security laws but the message is clear. Some of our elected officials have both knowingly and unknowingly allowed themselves to be supported by foreign actors.

That is a very serious situation and it bears much more scrutiny. If we had a fully functioning Parliament all of the parties would be working together to get to the bottom of it and then coming up with new laws and regulations to reduce foreign interference in all of its forms.

Of course we do not have a fully functioning Parliament and I will not go into details as to why.

What I did find interesting was the thundering silence on the findings of the report from the CPC when it was published. It took them 24 hours to finally come up with an attack line and that attack line was that the government should release the names of the MPs. Of course they cannot do that because to do so would be breaking the law. So the CPC can safely continue to demand the release of those names knowing that the government cannot comply.

I do have a question as to why the Conservatives took this tack. I have stated before that none of the Federal parties would come out smelling like a rose if the names were released because I can pretty much guarantee that some past and current MP's, of all political stripes, have benefited in some way from foreign interference. 

So does the fact they took this tack indicate that one or more of the Conservatives MPs on the NSICOP informed Pierre Poilievre of the names and him seeing that his name was not mentioned or a very prominent Liberals being mentioned lead to their reaction? Or is this just Pierre Poilievre being himself and throwing shit at the wall hoping it would stick knowing that the government has no defence because they cannot legally release the names?

For now I am going to give the Conservative MPs the benefit of the doubt. The second option is typical Pierre Poilievre and I cannot yet think that the Conservative members of the committee can break the law so readily.

Of course, we cannot talk about this without talking about the media reaction, which has been as predictable as the tides. I have noticed that many in the media have parroted the Conservative talking points while downplaying the fact the government cannot release the names without breaking the law. Indeed, I saw one news report last week that completely omitted that fact. 

As I stated in my last post the government has to cut off all public financial support going to our media. The fact one news organization completely omitted the legal reasons for not releasing the names is obvious and overt misinformation. It is the right of the media to tell stories as they see fit. It says so right in our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. However, it is also the right of Canadians not to have their tax dollars to go to organizations that lie to them. 

In the end foreign interference will continue in our politics because no real measures have been taken to measure the true extent of it and its impacts in our politics, probably because all parties know they would be badly hurt if the truth were to really come out. As well, do not expect any of those MPs named in the report to ever see the inside of a courtroom as a result of the report findings. It's just not going to happen.

They are still talking about the changes to the capital gains tax

Too bad no one else is.

In my previous post I stated one of my laws of politics is whenever your opponent talks about your policy for longer than just a single news cycle they are worried that it might resonate with voters.

So here we see them still talking about one of the less remarkable provisions of the 2024 Budget. I realize that one of the reasons is the government is going to have a vote on the provision tomorrow but votes for government bills happen every week when the House is sitting. So why are they singling this one out? And why has there been low grumblings about this provision since it was announced?

I can see four reasons. The first is in my first sentence of this post. The simple fact is taxing the wealthy is a popular idea. Most ordinary Canadians see no problem with it. Added to that is the fact that most Canadians will never be impacted by this provision. So they are not going to get worked up about it, despite the efforts by those opposed to it to make them care. The trotting out of doctors and assertions that some Canadians will take a hit when they sell their cottages is not going to have the impact they hope it will. Most know that doctors are going to be fine financially regardless of the changes, most people do not own cottages and they also know that rich people will be paying more.

The second reason is this provision is going to directly impact those who are pushing to have it canceled the most. Namely, the wealthy, which includes the owners of our media. Our media has been trashing the Liberals for almost a decade but the fact that the owners of them are going to take a hit explains why I have yet to see a media outlet give equal time to the benefits of the changes. The media is obsessed with "both sides" of every issue but for some reason not this one. The obvious bias, probably at the behest of the owners of our media, further cements in my mind that we need a complete overhaul of the media landscape in this country. The government can probably go along way towards bringing that about if they would stop all subsidies and financial support to the media. The media has been purveyors of disinformation and misinformation for quite some time and I believe that we taxpayers should not be on the hook to pay for that. Stop all support and let the chips fall where they may.

The third reason is the wealthy are actually being forced to pay more. Make no mistake, these changes will not put any of them in the poor house. Hell, they will not even see a single change to their lifestyles. However, the wealthy have been calling the fiscal shots in this country for more than three decades and having their demands be ignored by the government must be disconcerting. 

Which brings me to reason number four. The continued breakdown of the Conservative Consensus. Since 2015, the Liberal government has raised taxes on the wealthy at least twice before the 2024 budget and they actually introduced a new "tax" in the form of putting a price on carbon. Further they have not suffered any political harm from any of it and it appears they will not suffer too much harm from the changes in the capital gains tax. As well, they have not suffered from running deficits, while substantially increasing government spending. None of this would have been accepted by Canadians 15 years ago. (Nor would the recent anti-scab legislation) Now they are and that must really be freaking out those who benefited the most from the Conservative Consensus. Incidentally, that breakdown is probably one of the reasons why our media has been so damned hostile to the Liberal government, not the only reason but certainly one of them. Those that own the media and those who benefit from the Consensus want to maintain it and they are doing their damnest to convince Canadians that it is in their interest to maintain it and not succeeding very much it would seem.

At any rate the vote will happen tomorrow and the changes will be the law of the land. There is no way the NDP, which supports higher taxes for the wealthy as a matter of general principle, are going to vote against higher taxes for the wealthy. (Yes I know, famous last words and all of that, but I do not think they want to commit political suicide.)