By Lori Turnbull

October 27, 2024

As the Liberal Party processes the potential impact of last week’s caucus revolt against a deadline imposed by the rebels issued to a prime minister who has already answered that ultimatum in the negative, it may be useful to keep in mind what the options are, and are not, for next steps.

There are four ways for political parties to remove leaders who are unwilling to remove themselves, even when there is both internal and external pressure to do so.

The current predicament that the Liberal caucus finds itself in, specifically that a rebellion by 24 MPs – one sixth of the parliamentary caucus – has fuelled questions about whether Justin Trudeau can lead the party into the next election, is the result of the fact that none of these pathways is available to the caucus or even to the party at large at the current moment.

In short, there is no resolution to the dilemma if Trudeau won’t step aside. This is largely because Trudeau is a sitting prime minister governing with a minority in the context of a fixed election date roughly one year away, not an opposition leader clinging to his title in the wake of an election defeat – the more familiar defenestration model.

The four leadership removal mechanisms that exist, none of which help the Liberals, are as follows. For brevity, each one is named for a former party leader who was eventually shown the door.

• The Erin O’Toole: Following an election defeat, the leader is formally voted out by their caucus. Political party caucuses must choose, after every general election, whether to implement the Reform Act. This legislation equips caucus with the right to hold a leadership review and, if the numbers warrant, to remove the leader and replace them with an interim leader until the party at large chooses someone new. This would be the perfect remedy to the Liberals’ current predicament because it would clarify things. Caucus members would be able to bring Trudeau’s leadership to a close if more than half of them agreed that this was the right course of action. If the numbers weren’t there, detractors would likely have to abandon their cause and line up behind Trudeau. But the Liberals chose not to give themselves the Reform Act option back in 2021.
• The Thomas Mulcair: Following a poor election showing (a loss of 51 seats in the 2015 election) the leader loses a leadership review vote at an annual general meeting of the party and is subsequently replaced via leadership election. It would be interesting to see how Justin Trudeau would fare in a vote like this, but this option is no help to the Liberal caucus now as it gives the decision about the leader to party members rather than to caucus. For what it’s worth, the way that the Liberal Party governs itself now undermines any sense of accountability from the leader to the party. The Liberals don’t even have members anymore so it’s not even clear who the “party” is. Virtually anyone can sign up to vote in a leadership race and it’s not certain what percentage of these people would take an active role in holding the leader to account if given the opportunity.
• The Stockwell Day: caucus members remove themselves to sit independently because they no longer support the leader. This is a rare act of desperation, precipitated by a breakdown in communication with the leader as well as a belief that the leader no longer espouses the values of the party. It’s much easier to pull this off from the opposition benches, where there is no consequence to the stability of government. This was the case for Stockwell Day and his party at the time. If Liberal MPs left caucus in protest of Trudeau, they’d make it much more likely that his government would fall. And then they’d end up going to election as independent candidates or as members of some new post-Trudeau faction of the Liberals, either of which is likely a path to defeat.
• The Jean Chrétien: A challenger presents a leadership alternative waiting in the wings while maneuvering to replace the incumbent and mobilizes enough support, both within and outside caucus, to push that incumbent out. A key reason why Trudeau detractors are getting no real traction is that there is no Paul Martin ready or willing to put their hand up to challenge Trudeau for the leadership. As a result, pushing Trudeau out is a largely hypothetical exercise because it’s not clear who would replace him and whether they would have a better chance against Pierre Poilievre. It’s likely too late now to hoist anyone up as a competitor, particularly anyone within caucus, as any of these people will be tainted by the Trudeau brand. Former B.C. Premier Christy Clark has said she won’t contest the job before Trudeau vacates it.

In Canadian politics, we don’t have term limits for leaders and so parties are largely forced to trust them to remove themselves when the time is right. Trudeau’s critics in the Liberal caucus are saying the time has come. The question remains whether there are enough of them beyond those who’ve expressed that view publicly to generate critical mass.

By all accounts, those who wish to see him gone are not saying that they don’t like the prime minister’s policies or that he’s departed from the values that define the party. Such principle-based concerns might cause caucus members to depart themselves if the leader refused to. Instead, their concerns are more strategic. They are looking at the polling data that spell disaster for the Liberals. And they are hearing from their constituents that Trudeau himself is a ballot drag. When constituents are saying they won’t vote Liberal if Trudeau sticks around, MPs have nothing to lose by asking him to step aside, unless a tipping point is reached beyond which their involvement in the caucus chaos backfires by further degrading the party brand, creating a greater risk to their seats.

To be fair, even if the leadership changed hands tomorrow, there is probably no one who could reverse the momentum that the Conservatives have built. But perhaps, as has been speculated in the media, someone could save the furniture. At the risk of sounding crass, these MPs are the furniture.

If Trudeau continues on the path that he is on, and refuses to read the writing on the wall, he will find himself in the highly unenviable position of the fifth option for leadership removal: The Blaine Higgs. This is when a leader sticks his head in the sand, ignoring advice, evidence, and argument. Instead of being removed by the party, he ends up removed by the public. He loses government and perhaps even his own seat. His legacy is tarnished and political acumen questioned.

If Trudeau ends up there, he has no one to blame but himself. Even if caucus members weren’t pushing for his departure, the abysmal polling data combined with the fact that he has been leader for over ten years should have led him to his own conclusion that asking for a fourth term is not realistic or in the interest of his party. He’s almost out of time to make a change before it’s too late.

Policy Columnist Lori Turnbull is a professor in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University.