The United Kingdom is offering to lend a hand to Canada to help secure the Arctic against Chinese and Russian intrusions in the Canadian Arctic.
According to the UK’s chief of defence staff, General Sir Nick Carter, Britain is “keen to cooperate” with Canadians on northern operations.
Carter said that the UK wants to help “Canada do what Canada needs to do as an Arctic country.”
The comments were made near the announcement of the AUKUS pact which is a defence agreement between the US, the UK and Australia.
“We have military capabilities, certainly in the maritime domain and in terms of our science that would be useful to Canada, and operating alongside Canada in that regard is going to be good for both countries,” said Carter in an interview, before the pact was announced.
Gaining a foothold in the Canadian Arctic has long been a strategic goal of both Russia and China. Although China doesn’t have a geographic claim, it recently attempted to pursue a commercial foothold in the region by purchasing a Canadian mining company from Nunavut.
Although the purchase did not eventually receive government approval, national security experts at the time warned that it was an attempt by China to gain strategic access to the Arctic.
Critics of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau claimed that Canada’s exclusion from the agreement was a sign of declining international respect for the Liberal government’s foreign policy approach.
Following the agreement’s announcement, Conservative leader Erin O’Toole blasted Trudeau for being excluded from the partnership.
“This is another example that Mr. Trudeau is not taken seriously by our friends and allies around the world. Canada is becoming more irrelevant under Mr. Trudeau,” said O’Toole.
O’Toole said had he been elected, he would have sought Canada’s inclusion into the arrangement.
Despite the criticism, Trudeau called AUKUS a partnership to acquire US nuclear submarines, which he maintained Canada is not interested in.
A petition to recall Conservative leader Erin O’Toole following his failure to unseat Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has twice as many signatures as a counter-petition to keep him at the helm.
The “Recall Erin O’Toole as Leader of the Conservative Party” petition launched last week by Conservative national councillor Bert Chen had received 3,509 signatures as of Monday afternoon.
In comparison, a petition by Conservative activist and former campaign manager Fraser Macdonald to have O’Toole remain in the party’s top spot had 1,897 signatures at the same time.
The two duelling petitions were launched in the immediate aftermath of last week’s election, in which the Conservatives lost seats.
According to Chen, O’Toole’s campaign “betrayed the principles” of the Conservative Party by putting forward a plan that abandoned fiscal responsibility, avoiding a leadership review, supporting vaccine passports and embracing a carbon tax.
Since his defeat, critics have accused O’Toole of moving the party too far to the left to woo Liberal and progressive voters. As reported by True North, leading up to election day, O’Toole flip-flopped on key promises to his base including on gun control and defunding the CBC.
Last week, former finance minister Joe Oliver wrote an op-ed blasting the party leader’s decision to mimic the Liberals.
“The sad evidence is that O’Toole’s move to the centre did not attract new voters, yet it alienated the right-wing and yielded ground to Maxime Bernier’s People’s party,” wrote Oliver.
“There is an economic and cultural route to broaden the appeal of Conservative values and policies: bring the public to you, rather than mimic the left-wing’s latest faddish ideals and retreaded socialist truths. That is what leadership is all about.”
Despite the crushing defeat, O’Toole has insisted that he desires to stay on as party leader.
In a recent desperate bid to overcome the growing movement to have him recalled from leadership, former Ontario organizer for O’Toole’s campaign Dan Muys sent volunteers an email asking them to sign Macdonald’s petition.
“When our CPC caucus meets for the first-time post-election, it will be better able to speak to more Canadians. We now have a younger caucus with more women, Indigenous and LGBTQ+ representation, and greater regional diversity with our growth in Atlantic Canada,” wrote Muys in the email.
A new Canadian Taxpayers Federation campaign is urging Albertans to vote yes to abolish equalization payments to have-not provinces, weeks before Alberta’s Oct. 18 referendum.
“Albertans have had it rough for the last six-plus years, and we’re tired of being treated as the cash cow for the rest of Canada,” said Kevin Lacey, the CTF’s Alberta director and head of the Fight Equalization campaign. “Voting yes in this October’s referendum is a great way to send the Trudeau government a message that the equalization status quo must go.”
Since 1961, Albertans have paid $661 billion more to Ottawa than they have received back in spending. Encompassed in that amount is equalization, which costs Alberta taxpayers approximately $3 billion per year, or over $600 per Albertan.
Despite this significant contribution to Canada, the government has made it extremely difficult for Alberta’s economy to develop by instituting policies such as the carbon tax, the tanker ban, and the anti-pipeline legislation.
Even as the oil and gas sector has declined, Alberta has still been on the hook for other provinces’ economic fortunes.
Quebec receives over half of all equalization payments. Yet Premier François Legault has railed against development of Alberta’s oil and gas sector, calling it “dirty energy” and saying “there’s no social acceptability for an additional oil pipeline.”
The referendum question will ask whether section 36(2) of Canada’s constitution, which commits to equalization payments, should “be removed from the Constitution.”
If Albertans vote yes, the equalization structure will not change, but Kenney said it would give him leverage as he tries to gain national support for a constitutional amendment.
“Albertans shouldn’t be expected to contribute so much money while politicians in other provinces and Ottawa continue to roadblock our development,” said Lacey. “Albertans know we are getting a raw deal and voting yes in the equalization referendum is a crucial step in Alberta’s fight for fairness.” The Fight Equalization campaign will include advertisements, campaign signs, and a digital presence on fightequalization.ca.
Embattled Green Party of Canada leader Annamie Paul will be resigning.
Paul announced her resignation Monday in Toronto, one week after an abysmal showing for her party, including a distant loss in her own riding.
At her brief press conference, Paul said the party apparatus had already triggered a leadership review, and she no longer wishes to deal with the “attacks” from within.
The Greens went from three seats in 2019 to two seats this year, with a drop in overall vote share from 6.5% to 2.3%.
The 2021 election was one of the worst results in the Greens’ history. The party fielded its smallest slate since 2000, fielding only 252 candidates across Canada’s 338 ridings.
Paul became leader of the Greens last October following her failed bid to win a by-election in Toronto Centre.
“When I was elected and put in this role, I was breaking a glass ceiling. What I didn’t realize at the time is that I was breaking a glass ceiling that was going to fall on my head and leave a lot of shards of glass that I was going to have to crawl over throughout my time as a leader,” Paul said.
In the lead-up to the election, Paul faced numerous attempts from Green party insiders to oust her. These internal tensions were inflamed when the Israel-Hamas conflict escalated in May.
Paul, who is Jewish, issued a statement calling for a deescalation in tensions and a return to dialogue on both sides. Two of the three Green Party MPs in Ottawa would publicly repudiate Paul’s statement.
Fredericton MP Jenica Atwin subsequently left the Green caucus to join the Liberals.
In response to the growing discontent among party members over Paul’s statement, her aide Noah Zatzman accused Green MPs of “appalling anti-Semitism,” “Jew hatred” and “discrimination.”
Paul was pressured by party members to denounce Zatzman’s post, however she declined to do so.
Now that Erin O’Toole has lost, the media suddenly love him.
Starting on Monday, at roughly the time the polls closed and after anything they said could have an impact in the election, much of the media began pumping out stories in support of the failed CPC leader.
We saw reports of former conservative leaders as well as elected officials, political consultants and backroom operatives all urging Conservatives to keep O’Toole on as leader, this despite his dismal performance as leader and failure to unseat our angry and unpopular Prime Minister.
Many journalists offered up similar pleas on social media, advising CPC members to continue on the O’Toole path to moderation.
Maclean’s editor Stephen Maher told Conservatives on Twitter: “you were doing the right things, too quickly, in this election. Keep O’Toole, take your time, do your homework.”
Sports journalist Matthew Sekeres let the cat out of the bag by saying: “Harper grew on people. O’Toole could too. Gotta convince cities that the fringe of (the) party won’t shape policy.”
Presumably by “fringe of the party” he was referring to the majority of Conservative members who are, well, conservative.
Similarly themed news stories appeared in the Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, Global News and the Canadian Press. Colour me skeptical.
After five weeks of treating Conservatives unfairly, misrepresenting O’Toole’s positions, repeating Liberal talking points, pushing Trudeau’s wedge issues and generally vilifying conservatives, many in the media suddenly have a change of heart.
Now that the election is over, now that he has no chance of becoming Prime Minister — at least not anytime soon — these journalists are suddenly happy to pretend they like conservatives.
O’Toole, after all, has proven to be exactly what journalists look for in a conservative politician: a non-threatening leader who promotes Liberal ideas and has proven he cannot beat Trudeau.
After running as a “true blue conservative” to become party leader, O’Toole shifted to the left for the federal campaign. He distanced himself from conservatives who believe that moral issues should be central in politics, and he drove libertarians out of the party and into the hands of the People’s Party of Canada.
His proposition to voters was basically this: I’m just like the Liberals in terms of my woke progressive values and big government spending policies, but unlike the Liberals, I’m a better manager of big government.
O’Toole could be forgiven for running as a centrist if his strategy had worked.
But it didn’t. In fact, he lost ground in Liberal strongholds like suburban Toronto and Vancouver, and he came out even in Quebec.
Worse than any position he took on the campaign, O’Toole refused to stand his ground.
He flip-flopped on the central issue of carbon taxes and by the end of the campaign, the Toronto Star reported that O’Toole would keep Trudeau’s carbon tax.
On the issue of Trudeau’s ban on scary-looking guns, O’Toole flip-flopped.
Once billed as a law and order Conservative, here, O’Toole had the opportunity to own the issue of public safety and crime. He should have hammered Trudeau over reduced sentences for serious gun crimes and touted his own impressive military and legal background.
Instead, an indecisive O’Toole changed his mind, changed his position and fell in line with the Liberal status quo after ever-so-slight pressure.
He failed to command respect or inspire Canadians. That’s the real reason he lost. But much of the media would have you believe that O’Toole needs to go even softer, even more moderate in order to win.
This is exactly the wrong advice.
Following the 2019 election, the media likewise pushed the CPC to take away all the wrong lessons.
Former Leader Andrew Scheer picked up 26 seats in that election. He knocked Trudeau down from a majority to a minority government and he won the popular vote.
Scheer was a young leader who was still building up his confidence and experience. He was likable, well-spoken and most importantly, he stood his ground — despite horrendous mistreatment by the media.
Scheer should have stayed on to build his momentum. But instead, the media began pushing a narrative that said he was too conservative to win. They soon concluded that the CPC had to move to “modernize,” move to the left, ditch moral issues and find a more “progressive” leader.
That was completely wrong, and listening to the legacy media is in part what led to Monday’s disappointing result.
Conservatives cannot make the same mistake twice. The media is wrong, do not listen to them.
Now that Ontario has implemented a vaccine passport and most businesses are enforcing the rule that you must be vaccinated to enter, why do we still have to wear masks? Anthony Furey discusses that question, and explains why the arbitrary nature of covid enforcement will only lead to more confusion.
Most Canadians believe that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau should step down to let a new leader take the helm, according to a new post-election poll.
Despite winning another minority in last Monday’s election, 55% of respondents said Trudeau should resign, while only 45% suggested he should remain Canada’s head of government.
The Canadians surveyed overwhelmingly believe that the country is now more divided than ever and that the electoral system needs to be overhauled.
In total, 77% of people polled stated that the country was fractured following the election which produced very few changes in the makeup of government. On the other hand, only 23% of respondents said the country is more united under Trudeau.
The poll was conducted by Maru Public Opinion on election day and the day following, with a random sample of 1,510 Canadians. The poll has a margin of error of +/-2.5% 19 times out of 20.
“This is a signal to leaders of this country, particularly the prime minister and whoever he’s going to end up dancing with, that the public is in need of some healing, and it starts with him,” said Maru Public Opinion executive vice-president John Wright.
When broken down regionally, Albertans were the most likely to say that Canada is divided, with 88% agreeing with the statement. Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario were second, with 79% of people thinking the country is divided.
Additionally, 52% of Canadians believed that the democratic system is broken and needs significant changes.
The poll respondents had also soured on Conservative leader Erin O’Toole, with 51% saying the beleaguered leader should leave his position.
Since failing to produce any significant results in the 2021 election, several prominent members of the Conservative party have sought to trigger a leadership review and have O’Toole removed from power.
Recently, Conservative national councillor Bert Chen launched a petition calling for O’Toole to be recalled.
Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig have finally arrived home in Canada after almost three years of arbitrary detention in Chinese prisons.
The two Canadians boarded a plane Friday night with Canada’s ambassador to China, Dominic Barton. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau greeted the pair in Calgary upon landing.
“These two men have gone through an unbelievably difficult ordeal. For the past 1000 days they have shown strength, perseverance, resilience, and grace, and we are all inspired by them,” said Trudeau.
Trudeau announced their release just hours after Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was taken off of house arrest in Vancouver and permitted to go back to China.
The deal was a result of negotiations between the US Justice Department and prosecutors who agreed to drop charges against the Chinese heiress once accused of several wire fraud charges related to her company’s dealings with Iran which is under strict sanctions by US authorities.
Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig were arrested on espionage charges in 2018 by Chinese Communist Party authorities in a move that is widely believed to have been in retaliation for Canada’s arrest of Meng on a US warrant.
Spavor was sentenced to 11 years in prison for trumped-up espionage charges, and a sentence had yet to be issued for Kovrig who was also accused of similar crimes.
China continues to maintain that the arrests of the two Michaels were unrelated to the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou despite the fact that their release occurred just hours after Meng secured her deal with the US.
Conservative Party Leader Erin O’Toole also congratulated the pair on their release following the announcement on his personal Twitter account. “Our family shares the elation of millions of Canadians that our citizens are coming home. Thank you to all diplomats involved,” said O’Toole.
Ontario’s vaccine rollout already seems to be running into challenges. Some businesses dont want to enforce the rule, some people aren’t satisfied and want more oversight and some people think this has gone way too far. Anthony Furey discusses in his latest video why this plan seems to be plagued by problems.
After a Conservative Party of Canada national councillor launched a petition calling for Erin O’Toole to be recalled as Conservative leader, a Conservative activist and former campaign manager has started a counter-petition expressing support for O’Toole and calling for him to remain in place to stand in another election. That activist, Fraser Macdonald, joined The Andrew Lawton Show to explain why he thinks O’Toole deserves another shot.
