Chrystia Freeland, Trudeau’s second in command, has resigned from cabinet. This has deepened the governmental crisis at a moment when the economy teeters on the edge of recession and the threat of Donald Trump looms on the horizon.
Prior to her resignation, rumors circulated that Freeland and Trudeau clashed over the GST holiday and $250 government rebate. In her resignation letter Freeland criticized Trudeau’s “costly political gimmicks” arguing that they instead needed to keep their “fiscal powder dry” faced with Trump’s “aggressive economic nationalism.”
Trudeau’s strategy of trying to placate Trump seems to have backfired, with Trump doubling down on his threat to impose a 25 per cent tariff on all Canadian goods coming into the U.S., while adding insult to injury by joking about making Canada the “51st state.”
With the government in crisis and the threat of Trump imminent, things are barrelling towards disaster.
Barreling towards disaster
Following Freeland’s resignation, calls for Trudeau to step down have multiplied, with one Liberal MP claiming that one third of the 153 Liberal MPs now want Trudeau gone. Even the staunchly Liberal Toronto Star, the most widely read newspaper in Canada, is calling for him to step down.
Now both the Conservatives and the Bloc Quebecois are calling for Trudeau to dissolve parliament and call an early election. But according to the polls, if elections were held now, the Liberals would lose well over 100 seats. Foreshadowing a future election, the same day Freeland resigned the Liberals were clobbered in a B.C. by-election, losing the seat to the Conservatives who won 66 per cent of the vote. Therefore, the Liberals are resisting a general election with all of their might.
Over the head of Liberals looms the imminent threat of a vote of non-confidence in the government, which will now almost certainly happen at the first opportunity.
The only thing that can help them to avoid this is continued support from the NDP. But the NDP’s desperate clinging to the Liberals has become increasingly ridiculous and is costing them support in the polls as well.
However, Jagmeet Singh seems impervious to the logic of the situation. In response to the resignation of Freeland, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh refused to clarify if he would support the government or not, robotically repeating “All tools, all options are on the table.”
This forced one reporter to inform Mr. Singh of the reality of the situation: “Sir, the room behind you is a parliament. The government continues to govern as long as MPs continue to have confidence in the government. You have no say who the leader of the Liberal party is. Will you support the government or are you withdrawing your support for the government?”
Unphased, Singh repeated the talking point: “With respect to that I have said that all options are on the table.”
Dark storm clouds overhead
When Trudeau came to power in 2015 he promised “sunny ways.” But nine years later the sun has been blotted out by dark clouds. The election of Donald Trump massively accelerates developments that are upending the entire political dynamic that has ruled the country for the last nine years.
What is clear is Trudeau is finished and this government will fall, one way or another. The NDP cannot prop up the government forever and the longer they do, the further they are discredited. Just as they were forced to pull the plug on the supply and confidence agreement, sooner or later they will be forced to bring the government down.
It seems to be a near inevitability that the Conservatives will handily win a majority government in any future election. However, it would be incorrect to think that this would be a stable government. On the contrary.
Pierre Poilievre would immediately be confronted with a massive crisis at all levels: an economy in the gutter, a crisis of public debt and a trade war with the U.S.
To top it off, the working class is angry from years of betrayal and falling living standards under the Trudeau Liberals.
Millions of people have illusions that Poilievre is going to make their lives better. And Poilievre has promised the moon—but he will ultimately be unable to deliver.
Speaking of how to counter Trump, Poilievre has pledged to “fight fire with fire.” However, these appear to be empty words as he has stopped short of proposing counter tariffs. Canadian capitalism is a small fish in a big pond and cannot hope to go toe-to-toe with the U.S. behemoth. This explains Trudeau’s subdued approach to Trump this time around and why all political leaders, on the so-called left or the right, are falling over themselves to meet Trump’s demands of increased border policing.
While Trump has not created the current crisis, he certainly has massively accelerated developments and is forcing the situation forward. Canadian politicians can no longer avoid dealing with the crisis.
Freeland, in her resignation letter, suggested that they needed to “fight for capital and investment.” As the Canadian economy has been steadily losing ground to the United States, the pressures for serious measures to break down barriers to capital investment have only gotten louder. Poilievre proposes to “axe taxes and unleash free enterprise.” But given the bloated federal debt, the only way to do this would be to embark on a brutal program of cuts to social spending, public sector layoffs, and further attacks on unions.
What this means is that in the long run, the Canadian social democratic model is no longer sustainable and future governments will be under increased pressure to attack all of the gains the working class has made in the post war period.
However, this is easier said than done. Poilievre is not running on a campaign of attacking unions, cutting social programs and laying off public sector workers. If he were to embark in this direction, millions of people would feel immediately betrayed.
Far from presenting himself as anti-union, Poilievre has promised that he will not pass any anti-union laws if elected. Already, trade unions are angry after having the right to strike consistently violated by the Trudeau government and if Poilievre tries to attack unions, any support he has among unionized workers will be replaced with malice.
Whatever happens, Canada is headed for crisis, instability and class warfare. There is no way to avoid this—the only thing for us to do is prepare.
This is exactly what the newly founded Revolutionary Communist Party is doing.
