Fixing What Harper Broke: A to-do list for the incoming government

October 29, 2015

We need a stock-taking A “to-do” list. Some of what the Harper administration broke will be easy to fix; much will be very hard indeed.

What we must do is insist the damage be reversed. There is an equally long list of steps to take moving forward – but we need to repair immense damage to nearly every aspect of federal law and policy.

Here’s a start:

1) Fixing security law:

• Repeal Bill C-51. As a compromise, the Liberals could amend part 2 (No Fly lists) while repealing Parts 1 (info sharing), 3 (terrorism in general propaganda), 4 (the most dangerous, unleashing CSIS as covert disruptors) and 5 (allowing evidence obtained by torture).
• Repeal C-44 – allowing CSIS agents to operate over-seas.
• Repeal C-38 – with a section eliminating the Inspector General for CSIS.
• Repeal C-3 (2007 legislation that introduced unconstitutional security certificates).
• Instead – build security law drawn from advice from the Arar and Air India Commissions of Inquiry.

2) Rebuilding our criminal law system:

• Reinstate the Law Reform Commission and Court Challenges programme.
• Repeal C-10 and other mandatory minimum provisions.
• Repeal C-2 (Insite).
• Repeal C-14 (NCR).
• Repeal C-25 (Truth in Sentencing Act).
• Repeal C-309 (Preventing Persons from Concealing Their Identity during Riots and Unlawful Assemblies Act).

3) Reverse trend to slippery citizenship:

• Return Canada’s embassies to aggressively act for Canadians abroad in trouble – including on death row.
• Repeal C-24 (only one citizenship exists – unless obtained by fraud, citizenship is citizenship).
• Repeal FATCA (found in omnibus C-31).
• Restore citizenship for Lost Canadians.

4) Immigration and refugee law:

• Repeal the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act from Fall 2011 that puts refugees arriving by boat in jail for a year (C-31).
• Return to principles of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act – create a predictable path to citizenship.
• Prioritize family reunification.
• Create a sponsor-friendly refugee support process. Restore health, housing, language and other supports to refugee claimants.
• Appoint board members to Immigration appeal board to deal with backlog.

5) Restore evidence-based decision making:

• Restore Long Form Census. Rehire Munir Sheik as Chief Statistician of Canada and give him the Order of Canada.
• Repeal C-38 sections that wrecked environmental assessment (EA). Eliminate any EA role for energy regulatory agencies (NEB, offshore petroleum boards, CNSC, etc) and return EA to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency. Repeal C-38 destruction of CEAA, and further amend the Act to remove the conflict of interest found in the pre-2011 CEAA. A good model can be found in the Liberal 1993 Red Book (never implemented).
• Repeal C-38 elimination of the National Round Table on Environment and Economy.
• Re-hire scientists.
• Restore funding to the Canadian Climate Forum (formerly the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences).
• Restore funding to Polar Environmental Atmospheric Research Laboratory (PEARL).
• Restore the Marine Mammals Contaminants Programme.
• Restore testing of smokestacks for air quality.
• Restore ozone layer testing.
• Restore freshwater science. Resume funding and DFO work in Experimental Lakes Area.
• Restore research funding and monitoring for ecological integrity to Parks Canada.

6) Repair environmental laws and policy:

• Repeal C-38:

I. Damage to Fisheries Act (restore habitat protection, reverse administrative changes in interpretation of “deleterious to fish” as meaning acute toxicity at LD50, as well as removing the equivalency provisions for provincial down-loading);
II. Section that amended NEB also damaged Species at Risk Act, Navigable Waters Protection At, Fisheries Act exempting these acts – as not applying along route of a pipeline;
III. As above in decision-making section, restore CEAA as sole agency to oversee environmental reviews.

• Repeal C-45:

I. Restore Navigable Waters Protection Act (NWPA), and repeal the 2009 omnibus bill that re-defined “navigable waters” to a matter of ministerial discretion. Return NWPA to its pre-2006 condition. Navigable waters are any and all waters that can be navigated.

• Restore funding to Canadian Environmental Network.

7) Climate action:

• Ratify the Kyoto Protocol.
• Work with other Kyoto parties and support the information sections and the mechanisms, especially the Clean Development Mechanism. No new targets need be established within the KP as our new targets will evolve in the new comprehensive COP21 agreement.
• Restore ecoENERGY Retrofit – Homes program.
• Consider the other actions in place in 2006 that the Harper administration cancelled.

8) Repair Official Development Assistance:

• Restore funding to MATCH, KAIROS, Canadian Council for International Cooperation, etc.
• Consider re-establishing CIDA as its own agency, but at a minimum reverse funding cuts and restore goal of poverty alleviation.

9) Service Canada:

• In what was described as an effort to save money, the Harper administration created a new department to house administrative, IT and finance roles. Call for a full audit by the Auditor General and determine if Service Canada has in fact resulted in savings, or, if, as many suspect, it has been a boondoggle. Consider restoring functionality in the public service.

10) Reverse monumental mistakes:

• Cancel any federal funding to Canadian Memorial to the Victims of Communism and cancel plans for its current location. Allow it to proceed in another location with a more modest and reasonable design as a private charitable project.
• Restore land from French Cove in Cape Breton Highlands National Park to the park, reversing private give-away to private sector interests. Allow the so-called Mother Canada statue to be built on an appropriate site in industrial Cape Breton.

11) Repair national parks:

• Cancel any and all plans to further privatize within national parks.
• Amend the Sable Island National Parks Act to remove the role of the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board as a regulator within the park. Ban seismic testing, drilling and any industrial activity in the park.
• Amend the Rouge Valley National Parks Act to restore ecological integrity.
• Re-affirm the guiding principle of the National Parks Act to protect ecological integrity.

12) Repair legislative damage to First Nations rights and title:

• Amend the NWT devolution act to restore the water boards and other agencies created by treaty.
• Repeal C-27 (First Nations Financial Transparency Act) and S-2 (Family Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights Act).
• Restore funding and re-open the National Aboriginal Health Organization and the First Nations Statistical Institute.

13) Women’s rights:

• Restore purpose of Status of Women Canada to include achieving equality for women.
• Restore funding to Canadian Association of Women and the Law, National Action Committee, etc.
• Institute an inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women.
• Implement pay equity for women in federal civil service.
• Repeal manipulative laws that contort women’s rights creating increased risks to women:

I. S-7 (Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices Act)
II. C-36 (Sex trade worker law)

14) Restore funding to CBC-Radio Canada:

• Cancel sale of assets.

15) Reverse cessation of home delivery by Canada Post

16) Investor State agreements that cannot be undone:

• Canada-China Investment Treaty was signed and ratified without any hearings in Parliament, without a ratification vote in the House or Senate.
• The earliest Canada can be out from under this treaty is 2045. To protect Canadian interests and sovereignty, we need a law requiring immediate public disclosure of any and all complaints by the People’s Republic of China against Canadian legislation, regulation or policy changes, pending or concluded, at all levels of government. This notification includes any diplomatic pressure from the PRC in the six month window for conflict resolution prior to the lodging of an actual arbitration claim. Canada must be prepared to pay damages to the People’s Republic of China if our environment, labour or safety laws require it. The Canada-China Investment Treaty is the worst of the changes wrought in the Harper era. It could operate to stop the needed repairs. All we can do now is ask to re-negotiate while ensuring our domestic legislation guarantees transparency.