1. School's out for summer. It took a long night and many words of despair from both Liberals and independents but the Senate passed a contentious omnibus budget bill Monday that contains measures its detractors say have little to do with the budget.
Bill C-9 is now law after opposition attempts to amend it were defeated by a vote of 48 to 44. It received royal assent late Monday night and the senators have been released to begin their summer vacations.
The Liberals and three of the four Senators who are not aligned with either major party opposed the bill, saying the minority Conservative government was burying measures within the 900 pages that it could not have pushed through the House of Commons as stand-alone items. Liberals in the House had allowed the bill to pass to avoid an election.
The legislation provides, among other things, for the sell-off of the power division of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., the privatization of part of Canada Post and a major restructuring of environmental assessments.
Late Monday afternoon, the Conservatives moved to close debate on the issue and listened quietly as Liberals and independents rose to oppose it. Several hours later, the Tories managed to defeat amendments from the Senate finance committee, which would have hived off the controversial portions. And, finally, late in the evening, the bill was passed.
The Liberals say they tried to get enough of their members in their seats to stop the bill. Senator Terry Mercer of Nova Scotia, who has been laid up with a bad back and was not expected to make it to Ottawa for the vote, was in the chamber. But seven of his Liberal colleagues did not show up.
So, even though there were five Conservatives missing (independent Senator Jean-Claude Rivest voted with the Tories to pass the bill), the Liberals could not muster the forces to defeat it or change it.
But James Cowan, the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, spoke out against it.
“Selling off AECL, watering down environmental assessments, changing the authorities of the post office – these are significant policy issues that should be brought individually before Parliament so that interested Canadians can make their views known, and then Parliament can decide on their merit,” Mr. Cowan told the Red Chamber.
“Honourable senators, good public policy is not made this way. If these provisions did not belong in a budget bill before, then they certainly do not belong there now.”
2. Road trip. Public Safety Minister Vic Toews travels to Washington on Tuesday for three days of meetings with members of Congress and his American counterpart, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.
When the Obama administration first took office, the two countries agreed to meet twice a year to discuss border and security issues.
Meanwhile Mr. Toews’s cabinet colleague, Defence Minister Peter MacKay, is preparing for an international assignment of a different sort.
Mr. MacKay and Laurie Hawn, parliamentary secretary to the Minister of National Defence, are training with members of the Canadian Forces in preparation for the 94th annual International Four Days Marches Nijmegen, a long-distance marching event in the Netherlands.
Between July 20 and July 23, the marchers will cover 160 kilometres through the Dutch countryside, each carrying a pack weighing at least 10 kilograms.
According news release from National Defence, the event is not only a test of physical fitness and stamina, but also helps develop leadership skills and camaraderie amongst the Canadian Forces, and other participating nations.
