Tories convene in Calgary, hoping to leave Senate scandal in rear-view mirror

Thanks to the Conservative party convention in Calgary, Thursday’s session of Parliament will follow a Friday schedule, with question period taking place in the morning so Tory MPs can jet off to Alberta.

The Senate, of course, is also still sitting, so the expense scandal involving senators Patrick Brazeau, Pamela Wallin and Mike Duffy will continue to unfold.

The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation will gaze into its crystal ball Thursday, and predict how Canada’s housing market will fare over the next two years, as part of its latest quarterly report.

Statistics Canada, meantime, will provide a couple of indicators of how Canada’s economy was doing over the summer as it releases reports on employment earnings and hours for August and the industrial gross domestic product for the same month.

The Supreme Court of Canada is set to release three judgments that could spell out whether consumers can sue manufacturers, indirectly, if the product makers are involved in price fixing.

Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney will be joined by Ottawa-area MP Royal Galipeau to talk about how seniors can protect themselves on the Internet.

Later in the day, Blaney will table the latest annual report of the Security Intelligence Review Committee, which oversees Canada’s spy agencies.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair will brush up on federal-provincial relations as he introduces his Ontario counterpart, Andrea Horwath, to the Economic Club of Canada.

And there will be a lot of shave cream and giggles over facial hair in Ottawa today as NDP members of Parliament head to a local barber shop to launch their Movember campaign in support of prostate research.