Harper in China: we come bearing goodwill

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, February 7, 2012 at 7:13 AM - 0 Comments

The plane carrying Stephen Harper, a handful of cabinet ministers and backbenchers, and the bedraggled media had barely taken off from a refueling stop in Anchorage when we received the “tidbit” one of the PM’s men had promised: Mark Rowswell, the Canadian who is famous in Canada for being famous in China, has been named Canada’s Goodwill Ambassador to China. This is a big change of pace for Rowswell, who as you know was, until today, an emissary of fear and suspicion. Just kidding.

The PM’s flight landed an hour ago at Beijing airport. Reporters were hustled into little vans, which hurried downtown with speed I found surprising until I realized the police had blocked the road we were on to all traffic but our own. Spotted in the vicinity of our hotel: Versace, Subway, 7-11, and the Globe’s China correspondent, Mark MacKinnon.

It’s Tuesday night here, and the agenda includes sleep. Wednesday begins around the time you’ll be eating dinner, and the Prime Minister, whom none of us have yet seen, has a Canadian Tourism Commission event in the morning, followed by a one-hour meeting with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao.

Alice Wong’s China delegation

By Paul Wells - Monday, February 6, 2012 at 2:45 PM - 0 Comments

So who follows the Prime Minister to China anyway? There’s a selection of backbenchers, a handful of cabinet ministers, and about 40 business and community leaders whose names were given to us by the Prime Minister’s Office. Let’s have a look. Continue…

Wislawa Szymborska: We leave without the chance to practice

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at 11:16 PM - 0 Comments

The great Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska died today in Krakow. She won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996. The Gazeta Wyborcza website is, at this hour, draped in black, with tributes from Poland’s president, prime minister, foreign minister. Woody Allen is quoted — he apparently viewed a paper bouquet from Szymborska as a greater honour than the awards he makes a show of ignoring. The Gazeta’s headline is taken from this poem:

Die? One does not do that to a cat.

Because what’s a cat to do in an empty apartment?

Climb the walls.

Caress against the furniture.

It seems that nothing has changed here, but yet things are different. Continue…

China’s oil imports from Iran take a great leap forward

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at 3:35 PM - 0 Comments

From the Wall Street Journal:

BEIJING—China’s crude-oil imports from Iran last year were up 30% from 2010, to 27.76 million metric tons, China’s General Administration of Customs reported Saturday. That works out to about 557,000 barrels a day.

China’s overall crude imports were up just 6.1%.

That 557,000 barrels a day is about 10% more than Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline would send to the B.C. coast, although it’s unlikely Gateway would export only to China.

Angela Merkel, in China this week, will urge Beijing to cut oil imports from Iran. U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner delivered the same message on a trip two weeks ago.

Stephen Harper leaves for China next Monday.

Harper and pensions: the choices you make

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 at 1:36 PM - 0 Comments

“There are tough, important choices that must be made,” Stephen Harper wrote to his caucus 16 days ago. All righty then. Let’s talk about choices and Old Age Security. One thing I’m going to resist doing is handing out white hats and black hats. There are fewer heroes and villains in this story than, well, choices.

Here (.pdf) is the Ninth Actuarial Report on the Old Age Security Program As At 31 December 2009, tabled before Parliament three months ago. The government says it took a look at that report and had a fright. “Demographic changes will have a major impact on the ratio of workers to retirees,” it says, with the result that “Total annual expenditures are projected to increase… from $36.5 billion in 2010 to… $108 billion by 2030.”

Out went the talking points. The cost of the program will triple! Something must be done! They were more reticent about the next paragraph, which says cost of the program as a fraction of GDP is projected to rise from 2.3% in 2010 to 3.1% in 2030, before declining after that. So 2030 will indeed be a high-water mark in the entire history of the OAS program’s cost, but it’s not really a tripling because everything, including our ability to pay, will have increased in the meantime.

Still, big bump up. Point taken. But then there’s this. Here’s (.pdf) the Second Actuarial Report on the Old Age Security Program As At 31 December 1991, tabled in Parliament on Feb. 7, 1994 — about the time a 34-year-old rookie Reform MP named Stephen Harper would have been getting used to his new job. That report said the total annual cost of OAS would grow from $34 billion in 2010 (it’s in the chart on page 4) to $119 billion in 2030. An even bigger increase than the one projected by the most recent report, but pretty much the same scale. And indeed, on Page 3, that actuary 19 years ago picked 2030 as the peak date for the cost of the OAS program.

Demographics doesn’t change radically from year to year. So anyone reading the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th or 8th Actuarial Reports on the Old Age Security Program would have seen the same trend lines that the government says spurred it to action now. Never mind last May’s election — this could have been an issue in any of the last six federal elections. (As we’ll see, and as many of you already know, it sort of was, once early on.) There quite literally could not possibly have been more warning.

So that’s one thing.

Then there’s this. Continue…

Maybe it’s the health-care house that’s burning, not the pension house

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 at 12:23 AM - 0 Comments

This one’s making the rounds tonight:

“Governments in large developed economies will face ‘ballooning’ debt levels and rating downgrades if they don’t act quickly to limit the impact on their budgets of rising healthcare costs, Standard & Poor’s Corp. warned Tuesday.

“…while a number of governments are taking action [on] rising pension costs, few have attempted to reform healthcare provision to achieve the same goal.

“S&P said that without any change in policy, it would start to cuts its ratings of developed-country governments from 2015, moves that would affect ‘a number of highly rated sovereigns.’…

“‘Healthcare spending represents the majority of the total increase in age-related spending in more than half of the G-20 advanced economies,’ it said.

“That group includes France, the U.K., the U.S., Japan, Canada and Italy…”

You should read the whole story. Some of it is less discouraging.

Today’s fodder for conversation

By Paul Wells - Monday, January 30, 2012 at 8:37 AM - 0 Comments

Pollster Jean-Marc Léger: “The race to succeed Jack Layton is much too long.”

Jack Layton’s last letter to Canadians: “I recommend the party hold a leadership vote as early as possible in the New Year…”

Yes, I truncated the sentence. The original left plenty of room for interpretation. And the party was, and should have been, free to set its own schedule. But who believes the NDP interpreted correctly, and who likes the schedule now?

While we’re on it: How does the Liberals’ decision to wait three times as long as the NDP look?

Sarkozy’s campaign director: Angela Merkel

By Paul Wells - Sunday, January 29, 2012 at 11:07 PM - 0 Comments

In one of the elaborate prime-time TV interviews with selected interrogators that are a staple of French presidential politics, Nicolas Sarkozy tonight put his fate in the hands of Angela Merkel. He announced a modest increase in, basically, the country’s GST — to kick in after April’s presidential election — to pay for reductions in business taxes to stimulate employment. That was a key feature of Merkel’s economic policy, designed to make it cheaper for employers to hire. He waved his hands a lot and alluded, in vaguer terms, to much tougher reforms implemented by Merkel’s predecessor, Gerhard Schröder, in 2004.

No analyst could miss the point: Germany is Sarkozy’s model now, and the perennially unpopular Sarkozy is following in the inexhaustibly popular Merkel’s footsteps.

But that wasn’t even the most extraordinary news in German-French relations this weekend, not even close. No, the most extraordinary news is that Merkel will campaign actively in France for Sarkozy’s re-election, going so far as to attend campaign rallies at his side.  Continue…

If only…

By Paul Wells - Sunday, January 29, 2012 at 10:11 PM - 0 Comments

I worry sometimes that the New York Times’ Tom Friedman is blowing a lot of his advantage as a columnist by spending too much time telling readers what should happen and not enough time telling them what’s happening. It’s always easier to write “If only” columns because you can ignore all the annoying reasons why people don’t behave according to your ideal. The resulting made-up people are invariably more boring than real people. If I read one more bit of made-up fantasy dialogue Friedman has written for a Middle East leader, I’m going to plotz. But this, from the bottom of today’s column, sure caught my eye:

If only — if only — we could come together on a national strategy to enhance and expand all of our natural advantages: more immigration, most post-secondary education, better infrastructure, more government research, smart incentives for spurring millions of start-ups — and a long-term plan to really fix our long-term debt problems — nobody could touch us. We’re that close.

Immigration, research, start-up incentives, and a long-term debt plan? Compare that list with the items in Stephen Harper’s Davos speech.

Katie Malloch retires

By Paul Wells - Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 6:50 PM - 0 Comments

I was at the Rex Hotel in Toronto last week for the first time in ages and I was surprised to see a mention in the club’s schedule for a “Katie Malloch Farewell Event” coming up this Wednesday. I checked, and it’s true: the host of CBC Radio 2′s Tonic (and, more significantly, the host for 23 years of Jazz Beat) is retiring at the end of March.

It’s impossible to express how much she’ll be missed by Canadian jazz musicians and fans. She has been den mother to the whole community, coast to coast, for decades. To be blunt about things, she’s already missed to some extent, and has been ever since the boneheads at Radio 2 made her give up Jazz Beat for Tonic, on which she is required to play a certain amount of disposable fizzy lounge-lizard chantoosie fare. It’s still impressive how much real music she manages to sneak past the bouncers, but clearly she has had enough of it and she is going off to well-earned rest with her family. Continue…

Major Harper: Long time coming

By Paul Wells - Friday, January 27, 2012 at 12:59 AM - 0 Comments

I don’t want to make too much fun of the Allies-on-Juno-beach tone with which the Globe covers Stephen Harper’s Davos speech…

After five years of minority governments, Stephen Harper finally has the freedom to act.

He’s no longer looking at the limited horizon of the next budget or the next election. He’s planning on transforming Canada for a generation or more. This is Stephen Harper’s blueprint for reform.

..Because I’ve been arguing for weeks that at least as far as Harper’s concerned, Harper is up to something big. But in the interest of perspective, it’s worth reminding everyone that in almost every particular, the Davos Blueprint (shots of men in black suits and Ray-Bans handing a steel briefcase from hand to hand) consists of things that were in the works during his five years of minority governments. Continue…

Harper reaches the age of major-ity

By Paul Wells - Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 4:49 PM - 0 Comments

The prime minister spoke in Davos today and promised major this and major that. A highlight of his remarks:

“But we will do more, much more. In the months to come our Government will undertake major transformations to position Canada for growth over the next generation.”

This continues a trend we’ve been following here at macleans.ca, and perhaps it’d be good to sum up the story to date. Continue…

That’s Western University to you

By Paul Wells - Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 1:43 PM - 0 Comments

Let’s begin with an annoying autobiographical pause: I studied at the University of Western Ontario. Well, “studied.” Anyway, onward:

There ‘s much fuss among alumni over the news that Western is changing its name, for most day-to-day purposes, to Western. Or Western University. Or Western University Canada.

What it won’t call itself, in colloquial use, is the University of Western Ontario. That remains the place’s legal name, but it won’t be the name Western travels with.

This is all causing a certain amount of consternation among people with a link to Western and, I think it’s fair to say, to people who follow branding exercises with a certain healthy amount of skepticism. Objections I heard this morning include:

1. This is dumb. Everyone calls it Western already.

2. This is dumb. It’s in Eastern Canada.

3. This is dumb. It’s in Southern Ontario.

To me, it’s not as dumb, but its cleverness takes a bit of explaining. Continue…

Canada’s cities (well, some of them) against Europe trade deal

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 6:51 PM - 0 Comments

A group called the Quebec Network on Continental Integration has posted the latest documents from the negotiations toward a Comprehensive Enhanced Trade Agreement (CETA) between Canada and the European Union. This led to a Presse Canadienne story tonight (in French) pointing out what was already pretty obvious, but still intriguing: that if a deal goes ahead, it will require provincial governments and municipalities, which are provincial creatures, to open bidding for government contracts to European firms.

So if you’re the Corporation of the Town of Hypothetical and you want to but out a contract for stationery supplies, or rapid transit, or whatever, you must permit European firms to compete on an equal footing with local contractors of long standing. The ones that employ your electors. The ones that may have donated to your campaign. Continue…

NDP plummets in Quebec, up three points

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 2:26 PM - 0 Comments

A cautionary tale about polling. La Presse is on fire this morning with news of horrible performance by the NDP in Quebec. A CROP poll has the party down to 29% in Quebec, its lead over the second-place party diminished from 14 points to 5 since December. This would seem to make my blog post from December germane again. The one about how the NDP, which has more than half of its caucus in Quebec, now has to pick a leader to “consolidate” a “hold” on Quebec that is becoming less and less of a hold.

But then I note that the December blog post was based on a Harris Decima poll that had the NDP at 26%. Three points lower than their current low-water mark in the CROP poll.  Continue…

Major Harper and the Reforms

By Paul Wells - Monday, January 23, 2012 at 12:16 PM - 0 Comments

In an interview with Emmanuelle Latraverse to mark the 6th anniversary of his 2006 election victory, Stephen Harper hints at some of the “major” initiatives he was describing before Christmas. There’s also some more specific language on health transfers. Highlights:

On what he means by “major” reforms: “The main preoccupation of this government is the creation of growth and jobs for Canadians. Not only during this global crisis but over the long term. We face very important challenges, especially demographic challenges. We’re examining all our policies. Not only the budget situation, but also research and development — we had a panel on that — on immigration, on the pension system, on regulation.”

On health transfers: “The basis of our approach on health care is to respect provincial jurisdictions. …We’re the first government in history that doesn’t intend to balance its budget by cutting transfers to the provinces. On the contrary… growth will remain predictable and stable over the long term.” Continue…

Farewell, then, Lazaridis and Balsillie

By Paul Wells - Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 10:58 PM - 0 Comments

It’s actually closer to say Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie, the co-CEOs of Research in Motion, are taking a big step away from the spotlight as they hand over CEO duties to a German guy named Thorsten Heins. Balsillie, the slim guy who (theoretically) took care of the business side, will remain a director of the company. Lazaridis, the silver-haired tech and ideas guy, will lead a new “innovation committee” of the board. But yeah, basically they’re no longer in control of the company’s direction. Continue…

Gilles Duceppe: Uh, nope

By Paul Wells - Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 3:11 PM - 0 Comments

The former Bloc Québécois leader was, oddly, seen in some quarters to be the best bet to replace Pauline Marois as Parti Québécois leader. Nobody ever really explained why losing all but 2 oops, 4 of his party’s federal seats made him a sure winner provincially, but nonetheless there was a lot of speculation that a coup was imminent.

Then yesterday La Presse reported that Duceppe spent 7 years paying his party’s director-general from a taxpayer-funded budget envelope reserved for parliamentary staff.

Today Duceppe announced he’s going to work full-time clearing his reputation and has no time for politics.

I feel a bit bad that I didn’t tell you about all of this last week, when it was still possible to wring a little suspense out of the whole situation. Now it’s too late, and all I can tell you is you didn’t miss much.

Hey look: the vast left-wing conspiracy covers the vast right-wing conspiracy

By Paul Wells - Friday, January 20, 2012 at 12:03 PM - 0 Comments

We’re brimming over with fresh bitumen this week at Maclean’s, where I’ve got a story connecting the Harper government with the Ethical Oil movement, and Colleague Nancy Macdonald has another one, perhaps more significant over the medium term, pointing out that one reason why the government is so eager to pick fights with shady foreign billionaires and oil sheikhs is that that’s easier than defeating northern British Columbia aboriginal communities.

A few people are demanding that I give due credit to some blogs that have already pointed out the connections between, especially, Conservative strategist and website host Hamish Marshall and the PMO. I’m happy to acknowledge that there’s been a lot of coverage of those connections, from Emma Pullman, Vancouver Observer, Deep Climate, The Tyee and probably others. I had a bad few minutes on Monday when I saw that Huffington Post even had a chart, because we’d just put my story to bed with its own chart. I daresay our chart is funnier. But none of my reporting comes from these sources; I got at the Marshall-Marshall-Velshi-Levant daisy chain by asking Conservatives who knew Conservatives.

Aglukkaq’s letter to provincial health ministers: slip-slidin’ away

By Paul Wells - Thursday, January 19, 2012 at 10:53 PM - 0 Comments

PostMedia’s Jason Fekete is a good reporter who writes about serious things, so I’m a little nervous to note I read Leona Aglukkaq’s new letter to provincial health ministers pretty much the opposite of the way he reads it. Maybe I’ve got it wrong. Wouldn’t be the first time. Let’s go through it.

Fekete says Aglukkaq is “calling for more teamwork” and “urging the provinces” to adopt a national approach to measuring health outcomes and “proposing greater collaboration.” An activist, what. Before I explain why I read it differently, I’ll point out that at least Fekete and PostMedia think a statement from the federal health minister on health transfers is worth covering. I sure do think they’re right on that, and at this hour they don’t have a lot of company.

Anyway. Aglukkaq’s letter is short enough to run in full. Here you go: Continue…

Harper and U.S. protectionism: a trip down memory lane

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:25 PM - 0 Comments

On May 28, 2002, the House of Commons debated a supply motion from the opposition Canadian Alliance: “That this House has lost confidence in the government for its failure to persuade the US government to end protectionist policies…”

Stephen Harper rose to speak. “Mr. Speaker, this will be my first speech as the leader of Her Majesty’s official opposition,” he said. He offered the customary thanks to his electors and the people of Alberta, before shifting gears. “I do not have a lot of time so I want to focus instead on the issue we chose for today’s supply debate, which perhaps is the most important issue that ever faces Canada: our relationship with the United States and in particular the increasingly troubled relationship we have on the trade front.”

The motion of the day referred to softwood and agriculture disputes. “To this I could easily add a third, energy,” Harper said, “the issue of pipeline movement of Alaskan gas reserves to the lower 48.” Or a forth, border restrictions.

“The question we must ask is why this has occurred. Why do we find ourselves victims of protectionist, isolationist and unilateralist sentiments from the United States? Why are Canadian interests being systematically ignored in Washington?”

“In fairness,” Harper was willing to acknowledge ”the reality of the United States’ domestic political interests, this being an important election year in the United States.” But there was another reason: ”the consistent and complete inability of the present Canadian government to make our case to American authorities, to congress and especially to the Bush administration.”

Why was there a secretariat for the Asia-Pacific in Foreign Affairs but none for the United States? Why all the trade missions to China? The reason, Harper said, was the Jean Chrétien had never been a free trader. “The Prime Minister went back to the future. He tried to revive the failed trade diversification of the 1970s, the Trudeau government’s so-called third option strategy, which did not work then and is not working now.”

What was missing, Harper said, was a proper working relationship between the Prime Minister and the President. He quoted former Canadian ambassador to Washington Allan Gotlieb: “Without the Prime Minister in play, the president will not be in play.”

Here, at last, it is possible to see real light showing between the Prime Minister Harper was criticizing in 2002 and the one he has become in 2012. The reason Chrétien wasn’t taken seriously in Bush’s Washington, he said, was because Chrétien was soft on a bunch of security questions.

“It should not be surprising that when Canadian ministers suddenly show up in Washington and demand something be done about softwood duties or agriculture many high level American decision makers do not pay much attention.”

So now what? “On this I will make a very controversial observation. When it comes to United States-Canada relations, the government has much to learn from former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.

“Whatever Mr. Mulroney’s shortcomings… he understood a fundamental truth. He understood that mature and intelligent Canadian leaders must share the following perspective: the United States is our closest neighbour, our best ally, our biggest customer and our most consistent friend. Whatever else, we forget these things at our own peril.”

The new opposition leader wrapped up his argument, the first he wanted to make on the subject he had selected in his parliamentary debut as a national party leader: “We will be unable to get the U.S. administration on board unless whoever is in the White House and leading members of congress value and respect what our Prime Minister brings to the table.”

Keystone: The Prime Minister and the President chat

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 3:32 PM - 0 Comments

From the PMO press office:

“Earlier this afternoon, Prime Minister Stephen Harper received a phone call from Barack Obama, President of the United States. President Obama informed the Prime Minister of his Administration’s decision to turn down TransCanada’s application to build and operate the Keystone XL pipeline.

“The President explained that the decision was not a decision on the merits of the project and that it was without prejudice, meaning that TransCanada is free to re-apply. Prime Minister Harper expressed his profound disappointment with the news. He indicated to President Obama that he hoped that this project would continue given the significant contribution it would make to jobs and economic growth both in Canada and the United States of America.

“ The Prime Minister reiterated to the President that Canada will continue to work to diversify its energy exports.”

Political editor

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, January 17, 2012 at 4:40 PM - 0 Comments

There’s been some chatter on Twitter to the effect that I’ll be the new Political Editor at Maclean’s, effective immediately. (Actually, effective last week, but we couldn’t announce it yet. That’s what I was doing at the story meeting last Wednesday, colleagues!)

Here’s what the job entails.  Continue…

Stephen Harper’s letter on the economy

By Paul Wells - Monday, January 16, 2012 at 11:42 AM - 0 Comments

Last night I posted the Prime Minister’s letter to Conservative MPs on the economy, which you may still not have seen because it received, judging from a quick Google News search, one-twentieth the coverage the election of Mike Crawley as Liberal party president got. Which makes sense, of course, because a sitting PM controls only $200 billion in program spending, whereas Mike Crawley beat Sheila Copps.

But onward. The timing of the Harper letter is obviously opportunistic: it’s designed to emphasize that Harper is Focused on the Economy—quick shot of the leader working late at the Langevin Block, pool of light from his single desk lamp his only defence against the gloom—whereas the Liberals want to legalize pot. The mise en scène is maybe a bit too obvious to be effective.

But there is also information in the letter, so let’s have a look.  Continue…