The Canadian Press
OTTAWA—Justin Trudeau was expected to give his first press conference today as prime minister-designate—hours after he steamrolled his Liberal party to a stunning majority victory.
Trudeau no doubt will be riding on an electoral high from the 184 seats the Liberals captured—an increase of a whopping 149 ridings from the last election—but he already will be facing tough questions on how and when he will implement his plan.
He has said the first piece of legislation his government would put forward is one to lower taxes for the middle class and raise taxes for the wealthiest Canadians.
The Liberal party becomes the first ever to vault directly from third party status to government. Even the Liberals’ internal pollster, who foresaw a majority, hadn’t imagined a total so high.
Trudeau, 43, also completes the first father-son dynasty in Canada’s federal government history as the first-born of Pierre Elliott Trudeau follows in his father’s footsteps.
Trudeau faced more than two years of Conservative attack ads before defeating Harper, including a barrage of “just not ready” ads so ubiquitous that school-age children could recite them.
Notwithstanding his appeal to Canadians’ “better angels,” the new prime minister-designate gave a lengthy denunciation last night of what he called the politics of division and fear, including a defence of veiled Muslim women who became an unlikely wedge issue during the campaign.
“Canadians have spoken,” Trudeau said.
“You want a government with a vision and an agenda for this country that is positive and ambitious and hopeful.
“Well, my friends, I promise you tonight that I will lead that government—I will be that prime minister,” he pledged.
During the October crisis of 1970, Pierre Trudeau famously told an inquiring reporter “Just watch me” when asked how far he would go in limiting civil liberties to combat separatist terrorists.
The elder Trudeau went on to shape much of the modern Canadian state that Prime Minister Stephen Harper came to power in 2006 in part to re-make.
With the magnitude of the Conservative party loss still sinking in, the Conservative leader—who called the extraordinarily long, 78-day election on Aug. 2 after almost 10 years in power—is stepping down as party leader, according to a statement from party president John Walsh.
“The prime minister indicated that he will continue to sit as a member of Parliament, and asks that a process to both select an interim leader and initiate the leadership selection process in our party begin immediately,” said the Walsh letter.
Harper did not announce his resignation in a concession speech to party faithful in Calgary, stating only that the “disappointment you also feel is my responsibility and mine alone.”
But he offered gracious congratulations to his younger opponent.
“While tonight’s result is certainly not the one we had hoped for, the people are never wrong,” said the prime minister, adding he had called Trudeau and “assured him of my full co-operation during the process of transition in the coming days.”
Finance minister Joe Oliver, Immigration minister Chris Alexander, Fisheries minister Gail Shea, Veterans minister Julian Fantino, and Aboriginal Affairs minister Bernard Valcourt were among the Conservative cabinet ministers rejected by voters.
NDP leader Tom Mulcair, who had aspired to lead Canada’s first NDP federal government, instead lost the party’s hard-won 2011 grip on official Opposition status.
That role will fall to the Conservatives.
The New Democrats were decimated—dropping to 44 seats after entering the election with 95.
Mulcair, however, managed to hold on to his Montreal seat despite a tough Liberal challenge.
NDP stars, including deputy leader Megan Leslie and foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar, also fell to Liberal challengers.
Olivia Chow—whose late husband, Jack Layton, led the NDP’s so-called “orange crush” in 2011—succumbed to Liberal juggernaut Adam Vaughan in downtown Toronto.
Green Party leader Elizabeth May also was re-elected on Vancouver Island but Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe went down to defeat.
