Modeling Journey

The so-called Blue Panel of Liberals and Tories working on EI has had limited success in actually coming to grips with the issues. The Tory members have been using the sessions and the media to paint the Liberal position on when EI should start and how long it should last as being out of touch with reality, very expensive, and not a good thing. The Liberals have asked for an independent analysis of the costs of the Liberal proposal, but the Tory members of the panel are once again dismissing this:

"But Mr. Savage has also written a letter to Mr. Page requesting an assessment of Conservative calculations that peg the cost of the Liberal proposal to create uniform national standards for EI qualification at up to $4-billion.
“They torqued it up beyond belief,” Mr. Savage said of the Conservative figure. He has asked that Mr. Page's analysis be completed by the end of August and that it be made public.

Mr. Page responded to Mr. Savage's request by asking the Human Resources Department for the data, analysis and assumptions that were used to calculate the cost of the Liberal plan.

Pierre Poilievre, a Conservative member of the working group, dismissed the move to bring in Mr. Page, saying, “We already have a costing.” The Liberals, he said, “are shopping around for a different number that suits them.”

He called the Liberal plan both “expensive and irresponsible.”"

Surprise, surprise!

Don't expect the Tories to accede to the demand for their working notes in a hurry.

Harper agreed to the bi-party panel (which excluded any Bloc or NDP MPs, despite these two parties representing a significant portion of the total votes cast during the past election) only because he thought this would gain him time, prevent Ignatieff sinking his government, and enable Harper to frame the issues in such a way that Ignatieff would be forced to give way yet again.

In other words, having played Ignatieff as a patsy for so long, Harper seems to believe he should stick with a game plan which has worked well in the past, and play Ignatieff as a patsy yet once more.

Witness therefore the reluctance of the Tories to date on the panel.

But here comes the twist.

Wait for Harper to call for a one on one meeting with Ignatieff, and then table some move that takes the Tory position closer to that of the Liberals, hoping that this will enable Ignatieff to announce that pressure from the Liberals has once again forced the reluctant Harper government to agree to a policy change more in favour of ordinary Canadians (while not bankrupting the feds).

And then wait for the Liberals to use this example of successful working together of Parliament as a further reason for not tabling a vote of no-confidence in the government at the end of September.

How pieces of silver will Harper dangle before Ignatieff in order to get him to buy into his cosmetic changes to EI?

And who will then be able to fight for ordinary Canadians who will continue to lose their jobs at an alarming rate?