Election 2015

[Brad Sallows]

>The Conservatives have the weakest cabinet in living memory

Interesting idea.  It does prompt the question: where does Justin Trudeau rank in the spectrum of "weakest to strongest" PM or PM candidate in living memory?

 

[Brad Sallows]

>Will they decide on "bread and butter" issues, or will "societal value" issues, like the niqab or security matters, like stripping the citizenship from convicted terrorists, matter more?

The NDP and LPC supporters' positions on these issues amuse me.

Ordinarily, I expect the "pro-women" vote (whatever that is) to be opposed to religious tyranny imposed by patriarchal religious hierarchies on "their" women.  But the anti-CPC faction jerks its knee in automatic opposition to whatever the CPC favours; so there they are on the other side, clinging to the fiction that all those women "choose" to wear the garments.

The objections to stripping citizenship chiefly hinge on the suggestion that it creates two classes of citizenship and that "two-tier" citizenship is wrong.  But we already have two classes of citizenship in Canada - non-aboriginal, and aboriginal.  I don't think the NDP or LPC is going to stake out a genuine position to have exactly one class of citizenship in Canada, so again their supporters (mostly) find themselves raising a reactionary objection rather than a reasoned one.  Would they be happier if birth citizenship were also revocable, so that enemies of the state could lose citizenship privileges and be mere residents?

 

[Kirkhill]

Saputo and Agropur (Parmalat is an Italian firm) are home grown Canadian success stories in the dairy industry.  Saputo, Agropur and Parmalat control 75% of the Canadian milk supply.

Saputo is a family firm based in Montreal.
Agropur is a very large Co-Operative of Quebec dairy farmers (3445 members) processing milk in Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Alberta, BC, PEI, NS and NB as well as 6 US states.

Agropur also is invested in Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina through Grupo la Lacteo

Our Cooperative is the product of more than 140 mergers
and acquisitions since 1938. It has grown from a regional
organization into a North American leader that is
positioning itself for the future. We are confidently
pursuing growth and we are gratified that our efforts
are bearing fruit.

Saputo By Region

Canada, USA, Argentina, Australia

Canada’s dairy giant Saputo is targeting emerging markets for growth
With the $450 million purchase of Australia’s Warrnambool under his belt, Lino Saputo Jr. sees potential in Brazil

Jun 30, 2015 Sissi Wang  1

Link

Agropur

CORPORATE PROFILE

Each waking day, Agropur cooperative responds to the call of some 3,473 dairy farmers who rely on this organization, which they jointly own, to enhance the fruit of their labour. More than 5.4 billion litres of milk are processed annually in 40 plants spread throughout North America.

Generating more than $4.7 billion in sales, the resulting products grace the tables of thousands of consumers from coast to coast. But before these products reach their tables, more than 8,000 employees and many contract agents assigned to milk collection and distribution combine their efforts and expertise to ensure that the final product meets all expectations.

Business unit Agropur USA

Grand Rapids (Michigan, É.-U) 8
Hull (Iowa, É.-U.) 9
Jerome (Idaho) 15
La Crosse (Wisconsin, É.-U.) 10
Le Sueur (Minnesota) 15
Lake Norden (Dakota du Sud) 15
Little Chute (Wisconsin, É.-U.) 6
Luxemburg (Wisconsin, É.-U.) 6
Maplewood (Minnesota, É.-U.) 7
Nicollet (Minnesota) 15
Preston (Minnesota) 12
Weyauwega (Wisconsin, É.-U.) 6

http://www.agropur.com/en/profile/plants/

Agropur Co-operative

Address:510 Rue Principale
Granby,  QC ,
J2G 2X2 Certification: ISO 9002:1994
Business Activity:Manufacturer Phone:450-375-1991Toll Free:1800-463-7477
Fax:450-375-2099Website: www.agropur.ca Contact this Company
This company is located in the Eastern Time Zone and the office is currently Closed

Export Regions: Central America/Caribbean, China/Hong Kong, Japan, Mexico, South America, South Asia, USA - North-East, Western Europe.

Trade Names: Allegro (fine chesses), Anco (fine cheeses), Chevalier (fine cheese), Crino (powdered skim milk, butter), Delicreme (fine cheeses), Miko-glacier (frozen desserts and treats), Milko (powder milk), Minigo (fresh desserts), Oka (fine cheese), Prestigio (cheese), Purdélice (butter), Quebon Laval (ice cream), Québon- Laval (fluid milk), Savourin (butter), Ultra' crème (cream), Ultra' Milk (fluid milk), Yop (drinkable yogourt), Yoplait (yogourt).
Get a Free Quote from Agropur Co-operative and other

National and international strategy:
Building the Agropur of tomorrow
Agropur made substantial investments to drive its recent
growth. Over the last two years, the Cooperative carried
out ten transactions in Canada and the U.S., including
six in 2014: Damafro, M. Larivée International (MLI), the
merger with Dairytown Products Ltd., Northumberland
Dairy, Sobeys, and Davisco Foods International in the
U.S. We firmly believe that we must remain a significant
player and be a consolidator in the global dairy industry
if we are to solidify our market position and ensure
Agropur’s sustainability.
To finance our acquisitions and our plant investment
plans, we have consolidated our credit facilities
and increased the total amount to nearly $2 billion.
As of November 1, 2014, we were using a little over
half of that amount. However, despite our higher debt
levels, our financial position remains sound.
We are confident that the measures we are taking and
the mergers and acquisitions we are carrying out will
better position us to take advantage of our industry’s
development. We see this as a prudent and strategic
approach to achieving profitable growth.
Following our recent transactions, we will be processing
5.4 billion litres of milk* per year in 40 plants* across
North America thanks to the daily work of our employees,
to whom I am truly grateful.
2014 was a year of great challenges and great
achievements. While the market environment remains
difficult and competition has increased, we believe
we have taken the right steps for our future. But with
our increased presence in the United States, we will have
to deal with the impact of a greater price fluctuation
on our financial results.
In the coming years, Agropur intends
to continue its consolidation efforts
in Canada, expand its presence in the
U.S. market and develop in high-potential
global markets.
Our growth will maintain our status as a significant player
in the North American arena. Business risk will persist
but we will manage change and adapt the organization

Quebec dairy farmers control a very large dairy company that operates outside of Quebec and across North America and has interests in South America.

Saputo, a Quebec based company that processes an awful lot of milk from Quebec farmers also has operations in the US, Argentina and Australia.

I suggest that the Canadian dairy industry is very well positioned to take advantage of freer trade via a TPP. 

The National Farmers Union is likely of a different opinion.

 

[Altair]

More on the 'merger,' reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from the Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/john-ibbitson/talk-all-you-want-but-liberal-and-ndp-pieces-just-wont-fit/article2147672/

I think Ibbitson is right when he focuses on the political DNA. The old PCs and Reform/Alliance folks were, indeed, different breeds of the same species but the Liberals and NDP are completely different species: wolves and donkeys.

Coderre is impatient; he judges, I'm guessing, that it's his turn - now or never - but that the next leader of the Liberals will lead them to another defeat, as did Dion and Ignatieff, and that he will suffer the same fate as they did. But, I guess he guesses, a coalition might, just, succeed in 2015; I suspect he sees it as his only chance because Trudeau is gaining on him.

The NDP knives are out for all to see. It is Topp and the old Layton gang vs. Mulcaire and the new Québec team – which I beieve he has in his camp. I understand that Topp is on the left of the party – not as far left as e.g. Libbie Davies but far left of Mulcaire and some of the new Québec MPs.

My guess is that Mulcaire does not have much (any?) support outside of the Québec caucus but that no one other than Mulcaire has much support in that caucus. The result: stalemate and, eventually, a backroom deal that will please no one. That's one of the reasons why I am 99.99% certain that the NDP will drop from 50+ to 20- seats in Québec in 2015.

How is this for a prediction for 2015?

Conservatives – 163 seats
Liberals –            60 seats
NDP –                  60 seats
BQ (revived) –      20 seats
New QC Party –  20 seats
Greens –              5 seats

Edited to add 338 seat count.

It's not even four months, but I'm updating my prediction based on:

1. A 338 seat House; and

2. My perception that the NDP will falter in Québec.

Here is my new guess, for fall 2015, at end of year 2011:

Conservatives:                177
Greens:                              3
Liberals:                            69
NDP:                                61
New QC Nationalist Party:  21
Others:                              7
TOTAL                            338

you were off some.

It's really interesting reading the first 10 or so pages of this thread.

How time changes.

 

[Edward Campbell]

According to what I'm seeing this morning ~ and I'm sorry, I lost the reference/link ~ Nanos, at least, is suggesting that the race is spreading out, in the LPC;s favour:

LPC - 35±% of decided voters

CPC - 30±%

NDP - 25±%

If that's true then:

    1. The NDP decline, something the Globe and Mail nicknamed the Orange Crash, is real; and

    2. The LPC is edging close to majority territory (38±%).

But: there are two "long times in politics" to go and don't forget the "events, dear boy ..."

 

[Edward Campbell]

Chantel Hébert, writing in the Toronto Star, says that, "With the NDP bleeding support in Quebec, Thomas Mulcair needed to stand head and shoulders above the competition at Friday’s second French-language leaders debate to have a shot at staunching a debilitating hemorrhage ... [but] ... it is not that Mulcair had a bad debate night, but rather that he fell short of dominating the leaders podium."

She goes on to say that, "The niqab issue that has acted as a catalyst for a steady drop in NDP fortunes in Quebec did not come up until the second half of the debate ... Both Mulcair and Trudeau put up a more spirited defence of their opposition to the niqab ban than they had to date ... But with an overwhelming majority of Quebecers—including most members of its political class—overwhelmingly in favour of requiring Muslim women to unveil their face to take the citizenship oath, this is not the ground on which either of them can expect to score a lot of points in this province."

Finally, she adds: "Polls show that regime change remains the primary objective of a majority of Quebec voters," and she suggests that "... coming out of the five-round debate fight, he [Mulcair] is not even the leading contender for his former job of official opposition leader."

I have been saying, pretty consistently, that M Trudeau's route to power (24 Sussex Drive) or to retaining his own leadership of the LPC (winning Stornoway, at least) must be "through Quebec." If Mlle Hébert's analysis is correct then he may have made that decisive step.

 

[The Bread Guy]

According to what I'm seeing this morning ~ and I'm sorry, I lost the reference/link ~ Nanos, at least, is suggesting that the race is spreading out, in the LPC;s favour:

LPC - 35±% of decided voters

CPC - 30±%

NDP - 25±%

If that's true then:

    1. The NDP decline, something the Globe and Mail nicknamed the Orange Crash, is real; and

    2. The LPC is edging close to majority territory (38±%).

That, versus David Akin's Predictinator ....

But: there are two "long times in politics" to go and don't forget the "events, dear boy ..."

Oh yeah ....

 

[Edward Campbell]

Davis Akin explains his Predictionator in his blog. The key, it seems to me, is that he makes riding-by-riding judgments (guesses?) which he explains in this note:

    "Every riding has to have a winner for the seat count project but when I do individual riding assessments, I assess one of three grades: A Likely win means that, on the date of the assessment, this seat looked pretty safe to go to the party
    I have called it for. The winner is probably got at least 10% per cent more votes than the nearest challenger. But if it’s Leaning, the party I’m calling it for is going to have to work hard and there’s a reasonable chance of another
    party winning this riding. Leaning ridings are definitely ridings to watch where a winner is within 5% of the votes of the nearest challenger. Finally, the TossUp rating is used when my model spits out a result where the one or more parties
    are within about 2 per cent of each other. I list tossups with the party my model has in first followed by the part that is right behind it."

I think that's why he can predict a CPC minority in the face of a Liberal national advantage. It is the same, as I understand it, for the Globe and Mail's Election Forecast which explains itself as:

    "Our predictions use polling numbers and other data to calculate each party’s chance of winning a particular seat (read our methodology for more on how it works). We run simulated elections in each riding 1,000 times. The average of
    all of these simulations gives us our national forecast."

My earlier comments about "vote efficiency" also matter.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Speaking of riding-by-riding results, here in Ottawa, the Ottawa Citizen reports that the latest polling (Mainstreet Research), "found that Leslie, a retired Canadian Forces general, has a healthy lead in public support over Galipeau and political rivals running for the other parties in the federal election."

    "The poll found Leslie with the support of 40 per cent of voters who have made up their mind or are leaning toward one party.

    Galipeau has 33 per cent of the decided and leaning vote. NDP candidate Nancy Tremblay has 19 per cent of that vote, compared to eight per cent for Green candidate Raphael Morin.

    Mainstreet polled a random sample of 660 people in Orléans on Sept. 28 and 29. A mixture of land lines and cellphones was surveyed, using interactive voice response (IVR) technology. The margin of error was plus or minus 3.8 percentage points,
    19 times out of 20."

 

[jollyjacktar]

Too bad.  I would like to see Leslie share the same fate Mackenzie did when he ran.

 

[Old Sweat]

I suspect these predictions, and I don't doubt the sincerity and the motivation of those who make them, are largely based on historical trends in many ridings. Take mine, the clumsily renamed Leeds-Grenville-Thousand Islands-Rideau Lakes, as an example. Based on our population it would be very strange indeed if more than one or two individuals were sampled in a poll. (I was called by Forum Research a couple of weeks ago.) Since 2004 this riding has voted solidly CPC and before that, the only reason the Liberals won in the 1993-2000 period was vote splitting between the PCs, Reform and later the Canadian Alliance.

The cost and logistics of conducting a proper sample of each riding nightly or even weekly is surely beyond the resources of all interested parties and organizations. To state that a thousand simulations are run for each suggests to me the use of a data base. Is this acceptable? Probably, and I accept the limitations of the technology.

 

[The Bread Guy]

I think that's why he can predict a CPC minority in the face of a Liberal national advantage.

Which is also why it's a good idea to, if you're keeping an eye on polling, to look at WAY more than one poll, and pay close attention to what they ask.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I think what you want to look at are trends and I think the trends, this week, are:

    The Conservatives are tending up  ↗

    The Liberals are holding steady      ➙  and

    The NDP are trending down          ↘

Edited to add:

The important question, it seems to me, is not who is leading (or trailing) in which poll? Rather, it is: do polls influence results on voting days? (Polls are open 9, 10, 11 and 12 Oct (12 Oct is Thanksgiving Day) and, of course, on 19 Oct.) Many analysts consider Momentum, the Big Mo, as being all important in the last two weeks of a campaign. The Conservatives must be holding their collective breath to see if they do, indeed, have momentum and the Liberals might be asking themselves if they are stalled at the worst possible time.

One would love to be privy to the parties' internal, private polls ...

Another poll, this one, released yesterday, by Ekos:

If those results mean anything then, it seems to me:

    The Conservative's upward trend has stalled and they are holding steady  ➙

    The Liberals are continuing to hold steady                                                          ➙  and

    The NDP's downward trend has stalled and they, too, are holding steady  ➙

 

[Remius]

For those that want a decent analysis of most polls Eric Grenier offers his take on the current situation.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-grenier-polls-oct2-1.3254490

It's a good take on the situation.  He declares that unless both groups of polls come to closer results of each other we likely won't really know until election night who was right.

For me, I'm fairly confident now that I can predict a very slim and fragile conservative minority, liberal official opposition and the NDP in third.  I'm also predicting another election come spring if not sooner unless an informal coalition is formed to unseat the CPC.

 

[SeaKingTacco]

I cannot see the liberals doing a formal coalition with the NDP. If they do well enough on 19 October to get a close second to the conservatives (or even barely finish first), they will be flushed with enthusiasm and will want the whole thing for themselves. I also do not detect that they much like or trust the NDP, so why would they share power with them?

I say that we are in for some version of minority and a spring 2016 election. Unless, there are about 5 percent of the voters who have been hanging out in the weeds and masking their intentions (like in the UK) and intend on voting Conservative. in that case, the election is already over...

 

[FSTO]

I cannot see the liberals doing a formal coalition with the NDP. If they do well enough on 19 October to get a close second to the conservatives (or even barely finish first), they will be flushed with enthusiasm and will want the whole thing for themselves. I also do not detect that they much like or trust the NDP, so why would they share power with them?

I say that we are in for some version of minority and a spring 2016 election. Unless, there are about 5 percent of the voters who have been hanging out in the weeds and masking their intentions (like in the UK) and intend on voting Conservative. in that case, the election is already over...

In that scenario I can see Harper resigning. Which could trigger a sort of a reinvention of the Conservatives that would be more receptive to the blue Liberals. If Trudeau remains to the left of the NDP...........?

 

[Remius]

That is why I say "informal".  The runner up goes to the GG with support from the third party.  It isn't inconceivable that say the liberals and NDP informally come to an agreement that one of the two forms government and agrees to some of the other party's platform.  So say the liberals agree to bring forward the NDP childcare program in exchange for 9 months of peace to refill the coffers and election war chests.  Stephen Harper would likely leave and the CPC forced to have a divisive leadership campaign.

 

[Edward Campbell]

That is why I say "informal".  The runner up goes to the GG with support from the third party.  It isn't inconceivable that say the liberals and NDP informally come to an agreement that one of the two forms government and agrees to some of the other party's platform.  So say the liberals agree to bring forward the NDP childcare program in exchange for 9 months of peace to refill the coffers and election war chests.  Stephen Harper would likely leave and the CPC forced to have a divisive leadership campaign.

All leadership campaigns are, inherently, divisive... the only exception that comes to mind is 1948 when the Liberal Party (the cabinet and the national executive) was virtually wholly united in wanting Louis St Laurent to succeed Mackenzie King. Some leadership conventions (think the PCs in 1967, and the Liberals in 1968 (Trudeau vs e.g. Winters (and LaMarsh)) and 1990 (Chrétien vs Martin) are very divisive and create long lasting feuds, in fact I would argue that the Liberal ideological split or civil war than began in 1968 persists to this very day.

The CPC, it seems to me, is less divided, within itself, than the others: there is a fairly prominent left <> right divide but the CPC also has, now, a pretty substantial centrist group that clearly outnumbers both the old Red Tories and the hard right, the centrists may even have a "lock" on the leadership. I believe that Stephen Harper's legacy to the Conservative Party is that the centre is now the vital ground which the party understands it must seize and hold, if you'll forgive the military analogy.

 

[observor 69]

Joyce Bateman, Tory Candidate, Lists Retired General Among 'Enemies' Of Israel

The Huffington Post Canada    |  By  Ryan Maloney
Posted:  10/03/2015 2:18 pm EDT    Updated:  18 minutes ago

A Conservative incumbent sparked boos at a debate this week after reading out a list of Liberal candidates and volunteers she identified as "enemies" of Israel.

But those jeers reportedly turned to cries of "shame" when Joyce Bateman, running again in Winnipeg South Centre, got to Andrew Leslie, the Liberal candidate in the Ontario riding of Orléans.

Leslie is a retired Canadian Forces Lieutenant-General who commanded troops during the war in Afghanistan.


More at link:
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/10/03/joyce-bateman-andrew-leslie-israel_n_8238104.html?ncid=tweetlnkcahpmg00000002

 

[jollyjacktar]

"enemies of Israel"...  :facepalm:  what is with the candidates of this particular election campaign and their feet or keyboards in their mouths?