The following shows the economic, if not practical, lunacy of our governments’ (note the plural) insisting that our Navy’s ships be built in Canada:

Shipping industry gets tariff break

Imported cargo ships, tankers and large ferries will no longer be subject to a 25 per cent tariff, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced Friday.

The measure is aimed at making it cheaper for Canadian shipowners to replace aging fleets with more modern and more efficient vessels.

Waiving the tariff will save the industry $25 million a year for the next 10 years, the government estimates.

“These were tariffs that don’t serve any purpose because … the ships to which they apply are not capable of being made competitively in Canada [emphasis added],” Flaherty told reporters in St. Catharines, Ont…

The tariff removal will be retroactive to the start of the year. The measure applies to all general cargo vessels, tankers, and ferries longer than 129 metres…

Surely our Navy could use a break to stretch its shipbuilding dollars further. If Canadian industry can’t competitively build civilian vessels, how can it do so at any reasonable cost for more complex naval ones? Instead this government has announced a “National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy” under which, for vessels over 1,000 tonnes, one Canadian shipyard will be selected to build combat ships for the Navy (Arctic Offshore Patrol Ship), and one non-combat ships for the Navy (Joint Support Ship) and Coast Guard.

Monopoly builders will sure help efficiency and bringing down costs. Pork, pork, pork; jobs, jobs jobs; votes, votes, flipping votes. Hurl.

But at least the government is now finally open–at least in theory–to selecting proven foreign designs. See:

Joint Sometime Ship (JSS): At least five years late

Also take a look at the “Arctic” ships section of this post:

New fighters, Joint Support Ships, and Arctic Offshore Patrol Ships: What’s good enough?..

This government is either logically shameless or challenged, eh?  Heck, even the Russkies (so dreaded by the Conservatives) are buying naval ships abroad.

Update: A comment at Milnet.ca:

This is very simple, very, very old fashioned pork barrelling and vote buying. They used to set up beer stalls by the voting booths, now they are a wee tiny bit more subtle, albeit a lot more expensive.

Canadians yards can build first rate, modern, sophisticated ships, including warships – they just cannot do it without buying a whole boat load of technology and expertise, at enormous cost. But, hey, a job’s a job, right? Gotta keep those Canadian workers on the job and shopping at WalMart. Wouldn’t do to let the market decide; this is Canada!

Well, except now for civilian ships.

Mark
Ottawa

Earlier:

Puck porc?

Now:

Bernier slams PM pledge to fund arenas

Anything really wrong with liking big…or not properly protecting documents that likely contained nothing of true sensitivity if one has the, er, right ideas?  And can be trained about certain matters?

In any event M. Max is showing a certain amount of, er, balls.  This sounds good to me:

Dans la culture entrepreneuriale qui est la nôtre, lorsqu’on subit un dur coup, on se retrousse les manches et on reprend le travail.

Toujours de l’audace!

Mark
Ottawa

The lard train getting ready for a new stop?

Don Martin: Harper prepares to buy off Quebec

The picture of beaming Conservative MPs sporting new Quebec Nordiques hockey jerseys on Wednesday was worth a thousand words of political insight.

Canadian taxpayers, it seems obvious, are about to sink almost $200 million deeper into deficit to finance a giant hockey arena in Quebec’s “national” capital to help land a second NHL hockey team for the province, in exchange for more Conservative seats.

The signs are not even subtle. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s lapdog MPs would never pose in such a giddy thumbs-up stance without first getting the go-ahead from above. And there’s no way they’d get clearance from the PMO, where this contentious file now sits, unless Mr. Harper was setting up great expectations for a cash delivery.

It was instructive that Quebec MP Maxime Bernier, who opposes public handouts for private enterprise, was missing from the photograph and e-mailed me a curt ‘no comment’ when asked about the merits of federal support for the arena.

And so, the elements are converging to create a political squeeze play pitting West against East, fiscal prudence against profligacy, vote buying in Quebec against voter backlash everywhere else…

Thank goodness for Minimum Max Bernier. More:

Long live the Nordiques! (But let someone else pay for them)

Thumbs hurling up:

Quebec Conservative MPs wear Quebec Nordique jerseys during a caucus meeting in Quebec City on Wednesday, Sept. 8, 2010. The MPs wore the jerseys to support the construction of a new arena. A march will be held Oct. 2, 2010 in support for the return of the Nordiques. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Le Soleil-Yan Doublet

Oinking earlier:

Stephen Harper, Quebec Nordiques fan

Paul may be on to something.

Mark
Ottawa

Further to the Upperdate at this post,

Why we need F-35s, or, do the Russians have a radar that can reach Cold Lake?/Nuclear Voodoo Update thought/Boys in blue ties Upperdate

the government sure keeps trying to get those votes in Québec:

Deal keeps Mirabel firm aloft
$468-million accord with fees Contract to maintain CF-18 fighter jets would save 500 jobs, L-3 MAS says

L-3 MAS (Canada) Inc. of Mirabel pocketed a $468-million cheque from Prime Minister Stephen Harper yesterday for the last contract to maintain Canada’s aging fleet of 78 CF-18 fighter jets.

The deal runs to 2017, with possible extensions to 2020 that would add $86 million to the contract’s value and maintain 500 jobs at L-3 MAS’s Mirabel plant.

After the elaborate photo op and announcement ceremony -at which Harper answered briefly to only five questions -L-3 MAS president Sylvain Bedard told reporters that without the agreement, his company would have had to fire 500 employees…

But the bigger prize by far still eludes L-3 MAS, the Canadian subsidiary of New York City-based L-3 Communications, a major global provider of aircraft maintenance and modernization services.

That would be a deal to service the CF-18′s successor, the 65 Joint Strike Fighter CF-35s the federal government recently agreed to buy from Lockheed Martin for $9 billion. The maintenance and servicing clause of that deal is worth another $7 billion.

In a brief interview, National Defence Minister Peter Mackay said L-3 MAS “certainly has the inside track (to snag the CF-35 deal), especially after the job they’ve done (on the CF-18) all these years.”

“The great thing is that they would be in line not just for the 65 (CF-35s), but possibly for other armed forces as well. I mean, (Lockheed Martin) sold 3,000 of those things.”..

Via Spotlight on Military News and International Affairs.

I mean, those jet fuel fumes really are getting to poor Peter’s brain if he thinks other countries are going to give up their own pork to have their F-35s maintained in Canada Québec. And if he believes Lockheed Martin has actually sold 3,000 F-35s he’s truly in cloud cukoo land; he might do well to read this post:

Fighter sales prospects

Plus the “…F-35 fact check Update” here.

Update: More Conservative pork-o-mania here and here, via John Robson.  Dig the audio of his weekly Friday morning interview at CFRA Ottawa this morning, today on the nth resurrection of the Palestinian peace “process”, Iraq, Afstan, health care run by central planning–plus the federal government’s seeming insatiable propensity for pushing pork.  Mr Robson is a rare Canadian who can speak with real knowledge, fierce intelligence, and wicked wit.

Upperdate: I won’t link to this Ottawa Citizen story,

Russian planes don’t often fly into Canadian territory: Documents

since the only “expert” it quotes is St. Steve Staples.

Mark
Ottawa