Polls indicate Canadians like and trust Prime Minister Mark Carney; they have given him approval ratings of 66%, some north of 70%. But they will also not wait forever for his promises to bear fruit. He needs concrete results – not more announcements or memo signings – if he wants those exceptional poll numbers to last..“That’s the hinge point, to use one of his own expressions,” says Yaroslav Baran, tonight’s guest on Hannaford. “In fact, he would be wise to call a snap election and lock in a strong majority while he can.”.Parliament came back from summer recess on Monday. After a month of summits, speeches and photo-ops, Carney added still more pledges to the pile he has been stacking for eighteen months. On his watch, un-matured federal debt is up more than $100 billion from March 2025. That is real money. What Albertans, and other taxpayers watching grocery bills and kids hunting for work, want to know is whether any of it is ‘catalysing’ (as the PM likes to say) into pipelines, ports, mines or paycheques.Baran, principal at Pendulum Strategies and a former adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, says the centrepiece is Bill C-39, Carney’s own “big beautiful bill”: a fat omnibus rewrite meant to grease the Major Projects Office, lock in a one-year federal project review clock, and give the labour minister sharper tools to end strikes at ports, post and airlines..The irony is not lost on Baran. The office is a kissing-cousin of Stephen Harper’s old Major Projects Management Office – the same model Liberals once denounced as anti-environment and too friendly to capital.Bill C-39, the Building Canada Strong Act, also kills the sunset clauses on last year’s Building Canada Act, making a still-unproven fast lane permanent. Unions have already indicated that they hate the back-to-work language. Carney speaks of promised “guardrails” (another Carney-ism) but Baran doubts they mean much: every serious strike is designed to have an economic impact. He also thinks the bill is a gift to new NDP leader Avi Lewis – a concrete fight on which a seatless, little-known leader can rebuild a brand.Then there is the $500 billion “unleashed” at the Investment Summit. Earlier this month Dig in and most of it is Canadian bank lending envelopes, pension allocations and Bell’s Saskatchewan data-centre plan – not a super-major dropping $40 billion on a new energy project..As for talk of becoming an “associate member” of the European Union, such talk is largely symbolic. That door was opened by former prime minister Stephen Harper when he concluded the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) in 2014. Baran: “Shipping widgets to France will never be as cheap as putting them on a train to Ohio. Exports to the United States have fallen from about 76 per cent to the mid-60s, but the next ten points of diversification will be harder than the first, and China remains an arbitrary customer. Opposition leader Pierre Poilievre and Shuv Majumdar (Shadow Minister for Canada-US Relations) have already drawn red lines: no EU product rules, no EU refugee standards, no cheque for Brussels.”So, the clock is running. To the discomfiture of the Conservatives and enabled by a widespread lack of curiosity among Canadians about what Mr. Carney is really up to, Carney is Captain Canada as long as Trump fills the headlines.Nevertheless, Baran’s window for Mr. Carney is brutal and specific: get a U.S. deal before January 1, or fresh auto, parts and steel tariffs could close mills and sour the mood overnight. Seat projections say a snap vote now would grow the Liberal majority. Baran: "It could cost Conservatives twenty seats or more."Will he do it? There are no bus-wrap rumours yet. Strategically however, says Baran, it would be negligence on his part not to talk about it.Promises, debt, and a hinge that will not stay open. That is tonight’s conversation.
