National Post (National Edition)
Trudeau’s to-do list has a lot of urgent items
Justin Trudeau has a lot to do. With a majority in Parliament, he can do a lot. Some things he has promised to do, others he will be forced to do, others he has only hinted he might. Middle-class tax cuts were his big campaign promise, so that comes first, but hanging over every plan or promise is the absence of a Senate Liberal caucus, which could stall his legislative agenda. The clock ticks on assisted dying, for example, which threatens to follow abortion into the legal netherworld of unlegislated private medical issues. He must call an inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women, legalize weed, reform elections and meet with premiers to draft a climate policy for the Paris summit, while also getting the ball rolling on his infrastructure spending plan. And this is just what can be predicted now, free from the famous complications of “events, dear boy, events.” Joseph Brean takes a look at the new PM’s to-do list.
SENATE REFORM
1 By Trudeau’s own action, there are no Liberal Senators, just a group of Senators appointed as Liberals who call themselves, not uncontroversially, “Senate Liberals.” And though it sometimes seems like Canada’s junk-strewn attic — a room more easily ignored than tidied — senators remain crucial actors in Canadian democracy. To fix what he described as a “partisan swamp,” Trudeau promised to appoint a panel of experts to recommend potential senators, rather than try to reform or abolish the Senate, for which the Supreme Court of Canada has set the highest possible constitutional bar.
ASSISTED DYING
2 The Tories fought this battle in the courts, and lost, but the fallout is Trudeau’s problem. Within weeks, Quebec will permit doctors to help patients die. Early next year, the one-year grace period the Supreme Court offered in striking down the criminal law against assisting suicide for those suffering intolerably will expire. He could do nothing, and leave it to the provinces to handle as a health question, like abortion. Solving this the old-fashioned way, though, with new legislation, would require an intense parliamentary debate for which there is little time. Or he could invoke the notwithstanding clause, the Charter of Rights & Freedoms’ dread Section 33, and buy some time.
TAX CUTS
3 The big-ticket campaign pledge was to cut the tax rate to 20.5 per cent from 22 per cent for middle-income earners ($45,000 to $90,000 a year) and boost the rate for higher earners. This is likely to happen soon and take effect in January.
TERROR LAWS
4 Although Trudeau supported Bill C-51, rather than be wrongfooted on the volatile issue of national security, he has pledged to revisit the legislation to ensure it complies with the Charter. He expressed serious doubts it is, on issues like new powers granted to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Part of the solution could be a joint Commons-Senate committee, with clearance to oversee all aspects of national security strategy.
MISSING WOMEN
5 As a centrepiece of First Nations activism, and a Liberal campaign promise, an inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women is likely to be announced soon. Trudeau has also pledged to implement all 94 recommendations of the Truth & Reconciliation Commission. He has also said he would address the problem of water supply on reserves, but not with a specific itemized promise or timeline.
PROSTITUTION
6 One hangover from the Harper government’s acrimonious relationship with the Supreme Court is the issue of prostitution. Having lost in court, the Tories passed a new law that targets buyers of sex, not sellers, while maintaining penalties for sex workers who communicate with clients in certain places. Critics, Trudeau among them, fear this will increase their risk by keeping activities underground.
SENTENCING
7 Trudeau has said he supports mandatory minimum sentences for gun and drug crimes in extreme situations, but courts have ruled against so many as cruel and unusual that few remain. On crimes involving prohibited drugs, for example, the Supreme Court struck down the law, finding a “cavernous disconnect” between a “licensing-type offence” and three years in jail.
MARIJUANA
8 After a massive industrial push to medical marijuana, and a campaign pledge to legalize it for recreational use, there is great expectation of movement on this file. It will likely require major regulatory effort, and government bureaucracies are not built in a day.
ELECTORAL REFORM
9 Trudeau has promised to introduce legislation within 18 months to amend the Elections Act to replace first-past-thepost federal elections with an alternative as yet unspecified. After the dirty campaign tricks of Conservatives Dean Del Mastro and Peter Penashue, and the robocall fiasco, he also hinted at a review of campaign spending rules, increased penalties for election fraud, and stronger investigative powers for Elections Canada, with stricter enforcement by the commissioner of Canada Elections.
UNBALANCED
10 Before they left office, the Conservatives passed a law requiring balanced budgets except in recessions. Liberals called it a campaign “gimmick” and because it conflicts with Trudeau’s plans to run three deficits in a row, it is doomed to repeal.
HEALTH CARE
11 Trudeau promised to invest $3 billion in home-care services — easier said than done, as provinces tend to guard their primacy in health-care delivery. On pharmacare, he also pledged to help provinces with bulk buying of drugs and help those with catastrophic costs.
CLIMATE CHANGE
12 The new prime minister is to meet the premiers to prepare a federal framework on climate change for the Paris summit in December.
INFRASTRUCTURE
13 They will also likely be consulted on how best to target Trudeau’s infrastructure investment, mindful the economy is growing slower than forecast in the last budget.
WARPLANES
14 As he backs out of the Mideast mission, Trudeau must also extricate Canada from the F-35 stealth fighter jet program and find a new replacement for the aging CF-18s. He expects to save billions this way, earmarked for new ships for the navy.
CENSUS
15 There have been rumours Trudeau intends to restore the long-form census, abolished over privacy concerns in one of the stranger moves of the Harper era, for which Canada’s top statistician resigned in protest. This would enjoy wide support.