Raymond J. de Souza: A Carney in cabinet would temper Trudeau’s climate zealotry

The federal cabinet has been on retreat this week in Halifax. All were present save for one notable exception. Mark Carney has not joined the cabinet, despite meeting earlier this year with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who said that he has been trying for years to get the former central banker to board the HMCS Trudeau.

Trudeau is evidently not persuasive, and Carney evidently not foolish. I know that personally, as the latter has been my guest for public conversations on values and markets.

Like Donald Trump, Trudeau has an astonishing ability to diminish those whom he calls to serve. He has, in various scandals, managed to lose a governor general, a clerk of the Privy Council and a speaker of the House of Commons, altogether remarkable as those nonpartisan offices were thought to be beyond the reach of political figures to compromise. He pulled in the respected former governor general David Johnston on an ad hoc basis, only to stain his lifetime record of admirable service.

He has lost a finance minister, attorney general, Treasury Board president and his own principal secretary. The commissioner of the RCMP was sullied by her contact with Trudeau’s cabinet. After the release of the Two Michaels, he lost his ambassador to China. WE Charity drew close to his celebrity flame and was singed, reducing its Canadian branch to ashes.

“I wish that I had never met you,” Jody Wilson-Raybould told Trudeau to his face. The former attorney-general was more blunt than others, but her words would be a fitting epitaph for the many political careers Trudeau has destroyed.

Carney is the former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England. Central bankers are supposed to see economic trouble coming and take prophylactic action. In terms of Carney’s future public service, appropriate prophylaxis regarding Trudeau is to keep as far away as possible, which means that cabinet — and the nation — will be denied a key debate about climate policy.

Some may think that the two have similar positions on climate; Carney is the United Nations Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance, and Trudeau began his premiership by leading a gargantuan delegation to the Paris climate talks in 2015. While they agree on the urgency of reducing carbon emissions to mitigate global warming, they are miles apart on their preferred policy. It is a difference of maximum importance.

Carney favours climate prosperity. Trudeau climate penance.

Carney wishes to see Canada lead what he believes will be a lucrative transition to a low-carbon economy. Trudeau thinks Canada should be punished for its high-carbon past.

Carney, the optimistic investor, sees opportunities opening up. Trudeau, the harsh moralizer, shuts down new developments.

The climate debate in Canada has generally been about policy instruments. Carbon tax? Cap and trade? Regulation or incentives? Federal or provincial?

Carney vs. Trudeau would be about something deeper, about competing visions of the country. Is Canada an admirable player in the global economy, with abundant energy to offer a world in need of ethical alternatives? Or is Canada a fundamentally wicked player, who must make reparations for fossil fuel sins?

Carney has the former view, arguing that net zero “is creating the greatest commercial opportunity of our age.” His view of markets, including financial markets, is that they allocate resources efficiently toward what is valued. As carbon reduction increases in value — as is evident in the insurance industry, for example — so too will the rewards to those who are favourably positioned.

The prime minister has a different view. Canada ought not to take advantage of climate change opportunities because Canada has behaved badly and deserves a measure of penitential suffering.

What else would explain Trudeau’s decision to turn down allies seeking to buy our natural gas? Germany came first, in August 2022, desperate to replace its Russian supplies. Trudeau infamously declared that there was no “business case,” even though that is not his judgment to make. If Canadian suppliers were willing to sell to German buyers, on what grounds would the Canadian government prevent it — aside from the preening purity of supposedly superior climate morals?

Qatar apparently did see a business case, and signed a 15-year deal with Germany. Trudeau’s desire to punish Canada thus fills the coffers of a most distasteful regime which, amongst other things, is a key funder of Hamas.

The Japanese followed the Germans in January 2023, and the Greeks followed the Japanese in March 2024. All wanted to buy Canadian natural gas. All were turned down flat.

We don’t know whether the prime minister asked cabinet for its view. If he did, we don’t know how the debate unfolded. But we can surmise that if Carney was around that table, the discussion would have had a different shape, if not result.

Trudeau is an ideologue on climate. Hence the willingness to make life worse off for Canadians and our allies. Meanwhile, Carney told a Senate committee in May that while he supported the carbon tax as serving a “purpose up until now,” he was open to other measures if they could drive investment.

The Carney vs. Trudeau climate debate won’t take place behind closed doors in cabinet. One might imagine a different scenario where those views could be debated openly. The country would benefit.

National Post