The report presented by Liberal Labour Minister Seamus O’Regan suggests giving special privileges to ‘LGBT-identifying and Black Canadians’ in the hiring process in the name of ‘equity,’ and dismisses concerns that such a move is tantamount to discrimination.
The Trudeau government is celebrating a newly proposed equity mandate which would reward LGBT-identifying job applicants over those with natural sexual proclivities.
On December 11, Liberal Labour Minister Seamus O’Regan announced the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force report, which seeks to add “LGBT-identifying and Black Canadians” to the list of those with special hiring privileges.
“It’s pretty historical,” O’Regan said outside the House of Commons foyer on Monday. “We are naming Black people and 2SLGBTQI+ individuals as designated groups under the Employment Equity Act.”
According to information obtained by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), the Liberal government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, “broadly supports” the recommendation.
The report, led by McGill University law professor Adelle Blackett, assured Canadians that it would not lead to “reverse discrimination” or abolish a merit-based hiring system, despite seemingly being formulated to do exactly that.
“Let us be clear: the Employment Equity Act framework does not impose quotas, and the notion of ‘reverse discrimination’ is not part of Canadian equality law and is likewise not part of the Canadian Employment Equity Act framework,” reads the introduction.
While the job candidates would still have to meet certain requirements to be considered for the position, they would not be competing against all candidates for the position but just those within their so-called minority group. As a result, they would have a higher chance of being hired for the position compared to someone who did not fit into the group.
The report dismissed this concern, however, labeling it as an American, not Canadian, argument. “The U.S. idea of ‘reverse discrimination’ has in particular gained a lot of attention. It is used so often in common parlance that many people do not recognize that it is not a part of Canadian substantive equality law,” reads the report.
The report also attempted to address the problem that because being an LGBT-identifying person is not an objective category, it is conceivable that people could just say they are members of the LGBT so-called community as a way to gain an advantage in the hiring process.
“Declarations of this nature… would constitute dishonesty in the employment relationship and although the threshold for dismissal on that basis is high, contextual factors to assessing the appropriate sanction would rationally include any preferential treatment received on the basis of the false statement,” the report said.
In recent years, there has been a push for in Canada, the United States and much of the West to go along with so-called “diversity, equity, & inclusion” (DEI) hiring and promotion practices.
The controversy surrounding DEI is that it usually goes hand-in-hand with a slew of identity-based social causes and grievances that undermine merit-based hiring, meaning that the most qualified person for a job may be overlooked in favor of someone of a particular skin color, ethnicity or sexual proclivity.
In 2019, the Canadian military was exposed for periodically closing all applications to the armed forces except to women if their so-called employment equity targets had not been met.
Similarly, in June 2023, Ontario announced free training for truck drivers; however, the offer was only extended to “women, newcomers and others from underrepresented groups,” effectively barring anyone except white, heterosexual men.
Additionally, this October, British Columbia construction companies were offered an extra cash incentive if they hire first-year apprentices who “self-identify” as LGBT, disabled, or anything other than a white heterosexual male.
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For the summer leading up to the 2025 fall budget, the Carney government has launched a federal spending review aimed at finding savings that will help pay for recent major policy announcements. While this appears to be a step in the right direction, lessons from the past suggest the government must be more ambitious in its review to overcome the fiscal challenges facing Canada.
In two letters sent to federal cabinet ministers, Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne outlined plans for a “Comprehensive Expenditure Review” that will see ministers evaluate spending programs in each of their portfolios based on the following: whether they are “meeting their objectives” are “core to the federal mandate” and “complement vs. duplicate what is offered elsewhere by the federal government or by other levels of government.” Ultimately, as a result of this review, ministers are expected to find savings of 7.5 per cent in 2026/27, rising to 10 per cent the following year, and reaching 15 per cent by 2028/29.
This news comes after the federal government has recently made several major policy announcements that will significantly impact the bottom line. Most notably, the government added an additional $9.3 billion to the defence budget for this fiscal year, and committed to more than double the annual defence budget by 2035. Without any policies to offset the fiscal impact of this higher defence spending (along with other recentchanges), this year’s budget deficit (which the Liberal’s election platform initially pegged at $62.3 billion) will likely surpass $70.0 billion, and potentially may reach as high as $92.2 billion.
A spending review is long overdue. Recent research suggests that each year the federal government spends billions towards programs that are inefficient and/or ineffective, and which should be eliminated to find savings. Moreover, past governments (both federal and provincial) have proven that fiscal adjustments based on spending reviews can be very successful—just look at the Chrétien government’s 1995 Program Review.
In its 1995 budget, the federal Chrétien government launched a comprehensive review of all federal spending that—along with several minor tax increases—ultimately balanced the federal budget in two years and helped Canada avert a fiscal crisis. Two aspects of this review were critical to its success: it reviewed all federal spending initiatives with no exceptions, and it was based on clear criteria that not only tested whether spending was efficient, but which also reassessed the federal government’s role in delivering programs and services to Canadians. Unfortunately, the Carney government’s review is missing these two critical aspects.
The Carney government already plans to exclude large swathes of the budget from its spending review. While it might be reasonable for the government to exclude defence spending given our recent commitments (though that doesn’t appear to be the plan), the Carney government has instead chosen to exclude all transfers to individuals (such as seniors’ benefits) and provinces (such as health-care spending) from any spending cuts. Based on the last official spending estimates for this year, these two areas alone represent a combined $254.6 billion—or more than half of total spending after excluding debt charges—that won’t be reviewed.
This is a major weakness in the government’s plan. Not only does this limit the dollar value of savings available, it also means a significant portion of the government’s budget is missing out on a reassessment that could lead to more effective delivery of services for Canadians.
For example, as part of the 1995 program review, the Chrétien government overhauled how it delivered welfare transfers to provincial governments. Specifically, the federal government replaced two previous programs with a new Canada Health and Social Transfer (CHST) that addressed some major flaws with how the government delivered welfare assistance. While the transition to the CHST did include a $4.6 billion reduction in spending on government transfers, the new structure gave the federal government better control over spending growth in the future and allowed provincial governments more flexibility to tailor social assistance programs to local needs and preferences.
In addition to considering all areas of spending, the Carney government’s spending review also needs to be more ambitious in its criteria. While the current criteria are an important start—for example, it’s critical the government identifies and eliminates spending programs that aren’t achieving their stated objectives or which are simply duplicating another program—the Carney government should take it one step further and explicitly reflect on the role of the federal government itself.
Among other criteria that focused on efficiency and affordability of programs, the 1995 program review also evaluated every spending program based on whether government intervention was even necessary, and whether or not the federal government specifically should be involved. As such, not only did the program review eliminate costly inefficiencies, it also included the privatization of government-owned entities such as Petro-Canada and Canadian National Railway—which generated considerable economic benefits for Canadians.
Today, the federal government devotes considerable amounts of spending each year towards areas that are outside of its jurisdiction and/or which government shouldn’t be involved in the first place—national pharmacare, national dental care, and national daycare all being prime examples. Ignoring the fact that many of these areas (including the three examples) are already excluded from the Carney government’s spending review, the government’s criteria makes no explicit effort to test whether a program is targeting an area that’s outside of the federal purview.
For instance, while the government will test whether or not a spending program fits within the federal mandate, that mandate will not actually ensure the government stays within its own jurisdictional lane. Instead, the mandate simply lays out the key priorities the Carney government intends to focus on—including vague goals including, “Bringing down costs for Canadians and helping them to get ahead” which could be used to justify considerable federal overreach. Similarly, the government’s other criterion to not duplicate programs offered by other levels of government provides little meaningful restriction on government spending that is outside of its jurisdiction so long as that spending can be viewed as “complementing” provincial efforts. In other words, this spending review is unlikely to meaningfully check the costly growth in the size of government that Canada has experienced over the last decade.
Simply put, the Carney government’s spending review, while a step in the right direction, is missing key elements that will limit its effectiveness. Applying key lessons from the Chrétien government’s spending review is crucial for success today.
President Donald Trump on Saturday said he will impose 30% tariffs on imported goods from the European Union and Mexico in his latest move to balance trade between the U.S. and other countries.
The tariffs are set to go into effect Aug. 1.
Saturday’s announcement comes a day after the U.S. Department of Treasury released a report Friday showing that tariff revenue helped revenue in the month of June exceed expenses by $27 billion.
“We have had years to discuss our Trading Relationship with The European Union, and we have concluded we must move away from these long-term, large, and persistent, Trade Deficits, engendered by your Tariff, and Non-Tariff, Policies, and Trade Barriers,” Trump wrote in the letter to the EU and posted on his Truth Social account. “Our relationship has been, unfortunately, far from Reciprocal.”
The 30% tariff on EU goods is higher than expected. EU trade ministers are scheduled to meet Monday and could agree to increase tariffs on U.S. goods as retaliation.
In his letter to Mexico, Trump said the U.S. neighbor to the south has helped stem the flow of illegal narcotics and people from entering the country but added that it needed to do more to prevent North America from being a “Narco-Trafficking Playground.”
Earlier in the week, Trump announced new tariffs on several other countries, including 20% tariffs on imports from the Philippines; 25% on Brunei and Moldova; 30% on Algeria, Iraq and Libya; and 50% on Brazil.
All of the new tariffs announced this week are scheduled to go into effect Aug. 1.
• The Center Square reporters Therese Boudreaux and Andrew Rice contributed to this report.
