Konrad Yakabuski, Globe and Mail business writer, broke a story on December 30th reporting that Hydro Quebec is negotiating with two New England states for the first long term export of Quebec hydro electrical power to the USA in two decades. The 20 year sweet deal for US consumers requires approval of the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). No mention was made of any Canadian approvals.
The deal will require two private US power utilities to invest $700 million (U.S.) to build a transmission line from a substation in Sherbrooke Quebec to New Hampshire USA where clean Quebec hydro power will be distributed through the New England power grid to provide non-polluting Canadian generated electrical power to Boston USA.
Ontario, desperately in need of clean power and anticipating imports of Quebec Hydro power, planned to build a transmission line from Quebec to Ontario. Slowness of the McGuity Liberals to conclude a deal on the project between Canada’s two largest and most industrialized provinces means the line may now be used to transmit Quebec hydro power through Ontario to the USA leaving Ontario out in the cold.
The plan to export large volumes of clean Quebec hydro electrical power to the USA occurs at a time when Canadian environmentalists are demanding that Ontario seek alternatives to its reliance on coal fired and expensive nuclear generated electrical power.
US environmentalists are calling for boycotts of energy imports produced from the Alberta Tar Sands. Nothing like having it both ways, use clean Canadian hydro power (No Buy American ban on this commodity) to meet President Obama’s targets for clean energy while at the same time damning Tar Sands production that employ Canadian workers.
Canadian environmentalists need to reassess. So long as Canadian energy is considered an exportable commodity instead of a national resource needed to serve the common good, neither Canadian jobs nor the environment can be protected.
The answer is obvious! Nationalize all Canadian energy and do it now! Develop east west hydro electric grids and construct east west natural gas and oil pipelines with up graders and refineries in Canada to process the products. That is real stimulus and job creation.
A new energy policy is needed to serve Canadian needs first. Then we can talk about exporting surpluses to the USA.
Left Turn Canada!
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Prime Minister Harper Preaches to the Converted
Don Currie, Editor, Focus on Socialism
March 10, 2009.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s speech before a big business crowd in Mississauga Brampton Ontario on March 10th re-stated his government’s pledge that the interests of wealth and privilege will continue to come first as the country slides into depression, and the working class and the unemployed are welcome to go along for the ride. He was heartily applauded by the partisan audience.
As he was speaking to the upscale crowd, GM workers and retirees with their backs against the wall were being urged by their union leadership to vote in favour of a roll back in wages and pensions to keep GM in business and a shrinking work force temporarily employed to produce cars that most people can’t afford to buy.
Meanwhile in the House of Commons, the Liberals and the NDP chided Finance Minister Flaherty for not admitting the economic situation for wage earners was dire, as though the Conservative minister really cared. The Conservative finance minister is content to rebut all criticism of his failed policies for working people by claiming that Canada is hostage to the financial melt down in the USA. Flaherty claims that until US banks start lending there is nothing to be done. Finger pointing is a safe bet for Flaherty and a convenient way of dealing with any future failure as the US economy continues to slide with no bottom in sight. Even as Flaherty was speaking in the House Ben Bernanke, head of the US Federal Reserve Board characterized the economic debacle as worse than the Great Depression.
At the same time Minister Flaherty boasts that Canada is the envy of the G20 because the Canadian chartered banks aren’t failing and are well capitalized unlike US banks. Canadian banks are all reporting quarterly profits in spite of the real economy tanking. What’s up? Bank profits and unemployment are rising at the same time! Minister Flaherty is mute about rising bank profits and a disintegrating real economy. He says nothing about this obvious anomaly because he worked for this outcome.
The Finance Minister was instrumental in backstopping the banks with $200 billion of government guarantees long before there was any talk in Parliament about a stimulus budget for workers and communities. Flaherty knows that the banks don’t have to lend to the real economy to make profit. They are doing fine on spreads between a falling Bank of Canada rate, high interest credit cards, safe mortgages and loans (the government removed the toxic debt and burdened CMHC with it) to preferred lenders that really don’t need the money anyway. Canadian Banks got their Harper Government “stimulus” up front last October after President Bush convened the G20 and all present agreed to pump 2% of GDP into the economy. Do the math. Two percent of $1.3 trillion GDP is about $260 billion; $200 billion for the banks and the rest for a “stimulus” budget that has within in lots of room for big business insiders to do very well. Flaherty only presented the budget to Parliament after it was vetted by a blue ribbon big business committee.
The actual amount of stimulus that will reach workers and communities is dubious. There is no reason for the opposition parties to rubber stamp it. There is stimulus and then there is talk of stimulus. The opposition charges that the budget is entangled with a number of Conservative plans having nothing to do with infrastructure funding. Environmentalists are concerned about the removal of restrictions on industrial development on inland waterways. Women workers are angry about the budget endorsing pay equity discrimination. The budget is not user-friendly compelling small communities to come up with co-pay money they don’t have and foisting P3’s on infrastructure projects that private investor abuse. Flaherty is bullying the Senate and the opposition to rush through the budget, before the people realize what is really in it. The Conservatives do not want the public to look too closely at the budget (all 300 plus pages of it) for fear of what they might find there. The Conservatives have stuffed the budget with barbs and hooks and at the same time, as a side show, are attempting to slip through the Finance Committee a $3 billion no strings attached pork barrel.
The Canadian people are paying a heavy price for the failure of the faint-hearted Ignatieff Liberals recoiling in fear from joining with the NDP and the Bloc to administer a crushing defeat to the Harper Conservatives when they had the chance. The Liberal and Conservative back room brain trusts held their noses, gave each other a little “upper class hug” and signaled to the Bay Street, Calgary Petroleum Club, the Irving Empire, the Montreal and Vancouver investor groups, and the TSX, that as much as they find each other distasteful, when the chips are down they will unite against any threat of organized labour and the movements of the people gaining a position of influence over Parliament.
The academic-intellectual left advice to labour to be “more clever and persuasive” in pleading with capitalism to reform itself is not helpful. An article in the last issue of CCPA Monitor suggesting to their 10,000 readership that progressives should support pleading for a place at the corporate table as a means of democratizing capitalist decisions is typical. Likewise, the Lakeland Institute, correctly lambasting the Stelmach government for funneling $5 billion to the oil investors continues to fail to demand nationalization the whole energy sector as the way to end its privileged position in the economy. The entire gamut of left academia remains timid and mute about the ruinous influence on the economy of $492 billion over 20 years allocated by the Canada First Defense Policy of the Harper Conservatives.
The G20 finance ministers will be meeting next week in preparation for their April Summit. The global depression is much worse than Flaherty and Harper are prepared to admit. The Conservatives are going to the G20 with one eye on the event and the other on their political base. That base doesn’t include organized labour. Flaherty and Harper will be coming back to Canada after the G20 to sell the plans of the IMF, the World Bank and G7. They will confront at the meeting a brawl among the USA, the EU, as they confront the rising power of China, Brazil, India.
Now is the time for organized labour to send a message to the Government that Canadians will not accept any plans of international finance capital that require the working class and the farmers to make more concessions to save the profit system.
Organized labour and the left-progressives confront a challenge. Either continue to support one of the alternatives offered by the Liberals or the Conservatives, fronting for corporate and banking capital, or begin the difficult task of organizing now around an independent program of economic development for Canada.
What is happening to the autoworkers, forced into concessions and condemned to long term unemployment is a template for what the employers will be demanding from steel, forestry, transportation, the energy sector and what remains of manufacturing. Following employer attacks on the productive sector workers there will be pressures on the civil service and the entire service industry for wage rollbacks and benefits concessions.
Labour needs its own summit! Relying on the banking and corporate elites to plan our future is a mugs game. Labour can and must lead the country!
Left Turn Canada!
March 10, 2009.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s speech before a big business crowd in Mississauga Brampton Ontario on March 10th re-stated his government’s pledge that the interests of wealth and privilege will continue to come first as the country slides into depression, and the working class and the unemployed are welcome to go along for the ride. He was heartily applauded by the partisan audience.
As he was speaking to the upscale crowd, GM workers and retirees with their backs against the wall were being urged by their union leadership to vote in favour of a roll back in wages and pensions to keep GM in business and a shrinking work force temporarily employed to produce cars that most people can’t afford to buy.
Meanwhile in the House of Commons, the Liberals and the NDP chided Finance Minister Flaherty for not admitting the economic situation for wage earners was dire, as though the Conservative minister really cared. The Conservative finance minister is content to rebut all criticism of his failed policies for working people by claiming that Canada is hostage to the financial melt down in the USA. Flaherty claims that until US banks start lending there is nothing to be done. Finger pointing is a safe bet for Flaherty and a convenient way of dealing with any future failure as the US economy continues to slide with no bottom in sight. Even as Flaherty was speaking in the House Ben Bernanke, head of the US Federal Reserve Board characterized the economic debacle as worse than the Great Depression.
At the same time Minister Flaherty boasts that Canada is the envy of the G20 because the Canadian chartered banks aren’t failing and are well capitalized unlike US banks. Canadian banks are all reporting quarterly profits in spite of the real economy tanking. What’s up? Bank profits and unemployment are rising at the same time! Minister Flaherty is mute about rising bank profits and a disintegrating real economy. He says nothing about this obvious anomaly because he worked for this outcome.
The Finance Minister was instrumental in backstopping the banks with $200 billion of government guarantees long before there was any talk in Parliament about a stimulus budget for workers and communities. Flaherty knows that the banks don’t have to lend to the real economy to make profit. They are doing fine on spreads between a falling Bank of Canada rate, high interest credit cards, safe mortgages and loans (the government removed the toxic debt and burdened CMHC with it) to preferred lenders that really don’t need the money anyway. Canadian Banks got their Harper Government “stimulus” up front last October after President Bush convened the G20 and all present agreed to pump 2% of GDP into the economy. Do the math. Two percent of $1.3 trillion GDP is about $260 billion; $200 billion for the banks and the rest for a “stimulus” budget that has within in lots of room for big business insiders to do very well. Flaherty only presented the budget to Parliament after it was vetted by a blue ribbon big business committee.
The actual amount of stimulus that will reach workers and communities is dubious. There is no reason for the opposition parties to rubber stamp it. There is stimulus and then there is talk of stimulus. The opposition charges that the budget is entangled with a number of Conservative plans having nothing to do with infrastructure funding. Environmentalists are concerned about the removal of restrictions on industrial development on inland waterways. Women workers are angry about the budget endorsing pay equity discrimination. The budget is not user-friendly compelling small communities to come up with co-pay money they don’t have and foisting P3’s on infrastructure projects that private investor abuse. Flaherty is bullying the Senate and the opposition to rush through the budget, before the people realize what is really in it. The Conservatives do not want the public to look too closely at the budget (all 300 plus pages of it) for fear of what they might find there. The Conservatives have stuffed the budget with barbs and hooks and at the same time, as a side show, are attempting to slip through the Finance Committee a $3 billion no strings attached pork barrel.
The Canadian people are paying a heavy price for the failure of the faint-hearted Ignatieff Liberals recoiling in fear from joining with the NDP and the Bloc to administer a crushing defeat to the Harper Conservatives when they had the chance. The Liberal and Conservative back room brain trusts held their noses, gave each other a little “upper class hug” and signaled to the Bay Street, Calgary Petroleum Club, the Irving Empire, the Montreal and Vancouver investor groups, and the TSX, that as much as they find each other distasteful, when the chips are down they will unite against any threat of organized labour and the movements of the people gaining a position of influence over Parliament.
The academic-intellectual left advice to labour to be “more clever and persuasive” in pleading with capitalism to reform itself is not helpful. An article in the last issue of CCPA Monitor suggesting to their 10,000 readership that progressives should support pleading for a place at the corporate table as a means of democratizing capitalist decisions is typical. Likewise, the Lakeland Institute, correctly lambasting the Stelmach government for funneling $5 billion to the oil investors continues to fail to demand nationalization the whole energy sector as the way to end its privileged position in the economy. The entire gamut of left academia remains timid and mute about the ruinous influence on the economy of $492 billion over 20 years allocated by the Canada First Defense Policy of the Harper Conservatives.
The G20 finance ministers will be meeting next week in preparation for their April Summit. The global depression is much worse than Flaherty and Harper are prepared to admit. The Conservatives are going to the G20 with one eye on the event and the other on their political base. That base doesn’t include organized labour. Flaherty and Harper will be coming back to Canada after the G20 to sell the plans of the IMF, the World Bank and G7. They will confront at the meeting a brawl among the USA, the EU, as they confront the rising power of China, Brazil, India.
Now is the time for organized labour to send a message to the Government that Canadians will not accept any plans of international finance capital that require the working class and the farmers to make more concessions to save the profit system.
Organized labour and the left-progressives confront a challenge. Either continue to support one of the alternatives offered by the Liberals or the Conservatives, fronting for corporate and banking capital, or begin the difficult task of organizing now around an independent program of economic development for Canada.
What is happening to the autoworkers, forced into concessions and condemned to long term unemployment is a template for what the employers will be demanding from steel, forestry, transportation, the energy sector and what remains of manufacturing. Following employer attacks on the productive sector workers there will be pressures on the civil service and the entire service industry for wage rollbacks and benefits concessions.
Labour needs its own summit! Relying on the banking and corporate elites to plan our future is a mugs game. Labour can and must lead the country!
Left Turn Canada!
Monday, January 26, 2009
The Speech from the Throne and the 41st Parliament
Defeat Harper and Move On!
After debasing Parliament, expressing contempt for the majority of Canadians who do not support their policies, the Harper Minority Conservatives are now pleading for a second chance. Their repentance is phony.
Following the throne speech, initial statements by Michael Ignatieff, Liberal leader and Liberal war horse Ralph Goodale, were remarkable and contemptible showing that they may betray the NDP-Liberal Coalition and prop up a lame duck Conservative Prime Minister.
There is no basis for a national consensus under a Conservative Prime Minister. Unity can only be built around progressive economic and social programs. It can never be built on reaction and backwardness.
The Harper government needs to be swept aside for reasons that go beyond the budget. The Harper Conservatives are unrepentant far right neo-cons. They are incapable of redemption. Their time is up.
Under the Conservatives Canada has declined on all vital benchmarks. Canada has less jobs, less science, less arts, less mass participation in sports, recreation. Fewer youth can go to university and post secondary education. There is more homelessness; more poverty, less optimism and more despair.
The Harper Conservative Government is fundamentally a neo-con government of the Thatcher-Reagan-Mulroney-Bush ilk: after all the others have been consigned to the rubbish heap of history, Harper lingers on – now his time has come.
Neo-cons are slaves to the capitalist free market. They are anti-labour. Neo-cons are for privatizing the public health care system and using pension funds for private investment. They are for the militarization of the economy. They are anti-science. They oppose regulation of banks, markets, health, and all forms of industry.
Neo-cons are against pay equity for women. They oppose the legitimate demands of first nations and aboriginal people’s for the redress of all outstanding land claims and rights. They are against single desk marketing and work to abolish the Wheat Board. Neo-cons oppose universal child care. They oppose universal unemployment insurance for all. They oppose public housing. They believe in punishing the addicted and imprisoning adolescents. They are intolerant of racial minorities, immigrants and attempt to challenge the separation of church and state. They are against the CBC and all public broadcasting. They are contemptuous of creative artists, writers, public sports and recreation for all. They are penny pinching and mean and they should not be in power.
Throw them out!
Left Turn Canada!
After debasing Parliament, expressing contempt for the majority of Canadians who do not support their policies, the Harper Minority Conservatives are now pleading for a second chance. Their repentance is phony.
Following the throne speech, initial statements by Michael Ignatieff, Liberal leader and Liberal war horse Ralph Goodale, were remarkable and contemptible showing that they may betray the NDP-Liberal Coalition and prop up a lame duck Conservative Prime Minister.
There is no basis for a national consensus under a Conservative Prime Minister. Unity can only be built around progressive economic and social programs. It can never be built on reaction and backwardness.
The Harper government needs to be swept aside for reasons that go beyond the budget. The Harper Conservatives are unrepentant far right neo-cons. They are incapable of redemption. Their time is up.
Under the Conservatives Canada has declined on all vital benchmarks. Canada has less jobs, less science, less arts, less mass participation in sports, recreation. Fewer youth can go to university and post secondary education. There is more homelessness; more poverty, less optimism and more despair.
The Harper Conservative Government is fundamentally a neo-con government of the Thatcher-Reagan-Mulroney-Bush ilk: after all the others have been consigned to the rubbish heap of history, Harper lingers on – now his time has come.
Neo-cons are slaves to the capitalist free market. They are anti-labour. Neo-cons are for privatizing the public health care system and using pension funds for private investment. They are for the militarization of the economy. They are anti-science. They oppose regulation of banks, markets, health, and all forms of industry.
Neo-cons are against pay equity for women. They oppose the legitimate demands of first nations and aboriginal people’s for the redress of all outstanding land claims and rights. They are against single desk marketing and work to abolish the Wheat Board. Neo-cons oppose universal child care. They oppose universal unemployment insurance for all. They oppose public housing. They believe in punishing the addicted and imprisoning adolescents. They are intolerant of racial minorities, immigrants and attempt to challenge the separation of church and state. They are against the CBC and all public broadcasting. They are contemptuous of creative artists, writers, public sports and recreation for all. They are penny pinching and mean and they should not be in power.
Throw them out!
Left Turn Canada!
Friday, January 23, 2009
President Obama and Real Change
Don Currie, Chair CPS
The litmus test for the international working class and all oppressed people as to whether or not the election of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the USA represents real change will be revealed in the months and years ahead in his government’s attitude to the struggles of the people of other countries that choose a path of economic and political development different from that prevailing in the USA.
Will the Obama Government greet with grace and equanimity, the declaration of other peoples that they also love their country and believe they also live “in the best country in the world” and insist on doing so without the permission or interference of US imperialism?
The people of the USA as is their inalienable right are determining their own destiny. It is not yet clear if in voting for real change, if that change includes recognition and support for the right of other peoples to do likewise.
In the appeals for unity and reconciliation expressed in both the concession speech of Senator McCain and the victory and inaugural speeches of President Obama it is not clear if those appeals are for a graceful and long overdue retreat from empire and acceptance by the people of the USA of the necessity to live as others do, within their own borders and within their own means, or whether the appeal for unity is around a new, revised and perhaps less belligerent version of US imperialist destiny.
While the former is the business of the people of the USA the latter is the business of the people of the world.
That is not a small consideration for Canadians who will inevitably be compelled out of economic necessity to call for a recasting of any and all agreements with US finance capital that limit Canadian sovereignty, restrict Canadian independent economic development and interfere with Canadian sovereign ownership and control of its own resources. Most revealing will be the attitude of the Obama Government to the majority opinion of Canadians as expressed in the last federal election to end to Canadian participation in the US-NATO war of aggression in Afghanistan.
Nothing that is said here should be understood to mean that Canadians do not also confront the urgent need to denounce and break with the imperialist ambitions of our own state monopoly rulers and its interference in the internal affairs of the peoples of other countries.
The challenge confronting the Canadian people is the same as people of the USA, whether we will permit our state monopoly ruling class to continue to pursue its imperialist ambitions at the expense of our dignity and at the expense of other peoples or whether we will use our own resources and ingenuity to overcome the process of deindustrialization that threatens our economy with ruin.
That issue becomes the only principled basis for the unity the working classes of North America, an anti-imperialist unity that will be understood and greeted by all the oppressed people of the world suffering from the curse of underdevelopment, poverty and oppression imposed on them by all of the leading imperialist states.
Left Turn Canada!
The litmus test for the international working class and all oppressed people as to whether or not the election of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the USA represents real change will be revealed in the months and years ahead in his government’s attitude to the struggles of the people of other countries that choose a path of economic and political development different from that prevailing in the USA.
Will the Obama Government greet with grace and equanimity, the declaration of other peoples that they also love their country and believe they also live “in the best country in the world” and insist on doing so without the permission or interference of US imperialism?
The people of the USA as is their inalienable right are determining their own destiny. It is not yet clear if in voting for real change, if that change includes recognition and support for the right of other peoples to do likewise.
In the appeals for unity and reconciliation expressed in both the concession speech of Senator McCain and the victory and inaugural speeches of President Obama it is not clear if those appeals are for a graceful and long overdue retreat from empire and acceptance by the people of the USA of the necessity to live as others do, within their own borders and within their own means, or whether the appeal for unity is around a new, revised and perhaps less belligerent version of US imperialist destiny.
While the former is the business of the people of the USA the latter is the business of the people of the world.
That is not a small consideration for Canadians who will inevitably be compelled out of economic necessity to call for a recasting of any and all agreements with US finance capital that limit Canadian sovereignty, restrict Canadian independent economic development and interfere with Canadian sovereign ownership and control of its own resources. Most revealing will be the attitude of the Obama Government to the majority opinion of Canadians as expressed in the last federal election to end to Canadian participation in the US-NATO war of aggression in Afghanistan.
Nothing that is said here should be understood to mean that Canadians do not also confront the urgent need to denounce and break with the imperialist ambitions of our own state monopoly rulers and its interference in the internal affairs of the peoples of other countries.
The challenge confronting the Canadian people is the same as people of the USA, whether we will permit our state monopoly ruling class to continue to pursue its imperialist ambitions at the expense of our dignity and at the expense of other peoples or whether we will use our own resources and ingenuity to overcome the process of deindustrialization that threatens our economy with ruin.
That issue becomes the only principled basis for the unity the working classes of North America, an anti-imperialist unity that will be understood and greeted by all the oppressed people of the world suffering from the curse of underdevelopment, poverty and oppression imposed on them by all of the leading imperialist states.
Left Turn Canada!
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
An Open Letter to All Members of Parliament
Canadians for Peace and Socialism
Box 168 Slocan BC
V0G 2C0
1 250 355 2669
Email: editor@focusonsocialism.ca
Website: www.focusonsocialism.ca
January 20, 2009
Canada is the first country US President Barack Obama will visit following his January 20th Inauguration.
Canadians will be watching closely to see if during President Obama’s visit, there is a single Canadian political leader that will have the courage to publicly repudiate the long record of collusion of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative minority government with the President George W. Bush Administration’s policies of pre-emptive war and regime change.
President Barack Obama’s visit to Canada will be the opportunity for all Members of Parliament to call for a new direction in Canadian US relations based on the restoration of Canadian sovereignty lost during the long bleak years of the Bush Republican-Harper Conservative collaboration.
The opportunity has been presented to the Liberal, NDP and Bloc coalition to publicly enunciate a new direction for US-Canadian foreign, military, economic and political relations that can begin by disengaging Canada from the ruinous affects of membership in NAFTA, SPP, NORTHCOM and NATO and to align Canada with people’s progressive movements in the USA and around the world that seek peace and economic development that provides full employment, affordable housing, food, public medical care and education, child care and pensions for the millions that do not now have such basic needs.
It is important that the leader of the official opposition be sent a message. If Michael Ignatieff leader of the Liberal Party of Canada intends to become Prime Minister it can only be as the Prime Minister of the majority of Canadians that have consistently rejected the Conservative Party. Anything less, risks more years of minority Conservative government rule.
Should Mr. Ignatieff continue to equivocate, there is nothing preventing the NDP and the Bloc, leaders of organized labour, the peace movement, democratic and patriotic organizations of the Canadian people from speaking out resolutely for Canadian independence from US imperialist oversight.
In welcoming President Obama the left democratic peace and progressive movements are called upon to restate some fundamental truths for the benefit of the new incoming Barack Obama US administration and those in Canada who will greet him in our name.
Canadians are a sovereign people. From coast to coast to coast including the far arctic, all of the nations that inhabit this land, all those who labour in its economy, all those who contribute to its accomplishments, all those who value and seek to conserve its vast natural resources, its grandeur, wilderness and natural beauty, all those who believe in the youth and in their right to a future, all those who dream and fight for peace and justice for all people of the planet, all those who do not live in envy of anyone; the people of Canada who call this place our home and native land will decide its destiny.
Left Turn Canada!
Don Currie Chair, Canadians for Peace and Socialism
Box 168 Slocan BC
V0G 2C0
1 250 355 2669
Email: editor@focusonsocialism.ca
Website: www.focusonsocialism.ca
January 20, 2009
Canada is the first country US President Barack Obama will visit following his January 20th Inauguration.
Canadians will be watching closely to see if during President Obama’s visit, there is a single Canadian political leader that will have the courage to publicly repudiate the long record of collusion of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative minority government with the President George W. Bush Administration’s policies of pre-emptive war and regime change.
President Barack Obama’s visit to Canada will be the opportunity for all Members of Parliament to call for a new direction in Canadian US relations based on the restoration of Canadian sovereignty lost during the long bleak years of the Bush Republican-Harper Conservative collaboration.
The opportunity has been presented to the Liberal, NDP and Bloc coalition to publicly enunciate a new direction for US-Canadian foreign, military, economic and political relations that can begin by disengaging Canada from the ruinous affects of membership in NAFTA, SPP, NORTHCOM and NATO and to align Canada with people’s progressive movements in the USA and around the world that seek peace and economic development that provides full employment, affordable housing, food, public medical care and education, child care and pensions for the millions that do not now have such basic needs.
It is important that the leader of the official opposition be sent a message. If Michael Ignatieff leader of the Liberal Party of Canada intends to become Prime Minister it can only be as the Prime Minister of the majority of Canadians that have consistently rejected the Conservative Party. Anything less, risks more years of minority Conservative government rule.
Should Mr. Ignatieff continue to equivocate, there is nothing preventing the NDP and the Bloc, leaders of organized labour, the peace movement, democratic and patriotic organizations of the Canadian people from speaking out resolutely for Canadian independence from US imperialist oversight.
In welcoming President Obama the left democratic peace and progressive movements are called upon to restate some fundamental truths for the benefit of the new incoming Barack Obama US administration and those in Canada who will greet him in our name.
Canadians are a sovereign people. From coast to coast to coast including the far arctic, all of the nations that inhabit this land, all those who labour in its economy, all those who contribute to its accomplishments, all those who value and seek to conserve its vast natural resources, its grandeur, wilderness and natural beauty, all those who believe in the youth and in their right to a future, all those who dream and fight for peace and justice for all people of the planet, all those who do not live in envy of anyone; the people of Canada who call this place our home and native land will decide its destiny.
Left Turn Canada!
Don Currie Chair, Canadians for Peace and Socialism
Thursday, December 18, 2008
The Coalition!
The Coalition!
Majority Government Prepared to Govern - Or Timorous Prop for a Lame Duck Minority Harper Government?
When will the Liberal NDP Coalition begin to act like a majority government poised to take power on behalf of the disenfranchised 62% majority?
Michael Ignatieff is lapsing into his familiar and comfortable role as an academic advisor to the rich and powerful instead of a Coalition Prime Minister prepared to take power on behalf of the people of Canada.
Coalition inaction is breathing life into a gasping Harper Minority Government instead of preparing to deal it a crushing defeat on January 27th.
Liberal establishment meddling, behind the backs of its coalition partners and more egregious, the 62% majority that supports it, has paved the way for the appointment by Finance Minister Flaherty of a non-elected big business Economic Council that will have a greater say over the federal budget than the 162 elected coalition MP’s.
There is not a single labour representative to be seen among Jim Flaherty’s gold plated luminaries. It is doubtful if any self-respecting labour leader would want to be associated with such capitalist glitterati.
Flaherty has recruited former B.C. finance minister Carole Taylor, James D. Irving from the New Brunswick Irving Empire, James A. Pattison, applauded in corporate circles for his singular ruthless pursuit of wealth, University of Calgary professor Jack Mintz, who is the former president and CEO of the right wing C.D. Howe Institute and a frequent columnist for Can West Financial Post and Montreal financier Paul Desmarais of Power Corporation, a major behind the scenes player in the selection of Canadian Prime Ministers from Trudeau and Mulroney to Chretien and Martin.
Organized Labour must appoint its own Economic Council and a shadow cabinet of working people representing the 62% majority and outline a democratic people’s economic program for Canada.
There are many honest left-labour economists that have no other agenda than what is in the best interests of working people as the country slides into depression. The people need their help. The Coalition Policy Accord is a good start. Use it, develop it, publicize it, fight for it…
Left Turn Canada!
Majority Government Prepared to Govern - Or Timorous Prop for a Lame Duck Minority Harper Government?
When will the Liberal NDP Coalition begin to act like a majority government poised to take power on behalf of the disenfranchised 62% majority?
Michael Ignatieff is lapsing into his familiar and comfortable role as an academic advisor to the rich and powerful instead of a Coalition Prime Minister prepared to take power on behalf of the people of Canada.
Coalition inaction is breathing life into a gasping Harper Minority Government instead of preparing to deal it a crushing defeat on January 27th.
Liberal establishment meddling, behind the backs of its coalition partners and more egregious, the 62% majority that supports it, has paved the way for the appointment by Finance Minister Flaherty of a non-elected big business Economic Council that will have a greater say over the federal budget than the 162 elected coalition MP’s.
There is not a single labour representative to be seen among Jim Flaherty’s gold plated luminaries. It is doubtful if any self-respecting labour leader would want to be associated with such capitalist glitterati.
Flaherty has recruited former B.C. finance minister Carole Taylor, James D. Irving from the New Brunswick Irving Empire, James A. Pattison, applauded in corporate circles for his singular ruthless pursuit of wealth, University of Calgary professor Jack Mintz, who is the former president and CEO of the right wing C.D. Howe Institute and a frequent columnist for Can West Financial Post and Montreal financier Paul Desmarais of Power Corporation, a major behind the scenes player in the selection of Canadian Prime Ministers from Trudeau and Mulroney to Chretien and Martin.
Organized Labour must appoint its own Economic Council and a shadow cabinet of working people representing the 62% majority and outline a democratic people’s economic program for Canada.
There are many honest left-labour economists that have no other agenda than what is in the best interests of working people as the country slides into depression. The people need their help. The Coalition Policy Accord is a good start. Use it, develop it, publicize it, fight for it…
Left Turn Canada!
Monday, December 08, 2008
Liberal Establishment Politicians Come to the Aid of Conservative Prime Minister Harper to Scuttle the Coalition Policy Accord.
Right wing Liberal grandee John Manley is helping Prime Minister Stephen
Harper wreck the NDP-Liberal-Bloc Coalition. (Globe and Mail December 5, 2008)
John Manley is a right-wing corporate establishment lawyer, a former Finance Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister. Manley helped Prime Minister Harper condemn Canadian soldiers to another two years of bloody combat in the US-NATO war in Afghanistan.
Manley is a close associate of Paul Martin. Martin as Finance Minister from 1993 to 2002 rang up massive federal surpluses that were returned to big business in a series of tax cuts while systematically capping and rolling back funding for unemployment insurance and social programs.
Today’s media is reporting that Liberal Scott Brisson, a Martin protégé is working behind the scenes with the hapless Conservative Finance Minister Jim Flaherty to cut and paste a Lib Con budget for presentation to Parliament on January 27th . Their aim is to scuttle the Policy Accord signed by Layton, Dion and Duceppe and replace it with a conservative right wing budget with a liberal face.
Michael Ignatieff, true to himself is seizing upon the confusion and disarray in Liberal ranks to sink “his friend Bob Rae” by-pass the Liberal rank and file and propel himself into the leadership of the Liberal Party.
Such are the morals and ethics of Liberal establishment politicians who in a heart beat betray the coalition documents they just signed and turn their backs on the hardships confronting the working people and the unemployed.
The NDP and organized labour and the left must publicly condemn the establishment Liberal betrayal of the coalition policy accord and call upon the 161 MP’s from all opposition parties to renew the pledge given to the 62% of Canadians who support them that they will act together to defeat Harper on January 27th. and implement the policy accord.
The coalition policy accord falls far short of what the working class needs and much more will have to be fought for.
What are the supportable points of the NDP-Liberal-Bloc policy accord? What does the economic stimulus package of the policy accord say?
NDP-Liberal-Bloc Economic Stimulus Package
The top priority of the new Government is an economic stimulus package designed to boost the domestic economy beginning with (but not limited to):
Accelerating existing infrastructure funding and substantial new investments, including municipal and inter-provincial projects (such as
transit, clean energy, water, corridors and gateways). This would certainly include addressing the urgent infrastructure needs of First Nations, Métis and Inuit;
Housing construction and retrofitting; and
Investing in key sector strategies (like manufacturing, forestry and automotive) designed to create and save jobs, with any aid contingent on a plan to transform these industries and return them to profitability and sustainability.
Rapid Support for those affected by the Economic Crisis
The new Government is committed to ensuring that the federal government has the appropriate programs in place to assist those most affected by the economic crisis so that all citizens will be in a position to fully participate in the economic recovery to follow, including the following measures:
Facilitate skills training to help ensure Canadian workers are properly equipped to keep pace with the rapidly changing economy, while respecting provincial jurisdiction and existing agreements;
Amend the current law establishing a new crown corporation for employment insurance in order to guarantee that all revenue from EI premiums provides benefits and training for workers. Eliminate the current two week waiting period;
Lower the minimum required RRIF withdrawal for 2008 by 50 per cent;
Reform bankruptcy and insolvency laws to better protect pensions; and
Implement an income support program for older workers who have lost their jobs in order to help them make the transition from work to receiving retirement benefits.
Other Priorities to Stimulate the Economy
Support for culture, including the cancellation of budget cuts announced by the Conservative government.
Support for Canadian Wheat Board and Supply Management
Immigration Reform
Reinstate regional development agency funding to non-profit economic development organizations.
Families
As finances permit, we are committed to moving forward with improved child benefits and an early learning and childcare program in partnership with each province, and respectful of their role and jurisdiction, including the possibility to opt out with full compensation.
Working with our North American Partners
We will work with our North American Partners to pursue a North American cap-and-trade market with absolute emission targets, using 1990 as the base year.
Layton, Dion and Duceppe put their signatures to the above.
The Manley-Harper collaboration works for another type of coalition – a right wing majority Parliamentary coalition working on behalf of finance capital.
Canadian workers have had experience with a Conservative Government in power during a depression. When an unemployed delegation in 1935 went to Ottawa seeking help, Conservative Prime Minister Iron Heel Bennett replied that he would not subsidize idleness.
The Harper Reform-Alliance-Conservatives are the true inheritors of Iron Heel Bennett’s legacy. A Conservative Government in power during a depression in the 21st Century is the wrong Government for the working class, the farmers, the unemployed and oppressed.
Support the Coalition! Support the Coalition Economic Stimulus Package.
On January 27th. defeat the Harper Conservatives.
Left Turn Canada!
Harper wreck the NDP-Liberal-Bloc Coalition. (Globe and Mail December 5, 2008)
John Manley is a right-wing corporate establishment lawyer, a former Finance Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister. Manley helped Prime Minister Harper condemn Canadian soldiers to another two years of bloody combat in the US-NATO war in Afghanistan.
Manley is a close associate of Paul Martin. Martin as Finance Minister from 1993 to 2002 rang up massive federal surpluses that were returned to big business in a series of tax cuts while systematically capping and rolling back funding for unemployment insurance and social programs.
Today’s media is reporting that Liberal Scott Brisson, a Martin protégé is working behind the scenes with the hapless Conservative Finance Minister Jim Flaherty to cut and paste a Lib Con budget for presentation to Parliament on January 27th . Their aim is to scuttle the Policy Accord signed by Layton, Dion and Duceppe and replace it with a conservative right wing budget with a liberal face.
Michael Ignatieff, true to himself is seizing upon the confusion and disarray in Liberal ranks to sink “his friend Bob Rae” by-pass the Liberal rank and file and propel himself into the leadership of the Liberal Party.
Such are the morals and ethics of Liberal establishment politicians who in a heart beat betray the coalition documents they just signed and turn their backs on the hardships confronting the working people and the unemployed.
The NDP and organized labour and the left must publicly condemn the establishment Liberal betrayal of the coalition policy accord and call upon the 161 MP’s from all opposition parties to renew the pledge given to the 62% of Canadians who support them that they will act together to defeat Harper on January 27th. and implement the policy accord.
The coalition policy accord falls far short of what the working class needs and much more will have to be fought for.
What are the supportable points of the NDP-Liberal-Bloc policy accord? What does the economic stimulus package of the policy accord say?
NDP-Liberal-Bloc Economic Stimulus Package
The top priority of the new Government is an economic stimulus package designed to boost the domestic economy beginning with (but not limited to):
Accelerating existing infrastructure funding and substantial new investments, including municipal and inter-provincial projects (such as
transit, clean energy, water, corridors and gateways). This would certainly include addressing the urgent infrastructure needs of First Nations, Métis and Inuit;
Housing construction and retrofitting; and
Investing in key sector strategies (like manufacturing, forestry and automotive) designed to create and save jobs, with any aid contingent on a plan to transform these industries and return them to profitability and sustainability.
Rapid Support for those affected by the Economic Crisis
The new Government is committed to ensuring that the federal government has the appropriate programs in place to assist those most affected by the economic crisis so that all citizens will be in a position to fully participate in the economic recovery to follow, including the following measures:
Facilitate skills training to help ensure Canadian workers are properly equipped to keep pace with the rapidly changing economy, while respecting provincial jurisdiction and existing agreements;
Amend the current law establishing a new crown corporation for employment insurance in order to guarantee that all revenue from EI premiums provides benefits and training for workers. Eliminate the current two week waiting period;
Lower the minimum required RRIF withdrawal for 2008 by 50 per cent;
Reform bankruptcy and insolvency laws to better protect pensions; and
Implement an income support program for older workers who have lost their jobs in order to help them make the transition from work to receiving retirement benefits.
Other Priorities to Stimulate the Economy
Support for culture, including the cancellation of budget cuts announced by the Conservative government.
Support for Canadian Wheat Board and Supply Management
Immigration Reform
Reinstate regional development agency funding to non-profit economic development organizations.
Families
As finances permit, we are committed to moving forward with improved child benefits and an early learning and childcare program in partnership with each province, and respectful of their role and jurisdiction, including the possibility to opt out with full compensation.
Working with our North American Partners
We will work with our North American Partners to pursue a North American cap-and-trade market with absolute emission targets, using 1990 as the base year.
Layton, Dion and Duceppe put their signatures to the above.
The Manley-Harper collaboration works for another type of coalition – a right wing majority Parliamentary coalition working on behalf of finance capital.
Canadian workers have had experience with a Conservative Government in power during a depression. When an unemployed delegation in 1935 went to Ottawa seeking help, Conservative Prime Minister Iron Heel Bennett replied that he would not subsidize idleness.
The Harper Reform-Alliance-Conservatives are the true inheritors of Iron Heel Bennett’s legacy. A Conservative Government in power during a depression in the 21st Century is the wrong Government for the working class, the farmers, the unemployed and oppressed.
Support the Coalition! Support the Coalition Economic Stimulus Package.
On January 27th. defeat the Harper Conservatives.
Left Turn Canada!
Saturday, December 06, 2008
Stop the Extreme Right Coup – Labour Wants In!
An arcane remnant of Canada’s colonial past has been used by Prime Minister Harper to legitimatize a far right coup to padlock Parliament and keep the cause of labour out of national politics.
Political trends representing the far right, the ultra-left, and the most despicable of all, condescending centrist evasion, have joined together to oppose the formation of a Parliamentary coalition of a majority of liberal and social democratic MP’s. Objectively these trends fear any opening to political power that might open up in Parliament that will accord to the working class, the unemployed and working farmers a say over the economic affairs of state.
Prime Minister Harper “locked the doors” on Parliament to ensure that in an economic crisis rapidly assuming Great Depression proportions, a non-elected cabal of banks and corporate insiders will continue to have exclusive say over how the wealth of the nation will be apportioned. They are supported by a small class of wealth and privilege accustomed to entitlement of the best the capitalist system has to offer and determined to keep it all for their private pleasure.
The Harper coup has reactivated the extreme right wing Reform-Alliance base of bigotry and division that democratic Canadians have rejected time and again. It has been kept alive by a cabal of extremist right wing professors at the University of Calgary political science department, the Fraser Institute and media hacks that serve US-Canadian oil and investor elites of Alberta, BC and Saskatchewan. Their minions include a motley crew of right wing talk show hosts inciting a network of western separatist and US style religious right wing groups with hot button non-issues.
All of this political noise, refined into pap by the likes of CTV’s Mike Duffy and his little band of self-promoting pundits covers up a far right economic and political agenda that will be embedded and concealed in the January 26th Harper-Flaherty Budget.
The budget will have nothing to do with the needs of labour and job creation. The Harper Conservatives will appear to move to the centre on economic policy but continue to rule from the extreme right. The non-sectarian left must start to warn workers of the craft and guile the budget will contain and call upon the coalition to defeat it.
The betrayals of a democratic electoral coalition are already beginning to appear from frightened Liberal and NDP personalities. The Rae, Ignatieff, Leblanc road show is prepared to cash in on the coalition to strengthen their leadership bids. Stephane Dion’s foolish statements that if Harper made “huge concessions” he would consider them confirm the popular belief that the man is out of touch and in the best interests of all should leave the scene.
The splits and divisions appearing in the coalition are not surprising. How to cope with them is the issue. The “told you so crowd” who talk lots and do little are already preparing their bleak analysis.
The non-sectarian left must avoid barren politics. The fact is politics is being embraced by the majority and passing out of the control of pundits. That is what is new in this crisis. It marks the beginning of the end of passivity.
The rank and file among all of the coalition parties, most of whom are working people, have expectations of success and they have a right to demand that those who forged this alliance keep it together and make it work.
Those of us on the non-sectarian left who are familiar with betrayal need to be vigilant. Even if the coalition in its present form is betrayed and destroyed, the necessity to rebuild it into a stronger more durable form will remain.
There are enough committed forces in the three coalition parties, supported by the Greens, organized labour the non-sectarian left and the rest of the popular democratic movements to justify a real effort to make it work in the next election. The threat of a Harper majority should energize everyone.
The leading role of organized labour in this process is decisive. What the far right fears above all else is any expression of independent and united political action by the left and organized labour in determining the destiny of the country. That is precisely what the left must work for.
Left Turn Canada!
Political trends representing the far right, the ultra-left, and the most despicable of all, condescending centrist evasion, have joined together to oppose the formation of a Parliamentary coalition of a majority of liberal and social democratic MP’s. Objectively these trends fear any opening to political power that might open up in Parliament that will accord to the working class, the unemployed and working farmers a say over the economic affairs of state.
Prime Minister Harper “locked the doors” on Parliament to ensure that in an economic crisis rapidly assuming Great Depression proportions, a non-elected cabal of banks and corporate insiders will continue to have exclusive say over how the wealth of the nation will be apportioned. They are supported by a small class of wealth and privilege accustomed to entitlement of the best the capitalist system has to offer and determined to keep it all for their private pleasure.
The Harper coup has reactivated the extreme right wing Reform-Alliance base of bigotry and division that democratic Canadians have rejected time and again. It has been kept alive by a cabal of extremist right wing professors at the University of Calgary political science department, the Fraser Institute and media hacks that serve US-Canadian oil and investor elites of Alberta, BC and Saskatchewan. Their minions include a motley crew of right wing talk show hosts inciting a network of western separatist and US style religious right wing groups with hot button non-issues.
All of this political noise, refined into pap by the likes of CTV’s Mike Duffy and his little band of self-promoting pundits covers up a far right economic and political agenda that will be embedded and concealed in the January 26th Harper-Flaherty Budget.
The budget will have nothing to do with the needs of labour and job creation. The Harper Conservatives will appear to move to the centre on economic policy but continue to rule from the extreme right. The non-sectarian left must start to warn workers of the craft and guile the budget will contain and call upon the coalition to defeat it.
The betrayals of a democratic electoral coalition are already beginning to appear from frightened Liberal and NDP personalities. The Rae, Ignatieff, Leblanc road show is prepared to cash in on the coalition to strengthen their leadership bids. Stephane Dion’s foolish statements that if Harper made “huge concessions” he would consider them confirm the popular belief that the man is out of touch and in the best interests of all should leave the scene.
The splits and divisions appearing in the coalition are not surprising. How to cope with them is the issue. The “told you so crowd” who talk lots and do little are already preparing their bleak analysis.
The non-sectarian left must avoid barren politics. The fact is politics is being embraced by the majority and passing out of the control of pundits. That is what is new in this crisis. It marks the beginning of the end of passivity.
The rank and file among all of the coalition parties, most of whom are working people, have expectations of success and they have a right to demand that those who forged this alliance keep it together and make it work.
Those of us on the non-sectarian left who are familiar with betrayal need to be vigilant. Even if the coalition in its present form is betrayed and destroyed, the necessity to rebuild it into a stronger more durable form will remain.
There are enough committed forces in the three coalition parties, supported by the Greens, organized labour the non-sectarian left and the rest of the popular democratic movements to justify a real effort to make it work in the next election. The threat of a Harper majority should energize everyone.
The leading role of organized labour in this process is decisive. What the far right fears above all else is any expression of independent and united political action by the left and organized labour in determining the destiny of the country. That is precisely what the left must work for.
Left Turn Canada!
Monday, December 01, 2008
Defeat the Harper Conservatives. Support the CLC Sponsored Thursday December 4th Rallies for a Coalition Government
A major Parliamentary crisis is underway resulting from the most serious economic crisis since the Dirty Thirties. The country is being momentarily polarized around a liberal social democratic coalition and far right political reaction. A major struggle for Parliamentary democracy is underway.
The main danger at the moment is for the left democratic forces to miss the opportunity to defeat the autocratic Harper Government. It won’t be easy. Prime Minister Harper and his right wing supporters are in panic mode. This week leading up to December 8th and a non-confidence vote in the House of Commons, the Conservative Party will conduct an unprecedented media disinformation campaign reminiscent of the darkest days of McArthyism. Prime Minister Harper will resort to the most desperate measures to stay in power.
No progress in our country can be made while a minority Conservative government is in power. They have inflicted serious hardship on the people. They are the wrong party to have in power during an economic crisis. The time to discuss the problems that will arise with a coalition government is after Harper is ousted.
The Canadian Labour Congress, the Canadian Peace Alliance, the Council of Canadians and the coalition parties will conduct rallies on Thursday December 4th in support of the coalition accord signed today in Ottawa by the leaders of the Liberal Party, the New Democratic Party and the Bloc Quebecois.
Phone your local labour council to find out where the local rally will be held.
Left Turn Canada!
The main danger at the moment is for the left democratic forces to miss the opportunity to defeat the autocratic Harper Government. It won’t be easy. Prime Minister Harper and his right wing supporters are in panic mode. This week leading up to December 8th and a non-confidence vote in the House of Commons, the Conservative Party will conduct an unprecedented media disinformation campaign reminiscent of the darkest days of McArthyism. Prime Minister Harper will resort to the most desperate measures to stay in power.
No progress in our country can be made while a minority Conservative government is in power. They have inflicted serious hardship on the people. They are the wrong party to have in power during an economic crisis. The time to discuss the problems that will arise with a coalition government is after Harper is ousted.
The Canadian Labour Congress, the Canadian Peace Alliance, the Council of Canadians and the coalition parties will conduct rallies on Thursday December 4th in support of the coalition accord signed today in Ottawa by the leaders of the Liberal Party, the New Democratic Party and the Bloc Quebecois.
Phone your local labour council to find out where the local rally will be held.
Left Turn Canada!
Thursday, November 27, 2008
A Moment of Opportunity for the Left and Organized Labour
Finance Flaherty’s economic update had two goals; one to cover up the Harper Government’s responsibility for the crisis and the other to use government fiscal policy to assist the banks and the corporate sector to profit from it.
Flaherty failed utterly on the first, but hasn’t given up on the second. Budget cuts and restraints were imposed on transfers to the provinces, while no strings attached public money will continue to flow to private banks and financial institutions. Massive military spending on the US-NATO war in Afghanistan is to continue.
Neo-con deficit abstinence and deregulation is no longer the hallmark of Conservative economic virtue. In fact it never was. Harper copied the George W. Bush deficit and deregulation policy to militarize and give speculative investors free reign in Canada. Without the slightest embarassment Flaherty is now ready to engage in illicit deficit sin because the Conservatives blew a $13.7 billion surplus on war and corporate tax cuts and has no where to go but into deficit. Now after three years of de-regulation Flaherty wants to re-regulate.
Budget deficits aren't sinful. On whose behalf will deficit be incurred determines its virtue? Avoidance of deficit by the Conservatives is the rhtetoric used cut spending on people’s needs. They have renamed deficit “budget restraint” to enact attacks on labour.
Under cover of “budget restraint” Flaherty announced the Harper Government will eliminate the right to strike for public sector workers, impose a wage freeze on the civil service, (a signal to the private sector to do the same), halt and roll back pay equity gains for women workers and eliminate the $1.75 per vote that helps smaller parties to participate in federal elections.
The opposition parties all attacked the government as though they had a joint caucus prior to the debate. Surprisingly the NDP muted its attacks on the Liberals and the Bloc did the same. Scott Brisson for the Liberals, Gilles Duceppe for the Bloc and Jack Layton and Thomas Mulchair for the NDP between them said what had to be said. All pointedly continue to avoid comment on the disastrous and costly war in Afghanistan.
Now what?
The opposition parties are temporarily on the same page regarding the urgency of the need for massive government stimulus package to get the economy moving. All have stated they will vote against the Government. The chattering classes and the media are speculating about a coalition government not another election.
This is a moment of opportunity for the left and organized labour to come forward with its own plan for the working people. A Parliamentary coalition government can make sense as a short term answer to a long term problem.
If that is to happen, labour must convene its own Parliament and layout now its minimum demands. If that were done, labour could establish its terms of support for a Parliamentary coalition and just possibly make it work for the people.
Left Turn Canada!
Flaherty failed utterly on the first, but hasn’t given up on the second. Budget cuts and restraints were imposed on transfers to the provinces, while no strings attached public money will continue to flow to private banks and financial institutions. Massive military spending on the US-NATO war in Afghanistan is to continue.
Neo-con deficit abstinence and deregulation is no longer the hallmark of Conservative economic virtue. In fact it never was. Harper copied the George W. Bush deficit and deregulation policy to militarize and give speculative investors free reign in Canada. Without the slightest embarassment Flaherty is now ready to engage in illicit deficit sin because the Conservatives blew a $13.7 billion surplus on war and corporate tax cuts and has no where to go but into deficit. Now after three years of de-regulation Flaherty wants to re-regulate.
Budget deficits aren't sinful. On whose behalf will deficit be incurred determines its virtue? Avoidance of deficit by the Conservatives is the rhtetoric used cut spending on people’s needs. They have renamed deficit “budget restraint” to enact attacks on labour.
Under cover of “budget restraint” Flaherty announced the Harper Government will eliminate the right to strike for public sector workers, impose a wage freeze on the civil service, (a signal to the private sector to do the same), halt and roll back pay equity gains for women workers and eliminate the $1.75 per vote that helps smaller parties to participate in federal elections.
The opposition parties all attacked the government as though they had a joint caucus prior to the debate. Surprisingly the NDP muted its attacks on the Liberals and the Bloc did the same. Scott Brisson for the Liberals, Gilles Duceppe for the Bloc and Jack Layton and Thomas Mulchair for the NDP between them said what had to be said. All pointedly continue to avoid comment on the disastrous and costly war in Afghanistan.
Now what?
The opposition parties are temporarily on the same page regarding the urgency of the need for massive government stimulus package to get the economy moving. All have stated they will vote against the Government. The chattering classes and the media are speculating about a coalition government not another election.
This is a moment of opportunity for the left and organized labour to come forward with its own plan for the working people. A Parliamentary coalition government can make sense as a short term answer to a long term problem.
If that is to happen, labour must convene its own Parliament and layout now its minimum demands. If that were done, labour could establish its terms of support for a Parliamentary coalition and just possibly make it work for the people.
Left Turn Canada!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
