Front Burner - The Liberals face a summer of discontent

Episode Date: June 29, 2022

The Liberal government faced tough questions this session on everything from accusations they pressured RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki on the Portapique investigation, to their decision to invoke the Emergencies Act in the winter, to inflation. Today, CBC Parliamentary Bureau senior writer Aaron Wherry explains why those questions won’t just disappear over the summer, and why the Liberals are “arguably in as difficult a stage as it has maybe ever been, which is a funny thing to say for a government that’s been through some pretty major crises.”

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Order. Order. Hello, I'm Jamie Poisson. The heckles and jeers of question period have gone silent for a few months as Parliament has adjourned for the summer. But just because the legislature is quiet doesn't mean it's smooth sailing ahead for the liberals.

Inflation is still bashing the country at levels not seen since the early 80s. And the conservatives are preparing to select a new leader, likely the fiery antagonistic Pierre Palliot, just in time for when Parliament returns come September. So today, I'm talking to Erin Wary to recap what the liberals have been up to before the break and why the party might be in for a pretty rocky season. Hey, Aaron. Hey, Jamie. So good to have you.

So before we get into some of the bumpier territory, because there is some, let's start with what the Liberal government has accomplished these last few months, because by their own measure, at least, they might have been feeling pretty productive coming out of the spring. And why? Yeah, I mean, it feels, it sort of feels like ancient history now. But it wasn't that long ago that they, you know, signed a childcare deal with Ontario, which gave them child care deals with every province and territory. They signed a confidence in supply agreement with the NDP, which should keep them in power until 2025. You know, and they passed a budget that had, you know, major spending commitments to innovation and clean energy.

and clean energy. And they had a decently productive legislative calendar with, you know, justice reforms and some other bills that got through that, you know, are decent pieces of the sort of larger agenda they want to go forward with. So, you know, there's been a lot going on, and it kind of gets lost in the shovel. But this wasn't an unproductive spring for them. It's just that a lot of other things kind of kept coming up. Yeah. And I guess let's talk about some of those other things. Now, there have been a bunch of stories, some big, some small, that the Liberals might not be feeling so good about as the summer kicks off.

And I want to start with a controversy from just before the break. It stems from documents that have been released as part of the inquiry into the Portapique massacre. The allegation, RCMP Commissioner Brenda Luckey asked officers for more information about the guns used to kill 22 people in Nova Scotia. It comes from notes taken by the Nova Scotia RCMP superintendent written shortly after the shooting. They say Luckey had promised that information to then-Public Safety Minister Bill Blair and the Prime Minister's office. And this was apparently tied to liberal gun control legislation. People might remember that Trudeau banned 1,500 types of assault-style weapons in the weeks after the massacre. So, Brenda Luckey has denied that she interfered. And how have the Liberals responded to this claim of police interference for political gain? Yeah, the Liberals have come out, the Prime Minister, our Emergency

Preparedness Minister Bill Blair have come out and said, we did not put any undue influence or pressure. It is extremely important to highlight that it is only police that determine what and when to release information. And sort of left it at that. The problem is that, you know, that leaves a bunch of unanswered questions of, OK, if there wasn't pressure, what exactly happened here? Did Brenda Luckey make a promise to the government? Was she pressured to make that promise? What exactly did she say in this conversation? And that has been kind of left unanswered. There hasn't really

been a detailed breakdown of exactly what the conversations were and who said what to who. And, you know, that has obviously led to lots of speculation about what happened and lots of, you know, leaping to various conclusions about what had happened. And it's eventually going to lead to committee hearings this summer to look into what happened. But in the meantime, it's sort of hanging out there as this kind of unsolved mystery. And I suppose, quote, undue pressure sort of leaves some wiggle room here, right? Like, like define undue. Yeah, it's, the undue is a curious word. And it will also remind people of the SNC-Lavalin experience where the governments came out and said we didn't exert any pressure. Jody Wilson-Raybould and I had a

conversation in September in which I emphasized to her that the decisions she makes as Attorney General, particularly in this matter, are her decision and I was not directing or pressuring her. And then, you know, Jody Wilson-Raybould came out and said actually there was a lot of pressure and then it got into a debate about what is pressure and, you know, Jody Wilson, Raybould came out and said, actually, there was a lot of pressure. And then it got into a debate about what is pressure. And, you know, so it's bringing back some kind of bad memories for the government. And it's just the lingering out there without answers. It either means that, you know, this is going to stay out there for a month or so and then eventually kind of get knocked down. Or it means, you know, they're going to be kind of dancing around this and then we're going to find out even Or it means, you know, they're going to be kind of dancing around this

and then we're going to find out even more and it's going to cascade from there in the summer. It's a big kind of unanswered question and it's a potentially pretty big cloud hanging over them. Worth noting here, I think that this information, the notes of this senior Mountie claiming the head of the RCMP, Lucky, promised these politicians that they'd release information about the guns, it wasn't included in the Federal Department of Justice's original submission to the inquiry. Right. And that's going to lead to other questions. It is in that way also reminiscent of

SNC-Lavalin, where there's just sort of, you start pulling on the thread, and then you kind of keep finding other things you want to ask about and figure out. And the lack of straightforward clarity and explanation and full transparency just sort of, in a way, just makes the situation worse. There's another significant frustration with this government right now surrounding their explanation for invoking the Emergencies Act after the anti-vaccine mandate freedom convoy camped out in Ottawa this past winter. And just to remind people, using this act was unprecedented. It gave the government extraordinary powers. The Liberals said it was necessary to end the protest. A parliamentary committee is now examining this decision. And it's not, I don't, it's not, it doesn't seem like it's going so great so far. What's been the main source of contention here?

So the issue here is that Public Safety Minister Marco Medellino, in his first appearance before the committee, said we acted on the basis of advice from law enforcement. So that was sort of left there. He didn't say who exactly provided that advice, what exactly the advice was. But he said that the using of the Emergencies Act was based on advice from law enforcement. And then, you know, understandably, opposition MPs, when they got the opportunity, started asking law enforcement sources, law enforcement figures and officials about that. They, though, framed the question in terms of, did you ask for the Emergencies Act to be used?

And the RCMP, the Ottawa police have said, no, we didn't ask for it. And so then the opposition stands up and says, well, look, you said you acted on advice. They say they didn't ask for it. He said over and over again, the law enforcement requested the Emergencies Act. Those were his words. We now know his words were not true. How can the prime minister have any faith in this minister? Will he ask this minister to resign? The government's response has been essentially to imply, like, look, there's a difference between asking for something and advising something, and law enforcement isn't supposed to ask for the Emergencies Act. And then adding to that, a deputy minister for Marco

Mendocino had a later committee appearance, and he said, well, look, the advice, it wasn't that the advice was to use the act. It was the advice was that they wanted the powers for the act, the powers that are within the act. And so that that ended in another round of, OK, well, what exactly are we talking about here? What is it? You know, how do you define advice? How do you define ask?

And and is there a big contradiction here? What happened? And, you know, again, part of the problem here seems to be that the opposition and the media is asking for information about arguing about whether it was advice, who advised it, what exactly the advice said. And it's possible that, you know, there's going to be sort of documented evidence that's going to come out either through the special parliamentary committee or through the official inquiry, judicial inquiry into the use of the Emergencies Act. But in the meantime, sort of like the situation with Brenda Luckey, everybody's kind of standing around arguing over what may or may not have happened without having any kind of real clarity or documents to kind of prove what happened. Right, right. I am thinking about

this exchange between NDP MP Matthew Green and Deputy Prime Minister Krista Freeland. Let me be very clear. and with all due respect, I have... Those two statements, by the way, they preclude neither of the above. It was kind of this testy back and forth, and Green clearly felt like he wasn't getting straight answers. Reputational damage when it comes to an economy, when it comes to a trading relationship, when it comes to Canada's reputation. This is just repeating the same answer. I have to say that I'm very concerned with the nature of the answers. I'm now the fourth intervention, and I'm not sure that you've brought any additional facts. I guess my question is, like, why can't cabinet, why can't the liberals

just decide that they're going to clearly state their reasoning here? Like, can they not just give a clearer explanation? Can they not just choose to do that? changes over information. They're just, they're, everybody's short on time. Witnesses are only there for an hour. MPs only get like five minutes for questions. Everything's conducted at the pace of like a lightning round on a game show. I feel like you could do a whole podcast about how dumb these are, but yeah. It's all, it's terrible. There's, if you actually wanted clarity of information, like parliamentary committees have found the absolute worst way to go about it. But the lot, like the sort of longer term, bigger picture issue here is that, you know, I don't think I would be hardly alone in saying this. This government is not very good at explaining itself and not very good at just stating clearly and directly, here's what happened. Here's why it happened. Here's what we were told.

Here's what we did. Here's why we did it's it's like they have a mental block where they just can't bring themselves they're worried that if they start speaking straightforwardly and clearly they'll get themselves in trouble and so they hesitate and then they want to think about it and then they want to maybe you know later they'll come back and go okay well here's what the explanation was and a lot of times you can get away with that in politics right you can sort of go well you know we're here to work hard for the middle class and those working hard to join it. And we've got Canadians backs. And people go, okay, well, that's, you know, that's what I want to hear. But they when it comes to actual details, there are situations like the Emergencies Act, like the Brenda Luckey situation, like SNC-Lavalin, you know, sorts of situations where

you just want them to come, you just need somebody to come out and say what exactly happened here, and they don't. And even if, you know, potentially the actual explanation is benign, we're sort of left in this vacuum of waiting around for an explanation. Why do you think that is, right? Like, why has this government not learned from what seemed like pretty objectively clear past mistakes, like the lack of clarity around SNC-Lavalin? So, I mean, this is a bit of armchair psychology, but personally, I think it all comes back to Trudeau. And he started out as a politician who was very willing to just sort of talk and he would say things off the top of his head and think out loud.

And the problem is that got him in trouble multiple times. Well, Peter, Justin Trudeau has done it again. Another unfortunate comment, which his rivals are happy to jam down his throat. Why aren't we talking more about the kind of humanitarian aid that Canada can and must be engaged in, rather than, you know, trying to whip out our CF18s and show them how big they are?

You know, it just doesn't work like that in Canada. The level of admiration I actually have for China, because their basic dictatorship is allowing them to actually turn their economy around on a dime and say, we need to go green as fast as, we need to start investing in solar. I mean, there is a flexibility that I know Stephen Harper must dream about

of having a dictatorship that he could do everything he wanted. So the sort of response to that was, be more disciplined in what you say. Stick to the simple messages, the straightforward messages, the broad messages. Don't try to get into a debate about the details. Try to keep things kind of simple. And for a lot of times that works,

right? Like if you're if you're just trying to win sort of the news of the day, you can sort of do that and get away with it. And if if there isn't a problem, you know, maybe in the end, people will kind of move on and they won't worry that you weren't immediately straightforward with an explanation. But in cases like this, you would think they would ask themselves at some point, like, well, shouldn't we just be more straightforward with these things, and then people will move on, and we can kind of clear more space for ourselves to do things. But instead, they seem to kind of go, well, don't worry, in the fullness of time, the details will come out and will look okay. But that just draws these things out for weeks and months, and really

creates this impression, rightly or wrongly, fairly or not, that they're not being truthful. So on top of everything that's been going on in and around Parliament Hill, there are also these staggering levels of inflation that the government has to contend with, right? Like just last week, StatsCan came out and said Canada's inflation rate is 7.7%, a rate not seen since the early 80s. And this is something just about everyone I know has been feeling, I'm sure you too. But Finance Minister Chrystia Phelan, she only really addressed this with a big speech mid-June. And talk to me a little bit about what she's had to say on the inflation front. Yeah, they came to it pretty belatedly in terms of figuring out what they wanted to say.

Their first response to the complaints from Conservatives and New Democrats about inflation was, look, this isn't a problem created in Canada. And inflation here isn't as bad as it is in other countries. And that means we all need to recognize the reality and be honest with Canadians about the reality that inflation, including the higher price of fuel, is a global phenomenon. It is being driven by Vladimir Putin's illegal war in Ukraine. And then they would say, well, you know, look, we're also we're doing child care. We're doing other things that are going to help people in the long run with their cost of living. And they didn't really, until this speech by the finance minister, really start to say, OK, here are the things we're actually doing that are going to help you with inflation. I understand keenly that millions of Canadians drive a long way to the store and that today

they will wince when they fill up their tank and when they buy their groceries. And I know that many of them are asking what their government is going to do about it. So that's what I want to talk about here today. You know, we've enhanced the Canada workers benefit. The Canada child benefit's been indexed to inflation. We've topped up OAS. You know, they've come up with this argument that there's all these things that we're already doing that are going to help you with inflation ultimately. But there's sort of two problems with it. One is they waited a couple months to get to this argument.

they waited a couple months to get to this argument. If Christopher Freeland had made this speech two months ago, you know, it might not have satisfied everyone, but it would have at least got it would have at least been sooner. And it would have at least kind of given them something they could say for themselves. And the other problem is that they didn't really have anything new to offer. There wasn't any kind of like, okay, we saw, you know, inflation is a problem now. And so here's the new thing we're going to do to fix it. It was more like, here are the things we have already been planning to do or we're already doing that will, by luck, end up helping you with inflation. And so those are the kind of the two, you know, the two problems with this sort of political approach. Like inflation is one of those things, as you say, everyone feels it. That makes it unlike, you know, 90% of other political issues,

right? Like, it's so tangible. It's so immediate. It's so direct. Yeah, it's not like the Emergencies Act or what Brenda Luckey did or did not do. It's a very tangible thing that everyone regardless of whether they're paying attention to politics is going to understand. And there's a long history of governments contending with inflation and it just grinding away at their popularity because, you know, as much as the liberals can stand up and say, look, inflation is caused by coming out of the pandemic and the, you know, the war in Ukraine. If you're suffering economic hardship and you're mad about it, you're not going to be satisfied to go, well, it's Vladimir Putin's fault and it's COVID-19's fault. You're going to say, I want someone to fix it. And I'm

going to blame whoever happens to be in power at the moment. Well, what do you make of that argument that it's not the government's fault that we're feeling this crunch right now? Because obviously, there are critics who say that they did have a role here. Obviously, there are other things that contribute to inflation, like the war in Ukraine, but that all of this spending has increased inflation in this country, all of this government spending. Yeah, so the spending argument, it has a certain immediate appeal, right? You can say, well, look, the government spent all this money, and that's why there's all this money sloshing around in the economy, and that's driving up inflation. And if there was less money, there wouldn't be as much inflation. And there's a couple of weaknesses, I guess, with that argument. One is that, yeah, okay, maybe this money has

contributed to it. But you know, let's be serious here, there is inflation in basically every country on earth. So, you know, Justin Trudeau didn't cause that. The other problem with the argument is that it kind of it relies on a very short term memory, you know, right? Like, the reason that money was spent is because people were worried about their jobs and paying bills during the pandemic. And so, if you want to say that the problem was too much spending, you kind of have to take two steps back and then go, okay, well, what, you know, would you have given people less support during the pandemic? Is that the argument you want to make? The people who are complaining about spending don't quite want to go that far either. The issue with the government spending is kind of almost more acute than that.

So it makes them vulnerable because any time you spend and things go wrong or things don't go well, people will go, well, why did you spend all that money? Like, well, maybe that was the mistake. The other problem is that now they're in a situation where interest rates are going up, inflation is a problem, and spending more money is just going to inflame that problem. And so they're in a position where people need support, people need help. But if the government now puts a lot of money towards support, they're just going to make the problem worse. And so they're kind of stuck in a spot where they are being asked to do something to help. But there's a potential downfall where if they do help, they're just going to make the situation worse. Almost in their response so far, you can get the feeling that they're kind of hoping that what they've done already will somehow kind of allow them to skate through the next six to 12 months,

because they don't want to put any more money in to the system system because that could both politically and economically have big problems for them. Right. You could hear this logic. Freeland was on our colleague Rosie Barton's show on Sunday. She's talking about how she thinks Canadians are going to have a soft landing when it comes to inflation. Though I imagine that could really backfire because there's no evidence right now that this landing is definitely going to be soft, right? No. And if you go back to her speech, she kind of started to prepare people for the possibility that it's not going to be that soft a landing. I think only a naive or arrogant or foolhardy person would claim to have certainty about where we are going. It is a time of significant uncertainty. It feels like they're trying to calibrate it in a way to find the soft

landing. But I don't get the sense that anybody's super confident it's definitely going to be a soft landing. And, you know, in a way, this is where that NDP deal becomes either a liability for the NDP or a huge asset to the liberals and maybe to the NDP if they can use it as a bargaining tool. You know, if the liberals were governing day to day right now, they would have to have real concerns about the possibility that they're going to go into an election next fall or next spring. going to go into an election next fall or next spring, because, you know, the opposition parties, you know, especially once the Conservatives have a new leader, are going to look at this and say, well, this government's facing inflation, they're struggling to find a response, let's take them out now. Whereas the Liberals with a deal can at least maybe say, okay, we've got three years, if we can get through this, you know, we can hopefully kind of get things pointed back in the right direction in time for the next election. But the flip side of that is that they have a big problem to deal

with right now. And they can't be complacent about that. If they're complacent about it, no amount of time is necessarily going to save them. Right. But the New Democrats called Freeland's speech on inflation insulting, right? They're arguing for things like excess profit taxes on oil and gas companies and upping the Canada child benefit even more, GST rebate. So could this become a problem for the Liberals in this Liberal NDP deal? Yeah. So there's two things. One is that if inflation continues to be a problem and the liberals don't seem responsive to it, does there come a point where the NDP says we're walking away from this deal?

The other thing is that talking to economists, you know, one of the things they do say that, you know, might be beneficial right now is something like the GST rebate, because it's targeted to lower incomes. So it's unlikely to have a huge inflationary impact, but it will also be targeted at people who are least equipped to deal with rising costs. So it's possible the NDP has an idea there that the liberals should be latching on to. And it wouldn't shock me to see the liberals turn around in the fall and say, yeah, actually, we're going to do that. The question then will just be, well, why didn't you do that six months earlier? Why didn't you do this in April or May or June? And again, it seems like the liberals are kind of hoping that what they're doing right now is enough to just get them through the next few months.

And then if they need to, they can do more. But of course, the longer you wait, the more questions will be, why didn't you do it sooner? A simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here. You may have seen my money show on Netflix. I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people and I have some startling numbers to share with you. Did you know that of the people I speak to, 50% of them do not know their own household income?

That's not a typo. 50%. That's because money is confusing. In my new book and podcast, Money for Couples, I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this episode, but we have talked about on the show before, there's also chaos at the airports and passport offices. And of course, any frustrations Canadians may be feeling with the government and the cost of living now will likely be voiced very strongly by whomever the next conservative leader is. And that leader will be picked before Parliament resumes again in the fall. leader will be picked before Parliament resumes again in the fall. Yeah, you've got this convergence of a bunch of different things that are all, you know, even on airports and passports, like Canada isn't the only country struggling with these things. But that might be an explanation.

It's not much of an excuse. And the Liberals, you know, so instead of kind of going into a summer and just kind of putting their feet up and relaxing, they're going to have to worry about all these things. And the convergence of these things, you know, inflation, passports, airports, the Emergencies Act, Lucky, all of these things could really tee up the next conservative leader to come in in the fall, especially if, as it's assumed, he's considered the presenter of Frontrunner. If it's Pierre Polyev, who has campaigned very stridently on a populist message of government is the problem, government is making things worse, government

spending is making things worse, you know, all this sort of adds fuel to the fire he's trying to start. And he could really come in with a lot of arguments to make against this liberal government. And, you know, he's not just coming in as a moderate who's saying, you know, let's just tweak a few things. He's coming in saying, you know, let's tear down what the liberals have been doing for the last seven years. And so, you know, in a way, the liberals are facing big questions and big challenges about their management of the economy and their ability to run government, and their ability to be truthful. And it's going to kind of enhance that direct challenge to what they stand

for. And that, you know, really challenges them to remake the argument for what they've been doing the last seven years and what they presumably want to do for the next three and perhaps longer, in terms of showing that it's responsive to the problems of today and that it's a better answer than whatever Pierre Polyev or whoever the next conservative leader might offer. You know, the government hasn't hit a comfortable stage here. The government is now arguably in as difficult a stage as it's maybe ever been, which is a funny thing to say for a government that's been through some pretty big crises. But it's a very challenging environment for them.

And the pressure on them to execute and get it right is immense. Erin, thank you very much for this. This was really fun. I guess unless you are someone who's listening who works for this liberal government because it seems like you're probably not going to get much of a vacation. Yeah, we can take a vacation.

The government probably shouldn't. Yeah, cool. Thank you. Thank you. All right, so before we go today, just a quick update to part of this story. On Tuesday afternoon after Aaron and I spoke, the Liberal government agreed to waive cabinet confidence over documents related to its invocation of the Emergencies Act. The move comes in response to a request from the head of the public inquiry examining the use of the act.

That's all for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening. We'll talk again tomorrow. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.