Federal election - 2015 (Ontario)

Again!  

Liberals mum about nomination challenge in Toronto riding

The Liberal party is refusing to disclose details of an appeal of a nomination process that has triggered allegations of ethnic profiling and vote-suppressing robocalls in a downtown Toronto riding.

The party will not discuss the grounds for the appeal launched by engineer Marisa Sterling, who sought to become the Liberal candidate in the riding of Beaches-East York but who lost to lawyer Nathaniel Erskine-Smith at a nomination meeting before Christmas.

Sterling filed her complaint with the Liberal permanent appeals committee, led by lawyer Jim Graham, seeking to have the result overturned and Sterling herself named as the successful candidate.

Although no one involved would disclose specific details of the appeal, the Citizen has learned it concerns robocalls and a letter sent by Erskine-Smith’s campaign to warn riding members about voting rules.

In November, the authenticity of some memberships were called into question when a large number of new names from the Bangladeshi and South Asian communities suddenly appeared on the riding association list of members eligible to vote.

That prompted Erskine-Smith’s campaign to send out emails and automated robocalls to party members reminding them they would be eligible to vote only if they had personally paid for their own memberships.

He also sent out an email with a similar message.

“Buying a membership for someone else is fraud, and will result in a waste of the voter’s time,” the message read.  “Voters who did not buy their own membership will be stopped from voting.”

http://www.canada.com/News/politics/Liberals+about+nomination+challenge+...

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If Alan & Debater had their way we would only see Liberal joined at the hip pollsters like Forum and EKOS publishing their results. Love manipulating the voters much fellas........

alan, you can do the analysis yourself, but if you want to be accurate don't forget to take herding into consideration when doing the math, eh!. 

The politics behind Stephen Harper's fixation on a balanced budget

Falling oil prices have sent federal revenues into a tailspin, but the PM is not for changing course

Low oil prices are bad news for Alberta and Saskatchewan, the bedrocks of federal Conservative support, but they are shaping up as good news for Ontario and B.C. where the party needs to at least hold onto the gains it made in 2011.

In Ontario, the opposition parties insist targeted, stimulus spending is needed to boost the manufacturing sector, a message that may play well in those suburban ridings around Toronto, and in regions of southwestern Ontario  particularly hard hit by plant closures.

Canada is facing difficult economic challenges. The government is facing tough political choices heading into an election. And for Harper, the answers so far suggest the trained economist will trust his political instincts.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/the-politics-behind-stephen-harper-s-fix...

This looks like a big one.

PMO taking a look at Ring of Fire plan to rival Ontario’s: Cree chief

A snowmobile rides down the main street Tuesday, December 18, 2012, on the Fort Hope First Nation, Ont. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz

The Prime Minister’s Office has expressed interest in a First Nations-led plan to build a new seaport and railroad across northern Ontario to the Ring of Fire mineral deposit, an election-year effort that would rival Premier Kathleen Wynne’s own designs for the region.

The Mushkegowuk Council and TGR Rail Company are preparing a joint purchase of the Ontario Northland rail line between North Bay and Moosonee, pending the First Nation group’s approval from its council of chiefs this week, said Mushkegowuk Council grand chief Lawrence Martin Friday.

The plan would open the door to a east-to-west rail, transmission line and telecommunications corridor to the Ring of Fire, a 5,120 square kilometre crescent of ore that could bring a $9.4 billion increase to Ontario’s GDP over the next decade if developed.

After more than a year of what Wynne has characterized as foot dragging from Ottawa on a federal-provincial plan, the PMO and Natural Resources Minister Greg Rickford’s office called TRG Rail in the past three weeks expressing interest in the new plan, Martin told iPolitics.

“We’ve even had a call from the PMO office asking for information for our project,” said Martin, adding it was TGR Rail, a Toronto-based rail company, that took the call. “It’s gaining momentum, so it looks like it’s going ahead.”

TGR Rail would not comment on the corridor plan, saying only that the firm would issue a news release Monday.

The PMO also did not respond to a request to clarify their interest in the Mushkegowuk plan, while Rickford’s office was still looking into the issue at deadline.

At an Ottawa meeting in December, 2013, Wynne and Harper apparently made progress on their differences over Ring of Fire development. Progress then stalled, which Wynne used as an election issue during her re-election campaign last spring. Harper and Wynne famously did not meet again face to face until this January 5th in Toronto, after which Wynne told reporters they had discussed her request for $1 billion to develop transportation infrastructure for the Ring of Fire.

Mining companies interested in the Ring of Fire have in the past planned for a transportation corridor from the mining deposit to the rail and road networks that run along the north shore of Lake Superior.

In recent years, the Ontario government has also focused on opening the Ring of Fire with an emphasis on communities west and south of the area.

Wynne launched a development corporation and opened negotiations for a regional framework between the province and First Nations communities in the northwest of the province. Those First Nations, despite operating as individual communities, often negotiate with outside groups as the Matawa First Nations, who have hired former premier and federal Liberal Leader Bob Rae as their chief negotiator.

The Mushkegowuk, who reside further to the east and have Cree ancestry, are against the development corporation because it would dilute First Nations power in the development of the Ring of Fire, said Martin. They are lobbying the Matawa First Nations to join the east-to-west corridor plan and leave the development corporation behind, he said.

“We’re offering it as a partnership with them, “ said Martin. “It would be a business, there’d be dividends and everything would be run in that fashion.”

The Matawa First Nations’ participation in the Mushkegowuk plan would deal a serious blow to Wynne’s aims in the region.

Her development corporation, which the province launched unilaterally in the fall of 2013, is meant to be a clearinghouse for all the major economic and industrial investment that needs to happen to develop in the Ring of Fire. The mining deposit contains chromium, nickel and other ores and could increase Ontario’s GDP by $9.4 billion over the next decade, according to Ontario’s Chamber of Commerce.

Chiefs from two of the Mattawa communities closest to the Ring of Fire deposit, the Webequie First Nation and the Marten Falls First Nation, were not available to comment on their position Friday.

Martin, for his part, sees the effort as one that would give a better deal for First Nation than the plan currently on offer from Ontario.

“We’re against (the development corporation) because we only get one seat on this corporation,” said Martin. “We’d rather have a majority share in that corporation, so we’re saying how about we set up our own with Matawa and Mushkegowuk, then we’d have much more control over what goes on, how it goes on and how we can benefit even better.”

The new plan requires buying Ontario Northland, which already runs a railroad from North Bay north to the town of Moosonee on the coast of James Bay.

The Mushkegowuk would then like to invest in transmission lines and telecommunications to the seaport and the Ring of Fire, said Martin. The Mushkegowuk already own transmission lines around Moosonee in northwestern Ontario that connect to Ontario Hydro’s infrastructure through a company called Five Nations Energy Inc., he said.

http://www.ipolitics.ca/2015/01/24/pmo-taking-a-look-at-ring-of-fire-pla...

As oil prices fall, a political challenge for budget honesty

http://www.torontosun.com/2015/01/26/as-oil-prices-fall-a-political-chal...

Chantal Hébert, Naomi Klein among finalists for political writing prize

Now in its 15th year, the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize was set up in to honour MP from Windsor.

The Longer I'm Prime Minister by Paul Wells won last year

Winner gets $25,000

http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/2015/01/27/chantal-hbert-naom...

Sounds like it will be a fascinating event.

NDP’s Mulcair hopes ‘urban agenda’ speech will raise his profile in Toronto

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ndps-mulcair-hopes-urban-ag...

Official Opposition Leader announces plans to focus on transit and infrastructure needs across Canada

http://globalnews.ca/canada/

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Thomas Mulcair focuses on child care, transit in appeal to Toronto votersCampaign-style speech appeals to Toronto communities and the 905.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/03/15/thomas-mulcair-focuses-on-chi...

Here's the Official Opposition Leader's speech in its entirety

For the record:  Thomas Mulcair tries to win over Toronto

NDP leader Tom Mulcair details his urban agenda

http://www.macleans.ca/politics/for-the-record-tom-mulcair-tries-to-win-...

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My hunch was that there were a lot of people out for Mulcair's speech, and now Chantal Hebert has confirmed in her column tonite that it is one of the biggest in-between-elections rally ever held by the NDP.

Good on Mulcair to be able to draw such a crowd in Toronto! In Ontario!