Selling the doubleplusgood TPP to Canadians

When she signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal above a NZ casino two months ago, International Trade Minister Chrystia Freetrade was at pains to reassure us that signing it was not the same as ratifying it, and besides there would be conversations with Canadians about it first. 

"Signing does not equal ratifying. Signing is simply a technical step in the process, allowing the TPP text to be tabled in Parliament for consideration and debate before any final decision is made."

Yesterday in Washington DC, PM Justin Trudeau called for "an increasingly integrated North America" and extolled "the investment opportunities for U.S. business on the billions of dollars of infrastructure projects announced in the Liberal budget."
Here's what he said about the TPP :

“In our conversations with Canadians, with industries which are ongoing, there are a lot of people in favour of it and there are a few who have real concerns and we’re looking at understanding and allaying certain fears ...”   

This March 10 presser from the International Trade Committee explains what JT means by "allaying certain fears" :





Second line : "The committee's primary objective is to assess the extent to which the agreement would be in the best interests of Canadians."

So will there be a whole other trade committee to assess the extent to which the TPP is not in the best interests of Canadians?

Because here's what JT's "few who have real concerns" about the global corporate rights pact are concerned about :

TPP opens floodgates to unregulated temporary foreign workers

"The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) could see hundreds of thousands of additional temporary foreign workers (TFWs) entering Canada without any consideration of their impact on the local labour market leading to worsening unemployment among Canadian workers, labour groups warn.

The Canadian Workers Advocacy Group(CWAG) points out that 230,000 TFWs enter Canada annually under the labour mobility provisions of existing agreements, and the magnitude of the latest trade deal means that the numbers will increase significantly.

This is on top of the 165,000 TFWs who enter the country on average per year with a positive Labour Market Impact Assessments (LMIA).

CWAG also expressed concern that unlike other trade deals, the TPP includes developing countries such as Vietnam and Peru, and corporations will use the intra-company transfer provisions of the trade agreement to bring in low-wage workers and displace Canadians.

The minimum wage is 65 cents per hour in Vietnam and $1.27 per hour in Peru."

Former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich : The New Truth About Free Trade

"I used to believe in trade agreements ...."

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz : "TPP worst trade deal ever" 

"I think what Canada should do is use its influence to begin a renegotiation of TPP to make it an agreement that advances the interests of Canadian citizens and not just the large corporations."

The Star : Joseph Stiglitz told Freeland that Canada should reject the TPP 

Economist Joseph Stiglitz says he has told his “friend,” International Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland, that Canada should reject the Trans-Pacific Partnershipbecause it’s a badly flawed trade deal.

The controversial but not-yet-ratified trade agreement could tie the hands of the Trudeau Liberals on two key parts of its agenda — fighting climate change and repairing relations with aboriginal people, the Nobel-winning professor warned Friday.

Stiglitz said he relayed some of his concerns to Freeland personally in January, when the two were attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland."

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"What is Plan B?"

asked Armine Yalnizyan of Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives on CBC's The Current this morning. "What if your plan is not oil?" 

I'll get back to Yalnizyan's Plan B in a moment, but preceding her on the program was TD Bank VP and chief economist Craig Alexander. He spoke to that Bank of Canada survey of 100 executives that came out this week, 62% of whom called for diversification to reduce Canada's dependence on the energy sector as oil prices collapse.

"Energy plus metals and minerals mining amounts to less than 10% of Canadian economy but 25% of the entire Albertan economy," he said, where loss of oil jobs and stagnant wages will also affect retail spending despite a projected $900 saving per family per year at the pumps. So no growth for Alberta and Saskatchewan this year and under a 3% increase for BC and Ontario.  

Two and a half years ago and before the collapse of oil prices, he was calling for investing in childcare and early education in his TD report :
“It is very much an economic topic,” said Alexander. "If you are concerned with skills development, productivity and innovation, you should really care about this subject."

"For every dollar invested, the return ranges from roughly $1.50 to almost $3. For disadvantaged children, the return runs into the double digits ...  it follows that more focus should be put on investing in, and improving the system,” the report says." But later, when we can afford it.


CCPA's Yalnizyan says that time is now :

"In our global economy we need our best and brightest to be our best and brightest. We can ill afford to discount Canadians who cannot afford to upgrade their skills at any point in their lives, not just when they're getting out of high school." 

We are part of global economy in which Canada has fallen from 8th to 11th place while current government policy is directed at "ripping and stripping our natural resources," she said, despite those collapsing oil prices and the coming expense of population aging.

Plan B? Mission-oriented public policy is required, she said, because without it we will just get higher healthcare costs without necessarily any improvement.
Taking your hands off the wheel won't necessarily deliver what we need so how can we make life cheaper for the people who, unlike our corporate hoarders, spend every dollar they earn in the economy? 

"The global economy is transitioning and pivoting away from fossil fuels to renewables and we should be contributing to this fight to find the most energy-efficient ways of using and generating energy .

Focus on healthcare costs in a different way. Spend on social determinants. What causes all round good health?  Better housing, public transportation, education, even income redistribution. Population health-based intervention. 

While 10% of the economy is in the energy sector, 11% of our economy is in the health sector. Use that engine of the economy to improve peoples' lives and get a better bang for the buck.

We spent $14-billion on dental care for children in Saskatchewan and Manitoba in late 70s and early 80s. The mouth is the only part of healthcare that isn't covered."

$14B sounds like a lot to have spent on childrens' health until you consider that the government already spends $13B a year in taxpayer-funded subsidies to oil and gas industries. 

The program wrapped up with Stephen Gordon, economist at LaValle University. 
Shorter and presumably not ironic Gordon : "Oil is our precious. Why can't we just leave the markets a-l-o-o-o-o-o-n-e?"
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One minute against austerity in Montreal

A one minute time lapse of yesterday's student strike against austerity in Montreal. 
Austerity - that's when your government impoverishes its citizens by decimating public services like education and health in order to balance its lining of corporate pockets with tax breaks.

“Our services are worth more than your profits” is the slogan of the march.

Quebec police declared the march illegal before it began - itself an illegal move on their part in Quebec - highlighting why the Cons' didn't want to fix that bit about *illegal* strikes in Bill C-51.

Ricochet : Everything you need to know about Quebec’s latest student strike

Flashback to G&M last May : Canadian businesses accumulating ‘dead money’ faster than other G7 countries :

"Statistics Canada data shows Canada’s corporate cash hoard was $626 billion in the last quarter of 2013, a jump of six per cent over the previous quarter — more than the federal debt and almost a third of the country’s gross domestic product."

Let's hear that once again : "Canada’s corporate cash hoard was $626 billion ... more than the federal debt and almost a third of the country’s gross domestic product."

"The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has found that CEO pay for Canadian public companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange has ballooned by 73 per cent between 1998 and 2012, the latest figures available."

So naturally we really really need to bring in a half a million temporary foreign workers who will eventually have to join the underground workforce as Canadian graduate students intern for free and the many of the rest of us struggle to make ends meet with several part time jobs with no benefits.

Think the Quebec student strikes aren't about you?

We will now go to our corporate sponsored media who will interview someone stuck in traffic whining about being inconvenienced by the strike, followed up by Dan Kelly, head of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, whining about how expensive TFWs are.

Meanwhile I'm trying to remember when 75,000 people showed up in the streets of any other Canadian city for something other than a funeral. 

h/t Kev @ Trapped in a whirlpool for G&M and Ricochet links
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John Manley's Ode to Corporate Loveliness

John Manley, chief of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, was quite breathless in his Sunday Edition ode to corporate loveliness. Sure, according to Canadians for Tax Fairness :

"analysis of the top 60 companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange found only four companies paid the full corporate rate. More than half paid less than 10 per cent, and 13 firms paid less than five per cent."

but they contribute in "lots of other ways" Manley insisted ... like property taxes which you and I also pay so wtf, John?

Your Ode to Corps? Here you go - I fixed it for ya.


Shall I compare thee to a Larry Summers day?
Thou art more lovely and more temporary foreign workers.
Rough news do shake the darling Betts' Mcday,
No summer jobs thanks to thy corporate twerkers

Oft times too hot thy Eye of Sauron shines
And often is thy gold reposed offshore,
As every fair chance at fair work declines,
Thanks to Kenney's program - rotten to the core.

But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that $53B thou ow'st
Until Barbados cease to lend you shade
For thy eternal tax shelters that grow'st.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
Thy greedy perfidy will live in infamy.  

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Cons pay manufacturers to move to China

From Blacklocks, via The Jurist, a tale of taxpayer-funded government-facilitated corporate welfare off-shoring :

"Cabinet paid millions of dollars in grants to Canadian manufacturers to move production and jobs overseas in the name of foreign aid. 

Newly-released accounts show the program paid cash grants totalling $3,852,927 to manufacturers to move production out of Canada, including $450,000 paid to one applicant that told Fantino’s department it had to “establish ourselves in Mexico so we can offer lower costs.” "

But most went to factories in China - automotive parts, rugs, fencing, furniture, plastics recycling .... over a two year period in 2006-7.

Because clearly China, the world's 2nd largest economy by GDP and we're #11, btw , is sorely in need of our "foreign aid" and "manufacturing jobs".

"International Cooperation Minister Julian Fantino ... had not heard of the grant scheme called the Industrial Cooperation Program."

Ah well, that's because you guys rebranded it in 2010 as the Investment Cooperation Program  or CIDA-INC.  According to the DFAIT website : 

• Managed by DFAIT, the Investment Cooperation Program, formerly the Industrial Cooperation Program, supports developmentally beneficial direct investments by Canadian firms in developing countries.

But only Canadian firms with at least $2M in annual revenues were eligible for 50- 75% taxpayer coverage of up to $1M of their costs in assessing and moving a project abroad.

Happily touted as a Canadian success story as late as March 2012 by the previous International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda, CIDA-INC was the object of damning internal audits until it was finally shut down on May 18 2012 by Trade Minister Ed Fast in a statement citing "irregularities" and "taking immediate action to recover taxpayer funds that had supported these particular INC projects" and promising a "fundamental review of the program, expected later in 2012-13".

Terrific. 

What about those intervening six years of sending Canadian manufacturing jobs to China and elsewhere - you know, the period from 2006-7 covered by Blacklocks and up to when you shut it down last year?

And does your newly branded "foreign aid" model of "doubling down on partnership with the business sector" and "vigorously promoting and defending Canadian interests and values abroad” benefit anyone here in Canada? Outside of those in the business sector looking for new avenues of taxpayer money to send Canadian manufacturing jobs overseas of course.

5 pm Update : I see SNC Lavalin had a multi-year contract with the Investment Cooperation Program, dated 2011-11-04.

"The purpose of this Investment Cooperation Program (INC) contribution agreement is to support responsible, developmentally beneficial, private sector engagement in developing countries leading to sustained economic growth and poverty reduction."

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CIDA doles out corporate welfare to mining giants

In Oct 2010, Bill C-300, An Act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries, went down to defeat 140 to 134 because 13 Liberals, 4 Bloc, and 4 NDP skipped the vote. The bill sought only to limit Canadian tax dollars being spent to subsidize mining abuses committed by Canadian-registered companies abroad and only if they agreed to it.


A couple of months later in January 2011, Bev Oda, Minister of 'Not Kairos' and International Cooperation, acknowledged that Canadian tax dollars were subsidizing mining companies' CSR (corporate social responsibility) projects through CIDA - half a million to Barrick Gold, another half million to Rio Tinto, etc etc up to a total of $50-million for the year.

Today's G&M : CIDA funds seen to be subsidizing mining firms

This marks the first time that CIDA and mining firms are jointly funding aid projects abroad ...         The mining industry is welcoming the new trend in Canada’s foreign-aid policy. 

“There is a policy shift under way, and it’s one we’re encouraged by,” said Pierre Gratton, the president of the Canadian Mining Association.

while World Vision Canada, a CIDA partner with Barrick Gold in Peru, put it this way  (italics mine):

 “Anything we can do to encourage and advocate for better mining practices, and support the communities that they are displacing or affecting, we’re contributing to a better lifestyle and environment for them.” 

Yes, sadly, communities will be displaced but at least our taxes will be there to help polish the image of their new corporate landlords . 


It's particularly galling that multinational mining giant Rio Tinto ($US15 billion-plus earnings in 2011) is receiving Canadian corporate welfare after locking  800 Canadian workers out on New Years Day in Quebec for protesting having their union jobs replaced by contract workers. Additionally, a court injunction only permits 20 workers to demonstrate at any one time and only at a distance of 150 metres from the front gate.


Back to the G&M :

Federal officials said the policy shift at CIDA is co-ordinated with efforts by International Trade and Natural Resources to encourage the growth of Canadian firms abroad

Sure it is.
A couple of days ago, Rio Tinto took majority control of Canada's Ivanhoe Mines which owns 66% of Mongolia's Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold mine, the rest being owned by the state of Mongolia. 
As it happens, Bev Oda was in Mongolia last August :

"looking to assist Mongolia to strengthen its democratic governance and economic growth"

 presumably with the help of China :

"In 2010, Rio Tinto said that it had held talks with its biggest shareholder, Chinalco, about the possibility of bringing in the Chinese state-owned company as a partner in Oyu Tolgoi"

Why are Canadian tax dollars subsidizing these massive multinational mining corps with corporate welfare again?
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Stephen Harper - 12 billion dollar man

The Jurist explains the math.

While Stephen 'Jets & Jails' Harper did not directly mention raising Canadians' OAS pension eligibility age from 65 to 67 in his SOTU speech from the Davos 1%-ers bunfest :

"We've already taken steps to limit the growth of our health care spending over that period. We must do the same for our retirement income system."

... Con house organ the National Post cranked out three  articles  this month stating the Cons are considering it.

PMO Office today: "Fact: If we do nothing, OAS will eventually become too expensive and unsustainable"

Fun fact : Steve's projected MP pension is +$5M if he retires in 2019.


In other not-quite-$12-billion Con news, Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page estimates the Cons' plan to cut the corporate tax rate from 18% to 15% will cost $11.5 billion in government revenue next year. 

And Mound of Sound reminds us in comments that $12 billion is also the yearly amount slashed from government revenues by the Cons 2% cut to the GST. 

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Monday Update : G&M : Research belies PM's warning on OAS

"Expert advice commissioned by the federal government contradicts Stephen Harper’s warnings that Canada can’t afford the looming bill for Old Age Security payments."

Seems the finance committee heard from six expert witnesses who said the OAS is in fine shape with no need to raise pension eligibility age so the committee's final report reflected this testimony but ... 
but there was a dissenting minority report from Cons on the committee advising a pension review so naturally Steve is going with that instead. 
Ideology uber alles. 
Apparently undaunted by this disclosure, Steve pressed on in the House today with his dire OAS frowny face. Wanker.


You get how this works, right? Steve says burgeoning OAS threatens social programs.
By setting up a false choice between working two more years or having social programs, he gets seniors' consent to up the age eligibility. This course of action is much easier than negotiating with unions or the provinces to get cuts .
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Yo! 'Freedom 75' Harper supporters!

Corporate Tax Freedom Day now arrives on Feb 1 next week as corporate income tax has been slashed to 8% of all government revenue at a cost of $13 billion a year.

Notice that invisible hand of the marketplace giving the PotashCorp green piggie a surreptitious extra little push in the vid?
That's because Saskatchewan PotashCorp was the “leading cash hoarder” between 2000 and 2010, porking away over $5 billion for a rainy day that only ever rains on you. 
PotashCorp CEO Bill Doyle of Chicago pulled down $11.6 million in benefits in 2010. While his base salary was only $1.17 million, he also aced a $2.06 million bonus for 2010, in addition to $3.7mil in stock options and $4.5 mil in pension benefits.


Speaking of pension benefits, who exactly does Steve have slated to make up all that lost corporate tax revenue?
Low income pensioners, apparently, according to his SOTU delivered from Davos, home of the .01%.


But wait a minute. Aren't Freedom 75 guys his main voter demographic? 
Damage control alert! Urgent update from PMO-bot quickly spreads across the media :

"The memo tells MPs to counter opposition attacks by pledging there will be substantial notice and an adjustment period so that any cuts don't impact benefits to those close to retirement. The talking points say other Canadians will have time to adjust."

Yeah. Time to adjust. Flashback to Steve in 2008 :

"I think there's probably some great buying opportunities emerging in the stock market as a consequence of all this panic," Harper told reporters as the S&P/TSX fell for the fifth straight day."

On CBC's The Current (9:40 mark) this morning - Privatizing Water - Elizabeth Brubaker of the water privatization lobby group Environment Probe said Canada needs at least $90B, maybe more, to invest in water and sewage utilities in Canada and only corporations have the money to do it. 


And why is that? Because we have starved government revenue for a decade by slashing corporate taxes.


Hope all you 'Freedom 75' Harper supporters are paying attention here.
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Friday night update : Stephen Maher totally nails it.  Tories have put Canadians in a hole


Sunday am OAS quotes : 
Con MP Shelly Glover on CTV : "There are no changes that are going to be occurring with our seniors with regards to OAS at this point",  plus complaints about media bring it up
PMO Office : "Fact: If we do nothing, OAS will eventually become too expensive and unsustainable",  plus complaints about media bringing it up.


Hey, it was Steve who brought it up.
Confused? The Jurist explains.
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All day, all week, occupy your streets!

h/t Boris

But that's just the US, right? No reason for us to protest up here in Canada, origin of the Occupy movement.

NOW Mag : The Arsenal of Corporatocracy : Why We Should Occupy Bay Street

• A person making $45,000 a year and a person making $1 billion essentially pay the same tax rate.
• A person making $130,000 a year and a person making $1 billion a year pay the exact same tax rate.
• A person making $45,000 a year pays a higher tax rate than a multi-billion dollar corporation

Muldoon began this by lowering the corporate tax rate from 36% to 28%. By next year it will be down to 15%, for those that pay any at all.

Meanwhile, over at The Onion ...
Nation Waiting For Protesters to Clearly Articulate Demands Before Ignoring Them

 "If they don’t have a clear power structure organized around specific demands first, then I'll never be able to completely tune them out due to a political conflict of interest or an inability to comprehend complex, detailed economic concepts. These people really need to get their act together." 

Once Occupy Wall Street has a concrete set of objectives in place, the majority of Americans said they would go back to waiting for the sluggish economy to recover while blindly accepting things the way they are."

For everyone else  : How to Stream Live From a Mobile Phone

Occupy Vancouver vid and photos from: West End Bob @ The Beav and Jymn @ Let Freedom Rain

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Homeland perimeter security blanket

Up until it was taken down a couple of days ago, this was the front page for the 2011 Ottawa Conference on Defence and Security bunfest.

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It was hosted by the Conference of Defence Associations, CDA Institute, described on their website as "a non-partisan, independent, and non-profit organization" ... aka a military lobby group primarily funded by the Department of National Defence.

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I found it kind of touching - the way the logos of all the corporate defence contractors are laid out so boldly right under the word "AGENDA" like that.

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Some highlights from the first panel group, moderated by CDA/CDFAI deep integrationist Colin Robertson, on loan from DFAIT to direct the Canada-US Project, to which the new SPP Harper Obama perimeter security blanket bears a singular resemblance.

Everyone was very bumfed up about the Harper Obama plan for armouring NAFTA :

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Michael Wilson, former Canadian ambassador to the US and Nafta negotiator : "The definition of national security includes energy and the economy."

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James Blanchard, former U.S. ambassador to Canada and Nafta negotiator :

"We hear the phrase ‘security trumps trade’ but the fact is energy security is part of security. To suggest they are separate and apart is a lot of baloney.
I don’t think the average person understands how closely we co-operate already on information and technology in the military or people would not be throwing around the word sovereignty so loosely."

Lt.-Gen. Frank Grass, deputy commander of U.S. Northern Command, on expanding NORAD to include land and sea:

"We’ve brought NORAD and NorthCom together - the Canadian and US staff below command level are fully integrated. The civil assistance program is already operational. Ready to help RCMP during the Olympics, we prepositioned forces south of the border – another example of the great cooperation we have with CanCom."

A question from the floor from retired diplomat John Noble : "BMD ... ballistic missile defence ...Is the door still open?"
Michael Wilson : "We should have joined the US in BMD. I hope discussions can be reopened."

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Yesterday Janet Napolitano addressed the US Senate Committee "Department of Homeland Security Oversight" :

Canada Minister of Public Safety Vic Toews and DHS announced a first of its kind plan to establish a comprehensive cross-border approach to critical infrastructure resilience, focused on sharing information and assessing and managing joint risks.

Moreover, last month, President Obama and Prime Minister Harper signed a landmark "Shared Vision for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness" that sets forth how our two countries will manage our shared homeland and economic security in the 21st century."

Our shared homeland and economic security?

A bit later on she mentions protecting "shared assets and key resources".

It's all about sharing evidently. Lots and lots of sharing.

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This deep integration stuff has always been pitched to Canada as : After 9/11, we have to go security for the Americans so they'll continue to buy our stuff. Security vs. trade.

But there is no balancing of opposites going on here really, is there? There's just the one deal - markets and resources wrapped up in a big old homeland perimeter security blanket. With logos.

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Librocons : Soft on corporate welfare and off-shore tax havens

A week ago Stephen Harper pledged to go after some 1,800 Canadian foreign bank accounts in Switzerland in a crackdown on off-shore tax evasion, amounting to an estimated $1 billion in lost federal tax revenues. The Cons - tough on white collar crime.

Meanwhile back in the House, Lib and Con MPs are taking turns congratulating each other for their mutual enthusiastic support for the speedy implementation of the Canada-Panama Free Trade Agreement.

Such passion for a deal covering what amounts to less than 1% of Canadian exports seems odd till you recall that according to the U.S. State Department, in addition to being the largest drug money laundering state in the hemisphere, Panama has more than 350,000 off-shore companies with accounts hidden at over 300 Panamanian banks where they face no taxes or legal trail at all.

Currently, $200-billion taxdollar corporate welfare bailout pig, AIG, is suing the U.S. government for $306 million in back taxes based in part on the fact one of its corporate ops based in Panama is AIG's largest shareholder.

So just how easy is it to set up a corporate tax dodge in Panama?
Jessica, a 20 year old intern at Public Citizen, shows you how it's done.



An emailed copy of your passport, a couple of hundred dollars, and voilà -
32 hours later you're now the proud owner of an off-shore company in a country where the president just passed a law to criminalize union activity and public protest this past June.

But no worries. Canada has included yet another "kill a trade unionist, pay a fine" provision in a side agreement to this FTA which asks each country to abide by its own labour laws and to "voluntarily practice corporate responsibility".
Last week Export Development Canada opened an office in Panama City.


The Lib MPs are all very scornful of Bloc/NDP arguments against ratifying this FTA without ensuring stronger labour rights for a country which already has one of the worst wealth distribution rates in the region.
"Just pass it through second reading and send it back to committee for revision," mock the Libs.

The committee in question - International Trade - is comprised of 6 Cons, 3 Libs, 2 Bloc, and 1 NDP. All three Lib committee members have already spoken in support of the agreement in the House.

Chalk up another one for the Librocons.
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And now ... a message from CEO Steve

Another brilliant vid from Pale at A Creative Revolution , featuring the smooth but fuzzy blue sweater vocalizations of Reverend Paperboy from the Maple Syrup Revolution and the Beav.

Canada-EU Trade Agreement update

Why does it fall to a former Irish MP and Member of the European Parliament to raise questions about the detrimental effect to Canadians of the proposed Canada-EU trade agreement? Isn't that the job of the Canadian government and the Canadian media? *rhetorical lol*

Under the guise of harmonizing regulations between provinces, TILMA enjoyed limited success in the west in jettisoning the provinces' and municipalities' right to "Buy Local" in favour of investor rights for international corps. That was a big sticking point for the EU going ahead with a Canada-EU trade deal - if European companies weren't allowed to bid as equals on Canadian government contracts for both goods and services and if the provinces refused to end the favouring of local or national providers of public-sector services, well then the EU wasn't very interested in pursuing a deal.

Luckily - for Harper and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and the 100 transatlantic CEOs - the big "Buy American" scare showed up. In exchange for a one day opportunity window into the 4 or 5 billion dollars left in Obama's Buy American stimulous package - jobs! jobs! jobs! - Harper convinced the provinces to give up their local procurement rights.

Between the two deals - the throw-away Buy American 'exemption' and the proposed Canada-EU deal - we're caught in a pincer move to further corporatize public services.

Good thing there's one lone Irishman at the European parliament asking a few questions on our behalf then, eh?

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Let the Games begin!

The official Olympic schedule so far :

"General Electric's entire board of directors, led by CEO Jeff Immelt, is making a long-planned trip to Vancouver for the first weekend of the games, after first stopping off in Alberta's oil sands to do some business.

Vancouver-based investment bank Canaccord Financial has at least one corporate hospitality suite booked for all the hockey games, as does Goldcorp Inc., which is hosting out-of town mining types and some employees from its global operations.

Teck Resources Ltd. plans a huge bash on the top floor of its ocean-side offices for the first Canadian athlete to win gold on home soil.

Bell Canada ... is feting clients with ... Vancouver singer Sarah McLachlan

Hudson's Bay Co. ... opened a retreat for the families of Olympic athletes the night before the Games, with a bash that drew Liberal Party Leader Michael Ignatieff "

More exciting Owelympic events to come ...

P.S. VANOC and the International Luge Federation pronounce death by steel girder of Georgian luger due to athlete error.
Despite their joint statement that there was "no indication that the accident was caused by deficiencies in the track", changes to the ice profile, higher walls, and a later start to slow down speeds have been implemented anyway because the show (see above) must go on.
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Only $24 billion, you say...

Two weeks ago The Star published this rogue's gallery of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and the extravagant bonuses they received despite having lost $24 billion in taxpayers' money.

Yesterday in the HoC : NDP Wayne Marston :

"...according to economist Toby Sanger, in the last 10 years, the CPP fund would have made $13 billion more than it did if it had been invested in government bonds, rather than in a diversified portfolio of equities, real estate and bonds.

In the fiscal year 2009, the losses in the fund wiped out four years of contributions..."

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Four years of contributions...

Naturally the CPPIB defence team immediately rushed to its defence :

Ted Menzies, Con : "We do not want political interference in the remuneration of this board. They have done a very good job... We are absolutely on the right track"

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Dean Del Mastro, Con : "The NDP has a history of advocating explicitly for political interference in the CPPIB. That is inappropriate.

I actually believe that the CPP Investment Board is very well managed"

Steve : "I actually noticed, by the way, that the board, in fact, did drop a total compensation for its executives by 31 per cent last year."

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Canada Pension Plan corporate welfare

The Star : "Four top executives of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board pocketed nearly $7 million in bonuses this year despite losing $24 billion of taxpayers' money in bad investments, according to the board's annual report released yesterday. Their investments lost 18.6% of their value. "

Plus as NUPGE reports, "they are due another $7 million in long-term awards that will be paid out over the next three fiscal years."

This is on top of their salaries, of which Dennison's is almost $½-million a year, compared to Stephen Harper at $315,400 a year and the average CPP retirement benefit for Canadians at around $6000.

CPP Investment Board chair Robert Astley explains that the size of these bonuses ... wait for it ... "enables us to compete for talent within the private sector world of capital markets."

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Hard to believe, isn't it?

I mean, as Canadians we have millions of our hard-earned dollars invested for us by CPP in war profiteers like Halliburton, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, and Lockheed Martin, not to mention Monsanto, Walmart and the US tobacco industry, and yet somehow the CPP comes up short.

You would think the war on terra would pay better, and not just to CPP CEOs.

Say, whatever happened to those Principles for Responsible Investing CPP proudly signed onto with the United Nations Environment Programme Financial Initiative (UNEPFI)? Are cluster bombs and land mines mentioned on there somewhere?

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Saturday Update from Progressive Economics : The tortoise and the Hare

"Before the CPP Investment Board was created, Canada Pension Plan savings were invested entirely in government bonds. Canadians were told that we could make higher returns on these savings if they were invested in the stock market and in private investments instead.

Out of interest, I calculated what these returns would have been if the initial investment had been left in government bonds and if these funds and all the further net transfers to the CPPIB had been reinvested in long-term government of Canada bonds at their yield for each year since 1999.

These calculations show that leaving these investments in long-term bonds would have earned about $36.5 billion over the past decade: $13 billion more (and 50% higher) than the CPP Investment Board earned."

We'd have been better off both ethically and financially if public pensions had continued to be invested in public debt.

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Binational poll on NAFTA and energy policy

From Environics, a poll of 1,000 Canadians and 1,000 American respondents conducted between January 22 and February 1, 2009 :

" Chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, allows corporations to sue member governments for compensation anytime they feel that government policies, such as environmental policies, might reduce their profits.
Do you strongly support, somewhat support, somewhat oppose or strongly oppose energy companies being able to sue national governments for lost profits as a result of government policies? "

U. S. : SUPPORT 26% ... OPPOSE 71% ... DON'T KNOW/REFUSED 3%

Canada: SUPPORT 23% ... OPPOSE 72% ... DON'T KNOW/REFUSED 5%


That 23% of Canadians support foreign corporations doing an end run around locally elected governments is surprising till you remember the following related fun fact :
Percentage of eligible voters who voted for Steve in the last election : 22%
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The state of corporate welfare

From Canada's first independent parliamentary budget officer :

"Though Canada's disappearing surplus is partially the result of a global financial crisis, the report says the minority Conservative government shoulders some of the responsibility because of policy decisions during Prime Minister Stephen Harper's first term in office.
"The weak fiscal performance to date is largely attributable to previous policy decisions as opposed to weakened economic conditions," the report says.
It pinpoints the government's second one-percentage-point reduction in the goods and services tax and reductions in corporate income taxes for causing the lowest budget balance in the first five months of the fiscal year in recent times.
In August, the year-to-date budget surplus stood at $1.2 billion, down from $6.6 billion the year before."

Thank you, Mr. Kevin Page.

Meanwhile Chrysler Canada has asked Ottawa and Ontario for $1-billion in aid, after the "big three" in the US hit up their taxpayers for $25-billion.

On the US side, Ford CEO Alan Mulally took home $28 million in pay in 2007 while GM's Rick Wagoner struggled by on $15.7 million.

As a private company, Chrysler is not required to disclose the salary paid to its execs and CEO Robert Nardelli has offered to reduce his salary to $1 till business picks up, but don't feel too bad for him - Home Depot paid him $210 million to piss off last year.

About now one usually hears the free market argument that CEO's must be "adequately reimbursed" in order to remain competitive.

All three U.S. auto industry leaders flew to the Washington bailout hearings to ask for money in separate luxury jets. Each flight was estimated to cost $20,000 (U.S.)

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One final note. While knocking around google, trying to find out how much the Canadian Chrysler CEO makes, I ran into this at The Truth About Cars :

Chinese May Buy GM and Chrysler from The Middle Kingdom Herald.

An editorial at TTAC notes : "As of September, the U.S. Treasury owes China $585b. With GM’s market cap now standing at a pocket change rate of $1.35b, and getting cheaper by the minute, China could buy 433 General Motors with their T bills alone."

On Oct 7, Harper told Peter Mansbridge that there's probably "some great buying opportunities out there ... I think there are probably some gains to be made in the stock market. That's my own view."

Corporate welfare fraud

Naomi Klein :

"Washington's handling of the bailout is not merely incompetent. It may well be illegal.

According to Congressman Barney Frank, one of the architects of the legislation that enables the deals, "Any use of these funds for any purpose other than lending -- for bonuses, for severance pay, for dividends, for acquisitions of other institutions, etc. -- is a violation of the act." Yet this is exactly how the funds are being used."

American International Group Inc. got an expanded $150 billion government bailout this week, and is setting aside $503 million in compensation for executives.

Bloomberg : "The Treasury has committed $290 billion of the $350 billion already allocated through capital injections to banks and AIG. The four attending members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee's subcommittee on domestic policy accused Treasury of picking "winners and losers'' by giving loans to healthy banks to use in buying smaller ones."

"This administration wants to privatize Wall Street’s gains and socialize Wall Street’s losses," said Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md.

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs. ~ Thomas Jefferson, 1802