TRUDEAU TOUR OPENS DOOR TO PRAISE AND CRITICISM.
‘ TRUDEAU BRAND’ GETS DISSECTED — FOR BETTER OR WORSE
The first person to get a chance to put a question to the Prime Minister of Canada was picked by Justin Trudeau himself.
It was Friday night and more than 1,800 people had taken their seats in a hall on the campus of Western University for an hourlong town hall meeting with the PM. Hundreds of hands shot up as Trudeau looked around the room for his first question. He settled on a young man who introduced himself as Zack, a 21-year-old student.
And then Zack unloaded on the PM. “Hello, Justin,” Zack started. “When you were running for the office of prime minister, your party said Canada would run modest $ 10- billion deficits until the end of your term, that then the budget would become balanced. But now that’s no longer the case.”
Zack then noted that the federal finance department recently said Canada will likely run deficits to 2055 and the debt will exceed $1.5 trillion.
“That is totally unacceptable,” Zack continued. “Justin: What are you doing to this country? You are intentionally setting up millions of young Canadians like myself … and for what? Your own moral superiority complex?”
At this point, many in the crowd started to boo, trying to drown Zack out but Trudeau put his hand up, palm facing out, as a teacher would to an unruly group of students.
“This is an open town hall,” Trudeau told them. “And we’ll let Zack finish his question.” So Zack finished. “My question is this: What, if anything, are you going to do to curb your insane and reckless spending habits?”
Trudeau’s answer to Zack was similar to the one he gave Canadians during the 2015 election campaign as the only leader of the three major parties ready to spill some red ink to improve the country’s economy.
But the answer, in this case and at other times during the four town hall meetings he held last week in southern Ontario, was less important than the question.
Here was a prime minister opening himself up to potential criticism from everyday Canadians in an unscripted, live- to-television event where the attendees were not just party members but open to anyone on a firstcome, first-served basis.
He was heckled more than a few times. In Kingston, a young girl told him, “I’d glad you’re the prime minister. I would have voted for the Green Party if I could have voted but I’m still glad you’re the prime minister.”
Trudeau was accused by one woman of having the cold heart of Stephen Harper when it came to the way he was dealing with the country’s veterans. He was taken to task for approving the Kinder Morgan pipeline.
An indigenous woman in tears begged him to protect the water. A newly arrived immigrant made an emotional plea to change the system to make it easier for her to bring relatives from overseas to Canada.
At a meeting in Peterborough, a woman named Kathy Katula made her way into every nightly newscast with a four-and-a-half-minute rant levelled directly at Trudeau: “I feel like you’ve failed me. Something’s wrong now, Mr. Trudeau.”
Shortly after Zack had lit into Trudeau at the London meeting, one of Trudeau’s senior aides came over to where I was sitting. Her name is Zita Astravas. She is the PMO’s director of issues management, which means it’s her job to put out fires or, if she can, prevent fires from starting.
For two days, her guy had taken one pop on the chin after another and it had dawned on me that this is exactly what Trudeau and his handlers had wanted. “You actually want guys like Zack,” I said to her. “It’s as if you’re saying to them, bring it on!” Astravas looked at me and smiled. “Yup.”
That’s because Liberals believe that Canadians will be more impressed by the way Trudeau handles interlocutors like Zack than they will be convinced by the substance of any criticism.
In Kingston, a federal correc- tions officer named Brad Dade was one of several who took the PM to task for the failures of a new public service payroll software system called Phoenix, which has left tens of thousands of civil servants without paycheques for months.
After the meeting, I asked Dade if he got any answers that he liked from Trudeau. Dade said he didn’t, but added, “I appreciate the guy coming to talk to us.”
The contrast, of course, is with the last prime minister who, if he did a town- hall meeting at all, it was only for the benefit of pre- screened Conservative party members. Senator Mike Duffy was often conscripted to be the MC and chief quizmaster to Harper.
The Liberals are betting that Canadians will appreciate the authenticity, charm and sheer gumption of a prime minister at an unscripted town hall over the propaganda of what passed for a Harper town hall.
Such a demonstration of the “Trudeau brand” may be particularly important now because Trudeau’s opponents are about to ramp up accusations that he is a scofflaw who likes rubbing shoulders with foreign millionaires at fundraising events and would rather hang out with a billionaire buddy in the Bahamas than join everyday Canadians at a New Year’s Party ushering in the country’s 150th anniversary.
The two- day swing through Ontario was part of a national “listening tour” hastily put together by a PMO clearly interested in changing whatever channel the opposition had dialed up. The tour continues this week through Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec. The cynical will look at this taxpayer-funded tour as little more than an al fortunes and, at times, it will be hard to disagree.
But there were moments last week in Ontario that validated this exercise as something more authentic and real.
In London, f or e xample, Amar Malekh and his wife had a front- row seat in the crowd of 1,800. He had put his hand up to get Trudeau’s attention several times. With a few minutes to go, Trudeau motioned to his microphone runners to give the mic to Malekh.
From his seat, in broken English, he said: “I am a Syrian refugee.” There was a pause. Then the crowd started to applaud as if to welcome him to Canada and encourage him to continue. “I want to say: Thank you.” Another pause. Then he handed back the microphone, having said all he wanted to say to Canada’s prime minister.
JUSTIN: WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO THIS COUNTRY?