GUNTER: NDP’s Singh ongoing support for Trudeau is humiliating

Get the latest from Lorne Gunter straight to your inbox

Published Sep 03, 2024  •  Last updated 6 minutes ago  •  3 minute read

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh meets with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Thursday, Nov. 14, 2019. Photo by Sean Kilpatrick /THE CANADIAN PRESS

Back in 1991, all the provincial premiers except Quebec’s Robert Bourassa worked with Joe Clark (at the time Brian Mulroney’s Constitutional Affairs minister) to hammer out a constitutional deal that might be acceptable to Quebec.

Article content

In August that year, while Mulroney was out of the country, Clark announced an agreement had been reached only to have Mulroney hurry home and unannounce the agreement.

Clark should have been embarrassed enough never to serve in Mulroney’s government after Mulroney pushed Clark out as leader of the Tories in 1983. And he should have resigned after Mulroney’s renunciation of his constitutional deal.

But Clark didn’t because, as University of Calgary political science professor Tom Flanagan put it at the time, “Joe Clark has the highest threshold for humiliation of anyone in Canadian political history.”

Until now.

How many times has NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said he was really, really angry with the Trudeau Liberals – so angry he might just have to end the two parties’ cozy little arrangement to keep the Libs in power – only to vote with the Liberals time and time again.

Article content

Article content

When Singh gets home from Parliament Hill after a hard day of polishing Trudeau’s apple, he spends his evening posting messages online about how Trudeau’s government is the enemy of the working class, a band of incompetents who are only in it for their wealthy friends.

Then the next day, Singh is right back at his desk in the House of Commons voting the way the Liberals want him to.

He is the political equivalent of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

The Liberals have betrayed their promises to Singh on pharmacare, dental care, national daycare and a host of other issues that Singh insisted were uncrossable lines. Yet after each Trudeau treachery, there has been a social-media outburst from the NDP boss, followed almost immediately by staunchly pro-Liberal votes.

Article content

Jagmeet Singh makes Joe Clark look like a man with an iron spine.

Of course, the latest example of Singh’s willingness to renounce any values he or his party have ever held came last month over the strike by unionized workers against Canada’s two largest railways, CN and CPKC.

When the Liberals sent the dispute to binding arbitration just 17 hours after it began, Singh was enraged. Before the strike even began, Singh had warned the Liberals not to intervene, to let collective bargaining run its course.

And still, the Liberals did exactly what they thought would be the best for their political fortunes, which was to stop the strike before it did any serious economic harm.

At the time, Singh huffed and puffed that there was a good chance he would end his deal to keep the Trudeau Liberals in power. Yet here we are more than a week later and Singh shows no signs of pulling the plug on the Libs’ political life support.

Article content

On Labour Day, in Winnipeg, surrounded by workers wearing t-shirts that read, “NDP Stands with Workers,” Singh said Trudeau had “crossed a line in the sand” with his government’s arbitration order.

But Singh has no credibility. His threats are hollow.

I don’t know how his party stands by him any longer. (And judging by their declining poll standing and fundraising, many NDP supporters have abandoned him.)

If you were a unionized worker, especially in the private sector, how could you trust Jagmeet Singh to protect your interests?

Singh protects Trudeau’s interests ahead of workers.

There is plenty of speculation online that Singh is waiting until his Parliamentary pension vests in February 2025 before he forces an election. I’m not that cynical. Singh probably just mistakenly thought backing the Liberals would lift his party as Trudeau’s party fell.

The NDP have had their best chance to trounce the Liberals since Jack Layton replaced the Libs as the official opposition in 2011. But they whiffed at the chance because of Singh’s loyalty to Trudeau.

Article content