Last week I wrote a post about the potential ramifications of a loss or near win in the Toronto-St. Paul’s byelection. When I woke up Tuesday morning and saw that the Conservatives had in fact won, that made me wonder whether those other predictions could come to pass.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Trudeau put the speculation to rest by saying that he and his team had more work to do, that was the end of it…perhaps.

But the speculation continues, the PM and his team must be thinking, should I stay or should I go?

In my view, the old song from the Clash by that title might be an appropriate analogy. In the chorus of that song it says “if I go, there will be trouble….And if I stay, it will be double”. Let’s look at it through that political history lense.

If I go, there will be trouble.

A leader of a political party leaving towards the end of a term in office is rare but not at all unprecedented in Canadian politics.

Brian Mulroney resigned  in 1993 and left the reins of the Progressive Conservative government to Kim Campbell, who later that year lost catastrophically. Trouble. A decade later, they merged with the Reform/Alliance under Stephen Harper and that led to 9 years of Conservative rule.

Mike Harris, former Premier of Ontario, left the PC Party to Ernie Eves in 2002 and he lost badly to Dalton McGuinty in the 2003 Provincial election. Again, trouble. The Ontario Liberals ruled Ontario from 2003 until 2018 until a Doug Ford led PC party took over.

And if I stay, it will be double

Again, leaders staying on to fight out one last election are not uncommon in Canadian politics, despite polling and other signs of a stale and unpopular Government.

In the fall of 2014, a number of Cabinet Ministers to then Premier Greg Selinger (Manitoba) threatened to resign in protest over his unpopularity. Selinger said at the time, “focus on the priorities of Manitoba families as part of our team, or resign.” (which they did). Selinger then asked the party executive to call a leadership race. In March of 2015, he won that leadership race on the second ballot with 50.93% of ballots cast. He went on to lose the 2016 Provincial election and just 14 NDP MLAs were elected to the MB Legislature (the fewest in over 30 years). It will be double.

On October 15, 2012, Premier Dalton McGuinty announced that he would resign as leader and Premier of Ontario. Kathleen Wynne won the leadership in January of 2013 and became Premier. In the 2014 Ontario election, she won a majority Government, largely due to her popularity among Ontario progressives. After a number of mis-steps, her popularity plummeted. By late 2016, polling showed that she was headed for a loss in 2018. Despite a last minute leadership change among the Ontario PC Party from Patrick Brown to Doug Ford in March of that year, she lost and reduced the Ontario Liberals to third place, behind the Ontario NDP, not even achieving official party status. Again, it will be double.

There are other examples of the above, but I’ll let others expand.

Stay

The Prime Minister and those inside his inner circle of advisers may have a few compelling stories to tell about why he should stay.

1. He’s our best chance – This argument is supported by recent polling from my colleagues at the Angus Reid Institute. Our own polling shows that other potential candidates might not do as well as Trudeau.
2. There isn’t time to hold a leadership race – A leadership race to replace Trudeau would take 5+ months and direct fundraising and other resources to those candidates at a time when the Liberals need the resources going towards the next election.
3. He deserves to go down swinging – Like the early days of Trudeau, the argument could be made that Trudeau deserves to go down swinging in the next election. It could be said that almost every Liberal MP owes their current electoral position to Trudeau. For the class of 2015, that may be somewhat true. During the 2015 election for example, our riding polls showed that Trudeau polled better than local candidates by 10+ points on average in nearly every riding, except for some long term incumbents.

Go

Those who may want the Prime Minister to retire and call a leadership race to replace him as leader and PM may have some equally compelling arguments.

1. It’s going to get worse – The recent by-election in Toronto-St. Paul’s points to the possibility that the National polls might even be under estimating the extent of the enthusiasm advantage held by the Poilievre Conservatives. Unlike other by-elections of recent years that showed better results for the Liberals than reflected in National polls. This points to potential losses in other upcoming by-elections. It could be a series of unexpected losses leading to a historic loss at the next general election.
2. Someone else – The polling we did on other potential leadership candidates back in March does point to the possibility that the Liberals could recover before the next election, under the leadership of “someone else”. This points to the possibility that the entire Trudeau team is compromised politically speaking, and that someone from outside the ranks of current contenders, could claw back to a competitive 10 point deficit with support of more than 30% of the electorate. This is similar to polling we did in Ontario in 2016 that showed that the Ontario Liberals could recover without Kathleen Wynne at the helm.
3. Caucus saved the Party twice, and could do it again – Our riding polls during the 2015 election consistently showed that Justin Trudeau was polling well above local candidates by 10+ points, with few exceptions among the longer term incumbents. By 2019, that trend had reversed itself and local MPs polled 5+ points above the leader and Prime Minister, this secured a second mandate. In 2021, that trend continued and many local incumbent candidates polled 10+ points above Justin Trudeau, this allowed the Party to secure a near majority third mandate. The local MPs are more popular than their party leader at this point, under new leadership, this could be enough to secure a fourth mandate.
4. There is always time to do the right thing – There are many examples of relatively short leaderships that led to electoral success including Doug Ford, Kathleen Wynne and Christie Clark.

Ultimately, this will be a very personal decision by the Prime Minister, but I should point out clearly that it’s not personal. Trudeau supporters who believe that he has accomplished a lot and deserves to stay, should know that. Trudeau was definitely the leader and PM Canada needed after 9 years of Stephen Harper, he was the right person at the right time, but that time has passed. Not because Trudeau is a bad person, not because this Government hasn’t accomplished a great deal, but because its a historical certainty. Every Governments and leader that has come to power, has eventually lost popularity and gone down in defeat.

There are few exceptions to this in Canada in this century. The Sask Party has been in power since 2007 first under Brad Wall for 11 years and since then under Scott Moe for another 8 and counting.

Very few leaders leave the political arena on their own terms. In my lifetime, Brian Mulroney at the federal level. Provincially, Brad Wall, Frank McKenna, Dalton McGuinty, John Horgan, and municipally Hazel McCallion, John Tory and Naheed Nenshi are three that come to mind.

So you got to let me know. Should I stay, or should I go?