At Issue - What does Carney need from Mexico?

Episode Date: September 19, 2025

At Issue this week: Prime Minister Mark Carney goes to Mexico to try and shore up a new trade partnership. Chrystia Freeland and David Lametti leave the Liberal team. And the federal government asks the Supreme Court to limit how provinces use the notwithstanding clause. Rosemary Barton hosts Chantal Hébert, Andrew Coyne and Althia Raj.

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why does the best beer nation have the worst beer taxation? This is a CBC podcast. Hey there, I'm Rosemary Barton this week on At Issue, the podcast edition for Thursday, September 18th. I would say it's the best date if you look at the parliamentary calendar. Over a decade. And yet the Prime Minister is busy, looking busy, flying around, grip and grin, pretending to do a lot while doing very little. So this week we're asking, what will the next budget tell us about Canada's spending habits? and what might come from the Prime Minister's trade mission to Mexico

plus what changes the Garni's cabinet and office mean for the government. So what will the next budget tell us about Canada's spending habits? What might come from this trade mission, brief trade mission to Mexico? I'm Rosemary Barton, here to break it down tonight. Chantelle Iber, Andrew Coyne, Althea Raj. Andrews, let's start with you. We've got a date now, perhaps a little bit later for the budget than we anticipated on Monday pushing into November.

But all those things that I mentioned there are factors that are making it difficult to come up with, I guess, that's what the government says, a budget for right now. What do you make of where they have landed on the date? Well, it may also be because they're struggling to make the numbers add up. Look, the situation is deteriorating. This time, the last budget, which was 18 months ago, the budget for this year was supposed to be 39, budget deficit for this year was supposed to be 39 billion. By the last spring liberal platform, it was 62 billion. The C.D. Howell Institute in just, July said it's $92 billion, but the economy shrunk since then.

It shrunk certainly three months in a row, maybe six months. So we could be looking at a number over $100 billion for all we know by this point. So we've had that message, that letter from the finance minister to his colleagues saying you've got to cut spending by 15% over three years, but then we find out that doesn't apply to about two-thirds of federal spending. When the C.D. Howe Institute looked at the numbers, they said that adds up to about a $22 billion cut over three years from a budget of over $500 billion. With a deficit of $100 billion, with all the defense spending coming down the road in years to come,

I don't think we're close to coming to grips with the fiscal situation. Prime Minister said the other day that they're still going to just achieve cuts in the federal payroll from attrition. I suspect that they're punting a bit. I think they're going to try to put off the really hard work until after the next election, if then. But part of why Mark Carney is down in Mexico is not just to make sure the relationship is good, but it's also because, obviously, the numbers are in part that way because of what has happened with the tariff war, and in part, because as Andrew points out,

some of the big spending promises the government made. Is that something you think, Chantal, that Canadians are going to buy, that as Mark Carney says, we are in the worst economic crisis of our time? I don't know if they're going to buy that we are in the worst economic crisis of our time, but they will certainly buy the fact that we are in the... the least predictable and least positive juncture in a long, long time. And in a situation where we lived through the 90s and the deficit wall then and Paul Martin doing what he had to do.

But at that point, we mostly had control over what we were doing. Other things were stable. We didn't have this tariff issue. We kind of knew where all the marks were. This isn't the case. There's a lot of things we don't know. We don't even know if in six months the U.S. will still want to renegotiate Kuzma or just say we don't really care about this deal anymore unless you sign up for more concessions that will cost.

But I agree with Andrew, the economy is deteriorating fast. unemployment is going up quickly, and that's not going to stop. And I'm starting to think that maybe in hindsight the government regrets not having brought in a quickie budget last June. Rather than half this situation, especially since last June, no opposition party, including the conservatives, would have felt like bringing down the government. But the more the weeks go on and the situation deteriorates, the more that temptation will be there. I'm not predicting an election on that basis, but still it becomes more complicated. Then the other question the liberals have to ask themselves is, if it's going to get worse, do we want to survive the budget and delay it to weaker in an election?

those are all questions to which I don't have answers, but they're all facing the government at this point. Yeah, and I mean, the other question they could be asking themselves, Althea, is there any promise or thing we should be scaling back here because we're in such dire straits? And it doesn't seem that that is a consideration at this point, but you have to wonder why that's not also on the table. Well, it seems like climate change has definitely taken a backseat, I would say.

It's interesting that Jean-Tadden mentions, like maybe the liberals would, want to have an election right now because that is certainly the sentiment among the opposition, i.e., nobody wants to vote for this budget because everybody fears this sticker shock on the size of the deficit. And there seems to be poison pills for every opposition party in this budget, either too much spending or too many cuts or cuts that we're told will happen later to Andrew's point. So I find that very interesting. The other point I think that's, worth mentioning, I agree with everything my colleagues have said so far, but that the prescriptions that Mark Carney has outlined for this moment in time are prescriptions that he talks about

in his book values, which is from 2021. And a lot of these prescriptions sound pretty similar to Canadians if they paid attention to what Justin Trudeau was saying, especially in the early part of his mandate. It's just that the price tags are a lot bigger now. So I think at some point the government is going to have to explain why it thinks it can succeed with similar policy, at least similar philosophically intude policies. I'm thinking about like the housing spend, for example, where Justin Trudeau failed.

That, I think, is a reason why, perhaps, not just the opposition, but the liberals might start thinking about going now rather than going in the spring on the spring budget. Andrew, how long will people do you think give the prime minister to try and turn things around? It hasn't been very long. be fair. And, you know, you would at least get a budget to sort of see, I think Canadians

would give him a budget to sort of see where are things at. Can he make some improvements here with his economic vision? Yeah. I mean, I don't know how many months or years people will give them. I think, as you say, they've given him the benefit of the doubt until now, probably rightly so. The budget will certainly be a reckoning point. I think with these things, there has to be a sense that you're getting your arms around the problem, that you're making progress against, that you know what you're doing. If you look like events are getting away from you, that you're running on the spot to catch up, then people can smell that. They can smell when a government is losing confidence and competence in the face of large

problems. So that's the absolute lowest bar that they have to get over in this budget is look like they've actually grasped the size of the problem and have a plan to get forward towards it. As I say, I doubt whether they're going to execute the whole of the plan at this point because the spending cuts at this point to me look like they're going to have to be a lot deeper than what they're talking about. We are going to have, for example, to start talking about a reform of cuts to transfers to the provinces and transfers to individuals. You cannot wall

off such enormous parts of the budget from any cuts when you're engaged in this kind of exercise. The other thing they have to be thinking about is how do we start grappling with the growth problem in this country? It really is true in the long run that if you want to get out of your fiscal hole you have to get faster growth. It doesn't solve things in the short run, but in the long run, that's absolutely key to restoring fiscal health to this country. Okay, about 30 seconds, Chantel. Yes. At this point, the benefit of the doubt is in part due to Mark Carney, but in part because voters are saying they're not seeing that the alternative would do better.

So Mr. Pueleev basically has the next few months to convince more Canadians that he could handle all of these issues in a more efficient way than Mark Carney. And that, so far has not happened. Well, and you wonder if you were in an economic crisis, again, is there an advantage there for the current Prime Minister? Maybe not, but there might be as well. Okay, we're going to leave this part here. When we come back, we'll take a look at the departure of Christia Freeland from Cabinet.

So what do changes in Carney's Cabinet mean? Is the Prime Minister rebranding the Liberal Party? That's next. And how about any diplomatic appointment? Should we be expecting to see you in that House for the entire term? or what's on the horizon for you? Right now I'm focused entirely on working and serving my community and this government. So what do these changes mean?

And is the Prime Minister trying to make a team that better fits his needs and his image? Let's bring everybody back. Chantelle, Andrew and Althea? Althea, your thoughts on maybe you want to start with Christia Freeland or some of the other moves that we have seen or are expecting? I think the general theme is that Mark Carney is managing disappointment. Ms. Freeland, I'm told, has barely met with, any of her stakeholders at transport.

So she obviously had her foot out the door for a while now. David Lometti was offered a job that was held by somebody who didn't leave the job. So that was an interesting HR issue to resolve. And David Lomedi is a close friend of Mark Carney's. Bill Blair, Jonathan Wilkinson, is another name that's kind of been rumored to be headed towards the exit. these are two former cabinet ministers who assumed that they would have a place at Mark Carney's cabinet table and there was no room for them. So they, again, I guess getting a nice little reward. Now there are others who expected to be appointed to cabinet and warrant. Are they going

to take their own leave? There may be people leaving for policy issues as well in the months to come and there may be people who leave for the Ontario Liberal leadership. I think what it shows, though, and to your point, there were talks in the lead-up to the March-April election, that there were people Mark Carney wanted to bring in, but they just didn't have time. They had private sector jobs, and they couldn't get out of it. So there are some nice safe seats in Toronto that have opened up.

But I think part of it is not this grand strategy, I'm not Justin Trudeau, although this government is kind of obsessed with that theme. I think it's really like you have all these, people who don't want to be here and could make your my life miserable, what can I do for them? Chantal. I also think the circumstances that brought Mark Carney, one to the liberal leadership and then to that quick election did not allow him to build the team. So we are seeing another thing that is unprecedented. You do not usually see the parliament return for the first time under a so-called new government and see a leading figure of the government resigned from capital.

and be replaced by nobody. And that's the tell. We did not swear in a new transport minister to replace Christopher Land this week. We added our portfolio to somebody else's job. Same with internal trade. And that kind of tells you that they're keeping those seats open, not for people who are currently in caucus,

but because they hope at some point to have, I suspect, a bunch of by-elections to bring in the people that Mark Carney, would have if he'd had months to prepare for an election rather than a couple of weeks. Now, that being said, the list that Althea gave you mostly involves what would be considered safe liberal seats at this point. So if you're going to talk someone into coming, you basically can say, well, you know, you probably will win the election. It's not going to be a huge fight to win a by election. We'll see, and that presumes the government survives. That should, that's probably

plan A. Government survives budget. Then does this. Plan B, we go in an election and all these star candidates show up. It is, it would be hard not to be a little bit cynical watching this, though, Andrew. You know, people who just wanted an election, either leaving, yeah, a little bit. I'm just speaking for myself, leaving Cabinet to get these positions that the Prime has come up with, be appointed to diplomatic positions. And, you know, we might find ourselves with three, four, maybe more by-elections in the new year right after having an election. I don't know. I don't know what that tells us about the people that chose to run again, the importance of being in cabinet. I don't know what it tells us.

I don't know either. But while we're being cynical, I can't help noticing the timing. Maybe it's coincidental. But Ms. Freeland leaving right after it's revealed, she may have misled Parliament, inadvertently or otherwise, in the matter of the BC Ferry's contract, where she told the House that the federal government had no involvement in it, even as liberal officials were meeting behind closed doors, discussing how they could spend a $1 billion loan for the purchase from the Canada Infrastructure Bank. So maybe that's coincidental, but it's awfully interesting. We've got committees clamoring for her to appear and explain herself on this,

so maybe a good time to get out of Dodge. Maybe, although she was looking for a way to get out of Dodge before that. The timing is interesting. But look, any prime minister is going to want to put his own stamp, his own style, particularly when he's coming in, replacing a very unpopular predecessor. And yes, one does hear that he wants to bring in some people from the corporate sector. I've heard a couple of names in the last couple of days. This is a business liberal.

He reminds me more and more of an early 60s Pearson liberal in style and in content. And that would be in keeping. I hope he has noticed that since the Pearson 60s, women have taken seats at the table that they're not planning to give up to return to that golden era. And let me be un-synical for two seconds. Please. I think Christian freelance talents are better used in those new endeavors than they were sitting back at transport. It does make sense after 10 years in the business to look around.

I held all the top jobs. I'm not going to become the leader and the prime minister. And she does have talents that can be more productive for Canada on the Ukraine front than sitting, trying to figure out what Air Canada is trying to get itself into. Yeah, and we're also told she's got other things that she's considering internationally and otherwise, so that won't be the only thing probably that she ends up doing. Althea, last word to you. I was going to bite on your cynical comment.

and just say, this help explain why Mark Kearney was so eager to have a by-election to get Pierre Puehliev back in the House of Commons and why you heard no liberals complain about the price tag of that by-election. Because he knew he was going to have to do it soon himself. Is that what you're in furry? Yes. Does it tell you something, though, about the way he formed that first cabinet, that maybe he knew what he was doing, that he had. I think it's very clear that he did not, really. I'm sorry. Like, the immigration minister needs to be shuffled.

I don't know what happened with that vetting process. And there are other people who, it's not just the opposition who has that viewpoint. So I think that there will be, there would have been a cabinet shuffle even without these departures. This just makes it a much wider, a wider one. And I'm not sure that, frankly, she can survive until 2026. I think there's a lot of questions around the public safety minister as well. The public safety minister, all right. And shall tell the last word there?

No, I think you can figure that this cabinet is like the one that we saw just after the liberal leadership, not meant to go to distance. Okay. We're going to take a short break here, but when we come back, we'll talk about Quebec's Bill 21 and concerns from the federal government about provinces circumventing charter rights. That's next. So what's to be made of the position put forward by the federal government?

what could it tell us about where this is headed when it gets to the Supreme Court? Let's bring everybody back, Shantel, Andrew, Althea. Chantel, so this was the federal government's factum where they sort of laid out some of their views on the notwithstanding clause. I don't think there was anything surprising in it, but tell me what you made of it and what you made of what it tells us about where this is going. Well, two things that it's not about. The first is it's not really about the preemptive views of the not automatic clause. And what does that mean? It means that you present the bill.

You don't even wait for the law to be not charter friendly to say we're exempting it from the charter. That is not where the federal government decided to go. The other place it decided not to go was to go into the core issues of the bill, i.e. secularism, how it's applied, et cetera. You talked about civil servants, public servants, not being allowed. out to wear religious symbols at work. The federal factum is silent on that. The road that they take, they take two roads. One, they argue that because the notwithstanding clause only applies for five years at the time

and you need to renew it, it is meant to be temporary, i.e., you cannot use it repeatedly five years after five years after five years, because that would amount to eliminating a right and basically amending the Constitution through the background. So that's their first argument. The other argument or the missing argument on secularism, I think is probably a wise route that they took. They are asking the Supreme Court, they're saying, we believe that courts should pronounce

on the content of bills even when the clause is used because it informs the public debate, it informs the political debate. In clear, they're asking the Supreme Court to say about Bill 21 what the federal factum does not say. Andrew. It's, I'll agree with everything that Shantel said. It's a remarkably modest, I might even say, timid document.

It doesn't go after the core of the issue, doesn't even go after preemptive use of the thing. I mean, who can be against judges actually being able to inform the public on what happened? Or who can be against the idea that you cannot simply extinguish a right in the guise of suspending it? And even so, you saw an enormous reaction, particularly from conservatives on this, that this was a violation of constitutional understandings. It was going to lead to separation of Quebec and governments ignoring the charter, et cetera. And the core of that is this idea that there was an understanding, there was a constitutional bargain in 1982 that involved the not-wistanding clause. Yes, there was.

But what was at the heart of that understanding was, and people who were involved said so very clearly at the time, that the notwithstanding clause would be used only sparingly, if at all, would be for emergencies, for crazy court rulings that had a terrible impact on the public interest. That's not what we're dealing with here. That's not what we've been dealing with with the repeated use of the notwithstanding clause in recent times, eight times in the last eight years. And I think it is entirely behoovement for the federal government to say, look, we need to get back to something closer to the understanding that was signed in 1982.

as Shantel said, it amounts to unilaterally amending the Constitution. Althea. Okay, so I agree with almost everything that was said. There are lots of people who disagree with giving judges the power to do that. And the federal government is asking the court to give future judges, not a test, but to give them the ability to kind of design their own test based on the context of whatever right is being infringed in that particular case. So there's a lot of leeway, and that's why you have a lot of conservatives and not just

conservatives, but people who believe that the final say should rest with legislators, not judges, who find the government's factum really problematic. I will say I was very surprised to read this, because this is a far cry from Justin Trudeau in 2015 and 2019 saying that. You know, La Laistae in Quebec was, this is not the way of Canada, basically, and that he was going to fight it on the merits of the law. It is not even the way that Mark Carney expressed concerns about Bill 21 during the election campaign, where he said he was opposed to the preemptive use of the clause. Now, I'm told that government was informed, advised that they were going to highly likely lose an argument that said, we don't think that the notwithstanding clause should be used preemptively. But what is wild about reading all these factums, and I didn't read them all because there's like 50, but the scope and the breadth of all the arguments put forward, it's, if you were a law clerk, you'd probably be in heaven.

But it is really interesting all the different arguments people have found to contest this law. Chantelle, you've got 10 seconds. We'll talk about it again. I know we will. Which probably means that we will not get a decision on this from the court before next fall's Quebec election. There you go. We'll see, but that might work out for everybody. Or maybe in time for referendums. Okay.

Oh, my God. We'll talk about it again. Maybe not that last part. We'll talk about it. Thank you. That's at issue for this week. Are you looking forward to that budget, even if it's got cuts? Let us know what you think. Send us an email. We are at ask at cbc.ca. You can catch me on Rosemary Barton Live Sundays at 10 a.m. Eastern. We'll be back here next week.

Thanks. For more CBC podcasts, go to cBC.ca.ca slash podcasts.