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New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs says he will lead his party into the next election after a summer of political turmoil that included efforts to oust him as Leader of the Progressive Conservatives.
“With the encouragement of many colleagues and people from across this province, I am confirming my intention to return as Leader and to reoffer in the next provincial election,” Higgs said in a social-media post Friday.
Still, the veteran member of the New Brunswick legislature acknowledged the “internal dissent” his government has experienced over the last six months. He said residents of the province are entitled to a government focused on better outcomes for the province.
In August, the PC party’s executive director – story here – said an effort to trigger a review of Mr. Higg’s leadership had failed.
That next election is scheduled for Oct. 21, 2024, although Higgs could seek to trigger a vote earlier than that.
Now 69, Higgs was first elected an MLA in 2010, won the PC party leadership in 2016 and led the Tories to power with a minority government in 2018. Under his leadership, the PCs won a majority in the 2020 election.
But over the summer, two ministers quit, expressing objections to Higgs’s leadership style and his changes to school policy in which teachers aren’t required to use the preferred pronouns or names of transgender or non-binary students under the age of 16 without their parents’ consent.
Higgs also ousted two cabinet members over the dissent.
The Globe’s Atlantic reporter Lindsay Jones reports here on the turmoil, which included national human-rights organizations and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau raising concerns about the New Brunswick government for targeting trans and non-binary children.
This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you're reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.
TODAY'S HEADLINES
Danielle Smith announces ‘compassionate payment’ for families affected by E. coli outbreak – Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said the province will give families affected by the massive E. coli outbreak at a chain of Calgary daycares a one-time payment as part of a compensation package to ease the financial burden caused by the crisis. Story here.
Canadian home sales fell roughly 4% as market slows: CREA – The national housing market slowed last month with sales and prices tumbling between July and August as the Bank of Canada’s latest interest rate hike rattled buyers. Story here.
Ontario Liberal leadership debate kicks off with warning to avoid ‘Doug Ford lite’ – The five candidates vying for the Ontario Liberal Party leadership squared off for the first time on Thursday, taking aim at the Progressive Conservative government, but some targeted perceived front-runner Bonnie Crombie, with one suggesting she is “Doug Ford lite.’ Story here. There’s an explainer here on who is running for the leadership.
Ottawa pledges to overhaul competition rules, spur rental-housing construction – The federal government plans to strengthen competition laws, cut the GST from new home rental construction and push grocery chains to stabilize prices or face consequences, in a wide-reaching effort to address the rising cost of living that the Liberals acknowledge has left voters angry and frustrated. Story here.
Nearly half of hospitals failed to report adverse drug reactions despite requirements, analysis finds – Nearly half of the hospitals across Canada failed to report any serious adverse drug reactions in their facilities in the three years since the introduction of mandatory reporting requirements, raising concerns about the quality of information Health Canada uses to assess drug safety. Story here.
Insite turns 20 amid a new public-health crisis – Insite, North America’s first public supervised consumption site, is marking 20 years of operation this month, but that milestone takes place against the backdrop of a new public health crisis, one whose carnage eclipses that of the late 1990s. Story here.
Minister won’t confirm status of Team Canada mission to India amid strained relations – Trade Minister Mary Ng has spent the past four months talking up a major visit to India designed to boost Canadian exports to the world’s most populous country. But now she is not saying whether the trip is going ahead, raising questions about a halted trade deal amid frosty relations between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his counterpart in New Delhi. Story here.
Man accused of random stabbing in Vancouver’s Chinatown had been deemed a significant threat by psychiatric review panel – B.C. Premier David Eby says an independent review will study why a man accused of stabbing three people on Sunday in Vancouver’s Chinatown had been allowed to leave a psychiatric hospital, when just five months earlier a panel of experts had deemed him a threat to the public. Story here.
THIS AND THAT
Summer break – Both the House of Commons and the Senate are on breaks. The House sits again on Monday. The Senate sits again on Tuesday.
Deputy prime minister’s day – Private meetings in Toronto.
Ministers on the road – National Revenue Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau made an infrastructure announcement in the southeastern Quebec town of Coaticook. Immigration Minister Marc Miller, in Kitchener, welcomed 48 new Canadian citizens in a ceremony presided over by a citizenship judge.
In Ottawa – International Trade Minister Mary Ng hosted a meeting of her provincial and territorial counterparts on international trade.
Governor-General on the road – Mary Simon, in Pictou during a tour of Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, delivered remarks at the 250th anniversary of the arrival of the Hector, a ship noted for being part of a major migration of Scottish settlers to Nova Scotia. She also attended and delivered remarks at a reception held by the Black Cultural Centre in light of its 40th anniversary, also meeting with community elders, youth and descendants of the No. 2 Construction Battalion.
PRIME MINISTER'S DAY
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in Toronto, held private meetings and met with Portugal’s visiting president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa. After a working lunch, Mr. Trudeau and the president attended the opening ceremony of a Portuguese diaspora photo exhibit, commissioned by the Embassy of Portugal in Canada. Mr. Trudeau then convened the Incident Response Group to discuss the response to Hurricane Lee.
LEADERS
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is scheduled to attend an evening rally in Whitehorse.
Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, in Vancouver, took part in a climate march.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is en route from Edmonton to Toronto.
No schedules released for other party leaders.
THE DECIBEL
On Friday’s edition of The Globe and Mail podcast, reporter Dave McGinn talks about Canada’s worst-ever outbreak of E.Coli in kids, which has left hundreds sick and dozens in the hospital in Calgary. The Decibel is here.
OPINION
The Globe and Mail Editorial Board on how the opioid crisis is chronic, and should be treated that way: “This is an emergency that isn’t about to end. The illicit synthetic opioids that have been implicated in at least 90 per cent of fatal overdoses appear to be getting cheaper and stronger, and are being mixed with other drugs that make them more difficult for emergency responders to counteract. And yet Canada’s efforts to save lives continue to rely on two pillars – supervised consumption and uncontaminated supply – that were implemented in a reactive fashion after the illegal opioid crisis erupted in 2016. The death tolls this year do not mean those tools aren’t helpful, but they aren’t enough.”
Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on Justin Trudeau conceding not everything is awesome: “There is discontent across the country.” That is a phrase you might expect to hear from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, whose speeches focus on the hardships caused by the high cost of living and the general brokenness of Canada. But it was Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada for the past seven years and 11 months, who was talking about disgruntlement in the land on Wednesday. Or, as he termed it in French in response to a reporter’s question, ‘la grogne.’”
Andrew Coyne (The Globe and Mail) on home truths about Canada’s housing mess: “By the time you read this the federal government will have unveiled its latest suite of policies designed to address the crisis in the Canadian housing market, or at least the crisis in Liberal polling. Whether these are likely to be any more effective than the policies it has introduced to date we shall see. But unless they have miraculous effects, the issue is likely to dominate our politics from now until the election, if only because the opposition has found it so effective.”
Tony Keller (The Globe and Mail) on Joe Biden copying Justin Trudeau’s smartest economic idea: “Canada is not as successful as it should be, nor as boringly un-newsworthy as it deserves to be. But this country still gets a lot of things right. The best way to see it is by looking south. A number of U.S. policy experts have long urged the United States to copy a signature Canadian anti-poverty policy. In 2021, the Biden administration persuaded Congress to do exactly that. Result: Between 2019 and 2021, the level of child poverty was more than halved. The Canadian initiative that the Americans copied is one of the Trudeau government’s best ideas: the Canada Child Benefit.”
Rita Trichur (The Globe and Mail) on Russia benefiting from Canada’s lax approach to sanctions enforcement: “Canadians are getting a reality check about our country’s struggle to enforce sanctions against Russia within our own borders. This information, of course, isn’t coming from Ottawa. Transparency isn’t the Canadian way. As usual, we are learning about our domestic failings from the U.S. government rather than our own. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, an arm of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, recently published a report that provided disclosures about suspected Russian sanctions evasion by companies including those based in Canada. Buried in the bowels of its financial trend analysis is the revelation that Canada is a top 10 country when it comes to Russia-related export control evasion.”
Jennifer DeLeskie (Contributed to The Globe and Mail) on how parents should be defending children’s rights, rather than rushing to claim their own: “I’ve been thinking a lot about Gibran’s words in the context of the so-called parental rights movement, which forms the basis of recent legislation passed in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick, whereby teachers must obtain parental consent before using the preferred names and pronouns for students under the age of sixteen. Here, the parent’s right to information about their child, specifically their child’s gender, and their right to determine whether and how their child expresses their gender, is being enshrined and privileged by politicians in a way that trumps the child’s right to privacy and their right to explore and express their gender on their own terms.”
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Ian Bailey