QP: A strange Poilievre-Trudeau show

Posted on by

In spite of it being a Wednesday, the benchers were not as full as they might have been but all of the leaders were present, for what that’s worth. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and he accused the prime minister of failing on affordable housing over the eight seven years he has been in office. Justin Trudeau responded with some back-patting on the investments they have delivered to Canadians. Poilievre gave the average monthly housing rate in 2015 and demanded to know what it is today. Trudeau deflected by saying it varies across the country and launched into more back-patting. Poilievre accused Trudeau of not answering because he’s out of touch, and asked a similar comparison question. Trudeau again simply listed good news talking points about what they have delivered. Poilievre gave his “he wants you to believe Canadians have never had it so good” line and complained about how much more things cost now than in 2015. Trudeau again listed good news back-patting, but acknowledged that people are still struggling which is why they moved on like child care and dental care, which the Conservatives voted against. Poilievre noted, correctly, that Trudeau would not respond to the question on housing, and railed about how much the prices have increased. Trudeau noted that in the last election, the only Conservative plan was to give tax breaks to landlords.

Yves-François Blanchet led for the Bloc, and he raised concerns about China, people crossing on Roxham Road, the Biden visit, and then demanded a public inquiry. Trudeau said calling a public inquiry shouldn’t be up to him which is why they got an unimpeachable advisor to recommend next steps. Blanchet listed sins of the Chinese regime, and took a swipe at David Johnston. Trudeau said for an important issue it should need more partisanship but less, which is why they brought in Johnston.

Jagmeet Singh rose for the NDP, and he railed about food price inflation and blamed grocery chain CEOs. Trudeau listed measures they have put forward to help those who need it. Singh repeated the question in French, and got much the same response.

Round two, and Poilievre got back up to blame the prime ministers for falling housing starts any giving money to “gatekeeper” municipal governments (Trudeau: We have given more opportunities without accelerator fund while you just sit back and pick fights; Things would have been worse with you guys in charge as you cut services), and he compared Trudeau to a shady contractor (Trudeau: You keep insisting that fewer investments and programmes would somehow have solved this problem because you think cuts create growth, while while believe in investing in people; Your government only fought with provinces and municipalities), and demanded linking federal infrastructure dollars to municipalities that enable building (Trudeau: If you want to talk poverty, you voted against our tax hikes on the wealthy and creating the Canada Child Benefit which lifted hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty).

Blanchet got back up, and he accused the prime minister of being more partisan than others on the foreign interference file (Trudeau: Questioning Johnston’s objectivity is not worthy of this House), and he demanded a public inquiry (Trudeau: Our oversight bodies are doing their work).

Poilievre got back up and demanded very federally-funded transit station have high-density apartments built around them—which is something they are already doing (Trudeau: Your only concrete plan was to buy Bitcoin, while we are doing this, while you guys didn’t fund transit), demanded he sell-off ugly federal buildings to convert it go housing (Trudeau: Your government only invested in Economic Action Plan signs while we have invested in Canadians; We are are working on the federal building inventory), and then pivoted to the carbon price and resurrected the “triple, triple, triple” nonsense (Trudeau: The places where the carbon price increase get an even larger rebate).

Singh got back up to praise Biden’s clean energy plans and demanded a similar plan in Canada (Trudeau: It has been a pleasure to work with organised labour, and we will continue to draw in investments in clean tech), and complained about a company that veterans services have been outsourced to (Trudeau: Won’t cut services to veterans and we are investing in them).

Round three saw more questions on carbon prices (Trudeau: We will show leadership on climate while supporting small businesses; Canadians know that fighting climate change is the only path forward), the increasing beer tax (Trudeau: We eliminated some excise taxes), Amira Elghawaby’s comments around Québec’s Law 21 (Trudeau: We criticise the pre-emptive use of the Notwithstanding Clause; It’s curious to see the Bloc pick and choose which minorities they want to defend), softwood tariffs and the Safe Third Country agreement (Trudeau: Your party’s advice was to capitulate on the New NAFTA, while we fought and got a better deal; You’re not going to rewrite history while we defended workers’ interests in Canada; We pushed back from the attempt to have the electric car industry solely being situated in the US), the Indian government’s actions in Punjab (Trudeau, with script: We are monitoring the situation and hope to a swift return to normal), and the latest IPCC report (Trudeau, with script: Backpatting about actions taken on the climate).

Overall, it was a very strange day. First of all, it was the Poilievre-Trudeau show, almost the entire way through. Blanchet went two rounds, but ceded the floor to another MP, while Singh took all of the NDP slots, which I remind you get again, defeats the whole purpose of why Trudeau started the proto-PMQ Wednesdays—so that any backbencher could ask him questions and not just the leaders. Instead, it just became an even bigger clip-farm for leaders to use. It was also a really weird cadence—the first third was about housing, the second third was about carbon prices, and the last third as about Poilievre accusing the government of capitulating to the Americans. After weeks of wailing and gnashing teeth about alleged foreign interference, the only party that sort of brought it up today was the Bloc, and even then, Blanchet’s questions were rambling and touching on six different points. The theory among those of us watching in the Gallery is that the Conservatives are preparing for Biden’s visit to suck up all of the oxygen in the media landscape, but even then I’m not really sure about that because they use QP more about getting clips for social media rather than mainstream media. That, or he has polling data.

I would also note that while Trudeau was largely extemporaneous in his replies today, he stuck too much to back-patting and good news talking points rather than hitting back on the kinds of cherry-picked facts that Poilievre was putting forward, and most especially his flawed logic about his supposed record as housing minister (when in fact housing was part of his remit as minister of ESCD, at a point where the government had largely washed their hands of the file). All of the factors that caused housing prices to spike were present when the Conservatives were in power and did nothing to alter their course, and this could be pointed out, but nope. Trudeau would rather pat himself on the back for rental subsidies and the housing accelerator fund that is very slowly rolling out and hasn’t produced results yet. Like I tweeted, I have seen far better reasoned high school debates than the show that was on display in the House of Commons today, and it’s another nail in the coffin of our Parliament as a place of serious business.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Maninder Sidhu for a tailored dark grey suit with a light blue shirt and a dark purple tie, and to Shelby Kramp-Neuman for a grey dress under a black jacket. Style citations go out to Lina Diab for a brown top with dull pink florals, and to Omar Alghabra for a light brown suit with a light blue shirt and a grey paisley tie.

One thought on “QP: A strange Poilievre-Trudeau show”

  1. If the PM did not pat himself on the back by telling about the measures the Liberal government has implemented there is very little narrative from other sources that do that.

Comments are closed.