Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he was “embarrassed” that NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh terminated the party’s supply and confidence agreement with the Liberals without making a phone call first.
“The relationship was obviously not what I thought it would be,” Trudeau said in a recent conversation with Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith on the podcast “Uncommons.”
“I know that if I had chosen to end it, it would have started with a phone call to him. I would have said, ‘You know what, Jagmeet? That’s not going to work. ‘You make tough decisions.’
For more than an hour, Trudeau and Erskine-Smith, a maverick Liberal member with a history of voting against his own government, spoke about the party’s recent by-election loss to Conservative leader Pierre Poièvre. They touched on many topics including his initial approach and message. He will face the next election and his biggest regret as prime minister.
clock | Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Nathaniel Erskine-Smith said on the Uncommons podcast:
The Supply and Confidence Agreement signed between the Liberals and the NDP in March 2022 committed the NDP to supporting the Liberal government in confidence votes in exchange for legislative commitments on NDP priorities.
The agreement guaranteed the survival of the minority Liberal government and was the first formal agreement between the two parties at the federal level. Singh announced last month that the agreement had been terminated.
“I don’t know why he hasn’t called me, because…I know he really wants to see this country move forward in a more progressive way,” Trudeau said. ” he said. “It was upsetting for me to see him do things like that and do things that way, because I know these things are important to him.”
Prime Minister Trudeau believed Singh made the decision because he was under pressure from his base to end his partnership with the Liberals and distance the two parties ahead of the recent Winnipeg and Montreal by-elections. He said that
“I wouldn’t do that,” Trudeau said, adding that he believed there were “no hard feelings” about what happened between the two leaders.
Mr Singh said the Liberals would abandon the deal so as not to go against corporate interests.
In a recent by-election, the NDP managed to hold on to its seat in Winnipeg, but the Liberals lost the safe seat of LaSalle-Aimard-Verdun in Montreal to the Bloc Quebecois.
The defeat came just weeks after Conservative candidate Don Stewart defeated his Liberal opponent in the Toronto-St. Louis election. Paul’s seat has been held by the Liberal Party for more than 30 years.
“One of the things we know we should have done earlier is to establish candidates and keep them on the ground longer,” Trudeau said.
“In both of these by-elections, we did not concede. [Leslie Church] Not given enough time on the ground [Laura Palestini] There’s plenty of time on the ground. ”
Mr. Erskine-Smith, who is not running in the next election, told Mr. Trudeau that when Mr. Poièvre was nominated as Conservative leader in September 2022, he hoped the Liberals would not “take the fight to him” sooner. Instead, he asked Mr. Poièvre “why he gave him a slightly more advantageous position.” Free pass since he became leader.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said former Prime Minister Stephen Harper tried that instant attack approach when he took office, but “none of it worked.”
“Did that define me? Not particularly, because Canadians kind of knew who I was,” he said. “Canadians don’t really know who Poièvre is. [is]. He’s been in the House for 20 years and no one knows who he is.”
Under Poièvre’s leadership, the Conservatives currently lead the Liberals by about 43% to 23%, according to reports. CBC’s poll tracker.
Trudeau said he could have attacked Poièvre as soon as he became prime minister, but thought his focus at the time should be on recovering from the pandemic and fighting inflation.
“It could have worked, it could have worked…but at the same time, it doesn’t ring true to me in that ‘I have to fight for the Canadian and now I’m going to pick a fight with him.’ “There was something that made me feel like we weren’t at a time when we should be tackling inflation.”
The prime minister also said he was calculating that it might be more advantageous to postpone such attacks until later.
“If you’re going to corner someone in the polls a year or two before the election, or even three or four years before the election, is that the best time to kick that person down and lift yourself up?” he said. . “Or do you want it to happen a little more organically and closer to the actual day that people choose?”
Message for the next election
The Prime Minister said part of his message heading into the next federal election would be to warn voters that the Conservative Party would cut popular programs run by the government.
“I have to highlight some of the things we have done [that are] “It’s frankly at risk,” he said.
Prime Minister Trudeau said these achievements include the Canada Child Benefit. Contributed to poverty reduction in Canada, National climate change policy, dental treatment, childcare progress towards school lunch Programs and limitations Pharmacare.
“But if Canadians don’t understand what we’ve been doing and what we’ve been delivering, then there’s a big challenge there,” he said.
“We also need to have a positive ambition to say, “This is what we’re going to do together in our next mission, this is the next step we’re going to take.” And that’s what we need to do. Right now, I’m busy working with the executive committee and everyone to put this together. ”
Regret over electoral system reform
Erskine-Smith asked Trudeau if he had any regrets from his nine years in office. The prime minister did not hesitate to point out the response to the electoral system reform file.
During the 2015 election, Prime Minister Trudeau promised to abolish the first-past-the-post system and replace it with “an electoral system that better reflects the concerns and voices of all Canadians.”
Trudeau then abandoned his promise after seeing growing support for his preferred proportional representation system, an option favored by Erskine-Smith. Ranked voting.
Prime Minister Trudeau reflected on that decision this week, saying he made two major mistakes in managing that file. The first is to allow proportional representation to be part of the discussion, he said.
“The second thing is that we didn’t use the majority to implement the model that I wanted,” he said.
“I believe in ranked voting. Giving people the option to rank 1, 2, 3.” [and] Political parties will try to sell themselves as people’s second or third choice. This, in turn, will lead to greater cooperation and overlap between political parties in opposition to parties that actively seek to promote polarization.
“But the impact of changing our electoral system is very significant. When you change the way people are elected, it becomes really difficult to change that… You need a consensus across the board, and it’s hard to get it. That idea is why I decided to say, “Okay, I’m not going to risk irreversible change just to make good on my promise to change this. ”
Prime Minister Trudeau called it “heartbreaking” to have to abandon electoral reform.
