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Sunday Times | August 29, 2021 | Charlie Mitchell, Ottawa
When Justin Trudeau called a risky snap election earlier this month, he said Canadians faced their most consequential choice since 1945 — progress with him at the helm, or a step backwards under the Conservatives.
Amid a fourth wave of the pandemic and a chaotic Afghanistan evacuation, Canadians responded with a collective shrug. Within a week, the prime minister’s five-point poll lead disappeared. Now he is six points behind — his political future in doubt.
Once again, the golden boy of western politics looks chastened, just two years after Canadians re-elected him without a majority. If he loses, it will mark a dismal end for Trudeau, whose ambitious agenda and promises of “sunny ways” saw him catapult the third-placed Liberal Party to a handsome majority in 2015, but who has since been tarnished by ethics scandals, unkept promises and blackface images.
Trudeau, 49, hoped to swap his minority government for a majority by riding a wave of vaccine-related optimism when he called the election for September 20. The campaign period is the shortest permitted by law. With 66 per cent of its population double jabbed, Canada’s vaccine rollout is among the world’s most successful.
Although he insisted Canadians should choose who leads them through the post-pandemic recovery, Trudeau’s opponents, Erin O’Toole’s Conservatives and the young, left-wing New Democratic Party, have successfully cast the election as a cynical power grab.
“It has not been a great start to the campaign for the incumbent,” said Shachi Kurl, a pollster with the Angus Reid Institute. “The Trudeau Liberals have been losing ground, not gaining it, and the NDP has been a key beneficiary. At the same time Canadians are taking a first real look at Erin O’Toole and they are liking what they see.”
A recent poll had the Conservatives six points ahead at 37 per cent, while polling averages have the two frontrunners neck and neck. Particularly worrying is the disintegration of his lead in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, where elections are won and lost.
The polling aggregator 338Canada now gives the Liberals an 11 per cent chance of winning a majority, well below the 41 per cent chance of a Conservative minority, which would send O’Toole, 48, not Trudeau, to the prime minister’s residence in Ottawa.
Two-thirds of Canadians feel it is time for a change in government, according to a poll. When voters are asked which party leader would earn their support based on their heart or gut, Trudeau comes third to the NDP’s Jagmeet Singh, 42, and O’Toole. “Liberals were prepared for some first week poll drop,” insisted a former senior Liberal staffer, speaking on condition of anonymity. “We feel it helps with progressives and our core that we need to work hard and that there are no free NDP votes.” However, the staffer cautioned: “Liberals should worry. And work harder.”
The campaign has already turned nasty, with Trudeau attacking his opponents as behind the times on social issues, such as abortion and euthanasia. His powerful deputy prime minister, Chrystia Freeland, was hit with a “manipulated media” tag on Twitter after her staff doctored a video of O’Toole to suggest he supported for-profit healthcare, a key dog whistle for the Liberal base amid fears of low turnout.
Trudeau has also tried to make vaccines a wedge issue, by casting the Tories as weak on vaccine mandates.
Unlike his predecessor, Andrew Scheer, a practising Roman Catholic whose social conservatism repelled many Canadians, O’Toole, a former air force officer and detail-oriented lawyer, who sits towards the centre of his party, is less vulnerable to such attacks.
Gone, said Kate Harrison, a Conservative strategist and vice-chairwoman at Summa Strategies, is the hopeful, forward-thinking Trudeau. “It’s just a very different tone,” she added. “It’s difficult to spin [a close race] as being an okay outcome for the Liberals — they had the lead heading into this.”
Despite calling the election themselves, and choosing its timing, the Liberals have not released their manifesto. A source told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that Trudeau has been asking his candidates for “big ideas” with a “wow factor”.
Insiders suspect the campaign will not pick up steam until Labour Day on September 6, which will be quickly followed by televised debates. The prime minister has already made big-money promises, including billions for affordable housing and care for the elderly, and has vowed to increase taxes on big banks and insurance companies.
“They have opted for the shortest [campaign] period possible, which means that there’s not a lot of time to stop a trend if it emerges,” said Nik Nanos, founder of Nanos Research, a polling firm. “If something transpired in the debates, there’s not enough runway to change that trajectory.” Conservative insiders say the so far untested O’Toole is a fierce debater.
A Trudeau defeat would go down as one of the biggest miscalculations in Canadian political history. His triumph in 2015 was not only electoral: his uncommonly good looks adorned magazine covers around the world. Yet while he enjoyed an unprecedented honeymoon period, many Canadians feel he did not deliver.
Despite lambasting Saudi Arabia for its human rights record, his government continued to sell it billions of dollars worth of weapons. He preached environmentalism, but spent C$4.5 billion (£2.6 billion) on an oil pipeline. On a clumsy official trip to India, he donned traditional robes and pressed his hands together in prayer, drawing mockery from the right.
He stood up for equality but admitted to three times wearing blackface as a younger man, most recently in his early thirties, which nearly cost him re-election.
And he was twice found by the ethics commissioner to have broken conflict of interest laws, first for holidaying on the Aga Khan’s private island and second for pressing his attorney general to drop a corruption case against an influential engineering company.
Another scandal last year, when Trudeau’s government handed a billion-dollar contract to a charity with close links to his family fuelled claims by Conservatives that Trudeau is incapable of seeing conflicts of interest, despite the prime minister ultimately being cleared of wrongdoing.
While Canada is a resource-rich G7 member, many Canadians are struggling. Housing has become unaffordable in its major cities. Gun violence is on the rise. And 31 indigenous communities lack reliable access to clean water, forcing residents to haul water from public taps.
Trudeau points out that his government has supported Canadians to the tune of C$95.2 billion in direct payments during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Campaign issues include record spending amid ballooning deficits, climate change following a summer of heatwaves and wildfires, indigenous reconciliation amid a reckoning over Canada’s colonial past and a sexual misconduct scandal gripping the military.
The hasty Afghanistan withdrawal and the bitter relationship with China, which has jailed two Canadian citizens in retaliation for Canada’s arrest of a Huawei executive, also threatens to impact the campaign.
While Trudeau’s adroit pandemic response, which mostly saved Canada from the chaotic spread witnessed in America, and an impressive vaccination rollout could see him through next month, Canada’s love affair with Justin Trudeau is over.
“He’s no longer the bright young thing — hasn’t been for some time,” said Kurl. “The ‘new boy’ in this race is Erin O’Toole, he is the X factor.”
@legalfalcon or any one who can guide...
Sir I got LMIA approved job in early 2020 and FSW-O AOR since fall 2020.
If I visit my sibling in Canada for 2-3 months with FSW pending, will it have negative impact?
Is it necessary to only go with PR or work permit if you have LMIA approved job?
P.S. I was just concerned they might say if came to Canada why not started job via work permit. I didn't want to pause my Indian job before PR confirmed. I hope that it is not a concern?
Sir I got LMIA approved job in early 2020 and FSW-O AOR since fall 2020.
If I visit my sibling in Canada for 2-3 months with FSW pending, will it have negative impact?
Is it necessary to only go with PR or work permit if you have LMIA approved job?
P.S. I was just concerned they might say if came to Canada why not started job via work permit. I didn't want to pause my Indian job before PR confirmed. I hope that it is not a concern?
Best paragraph of that long read;
A Trudeau defeat would go down as one of the biggest miscalculations in Canadian political history. His triumph in 2015 was not only electoral: his uncommonly good looks adorned magazine covers around the world. Yet while he enjoyed an unprecedented honeymoon period, many Canadians feel he did not deliver.
A Trudeau defeat would go down as one of the biggest miscalculations in Canadian political history. His triumph in 2015 was not only electoral: his uncommonly good looks adorned magazine covers around the world. Yet while he enjoyed an unprecedented honeymoon period, many Canadians feel he did not deliver.
D
Deleted member 1050918
Guest
I've waited 8 whole months without a sweat but the last 3 damn weeks won't pass damn it. Time is a funny thing. Wish someone could knock me out for 3 weeks then I wake up like
I’m now thinking JT could even lose, handsomely. After that long read, i had no idea what level of atrocity he had caused while in power until now. Man really messed upI've waited 8 whole months without a sweat but the last 3 damn weeks won't pass damn it. Time is a funny thing. Wish someone could knock me out for 3 weeks then I wake up like
He’s no longer the bright young thing — hasn’t been for some time,” said Kurl. “The ‘new boy’ in this race is Erin O’Toole, he is the X factor.”
This writer is so smooth lol
D
Deleted member 1050918
Guest
Still too soon. I can't believe how stressful and uncertain this whole thing turned. When I decided to immigrate to Canada years ago, it was the certainty and transparency of the process that made me choose Canada over other countries with far better opportunities. I valued permanency more than anything and put my years into maxing out IELTS, getting a master's, getting years of industry experience. All for what? This mess that's been going on for a year. Life is chaotic indeed.
Whoever wins all I hope is it wont impact pending FSW-O applications and FSW program overall.
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For folks waiting months for an invite it apparently can’t get worse than this. It’s been 9 months without an FSW draw. As a pre-ITA, I’m logically inclined to hope the conservatives win (because we are already forgotten by the Liberals). However, I’m careful not to pick sides because no one knows what the near future holds. I just want the party that would be most beneficial to outlanders in the long run to win.
D
Deleted member 1050918
Guest
It's unbelieve that the minister of immigration has not once said a word of FSW in 8 whole months. They played dead and completely ignored us like we don't even exist. We understand how a conservative government could affect immigration but after being treated like we don't exist for almost a year, we don't have much to lose here. We've seen that liberals also don't want us, so we might as well hope to see a different party in power and see how it goes.
Exactly! That’s why I’m indifferent. But deep down, i hate the liberals with every neuron in my nervous system.
D
Deleted member 1050918
Guest
What else could it be other than hatred after how MM and JT threw away my years of hard work and hopes and dreams for a better life? I couldn't even count the lies we've been told by them in the past 8 months. Lying, deceiving, and ignoring continually for 8 whole months. No one can describe how inhumane this is. So liberals aren't that liberal, they've been literally torturing thousands in all of this year.
Let us assume that the cons win the election do you guys think they will cancel the pending applications .They have done that in 2012 if they get a majority this time why do you guys think they won't do it again .I hate liberals that is another story but the way things are going cons have a chance even though small to win the majority or a minority government. I don't understand why many in this group are supporting cons even though they have a history of canceling applications. Is it something that I am missing.