Canada General Discussion: Trudeau II

[RogueBeaver]

Continental environmental strategy incoming.

Food for thought.

Forum-ON: 44/27/23. Wynne loathed at 67% disapproval.

[RogueBeaver]

Environmental holding pattern.

Believe Mulcair loses when seen. Hudak got 78% in '12. Ironically, Edmonton is where Clark lost his leadership...

Yeah, the usual (and logical, IMO) pattern is wiping them out.

[DC Al Fine]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

[136or142]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

Isn't Halifax a fairly wealthy city?

[DC Al Fine]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

Isn't Halifax a fairly wealthy city?

Yes. We certainly aren't as well off as the oil producing parts of the country, but its definitely easier to achieve a middle class lifestyle than in Toronto or Vancouver. Household incomes are comparable to Toronto or Vancouver, but you can buy a detached house 20 minutes from downtown for 250k.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

Maybe we will see a flood of Albertans rushing to Quebec and Atlantic Canada to find work . Would be interesting to see the West becoming stagnant with a booming East.

[MaxQue]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

Maybe we will see a flood of Albertans rushing to Quebec and Atlantic Canada to find work . Would be interesting to see the West becoming stagnant with a booming East.

I won't be happy until that putrid Brad Wall is forced to be nice to the East.

[RogueBeaver]

Very sobering Maclean's long read on NB.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Quebec's unemployment rate is lower than Alberta's for the first time in 30 years. Halifax is a solid 1.5% below Calgary. No schadenfreude for me though as my brother in law was just laid off there

Isn't Halifax a fairly wealthy city?

Yes. We certainly aren't as well off as the oil producing parts of the country, but its definitely easier to achieve a middle class lifestyle than in Toronto or Vancouver. Household incomes are comparable to Toronto or Vancouver, but you can buy a detached house 20 minutes from downtown for 250k.

Maybe I'll head out to the east coast, haha. Life in Toronto and Vancouver has made me feel pretty dejected about my future. I don't know if there's enough going on in Halifax for me to be perfectly happy, but... house prices in vancouver are ridiculous.

[RogueBeaver]

Ontario will be experimenting with a guaranteed minimum income. Feds might too.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Ontario will be experimenting with a guaranteed minimum income. Feds might too.

That's awesome!

[RogueBeaver]

Would be ironic since another Trudeau rejected that idea when first mooted 40-odd years ago.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Would be ironic since another Trudeau rejected that idea when first mooted 40-odd years ago.

Hey, if Andrew Cuomo and Evan Bayh can piss on their fathers' legacies, I don't see why Justin couldn't improve on his.

[RogueBeaver]

Ironic because Justin is much more Chretien's ideological heir than his dad's. At any rate, a larger "kill the NDP" strategy, if this is a prelude to that, is something I'd be highly skeptical of.

[DC Al Fine]

Ontario will be experimenting with a guaranteed minimum income. Feds might too.

That's awesome!

As with the Ontario Liberals' pension reforms, the devil is in the details... I like the idea but I'm not confident that Wynne will execute it well.

[Blue3]

Can anyone give me a quick summary of what Trudeau has actually done since become Prime Minister, and what his big proposals are?

[2952-0-0]

Ontario will be experimenting with a guaranteed minimum income. Feds might too.

That's awesome!

As with the Ontario Liberals' pension reforms, the devil is in the details... I like the idea but I'm not confident that Wynne will execute it well.

Looks like Wynne's re-election strategy is well underway. She will pray to God (which she nominally believes in) that her plan to balance the budget by FY17/18 will run its course. She will implement measures such as this and the university tuition program to bolster her progressive credentials which were badly damaged by selling off Hydro. She will then repeat the 2007/11/14 re-election strategy of seizing on Tory stupidity (this time probably through their candidates rather than the leader) to retain the loyalties of centrist voters.

And presto (which, like everything else her government touched, costed way over budget), the OLP becomes the Natural Governing Party.

[RogueBeaver]

Good: feds easing path for international students' permanent residency.

[DC Al Fine]

Can anyone give me a quick summary of what Trudeau has actually done since become Prime Minister, and what his big proposals are?

Stuff he's done
1) Cut taxes in the 45-90k bracket, raise taxes for people making over 200k

2) Inquiries into the high death and disappearance rates of aboriginal women

To come
3) Consolidating several child benefits into one program. Removing the universal element and making the whole thing income based.

4) Legalizing marijuana

Long term goals
5) Changing the electoral system from FPTP to IRV

6) Expanding the Canada Pension Plan

Other posters feel free to chime in.

[Poirot]

The tax cut was supposed to pay itself by a tax increase in higher bracker but it turns out it will not be true and this promise will add to the deficit.

One big promise was to invest more in infrastructure.

Things being done:
Reinstate the mandatory long form census
Moratorium on eliminating home delivery of mail (reinstating or what happens in the future remains to be seen)
No toll to be put on the Champlain bridge linking Montreal to the south suburbs
End air strikes mission against ISIS

[Blue3]

Thanks!

So nothing earth-shaking. I was wondering if there might be, since this was the first big change in Canada's politics in a while, and he seems like a young/charismatic/progressive leader. But Canada is too close to perfect that it doesn't need any fundamental reforms, it seems, at least compared to the USA

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Has Bieber's war on FPTP sunk down to provinical level yet?

[Poirot]

One big promise that will not be respected is running a "modest" budget deficit of up to $10 billion in the first two years of the mandate and I think a balanced budget in the fourth year. The deficit in the upcoming budget will be higher than that. People may not mind because there will be money for projects and programmes and investment instead of cuts and spending restraint.

The Parliament Budget Officer told La Presse according to the numbers from the Finance Department, the Conservatives have balanced the budget in 2015-2016. There is a surplus after the first 9 months of the fiscal year. 

http://affaires.lapresse.ca/economie/canada/201603/15/01-4960825-les-conservateurs-avaient-equilibre-le-budget.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=lapresseaffaires_LA5_nouvelles_98718_accueil_POS15

One key message I remember hearing in the liberal ads is middle class parents would have more money in their pockets.

To follow the the completion of promises there is the Trudeau polimeter of Université Laval Political Science Dept.
https://www.poltext.org/en/polimeter

And the Trudeaumetre website
https://www.trudeaumetre.ca/

 

[DC Al Fine]

Has Bieber's war on FPTP sunk down to provinical level yet?

Not really, no. Actually things are worse than a few years ago when a few provinces put on (failed) electoral reform referendums.

[Poirot]

I've answered an Ipsos poll about the future federal budget. I had to rank 15 priorities, give opinion on different size of deficit number and if I agree on different statements. I hope it was for a media and made public before the next budget.

Will the NDP send itself into a leadership contest ? Some socialist wing wants new leadership. There was also an open letter by 35 NDP members in Quebec saying they don't recognize their party, they want to rebuild the party on its founding values and the party should be more progressive, democratic and transparent. They don't ask for a new leader explicitly but the timing is strange. They could speak within the party at the convention. 40% of them are from NDG-Westmount riding and the vast majority have non- francophone names.

Niki Ashton wouldn't say if she will support Mulcair for leader. Is that because she is interested in the job?

I don't know if the NDP has some mechanism to change leader later but I think it's too soon. Maybe Mulcair will decide before the next election to leave leadership if he sees no improvement. Selecting a new leader should be done later to see what happens in a year or two. You could attract people outside of caucus. Right now probably not possible to choose someone outside caucus. Later you also know who will be the Conservative leader. You know what type of person, or from what region could lead the party to electoral gains.