Because It's 2016: Canadian Politics in Sunnier Days

^ Fuck that makes me so happy!

Viola was pre-Parks. Does that make Rosa Parks the USA's Viola Desmond?

New American $10 bill will have the face of James Blake (Rosa Parks' bus driver) on it, Trump vows.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/keystone-pipeline-approval-could-tilt-trade-balance-against-canada/article33711159/

canada treading on dangerous waters

not looking forward to the oil version of the softwood lumber dispute

Canada's Rosa Parks is replacing Canada's George Washington on our $10 bill.

http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-thursday-edition-1.3887380/i-m-feeling-so-proud-sister-of-viola-desmond-new-face-of-our-10-bill-1.3887383

― clemenza, Friday, December 9, 2016 6:30 PM (one month ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this was p great especially considering that john a macdonald - a fellow glaswegian - was a real piece of shit white supremacist

http://www.businessinsider.com/keystone-xl-canada-oil-sands-photos-2017-1/

photo essay on how oil is mined at the tar sands

the magnitude of it is out of this world

trudeau really twerping it up left and right these days

xp. flying over northern alberta it just looks like such a crazy hellscape.

Just signed: https://you.leadnow.ca/petitions/tell-trudeau-welcome-those-fleeing-violence-and-deportation-under-trump?bucket=noii&source=facebook-share-button&time=1485522319

Well-intentioned but that is not a good idea

Why not?

There are a lot of mexicans and hispanics that want to go to canada and canada's economy is nowhere near as diverse to withstand such a huge volume of people

Thered be massive unemployment and this would just create a slew of social problems and an unregulated underground economy of whatever they sell to survive

I know at least a dozen people in canada with arts degrees working at places like subway, retail and other restaurant/pub type establishments

Here in the US, those jobs are given to those without degrees and the economy and demand is diverse enough to allow for niche economies

I think it's calling for eliminating the “Safe Third Country” agreement that would prohibit Canada from accepting asylum seekers who landed in the US, not for Canada to accept anyone deported from the US.

Hm, well, there's a lot of rhetoric there but I thought this is what the petition is actually calling for:

We are calling on Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister Hussen to immediately rescind the “Safe Third Country Agreement”, and that immediate steps be taken to allow special consideration of humanitarian and compassionate reasons for entry to Canada as enabled by the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Based on reading the Safe Third Country Agreement, I didn't really think that would mean that Canada would be required to admit the (ostensibly) 11M undocumented immigrants that Trump wants to expel so much as it would mean that we wouldn't turn away non-American refugees because they arrived at the US first (which is what we have to do now according to the treaty).

(I gotta say that I've definitely known American arts grads working in the sorts of places you describe, though!)

xp! Thanks, that was more concise.

I'm glad Trudeau said this at least: https://twitter.com/JustinTrudeau/status/825438460265762816

and he's a real man of his word: http://startouch.thestar.com/screens/9d4cadfb-9ac8-4eda-8b25-7e0aed44b9ab%7C_0.html

What's stopping millions of illegal mexicans applying and entering canada (legally of course) once the safe third country agreement is rescinded and canada allows entry to immigrants under the immigration and refugee protection act?

If there's no stopping them and canada does admit them, what can canada offer them in terms of jobs and careers?

Keep in mind most illegal mexicans only have a high school education, and were educated in a language that is neither English nor French

Sund4r, canada has a higher population with a post-secondary education per capita than the US. While university educated americans work menial jobs, it is not as common, and there are far more opportunities for them in the US than in canada

Point is Canada has by and large failed its own citizens and has hardly recovered from a recession and yet they want to bring in more unskilled immigrants

Sund4r, canada has a higher population with a post-secondary education per capita than the US. While university educated americans work menial jobs, it is not as common, and there are far more opportunities for them in the US than in canada

Hm, I guess it's hard to argue this when both of us are working in the US. I think I see your point but undocumented Mexicans would still have to go through the whole legal refugee/immigration process in that case. Maybe it's true that this would put excessive strain on the system. I guess the current crisis seemed like the more pressing issue but maybe it was hasty to agitate for this while courts in the US are still working it out.

xpost

What nonsense. Pulling out of the Safe Third Country Agreement doesn't mean Canada will begin accepting every immigration applicant. It simply means that refugees who were refused at the US border can still apply for Canadian visas.

Regardless, I disagree with your anti-Mexican diatribe. Yes, you ought to have some kind of parameters governing immigration. No, immigrants don't steal our jobs.

We should probably build a wall just to be safe

Fuck.

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/29/5-dead-in-quebec-city-mosque-shooting-mosque-president.html

:(

Awful

Yes, you ought to have some kind of parameters governing immigration

No shit sherlock, we're talking about the details and how to go about doing it

No, immigrants don't steal our jobs.

Might want to work on that reading comprehension

Would you at least stop fucking calling them "illegal Mexicans"? Sorry your washout friends couldn't get good jobs, but: a ton of agricultural work in Canada is done by migrants (go to Niagara-on-the-Lake). Immigrants (including unskilled ones) tend to grow economies, and not by "selling whatever they do", and Canada just raised its immigration quota to 300,000 to help drive economic growth.

As was noted, Safe Third Country only bars asylees applying for status in the US from doing so in Canada. If removed, people would still need to get approved for entry.

You have no idea what you're talking about, legally or economically.

Comp sci friends who attended ubc and waterloo also left to the states for better opportunities

No need to repeat something so basic about safe third country agreement, but you can answer my question above about what happens to undocumented Mexicans of the US once they are admitted into Canada though

Unskilled immigrants grow economies that are diverse; where opening a small business is streamlined and a country that fosters innovation and entrepreneurship. Canada has none of these things

also if a tonne of agricultural work is already done by migrants how much more can that sector sustain?

as you suggest, undocumented immigrants in the us are overrepresented in farming occupations, and as well as in construction, but canada's economy is tiny

removing the safe third country agreement right now, with what's going on with trump, would cause a rise in refugee applicants. and sure, canada would just take forever to process each one and do it at a pace it can sustain, but gov't would be oversaturated with these applicants and would need to put in more time, effort, and resources into processing all of them, especially if wanting to do it in a timely manner. i think removing the agreement should be considered at another time when things are not so chaotic in the states

living in la, i notice that most undocumented immigrants, who tend to be of mexican origin, would rather work for themselves. you are assuming all immigrants into canada want to work in agriculture, though. what kind of economy does canada need to have to get these people to easily open their own businesses and can they successfully operate businesses that meet a demand in a largely english-speaking country? if not, then why not promote entrepreneurship and innovation more for starters? why shut down applicants by bright engineers, computer scientists, and entrepreneurs (see brain drain) living in toronto and vancouver and force them to flee to the us for better opportunities? because that is what is happening right now

this is highly contentious, so take it or leave it, but with this agreement lifted, i can totally see trump saying "fine. deny entry to all mexicans and let them all go to canada"

and yes, i have read the agreement in its entirety

im confused as to how you seem to think the immigration system in canada works.

wannabe immigrants or refugees just showing up at the border wouldn't be allowed in.

mexicans would generally not be able to claim refugee status. even if they could they would have to initiate the claim from outside the country, fill in a bunch of forms, be vetted etc. before years later being rejected or accepted.

for a low skilled mexican with no family in canada to get permanent residence is basically impossible under the current system. they could apply to work in canada through the temporary foreign worker scheme, but that would be their only option, and there is no pathway from their to permanent residence.

a huge number of low skilled jobs in canada are performed by temporary foreign workers. fast food jobs, low skilled manual labour, agricultural,etc. they're basically unfree labour, and are routinely misused by companies who claim the labour isnt available locally but are bullshitting because it is but they just want to keep costs down.

the canadian govenrment actively restricts numbers of refugee claimants at times whenever they are "swamped", so it's not really a huge issue for the effective working of the cic to receive high volumes

mexicans would generally not be able to claim refugee status. even if they could they would have to initiate the claim from outside the country, fill in a bunch of forms, be vetted etc. before years later being rejected or accepted.

― Islamic State of Mind (jim in vancouver), Sunday, January 29, 2017 10:36 PM (fourteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

do you have a source for that? the way the current agreement works is:

Under the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement, persons seeking refugee protection must make a claim in the first country they arrive in (United States or Canada), unless they qualify for an exception to the Agreement.

http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/stca-etps-eng.html

what the petition is calling for, as it states on the page provided by sund4r, is to allow those deported under trump's gov't to use the safe third country agreement to go to canada and apply there if the us does not allow them entry (from sund4r's link: immigrants "fleeing violence and deportation from Trump’s America")

for a low skilled mexican with no family in canada to get permanent residence is basically impossible under the current system.

― Islamic State of Mind (jim in vancouver), Sunday, January 29, 2017 10:36 PM (fourteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

probably. but technically, by law, it is not impossible, as family connections is an exception to the safe third country agreement:

Family member exceptions

Refugee claimants may qualify under this category of exceptions if they have a family member in Canada who:

is a Canadian citizen;
is a permanent resident of Canada;
is a protected person under Canadian immigration legislation;
has made a claim for refugee status in Canada that has been accepted by the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB), an independent organization;
has had his or her removal order stayed on humanitarian and compassionate grounds;
is the holder of a valid Canadian work permit;
is the holder of a valid Canadian study permit; or
is over 18 years old and has a claim for refugee protection that has been referred to the IRB for determination.

http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/stca-etps-eng.html

if companies are misusing the system already wouldn't it be wiser to fix or somehow mitigate this before taking in more refugees that will be fleeing the us currently?

your last point is fair, i understand that

mexicans would generally not be able to claim refugee status. even if they could they would have to initiate the claim from outside the country, fill in a bunch of forms, be vetted etc. before years later being rejected or accepted.
― Islamic State of Mind (jim in vancouver), Sunday, January 29, 2017 10:36 PM (fourteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

nevermind, i found the answer:

Refugee claimant is found eligible

If the refugee claim is found to be eligible to be referred to the IRB:

the border services officer will provide the refugee claimant with a number of documents and an explanation of each document and its purpose;
the refugee claimant will be allowed to stay temporarily in Canada while waiting for a decision to be made by the IRB;
a removal order will be issued and will be conditional pending the decision by the IRB; or
if the refugee claimant is found not to be a Convention refugee or a person in need of protection by the IRB, the removal order will immediately come into force and the claimant will be required to leave Canada.

http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/stca-etps-eng.html

all this actually happens at the border (hence "border services officer") so it can take hours per person, so no way is this an application process where you just sit and wait in your home country and it could very well put a strain on the people and time available to process apps and interview them

sorry, misread your family point, you're right

Refugees can apply for protection either within or outside of Canada. If within Canada you are allowed to remain within the country pending the determination of your claim; you don't have to wait at the border or in detention unless there are security/identity concerns.

interesting data here about the 7-country immigration ban:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/us-politics/trump-immigration-ban-canada/article33822491/

warm winds, see, i think there's confusion/ambiguity because see in this same article how the globe and mail words the safe third country agreement:

people turned away from the U.S. can’t come to Canada’s border or airports and ask to seek asylum there

this suggests that if the safe third country agreement was to be rescinded, they would be able to go to canada's borders or airports and ask to seek asylym there

i know some people who had to submit apps by going to the border, so this is why i'm curious about this, because it's not far-fetched

You use the word 'they' as if everyone should be able to know who you're talking about...

applicants

i don't really see why an undocumented mexican who is living in the U.S. on the DL would want to go to the canadian border and get fingerprinted and interviewed and the rest of it for a, likely to be failed, attempt at gaining asylum to canada.

i mean there is no visa requirement for mexicans to visit canada now, if we're going to get unauthorized migration or asylum claimants from mexico in significant numbers i imagine it will likely be mexicans arriving here by plane.

and of course the shooter in the quebec city mosque attack was a trump supporting, le pen loving, anti-feminist dickhole

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/visit/visas-result.asp?country=MX&result=11&message=0&standard=2&q3=

“(Bissonnette) was not necessarily overtly racist or Islamophobic, but he had borderline misogynist, Islamophobic viewpoints,” said Vincent Boissonneault, a fellow Laval student."

I'd hate to see overt Islamophobia.

xp. those ETAs are a formality, basically automated, not like an actual visa application process - which until recently mexicans had to go through to visit canada

as a uk citizen i have to do the same thing to enter the US, you pay via credit card online and you print off a little slip, you show it at the border, you go through.

xp. yeah the hedging bets, waiting for more to come out, minimizing of bissonnette's ideology is sickening but to be expected.

also on fbook i was seeing people complaining about people bringing up the xenophobia of quebecois culture in light of the shooting. smh.

A Trump lover on my FB feed was talking about the (supposedly multiple) killers' 'Arabic heritage' and 'Moroccan descent' soon after the shooting.

Those actually were some of the initial reports (even CBC I think - I was watching tv switching channels) which is pretty messed up.

Oh, I know, but this guy was really making a point of it: "Two people of Arabic heritage - so NOW we know why the media hasn't been covering it". Eating crow now, hopefully.

jim

okay good to know

i need one if i wanted to visit canada as well (because i am a us lpr) so i decided not to go

Goddamn Fox: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-01/quebec-mosque-shooting:-fox-news-deletes-tweet/8233210

Good on Trudeau for saying this:

"Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack,"

and fuck him on this

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/trudeau-abandons-electoral-reform/article33855925/

god if the ndp had their shit together they're so much material to attack the grits from the left with

(I'm of the opinion that the ndp are not going to get anywhere near being the party of government for the indefinite future and should use their parliamentary platform as a sort of pressure group)

What I wrote on FB fwiw:

"We'll definitely replace the system but we have no idea with what" was never that inspiring of a promise tbf.

If I had ever actually thought "the Liberal Party of Canada is serious about keeping its promises", this would have been an alarming one: FPTP has its problems but it has at least been the basis for a functional democratic system for 150 years in Canada (and centuries longer in the UK). I'm in favour of reform but promising to replace the entire electoral system in a short time before even deciding on an alternative would have been pretty reckless if it were not an empty promise that every voter could interpret the way they wanted. Lots of alternatives could be worse.

I'd rather start by seeing more autonomy and less party discipline for MPs, since they're the only people we actually vote for, before changing the voting system. If we're going to reform the way we vote, I'd favour some sort of ranked ballot system. The way the Liberals went about this was definitely not the way to do it, though.