Thoughts on BC Politics and More

Canada’s Privy Council Office (PCO) has a behavioural science unit established under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that quietly shapes public policy and influences citizen compliance through psychological experiments and data modelling. The Impact and Innovation Unit (IIU), which bases its framework on a UK government initiative and tools issued by the World Health Organization (WHO), has quietly pioneered its approach to behaviour change using psychology, economics and social sciences for years  — but its role became most visible in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.  The IIU conducts behaviour-modifying trials and public “challenges” that test government communication strategies and incentives to encourage compliance with government objectives ... CLICK HERE for the full story

  ...  Investigations that would normally be conducted by a commissioner are on pause until a permanent replacement is found.  Dion said the role serves as a good safeguard to detect corruption, and Canadians should care that the instruments it has are being used.   "It's a little bit like judicial appointments. If you don't appoint judges, it will be hard to deliver justice," Dion said in an interview.   "So it means that things can go essentially unpunished and unnoticed for a period of time until a new person has been appointed" ...   CLICK HERE to read the full story

  Government officials in the Privy Council Office discussed a Conservative private member's bill launched in response to convicted killer  Privy Council Office 's transfer to a medium-security prison, noting it would likely never hit Parliament, internal emails show.   Documents obtained by The Canadian Press through access-to-information law show staff speculated about the chances the bill would ever be debated, unless the Liberal government agreed to move it up the priority list.   The bill proposed by Tory MP Tony Baldinelli, who hails from the region in Ontario where Bernardo committed his crimes, seeks to change the law so that people convicted of multiple murders would be required to serve out their entire sentences in maximum-security institutions ... CLICK HERE to read the full story

Mark Norman’s lawyer warns of interference in courts despite dropped charge Lee Berthiaume, ~~ The Canadian Press ~~ May 8, 2019 OTTAWA — Canadians must be on guard against government efforts to tip the scales of justice, said Vice-Admiral Mark Norman's lawyer on Wednesday, as she hailed the surprise stay of a breach-of-trust charge against her client. That decision came despite — "not because of" — the Trudeau government's interference in the case ... that included withholding key documents and information that could have helped ... demonstrate his (Mark Norman) innocence on allegations he tried to undermine a federal cabinet deliberation on a large shipbuilding contract. "No person in this country should ever walk into a courtroom and feel like they are fighting their elected government or any sort of political factors at all," Henein told a packed news conference right after Norman's final court appearance. The ...

'The prosecution should not be discussing trial strategy with the (PMO's) right hand person' – Mainville Murray Brewster ~~ CBC News ~~ Feb 11, 2019 A pretrial hearing in the breach-of-trust case against Vice-Admiral Mark Norman took a sudden political turn Monday when the defence alleged that prosecutors have been talking trial strategy with the bureaucratic department that supports Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's office and the federal cabinet. Former Commander of the Royal Canadian Navy, Vice-Admiral Mark Norman The federal government is fighting defence requests for the release of un-redacted notes from meetings between officials at the Privy Council Office (PCO) and Crown lawyers ... that prompted defence counsel Christine Mainville to accuse the Prime Minister's Office of trying to direct the case. Mainville said the discussion with PCO is "more concerning" than the allegations at the centre of the SNC Lavalin...