“If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you, it is yours. If it doesn’t, it never was.”It never feels good to be dumped and Justin Trudeau must be sitting alone in his room right now, listening to his go-to breakup playlist. Alas, Jagmeet Singh left him today, ending his de facto coalition, otherwise known by the dry name "supply and confidence agreement." For more than two years, Singh has propped up Trudeau's Liberal government in exchange for some goodies with expensive price tags. On the policy front, leftists should be happy with what they achieved. They've given us years of unrestricted mass migration, and the federal government is larger than at any point in Canadian history (including during both world wars,) fueled by a combination of high new taxes and huge new record levels of debt. It's something a democratic socialist like Singh should be happy to plant his flag on. But the NDP's victory on the policy front has not translated into advantage on the political front. The Liberals have been able to take credit in large measure for policies that leftist voters support, leaving Singh yelling from the cheap seats of Parliament, "That was because of me!" . As the Liberal Party's fortunes continue to sink to new levels of desperation in the polls, the NDP has seen to its horror that voters aren't splitting both left and right to his party and Pierre Poilievre's Conservatives. They are just going right. They are going right past the NDP and straight into the arms of the Conservative Party, which has successfully made Singh's NDP wear the failure of its coalition agreement with the Liberals. Poilievre, for his part, has been mischievously trying to wedge the two apart in order to trigger an election earlier than the scheduled October 2025 date. In an open letter he penned last week, the Conservative leader called him "Sellout Singh," accusing the NDP boss of propping up Trudeau because he needs more time for his big MP pension to vest. It's a line of attack that appears to have gotten under Singh's skin. Singh's dinghy is tethered to Trudeau's sinking ship as it slips beneath the waves. In a panic, he has ordered that the lines be cut lest he be pulled down with it. He will now desperately try to put some political distance between his party and Trudeau's Liberals between now and the next election. But will voters buy it? Singh's NDP has been front and centre with all of the Trudeau government's big policy fumbles: unrestricted mass migration, carbon tax increases, record deficits, inflation and the cost-of-living crisis. Singh has formally ended their coalition/supply agreement but hasn't declared that he is prepared to vote non-confidence in the Liberal government and thereby trigger an election. Instead, he says he will vote on each Liberal bill on a case-by-case basis. That could mean an early election, or it could mean more business as usual. While Singh preens for the cameras as a newly single bachelor, the Conservatives will surely put him to the test by tabling a motion of non-confidence on the first day that Parliament returns. If Singh is serious, he will vote to bring the Liberals down and trigger an election. But if he sheepishly votes to keep Trudeau in power, the Conservatives will have all of the evidence they need to keep taunting him with the moniker "Sellout Singh". But Singh would be mad to trigger an election right now. His pension isn't yet vested, and his party stands to lose both seats and influence. While the polls show the NDP is roughly equal to where it was in the last election, the Conservatives have risen so sharply that they stand to take seats from the Liberals and NDP alike. Right now, his party enjoys junior partner status in Parliament, even without his formal agreement with the Liberals. In a new Parliament dominated by a huge majority Conservative government, all the NDP can do is yell and scream as their policy victories are undone before their eyes. Singh has already had two elections at the helm of the NDP, overseeing significant seat losses in 2019 and making effectively no headway in 2021. His next election may be his last as leader. For all of these reasons, the good money isn't on Singh taking down the Trudeau government that he suddenly has an issue with. But we will know soon enough this fall when they are forced to stand up and be counted in a vote of non-confidence.
“If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you, it is yours. If it doesn’t, it never was.”It never feels good to be dumped and Justin Trudeau must be sitting alone in his room right now, listening to his go-to breakup playlist. Alas, Jagmeet Singh left him today, ending his de facto coalition, otherwise known by the dry name "supply and confidence agreement." For more than two years, Singh has propped up Trudeau's Liberal government in exchange for some goodies with expensive price tags. On the policy front, leftists should be happy with what they achieved. They've given us years of unrestricted mass migration, and the federal government is larger than at any point in Canadian history (including during both world wars,) fueled by a combination of high new taxes and huge new record levels of debt. It's something a democratic socialist like Singh should be happy to plant his flag on. But the NDP's victory on the policy front has not translated into advantage on the political front. The Liberals have been able to take credit in large measure for policies that leftist voters support, leaving Singh yelling from the cheap seats of Parliament, "That was because of me!" . As the Liberal Party's fortunes continue to sink to new levels of desperation in the polls, the NDP has seen to its horror that voters aren't splitting both left and right to his party and Pierre Poilievre's Conservatives. They are just going right. They are going right past the NDP and straight into the arms of the Conservative Party, which has successfully made Singh's NDP wear the failure of its coalition agreement with the Liberals. Poilievre, for his part, has been mischievously trying to wedge the two apart in order to trigger an election earlier than the scheduled October 2025 date. In an open letter he penned last week, the Conservative leader called him "Sellout Singh," accusing the NDP boss of propping up Trudeau because he needs more time for his big MP pension to vest. It's a line of attack that appears to have gotten under Singh's skin. Singh's dinghy is tethered to Trudeau's sinking ship as it slips beneath the waves. In a panic, he has ordered that the lines be cut lest he be pulled down with it. He will now desperately try to put some political distance between his party and Trudeau's Liberals between now and the next election. But will voters buy it? Singh's NDP has been front and centre with all of the Trudeau government's big policy fumbles: unrestricted mass migration, carbon tax increases, record deficits, inflation and the cost-of-living crisis. Singh has formally ended their coalition/supply agreement but hasn't declared that he is prepared to vote non-confidence in the Liberal government and thereby trigger an election. Instead, he says he will vote on each Liberal bill on a case-by-case basis. That could mean an early election, or it could mean more business as usual. While Singh preens for the cameras as a newly single bachelor, the Conservatives will surely put him to the test by tabling a motion of non-confidence on the first day that Parliament returns. If Singh is serious, he will vote to bring the Liberals down and trigger an election. But if he sheepishly votes to keep Trudeau in power, the Conservatives will have all of the evidence they need to keep taunting him with the moniker "Sellout Singh". But Singh would be mad to trigger an election right now. His pension isn't yet vested, and his party stands to lose both seats and influence. While the polls show the NDP is roughly equal to where it was in the last election, the Conservatives have risen so sharply that they stand to take seats from the Liberals and NDP alike. Right now, his party enjoys junior partner status in Parliament, even without his formal agreement with the Liberals. In a new Parliament dominated by a huge majority Conservative government, all the NDP can do is yell and scream as their policy victories are undone before their eyes. Singh has already had two elections at the helm of the NDP, overseeing significant seat losses in 2019 and making effectively no headway in 2021. His next election may be his last as leader. For all of these reasons, the good money isn't on Singh taking down the Trudeau government that he suddenly has an issue with. But we will know soon enough this fall when they are forced to stand up and be counted in a vote of non-confidence.
