Phreedom 67

Here's a great cartoon from the Brant News. It features Phil pretending to care about seniors, while at the same time slashing their Old-Age Security benefits, and hiding his gold-plated MP pension behind his back:

Ironically, Phil just announced that he was in fact holding a town hall on OAS this week. However, he did not post the time and date of the event on the "events" section of his website, and only buried the details at the bottom of a press release, where he only gave one day's notice!!! He clearly did not want many people to attend the event other than his cronies who already knew about it.

Phear Mongering on Old Age Security

DumpPhil has already written about Phil McColeman's reckless support for the Old-Age Security cuts in this post and this post. Now, Phil is spreading fear around Brantford just like Scarecrow spread fear around Gotham City.

Here's an excellent letter in the Brant News analyzing Phil McColeman's fear mongering:

Phil McColeman ‘fear mongering’: Brison

Brant MP Phil McColeman was fear mongering in Parliament on Feb. 2 when he said it “is necessary at this point…to reinforce the sustainability” of your old age pension benefits by cutting them.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, experts from the OECD, leading universities and the government itself have all said our Old Age Security (OAS) program does not face major challenges and there’s no pressing need for change.

Canada’s parliamentary budget officer says that Old Age Security is sustainable beyond the year 2082. Payments today cost 2.4 per cent of our national GDP. When the boomers max out in 2031, that percentage will climb to 3.1 per cent, but then drop off again.

Conservatives like Phil McColeman are really trying to raid your retirement savings to pay for their extreme ideological agenda.

They say current seniors won’t see their benefits cut, but they aren’t saying anything about tomorrow’s seniors – hard working Canadians who have based their retirement plans around having old age pensions available to them.

The fact is that more than half of old age pensions go to seniors earning less than $25,000 year.

Canadian workers have paid taxes their entire careers expecting that these benefits will be available to them when they turn 65.

Raising the age for OAS will mean that some will have to stay longer in the workforce, whether they’re physically up to it or not.

Seniors’ poverty rates could rise by one-third.  That’s just not right – not in a successful country like Canada.

Scott Brison, MP
Liberal Party of Canada finance critic

#OccupyPhil

Phil McColeman's constituency office was occupied by protesters who were suitably upset over his support for cutting Old-Age Security benefits (OAS). The protesters were worried that their retirement would be jeapordized by the OAS cuts. For more details, see articles in the Brantford Expositor and the Brant News.

Phil McColeman, for his part, "made light of the protest". He apparently doesn't care that the OAS cuts will force many senior citizens into poverty.

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Phil Supports Cuts that Hurt Seniors

Phil McColeman defended his government's awful and unnecessary plan to reduce Old-Age Security, a move which could force tens of thousands of senior citizens into poverty. He claimed that his government is "protecting the financial security of seniors now and for future generations", which is, of course, a complete and utter lie.

This isn't the first time that Phil has pretended to care about seniors while actually doing the opposite.

Logic? Never heard of it.

Some politicians when making important policy decisions use a mixture of statistics, academic studies, advisory reports and the general public mood at the time. Other politicians base their decisions on isolated anecdotes that go against ALL of the other evidence. Which camp do you think Phil is in?

On October 27, Phil said:

"[W]hen this came before committee, we heard witnesses from the police association. We also heard from individual chiefs from across the country. Some of those chiefs believed that the long gun registry served no specific purpose. Although the police association was involved, chiefs in other areas of the country said that it was not the case in their jurisdictions. Also, front-line police officers, in their basic training, have said that they are told to assume that there are guns inside every door when they go there.

Therefore, the unreliability of information that is not current or updated actually does the opposite. It puts some police officers, were they to rely on the information, in harm's way in terms of this information going forward."

Let me get this logic straight: The majority of police chiefs say they want the gun registry. One or two police chiefs say that the gun registry serves no specific purpose. Therefore the gun registry puts officers in harm's way.

It. Makes. No. Sense.

Why was this man elected to be your voice in Ottawa?

Forgetful Phil Wrongly Accuses Another MP of Lying!

Yesterday in Ottawa, Phil McColeman called another Member of Parliament (MP) a liar. Phil said:

"Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

"During question period today, the member for Winnipeg Centre quoted this member as saying something that I categorically did not say. I would like him to table the document that he is referring to where that quote was made, as well as the source and the time that he is referring to for the quote he put forward."

Phil was referring to NDP MP Pat Martin, who had said earlier:

"Mr. Speaker, I have a quote of the member for Brant of April 14. He stated, “The Canadian Wheat Board...should be decided upon in terms of its existence by the farmers themselves in a plebiscite or a vote as to whether it should continue with the mandate it was originally given”."

In all fairness, Pat Martin actually meant April 13th, not 14th.

Well, Phil, do you remember what you were doing on April 13, 2011?  We here at DumpPhil do: you were at the Brant Federation of Agriculture All-Candidates Debate at the Brant Sports Complex.  Here's a video clip (watch 1:28:00–1:28:25):



So we have a video of Phil saying something, then an MP claims that Phil said that very thing, and then Phil calls that MP a liar.  Not very classy!