Last night was a long tense one here in Canada for political people. Especially for the two main candidates for Prime Minister, Mark Carney, and Pierre Polievre.
Carney had been parachuted into my own riding (constituency) as he needed a safe Liberal seat to gain a presence and a mandate in the parliament. The incumbent was dropped by party HQ to facilitate this, and Carney won his seat comfortably.
Polievre was not so fortunate. In what was considered a safe rural seat, in the corn and soybean growing farmland of Carleton (beyond the suburbs of our capital, Ottawa), he was summarily defeated by newcomer, Bruce Fanjoy of the Liberal party. This was something the Liberals have wanted to achieve since Polievre left his former role as Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s attack dog, to become leader of the Tory party.
However, the evening wasn’t totally an outstanding Liberal victory, They have won a mandate of sorts, with a 43.5% to 41.4% split in the popular vote, and )at local time 545am) a projected seat count in parliament of 168 to 144 for the Tories, 23 for the Bloc Québécois, 7 for the NDP and 1 for the Greens. Some of the pollsters were close on the percentages, but they mostly missed the seats at distributions.
172 seats are required for a majority and the Liberal party did not make that magic number. So, the horse trading will begin shortly.
Canada does not have a tradition or culture of forming coalition governments, as is common in the twenty-six counties, and indeed in EU countries. Power sharing is also an unfamiliar habit, whether voluntary or otherwise. The anticipated outcome will ne that a smaller party will be asked, cajoled, or brined (with political leverage) to support a minority government in a confidence and supply arrangement,
This was actually the nature of recent Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s last government before he resigned. He needed such an arrangement with the left leaning NDP and in return they supported his government until his resignation recently.
The NDP obtained some progressive commitments and recent programs enacted from Trudeau including a new federal plan for free dental care for senior citizens (over 65) and replacement worker legislation. The law — which received royal assent last summer — bans the use of replacement workers at federally regulated workplaces during a strike. But other agreements had not been yet implemented, including a federal pharmacare program, and the NDP pulled the plug on their support for that government last Fall. This decision kicked off a campaign to unseat Trudeau by Polievre and directly to the election yesterday.
This recent history review helps put into context the difficulties that lie ahead for Carney to form a minority government with external party support. There is a new complication, in that this has been a dreadful election for the NDP as many of their supporters strategically voted for the Liberals this time, to strengthen the position of a Canadian government as it fights back against the chaos, malevolence and aggression of Trump’s Tarriff war and annexation threats against Canada.
The Trump aggression has been the single motivating issue that has resulted in a high turnout at the polls. Canadians are united against the threats from Trump but have different ideas on how best and who best to deal with these. The election results leave it in the hands of Carney, an Irish Canadian with global experience as governor of both the bank of Canada and also the Bank of England.
Indeed, it has been reported that Carney orchestrated through his connections, a sell off of US treasury bonds that pressured Trump to retreat from some of his outlandish, inconsistent, and changeable ideas on tariffs.
The election results also exposed some of the fracture lines in Canada’s political life. The regional differences between the East/Central Canada, and the West are bleeding red and blue. Then there is the unique politics of Québec. If Carney looks to the support of the Bloc Québécois, as numbers suggest he must do, there may be unpalatable demands from these Québec sovereigntists that the rest of Canada will not tolerate. Carney’s work is cut out for him.
The NDP under Jagmeet Singh surprised Trudeau last fall by withdrawing their support overnight, without warning. A negotiation with BQ to support a Carney government through a confidence and supply arrangement is unlikely to last a full term either. An earnest effort to govern as a minority government without such an arrangement is less likely to survive more than a breathing space period.
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