Maclean’s Ottawa bureau chief parses the Prime Minister’s address to hard-core Liberals in Winnipeg
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau greets delegates at the 2016 Liberal Biennial Convention Winnipeg Saturday, May 28, 2016. Macleans/John Woods
Justin Trudeau bounded onto stage in the main hall at Winnipeg’s RBC Convention Centre this afternoon—jacketless, as is his custom, shirt sleeves rolled up—to run through a series of key themes to this weekend’s Liberal convention.
Among the highlights:
“Close to 3,000 people had come out on a lovely fall evening, with their kids, with their friends, just to be part of the moment. We knew they all wouldn’t fit in the building. So did they. So I got out of the car and walked the line to shake everyone’s hand. To thank them for coming. To thank them for being part of our campaign. To ask for their support. For me, that’s what our campaign was all about.”
“Starting this July, the Canada Child Benefit will give nine out of 10 Canadian families more money, tax-free, to help with everyday expenses. Things like clothes, food, and child care. The Canada Child Benefit is not just real change, it’s a real investment. In people. In Canadian families, in a stronger middle class, and in our shared future.”
Bonus read: Find out how much the Canada Child Benefit will help your family
“Begin, spend, and end every single day working for everyday Canadians. People, people, people. It wasn’t just a campaign strategy. It’s the way we govern.”
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“No relationship is more important to me and to Canada than the one with First Nations, the Metis Nation, and Inuit peoples. That’s why we have taken real, positive steps to ensure that Indigenous peoples have the opportunities that other Canadians have enjoyed for centuries. We know these changes won’t happen overnight, or even over the course of a single mandate. But we’re not letting that stand in our way. Instead, we’re investing $3.6 billion in First Nations education, and more than a billion dollars in essential social infrastructure, like accessible housing and child care on reserves.”
Bonus reading: Can the Liberals keep their promise to First Nations youth?
“[The] constitution we have today is a product of the era we worked so hard, together, to put behind us—the era of factional battles and hyphenated Liberals, of regional chieftans and behind the scenes power-brokers, of the closed, insular thinking that almost killed this party. That is the constitution we need to replace…This new constitution is about closing the distance between the leader and every single contributor to this movement we’ve built. Hundreds of thousands of Canadians joined us in the past few years. They created a movement…This new constitution is written to build the next steps in our movement. A modern, responsive, wide-open organization that anyone can join and shape and work to build.”
Bonus reading: 10 challenges for the Liberals in 2016
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