In Absentia

In the September 12, 2026 edition of the Globe and Mail, the Editorial Board took Prime Minister Mark Carney to task for avoiding the House of Commons.

Apparently, Mr. Carney has a “pattern of distain toward the institution of Parliament”. In 137 opportunities since he was elected in April of 2025, he only attended Question Period 36 times. To add insult to injury, he was actually in Ottawa for 64 of 101 opportunities when he was absent from Question Period.

Oh my. I’m clutching my virtual pearls.

What the Globe and Mail either fails to understand or chooses to ignore is that like anything on television or the internet, Question Period is a performance piece. The Globe acknowledged that "that Mr. Carney believes he has more important matters to attend to than submitting himself to the vagaries of the House of Commons. Certainly, Question Period is no model of Athenian debate. Showboating, grandstanding, heckling and (on the government side) bloviating, prevaricating and deflecting: all are unlovely features of QP."

But at this time, requiring the Prime Minister to spend more of his time in performative activities isn’t useful. Pierre Poilievre, the leader of the opposition Conservatives, wants answers. But his questions are not helpful. He wants Mr. Carney to explain the terms of the failed U.S./Canada trade talks. He believes the public has a right to know. He also believes he has a right to this information, when he won’t sign the necessary security agreements to view classified briefings.

Mr. Carney’s globetrotting serves many purposes. He is trying to pivot Canadian business from relying on the United States. Despite tariffs, our exports to the United States have remained steady at approximately 68% of all Canadian exports since May of 2025 to the present. This is heavily weighted for energy though. Non-oil and gas exports are down approximately 8% in the last year. Canadian businesses appear to be getting the message but more needs to be done.

Trade relationships aren’t just about trade. They’re also about security. If we can knit together an alliance of trade partners and move a significant amount of trade from the U.S. to those partners, then they likely wouldn’t take kindly to the U.S. interfering with partners' agreements with Canada. The European Union is the European Union to help prevent war. If you freely trade with other countries, share a currency, easily travel and work from one jurisdiction to another, you’re less likely to pull a gun on your neighbour. The EU exists primarily to prevent war.

But when you’re at the helm of the world’s largest, most lucrative economy and one of the the world’s best equipped standing armed forces, you don’t really have to care about your neighbour, no matter where they live. Mr. Trump has pulled a trade gun on his neighbour. He’s rattled his sabre about making us a vassal state. The last round of trade talks collapsed due to a number of points, such as wanting to dictate with whom and on what terms we could trade, language rights, and destroying supply management that keeps dairy and egg farmers in business and ensures a safe Canadian supply of these staples. At the last minute, the U.S. also demanded a carve out of the tariff exemption on heavy duty pickup trucks that would slap high tariffs on the components of these trucks, rendering them unsalable in the U.S. Mr. Trump has stated he wants to kill the Canadian automotive industry and he’s well on his way to doing that. Even a 15% tariff is economically unfeasible.

Assuming that the Canadian automotive industry will die a slow death, and it will with the U.S. market unavailable to us, that’s 500,000 jobs that need to be replaced. Defence spending with help offset some of this, but in order to insulate Canada from the vagaries of the U.S. market, we need to find other partners for trade. Ones that will actually honour the agreements they sign.

In order to do this, Mr. Carney needs to travel. He needs office time to organize. He doesn’t need the waste of time that Question Period often becomes so that Pierre Poilievre has a meme he can use for fundraising. Mr. Carney guided Canada through the liquidity crisis in 2008 and did what he could to get the U.K. through Brexit. He has another moment to meet in the current U.S. administration. The Globe and Mail should be more concerned with the impact of U.S. policy on Canada and calling that out than checking the attendance sheet on our Prime Minister.

In the meantime, here's a visitor to our home.