The Current - One word to describe 2025 politics? Our National Affairs Panel weighs in

Episode Date: December 29, 2025

As 2025 comes to a close, Canadian politics looks very different than it did a year ago. Prime Minister Mark Carney wraps up his first year in office leading a minority government. It was a year that saw Justin Trudeau step aside, a surprise election, and a tariff war. Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre lost his seat and now faces tough questions about his leadership. All of this has unfolded as Donald Trump’s second presidency continues to reshape Canada’s political and economic reality. To take stock of the year, and to look ahead to what 2026 might bring, we convene our year-end national affairs panel with Rosemary Barton, Ryan Tumilty, and Rob Shaw.

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In fact, the entire Canadian political landscape was served up a new reality this year, a federal election that resulted in a minority liberal government and the leader of the official opposition losing his own seat, only to later win one in another province. And this year saw Canada's relationship with United States evolving. So as we say bye-bye to 2025 and hello to 26, we've convened our National Affairs panel. Rosemary Barton is CBC's chief political correspondent. Ryan Tummeltie is a political reporter with the Toronto star, and Rob Shaw is a political correspondent for Czech News in Victoria.

Good morning to all three of you. Good morning. Let's do a quick go-round just to kick things off. And Rosie, let me begin with you. What word or phrase would you use to describe Canadian politics in 2025? I suspected you might ask that kind of question. So I was readying myself. Tumultuous, I think, is what I'm going to go with.

And also, like, incredibly dramatic. If you think back to where we were last year, we were waiting to see if Justin Trudeau was going to quit. And Mark Carney was not even officially a politician. I don't think I've ever lived through such a dramatic year in politics where really almost everything changed. And the things that we suspected might happen, i.e. Pierre Puelev, becoming prime minister because he was head in the polls. by 20 plus points didn't, not only didn't happen, but he didn't win his own seat. It has been a total upending of the landscape, and we can get more into that in terms of also the way Mark Carney is redefining the Liberal Party. And frankly, really astonishing almost every turn, in part because of Donald Trump and in part because of all these changes happening domestically.

But listen, why I love politics is what this year has all been about. Yeah, certainly no end of things to talk about this year. Ryan, what about you? How would you characterize or a word or a phrase to describe Canadian politics this year? Yeah, I mean, Rosemary sort of stole mine. I think it's going to be all of ours, but upended is the word I think of. I mean, not only were we talking about would Justin Trudeau quit a year ago, but we were also talking about would it matter if he did.

The Conservatives had a 25-point lead. They were headed for a strong majority government, the likes we haven't seen from a conservative party in, you know, more than a decade. So everything about this has changed. You know, the liberal prime minister in Ottawa is making deals with the Alberta Premier. You know, people in the liberal caucus are quitting over environmental issues. The conservatives are dealing with floor crossers. It's just everything about politics has changed over those last year. Yeah, none of these things were probably on most of our own.

our bingo cards for sure. So lots of surprises. Rob, we got tumultuous. We got upended. I threw in doozy. What's your word for 2025? I am not using unprecedented because I'm so tired of that word as we end the year. Everybody's used it again and again and again. I'm going to go with whipsaw. Because I think, you know, it was a year in which when it looked like people had their feet underneath them and the political environment, they were yanked in a completely different direction, and I have a lot of sympathy in some cases for premiers and, you know, prime ministers in a year where no one could predict the erratic behavior of the man in the White House that just continued to sort of knock over the chessboard of politics again and again and

again. And, you know, also just think of, to carry on that Christa Freeland story from this time last year, that she goes from deputy prime minister to essentially out of politics, as an immensely consequential figure, but done within a year, is an incredible story after bringing down the Prime Minister. And just what a whipsaw. I'm trying to use it in a sentence now. A whip saw of a year. Yes. And Christopher Freeland, of course, leaving Cabinet, but an MP nonetheless. Rosie, in your year-ender with the Prime Minister, you covered a lot of ground. But one thing that really stuck out to me when you were asking him about the relationship with Canada and the United States is that he repeat.

He did that line that he has often, which is, we have the best trade deal with the U.S. of any country in the world. But then he said, Canada is in a better position now than at the start of the year. What was your impression of that comment? What was he trying to tell Canadians with that comment? Well, listen, I mean, he was elected on a promise that he could stand up to Donald Trump, deal with Donald Trump, get a deal with Donald Trump. And my point in that interview was that Canada has had to back down time and again in order to get Donald Trump to stay at the table, whether it be with reciprocal tariffs, getting rid of the digital services tax and other measures, and still all those punishing sectoral tariffs remain. His point, and it's fair, is that because Canada still has Kuzma, the new NAFTA, that 85% of the products that we ship out, are still tariff-free and that he was able to prolong that, to hold on to that, to make sure that

things didn't get any worse. And now they are essentially in the midst of negotiating towards that Kuzma review. You know, fair points, except, you know, the issue with Mark Carney and Donald Trump is that we are sort of putting the test of Mark Carney against what he himself promised Canadians and what he said he could deliver. And I'm not sure that he's got there yet. I'm not sure that he's delivered fully on what Canadians thought he would do. I'm also not sure it matters, to be honest. I think Canadians understand that this is not a normal situation,

and they're willing to give the Prime Minister a little bit more time to see where he can get. Ryan Doublety, how were you rating Mark Carney's performance in terms of his dealings with Donald Trump over the past year? And to Rosie's points, does it matter? Are Canadians willing to give him a pass at least for now, given how big the challenges are? I think it does matter. I mean, you know, not more than a few weeks ago, we saw massive layoffs at Algoma Steele in Souset-Marie. And that's a company town. That town is going to feel those layoffs, and those layoffs are entirely tariff-related.

That company would not be doing that if Donald Trump was a more normal president or a more reasonable president, I guess, when it comes to trade. So, you know, yeah, I think Canadians are willing to give the prime minister some more time on this. They understand this is hard. You know, every Canadian can see Donald Trump on the news, changing positions rapidly on all kinds of issues, making ridiculous demands, not just of Canada, but of all of America's allies.

So I think there's some latitude here, but a certain point. There have to be results. There has to be a settlement to these deals because it is starting to cost jobs. And that's, people are going to feel that. And Rob, of course, we are heading into 2026, the year that discussions and renegotiations of Kuzma happen, Donald Trump has been sort of Senate and the people around them saying different kinds of things. One day, it's like, yeah, it's great deal. We want some changes. The next day, it's like, we'll see if it holds.

We'll see if we want this. So what's at stake for our country as we head into 2026 with these renegotiations? Oh, I mean, there's so much. And I sympathize again with folks who are going to have to negotiate with the Trump administration and eventually with the president himself because what might look like a deal or progress towards a deal, as we saw in the last year with a simple ad from the Ontario government can collapse in front of you, like, you know, dust between your fingertips. And I think the real risk to go back to, you know what Rosie and Ryan were saying, for Carney, is, yes, the public understands that Donald Trump is immensely difficult and unpredictable.

But there's sort of a kind of through line of 2025 where there was maybe some overpromising and under-delivering from Mark Carney. And you can carry that through the budget, the most consequential budget of our time that didn't appear that consequential. the elbows up, the dealing with the president, the get a deal, the Trump whisperer. And that is the real sort of macro risk, I think, is that that office and that prime minister talks a big game and are Canadians seeing what they think they were promised? And we'll be watching that in the coming year. Ladies and gentlemen, one of the great Canadians. Oh, here you are. You're here and we're here.

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Rosie, you sort of hinted at this earlier about how Mark Carney has shifted, redefined, what it means to be a liberal in Canada, at least what it means to be a liberal government. How is that faring for him and his party? Well, I mean, he's one seat away from a majority that he didn't get during the election campaign. So probably okay. I think, yes, I mean, he's moving the liberal party to the center right, let's say, to sort of some of the territory where progressive conservatives, formerly progressive conservatives in this country would be comfortable. I myself know many conservatives who really think he's doing a great job already. And he's obviously attracting some of those conservatives or recruiting them, however you want to call it.

It also means that he runs the risk of sort of exposing the progressive side of the liberal party. And we saw that, of course, with the departure of Stephen Gilbo, longtime climate activist who believed that he gave away too much when it came to that deal between. Canada and Alberta. Liberals are so good at sort of shape-shifting and finding Canada in the moment where it is. That's where they find a lot of political success. And I think that that is obviously smart, but also very risky because then you sort of change the political landscape as you're governing. And Mark Carney, just like anyone who's governing for a country and a coalition, has to make

sure that he's representing all the viewpoints inside. of his party and inside of his caucus to keep them all happy. He is a new politician, and I don't know how he's doing with that piece of things. But for now, it seems to be a net positive as opposed to anything riskier than that. Pierre Paulyev is sort of dealing with the flip side of that, and we could talk more about him. But that is sort of a fascinating turn of events when it comes to politics this year. Yeah, let me go to Ryan on Pierre Pahliav because one of the criticism of him this year, Ryan, has been that he hasn't been very good at shape-shifting and kind of getting all the

constituencies in his own party rowing in the right direction. So as we round out this year, do you think that Pierre Polyev has learned those lessons and do you expect to see them applied in 2026? Yeah, you know, I think Pierre Polyev is in a difficult position, a position that's difficult, would be difficult for anybody. Because while he is not prime minister, as he can, hoped to be at the start of 2025. The Conservative Party had an election result that's better than they have seen in decades.

You know, they had 41% of the vote, I believe. That's enough for a majority under most circumstances. So, you know, we've got the Olympics coming up in 2026. It's a bit like asking someone who ran a personal best

to change everything about themselves. So I think Pierre Polyev's going, you know, we've seen some changes with Pierre Polyev. You know, he has done more mainstream media. But, you know, I think the politician that we have all seen formed over the course of 20 years, you know, is who he is. And I think it's difficult to, you know, for those around him to say, let's upend this whole thing, let's be a different person. Because one, it would be inauthentic.

It wouldn't be who he is. And two, they were very close. to a win here, you know, they did at one point have that 25-point lead. So I think it's going to be hard for him to change, and that potentially could make it hard for the conservative party to have electoral success. And so, Ryan, or Rob, sorry, as the leadership review in January, Pierre Pauliev is expected to win that, but he also has this other potential threat, which is if he loses another MP to cross the floor there by giving the liberals a majority government. What do you think Pierre Polio's chances of surviving are, if another MP crosses?

Slim, I would say, you know, like it's, he's hanging on by a thread, I think, in that scenario. And partly it is that a little bit of chickens come home to roost in the way he, he and the people around him treated other people across the country in the conservative kind of movement at a time when they were so far ahead in the polls in 2025 that it looked like they were going to win. You remember, you know, his campaign director, Jenny Byrne kind of ripping into one of the premiers out in Nova Scotia at one point, saying if once we win, we're never going to deal with you and your conservative government. I know that happened out in B.C. where at their peak, the federal conservatives told the provincial BC conservatives, you guys embarrass us. And by the end of the year, I think when you're in a weaker position and you haven't won an election, you've lost some of that goodwill, Doug Ford in the election, you know, and the federal election came out and took swings at Pierre Polyev. Like, there is not a lot of grace left, I think, for the people around him. And yes, he is moving in a better direction now. And he's doing interviews with people like Rosie.

But, like, you know, is there goodwill? to survive when you lose that final MP, which I think, and you guys would have a better view in Ottawa than I do, I think is very close to happening, and that may spell the end of his leadership. Anyone want to challenge what Ryan said there, very close to happening? Anyone want to add anything to that? Rosie? it's definitely still very possible it's definitely still very possible I mean the thing is we it's being kept very tight around the Prime Minister and the Liberal Party how how persistent these efforts are to recruit people

and I would also point out that the attempts to recruit are not happening just on conservative benches so yeah Rob's right it is still a very much possibility and a reality Okay, so Ryan, as we head into 2026, we'll also have the NDP choose its new federal leader. I think that's in March. But what else are you looking forward to or maybe not forward to, but what are you expecting in 2026 when it comes to Canadian federal politics? You know, I think on some level what will be interesting this year is, you know, as Mark Carney settles in as prime minister, you know, how does he deal with everything that will come at him?

And a lot of it is completely unknown. You know, Mark Carney, more so than I think any prime minister before him, was elected on one file. It was on the Trump file and on the economy file. But the job of prime minister is not one file. It doesn't. So, you know, he's going to have to deal with, you know, health care concerns as we head into what looks like a bad flu season. He's going to have to deal with international concerns. You know, President Zelensky from Ukraine was here just yesterday.

you know he is going to have to deal with a lot of other issues that come his way and I think you know we know he understands business and finance we know he understands trade and the economy how does he deal with all those other issues you know we're looking at the potential of a separation referendum in Alberta we're looking at the party quebecua potentially being elected in in Quebec and with a promise of another referendum there so there's going to to be a lot on his plate that isn't just about Trump. Yeah. And Rob, from your perch in BC, what are you looking to to 2026 in terms of federal Canadian politics? I'm still, like, I'm watching the play out of the Alberta, you know, pipeline issue. And I am left with a sort of fundamental question about the Carney government. And Rosie probably has a better answer to this than I do. But is it brilliant? Is that pipeline announcement and the way it was done? And is it like an extraordinarily brilliant attempt to thread the most complex needle of like 10 years of dispute, or is it just

simplistically naive to think that you can meander in and do what the Kearney government did with an MOU that cut out British Columbia and ticked everybody off and authorized a pipeline that may not exist? I don't know, and I'm watching 2026 to kind of figure out, is this a brilliant government or a government that is trying to reinvent the wheel? on the fly. And I just don't know. And it's a fascinating position to kind of be in because it looks so impressive from the outside. But then you sort of watch it in some of the policies and the budget and that just sloppy way that the pipeline was done. And you think, my goodness, that is, you could see that coming. You could see that problem coming and it's still there and it wasn't

handled very well. I don't know. I'd be interested in Rosie telling me the answer to that. I would love to hear Rosie's answer, but she's going to have to do it elsewhere because I have to let the three of you go. Apologies to you, Rosie. That's all right. I'll tweet it at it later. You'll tweet it. We'll read it later. Okay. Thanks all three of you. Appreciate it so much. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Rosemary. Mary Barton is a CBC's chief political correspondent.

Ryan Tammeltie is a political reporter with a Toronto star. And Rob Shaw is a political correspondent for Czech News in Victoria. You've been listening to the current podcast. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you soon. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca. It's.