O’TOOLE’S BOLD VISION TO BOLSTER CANADA GLOBALLY.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s vanity project of pursuing a temporary seat on the United Nations Security Council is a poor excuse for a foreign policy. With China and other pariah nations causing mischief around the world, notably China’s crackdown in Hong Kong, international relations have never been more important, or more badly mishandled in Canada.

I interviewed Tory leadership candidate Erin O’Toole last week because I like his views and because he is the only credible leader who hasn’t had a career in Ottawa’s parochial political bubble. He served for years as a pilot and officer in the Canadian military, then became a corporate lawyer on Bay Street before running for Parliament. I respect such real-world credentials in public life and sought his views on global challenges, among other issues.

“The most important job of the Canadian prime minister is to make sure we have strong relations with the U.S. and influence them in a way that’s in our interest and their national interest, too,” said O’Toole.

The international order has been broken, he continued, and the only counterbalance to the corruption and incompetence of international institutions, notably the United Nations, is to strengthen the Five Eyes alliance, an intelligence partnership between the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

“A prime minister of Canada should work with the Five Eyes to correct the international order, rid the bad actors and stop the gaming of United Nations agencies. The U.S. and Canada must lead these efforts,” he said. “There is a remarkable opportunity for this alliance to reassert and reorder the global trading system, too, but right now Trudeau is considered a joke.”

(Canada has some work to do after last year’s arrest of RCMP master spy Cameron Ortis, under the Official Secrets Act, whose breaches were caught by the Five Eyes and allegedly involved giving China access to Five Eyes intel.)

Besides that, there is the eyebrow-raising and sudden dismissal last year of a Chinese national from the federal government’s top-secret lab in Winnipeg, where she worked on dangerous viral research and had been involved with training staff at a similar lab in Wuhan, China.

Clearly, things have run amok since Trudeau took over in 2015. We’ve seen the resurgence of two separatist movements, he has overseen a degradation in our relationship with the United States, mishandled all diplomatic matters concerning China and now pins his hopes on a temporary seat on the UN Security Council, a useless talking shop whose initiatives are routinely vetoed by two permanent seat holders, China and Russia.

Most disturbing is the hostage situation in China, where two innocent Canadians have been held for nearly two years in retaliation for the arrest of a Huawei executive on a U.S. extradition request. The only solution was to enlist the help of U.S. President Donald Trump, but Trudeau "tweeted and ridiculed him, driving a wedge between his administration and theirs when we needed U.S. help,” according to O’Toole.

O’Toole believes that we must join America’s ballistic missile defence system and increase our support for NATO, in order to show our solidarity, and improve our relationship, with out neighbours. Doing so will underscore the fact that Canada is America’s “only domestic homeland security partner,” said O’Toole. Canada should also join the Americans and apply tariffs against China for its abuses, as well, he said.

“Canada has no friends around the world now,” he continued. “The Security Council seat is useless. Canada should become a leader in a movement of democracies to demand reform of these corrupt and broken institutions internationally.”

There’s also damage incurred at home. O’Toole’s campaign motto is “Take Back Canada,” and his launch video emphasizes the fact that the country is governed by ideologues and hurt by landlocked resources, uncompetitive taxes, bad trade deals and a “bad reputation globally.”

“We don’t need a typical career politician, but someone that can take charge and return the country back to prosperity and make sure Canada is a leader in international efforts. We need a leader that is proud of our industries and understands them,” he said.

Wouldn’t that be refreshing?

JUSTIN TANG / THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES “The most important job of the Canadian prime minister is to make sure we have strong relations with the U.S. and influence them in a way that’s in our interest and their national interest, too,” Erin O’Toole told columnist Diane Francis.