Canadian Federal Politics Thread v5

[PepsiFree]

And, despite some people (conservatives) arguing they haven’t done enough with the power, the alternative was doing nothing and watching the Conservatives do whatever they want (which is additionally why conservatives hate them).

At the end of the day, skippy can try to bully whoever he wants, but nobody cares. As the NDP said, there’s things that need to cross the finish line and more work to do yet. They know the Liberals are toast, so the only thing on their side is time and the only intelligent move is to use it.

His supporters will never hold his feet to the fire over it and never dare criticize their dear leader over his approach, but if he actually wanted to end the coalition on his desired timeline, he’d moderate and cut a deal with the NDP.

If he doesn’t want to work with them, why would they do his work for him?

[Doctorfever]

So the NDP just know they have no chance at forming the opposition next election, so don’t even try? I know the Orange Crush wouldn’t be sitting back and waiting for the next defeat.

[Azure]

Its a CP majority either way.

But pretty sure the NDP could grab more seats if they wouldn't come across as a Liberal lap dog.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

So the NDP just know they have no chance at forming the opposition next election, so don’t even try? I know the Orange Crush wouldn’t be sitting back and waiting for the next defeat.

Who said anything close to that?

[Doctorfever]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Who said anything close to that?

Well the voters I guess, or at least the polls.

The NDP clearly aren’t doing enough to distance themselves from the Liberals or make them a viable alternative.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

Well the voters I guess, or at least the polls.

The NDP clearly aren’t doing enough to distance themselves from the Liberals or make them a viable alternative.

Sure, but how did you come to the conclusion that the NDP have just given up internally and are just not even going to try form the opposition?

The election isn’t tomorrow.

[Doctorfever]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Sure, but how did you come to the conclusion that the NDP have just given up internally and are just not even going to try form the opposition?

The election isn’t tomorrow.

Thankfully it’s not (for the NDP). Although they could have the election basically whenever they want.

They are moving in the wrong direction in the polls.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

Thankfully it’s not (for the NDP). Although they could have the election basically whenever they want.

They are moving in the wrong direction in the polls.

Good thing they control how much time they have to turn it around

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Azure

Well they might be doing the right thing 'now.'

But everything they've done up till now is pathetic, and they are a joke of a party.

Saying don't you dare to the Liberals only to then not actually do anything when they dare is laughable at this point.

I'm sure you would have totally considered voting for them if they hadn't entered the agreement with the Liberals.

[GGG]

I’d like the government to fall sooner rather than later to get over this PP government and someone else can take over the Liberals. Since Trudeau won’t quit like he should why wait.

I get why Singh isn’t calling an election as he would be worse off in terms of influence but for Canada getting the conservative years over with would be nice.

[chemgear]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828428222482018607

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828000749940269356

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828106776841236547

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828004542379639106

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by chemgear

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828428222482018607

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828000749940269356

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828106776841236547

https://twitter.com/user/status/1828004542379639106

Is this person not aware that a lot of employers bringing in TFWs and shacking them up 4-5 in a 1 bedroom apartment? 20 in a 3 bedroom house?

If they really want to make the argument that we don’t have enough housing to support the number of people being brought in they should probably present the data in a more accurate and less manipulative fashion.

The public didn’t really seem to care about this program or the exploitation until people started using it as a scapegoat for high rent/housing prices but I doubt many are going to bother boycotting businesses that have and are abusing the system for cheap and subservient labour.

This stuff stops when people choose to hold the businesses accountable, regardless of how the government decides to handle it. Unfortunately too many people seem more worried about the consumer costs associated with businesses paying Canadians a wage they’d actually work for than they are with all of the other negative consequences that stem from not doing so. Pick your poison. Do you want to pay an extra 50 cents for your Big Mac or an extra 50% for your house?

[opendoor]

Yeah, the entire anomaly in population growth is due to an increase in temporary residents that the government allowed in a panicked attempt to alleviate a labor shortage. Relating that to housing starts (which are more of a long-term thing) and comparing to other eras doesn't make a whole lot of sense unless you think nothing will be done to scale back the number of temporary residents.

If you exclude the growth in temporary residents (which can and should be reversed), Canada's population has grown by about 3.8% in the last 3 years, which is 1.25% a year. That's a totally sustainable number and about 2.5 people per housing start.

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

Is this person not aware that a lot of employers bringing in TFWs and shacking them up 4-5 in a 1 bedroom apartment? 20 in a 3 bedroom house?

If they really want to make the argument that we don’t have enough housing to support the number of people being brought in they should probably present the data in a more accurate and less manipulative fashion.

The public didn’t really seem to care about this program or the exploitation until people started using it as a scapegoat for high rent/housing prices but I doubt many are going to bother boycotting businesses that have and are abusing the system for cheap and subservient labour.

This stuff stops when people choose to hold the businesses accountable, regardless of how the government decides to handle it. Unfortunately too many people seem more worried about the consumer costs associated with businesses paying Canadians a wage they’d actually work for than they are with all of the other negative consequences that stem from not doing so. Pick your poison. Do you want to pay an extra 50 cents for your Big Mac or an extra 50% for your house?

Wait a second...where did Chemgear or the tweet he linked talk about TFW at all? Sounds like an extremely poor strawman argument.

Also on the bolded is an odd take. TFW was indeed a huge issue during the Harper days . So much so that Trudeau claimed that the Conservatives were destroying Canadian values and sought for a full reform, as a major part of his 2015 platform.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...says-1.2737422

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle11304229/

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/so-...mess-1.2626254

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...642e4eb7c.html

RW FRAUDs Stalk Me & Flag My Posts (because they're fascists)
August 16, 2014
How much more evidence does the electorate in this country need that exposes the harper govt's fascist tendencies?

Look at the comments in the CBC section. Ironic that even back then the radical left were branding Conservatives as fascists. Some things never change I guess.

And the main reason why the TFWP wasn't talked about much until recently...is because it was no longer a problem, and at first Trudeau did actually slow the TFW program when he first got elected. It's a newer issue that has started from the 2019 re-election (temporarily slowed because of Covid) that ramped up significantly since.



On the population growth breakdown.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/poi...owth-1.7308184

Non-permanent resident population more than doubles in 3 years
In the last three years, the number of non-permanent residents — a category that includes TFWs, international students and asylum seekers — has more than doubled from about 1.3 million in 2021 to nearly 2.8 million in the second quarter of this year, according to data compiled by Statistics Canada.

Of that figure, 1.3 million people are in Canada on work permits, a category that includes TFWs.

The low-wage TFW sector, which has admitted workers in food services but also in sectors such as construction and hospitals, has grown from 15,817 such workers in 2016 to 83,654 in 2023, according to federal data.

TFW is a very small subset of the overall picture.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by Firebot

TFW is a very small subset of the overall picture.

Yeah, the main source of growth in the temporary population comes down to 2 things:

1) Students, their families, and post-graduate work permit holders. That represents about 60% of the temporary population.

2) Ukrainian refugees, who represent about 20% of the growth in the last 3 years.

#2 is unavoidable and a necessary thing. But #1 is a result of decades of policies designed to encourage international students to come to the country to make up for underfunding post-secondary institutions. Successive governments made it easier and more attractive for international students to live and work in Canada, and as a result the number of international students in Canada doubled between the late '90s and 2008, doubled again from 2008 to 2014, doubled again from 2014 to 2021, and if left unchecked would be estimated to double yet again by 2027.

So this was a long time coming, though the government was definitely too slow to introduce caps.

[Harry Lime]

So, fixing (or at least altering) the temporary population is great and all, but isn't it skirting the real issue, which is the permanent population increase? Lowering the TFW issue doesn't even count as a bandaid. As Iggy pointed out, the exploitation of these workers was already keeping the negative effect on housing at bay, to some extent. Getting control of resource allocation would come from the PRes and immigration reform that is needed.

[opendoor]

The permanent population increase is totally reasonable and within historical norms, why would you want to curtail that? If we did, we'd need to be OK with one or more of the following happening:

1) Higher taxes

2) Bigger deficits

3) Reduction in pension, OAS, healthcare, etc.

Given our demographics, we need about 500K new primary residents through immigration each year to maintain our historical rate of labor force growth and that's roughly what the current targets are. Without that, then we just have an aging population that relies on a shrinking workforce to fund everything.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Firebot

Wait a second...where did Chemgear or the tweet he linked talk about TFW at all?

Nowhere. That’s exactly the point.

Sounds like an extremely poor strawman argument.

Straw man argument for what? I’m pointing out that the data presented leaves out important information that needs to be considered when determining the impacts of immigration on housing costs. I could have used a number of programs or factors as examples but chose that one since it’s been in the news lately.

A lot of people didn’t care about the TFWP’s impact on housing. At a quick glance even your examples(the globe and mail one is behind a paywall) don’t mention anything about housing. There have always been opponents to it due to the exploitation but the exploitation isn’t the reason we’ve seen a recent spike in opposition.

Also on the bolded is an odd take. TFW was indeed a huge issue during the Harper days . So much so that Trudeau claimed that the Conservatives were destroying Canadian values and sought for a full reform, as a major part of his 2015 platform.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...says-1.2737422

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle11304229/

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/so-...mess-1.2626254

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...642e4eb7c.html

Like I said nothing about housing from the opponents of the TFWP in those articles and no one is arguing that there was never any opposition to the program so we’ll just move on.

Look at the comments in the CBC section. Ironic that even back then the radical left were branding Conservatives as fascists. Some things never change I guess.

Can you clarify where on your imaginary spectrum does one go from say the moderate or light left to the RaDiCaL LeFt? I mean aside from being a random person calling someone fascist on the internet obviously.

And the main reason why the TFWP wasn't talked about much until recently...is because it was no longer a problem,

The same groups who opposed the program in your previous examples weren’t saying that.

and at first Trudeau did actually slow the TFW program when he first got elected. It's a newer issue that has started from the 2019 re-election (temporarily slowed because of Covid) that ramped up significantly since.

The only “new” issue with it is the blame it is currently getting for the cost of housing.

This chart doesn’t support your claim that the TFW program has ramped up all that significantly. At least not in relation to the overall immigration numbers, population growth or its historic percentage of the population. Yet for some reason suddenly it’s allegedly having a significant impact on housing prices.

On the population growth breakdown.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/poi...owth-1.7308184

TFW is a very small subset of the overall picture.

You seem to be arguing that the TFWP is both a new issue that needed to be addressed due to its recent “ramping up” having an impact on housing and it not being relevant enough to have a meaningful impact anyways.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by opendoor

The permanent population increase is totally reasonable and within historical norms, why would you want to curtail that? If we did, we'd need to be OK with one or more of the following happening:

1) Higher taxes

2) Bigger deficits

3) Reduction in pension, OAS, healthcare, etc.

Given our demographics, we need about 500K new primary residents through immigration each year to maintain our historical rate of labor force growth and that's roughly what the current targets are. Without that, then we just have an aging population that relies on a shrinking workforce to fund everything.

I wonder what a long term flattening of the demographic pyramid would look like. Say over the next 80 years we set immigration targets to create a demo graphic square and limit total Canadian population to 100 million. At some point as the world becomes more well off and educated birth rates drop off so eventually immigration won’t be a solution.

So a prudent country should be preparing for that over a long period of time rather than just kicking the can down the road. You will definitely need to increase CPP contributions (or perhaps just maintain as currently we are still repaying past under contributions). Health care costs go up dramatically and the percentage of costs from OAS go up too.

Buts it’s a reality that is coming within our children’s lifetimes.

[Doctorfever]

Steelworker goes viral after telling off Justin Trudeau in Sault Ste. Marie

https://torontosun.com/news/national...n-another-year

Trudeau’s visit to the city came following the government’s announcement that it will impose a 25% surtax on Chinese-made steel and aluminum, as well as EVs imported from the communist country.

But when Trudeau tried to boast about his new policies at Algoma Steel, which is one of the city’s largest employers, he was met by one disgruntled employee, who complained about his struggle to make ends meet.

In the footage, which was shot by CTV News on Friday, the unidentified man refused to shake Trudeau’s hand after the prime minister offered up some sweet treats.

I suspect Trudeau thought he would get a better reception. Has he completely lost the support of the workers?