“I make promises because I believe in them.”
PM JUSTIN TRUDEAU EXPLAINS WHY HE IS COMMITTED TO ELECTORAL REFORM, DESPITE MPS URGING HIM TO DELAY IT,
OTTAWA— Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recommitted to electoral reform a day after Liberal MPs recommended abandoning his pledge to put a new voting system in place by 2019.
In a conversation with the Star’s editorial board Friday, Trudeau refused to give up on reforming Canada’s 149-year-old electoral system in time for the next general election.
“I make promises because I believe in them,” Trudeau said in Toronto. “I’ve heard loudly and clearly that Canadians want a better system of governance, a better system of choosing our governments, and I’m working very hard so that 2015 is indeed the last election under first-past-the-post.”
Trudeau’s comments come after Liberal MPs on the all-party electoral reform committee recommended abandoning the prime minister’s election promise. In a supplemental comment to the committee’s 333page report, released Thursday, Liberal MPs wrote that the 2019 deadline was hasty. The representatives worried Canadians weren’t sufficiently engaged for the “radical” proposals for a new election system.
The main report, supported by all opposition parties, recommended taking the issue directly to Canadians through a national referendum on two options — the status quo (first-past-the-post) and a new proportional system that more accurately reflects Canadians’ votes.
Democratic Institutions Minister Maryam Monsef was accused of lying and insulting the committee’s work Thursday, after she suggested they failed to recommend a clear alternative to first-past-the-post.
The minister, who was defiant Thursday at a press conference after question period, apologized Friday.
“Yesterday, in the House, I used words that I deeply regret,” Monsef said in the first of three apologies. “I would like to sincerely apologize to the members of the House, to Canadians and to the members of the special all-party committee on electoral reform. In no way did I intend to imply that they did not work hard, that they did not put in the long hours, or that they did not focus on the task at hand. I thank them for their work.”
Trudeau stood by his minister Friday, but suggested the “outburst” warranted the apology.
“The fact is that Canadians expect that when someone behaves in a way that isn’t consistent with their expectations of themselves, or Canadians’ expectations of them, that they apologize,” Trudeau said. “The minister is working very, very hard on an important file and she apologized for her outburst.”
In the wake of Monsef’s comments and the Liberal MPs’ recommendations, there was widespread specula- tion that the Liberals would shy away from Trudeau’s pledge to do away with first-past-the-post.
The perceived wisdom in Ottawa is that there is little, politically, for the Liberals to lose in abandoning that promise. Electoral reform is seen as a niche issue, one that would take a lot of work to pull off, but would cause little damage if quietly abandoned or punted to a second mandate. But Trudeau said it’s “not a good enough answer to Canadians” to give up because it requires some hard work.
“Canadians elect governments to do hard things and don’t expect us to throw up our hands when things are a little difficult,” Trudeau said. “‘Oh, it’s more difficult than we thought it could be and therefore we’re just going to give up.’ No, I’m sorry, that’s not the way I was raised, that’s not the way I’m going to move forward on a broad range of issues, regardless of how difficult they may seem at a given point.”
Trudeau said he’s looking forward to the results of a postcard survey the government launched this week, which he called the “third pillar” of the Liberals’ plan.
“People are going to be able to go online and fill out a fun little questionnaire that gets into values rather than models, to help us see if there are underlying principles and things that Canadians all agree on broadly that can drive a solution for electoral reform,” Trudeau said. “I’m going to keep working towards fulfilling that and all my election promises.”