The Spin Doctors
Mike Storeshaw Conservative Strategist “Mr. Nanos is correct: getting people to consider voting for your party, and having the means to translate those good feelings into actual votes, are two very different things. The latter requires significant resources, party infrastructure, and membership and volunteer bases. These are the nuts and bolts of Canadian politics, and […]
Harper says the Internet will help get out his message. But without the press gallery, can he grow his tent?
Last week, national reporters received a little reminder about what to expect in their relations with the Prime Minister in the coming session of Parliament. After Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) announced on the Hill last week that the softwood lumber deal would go forward as a confidence matter this fall, a swarm […]
Liberals are in disarray, but they are also in transition
Last week, the Liberal Party’s deputy foreign affairs critic, Borys Wrzesnewskyj, resigned from his position as critic over yet another divisive issue for the party. On a trip with a fact-finding Parliamentary delegation to Lebanon, Mr. Wrzesnewskyj apparently made a slip by telling a reporter that Canada should negotiate with Hezbollah, adding that Canada should […]
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Honour sale of generic drugs to fight AIDS I was surprised when Stephen Harper deferred an announcement on increased funding for AIDS, saying, “We are undertaking some evaluations, but this government’s concentration in the fight against drugs in the next few years will be on enforcement, prevention and treatment.” The Canadian government recently enacted legislation […]
Environmental groups briefed on Conservative green plan
The government provided briefings on its environmental plan to environmental groups last week, but they were said to be very general and did not contain enough details to draw any conclusions about the Conservatives’ upcoming environment policy. “It was a very general briefing, I think there were only eight slides that we were shown,” said […]
Harper has the right strategy on Senate reform: Senator Elect
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is serious about Senate reform and is taking a strategic approach by tackling the issue in incremental steps, says Link Byfield, an Alberta Senator elect. “Serious Senate reformers realized a long time ago-some time between the death of the Meech Lake Accord and the death of the Charlottetown Accord-that the total-package […]
PM touts northern tourism
Northern tourism will play a large role in the future of Canada’s territories, Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) said in a speech from Whitehorse, Yukon on Aug. 17. Mr. Harper also used the speech to announce an extra $9.5 million in funding for the 2007 Canada Winter Games to be hosted by Whitehorse. […]
Tories should take responsibility for toxic sites in the North: MP Angus
Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor (Carleton-Mississippi Mills, Ont.) needs to acknowledge the Defence Department’s responsibility for numerous toxic sites in Ontario’s North, NDP MP Charlie Angus (Timmins-James Bay, Ont.) said at a news conference last week. The Department of National Defence built and then abandoned 17 radar bases in the early 1960s in the James Bay-Hudson’s […]
Parliamentarians go to South Africa
A delegation of MPs is headed to South Africa this week to meet with their Parliamentary counterparts from Aug. 27 to Sept. 3. House Speaker Peter Milliken (Kingston and the Islands, Ont.) is leading the delegation to Cape Town, Johannesburg and Pretoria. Conservative MP Jay Hill (Prince George-Peace River, B.C.), Liberal MP Karen Redman (Kitchener […]
Bernier joins Summa Strategies
Last week, Summa Strategies announced that it hired Tory Daniel Bernier, formerly chief of staff to Environment Minister Rona Ambrose, to head up the firm’s new research division. The Hill Times caught up with Tim Powers, vice president at Summa. HT: What was the impetus for creating the new research division? Will it be servicing […]
