Set featured image Recently ousted leader of the Conservative Party of Canada Erin O’Toole (left) and heir-apparent Pierre Poilievre (right). Photo credit: Reuters/Blair Gable and The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld   Readers who turned on the TV or opened Twitter last week would be convinced that the Conservative Party is in a sorry state of shambles. […]

Photo credit: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images   It’s been three years since Chinese technology giant Huawei’s Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou was detained by Canadian authorities at Vancouver International Airport. A political lifetime has passed since then: two federal elections, four different foreign affairs ministers, and a global pandemic have all taken place. Still, Canada is […]

Summa Strategies’ vice chair assesses the year that was for Canada’s three major federal party leaders. Photo credit: The Canadian Press/CBC   2021 was not the year of sunshine and rainbows many banked on after a doom-and-gloom filled 2020. COVID-19 still loomed large over the year, dominating Canadians’ lives and political decisions and discourse throughout […]

Trudeau’s new, but generally familiar cabinet at its swearing-in ceremony, Oct. 26, 2021. Aside from briefly calling together his inner circle, the prime minister has largely ignored many of his Liberal caucus colleagues since regaining a minority mandate in September. Photo credit: The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld    If politics is a team sport, Justin Trudeau’s […]

Parliament Hill in Ottawa. Photo credit: Flickr   Nearly a month has passed since the election was held, and another full month will go by until we see a return to Parliament in Ottawa. It’s a remarkably slow pace for a return to government business, even without the backdrop of the absolutely urgent pandemic election […]

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau participates in a ceremony on Parliament Hill on the eve of the first National Day of Truth and Reconciliation, just prior to jetting off for a family vacation in Tofino, B.C. Photo credit: The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld   “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”  In the […]

Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole (left) and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh (right) on the campaign trail at the end of August. Photo credit: CTV News Montreal    So… what was that all about? Canada’s forty-fourth general election came in hot, and went out lukewarm. Manipulated media, candidate fumbles, protests and debates were all inconsequential in […]

From left to right: Conservative leader Erin O’Toole, Liberal leader Justin Trudeau, and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh. Photos via The Canadian Press.    Bottom of the ninth. Home stretch. Fourth and goal. Whatever sports analogy you choose, it aptly applies to the final week of a political campaign. As far as elections go, the stakes […]

O’Toole (right), himself a former helicopter pilot in the Royal Canadian Air Force, at a recent campaign stop at a helicopter operator in Nova Scotia. Photo credit: Twitter/Erin O’Toole   With three weeks left in the suddenly interesting federal election – and lots of time yet for momentum to be gained and lost – one […]

An Afghan mother and her children wait on the tarmac at Hamid Karzai International Airport, hoping to flee the country before Taliban forces take over Kabul and its assets. Photo credit: AFP/Wakil Kohsar via Getty Images Every federal election gets a curveball. Unforeseen events or issues arise to force politicians off their message track. Insufficient […]