When he was first chosen as LPC leader, I hadn’t even realized that he was a party member. I suspect he was chosen for the name recognition, and while I don’t like the idea or existence of political dynasties, I didn’t care because I wanted Harper out.

The Proportional Representation Bait-and-Switch

One of the LPC’s central campaign promises in 2015 was the end of First-Past-the-Post. He reneged on that promise as soon as the committee he’d empanelled recommended a referendum between FPTP and PR, but did not include his preference (ranked ballot). He took his ball and went home. This was deeply impactful on me. I had no great trust in politicians as a rule, but this was the final nail in the coffin for my faith in my country’s electoral system.

A few months ago he went on MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith’s podcast, and this was one of the topics they discussed. As one of the “FairVote” people the party was all but explicitly trying to bait into voting Liberal, I find his arguments to be insulting and patrician, though unsurprising. Even in my most generous interpretation of what he says there is that he and I have a values mismatch when it comes to what we think democracy can and should be.

Strike Breaking

Early on in his PMship in 2016, the Trudeau government threatened to follow Harper’s 2011 precedent and table back-to-work legislation against legally striking Canada Post workers. In December 2024, after saying they wouldn’t force striking postal workers back to work, they did. By my count, this marks the third time in 15 years that our Posties have been prevented from improving their pay and working conditions, twice by Trudeau’s government.

“Affordable” Housing

About a year ago, his deputy PM came under fire for touting an “affordable housing” development for low- and middle-income people where the rents started at $1700/month for 330sqft, and $3315/month for 816sqft.

Again, deeply personal for me, as I live in the metro area with the worst rents in the country and have suffered 7 years of housing instability as a result.

This was a completely headassed publicity stunt from a woman who is not low- or middle-income, and definitely does not struggle to afford rent; it is archetypical of the “arrogant and out-of-touch” Liberal, from a woman who had previously been lionized by legacy media (most of which, incidentally, are majority US-owned - see PostMedia).

I have not seen any indications from the party that it sees the financialization of our housing market to be a concern for them, which I don’t find surprising for any liberal party, but is nonetheless concerning to me as a renter who would like not to have to spend the rest of my life at the whim of a landlord for my use of what my country officially considers to be a human right, my housing.

Truth and Reconciliation Weaselry

His government’s stated commitment to truth and reconciliation has repeatedly been shown to be all hat, no cattle. The have repeatedly fought court battles to get out of making any actual material reparations, most recently to mind was this absolutely galling stance from government lawyers that Canada has no legal obligation to provide First Nations with clean water. They’ve also wasted millions fighting residential school survivors in court.

Influence Peddling for a Criminal Business Conglomerate

SNC-Lavalin. The PMO tried to influence the Attorney General/Minister of Justice to decline to prosecute SNC-Lavalin on charges of bribery. The initial story by the Globe & Mail (which I cannot find, sorry) claimed that she objected, and was then “shuffled” from Minister of Justice to Minister of Veterans’ Affairs. The ethics commission report did find that the Trudeau had contravened the Conflict of Interest Act, and found that Trudeau had “continued to engage both with SNC-Lavalin’s legal counsel and, separately, with [then-AG and Justice Minister] Ms. Wilson-Raybould and her ministerial staff to influence her decision”, after she met with him and expressed her concerns that the PMO was inappropriately trying to interfere politically with the AG in a criminal matter.

Means-Tested Pandemic Relief

The Liberal government tried to claw back CERB, the emergency benefit they rolled out for COVID-19. They also demanded that claimants deemed to be invalid recipients pay back the disbursements, but were (unsurprisingly) overzealous, and $246M worth of outstanding CERB “debt” has been canceled because the claims were found to be justified. I wasn’t eligible for this, but someone in my family was, and got extremely stressed when the initial talk of clawbacks started, because their work venue had no plans to reopen at that time. Stuff like that leaves a bad taste in people’s mouths.

Failure to Shore Up Healthcare

And lastly, the doctor shortage. I’m honestly (mercifully) pretty out of gas, but uh… family doctor shortages everywhere, private for-profits making incursions (more than the ~30% they already have) into our system, fucking… telecoms?! somehow also doing this (although I’d have pretty much no problem with this if we nationalized them.)