Canada making waves

It may not have made front pages, but Canada's Navy was front and center on the high seas this week. Our sailors and pilots played a key role in a major Caribbean drug take down.

Using the HMCS Toronto, a chopper and surveillance planes we were involved in an operation that stopped major drug shippers in their tracks, seizing a load of cocaine in the process.

These are high risk events that require courage, professionalism and skill, especially at sea. The effects of shutting down a narcotics pipe line ripple all the way back to the nerve centers of the dealers and manufacturers.

It doesn't mean it scares the whole network of drug lords enough to make them totally shut down. But for a while it does put a major dent in their capabilities to have their poisonous product dumped onto our streets here at home.

So here's a salute to our troops for once again having an impact and keeping our world a little more secure.

Also on the world front, Canada played a lead role at the G-20 meetings in Paris this week.

At the risk of over complicating things, I can tell you this was a strategic set of meetings to try to agree on what measures should be put in place to monitor a country's debt levels and sound the alarm to avoid future financial meltdowns

A number of the key players at the meeting are saying it was Jim Flaherty, our Finance Minister who came up with key proposals to keep China and the US "in play".

NDP Leader Jack Layton was for a while this week looking and sounding like he might decide to support our upcoming Budget. Then by week's end he was saying he would vote against it.

All I'll say is that we are not pushing for a federal election. We believe that most of you want us to stay focused on jobs and the economy. That's our plan.

As a matter of fact that's pretty well what I heard as I was door knocking this weekend.

I've explained in this paper before that I door knock year round. It’s a great way to stay in touch and to get a sense of how people are feeling about the issues.

With no fear or reprisals and with no cameras around, I have found people are pretty good at getting right to the point with me. That was certainly the case this weekend. A number of people brought up the issue of a federal election. And they were very clear. They don't think we need one.

I assured them, and I'm assuring you, we don't think this is the time for an election.

Our economy continues to do well, but there are still risks globally. We need to stay focused. As the time for the Federal Budget draws closer I hope the Opposition parties will see it that way too.

I'll be in Vancouver this week with the Prime Minister, then back to the riding mid-week for meetings and some announcements.

Don't forget on Tuesday evening your phone will ring around 6:30. It will be me inviting you to stay on the line for a “Telephone Town Hall Meeting”. Hope you can join in!

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.