So the Throne speech in Ottawa has been given. Here is some useful information about it.: For Your Information Details from the Harper Throne Speech The October 16 speech is entitled Seizing Canadas Moment: Prosperity and Opportunity in an Uncertain World. It is divided into three sections: 1. Creating Jobs and Opportunities for Canadians 2. Supporting and Protecting Canadian Families 3. Putting Canada First Stepped Up Attack on Public Sector Workers and the Services Canadians Rely On In the name of creating jobs and opportunities for Canadians, the Harper governments opening salvo outlines a stepped-up attack on public services and the jobs of public sector workers, along with plans for privatization of significant public assets to open up opportunities for the monopolies to make a killing. The government is freezing spending on the services Canadians require, while at the same time attacking the wages and working conditions of those who provide them. In addition, the government will focus on selling off those areas of government, which the monopolies see as places they can make profit. This indicates that the sell-off of Canada Post will be the next big target of the Harperites, along with other assets. Having destroyed the Canadian Wheat Board and the Canada Health Accord, the Harperites are setting their sights on one of the last and most significant nation-building institutions left in Canada. Harper announced that the government will table so-called balanced budget legislation requiring the government to balance its budgets. This measure is similar to legislation enacted in several provinces that is then used to negate free collective bargaining with employees and attack social programs and public services. The Harris government in Ontario was one of the first to use a similar law against school boards and universities to ensure that cuts to social programs would be implemented at the local level, and privatization would be presented as the only alternative for public services. The speech states: Last years deficit was less than forecast. Our Government will balance the budget by 2015. And it will go further. Our Government will enshrine in law its successful and prudent approach. Our Government will introduce balanced-budget legislation. It will require balanced budgets during normal economic times, and concrete timelines for returning to balance in the event of an economic crisis. The government is careful to give itself an opting out or escape clause to allow extraordinary payments to the rich during [non] normal times such the 2008-09 economic crisis when it handed over billions to the banks and auto monopolies. Our Government will freeze the overall federal operating budget, which will continue to restrain hiring. Our Government will reform the way the federal system manages spending. Our Government will review federal assets; when it is in the best interest of Canadians, they will be sold. Public Service pay and benefit levels will be reasonable, responsible, and in the public interest. Our Government will amend the Public Service Labour Relations Act to ensure that the Public Service is affordable, modern and high-performing. Our Government will increase performance accountability in the Public Service to provide better service to Canadians, at a reduced cost, and to better recognize dedicated and effective employees. And we will make government more efficient and responsive to Canadians — by, for example, moving from 63 different email systems to one. With this opening salvo against public sector workers and the services they provide for all Canadians, Harper is signalling that similar to his first term, his target is the ability of workers to uphold their wages and working conditions against arbitrary dictate. Providing the Monopolies with Trained Labour The Throne Speech continues the disinformation about people without jobs and jobs without people so as to justify slave-labour type arrangements in Canada to serve the needs of the monopolies, especially in the resource extraction sector. In addition, it points out that new arrangements will ensue to redirect federal investments in youth unemployment towards real-life work experience in high-demand fields. This likely means paying these same monopolies to hire youth so they have free labour paid for by Canadians. Infrastructure for Energy Monopolies The speech asserts that infrastructure demanded by the energy monopolies to rip and ship product to market cannot be threatened, as a narrow window for selling these resources internationally will not stay open forever. In this way the government is seeking to set up those who oppose the various projects the monopolies are pushing, in the form of pipelines, or fracking, for example, as blocking Canadas future prosperity, so that they can be criminalized. The brutal October 17 RCMP attack against the Elsipogtog First Nation in New Brunswick and their supporters is a sign that the state will use every weapon at its disposal to serve the global energy monopolies. The speech states: However, for Canadians to benefit fully from our natural resources we must be able to sell them. A lack of key infrastructure threatens to strand these resources at a time when global demand for Canadian energy is soaring. International Trade The Throne Speech announces that the Government will soon complete negotiations on the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with the European Union. The agreement was officially announced two days after the speech in Brussels requiring now only approval of Parliament where Harper holds a fraudulent majority and from Quebec and the provinces, all of which have already signalled their acquiescence. Despite its scope and the involvement of almost every level of government, Canadians have not been permitted to see the agreement, or have any say as to whether it should or should not be passed. Attacks on Canadas Institutions and Election Reform to Come The speech confirms that the Harper government is using the scandal in the Senate, despite its own fingerprints being all over it, to justify bolstering its desire to destroy the Senate as an institution within the Canadian parliamentary system. It states: The Government continues to believe the status quo in the Senate of Canada is unacceptable. The Senate must be reformed or, as with its provincial counterparts, vanish. The Government will proceed upon receiving the advice of the Supreme Court. The speech also indicates that the government will seek to change the electoral law in advance of the next federal election. Given the fact that the Harperites are fully implicated in alleged violations of the electoral law, especially election spending limits, it is likely the Harperites will seek to make legal what was previously illegal so that they can claim retroactive innocence: And, the Government will propose changes to Canadas elections laws to uphold the integrity of our voting system. Legislation will be introduced in time for implementation prior to the next federal election. The indication that the government will change electoral laws coincides with the October 15 announcement by Chief Electoral Officer for Elections Canada, Marc Mayrand, of the appointment of prominent Canadians to an Advisory Board to provide non-partisan advice on matters related to Canadas electoral system.
Posted on: Wed, 23 Oct 2013 00:20:03 +0000
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