21 September 2021 - Canada election: Trudeau wins third term
Canadians have re-elected a Liberal minority government
John Paul Tasker (CBC News, 20/09/2021)
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau has won enough seats in this 44th general election to form another minority government — with voters signalling Monday they trust the incumbent to lead Canada through the next phase of the pandemic fight by handing him a third mandate with a strong plurality.
After a 36-day campaign and a $600-million election, the final seat tally doesn't look very different from the composition of the House of Commons when it was dissolved in early August — prompting even more questions about why a vote was called during a fourth wave of the pandemic in the first place.
Canada’s status quo election: Trudeau returned with another minority, faces uncertain future
Kimberly Speers (The Conversation, 21/09/2021)
The 2021 Canadian election results were almost a mirror of the results of the 2019 vote. After calling an election in the middle of a fourth COVID-19 wave, Justin Trudeau’s gamble for a majority government failed.
It won’t be an easy time for the re-elected Liberal minority government to lead. There are a multitude of crises the Liberals are returning to and must address — including the impact of climate change, housing affordability, opioid abuse and economic issues like deficit and debt management.
What Trudeau’s win means for Canada-U.S. relations
Andy Blatchford (Politico, 21/09/2021)
Justin Trudeau’s election win will earn him a congratulatory call from a figure largely forgotten during Canada’s election campaign: President Joe Biden.
But staying on Biden’s radar will be key for Trudeau, as he resettles into the Prime Minister’s Office.
Canada’s election Monday capped a campaign that paid very little attention to foreign policy or the country’s vital relationship with the United States. Trudeau, however, did receive two late-campaign endorsements from Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
If this election was a test of leadership, all of them failed
Robyn Urback (The Globe and Mail, 20/09/2021)
During the provincial election in Ontario in 2014, incumbent Liberal premier Kathleen Wynne framed the choice as one between her “safe hands” and the opposition’s “reckless schemes.”
It was an unintentionally hilarious slogan for a party drowning in scandal, dysfunction and waste, but the message nevertheless resonated with Ontarians. Voters were asked to consider whom they believed they could trust to safeguard their fundamental needs and interests, and in the end, Ms. Wynne’s “safe hands” were it.