Cabinet is again assuring parliamentarians Canada has not exported arms to Israel. The latest statement, in a report to the Senate defence committee, follows repeated false allegations that Canadians are complicit in “genocide.”
Health Minister Mark Holland yesterday said the Senate must pass a pharmacare bill. Holland’s appeal followed mounting criticism of Bill C-64 An Act Respecting Pharmacare as vague and incomplete: “Pharmacare legislation needs to pass.”
Green Party leader Elizabeth May yesterday proposed that Parliament nationalize the country’s two largest railways for the sake of “ensuring the future of sustainable public transportation.” Parliament privatized Canadian National Railway 29 years ago and never owned Canadian Pacific: “The Party’s vision is to return these vital transportation networks to their original purpose.”
The Commons transport committee has ordered hearings into poor VIA Rail service for the second time in two years. It follows disruptions on one of VIA’s busiest lines that turned a routine four-hour holiday trip into a 14-hour odyssey that left passengers in tears: “There were passengers who were crying, who called 911.”
Write-offs under a taxpayer-backed loan program for “future entrepreneurs” have cost over $45 million, says a Department of Industry audit. Best-known borrowers under the Futurpreneur Canada program include Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly’s husband: “She has recused herself from all discussions.”
Canada Post’s proposal for the steepest stamp rate hike in its history follows a warning from Public Works Minister Jean-Yves Duclos to cut costs. The 25 percent hike proposed to take effect next January 13 follows a separate eight percent hike just four months ago: “Decrease costs by working with unions.”
Winnipeg broadcaster Charles Adler on Saturday came a step closer to taking a $178,100-a year seat in the Senate. Cabinet served the required legal notice that Adler, 70, should represent his province despite describing Indigenous Manitobans as lazy “boneheads.”
More Canadians now play soccer than hockey, says Department of Canadian Heritage research. No reason was given, though the figures follow Commons investigations of recreational hockey as a leading cause of sports-related brain injury: “This is a topic of discussion in almost every community where there are sports played.”
Churches burn,
Communities withdraw into
Crenulated realms within and without.
Misery deepens,
And spills out to the untouched spaces,
As addiction overwhelms the seats of power.
Laws promulgate,
Scattered by bureaucrats in all directions,
To settle as a foretoken of transformation.
While the Oracle,
Tends bar at the Fort Garry and
Contemplates three promises made,
Peace.
Order.
And Good Government.
By W.N. Branson
MPs like to quote Churchill. No MP ever quotes Mackenzie King. One Conservative said King was guided by “the cold hand of political expediency” in the Second World War, perhaps forgetting both major parties campaigned against conscription in a 1940 general election for fear of losing seats in Québec.
Historian Jack Granatstein’s Canada At War documents the era in a compelling collection of essays. Consider the 1940 election. At the very moment Britain was rationing butter and evacuating schoolchildren from its cities, when Finland and the USSR were at war, when Japan was waging its brutal campaign of “kill all, loot all, burn all” in northern China, Liberal Party fundraisers were shaking down federal contractors for cash contributions: Canada Packers, Northern Electric, National Steel Car. “Companies were virtually forced to contribute to party coffers out of fear of losing their government contracts,” writes Granatstein.
One Liberal Party contributor bought the lieutenant governorship of Ontario for $30,000. Six other fundraisers won appointments to the Senate. “There were no problems whatsoever with money,” writes Granatstein. Mackenzie King won the election handily.
“Many Canadians, French-speaking and others, believed incorrectly that their interests, Canadian interests, were not directly threatened by Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo,” notes Canada At War. It is an arresting statement.
Granatstein describes Canada as “a small and weak country” at the time. “We are the safest country in the world as long as we mind our own business,” he quotes one Canadian diplomat of the era. When Churchill met Roosevelt at the famed 1941 Atlantic Charter conference at Newfoundland, Prime Minister King was not even asked to attend. Canada was “reduced to the status of a pest with its perpetual clamour to be present,” says Canada At War.
If the story ended there, it would rank as an inglorious chapter unworthy of being quoted by any MP. Of course the story does not end there.
Granatstein puts it best: “Like those of other prime ministers, King’s separate acts do not always appear honourable, fair or just. Too often expediency, power considerations or patronage appear to shape policy, and the individual parts of the whole often look pretty shabby. But the entire picture should not be distorted by too much emphasis on the bits and pieces.”
Canada did win its war. In a country of 11.5 million people a total 330,000 did volunteer to fight and die with the army, navy and air force by 1941. Canada did make a gift of billions in war production that helped turn the tide. Canada At War documents this in spirited anecdotes and tireless research.
A final word about the author: Jack Granatstein rates among those few historians who have devoted their lives to telling Canadian stories. Their work is indispensable. Everyone is richer for reading and enjoying it.
By Holly Doan
Canada at War: Conscription, Diplomacy and Politics, by J.L. Granatstein; University of Toronto Press; 328 pages; ISBN 9781-48752-4760; $21.42
New Democrat leader Jagmeet Singh yesterday said he is “not afraid” to go to the polls. The 44th Parliament faces quick dissolution this fall after Singh formally rejected a pact that promised to keep Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in power until June 30, 2025: “I am not afraid of causing an election.”
Cabinet’s deputy secretary yesterday refused to tell MPs how much was paid to a disgraced Chief Human Rights Commissioner who described Muslim terrorism as a “well-calculated strategy.” Birju Dattani was appointed to the $394,000-a year post but never took office: “I understand in this case the Government of Canada saw fit to offer him a compensation package.”
The former chair of a now-disbanded “green slush fund” was selected from some 100 applicants for the job, the Commons public accounts committee was told yesterday. MPs questioned why cabinet chose Annette Verschuren, a Liberal Party donor with a conflict of interest: “It appeared one of the qualifications required to be appointed to this board is that you have a conflict.”
Parks Canada will not disclose details of its forest management prior to a July 24 wildfire that burned Jasper, Alta. Managers four years ago warned of “dead trees and the fuel load” at Jasper National Park: “Obviously one of the big concerns is the dead trees.”
Canadians fear climate change will lead to food shortages here, says in-house Privy Council research. Figures show Canada has been self-sufficient in food since Confederation and is one of the world’s largest food exporters: “Food is abundant with plenty to spare.”
