The hills notebook | The Press

From Quebec to Ottawa, find out what caught the attention of our parliamentary correspondents this week.

The quote of the week

Have a good week for Anthony Housefather

The member for Mount Royal co-signed a letter with his Liberal colleagues to ask Canadian universities to take a clear position against anti-Semitism in Canadian universities. A worrying wave of intolerance is indeed blowing across campuses. In the United States, universities struggle to clearly denounce anti-Semitism. Last week, the president of the University of Pennsylvania was unable to answer the following question: “Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate the rules or code of conduct of [votre établissement] ? »It depends on the context, she replied. She had to resign. In Canada too, intolerant speech is being freed. At McGill, a student committee called the Hamas terrorist attack “heroic.” The murder of all innocent people must be denounced, on both sides. Let’s not import the excesses of American campuses.

Paul Journet, The Press

Tough week for Catherine Tait

It’s a difficult second week for the boss of CBC/Radio-Canada. Last week, she announced to employees just before Christmas about upcoming cuts, without being able to say who would be affected or to what extent. She did this even before knowing the budgetary targets imposed by the federal government. And she will proportionally want to make more cuts in the French-speaking network, although it is more popular. Despite everything, she does not rule out paying bonuses to executives. We are beginning to understand why Michel Bissonnette, senior vice-president of French services at Radio-Canada, resigned this fall. She followed this week by confirming her trip to Australia to participate in a summit on public television broadcasters. Pierre Poilievre could not have dreamed of a better person to justify wanting to reduce the funding of the state corporation.

Paul Journet, The Press

An expensive “crisis”

Because he wanted to “spoil the Christmas of Justin Trudeau” and his troops, the Conservative leader forced them (and the MPs from other parties) to submit to a marathon of 135 votes on measures involving the confidence of the House. Consequently, the staff who ensure the operation of the works had to remain on duty. “The Conservative leader’s plan to shut down Parliament last week failed. All his 30-hour tantrum did was show Canadians the true colors of this party and cost taxpayers $2 million in unnecessary spending,” the Prime Minister railed during question period. Among those who must continue to work in such circumstances are employees of parliamentary cafeterias. Pierre Poilievre preferred McDonald’s, on the night of Thursday to Friday – “cold croquettes”, mocked Justin Trudeau.

Baby boom on Parliament Hill

A sign that times have changed, MPs from all political parties, with the exception of the Green Party, have had or are expecting children. New Democrat leader Jagmeet Singh welcomed his second baby, a little girl, on Tuesday the day after the announcement on the dental care program dear to the New Democrats. In November, it was conservative MP Raquel Dancho who announced the birth of little Elizabeth. Last week, Bloc MP Xavier Barsalou-Duval walked through the corridors of parliament with a stroller. Her daughter had just been born seven days earlier. And Government House Leader Karina Gould is due to give birth in January. She was the first woman in a ministerial position to have a child in 2018. Elected officials have been entitled to 12 months of paid parental leave since 2019. They can therefore be absent from the House of Commons for more than three weeks without penalty. financial, but they must still continue their work in the constituency.

Distinct values

Quebec Finance Minister Eric Girard says he does not have many chemistry with Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative Party of Canada. “There’s not a lot of intersection between my values ​​and those of the Conservative Party,” he said during a press scrum Wednesday. It remains to be seen what has changed since 2015, when he wore the colors of the PCC in the constituency of Lac-Saint-Louis. The party was then led by Stephen Harper. According to information from The Press, Mr. Girard has nevertheless made it known to certain PCC apparatchiks that he is willing “to make a difference elsewhere”. But a conservative strategist who requested anonymity stressed that Mr. Girard “is coping too well” with the federal carbon tax and that his political judgment leaves something to be desired, citing the subsidy to the Los Angeles Kings as an example.

Lieutenant governors are not “pariahs”

The outgoing lieutenant governor of Quebec, Michel Doyon, affirms that his role is not to “meddle in politics”, but he emphasizes that he and his counterparts are not “pariahs”. The National Assembly unanimously voted to abolish the function last week. Mr. Doyon is generally discreet, but he was intercepted by the parliamentary press on Wednesday as he left his office. He maintained that the position he has held since 2015 is “fundamental and beautiful”. It allowed him “to go to areas where no one goes”. “We must not dramatize the whole situation with the lieutenant governors and imagine that they are pariahs,” he added. Last week, the Trudeau government named administrator and former Mi’kmaq leader Manon Jeannotte to succeed Mr. Doyon. The National Assembly, however, quickly adopted a motion tabled by Québec solidaire which calls for the replacement of this function by a democratic institution.