TARGET: HESA — Conservative leader ERIN O'TOOLE chose a Wednesday presser to sharpen the contours of his next Covid fight with JUSTIN TRUDEAU's Liberals. His favored arena: the House health committee (aka HESA). — The argument: Quebec has a curfew. Ontario has reverted to a partial lockdown. O'Toole name-checked kids who are back to virtual schooling, business owners who are shutting their doors and everyone else who's being asked to "sacrifice their civil liberties" as healthcare systems grapple with Omicron. He blamed Trudeau for it all. "In a population that is now largely fully vaccinated, in fact the action and inaction by the Trudeau government is normalizing lockdowns and restrictions as the primary tool to fight the latest COVID-19 variant. It didn't have to be this way." Liberals will quibble with O'Toole's silence on provincial competence, but the Conservative leader's job is to oppose. So oppose he will. — Times change: Recall that only a year ago, O'Toole was leading the opposition charge against a government he said was way behind peer countries on vaccinating its people. By the summer, Canada had lapped other developed nations and achieved world leader status. But we digress. — The new battleground: O'Toole called for emergency meetings of HESA to study the Liberals' apparent failures — not a bad idea, really, given the rapid spread of Omicron and persistent fears that healthcare systems are on the brink. That'll put the spotlight on the committee chair and every party's leading figures. Who are they? Liberal MP SEAN CASEY chairs the committee. He's been elected for a decade — a rare Liberal elected during the party's 2011 meltdown — and held the gavel at the Commons human resources committee in the last Parliament. The P.E.I. MP also sits on the veterans affairs committee, which keeps an eye on the department headquartered in his constituency. But Playbook bets he'll focus on HESA. Olympic gold medalist ADAM VAN KOEVERDEN is parliamentary secretary to Health Minister JEAN-YVES DUCLOS . He's the government's first line of defense at HESA — a serious test of his rhetorical bona fides as he enters his second term. Conservative MP LUC BERTHOLD is the party's shadow minister for health and committee vice chair. STEPHEN ELLIS, a rookie Nova Scotia MP, was a family physician who oversaw his region's response to Covid. He's now his party's "special adviser" on the virus. They'll lead the Tory side. The resident New Democrat at HESA is DON DAVIES, a member of the committee since early 2016 and a vocal critic of the Liberal pandemic response from Day 1. Bloc Quebecois MP LUC THÉRIAULT, the second vice-chair who's also sat on the committee since the beginning of the global nightmare, rounds out the opposition. — Notable notables: The Liberals also have a couple of doctors at the table: MARCUS POWLOWSKI, a northern Ontario MD and outspoken MP; and BRENDAN HANLEY, a rookie parliamentarian whose last gig served Yukoners as medical officer of health. SONIA SIDHU also worked as a diabetes educator. MAJID JOWHARI has sat on the Liberal benches since Trudeau's first win. SHELBY KRAMP-NEUMAN, another first-time MP, is the Tory critic for seniors. — What's next: The committee only needs four MPs to agree to a meeting. The odds are good it won't only be Tories who want to talk urgently about just how poorly they think Liberals are managing Omicron. Prepare for opposition rants and lengthy Liberal filibusters. And if PIERRE POILIEVRE gets his wish for emergency finance committee meetings — that's FINA, for short — expect much the same. IRAN WON'T PLAY BALL — The multilateralists gave it their level best. Saturday marks the two-year anniversary of the Iranian military's downing of Ukrainian International Airlines Flight PS752, a missile strike that killed dozens of Canadians. Soon after the tragedy, Canada joined with the other nations who'd lost citizens — Afghanistan, Sweden, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom — to demand answers from Iran. Afghanistan has been dropped from the group's communiqués, but Thursday brought an admission of failure: Iran wouldn't honor any requests for reparations negotiations. Foreign Minister MÉLANIE JOLY tweeted from Mont-Tremblant that allied nations "will now focus on subsequent actions to take to resolve this matter in accordance with international law." The communiqué lacked specifics. Prime Minister JUSTIN TRUDEAU will join a private virtual discussion with the families of the victims today at 11:30. Also in attendance: Joly, Transport Minister OMAR ALGHABRA , Immigration Minister SEAN FRASER, and High Commissioner in the U.K. RALPH GOODALE, who penned a report on the tragedy. On Saturday, Trudeau and Joly will make remarks at a virtual anniversary event hosted by the families. Ontario Premier DOUG FORD, Toronto Mayor JOHN TORY and Ukrainian Ambassador ANDRIY SHEVCHENKO will also deliver messages. — The last word: That goes to BRETT BYERS , a comms manager at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute: "Looking forward to seeing what this international legal action entails. Hopefully it serves as an awakening for Ottawa about the odiousness of the regime in Tehran." PERSPECTIVES | 
