Liberal MPs give Trudeau October 28 deadline to decide his future as party leader

After a Wednesday caucus meeting that lasted over three hours, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau emerged looking confident and declaring “the Liberal Party is united.” At the meeting, dissident Liberal MPs had presented the Prime Minister with a petition asking him to resign as party leader and prime minister. It was signed by at least 24 members of the caucus.

But, the caucus revolt is not over, as many of the dissident MPs issued Trudeau with an ultimatum of either leaving as party leader or staying and facing further consequences, CBC News reported.

One of those consequences might be Liberal MPs voting along with Conservatives in the next non-confidence vote. Ken McDonald (L-Avalon), who was one of the MPs who signed the petition, has mentioned that some MPs have talked about voting against their own government as a way of forcing Trudeau out of office. An Abacus Data poll released Tuesday showed that 57 percent of Canadians in a Liberal-held constituency wanted their MP to tell Trudeau to resign at Wednesday’s caucus meeting. The same poll found that only 20 percent of those surveyed want Trudeau to seek reelection while 47 percent want him to step down.

The caucus revolt dominated Wednesday’s Question Period in the House of Commons as Trudeau faced off with Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre over the prime minister’s political future. After Trudeau declared that the “Liberal Party and the Liberal government are totally united,” Poilievre countered that “24 liberal members recognize that this Prime Minister is not worth the cost, the crime, the corruption and now the chaos.”

Poilievre accused Trudeau of having “to muzzle half of these members at the caucus, forcing some of them to go to the bathroom, to send text messages to the journalists telling them what's going on at the caucus. The Liberal members know what Canadians have already known, that the prime minister is not worth the cost, the crime and the corruption. When will the election be?”

Trudeau didn’t mention any election but said “the Conservatives are concerned with division and personal attacks,” while “we are focused on the fact that we have to deliver for Canadians, deliver dental care for seniors, deliver more daycare spots, deliver investments in a greener economy and create jobs for the future.”

Poilievre replied, “This prime minister has doubled housing costs, doubled the national debt, given us the worst economy in the G7, he has paralyzed Parliament with a cover-up of corruption, and two million people are lined up at food banks, but he cannot fix what he broke, because his caucus is revolting. Will he call a carbon tax election today?”

Discontent has been building since the Liberals’ byelection loss this summer to Conservatives in the once-safe seat of Toronto-St.Paul. Anger accelerated when Trudeau lost two more byelections in Winnipeg and Montreal, including a Montreal riding once occupied by former Justice Minister David Lametti. Trudeau avoided attendance at the daily House or Commons Question Period in the week before the October break week, traveling to Laos.