Canada's dysfunctional family Christmas

The Prime Minister's lump-of-coal gift to Canadians is more chaos

Dave Chan/Getty Images

The country is in such shambles these days, it’s hard to shock me. But finance minister Chrystia Freeland’s bombshell resignation from cabinet managed to do it. I had not expected to spend the leadup to Christmas frantically toggling between TV, YouTube, podcasts, and online reporting and commentary, as adrenaline-filled as if I’d chugged a dozen cups of coffee, gobsmacked by a Canada I no longer recognize — but here we are.

The deputy prime minister stunned many with her open letter to Trudeau, released on Twitter Monday morning. According to Freeland, the prime minister asked her to step aside on Friday, but nevertheless expected her to deliver Monday’s Fall Economic Statement, unveiling a $62-billion deficit. Freeland’s letter also referenced Donald Trump’s economic nationalism and tariff threats, arguing that now was not the time for “costly political gimmicks” — an apparent reference to the GST holiday and the $250 government cheques — “which we can ill afford and which make Canadians doubt that we recognize the gravity of the moment.”

Just when we thought things could not get any worse in Canada — just as we were all prepared to log off in frustration and forget about politics for the holiday season — the country has fallen off an entirely new cliff.

Amid the turmoil, Trudeau shows no signs of backing down. This, despite the fact that Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has demanded that Trudeau call an election, that Bloc Québécois leader Yves-François Blanchet has said Trudeau must call an election in January, and that NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has openly called for his resignation. Many of Trudeau’s own MPs have also called for him to step down, including Anthony Housefather, who has said that Trudeau is past his “shelf life.” Even The Toronto Star editorial board has called on the prime minister to resign.

Add to all of that ordinary Canadians, who have sent signal after signal that they are fed up with Trudeau — in the polls (an Abacus survey from yesterday found just 11% believed Trudeau deserved to be re-elected) and in byelections, including one yesterday in Cloverdale-Langley City, which saw the Conservatives clobber the Liberals. What more will it take for Trudeau to get the message?

Trudeau’s former parliamentary secretary Celina Caesar-Chavez has pointed out that Freeland is just the latest in a line of female Liberals to be thrown under the bus by Trudeau, including herself, Jane Philpott, and Jody Wilson-Raybould. (As Lean Out guest Stephen Maher noted in The Toronto Star, Trudeau is quite the “proud feminist.”) But I must say that I find it difficult to muster any sympathy for Freeland. Let’s not forget that she froze the bank accounts of non-violent protesters, refusing to clarify whether small donors to the Freedom Convoy would be swept up in that profoundly illiberal dragnet. I still remember the panicked emails I got from members of the public who had donated miniscule amounts to a popular, grassroots movement — and had no idea whether they’d be able to buy groceries going forward. Not exactly the picture of a progressive, liberal democracy, is it?

The mainstream media seems to have amnesia around this abuse of power, with much of the commentary so far this week reading as outraged on behalf of Freeland, highlighting her competence and her years of loyalty to the prime minister. But I fail to see why she should be celebrated, having played a key role in a governmental overreach so glaring that it earned a rebuke from the Federal Court. Nor should she be rewarded for standing by a leader who has long overstayed his welcome. And let’s not ignore the fact that, as finance minister, she wears the deficit.

Ultimately, Freeland’s resignation is shocking but not surprising. The Liberal Party has demonstrated time and time again that its guiding principle is self-interest, so it’s predictable that Freeland would act in her own best interest. The real kicker here is that our country’s stability now rests on the most fragile of foundations, weeks before a potential tariff war with the United States.

Last night, Freeland reportedly received a standing ovation at an emergency caucus meeting. The prime minister, meanwhile, appeared largely unfazed by the day’s developments, full of his customary swagger speaking at a donor event. Probably because he knew today was the last sitting day of Parliament before winter break— and that, as Lean Out guest Jen Gerson has argued, all he had to do was get through the day. Then the holidays would arrive, and tempers would cool. And voila, he would have bought himself time. Again.

Before everyone in Ottawa breaks for the season — armed with the PMO’s lump-of-coal Christmas gift of more chaos — let’s take a look at where we are at as a country.

We are in the grips of a serious housing crisis. (Housing minister Sean Fraser resigned from cabinet yesterday.) We are grappling, too, with a serious cost-of-living crisis. (The Hub reports that Canadians spend about 17.5% more to purchase the same things they bought five years ago, with food and shelter seeing price increases of 30% since 2019.) A tragic opioid crisis is killing our most vulnerable. It’s difficult for many to find a family doctor. Food bank usage has skyrocketed to two million monthly visits. Violent crime is up. Productivity is down. Our decades-long, pro-immigration consensus has collapsed. Antisemitic incidents have increased 670% in the past year. Monopolies and duopolies and oligopolies dominate our markets, making daily life expensive and dysfunctional. (The Canadian Transportation Agency, for instance, has a backlog of more than 80,000 air passenger complaints.) Pandemic vaccine mandates and the invocation of the Emergencies Act remain gaping wounds at the heart of our country’s psyche, and we have yet to see any real accountability.

The civil service has ballooned under Trudeau, and, according to The Globe and Mail, at least $116.8 million in federal contracts have been awarded to McKinsey and Company since 2015. Our federal government and its bureaucrats have been embroiled in scandal after scandal, with offences ranging from gross incompetence to false identity claims and fraud. If all of that was not enough, Health Canada just released its report on MAID for 2023, showing that we are now a nation of despair, with medically-assisted suicides accounting for one in twenty Canadian deaths.

Can it be any wonder that Canadians have lost faith in our country?