The excitement of the Government Caucus Office

Because the Member I am working for this placement is the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, our offices are at the Ministry, which is a solid ten-minute walk from the main legislative building. This means that whenever I come up to Queen’s Park, I inevitably spend a good deal of time in the Government Caucus office – a place, I have discovered, that is full of excitement. Without divulging any party secrets, it would be safe to say that the office is a hub of activity – Members and their staff are always coming and going, bells for a vote are being rung, Member’s visitors will mistake me for someone who actually knows what’s going on and ask me for directions or to pass along messages. And occasionally there’s even a fire alarm. Many afternoons I will set up at one of the computers in the office and try to get work done while I wait for Khalil to finish up in the House before we sit down to discuss any issues for the day. With all the activity and excitement of the office though, work sometimes takes a back seat…

Taking the Lead

I’m continuing to find Mr. Yakabuski’s office to be very challenging and fulfilling. It is a fast-paced office with lots of responsibilities, but it is exactly what I wanted to get out of the programme. Particularly, I have been given a lot of rope to investigate energy policy issues that I find interesting and report back on possible ways to criticize the government. Not only am I reporting back to MPP Yakabuski, but also to PC Leader Tim Hudak’s strategy team, who have been impressed with my ability to dig up useful research. This week I organized and ran a meeting with executives from the Independent Electricity System Operator, the organization that is responsible for the minute-to-minute supply of electricity on the grid. They are also responsible for the implementation of the government’s smart meter initiative, and I had through my research found some issues surrounding implementation and cost that needed further investigating. The executives were frank and candid, and I’m going to continue pursuing the matter. Learning about energy policy is incredibly interesting and may even open up career opportunities in the future, and so I’m glad OLIP has led me to this type of an experience.

Interns meet Peter Mansbridge!

This past monday we had the opportunity to meet with The National’s Peter Mansbridge.

Getting to see the CBC headquarters on Front Street was pretty exciting, especially for a bunch of interns with a slight addiction to the National’s “At Issue” Pannel.

 

Despite being a commanding presence on television, Mr. Mansbridge was soft spoken and thoughtful as he answered our questions on the role of the Media in our province, our country and abroad.

 

Although Mr. Mansbridge was careful to remain completely neutral with his answers – a dance we interns have become quite familliar with – he spent considerable time explaining how the CBC functions within Canada, and the important job that reporters do in keeping the country informed.

 

I really enjoyed the meeting. I got to see a side to Mr. Mansbridge that I never knew existed. A quiet, thoughtful man with humble beginnings and an incredibly impressive journalistic career.

Picking Up the Pace

My placements in Government and Opposition have been very different in a wide variety of different ways, but if I had to point to the one major difference that struck me from the very first day of my new placement it would have to be the difference in pace. Things move quickly in an opposition office.

 

 This should not be surprising in and of itself. In my placement with Helena Jaczek I was called upon to perform a wide variety of different tasks but the time between my recieving an assignment and my having the deliverable prepared was always very reasonable. This is the way of a government office, especially when it comes to communications. A government MPP can’t afford to behave or react in a knee-jerk kind of way. Public statements have to be in some sense reserved, deliberate, and well within party messaging. This kind of behaviour is possible for government MPPs in a majority government because party obligations can be spread out over a larger number of employees and because to a certain extent the government can rely on party-generated messaging to deal with particular issues and scenarios. These traits provide a comparative advantage to government MPPs and their staff giving them more time to research and deliberate on public statements or private member’s projects.

 

Things in opposition are much more hectic. Opposition members and their staff are made to do more with less as a result of their comparative lack of resources and this is reflected in the pace of work in an opposition office. I would say that this is definitely the case in my own office. John O’Toole, in whose office I am now placed, speaks on just about every Bill that comes through this place. It has become my job to ensure that Mr. O’Toole is briefed on the nature and intent of any Bill that comes through the House at any given time as well as any weaknesses it might have. You can imagine that this can be a little overwhelming. It isn’t a task that lends itself to much thoughtful deliberation or review. But it is also incredibly rewarding to run that briefing note to the House – even if it doesn’t get used – knowing that you were able to pick up the pace and step up to the challenge.

Visiting Eglinton-Lawrence Constituency

This past week was constituency week and I had the opportunity to visit the constituency office as well as several businesses and organizations around the riding. The staff at the constituency office, Angela, Kathy and Dustin, have been very helpful over the past few weeks with while I have been getting oriented to working with Mr.Colle. I was able to see more of the day-to-day happenings and their work of serving constituents. I then spent time with Mr.Colle making visits around the riding to local landmarks, like Randy’s Patties and the Eglinton theatre, snapping pictures along our tour. It was interesting to see the diversity within one city riding that is only 24km (one of the smallest in the province). Another place I learned about was The Studio at Delisle Youth Services – a community space that was designed by young people for a recreation space, like arts and dance. Youth can also access the counselling services and workshops at Delisle. I’ve thoroughly been enjoying this new opportunity to learn about neighbourhoods very different from what I know and I appreciate Mr.Colle and his staff for helping me gain new knowledge.

First few weeks working for MPP Yasir Naqvi

This is my first blog entry since switching offices after our trip, and I am now working for Yasir Naqvi, MPP for Ottawa Centre. These three weeks working for MPP Naqvi have been both busy and exciting.  On my first day in the office it was also the beginning of ‘Kindness Week,’ an initiative started in Ottawa a few years ago to promote passing on kind acts.  For this year’s Kindness Week we handed out cookies after Question Period, and also helped organize a Queen’s Park book drive, which produced over 30 boxes of books for the Ontario Literacy Coalition.  Since then I have settled into the new office nicely, and am currently working on a number of different projects. MPP Naqvi is the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Education, and it has been very nice to see how active he is in this role and how closely he works with the Minister on important projects.  I am amazed by how fast the internship is flying by, and I often have to remind myself to sit back every once in a while and appreciate where I am and the amazing opportunities this job affords.

A week to catch my breath

Constituency week brought a definite change in the pace here at Queen’s Park.  The first few weeks in Kevin’s office were fairly hectic as we set out to arrange an innovative and groundbreaking project for the months ahead.  That involved a lot of time on the phone talking to stakeholders about what we are proposing.  This week was a lot quieter.  Short term day to day projects and office admin occupied my time this week.  I did, however, travel to Kevin’s constituency office in Oakville on Wednesday.  Kevin has a great team there and it was a pleasure to meet Ellen and Nancy.  Along with Steven and Glenn, Kevin has a really good group of people around him who provide integral support and political insight that Kevin makes the most of.  As I’ve said in past posts, constituency work is a real eye opener and completely different animal to our usual work at Queen’s Park.  A day in the Oakville office reaffirmed what I already knew about Kevin and the way he does politics: his constituents come first, he’ll do all he can to help people and organizations in his riding and he does not engage in partisan politics.  We could all learn a lot from such an approach to life in the political fast lane.

Springing Forward with OLIP

As this week was constituency week, I had the chance to catch up on some files and research tasks. When the House isn’t sitting, there is less immediate, reactionary day-to-day work. On Tuesday, I worked out of Ms. Elliott’s constituency office in Whitby. It was great to meet some other members of her team, and to get a first-hand look of the work undertaken from her community office.

The files I have been working on are giving me a comprehensive overview of some of the issues of concern to people in Ontario. This week, I did some research on wait times for surgery, issues experienced with hospital equipment, and care for individuals who have MS.

I have also been finding some time to do some work on my intern paper; a mandatory component of our OLIP internship. My research focuses on centralization of power with the Premier in the Ontario legislature, and how this impacts Cabinet Ministers. I am just getting started with my interview process – but so far, MPPs, and other Queen’s Park staff have been very helpful in providing me with helpful, relevant information.

Jim Coyle’s Farewell

There have been moments throughout this internship when I am struck by just how lucky we are to have the opportunities that the program presents to us. Attending the farewell party for veteran Queen’s Park journalist (and proud honorary OLIP Intern) Jim Coyle on March 10, was one of those moments.

After each of the party leaders took their good-natured shots at the man who had reported on them for years, we all listened as Coyle spoke about the power of words and of story to bring people together. Speaking about how political views are often forged at a young age, he recounted stories from his childhood. He recalled growing up in a tight-knit community, with Irish immigrant parents who never made it past the seventh grade, but who worked hard to build a life for him and his siblings. He concluded that his views were very much informed by the fact that strong public institutions, such as libraries and a system of public education, were instrumental to his ability today to make his living playing with words and telling stories. As he recounted some of the more touching vignettes, I looked around to see cabinet ministers and party leaders wiping tears from their eyes and it hit me – there are not a lot of people who will ever have the opportunity to stand in a room with some of the most powerful individuals in the province and to see them as regular people who are moved by a touching story. Interns are pretty lucky.

The other thing I realized at this farewell party was just how much I am going to miss coming in to work at the legislature every day. Listening to Jim Coyle speak about how lucky he felt to have worked at Queen’s Park for so many years, and how much he missed it now that he was gone made me realize how difficult it will be for us to leave when the internship is over. Again, interns are pretty lucky.

Kevin Flynn’s Office

It has been an interesting and fast-paced week in Kevin’s office.  I have to say that working for a government MPP is really very different to working for an opposition MPP; the resources available to government members, in terms of sheer numbers of staff, means that it was always going to be harder to define a clear role for myself in a government office.  Having said that, I have been assigned responsibility for a pretty exciting and important project – skypeing Kevin in to civics classes in Oakville.  Our first skype session is in a few weeks!  I’ve also been working closely with Kevin’s EA, Glenn, and Kevin’s LA, Steven, on day to day tasks in the office.  A defining issue in the coming election will for sure be energy and the quality of the environment; we’ve been looking at how these issues will affect the people of Oakville in the coming years.  I am looking forward to working hard for a great government member.