Welcome back New Democrats - WOW!
So we're trading in the sacred trust of universal healthcare for a better number from the CBO?
Umm CBO. Wrong country, eh!
Yes it is a brilliant startegy which will eventually create dental coverage for everyone, as opposed to going in the opposite direction, with the constant attempts at privatization (Dr Day anyone) from the right-wing Liberals and Conservatives
So we're trading in the sacred trust of universal healthcare for a better number from the CBO?
This is absolutely huge, and long, long overdue
NDP promises to cover dental care for all Canadians earning less than $70K per year
The program would kick in next year and cost more than $800 million per year, according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer.
Even more significantly is that Jagmeet is having a great beginning to the election camapign. Crowds are enlarging day by day, and news commentors are observing the contrast from the naysayers (many Liberals), some of whom post here, who have been down on Jagmeet since he won the NDP leadership (Liberal CBC Terry Milewski's smear job anyone).
Now you’re talking!
The money’s there but it’s being grabbed by Canada’s elite, the one percenters
Jagmeet promises $5000 for renters and also promises to build 500,000 affordable homes
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/beta.cp24.com/news/2019/9/26/1_4612125.html
This is the Justin Trudeau Liberal’s Housing Policy in Canada in the 21st century!
BC family of 5 living out of a van draws attention at NDP campaign stop
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/beta.ctvnews.ca/national/federal-election-2019/2019/9/26/1_4612084.html
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh vows to protect coast, attends climate strike rally at B.C. Legislature
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/toronto.citynews.ca/2019/09/27/singh-fed-elxn-day-17/amp/
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Money for youth programs to help prevent organized crime
NDP says that if elected, they will create a $100-million fund to help keep young people out of gangs if elected.
The NDP leader got the start he needed and a Liberal scandal that helped reframe his supposedly hopeless campaign
And so an hour after Trudeau spoke on his campaign plane, Singh stepped before the cameras in a hotel meeting room scrambled for the occasion. He ignored the perpetrator entirely and spoke only to the people who had been hurt by the photo that he said had “jarred” him. “The kids that see this image, the people that see this image, are going to think of all the times that they were made fun of, that they were hurt, that they were hit, that they were insulted, that they were made to feel less because of who they are,” he said, looking directly into the camera. “I want you to know that you have value, you have worth and you are loved. And I don’t want you to give up on Canada, and please don’t give up on yourselves.”
His demeanor cracked when he talked about how he’d been spurred to make a public statement after a friend reminded him that not everyone could battle racists with their fists, as Singh had when he was young. “There are a lot of people that couldn’t do that. They couldn’t fight back. They didn’t have the ability to do that,” Singh said, then paused, looked at the ground in front of him and knocked his knuckles against each other while he composed himself. Finally he finished, with a shrug that suggested he didn’t know where to head next. “They couldn’t. They couldn’t do it themselves. And I think it’s gonna hurt to see this.”
It would swiftly become clear that there wasn’t just one occasion on which Trudeau had worn blackface, but several, and the story gobbled up the campaign for days. Each time he was asked about it, Singh occupied a very specific leadership role, speaking to the people hurting from this and ignoring the motivations, explanations or mea culpas of the man who had seen fit to play dress-up in such a way.
Two days after the story broke, Singh was back in his hometown of Windsor, holding yet another a town hall. At the end of it, a reporter pointed out a supporter in the background hoisting a bright orange sign that paraphrased Singh’s words: “I have value. I have worth. I am loved. Thank you Singh.” The leader hadn’t noticed the sign before that moment, and he wheeled around, delighted. “That sign is what we’re all about. I want everyone to know that you have value, that you have worth, that you are loved,” he said.
Then he paused for a moment and smirked. “And I guess I am Singh, yes,” he said, hoisting his shoulders in a “Here I am” shrug as the crowd laughed and cheered. “That is true.”
Appealing to this middle class BS is just another ploy by the one percenters.
It's always about the rich vs the poor. Climate change, health care, education, jobs, basically everything.
The NDP has dusted off the 1972 playbook. It’s tired, class warfare stuff, but it's starting to resonate
Jagmeet Singh was a pretty hopeless parliamentary party leader in his first 18 months at the helm but now he is playing to his strengths
Finally support for working people as opposed to the one percenters
NDP government would be in ‘no rush’ to ratify USMCA, Singh says
By Victoria Gibson. Published on Oct 3, 2019 4:37pm
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh outlines the NDP's plan to help small businesses and workers by making pharmacare and dental care part of Canada's universal health care. Singh, was joined by NDP candidates Nick Milanovic (Hamilton East-Stoney Creek), Scott Duvall (Hamilton Mountain), Matthew Green (Hamilton Centre) and Yousaf Malik (Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas) at Kebabish Restaurant in Stoney Creek. Singh is seen in this photo with Gina Angelino and Nadeem Younis small business owner of Kebabich Restaurant. Cathie Coward/ Hamilton Spectator
An NDP government would be in “no rush” to ratify the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement, party leader Jagmeet Singh told reporters Thursday — and the NDP would look to alter the deal to include measures like explicit penalties for breaching labour or environment provisions.
“What’s the point of having provisions on labour rights, having provisions on the environment, if there’s no enforceability? That’s, to me, meaningless,” Singh said in Toronto. The NDP leader made similar comments in a French-language debate on Wednesday night, prompting a rebuke on Thursday from Liberal Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland.
In a Twitter post directed at Singh, Freeland wrote that claiming the new trade deal didn’t have protections for the environment or workers was “false.”
“Our government negotiated and secured enforceable, standalone chapters on labour and the environment. Facts matter,” Freeland wrote.
Responding to Freeland’s criticism on Thursday, Singh replied that his issue with the trade deal wasn’t that such sections didn’t exist — it was about whether they could be enforced.
“The fact that Ms. Chrystia Freeland has pointed that out is highlighting my exact criticism of a government that thinks saying pretty words is enough. It’s not,” Singh said.
READ MORE: NAFTA 2.0 ratification likely won’t happen until the fall: US AG official
The NDP leader was then asked by a reporter what specific enforcement mechanisms he would prefer to see in the deal.
“We can have enforcement which requires that the protections are brought before international laws, that there’s accountability measures put into place, that there are penalties in place if they’re not followed,” Singh replied. “Enforcement means making sure we use all the tools available to hold to account any breach in the rights, whether it’s workers rights or environmental rights.”
Singh did not specifically answer when asked whether he would fully “walk away” from the existing USMCA deal, nor how, in that case, he would compel the U.S. and Mexico to return to the negotiating table.
The suggestion that an NDP government would attempt to renegotiate the high profile trade deal has been in the spotlight this week, after Essex incumbent Tracey Ramsey said an NDP government’s “top priority” would be securing a “better” trade deal during an interview with Power & Politics.
“There are improvements that can, and should, be made to this deal and we would make every effort to ensure that we do so,” Ramsey said of the deal — which has been signed by all parties, but has not yet been ratified.
The USMCA deal, sometimes referred to as the new NAFTA — the nearly three-decade old North American Free Trade Agreement it’s posed to replace — was signed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, U.S. President Donald Trump and then-Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto last November.
The deal’s future is still on uncertain ground, as U.S. Democrats — who control a majority of the House of Representatives — have raised several concerns, particularly around the labour and environment chapters. Canadian foreign affairs officials, in communication with concerned U.S. Democrats, have been attempting to stress that the two chapters in question are subject to state-to-state dispute settlement under Chapter 31.
Reuters reported last month that the Trump administration had sent its latest proposals for addressing such concerns to the Democrats, citing “lawmakers and congressional sources.” The Canadian Press also reported this week that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has launched a new effort to push for the deal’s final legal approval in Congress by the end of November.
The USMCA deal was negotiated during a time of high trade tensions between Canada and its southern neighbour. The U.S. hit Canada with tariffs on steel and aluminum last June, and the Canadian government retaliated with their own levies on those products, as well as a variety of other goods. The U.S. agreed to lift its tariffs on steel and aluminum in May of this year, with CNN reporting that officials from Canada and Mexico refused to ratify the new trade agreement until the levies were removed.
Now, questions are swirling about if and how a House impeachment inquiry, recently launched against U.S. President Donald Trump, will impact the ratification process. Trudeau was asked about the impeachment inquiry at a campaign stop in Delta last week, and whether he was concerned about its impacts on the ratification of USMCA.
“We’ve always been focused on the ratification of USMCA in a way that tries to go beyond the partisan differences in the United States right now,” Trudeau replied.
He stressed the continued existence of NAFTA, USMCA’s predecessor, in the meantime.
“Until the new one is brought in, the old one remains in place,” the Liberal leader told reporters in British Columbia.
The federal NDP’s critiques of the USMCA deal did not begin on the campaign trail, with Singh taking aim at perceived shortfalls in the trade agreement soon after it was tentatively agreed upon last year. In May of this year, Ramsey issued a statement condemning the federal Liberals for trying to push forward USMCA’s ratification, urging the government to allow the U.S. Congress to continue their work “to improve the deal.”
“Congressional members, labour and environmental groups in the U.S. are working hard in talks with Ambassador [Robert] Lighthizer calling for stronger language to improve labour and environmental provisions and pushing hard to remove the intellectual property protections that will lock in higher prescription drug costs for all three countries,” Ramsey wrote.
Singh was asked on Thursday about how he would address the provision he sees as leading to higher drug prices, particularly given its connection to data protection. (The deal extends the minimum data protection period for a class of drugs known as biologics.)
“It’s made it harder, absolutely,” Singh told reporters. He pointed to his party’s pledge to bring in universal pharmaceutical care as the answer to such concerns. “That is the way we bring down the cost of medication. In fact, we make it free. We use the buying power of our entire nation. Our plan is exactly that,” he said.
Singh then repeated a figure of $10 billion, which he has said on the campaign trail the government would need to invest to ensure universal pharmacare. The only independently released Parliamentary Budget Officer costing assessment of a drug-related pledge so far has been from the Green party. The assessment of their universal drug plan resulted in an estimate of $6.69 billion for 2019-2020, rising to $36.64 billion in 2028-29, with the PBO designating their estimate as having high uncertainty.
READ MORE: Singh says Liberals can’t be trusted to implement pharmacare
The NDP leader was asked by a reporter in Toronto on Thursday about his pharmacare plans, and specifically, how an NDP government would prevent Americans from coming into Canada to buy their drugs — which could either create drug shortages, or drive up prices.
“That’s something we’ve got to look at. It’s a new concern that people are raising,” Singh acknowledged, pointing to price differences for medicines like insulin.
But he stressed that creating a universal pharmacare system would be an NDP government’s first priority, saying his party would address that particular risk afterwards. “Let’s not get the horse before the cart,” he said.
*This story has been updated with details about Canadian foreign affairs officials’ communication with the U.S. on Chapter 31 dispute settlement.
https://ipolitics.ca/2019/10/03/ndp-government-would-be-in-no-rush-to-ratify-usmca-singh-says/
Finally support for working people as opposed to the one percentersNDP government would be in ‘no rush’ to ratify USMCA, Singh says
That's the one thing the NDP really needs to double down on, is full-throated opposition to free trade agreements. They will gain supporters from all other parties if they do this. Most importantly, it will expose the Conservatives and the PPC as the globalist hypocrites they are. Hammering on the free trade issue can really drive a wedge between these 2 parties, and the people who support them because they want to protect Canada, which you don't protect your country by going along with neoliberal free trade agreements.
Agreed
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Now I see why NDPers chose Jagmeet Singh as the NDP Leader
The night belonged to Jagmeet Singh
Minority Government hear we come. What does the NDP absolutely need to obtain to support the Liberals? One thing the NDP doesn’t need to do and that is worry about another election so quickly after this one The party that does that will be punished by the voters so hopefully the NDP will not let the Liberals try and intimidate them over that. Either the Liberals make some major concessions to the NDP or the NDP should shaft them. This could become the moment the NDP has been waiting for since 2011
Jagmeet Singh turns table on reporter who asks him if he is giving a blank cheque for First Nations
NDP veterans in B.C. laid groundwork for federal party's revival under Jagmeet Singh
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- Jagmeet Singh's NDP leadership campaign received a big boost when he was endorsed by Jenny Kwan, the NDP incumbent in Vancouver East.
As I reflect on the federal NDP's Lazarus-like emergence in this election campaign, it's clear that veteran political warhorses were part of the equation.
While Jagmeet Singh has deservedly received tremendous praise for his poise, compassion, and ability to connect with voters, he's been ably assisted by NDP politicians with decades of experience.
Vancouver Kingsway incumbent Don Davies, for instance, was the first to start talking about dental care in his role as the NDP health critic. This made it into the NDP platform, demonstrating a key difference between his party and the Liberals.
Davies has also tried to play up the hollowness of Liberal promises around a national pharmacare program.
He's done this by repeatedly pointing out that this was being pledged by Jean Chrétien as far back as 1997.
In fact, Davies was such an effective health critic that he's even been endorsed by a former Liberal health minister, Jane Philpott, who bore the brunt of his cross-examinations in Question Period.
Jenny Kwan, the incumbent for Vancouver East, has also helped the NDP's fortunes with her hardnosed criticism in Parliament of the Liberal record on immigration and multiculturalism.
The Liberal brand is rooted in being the party for minorities—a brand forged decades ago. Justin Trudeau helped reinforce that by inviting 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada in 2015.
But it was Kwan who pressed the Liberals to abandon the third-party agreement with the Americans on refugees, which Trudeau refused to do. She also highlighted failures in the government's citizenship legislation.
And she drove home the point that the Liberals' refusal to grant permanent-residency status to caregivers until they spent two years in a government program was inhumane.
In the process, she often reminded many voters that Trudeau isn't quite as progressive as he likes to present himself.
The upshot was the NDP repositioned itself as a legitimate contender for the votes of immigrants and people of colour. This was further advanced by the election of Jagmeet Singh as party leader, which came about, in part, because of her endorsement.
Kwan has also spent many years listening to and learning from Indigenous leaders in the region as a city councillor, MLA, and MP. This also likely a factor when major figures in the Indigenous movement signed on with the NDP rather than the Greens in this election campaign.
When some veteran NDP MPs jumped ship, Peter Julian and Don Davies decided to run again—and they could end up wielding lots of influence if there's a minority government.
CHARLIE SMITH
Then there was the credibility that long-time NDP MP Svend Robinson brought to the party on environmental issues as he tries to stage a political comeback in Burnaby North–Seymour.
Robinson was a green-minded MP before there even was a federal Green party. This point was not lost on his backers, including former B.C. Green leader Stuart Parker and environmental legend David Suzuki.
Another one stirring the drink has been Peter Julian, the NDP incumbent for Burnaby–New Westminster. He realized long before the devastating Nanaimo-Ladysmith by-election that his party had to "green up" in time for the next election. He was ahead of his time in making these arguments.
At the start of this campaign, Julian took his Green New Deal tour on the road in an attempt to prevent the hemorrhaging of NDP votes to Elizabeth May's party.
In addition to being a fluent French speaker, Julian can converse in Mandarin, which has helped bring Taiwanese immigrants into the NDP camp. That, along with Kwan's fluent Cantonese, has also helped rebrand the party as being more inclusive.
These days, politics in Canada has become very leadercentric, particularly in the coverage of national campaigns.
But on the ground, it's candidates like Davies, Kwan, Robinson, and Julian who laid a firm foundation for their party before the writ was issued.
A political star may have been born in Canada in this campaign in the form of Jagmeet Singh.
But let's not forget that he's also had a strong supporting cast of veterans in Metro Vancouver.
Without them sticking around for one more election, Singh likely would not be where he is today.
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