With the House of Commons set to reopen for business following the three-month summer hiatus, the government is poised to test its newly-secured narrow-but-functional majority with a high-stakes legislative bid to “build Canada strong,” which, as iPolitics revealed last week, is expected to include major changes to federal labour laws, as well as new measures “aimed at accelerating project approvals,” according to The Globe and Mail.

During a media availability alongside his Norwegian counterpart on Sunday night, Prime Minister Mark Carney hinted that the bill — which is expected to be presented to the House of Commons by Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon this afternoon — is “the most consequential economic legislation, certainly, of this parliamentary session, (and) arguably over the course of the next few years.”

According to his office, MacKinnon will hit the House of Commons Foyer to promote his government’s latest push to “create certainty for a more competitive, resilient, and independent Canadian economy” during a joint media availability with Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu and Canada – U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc this afternoon. (4:30 p.m.)

Meanwhile, before jetting to New York City later this afternoon — where, as previewed in What We’re Watching, he’ll spend the next few days making the rounds on the high-level diplomatic circuit that accompanies the fall opening of the United Nations General Assembly — Carney will be back in his front-and-centre seat in the chamber for the first time since June, where he’ll undoubtedly face a flurry of questions over his push to align Canada more closely with the European Union, as outlined in his speech to the European Parliament in Strasbourg last week. (2:15 p.m.)

Speaking at a rally in southwestern Ontario yesterday evening, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre once again vowed that Canada will “never be the 28th state” of the European Union, Canadian Press reports.

“Poilievre told a crowd of Conservative supporters (that) Canada already has a free trade agreement with Europe and close defence ties with the continent through NATO, but he doesn’t support European taxes, laws and what he called ‘reckless European-style immigration’ being brought to domestic shores,” the wire service notes.

During a back-and-forth with reporters yesterday afternoon, Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet acknowledged that closer ties with the EU “could prove useful,” but stressed that it “must not be a Trojan horse hiding the export of gas and oil,” Canadian Press notes.

“According to Blanchet, the prospect of Canada forging closer strategic ties with Europe to reduce its dependence on the United States represents ‘an opportunity to be seized from a Quebec perspective,’ (but) does not expect Ottawa to conclude a new treaty, since the free trade agreement known as CETA has still not been ratified by several members of the European Union.”

For his part, Carney has resolutely avoided using the phase ‘associate member” to describe the hoped-for new relationship between Canada and the EU, which he has framed as an “alliance for the future,” including in the readout from his whirlwind meeting with French president François Macron in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon yesterday afternoon.

Also on the opening day docket: Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Rebecca Alty’s proposal to appoint a new federal commissioner for modern treaty implementation, which is intended to provide “an independent, credible, effective and sustainable oversight mechanism to hold (the government) accountable to Parliament for its actions,” and is set to begin working its way through third reading this afternoon. (1 p.m.)

Before that debate gets underway, Liberal MP Parm Bains will get one final chance to make the case for his backbench pitch to establish a “national framework respecting skilled trades and labour mobility” before it is automatically added to the queue to go to a make-or-break second-reading vote on Wednesday. (11 a.m.) 

As for the prime minister, after touching down in New York later this afternoon, he’ll join European Council president António Costa, as well as his Kenyan counterpart, William Ruto, to co-host the Partners for Multiculturalism Summit, which will “bring together a diverse group of countries from different regions that share a commitment to strengthening multilateralism, upholding international law, promoting peace, and advancing sustainable and inclusive prosperity,” according to the programme. (6:30 p.m.)

ON AND AROUND THE HILL

Canadian Voice of Women for Peace senior researcher Tamara Lorincz and co-chair Lyn Adamson team up with members of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom-Canada and other advocacy groups to mark International Peace Day by highlighting their ongoing opposition to what the advisory describes as the “federal government’s militarization of the Canadian economy,” which “risks serious harm to women, the climate, and the environment,” and urge the federal Liberals to “prioritize care, not warfare.”(11 a.m.)

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Committee highlights courtesy of our friends at iPoliticsINTEL.