Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau watches the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine being extracted while he visits a vaccination clinic at the Palais des Congres in Montreal on March 15, 2021.
Andrej Ivanov/Reuters
The Liberal platform had thousands of words and hundreds of promises to spend $78-billion, but at the press conference to unveil it, Justin Trudeau kept talking about a single paragraph tucked away on Page 51.
That’s the passage that outlines the Liberals’ promise of protection from lawsuits for companies that require their workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
It’s the next step in Mr. Trudeau’s increasingly strident support for vaccination requirements: promising federal protection to companies that demand their employees get the jab. “Making sure workplaces can keep themselves and their employees safe,” in the Liberal Leader’s words.
And Mr. Trudeau raised it three times in his news conference – although no one asked – because he is hammering in the vaccine wedge harder and harder every day.
Never mind that the Liberals aren’t entirely sure how they would do it. It doesn’t seem to be federal jurisdiction. Mr. Trudeau wants to tell voters he’s going to help businesses require employees to get vaccinated.
The Liberal Leader started the campaign using vaccination requirements as a wedge issue, pointing to his newly adopted plan to require proof of vaccination for air and rail travel, and for federal public servants. But it seemed to peter out after a few days; Mr. Trudeau couldn’t explain what would happen to civil servants who didn’t get vaccinated.
Now he’s bringing it back with an edge. He’s been whetting the blade all week.
When angry protestors forced the Liberals to cancel his campaign event last Friday in Bolton, Ont., Mr. Trudeau took them to task for unacceptable behaviour, but also suggested they’d had a hard pandemic year. But on Sunday, as protesters surrounded his event in Cambridge, Ont., he started using them as a political foil, saying he wouldn’t back down.
By Tuesday, as anti-vaccine demonstrators shouted while he spoke in Sudbury, Mr. Trudeau was drawing a sharp dividing line between the vaccinated – the people who had done the right thing, he said – and the vaccine resistant that he said were putting kids at risk.
Then he drew a straight line between the demonstrators and Erin O’Toole, arguing the Conservative Leader is “siding with” the protesters when he argues that individuals must be able to make a personal choice about being vaccinated.
“Shame on you, Erin O’Toole,” Mr. Trudeau said. “You need to condemn those people. You need to correct them.”
It takes some magic to lay ownership of the protests on Mr. O’Toole. For starters, he did condemn the Bolton protesters, “and any form of harassment and protest like we’ve seen.” And it’s absurd to suggest the Conservative Leader’s opposition to vaccination requirements for public servants or air travel – he argues rapid tests could be used for the unvaccinated – makes him the inspiration for the mob shouting about conspiracies.
But the first half of Mr. Trudeau’s campaign has not gone well. He clearly believes the pointier rhetoric will appeal to the desire to get the pandemic over, and draw a sharper dividing line between those who want more robust vaccine requirements and those who don’t. And put him on the popular side.
He is breaking out new lines, attacking Mr. O’Toole’s argument about personal choice. “What about my choice to keep my kids safe?” he said in Sudbury on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Mr. Trudeau said the shift was inspired on Monday morning, when he took his youngest son, Hadrien, to school for the first day of second grade and thought that he doesn’t want him going to virtual school again. Vaccinations, and vaccination mandates, are the way to end of the pandemic, he said.
And to take it a step further, that little paragraph on Page 51 – the promise to make it easier for private companies to require employees to get vaccinated – was made into a talking point.
In practice, it’s not easy to do, and the Liberals aren’t really sure how it would work. Civil law is provincial jurisdiction, and except for a relatively small number of federally regulated companies, so is labour law.
Liberal advisers suggested it might be legislated for those federally regulated employees first. Or the provinces might help. One said that lawyers were of the opinion that as long it is only a temporary measure, it could be invoked as an emergency federal government power under the Constitution to ensure “peace, order and good government.”
No wonder there was just one paragraph in the platform to explain it. But it’s still something Mr. Trudeau wanted to talk about a lot.
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Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
MONTREAL – NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says he will not be taking advice from Pierre Poilievre after the Conservative leader challenged him to bring down government.
“I say directly to Pierre Poilievre: I’m not going to listen to you,” said Singh on Wednesday, accusing Poilievre of wanting to take away dental-care coverage from Canadians, among other things.
“I’m not going to listen to your advice. You want to destroy people’s lives, I want to build up a brighter future.”
Earlier in the day, Poilievre challenged Singh to commit to voting non-confidence in the government, saying his party will force a vote in the House of Commons “at the earliest possibly opportunity.”
“I’m asking Jagmeet Singh and the NDP to commit unequivocally before Monday’s byelections: will they vote non-confidence to bring down the costly coalition and trigger a carbon tax election, or will Jagmeet Singh sell out Canadians again?” Poilievre said.
“It’s put up or shut up time for the NDP.”
While Singh rejected the idea he would ever listen to Poilievre, he did not say how the NDP would vote on a non-confidence motion.
“I’ve said on any vote, we’re going to look at the vote and we’ll make our decision. I’m not going to say our decision ahead of time,” he said.
Singh’s top adviser said on Tuesday the NDP leader is not particularly eager to trigger an election, even as the Conservatives challenge him to do just that.
Anne McGrath, Singh’s principal secretary, says there will be more volatility in Parliament and the odds of an early election have risen.
“I don’t think he is anxious to launch one, or chomping at the bit to have one, but it can happen,” she said in an interview.
New Democrat MPs are in a second day of meetings in Montreal as they nail down a plan for how to navigate the minority Parliament this fall.
The caucus retreat comes one week after Singh announced the party has left the supply-and-confidence agreement with the governing Liberals.
It’s also taking place in the very city where New Democrats are hoping to pick up a seat on Monday, when voters go to the polls in Montreal’s LaSalle—Émard—Verdun. A second byelection is being held that day in the Winnipeg riding of Elmwood—Transcona, where the NDP is hoping to hold onto a seat the Conservatives are also vying for.
While New Democrats are seeking to distance themselves from the Liberals, they don’t appear ready to trigger a general election.
Singh signalled on Tuesday that he will have more to say Wednesday about the party’s strategy for the upcoming sitting.
He is hoping to convince Canadians that his party can defeat the federal Conservatives, who have been riding high in the polls over the last year.
Singh has attacked Poilievre as someone who would bring back Harper-style cuts to programs that Canadians rely on, including the national dental-care program that was part of the supply-and-confidence agreement.
The Canadian Press has asked Poilievre’s office whether the Conservative leader intends to keep the program in place, if he forms government after the next election.
With the return of Parliament just days away, the NDP is also keeping in mind how other parties will look to capitalize on the new makeup of the House of Commons.
The Bloc Québécois has already indicated that it’s written up a list of demands for the Liberals in exchange for support on votes.
The next federal election must take place by October 2025 at the latest.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante is defending her decision to turn off comments on her social media accounts — with an announcement on social media.
She posted screenshots to X this morning of vulgar names she’s been called on the platform, and says comments on her posts for months have been dominated by insults, to the point that she decided to block them.
Montreal’s Opposition leader and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association have criticized Plante for limiting freedom of expression by restricting comments on her X and Instagram accounts.
They say elected officials who use social media should be willing to hear from constituents on those platforms.
However, Plante says some people may believe there is a fundamental right to call someone offensive names and to normalize violence online, but she disagrees.
Her statement on X is closed to comments.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
