Jack's Newswatch

According to media reports this week, the federal Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) is undertaking a project to review best practices on the nation’s Indian reserves. Officials made a list of Canada’s 65 most economically successful aboriginal communities and is sending a senior official to meet with 33 chiefs. The goal is to uncover the secret to the reserves’ success, and use this knowledge to help struggling communities.

A good idea? Not according to some aboriginal leaders. Apparently, one of the key ways native communities have overcome poverty is through profitable management of on-reserve projects such as resorts, industrial parks and condominium developments. Some chiefs claim that the DIAND study constitutes a covert attempt to multiply such successes by introducing the concept of private property ownership throughout aboriginal lands.

We can only hope such “fears” will be fully realized.

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Popularity: 1% [?]

In B.C., there’s something almost sacred about salmon. So when the salmon runs started to dwindle, the blame game began in earnest. The disastrous decline in salmon stocks has been blamed on everything from misguided first nations’ fishing policy to global warming, pollution and habitat loss – to say nothing of mismanagement by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. But the biggest villain is fish farms. Many people believe the fish farms are responsible for spreading deadly sea lice and disease to wild fish. Three years ago, activists warned that B.C.’s population of pink salmon would be virtually wiped out if the infestations continued.

Now, to everyone’s astonishment, the fish are practically leaping into the boats. It’s the biggest sockeye run in a century. The pink salmon are also back in droves. In Atlantic Canada and Quebec, too, salmon returns are setting records. So much for sea lice.

“I think it’s sad,” says fish researcher Vivian Krause. “We’ve spent close to $15-million on sea lice research and now the Cohen commission, which was largely forced into existence by sea lice fears.”

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After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a parliamentary delegation from one of the newly independent Baltic states visited Ottawa to observe Canada’s democratic institutions in action. As is common for such groups, they were ushered into Question Period, Parliament’s most extensively covered activity. Shocked at the spectacle, they cringed. Is this how political debate is conducted in a leading democratic state, a country to which many emerging democracies look in modelling their own institutions? But one member of the delegation, an actor, chuckled at what he saw. He had quickly realized that a theatrical performance, albeit amateurishly executed, was on display. Many Canadians see Question Period the same way.

A healthy measure of partisan combativeness is the essence of parliamentary debate, but what now characterizes Question Period often borders on what many foreigners would consider offensive to the standards of decency and modesty associated with Canadians. The pretense of Question Period is that it allows the opposition to hold the government accountable, to illuminate issues of public policy and public administration. The reality is one of ferocious fulminations, of members mindlessly jumping up to applaud every few syllabic utterances of their caucus colleagues. How has this happened, and how can it be tempered?

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Popularity: 3% [?]

Everyone remembers when 15-year-old Jane Creba was murdered on Boxing Day 2005, caught in a deadly crossfire between two rival gangs in the heart of downtown Toronto, while shopping with her sister.

Last week, the final two of the four men convicted in Creba’s murder were sentenced.

So, did we get justice?

You decide.

Tyshaun Barnett and Louis Raphael Woodcock, both 23, were convicted of manslaughter in Creba’s murder and on four counts of aggravated assault for wounding others.

At the time of the shooting, both were under court orders not to possess firearms due to their criminal records.

On Thursday, Superior Court Justice Gladys Pardu sentenced each to 12 years in prison for manslaughter and eight years concurrent for the aggravated assaults.

But with two-for-one credit for four years spent in pre-trial custody, plus parole, they could be free in just over two years.

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Here’s a warning for bogus Tamil refugees made by the Australian Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, just before she called an election last month:

“Do not pay a people smuggler, do not risk your life, only to arrive in Australian waters and find that you are far, far more likely than anything else to be quickly sent home by plane.”

Gillard does more than just talk tough to Tamil gatecrashers.

Australia is now in negotiations with East Timor, New Zealand and the United Nations about setting up a “regional processing centre” where intercepted ships will be taken.

“Arriving by boat would just be a ticket back to the regional processing centre,” warned Gillard.

Right now, refugee applicants are processed on a remote Australian island called Christmas Island, where they’re held until their cases are heard.

Gillard wants to go one better — outsource the job to other countries. Why not?

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Popularity: 2% [?]

Now that the sweet days of summer are becoming shorter, and our politicians are beginning to sound the themes with which they will torment us through the Fall, it’s almost charming that right at the top of the list is our old friend the long-gun registry. Vampire? Energizer Bunny? Terminator? It’s difficult to pick the apposite metaphor for the gun control issue. Its one undeniable quality, perhaps its political essence so to speak, is that it never quite goes away.

Just how long have Canadians been having a back-and-forth on this business? It was in 1995 that Alan Rock (then Justice Minister in the towering days of the Chrétien ascendancy) brought the useless and hopelessly confused gun-registry to light. That’s 15 years ago. It’s melancholy to think that there are now fully mature Lady Gaga fans who were just past teething when Mr. Rock introduced this rancorous and unkillable issue into Canadian public life.

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A familiar face on Canada’s political scene is calling for a new approach to politics in this country.

Former deputy prime minister John Manley says the country needs to reverse the current poisonous trend and create a more positive dynamic within the political life of the country. He’s calling on all involved, including political parties, public servants and the media, to make that happen.

“Political parties play an important role in our democracies by providing voters with choice, but partisanship that cannot compromise, that demonizes adversaries and that relies on vicious ad hominem attacks degrades our democracy,” Manley said Thursday night during an address at the University of Prince Edward Island.

“Increasingly, smart, sensible people who should be thinking of fulfilling a public role, either elected or non-elected, choose not to subject themselves to the poisonous atmosphere of public life, partisan self-righteousness and ‘gotcha’ journalism.”

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If former Quebec justice minister Marc Bellemare is to be believed, Premier Jean Charest has much to answer for. This week, Mr. Bellemare has been testifying before the Bastarache Commission, which is charged with investigating allegations of judge-buying, dating back to Mr. Bellemare’s short tenure in Mr. Charest’s Cabinet in 2003-2004. According to Mr. Bellemare, one Franco Fava, a Liberal party fundraiser and construction magnate, pressured him to appoint three Liberal partisans over the minister’s own choices. When Mr. Bellemare complained to Mr. Charest, the latter allegedly replied: “Franco is a personal friend. He’s an influential fundraiser. We need those guys…If he tells you to appoint [those persons], appoint them.” Mr. Bellemare also testified that he witnessed the exchange of under-the-table donations at Liberal fundraisers.

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Almost from the time he was elected in 2003, Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams has made Ottawabashing his centrepiece political strategy. Yet time and again, Ottawa graciously bails Mr. Williams out from his blundering anyway. In the latest episode of what might be called Rockstyle asymmetric federalism, Mr. Williams’ demagoguery has cost Canadian taxpayers $130-million.

In order to save Canada’s economy from a lengthy and costly free-trade fight, the federal government has agreed to pay that sum to pulp and paper giant AbitibiBowater, as compensation for Mr. Williams’ vindictive legislative attack on the company’s assets in 2009. After the company announced in 2008 that it would be shuttering its Newfoundland operations due to declining worldwide newsprint sales, Mr. Williams’ government passed legislation that the company argued effectively confiscated most of its assets in the province, including land, timber and water rights, and arbitrarily abrogated its favour-able water and electricity agreements. This capricious legislation provoked one of the largest lawsuits in the history of the Canada-U.S. free-trade relationship.

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Related:

Harper’s millions for Williams will cost Canadians billions

The Cuckoo of Corner Brook

Popularity: 3% [?]

On Sept. 21, the House of Commons will vote on a bill to close down the Canadian Firearms Registry’s authority over long guns. The legislation is up for third reading. If it passes, it will become law pending approval in the Senate and Royal Assent.

Though, technically, Bill C-391 is a private member’s bill initiated by Conservative MP Candice Hoeppner, it is widely seen as a Conservative initiative blessed tacitly by Stephen Harper. In both the 2005 and 2008 elections, the Conservatives promised to scrap the registry. After being elected, they declared an amnesty for long gun owners, since renewed four times, effectively putting registry enforcement in limbo.

Since the Tories form a minority government, however, the bill’s passage is far from guaranteed. While it easily survived second reading, thanks to the support of eight Liberal, 12 New Democrat and one independent MP, Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff announced in April that he will whip the Liberal vote this time around, reducing the majority support for the bill to a scant 158 out of a total of 308 MPs. (Mr. Ignatieff is promoting his own “compromise” on the issue — which would keep the registry, but strip away some of the associated sanctions.) Hence the mounting interest in recent days, as the Sept. 21 vote approaches.

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