Sheila Copps is running for President of the Liberal Party of Canada. I ask her to address the criticism of her competitors and why the Liberal Party didn’t appeal to the electors last time around.

I interviewed Anne McLellan at the 2012 biennial Liberal convention in Ottawa. McLellan is the former Minister of Public Safety for the Paul Martin government and she’s also a former Edmonton-area MP.

I asked McLellan about what the Liberal Party needs to do about renewal and I also asked her about Alberta politics.

Ottawa has been covered by a fresh blanket of snow this second week of January giving the nation’s capital an idyllic calm as delegates, press, and observers gather for the Liberal binennial convention.

The party was crushed in the last general election that saw the ascendance of the first majority Conservative government in 23 years. And for a party that has held government 4 out of 5 years of the past 100, the Liberals saw many of their own littered on the landscape — the most disasterous defeat of that party in its history.

Serious and sober discussions are expected as Grits assess party administration, party leadership, membership, fundraising, and policy.

There are also some old scores to settle that are already starting to surface as a contentious race for party president is underway that is already promising to reopen old wounds.

Policy is also going to be particularly challenging as a party looks not only to oppose the current administration, but to offer its own plan to the electorate. Will Liberals end up discussing policies that widely appeal to Canadians? Will we see the next grand Liberal vision for Canada emerge? Or will we see the old standbys discussed to reaffirm what has defined the party in the past? Will the Liberal policy primarily focus outward or internally on how the party conducts its own affairs?

The party is also assessing the monumental challenge of its own finances. To appeal to the electorate is a far-off challenge. First, the party must grow its own numbers and rescue its balance from the red. The process of politicking is one discussion the Liberals must have this weekend in order to ensure their survival. Liberals are looking to tap into US Democratic methods for fundraising and building winning membership networks.

The party is describing this weekend’s effort as one of rebuilding, renewal, and reboot, however, Liberal troubles run deep and are pervasive through every thread of its institution. The Liberals do face a challenge to avoid reducing its partisans to rehash old scores, to stay away from reusing ineffective tactics to raise money and increase membership and to resist recycling old policies that don’t appeal to an electorate that has changed since the days of Trudeau, Turner, Chretien and Martin.

When the snow of this weekend melts, will the Liberal Party see the first sprouts of its renewal, or will old and wasted remnants of days past remain as Canada’s former Natural Governing Party hunkers down for a long and cold winter?

A few news stories have been written about the Advanced Leadership Program exposed yesterday.

National Post
Postmedia Papers
QMI Papers
Huffington Post

Of note, the NDP and the Public Sector Alliance of Canada have responded to the story suggesting that the program is outrageous.

This is smart positioning by PSAC which is the union that represents the bureaucratic sector in Ottawa.

PSAC notes that some of their members will be receiving pink slips after the government reviews spending to cut the deficit. EX-level bureaucrats who traveled on the Advanced Leadership Program are not represented by PSAC.

The NDP is now active on this issue as well. They question the value of spending tens of thousands on training per senior bureaucrat. Their position is one of saving money on services to Canadians. Given a limited pool, the Advanced Leadership Program is superfluous.

The government’s only response has been to say that the program (like others) is under review.

Stephen Harper’s former Chief of Staff, Ian Brodie, has come out in defense of the program. Brodie suggests that the when the Conservatives came to power in 2006, many senior-level bureaucrats were set to retire with no plan on how to replace the mandarins. Like any other organization, Dr. Brodie asserts, the Government of Canada has senior staff that require training in executive management. While I have tremendous respect for Brodie, I must say that while we’re in deficit, we can’t have all that we want and now is the time to prioritize need. Further, $50,000 trips around the world for training is a tough sell to most Canadians. The Advanced Leadership Program seems to be a unwise use of tax dollars.

The story still has quite a bit of active interest from news/advocacy/political organizations today and I’m somewhat surprised that the government has not yet addressed this issue specifically.

Senior bureaucrats are flying around the world on lavish multi-destination trips on the taxpayer dime, all under the guise of “leadership training”, and seeing how bureaucrats handle their jobs in other countries.

The Conservative government has stated that the next budget will be an austere one as Canada’s federal deficit looms large and the Prime Minister has tasked instated a “Deficit Reduction Action Plan” across all ministries. Every department has been told to come up with a 5% reduction plan and a 10% reduction plan for their overall spending.

However, one area that they should look into is the “Advanced Leadership Program” run by the Canada School of Public Service. From the program website,

Learning and development are often best achieved through the exploration of and reflection upon real-life experiences. The Advanced Leadership Program (ALP) provides relevant experiences to senior public service leaders that challenge and expand their current worldview and allow them to gain insight into the world and thinking of top leaders, thus preparing them to effectively lead the public service into the future and achieve results for Canadians.

Participants will be exposed to a highly experiential and strategic program that aims to build a cadre of more effective senior leaders across the public service, that creates a stronger community of senior leaders to better enable teamwork based on trust, that expands the talent pool of future senior leaders and aligns senior leaders’ values and their connection to the strategic business priorities of the public service.

Who participates, and what’s involved? The website continues,

Participants — EX-04s, EX-05s and a few seasoned EX-03s – are nominated by the Clerk of the Privy Council in collaboration with a select group of Deputy Ministers.

The program is comprised of three main blocks of 2 – 3 weeks each, as well as two-day integrated sessions, delivered over a period of twelve months.

The Canada School of Public Service which offers the Advanced Leadership Program has an annual expenditure of about $145 million a year.

In 2009 for example, the program had various participants visit 35 different cities around the world with all participants visiting India, the United Arab Emirates, Mexico, Washington, DC and Yellowknife.

I decided to dig up the associated expenses involved with this Advanced Leadership Program. For a government that is claiming a new urgency for cuts, it’s surprising to see how this program spends and spends on a handful of public servants.

The program for most participants came in three blocks which encompassed three different global regions. One block would encompass Asia, Africa, Europe or the Middle East, the second block US cities and the Americas and the third block various Canadian cities. Generally the first two blocks would cost between $10k-$20k+ each, while the third block would come in just under or around $10k.

Why is the government spending all of this money on travel for senior bureaucrats to far off places? The program states,

An important objective of the program is to expand participants’ frame of reference by developing their capacity to integrate regional, North American, and global perspectives in dealing with public service challenges. Study tours were organized to expose participants to these perspectives.

Many senior bureaucrats go through the program, but here’s a sample:

Richard Wex, the Assistant Deputy Minister for policing, law enforcement and the interoperability branch. From January 16th through February 5th of this year, Mr. Wex traveled from Canada, to the US and Brazil at a cost of $21,999.23. From April 30th – May 14th, he hopped between Belgium, to Norway, to India at a cost of $21,745.32.

Also traveling this year, consider Marie Lemay, the CEO of the National Capital Commission. The taxpayer spent $21,745.86 in January and February of this year taking her to Calgary, Chicago, Washington, Rio and Brasilia, and another $23,826.87 shuttling her from Brussells, Oslo, Frankfurt, Chennai and New Dehli in May

Consider Anil Arora, the Assistant Chief Statistician at Statistics Canada. In less than one year, Arora took three trips with the Advanced Leadership Program. In November 2008 he traveled to Montreal, Japan, China, United Arab Emirates and India for $24,548.58, in January 2009 he traveled to Sacramento, San Francisco, Washington, Port au Prince and Mexico for $17,081.60, and then in April and May 2009 he traveled to Yellowknife, Regina, Saskatoon, Sydney and Halifax for $7,891.92

Other high flying bureaucrats on the Advanced Leadership Program:

Barbara Ritzen, Justice. $17,909.53, $17,337.31

Thanh Thao Pham, Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency. $17,951.47, $13,825.72, $8,401.90

Jean-Pierre Blais, Heritage. $19,266.31, $10,718.95, $15,645.12

Catherine MacQuarrie, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. $19,751.64, $15,565.90, $8,244.27

Don Head, Correctional Service Canada. $20,604.95, $11,822.29, $7,958.36

Helena Borges, Transport Canada. $22,877.55, $14,369.82

Daniel J. Caron, Library and Archives Canada. $21,807.44, $11,238.77, $8,063.74

Keith Clark, RCMP. $16,483.40, $11,296.24

Martine Dubuc, Canadian Food Inspection Agency. $15,149.61, $21,582.81

Greg Fyffe, Canada School of Public Service. $22497.70, $9336.80

Christine Hogan, CIDA. $19,604.16, $18,286.86

This is only a sample to illustrate that this program seems to span all departments and is offered to senior bureaucrats. The data is disclosed on the government’s website via proactive disclosure. Many Canadians will be shocked to hear that senior public servants are traveling around the world each at a yearly expense that eclipses the mean Canadian income. The government is looking to cut back on departmental expenses in its strategic and operational review. It should cut the Advanced Leadership Program.

If you agree and think that the Advanced Leadership Program should be cut under the Strategic and Operational Review, click the recommend button below.

UPDATE: Treasury Board has responded to my request for comment. Jennifer Geary from Minister Clement’s office replies, “our Government is working to reduce wasteful and inefficient spending across the government, and this program, like many others, is under review.” Also, while the expenses of the Canadian School of Public Service come in around $145 million per year, that of the Advanced Leadership Program within the school come in at $2.2 million.

You may have come here by googling “why are unions bad?”

If a private company was contracted for snow removal, they certainly wouldn’t be wasting labour costs like this (and any city would be foolish to pay for snow removal via a private company when there’s no snow!)

Why are they bound by the public sector union like this? “Work” seems to be a “right” even when there’s no work to do!

According to the YouTube uploader, this video was taken at the Villeray neighbourhood, close to St-Michel and Jean-Talon in Montreal.

Late last week, I wrote about an email received by Dr. Roy regarding his interest in covering the upcoming Liberal convention as a blogger. He received a response from the Liberal Party stating that,

Media Accreditation is open to recognized news organizations. Freelance and social media representatives must be sponsored by a recognized news organization.

In other words, freelancers and bloggers must be “sponsored” by the MSM. After republishing his email, with his permission, I took to twitter to raise awareness of how this was an unprecedented move on behalf of any modern mainstream North American political party.

stephen_taylor

(Stephen Taylor)

Liberal convention will be the first modern political convention that doesn't accredit bloggers. #cdnpoli On 16-12-2011 16:32:10 from Twitter for iPad

The issue caused quite a stir on twitter, with Liberal partisans, MSM journalists, and others criticizing the Liberal Party for their policy. But then, in the midst of the stir, seeking to perhaps clarify, the Liberals issued this tweet,

liberal_party

(Liberal Party)

Bloggers welcome at #LPC convention! through media accred or observer status. Contact media@liberal.ca On 16-12-2011 18:16:42 from HootSuite

I took this as a positive sign, yet still questioned whether or not a policy change had been enacted by the Liberals. So, I emailed their media address with the following,

Hi,

I hope that you have indeed changed your policy as I would love to join you at your convention as a media-credentialed blogger. Can you confirm if this is possible?

Here are my details:
Name: Stephen Taylor
Blog: Stephen Taylor – a blog on Canadian politics
URL: http://www.stephentaylor.ca
Twitter: @stephen_taylor

Thanks!

Here is the response I received today,

Dear Stephen,

Thank you for your interest in attending the Ottawa 2012 – Liberal Biennial Convention.
There are many ways to attend the Convention. We are encouraging everyone to attend as a delegate or an observer, and hope you will join us in that capacity. To learn more about how to become an observer, please visit our Convention website: https://www.liberal.ca/register-convention/.

As well, freelance and social media representatives who are sponsored by a recognized news organization can complete the Media Accreditation form, that will be posted to our site closer to the Convention date, and attach a letter of assignment.

Thank you,
Isabella

There it is. No policy change.

For reference, here are some of the tweets from all walks condemning this move,

adamgoldenberg

(Adam Goldenberg)

+1. Um, what decade is this? MT @jordanowens: This is a giant mistake. MT @stephen_taylor #LPC convention won't accredit bloggers. #cdnpoli On 16-12-2011 17:22:21 from Twitter for Mac

kinsellawarren

(Warren Kinsella)

Idiocy. Dumb. Wow. "@stephen_taylor: Lib convention will be the first modern political convention that doesn't accredit bloggers. #cdnpoli" On 16-12-2011 17:40:07 from Twitter for BlackBerry®

kady

(kady o'malley)

Seriously? Idiotic. @stephen_taylor: @kady "Freelance and social media representatives must be sponsored by a recognized news organization." On 16-12-2011 17:28:52 from TweetDeck

This tweet, which I used to raise awareness of the issue was retweeted 78 times,

stephen_taylor

(Stephen Taylor)

"We stand against the Liberal ban of bloggers and freelancers at their upcoming convention." RT if you agree #cdnpoli On 16-12-2011 17:33:42 from Twitter for iPad

UPDATE: For a matter of comparison, here was the CPC policy for bloggers during their last convention,

Deadline for Blogger Registration May 27, 2011

Conservative Party of Canada recognizes the growing importance of bloggers in sending our vision to Canadians. As a result, for the 2011 Conservative Party of Canada’s National Policy Convention we will be formally accrediting bloggers.

The accreditation of bloggers will be based on, but not limited to: interest; space availability at the convention; the readership and influence of a blog; and the amount of original content the blog typically generates.

Bloggers who would like to register for accreditation must submit a request by email to Fred DeLorey, Director of Communications for the Conservative Party of Canada at freddelorey@conservative.ca

UPDATE: Jeff Jedras writes a great post on this

UPDATE: LPC Presidential candidate Mike Crawley weighs in,

_Mike_Crawley

(Mike Crawley)

Legitimate bloggers should be accredited at the #LPC convention. Caps/screening good idea. Media is changing...we need to keep up. On 20-12-2011 21:23:48 from Twitter for BlackBerry®

I’ve learned the news today that the Liberal Party of Canada will host the first modern political convention that doesn’t accredit bloggers. Our friend Dr. Roy received a letter from the party rejecting his request for accreditation. I’ve shared it with his permission below,

From: xxxxx@liberal.ca
Date: December 16, 2011 10:14:10 AM EST
To: [Roy]
Subject: Re: Convention

Hello Roy,

Thank you for your interest in attending the Ottawa 2012 – Liberal Biennial Convention.
 
Media Accreditation is open to recognized news organizations. Freelance and social media representatives must be sponsored by a recognized news organization.   They will be asked to attach a letter of assignment to their electronic Media Accreditation Form. We will be posting an electronic Media Accreditation Form to our site closer to the Convention date.

 As well, we are encouraging everyone to attend the Convention as a delegate or an observer, and hope you will join us in that  capacity. 

To learn more about how to become a delegate or an observer, please visit our Convention website: http://convention.liberal.ca.
 
Thank you,
Sarah

I don’t think this is the right thing to do. I was invited by the Liberal Party in 2006 to blog about their leadership convention and I had a blast doing it. The Blogging Tories produced a lot of video and blogs regarding the convention.

The Liberal Party is rebuilding. It needs to engage with new media and those that have influence on the various platforms with respect to Canadian politics.

I suspect that the Liberal decision is related to delegate fees; Liberal bloggers will likely pay the delegate fee anyway. Other bloggers are faced with paying an >$1000 observer fee.

I took to twitter this morning to express disappointment with the Liberal Party decision.

UPDATE: Success? The Liberal Party looks to have reversed its decision regarding bloggers and will may now allow them to register for media credentials. However, do they mean that bloggers and freelancers need not be sponsored by a mainstream media news outlet? I will try to register as media for this convention and report back the results.

@liberal_party: Bloggers welcome at #LPC convention! through media accred or observer status. Contact media@liberal.ca

What’s this? A CBC story about huge guns, a baby, and Santa?

From Scottsdale Arizona? What is the relevance?

Oh, those Americans and their guns. “Is it appropriate?”, CBC asks.

Well, no. But, for a different reason. The long-gun registry vote is in the news as the Conservatives uphold a long-standing promise to their base to eliminate the registration of legal rifles and shotguns. Amendments were voted upon this week and the final vote is upcoming. What better time for the CBC to remind Canadians what’s at stake?

Every gun featured in the Christmas card photo is prohibited in Canada.

Yesterday, the NDP had to walk back an attack ad on the Conservatives that featured a gun that is restricted in Canada and is thus would have to be registered anyway despite the scrapping of the long-gun registry.

This isn’t the first time the CBC has played politics in the long-gun registry debate. On the eve of Candice Hoeppner’s Private Member’s Bill defeat, the CBC ran this conspiracy theory disguised as an investigative report into links between the Conservative government, it’s activists and the Gun-lovin’ American NRA. CBC provided a 10 year old clue that the NRA once produced a commercial that aired in the US and was available to Canadians! Also, they helped fun a pamphlet for a Canadian long-gun advocate, also 10 years ago.

We consider Americans and their huge military-grade machine-guns.

We also consider the Canadian debate about the registration of long-guns.

If one were against the dismantling of the long-gun registry, one would be irresponsible to suggest that Americans are not only trying to influence the debate but it would also be irresponsible to create a scarecrow argument against guns which are already illegal in Canada. How much of this debate is honest? And what element of dishonesty is being driven by the CBC?

Was Canada ever even in? The Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997 in the city of the same name in Japan. The United States was the only holdout at the time, with Congress refusing to ratify the agreement under President Bill Clinton.

Canada’s Liberal government led by Jean Chretien bound Canada to the international accord at the time, promising to reduce Canada’s greenhouse gases (GHGs) by 6% of 1990 levels by 2012. The protocol has come under heavy criticism since as it provides exemptions for many emerging economies, namely India, China and Brazil. Further, the 1990 level was so pegged to satiate Russia’s demands to use the Soviet Union as the reference point to mark Russia’s future emissions against the Soviet era, pre-industrial and economic collapse.

Other criticisms of the protocol include carbon trading that were dismissed by our current Prime Minister as a socialist scheme, exchanging ‘pollutability’ for cash. Again, much of it to the Russian Federation.

The Protocol expires in 2012 and has largely been a symbolic icon of the progressive movements in Canada, the US, and Europe. Carbon emissions under Chretien (and Dion as his environment minister) actually increased. Again, the emissions under the next Liberal administration increased. In fact, between 1990 and 2005, Canada’s GHGs increased 25%. We should have spent money fashioning a statue of Gaia in our own image. Our vanity would have been satisfied, it would have been as effective, and it would have costed much less. As far as symbols go, it’s pedestal ‘footprint’ would have less of an environmental impact than that caused by sending our jobs and capital to emerging exempt economies.

It’s been reported today that Canada will not “renew” its “commitment” to the Kyoto Protocol. To do so would be foolish, as Canada is nowhere near meeting 1990 targets anytime soon. Further, a cap on industrial production would be foolish at a time of global economic fragility (not to mention coercive at any time).

The utility — either environmental or economic — of signing onto such an agreement has not been established. If humans face any challenge, global bureaucracy is certainly the most unagile method of addressing it. Kyoto seemed to be focused on special interests and side-deals rather than some superordinate goal.

Oh, was it mentioned that it’s a socialist scheme?