However you interpret the American president’s threats to cripple the Canadian economy for whichever of the illogical reasons he cites, and whatever anyone makes of Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, he’s dead right about this: Canada needs to quickly develop a plan for retaliatory tariffs, and that means Parliament has to be immediately reconvened.
Unless and until that happens, all we have is a kind of extraparliamentary provisional government in the form of the Council of the Federation, which consists of 13 premiers of Canada’s ten provinces and the Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. Or rather 12 premiers, now that Alberta’s Danielle Smith has struck out on her own to engage in freelance diplomacy on behalf of Alberta’s oil companies.
In any case, put them all together and they still have no constitutional authority to negotiate with a foreign power, which is Ottawa’s business, and the Council carries a national mandate every bit as tenuous as the hold Justin Trudeau maintains over the paralyzed federal government.
As things stand, the House of Commons will remain effectively under lock and key until Justin Trudeau is replaced by his own party in a leadership race, Parliament is recalled and a failed confidence motion triggers a federal election. This rigmarole was precipitated by a prime minister whose own party and caucus wanted him gone even before Trump decided to rampage onto the scene. It could end up prolonging Canada’s democratic interregnum until early May.
Faced with a rupture in Canada-U.S. relations that could cost 1.5 million Canadian jobs, a massive economic contraction and supply-chain mayhem, just for starters, recalling the House just to formally and officially defeat the minority Liberals in a confidence vote would be wholly insufficient in light of the crisis Canada is facing.
For one thing, the $1.3-billion border-armouring plan Ottawa announced last week, which will merely address one of the concocted pretexts U.S. President Donald Trump has cited for his belligerence, is technically unfunded because there’s no sitting Parliament to authorize the expenditure.
“We also need retaliatory tariffs, something that requires urgent Parliamentary consideration,” Poilievre said Tuesday.
This stands in stark contrast to the clever talk in certain Conservative circles that we shouldn’t be talking about tariffs at all, that we should be trying to persuade the Americans how helpful we can be in their delusions of grandeur and Trump can be appeased if we just slobber on his slippers and bend to his will.
By all means, yes, the Americans should be made to understand how good a deal they’re getting out of our $700 billion annual trading relationship, and yes, Canadian diplomats should make the case to American lawmakers that Trump’s claims about Canada enjoying a $200 billion annual “subsidy” in the relationship is a jumble of falsehoods and illiteracy, but if it’s a North American fortress they want we can help them build that, too, whatever it’s supposed to mean.
But all that is for Canadians to decide, through their own Parliament. And at the moment, we don’t have one.
“Canada has never been so weak,” Poilievre said, “and things have never been so out of control. Liberals are putting themselves and their leadership politics ahead of the country.”
That’s a hard argument to beat.
On Jan. 6, Governor General Mary Simon granted Trudeau his request to prorogue Parliament to allow the Liberals time to pick his successor — a move which may have been unconstitutional. On Jan. 7, Trump said he intended to apply “economic force” to carry out his intention of absorbing Canada as the 51st American state.
Last week, ruling on an application filed by the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, the Federal Court of Canada’s Chief Justice Paul S. Crampton granted an expedited hearing on an “urgent” basis to consider the legality of the Governor General’s decision.
In Iight of Trump’s threats, Judge Crampton ruled against the Liberal government’s lawyers: “The fact remains that there would be no opportunity for Parliament to carry out its constitutional functions, including by availing itself of legislative tools at its disposal, for a significant period during which Canada will likely face a grave challenge.”
Quite apart from the sloppy constitutional hygiene involved, to prorogue Parliament at a moment like this, and for the reasons Trudeau offered, was contemptuous of Canadian democracy. “Open Parliament. Take back control,” Poilievre said Tuesday. “Put Canada First.”
Ontario Premier Doug Ford seems to be ready to do just that. Wanting what he’s called a “clear mandate” to ask for what could be painful sacrifices from Ontarians in the adoption of retaliatory actions against U.S. business interests, the Ontario Conservative leadership has alerted the party that a provincial election is likely imminent.
“I’m going to use every tool in the toolbox to protect the people of Ontario,” Ford said. “We need a clear mandate, not for tomorrow, not for the next day, for four years of dealing with our American friends.”
So does the federal government.
Trump did not follow through with his pledge to sign an executive order immediately after his inauguration on Monday to impose a 25 per cent tariff on imports from Canada and Mexico. Instead, after affixing his signature to dozens of executive orders, Trump told reporters the 25 per cent tariffs will be in place Feb. 1, because Canada, like Mexico, is “allowing vast numbers of people . . . and fentanyl to come in.”
Canada is not allowing vast numbers of people or significant amounts of fentanyl to enter the United States, especially when compared to Mexico. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials say 19.5 kilograms of fentanyl was seized at Canadian border points last year, compared to 9,570 kilograms seized on the U.S. Mexico border. U.S. officials recorded more than two million “encounters on the Mexico border last year, about ten times the number of encounters on the Canada-U.S. border, and “ecounters” can mean all sorts of situations.
Whatever the Feb. 1 deadline turns out to mean, Trump has given his officials until April 1 to prepare a report on migrants and fentanyl from Mexico, Canada and China. So there’s time to talk sense to American lawmakers, and as chair of the Council of the Federation, Ontario’s Ford will be leading a delegation to Washington, D.C. on Feb. 12 “to advocate for maintaining strong Canada-U.S. relations.” On the agenda: employment, the economy, energy, critical mineral supply chains, border security and immigration.
While American law grants the president tremendous leeway in foreign trade and in the executive application of tariffs, Congress can restrain the president if it wants to, and there are midterm elections two years down the road. The Republicans enjoy a small majority in the Senate, 53-47, and in the House their edge is paper thin: 218-215.
So there’s hope that if Trump means war, and Canada retaliates with tariffs or export restrictions that make key states and districts sting, we might be able to fight this thing. But we need a plan. Ottawa needs a mandate. And for that we need a Parliament, and we need it now.
National Post