When Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently reached out to a local steel worker in northern Ontario for a handshake, he was snubbed, with the worker instead confronting him about his struggle to make ends meet despite having a steady job.
Trudeau's response -- listing things his Liberal government had done to help Canada's working families -- didn't help the prime minister's case. In the tense exchange, caught on camera in late August, the steel worker can be seen replying, "I don't believe you for a second." And that too after telling the Prime Minister: "I think you are only here for another year." The clip went viral on the internet and was reported on by the media.
This exchange encapsulated the frustration that Trudeau is facing from the Canadian public, and the dramatic reversal of fortune he has witnessed -- in his ninth year as Prime Minister, Trudeau's approval rating has plummeted.
In September, Ipsos said that just one-third (33 per cent) of Canadians approved of Trudeau's leadership as Prime Minister, marking a new low, while around two-thirds (67 per cent) of Canadians were found to disapprove of his performance, an increase of 4 points since June. Meanwhile, Pierre Poilievre, leader of Canada's Conservative Party, retained his position as the top pick for Prime Minister, with 45 per cent of Canadians thinking he'd be the best person for the job, while Trudeau lagged by 19 points at 26 per cent.
Trudeau's party colleagues have also reportedly called for him to step down, even as he holds on after surviving two no-confidence motions in Parliament.
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New Delhi believes that it is this backdrop of mounting political troubles at home that could be driving Trudeau's actions against India, with the Canadian Prime Minister perhaps feeling the need to woo the country's politically-significant Sikh community, which has at least some Khalistan sympathisers, ahead of next year's federal elections.
India says Trudeau govt targeting it to serve 'political interests'
India said that the Canadian government, led by Trudeau, was targeting its representatives for "vote bank politics", as its diplomatic relations with Canada hit a fresh low on Monday following New Delhi’s decision to withdraw its High Commissioner, Sanjay Kumar Verma, along with other diplomats and officials, from the North American country and expel six Canadian diplomats, including Acting High Commissioner Stewart Ross Wheeler.
Tensions between India and Canada had already heightened after Trudeau alleged last September a "potential" involvement of Indian agents in the killing of Khalistan separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen. New Delhi had rejected Trudeau's allegations as "absurd."
Monday's escalation came after Ottawa conveyed to New Delhi its intention to question Indian diplomats and officials as part of its investigation into Nijjar's killing. In a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Monday, India revealed it had received a diplomatic communication from Canada on Sunday identifying Verma and other diplomats as "persons of interest" in the Nijjar case. New Delhi went on to firmly reject these "preposterous imputations", attributing them to a "political agenda" from the Trudeau government aimed at serving its "narrow political interests."
Recent events in Canadian politics and Trudeau's downwards political trajectory explain why India thinks so.
Election losses hit Trudeau's party
Trudeau's falling popularity coincides with two electoral setbacks in recent months.
In September, Trudeau's Liberal Party was defeated in a special parliamentary election in the city of Montreal. The Quebec nationalist Bloc Quebecois won the vote in the electoral district of Lasalle-Emard-Verdun, which was seen as a safe seat due to being a longtime Liberal stronghold.
Experts had told the media that the by-election was a "litmus test" for the Liberals, ahead of the Canadian general election set to take place before the end of October 2025. Opinion polls suggest that the Liberals are likely to lose next year's federal election to the Conservatives, the official Opposition in Canada's Parliament, ending nearly a decade of Liberal governments in the country.
At the same time, Trudeau faced calls to resign as leader of the Liberals, including from within his own party. However, he has insisted that he plans to stay on and lead the party into the 2025 election.
In June, Trudeau's party also lost a Toronto federal seat that it had held for 30 years to the Conservative Party. This was seen as a major sign of trouble for the party, which has been in power since 2015.
Parallels being drawn with defeat of UK Tories
By September, Trudeau's approval rating plummeted from 63 per cent, when he was first enthusiastically elected in 2015, to 33 per cent, leading the media and experts to believe that if recent polls are any indication on how Canadians might vote, the 2025 election could mark the end of the Trudeau era.
Speaking to the BBC in September, Darrell Bricker, a political scientist and pollster with Ipsos, drew a parallel between the state of Canadian politics to the historic defeat of the UK Conservative Party, often referred to as the Tories, who were trounced in the general election held on July 4, 2024, losing 251 seats in the British parliament after 14 years in power.
Regarding Trudeau's government, Bricker reportedly said, "It's basically over." He added, "... We're working our way towards an inevitable conclusion."
Trudeau, the son of former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, was elected in 2015 on a message of change and strengthening the Canadian middle class.
However, a cost-of-living crisis in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic has hit Canadians hard, with housing becoming unaffordable, grocery prices skyrocketing, and the public healthcare system struggling. Crime, too, has become more visible.
Losing the support of Jagmeet Singh's NDP
Making matters worse, Jagmeet Singh's New Democratic Party (NDP) in September withdrew from a two-and-a-half-year-old agreement with Trudeau's party that had helped keep his minority government in power.
Back then, Jagmeet Singh, a supporter of the Khalistan separatist movement, had said that the Liberals were "too weak, too selfish" to fight for Canadians. Under the deal, struck in March 2022, the NDP had been supporting the Liberals in confidence votes. While the two parties were not sharing power, the Liberals -- who had failed to win a majority in the past two federal elections -- were able to govern as a minority government, with the assurance that the NDP would support them in confidence votes.
While NDP's withdrawal of support does not automatically trigger a federal election, it could end up sending Canadians to the polls before the election originally scheduled for October 2025.
This is because, as explained by Singh, a non-confidence vote would be "on the table" with every confidence measure going forward. And, losing a confidence vote in the Canadian Parliament can trigger a general election.
Trudeau will also be mindful that Canada has over 770,000 Sikhs, who make up the country's fourth-largest ethnic community, with at least a section of them backing Khalistan separatism.
Trudeau facing 'foreign interference' storm
According to Monday's MEA statement, under criticism for "turning a blind eye to foreign interference in Canadian politics", Trudeau's government "has deliberately brought in India in an attempt to mitigate the damage".
"This latest development targeting Indian diplomats is now the next step in that direction. It is no coincidence that it takes place as Prime Minister Trudeau is to depose before a Commission on foreign interference," said the MEA statement, adding, "It also serves the anti-India separatist agenda that the Trudeau Government has constantly pandered to for narrow political gains."
Canada established the "Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference in Federal Electoral Processes and Democratic Institutions" in September 2023. The first phase of the Commission's work focused on alleged interference that China, Russia and other foreign actors may have engaged in, and any impact this could have had on the 2019 and 2021 federal Canadian elections.
While the first phase concluded with the release of the Commissioner's Initial Report in May 2024, the second phase is now underway, in which the Commission will examine the Government of Canada's capacity to "detect, deter and counter such interference". Public hearings were slated to be held on these issues in September and October 2024. The Commission is required to submit a final report by December 31, 2024.
In April, the Canadian spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), had alleged that India had tried to "interfere" in Canada's federal elections in 2019 and 2021.
An unclassified summary by the CSIS alleging the interference was reportedly tabled as part of the Commission examining possible election meddling.
India, for its part, had strongly rejected the allegations as "baseless" and asserted that the core issue was Ottawa's meddling in New Delhi's internal affairs.