I'll be back...just not quite yet...first, to Israel

Apologies for this corner having gone dark recently.

It's been a busy stretch at work, including spending most of the last week in Las Vegas for HP's Americas Partner conference. It's an event that always generates lots to cover for us, but then throw in HP deciding to drop $1.2 billion to buy Palm while I was there, and it got even busier. Was a fun trip though. Stayed at one of the newer Vegas properties, Aria, and I quite liked it. Unlike most cavernous Vegas properties where they don't want you to be reminded of the world outside, Aria has lots of glass and natural light. And there's also a route from your room to the conference centre that doesn't involve going through the casino , a first in my Vegas experience and surely a design flaw... And speaking of the casino, I'm not a big gambler but did finish in the green, including a win in the sports book from taking the Habs in game six. Didn't bet on game seven; they surprised me there.

After less than three days back home though, on Sunday afternoon I'm on the road again, but this time for pleasure. I've been invited on a week-long trip to Israel, organized by the CIC and funded by a private donor. Steve at Far and Wide will also be coming, along with some NDP/left-wing bloggers I look forward to meeting. Steve has a good run-down in the itinerary so I won't re-hash it, suffice to say it's busy, diverse and interesting. A good mix of sight-seeing and meetings with an interesting group of local politicians, journalists and bloggers, and even our ambassador to Israel. I shall try to approach it all with an open, but slightly skeptical mind. (If you're interested, here is the current Coles Notes of my opinion on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.)

I'm not sure the schedule will allow for much time for blogging during the trip, but I shall try, and certainly I'll have lots to say and share upon my return. All I ask are for two things while I'm gone: my Canucks to still be playing hockey, and my country not to have bumbled its way into an election.

Since my hiatus is to continue a little longer, a few brief thoughts on recent developments in Canadian political land:

* While we've all been distracted with either Jaffer/Guergis nonsense or the detainee docudrama, the Liberals have actually been talking and releasing policy. And much of it is aimed at rural Canada. First was some very sensible ideas around getting more doctors and nurses into rural areas by, among other things, forgiving part of their student loans if they make that commitment. This was followed by a "Canada First Good Policy" to support and promote local farmers and access to safe, healthy food, and a commitment to rural postal service.

Of course, policy isn't sexy enough for media coverage these days so you may not have heard about any of this, and the punditry that scolded the Liberals for not talking policy are, when they talk about it at all, scolding them for talking policy. Outside the Ottawa bubble, however, Canadians are much more concerned about finding a family doctor than they are about who Rahim Jaffer e-mailed. So I hope we keep pushing the policy.

* That's not to say the Jaffer/Guergis stuff isn't important. The investigations should proceed, and if serving ministers acting inappropriately or in contravention of the rules, that should be exposed and they should face the consequences. The e-mails and other documents that came out this week certainly seem to show that the Conservatives have been far from honest about Jaffer's access and influence in his seemingly not overly successful non-lobbying career. And it's often more the lack of honesty than the actual deeds that seems to hurt more in these stories, in my experience.

* On the docu-drama, the speaker's ruling this week was certainly very significant, as was the reaction of Conservative partisans. I think what some of them fail to recognize is that this isn't really about detainee torture anymore. It's about democracy, and it's about the right and responsibility of the legislative branch to be a check on the activities of the executive branch. Harper was elected by a little over 38,000 people in Calgary Southwest; he has no right to thumb his nose at the Parliament of Canada.

One has to think saner heads will prevail here. Ignore the testosterone-fueled rantings of the likes of Kory Teneycke. The Conservatives don't want an election over this. They won't be able to make it about coddling the Taliban, it's an asinine argument. It would be about a dictatorial leader refusing to respect the will of the people's elected democratic representatives. And the Cons didn't exactly fare well during the prorogation drama, now did they?

There will be a compromise reached that allows the opposition access to the uncensored documents, likely in a secret or confidential manner that respects national security concerns. We've seen signals along those lines already from Conservaland. Ironically, always concerned about political posturing and positioning, they're already trying to paint such a compromise as an opposition back-down. Truth is though, the opposition has been proposing such a scenario for months; the government has continually rebuffed it. So, as much as it matters, it would be them backing down. Let's just hope saner heads prevail all around though.

* Speaking of saner heads, the head of our military, General Walter Natynczyk, is cool with giving all of the un-redacted documents to parliament, saying the military has nothing to hide. Which raises two questions for me. One: must it be the Harper government with something to hide then? And two, if we employ standard Conservative logic here and respond as the government would in question period, I have to ask, why does our Chief of Defence Staff not support our troops, and why is he a Taliban sympathizer?

* Speaking of interlopers in our midst, turns out that pollster Frank Graves, who the Conservatives are portraying as some kind of undercover Liberal mole polluting the public airwaves of the CBC pretending to be unbiased, has actually been getting millions of dollars of polling contracts from the Conservative government. Including $131,440 from Harper's own Privy Council Office.

I'm sure Dean Del Mastro will join me in demanding that a Parliamentary Committee immediately investigate how this government could give millions of dollars in polling work to a know Liberal stooge. Or maybe they could just, you know, admit this whole manufactured drama is stupid and move on to serious issues. Either one would be fine.

* And on Graves and this culture war nonesense the Cons are hyper-ventilating about, I could go on at length but let me just say this: the Cons have been fighting a culture-war for years in this country. Urban vs. rural, Tim Horton's vs. academic elites and fancy gala goers, support the troops vs you're all taliban lovers, tough on crime vs hug-a-thug. They've been fighting a culture war, we just haven't been fighting back. All Graves "advised" was for the Liberals to start employing some wedges of their own, to fight back, to basically use some of the same tactics Harper et. al. have to some success. And this is news, somehow? For the Cons to be all bitchy about someone suggesting their own tactics be used against them, tactics which have been part of politics, by the way, forever, is just stupid.

* Lastly, I have a great deal of respect for Ujjal Dosanjh, for what he has consistently and resolutely stood for throughout his career, the principled approach he takes to public life, and the energy and commitment with which he approaches it. And I join those who have condemned the threats and attacks against him and others who have dared to stand up to extremism in any of its guises. I'm no sure I agree completely with his take on the impact multiculturalism is having on Canadian society. But it's an important issue we should be debating, and it should be a debate free of threat and intimidation, in the best of Canadian traditions.

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Why are we so dammed afraid to get smart on crime?

As a Liberal who would describe himself as socially moderate and fiscally conservative, I'm increasingly angry and frustrated with the inability and unwillingness of the centre/left to get smart on crime policy. Increasingly, we’re letting the conservatives define the terms of the debate as we cower in the corner frightened and whimpering, afraid of being tarred with that label of political death: soft on crime.

I remember being dumbfounded during the 2005/06 election campaign, when the Paul Martin Liberals included support for mandatory minimum sentences for some (gun-related) crimes in the election platform, a move to echo ineffective Conservative policy proposals that was also adapted by the NDP.

Mandatory minimums don’t work, the evidence on that point from the U.S. is pretty overwhelming. Criminals know what they’re doing is wrong and they know there are consequences, mandatory minimums aren’t a deterrent. They do nothing to prevent crime, they only increase prison populations. They're about appearing tough on crime without doing the heavy-lifting to actually prevent crime.

Yet mandatory minimums were back this spring, with the Conservatives proposing them for a range of drug-related crimes including, in some cases, simple possession. And while the NDP stayed offside this time (they were voting against everything at that point) the Liberals, rather than having the courage to call bullshit, rather than having the willingness and the gumption to argue (with the facts on our side, by the way) that this is an expensive and ineffective excuse for crime fighting legislation that will do nothing to address crime, instead took one look at the polls and the election possibility and, afraid of the “soft on crime” canard, supported the legislation.

And now, as I wrote yesterday, we see a trial balloon from Conservative justice minister Rob Nicholson about making a mockery of civil rights and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to “randomly” force people to submit to breathalyzer testing.

I was astounded, and I wasn’t, to see NDP leader Jack Layton immediately jump on board with this big-brotherish Conservative proposal, in a seeming abandonment of the core principles I’d have ascribed to the NDP:

The New Democrats would support efforts to craft a new law to curb impaired driving by giving police the power to conduct random breathalyzer tests, says Jack Layton.

"It’s the kind of thing that could save some lives," the NDP leader said Monday outside the House of Commons.

I guess civil liberties don’t mean much to Layton when it comes to appearing to be tough on crime to troll for votes. Sadly, my Liberals may be following down that same road. Don Martin, in a column where he argues in support of this thing, indicates the Liberals are supportive of the proposal although he doesn’t quote sources.

Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh is quoted by the CBC as raising many of the same concerns I raised yesterday but, to my dismay, he doesn’t dismiss the proposal outright:

Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh, the former attorney general of British Columbia and a member of the House justice committee, said the question of whether any legislation would be allowable under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms would come down to implementation.

"It remains to be seen what the actual legislation is when the minister brings it forward because we want to make sure that it's appropriately constrained and it's not too much of an infringement on civil liberties," Dosanjh told CBC News.

Dosanjh said the charter does allow for constraints on rights when they are deemed reasonable, but said he would need to see how those constraints are implemented before judging any future legislation.

"For instance... I wouldn’t want the east side of Vancouver monitored more than the west side of Vancouver because there is a clear economic division in the city," he said.

"We want to make sure that areas are not unnecessarily excessively focused on and that's why I think that we need to make sure that the legislation is properly drafted with appropriate constraints and guidelines for the police," he said.

I can’t believe my party is even considering this legislation which, to me, is diametrically opposed to what the Liberal Party of Canada, the party of the charter, has always stood for. And I’m surprised that I’m finding more alliance with conservatives, particularly I’m guessing libertarian Conservatives, in my opposition to this thing. Even the National Post’s editorial board thinks this is a bad idea. And while they occasionally publish my musings on the Web, the Post’s editors and I rarely, if ever, agree on policy.

So I ask again, why are we so dammed afraid of the crime issue? Why do we let the Conservatives falsely define the terms of debate?

We have the facts on our side, but we’re unwilling to even make the argument. Why aren’t we saying the Conservatives are soft on crime? Why aren’t we saying their crime policy is nothing but politically-motivated posturing designed to stoke public fears to win votes but that will do absolutely nothing to prevent crime?

Why aren't we pointing-out that, under the previous Liberal governments, most crime rates actually declined steadily, proof that the approach of balancing enforcement and detention with prevention and addressing root causes, being smart on crime, actually works?

Why aren’t we saying the Conservative crime-policy is half-assed? Why aren’t we saying that by ignoring crime prevention, by strangling crime reduction measures that are proven to work such as Insite, by doing nothing to address poverty and root causes, by focusing on detention and sentencing to the exclusion of all other areas of criminal justice, the Conservative crime policy is fatally flawed? That the Conservatives are ignoring measures that could actually reduce crime?

No, we’re not doing that. We’re too afraid we’ll lose and be labeled soft on crime. It’s pathetic.

I will grant that it would be a tough debate to win. It’s far easier to appeal to people’s demons than their better angels, its easier to stoke their fears than encourage their compassion, to sink to the lowest common denominator rather than raise the debate.

It would be difficult to do, but it would be the right thing to do. We have the facts on our side, we have truth on our side.

We might well lose the debate. But it’s not the debates that we lose that bother me. It's the debates we can’t be bothered to suit up for.

If we’re going to fall, we should fall standing-up for something.

Right now, we’re falling standing for nothing.

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(Videos) Ujjal Dosanjh and Gerard Kennedy in QP

From Monday's question period, Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh asks the Harper Conservatives why they won't provide equal protection abroad for all Canadians:



And Liberal MP Gerard Kennedy asks why the ridings of Conservative cabinet ministers are getting the lion's share of Ontario's infrastructure funding:

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Taylor lies and the Conservatives hide from the HST

The latest Conservative to try to hide from his government’s role as Harmonized Sales Taxes enabler is Blogging Tory poobah Stephen Taylor, who outrageously goes after Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh for making the point that the Conservatives, try as they might, can’t run and hide from their role in the HST or, if you prefer, the Harper Sales Tax.

Here’s the 10 per-center about the HST that has Taylor all riled-up:

Ujjal Flyer 2009


It’s all lies, says Taylor. Scandalous lies, oh, the humanity, and what not!

Dosanjh is fabricating by telling his constituents by blaming the unpopular tax on his main threat: the federal Conservatives.

Where are the lies, Stephen? It all looks pretty factual to me. (BTW, I love the irony of a Conservative complaining about lies in a 10 per center)

Let me put it this way: if the HST were a drug, BC would be the user, and the federal Conservatives the drug dealer.

The Conservatives can’t run and hide from their role in the HST, no matter how hard Taylor and much of the Conservative caucus might try. Not when their finance minister has been pushing the product for years…

"First of all, the decision to harmonize the GST and PST has to be that of the provincial government," (Jim Flaherty) said.

"I realize that this is challenging for provincial leaders, but I have no doubt in my mind that it's good long-term economic policy for our country.

...including in the budget...

Provincial sales tax harmonization is the single most important step provinces with RSTs could take to improve the competitiveness of Canadian businesses.

… and been offering any takers BILLIONS of dollars in incentives if they buy in.

How can the federal government say to provinces “we want you to harmonize your provincial sales tax with our GST, we’ll collect and administer the tax and send you your cut, and here’s a billion dollars and change to help with the transition” and then have its members and supporters claim they had nothing to do with it? It’s laughable.

If this is nothing to do with the federal Conservatives, why are they cutting the $1.6 billion cheque to grease the wheels?

Now, no one is saying the provincial governments aren’t responsible as well. While the lure of billions of federal dollars in the middle of a recession is strong, they are responsible too. But the Conservatives are the pushers here, and you can’t pretend otherwise. And to try to hide that is the real lie, Mr. Taylor.

To try to end on a more constructive note, Liberal MP Keith Martin wrote a recent op/ed with some thoughts on the HST matter. He notes that Harper and Flaherty pushing tax harmonization during a recession is irresponsible, and offers suggestions on how the province and the federal government can work together to implement it more responsibly.

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(Videos) Michael Ignatieff in Vancouver

Some early videos of Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff's visit to Vancouver, and to British Columbia.

After flying into YVR, Ignatieff rode the new Canada Line train (a project conceived and funded with the support of the previous Liberal government) into Vancouver with MPs Ujjal Dosanjh, Joyce Murray and others.



And in this video, Dosanjh talks about Ignatieff's plans during his visit.

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A welcome mat with nice, comfy fur

Congratulations to Gary Doer, who is stepping down as leader of Manitoba's NDP and premier of the province after a distinguished career in provincial politics.

As Gary considers his future career prospects, I might remind him that over in the federal Liberal Party we already have two former NDP premiers, and a welcome mat with nice, comfy fur.

So, Gary, if you decide you don't want to gun for Jack Layton's job, you're always welcome over here in Liberal land. Bob and Ujjal will keep the light on for you...

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Call grows for a BC salmon summit

I wrote yesterday on BC's growing salmon crisis, and I'm glad to read today that the NDP is echoing the earlier call by Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh for an emergency salmon summit. As I outlined yesterday, this is a critical industry for British Columbia, and its crisis. It's critical that the federal government bring the stakeholders to the table here.

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B.C.'s growing salmon crisis

There’s a growing salmon crisis in British Columbia, and you can be assured it’s going to be an election issue on the left coast this fall, or whenever the next campaign comes. The fishery is a critical industry to the province that crosses many levels: commercial fishing, tourism, First Nations. The ripples of the apparent collapse of the Fraser River sockeye run, which DFO is now projecting will number 1.7 million sockeye after earlier projecting 13 million, will be widespread.

Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh drew attention to the issue recently:

Ujjal Dosanjh, a Liberal MP whose riding lies near the north arm of the Fraser, said Thursday the situation is grave enough that it deserves to be the focus of an intergovernmental conference involving federal, state and provincial representatives.

The collapse of the Fraser run “is going to have an impact on the aboriginal community, the commercial fishery and potentially the ecosystem as well – and that's pretty significant,” said Mr. Dosanjh.

“Governments on both sides of the border [need] to come together to look at this situation and determine if there's anything we can do to ensure this doesn't continue.”

And a column by Stephen Hume in the Vancouver Sun today also draws attention to the issue:

Have we so degraded the Fraser that we are now in the early stages of an Atlantic cod scenario for British Columbia's iconic wild salmon? Is there something else going on in this enormous ecosystem that has implications for us humans who are perched atop the food chain, perhaps more precariously than we like to think?

I don’t claim to have the answers on what is a very complicated situation, and one that is fraught with sensitive and politically dicey questions (farmed vs. wild salmon, commercial fishers vs. sport fishers vs. First Nations treaty rights, and more).

But I do know that this is a very serious situation that isn’t getting the attention it deserves from either the provincial or federal governments. And I know how critical the salmon industry is to the province, and the ripples its collapse would have.

Sport fishing is critical to our tourism industry, with anglers from around the world spending big money to come into places like Campbell River to hook a big salmon. I know the commercial fishing industry is a major economic driver for the province, particularly small communities already hit hard by the softwood lumber dispute. These communities and families are struggling as it is. And I know the salmon fishery is a culturally vital way of life for many of our First Nations communities.

So I think Dosanjh’s call for a salmon summit is very important. The stakeholders need to all come to the table with the various levels of government, and particularly the scientists at DFO, to talk about just what the heck is going on here, and how we can all work together to safeguard the resource for our generation, and for future ones.

It’s past time that the profile of this issue was raised.

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Video: Ujjal Dosanjh on Canada AM talking health care

I haven't seen any online video of his second CNN appearance yet (and it appears the first one has been removed from YouTube for a "Terms of use violation" UPDATE: It's still here though) but here's Liberal MP and former health minister Ujjal Dosanjh on Canada AM yesterday talking about his recent appearances on CNN to defend Canada's health care system, and health care reform:



Health care reform, by the way, is a debate we need to be having in Canada too because, as Ujjal says, our system isn't perfect either. And if you look at most polls, health care still trumps the economy and the environment as the top issue of concern for Canadians.

It's a debate we need to begin having.

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Video: Ujjal Dosanjh talks health care on CNN

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Happy Canada Day, eh!

A Happy mid-week Canada Day to all. Here's a few Canada Day videos from Liberal MPs. And, for my friend SH, a piece from the NY Times where Canadian ex-pats reflect on what they miss about the Great White North.

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Crime...boy, I don't know (with video)

With, to the chagrin of the BC Tourism people, Peter Van Loan having helpfully labeled Vancouver as “Canada's gang capital” last week (I suggest we stick with 'Supernatural British Columbia' on the license plates), his boss Stephen Harper was in town today to capitalize on public concern about gang violence introduce considered legislation aimed at addressing the problem.

And, almost as importantly, appear tough and decisive on crime while painting the opposition, particularly those lilly-livered Liberals, as soft on crime pansies that want to hug thugs and, I don't know, bake them cookies or something.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper insists tougher sentences included in the anti-gang legislation the Conservatives tabled on Thursday will deter crime but said he expects opposition parties will "parrot" critics of the measures because they believe in "soft-on-crime" policies.

Speaking in the Vancouver area, which has seen 18 shootings in the past month, Harper said the Tories received the Canadian public's backing in the last election to ensure violent criminals face strong penalties.

"The truth of the matter is, those who say that the tougher penalties on perpetrators will not work don’t want them to work because they don’t believe in his kind of approach," he told reporters.

"We know that we’re going to hear these critics, and we know that we’re going to hear the opposition parrot some of these critics because they all believe in soft-on-crime policies."

Yeah, that's right, people that oppose conservative crime policies actually WANT people to get shot and what not so our philosophical beliefs can be proven correct. Ladies and gentleman of Canada, your Prime Minister. Be proud.

But wait, what's this, in the next paragraph in that CBC story:

Shortly after the prime minister spoke, the Liberals and NDP announced they would support the bill in principle, while also criticizing the Tories for not going far enough in terms of crime prevention.

Oh, snap! How do you like them apples, Steve? We'll see your tough on crime, and raise you a you should have done it sooner AND do something about prevention, you old crime softie you.

You know, I may still be surprised but from what I've read so far, I have no problem with what the Conservatives seem to be proposing in this legislation.

The proposed amendments to the Criminal Code would make any gang-related homicide a first-degree murder charge, as well as create a new charge for drive-by shootings that would carry a mandatory four-year minimum sentence upon conviction, Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said.

The bill will also seek to increase sentences against those convicted of assaulting police officers with a weapon or causing bodily harm to a maximum of 10 years in prison.

Sure, why not. That's all fine with me. But if you think this is going to do anything to actually help the gang problem in B.C's Lower Mainland, you're on crack. Longer, tougher sentences. Sure. But are you under the impression gangsters don't know drive-by shootings, assaulting cops and running drugs is illegal? Do you think they're going to look at a longer sentence and decide 'yeah, it's not just worth it?' I really don't think so. They're aware it's wrong. They're aware of the risk. Make the sentences as long as you want. It may make the public feel better, but the impact on gang violence will be negligible.

It's not an either/or, prevention or tougher sentences, like Harper tries to make it. Why can't we do both? If we want to be truly effective, we need to. Ask yourself, would you rather throw the murderer in jail for life at taxpayer expense, or prevent them from turning to a life of crime in the first place. With the latter, not only do you save taxpayers the cost of incarceration but, well, you also save one taxpayer's life.

Frankly, a more effective thing that could be done to deal with BC's gang problem, and this is more something that needs to happen at the local level, would be to have one, single police force for the entire Greater Vancouver area. The mish-mash of different police forces, municipal and RCMP, that cover the area today is part of the problem. A single force would be more effective at dealing with a problem that crosses municipal boundaries.

Here's Liberal MPs Dominic LeBlanc and Ujjal Dosanjh reacting to the Conservative legislation. As a former BC Premier, and particularly as a former BC Attorney General, Dosanjh has some insight here.

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Maybe everyone gets a job after all?

It’s hard not to call this damage control in response to the furor over Ujjal and Irwin’s exclusion from the critic line-up last week. Still, rather than being a downer, I’ll just say its good that mistakes are being recognized and corrected. Well, most mistakes.

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff announces new roles for caucus
Ujjal Dosanjh, Irwin Cotler and Ken Dryden named as Special Advisors

OTTAWA – Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff today unveiled new roles for members of the Liberal caucus and announced his nominees for House committee chair positions.

The Honourable Ujjal Dosanjh (Vancouver South), former premier of British Columbia, will assume the role of Chair of a new Intergovernmental Liaison Secretariat and will be consulting with provincial premiers and territorial leaders on the best way forward to secure stability and fairness in our federation.
(more)

And it an article that’s totally unrelated to the above…Gary Mason made some good points in the Globe & Mail yesterday:

VANCOUVER -- There were likely few federal Liberals lamenting Michael Ignatieff's decision yesterday not to force an election over the budget. A national vote could well have been a disaster for the party, especially west of Ontario.

The West represents ground zero for the Liberals, both organizationally and in terms of the number of MPs they have in the region. The party has only seven of a possible 92 seats. This in the most prosperous and fastest-growing area in the country.

Five of those seven seats are in British Columbia, where the Liberals won half the number of seats they held when Paul Martin was at the helm. The Liberals made some real inroads in the province under Mr. Martin, but all that momentum has been lost.

Mr. Ignatieff has a massive job ahead of him if he is serious about rebuilding the Liberal brand in the West. The Liberals are a national party in name only now, and the Liberal Leader knows that. Remedying the problem will take ages. There are no quick fixes.
(more)

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All ballots counted, Dosanjh still won

The re re-count is over, all the votes have been counted a second time, and Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh is still the MP for Vancouver-South:

Liberal Ujjal Dosanjh retains Vancouver South seat after 2nd recount

Tuesday, November 04 - 12:34:53 PM Shane Bigham

VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - It's now official, and final. A second (and complete) recount of federal election results in Vancouver South has not changed the result. Incumbent Liberal Ujjal Dosanjh has retained his seat by 20 votes over Conservative Party candidate Wai Young.

The original recount gave Dosanjh a win by only 22 votes instead of the 33-vote margin on election night. The original recount was protested by Young, because a number of ballot boxes were not opened.

Much analysis to come over at ITQ I'm sure. Next challenge for Liberals: ensuring it's never that close again. And for everyone, perhaps some clarity around the rules for recounts and what not.

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Liberals up one in Quebec, and Dosanjh is back in

Good news for the Liberal Party on the election recount front today on both ends of the country.

We've gained one seat in Quebec that was originally in the Bloc column, with a judicial recount today awarding the suburban Montreal riding of Brossard-La Prairie to the Liberals:

Liberal candidate Alexandra Mendes has unseated Bloc Québécois incumbent Marcel Lussier in the riding of Brossard- La Prairie, according to a recount conducted by a Quebec Superior Court judge.

Mendes defeated Lussier by 69 votes, boosting the Liberals' national seat count to 77 and dropping the Bloc's to 49.

Lussier, an engineer and environmental specialist who has held the riding since 2006, originally thought he had won the riding by 102 votes in the Oct. 14 election.

And on the left coast, although a judicial recount lowered his margin of victory to a bare 22 votes, Liberal Ujjal Dosanjh has been upheld as the winner in Vancouver South.

Ujjal Dosanjh, the federal Liberal incumbent, said Friday he was humbled by a recount victory in his Vancouver South riding that gave him a win by only 22 votes instead of the 33-vote margin on election night.

We're not out of the woods yet in BC. Liberal Keith Martin in Esquimalt-Juan De Fuca is facing a judicial recount on Monday. Election night numbers gave him a 68-vote margin over Conservative Troy De Souza.

In other recounts still outstanding, Kitchener-Waterloo (where the Conservatives upset Liberal Andrew Telegdi) will go Wednesday, and a recont in Brampton-West, which Liberal Andrew Kania took by 223 votes, has yet to be scheduled. Earlier, a Conservative victory was upheld in PEI.

I've got my fingers crossed for Keith Martin, but very relieved for Ujjal Dosanjh. He's a good man, and we'll need his experience and his energy for the rebuilding exercise facing the Liberal Party in British Columbia and across Canada.

And the tightness of his race should be a wake-up call. This was thought by most to be one of the safer Liberal ridings in the province. That it was so close -- 22 votes! -- underscores the rebuilding job we face as a party, and the challenge ahead of us. It also underscores the inroads the Conservative Party has made with its strategy to woo ethnic voters, a strategy the Liberals have yet to effectivly counter.

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The Vancouver-South candidates debate the issues

On Friday morning I had a chance to escape from the campaign office for a little while and attend an all candidates meeting for the riding of Vancouver-South, held on the campus of Langara College. I briefly considered doing j-school at Langara back in the day, but I decided on a four year program and ended up at Carleton instead.

Participating in the debate were Liberal Ujjal Dosanjh, Conservative Wai Young, NDPer Ann Chambers, the Greens’ Csasba Gulya and Marxist-Leninist candidate Charles Boylan.
Besides being a political nerd that for some reason really enjoys all candidates meetings, I was particularly interested to see if Young would shake the Conservative muzzle (there seems to be an epidemic of Conservative candidates hiding from the public this election) and answer questions about the $579,000 grant she received from the federal government AFTER she received the Conservative candidate. To Young’s credit she did participate in the meeting, even if she did dodge the issue.

The opening statements were pretty standard. Boylan (ML) wants his leader in the TV debates too, and wants to end the per vote subsidy that he says parties use to bribe the tv corporations to exclude parties like his from the debates. He’d like to end party nominations, have groups like nurses pick candidates, and give the vote subsidy directly to candidates. Chambers (NDP) hit on all the expected points, such as accessible education, affordable housing and daycare.

In his opening statement, Dosanjh (LIB) pointed-out that with a majority Stephen Harper would have killed the Insite safe injection site. The Liberal vision is a progressive vision for Canada with investment and education, not plagiarized speeches from George W. Bush disciples. The gang and drug wars are taking a toll, and we need more officers on the beat, and must also invest in crime prevention. We need to get tough on repeat offenders, but putting 14 year olds (16 in Quebec) in jail with hardened criminals for life is not the answer. This must be the Conservative child care program, cracked Dosanjh. The Harper vision would wreck Canada; the Liberals are Canada’s only progressive alternative.

Gulya (Green) promised free votes, a promise he noted Harper broke, and said the environment is all around you and you can start the positive change right at home. Young (CON) burned much of her opening statement on a lengthy biography and shout-outs to the campus, before going on to say elections are about how tax dollars are spent, and students should research how the various parties plan to spend their tax dollars. She added the Conservatives are the only party with a long-term policy for student loans and grants, which drew a few guffaws from the assembled students. She also told the audience she wouldn’t be getting into policy, but that people could find it on their Web site.

The first question asked Young (CON) not to be so ambiguous about CPC policy but to share some of it with the audience; she directed them to the Web site, and threw in some attacks on Liberal immigration policy for good measure.

Dosanjh (LIB) rightly retorted that Young can’t show the questioner the Conservative platform because they don’t have one, which drew laughs. He went on to say last night at the debates Stephen Harper said Canadians are only concerned about the stock market, but this morning the Bank of Canada invested to protect mortgages, which he said sounds like a crises to him.
Responding to Young’s immigration charges, Dosanjh pointed-out that under the Conservatives there has been an increase in temporary worker permits and a corresponding decrease in the number of permanent residents admitted. Dosanjh said if they’re worthy to work here, Mr. Harper, they’re worthy to stay, which even earned applause from Young.

Gulya (Green) made the correct point that the Conservatives are replacing lost high-paying manufacturing jobs with low-paying service industry (often part-time) jobs, which is no way to grow a sustainable economy.

Young (CON) refused to sign the Kyoto Plus Pledge signed by all the other candidates, including early on the stage by the Marxist-Leninist.

A woman who identified herself as a Conservative supporter asked Young if her party would ever actually release a written platform and if she have time to read it before election day; Young promised she would.

Dosanjh (LIB) challenged Young on her plum government contact, and Young bizarrely responded by accusing Dosanjh of not wanting working moms to run for public office. What that has to do with lucrative government contracts going to Conservative candidates I don’t know; neither did the audience who laughed with puzzlement.

I liked the accent of the NDP candidate, I think it was Irish (as is ¼ of me) but I felt bad for her when she seemed to froze when asked to explain her party’s environmental policy. She looked like a deer in the headlights, and seemed tongue-tied for a good 20 seconds before the moderator pitched in “cap and trade” and she got back on track a little. She also flipped madly through a thick briefing book for 2 minutes before answering a question on Darfur, but Ms. Chambers seemed genuinely sincere. Ms. Young, however, seemed chippy and combatitive, and her reluctance to discuss much actual Conservative policy, and instead insist the students research it themselves, was puzzling.

In the end, I felt Dosanjh’s closing remarks summed it up well. This election is a choice between a Conservative vision and a Liberal vision. The Conservatives want you to fend for yourself with a few tax cuts, and say you don’t need government. The Liberals believe government has a vital role to play in providing the best health care, ensuring social justice, and providing a distinct Canadian voice to the world (and one that’s written in Canada too).

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