By Paul Vieira
OTTAWA--Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has secured a majority government, cementing his hold on power after electoral victories Monday night and defections to his Liberal Party caucus over the past six months.
The political developments give Carney a freer hand to aggressively pursue a policy agenda aimed at rebuilding a struggling Canadian economy, through increasing exports to non-U.S. markets, accelerating infrastructure and resource projects, and stabilizing public finances. With a majority of the seats in the federal legislature, the governing Liberals can pass legislation without cutting side deals with opposition parties and can wait until 2029 to call an election.
The Liberals won an election roughly a year ago, but fell just short of a majority mandate.
Based on early results, Canadian news networks projected the Liberals victorious in two special elections to fill vacant electoral districts in Toronto. With these projections, the Liberals hold 173 seats, or just over half of the 343 in the national legislature. The last time Canada had a majority government was in 2019, or at the end of former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's first term.
A third special election in a northern Montreal suburb, also vacant, was too close to call. A Liberal victory in Quebec could push the party's seat count to 174.
Carney took over last year a Liberal Party that was floundering in the polls due to Trudeau's unpopularity and Canadians' unhappiness about their financial future. He turned the party's fortunes around by persuading Canadians that his experience in central banking and business was best suited to counter President Trump's protectionist trade agenda, which would deliver a body blow to the Canadian economy.
Nearly all the polls put the Carney-led Liberals in a comfortable lead over the Conservatives. Leger, a pollster based in Montreal, said this month the Liberals enjoyed a 14-point lead over the Tories, and 58% of Canadians approved of the Carney administration's performance.
Since November, Carney and the Liberals have persuaded five members of the opposition parties, both right- and left-wing, to join the government--the latest last week, which put the government just one legislative seat short of a majority.
Daniel Beland, a politics professor at McGill University in Montreal, said Carney's ability to bring in new lawmakers stems from the Canadian leader's pragmatism. "He is a centrist," said Beland, adding this marks a sharp contrast to Trudeau, whose political priorities leaned to the left.
In a speech this past weekend in Montreal at a Liberal Party convention, Carney said some Canadian lawmakers switched sides to join the Liberals "because they understand the stakes. They believe together, we can do better."
Jamie Carroll, a former national director for the Liberal Party, said Carney's Montreal speech signaled that he intends "to be a benevolent majority prime minister because this isn't the time for partisan politics."
Beland said that Carney is benefiting from global turbulence, such as Trump's trade policy--which is squeezing Canadian manufacturers--and military actions in Iran.
Now equipped with a majority, "it's important for Carney to actually deliver," Beland said. The Canadian leader has promised to build projects such as new trade corridors at a faster pace than previously seen, to rewire an economy that became too complacent on relying on trade with the U.S. to drive growth. And he has promised to get the best deal possible following the U.S.-led review later this year of the existing North American trade treaty.
Carney warned Liberal Party members about a bumpy road ahead for the country. "We should be under no illusions. The path we have chosen is hard," Carney said this weekend. "There will be headwinds... We'll have to be pragmatic and determined to keep moving forward, but this is the journey that we must make."
Write to Paul Vieira at paul.vieira@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
04-13-26 2246ET
