The high-flying trial balloons the federal Liberals launched just a month ago, after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau prorogued Parliament, have all but disappeared amid the ominous clouds of rising COVID-19 numbers across central and western Canada.
Meanwhile down east, Teddy’s arrival in the Atlantic bubble over the next 24-plus hours seems certain to divert attention to more pressing matters than Wednesday’s federal throne speech.
Widespread power outages — the most common and predictable torment Nova Scotians suffer from tempests that pack less punch than Teddy — are likely to make real-time consumption of the federal plan for our future beyond the reach for many of us, anyway.
That said, it bears noting that the bold and ambitious new agenda team Trudeau was foreshadowing just a few weeks back has been overshadowed by the renewed urgency in Ottawa and provinces to our west to deal with the resurgent health crisis and the prospects for additional economic misery that come with it.
Most folks will recall that soon after pulling Parliament’s plug on Aug. 18, Trudeau and his newly minted Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland were bullish, not only about a post-pandemic recovery, but about a green recovery. There were also musings from within the federal government about lasting changes to Canada’s employment insurance and income assistance safety nets.
But back then the curve was flat. In mid-August, Canada was posting about 350 new COVID-19 cases daily.
Beginning in late August and accelerating through September, the number of new cases identified daily has spiked back up to over 1,000 — levels not experienced in Canada since late May or early June. The majority of those are in Quebec and Ontario, although the West is also experiencing a resurgence.
The rise in case numbers and the fear that they portend a second wave of the virus, has tempered or delayed the government’s longer-term ambitions and refocused the Trudeau Liberals on immediate measures that are required to respond to the health emergency and its economic toll.
The government’s longterm vision of transformational change to a green economy and a more robust and enduring income support program has given way to the reality that Canada remains in the grip of the coronavirus.
It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that the trial balloons about a bold and ambitious new agenda were intended, not so much as a preview of the upcoming Throne Speech, as a distraction from the controversy that surrounded the government when Parliament was prorogued.
Prorogation meant that several parliamentary committees examining the controversy around an aborted billion-dollar federal contract to the WE charity went into hiatus. The prime minister and former finance minister Bill Morneau had close ties to the charity.
That controversy seems a long time ago now, although when Parliament resumes following Gov. Gen. Julie Payette’s reading of the speech Wednesday, those committees are likely to resurrect their inquiries.
Trudeau’s mother and brother have received speaking fees from WE, and Morneau had taken a $40,000 trip on the charity’s dime, although he said that was an oversight and repaid the money.
The government was probably motivated by a little of both — a desire to put the WE controversy to bed and to hit the reset button on an agenda that was derailed for by the pandemic.
Like most of us, after months of COVID-19 restrictions, and buoyed by optimism that the spread of the virus was under control, the national government wanted to move on. It hoped to do that with its bold plan.
But, like Mike Tyson famously said, “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.”
While we are insulated here on the East Coast by the Atlantic bubble, COVID-19 has punched central Canada and parts of the west in the face, again.
The reality is that we are all still living with COVID-19, and it appears we will be for the foreseeable future. Travel restrictions to Atlantic Canada — everyone coming into the region must self-isolate for 14 days — seems to have created a little haven from the virus here.
But it would be folly to expect that to continue. COVID-19 is likely to pay a return visit to this part of the country, and how bad the second wave is depends on how well we adhere to the public health protocols designed to limit its spread.
Living with COVID-19, while getting on with life as much as is possible and safe, is the reality.
Wednesday’s throne speech will reflect that reality and will also offer some hope that the government can and will “build back better” — as Democratic President candidate Joe Biden promises — once the virus is truly under control.
