Trudeau has nothing to fear from his caucus, and that’s his real problem.

The Liberal backbench ceded the power their constituents entrusted them with a long time ago.

Since the Liberal Party’s stunning loss of the Toronto - St. Paul's byelection, even the Toronto Star has been rife with quasi-gossip pieces citing anonymous Liberal caucus insiders calling for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to resign. But no one should kid themselves - there's no way the Liberal caucus can or will force Mr. Trudeau from the party's top job. Here's why.

There are currently 155 Liberal Members of Parliament. MPs—from any party—theoretically have an enormous amount of power. They can table legislation and move motions in committee and in the House of Commons. They can choose how they vote on legislative and procedural issues. Virtually anyone in the country will return their call if they seek advice. They can hold press conferences, write opinion pieces, speak to any given issue and be listened to. 

But if the Liberal caucus realizes they have this power, they haven't shown much evidence of it. Few of their caucus come prepared to think independently at committee meetings, choosing instead to follow whatever direction their party overlords give them on key votes or motions. Many of them willingly go on television panels or rise in the House of Commons to repeat indefensible talking points. They all have toed the line on some of the party's most disastrous policies, but none have taken accountability or apologized for those actions.

So it's a laughable prospect for outside observers to think that somehow now, after nine years of serving in a party culture that rewards acquiescence as opposed to independent thought, and with little practical knowledge of how to manipulate the levers of power, that these MPs will revolt en masse. That's because while being elected under a political party's banner does mean that an MP will generally support their party's overall direction, it's another thing entirely to never question it, which is how Mr. Trudeau has structured the incentive structure within his Liberal party. Mr. Trudeau has actively squashed any culture that encourages constructive dissent within his caucus, so why would they start now?

The proof of this point abounds. The only Liberal MPs who have openly questioned Mr. Trudeau's viability are those who have already given up on advancing into or within the cabinet and have announced their retirement or cabinet ministers shown the door by Mr. Trudeau himself. Within Mr. Trudeau's caucus, his public defenders - of which there are many - seem to be those who think they can hold onto their appointed positions and the salary top-ups and internal caucus social status that accompany the same (e.g. House officers, committee chairs, Parliamentary Secretaries, and cabinet Ministers). No prospective Liberal leadership contender has publicly criticized Mr. Trudeau either. That these people don't realize that this posture is killing their personal credibility, reelection chances and their party's overall brand is insane. The proof isn't just in election polls; it can be found on any elector's doorstep they choose to knock on. But yet, here we are.

And even if his MPs somehow found the will to publicly call for Mr. Trudeau's resignation, their collective inaction has meant that they have no tools by which to oust him even if they wanted to. They've allowed their party governance to stand with no tools to call for a convention or a leadership review by members (it was pure insanity for caucus not to amend this at previous party conventions). And despite knowing this, they voted to remove any powers of their caucus to do so via the Reform Act. These facts mean that internally, Liberal MPs know that even if they were to mount a coup, the final decision to leave still rests entirely within Mr. Trudeau's hands.  

That's not to say that the Liberal caucus doesn't have any tools at their disposal. For example, a group of them could leave the party and sit as a collective of independents (it would only take twelve of them to get House resources associated with official party status) in a bid to force Mr. Trudeau's hand. They could independently organize a summer caucus meeting and force Mr. Trudeau to attend or turf their current Caucus Chair, who refuses to organize one. They could use Parliamentary procedure to force committee meetings to examine issues that are pressure points for Mr. Trudeau's inner circle. Instead, they all seem to be sitting on their hands, waiting to see where the chips will fall, allowing their fates and those who they represent to be determined by an ever-shrinking group of staff within the Prime Minister's Office.

But overall, outside of the Canadian people, the biggest loser of Liberal caucus inertia is Mr. Trudeau himself. It's a well-known fact that Mr. Trudeau has, since day one, isolated himself from his caucus and tacitly encouraged his cabinet to do the same while turfing dissenters and promoting weak bumblers. No organization survives long when anyone who constructively identifies risk is snuffed while simultaneously the most compliant people are allowed to fail upwards. A lot of Mr. Trudeau's failures might have been curtailed if he had been humble enough to make listening to his caucus a standard operating procedure, and in so doing proactively identify and solve problems.

Perhaps the biggest reason the Liberal caucus won't oust Mr. Trudeau is that they are signaling that they'd rather quit than force a coup. Movement political activists dedicated to the long-term survival of a party would be talking about the action that they'd take to force a change. Instead, the “dissenters” in the Liberal caucus seem to be conceding defeat. 

So, the next time you read a story that cites an anonymous Liberal caucus member wanting Mr. Trudeau's head, know that it's clickbait. The Liberal caucus has long ceded its power and is as complicit in the failures of the Liberal government as Mr. Trudeau is.

None of this is to say that being a team player in politics isn’t important. But a rule the best political leaders learn is that when the chips are down and shit is truly hitting the fan, real change can’t come without people taking a humble leap of faith or having the courage to risk personal political consequences to fight for something better. That's real courage, and what real public service looks like. 

Neither can be found within this Liberal backbench, so Mr. Trudeau has nothing to fear from them, anyway.