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politics briefing newsletter

Good morning,

It’s the summer before the election and political parties are warming up their attack lines for the campaign trail.

Despite Parliament being on break, both the Liberals and Conservatives called press conferences in Ottawa this morning to rail at the other party.

Conservative finance critic Pierre Poilievre was first up, raising concerns with the return of Gerald Butts to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s inner circle.

Mr. Butts resigned during the SNC-Lavalin affair, and Mr. Poilievre said the return signals that Mr. Trudeau did not learn enough from the incident.

“There will be more SNC-Lavalin scandals and we know that because [Mr. Trudeau] brought back the very architect of that scandal to serve at the centre of his decision-making organization,” Mr. Poilievre said.

Then, an hour and a half later, Health Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor and Liberal MP Marco Mendicino took their place in the National Press Theatre to criticize Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer for his criticism of the Canada Food Guide.

“I was really shocked that Andrew Scheer promised to throw out Canada’s new food guide and the science and research that underpinned it,” Ms. Petitpas Taylor said, with her colleague Mr. Mendicino extending the attack to accuse the Conservatives of being anti-science in general.

The election is just 92 days away.

This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Chris Hannay, with additional reporting by Rachel Emmanuel. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.

TODAY’S HEADLINES

Families of Canadians trapped in Syrian camps after the fall of the Islamic State say they should be brought home – but the federal government has so far been reluctant to do so because of security concerns.

A Canadian human rights investigator is leading a team that is building war-crimes cases against leaders of the Islamic State, as well as senior figures in Bashar al-Assad regime.

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May says she hopes the next election results in a hung Parliament, in which no party has a majority of seats, so that her party can influence more pro-environmental policies such as a carbon tax.

Three Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative MLAs are going to quit the provincial legislature to take a shot at a seat in Ottawa.

Many Members of Parliament who were defeated in 2015 want another shot at their old jobs this fall. This phenomenon happens in every election. Ralph Goodale and Navdeep Bains – just to name two – are current cabinet ministers who returned to Parliament after earlier defeats.

No major party leader will say if they want to move into 24 Sussex Drive – ostensibly the official residence of the prime minister – after the fall election. The bill to renovate the historic building could be as much as $100-million, a sum no leader seems eager to spend on their living quarters.

And speaking of renovations, heavy trucks on Parliament Hill are to said to be causing some shaking in the newly opened visitor welcome centre.

Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on Gerald Butts returning to work for the Liberals: “Yet the fact that Mr. Butts is back on Team Trudeau after the SNC-Lavalin affair is a symbol of the big question the Liberals face: can Mr. Trudeau get past the sense of disillusionment and disappointment that many voters who once supported him seem to feel. Can Gerry Butts help Justin Trudeau get his mojo back?”

Glynis Ratcliffe (The Globe and Mail) on Canada’s history with xenophobia: “But we should be wary of getting on a high horse. Even beyond Canada’s reprehensible legacy of Japanese internment camps, the Second World War was also marked by a system of lesser-known Canadian internment camps in which innocents, trying to flee persecution in Europe, were detained. In some of these camps, Jewish refugees were held alongside prisoners-of-war, some of whom were the very Nazis who had forced them to flee their homes. Guards could sometimes display anti-Semitic attitudes. Internees did hard labour for little to no pay.”

John Weston (National Post) on Canadians detained abroad: “Extricating a detainee from overseas is difficult and time-consuming. It’s tempting to blast the government for its handling of overseas hostage situations. There are two surprises for most Canadians. Firstly, no matter what party is in power, efforts to rescue Canadians detained abroad seldom pay off politically for the government. Secondly, no matter how earnest and competent are the government’s efforts, supporters usually need to supplement governmental efforts with their own.”

David Suzuki (Victoria Times-Colonist) on the constituency for environmental issues: “All parties should have policies to protect life-sustaining air, water, soil and biodiversity and to encourage renewable energy. Those of us who prioritize these factors are not like opera, rodeo or car-racing buffs, yet that’s how we’re often perceived.”

Elizabeth Renzetti (The Globe and Mail) on humans and not-humans: “What if the era of human supremacy is coming to an end? What if, a century from now, we look back on the idea of keeping animals captive and eating their flesh with revulsion? If the human race survives, that is. Intensive animal agriculture is one of the leading causes of greenhouse gas emissions, and consumers’ desire to reduce meat consumption in the Western world has led to the explosive growth of plant-based meat alternatives. At the same time, there is a growing movement toward giving animals legal rights, so that they can be represented as individuals in court.”

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