Not a week goes by in Ottawa without a new wave of speculation about Justin Trudeau’s future.
Will stay, won’t stay.
He may promise that he will finish his mandate, but nothing happens.
Every new poll confirming his party’s astonishing decline fuels the rumor mill. Every new investigation that confirms voters’ dissatisfaction with him personally revives speculation.
Still, the liberals’ dilemma is Faustian.
Is it better to risk defeat with Justin Trudeau? Or should we bet on a new leader to revive the government?
Avoid the slaughterhouse
It is hard to remember a government that has faced such headwinds.
Two-thirds of his 2021 voters are ruling out renewing their trust in him. If elections were held today, Pierre Poilievre would be elected Prime Minister!
The concern in the caucus is real. But under such circumstances we are still a long way from a revolt worthy of the Parti Québécois.
The reason is twofold.
Today’s Liberal Party of Canada (PLC) is entirely the creation of Justin Trudeau and his inner circle. They raised it from the ashes, they control all the levers, all the centers of power.
There is therefore no legitimate counterweight in the PLC that could stage a revolt against the king.
Secondly, the Liberals can criticize their leader harshly; there is no natural alternative to the Council of Ministers.
In Quebec we often quote François-Philippe Champagne and Mélanie Joly. But could they do better than Justin Trudeau in English Canada? Many people doubt it.
Would Chrystia Freeland, the all-powerful prime minister, save the furniture in Quebec? Probably not.
There remains the man everyone is talking about: Mark Carney, the former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England.
The saviour
Many liberals see it in their soup.
What better way to restore the credibility of a PLC that spends too much, has little interest in the economy, and is too woke than a banker? And not just any banker, but the one who enabled the Canadian economy to overcome the 2008 crisis and who steered the impossible Brexit on the other side of the Atlantic.
The main party allowed itself to be courted and allowed the rumors to spread. Then he broke his silence.
Mark Carney confirmed in an interview with the Globe and Mail that he has not ruled out a possible race to lead the PLC.
Important signal. Strategic or unfair?
When all bets are off, the answers are far from clear.
Mark Carney has no political experience. Still reeling from the abject failure of Michael Ignatieff, the greatest prime minister Canada has ever had, many fear that the banker and businessman has as little political savvy as yesterday’s Harvard intellectual.
Then comes the existential question. Is it better to seek a fourth term with a new leader like Mark Carney and risk burning him in a crushing defeat? Or is it better to let Justin Trudeau bear the risk of this defeat so that Mark Carney can rebuild the party?
Until the answers to these questions are clear, Justin Trudeau will remain firmly in the saddle.
