McCrimmon appointed to Transport role BY Jessica Cunha jessica.cunha@metroland.com
Jack MacLaren Member of Provincial Parliament Carleton-Mississippi Mills
Kanata-Carleton MP Karen McCrimmon’s parliamentary secretary role has been switched up after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a number of changes on Jan. 26. McCrimmon was appointed parliamentary secretary to Minister of Transport Marc Garneau following her 13 months in the same role for the minister of Veterans Affairs and the associate minister of National Defence. “It’s a very interesting role and Transport is a huge file these
days, it’s critical,” said McCrimmon. “The parliamentary secretary role is really interesting. You're helping both the minister and you're helping the committee. You're really more of a co-ordinator and someone who can find the information, find the processes, find tools that they can use in order to get to whatever their goal is.” With an environmental assessment scheduled for light rail transit to Kanata, rural transportation issues and autonomous vehicle testing, transportation is a big topic in her riding, she said.
“The advancement of technology in transportation, it’s huge,” she said. “In Kanata there’s a lot of that going on right now.” Top priorities in the ministerial mandate letter for Transport include: • improving public transit and other green infrastructure; • delivery of a new infrastructure fund for investments in roads, bridges, transportation corridors, ports and border gateways; • proposing measure to reinforce railway safety; • reviewing the Canadian grain transportation system;
• improving marine safety; • reviewing changes made by the previous government to the Fisheries Act and the Navigable Waters Protection Act, restoring lost protections and incorporating modern safeguards; • formalizing a moratorium on crude oil tanker traffic on British Columbia’s north coast. “I'm going to have to work really hard to learn this file,” said McCrimmon. “It’s huge and there are a lot of new things happening when it comes to transportation. I have a lot to learn, but that doesn’t scare me at all.” See TRANSPORTATION, page 11
Kanata-Carleton MP Karen McCrimmon has been appointed parliamentary secretary to Minister of Transport Marc Garneau.
Cap-and-trade boondoggle! I hope everyone had a calm and restful Christmas and happy new year, because it looks like 2017 is off to a rough start. The Government’s cap-and-trade tax went into effect on the 1st of January. The tax is basically a scheme to make everyone pay for carbon dioxide emissions. Fuel prices have already gone up. Gas at most pumps was up to $1.16 a litre. The cost of heating your home is going up by about $7 a month, and this is on top of the already ridiculously high cost of hydro. The cost of everything else is going up too. Almost all products in Canada are shipped to a store or to your doorstep by trucks. So if the cost of gas goes up, the cost of shipping does too. Business have to pass those costs on to their customers. This is why the Auditor-General of Ontario estimated that over the next two years households will pay almost $300 more indirect costs everything. These higher costs are going to hurt the poor most, and enrich the government by about $2 billion a year. The cap-and-trade tax is not going to be offset by reductions in any of our other taxes. So as we all get poorer, the government will get richer. The next election just can’t come soon enough!
Contact Information Constituency Office of Jack MacLaren, MPP Carleton-Mississippi Mills 240 Michael Cowpland Drive, Suite 100 Kanata, Ontario K2M 1P6 Telephone: (613) 599-3000 E-Mail: Jack.MacLarenCo@pc.ola.org www.jackmaclarenmpp.com Let’s Stay In Touch
DEVELOPMENT APPLICATIONS / AMENDMENTS UNDER THE PLANNING ACT NOTICE OF PLANNING COMMITTEE MEETING Tuesday, February 14, 2017 – 9:30 a.m.
The items listed below, in addition to any other items previously scheduled, will be considered at this meeting which will be held in the Champlain Room, City Hall, 110 Laurier Avenue West, Ottawa. To see any change to this meeting agenda, please go to Ottawa.ca.
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10 Kanata Kourier-Standard - Thursday, February 2, 2017
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