Canada: government & governance November 2023-

New Canadian laws and rules coming in 2024, and how they’ll affect you
A new year often brings new federal regulations and rules. In 2024, there will be a slew of new laws that come into effect – some as early as Jan. 1 – including changes to Canada Revenue Agency’s tax rules, increases to hourly minimum wages, timelines for Ottawa’s dental insurance program and changes to the country’s bail system.
Here is a breakdown of the new federal and provincial laws coming this year, and how they will affect you.
New CRA tax rules
From remote worker changes to payroll deductions, here’s what to look out for this year when it comes to the CRA’s latest tax rules. … (1 January 2024)

4 September
Deal done
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said today his party is pulling out of a supply-and-confidence agreement with the governing Liberals that was supposed to run until June and would have kept the Liberals in power until the next scheduled election in October 2025. It traded NDP support on confidence votes for the Liberals championing key NDP priorities such as pharmacare, dentalcare and anti-replacement workers’ legislation.

1 September
The quakes that led to a seismic shift in B.C. politics just weeks before the provincial election
BC United Leader Kevin Falcon: what led to his decision to suspend his party’s election campaign and support the B.C. Conservatives

28-30 August
Jerome Gessaroli: Want to be a more productive country, Canada? Get the government roadblocks out of the way
A majority of Canadians think that Canada is broken after years of stagnant incomes, affordability challenges, rising crime, government failures on basic functions like healthcare and immigration, and a deepening cultural malaise. But decline is a choice, and better public policies are needed to overcome Canada’s many challenges. Kickstart Canada brings together leading voices in academia, think tanks, and business to lay out an optimistic vision for Canada’s future, providing the policy ideas that governments need to ensure a bright future for all Canadians.
(The Hub) The federal government has heard the message from economists, the Bank of Canada, and Statistics Canada clearly: Canada’s productivity growth is dismal. Without a policy change, the OECD forecasts that our productivity growth will rank last among its 38 member countries.
‘Managing decline, Liberal Party style’: The Hub Roundtable breaks down the no-reset federal cabinet retreat
(The Hub) Publisher Rudyard Griffiths and Editor-at-Large Sean Speer discuss this week’s federal cabinet retreat and the lack of contrition or new ideas from the Trudeau government in advance of Parliament’s impending return. …
‘Canadians are right to be skeptical’: The Hub reacts to the Liberals’ Halifax cabinet retreat
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal cabinet ministers gathered in Halifax early this week for the government’s annual cabinet retreat. The Liberals find themselves on shaky footing heading into the fall sitting of Parliament as criticism over the government’s handling of immigration and the temporary foreign worker program escalates.

26-29 August
Union alleges abuse of foreign workers, calls for program to be suspended
Earlier this year, the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades began looking into allegations of exploitation of Indonesian migrant workers hired as painters for Concord Painting and Wallcovering Ltd.
Ottawa to clamp down on low-wage temporary foreign worker program
Ottawa will reverse its expansion of the low-wage temporary foreign worker program and is considering whether to reduce the number of permanent residents that Canada accepts annually, the latest moves to restrain population growth that has soared in recent years.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau unveiled the changes on Monday, the second day of his cabinet’s retreat in Halifax, where ministers are crafting the fall agenda with just one year to go until the next federal election. Mr. Trudeau said the government will update its immigration plan with targets for temporary and permanent residents by the fall.
Prime Minister to unveil changes to temporary foreign workers program
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to unveil changes to the temporary foreign worker program Monday morning as his government wrestles with immigration streams that exploded in numbers during the pandemic, which critics say have put pressure on housing and health care.
Two government sources said Mr. Trudeau will release the details in Halifax before heading behind closed doors with his cabinet for day two of their retreat.
Ottawa needs to abolish the temporary foreign worker program
Christopher Worswick, chair of the Department of Economics, Carleton University.

29 August
Paul Wells: At last, the immediate working group
Canada: We suck at productivity, but we’re #1 at reinventing wheels
I’ve decided I actually kind of like late-stage Justin Trudeau. He’s quite Zen.
In 2023 he tried to get mileage out of a cabinet shuffle. That didn’t work. This spring he spent a month pre-announcing his budget. That didn’t help either. One conclusion you could draw from a year like that is that stunts don’t help. To my surprise, that seems to be the conclusion Trudeau has drawn.
After the lousy June by-election result in Toronto-St. Paul’s, a few people listlessly suggested some other changes. Maybe Trudeau could quit. Or fire Chrystia Freeland. Or fire Katie Telford. Or bring Mark Carney into cabinet. Or cancel the carbon tax.
So far he’s done none of the above. This is pretty close to matching the advice I’d have given him.
… While they wait for the election, the Liberals must occasionally govern. I was struck by remarks from one of them the other day in Halifax.
Anita Anand promised to fix Canada’s lagging productivity. The Treasury Board president was in Halifax for the cabinet retreat. She told reporters: “I am immediately striking a working group on productivity.

19 August
Labour minister to meet with rail companies, union as deadline to avoid massive shutdown looms
CN Rail and CPKC plan to lock out workers early Thursday if there’s no deal by then
(CBC) Both the Canadian National Railway and the Canadian Pacific Kansas City remain at loggerheads with the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference union. The union has been demanding better wages and benefits — including better crew scheduling — for workers.
(iPolitics) As Canada braces for a possible historic shutdown of its two major freight rail operators later this week, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said today that the federal government shouldn’t “tip the scales” by interfering in labour talks with the railways and their workers.
He said the NDP would oppose any effort by Ottawa to curtail the Teamsters union’s right to bargain, including imposing binding arbitration or introducing back to work legislation.
The only appropriate intervention, he said, is forcing Canadian National (CN) and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) “back to the table [to] negotiate fairly with the workers.”
“The government should be there to defend workers and not be tipping the scales for big bosses again and again, to the point that they know that they’re just going to come in and tip the scales and… workers aren’t going to be able to get a fair deal,” Singh said during a press conference in Halifax.
“Both companies have failed to negotiate fairly with workers, and in fact, not shown good faith. If they negotiated in good faith, we would have a fair deal that gives good wages and safety for the workers, which means safety for citizens.”
However, Singh wouldn’t directly say whether the Liberals imposing binding arbitration or introducing back-to-work legislation would end the two parties’ supply-and-confidence agreement.

29 July
Privy Council Office workers face culture of ‘racial stereotyping’: internal report
Managers used the N-word ‘comfortably’ in presence of Black employees, report says
Black, Indigenous and racialized employees in the Privy Council Office are regularly subjected to a culture of “racial stereotyping, microagressions and verbal violence,” according to the findings of an internal report.
The damning report — obtained by the Coalition Against Workplace Discrimination through the Access to Information Act and released by the coalition Monday — said the office does not have a grasp on the scope or impact of the discrimination that those employees face.
There are also “significant material barriers to meaningful representation and inclusion” in the workplace, it says.
The Privy Council Office’s 1,200 employees make up the lead branch of the civil service, providing support for the prime minister and cabinet in executing policy directives across the federal government.

19 July
No absolute immunity for government from lawsuits over unconstitutional legislation: SCC
By Ian Burns
(Law360 Canada) The Supreme Court has confirmed that the state can be required to pay damages for making unconstitutional legislation in some limited circumstances.
In a 218-page decision released July 19, a five-member majority of the court has held the state is not entitled to an absolute immunity from liability for damages when it enacts unconstitutional legislation that infringes Charter rights, but rather — as the court held in Mackin v. New Brunswick (Minister of Finance), 2002 SCC 13 — the state may be liable for Charter damages if the legislation is “clearly unconstitutional or was in bad faith or an abuse of power.”
The decision, which was jointly authored by Chief Justice Richard Wagner and Justice Andromache Karakatsanis, says absolute immunity “fails to properly reconcile the constitutional principles that protect legislative autonomy, such as parliamentary sovereignty and parliamentary privilege, and the principles that require the government be held accountable for infringing Charter rights, such as constitutionality and the rule of law.”
… The Attorney General of Canada asked the court hearing Power’s claim to answer two questions — first, can the state be required to pay damages for governments preparing and drafting a bill that later became law and was subsequently declared unconstitutional and second, can the state be required to pay damages for Parliament enacting a bill into law, which was later declared unconstitutional.

18 July
There’s a troubling amount of churn at the top of Canada’s public service
Over the nine years it has been in power, the Trudeau government has shuffled senior officials 98 times, with more than 300 specific changes – some individuals multiple times.
David McLaughlin, a former clerk of the executive council and cabinet secretary in Manitoba, and past CEO of the Institute on Governance.
(Globe & Mail) Is Canada’s public service quietly preparing for the change in government that voters are expected to deliver next year – or is the significant juggling in our bureaucracy just more of the same, in terms of senior-public-servant office churn?
Just one year into his new job as Privy Council Clerk and the federal government’s top public servant, John Hannaford has presided over 14 shuffles affecting 30 deputy-minister and associate-deputy-minister-level officials. The public service has not seen this kind of senior official churn since the first term of Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government.
Changes in the deputy-minister ranks get far less attention than cabinet shuffles. But they are equally – and sometimes more – consequential to government success. They occur for internal reasons that are either prosaic (such as retirement, tactics, or matching skills and strengths to specific positions and ministers) or empowering, including promoting women and traditionally underrepresented societal groups. Some shuffles are unexpected, and others are planned, such as after a new Clerk takes over or following an election.

17 July
Trudeau pushes back after premiers accuse him of encroaching on their territory
(CBC) Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is pushing back against the claim that his government is infringing on provincial and territorial jurisdiction after the premiers repeatedly attacked his program spending during their annual summer meeting this week.
Canada’s 13 premiers spent nearly three days in Halifax discussing shared priorities and challenges.
While the premiers didn’t agree on all topics — including the thorny issue of equalization payments — they appeared shoulder to shoulder to attack what they see as Ottawa’s habit of intervening in areas of provincial responsibility ranging from dental care to the cod fishery.
Premiers have requests for Ottawa
While the premiers called on Ottawa to back off, they also didn’t leave the sunny port city without first issuing a list of requests.
They floated several areas where they want to see the federal government play a bigger role, including infrastructure spending, Arctic security and immigration supports.
Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew said he’d be prepared to welcome more asylum seekers, especially francophones, but only if the province sees a boost in funding from the federal government.
As the meetings wrapped up Wednesday, Ontario Premier Doug Ford took aim at the federal government’s billion-dollar national school food program, which promises to deliver meals to an additional 400,000 children per year. He said his province’s program feeds more kids, for less.

22 June
Naheed Nenshi elected new leader of the Alberta NDP
Former Calgary mayor garners 86 per cent of votes
Alberta NDP members have overwhelmingly chosen former Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi as their new leader.
After a commanding win with 86 per cent of members’ votes, Nenshi told reporters in Calgary he is blown away by the support from across Alberta.
In his first speech as leader, Nenshi urged party members to redouble their effort to grow the Alberta NDP into an unstoppable machine that leads to an inevitable NDP win in the next provincial election, slated for October 2027.

19 June
‘Not a happy time’: MPs to leave muggy Ottawa for summer break after rocky spring session
After a session marked by a capital gains tax hike and foreign interference, MPs are headed to their respective ridings until Sept. 16
Members of Parliament will be hitting the barbecue circuit two days early, as the House of Commons is set to rise for the summer on Wednesday for the next three months.
After a session marked by a capital gains tax hike and speculation about foreign interference, MPs are headed to their respective ridings until Sept. 16 with the Conservatives still enjoying a solid double-digit lead in the polls ahead of the Liberals.

17 June
Calgary water main break section repaired, but 5 hot spots remain
Update on implications for Calgary Stampede expected at 2 p.m. Monday
Over the weekend, the portion of the water feeder main that ruptured in Calgary was fully repaired. Now, the city’s focus is on repairing the five hot spots that were identified after robots were sent through the pipe to inspect it.
A catastrophic water feeder main break cut Calgary off from 60 per cent of its treated water supply on June 5 and a a state of local emergency was declared on Saturday morning, with city officials urging residents to use less water.

11 May
Canada’s out-of-touch public sector unions are taking their entitlement too far
Union reaction to Ottawa’s back-to-work rules is an opening for Max Bernier
(The Hub) A minority parliament is usually the subject of regular election speculation. But we haven’t seen much of that since the Liberals and New Democrats announced a supply and confidence agreement in the months following the 2021 election.
This week, however, we heard calls from public sector unions for the NDP to abandon the parliamentary agreement and precipitate a federal election due to the government’s new policy that federal public servants must be in the office at least three days per week.
It seems like a rather odd issue over which to plunge the country into a summer election. Especially since most Canadians have returned to the office. While remote and hybrid work reached as high as 40 percent of workers in April 2020 and then remained constant at about 24 percent between May 2021 and May 2023, the percentage was cut in half to just 12 percent as we entered 2024.
The remaining share of Canadians still working from home is by far disproportionately comprised of public servants. A late 2023 poll, for instance, found that four in five federal employees were still working remotely in part or in full.

6 April
Beneath ArriveCan
MPs want to know how a mobile app’s costs grew out of control. An abandoned house on an Ontario First Nation is an important stop in the search for answers
On the shore of Ontario’s Rice Lake, the houses on Vimy Ridge Road include an abandoned-looking property with a dark grey roof. It is tied to a man who has become an important figure in the political controversy over how the ArriveCAN app was paid for. … In corporate records, the home is the registered address for David Yeo, a former soldier who is now an entrepreneur and the founder of Dalian Enterprises Inc., one of the companies at the centre of a growing controversy over government contracting related to the ArriveCan mobile app.
…the ArriveCan investigations have also raised questions about the PSIB, the program Mr. Yeo participated in. It has come under scrutiny for a feature that some critics say can be exploited: non-Indigenous businesses are allowed to receive federal contracts under the program, as long as they partner with Indigenous businesses in joint ventures. In those cases, the government requires that at least a third of the total value of the work be performed by an Indigenous company or Indigenous subcontractors.
This aspect of the program has been key to the success of Mr. Yeo’s company.
Dalian Enterprises, which last month was suspended from federal contract work, received $7.9-million in taxpayer funds to build ArriveCan, according to a recent report from the federal Auditor-General, who said her numbers were only an estimate because of poor recordkeeping. The company has long availed itself of the PSIB, including for the ArriveCan work. Mr. Yeo told parliamentarians at a hearing in March he had advised the government on designing and implementing the program. “It’s a very good policy,” he said via video conference.

4 April
Lawrence Martin: Trudeau shouldn’t reject Chrétien and Harper’s offer on 24 Sussex
Former prime ministers Jean Chrétien and Stephen Harper have volunteered to lead a campaign to raise the money to do a restoration of the building. They would do so with donations from individuals and businesses who want the embarrassment to end. There would be limits on contributions so no one could claim credit as a prime driver.
They would do the work for $1, with the goal of having the renovation completed within two to three years.
How could anyone object to that? Two giants of the Liberal and Conservative parties joining hands to preserve a prime piece of our heritage. In this era of knee-jerk partisanship, what a fine example of non-partisanship it would be.

2 April
An open letter to Canada’s political leaders – for the sake of the country’s future
We, the undersigned, are calling on you to address urgently the rise of incivility, public aggression and overt hatred that are undermining the peace and security of Canadian life. This issue is so important that it transcends partisanship.
Whether they are connected to geopolitical events happening thousands of kilometres away or derived from homegrown causes, one cannot deny that tensions are on the rise in our streets and on our campuses.
We believe this phenomenon is part of a broader, worrisome trend. Canadians appear increasingly unwilling, unable or ill-equipped to talk to or live peaceably alongside those with divergent views of complex and divisive issues including, as in the current instance, those with significant geopolitical overtones and implications.
What is going on? In the case of the current conflict between Israel and Hamas, perhaps its particular contours and content are so significant in scale and impact that some Canadians feel justified acting out in intimidating and violent ways. Perhaps strident ideologies have erased the nuance required to understand complex events fully. Perhaps a growing number of us no longer consider it part of a common Canadian value system to put aside our differences and work alongside those with whom we disagree in the broader interests of Canada. Or perhaps such negative tendencies were always present in Canada and it has taken the increasing ubiquity of social media to reveal them fully.

19 March
MPs poke holes in ArriveCan contractor’s claims that his government employment was no conflict
David Yeo raised the hackles of MPs of all parties on the public accounts committee Tuesday during his testimony marked by contradictions and confrontation
The embattled head of ArriveCan contractor Dalian told MPs he was never in conflict of interest while working at the Department of National Defence, despite his signature appearing on a Dalian contract with government as he became a public servant.
12 March
Public sector watchdog will be latest to dig into ArriveCan scandal
(Global news) Public Sector Integrity Commissioner Harriet Solloway is probing “several allegations of wrongdoing” and looking into complaints alleging two former Canada Border Services Agency officials faced “reprisals” for accusing their superiors of “misleading” Parliament about who ultimately hired GC Strategies — the IT firm behind the program.
The two-person company is now at the center of a widening political scandal, after Auditor General Karen Hogan found the problem-plagued app cost taxpayers at least $59 million.
Solloway confirmed her review into the matter in a letter dated March 4 and sent to Conservative MP Kelly Block, who had recently written to her about the pandemic-era app.
6 March
Companies at heart of ArriveCan scandal received more than $100M in government contracts
Part of the issue was a ‘glaring disregard’ for basic procurement principles
Companies run by two consultants at the heart of the ArriveCan scandal received over $100 million in government contracts since 2011, according to a new government tally.
Speaking to the House public accounts committee Wednesday, federal Comptroller General Roch Huppé said he ordered a tally of all contracts given to GC Strategies and its predecessor Coredal — both owned by Kristian Firth and Darren Anthony — following conflicting reports by the government and media in recent weeks.

15 February
Security and access cards, office key stolen in most recent theft of justice minister’s vehicle
The department says security passes were deactivated when the theft was reported

13-15 February
Tasha Kheiriddin: ArriveCAN could be the nail in the Liberal coffin
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is bent on throwing bureaucrats under the bus. They have a lot to answer for, but so do their political masters.
By the numbers, the federal government’s ArriveCAN app is a disaster. Designed during the pandemic to pre-screen travellers to Canada, its cost ballooned from $80,000 to $59.5 million — and possibly more.
Over $12 million worth of invoices for work done on the project was potentially unrelated to it. Over 10,000 people were told by the app to quarantine when they didn’t have to, and only 10 per cent of travellers have continued to use ArriveCAN since it was made optional. …
The unknown cost, and political price of the ArriveCan app
Canada’s Auditor General has found the government overpaid for the ArriveCan app … And poor record keeping has made it impossible for her to figure out that final total. Transcript

9 February
What Canadians think about the Emergencies Act, according to Nanos polling
(CTV) The majority of Canadians still support the federal government’s use of the Emergencies Act to shut down the so-called “Freedom Convoy” protests in early 2022, according the new data from Nanos Research.
The survey found 44 per cent of people “support” the use of the Act, in addition to 20 per cent of people who “somewhat support” the move.
Six per cent of people “somewhat oppose” the use of the legislation, versus 27 per cent who said they “oppose” it.
The numbers are similar to those gathered nearly two years ago, in late 2022, which showed 48 per cent of respondents “support” the use of the Emergencies Act in response to the protests

8 February
Government of Canada hosts National Summit on Combatting Auto Theft
Today, the Honourable Dominic LeBlanc, Minister of Public Safety, Democratic Institutions and Intergovernmental Affairs; the Honourable Arif Virani, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada; the Honourable Pablo Rodriguez, Minister of Transport and Quebec Lieutenant; the Honourable François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry; and the Honourable Anita Anand, President of the Treasury Board; convened provincial, territorial and municipal government officials, industry leaders and law enforcement representatives from across the country at the National Summit on Combatting Auto Theft.

23-25 January
Court rules convoy must return to Ottawa after finding Emergencies Act unreasonable
(The Beaverton) In addition to restoring the convoy protesters’ hopelessly dug-in position among the downtown Ottawa core, Mosley emphasized that all other conditions must be replicated as well. The Judge ordered the Ottawa Police to stand down and welcome any truckers with open arms, the Ontario Provincial Police to promptly forget how to find Ottawa, and for Premier Doug Ford to immediately disappear on a snowmobiling trip.
… At press time, the returning convoy protestors have been forced to fight for space in downtown Ottawa with the numerous homeless encampments that have sprung up in the meantime.

Judge delivers blow to Trudeau
(GZERO media) Canada’s Federal Court ruled Tuesday that the prime minister’s government violated the constitutional rights of anti-mandate protesters by cracking down on the convoy protests that paralyzed Ottawa in 2022.
By invoking the Emergencies Act, the government forced reluctant tow-truck drivers to tow the trucks that had paralyzed Ottawa for a month. The act also allowed the government to freeze bank accounts belonging to protesters and shut down much of downtown Ottawa while police cleared the streets.
On Tuesday, Justice Richard Mosley ruled for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, which argued that invoking the Emergencies Act led to the violation of the rights of Canadians. It “led to infringement of Charter rights,” he wrote.
… Did Tucker Carlson and other conservative American critics of Justin Trudeau have a point? Canada’s Federal Court ruled Tuesday that the prime minister’s government violated the constitutional rights of anti-vaccine mandate protesters by cracking down on the convoy protests that paralyzed Ottawa in 2022.
By invoking the Emergencies Act, the government forced reluctant tow-truck drivers to tow the trucks that had paralyzed Ottawa for a month. The act also allowed the government to freeze bank accounts belonging to protesters and shut down much of downtown Ottawa while police cleared the streets.
The ruling came as Trudeau and his cabinet were finishing a retreat in Montreal ahead of the winter Parliamentary session, throwing the government off balance as it attempted a much-needed communications reset. Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland defended the action and said the government would appeal the ruling.
Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, meanwhile, welcomed the ruling, saying that Trudeau “caused the crisis by dividing people. Then he violated Charter rights to illegally suppress citizens. As PM, I will unite our country for freedom.”
When Trudeau ordered the streets cleared, some American conservatives, including Carlson, argued that the prime minister was being tyrannical. Republican congresswoman Lauren Boebert even called for Canada “to be liberated.”
On Wednesday, a day after the ruling, Carlson visited Alberta for two events with conservative Premier Danielle Smith. But before he arrived, he called Trudeau’s office to warn them he was coming to “liberate Canada.” At the event, he pressed Smith to intervene in the case of four convoy protesters charged with conspiring to murder RCMP officers. She expressed regret about the limits of her office.
Invocation of Emergencies Act unreasonable, measures against Freedom Convoy unconstitutional: court
(Canadian Lawyer) Federal Court found decision to declare emergency fell short of Emergencies Act requirements
The decision of the Prime Minister and Cabinet to invoke the Emergencies Act was unreasonable, and some of the measures directed at the Freedom Convoy protests were unconstitutional, the Federal Court has found.
Federal Court Justice Richard Mosley concluded that the decision to declare an emergency fell short of the requirements under the Emergencies Act. He also found some of Ottawa’s temporary measures aimed at the protests infringed the Charter.
The act requires that to declare a public order emergency, there must be a “threat to the security of Canada.” The threat must be one outlined in s. 2 of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act. The federal government’s proclamation relied on s. 2(c): “activities within or relating to Canada directed toward or in support of the threat or use of acts of serious violence against persons or property for the purpose of achieving a political, religious or ideological objective within Canada or a foreign state.” The threat cannot be “lawful advocacy, protest or dissent,” unless it is carried out in conjunction with one of the four “threats to the security of Canada,” defined in s. 2.
Ottawa’s use of Emergencies Act against convoy protests was unreasonable, violated Charter, court rules
(CBC) Government says it plans to appeal the decision

2023

27 December
Ottawa, we have a problem: the federal public service
Donald Savoie
(Globe & Mail) What on earth is going on in Ottawa? One day we are informed that a federal government department signed a $670,000 contract with a consulting firm asking for advice on how to cut back awarding consulting contracts. A few days later, two senior federal public servants pointed at one another to explain why contracts with a private sector firm went horribly wrong. Two federal public servants blaming each other raises fundamental questions about the principle of ministerial responsibility, which underpins our parliamentary system.
A few days later, we were told that federal government call centres, with an annual price tag of $368-million, are not meeting reasonable service standards, notwithstanding seeing the number of full-time staff going from 2,651 to 5,610 over an eight-year period. And a few days after that, Canadians were told that there is a profound malaise in Canada’s diplomatic service.
We know that the size of the federal public service has grown by 24 per cent over the last eight years and spending on outside consultants has increased by a third over the past five years. But growth in the size of the federal government and the scale of government spending has not improved access to government programs and services. Public-opinion surveys report a growing frustration over the deteriorating level of federal government services: Nearly 50 per cent of Canadians report that they are “very unsatisfied” or “unsatisfied” with the services the federal government provides. We need to go below the surface to understand why.

5-6 December
‘Profound malaise’ lingers in Canada’s diplomatic service, Senate committee finds
Canadian governments have undermined their diplomatic corps for two decades by failing to spend money and recruit foreign service officers, a Senate committee has found.
Ottawa needs to “reinvest” in the country’s diplomatic muscle to ensure that the country is “prepared to meet the complex global challenges of the decades to come,” the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee reported Wednesday.
Auditor-General to review CRA call centres as complaints on the rise despite more funding
The Canada Revenue Agency recently tabled information in Parliament showing its budget for call-centre operations is at $368.6-million for the current fiscal year.
More than six years after warning of excessive waiting times and frequently unreliable answers from Canada Revenue Agency call centres, Auditor-General Karen Hogan is planning a fresh review after concerns that client complaints are well above prepandemic levels – in spite of major spending and staffing increases.

9 November
Can Mark Carney save Justin Trudeau?
By Max Fawcett
Over the last week, two things have become abundantly obvious to anyone watching Canadian politics. First, Justin Trudeau is in deep, deep trouble — deeper even than the SNC-Lavalin scandal or the revelation of his Blackface photos in 2019. And second, Mark Carney’s interest in his job is much more than just a rumour. As Carney told the Globe and Mail, running for Trudeau’s job isn’t a decision he’s ruled out. In the dialect of aspiring political leaders, that’s as close an answer to “hell yes” as you’re going to get.
These two things are closely related, of course. Carney wouldn’t be getting asked about his own leadership aspirations if Trudeau’s standing wasn’t so diminished, and Trudeau’s political problems might not be quite so dire if he had more people with Carney’s economic credentials — which is to say, any — in his caucus and cabinet.

Is Canada coming apart at the seams?
David Moscrop
If Canada’s provinces weren’t squabbling with the federal government, it wouldn’t be Canada. But lately, these tensions seem to be cropping up more forcefully at every turn, and they couldn’t come at a worse time.
(GZERO North) The Alberta factor
In recent weeks, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has launched an effort to take half the money in the Canada Pension Plan and set up a separate, Alberta-only pension scheme. The feds, unsurprisingly, say “no way” and have warned of significant economic pain if the province splits from the national plan.
But it’s not just the Albertans. As the struggle over pensions and electricity regulations plays out in the West, provinces across the country are fighting with Ottawa over carbon pricing.
Since 2019, Canada has had a federally mandated price on carbon for any provinces that don’t have their own local emissions taxes. It is one of the government’s signature climate policies. But now, with inflation high and his political fortunes in question, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is suspending the carbon tax on home heating oil for three years in a bid to give consumers a break.
It just so happens that home heating oil is used primarily in Atlantic Canada, where the Liberals are doing particularly badly in the polls. Now, some other provinces want carve-outs for the fuels that they use too.
Even the deepening housing crisis isn’t immune from conflict between the premiers and the prime minister. In a meeting on Tuesday, provincial heads blasted the federal government’s approach of bypassing provincial governments to cut housing construction deals directly with municipalities. One premier is even considering a law to prevent the feds from making the local bilateral deals at all.
[Federal government will spend $900M to build housing in Quebec, matched by province]
An old challenge looms. As if all of this wasn’t enough of a problem, the mother of all federal-provincial tensions is quietly stirring again. A recent poll found support for Quebec separation rising several points to 38%, a jump from the 32% support it enjoyed in 2020. Meanwhile, a Quebec plan to increase university tuition costs for out-of-province students, also aimed at shoring up Francophone dominance, has sparked fresh protests.
All of this couldn’t come at a worse time. The federal government is trying to tackle overarching challenges like climate change, healthcare, and housing that require comprehensive approaches. But with the Liberal government trailing in the polls by double digits, provinces may smell blood in the water and believe now is the time to strike for concessions. (9 November 2023)

9 November
Trudeau government unveils plans to cut $500 million in spending
Government spending cuts vary widely by department
While some agencies like the Canadian Space Agency and the Invest in Canada Hub will see more than one per cent of their spending frozen and returned to government coffers, 61 departments and agencies don’t appear on the list of government bodies taking cuts.
The government said the cost-cutting initiative excluded agents of Parliament and small organizations with budgets under $25 million a year. But many of those not included on the list of organizations affected — such as the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the National Capital Commission — have budgets much higher than $25 million.
7 November
Government defends hiring consulting firm KPMG to find ways to save money
KPMG hired to find ways to cut spending on IT, property
“There are times when you actually need an external perspective to help you to think about how to find cost efficiencies … ” Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson told reporters Tuesday on his way into cabinet. …
Wilkinson’s comments came in the wake of news reports saying the government paid KPMG nearly $670,000 to find ways to save money — and after the the Trudeau government announced an initiative to tighten spending and reduce its reliance on outside consultants.
Ottawa paid nearly $670,000 for KPMG’s advice on cutting consultant costs