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'The plan of the Liberal Party is to push out this misinformation this conspiracy theory to discredit Chong and to exonerate the Prime Minister'

Published May 05, 2023 Last updated 2days ago 4 minute read

Attempts by two Liberal MPs to throw cold water on claims the Chinese government intimidated relatives of a member of parliament are part of larger efforts by the party to save face by discrediting the accusations, a Conservative MP said on Friday.

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Grande Prairie-Mackenzie MP Chris Warkentin told the National Post that comments made Thursday by Liberal MPs Kevin Lamoureux and Mark Gerretsen in the House of Commons are part of a larger scheme by the Liberals to sow doubt in the claims of Wellington-Halton Hills MP Michael Chong, who discovered Monday that members of Chinese intelligence service were targeting him and his family as part of Beijings ongoing efforts to meddle in Canadas affairs.

The plan of the Liberal Party is to push out this misinformation this conspiracy theory to discredit Chong and to exonerate the prime minister, Warkentin said on Friday.

Warkentin was one of two Conservative MPs called on the carpet during Thursdays raucous question period for accusing the government of dishonesty over when it became aware of threats against Chongs family.

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During an opposition motion debate earlier on Thursday, Lamoureux implied Chong had known about the intimidation for years, but chose not to disclose it.

The question is, has the member actually raised it with any member of their caucus? Lamoureaux said.

Has he brought it up in the chamber, has he done anything on the issue?

During the same debate, Liberal MP Mark Gerretsen likewise attempted to cast doubt on Chongs claims.

The statement of fact is this: The prime minister first heard about this incident earlier this week when it was reported in the media, as did everybody else, he said.

The member from Wellington-Halton Hills actually had a defensive briefing on this two years ago, so he knew about this when it actually happened.

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Gerretsen then asked when Chong knew about the alleged harassment, questioning why he didnt bring the issue to anybodys attention before the media did.

Publicly casting doubt on Chongs claims, Warkentin alleges, is the government saving face after a week of criticism from all sides.

When (Public Safety Minister Marco) Mendicino was asked specifically to condemn the comments of the Liberals members, he refused to do that, Warkentin explained.

Then he started to insinuate that briefings were given to members of parliament, therefore insinuating that Chong has received this briefing that would have allowed him to know that his family was under threat.

He also pointed to comments made Friday morning by the prime minister, suggesting that Chong had received multiple briefings to ensure his family was kept safe.

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Its also clear that information never made it up to the political level in my office, to me, or the minister of public safety at the time, Prime MInister Justin Trudeau told reporters from the floor of his partys annual convention in Ottawa.

Mendicino, who served as the governments whipping boy on the issue, spent yet another question period ducking questions from all parties on what the Liberals knew about the allegations, and when.

I want to assure my colleague opposite that we take the concerns that he has expressed and had been expressed in public in regards to foreign interference, and the targeting of himself and his family, extremely seriously, Mendicino said.

That response garnered heckling from the opposition benches.

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As Speaker Anthony Rota attempted to restore order, an interjection from Warkentin caused an even bigger uproar.

Hes lying! he shouted over the din.

The honourable member well, Im not going to say honourable member did he want to withdraw that, please? Rota responded, to which Warkentin refused.

You do not respect the chair, the chair will not recognize you while you are in this house, a clearly irked Rota said.

Chong, who had previously dismissed Lamoureux and Gerretsens assertions, told the house it was impossible the PMO had no idea about the threats made against his family.

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Ive just been informed by the national security advisor that the CSIS intelligence assessment of July 20, 2021, was sent by CSIS to the relevant departments and to the national security advisor in the PCO (privy council office,) Chong said, explaining the report concerned himself and other MPs being targeted by the Chinese government.

This contradicts what the prime minister said yesterday he said that CSIS made the determination that it wasnt something that needed to be raised to a higher level, because it wasnt a significant enough concern.

In response, Mendicino maintained that both he and the prime minister only found out about the allegations in the media on Monday.

That began a stream of pointed questions from both Conservative and Bloc Qubcois members, questioning the version of events proffered by the public safety minister and the prime minister.

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Tempers flared again during a question from Chilliwack-Hope MP Mark Strahl, who called out the Liberals attempts to discredit Chong and directly accused the government of being intentionally untruthful.

Liberals are now targeting the MP, who himself has been targeted by Beijing, Strahl said.

When will the prime minister get up and apologize for these Liberals MPs spreading these outright lies?

After a 30-second standing ovation from the Conservative benches, Rota asked Strahl to withdraw his statement.

Mr. Speaker, I stand by what I said, Strahl responded.

Warkentin described the entire situation as unbelievable.

Its an intentional tactic by the Liberals to try and discredit Michael, but this is what they do, he told the National Post.

We saw this with Jody Wilson-Raybould, anytime that anyone has stood up to this prime minister they attempt to discredit the victim, and victim blame.

Email:bpassifiume@postmedia.com| Twitter:@bryanpassifiume

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Continued here:
Liberals trying to save face by quietly discrediting Michael Chong ... - National Post

Outbreaks of Victorian Liberal Party infighting have been so regular,you can just about set your watch to them.

The latest outburst of infighting, inspired by exiled MP Moira Deeming and her band of supporters, has once again focused the national spotlight on the under-performing Victorian Liberal division which has won just one state election since 1996.

What is so galling to Liberal supporters indeed all voters who care about good government is that the public blue is occurring at a time when the Andrews government deserves scrutiny.

This month's state budget will be a horror show full of cuts, casting a spotlight over management of the state's finances, whilethe Premier's integrity is also under scrutiny by state watchdogs.

But once again, the Victorian Liberals are talking about themselves, capturing media attention, and providing an entertaining blood sport for political junkies.

The origin of this latest chaos goes back six weeks, when Ms Deeming was suspended by the party room over links to an anti-trans rights rally, which was gatecrashed by neo-Nazis.

At the time, Pesutto wanted to expel the MP for bringing the party into disrepute. It was a bid to signal to Victorians that he was serious about bringing his side back to the centre.

Pesutto has to wear some of the blame for the current chaos. His handling of the Deeming expulsion motion was botched and lacked a clear argument with authority.

"The leader's job is to hold the party together, on that he has failed,'' a senior Liberal MP said.

But Deeming's decision to sue Pesutto this week has rallied support behind the leader and has emboldened MPs to take on Deeming and her supporters, who have attacked Pesutto's leadership at every chance.

"You can't have a situation where someone is suing the leader,'' the same MP said.

Deeming is unlikely to ever rejoin the party room, with a new expulsion motion to be circulated as early as today.

So, could this be the moment the party resets?

There are some in the Liberal Party community who are hoping that this crisis may provide the opportunity for the leader and broader party to set a new tone by cleaning the party up and focusing on issues that actually matter to Victorians, like the parlous state of the budget.

"This is a real problem, not just a political problem because we have a bad government and we're not holding them to account,'' a senior Liberal said a view shared by multiple Liberals who spoke to the ABC.

A reset may be wishful thinking.

There's been a culture of leaking and undermining the leader that stretches back to when Ted Baillieu was brought down as premier some of those malcontents remain in the state parliament and are part of the reason for this current crisis.

"Matthew [Guy] had many chances, [Michael] O'Brien was given half a chance, they haven't given John any chance,'' one senior Liberal MP said.

This is the 'enough is enough' moment. And MPs made that clear at parliament this week.

"There are three or four terrorists who care more about blowing up the Liberal Party than they do Daniel Andrews,'' frontbencher James Newbury said.

"They are holding the Liberal Party hostage; they need to work out whether they're Liberals or whether they want to sit on the crossbench."

Pesutto has made similar, but less colourful statements.

It poses the question: Why are some MPs in public life? Is it to serve their communities? Hold the government to account and present a viable alternative? Or is it just to pursue personal projects while getting paid at least $192,115 a year on the backbench?

Despite the party's long stint out of power, there appears to be a group of MPs content with opposition who like the lifestyle of being a MP, rather than working hard to force a change of government.

There are also Labor MPs who take a similar attitude, but being in government means its less obvious, or damaging.

A constant concern for Liberals is that the party is willing to preselect candidates who are prominent on specific issues, often on the fringe of what matters in state politics.

Deeming is a case in point.

"She's an activist and she's failed to make the transition to MP,'' oneMP said.

It means that their views are blinkered to wider issues, which is what is required for a party of government.

Part of this problem is that preselection processes are often dominated by culture-war issues which don't win large slabs of votes. Voters are usually interested in issues like the cost of living, the health system and schools.

Branch members have huge sway on preselection and sometimes what they view as important issues don't reflect the realities of government.

"To be electable requires compromise, too many that we pick are activists,'' a senior figure said.

Some MPs want the preselection overhauled, which will set them on a collision course with the membership, who cherish their voting rights.

Also on the cards, a federal intervention of the Victorian division.

This would be a takeover of the party's state administration, which has been riven by factionalism and a lack of professionalism for years.

On Friday, federal leader Peter Dutton did not rule out an intervention into the Victorian branch.

There are no powers to intervene in the state's parliamentary party room, because that is the domain of the elected state MPs.

An intervention would be resisted in some quarters, especially given Dutton's standing with voters in the state.

Remember, this is a party that under his leadership broke records by losing a by-election in a "safe seat" just last month. It was the federal party that ran the Aston campaign.

Deeming is now unlikely to ever return to the party.

MPs are openly discussing expelling her, andmotion to expel Ms Deeming could be circulated as early as todaywith a vote by the end of the week.

"That's on the table, it's been reported publicly, but I'm going to be consulting with my colleagues on this," Pesutto told ABC News Breakfast on Friday.

Others want the party to go further and sanction MP Renee Heath after she circulated an email that accused Pesutto of bullying her.

There are other MPs in their sights too, particularly those referred to as terrorists they're yet to be named publicly.

"It's time to take out the trash. This is going to be really ugly and we're going to see a lot of blood but something needs to change and we need to get rid of these extremists,'' an MP said.

More public fighting. Just like clockwork.

Read the original here:
Internal strife is threatening the Victorian Liberal Party, and now members are calling for a clean-out - ABC News

On Saturday former Liberal minister Stuart Robert announced that he would soon retire from politics, setting up a byelection in his Queensland seat of Fadden.

There has been recent speculation that former Liberal PM Scott Morrison will also soon retire, which would mean a byelection in his New South Wales seat of Cook.

At the 2022 federal election, Robert won Fadden by a 60.6-39.4 margin over Labor, while Morrison won Cook by a 62.4-37.6 margin over Labor.

At the April 1 federal Aston byelection, Labor had a 6.4% swing in its favour to overturn a 52.8-47.2 Liberal margin at the 2022 election. Even if Labor achieved such a swing in its favour in Fadden and Cook, these seats would still be comfortable holds for the Liberals.

As they are very unlikely to win either Fadden or Cook at byelections, and could be embarrassed if there were a swing to the Liberals in either seat, I do not expect Labor to contest either byelection.

In last weeks pre-budget federal Essential poll, conducted in the days before May 2 from a sample of 1,130, Labor led by 53-41, an increase from 52-43 four weeks ago. Primary votes were 33% Labor (down one), 32% Coalition (up one), 14% Greens (steady), 5% One Nation (down one), 2% UAP (down one), 8% for all Others (down one) and 5% undecided (up one).

Despite the Coalitions primary vote gain, Labor increased their two party lead. That suggests respondent preference flows to Labor were stronger than previously.

By 48-29, respondents supported raising the JobSeeker rate without a cost of living component in the question (this applied to half the sample). With the cost of living component, support was 50-29. An additional question from the April Resolve poll had support for increasing JobSeeker at 43-31.

Respondents were asked to rate Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton from 0 to 10, then ratings of 0-3 were counted as negative, 4-6 as neutral and 7-10 as positive. Albanese improved to a 41-24 positive rating from 40-27 in March, while Dutton dropped to 35-23 negative from 33-26.

Asked to name the treasurer, 33% correctly named Jim Chalmers. By 41-27, voters approved of his job performance. By 45-42, voters thought the budget could make a difference to the cost of living.

For health, education and social security, far more people thought government spending was too low rather than too high. For renewable energy projects and the NDIS, the difference between too low and too high was much reduced. For defence, more people thought spending too high than too low.

On taxes, far more thought personal taxes too high rather than too low, but too low and too high were equal for taxes on oil and gas producers and too low was far ahead for taxes on international corporations.

By 52-22, voters supported allowing New Zealanders who have lived in Australia for at least four years to become Australian citizens.

In last weeks weekly federal Morgan poll, conducted April 24-30, Labor led by 53.5-46.5, a three-point gain for the Coalition since the previous week. Primary votes were 36% Labor, 35.5% Coalition, 13% Greens and 15.5% for all Others. I believe this is Labors worst result in a Morgan poll since late November 2022.

I covered Thursdays United Kingdom local government elections for The Poll Bludger. The Conservatives lost over 1,000 councillors, but Labour only had a nine-point margin over the Conservatives on the BBCs Projected National Share.

While thats Labours best performance since they were last in government nationally in 2010, it was much worse than current national polls that give Labour about a 17-point lead.

A United States debt default could occur as early as June 1 if no action is taken by Congress to lift the debt limit. The May 14 Turkish election and May 21 Greek election were also covered.

Every May two or three of Tasmanias 15 upper house seats are up for election for six-year terms. On Saturday there were elections in Rumney, Murchison and Launceston. Independents in the latter two held with over 70% of the primary vote, while Labors Sarah Lovell won 50.5% of the primary in Rumney, with 26.5% for the Liberals and 16.6% for a conservative independent.

These results mean the status quo in the upper house is retained. Analyst Kevin Bonham said there are four Labor out of 15, four Liberals, three left-wing independents, one centrist independent and three conservative independents. The Liberals hold a majority in the lower house.

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See original here:
Easy Liberal wins likely in byelections in Robert's and Morrison's seats; support for rise in JobSeeker - The Conversation

Published May 2, 2023 11:22 a.m. ET

Updated May 2, 2023 4:58 p.m. ET

OTTAWA -- The Conservative Party of Canada brought in more donations during the first three months of the year than any other federal party.

Financial statements from Elections Canada show the Conservatives raised more than $8.3 million during the first quarter of the year from nearly 46,000 donors.

The Tories routinely outperform their political rivals on fundraising, and this time they beat out the governing Liberals by nearly $5 million.

The Liberals brought in about $3.6 million from nearly 31,000 donors during the same period.

The New Democrats, who agreed to support the Liberals in the minority Parliament with a supply-and-confidence deal, raised almost $1.3 million from about 16,000 donors.

The Green party brought in nearly $401,000, the Bloc Quebecois brought in more than $322,000 and the People's Party of Canada raised over $296,000.

The Conservative party said in a statement that their fundraising bounty "speaks to the growing movement of Canadians who are putting their hard-earned dollars behind a leader who is listening to them and speaking to their concerns."

The Liberal party may have trailed the Conservatives by a wide margin but it can still point to positive news in having its best first-quarter showing in three years.

Liberal party spokesman Dmytro Basmat said it was a strong first quarter for the party which followed a byelection win in Mississauga in December.

Basmat said 97 per cent of donations were for less than $200, and half the donations were made $10 or less at a time

Basmat called that "a true testament to the party's strong grassroots support."

"While Pierre Poilievre and the Conservative Party believe that the best way to fundraise is by doubling down on negative and divisive politics, Justin Trudeau and our Liberal team are focused on moving forward with a positive plan to make life more affordable, create good middle class jobs, and deliver clean air and a strong economy -- and all of our grassroots fundraising approaches have reflected that focus," Basmat said in a statement.

However, the Tories can brag that they have widened the gap between their results and those of the Liberals since Pierre Poilievre took the helm.

While the Conservative party was consistently ahead of Liberals in the first three quarters of 2022, the biggest gap was $1.8 million in the first quarter. That lead widened to $4 million in the last three months of the year after Poilievre's election as leader in early September, and then $4.7 million in the first three months of 2023.

As the party grows its fundraising momentum, Poilievre said in a statement that his party will continue to fight for Canadians to have "a decent life."

He said the Liberal government's policies "have broken this country and have made Canadians broke."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 2, 2023.

Read this article:
Conservatives out-fundraise Liberals by nearly $5 million in first ... - CTV News

Amidst the tidal wave of modern political hypocrisy, it can be hard to identify all the ridiculous acts deserving of scorn. Drinking from a fire hose of about-faces inevitably means Canadians will not savour every drop. The recent proposal from Swiss-headquartered Glencore to take over Vancouver-based Teck Resources is a case in point.

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Whenever we are confronted with such abrupt turnarounds in previous attitudes on a potentially emotional issue it is valuable to take a step back and ask ourselves the essential questions. In this case: one, based on past activity who should we ultimately trust more in their intentions? Glencore or the government? Two, do we still believe in the free market system? And finally, why isnt Teck the one acquiring companies all over the world?

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Who we should trust in their stated intentions is an easy one. Whether one agrees with Glencore as a company or not, their motivation is naked and simple: profit and shareholder value. One can filter any statements and actions through that framework and understand what their motive is likely to be. Glencore sees future value in Teck, notably its coal resources, and so it wants to make it part of its global empire. End of story.

The governments rhetoric is much less clear. Having spent the better part of their term bashing natural resources, particularly oil, the Liberals seem very belatedly coming to the realization that our energy does need to come from somewhere, and that somewhere will be electricity.

The issue is that electrification requires minerals and minerals mean you need miners; not exactly the constituency most environmentalists tend to love. Open pit mines arent pretty and even underground mines must disrupt some of the surrounding area to work. Thats the reality of an extraction industry. The other stark and for some uncomfortable reality is that there is no electrification without miners. Anyone believing otherwise is an enviro-irrealist.

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Teck Resources is a world leader in mining, specifically copper and zinc, as well as steelmaking coal, and so, perhaps, the government truly has come to suddenly value that home grown capability. However, losing a company headquartered in Canada also looks terrible politically. This is a muddy question, currently impossible to parse. Should we believe in a long-term commitment to mining from Justin Trudeaus Liberals? In theory Id love to, but anyone involved in the mining industry for any length of time has more than enough government-induced PTSD to take the seriousness of this commitment du jour with an extra helping of freshly mined salt.

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Canadas, and indeed the worlds, success is based on a free market system with minimal government intervention. So, much as I personally want Teck Resources to say put in Vancouver a city all too bereft of head offices compared to, say, Seattle I ultimately believe in a free market more. In that, Glencore is doing nothing improper or evil. They are using the free market to unlock value in a company they believe has more potential when integrated into their corporation than the two do separately. It remains to be seen if they are correct, but the basic mechanism is one to be supported and one which Pierre Poilievres Conservatives should support, not deride. There are emotional reasons to stop Teck leaving Vancouver and I share those emotions, but logic and a belief in the free market must ultimately win out.

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In a more certain regulatory environment with a supportive government it is not hard to imagine homegrown Canadian miners more willing to invest in Canada first, exporting their expertise and being the ones acquiring companies in other countries. We have the resources and ability to extract our minerals better than anyone, our government all too often simply doesnt want to.

Recent developments offer possible glimpses of light at the end of the mining tunnel. Initiatives such as the Canadian Critical Minerals Strategy and tax incentives for exploration are positive developments for Canadian miners. In that, we should acknowledge that farcically late though the government may be, its still better than never. The impact will nonetheless be slow. The current timelines of 10-15 years to take a mine to production will not change overnight and any visible impact could easily be more than a decade off; do we, as a country, have the will to see through our new vision so that in 2035, Canadian companies are the acquirers, not the acquired?

National Post

Adam Pankratz is a lecturer at the University of British Columbias Sauder School of Business.

The rest is here:
Adam Pankratz: Wait, so now the Trudeau Liberals care about mining companies? - National Post