How do we ensure the defense stuff we build stays in canada and is not shipped elsewhere. How do we ensure X amount of work being built gets built in canada so we have great engineering jobs not just over priced cut and paste pencil pushing jobs (ie government now)? How do we ensure all the giants don't gobble up all the work and the work is spread out to smaller firms as well (a complaint I keep hearing about). And, then comes economic and patent espionage which I suspect is massive https://www.dni.gov/index.php/ncsc-what-we-do/ncsc-threat-assessments-mission/ncsc-economic-espionage ) plus losing trained talent elsewhere etc...
Do we still have the talent, ambition, determination, wisdom, knowledge etc... ? does the government have the same? (that I question, as it seems a mess builds empires now). If not, how do we change the mindset? how do we set forth a new direction? aiming to really grow Canada - knowledge based economy building fabulous stuff that works well always - quality stuff with innovation and smarts. How do we change the education system as well and put in the mindset of value added risk taking? with great engineering and science talent.
We seem to be missing something now - very risk adverse, lack of R&D investment, lack of talent? education system failures? parenting bubble wrapping (remember when kids used to build stuff like tree forts, gokarts, etc...) ? A consumer based nation now no longer producer based thinking-hey nice house not much inside it syndrome. Its easy to print/borrow money plus sell bonds (country) to no end and dump it into housing to falsely prop up GDP. Politicians favoring the easy way out going with giant corporations and foreign investment which means very little to no knowledge growth or intellectual property built here thus very little ROI/value to be had at all etc... etc... we all know the story and see the cracks now.
I fear greatly for the next generation of engineers and scientists if we don't change the mindset and set forth new sails along with direction in this country. As the janitor now makes as much as the engineer/scientist now. Pushing paper and sharpening pencils seems to be the norm. I've seen places go from great science/engineering to great administration work during my career esp the last decade.
I appreciate the pragmatic and objective way Build Canada is approaching what the government is announcing and doing. It is a breath of fresh air from the partisan crap that pollutes both social and mainstream media.
With regards to the following section:
"On the downside, there are a number of places where it doesn’t go far enough, especially on internal trade barriers. One of the things we didn’t like out of Monday’s first ministers meeting was this part of the the readout: “First Ministers directed the Committee on Internal Trade to rapidly conclude a comprehensive Mutual Recognition Agreement covering consumer goods, in alignment with the Committee on Internal Trade discussions, with implementation by December 2025.”
This is too slow. Carney needs to push the provinces, with carrots and sticks, to get things moving on this front."
I think Carney is being realistic with his timelines. While I also wish the federal government could push the provinces a little harder, MPPs and Premiers face an uphill battle against the groups that benefit from these interprovincial barriers. These groups are organized and well funded, and will fight to keep these protections in place. I am not sure how much the federal government can do to assist in this regard.
Throughout his campaign, he repeatedly pledged to eliminate interprovincial trade barriers by Canada Day. It does raise eyebrows that timelines are already being pushed back. Perhaps you're right and this is just reality setting in. In any case, we hope to see this get done quickly.
Carney's 5 conditions almost guarantee that nothing of signifigance will be built. I suspect the only improvement to our economy will be hiring new bureaucrats for his Build Canada department.
government hiring practices are absolutely ridiculous - make it difficult for experienced, knowledge, wisdom and real talent to get in. Then only to find out buddies of buddies circumvented the whole process. I have seen this hundreds of times. Its as though they want failure so many can milk the created mess. There is no real HR dept in government wing it. There is no real career path, training plan, mentoring, coaching plan etc... wing it. There is no get the best of the best with success stories they typically favor failure and surround self with failure then promote failure time and time again. A mess builds empires, I have seen this many and many of times over. Promoting failure time and time again. The root of the problem.
Throwing more money at the mess is not going to fix the mess in fact many will feast off the new money thrown at the fire pit. We need a change in mindset. Some real determination, vision, strategy and plan etc... not just more empire building that doesn't work at all. Seen that, seen the failures.
Government needs to stand up again and put some real talent in place with success. We need some good solid leadership with those that have dug hard trenches and ditches. So, we don't keep digging in the mud. Building solid leadership is tough. Are we up for the challenge time will tell.
Canada used to build all sorts of quality stuff from space stuff, electronics & communications leaders (https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/rob-magazine/article-when-we-were-kings-the-rise-and-fall-of-nortel/ ) aircraft stuff (Bombardier https://dehavilland.com/ ), satellites (https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/satellites/radarsat/ ), defense stuff etc... (used to work for DRS/SparAerospace https://www.insideottawavalley.com/news/drs-technologies-to-leave-carleton-place-by-next-year/article_9ad6028f-3061-582b-85d5-b8fe29fec67e.html https://www.photonics.com/Articles/DRS_Technologies_Granted_Contractfor_Naval/a6228 but much of that work has moved south with the biden administration rules put in place)
How do we ensure the defense stuff we build stays in canada and is not shipped elsewhere. How do we ensure X amount of work being built gets built in canada so we have great engineering jobs not just over priced cut and paste pencil pushing jobs (ie government now)? How do we ensure all the giants don't gobble up all the work and the work is spread out to smaller firms as well (a complaint I keep hearing about). And, then comes economic and patent espionage which I suspect is massive https://www.dni.gov/index.php/ncsc-what-we-do/ncsc-threat-assessments-mission/ncsc-economic-espionage ) plus losing trained talent elsewhere etc...
Do we still have the talent, ambition, determination, wisdom, knowledge etc... ? does the government have the same? (that I question, as it seems a mess builds empires now). If not, how do we change the mindset? how do we set forth a new direction? aiming to really grow Canada - knowledge based economy building fabulous stuff that works well always - quality stuff with innovation and smarts. How do we change the education system as well and put in the mindset of value added risk taking? with great engineering and science talent.
Con't:
We seem to be missing something now - very risk adverse, lack of R&D investment, lack of talent? education system failures? parenting bubble wrapping (remember when kids used to build stuff like tree forts, gokarts, etc...) ? A consumer based nation now no longer producer based thinking-hey nice house not much inside it syndrome. Its easy to print/borrow money plus sell bonds (country) to no end and dump it into housing to falsely prop up GDP. Politicians favoring the easy way out going with giant corporations and foreign investment which means very little to no knowledge growth or intellectual property built here thus very little ROI/value to be had at all etc... etc... we all know the story and see the cracks now.
We built this stuff during my career: (I'm so lucky to have been on such projects but it was lotta work searching for those a lotta work and sacrifices as well) https://www.canada.ca/en/news/archive/2006/04/canadian-navy-acquires-sirius-long-range-infrared-search-track-system.html which was world class. https://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/rcmp-unveils-massive-border-security-project when boeing failed horribly https://www.zdnet.com/article/boeing-virtual-fence-30-billion-failure/ and finally https://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/defence-watch/canadian-surveillance-satellite-system-now-operational But, looking for good engineering (and science) work now is getting harder and harder to find - I'm at the bottom of the cereal box really scrapping the crumbs over the past decade. There seems to be a lotta photo ops though not much substance. What ROI/value for the nation rather than a quick made buck thinking. Those die hard and fast. No vision over a 5 year horizon.
I fear greatly for the next generation of engineers and scientists if we don't change the mindset and set forth new sails along with direction in this country. As the janitor now makes as much as the engineer/scientist now. Pushing paper and sharpening pencils seems to be the norm. I've seen places go from great science/engineering to great administration work during my career esp the last decade.
I appreciate the pragmatic and objective way Build Canada is approaching what the government is announcing and doing. It is a breath of fresh air from the partisan crap that pollutes both social and mainstream media.
With regards to the following section:
"On the downside, there are a number of places where it doesn’t go far enough, especially on internal trade barriers. One of the things we didn’t like out of Monday’s first ministers meeting was this part of the the readout: “First Ministers directed the Committee on Internal Trade to rapidly conclude a comprehensive Mutual Recognition Agreement covering consumer goods, in alignment with the Committee on Internal Trade discussions, with implementation by December 2025.”
This is too slow. Carney needs to push the provinces, with carrots and sticks, to get things moving on this front."
I think Carney is being realistic with his timelines. While I also wish the federal government could push the provinces a little harder, MPPs and Premiers face an uphill battle against the groups that benefit from these interprovincial barriers. These groups are organized and well funded, and will fight to keep these protections in place. I am not sure how much the federal government can do to assist in this regard.
Throughout his campaign, he repeatedly pledged to eliminate interprovincial trade barriers by Canada Day. It does raise eyebrows that timelines are already being pushed back. Perhaps you're right and this is just reality setting in. In any case, we hope to see this get done quickly.
Carney's 5 conditions almost guarantee that nothing of signifigance will be built. I suspect the only improvement to our economy will be hiring new bureaucrats for his Build Canada department.
government hiring practices are absolutely ridiculous - make it difficult for experienced, knowledge, wisdom and real talent to get in. Then only to find out buddies of buddies circumvented the whole process. I have seen this hundreds of times. Its as though they want failure so many can milk the created mess. There is no real HR dept in government wing it. There is no real career path, training plan, mentoring, coaching plan etc... wing it. There is no get the best of the best with success stories they typically favor failure and surround self with failure then promote failure time and time again. A mess builds empires, I have seen this many and many of times over. Promoting failure time and time again. The root of the problem.
Throwing more money at the mess is not going to fix the mess in fact many will feast off the new money thrown at the fire pit. We need a change in mindset. Some real determination, vision, strategy and plan etc... not just more empire building that doesn't work at all. Seen that, seen the failures.
Government needs to stand up again and put some real talent in place with success. We need some good solid leadership with those that have dug hard trenches and ditches. So, we don't keep digging in the mud. Building solid leadership is tough. Are we up for the challenge time will tell.