Category: Chairman’s Desk

This article first appeared in the Toronto Star on November 3, 2019.

This week saw Toronto City Council endorse, by a wide margin, a new transit plan proposed by the Ford government. Federal support is expected soon to follow. This is good news for the residents of Toronto — but also for the Premier’s Office, a vindication of its newly adopted, collegial tone and a sterling example of the fruits that might be borne of it.

A recap for those who no longer follow the twists and turns of transit-building in Toronto: last spring, then-Transportation Minister Jeff Yurek proposed the Ontario Line, a 15-station stretch of subway that broadly followed the contours of the much-needed Downtown Relief Line, as well as two additional stops along the Scarborough subway.

Because the announcement came on the heels of a simultaneous plan to upload control of the subway from the TTC to the province, and because it proposed to use an unspecified, new technology that did not accord with the rest of the subway system, the Ontario Line was greeted with derision. It was a “finger painting,” drawn on the back of a napkin and most of city council was adamantly opposed to the proposed subway upload, even though they had no real say in the matter.

As it happens, all this derision toward the transit lines themselves was never justified. The Ontario Line plan was conceived by experts at Metrolinx, and the route is sensible, even preferable to the Downtown Relief Line, whose only advantage was that it was marginally more advanced in the early planning stages.

The Ontario Line makes more liberal use of above-ground tracks, a far cry from the underground-subways-only mantra from Ford of yore. By extending further north and further west, it will provide greater relief to the congestion epicentre that is Bloor-Yonge, funnelling riders from a wider area. As for Scarborough, a single-stop subway never made sense to begin with.

How, then, did this so-called finger painting go on to win an overwhelming majority of votes in city council?

The simplest explanation is to follow the money. Under the terms of the new agreement, Toronto won’t be on the hook for the Conservative government’s $28-billion transit plan. That means subways north to Richmond Hill and the Eglinton West LRT, at no cost to the city and political advantage to PC MPPs from those ridings. Relief-line diehards should have been pleased with reimbursement for sunk costs, though three such councillors still voted against the plan. The agreement also frees up substantial amounts of city cash to spend instead on more pressing matters, like repairs and upkeep of the existing subway system.

But money alone does not account for this victory. Historians of this government will recognize it emerged at the beginning of a new era — AD, or After Dean. The deal’s origins can be pinpointed approximately to the cabinet shuffle that saw Yurek moved to the Ministry of the Environment, with Caroline Mulroney inheriting the transit file.

Though some viewed it at the time as a demotion, Mulroney has evidently delivered within her first few months on the job. During that time, she has worked quietly and assiduously, negotiating in good faith with City of Toronto staff.

Whether the subway upload was proposed as a shrewd negotiating tactic, always intended to be disposed of at the right moment to seal the deal, or another ingenious way to stick it to Toronto City Council, by all accounts the turning point in negotiations came when the province agreed to drop the idea.

Compromise, conciliation — these are novel ideas to a government that has relied up to this point on aggressive negotiation. Mulroney herself deserves credit. She personifies the softer touch and collegial approach to governing that the Premier’s Office now hopes to adopt on all fronts.

In the meantime, the residents of Toronto should applaud the fact that provincial and municipal governments have learned to play nice. If all goes according to plan, the Ontario Line will be completed by 2027. That may be optimistic, but it was optimistic also to expect that these two levels of government would ever learn to get along in the name of progress. Yet here we are.

This editorial first appeared in the Toronto Star on October 27, 2019.

So, just what happened on Monday night and how did we end up with the most divided and regionalized Parliament we have seen in recent memory?

In my view, it was the utterly predictable outcome of the campaign our leaders chose to run.

The result? For some Canadians, this was the “Seinfeld” campaign — a campaign about nothing. To others, it was a campaign about everything, except what mattered. And for still others, it was a campaign about micro items designed to help you get ahead or to allow you to have your turn.

What it wasn’t was a campaign around big ideas for a better future, for a more cohesive union or a more prosperous, just and responsible society.

And so, Canadians listened to what was put on offer by their leaders and voted accordingly. When they did, they voted in their narrow, parochial and regional interests rather than in the interests of the country as a whole or, aspirationally, for what Canada could be.

In short, they voted for what was best for them; not what was best for us. The consequence? A map of virtually irreconcilable differences. At the same time, by handing Justin Trudeau a minority government, voters took away many of the tools a government could have used to heal these divisions.

The prime minister’s first order of business — a tax cut for the middle class — is unlikely to face serious resistance in the house but from there on out, things will only get more complicated.

Consider other Liberal priorities. An assault weapons ban, higher carbon reduction goals and a potential increase in immigration. Each will enrage a different part of Canada where tensions are already reaching a breaking point.

The complications will only continue to worsen. The Liberals will need to rely on the support of the NDP caucus to govern, the very MPs who are staunchly opposed to the steps needed to effect Western reconciliation. Even beyond pipeline politics, that informal partnership will frustrate the government’s outreach to Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Faced with a minority house, the temptation will be for each party leader to bring a laundry list of asks and for the horse trading to begin. This will simply result in more of what we have now: small, incremental policies that are the result of back room dealing and electoral trade-offs.

What’s more, their continued focus on regional issues will only serve to exacerbate the divisions that were revealed on Monday. And even worse, as Canadians see their politicians delivering for the narrow interests of other constituencies, they will expect the same.

Then there is the increasingly urgent need to deal with the growing issue of “Wexit.” The anger and anxiety that propels those feelings is not going away anytime soon, and it is up to Trudeau to show Albertans their place in his vision for Canada.

At the same time, he will need to deal with the priorities of a newly resurgent Bloc Québécois and all that means. Not to mention the economic development challenges of Atlantic Canada and the increasingly high priority of matters green in B.C.

Many doubt that balancing all of this will even be possible, but the prime minister certainly has to try. He knows, all too well that the project of Confederation is too fragile, too hard-won and certainly too important to be allowed to fall to the whims of our current politics.

And so, the Liberals have their work cut out for them.

As a returning government, they have much to do to complete initiatives from their first mandate. But as a new government, they will have to acknowledge that Canadians have sent them back to work with both a different set of expectations and a different set of tools.

And that means looking at the map of Canada in a way they have not had to before. And seeking to find those ideas, initiatives and policies that will reach across the divisions that were exposed on Monday night.

The government’s — and the prime minister’s — ability to do just that will be the biggest predictor of their success in the polls next time out and in the history books yet to be written.

This editorial first appeared in the Toronto Star on October 20, 2019.

Given the haze, ambiguity and, crucially, the unpredictability of this election campaign, it is becoming harder to determine how everything will shape up after Canadians head to the polls on Monday. While still unclear, seat distributions seem to signal a return to the minority governments of our not so distant past.

Among all the uncertainty however, one thing is crystal clear: the Bloc Québécois is well and truly back.

When Gilles Duceppe stepped down as leader of the Bloc in 2011, the party was careening toward irrelevance at breakneck speed. Stripped of official party status and struggling with its identity at a time when the notion of sovereignty had become less and less popular with Quebecers, the party was a pale shadow of its former status as a potent third-party in the early Harper years.

While the 2015 election saw the party elect 10 MPs, the ensuing years were marred by defections, infighting and the decline of Pauline Marois’ Parti Québécois — their provincial cousins. All the while, pundits, politicos and partisans continued to raise the same nagging question, “how can a sovereigntist party remain relevant when most Quebecers no longer support sovereignty?”

Over the past few months, party leader Yves-Françoise Blanchet has answered that question and done much, much more. Facing a serious decline in support for separatism in Quebec, Blanchet has responded by transforming the party with a pivot from sovereignty to nationalism.

While only about 30 per cent of Quebecers currently support sovereignty, the Bloc has managed to tap into a rising nationalist sentiment, driven by a feeling that Quebecois culture is under threat. It was this emotional tide that François Legault’s Coalition Avenir Québec rode to victory in 2018, promising voters that rather than fighting for sovereignty, they would forcefully stand up for the interests of the province, within Canada.

Despite his past as a Parti Quebecois minister, Blanchet has skilfully managed to align with Legault in a way that has eluded the other federal parties. Indeed, Blanchet has explicitly said his decision to run for the leadership of the Bloc was motivated by his desire to ensure there would be Quebec MPs to defend actions taken by the CAQ.

It has started with his ardent defence of Bill 21. Over the course of the election campaign, Blanchet has made the bill a key issue, defending above all the Quebec government’s right to implement legislation as it sees fit.

And it has hurt the Liberals and Conservatives, especially. For weeks, Blanchet has forced other party leaders to speak up on the issue and clarify their stance on the bill, which has become a shorthand of sorts for Quebec’s right to self-governance.

We’ve seen both Scheer and Trudeau squirm on the debate stage as Blanchet accused them of meddling in provincial affairs when it comes to the controversial bill. By doing so, the Bloc leader has shown Quebecers what a vote for the Bloc can deliver. In essence, Blanchet is saying: “this is what it would look like to have an ally in the House pushing the other parties to stand up for you.”

What’s more, Blanchet has done it all with a certain flair. It is no coincidence that the resurgence of the Bloc is being led by a former media commentator and known personality in provincial politics. He is media-savvy and his ability to earn public attention has served the party well throughout the course of the campaign.

Those skills stand him in stark contrast to Gilles Duceppe, whose blunt communication style and stern demeanour reminded Canadians — and Quebecers — of the implied conflict embedded in separatist politics. Blanchet, on the other hand, is a leader of the social media age: calm, sensible and likeable.

Many will say that Blanchet has an inherent advantage because he is not, at the end of the day, running to be prime minister of Canada. Indeed, he is running to be — for all practical purposes — the prime minister of Quebec. But to anyone who witnessed firsthand the decline of the Bloc, that does not make the party’s resurgence any less impressive. And it does not mean that his success will have any less impact on the formation of government, come Tuesday morning.

This column originally appeared in the Toronto Star on Sunday, October 13.

As we all gathered around to celebrate thanksgiving this weekend, I felt especially grateful for my incredible family and so lucky to have with us my amazing mother, a woman whose view of the world and commitment to the service of others has so profoundly influenced me and the person I have become.

Sadly, in recent years, my mother’s cognitive facilities have declined with a swiftness that is both devastating and unspeakably heart breaking.

As our family, like so many others, talked about the election together this weekend, I began to think about the role played by Canadians — approximately 500,000 Canadians — with cognitive impairments in our most basic democratic tradition. How, I wondered, do individuals like my mother participate in our democracy and what supports are in place for them to do so?

By the next election in 2023-2024, nearly 1-in-5 Canadians will be older than 65, and with that demographic shift will come increased rates of Alzheimer’s and dementia. We also know that older voters turn out to the polls in disproportionate numbers.

Having reached her eighth decade, my mother lives in a country almost unique in the world where there are no restrictions on her ability to vote regardless of how much her mental condition deteriorates. In a survey of 62 countries, only four lacked a mental capacity requirement on the right to vote. (The others are Ireland, Italy and Sweden.) Within Canada, only one province or territory, Nunavut, has such a restriction on the eligibility to vote.

South of the border, by contrast, such restrictions are the norm. More than 30 U.S. states have laws limiting those with mental disabilities or cognitive impairments from voting if they have been ruled legally incompetent.

These restrictions do not only impact the elderly, as many illnesses or conditions can result in cognitive impairment including multiple sclerosis, strokes, traumatic brain injuries, Parkinson’s or Huntington’s disease, as well as Alzheimer’s and dementia. In cases where successful legal challenges have been mounted against mental capacity requirements, the plaintiffs are often autistic.

As with so many of the battles over voting rights, the argument in favour of restrictions boils down to a defence against voter fraud. Proponents fear that people will use the vulnerable and the elderly to harvest their ballots.

Until 1988, this was the basis of the law in Canada, as dictated by the mental capacity provision of the Canadian Elections Act, which excluded from voting any person who was “restrained of his liberty of movement or deprived of the management of his property by reason of mental disease.” That year, Madam Justice Reed held that the provision was in violation of the Charter, which guarantees to every Canadian citizen the right to vote.

“It simply does not follow that people who are declared incapable of managing their financial affairs are necessarily incapable of understanding the nature of the right to vote and of exercising it in a rational manner,” wrote Justice Reed.

While subsequent blue-ribbon panels recommended a narrower restriction, Parliament opted simply to repeal the law in time for the 1993 federal election. Nothing has yet replaced it, and so far, our democracy has gotten along just fine since then.

What’s more, a number of informal approaches have developed to ensure abuse does not take place. U.S. surveys have shown that in nursing homes, where this kind of challenge is a perennial problem, staff have figured out a gatekeeping system, quizzing residents on political questions to assess whether they are in a state of mind to vote.

The approach that forbids anyone in a long-term care home or anyone with a cognitive impairment from voting is rooted in an outdated view of mental health. Where once we sought to institutionalize those with mental disabilities to be cared for and saved from themselves, today, the prevailing view favours integration with the community. Today, the goal is a meaningful life lived as much as possible like everyone else. And there is no more meaningful contribution to our society than voting.

This article first appeared in the Toronto Star on October 6, 2019.

Watching the first French-language leaders’ debate this past Wednesday, I was struck by the increasing banality of our current election campaign. Over the course of my career, I’ve seen — and been involved in — many elections. I have seen promising candidates brought down by the pressures of the campaign, I’ve seen parties unexpectedly soar, only to fall again and, through it all, I have learned that no two elections are ever the same.

True, there are always similarities. Some unexpected development will always shift the spotlight away from policy discussions, one candidate will always have something dredged up from their past and the media will almost always decide that a performance in the leaders’ debate has “changed the game.”

That being said, as the leaders unveiled their platforms in recent weeks, I have been struck less by what is new and more by what is missing. Frankly, I find myself asking: where is the “moon shot” designed to capture the imagination of Canadians? Whatever happened to sweeping, bold ideas that would serve to unite our country?

Whether it’s the result of too many focus groups or an overreliance on polling, this election has seen the major parties put forward suggestions that are small, incremental, narrow-minded and focused on the short-term. It has resulted in a series of platforms that are concentrated on the lowest-common denominator.

Gone, it seems, are the days when voters were challenged to think about “What’s in it for Canadians?” Instead, our parties have settled on “What’s in it for you?”

In elections past, parties sought to capture Canadians’ imaginations with a vision of what the future could be.

Lester Pearson rallied Canadians in 1963 with his “60 Days of Decision,” a pledge that his government would do more on key issues in mere months than the Diefenbaker government had. His vision ran from universal health care to the Canada Pension Plan and he pressed a serious debate about our national identity and its symbols.

In 1988, Brian Mulroney championed the possibilities that would come from free trade. Whatever you might think of the issue, it served as a mission, something for Canadians to fight for, together.

In 2015, Justin Trudeau offered a different kind of vision. In contrast to the balanced budget orthodoxy of the Chretien-Martin-Harper years, Trudeau suggested Canadians should embrace deficit spending. For a country that had fared comparatively well in the 2008 recession but was nonetheless still feeling its aftershocks, the Liberals’ vision was a welcome — and in the minds of many Canadians, well-deserved — reprieve from a long period of austerity.

All of which asks the question: what would happen if our parties were focused not just on giving things to the middle class, but instead giving something for the middle class to believe in?

Some say national pharmacare is just that: a vision for a changed society in which no Canadian goes without the medication she or he needs. It’s clear that Canadians are hurting and simplified access to medication could provide help to families and individuals who desperately need it.

But, in my view, pharmacare is an incremental change, not a revolutionary one. And, as any economist or policy wonk will tell you, the problem is that it’s near impossible to capture the imagination with incremental change.

And it is certainly not a big enough idea to serve as a rallying cry for our country as a whole.

So, what would a sweeping policy vision look like in this election? Well, given that we know stable housing is a key determinant of social and health outcomes, how about a pledge to provide stable housing for every single Canadian?