Month: March 2008

Dona Cadman, the widow of former MP Chuck Cadman, released a statement this afternoon:

March 3, 2008

Personal Statement by Dona Cadman

I’m a little bit surprised at the level of reaction to the disclosures in Tom Zytaruk’s book and I guess that’s probably because it was put to rest in my mind, when I discussed the matter with Stephen Harper, 2 ½ years ago. At that time, I recall specifically asking him if he was aware of a million dollar insurance policy offer, that upset Chuck so much.

He looked me straight in the eyes and told me he had no knowledge of an insurance policy offer. I knew he was telling me the truth; I could see it in his eyes. He said, yes he’d had some discussions with two individuals about asking Chuck to rejoin the party, but he’d told them they were wasting their time trying to convince Chuck.

From that point forward…. I didn’t regard it as a “Party” initiative, but rather; the overzealous  indiscretion of  a couple of individuals…. whose identity, Chuck never revealed to me.

It all comes back to my conversation with the Prime Minister…. 2 ½  years ago.  I want to be perfectly clear in that regard. Chuck liked, respected and trusted Stephen Harper. I like, respect and trust Stephen Harper. If I didn’t believe in my heart, that he was telling me the truth…. I wouldn’t be running as the Conservative Candidate for Surrey North.

Dona Cadman

 

Sometime around breakfast this morning at Stornaway, Stephane Dion became what is believe to be the first-ever Leader of the Official Opposition to be sued for saying something nasty about a Prime Minister. Lawyers for Stephen Harper served Dion with a Notice of Libel for “two devastatingly defamatory articles” that Harper’s lawyers say were published at the Liberal Web site.

Harper’s lawyers want the two offending articles immediately taken down from the Web site and  then,

We require that on the first available opportunity the Honourable Stkphane Dion read the following Apology in English and French during Member's Statements time in the House of Commons and that this Apology be posted in English and French on the Liberal Party website at www.liberal.ca:

“Member’s Statement” time in the House of Commons runs for the 15 or 20 minutes just prior to Question Period which, on Mondays, begins at 2:15 pm Ottawa time.

Read the Notice of Libel Harper gave to Dion today:

Every year, each federal government department and agency produces a “Departmental Performance Report” or DPR and — you won't be surprised to hear — the news is generally good. Departments are doing what they are supposed to be doing! Departments are doing things efficiently! Departments are wisely spending tax dollars!

Well, retiring Conservative MP John Williams (left), who's had a keen interest in his Parliamentary career in pink ties (really!), audit and oversight, isn't quite so believing.

And so, a couple of weeks ago, Williams asked the Standing Committee on Public Accounts to adopt this motion: “That in the interest of accountability, the Auditor General of Canada be requested to select two departmental performance reports at random each year and audit them …”

That motion found support among members of all parties and has now been submitted to the House of Commons where, presumably, it will pass as well, and give Auditor General Sheila Fraser and her staff one more annual task.

Here's Williams, telling the Public Accounts Committee why this is a good idea:

I have believed for a long time that accountability is the thing that drives good performance. I have been concerned over the last many years, in fact since we started with departmental performance reports in the mid-1990s, that they tell a good story but they sometimes ignore telling us the whole story. On that basis, I thought it would be appropriate that we put in some kind of motivator for [bureaucrats] to feel obligated to tell the whole story.

Mr. Chairman, that's why I said “two…at random each year”. You never know whether your name is coming up, and therefore you're motivated to say, “I'd better do a good performance report, because I really would prefer to avoid having to come to explain my fluffy, self-serving report to the public accounts committee.”

Liberal MP Boris Wrzesnewskyj gives this idea the Parliamentary equivalent of a “hell-yeah!”:

Too often we're given a good story here, but not the whole story. It's quite unfortunate. What this motion speaks to is a lack of confidence in this committee among parliamentarians that even when reports are compelled because of concerns, those reports perhaps don't accurately reflect everything that's transpired. On a number of occasions, what has been tremendously worrisome is how the resources in departments are utilized when they're called to account before this committee. Too often, instead of people having been briefed so that they can provide us with the information, it's actually departmental communications people with whom they sit to discuss these issues, and strategies are laid out not on how to provide us with accurate information, but on how in fact they can spin us.

Mind you, Conservative MP Brian Fitzpatrick (who is also retiring) believes this still may not get rid of “fluffy, self-serving reports”:

I find it really unfortunate, if that's really the state of affairs with these performance reports, that we have to hire more auditors to check up on their reports. It's really a disappointing state of affairs that we have in the public service. I'm not sure that ultimately would be the cure. If that's a real problem we have here, I'm not sure

hauling in more auditors, with all due respect to Mr. Williams, is the cure for that problem. It's a leadership problem in those departments.

That's my frustration with having to reluctantly support this thing. I don't see it being the answer.

As for the NDP, David Christopherson is two thumbs up for the idea (and for Mr. Williams):

I remember the first time I read one of those reports. I was infuriated. I thought it was a public relations piece. I think it's also an opportunity for us to mention that the legacy Mr. Williams leaves, because he's not running again, is phenomenal.

His impact on this work is that the impression of it within Parliament has been changed forever for the positive. I think we'll be referring to Mr. Williams' legacy and the things we've all learned from him for many, many years. I hope that's the case beyond, for those of us who are here, because I think he's got us going on the right track. Accountability is everything.

The only other thing I would add is that I hope even now this motion, before the Auditor General even responds, is circulated to all the key people who generate these reports, to let them know what's coming. Start now, folks, because the world's changing, and these reports are not going to be what they have been before. We're going

to drag them into what they should be.

So I'm pleased to support this.

EADS, the European aeronautics consortium often referred to by its most popular brand name, Airbus, finally won a military contract — and it's a doozy. The United States Air Force decided that the A330 MRTT/ KC-30B from Northrop Grumman and EADS Airbus will be its next aerial tanker. It's a contract for nearly 180 planes that could be worth more than $100-billion when all is said and done.

Even EADS couldn't believe it:

Louis Gallois, EADS chief executive, said on Friday night the contract was a ”breakthrough for EADS” in the biggest defence market in the world. ”To win against Boeing is just great,” he told the [Financial Times].

As recently as Friday afternoon the EADS team had been convinced that Boeing would take the contract. Mr Gallois, about to leave Paris for a mountain holiday, said he had simply not believed his ears when informed at 10.25pm local time last night. ”I think it is the best contract I have won in my life.”

The EADS offering was up against Chicago-based Boeing. But despite being the hometown favourite, Boeing couldn't swing the deal and is now threatening that it may be forced out of the tanker business.

Almost predictably, U.S. politicians are freaking out over this deal. “It’s stunning to me that we would outsource the production of these airplanes to Europe instead of building them in America,” said Sam Brownback, the Republican senator for Kansas, where Boeing has a site. “I’ll be calling upon the secretary of defence for a full debriefing.”

But the Air Force fell in love with the Airbus offering. Said one air force general: “More passengers, more cargo, more fuel to offload, more availability, more flexibility, more dependability…more patients in the aeromedical evacuation role.”

There is a rising tide of protectionism among U.S. lawmakers right now — the threats by Senators Obama and Clinton to cut NAFTA ties are great examples of that — and, as a result, any company or country that is eating lunch normally made in America ought to be eyeing these developments carefully.

Late last week, Treasury Board President Vic Toews tabled the 2008–2009 Main Estimates. The Estimates are the vehicle through which spending for the current fiscal period is actually approved. The federal budget sets the broad paramaters for the government’s overall financial plan – it sketches out, for example, both spending and revenue — while the Estimates are the details on where the money’s actually going.

Now, just as Parliament must vote on the Budget, Parliament must approve Estimates. Both are confidence issues. If Parliament approves a budget, for example, but rejects Estimates, the Prime Minister can say he’s lost the confidence of the House.

Your federal government had planned to spend just over $220–billion between April 1, 2008 and March 31, 2009. That would be a 4.6 per cent increase for fiscal 2009 over spending in fiscal 2008, which ends in a few weeks. Most of that spending is what is known as statutory spending — spending programs, such as servicing the national debt or providing transfers to the provinces — which was already locked in by previous governments. But $79.1–billion of that spending is what is known as ‘voted’ spending. To use a metaphor from your household budget, this would be discretionary spending, money left over after all the real important bills are paid, like your mortgage.

So the discretionary spending, if you will, this year will be just over $79.1–billion. This being a Conservative government, Conservative supporters would have expected that spending to be less than it was last year or at least the same. Wrong. This discretionary spending is up 5.4 per cent compared to last year. The non-discretionary spending is up 4.2 per cent.

But — and it’s a big but — these spending estimates just tabled in Parliament were put together before the federal budget was tabled.

Given both production and secrecy constraints and the fact that the Budget was tabled two days before the Main Estimates, not all new spending plans can be reflected in the Main Estimates. Therefore, while these Main Estimates represent the major part of the Government's spending plans, additional changes to the amounts will be dealt with in Supplementary Estimates later during the fiscal year.

These Main Estimates represent the Government's expense plan as announced in its March 2007 Budget, as well as further updates as provided in its October 2007 Economic and Fiscal Update.  

There was, by my count, nearly $2–billion of new spending in the federal budget although not all of it will take place in the next fiscal year. So overall government spending will certainly grow by more than 4.6 per cent and discretionary spending is certain to grow by more than 5.4 per cent.

As a benchmark, Canada’s Gross Domestic Product — the sum total of all economic activity in the country –grew by 5.9 per cent between the end of September 2007 (the most recent quarter for which data is available) and the end of September 2006. So government is planning to increase spending at a rate that is less than GDP growth for the third quarter of 2007 but I know of no economist who expects GDP to be growing by 5 per cent next year. So watch out for government spending to eclipse the overall growth of the economy.

So where’s the money going? I’ll be going through departments I cover over the next few days, but here’s the big picture (and remember, these numbers do not account for anything in the last federal budget):

• Ottawa will transfer $45.3–billion to other governments in Canada, an increase of 12.4 per cent compared to the year-earlier period. Within that category, the biggest jump — 16.6 per cent — was a result of a big boost in equalization payments. Ottawa will dole out $13.6–billion in equalization payments this year.
• Federal transfers of money to individual Canadians, for things like the Universal Child Care Benefit and payments to the elderly, will likely come in around $51.2–billion in fiscal 2009, a jump of 3.2 per cent. The child care benefit is costing $2.47–billion next year, just slighly more than the $2.46–billion it cost thisyear.
• Transfers to international financial organizations, like the World Bank, will jump significantly by 28.5 per cent to $693–million.
• Other transfers and subsidies will cost $29.3–billion, an increase of 7.2 per cent.
• Crown corporations will receive $5.2–billion, up 3.8 per cent year-over-year.
• General operating and capital expenses will climb 4.6 per cent to $55.3–billion.
• Public debt charges drop 2.9 per cent to $33.7–billion.

Typically fascinating reportage from James Fallows:

“…what the Olympic-era visitors will be discovering is not the absence of China’s electronic control but its new refinement—and a special Potemkin-style unfettered access that will be set up just for them, and just for the length of their stay. According to engineers I have spoken with at two tech organizations in China, the government bodies in charge of censoring the Internet have told them to get ready to unblock access from a list of specific Internet Protocol (IP) addresses—certain Internet cafés, access jacks in hotel rooms and conference centers where foreigners are expected to work or stay during the Olympic Games.

Depending on how you look at it, the Chinese government’s attempt to rein in the Internet is crude and slapdash or ingenious and well crafted. When American technologists write about the control system, they tend to emphasize its limits. When Chinese citizens discuss it—at least with me—they tend to emphasize its strength. All of them are right, which makes the government’s approach to the Internet a nice proxy for its larger attempt to control people’s daily lives….

[Read the full story]