When Justin Trudeau announced he was stepping down as Prime Minister, and proroguing Parliament, he all but guaranteed the loss of a number of significant pieces of legislation that would surely improve the lives of many Canadians.

Trudeau was first elected to the house in 2008, became leader in 2013 and took power in 2015, following a decade of mean and sour Conservative rule under Stephen Harper. He came in on a wave of change and “sunny ways,” restoring pension eligibility to 65 (from 67), and promising sweeping progressive changes. And for a little while that is (sort of) what we got.

But now Canada is facing an increasingly worrying situation. With rising authoritarianism in the United States under Donald Trump and the possibility of an all-out trade war — Canada is perhaps in its most vulnerable position since the Second World War. Trudeau’s resignation announcement could not have come at a worse time.

Policies now at risk, such as pharmacare, dental care and daycare, should never have taken this long. The Liberals governed for nearly a decade — and nearly the first half with a majority. The death of these critical policies are completely the fault of the Liberals, who dragged their feet their entire time in power, breaking promise after promise. 

What is at risk at this political moment?

For years, Canadians have been demanding that the federal government expand dental care and pharmacare. The Supply and Cooperation Agreement between the Liberals and the NDP from March 2022 to September 2024 meant progress was finally made on these two key files. Dental care is partially in place, but only B.C. has signed on to the pharmacare program. Both are at risk, as are changes to the capital gains tax inclusion rate that would force wealthy investors to pay slightly more taxes on investment income — but still less than the rest of us pay on income from work.

The 0.13 per cent of Canadians who make more than $250,000 per year in investment income currently pay zero tax on 50 per cent of their gains.

The federal greenhouse gas emissions cap for the oil and gas industry — Canada’s largest source of emissions by far — which took far too long to materialize and doesn’t go nearly far enough, is also now dead in the water. Most of the Liberals’ other climate policies are already well established and won’t be lost immediately with prorogation, although a Conservative electoral victory would likely turn back the clock on many of those measures.

A policy that was instrumental in building Trudeau’s brand as a “feminist” was the promise of $10 a day daycare. Canadians were told during the 2021 election that it was on the chopping block unless the Liberals are re-elected.

Canadians have a right to ask why it takes so long for progressive policies to be implemented. We certainly can’t expect it to move forward under a Conservative government.

Other policies and proposals that seem destined to die on the order paper include the long overdue First Nations Clean Water Act, which would have ensured First Nations had clean water and wastewater services that are on par with Canadian cities; the Online Harms Act would have taken meaningful steps to protect children on the Internet; a court-ordered piece of legislation to grant citizenship to individuals born outside of the country to Canadian parents who were also born in another country; and a bill that sought to create a modern treaty commissioner, which would ensure the government was abiding by the terms in modern treaties with First Nations.

Canada’s newly precarious position

The day after Trudeau resigned, then president-elect Donald Trump announced that he planned to impose tariffs on Canada and possibly annex the country to “become the 51 state,” along with the hostile taking of Greenland and the Panama Canal.

After his inauguration on January 20, Trump promised to move forward with hostile tariffs on Mexico and Canada as soon as February 1.

Trump says the tariffs are necessary to force Canada and Mexico to stem the flow of migrants and illegal narcotics like fentanyl into the United States.

It’s worth noting that, while Trump may make good on his threats, this could also be posturing ahead of a 2026 deadline to review the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) trade agreement.

The Liberal leadership race is on

Mark Carney entered the leadership race last week in Edmonton. Chrystia Freeland launched her campaign in Toronto last week, and Karina Gould launched her leadership bid on Saturday on social media and in person in Burlington on Sunday. 

Frontrunners Carney and Freeland are both saying they would scrap the consumer carbon tax in its current form, if elected. Freeland has also promised to scrap the proposed capital gains tax changes. 

Also running for leader is Jaime Battiste, Frank Baylis, and Ruby Dhalla.

None of the leading contenders speaks French fluently — giving Pierre Poilievre, who does speak French, another advantage.  

What happens now that Parliament is prorogued?

Parliament will return March 24, and the government is expected to fall on the Throne Speech. The NDP will likely not support the government, leading to a vote of non-confidence, and ensuring an election in early May. Or not. Depending on who becomes leader.

The House of Commons was already bogged down because of a Conservative filibuster from late September until the Christmas break. 

“The fact is, despite best efforts to work through it, Parliament has been paralyzed for months after what has been the longest session of a minority Parliament in Canadian history,” Trudeau said in an emotional resignation speech, referring to the government elected in 2021. “That’s why, this morning, I advised the Governor General that we need a new session of Parliament.”

What is prorogation?

Prorogation is often referred to as a “parliamentary reset button.”

The word “prorogue” comes from the Latin word prorogare, which means to extend or stretch.

Prorogation follows a decision made by the PM, which has to be approved by the Governor General, to suspend all parliamentary activity, including legislative and committee work in the House of Commons and the Senate. Everything goes on hold, but Parliament is not dissolved. (Dissolution means Parliament is terminated, and usually precedes a general election.)

Prorogation can be controversial, and is sometimes seen as a weasel way to stay in power. 

In 2008, Harper prorogued Parliament to avoid a confidence vote, and then went on to prorogue Parliament four more times. Harper wins the prize for most days prorogued. Meanwhile, Chretien prorogued four times, and Mulroney three times. 

In 2010 there was a prorogation to avoid a committee inquiry into the mistreatment of Afghan detainees. And back in 2002, the Chretien Liberals avoided accountability by proroguing to prevent the delivery of a committee report on the sponsorship scandal.

The government continues to function as it does normally, and parliamentarians continue their constituency work, including ministers who can continue to advance existing legislation. The prime minister, cabinet ministers and other executive staff are all still in their roles.

Prorogation won’t have a noticeable impact on most Canadians because in areas that affect most people’s daily lives — like health care, education and social welfare — Parliament transfers money to the provinces and that money has already been allocated within the budget.

Parliament starts up again in the spring with a speech from the throne, which presents the government’s new directions and goals. The speech, read by the Governor General from the seat, or throne, of the Senate, which is modelled on the English House of Lords, and is reserved for the King or his representative in Canada.

Quaint. 

But that’s just the way we do things in a Westminster-style Parliamentary democracy.

Why did Trudeau step down? 

Trudeau stepped down for a lot of different reasons, depending on who you are and where you fit in the class system. 

For many Canadians, the erosion of his popularity can be traced back to the twin crises of housing and cost of living. The trucker convoy in 2022, and the movement that it emboldened, particularly in the west, was the beginning of the end.

The Liberals sat on their hands and did not take action on basic household bread and butter issues. They over-promised and under-delivered over and over, on nearly every file. That led to an erosion of trust among voters, whose faith that government can deliver substantive and meaningful policies that improve people’s lives has been frayed, and to a rising tide of cynicism and anger. 

In the last 20 years the cost of housing and rents have gone up relentlessly, forcing people to pay increasingly more of their stagnant incomes for a roof over their heads.

Canadians haven’t forgotten that in the early 90’s, the Liberals changed the role of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and removed its ability to shape the housing market, a program that was set up after the war (and allowed my parents to buy a house). Private interests then took over housing in Canada, and developers built smaller and more profitable units. Then the housing market crashed in 2008, causing a big bubble in which prices skyrocketed. Housing is now increasingly financialized, with huge companies owning thousands of “doors.”

Specifically, the Trudeau Liberals paid no attention at all to tenants, and those who are not looking for a traditional family home. There was no discussion regarding off-market housing, co-ops and non-profit housing. There was no recognition of housing as a human need and not simply a place for people with money to invest. 

Could this be because the real estate lobby is up on the Hill all the time — and because so many Liberal and Conservative MPs are landlords? 

Or that the PM has never felt the pinch of wondering where he is going to live, or lacked housing or the money to pay rent? Justin Trudeau inherited a fortune from his father, and is after all, a millionaire. Many MPs are also quite well off, the vast majority own property, and many, including Pierre Poilievre, are landlords.

Meanwhile, most Canadians are increasingly struggling to just keep up with skyrocketing rents and the cost of basic groceries on stagnant salaries.   

Running against Trudeau

Justin Trudeau is a formidable campaigner and has an aristocratic pedigree. His father had a kind of hauteur that he fought hard against, branding himself the “sunny ways” candidate and taking selfies with people at every turn. But he broke a lot of promises, notably the one he made over 80 times in 2015 to reform the electoral system and drop the first-past-the-post system.

And then there was the U.S. style so-called freedom convoy. A bunch of people driving trucks (as an aside, 90 per cent of cross-border truckers were vaccinated because you couldn’t cross the border in a truck if you weren’t) organized a dynamic, and even impressive, protest and occupation of Ottawa, Windsor, and Coutts, specifically targeting Justin Trudeau. They blocked the border crossings causing shutdowns and preventing the movement of goods and trade. 

What started as protests against vaccine mandates and other pandemic measures that were mostly provincial, spiraled into a wider protest at the inflation crisis — and that anger was contagious. 

I have never met Trudeau, although I did run for the NDP in his Papineau riding in 2015. I have only seen him once in person — when he was double parked on a high-end shopping strip in tony Outremont. Stuck behind a shiny SUV, I looked up to see who was causing everyone to go around him, and lo’ and behold it was then MP Justin Trudeau. But when I campaigned against him I never once saw him, or debated him.

But even as a longtime political opponent I found the scapegoating of the PM by the far right convoy activists and their sympathizers to be next-level bullying.

Nobody deserves to be waylaid with their kids on a ski holiday, and told to “Get the fuck out of B.C.” as Emily Duggan, a known right-wing Poilievre supporter, did to Trudeau. 

A torrent of attacks from all sides, including from inside his own party, finally did him in, most notably the resignation of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, one of his earliest and best allies, and who he tried to sideline in favour of Mark Carney. Freeland’s letter of resignation was the coup de grâce — the blow that opened the floodgates in December. 

Nine years is a long time in power, and the pendulum in Canadian politics tends to swing like clockwork back and forth from Liberal to Conservative on roughly that timeline. 

Trudeau came in on a wave of a desire for change, energized amid a backdrop of movements rising up and demanding justice, such as Idle No More and Black Lives Matter. Canadans were horrified by Harper’s attacks on marginalized people, his lack of sympathy for Syrian refugees, and his barbaric “Cultural Practices Act.”

Trudeau defeated a sour and worn out Harper government, beset with scandals and bad behaviour in 2015. Harper thought he could hang on to power beyond the natural lifespan of the old line parties, but went down to defeat. 

What happens next?

Trudeau stays on as an MP and interim PM. There will be a short and very intense race to replace Trudeau as leader, making that person the PM for what will probably be a very short time.

The new leader will be chosen by March 9 and automatically becomes PM. Then the new PM will potentially have just a little more than two weeks in office before the country is plunged into a spring election — less time than Charles Tupper, one of the so-called Fathers of Confederation. He was PM for two months in 1896.

That’s because the opposition party leaders say they will vote against the minority Liberal government as soon as Parliament returns, which will trigger a federal election. 

Closing thoughts

In 2015 when I ran against Justin Trudeau in the Papineau riding, the Liberals did a masterful job of out-maneuvering the NDP, then led by Tom Mulcair, and campaigned on reversing Conservative austerity, as well as the attacks on social programs and unions.

And since the Liberals failed to address any of the root causes of working class insecurity, Trudeau opened space for the far right Conservative backlash we are seeing now. 

Pierre Poilievre has been leading in the polls for months. During a recent interview, he told discredited former University of Toronto psychology professor Jordan Peterson, that he wants to get rid of the “socialist” policies of the Trudeau government, making the bizarre claim that social programs like healthcare siphons money from the poor to the super-wealthy.

It appears that Liberal decade is over, and the country is about to lurch to the right with cuts to social programs and a return to the Harper agenda.

Poilievre has been making three word promises on the carbon tax, housing and jobs, but he will not be able to deliver. Maybe he can axe the tax but he cannot build the homes.

Anne Lagacé Dowson is the chair of Ricochet’s board, a former CBC commentator and radio host, and a former NDP candidate.