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A voting station in Calgary on Monday, Oct. 19, 2015.Ben Nelms
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Too long, too costly
Your editorial, The Trudeau Government’s Election Fiasco (May 4), criticizes the government for taking too long to pass “a perfectly good election-reform bill” to replace Stephen Harper’s Fair Elections Act. But it begins by attacking fixed election dates, enacted years earlier, as “particularly bad … All that it has accomplished [is] that the parties never stop campaigning, politicking and fundraising.”
Is that really all?
Election dates are fixed in most democratic societies (including Canadian provinces). The logic is simple: Rather than only strategists of the governing party, citizens, journalists, civics teachers, potential candidates and volunteers, and politicians of all stripes know when the next election will take place and can plan accordingly.
Rather than denouncing the principle of fixed election dates, the editorial would have done well to limit its discussion to that part of the proposed law which addresses the too-long and expensive campaign by extending campaign spending limits back to June 30 of an election year, and reducing the election period to 50 days.
Henry Milner, associate of the Canada Research Chair in Electoral Studies, Department of Political Science, Université de Montréal
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Your editorial claims the move to a fixed election date every four years was bad because now parties never stop campaigning and fundraising. In fact, there is no evidence that parties have changed these activities, and the advance notice of the election makes it more fair for everyone.
You also claim that “nothing short of a constitutional amendment can prevent a prime minister” from calling a snap election. Legislatures across Canada could simply pass a law like Britain’s Parliament did in 2011, and then the prime minister and all premiers would be required to stick to the fixed date unless there was a clear vote of no-confidence or two-thirds of the legislature approved an early election.
And while the government’s elections bill is late, it doesn’t require Elections Canada to do anything very different from what it does now, so there is no rush to pass it.
The real fiasco with the Liberals’ bill is that it doesn’t do enough to stop the undemocratic influence of donations and spending by wealthy individuals and interest groups (it actually increases some spending limits) or to stop secret, false online election ads and other dishonest campaign tactics.
Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch
Awash in plastic
Re Can Canada Reinvent The Plastic Economy? (May 4): On a recent visit to the U.S., my husband and I noticed a little sign on our restaurant table, stating that the restaurant was part of the Be Straw Free campaign, started by a Vermont youngster, Milo Cress, who was appalled at the level of unrecycled waste that plastic straws represent. We read the sign and refused straws. We noticed people at neighbouring tables doing likewise. We also noticed people who did not read it, or who did read it and asked for straws anyway.
And that says two things. One, that not all consumers are willing to change their habits. Perhaps many think that a single person refusing a single straw is too small an action to matter. Therefore, two, that it will take government intervention and pressure on the plastics industry to stem the rising tide of plastic rubbish.
Philippa Campsie, Toronto
Canada’s oil impasses
Re Ottawa To Intervene In B.C. Court Case That Targets Trans Mountain (May 4): By intervening in B.C.’s petition to the province’s appeal court, the federal government plays right along with Premier John Horgan’s delay tactics. The federal government should refer this matter directly to the Supreme Court of Canada, which is where the B.C. action is likely to end up in any event.
Patrick Cowan, Toronto
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Where in our deliberations over pipelines are the references to domestic refining and further processing? Not just “where,” but “why” – and as a famous American once said, “why not”?
George H.R. Goldsmith, Toronto
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How is using our tax dollars to bail out a sunset industry – yes, fossil fuels – a solid investment for taxpayers? I’d rather see my taxes go toward retraining Canadian oil and gas industry workers in both small- and large-scale renewable energy production, including First Nations projects, and thereby modernizing our economy.
Susanna Kaljur, Courtenay, B.C.
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Re A Sound Debate About Canada’s Emissions, Brought On By Fury Over Trans Mountain (Report on Business, May 3): Canada could, as many European nations have done, offshore its carbon intensive businesses to reduce Canada’s emission levels. This would not reduce global emissions, as the Canadian oil lost from the global market would be replaced by production with a larger emissions footprint from a less environmentally and socially responsible constituency.
Canadians should support industries that are world leaders in low-carbon products. As global demand for oil continues to grow, the world needs more Canadian oil, not less. If we are truly committed to reducing global emissions, we need to move more Canadian oil to the rest of the world or even Eastern Canada. That would be the socially and environmentally responsible thing to do.
Derek Evans, Calgary
STEM the brain drain …
Re Tech Grads Shun Canada’s Startup Scene For Silicon Valley (Report on Business, May 3): Canada is experiencing a brain drain that’s going to get worse. As this article points out, Canadian taxpayers are spending billions educating science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) grads who fly out to the U.S. the day after graduation. Few return – well, actually, they do if they get sick or if they have a sick child requiring expensive ongoing care.
Who can blame them? They can earn as much as twice what their Canadian counterparts make and pay a lot less in taxes.
This fiasco has generated surveys and studies where solutions have been put forward such as calling on companies to increase salaries (really?), government subsidies to fund start-ups or help grads with student loan repayments. I know Canada loves studies, surveys and inquiries but are those the best solutions we can come up with? Are we naive enough to believe that any of those suggestions would make a difference? The more obvious solutions would be to attract big businesses like the Amazons of this world and to slash taxes.
We’re living though times of reckless government spending, both at the provincial and federal level. Ultimately, taxes have nowhere to go but up, and the brain drain will follow this trend.
Claude Gannon, Markham, Ont.
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Given that the U.S. market is 10 times Canada’s, not to mention a global market for employment, I think it’s a testament to how attractive it is to work here that 75 per cent of STEM grads from top universities stay in Canada when I’m sure they have other options.
Paul King, London