Growing up in Edmonton, Alberta, Mark Carney learned the hockey maneuver of swinging around the goal and stuffing the puck in the net. Carney is now the newly minted prime minister of Canada, playing forward against protectionist goalie Donald Trump. And he’s looking to score quickly for team Canada.
Carney embarks across the Pond this week on a mission to “strengthen two of our closest and longest-standing economic and security partnerships.” He will meet with France’s President Emmanuel Macron, plus Great Britain’s Prime Minister Keith Starmer and King Charles III.
In response to the Trump tariffs, Canada is seeking to grow trade with its Commonwealth partners. As well, it is pursuing a buy-Canada strategy. Ontario, a big buyer, is targeting red-state Kentucky with a total ban on bourbon.
As well, French-speaking Quebec is a bedrock of support for Canada’s governing Liberal Party., commonly nicknamed the “natural governing party” of the country. Trump hates the Liberals and tweeted that Justin Trudeau was a “disaster” who was “destroying” his country.
Come to think of it, Trump has reason to despise Carney. The new PM is an environmentalist. He has been an adviser to the United Nations climate initiative. In the private sector, he successfully advised Brookfield Asset Management to invest in renewable energy and back off from the carbon economy.
A recent Angus Reid poll showed far more Canadians believe Carney can take on “the Donald” than feel clockwise about opposition leader Pierre Poilievre. The survey was taken before Carney’s fiery, defiant anti-Trump speech on winning the Liberal leadership. Poilievre is a bombastic Trump-of-the-north in an historically calm country.
Once in Europe, Carney will encounter leaders with their own agendas. Both Macron and Starmer have sought to appease and flatter Trump. Macron has boosted France’s defense budget. During Trump’s first term, Macron invited “the Donald” to Paris for Bastille Day. Trump came home wanting to emulate the military parade he had witnessed.
Starmer came calling at the White House earlier bearing a visit invite from King Charles. It worked, as Trump was singing praises of a Labour prime minister at meeting’s end. He used the phrase “beautiful meeting,” a locution first used to describe the Ukrainian conversation which got him impeached the first time.
Carney brings assets of his own to the table. As governor of the Bank of Canada during the Great Recession, he sharply lowered interest rates. The result of this early action saw Canada’s economy recover more quickly than its G7 neighbors.
Carney did such a good job that he was named Governor of the Bank of England. He strongly opposed Great Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union but oversaw the country’s economy during Brexit in a post he held from 2008 to 2013. He later advised Prime Minister Trudeau during the Covid 19 crisis.
Once back in Canada, Carney’s next stop is the territory of Nunavut in Canada’s far north. It has but a single Member of Parliament, but the PM’s purpose is to talk security and defense. The Trump-Putin bromance aside, Russia’s presence in the Arctic is cause for concern.
Time is growing short. An election call is coming, likely in late spring. Carney will set the date for one of Canada’s two-month election campaigns.
Carney is clearing the decks. The new PM has surrendered two passports, one Irish from his ancestry and the other British bestowed when he took up duties with the Bank of England. He now needs a visible achievement, promising expanded trans-Atlantic trade and renewal of Commonwealth ties.
The latter may already have been accomplished. Trudeau planted a maple tree on grounds of Buckingham Palace on a valedictory trip to London — a tried-and-true photo op. Richard Nixon planted a tree on Parliament Hill in Ottawa. It grew up crooked.
This article also appears in Cascadia Advocate.
