The PM was in town but readying himself for a meeting with Danielle Smith before he flew out to Washington, but only some of the other leaders were present for QP. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and he recited a scary crime story before exhorting the government to pass their “jail not bail” bill. Sean Fraser said that they have made commitments to reforms to the system, and that they are willing to work across the aisle to advance sensible legislation and not cut-and-paste American legislation. Poilievre switched to English to recite another scary tale, decried so-called “Liberal bail,” and demanded the vote on their bill. Fraser reminded him that some of the laws he decries came in under Harper, when Poilievre was in his Cabinet. Poilievre returned to French to wonder if Carney was going to announce the elimination of tariffs with the U.S., and Dominic LeBlanc gave a general assurance of issues they will be discussing but no promises of announcements. Poilievre switched back to English, and repeated the same demand, and got the same response from LeBlanc. Poilievre was outraged that there was no deal, and decried all of the capitulations, and LeBlanc reminded him that we remain in the best position of any other country, and wondered if Poilievre would turn down an invitation to a working lunch if he was in government. Poilievre tried to poke holes in the assurance that we have the best deal, as though it wasn’t all relative. Mélanie Joly accused Poilievre of talking down workers and the economy, before she listed new job announcements.
Christine Normandin led for the Bloc, and she praised the visit to Washington before lamenting his past capitulations, and demanded some gains for Quebec. LeBlanc got back up praise the work they are doing to get a deal. Normandin again listed failures, and demanded the government let the promised aid for the forestry sector flow to companies. Joly said that different streams of funding “will be available,” but didn’t give an indication as to when. Xavier Barsalou-Duval worried about immigrant truck drives in Ontario who don’t have proper certification and demanded the government do something about it. Patty Hajdu read a statement about truckers advancing the economy, and that they have created a specialised inspection team to enforce the law rigorously, while working with provinces to fight against false classifications.
Round two, and Andrew Scheer got up to concern troll that there has been no deal with Trump (Champagne: The world is changing, and we will have a new budget cycle in the fall; LeBlanc: You were railing that we weren’t meeting enough), Shelby Kramp-Neuman read another script of the same (Joly: We are supporting sectors being tariffed; Anand: Is it a failure when we support our sectors and we are diversifying our trade routes), Jamil Jivani worried about shifting auto production (Joly: We have been meeting with auto makers and we are engaging with the unions and we have a fund to help them), Luc Berthold read the day’s script in French (Champagne: We have an enviable position in the G7).
Conservatives: You blame tariffs for job losses but say we have the best deal. Both of these cannot be true!*sigh* Both are true, if you think about it for more than two seconds.
— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-10-06T18:37:59.237Z
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau denounced the latest Canada Post offer and blamed the government (Lightbound: We need to save Canada Post, and we need to modernise and transform it; The Bloc lives in some kind of parallel universe).
Raquel Dancho read the day’s script on the trade deal (Sidhu: We are protecting and supporting industry with a strategic response fund; Solomon: We gave 22 million Canadians a tax cut), Bob Zimmer read the same script (MacDonald: 96 percent of agriculture products are moving tariff free and we just signed a deal with Indonesia), Aaron Gunn also read the same script (Hogan: We will buy Canadian and we are changing federal procurement rules).
Round three saw questions on bail (Sahota: Violent and repeat offenders should not be on the streets, but your bill misses the mark; We spent the summer consulting but you should support C-2; Fraser: You didn’t read the bill you want to repeal, and you haven’t included the things law enforcement actually wants; Your bill is completely deficient; Your arguments are self-defeating; Anandasangaree: We have legislation that you should support to help law enforcement), steel and aluminium tariffs (Champagne: We are supporting the sector), Alberta’s plan for a pipeline in spite of Indigenous objections (Dabrusin: The Act has strong provisions for Indigenous consultation, and the two premiers would work it out).
Apparently there is a “bloodbath” happening on Canadian streets. #QP
— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-10-06T18:55:53.762Z
Overall, it was another day with pretty much two topics, and one of them was a rehash of the same scripts from last week. The first topic was Carney’s trip to Washington, and the Conservatives demanding a “win” from him, as though he has any control over what Trump is going to say or do, or even if the things that they have been saying they have reached an agreement (allegedly reducing some of the steel and aluminium tariffs) will actually happen because again, Trump. And the Conservatives nevertheless keep pretending that he’s the rational actor in this and that Carney is just inept, which is just sad in the end.
And of course, it was a full rehash on the bail questions for the second half of QP, in the run up to the vote on the Conservatives’ Supply Day motion (which did go down to defeat, as it should have). I will note that the government line did change a little bit today in that they described the Conservative bill as bing insufficient and “missing the mark,” as opposed to it being blatantly unconstitutional, so I’m not sure what that heralds in particular. I also noted that a number of ministers ducked out of the proceedings halfway through, no doubt headed to the airport for the trip to Washington, but it was nevertheless slightly odd for them to show up for 20 minutes and then leave.
Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Eric St-Pierre for a tailored navy suit with a crisp white shirt and a light blue tie, and to Arielle Kayabaga for a smart black suit over a light blue collared shirt. Style citations go out to Linda Lapointe for a short-sleeved navy dress with bright multicoloured florals across it, and to Randy Hoback for a taupe jacket over a light blue shirt with blue jeans and no tie. Dishonourable mentions go out to Kelly DeRidder and Shannon Miedema for each wearing bright yellow jackets over black tops and slacks.