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The federal government is imposing new mandatory national security risk assessments on funding requests from university researchers to protect Canadian intellectual property from falling into the hands of foreign governments and their proxies.
Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne on Monday unveiled rewritten guidelines for Ottawa’s main scientific research granting agency amid growing concerns that Canadian universities and researchers are transferring intellectual property to China, which benefits Beijing’s military and security apparatus.
Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife and Senior Parliamentary Reporter Steven Chase report here.
Reporter’s Comment, Mr. Chase: “This is an important development. It changes the conversation about research partnerships and requires researchers to consider the national security consequences of their work. Plus it gives national security agencies such as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service a formal role in scrutinizing partnerships with authoritarian regimes.”
TODAY’S HEADLINES
`CRITICAL RETHINK’ NEEDED - An independent review of Canada’s pandemic early warning system has called for a “critical rethink” of the operation and has recommended the federal government overhaul how it conducts risk assessments on outbreaks. The review, made public Monday, was ordered after a Globe and Mail investigation last year detailed how the system was mismanaged prior to the pandemic, affecting how Canada gathered intelligence on COVID-19.
VACCINE DONATION - The federal government will donate 17.7 million COVID-19 vaccines to the global vaccine-sharing network COVAX and match Canadians’ donations to UNICEF’s vaccination fundraising campaign to bolster international supply. Story here. From CTV.
NEW BANK OF CANADA EXECUTI VE - The Bank of Canada has named Carolyn Rogers as senior deputy governor of the central bank. Ms. Rogers is the former assistant superintendent of the regulation sector for Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions at Canada’s banking regulator as well as a former superintendent and chief executive of British Columbia’s financial sector regulator.
HARPER ADVICE ON IRAN- Former prime minister Stephen Harper is urging the international community not to give Iran’s incoming president a seat at the global negotiating table.
NEW MOUNTIE MUSEUM - The national police force’s role in the residential school system must be highlighted in the RCMP’s new museum, according to Canada’s Heritage Minister and the institution’s leaders.
BREAK FROM HER PREDECESSOR - NEW GG TO LIVE AT RIDEAU HALL - Governor general-designate Mary Simon plans to move into Rideau Hall, unlike her predecessor Julie Payette — the first governor-general since Confederation to live outside of the official residence. Story here. From CBC.
ELECTION FORECAST - FEDERAL LEADERS:
Federal party leaders have been on the road to tout their political and policy credentials ahead of a national election call expected in weeks. Pollster Nik Nanos reflects on the challenges each leader faces in this pre-election season:
Justin Trudeau – Avoid defeating oneself. The Liberals are entering a potential election cycle with a vaccination halo as more Canadians get the jab and also an advantage in the polls. The pressure will be on the Liberals and Trudeau to avoid a mistake that derails their election fortunes.
Erin O’Toole – Keep the Blue Team united. After winning the Tory leadership by tilting to the political right, Mr. O’Toole sought to be more ideologically pragmatic on issues like climate change. This has caused rumblings among Conservatives. Before he can challenge the Liberals he needs to make sure his own party is united behind him and his vision for the future.
Jagmeet Singh – Recapture the Layton/Mulcair magic. The Singh leadership started with hope but was crushed by progressives strategically voting Liberal to block a Conservative win. A weak Conservative showing may give license to progressives to support parties other than the Liberals and buoy Mr. Singh’s chances.
Yves-François Blanchet – Stop the Liberals from eating the BQ’s lunch. The federal Liberal embrace of the Quebec government’s initiative to recognize Quebec as a nation and French as the only official language is no coincidence. Liberal big-government spending and an adoption of a Quebec-style national day care program suggest that the Liberals are working to make the BQ an irrelevant voter choice among soft nationalists.
Annamie Paul – Mobilize party members and deliver a solid election performance. Grumblings among senior members in the party about her leadership style and loss of a caucus member will put a spotlight on Ms. Paul and her ability to mobilize the Greens. As the new addition to the political menu, Canadians will naturally be intrigued by her vision for the country, watch how she does in the leaders debate but at the same time wonder why there seems to be internal strife among the Greens.
Nik Nanos is the chief data scientist at Nanos Research, a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, a research professor at the State University of New York in Buffalo and the official pollster for The Globe and Mail and CTV News.
PRIME MINISTER’S DAY
In Ottawa, The Prime Minister attends private meetings. Along with Public Services Minister Anita Anand, he also virtually meets with volunteers from the This Is Our Shot campaign.
LEADERS
Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet continues a summer tour of Quebec with stops in Victoriaville and Lac-Mégantic.
Conservative Party Leader Erin O’Toole delivers remarks, in person, to the Richmond, B.C. Chamber of Commerce.
OPINION
Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on the Green Party’s potential crumbling in small-time bickering: “What’s next? Surely, you would think, this group of small-time squabblers will pull back from the brink before they bring the whole thing down. Surely the council will not stop its new leader, the first Black and Jewish woman leader, from taking the party into one election, no matter what mistakes she has made. Right? But after a shallow show of unity, you can expect Ms. May and Paul Manly will run local campaigns in their Vancouver Island ridings without much mention of Ms. Paul. Ms. Paul herself is likely to lose again in Toronto Centre, and then she will have a hard time winning a leadership review. This was supposed to be the time when the Greens would ride the cause of climate change to become a major national political organization. Instead, they squabble as they run the party into the ground.”
Gary Mason (The Globe and Mail) on whether Western Canada has really been mistreated: “It didn’t take long for federal Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole to follow Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in visiting the centre of Western grievance in Canada – Alberta. One day, in fact. While Mr. Trudeau used his stop last week in Calgary to announce federal funding support for a long-delayed rapid-transit line, Mr. O’Toole went in a different direction the next day. He said if his party forms government in the next election, he will revamp the country’s fiscal-stabilization program as an initial step in ending what he termed “the mistreatment of Western Canadians.”
Lena Faust and Courtney Heffernan (Contributors to The Globe and Mail) on residential school deaths from tuberculosis being caused by deliberate neglect: “A genuine attempt at reconciliation involves not only recognizing the truth of the suffering deliberately inflicted on Indigenous peoples by settlers, but also honouring Indigenous community mourning and calls to action with a comprehensive review, and addressing the harms that persist in our relations today. As long as we allow TB – a preventable, and for decades, curable and treatable disease – to have a disproportionate impact on Indigenous communities, we fall deplorably short of this.”
Don Braid (The Calgary Herald) on the challenges the federal election campaign could raise for Rachel Notley: “For the Alberta NDP, the most dangerous player in the looming federal election might be the federal NDP. Opposition Leader Rachel Notley is in Calgary for Stampede. She won’t be riding any ziplines this year, but she’s spending a lot of time connecting with people in parks and communities. Notley and her party are well ahead of the UCP and Premier Jason Kenney in the polls, even in Calgary, largely because of unhappiness with government performance on provincial issues. But the federal election campaign, expected to launch in coming weeks, could be a challenge. Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has been wildly contradictory about pipelines and energy development. He calls for supporting workers in the energy transition without much reference to Alberta, which will obviously be most affected by the race to net-zero emissions.”
Steve Paikin (TVO) on debunking the David Peterson election curse: “As Trudeau no doubt considers these examples and more, it’s finally time to say it: there is no Peterson curse on first ministers who call early elections. Peterson lost that 1990 election for perfectly valid reasons that were unique to that time in our history. They have proved not to be a template for future elections, and it’s frankly unfair to Peterson, who, for decades, has had to carry the burden of that election defeat and hear his name invoked whenever an early election call is made. If Trudeau calls an early election, he will sink or swim for reasons that are unique to this moment in our country’s history. It will have nothing to do with events of 31 years ago.”
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Ian Bailey