The 4th Quarter Economic Update at 40,000 feet over Siberia

Having a drink with a Conservative source the other night in Ottawa, I was told that Prime Minister Stephen Harper was going to release the fourth quarter update while he was in China. No way, I said. True, my friend said. The communication shops across each government department had been warned to keep the day free today to allow for maximum news coverage of the government's quarterly report (a report demanded by the Liberals last spring as their condition for supporting the government's budget).

I was intrigued and began phoning around but, unable to find a second source to make this story stand up, I had to keep this to myself.

So, truth be told, I was not surprised to see Dimitri Soudas, the prime minister's press secretary, and his deputy, Andrew MacDougall, come walking down the aisle of the plane earlier today with a big box full of the hard copies of the very same fourth quarter update. We had just taken off from Anchorage, Alaska where the prime minister's Airbus had refueled en route from Ottawa to Beijing. I was not surprised but a bit regretful that I had not gone with gut instinct and reported earlier this week what was about to happen. And what was about to happen is that the dozen or so journalists travelling with the prime minister this week (he's in Beijing today then travels to Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Seoul, Korea) were about to engage in, by my count, the longest budget lockup ever. Much of that lockup would held somewhere high over Siberia of all places. The flight from Anchorage to Beijing was nine hours and then, we agreed, as a condition of getting the update, to respect an embargo placed upon us by the PMO not to divulge the contents of the update until, lo and behold, Harper began to speak about it in a press conference in Beijing. That's right: Beijing. Harper was going to present his “Report to Canadians”, 13 time zones and thousands of kilometres away from the House of Commons.

I asked the prime minister about this odd unfolding of events. His response — and early opposition reaction — is here.

Some have suggested that, in giving the update to reporters already weary after eight hours of plane travel from Ottawa to Anchorage, and without access to the Internet, our research librarians or any other outside experts, we were ripe to miss something in the numbers-rich 168-page document.

To our credit, we pooled our collective wisdom and I don't believe there is anything we missed. In fact, there are not a lot of new numbers in the report. I have, on the laptop I travel with, the digitial versions of the first three updates, the original federal budget, the ensuing reports of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, and several analysis of the federal economic action plan by leading Bay Street economists. We made use of that material. We were also blessed to have Julian Beltrame of The Canadian Press on this flight. Julian is CP's go-to guy for almost all things related to Flaherty and budgets and he is not fazed by a book full of numbers. Our group of journalists also included experienced vets like CTV's Bob Fife, the Globe's John Ibbitson, CBC Radio's Susan Lunn, CBC television's Terry Milewski, and our talented French-language colleagues, Madeleine Blais-Morin of RDI, Emmanuelle Latraverse of SRC, and Malorie Beauchemin of La Presse. A pretty good group, if I dare say, to go over this material during the Longest Lockup Ever.

That said: I am keen to see what my colleagues back in Ottawa come up with after going over the document and after talking to opposition MPs and economy watchers.

The government, you won't be surprised to hear, gives themselves a very big pat on the back for a job well done guiding Canada's economy through the recent recession. There were 12,000 infrastructure projects, 97 per cent of funds committed, and more than 12,000 jobs created. It all sounds wonderful. But, as opposition MPs have pointed out for more than six months, whenever these numbers are released, the government is found wanting when it comes to the data to support these claims. Indeed, one of those who wishes he could verify the data is none other than the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who knows his way around a spreadsheet.

In any event: I encourage you to review the report and I look forward to your comments and suggestions for further reporting on this document.

*The word “China”, incidentally, comes up exactly twice in the 168 page report.