A new Parliament, a new and untested Speaker, a new and untested prime minister, and an old familiar smirking face filling in for the leader of the opposition, at least until the party leader can win a new seat. Will anything actually change with all of these new faces, or have the dynamics entrenched themselves? We are about to find out.

Andrew Scheer led off in English, welcoming Mark Carney to his first Question Period, and complained that the government “secretly” dropped counter tariffs (it wasn’t secret), and wondered how he would make up the fiscal shortfall. Carney first thanked his constituents and the Speaker, and gave the line that the tariffs have maximum effect on the U.S. while minimal effect on Canadians. Scheer chirped that he didn’t take long to not answer questions, before demanding a budget before summer vacation. Carney suggested that Poilievre’s plan did not include a budget, and said that new legislation would be on the way to build the economy. Scheer recited a bunch of bullshit about the Liberals damaging the economy, and demanded the government repeal the old Bill C-69. Carney recited some lines about building the economy and a major project office. Pierre Paul-Hus took over in French to demand a budget, and Carney insisted in French that he has a daring and ambitious plan to bring together the Canadian economy into one economy and not thirteen. Paul-Hus repeated the demand, and Carney insisted that they would act immediately to cut taxes on the Middle Class™ and reduce or remove GST on new housing. Paul-Hus then turned to the false claim that that the counter-tariffs were removed in secret, and Carney responded that he must be referring to the Conservative platform with its $20 billion deficit.

Yves-François Blanchet rose for the Bloc, and he called the King a “foreign monarch” before wondering why there was no mention of trade in the Speech from the Throne. Carney said that if he had been there, he would have heard about the global trade system. Blanchet called the Speech “centralising” and railed against the “one economy” talking points, likening provinces to branches of a bank headquartered in Toronto. Carney said this is a crisis and a time for unity, which is why the premiers are meeting this weekend in Saskatoon. Blanchet pivoted to the climate crisis, and noted that there was “nothing” about it in the Speech. Carney said that the climate crisis does exist, which is why we need to become an energy “superpower” in clean and conventional energy, and it would come up at the G7 meeting.

Round two, and Shannon Stubbs spouted bullshit about pipelines and Bill C-69 (Hodgson: We will get projects built; We will win this trade war and make Canada an energy superpower), Ellis Ross blamed the Liberals for low oil prices, essentially (Hodgson: While you want to play games, we will get projects built; Dabrusin: If Canada wants to be an energy superpower, it’s going to be low-cost, low-risk and low-carbon), Jonathan Rowe complained about the industrial carbon price (Dabrusin: Making sure that polluters pay is part of making companies competitive as more countries have border carbon adjustments), Andrew Lawton read his own script about the industrial carbon price (Joly: We are fighting for workers affected by the trade war), and Richard Martel also demanded the old Bill C-69 be repealed (Joly: I am looking forward to protecting jobs in Quebec and Canada).

Xavier Barsalou-Duval complained about the monarchy (Guilbeault: Some nonsense about the UK Crown that was civically illiterate; Champagne: We are serious with our Middle Class™ tax cut).

Melissa Lantsman noted that e incoherence on housing policy (Robertson: We are cutting taxes on day one and have an ambitious housing plan;  You may want to make seniors take a cut in what they can sell their houses for but we will deliver affordable housing), Scott Aitchison worried about the plummeting condo market (Champagne: We are eliminating GST for first-time home buyers and you should support that; You are talking down supports for Canadians), Gabriel Hardy complained about home prices for young Canadians (Champagne: We will cut GST for first-time buyers).

Round three saw questions on the the “crime wave” (Anandasangaree: We will address with issues of repeat violent offenders; Sahota: We are partnering with police across the country to fight organised crime; Our measures have decreased crimes and we will keep working), opioid deaths (Anandasangaree: We listed seven gangs as terrorist entities), offshore tax havens (MacKinnon: The PM has followed all of the rules), demanding a budget (Champagne: There will be a budget in early fall, but in the meantime, it’s great that you will support our motion on the tax cut; Joly: We are delivering the plan; marine protection areas affecting fisheries (Thompson: We understand the cultural and economic impact of the fisheries and I will ensure the industry is protected), and youth unemployment (Hajdu: We are working to ensure all Canadians have an opportunity to thrive in the changing economic environment).

We are back to questions about Carney’s wealth. He has already left the Chamber, but the Conservatives are having a performative meltdown because he won’t answer them. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-05-28T19:05:45.196Z

Overall, it took a little bit of getting used to the new flow and redistribution of questions now that the standings in the House have changed, meaning that the leaders’ round is shorter, and we have a lot fewer Bloc questions, to say nothing of the fact that the NDP now only have a single question at the very end. And because it was the first day, we had a lot of answers prefaced by thanks to constituents before they gave their responses, and we can expect that to continue for the next week or two, before they get their initial responses out of the way. This all having been said, it was a pretty quiet day in that there was very little heckling or cross-talk today, which is still early days. The new Speaker, Francis Scarpaleggia, didn’t need to really assert authority today, and may get another few days of good behaviour before things start to get serious.

As for the main players, Andrew Scheer is now apparently wearing glasses to make himself look serious and less like a smirking doofus, not that it really worked that well. Mark Carney seemed to do fairly well in terms of answering without having a script in front of his face, but his answers while sharp and with the tiniest bit of wit, but most of his responses stuck to his established talking points. He also acquitted himself well enough in French, so he has that in his favour. Tim Hodgson was the newbie who had the most to deliver today, but he was very unsure on his feet, and he stuck to bland reassurances rather than hitting back on any of the bullshit around the old Bill C-69 talking points, or the nonsense around the “energy production cap,” as the Conservatives called it. Julie Dabrusin took over for him, and was much more practiced, and her response about the energy superpower being low-cost, low-risk, and low-carbon was interesting.

This all being said, the dynamics have not much changed. The questions were just as mendacious as they were before, with some absolute bullshit being promulgated around things like the former Bill C-69, and bills that they falsely claim have caused a “crime wave” around the country. We got some very worn questions about Carney’s assets before he turned them over to the blind trust, and because they were simply designed as theatre, they were asked at the point in QP once Carney had already left the Chamber, so that the Conservatives who asked could howl and scream about how Carney wasn’t answering them (because they’re not allowed to point out his absence), and Conservatives have been using this tactic for a while about trying to make it look like someone who isn’t present is merely just ignoring them. It’s childish, and I can see that the whole point of this remains gathering clips for social media rather than actually trying to do some proper accountability work. I will also note that the Conservatives were utterly incoherent on housing prices, demanding housing prices both go down, but selling prices not be reduced, and nobody called this out when it would have been so easy to do so.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Mélanie Joly for a white suit with a blue-grey striped collard shirt, and to Gabriel Hardy for a well-tailored dark eggplant suit over a black shirt and tie. Style citations go out to Steven Guilbeault for a charcoal jacket over a grey shirt, blue stripe tie and tan slacks, and to Lisa Hepfner for a pink long-sleeved dress with fuchsia florals. Dishonourable mention goes out to Amarjeet Gill for a black suit with subtle stripes with a white shirt and a bright yellow tie with black spots.