Highlights:

  • Trudeau further centralizes power to his advantage.
  • Left-of-centre Senators conform rather than provide independent, sober second-thought.
  • Threats to freedom of expression; legislating politically unpopular views as hate speech.
  • Trudeau punishes Canadians defending the unborn.

Trudeau’s authoritarian tendencies which led to the invoking of the dangerous Emergencies Act should not have been a surprise.  There were a number of red flags waving since Trudeau became Prime Minister in 2015.

Some of these alarming red flags are as follows:

Destruction of Parliament

Parliament is being destroyed by the increasing centralization of power in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and Privy Council Office (PCO). The latter advises the PMO, and carries out its policies.  The move away from Parliament to the PMO is similar to the system started many years ago under long time Prime Minister Mackenzie King who resigned in 1949. It greatly increased under Trudeau Senior, whose disdain for Parliament’s traditions, duties and privileges, and for individual MPs themselves, was legendary.  Justin Trudeau is no different.

Since Pierre Trudeau’s day, BOTH parties, Conservative and Liberal, have done much damage to Parliament by consolidating power in the hands of the Prime Minister, PMO and the PCO (bureaucracy).  In doing so, they have stripped Parliament of the many checks and balances which have protected citizens from arbitrary and unaccountable abuse of power by the government.

Justin Trudeau has accelerated this dangerous process.  He resents any obstruction to his agenda and therefore looks for any means to prevent meaningful Parliamentary oversight and control.  The following points are examples of Trudeau’s continuing the centralization of power in his hands and that of his unelected paid advisors and unaccountable bureaucrats:

  • Changes in the Role of the Cabinet

Under the parliamentary system, the cabinet has evolved, over the centuries, as the decision-making body of the government.  Under this system, a minister is held responsible for a particular department, implementing the policies for which the government party was given a mandate through elections.  Trudeau, however, has continued the practice of diminishing cabinet’s importance.  He has removed any individual responsibility from cabinet members, and, instead, issued “mandate letters”, which are, effectively, marching orders for the ministers.  Practically speaking, these mandate letters turn cabinet ministers into functionaries carrying out orders from Trudeau and his advisors.  Cabinet ministers may no longer even choose their own staff, who are chosen by the PMO and PCO.  As a result, the ministers’ staff are accountable directly to Trudeau and his advisors, not to the minister.  This system also serves as an effective way to monitor the ministers’ activities to ensure that they conform to Trudeau’s wishes.  In 2021, the Prime Minister spent $10.5 million for personnel and $9.4 million on staffing ministerial offices.  The cost of this staffing was a 6.9% increase over the previous year.

Typically, individuals appointed to Trudeau’s cabinet have been inexperienced and unqualified for their role.  They, however, share one singular characteristic, namely, that of unquestioning obedience to Trudeau.  There are no grownups in Trudeau’s cabinets.

  • Diminishing Presence of Parliament in the Political Process

COVID-19 has served as an opportunity for Trudeau to curtail the presence of Parliament in Canada.  Parliament has sat for an unprecedented short period of time over the past two years, supposedly because of the pandemic.   Even when Parliament is in session, it has been a hybrid Parliament, whereby only a handful of MPs actually sit in person in the House of Commons.  Others are required to participate remotely from their homes.  This has provided Trudeau with an efficient way to reduce interactions from MPs over his policies and the government’s performance.

  • Parliamentary Committees

Trudeau has diminished the importance of parliamentary committees by allowing only a few witnesses to appear in person.  Others wishing to provide information to the committees do so by a written brief.  Those briefs are dutifully translated into both official languages, but are seldom, if ever, read by committee members in either language.  Also, of the few witnesses permitted to appear in person, most support the bill. Few who object to the bill are requested to appear in person.  Committee reviews of bills are fundamentally a farce, as the vote by MP committee members is no longer an independent one, but is dictated by the party.  That is, MPs are obliged to vote at committee as instructed by the party leaders, and the MPs’ conscience and perspective are irrelevant. Attending committee hearings is now similar to attending a play where you have previously read the script and already know the ending.

  • Diminishing the Senate

In 2016, Trudeau announced that Liberal senators would, henceforth, no longer be members of his Liberal caucus, but would be “independent” senators.  This was a ridiculous proposition since the Liberal Senators were still members of the Liberal Party and supported the party’s policies.  Trudeau has now appointed many more senators, who, without exception, are left-of-centre in perspective. Although not called “Liberal” senators, they clearly are just that, and in no way independent of the party. The only time these recently appointed senators have raised objections to Liberal legislation and returned it to the House of Commons for further review occurred when they regarded a bill as not sufficiently “progressive”.  For example, when the bill amending the euthanasia bill, Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID), was before the Senate, the senators insisted that it be further widened to provide euthanasia for the mentally ill, even if such patients are not competent to provide a valid consent.  Trudeau was happy to oblige the Senate.

Under Canada’s founding Constitution, the British North America Act (1867), the Senate was modeled after the British parliament with an upper house to govern, and provided a check and balance on the House of Commons.  Providing regional representation across Canada, the Senate has often been described as “a chamber of sober second thought”. Under Trudeau, the Senate has become a sea of Liberal lackeys, or “yes” men and women.

With Parliament diminished, is it any wonder that Trudeau’s authoritarian and woke policies are receiving virtually no scrutiny or push back?  The following are some of Trudeau’s woke and dangerous policies:

  • Control of the Press

Trudeau has given hundreds of millions of dollars to select media outlets across the country, as outlined in the December 2021 REALity article, “Trudeau’s Manipulation of the Media”.  As a result, media outlets in Canada are moderating content and refusing to criticize the Liberal government and its policies.  Such media are, instead, providing Trudeau with deference, refraining from reminding the public of his many gaffes, lack of judgement, and ethical violations. Why would they, with Trudeau’s generous handouts?

  • Control of Free Speech

Trudeau’s agenda includes significant new restrictions on the ability of Canadians to exercise their constitutionally guaranteed right to free speech by controlling broadcasting communications and commercial internet.  This will include oversight and specific sanctions on what Canadians can say, do or view online.

Streaming services and web-sharing platforms such as YouTube, Netflix, Spotify and Crave will become licensed, monitored and regulated by the Trudeau-appointed Canadian Radio Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC).  In effect, this bill gives sweeping jurisdiction over all audio-visual services to control and restrict their content.  Freedom of thought and creativity are at stake.

In July 2021, the Trudeau government announced its plans to create a “Digital Safety Commissioner”, which will have the power to shut down any website deemed hateful or a threat to democracy.  Legislation will apply to “online communication service providers” which the government defines as major social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok.  The legislation will also provide a definition of the word “hate”, which is subjective and depends largely on the viewpoint of the beholder.

  • Control of Public Demonstrations

Under the guise of protecting health care workers in the performance of their duties, the Liberal government passed Bill C-3, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Canada Labour Code, in December 2021.  The bill is broadly written so that it will enable police to halt almost any demonstration on the basis that they are protecting lawful access to a place where “health services” are provided by health professionals.  The bill specifically prohibits any conduct that intends to provoke a “state of fear” in a health care worker or prevent anyone from obtaining health care services.  It is apparent that this bill can and will be used across the country to make pro-life demonstrations outside abortion clinics a criminal offence.  The penalty for doing so is ten years in jail.

Trudeau believes he has the authority to determine “Canadian values”, even though with his wealthy, elite background, he has minimal experience associating with the lives of ordinary Canadians.

  • Re-interpreting Canadian “values”

In September 2021, the Trudeau government instructed the Minister of Finance to apply the Income Tax Act to remove the charitable tax status of any pro-life group or pregnancy counselling centre that provides “dishonest counselling” or misinformation. It does not take much imagination to know what constitutes Trudeau’s (and, therefore, the Minister of Finance’s) interpretation of “dishonest counselling” or misinformation. Any pro-life information will, henceforth, be regarded as “dishonest”.  Trudeau has a limited understanding of the abortion issue, which he wrongly regards as a “right”.  He has no understanding of its wider implications to humanity and to society.  He has weaponized the Income Tax Act to, in effect, eliminate or at least curtail opposition to abortion in Canada.

This is not the first time that Trudeau has imposed his personal progressive ideas on Canadians.  The government’s summer jobs program is another example.  In 2017, in order to receive a grant under this program, the applicant was required to attest to his support for abortion.  This caused a backlash (even the pro-abortion media thought the ideological test was offensive) so, Trudeau attempted to “modify” this summer jobs policy in 2018, but these amendments were meaningless since applicants were still required to support progressive social policies before being eligible for a grant.

Finally, Trudeau has provided Canada with euthanasia on request, eliminating safeguards to protect the vulnerable.  The safeguard removed was the provision that euthanasia would only be permitted if the patient was terminally ill.  Trudeau claimed he was required to remove this provision because of a provincial decision in Quebec which he was required to follow.  This excuse was utter rubbish.  Trudeau removed the provision because he wanted to, not because of any legal or constitutional considerations.  Now, Canada has the widest access to euthanasia in the world.

Canada is Not a Democracy

Is Canada recognizable as a functioning Parliamentary democracy anymore?   Canada looks more and more like a totalitarian state, ruled by one man and by one party.  It is time to restore Parliament’s rights and privileges and bring back democracy.