It sounds good to vaccinate all truckers, but hampering $1-billion of daily traffic between Canada and the United States may not help.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on January 17, 2022.

OTTAWA—To vax tax, or not to vax tax, that is the question.

Once again, the Government of Quebec appears to be at the head of the pack when it comes to new public health policies.

Whether the proposed vax tax is actually brought to fruition remains to be seen.

Reaction to the tax proposal ranges from tepid to negative. The prime minister refused to weigh in, seeking more information. Multiple premiers said they would not be following the lead of Quebec Premier François Legault in levying a health fee on those who refused to be vaccinated.

Premiers opposed to the move include Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe diagnosed with covid just after his public briefing on the issue where the premier was not wearing a mask.

Legault has promised to introduce a package on the health tax in February that will be debated in the Quebec National Assembly. It was no coincidence that the controversial tax was floated at the same time the province lost its second public health director since the beginning of the pandemic.

The departure of Dr. Horacio Arruda was expected to take some heat off the premier for criticism his government has faced following the Christmas implementation of a curfew that now ends Monday.

Throughout the pandemic, Legault’s personal popularity numbers have remained high, even when his province experienced the highest national death rates in long-term care facilities.

Perhaps the surprise tax proposal was designed to keep those numbers high. Most observers have been skeptical about the tax proposal. Some have argued the proposal violates medical ethics. Others call it an attack on universal health care.

If there is a public policy to tax anti-vaxxers, what about smokers or others who contribute to health problems by personal choices? One could argue that the smoker’s tax already exists because the high cost of a package of cigarettes in every province is largely based on taxes, which are ploughed back into provincial health-care expenditures. What is next, an obesity tax? Some see the benefit in a sugar tax for that very reason.

The other question that begs is what result will the tax have in encouraging the non-vaccinated to step up and get the vaccination?

Eighty-five per cent of the Quebec population is already vaccinated and early reports indicate that there has been an uptick in vaccination appointments since the premier’s announcement.

The Government of Quebec also recently announced that vaccination proof will be required to purchase liquor or cannabis in government stores.

That may also be responsible for the increase in vaccination bookings, but the bottom line is that Legault is banking on the fact that the vast majority of Quebecers are tired of being locked down because a small minority of citizens refuses to protect the rest of the population.

Legault has been playing tough with anti-vaxxers while Ontario Premier Doug Ford seems to be going in the opposite direction.

His reaction to the pandemic has been focused on encouraging people to vaccinate but with no mention of coercion.

If anything, the Ontario government has been criticized for worrying more about anti-vaxxers’ rights than those of ordinary citizens. School boards and parents were outraged when the government announced that, with schools reopening in a few days, the threshold for informing families on active school covid cases was being increased.

The announcement that parents would only be informed when 30 per cent of the school student or teacher population was infected caught educators and school boards by surprise.

It runs counter to previous reporting requirements that let parents know when a dozen or so cases were reported in any school.

Minister of Education Stephen Lecce defended the move, saying families could use at-home rapid tests provided by the province if they are concerned about potential infection.

However, critics are saying the lack of transparency is not justifiable.

Meanwhile, the federal government reversed its position again on the requirement of all truckers, Canadians and foreign nationals, to be vaccinated or face quarantine when they are crossing the border. All have to vaccinated as of Jan. 15.

The United States is planning on imposing its own vaccination requirement within the next week.

Some 20 per cent of Canadian truckers are currently unvaccinated and existing supply chain issues could be exacerbated if one of five truckers stopped working this month.

It sounds good to vaccinate all truckers, but hampering $1-billion of daily traffic between Canada and the United States may not help.

Like taxing anti-vaxxers, the cure may be worse than the disease.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on October 22, 2018.

OTTAWA—Canada made history last week, becoming only the second country in the world to sell legal cannabis.

And judging by long lineups on the first day of sale, the decision was a long time coming.

Marijuana distributers are predicting shortages for several months as product has been flying off the shelves in provinces with storefront points of sale.

In others, like Canada’s largest province of Ontario, the internet was deluged with orders. Shopify Inc. reported it had sold millions of units in the first 12 hours.

Government revenues will be robust from this new source of taxation and international business consortiums are already eying the export market.

All in all, the first day of legal pot sales could be qualified as a success.

So why were some politicians jumping over each other to stir the pot, as it were?

Ontario Premier Doug Ford, the only leader who is alleged to have peddled weed in his past life, took a huge public dump on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a policing conference.

Ford got a round of tepid applause when he accused the prime minister of going into the witness protection program when it came to the launch.

Newly-minted Quebec Premier François Legault is sticking to his promise to hike the legal consumption age to 21.

Surveys show that, surprisingly, Quebec is the most conservative province when it comes to support for the legalization process.

Nova Scotia and British Columbia were vying for top pot consumption spot with the East Coast slightly edging out the West Coast in the score on regular use.

The figures, released on the eve of legalization, claim that almost one-quarter of Canadians in those two provinces are already regular consumers of the drug.

The province with the lowest level of regular consumption is Quebec. But judging by the lineups at the provincial pot stores, maybe they just don’t like to answer national surveys.

The most controversial future issues will be who gets to sell, rather than who gets to buy.

With players like former prime minister Brian Mulroney serving on cannabis corporate boards, the little weed has indeed arrived.

Notwithstanding Ford’s initial blowback, the financial benefits of legal pot will soon have him changing his tune.

With such a large portion of the population already engaged in cannabis consumption, legalization will get the drug out of the shadows.

No longer will buyers have to come up with medical reasons to avoid getting their recreational drug of choice from the local schoolyard pusher. The medical profession will be largely relieved of its dispensary responsibility.

The long arm of organized crime is about to be amputated, and that is a good thing. We can finally have a logical discussion in this country about how to manage the multiple challenges of drug use.

The opioid crisis, largely driven by the sale of illegal pills to unsuspecting young party-goers could be a thing of the past as consumers can now go to a legal distribution centre to purchase their regulated drug of choice.

Of course, we will now witness a spate of stories about the impacts of marijuana when consumed by young people whose brains are still being formed.

While that is undoubtedly a medical fact, the same statement could be made about alcohol consumption.

Any substance that alters your metaphysical state runs certain risks. But those risks can be mitigated by public information, discussion, and education.

It was pretty hard to have an informed classroom drug discussion when we were dealing with an illegal substance.

Canadian legalization will also unleash a vigorous international debate about new approaches to the failed war on drugs.

Warlords in Latin America and opioid manufacturers in Asia depend on clients in North America.

As long as weed was illegal, the lucrative business of importing and distributing was financially beneficial to crime syndicates.

Now Canada can be an incubator for a new approach to substitute for interdiction. We will witness firsthand whether legal sales can undercut the underground.

With the initial rollout behind us, the federal Liberals can also breathe a little easier.

The promise of legalized cannabis was one of the factors that encouraged droves of young people to get out and vote for Trudeau in the last campaign.

His success or failure in the next campaign will depend on just how many promises have been kept or broken.

Legal pot is one promise with benefits. Communities and government coffers will both prosper as a result of this world-breaking government decision.

Toke on, Canada.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.