The Decibel - King Charles III opens the 45th Parliament

Episode Date: May 28, 2025

On Tuesday, King Charles III opened the 45th Parliament by delivering Canada’s throne speech. The speech lays out the government’s priorities, and the King is only the second monarch to deliver it – his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, did so twice before.The speech affirmed Canada’s sovereignty amid ongoing tensions with the U.S., and touched on Liberal election promises, including a middle-class tax cut, an end to interprovincial trade barriers, and rapid approvals of major infrastructure projects.Stephanie Levitz is a senior reporter in The Globe and Mail’s Ottawa bureau. She joins to discuss the significance of the speech and what it signals, Carney’s first days in the House of Commons, and what’s new in parliament after nearly six months off.Questions? Comments? Ideas? E-mail us at [e-mail]

On Tuesday, King Charles III opened Canada's 45th Parliament and delivered the throne speech. It has been nearly 70 years since the sovereign first opened Parliament. In the time since, Canada has dramatically changed. The speech is written by the Prime Minister's office, and it highlights the government's goals. It's usually read by Canada's governor general, the representative of the sovereign. But on rare occasions, the monarch delivers it themselves.

This is only the third time in Canada's history that it's happened. The King's visit follows a slate of threats to Canada's economic and national sovereignty. The true North is indeed strong and free. Today, Stephanie Levitz is here. She's a senior reporter with the Globe's Ottawa Bureau. She'll talk about the significance of the throne speech, what we learned about the new government's

priorities, and whether the King's visit could help ease tensions with the U.S. I'm Maynika Ramen-Welms and this is The Decibel from The Globe and Mail. Stephanie, thanks so much for being here. My pleasure. So the King arrived in Ottawa on Monday, delivered the speech from the throne on Tuesday. I mean, this was a big event in the Senate, right? And there were lots of pomp and circumstance in Ottawa over the last couple of days. Can you just give us a sense?

Like, what was all this like? Yeah, there was definitely a sense of occasion in Ottawa, you know, the way that the streets were shut down, the way people, you could see them sort of running this morning to try and catch a glimpse of the king in his carriage, and they were dressed up and they were fascinators and there were signs and there was just like this happy, happy energy about this moment in time and even amongst the dignitaries who were present and even amongst the members of parliament and people who are, let's say, more accustomed to some of the regalia associated with governance,

even them, like that energy, that sort of happiness of, you know, I was talking to one who said, you know, I'm not even really a monarchist, but to realize that this is a moment in time, it's a moment in history, you know, the start of a new parliament is always a moment in time and a moment in history, but to have the king present really lent an energy to it that was different than you would ordinarily have if it was just the governor general reading the speech from the throne

that you might ordinarily have when a new government was formed, more of a sense of occasion and history for sure. Hmm. So let's dig into this a little bit because as you mentioned, usually the governor general just does the speech, but this year we got the king himself to come and give the throne speech. What is the significance of that? The significance I suppose is that, you know, our Westminster parliament is really rooted in British tradition. And so to have the personification of that tradition, the crown come, our crown,

our monarch, the Canadian monarch come, really demonstrates that unbroken line of history, that our traditions are rooted in something, that they come from somewhere, and they are part of our national way of being. And of course, our country has changed immeasurably in the years since we were but a British colony. But everything that we do, our legislation, our legislative system, it all flows from there. And so at a moment in time when Canadians are trying to reassert themselves globally, when they're trying to stand up

to US President Donald Trump, but also make a new mark on the world stage, to have that wrapped into the persona of the king as a visual image is meant to send a signal. It's meant to send a very strong signal. And so, you know, a big distinction with the speech, for example, is that, you know, he starts off the speech and he weaves in that reflection, right? He throws back to when his mother, the queen, delivered the speech and the arc of history and sort of situating that in the context. It's a moment of continuity. That's what the crown is supposed to be. And he really brought that messaging to bear to situate this moment in time for Canada as part of a larger national narrative for us and our development as a country.

Hmm. So what does Prime Minister Carney want to signal with this though? Like he was the one who invited the King to come to Canada. What does this signal about how Carney wants his government to be perceived? Transformative, right? And what I mean by that is he again is trying to, and I'm speaking right now of the Prime Minister, is seeking to or has said he will transform the Canadian economy, seize a once in a generation opportunity to do things very differently. But again, situating that in a long arc of history, he wants to be a man whose government is remembered for getting big things done and it being a moment in time. So you have the king, our head of state sitting there

and saying these words to give a sense of gravitas and purpose and momentum to what it is Mr. Carney is hoping to do. Okay. Part of this seems to be that Prime Minister Carney has invited the king to maybe send a message to the US and to Trump specifically, because of course we've seen this tension with the US in the last few months. Does this actually, I guess, accomplish that? What kind of message does it send to Trump?

It's a great question. I mean, was Trump even paying attention? Right? You know, he did say recently in the Oval Office that he watched the debates during the Canadian election, which was interesting. If he was paying attention to that, perhaps he was paying attention to the king. And perhaps he was paying attention because Mr. Trump is known to like pomp and pageantry and those sorts of things. And the king is certainly part of that world.

What it does though, I think is reminds the world, and I guess by extension, hopefully reminds Donald Trump that we are a country unto ourselves. And that sounds very basic, right? But it's another way of saying, no, we are not the 51st state. We come from a unique cultural tradition, a unique parliamentary tradition. We do things the way we do them. We've done them this way for hundreds of years.

And we will continue to do them this way. And so as Mr. Carney presents his own words coming from the mouth of the king, talking about what kind of Canada he wants to build, it is meant to send a signal that we are a sovereign nation. And we demonstrate that, I mean, most plainly, by having our sovereign speak about it. I wonder if there's any sense, though, that inviting the king could backfire in some way against Carney, because, you know, could it give Canadians the impression that our prime minister needs this reinforcement from the sovereign in this fight with the U.S., that we need someone else to kind of stand up for us here?

I'm not sure that's a backfire, though, or a good sign of we do need that. I mean, there was a lot of talk when Trump started with this 51st state narrative. And I know, like, lots of Canadians were looking around the world and being like, how come nobody's standing up for us? How come no other national leader is saying, hey man, that's not okay? And there's, you know, I'm sure lots of geopolitical reasons for that. But again, to have the king come, it is a way to sort of have somebody stand up for us and I think that's what Canadians are looking for.

I mean, insofar as it could backfire, it sets a very high bar. You know, if the king says it, you better get it done. You know, I wonder about in the longer term, if he manages to live up to the expectations he has placed on himself and is placed on his government by pulling out sort of the biggest tool in the toolbox, which is the king. Lauren Henry Does this resonate with Canadians though? Because we know that a lot of Canadians don't necessarily enjoy having the monarch as our head of state.

So again, I wonder, is there this chance that it could backfire for some people? I mean, if you take the Quebec instance, for example, and Quebecers don't generally, like they're not interested in the king, and they're going to look at this and go, that's not the way we would assert our sovereignty. That's irrelevant to us as a moment in time. And they might feel a bit frustrated about it, a bit cut off by it. I guess that's where you take sort of the king part out of the equation. You just look at the speech from the throne as a moment.

And it draws attention to it. It focuses it. I think probably more people were paying attention to this speech because of the king. So he, you know, in the way that the royals, even if you're not a monarchist, like the royals are still a celebrity, there's still a buzz factor there, there's still interest. The French television networks were here all the same, broadcasting live, right? So it's drawing attention to the government's priorities. And again, one hope that's a good thing because then forces more accountability on the government

because suddenly people are very keenly aware of what it is this liberal government has promised to do. We'll be right back. All right, Steph, we've talked around the speech. Now let's actually address the throne speech directly. So just at a high level, what stood out to you about the speech? At the highest level, you know, the extent to which it was a restatement of the liberal campaign platform.

And were we going into it expecting anything new? I'm not sure. I mean, are sometimes throne speeches are new. Sometimes they will contain the minutiae granular detail of how a government intends to go ahead. And sometimes they're like the one that we heard today, which is a restatement of campaign promises wrapped in flowery political language. Without the minutiae then, without the actual details. Right, without the here is how I am going to do this thing.

And that is really, you know, the devil will of course be in the details for any government and absolutely for this one, because we heard a lot over the last, you know, five, six, seven, eight weeks about what Mr. Carney would like to do. The question of the how he's going to do it is the thing. And what was interesting is like later, like maybe an hour or so after the throne speech, the government actually went ahead and introduced a motion to start acting on some of those promises to cut personal income tax, to remove the GST on housing, to actually get rid of the consumer carbon price, like remove it entirely. And so you can see, I guess, in the early stages,

they are trying to put some meat on the bone and just looking at the throne speech as being a minute to remind people, here's what we've promised to do, and now let's see how they actualize that. But none of that was in the speech itself. Did that surprise you that the speech was high level in that way in the sense that it kind of repeated the campaign promises but didn't get into those details in the speech

itself? It was surprising insofar as the way Mr. Carney was framing the speech heading into it was that it was going to demonstrate how the government was going to match the moment, match the thing it told Canadians to do. And he matched it by just saying the same thing he keeps saying. Not trying to sort of be overly kind or generous here, but it is also objectively true that we're not even

a month out from the election. I guess as of the 28th of this month, we will be a month out from the election. This is breakneck speed for a new, you know, a government to be reelected, swear in a cabinet, get going on an agenda. This is pretty fast. And so maybe in the throne speech, there wasn't time or space because they haven't figured out how they're going to do some of the things they're going to do. And we know that because for example, we're not getting a budget. We're

not, you know, some of the hallmarks that would send up those signposts of what is the government going to do? How are they going to do it? How much money do they have to play with? We don't know any of those things yet and it might be some time until we actually do. AMT – Yeah, the government has said they'll have a budget in the fall, still a little bit vague, but yeah, not in this sitting of parliament before the summer. Of all the different things that you did here in the throne speech though Stephanie, is there anything that stood out to you? Like did we learn anything about the government's priorities from that? MS – I mean that's a funny question about this all. I mean we didn't learn anything new about the government's priorities from that? I mean, that's a funny question about this all.

I mean, we didn't learn anything new about the government's priorities, right? There was no new addition to a policy idea. There was no new promise to do X, Y, or Z. I suppose what's interesting is what they chose out of the menu of options they presented to Canadians, right? They talked about defense spending

and getting the Canadian defense industry really spinning again by helping arm Europe. They talked about the middle class tax cut again. They talked about getting immigration down below a certain level. They talked about getting government spending down below a certain level. And a lot of these things line up in a way with the mandate letter that the prime minister put out, that solo mandate letter that divided the government's priorities into seven different buckets. And so he touched on a bit of each of those buckets, but there's a lot of other things in the platform that we'll see what he does with them.

Yeah, same mandate letter to all the ministers, basically. Everyone got the same priorities. Everybody got the same. We're all singing from the same song sheet here. We're all going to be working towards these particular directions. And I think in the throne speech, when you hear about things like defense spending, when you hear about things like securing the border and dealing with Fentanyl,

those are all Trump issues, right? That you didn't hear about retaliatory tariffs in the throne speech, you didn't hear about some of those things. Certainly an effort there to reframe the Canadian-American relationship. Mr. Carney has talked a lot about it being broken and destroyed and it's over, but this was about more negotiating a new relationship, rebuilding

a relationship. What was absent from the speech is probably more telling than what was actually in it because then you wonder, okay, well, what about all those other things you said you were going to do? When do we get to hear about those and how you might move ahead with them? Yeah. Okay. Let's also talk about the fact that the House of Commons is now back after nearly six months. It started on Monday and the first order of business, even before the throne speech, was to elect a new speaker. This is the person that essentially serves as kind of a referee in the House. Our new speaker is a Montreal area liberal

MP, Francis Scarpa Legia. Steph, is this generally who we expected to hold this position? You know what, it was a toss up going in about sort of what political strategy would be at hand. Let's recall that this is still a minority liberal government and it's a very tight minority in terms of the distance between the number of seats the liberals have versus the number of seats the conservatives have. So if you're the liberals and you're looking at this and you're thinking, can we afford to lose a vote? Because you know, all big money bills, all of these things, they'll

be confidence votes. They need every vote they can get. Can they afford to lose a vote? Yeah. So if they have a liberal become the speaker, they lose a vote then. Yeah. Correct. Um, conversely, I suppose if you have a liberal as the speaker and there's ever a tie, the speaker has the deciding vote. So maybe that's good. I don't know. But I do think there was a lot of gaming going on and where you could see the gaming play out absolutely is that there were two conservatives who had initially put their names forward to be the speaker

and at the very last minute they withdrew. And when we spoke to one of them after, Christentrum, about why, and he said, well, there's no path, he referred to there being no path to victory. He didn't think that the liberals were gonna vote for a conservative speaker But then he also let slip that it was a bit of gamesmanship it was a bit of if we withdraw then they've got no choice but to elect a liberal so that we cannot give them the option of Electing one of us to just save one of their own interesting

Okay, so there was some strategy happening then on the conservative benches about why they withdrew those names. Correct. Let's talk a little bit more about the conservatives then because leader Pierre Polyev is not in the House for the first time in about 20 years. Now we've got former conservative leader Andrew Scheer as the opposition leader in the House instead. Do we have a sense of how the conservatives are navigating the situation? Is there tension?

Is there unity? What's going on? I think there's uncertainty. Conservatives are trying to recalibrate, trying to figure out what is it going to look like in the House of Commons for them when Pierre Polyev is not in that front bench. I mean, a lot of eyes are thinking

about the first question period, for example, and that it won't be Pierre Polyev facing off against the prime minister. It will be Andrew Scheer. There are questions, of course, within the conservatives about the Carney agenda and the way Mr. Carney goes forward with things. A lot of the priorities he's laid out are the same priorities the conservatives had in the election, right?

Build more housing, cut taxes, cut government spending. And so are they going to be in a position where this idea that you need to both oppose and propose, well, what are they going to do with that? And what is the future indeed of Mr. Poliev himself? It's going to be a number of days before Prime Minister Carney calls a by-election. Pierre Poliev intends to seek an Alberta seat. That's going to be a moment fraught with tension. I mean, he's running in Alberta with separatist tendencies running high.

The outgoing MP from that riding got 82% of the vote last time. What if Mr. Poliev gets less? There are still people mad about how the election played out. Is there going to be any consequence for that anywhere? There are going to be any sign of active change, people doing things differently? I would definitely not say it's not that the conservative caucus elected right now wants mr. Poliev to go They just don't know what the ground looks like for them And you know a lot of the buzz on the hill the last couple of days has been about

The absence of Pierre Poliev and about man, you know, like he worked 20 years To have this job one to be prime minister, but even just to be a member of parliament and he lost. And that just has to be demoralizing. That just has to be a very difficult thing to calibrate. And you can see it on the faces, his own face, I think you can see it on the faces of some of his MPs. And it's that same emotion for the new Democrats, frankly. I mean, their leader, Jagmeet Singh lost their seat. They are no longer an official party in the House of Commons. Like when you sit up in the chamber and you look at the House of Commons right now, it's really disorienting because conservatives occupy two dozen more seats.

The NDP are tucked into the far, far corner. There's all sorts of MPs you've never seen before. And it's a changed place. And it is true that Mr. Poliev will be back there soon enough. But maybe this June session that we're in, this very short number of days that they'll sit, maybe it'll amount to nothing in the end and maybe everything will start again in September and we'll be having a totally different conversation. You did mention question period very briefly there, Steph. So I want to, I want to come

back to that because this is an interesting moment in the house. It's the chance for the opposition parties to ask the government questions. And we're going to see this on Wednesday this week. It's going to be Prime Minister Carney's first time in question period. What are you going to be watching for from him? One of the interesting things about the prime minister since he became prime minister, when he engages with reporters and he takes questions, sometimes he is very expansive in his answers. When he he has asked something about policy or decision or why did you do it this way, he goes on and on. And he has sort of a series of verbal ticks in a way that he uses to demarcate his points.

When he can talk at length, that's fine. There's a clock running in question period. And it will be very interesting to see what he's like in that respect. And we saw a bit of it during the debates during the election for sure, because there's a clock running then. But those debates weren't at the same level of accountability as the point of question period. The point is to hold the government to account. And in situations

where Mr. Carney has been grilled by journalists on things that he doesn't like or gets uncomfortable with, he tends to get his backup. And for a man who's sort of, I am a calm, steady hand, I am here to guide through a crisis, you know, how he manages sort of that inclination and gets into the political theater of all of it. Does he do that? What does the opposition choose to ask him about? And how does he answer in question period? Because we've gotten into this habit in our parliament where question period is nothing but theater. You have opposition parties asking questions that are framed and designed in such a way

as to go viral on social media. You have the government obfuscating on their answers and never quite answering directly anything they're asked. Is that gonna be different with Mr. Carney, who again has a tendency to actually answer questions? He tries to answer them. And so I'll be really interested to see what that's like. I'll be interested to see what the energy is like in the House of Commons. The last months of

the last parliament were very vicious in their tone and in their attacks and in the heckling and in all of these things. Is that gone? Is it back? Is it managed in any way? And again, because of the new makeup of the commons, like the new Democrats, how many chances will they even get to ask Mr. Carney a question? They don't have official party status. So that dynamic, it's going to be a lot of government versus opposition, opposition versus government and sustaining that, that energy, especially in the early days, right? When it's not like there's a record.

Yeah, brand new government. They don't have a record to kind of be quite there You know, there are certain definitely certain things that the opposition I'm sure will seize upon the lack of a budget all sorts of other things But just you know, how do you draw it out? We'll just be really interesting Stephanie always great to talk to you. Thank you so much for being here. Thanks for having me Stephanie Levitz is a senior reporter in the Globe and Mail's Ottawa Bureau That's it for today. I'm Maynika Ramon-Wilms. Our intern is Kelsey Howlett. Our associate producer is Aja Souter.

Our producers are Madeleine White, Michal Stein, and Allie Graham. David Crosby edits the show. Adrian Chung is our senior producer, and Matt Freiner is our managing editor. Thanks so much for listening and I'll talk to you tomorrow.