On fixing Canada’s affordability problem, Freeland needs to admit one exists.

For a cabinet shuffle that was supposedly about the economy, it curiously left the Minister of Finance and her very tired talking point binder untouched.

If last week’s federal cabinet shuffle was supposed to signal a change in the Liberal Party’s approach to the economy, you wouldn’t have known it based on remarks made by Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland in Prince Edward Island on Friday.

Freeland, one of the few Ministers not shuffled last week by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, found herself on Friday in front of a gaggle of local reporters, being asked tough questions about the impact of the Liberal’s carbon tax policies on the local community. 

The questions came on the heels of a full-court press made by Atlantic Canadian premiers to delay the implementation of the tax to give people in the region, which has significant rural populations with limited public transit, and a reliance on heating fuels, time to adapt. Freeland’s answer (full clip posted here on her X/Twitter feed) was, putting it mildly, evasive and offensively obtuse. 

At one point, she artlessly points out that she doesn’t own a car because of the location of her residence in downtown Toronto (while failing to admit she’s entitled to a car and driver in Ottawa due to her cabinet posting). At every point, she fails to either lean into a justification for her signature policy or admit that there’s room for improvement, given its significant impact on the cost of living in the region. Later, in response to criticism made by Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre over the nature of her reply, Freeland doubled down on her talking points. 

This post was roundly pilloried, including by Canadian economists, mainly because Freeland had failed to admit the obvious. Food inflation, rapidly rising interest rates, and a housing crisis have created economic hardship for many Canadians, and reduce their ability to spend on climate-positive substitute goods - particularly in rural areas where few exist. But Freeland’s comments, even after Trudeau’s massive shuffle, suggest that the person with the most say in Canada’s economic policies seems oblivious to this fact.

And thus, Freeland reinforced observations made by some of Canada’s most senior politicos that Trudeau’s shuffle seemed more about political optics than a signal that a change on the Liberal’s economic policies was in the offing. It also will offer cold comfort for Canadians looking for visionary, structural solutions from the government to address the core issues behind issues like food inflation and housing supply. Because if Canada’s Finance Minister isn’t even willing to admit there’s a problem, how will she develop solutions?

Election opinion polls are reflecting this fact. In the past week, several high-profile Canadian polling firms have confirmed that the Conservative Party holds as much as a ten-point lead over the Liberals. This trend is true even in areas traditionally considered Liberal strongholds like Atlantic Canada, where Freeland executed her flub on Friday. When drilling down into the issues causing this shift in voting intention, it should surprise no one that economic issues are at the core of the Liberal’s polling flaccidity problems.

Suppose the Liberals continue on the same tired lines of comparing net debt to GDP ratios as a way of laughably trying to convince someone paying $100 for a single bag of groceries or $3000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment that everything is fine. In that case, this polling trend is bound to continue.

That’s why Freeland’s remarks on Friday were so confoundingly bad. Even from a purely political perspective, if Trudeau was determined to use the cabinet shuffle to show heft and seriousness on the nation’s most significant issues, why leave Freeland - arguably the architect of much of Canada’s current economic policy - in her post, only to have her go out and rehash a very tired position less than 48 hours after the shuffle? The social media interaction between her and Poilievre only reinforced a message that, despite the shuffle, little policy or process has changed. (At a minimum, the entire incident - from her response to reporters and her decision to lean into it on X/Twitter - raises questions about her prowess as a supposedly brilliant political communicator.)

Nearly eight years into the Liberal’s mandate, Canadians are looking for solutions from the government to enable affordable food security and address the housing crisis while providing affordable solutions to lower Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions. While some partisans will point at the opposition Conservatives and ask what their plan is, right now, it’s the Liberals who are in power and have the mandate and responsibility to address these issues, if they are even willing to admit they exist, to begin with.

If the Liberals aren’t up to the task, Canadians - struggling to make ends meet - are bound to replace them with people who are.

(P.S. Over the course of the next month, I intend to use this platform to delve into some of the structural issues that are driving food inflation and the housing crisis. Stay tuned here - and subscribe - for more.)