The writ has been dropped and the election date has been set!
That means that Canadians will have to decide who they want to give their vote to in the
upcoming election, and one thing that might be affecting your decision is our current
Prime Minister’s track record.
It’s no secret that politicians don’t always keep their word, but just how many
promises has Justin Trudeau broken, and how many has he actually followed through on.
Today I’ll be taking a look at some of Trudeau’s key promises from the 2015 and 2019 campaigns
and determining whether or not he kept his promises.
And if you enjoy this video or find it useful then please consider subscribing to my channel!
Ok, before we get started I want to lay out the ground rules.
Politicians tend to make A LOT of promises during campaigns – Trudeau made 353 campaign
promises just in 2015!
So to keep this video short I’ll only be looking at his biggest, signature promises
that got a lot of media attention.
Also, I’ll strictly be looking at whether or not Trudeau did what he said he’d do
– I won’t be discussing whether or not I think his promises and policies are actually
any good.
A lot of the analysis for this video came from the website polimeter.org’s promise
tracker, so if I missed a promise you were hoping I’d cover then you can head on over
there and look it up yourself!
With that being said, let’s dive right in to Trudeau’s 2015 promises!
Let’s start by looking at some of his remarks on the environment and climate change.
The idea of imposing a bureaucracy out of Ottawa, a cap and trade system on provinces
like British Columbia that have already moved forward with a world-renowned carbon tax that
is actually working for them is actually a completely nonsensical plan.
We are committed to working with the provinces to reduce emissions, to encourage them to
hit those target needed so we can contribute as a responsible country once again to reducing
emissions.
In this clip, Trudeau is referring to his plan to set a national price on carbon but
allow the provinces to decide what type of system they want to enforce that price through.
Trudeau made a number of promises related to climate change and the environment, but
this was definitely the most prominent one.
And he has indeed followed through, with the federal carbon tax set to increase to $170/tonne
by 2030.
While Trudeau did keep his promise to put a price on carbon, he did wind up breaking
another major environmental pledge, which was to phase out fossil fuel subsidies.
Up next, let’s take a look at some tax and budget promises.
I am ready to do what my opponents won't: ask our wealthiest to pay more tax so our
middle class can pay less.
Trudeau did stay true to his word on this one.
He lowered the federal tax rate for incomes between $44,700 and $89,401 from 22% to 20.5%
and created a new bracket for earnings over $200,000 to be taxed at 33%, up from the previous
29%.
And when we talk about that investment we're very clear: we're going to run three modest
deficits in order to pay for it.
Nope!
During the campaign Trudeau promised those three deficits would be less than $10 billion
each but exceeded the $10 billion figure every year.
He also did not balance the budget after three years: in fact he’s never run a balanced
budget.
Next I’d like to take a look at a couple of promises related to Canada’s democracy.
We are committed to ensuring that the 2015 election will be the last federal election
using first past the post.
Well, 2019 was held under First Past The Post and so will the 2021 election, so this one
was definitely broken!
Trudeau did set up a special committee to examine alternate electoral systems.
But when the committee recommended a proportional system, Trudeau declined to follow their advice.
And that's why the appointments process that I'm proposing that will appoint people in
an open, transparent, non-partisan way will really be the follow up to this which is to
make sure we have a senate that becomes less seized with partisanship and more focused
on serving canadians to the best of its ability.
• In this clip Trudeau is referring to his promise to have an independent appointments
process for senators.
Trudeau did keep this one, as Canadians can now apply to be senators and applications
are reviewed by “The Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments.”
Now I’d like to take a look at a couple high profile promises on social issues.
So the Liberal party is committed to legalizing and regulating marijuana.
• As evidenced by the many dispensaries that have popped up around the country since
Cannabis became legal in 2019, this one was kept!
The second promise in this category was Trudeau’s vow to have a gender balanced cabinet.
Of course when a reporter asked why this was so important to Trudeau, he famously responded
with: Because it's 2015.
• And of course he did keep his promise.
Thus far every one of Trudeau’s cabinet’s has had gender parity.
The next two promises are about indigenous issues, which Trudeau vowed to take more seriously
and make more progress on than the preceding Harper government.
So here in shoal lake 40 where we are right now there's no access to clean water you yourself
were out in the community delivering bottled water and the last time we spoke you made
a promise to rectify this issue not just in shoal lake 40 but across the country within
five years.
While 108 long-term drinking water advisories have been lifted since Trudeau became Prime
Minister, there are still 51 left in the country, firmly placing this promise in the ‘broken’
category.
We will immediately launch a national public inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous
women and girls in Canada.
Those touched by this national tragedy have waited long enough.
The victims deserve justice, their families and opportunity to heal.
This promise was kept, as the report was published in 2019.
As I said in the intro, whether or not the government has actually done enough in response
to this report is separate debate.
The final two promises from 2015 that I’d like to look at are issues that Trudeau framed
as central to Canada’s character as a country.
The Prime Minister also said yesterday that "religious freedoms should be overruled because
almost all Canadians don't support the wearing of a Niqab."
Trudeau heavily criticized Stephen Harper for attempting to ban Muslim women from wearing
the niqab during citizenship swearing in ceremonies.
He did keep his promise to undo the ban, although it was only a matter of dropping the appeal
on a court ruling that said the Niqab could be worn.
Canada must immediately accept 25,000 Syrian refugees.
During the campaign, Trudeau promised to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada by the end
of 2015.
Canada did accept the 25,000 refugees and more, although it took a couple months longer
than Trudeau originally promised.
But it was close enough that I think we can categorize this one as kept!
Alright, that’s it for the 2015 promises I’ll be looking at.
Before we move on to 2019, let’s tally up the score.
According to Polymeter, Trudeau only outright broke 7% out of his 353 promises from 2015.
The rest were either kept (67%) or partially kept (26%).
Looking at the 12 I analyzed, Trudeau kept 8 (67%) and broke 4 (33%).
Considering those were some of his biggest promises, that definitely puts Trudeau in
a slightly less favourable light, although he still earns a passing grade.
Alright, let’s move into the 2019 campaign promises.
After a number of scandals, it’s honestly a minor miracle that the Liberals managed
to cling on to power.
While Trudeau may still be Prime Minister, he was reduced to a minority government.
That, combined with a global pandemic that has taken up a lot of the government’s time
and energy for well over a year now, means that Trudeau has been less able to fulfill
his more recent promises.
For that reason, there are a lot of promises from 2019 that haven’t really been kept
but also haven’t been outright broken – they’re either in progress or currently unfulfilled.
I’ll go through some of the major promises where something definitively can be said,
and then provide a list of uncertain promises at the end.
And on climate change after 10 years of Stephen Harper doing nothing in just four years we've
reached three quarters of the way to our 2030 targets which we will meet and surpass.
But we know that's not enough, we're going to continue to do more on making Canada net-zero
by 2050.
Since the election Trudeau has committed to this, and he also increased Canada’s emissions
targets from 30% to 40% below 2005 levels by 2030.
So I’ll call this promise kept, although we won’t know for sure if these goals will
be achieved for many years.
We need to keep moving forward in a way that respects indigenous peoples, respects that
there's going to be a range of views, but is grounded in the U.N. Declaration on the
Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Trudeau’s promise to implement the UNDRIP has been fulfilled, as The United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act received royal assent on June 21, 2021.
The next promise is Trudeau’s vow to ban so-called conversion therapy in Canada.
Earlier this morning our government introduced a bill to end conversion therapy in Canada.
While the House of Commons has passed a bill to outlaw conversion therapy, it did not pass
the senate before parliament’s summer recess.
So I’ll call this one in progress, as the bill has not yet officially become law.
That's why a reelected Liberal government will cut cell phone bills by 25%.
Once again this promise is in progress.
The government has given Canada’s three major cell phone providers until March 2022
to reduce prices, at which point the government will step in if providers haven’t complied.
As promised, here are a few major promises that haven’t really been kept or broken
yet.
According to Polimeter, Trudeau has only outright broken 3% of his 343 promises from 2019, but
he’s also only kept or partially kept 11% of them while a further 42% are in progress
and 44% are in an undetermined state.
Hopefully you found this analysis useful in deciding who to vote for in the upcoming election!
I’m considering making a series of videos summarizing the policy positions of the major
political parties throughout the campaign, so let me know in the comments if any of you
would be interested in that.
And as always, please consider subscribing if you’d like to see more content like this!