Alberta’s distorted view of their own political cultureTEST

Albertans have a distorted view of their political environment right down to what their “typical” fellow citizen is like.

While the origins and persistence of Alberta’s political culture are interesting, its impact on public policy has attracted less attention, even though it shapes voters and influences the type of government they receive.

Our Common Ground team has surveyed thousands of residents and held focus groups throughout the province over the past four years. The first thing we ask group participants is to “draw me an Albertan.” The results of hundreds of drawings are clear: Albertans are more likely than not to picture a cowboy, a farmer or an oil rig worker.

Nearly a dozen of these focus groups consisted of only women. Another in Lethbridge featured a roomful of recent immigrants from Africa. The result was the same. They choose a white, male, middle-aged, blue-collar worker from a rural area. “Joe” is the most common name they applied to him.

Of the dozens of sessions we’ve led, only two groups settled on a woman as a typical Albertan — but even then she is married to an oil and gas worker such as “Joe.”

As ubiquitous as it is, this image doesn’t match with demographics.

Calgary Stampede season aside, an Albertan is far more likely to bump into a teacher or nurse than a cowboy. Indigenous and racialized communities are growing quickly relative to the white population. More than 80 per cent of Albertans live in urban or suburban areas and the largest proportion of them work in the service industry. Yet the cowboy myth persists.

There are many reasons for this. Frontier masculinity has been baked into Alberta’s political DNA through decades of school curriculum, government branding campaigns and election rhetoric. To some extent, many of the people arriving in Alberta in record numbers are attracted to a narrative based on “freedom” or are at least not repelled by it.

This freedom-based political culture masks moderate and progressive tendencies in the electorate. It makes politicians less likely to choose certain policy options and voters less likely to support politicians who advocate for them. It stifles policy innovation or discussion of progressive solutions to big challenges such as climate change, the drug-poisoning crisis and the decline of public education.

The typical Albertan

We’ve paired our Common Ground focus groups with biannual surveys. Led by my colleague, Feodor Snagovsky, these Viewpoint Alberta polls allow us to assess the gap between who Albertans are as individuals versus how they see themselves as a community.

One set of questions asks people to place themselves and the “average Albertan” – whom we can imagine as “Joe” from the focus groups — on a standard political spectrum on which zero means very left wing and 10 means very right wing.

The results have been consistent since we started asking the question in 2021: Albertans are closer to the centre than they imagine “Joe” to be.

There is room to debate the validity of the left-right spectrum to gauge an ideological position. In this instance, however, respondents are using the same spectrum to compare themselves to the person they perceive to be an “average Albertan.” The fact there is a 12-per-cent gap suggests that Albertans are closer to the political centre than they see their province to be.

Indeed, when asked which terms capture their own political identities, more than half of Albertans tick the “moderate” box (56 per cent). This is higher than both “progressive” (50 per cent) and “conservative” (45 per cent). Participants could select more than one description for themselves.

These disparities also show up in policy issues.

Contrary to the image of their province as a conservative bastion, Albertans are relatively progressive on moving the economy away from oil and gas, maintaining access to safe consumption sites and cutting off public funds to private schools. On all three, support outstripped opposition in a January 2024 Viewpoint Alberta survey.

Yet Albertans fail to see the same level of consensus. Whereas 44 per cent of those surveyed said they either strongly or somewhat supported “transitioning Alberta’s economy away from oil and gas,” when asked to estimate the level of popular support for the transition, the average Albertan pegs it at 28 per cent.

The difference is even larger when it comes to “allowing safe consumption sites to continue operating,” with actual support more than double perceived support. Likewise, while more than half of participants favoured “eliminating provincial funding of private schools,” estimated support was 37 per cent.

We also asked participants if they agreed with proposed changes by the United Conservative Party government that would include schools needing parental approval before allowing students under 16 to change their preferred pronouns.

Some 57 per cent of those surveyed supported mandatory disclosure — up from 13 points from our summer 2023 survey. Yet 69 per cent of the same respondents thought the “typical Albertan” supported the policy.

Albertans appear better at estimating mainstream public opinion on issues core to the UCP government’s agenda. For example, 20 per cent of Albertans supported “further privatizing the health-care system,” just three points lower than the perceived average. Support levels for a provincial police service and pension plan were likewise very low — and Albertans know it.

This presents a large challenge to the government if it wants to advance these plans. It must not only change the minds of voters, but also shift perceptions around the mainstream view.

Political culture and policy stasis

The survey results show the importance of considering actual and perceived levels of public support when considering policy change. As outlined in the Overton window concept, policymakers are less likely to advance a policy initiative when they think it is offside with public opinion or the prevailing norms embedded in the political culture.

Consider the following reported encounter during the COVID-19 pandemic. On Nov. 28, 2020, a social media user recorded the following exchange with Tyler Shandro, who at the time was Alberta’s minister of health. The conversation happened outside a Calgary coffee shop and there were supporting photos attesting to the exchange.

Wearing a mask himself, Shandro was asked why he didn’t support a province-wide mask mandate. His constituent reported that the health minister responded: “What do I say to the guy in Cold Lake?” The constituent added: “Apparently our provincial policy is based on what you tell ‘the guy in Cold Lake.’” The exchange went viral in Alberta, trending for several days.

Shandro would have been aware of the science behind the effectiveness of mask mandates in stopping the spread of COVID-19. He would also have been aware of polls at the time showing Albertans overwhelmingly favoured masking. Yet concern over how an everyman such as “the guy in Cold Lake” would react kept him from advancing the policy.

The health minister’s idea of the typical Albertan was not far off our own research. More than a few of our participants’ drawings featured small-town men from places such as Cold Lake. In this sense, the power of the perceived typical Albertan holds sway beyond the cabinet room.

Albertans who underestimate support for a particular policy issue – such as energy transition, safe drug supply or redirecting funds away from police or private schools – are less likely to speak in favour of their own position for fear of being labeled extreme. In this “spiral of silence,” they may dismiss candidates or parties that advance those policies.

Public opinion and political culture are not synonymous. Unbeknownst to many, popular attitudes may conflict with age-old conceptions of what is acceptable to say, do or think in a particular political community. When they do, it is important to shine light on the discrepancies so that policymakers and the public can properly assess the right course of action.

Methodology

Under principal investigator Dr. Feodor Snagovsky, Viewpoint Alberta conducted an online survey from Jan. 22 to Feb. 25, 2024, among a representative sample of 1,213 Alberta adults through Leger. The figures are weighted by age, gender and region, according to census data. A copy of the questionnaire is found here. When measuring “perceived” public support for various policy initiatives, we took a pair of approaches. For pronoun mandates, the carbon tax, safe consumption sites, and police budgets, we asked respondents: “To what extent do you think the typical Albertan supports or opposes these policies?” We then combined responses of “strongly support” and “somewhat support” to arrive at the “perceived” figure. For pensions, policing, tax collection, oil and gas transition, PST, privatizing health care and private schools, we asked respondents: “What percentage of Albertans do you think at least somewhat supports the following policies?” We then took the average response as the “perceived” figure.

Reality, not religion, is the reason people need MAiD-free health careTEST

“On the question of religious hospitals, despite being a lesbian couple, Patricia and I would tolerate life-size crucifixes in the treatment room if it meant being safe from MAiD.” ~ Catherine Frazee, professor emerita at the School of Disability Studies at Metropolitan University, former chief commissioner of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, and co-founder of Disability Filibuster.

Disabled people often talk about being made invisible. This feeling is particularly striking around issues that are specific to us like MAiD, medical assistance in dying. The lobbyists and proponents for Canada’s MAiD regime routinely mischaracterize or, more often, omit mention of disabled people or our reasons for opposition entirely.

Consistent with this, Jocelyn Downie and Daphne Gilbert ridiculed B.C. Health Minister Adrian Dix’s plan for a clinical space for MAiD to be created next to a MAiD-free hospital in Vancouver. In their recent Policy Options article, they call the planned connecting hallway a “corridor of sin” and accuse the minister of making a plan that is church-centred, not patient-centred.

Some health-care providers see MAiD-free spaces as working environments that allow them to respect their conscience and adhere to their professional understanding of doing no harm.

Disabled patients, however, have expressed different reasons for wanting MAiD-free health-care settings.

To start with, we should have the right to receive medical care in places and from people who do not contemplate or participate in killing disabled people as part of a care plan.

Who wants to look up at a doctor from a hospital bed and wonder if they have just deliberately ended the life of someone with a similar condition? Or to overhear conversations in hallways, waiting rooms, nursing stations or on the other side of a curtain, about how a lethal injection preserved a relative’s dignity before she – gasp – became incontinent, like me.

The toll of ableism

The only MAiD-free spaces left are in faith-based facilities. This is a result of vigorous lobbying by well-funded and privileged groups, and the abandonment of disabled people.

Quebec prevents the creation of MAiD-free spaces, something the Quebec Archbishop is fighting in court. A B.C. hospice that chose to remain MAiD-free had its funding cut by the provincial government.

Deep convictions and deep pockets are needed to fight the MAiD lobby.

Many disabled people can remember a time in their lives when they would or could have agreed to MAiD had it been suggested to them. The reason for this unfortunate common bond is ableism.

A brief and widely adopted definition of ableism Fiona Kumari Campbell explains it as “a network of beliefs, processes and practices that produces a particular kind of self and body…that is projected as perfect and species-typical, and therefore essential and fully human.”

As a result, disability “is cast as a diminished state of being human.” It is a short journey from believing disability makes you less human to thinking that it is better to be dead than disabled.

Ableism in Canada is structural, codified, and acts as the rebar in our economy, politics, and culture. It defines and designs access to resources, services, public space, education, housing, health and health care, employment, and fundamental human rights.

Ableism affects how others perceive and treat us and how we perceive ourselves and our experiences. In this way ableism informs how our suffering is interpreted, making causal links that are not supported by evidence.

Podcast | Inequality and Disability Justice

When is suicide considered “rational”?

Medical ableism is often presented as “common sense” instead of bias, University of Alberta professor Heidi Janz says. Part of what allows it to remain unexamined is it exists within a larger contested framework referred to as the medical model of disability. In this model, disability is defined as deficiency, tragedy, and the opposite of health. Suffering is assumed and, because disability is understood entirely as a problem with an individual’s body, knowledge, power, and authority are placed within the medical field.

The result of this is our entire humanity is compressed into our diagnoses. There is no examination of the inherent political oppression or the bias in treatment because the medical model assumes the inequity disabled people experience is a logical result of being disabled.

This also incidentally is one of the many reasons MAiD assessors are ill-equipped to identify social suffering and solutions.

Health-care professionals have a lot of power over disabled people. For many of us, a physician’s signature governs far more than our essential medical care. It determines most aspects of our lives: housing, access to transportation, income, education, recreation, mobility, and other equipment.

That signature is shaped by their perception of us, which is shaped by how well we align with their judgment of us as a “good patient.” In recent years, medicine has moved away from the use of the word compliant to describe whether patients follow medical advice. Now they talk about adherence. But whichever word they use, the power imbalance remains, and patients and family are hesitant to ask questions or raise concerns. As well, in most interactions, patients have just 11 seconds to speak before a physician interrupts them, research has shown.

Physicians conflate disability with suffering. Some bioethicists have likened disabled people to “happy slaves” for daring to suggest that disability is not a synonym for misery. Physicians consistently rate disabled people’s quality of life lower than disabled people themselves do. This is called the disability paradox.

The contagion of MAiD

MAiD contagion is already happening. I have been doing research with FAFIA as part of York University’s Creating Spaces project. I listened to stories of disabled women and non-binary people. In one focus group of six people, two had experienced suicidal ideation for the first time because of MAiD and the promotion around it, and in particular its expansion to disabled people who are not dying.

The deluge of emotionally charged MAiD coverage is driven primarily by stories crafted or at least aided by the public relations and lobby efforts by proponents. As part of its recent campaign, Dying with Dignity, a national organization that campaigns for the expansion and liberalization of MAiD, emailed supporters urging them to submit opinion pieces to media organizations and offered the help of its communications team.

The CEO of Dying with Dignity has met with senators and members of Parliament in official lobbying capacity 41 times in the last 12 months. The charity also employs lobbyists at Blackbird Communications.

In a public-relations war, money can create even more imbalance than it does in a courtroom.

But much of the media coverage of MAiD runs counter to the World Health Organization’s guidelines for responsible reporting on suicide. The WHO warns against spreading suicide contagion through prominent placement of stories about suicide, by normalizing it or presenting it as a constructive solution to problems, and by explicitly describing the method used.

Perhaps a lot of the coverage of MAiD ignores contagion protocols because MAiD is a euphemism for assisted suicide or euthanasia.

Chronically ill and disabled Canadians need a say in health-care reforms

Dismantling systemic ableism in health research

Downie and Gilbert focus on St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver and offer an anonymous doctor’s fictional scenario of what they imagine a patient might experience while being transferred to another setting to access MAiD. They use the term “forced transfer.”

A former executive director of Dying with Dignity said in a 2019 statement of claim that it was her “creative-thinking” that is responsible for the “ground-breaking” term. The statement was part of an Ontario lawsuit in which the public-relations value of the term was highlighted, noting it has been adopted “nationally and internationally by academics, clinicians, lawyers, and others in the right to die movement.”

Patients are transferred every day to access care, equipment or expertise that is not available where they are.

And it is striking that the term “forced transfer” is selectively applied to MAiD and not, for example, patients forced to move to long-term care facilities not of their choosing, on threat of being billed $400/day by the government if they refuse.

Instead of fiction written by a physician imagining what a patient might feel, I have a real story about real events told by the person who really experienced them.

The deterioration of care

In 2009, before MAiD was legalized, I was living in North Vancouver. Since the onset of my rare neuromuscular disease several years prior I had been seen by an assortment of specialists at three different hospitals. Approximately two years of that time was spent in search of diagnosis for the multiple and worsening symptoms. At first, I thought I was just run down following a virus, but a turning point was when I had to be helped out of the community centre pool by a lifeguard because I couldn’t catch my breath a quarter of the way into my first lap. Over time, I transitioned from trail runner to using a cane, then walker and eventually a wheelchair. Simultaneously I transformed from being perceived as normal but sick to disabled and “unfixable” – and fat because of the corticosteroids.

No longer able to work and unable to access benefits due to eligibility criteria that declared me a dependent of the boyfriend I had been living with, my economic situation deteriorated.

Soon, my care changed, too. Nurses stopped complimenting me on my shoes, asking about my work, and telling me not to give up. The new answer to every question was a shrug and “you’re disabled.” It took three trips to two different hospitals and a tense standoff to finally be diagnosed and treated for deep-vein thrombosis and a pulmonary embolism following an intravenous immunoglobulin treatment (IVIG).

Meanwhile my condition created a smorgasbord of symptoms and managing one would sometimes worsen or create another. There were complications, “atypical presentations,” systemic infections, superbugs, and an ever-growing list of prescriptions sometimes accompanied by allergic reactions and serious side effects. I was a “high-cost health-care user.” The term is used to describe the five per cent of health-care users who are said to account for nearly two-thirds of health-care costs.

I sensed a growing defeatism among those providing me with care. But I was certain that the danger was at least partially a result of the health-care system’s siloed and almost exclusive focus on the latest acute crisis made worse by under-funding and embedded bias.

With each hospitalization, staff would do just enough to be able to send me home to die.

In between hospital stays, home-care aids and nurses would provide care.

One day I asked one of the visiting nurses if there wasn’t anyone anywhere who would put some effort into trying to prolong my life.

She said that she’d had some other patients like me (who had been given up on). Some had tried St. Paul’s and swore the care there was different. She told me it was probably my last hope.

She was right. St. Paul’s did save my life when others had given up and left me to die and by the time I finally found a way to get there, I was dying.

Unfortunately, no place is free of ableism. St. Paul’s was not the first place someone in a health-care setting told me it would be better if I died sooner rather than later, but it was the first time I was asked to indicate my agreement by signing on the dotted line.

A hospital employee carrying a box of tissues and a clipboard came to my room. After closing the door, she put her hand on mine and expressed her “sincere sadness” for my situation. She raised that my above-mentioned boyfriend had announced he was leaving me shortly after I had been admitted and this meant I would be without money or housing.

She told me I had been through so much and deserved to rest. The rest she was offering me was permanent. She urged me to sign a do-not-resuscitate order.

I declined.

We went back and forth as her veneer of concern peeled away. She was angry. She said she could not understand why I would want to go on living. I told her to get out of my room. I can still see the disgust in her eyes. I hope she can still see the rage in mine.

When the specialist came into my room, I grabbed his hand and told him that I wanted a chance to live. I asked him to please do more than patch me up just enough to make it out of the parking lot. The next day he said he would do everything he could to help me if I agreed to do whatever he told me to do.

We shook on it.

I was at St. Paul’s for nine months. It is too long of a story to share all the good that happened – and all that was lost or undone by the policies of the rehabilitation hospital I was sent to afterward. Not to mention a subsequent denial of treatment.

But 15 years later, I am still alive.

Throughout my long stay at St. Paul’s, there was an Indigenous woman down the hall who had been there longer than me. She had decorated her walls with art and blankets from home. There was a man who was a patient for many months. He had been living outside and had developed a skin infection. His whole body was bandaged.

These were people I had not seen in other hospitals. They were marginalized people who needed more time and more care due to the lack of supports available to them in the community and due to the social and political determinants of health that caused or contributed to their health crises. At St. Paul’s, no one ever asked me if I was Catholic. I never saw a priest or nun. No one brought up religion.

At a follow-up appointment with the specialist I showed him a photo of me on a sailboat. He smiled and then his expression became more serious. He explained that a medication I had been prescribed for years had been, in essence, poisoning me. “You were dying when I met you,” he said. “I know,” I said. I thanked him for not giving up on me.

I knew from the nurses that he had fought to keep me in hospital as long as he did.

He ran me through a strength test, in which I raised my arms. He pushed down on them and was surprised to meet any real resistance. He stepped back and shook his head, marvelling. The real change, though, was number of medications I required: it was declining, not increasing.

Many, if not most, disabled people would prefer the additional option of secular MAiD-free spaces. But Catherine Frazee, whose quote starts this article, has articulated the view of a great many disabled people who fervently want safety from MAiD.

Affirming support for the belief of “better dead than disabled” in health care is dangerous and cruel. Canada has made disabled people a killable class, and hardly anyone has considered the impact this would have on us. This country must maintain MAiD-free health-care spaces.

Senate rules must keep pace with a changing institutionTEST

Six more independent senators have taken their seats in the Red Chamber so far in 2024, ready to provide sober second thought on behalf of their regions without the pressure of following the top-down party directives associated with being part of a partisan caucus.

In the past decade, there has been a gradual yet dramatic transition away from the government-opposition duopoly that had characterized the Senate for nearly 150 years.

However, the current Rules of the Senate do not reflect the new reality, in which 80 out of 96 sitting senators are not affiliated with either the government or the opposition.

The rules continue to lag when it comes to the equitable treatment of these recognized groups. They need to be updated in several areas along the lines of a comprehensive package of proposed changes currently being considered in the Senate.

While senators once were divided along the same party lines as their counterparts in the Commons, there are now three new independent parliamentary groups with no partisan links. In addition, a handful of senators sit with no affiliation to any group.

This new organizational structure stems from the Trudeau government’s decision to create an arm’s-length body to advise the prime minister on Senate appointments, with a focus on diversity and gender balance.

Since 2016, 81 independent senators have been appointed under the new process, while others initially appointed to partisan caucuses have chosen to sit as independents.

The shift in the makeup of the Senate was recognized in May 2017 when its rules were changed to formally recognize and provide certain privileges to parliamentary groups not affiliated with a registered political party.

But the strict framework of the current rules, drafted at a time when there had only ever been two caucuses in the upper house, makes it increasingly difficult for many senators to fully participate.

A former special Senate committee on modernization anticipated this growing challenge in its December 2018 report entitled Reflecting the New Reality of the Senate. It called for changes to both the Parliament of Canada Act and Senate rules to keep pace with this changing dynamic.

One of the committee’s recommendations was realized in June 2022 when federal laws were amended to catch up with the major changes in the Senate. The updated Parliament of Canada Act now recognizes the growing contingent of independent senators and the various groups that they represent.

More than 80 per cent of senators now sit in non-partisan groups but the institution’s rules still do not reflect this reality, despite multiple efforts to do so in the chamber and at committee.

To advance these objectives, the Government Representative’s Office in the Senate has developed a comprehensive package of proposed changes and is seeking consensus to get them adopted this spring. This represents a firm commitment to ongoing modernization and fostering the conditions required for the Senate to continue to thrive.

The three main areas in this proposal are:

The equitable and fair treatment of the Senate’s non-partisan parliamentary groups;
The modernization of parliamentary processes to improve operations; and
The introduction of new terminology to reflect the changes to the Parliament of Canada Act.

One proposal addresses the lack of equity in speaking times. There are now four distinct groups in the Senate, in addition to the three-senator government team which should be enshrined in the rules to ensure the views of all senators are heard. A similar proposal was included as part of a recent report of the standing Senate committee on rules, procedures and the rights of Parliament (RPRD).

Equity is also the focus of proposed changes to extend the powers of vote deferrals and decisions on the length of time for votes to be held to non-partisan parliamentary groups, rather than just the government and opposition groups.

Another proposal would ensure more time is dedicated to chamber business on sitting days. The Senate currently has a two-hour evening break from 6-8 p.m. During the pandemic, the Senate adopted a sessional order to limit the evening suspension to one hour. This should be added to the rules for future sessions.

The package also responds to a proposal currently under consideration at RPRD concerning written questions, which are submitted directly to the Senate’s order paper.

There is currently no time limit for the government to respond. To ensure greater efficiency and accountability, we propose implementing a 60-day limit.

The rules would also be changed to introduce a limit on the number of written questions a senator can have at once and a process to examine cases in which the government fails to respond, in line with existing practices in the Commons.

The new independent Senate is more diverse than ever, making it more reflective of the Canadians it represents and therefore able to offer a broader perspective on the issues under consideration.

Improving the Senate’s role as protector of provincial rights

The Senate’s longstanding duopoly has finally faded

More than half of all senators are women, there is more Indigenous representation and there is also a broader range of experience and backgrounds, all of which enhance the knowledge and views of the Senate as a whole.

Because they are unincumbered by partisan politics and the electoral cycle, independent senators can study legislation through a lens focused on regional interests, minority rights and constitutional considerations.

The new independent Senate has shown an increased willingness to propose amendments and provide observations to legislation that the government ought to consider, in many cases improving the laws that govern this country.

At the same time, independent senators have retained the principle of democratic deference. Despite advocating for changes to legislation, senators have ultimately accepted the will of the elected Commons.

The new makeup of the Senate calls for changes to ensure all senators have a voice, regardless of independence or partisanship. There has been some recent progress on Senate modernization and there will be other proposals in the future.

But one thing we can do now is move forward with these proposed updates to the rules to help keep pace with the institution’s evolution, to enable greater efficiency in day-to-day operations and ultimately to ensure that all senators can fully serve the Canadians they represent.

Visible minorities have difficulty accessing the labour marketTEST

(Version française disponible ici)

The changing face of Canada and Quebec is leading to a transformation of the labour market. A growing proportion of the population comes from immigrant backgrounds and this trend will accelerate in the coming decades. Statistics Canada forecasts that immigrants and their Canadian-born children will make up nearly half the Canadian population by 2041, accounting for a significant share of the workforce.

While the vast majority of recently arrived immigrants belong to visible minorities, more and more people born here are from diverse backgrounds as well. StatsCan predicts that visible minorities could represent between 38 and 43 per cent of the total Canadian population by 2041.

Data from the 2021 census indicate that close to one in four young Québécois under the age of 25 is from a visible minority, a reality the labour market must now address.

Though the concept of an immigrant is clear, that of a visible minority is less so. Not all members of visible minorities are immigrants and not all immigrants are members of visible minorities, though for some years now the vast majority of recent immigrants (73 per cent in Quebec, 85 per cent in the rest of Canada) are members of a visible minority.

The term “visible minorities” refers to “persons, other than Aboriginal people, who are non-Caucasian in race or non-white in colour.” In Canada, Latino Americans, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Filipinos, South Asians, Southeast Asians, Western Asians as well as Blacks and Arabs are considered members of a visible minority. Hence, all individuals who emigrate from a Latin American country are deemed a visible minority, even those with white skin. In 2021 in Quebec, visible-minority members were mainly from three groups: Blacks (31 per cent), Arabs (21 per cent) and Latino Americans (13 per cent).

Major disparities in employment rates

Employment is an important indicator of integration. Many studies have looked into the circumstances of immigrants in the labour market, but the employment integration of people from diverse backgrounds, particularly of Canadian-born young people, is a much less documented phenomenon.

A study by CIRANO fills this gap using publicly available data from StatsCan’s Labour Force Survey and the 2021 census.

The findings are clear: belonging to a visible minority reduces the likelihood of finding employment. Visible-minority individuals born in Canada are the ones with the lowest employment rates, both among those in the 15-64 age group and those aged 15 to 24, as shown in Table 1. The results are qualitatively the same across Canada, with generally lower employment rates than in Quebec.

But more telling are the disparities once adjustments are made, namely the gaps that persist even when one cancels out the role of personal characteristics, other than belonging to a visible minority or having immigrant status, such as age, level of education, gender, attendance at an educational institution, province (for all of Canada), metropolitan area, and marital status. All gaps are statistically significant to 1%.

In Quebec, immigrants who are not members of a visible minority have employment rates that are lower by five percentage points than those of the reference group, all other factors being equal. This difference is even more pronounced for visible-minority immigrants, with employment rates lower by 9.4 percentage points.

Among young people between the ages of 15 and 24, the adjusted gaps are greater than for the overall 15-to-64 age group, even when controlling for differences in several personal characteristics, including school attendance. Thus, even if they were born in Canada, have a good command of French or English, and even if educated here, visible-minority youth appear to struggle to find a place in the labour market.

Visible minorities are not fairly compensated

We also examined the disparities in annual salary, both actually observed and adjusted, meaning the gaps that persist even after cancelling out the effect of several other factors that determine annual salary other than visible-minority or immigrant status.

As shown in Table 2, the adjusted disparities are very different from the observed disparities, reflecting the fact that the four groups do not share the same characteristics.

In the case of native-born individuals belonging to a visible minority, the gap with the reference group decreases from 26.9 per cent (observed) to nine per cent (adjusted). The 26.9 per cent gap means that, initially, native-borns belonging to a visible minority have characteristics unfavourable to them in terms of compensation compared to native-borns who are not part of a visible minority. The nine per cent gap after adjustment is problematic and signals integration difficulties for visible minorities, even if born in Canada.

As for visible-minority immigrants, the salary gaps compared to the reference group widen after adjustment, reaching nearly 24 per cent both in Canada and in Quebec.

The case of immigrants who are not part of a visible minority is unique because of the shift from a positive observed gap to a negative adjusted gap. At first glance, they are better paid than native-borns who are not part of a visible minority. However, after adjustment – and thus with equal characteristics – non-visible-minority immigrants earned on average 15.8 per cent less than native-borns not part of a visible minority.

These findings warrant further analysis to determine if these individuals’ experiences stem from discrimination or other non-observable factors that should be brought to light.

Taking action today to include the workers of tomorrow

More and more newcomers to the job market will be members of a visible minority. The case of young Canadian-born visible minorities merits special attention, with the goal of preventing their socioeconomic exclusion and the potential consequences for social cohesion.

In a context where Quebec and the rest of Canada rely on immigration to address the labour shortage, logic would dictate that we first realize the full potential of those already present. The integration into the workforce of Canadian-born individuals from ethnocultural minority groups, particularly the young, must be among the priorities of policymakers so as to avoid a situation where integration difficulties are passed on from one generation to the next. Failing this, a growing share of the population risks being marginalized.

Governments, the business community and all relevant stakeholders must work together on this in order to permanently eliminate the barriers hindering the economic integration of these young individuals and preventing them from fully contributing to the progress of society.

Breaking down government silos to address the crises of homelessness and housingTEST

Homelessness in Canada is an insidious, growing problem that directly and indirectly affects millions of people. At least 235,000 people experience it every year, according to Statistics Canada.

Based on estimates from the Homeless Hub, a research library, this costs Canada anywhere from $5.45 billion to $30.74 billion per year, including direct costs, such as shelters and services, as well as indirect costs (which economists refer to as externalities), such as increased use of health services, policing and the criminal justice system.

Two overlapping factors are helping to fuel this epidemic, which can appear like an unsolvable riddle.

First, we have a significant housing supply shortfall. In September 2023, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. (CMHC) estimated Canada needs to build 5.8 million housing units by 2030 to restore housing affordability. That’s 3.5 million units more than the current pace.

Second, we have a significant shortage of skilled labour, especially in the construction industry. In Ontario alone, there is a forecast deficit of 23,200 construction workers by 2027.

Many other complex factors also contribute to the homelessness epidemic, making it a compound problem that involves a dozen federal departments and Crown corporations.

But, by design, those government departments operate in silos. This disincentivizes collaboration and leads to a narrow scope of work.

These are issues, however, that necessitate a much broader and more co-ordinated response. Such an overarching shift in approach would better direct resources and ultimately help more people.

Siloed governance: to be or not to be?

Government departments often focus on a single policy area with interdepartmental co-ordination inconsistent and at times non-existent. This siloed approach can have significant ramifications.

A recent example was the federal government’s decision to cap international student visas to decrease pressure on the rental housing market. This decision was made in the absence of adequate co-ordination between the Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, and the CMHC.

Had immigration and housing policies been considered in tandem, it is possible that capping student visa permits may never have been necessary.

This example serves as a teachable moment about the importance of shifting to an un-siloed approach to policy management and programs defined by shared governance and funding.

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The double housing crisis needs a potluck approach

Two recent examples from Australia show the success of a co-ordinated approach to major policy challenges involving multiple departments.

First, a federal initiative there called “rewiring the nation” aims to transform Australia’s electricity grid. This initiative saw multiple federal agencies collaborate toward the creation and delivery of a fund worth the equivalent of about $17.7 billion Cdn with the equivalent of an additional $6.9 billion Cdn delivered in partnership with the state government of New South Wales for other projects.

Second, New South Wales created its digital restart fund for cross-departmental transformation projects. This fund is worth the equivalent of $1.9 billion Cdn and has led to a whole-of-government approach in areas including workforce capacity-building, shared digital assets and the modernization of outdated systems.

A case study of co-ordination at work

In Canada, there is one example beyond the halls of government that is demonstrating success using a de-siloed approach to help grow the construction workforce, boost housing supply and reduce homelessness.

Launched in 2020, Blue Door’s Construct provides a rapid pathway to secure a stable career in the skilled trades for vulnerable individuals stuck in a cycle of poverty and homelessness.

Blue Door partners with organizations such as LiUNA Local 506 Training Centre, Humber College, Durham College, The Home Depot Canada Foundation, the YMCA, the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, ACCES Employment and Ontario Works to provide a robust employment training program and wraparound support to participants.

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The precedent for a federal leadership role in housing

In three years, close to 500 participants have graduated from the program while completing hundreds of high-quality and competitively priced construction jobs in the York, Peel and Durham regions of Ontario. Eighty-two per cent of Construct’s graduates have found employment or a pathway to higher education within six weeks.

Construct also saves money, offering a pathway to self-sufficiency for a one-time cost of $21,000 per participant. By contrast, Homeless Hub estimates that in 2012 (the most recent year for which figures are available), the average monthly cost of a sheltering someone while homeless ranged from $1,932 for a shelter bed to $10,900 for a hospital bed. That is $23,184 to $130,800 per year.

Construct demonstrates that multiple policy problems can be addressed using a concerted approach and can have a positive impact on people’s lives. Governments should take a cue from this experience to address these and other issues at a national scale.

Close-up of the building, which has large square windows with a space underneath them for air-conditioning units. Pink sheets of insulation and an off-white membrane are visible on the exterior walls. — On Dunn Avenue in Toronto, the University Health Network has donated land to the city where a four-storey modular apartment building is under construction. It will provide 51 units for hospital patients within the UHN system who are, or are at risk, of homelessness, focusing on seniors, women, Indigenous Peoples and racialized persons. It is expected to open in this summer. (Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail)

An interdepartmental funding program

The country desperately needs a Team Canada approach to drastically increase housing supply, with the federal government shifting toward shared governance and funding programs that transcend departmental boundaries.

There would be significant benefit from the creation of an interdepartmental funding program jointly overseen by Infrastructure Canada, and Employment and Social Development Canada to support social enterprises such as Construct. Effectively tackling these complex challenges requires not just know-how but a co-operative approach in place of our current siloed system.

This could be achieved by establishing committees or working groups across departments, fostering collaboration among departments with shared goals and adopting shared-funding mechanisms.

Governments can facilitate this transition by revisiting historical governance policies and frameworks that impede cross-sector financing, thereby enabling more comprehensive solutions to challenges using a whole-of-government approach.

This article is part of a series called How does Canada fix the housing crisis?

For P.E.I., a model for a guaranteed basic income that is feasible and affordableTEST

A guaranteed basic income (GBI) has been discussed for more than half a century in Canada, but a well-researched proposal that takes into consideration both economic and political realities has never been put forward. Therefore, it has never been possible to develop viable alternatives to the status quo targeted approach to poverty reduction – an approach that is sometimes viewed as keeping people in poverty.

Until now.

The November 2023 publication of the report A Proposal For A Guaranteed Basic Income Benefit For Prince Edward Island addresses this omission at a crucial moment – when steps toward the goals of Canada’s Poverty Reduction Act (2019) are faltering.

This report breaks new ground both in the work done to address poverty and in the process of applying academic economic expertise to policy development. Along with supplementary materials, it is now available for public review and discussion.

Who will receive the benefit and what is its impact on poverty?

The report proposes a guaranteed basic income benefit for P.E.I. residents aged 18 to 64. It would be a collaborative federal-provincial program delivered through the income tax system and jointly financed by both governments.

This maximum annual benefit would be 85 per cent of the official poverty line, which is slightly more than $19,000 for a single adult and $27,000 for a family of two adults in P.E.I.

The proposed benefit for working-age adults would complete Canada’s social safety net, which already includes a guaranteed basic income for seniors – through old age security and the guaranteed income supplement – and for children – through the Canada child benefit.

The proposal would virtually eradicate poverty among working-age adults and their children. The lives of families in poverty would also radically improve with better food security, health, education, housing and community involvement.

Pressures on the health-care system would lessen and social cohesion would be enhanced. Intergenerational transmission of poverty would be reduced, leading to higher productivity and economic prosperity over time.

A multi-year development process

In November 2020, the special committee on poverty in P.E.I. recommended implementation of a federal-provincial guaranteed basic income program in the province, and the legislature unanimously approved the idea.

In response, Coalition Canada, a pan-Canadian organization supporting guaranteed basic income, led a working group of economists, public servants, politicians and advocates who spent two years studying the issue and preparing this report.

The result of this innovative process is a proposal that is politically feasible, affordable and socially acceptable.

In fact, the political representatives in our group ensured that the work reflected, as one of them put it, “the realm of the possible.”

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For example, there could be no changes to federal tax legislation to implement or finance the benefit. Economists modelled issues of cost, labour market (dis)incentives, financing and more.

One issue sometimes raised is that a guaranteed basic income delivered through the income tax system cannot address changes in family circumstances between tax filing dates.

Therefore, the team proposed an innovative partnership between federal and provincial systems in which the province remains the initial point of contact, providing necessary financial support and ensuring that recipients file taxes so that they can transition to the guaranteed basic income when their tax returns are next filed.

Significant changes in circumstances within the year would also be addressed by the province, allowing recipients to rely on predictable support.

The report has been presented to the government and opposition parties in P.E.I.

Recently, in response to Barb Ramsay, P.E.I. minister of social development and seniors, Jenna Sudds, the federal minister of families, children and social development, proposed creating a working group of departmental officials to share tax, survey and administrative data and information in support of P.E.I.’s work on assessing the feasibility of the proposal.

How much it will cost and who will pay for it?

Concerns have been raised about the cost of basic-income proposals.

Confirming recent research, our modelling indicates that a substantial portion of a guaranteed basic income for Islanders aged 18-64 would be delivered to young adults (18-29).

Currently, social support in the federal system is delivered using a family model for estimating net income, which counts adult children living with their parents as distinct families. Our P.E.I. team suggested an innovative way to move forward – using the census definition, which includes adult children living with their parents to all be part of one family.

Using this model, the proposal reduces the annual cost by about $120 million or almost 40 per cent, to $188 million from $310 million, relative to a guaranteed basic income using the typical narrower definition of a family, thus allowing better targeting of benefits toward low-income families.

These costs are gross costs. When accounting for factors such as reduced spending on income assistance, the annual net cost would be in the $100-million range – about one per cent of GDP or seven per cent of government revenues in P.E.I.

This, in turn, means it is possible for the P.E.I. government to modestly increase its income and sale taxes to finance up to 50 per cent of the proposal cost while simultaneously raising the after-tax income of most Islanders. Indeed, only the top 20 per cent of income earners in the province would experience a modest reduction in their after-tax income under our proposal.

What will be the impact on labour markets?

With respect to short-term labour market disincentives – a longstanding issue in the discussion of the implementation of a basic income – modelling done by the P.E.I. team indicated that using the census family definition to deliver the benefit would also limit the impact on labour markets, compared to proposals using the current family definition.

Indeed, the reduction in hours worked would be minimal – about 1.6 per cent, which translates to a reduction of only about 30 minutes less in a 35-hour work week. This is in line with work done to assess the impact of a basic income on work disincentives by the parliamentary budget officer and the British Columbia panel on basic income.

A demonstration project with a comprehensive evaluation

We are not proposing a permanent program or a pilot but rather a five-to-seven-year province-wide demonstration project that could become permanent in partnership with the federal government.

That would allow time to assess its full interaction with existing provincial and federal benefits. The effectiveness and efficiency of administering the guaranteed basic income via the tax system together with the provincial delivery system could also be assessed along with social and economic outcomes.

This would be a unique learning experience for the entire country and could put Canada at the forefront of the social policy of the 21^st century.

Because the proposal is for a full-province demonstration project, it would be necessary to find control groups in a region or regions of the country with population and other characteristics that closely match P.E.I.

Two possible areas for this are southeast New Brunswick (Albert, Westmoreland and Kent counties) and parts of Nova Scotia (Colchester, Cumberland, Pictou and Antigonish).

In creating a model for policy development that brings together key stakeholders to ensure both its economic and political viability, the report has resulted in a proposed model that indicates how to design a federal-provincial basic income demonstration project that is financially as well as politically feasible and socially responsible.

In doing that, it does in fact meet the objective of reflecting “the realm of the possible.”

The authors of the report are Robin Boadway, Miles Corak, Kendal David, Herb Emery, Evelyn Forget, Chloe Halpenny, Kourtney Koebel, Benoît Robidoux, Wayne Simpson and Harvey Stevens. Barbara Boraks was a project lead.

Ottawa saves the day by raising capital gains taxTEST

(Version française disponible ici)

In her economic update last autumn, federal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland set three main objectives for the 2024 budget.

The first was to keep the announced deficit in 2023-2024 at or below the 2023 budget forecast of $40.1 billion.

The second was to lower the debt-to-GDP ratio in 2024-2025 compared with the fall economic statement (42.7 per cent), and to keep it on a downward trajectory thereafter.

The third was to continue the decline in the deficit-to-GDP ratio in 2024-2025, and then to keep it below 1 per cent of GDP in 2026-2027 and beyond.

In her recent budget, the minister respects each of these objectives: the deficit for 2023-2024 is $40 billion; the projected debt-to-GDP ratio for 2024-2025 is 41.9 per cent; and the deficit-to-GDP ratio falls by 0.1 per cent in 2024-2025, to 0.9 per cent in 2026-2027, and declines further thereafter.

Increased interventionism

However, the fact that the budget targets are being met masks increased interventionism, leading to $57.9 billion in new initiatives between 2023-2024 and 2028-2029. Although the minister has identified additional sources of revenue (to which we will return shortly), the fact remains that the cumulative deficits over the entire period will increase by $10.3 billion.

The conclusion is that this budget is far from restrictive. Between 2023-2024 and 2024-2025, federal revenues will rise by 7.0 per cent, program spending by 6.7 per cent, and interest on the debt by almost 15 per cent.

Interest payments on the debt have risen significantly. After a low of $20.4 billion in 2020-2021, they are estimated to reach $54.1 billion in 2024-2025 and $64.3 billion in 2028-2029. It means that for the current year, Ottawa must now devote the equivalent of all the revenue from the GST to pay interest on the debt.

Capital gains tax to the rescue

The finance minister will be seeking additional revenue mainly by reducing the preferential treatment given to capital gains. The impact of this change alone on corporations, trusts and individuals will exceed $19 billion over 5 years.

Since the Liberals came to power in 2015, many had expected such a tightening, not least because the marginal tax rate on a capital gain was lower than the highest marginal tax rate on eligible dividends. This encouraged tax planning aimed at converting dividends into capital gains. Some of these have proved to be uncertain, creating uncertainty when challenged by the Canada Revenue Agency.

Historically, capital gains have always received preferential treatment. Such treatment is often presented as recognition of the effect of inflation on long-term capital gains, or as a way of rewarding risk-taking. The federal government explicitly recognised this when it introduced the Canadian entrepreneurs’ incentive in the last budget (which will be explained later).

Prior to 1972, capital gains were not taxed in Canada. It was the Benson budget of 1971 that reformed the definition of income to include up to 50 per cent of capital gains. In practice, this meant that half of the capital gain was added to income and taxed at the applicable rate. The other half of the capital gain remained exempt from tax, representing an advantage of 50 per cent.

This proposal followed on from the Royal Commission on Taxation (the Carter commission), which recommended, however, that it be included in its entirety under the principle of “a buck is a buck is a buck”, which essentially means that although income can be earned in a variety of ways, it is ultimately income, and therefore all income should be taxed in the same way.

For more than fifty years, the advantage has varied between 25 per cent and 50 per cent, as shown in table 1.

As an indication, when the capital gains inclusion rate was increased effective January 1, 1988 and January 1, 1990, the announcement was made in June 1987 (when the tax reform was announced), giving taxpayers time to adjust. Conversely, when the capital gains inclusion rate was reduced in 2000, the announcements took effect the same day.

The 2024 budget reduces the preferential treatment given to capital gains to 33.33 per cent. In other words, two-thirds of the capital gain (66.67 per cent) will now be added to taxable income. For corporations, this change affects all capital gains, but for individuals, it only affects the portion exceeding $250,000 of annual capital gains. This $250,000 exemption is determined after taking into account capital losses. The new treatment applies from 25 June 2024, giving taxpayers time to organise their affairs before the measure comes into force.

For their part, the provinces have always had the same partial inclusion rate for capital gains as that applied by the federal government. Quebec has decided to follow suit, representing potential additional tax revenue of $3 billion over five years.

Real estate assets

Many people are concerned about how the change will affect gains on the sale of property such as rental property or a second home. Taxpayers can continue to claim the exemption for the principal residence, which means that the gain remains entirely tax-free. Furthermore, in the case of couples where the secondary residence is 50 per cent owned by a spouse, each of them is entitled to the $250,000 exemption threshold. The capital gain on the secondary residence must therefore exceed $500,000 before the recent changes have a negative effect on a couple.

Presumed disposition at death

Apart from certain transfers of property between spouses that have no tax consequences at the time of death, the deceased is taxed on the capital gain accumulated at the time of death. Once again, the $250,000 exemption threshold applies, and only the excess is subject to the 66.67 per cent inclusion rate.

New support for small businesses

To avoid criticism of the effect that the increase in the capital gains inclusion rate could have on entrepreneurship, the minister of finance is increasing the lifetime capital gains exemption by 25 per cent to compensate for the increase in the inclusion rate. The new lifetime limit will reach $1.25 million as of June 25, 2024, and will be indexed to inflation as of 2026.

In addition, from Jan. 1, 2025, a new Canadian entrepreneur incentive will be introduced for entrepreneur-founders. This involves a reduction in the tax rate on capital gains when shares are sold. On the qualifying gain – amounts above the $1.25 million covered by the lifetime capital gains exemption – the inclusion rate is half of the current rate (i.e. 33.33 per cent instead of 66.67 per cent). The lifetime limit will be phased in by increments of $200,000 per year, up to a maximum of $2 million on January 1, 2034.

The more advantageous treatment will therefore eventually apply to a capital gain of $3.25 million arising from the sale of shares in a company, a significant improvement for those who qualify.

A more neutral tax regime

At current tax rates in Quebec, the difference between top marginal rates is almost 27 percentage points compared with ordinary income such as a salary (26.7 per cent versus 53.3 per cent), or just over 13 percentage points compared with dividends (26.7 per cent versus 40.0 per cent). Reducing the advantage associated with capital gains from 50 per cent to 33.33 per cent will reduce the gap and ensure greater symmetry in the tax treatment of dividends and capital gains. As a result, the marginal rates would be more uniform (35.5 per cent for capital gains versus 40.0 per cent for eligible dividends). The results are similar in Ontario.

Aside from assessing what this major change will bring in terms of taxation, we must consider the context of the current and future budget imbalances in Ottawa and the provinces. Both must at least consider ways to raise revenue. Ottawa’s move is also a benefit to the provinces, which are all likely to stay in lockstep on capital gains. To name one example, Chrystia Freeland’s budget has helped Quebec Finance Minister Eric Girard’s plan to return to a balanced budget.

Our North, Strong and Free: Odd innovations in Canadian defence policyTEST

In the 2022 budget, tabled on April 7 of that year, six weeks after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Trudeau government announced it would undertake a “swift“ defence policy review.

On April 8 of this year – 732 days later – the government published the results of that review under the title Our North, Strong and Free: A Renewed Vision for Canada’s Defence. A new definition of swift was thus born.

Much has been already written about Our North, Strong and Free. Its sensible emphasis on threats to, and investments in, Canada’s Arctic and Northern defence has been noted.

The government pledged to increase defence funding to 1.76 per cent of gross domestic product by 2029-30 from an abysmal 1.33 per cent today. While this keeps Canada well below the NATO target of two per cent – a level to which Ottawa has agreed twice in the past 10 years – it is still more than many expected.

It could, however, also be read as a firm commitment not to meet our commitments.

The undertaking to conduct and publish four-year reviews of both national security and defence policy has been applauded, while the shopping list of new equipment that the Canadian Armed Forces will buy has been discussed.

What is no less important, however, are the public administration innovations one can find within the pages of Our North, Strong and Free. Three chief ones come to mind.

In and out

The first we can call the “in and out play.” The new policy commits an additional $8.1 billion to the defence budget (on an accrual basis) over the next five fiscal years.

This fiscal year and next – the last two fiscal years in the life of the current Trudeau government – Department of National Defence funding will be increased by about $600 million and $1.1 billion, respectively.

However, also over these two fiscal years, between $800-$900 million will be taken out of the defence budget annually through a government-wide expenditure-reduction initiative aimed at cutting spending on “professional services” and travel.

Meaning that during the remaining mandate of this government, what comes in the front door courtesy of Our North, Strong and Free, mostly goes out the back door.

Fantasy Island

The second novelty we can label the “Fantasy Island move.” Our North, Strong and Free commits Ottawa to some $73 billion in defence funding increases over the next 20 years.

Normally a significant departmental funding boost would be phased in over five years (i.e., the fiscal framework time horizon, not to mention the lifetime of government), rather than a period equal to going from toddler to university graduate. Some have called this “back-end loading.” A less charitable take would consider it to be in the realm of fantasy.

The parliamentary budget officer forecasts a federal deficit of more than $46 billion and a federal debt ratio in excess of 42 per cent of GDP in this fiscal year (up from slightly more than 30 per cent five years ago).

Those numbers, both of which are rising, suggest a very strong likelihood that in the not-too-distant future (i.e., well within the 20-year framework) some government is going to have to get serious about deficit- and debt-reduction.

When that happens, it is a certainty that the defence budget will take a hit as it has in every expenditure-reduction exercise over the past 35 years by the Mulroney, Chrétien, Martin and Harper governments (Progressive Conservative, Liberal and Conservative alike).

As noted, the Trudeau government is already following in these footsteps, increasing the defence budget on the one hand, even as it cuts it on the other hand as the minister of finance and the president of the Treasury Board try to bring some fiscal probity to Ottawa.

Cutting defence spending in times of austerity has proven to be one of the few areas of bipartisan consensus over the past generation, owing chiefly to the fact the Department of National Defence is the second largest source of non-statutory spending for the federal government.

In other words, this is about math as much or more as it is about politics.

Let’s go shopping

The third innovation in Our North, Strong and Free is what we might label the “unfunded shopping spree.” The policy statement makes it clear that the Canadian Armed Forces will acquire various types of equipment over time, meaning those projects are funded within the financial resources provided.

This is the kind of thing defence policy statements normally contain. Then comes the novelty. There are about a dozen instances where the document states that the Armed Forces will “explore” buying various other kit, meaning those projects are not funded.

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Canada’s tin-pot navy

It’s anyone’s guess why the authors of Our North, Strong and Free thought that highlighting the exploration of hypothetical purchases was necessary.

Anyone with even passing knowledge of the military knows it is always exploring the acquisition of new equipment of various kinds. It is part of its job after all to look to replace constantly aging kit and to keep abreast of technological change.

Unfortunately for the forces, many of those explorations over the years have foundered on the rocks of fiscal and political reality.

All of which reveals a central, though unstated, theme in this policy statement.

Our North, Strong and Free is above all else an expression of a government that fails to see national defence as a high priority even after two years of war in Ukraine, but which is under increasing pressure from NATO and allies to significantly boost defence funding in the context of a relatively tight fiscal box of its own making.

The federal government must tackle water pollution from the oilsandsTEST

Perched on the shores of the Athabasca River in northern Alberta are a staggering 1.4 trillion litres of toxic industrial waste, stored in open pits known as tailings ponds created through oil production.

For decades, it has been public knowledge that this toxic waste is leaking into the surrounding environment. Yet the federal government has still not investigated the true dangers posed by these substances.

This could change immediately. With tools at its disposal under federal laws, it is time for Ottawa to take responsibility and protect communities and the environment from further contamination.

This is why First Nations, Métis and environmental groups joined forces in March to submit a formal request to the federal government to assess the harms caused by naphthenic acids, a major toxic component in oilsands tailings ponds. The goal is to compel the government to take further action to address oilsands water pollution. It has 90 days to respond.

Every Canadian should be protected

The federal government has the constitutional responsibility to protect people across the country from toxic pollution. It exercises this power under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA), a cornerstone environmental law upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada.

The federal government also has other important responsibilities for protecting the environment in the oilsands region. For example, it has constitutional power over fisheries and has enacted the Fisheries Act with the purpose of “protect[ing] fish and fish habitat, including by preventing pollution.”

The oilsands are also on territory subject to Treaty 8, of which the Crown is a signatory, which affirms the rights of First Nations to practise their traditional ways of life.

Unfortunately, however, successive federal governments have not taken their environmental responsibilities in the oilsands seriously, instead exacerbating the problem by approving more mines and tailings ponds.

In 2014, MPs from the then-Liberal opposition on the Commons environment committee published a scathing report in which they denounced the “abdication of federal leadership in an area (…) that is rightfully Ottawa’s under the Constitution’s division of powers.”

They accused the Conservative government of the day of “protecting the oil sands industry” by failing to assess the toxicity of one of its most harmful components found in the tailings ponds – the naphthenic acids.

Over the years, the response from successive governments in Ottawa has often been that while it has some responsibility, it lacks the tools to effectively regulate tailings pollution.

However, in June 2023, as part of the important effort to modernize CEPA, Parliament added a new mechanism allowing any individual or organization to ask the federal government to assess, and then address, the toxicity of specific harmful substances. That’s the basis of our joint request in March for a federal review of the situation.

The risk is increasing every year

Studies prove that naphthenic acids are harmful to fish and amphibians. While human health studies are incomplete, naphthenic acids are recognized as potential endocrine disruptors.

More than 6,000 tonnes of naphthenic acids are added to tailing ponds every year, increasing the risk that more of these substances will end up in the environment through leaks, spills or other incidents. For example, naphthenic acids were found in nearby freshwater following last year’s high-profile leak from Imperial Oil’s Kearl oilsands mine.

Yet, the federal Health and Environment ministries have so far declined to conduct a risk assessment. Unlike well-known pollutants such as mercury and certain hydrocarbons, there are no official national guidelines for dealing with naphthenic acids.

The lack of a federal risk assessment has become an excuse for Ottawa to turn a blind eye to the potential harms caused by naphthenic acids, including on Indigenous communities.

The formal joint request – submitted by Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, Keepers of the Water, and Environmental Defence, represented by Ecojustice lawyers – asks the federal government to use its powers under CEPA to conduct a formal assessment of the risks posed by oilsands naphthenic acids to the environment and human health.

If the federal government agrees, and if its assessment concludes that these substances pose a risk to human health or the environment, Ottawa will be required to adopt appropriate risk management measures.

This means the federal government could consider options such as regulations on production and conditions for the release of naphthenic acids, requiring companies to set aside funds for cleanup and demanding that the companies have environmental emergency plans to respond to incidents.

Indigenous communities are the most affected

Such tools are essential for protecting the nearby environment and people who live there, including Indigenous nations, from unacceptable levels of pollution.

The Athabasca oilsands region is a pollution hotspot and one of the gravest examples of environmental injustice in Canada.

Because this request was filed under the modernized CEPA, the federal government is required to consider the specific circumstances of “vulnerable populations” and “vulnerable environments,” as well as the principle of environmental justice when assessing the harms posed by substances and selecting risk management measures.

This gives our request more weight because pollution from the oilsands has been principally felt by Indigenous communities that are exposed to many pollutants through the air, water and the food they consume.

Action on oilsands pollution has been a long time coming. It wasn’t until 2020 that oilsands companies were required to report under the national pollutant release inventory how much naphthenic acids they produce and where they are disposing of it.

This happened only after environmental groups successfully advocated for reform. However, reporting alone is insufficient if it does not lead to action.

The ministers of Environment and Health have until June 11 to respond to our formal request and decide whether to conduct a risk assessment for oilsands naphthenic acids.

The federal government must uphold its responsibility to address toxic tailings and take action to protect people and ecosystems. For far too long, companies have been allowed to produce dangerous waste without proper investigation of the risks.