News Analysis
After narrowly missing a majority in the House of Commons, Prime Minister Mark Carney will have to do everything a new leader does, as well as enter highly consequential negotiations with Canada’s neighbour and world superpower, the United States.
The Liberals’ minority status is unlikely to be an impediment in the short term as opposition parties assess their campaigns and, in the case of the NDP, find a new leader, and in the case of the Conservatives, find a seat for their current leader.
Although both NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre lost their seats in the election, Singh said he was stepping down while Poilievre indicated he plans to stay on as leader.
Some of the issues Carney campaigned on are also likely to receive little opposition in Parliament, such as getting rid of internal trade barriers and implementing support measures to mitigate the impacts of the tariff conflict with the United States.
Carney’s minority is also a strong one, with 169 seats, though recounts in the coming days could lead to adjustments to seat counts due to close races in some ridings. The requirement for a majority is 172 seats in the House of Commons.
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Polls in the lead-up to the April 28 vote suggested the Liberals would capture a majority, but the party fell short due to the Conservatives over-performing in Ontario, staying strong in the Prairies, and gaining seats in British Columbia. The party increased its seat count by 25 seats compared to the 2021 election.
Preliminary Elections Canada results have the Liberals holding 169 seats, Conservatives 144, Bloc 22, NDP seven, and one for the Green Party.
In the event the Conservatives reject much of Carney’s agenda, the NDP—which has been reduced to unofficial party status—or the weakened Bloc Québécois could have the opportunity once more to play an oversized role, as they did in the latter years of the previous government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
As one of the first orders of business after winning the election, Carney spoke to U.S. President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron.
Carney’s campaign focused heavily on the tariffs levied by the U.S. president and his talk of making Canada the 51st state, casting this as an existential threat for Canada and arguing that Carney was the best choice to deal with the situation. One of Carney’s first moves after being sworn in as prime minister on March 14 was to visit France and the United Kingdom to strengthen ties amid turmoil with the United States.
A readout from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said that Trump congratulated Carney on his election win and that the two leaders “agreed on the importance of Canada and the United States working together – as independent, sovereign nations – for their mutual betterment.”
On April 30, Trump said that Carney would be visiting the White House “within the next week or less” and that the one who hated him “the least” had won the election.
On April 28, the day of the election, Trump repeated his refrain about the benefits of Canada becoming the 51st U.S. state. Before the start of the election in March, Trump had said the Liberal government under Trudeau was “nasty” in his first term as president, but that he would prefer to deal with a Liberal than a Conservative government this time around.
In their first phone call on March 28, Carney and Trump agreed to “begin comprehensive negotiations about a new economic and security relationship between our two sovereign countries immediately following the federal election,” according to Carney’s account of the call.
Domestic Front
On the domestic front, Carney has to make a number of preparations and plans in forming the new government, including establishing his new cabinet, setting the return date for Parliament, writing the speech from the throne, and preparing the new budget.
Carney opted for a streamlined cabinet in March, reducing the number of ministers to 24, down from 37 under Trudeau.
All of Carney’s cabinet appointees won re-election on April 28 except for Health Minister Kamal Khera. Some were re-elected in landslides, including Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne, and Minister of International Trade and Intergovernmental Affairs Dominic LeBlanc.
These ministers, who also held senior roles under Trudeau, are likely to retain key roles in Carney’s next cabinet.
Carney will also have newly elected talent to draw from, such as former Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson and former Quebec Finance Minister Carlos Leitão.
Hydro One chair Timothy Hodgson, whom Carney recruited to run in the election, won his Toronto-area seat. Hodgson, a former Goldman Sachs banker, advised Carney when he was governor of the Bank of Canada.
Some ministers who changed their minds about not running in this election, such as Anita Anand and Sean Fraser, were both re-elected. The two were cabinet mainstays under Trudeau.
As the first order of business, the Liberals have to build a “solid Canadian cabinet” not based on “old dogmatic ideas,” former Liberal Party president Stephen LeDrew told The Epoch Times in an interview. He noted that Hodgson, who took an unpaid leave of absence as chair of Hydro One to run for the Liberals, would be a good candidate for cabinet.
LeDrew said if Carney has the “right timber,” he can “hammer together a good, solid cabinet.”
“The people of Canada are thirsting for that. They want responsible, competent government, not people who are out there doing crazy things.”
Agenda
Carney will make decisions regarding the cabinet, the return of Parliament, the throne speech outlining the government’s agenda, and the potential budget when the time is right, says a Liberal strategist.
“We know that Mr. Carney’s style of leadership is that he makes decisions when he has to, and with as fulsome an accounting of the facts as he can manage,” Charles Bird, principal at Earnscliffe Strategies, said in an interview.
He suggested that the Liberals will take some time to “let the dust settle” from the election results, and he estimates that the House of Commons could be brought back in late May.
On the dynamics of the new House, Bird said he doesn’t expect a formal alliance between the Liberals and the NDP as occurred in the previous Parliament, saying the NDP paid a price for being associated so closely with the Trudeau Liberals.
“But that said, the NDP, the Green Party, and the Bloc Québécois are unlikely to want to go racing into an election anytime soon, so that likely suggests some degree of runway for Prime Minister Carney and his new government,” he said. “That’s especially important in the context of what is obviously going to be a very important negotiation with the U.S. administration and with President Trump himself.”
Aside from negotiations with Trump, Bird said the Liberals will try to address affordability issues as a priority, noting these played a key role in the election in Ontario where the party didn’t meet its own expectations.
The Conservatives, who focused more on affordability and less on Trump during the campaign, raised their seat total in Ontario from 37 in 2021 to 53 in this election.
Minority’s Durability
Aside from questions about Carney’s next moves and priorities, pundits are assessing the stability of his new minority government, including that it’s almost a majority, faces an opposition that needs to regroup, and must address the trade conflict with the United States. The latter point unites federal parties and provincial governments.
“Regardless of the fact that he’s four seats short of a majority, he’s going to probably take that on like it’s a majority mandate approach,” Tim Powers, chair of Summa Strategies, told The Epoch Times.
“Certainly, the will of the premiers is there to do that. And I think, as it relates to the U.S., the will is there from the other parties.”
In this context, Powers said he expects at least a year of stability for the Liberal minority.
LeDrew also predicts things could get rocky within a year and a half, calling the election result “transitory.”
“That’s not just because of a minority government, but because Canada needs to make a few decisions as to its future, and those decisions will never be unanimous, but they weren’t decided [in this election result],” he said, alluding to accelerating the development of Canada’s natural resources and industries.
Nelson Wiseman, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Toronto, views it differently. He expects the Liberals to be in power for at least three and a half years, despite being a minority.
“You always have people who, if they see a minority, they say ‘Oh no, it’s not going to last,’” he said in an interview, noting, “Who’s going to bring down the government? Is the NDP going to bring them down? Do they think they’re going to do better? Is the Bloc going to bring them down? Do they think they’re going to do better?”
Wiseman said that if one party doesn’t support the Liberals, another will, including the Conservatives, who could vote with the Liberals in some cases if the NDP and the Bloc don’t.
“Canadians don’t like too frequent elections,” he said.
Matthew Horwood contributed to this report.
