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An Elections Canada sign directs voters to early voting station at the Medicine Hat Lodge in September 2021.
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Medicine Hat’s Conservative MP says the election of a new Liberal Leader changes nothing in his mind, and he wants Canadians to go to the polls soon.
“Mark Carney might be the saviour for the Liberal Party, but he’s not the saviour for Canada,” said Glen Motz, MP for Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner, on Monday, the day after former Bank of Canada governor won the governing Liberal Party’s leadership contest in a landslide vote.
“I get the process that he can be sworn in… but the Canadian public hasn’t elected him Prime minister, and if he wants the trust of the Canadian public, he has to earn that.”
“Call an election. That’s the challenge: Call an election.”
Carney is expected to be sworn as Prime Minister in this week, and has promised a “seamless” transition after meeting government caucus members in Ottawa.
Parliament is set to resume sitting on March 24, and technically, a general election is slated to take place by Oct. 20 this fall, though many observers believe a vote will occur this spring.
“There is an economic threat and we need strong leadership, and we as Conservatives are positioned to handle it with experience and ideas that won’t hurt our country in a tariff war,” said
Motz.
He argued the Liberals under Justin Trudeau has done a bad job managing carbon pricing, immigration, government spending, and resource and infrastructure development.
He expects similar policy under a new leader, even though many changes have been outlined by Carney as a way to combat threats to the Canadian economy posed by tariffs and a trade dispute being driven by the White House under President Donald Trump.
Carney served as the Bank of Canada Governor under both prime ministers Stephen Harper and Trudeau, before serving as the governor of the Bank of England.
Polls suggest Canadians are confident he could manage the current tariff rift with the United States well, though Motz argued Carney takes over a government with a bad track record, with many of the same people in high-ranking positions.
“We can’t ignore the economic threat and we can’t ignore how we’ve gotten here,” said Motz.
“All of a sudden we have all the (Liberal leadership) candidates adopt the policies that Conservatives have been pushing for a considerable amount of time.”
“He’s been an advisor to Trudeau for the last five years, and look at the spot we’re in,” said Motz.
On the weekend acceptance speech, Carney reiterated that he would eliminate the consumer carbon tax.
As well, he said he would reverse capital gains changes that Conservatives have campaigned heavily against in the last budget.
The change comes years after the Conservatives began calling for an end to carbon pricing and recently calls to “call a carbon tax election” from Tory leader Pierre Pollievre.
The Conservatives have targeted Carney as an unelected government official and his private business dealings since Justin Trudeau announced that he would step down a party leader and Prime Minister in early January, Carney has campaigned on a “change” motif.
“He’s caused our debt to climb, carbon tax to climb, food prices to climb, and the affordability crisis are directly linked to him,” said Motz. “We might get a fresh face, but fresh polices? No.”
Motz says Conservatives should be trusted to eliminate carbon pricing which “hurts consumers and hurts our industries.”
Both the Liberals and Conservatives have yet to release policy on future look of industrial carbon levies, which, like the adjunct TIER program in Alberta, charges high emission industries like power.
City of Medicine Hat power officials have said a clear outlook on industrial pollution pricing is a key to general business plan as
