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First published at True North on February 1, 2020.

One of the two “independent senators” appointed by Justin Trudeau last week has contributed thousands of dollars to left-wing political parties and was a vocal critic of Stephen Harper’s former government.

University of Saskatchewan law professor W. Brent Cotter was appointed last week to the Senate on the recommendation of the Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments, the Prime Minister’s Office said in a release.

While the PMO says the selection process aims to ensure senators are “independent” and “reflect Canada’s diversity,” Cotter appears to be a long-time supporter of left-wing parties – in particular the Liberals.

Cotter donated to six riding associations – three Liberal and three NDP – in Saskatchewan, Alberta and Nova Scotia in 2015, according to Elections Canada donor records. Five of these contributions were registered the month before that year’s federal election.

The records reveal $400 to the Saskatoon—University Federal NDP Riding Association and $250 to the Calgary Centre Federal Liberal Association. Both of these campaigns were endorsed by Leadnow’s Anyone But Harper initiative, which directed people to vote strategically for the most electable non-Conservative candidate in 30 targeted ridings across Canada.

Cotter also gave $400 to the Liberal association in Saskatoon—University that year.

In 2011, Cotter gave $250 to the Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar NDP association, as well as to the Green Party of Canada.

Cotter says these contributions were to support individual candidates, rather than the parties, specifically.

“I would be happy to provide my thinking on the support I have provided to individual candidates in federal elections. But for your information, the donations were tied to my wish to support the individual candidates,” Cotter said in an email. “I do not identify myself as a Liberal or New Democrat or a member of any other party but I am someone who supports progressive public interest goals.”

Cotter fought against the previous Conservative government’s 2012 budget by signing an open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and members of parliament expressing “grave concern” about the budget’s streamlining of environmental measures.

The letter, signed by dozens of lawyers, called the budget an “attack on Canadian environmental law and policy” because of its easing of energy and resource regulations.

Cotter was part of a team of seven legal academics who called on the International Commission of Jurists to “conduct the studies and/or investigations it deems necessary” on the Harper government in 2014 after Harper and then-attorney general Peter MacKay said Beverley McLachlin, at the time Canada’s chief justice, acted inappropriately when she called Harper about a case before the court.

The letter accused Harper of conduct that “may seriously undermine judicial independence in Canada.” Cotter also signed another open letter alongside numerous lawyers and law professors to condemn “the unprecedented and baseless insinuation by the Prime Minister of Canada that the Chief Justice engaged in improper conduct.”

In 2015, Cotter openly criticized Harper’s appointment of a conservative judge, Russ Brown, to the Supreme Court of Canada, suggesting the appointment was based on “political orientation” rather than qualifications.

First published at True North on January 27, 2020.

The organizers of an upcoming keynote address by Omar Khadr at Dalhousie University are not responding to inquiries about whether the convicted terrorist and murderer is being paid to speak.

Khadr is scheduled to appear at the Halifax university on Feb. 10 as part of an event titled Children’s Rights Upfront: Preventing the Recruitment and Use of Children in Violence.

While the talk is being presented by the Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative in partnership with Dalhousie University, neither organization’s representatives responded to repeated inquiries from True North about the arrangement with Khadr.

It’s not known who’s paying for his travel to Alberta from Nova Scotia, let alone whether he’s receiving a speaking fee or honorarium for the talk.

The Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative also didn’t answer whether it or Dalhousie, a publicly funded university, took the lead in inviting Khadr.

This is Khadr’s first public appearance as a speaker, although he did appear last year on an episode of CBC’s Tout le monde en parle, where he received a standing ovation from the studio audience.

In 2017, Khadr received a $10.5 million settlement and apology from Justin Trudeau’s government, ending a lawsuit Khadr filed over his treatment in Guantanamo Bay. Khadr was serving a sentence after confessing to throwing the grenade that killed American army medic Sgt. Christopher Speer during a firefight in Afghanistan.

The Speer family, along with Sgt. Layne Morris, who was injured in the blast, won a US$134 million judgement against Khadr in a Utah court, which Khadr has not paid.

First published at True North on January 13, 2020.

The media went into a tizzy when Conservative leader Andrew Scheer met with oil and gas industry representatives ahead of the 2019 federal election. The Globe and Mail reported on it as a “secret meeting.” The National Observer said Scheer had “holed up in a resort with…Big Oil’s most powerful lobby group, to plot the demise of the Trudeau government, among other discussions.”

Big Oil conspiracies abounded, no doubt emboldened by then-democratic institutions minister Karina Gould’s suggestion of “collusion” and former environment minister Catherine McKenna’s accusation of “scheming.”

In fact, the April 11 session at the Azuridge Estate Hotel outside of Calgary welcomed a number of stakeholders, including senior Liberals and First Nations leaders. The host organization, the Modern Miracle Network, let the industry pitch its vision while giving Scheer an opportunity to share his own.

Modern Miracle Network, an oil industry-led group that openly celebrates and promotes Canada’s energy sector, was branded as some sort of shadowy cabal of executives with a hidden agenda.

The rhetoric around this event is indicative of how the media seems to view the oil and gas sector: any political lobbying is sinister, and any politician who supports Canada’s energy sector must be unethically in bed with the industry.

It’s why the Modern Miracle Network hosts dialogues like the one in Alberta, founder and executive director Michael Binnion told True North.

Binnion, who’s also the president and chief executive officer of Questerre Energy, wants an “adult conversation” on energy policy, which includes discussion about whether carbon taxation is the best way to protect the environment.

Modern Miracle Network, a registered non-profit, is transparent about its goals. The organization isn’t a household name because it markets its ideas to the media, politicians and other stakeholders, rather than to the public directly.

“We’re an organization that’s trying to bring people together who have a common view or alignment with our objectives, which is having an adult conservation on hydrocarbons and energy,” Binnion said. “Our job is to facilitate a network for that conversation.”

In an October article, the National Observer called Binnion the “little-known colossus behind the Conservatives’ anti-climate agenda,” a moniker rooted to some extent in the author’s confusion about a remark Binnion made at the 2018 Manning Networking Conference in Ottawa.

During a panel discussion about carbon taxes, Binnion joked that a page of hand-written notes was the “official list for the conservative movement on the options that we’re going to discuss.” The National Observer said this amounted to Binnion “boasting” that he held “key elements of the Conservative’s (sic) energy platform.”

Despite a reporter’s inability to differentiate between conservative ideas and the Conservative party, there’s no question Modern Miracle Network aims to reshape the discussion around energy policy. Much of this involves showcasing the work the sector has already done.

“I think the (oil and gas) industry has done an amazing job of actually delivering on what people say they want, which is a lower environmental footprint,” he said. “Every single year we continue to do that.”

The Canadian energy sector has spent more money on environmental technology, clean technologies and environmental protection than all other industries in the country combined, he noted.

It’s a quintessential Canadian success story, Binnion said.

“Thank goodness – for the planet – that the oil sands were put in Canada,” he said. “What other country, what other group of scientists or engineers, would have been able to take a resource that had the 90^th percentile of emissions intensity per barrel and have reduced new projects to the 50^th percentile, and are now talking about being better than average in emissions intensity? What an amazing Canadian achievement.”

It’s an evolution we’re not seeing in other oil rich nations, like Venezuela or Saudi Arabia, yet it is only domestic oil production that seems to be demonized by activists.

While corners of the media are  no doubt hostile to pro-oil voices, Binnion said the industry itself shoulders a lot of the blame for not better communicating its successes.

“I think our industry’s done a terrible job at that, but that’s because we’re an industry of geoscientists and engineers,” he said. “We’re not an industry of people who market Coca Cola. We’re too busy focusing on delivering. If you look at the amazing progress, it’s really quite something. What we haven’t done is convinced other Canadians that we actually care about what they care about.”

Modern Miracle Network isn’t just about naysaying – the group has its own proposals, which it believes are absent from the national discourse on environmental policy. Though the organization takes a firm stance against the carbon tax schemes pushed by left-wing governments in Canada, it isn’t against emission-reduction policies. Its members just want them to be more effective.

Binnion said a localized, regional carbon tax – which each province has been forced to implement under the federal government’s Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act – simply causes companies to migrate their emissions elsewhere.

“It doesn’t create an incentive for production to move where the emissions are lower; It actually creates an incentive for production to move where emissions are highest, because they can get away from the tax,” Binnion said. “This Canadian parochial approach – a patchwork of local taxes – actually does the opposite of what is intended relative to production.”

The argument is a sound one as much of the United States , makes itself more competitive. The higher a carbon tax in a Canadian province, the more likely a company is to set up shop elsewhere, making the policy environmentally ineffective and economically harmful.

Carbon taxation also doesn’t take into account future growth, Binnion said. The world population is expected to rise to 9.5 billion people by 2050, meaning there will be more people demanding a higher quality of life as time progresses. Opposing pipelines and imposing carbon taxes isn’t going to solve this impending problem, especially as countries like China and India prove unlikely to sacrifice economic progress in the name of the environment.

While there’s no silver bullet, Binnion said people need to stop demonizing the oil and gas sector while lionizing alternative energies that have benefits, but also bring their own baggage.

“We’re not afraid to admit that wind and solar have benefits,” he said. “They do. And we’re not afraid to admit that oil and gas have impacts, and that we need to make major technological leaps to solve them.”

“We’ve got some amazing initiatives that we’re working on that never get mentioned when people want to just tell that one side of the story.”

First published at True North on January 4, 2020.

Canada’s state broadcaster is sending a family on an all-inclusive Cuban vacation in a contest sponsored, in part, by Cuba’s communist government.

The CBC Holiday Escape to Cuba Contest, which is accepting registrants until Jan. 5, is also sponsored by the Canadian vacation company Sunwing. 

The winner of the contest gets economy airfare for two adults and two children on a Sunwing flight to Cayo Coco, as well as seven nights at the Memories Flamenco Beach Resort and an all-inclusive meal plan. The value of the package is $3150, according to CBC’s legal department.

CBC News has published numerous stories about the Cuban dictatorship over the course of 2019, including one about a Canadian tourist sentenced to 10 years in prison. The family of Benjamin Tomlin says he was denied access to adequate consular services because of staffing shortages at Canada’s embassy in Cuba.

CBC/Radio-Canada’s conflict of interest rules prohibits employees from accepting travel “that could influence, or be perceived to influence, their judgment and/or their performance of duties,” though a spokesperson told True North this promotion is “entirely independent” from CBC’s news division.

“This contest is a partnership between Sunwing Vacations and CBC Media Solutions (sales department), which has normal ongoing business relations with many companies and organizations as part of its work,” said CBC public affairs spokesperson Kerry Kelly. 

“It is entirely independent from CBC News, and the contest has no connection with how CBC News might cover issues relating to Cuba.”

Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault had no comment on the promotion, with a spokesperson telling True North “CBC is an autonomous Crown corporation responsible for managing its own operations.”

The Cuban government is currently under the leadership of Miguel Diaz-Canel, who was handpicked by communist dictator Fidel Castro’s brother, Raúl Castro.

Cuba has a long record of political executions, arbitrary imprisonment and torture. 

“Many of the abusive tactics developed during [Fidel Castro’s] time in power – including surveillance, beatings, arbitrary detention, and public acts of repudiation – are still used by the Cuban government,” says Human Rights Watch.

First published at True North on December 18, 2019.

Bureaucrats within Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada were tracking public sentiment and reaction as Canada’s confidence in the Trudeau government’s handling of the immigration file declined.

Documents obtained under Access to Information laws by True North reveal how the government thought this lack of confidence was a communications problem, rather than a policy problem.

A communications staffer sent a “sentiment comparison” report to his colleagues on Aug. 3, 2018, acknowledging that the “Conversation is 136% more negative than positive” in 2018 compared to the year prior. He also noted that the overall volume of conversation – in particular “negative conversation” – increased.

In response, the director general of the communications division of IRCC, David Hickey, said he is planning to start “rethinking the narrative going forward.”

Hickey, who did not respond to two requests for comment, told his colleagues he would be flagging the communications problems on an upcoming call with the deputy minister.

Tracking public response to the government’s immigration policies wasn’t just limited to IRCC, however. The Privy Council Office, the bureaucratic arm of the Prime Minister’s Office, commissioned a study on asylum seekers in June, 2018, which that over an 18-month period, confidence in the government’s management of immigration dropped significantly – from 51 per cent of Canadians believing the government was “on the right track” to 34 per cent.

In an Aug. 3 social media monitoring briefing, one staffer says the problem is a “significant lack of knowledge when it comes to policy on this issue,” suggesting that Canadians believe a majority government can do more than it actually can.

At one point, someone prepared a PowerPoint presentation that listed “Influencers” as a consideration. Also in the presentation was a “Case Study” about a tweet from conservative lawyer @manny_ottawa, which the presentation said “resulted in increased scrutiny of IRCC on social channels.”

In July, True North reported that IRCC officials were monitoring social media posts and flagging content for “condemnation of the Trudeau government,” among other descriptors.