MLI Newsletter
Vol. IV, No. 7
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EVENTS
MLI's next Great Canadian Debates
- Mark your calenders -
3rd Series begins:
October 24th,
2013
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VIDEO
WATCH:
Former Swedish Minister of Employment, Sven Otto Littorin on the "Swedish Model" for reform of the modern welfare state and what lessons Canada can learn about employment and healthcare
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House Speaker Peter Milliken to host Great Canadian Debates series
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The Macdonald-Laurier Institute (MLI) announced Oct. 4 that the Hon. Peter Milliken, former Speaker of the House of Commons, will be moderator for the entire 2013-14 edition of MLI's Great Canadian Debates series.
"We are thrilled that Peter Milliken has agreed to take on this important role," says Brian Lee Crowley, MLI managing director. "As the former Speaker of the House of Commons, Mr. Milliken represents the pinnacle of impartiality and brings impressive political star power to the debate series."
Mr. Milliken was the longest-serving Speaker in Canadian history.
In the first debate On Oct. 24 at 7pm, Ted Morton, former Alberta Minister of Energy, will argue in favour and journalist Andrew Nikiforuk, author of "The Energy of Slaves," will argue against the resolution "President Obama should welcome Canada's ethical oil." |
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next Great Canadian Debate
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New edition of Inside Policy now available
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The latest edition of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute's flagship publication Inside Policy is now available. Every issue of Inside Policy brings readers the in-depth analysis, cutting edge commentary and sound public policy options that have made MLI one of the top young think-tanks in the world.
In the cover story of this issue, international risk-management consultant Roger W. Robinson sounds the alarm over the complacency of Arctic Council members as China steps up its efforts to assert control over strategic areas in the north. Calling it a "long con," Robinson suggests Beijing's Arctic strategy is underpinned by the initial use of soft power to attain its regional objectives.
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MLI Commentary - Extracting the most value from Canada's petroleum
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Why doesn't Canada refine more of its oil in this country? Aren't we missing out on "adding value" to our exports of crude? It's not that simple, finds MLI Senior Fellow Philip Cross in his commentary paper, Extracting the Most Value from Canada's Petroleum
"The appearance of a discount for bitumen prices early in 2013 elicited widespread calls for processing more petroleum products in Canada," writes Cross. "These calls were based on a widely-shared assumption among analysts that Canada should extract more value-added by manufacturing its natural
resources rather than exporting raw materials."
But Cross's commentary clearly demonstrates the limitations of that argument for additional petroleum refining in Canada. More value lies in petroleum extraction and its transportation, not in its manufacture.
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Outlook brightens for exports, U.S. economy strengthening, MLI's Leading Indicator shows
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 Outlook brightens for exports, U.S. economy strengthening, MLI's
The index has strengthened steadily from gains of only 0.1% at the beginning of the year. Six of the nine components expanded, one was unchanged and two decreased.
"These gains point to a pickup in growth in the second half of the year, notably in export demand," said Philip Cross, a senior fellow with the Macdonald-Laurier Institute (MLI) and former chief economic.
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Latest MLI opinion articles and columns
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In the Globe and Mail, MLI managing director Brian Lee Crowley takes on the kind of natural resource nationalism that causes people to clamour for policies that with a moment's analysis are revealed to be simply wrong. "[C]onsumer advocates and many others believe Canada is somehow 'losing out' when it exports bitumen from the oil sands, for example, rather than refined products like gasoline and jet fuel. Many of them look at the discount on Western Canadian oil and, misunderstanding its significance, agitate for that oil to be shipped east where it will prove a boon for consumers. Both ideas are quite wrong," writes Crowley.
Also on the theme of fuel refining, in the National Post MLI senior fellow Philip Cross writes that it's already hard to remember "the concern that gripped some pundits and even governments just six months ago" about the "bitumen bubble" affecting the price of Canadian crude oil. But the discount has returned to normal levels, shrinking to $10 from $40 a barrel by July. "The unearthing of innovative strategies for transporting oil confounded the predictions of Monday Morning Quarterbacks with little expertise but lots of self-interest,"writes Cross.
In the National Post, Michael Watts, a partner at Osler, Hoskin and Harcourt LLP and author of the MLI report Debunking the Myths: A broader perspective of the Canada Health Act writes that too many politicians are willing to hide behind the Canada Health Act, and perpetuate the myth that it is a serious barrier to medicare reform. In fact it does little to prevent provinces from experimenting with new ways to deliver and pay for health services. "After witnessing the demolition of [Stockwell] Day, and the shouting down of politicians of any stripe who make a frank assessment of the CHA, it seems that members of the Harper government who have expressed such views in the past have lost their voices," writes Watts.
In his Ottawa Citizen column, Brian Lee Crowley writes that whatever you thought of his policies, there was no denying former prime minister Pierre Trudeau's leadership qualities. He could be "single-minded, authoritarian and downright steely in the pursuit of what he thought was good for Canada," writes Crowley. His son, Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau, on the other hand, rarely ventures into the policy debate, preferring to consult and delay than to take a stand. Crowley writes, "Trudeau père would, in my estimation, have scorned such an approach and the differences between the two tell us much about their respective styles of leadership and how the country might be run under Trudeau fils."
In the Globe and Mail, MLI senior fellow Linda Nazareth writes that the solution to skills shortages in Canada could lie in the U.S. "Canada has unfilled jobs and U.S. workers may be the best ones to fill them," she writes. "Yes, Canada had an unemployment rate of 7.1 per cent as of August, but there are plenty of places and plenty of occupations where the unemployment rate is much lower. In Alberta, for example, the unemployment rate is 4.8 per cent and there are an estimated 50,000 unfilled vacancies
right now, with about twice that number expected to materialize over the next decade."
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