Good morning,
Jagmeet Singh took over as leader of the federal New Democrats more than a year ago without a seat in the House of Commons. It appears he’s going to have to wait even longer to get his chance.
On the weekend, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a by-election to fill just one of the House of Commons' four vacancies. (There could be yet another vacancy soon.) Voters in the rural Ontario riding of Leeds–Grenville–Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes will head to the polls Dec. 3.
Since the federal Liberals have a healthy majority in the House, the by-elections won’t change the balance of power and, usually, would have gone unremarked upon.
But one of the people who has an eye on one of those empty seats is Mr. Singh. And now some NDP MPs are crying foul that Mr. Trudeau is delaying the opportunity for Mr. Singh to join the rest of his caucus in the House. “What a selfish and cynical act,” NDP MP Nathan Cullen said on Twitter. “With no justification (other than the obvious, cheap political calculation) Trudeau denies byelections b/c one of them included @theJagmeetSingh.”
What would that “calculation” be? As columnist Campbell Clark wrote last week: “Such a long delay would leave the NDP leader spending half his time in Burnaby for months. And if Mr. Singh lost in April, the NDP would have a weakened leader, just months from a general election, when it may be too late to replace him.”
For the Liberals' part, they say the blame lies with...Mr. Singh. “There have already been 4 by-elections since Jagmeet Singh became leader of the NDP - 6 since his federal leadership campaign began. He could have run in any one of those, but he decided not to,” Liberal spokesman Braeden Caley said on Twitter.
By law, Mr. Trudeau isn’t required to call the by-election until March.
This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Chris Hannay in Ottawa. It is exclusively available only to our digital subscribers. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.
TODAY’S HEADLINES
Eleven worshipers at a Pittsburgh synagogue were killed on the weekend by an attacker who spouted hatred toward Jewish people.
Europe’s most influential political leader is calling it a day. Angela Merkel, who has been chancellor of Germany since 2005, says she will not run for re-election as chair of her party. She said she intends to stay in her post until the country’s next election in 2021, however.
Conservative MP Ed Fast, who was international trade minister when Canada’s $15-billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia was signed, says facts on the ground have changed since the agreement was first negotiated. One example is the apparent killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Mr. Fast said that while he doesn’t think the deal should be cancelled, the current Liberal government could sanction Saudi officials for human rights violations or stop importing Saudi oil to Canada.
Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer and others in his party are stepping up criticism of the media in what appears to be part of their messaging for the next election.
Former army captain Jair Bolsonaro has won election to be Brazil’s next president.
As the federal government continues to consider a ban on handguns, Bill Blair, the Minister of Border Security and Organized Crime Reduction, says better data is needed on where illegal guns are coming from.
Newly disclosed cabinet documents reveal more about why the federal government handed responsibility for investigating sexual assaults in the Canadian Armed Forces from the civilian police to the military police.
And Calgary’s bid to host the 2026 Olympics might be in trouble over how to pay the multibillion-dollar price tag. Over the weekend, word leaked that the federal government would stick to their long-standing policy to pay half of the $3-billion public bill. But the Alberta government, which said it didn’t have the funds to pay its full share, said they hoped the federal Liberals would make up the difference. So far, Ottawa isn’t. Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi is threatening to pull the whole bid unless the monetary gap is filled.
Marie-Claude Landry (The Globe and Mail) on the attack on the Pittsburgh synagogue: “As we try to come to terms with this senseless anti-Semitic attack, some Canadians might try to explain away their grief by telling themselves that this is an American problem. But the truth is that anti-Semitism, hate and intolerance are not confined by borders. The threads of hatred and intolerance that brought a gunman to open fire on people in their place of worship are also woven into the fabric of Canadian society.”
Bruno Capinan (The Globe and Mail) on new Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro: “Most of his energies have gone into red-baiting, defending the memory of the dictatorship and maligning Brazil’s most marginalized groups, from women and low-income blacks to, perhaps most violently and consistently, LGBT people. He has said that he’d rather his son die in a car crash than come out as gay. In 2010 he suggested that homosexuality could be cured with some form of physical punishment. He has promised to repeal hate-crime laws. Many of his pronouncements are downright bizarre, such as his claim to the Brazilian edition of the newspaper El País that homosexuality is largely a product of peer pressure and drug use.”
Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi: “So when the Khashoggi case gets bogged down in broader policy questions, the big, important, but murkier issues of arms sales and national interest, or how best to protect human rights, let’s not forget this is personal. This was a shocking assassination of one person, Mr. Khashoggi. The question now is whether one person, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, or MBS as he is widely known, is held accountable.”
Stephen Maher (Maclean’s) on relations with Saudi Arabia: “The fact that they are being used in the war in Yemen is the kind of uncomfortable truth that we could ignore, at least until the Saudis flew a team of killers to Turkey to torture and murder Khashoggi, unwittingly creating the world’s weirdest thriller, transfixing news consumers around the world.”
Leo Groarke (The Globe and Mail) on Ontario cancelling three new university campuses: “The Ontario University Fair is the largest educational fair in North America. This year, attendance at the fair dropped. This should come as no surprise. Anyone watching developments in postsecondary education over the last decade knows that we have entered a period characterized by a decline in the numbers of Ontario high-school students attending universities and colleges.”
Jennifer Ditchburn (Policy Options) on the Parliament Hill renovation: “Parliamentarians don’t seem to have been asking the larger questions around what the overarching priorities should be for the Centre Block rehabilitation — not in any serious way — over the past two decades."
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Chris Hannay