In January the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO), Kevin Page, explained that the deficit had become structural, meaning it’ll keep existing when our economy is back up to snuff (if it gets there). I’ll have more to say about the budget another time, but consider an element in what happened today, the decrease of corporate income taxes.

The Globe and Mail’s John Ibbitson explained¹ (4 March 2010) that Harper is determined to eliminate the deficit by 2015. Of course, we know that Jim Flaherty presents this as happening largely through an upbeat economy, one that grows so well he doesn’t have to raise taxes and simply must prevent spending increases. But this message has been somewhat confusing. Flaherty used to talk about not allowing spending to grow. Later the Conservatives appointed Stockwell Day as the man to make cuts. Their messaging seems to vacillate between limiting spending growth and making cuts. They certainly aren’t going to raise any taxes.

The CBC reported³ (4 March 2010) on Flaherty’s perspective

“The government’s plan to get ahead of its $54 billion deficit is built largely on the back of $17.6 billion worth of savings over the next five years that will come from streamlining and reducing the operating and administrative costs of government departments. That plus a broadening tax base as the economy improves will be enough to bridge the gap, Flaherty said.”

Ibbitson reminds us early, what the PBO reported: the deficit is structural and regardless of Flaherty’s optimism, it’s very unlikely to go away as Flaherty says.

Now, switching topics a bit, Ibbitson writes

“With costs rising by 2.5 per cent a year, after accounting for inflation and population growth, health care is consuming nearly half of the budget in some provinces, even as the baby boom heads into retirement. Canadians need to confront the truth that the health-care system as it exists simply can’t be sustained.

“The federal government will be under intense pressure from the provinces, who will not be able to make ends meet because of the explosion in health care spending,” warns Pierre Fortin, an economist who teaches at the Université du Québec à Montréal. “The provinces will always be at the door, asking for more money.”"

I think this is significant commentary. Take stock, a structural deficit is established, and now the Conservatives are on track to further decrease the amount of money the government takes in by reducing corporate taxes even more than they already have. According to page 67 of the budget² (and mentioned throughout)

“The federal general corporate income tax rate was reduced to 18 per cent on January 1, 2010. It will be further reduced to 16.5 per cent on January 1, 2011 and to 15 per cent on January 1, 2012.”

That means Canada will have the lowest corporate income tax rate in the G7. The hope is that that will attract more investment. But at what cost?

Losing the federal surplus meant we lost our safety buffer. If something unexpectedly worse occurs than this recession, which we seem to be leaving, we’re in trouble. But that’s a big if. The heart of the worry here is that faced with the inevitable stresses of both the health of an aging population and the fact that there will be fewer people generating revenue for the government, now the government is giving itself further stressors by decreasing another source of revenue, corporate income taxes. Even in good times, that means there’s less the government can do to promote Canadian well-being.

So why do this? Are the Conservatives making a big gamble that the economy is going to improve so much, our worries of greater problems will not come to pass? Or are they being irrational? I don’t think they’re gambling or being irrational. They’ve calculated exactly what’s needed to bring about a widespread crisis in the government’s ability to fund the programs we expect. The Conservatives need to bring about a crisis in order to implement their vision.

A crisis makes arguments for drastic change seem required, people react. And after gradually being lulled into a low-tax stasis without much effort, it will be easy for Conservatives to make the degraded services around us seem unworthy of funding. It’s much harder to rebuild something anew than to maintain and improve upon what is working well. I can just hear the arguments “look at the state of health care, our equipment is useless, we don’t have the staff, etc. clearly the public option doesn’t work!” of course forgetting that it can work quite well when funded and operated properly. People will just see it in crisis state.

A government lacking the funds to do much, is one that cannot ensure health care and social services to its people. Indeed, when our health care system is so far extended beyond capacity, watch, the Conservatives will argue that the only solution is to bring in the private sector. And health care is only one example, there are many other government services that will suffer similar fates probably even sooner.

(P.S. I remember a time not long ago, when one of the arguments for doing business in Canada was our health system. The argument went something like, without companies having to foot the cost of health insurance, like they do to some degree in the US, an expense is saved along with a lot of bureaucratic work that doesn’t have to be done. Cut back on your HR team! More efficient employees because they’re healthy and on-the-job! That kind of stuff. If the Conservatives’ budgeting steps really do cause the crisis I’m suggesting they’re designed to, we’ll see what happens to this little bit of persuasion.)

According to the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) 28 January¹ 2007, Harper committed in 2006 to

“. . . support women’s human rights and I agree that Canada has to do more to meet its international obligations to women’s equality. If elected I will take concrete and immediate measures, as recommended by the United Nations, to ensure that Canada fully upholds its commitments to women.”

Instead, he started off by cutting 43% of the operating budget from the Status of Women Canada by closing 12 of the federal agency’s 16 offices. But that’s just to start.

Consider this column in the Winnipeg Free Press² (10 February 2010) about Harper’s Conservatives’ deeds.

“In late summer 2006, the Conservatives killed the internationally acclaimed $2.75-million Court Challenges Program created in 1978 to provide federal funding for women and minorities to fight systemic inequality and discrimination. . . .

Also that year, they removed the advancement of women’s equality from the mandate of Status of Women Canada. . .

They have been diligently rewriting Canada’s foreign affairs language to erase advocacy and empowerment. The phrase “gender equality” has been replaced with “equality of men and women.” Currently, the federal cabinet is being lobbied by a group of its own backbenchers to end funding to the International Planned Parenthood Federation.”

The article points out that in order to advance women’s health, you need to take into account the various interconnected issues that contribute to health problems, particularly with respect to rights covering “. . . sexual violence, child marriage, sexual trafficking, female genital mutilation and lack of economic autonomy, political representation, land rights and inheritance rights” Unfortunately the Conservatives continue to be less than great proponents for birth control or abortion safety.

The Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) is making press with its report (PDF) on the backwards slide of women’s status in Canada since 2004. The CBC published news³ (23 February 2010) about this report

“Women currently account for 22.1 per cent of members of Parliament, even though they make up just over 50 per cent of the population. And while that’s the highest political participation rate for women in Canadian history, it’s inched up only marginally over the past dozen years.

The report also slams the government for scrapping a nascent $5 billion over five years national child care program and contends that “senior advisers within the office of the prime minister [have] strong links to anti-feminist organizations.”

It’s true that there are some areas in which we’ve seen slight improvements such as better access to higher education but the larger setbacks are the more telling story. Consider the World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap reports. As you can see from this image from the report (PDF), Canada has dropped to 25th in 2009 from 14th in 2006 in terms of worsening gender inequality.

It’s also clear that Canada is behind the sample average on the economy, education, and health: that’s three out of four of the dimensions being graphed.

The Toronto Star⁴ (23 February 2010) also reported on the topic. It focused more on some of the differences over the last several years, leading to the reports claims that we’ve seen an erosion in the status of women.

“Kathy Lahey, a professor of law and gender studies at Queen’s University, whose research is part of the report sent to the UN this week, says Canada can’t claim many bragging rights.

She points out, for instance, that while more women may be in the workforce and at post-secondary institutions, their wage gap with men was actually worse in 2001 than it was in 1981. . .”

There may be a lot of different factors contributing to these declines, but it’s clear that the concrete cuts Conservatives have made to federal programs assisting women, do not help. If Harper really wants Canada to lead on women’s health, he’s got to do more than doublespeak on an international stage.

The CCL describes itself as “a catalyst for lifelong learning, promoting and supporting evidence-based decisions about learning throughout all stages of life, from early childhood through to the senior years.” That seems like a worthy thing to promote in Canada. It’s important after all, to ensure that people’s knowledge and skills are up-to-date with those required to keep Canada competitive and successful in the world economy. Additionally, I’d argue that lifelong learning has intrinsic value to individuals and our society as a whole–but that’s for another post.

Remember, the Conservative minority squandered our budget surplus with its poor planning over the last several years; cuts that Harper and Flaherty have been warning about have already begun. Here’s some evidence that they’re extending beyond silencing the watchdogs that keep government accountable. The Globe and Mail¹ reported (8 January 2010) that the Conservatives (through Conservative MP Diane Finley) stopped funding to the CCL and provided us with the following doublespeak:

“Ryan Sparrow, Ms. Finley’s communications director, said the government is working with the provinces and other stakeholders to create a better system that is more responsive to Canadians’ needs.

“Employers, workers, and economists in Canada have told the government that there is a need for better learning information that is more aligned with labour market demand and takes into account international competitive challenges. This need has become even more apparent due to the recent global economic downturn and the government’s focus on Canada’s economic recovery… In other words, there is a need for a more comprehensive learning information system than the CCL can provide.”"

Really? The public isn’t stupid. It doesn’t make sense to shut down an organization that was already successfully doing what the Conservatives claim they want. According to the President and CEO of the CCL² (January 2010):

“In 2004, Canada saw that it had some catching up to do. Canadians were falling behind the rest of the world in some crucial areas. Innovation. Creativity. Skills development. Learning.

There was no debate about what we had to do to stop the decline, and begin to improve. We had to figure out what works in education and learning, from early childhood to post-secondary schooling, from job training through adult literacy improvement, and we had to monitor our progress so that we were certain we were always on the right path.

That is why the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) was created.

By any measure, CCL has a proud record of accomplishment.

Our Composite Learning Index, the first of its kind anywhere in the world, measures learning conditions, not only in the country as a whole, but in almost 5,000 individual communities. It shows that when you make learning conditions better, you inevitably make economic and social standards better. Europeans have told us they have been “inspired” by the Index, and are now working to produce a version for themselves. …”

The letter continues with more bullet points and information about the CCL’s successful program. As you can see, the CCL was doing what the Conservatives claim they want to do. The Conservatives haven’t announced any other program to accomplish their goal. So how does it make sense to cut off the funding to the program that was designed and already functioning in service of the very goal they claimed to want to reach? It doesn’t. C’mon Conservatives, that’s blatant doublespeak.

Finally as a side note, it’s interesting to contrast Harper’s Conservative approach to the perspective, Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff presented in a speech, as reported by the CBC³ (2 May 2009).

“A key strategy for Canada to emerge from the economic downturn is lifelong learning because it fosters innovation that will help to create future jobs in a knowledge-based economy, he said.

“A strategy for recovery must be a strategy for learning. We must create a society where learning is a way of life and learning is lifelong… If you ask what I want for Canada, it is this: That we surprise ourselves, astonish ourselves, that we astonish the world.”"

Truly it surprises that the Conservatives, billing themselves as good stewards of the economy, prefer to cut our economic prospects by halting and reversing Canadian know-how, competitiveness, and leadership in a knowledge-based economy.

(Update 12 January 2010: The Toronto Star has an opinion piece on this issue, further examining the politics and faulty reasoning behind this cut.)

I remember reflecting at the time of the initial GST cuts what the real rationale might be–it couldn’t be what the Conservatives were saying publicly because that had too many holes to make sense. When the Tories kept announcing what seemed like short-sighted cuts to the taxes, which would have little to no economic affect on the majority of Canadians, why did they consistently tout these as putting money back into the hands of consumers (a sham).

What is the real rationale for the Conservatives’ GST cuts? The GST cuts affect the government’s ability to support various services and programs that impact the well-being of our society. Ah, but that’s right, the Conservatives aren’t generally in favour of such services and programs, they want to shrink government, preferring to leave everyone to fare for themselves. But they can’t come out and tell everyone they want to cut federal programs and services, because then they’d risk losing the minority popular support that they have. So what to do? How about engineering some great big deficits? A deficit situation enables the Conservatives to justify cutting federal programs and services, to justify selling off our crown assets to private interests, all under the guise of being fiscally responsible.

Let’s see how this adds up.

Reuter’s¹ reported (25 July 2008) that the Conservative-led government wasn’t off to a good start to the fiscal year.

“. . . posting a deficit of C$517 million ($507 million) for April and May as corporate and sales tax collection fell sharply. The deficit compares with a surplus of C$2.78 billion in the same two months of 2007. The weak results were due to a 17 percent decline in corporate income tax revenue as well as a 21 percent drop in intake from the goods and services sales tax, the Department of Finance said in a report on Friday.” [emphasis mine]

The article continues to note that the Conservative government estimated it would have a surplus of $2 to $3 billion for the year. It contrasts sharply with the prior year’s surplus of about $10 B. Striking however, that the Conservatives were still publicly estimating a surplus, not a deficit. It suggests that either they weren’t very good at taking stock of the economic situation or else they were simply trying to keep things quiet and control public perception over eventually slipping into a deficit.

Continuing with Reuter’s reports² (18 November 2008), we can see how much the Conservatives tried to veil the situation. This is about the time that budget officer, Kevin Page, prepared to release his first forecast.

“The idea of running a budget deficit in Canada has been political anathema since the 1990s when the previous Liberal government painfully eliminated it over a period of several years. Ottawa has subsequently posted annual surpluses, the only major industrialized country to do so.

The newly re-elected Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper insisted throughout this year’s election campaign that it would continue to balance the books. However, it has since allowed that a temporary deficit is likely. Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has said he expects to post a small surplus in the 2008-09 fiscal year but the budget might slide into deficit after that as the result of possible stimulus measures that have yet to be defined. In February, when the government laid out its spending plans for 2008-09, Flaherty saw . . . the surplus slimming down to C$1.3 billion in 2009-10.

Economists, including the influential chief economist of Toronto-Dominion Bank, Don Drummond, have estimated Canada could face a budget shortfall of up to C$10 billion next year.”

At about the same time, the Montreal Gazette reported³ (14 November 2008) Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty’s intentions to sell crown assets.

“Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said yesterday the Harper government is considering selling real estate and other crown assets to help keep the budget balanced as the economy worsens. . . . “We are going to review the corporate assets, the capital assets, of the government of Canada, to see whether they still perform a useful function for the Canadian people. If that review shows that there should be some assets that should be sold, then we’ll go ahead with them.”"

Clearly (because Flaherty says so) the Conservatives knew at this point that they would have at least a difficult time balancing the budget. But he puts the blame on a worsening economy, totally neglecting his own government’s reckless GST cuts. Or were they reckless? Maybe they served the Conservative strategy of reducing federal programs and services. Flaherty’s talking about selling off crown assets–those belong to us don’t they, not private parties. But this talking strategy will prove consistent with future Conservative announcements and with current Conservative ideology.

Jumping ahead, the Conservatives started predicting they’d run a $34 billion deficit for 2009/10, and a $30 B deficit the year after. Harper said the budget they’d introduce would have “permanent tax cuts”–interesting way to deal with a shortfall: lose more money.

The CBC reporting⁴ (22 June 2009) on the massive federal deficit expectation points out that we’re likely to see what had been estimated as a $1.3 billion surplus changed into a $50 billion deficit. Roughly $10 billion of that can be attributed to the GST cut. That’s $10 billion in federal social programs down the drain. The article quotes Canadian autoworks economist Jim Stanford on the link between cutting the GST and the purchasing decisions “The links are not as strong as you might think…” which corroborates others’s positions at the time of the announced cuts (I called attention to these just above).

To be fair, the article also notes that $10 B is only a portion of the ~$50 B deficit. But much of what led to the deficit was not as predictable or controllable as the $10 B portion. Part of the deficit comes from measures, like the economic stimulus taken (and to varying degrees pushed by the other parties) to deal with the severe recession.

Nevertheless $10 B of the deficit was within the purvue of the Conservatives’ decisions. That’s $10 B that could have been used toward stimulus and social programs. That’s $10 B that could have been considered a safety net for a worsening economy (which as we know now, it did). The Conservatives had a safety net coming into office, which gave them some  room to manage our country even while the world was heading into a deep recession. Rather than recognize their good fortune in having that wiggle room they put policies in place, which even at the time signalled an end to such a safety net. That’s an intentional act.

So I ask, can it be reckless planning? Lack of forsight? Or is it part of the Conservative strategy to reduce the government–recognizing that if anything dire did happen, they’d get their opportunity to cut federal programs to support only the most essential of federal duties? I think it’s the latter. While I may disagree with their goals, calling them short-sighted, I don’t actually think the Conservatives are stupidly bumbling around with these measures, rather they’re carrying through with their policies for a reason.

The United Press reported⁵ (11 September 2009)

“Canada’s budget deficit was adjusted upward to $55.9 billion this year . . . Flaherty said much of the effort to get the deficit down to $5.2 billion by 2015 will “require decisions of government that won’t always be popular or pain free,” and “it will require a lot of saying ‘no’ to pet projects and special interests.”"

In order to reduce the deficit (not even talking about hitting a surplus again) by 2015, Flaherty starts trying to get the public used to the idea that cuts will come, and that they’ll be painful. Wondering what he characterizes as “pet projects and special interests”?

My guess is that’s just about anything outside current Conservative doctrine. How long before the Conservatives proceed with deeper cuts to cultural programs, social services, and more? Could cuts required to get us out of this deficit eventually be a rationale for the Conservatives to open the door to privatized health care? So much of the Conservative agenda, reigning in the social infrastructure, which characterizes (in part) the well-being of Canadian life, comes down to cutting the programs and services that are now Canadian institutions.

The National Post⁸ (2 November 2009) discussed Kevin Page’s report (Parliamentary Budget Office) examining our future deficit in relation to the Conservatives’ plans. His office is of course, supposed to shed light on what goes on within their domain and has sometimes been at odds with the Conservatives’ numbers. Page says the federal government will be in a substanatial structural deficit for a number of years and that the government will have to raise taxes or else make cuts in its programs. He also brought up an interesting issue.

“According to Mr. Page, the government’s projections include $5.8-billion in unidentified savings over the next five years through reviews of program spending, including $2-billion this year. Mr. Page says his office has requested expenditure planning documents from the federal Treasury Board, but has thus far been rebuffed.”

And now that the holidays are upon us, the Conservatives are releasing plenty of bits warning that they’ll begin making cuts–are these the unidentified savings, Page mentioned? Perhaps the Conservatives think people will forget these warnings over the holidays, or that the warnings will sink into the background of our consciousness so we’re more receptive when they finally do occur. The Globe and Mail⁶ (21 December 2009) talks about Harper’s stimulus plan exit strategy involving years of “belt-tightening”. They quote Stephen Harper saying:

“The government’s approach will be clear. We won’t be raising taxes, but we will be constraining growth . . . And within four to five years, if we follow that path, we should be back to a balanced budget.”

Harper uses the euphemism “restraining growth” but as his government noted previously, they mean cuts to federal programs and services, along with selling off crown assets. Reading the language used by Harper and his Conservatives, and the way it gets reported frequently you can see that they use words like frugal and belt-tightening, which imply wisdom and resolve rather than the actual short-sightedness or cunning strategy. The article continues with insightful counterpoints from respected economists and ministers

“Mr. Harper’s view that his government will be able to chip away at deficits by squeezing the growth of public spending has been questioned by economists and by former officials with the Finance Department. Former deputy ministers Scott Clark and David Dodge [former Governor of the Bank of Canada] have already stepped forward to challenge the government’s plans for eliminating the deficit, which is projected to reach $56-billion this fiscal year. Mr. Clark has said that Ottawa will have to raise the GST, which Mr. Harper cut in 2006.

“I don’t think it’s very likely that they can balance the budget without some very severe spending restraint,” said Bank of Montreal deputy chief economist Douglas Porter.”"

It’s not just Flaherty and Harper talking cuts, but well-known economists saying the Conservatives cannot follow through on their promises without backtracking their initial decisions on the GST cut or else severely cutting spending. And last but not least, let’s follow this up with the most recent news coming from Jim Flaherty’s mouth and reported by The Globe and Mail⁷ (22 December 2009).

“”Over time, what we’re going to see in the federal government in any event is some attrition because of the demographics and aging public service and we’ll have to be mindful of that as we try to watch growth in spending and restrain growth in spending,”"

Which is an oblique way of saying the Conservative minority government would look toward cutting public services. How can I justify that comment? Consider that if you don’t rehire public workers, or worse, you eliminate their jobs, then you no longer can offer the public services they were responsible for delivering. The article says

“Aiming for a leaner civil service, and looking to the salary savings of a reduced federal work force, provides a new twist on what has long been viewed as the public service’s demographic challenge. . . . “I hope he realizes that when you cut public servants, you cut public service,” said Gary Corbett, the president of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada. Mr. Corbett said cutting public-service jobs means cutting back on important jobs like food safety inspectors and scientific research.”

The Star⁹ (23 December 2009) also has a piece on Flaherty’s recent announcements. It provides some other details such as marking a flippant sounding attitude toward the situation and this point of Flaherty history:

“In his 2001 Ontario budget, Flaherty handed $2.4 billion in tax cuts to the province’s corporations, promised personal tax breaks and paid down $3 billion in provincial debt – all while balancing the books by holding down badly needed expenditures for universities, hospitals and infrastructure projects.”

Furthermore, according to the Globe and Mal article, Flaherty believes government revenues will largely stem from economic growth. That’s sure a positive outlook. While that would be welcome and might even be likely, it’s far from certain. Things could even take a turn for the worse.

“The concern expressed by the deputy ministers and others is that the government’s revenues have fallen so steeply that Mr. Flaherty simply will not be able to find enough savings to wipe out the deficit. They argue that even when economic growth returns to normal, the Conservatives’ two point GST cut has left Ottawa with a continuing deficit.”

The Conservatives have thus set up the game board for a future election campaign. With the spectre of permanent deficits, they can pit their party’s harsh cuts to federal services against the other parties’ options, which will likely be to either mimic the Conservative choice or to reverse the tax cuts that the Conservatives propaganda’d their minority public support into applauding in the first place.

“A Conservative official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the mailing lists the Prime Minister’s Office uses are drawn from community directories, free publications available to the general public or word of mouth from friends and relatives, but not government records.”

I can’t help but think that it’s a bit creepy to imagine Conservatives getting names and addresses via “word of mouth from friends and relatives.” How exactly would a conversation go in which someone from the Conservative Party asks people to divulge contact information about their relatives and friends? In spite of the types of sources the official mentioned were used, a number of people that received these cards were not practicing Jews and did not have their names or contact information available in such sources to begin with. It casts doubt on how this list was developed.

A year later (10 September 2008), The Ottawa Citizen² followed up its report with another. The Conservatives repeated their weird greeting card campaign, with much the same sort of response. Many people in Jewish communities did not like receiving the blatant grab for votes delivered under the guise of goodwill. Indeed, the article quotes one person’s sentiments

“‘I was a little alarmed at the idea that the government might have some list of Canadian Jews, whether or not they’re using that for benevolent or malevolent or cynical reasons,” Mr. Terkel said. “It doesn’t seem my religion should be the business of any federal government.’”

Although the statement ought to apply to any religion, I would have thought the Conservatives might have given a little extra consideration to the issue not just because of the outcry the prior year but in the context of history, they should know better than to present themselves organizing lists of Jews. Bad form.

Finally they changed tactics as the Canadian Press reported³ (19 November 2009)

“Conservative MPs have distributed taxpayer-funded pamphlets that suggest the Grits are anti-Semitic.”

It goes on to quote Montreal Liberal MP Irwin Cotler

“‘To intentionally misrepresent the facts and to drive a wedge and to seek to associate the Liberals somehow with fuelling anti-Semitic polices or being associated with terrorism, that, I have to say, is something that I have not seen (before),’ said Cotler.”

It wasn’t just the Liberals that were outraged, even though they were the target of the attack. Both the NDP and the Bloc stood against it as well, derided it as a low point in the attack propaganda the Conservative Party distributes.

And finally, The Star reported⁴ (27 November 2009) that the Tories got officially rebuked by the Peter Milliken (the Commons Speaker).

“Agreeing that former justice minister Irwin Cotler (Mount Royal) had been dealt a ‘direct and personal’ blow with the circulation of the flyers, Commons Speaker Peter Milliken said ‘the mailing constitutes interference with (Cotler’s) ability to perform his parliamentary functions in that its content is damaging to his reputation and his credibility.’”

It also pointed out that after receiving the propaganda, some people in Cotler’s riding wanted him to leave parliament as well as the Jewish community. Cotler “…is an internationally recognized expert on human rights, especially surrounding Israel, and whose daughter has served in the Israeli military.” So the Tory attack campaign seems to have accomplished significant damage to Cotler’s reputation.

Will the official rebuke, shaming as it is, be enough to stop the Conservatives from their propaganda campaigns targeting Jews? I doubt it, the reports linked above seem to show that the Conservative Party is unable to see anything wrong with its actions.

Now its October 2008, post election, and with minority status the Conservatives sound intent to push through what they failed to accomplish previously. Although large quantities of candidates from the other parties signed on to Michael Geist’s copyright pledge, the Conservatives didn’t. Their words (spinning ideas copied from industry) saying their approach is balanced and trying to sound positive are hollow doublespeak at best. Here’s the background.

2007 from the Financial Post:

A single sentence on copyright reform in Tuesday’s Speech from the Throne spoke volumes about what the future of managing digital media could look like in Canada and suggested a U.S.-style amendment to the Copyright Act is on the way…

In the United States, copyright reform resulted in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which was passed by Congress in 1998 and centres around standards established by the World Intellectual Property Organization…

Mr. Knopf said the music industry and the U.S. government will gain if copyright reform is accomplished in Canada are.
“The American record industry is trying very hard to get the same kind of drastic remedies in Canada as [it] can ? in the United States, so you can go around suing children and dead grandmothers, which is not a very Canadian thing to do,” he said in an interview…

In 2007, this was the retreat as reported by CBC:

“A controversial bill that seeks to reform Canadian copyright laws will not be introduced this week, federal officials confirmed on Thursday…

…Prentice was expected to introduce the copyright reform bill earlier this week. The bill would have made such activities as the time-shifting of television shows, file-sharing of music and video, and copying files to CDs or MP3 players illegal…

…Critics said the proposed legislation will mirror the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act and take a hard line against the copying of digital materials. Geist accused Prentice of caving in to lobbying from U.S. entertainment companies, who are seeking to curtail digital copying in all its forms…”

12 June 2008, CBC reported on the introduction of Bill C-61:

The federal government has introduced a controversial bill it says balances the rights of copyright holders and consumers – but it opens millions of Canadians to huge lawsuits, prompting critics to warn it will create a “police state.”…

However, Liberal industry critic Scott Brison blasted the government for its lack of consultation with Canadian stakeholders and for not considering the implications of the bill if it passes.

“There’s no excuse for why the government has not consulted broadly the diverse stakeholders,” he said. “The government has not thought this through. It has not thought about how it will enforce these provisions.”…

“They’ve got a few headline-grabbing reforms but the reality is those are also undermined by this anti-circumvention legislation. They’ve essentially provided digital rights to the U.S. and entertainment lobby and a few analog rights to Canadians,” [Michael] Geist told CBCNews.ca. “The truth of the matter is the reforms are laden with all sorts of limitations and in some cases rendered inoperable.”…”

The Toronto Star Reported in early 2008:

“Last week’s introduction of new copyright legislation ignited a firestorm with thousands of Canadians expressing genuine shock at provisions that opposition MPs argued would create a “police state.” As opposition to the copyright bill mounts, the most common question is “why”?…

…Why did a minority government introduce a bill that appears likely to generate strong opposition from both the Liberals and NDP with limited political gain?…

Why did senior ministers refuse to even meet with many creator and consumer groups who have unsurprisingly voiced disappointment with the bill?…the bill dubbed by critics as the Canadian Digital Millennium Copyright Act (after the U.S. version of the law) is the result of an intense public and private campaign waged by the U.S. government to pressure Canada into following its much-criticized digital copyright model…

The private campaign was even more important. Sources say that U.S. officials, emboldened by the successful campaign for anti-camcording legislation, upped the ante at the Security and Prosperity Partnership meeting in Quebec last summer. Canadian officials arrived ready to talk about a series of economic concerns but were quickly rebuffed by their U.S. counterparts, who indicated that progress on other issues would depend upon action on the copyright file…

Those demands were echoed earlier by the USTR, which, according to documents obtained under the Access to Information Act, made veiled threats about “thickening the border” between Canada and the U.S. if Canada refused to put copyright reform on the legislative agenda….

7 October 2008, CBC reported that:

The Conservatives are promising to reintroduce controversial copyright-reform legislation if they are re-elected, according to the party’s official platform released on Tuesday…

The Conservatives’ previous copyright-reform legislation, Bill C-61, which died on the order paper when the election was called, was released in June to a wave of criticism. While a number of organizations that represent copyright holders, such as the Canadian Recording Industry Association and the Entertainment Software Association of Canada, praised the plan, it was roundly criticized as unfair by consumer advocates, artists, privacy watchdogs, education groups and other businesses…

Follow the links for the details

The GST enables the federal government to collect a sizeable amount of money that supports all sorts of programs improving the well-being of Canadian living. With respect to the Conservatives’ reducing the GST from 7 percent (in 2006) to ultimately 5 percent in 2007, The Toronto Star said¹ (2 November 2007)

“Economists winced. (Reducing a consumption tax neither boosts productivity nor encourages investment.) . . .  Cash-strapped mayors, weary anti-poverty activists and disheartened aboriginal leaders looked wistfully at the foregone $5.2 billion. And shoppers quickly forgot they had an extra $3.04 a week jangling in their pockets. . . . Ottawa is passing up the chance to strengthen Canada’s industrial base, shore up its aging infrastructure and upgrade the skills of its workers. It is saying that cities can solve their own financial problems, aboriginal communities can continue to languish and the gap between rich and poor can keep growing. . . . Urban voters could have been spared a steep rise in property taxes if Harper had shared 1 cent of the GST with municipalities, rather than giving consumers a bit of extra change at the cash register.”

So if cutting the GST would cause such difficulties for fixing our infrastructure and all sorts of societal issues, who and how exactly would it help? A CanWest News article on Dose² (1 January 2008) explained

“Patti Croft, chief economist with the investment firm Phillips, Hager and North, said anyone making big-ticket purchases will benefit from the consumption tax reduction. But, she said: “In general most economists would prefer a cut in income taxes. It’s a more efficient way to reduce the tax burden. . . . “”

According to the article the cut puts $5 billion ($6 according to Harper) back into the economy. But that equates to only between $150 – $200 per family, per year.

The cut in the GST is really only felt by those capable of making very large purchases, as The Star article noted: “The biggest beneficiaries will be the affluent. A corporate executive purchasing an $80,000 luxury sport utility vehicle will save $800. A single mother buying a $10 child’s snowsuit at Goodwill will save 10 cents.”

In other words the GST cut has almost no real effect on the majority of people’s disposable income but it rips roughly $5 billion dollars out of the government’s hands to effectively use on the programs that make Canadian life better.

The program’s web site offers the following regarding its goal of helping to financially assist court cases that further language and equality rights guaranteed within our constitution.

“Equality means giving every person equal respect in society. Sometimes, people are treated differently or unfairly because of things like the colour of their skin, their religion or a physical disability. This is called discrimination. Many groups of people through history have suffered discrimination. Equality means that all people are treated fairly, without discrimination.”

Looking at the site, it’s clear that the program has a history being involved in ethnicity, language, sexual orientation, women’s rights, and many other issues.

2006 from Toronto Star

Greetings from deep inside the conspiracy — where the mother and father of a child with multiple disabilities have to go to court to get the parental benefits they’re entitled to, where a woman who is deaf must fight for the right to be able to communicate with emergency room doctors and a youngster who uses a wheelchair battles to be included with other kids.

Scary, right?

The court challenges program was designed to help those who could not otherwise afford to pay for lawyers to fight for their constitutional rights.

Read the article for the rest.