Federal Government: 1) Liberals huddle for 1st big policy convention without Trudeau; 2) (Updated) Feds looking at how to ‘cushion the blow’ as gas prices rise amid Iran war: Carney; 3) Ontario MP Marilyn Gladu says she’s joining Carney’s Liberal government; 4) (Updated) Carney says floor-crossing MPs must follow Liberal values on abortion, LGBTQ rights
- 1)Liberals huddle for 1st big policy convention without Trudeau
Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press
By Kyle Duggan, April 9, 2026.
Liberal party members are gathering in Montreal and, for the first time in more than a decade, Justin Trudeau and his personal brand of politics won’t tower over the party’s proceedings.
This time, party faithful are meeting as Mark Carney’s ever-expanding big tent of MPs stands on the cusp of achieving a majority government after a series of floor crossings in Parliament.
The convention, which runs Thursday through Saturday, starts just ahead of three byelections set for Monday, and a day after a fifth opposition MP crossed the floor to join the Liberal caucus.
It comes at a high point for the Liberals, who a little more than a year ago felt like they were marching their way out of office. Polling aggregator 338 Canada has the Liberals at a staggering 45 per cent support nationally.
“There’s strong support across the country right now for the prime minister and for the party,” said Jonathan Kalles, a consultant with McMillan Vantage who formerly served as Quebec adviser to Trudeau.
“It’s not about patting themselves on the back, but momentum and energy are important in a political party. Right now the Liberals have it, so it’s an opportune time to get everyone together.”
While Carney handily took the party’s helm at a leadership convention in Ottawa last year, the last party policy convention was held in 2023 — when Trudeau issued a rebuttal to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s claims that the Liberals were too “woke” and were ignoring the real challenges facing Canadians.
Then the Liberals ousted Trudeau and won the 2025 election, and Poilievre lost four of his own caucus members to Carney, who pointed to his economic agenda as a reason to switch.
Carney is set to address the convention on Saturday at 2 p.m. ET — the first time he has done so since winning the leadership.
Kalles said many at the party level still know little about Carney and the convention offers a way for them to get to know him, and for party brass to check the pulse of the grassroots.
That’s going to become increasingly important as the party gets more diverse and more challenging to manage, with MPs from widely different political backgrounds assembling under the Team Carney banner.
“With people that have such diverse points of view and are fairly ideological, that becomes a challenge. Most Liberals may lean one side or the other, but I would say they are not particularly ideological,” Kalles said. “I don’t know that it’s sustainable in the long term.”
Cameron Ahmad, a former director of communications in Trudeau’s PMO, said five months of floor crossers in Parliament sends “a really strong signal that the party is doing well” and shows the party remains an “inclusive and welcoming place.”
Ahmad said Carney has re-energized the party and he remembers feeling a similar electricity in the air when Trudeau was first elected leader.
“There was such a breath of fresh air into the party and people felt like there was a renewal,” Ahmad said.
Liberal party national director Azam Ishmael boasted Thursday that the party expects a “record-breaking number” of supporters to attend the convention — around 4,500 members. The Liberal party said in 2023 the convention that year saw “over 4,000” attend, though it did not release an exact figure.
Zita Astravas, a consultant with Wellington Advocacy and Trudeau’s former director of issues management, said Liberals from across the country are “feeling pretty good” right now.
“There’s a spring in people’s steps being a Liberal in politics right now,” she said.
The party needs just two more seats to govern with a clear majority, and it’s all but certain to get them.
Two of the byelections are Toronto-area seats considered safe for the Liberals, while the third is a hot contest with the Bloc Québécois for Terrebonne — an off-island Montreal suburb that’s conspicuously close to where the party convention is being held.
The party machine is expected to crank out a steady stream of canvassers and several francophone cabinet ministers have already knocked on doors in the riding.
But after the latest floor crossing, the byelections are no longer make-or-break for Carney. The Liberals now face what looks like an easy path to a 173-seat majority in the 343-seat House of Commons as of Monday.
Two of the more recent floor crossers, Liberal MPs Lori Idlout and Matt Jeneroux, are speaking on convention panels this week.
Other guest speakers at the convention include Carney’s wife Diana Fox, accessibility activist and former athlete Rick Hansen, and Yoshua Bengio, one of the godfathers of artificial intelligence, who is slated to appear on a panel with AI Minister Evan Solomon.
Several top cabinet ministers are also scheduled for panel talks. Friday’s panel on Carney’s economic agenda and Buy Canadian policies includes Canada-U.S. Relations Minister Dominic LeBlanc, Finance Minister François‑Philippe Champagne and Industry Minister Mélanie Joly.
2) (Updated) Feds looking at how to ‘cushion the blow’ as gas prices rise amid Iran war
Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press
By Catherine Morrison, April 7, 2026.
The federal government is looking at ways to support Canadians as oil prices rise amid the ongoing war in the Middle East, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday.
Oil prices have surged since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28. The Canadian Automobile Association gas price tracker said on Tuesday prices across Canada averaged more than $1.80 per litre, compared with about $1.32 a year ago and $1.51 on March 7.
Carney said at a press conference on Tuesday that his government wants to help “cushion the blow” for Canadians.
“There’s a global market and those countries that have lots of oil and gas see their prices go up alongside with those who don’t have that oil and gas, it’s the same shifts up in prices in the United States as well,” Carney said Tuesday.
“The question becomes, and this is what the government’s focused on, is how long is this going to persist and what can we do to help cushion the blow for Canadians, and that’s something we’re looking at.”
The conflict has cut off flows of crude through the critical Strait of Hormuz and shut down energy production across parts of the Middle East. About one-fifth of the world’s oil supply comes through that strait, which connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, and then the Arabian Sea.
Conservatives have called on the Liberals to give Canadians some relief at the pumps by suspending federal taxes on gas and diesel for the rest of the year.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said last week lifting the fuel excise tax, clean fuel standard and GST surcharges from gas and diesel would save consumers about 25 cents a litre.
That cut, he said, would amount to savings of “about $20 a fill-up, and $1,200 for the average family of four between now and the end of the year.”
Poilievre said in a letter to Carney on Tuesday that rising oil prices have been a “massive windfall” for the government. He again called for the suspension of the federal fuel excise tax, the GST on gas and diesel and the permanent elimination of the clean fuel standard tax and industrial carbon tax.
“This would not only help drivers,” said Poilievre. “Lower diesel prices would reduce the cost of shipping food, homebuilding materials and other essential goods across the country, lowering costs throughout the economy.”
— With files from Sarah Ritchie and David Baxter
3) Ontario MP Marilyn Gladu says she’s joining Carney’s Liberal government
Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press
By Sarah Ritchie, April 8, 2026
Ontario MP Marilyn Gladu has left the Conservative caucus to join Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberals, pushing them closer to a majority government.
In a statement posted on social media Wednesday morning, Gladu said she has heard clearly from her constituents that they want “serious leadership and a real plan” to build the country.
“I have made a choice to do the best thing for our community’s priorities, and importantly, for our country,” she said.
Carney said in a statement of his own that Gladu is known to be willing to work across party lines.
“Having spent decades of her career in engineering and international business, she understands what it takes to create good jobs, strengthen supply chains, and ensure Canadian industry can compete in a rapidly changing global economy,” Carney wrote.
Gladu has been elected as a Conservative four times in the Sarnia region since 2015.
She ran for the Tory leadership in 2020, after Andrew Scheer stepped down, but did not meet the qualifications to be on the ballot. The party chose Erin O’Toole as its leader that year.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre named Gladu as the party’s critic for civil liberties last May. She is also chair of the House committee on the status of women.
After the Liberals chose Carney as their new leader last March, Gladu posted a video on social media sharing her thoughts. She was highly critical of Carney, saying he was part of the “disastrous mess” of inflation that she blamed on Justin Trudeau’s government.
“I don’t see that he is going to bring any change at all,” she said on March 15, 2025.
Gladu said in her statement Wednesday that she’s “ready to work with Prime Minister Carney to build a stronger, more independent, and more competitive Canadian economy.”
She also said her district of Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong “was always a bellwether riding.” It was last held by the Liberals from 1993 to 2006 and has been held by the Conservatives since then.
Gladu is the fifth opposition MP to join the Liberal caucus since November.
Matt Jeneroux, Chris d’Entremont and Michael Ma left the Conservative benches, while Lori Idlout crossed over from the NDP.
Gladu told a local media outlet in January that she believed MPs who leave their party to join another should quit their post and trigger a byelection. She supported a petition put forward by Conservative MP Lianne Rood that called for MPs to amend the Parliament of Canada Act to require floor-crossers to resign.
The Conservatives have decried the recent floor-crossings but have not put forward or formally supported any changes to laws that would prevent them from happening.
Carney’s government now has 171 seats in the House of Commons, with three byelections to come on Monday that could put them into majority territory.
The Liberals are widely expected to win in Scarborough Southwest and University—Rosedale, which were held by former cabinet ministers Bill Blair and Chrystia Freeland, respectively.
The race in the suburban riding of Terrebonne, north of Montreal, is a tight one. The Liberals are fighting to win a seat that traditionally has been held by the Bloc Québécois.
Carney told reporters Wednesday that the country “is uniting” and Gladu is “going to be a great member of our team, lots of energy, ideas, advice on a wide range of issues.”
When a reporter pointed out that his government is closer to a majority, he replied, “What’s important is that we command the confidence of the House.”
Kim Fyfe, head of the Liberal riding association for Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong, said the association did not know about Gladu’s plans in advance but hopes to meet with her in person at the Liberal convention this weekend.
“We really haven’t had a chance to process or discuss it yet. I only found out because people are sending me texts, emails in the last 45 minutes,” Fyfe said.
“We’ll be working with Marilyn. She’s been our opponent in the last number of elections but now we’ll be working with her to encourage Liberal values in our riding and try to co-operate and work together on this.”
A representative for the local Conservative riding association, reached by phone, did not provide a comment and directed media inquiries to an email address for the riding association.
Poilievre’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Gladu’s departure comes a day after Poilievre’s director of communications, Katy Merrifield, told caucus that she will be leaving her post after Friday.
— With files from Kyle Duggan
4) (Updated) Carney says floor-crossing MPs must follow Liberal values on abortion, LGBTQ rights
Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press
By Alessia Passafiume, April 9, 2026
Any member of Parliament who joins the Liberal caucus must adhere to Liberal values, including support for abortion and LGBTQ rights, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday as he faced questions about his decision to welcome Ontario MP Marilyn Gladu into his caucus.
Gladu joined the Liberal caucus on Wednesday, becoming the fourth Conservative, and fifth opposition MP, to defect to the Liberals since November. Her crossing leaves the government just one seat shy of a majority ahead of three byelections next week.
But Gladu’s past comments and positions as a member of Parliament have raised questions about just how big the Liberal tent has become, with one political expert characterizing the move as “shocking.”
In 2021, Gladu apologized for sharing “misinformation about the severity of COVID-19 and the safety and efficacy of vaccines” during an interview with CTV News. She was also a supporter of the 2022 “Freedom Convoy,” which saw protesters angered by pandemic restrictions block the streets of downtown Ottawa with large trucks.
In 2020, she said she would allow party members to introduce bills to restrict abortion, and in 2021 she was criticized for voting against a Liberal bill that banned conversion therapy. Shortly after that vote she issued a statement saying she “vehemently” opposes conversion therapy and supports the LGBTQ+ community.
At an unrelated news conference Thursday in Montérégie, Que., Carney was asked repeatedly about how Gladu’s previous remarks contradict some bedrock Liberal positions. He consistently replied that becoming a Liberal MP means supporting Liberal values.
“The Liberal party always will support the right of women to choose — always, without question,” Carney said.
The prime minister said all Liberal MPs are “subscribing to the values of the party, and the core element of our mission, which is to build Canada strong for all Canadians.”
The Liberals are presenting Gladu’s defection as an indication that the party and the government welcome a diversity of viewpoints.
“We have our values, our values of solidarity, of inclusivity, of sustainability, of the rights of women, of all the rights in the Charter of Freedoms,” Carney said. “We have those core values. Those values don’t change.
“Others come to support the mission of the party and the government at this crucial time and we are fortunate that they take those decisions, because they bring expertise, they bring perspectives, they bring energy, and they will help us work together.”
A senior Liberal government source with knowledge of the discussions leading up to Gladu’s floor crossing, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the private talks, said communications with her started early in the year and continued for months.
The source said Gladu expressed an interest in the Liberals’ push to get big projects moving and to rebuild the military. Some of those conversations, the source said, were frank discussions about her previous stances on things like abortion and the Freedom Convoy.
The source said when Gladu was told the party would not be bending on its policies, she was quite comfortable with that.
He did say, however, that Gladu will need to have conversations with Liberal MPs who are wary about sharing a caucus with her.
Building trust, the source said, is part of the hard work of finding unity.
The source also said conversations on Gladu joining the Liberals were already well underway before Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre sent an email at the end of March to members of his “shadow cabinet” asking them to show what they had done in their roles. Gladu was the Conservative critic for civil liberties until she crossed the floor.
The Toronto Star first reported on the email on April 3 and said it had been sent to Conservative MPs on March 30.
Asked whether more Conservatives will be joining the Liberals shortly, the source said many more conversations are underway but would not indicate how many, or with whom.
When he was asked about more floor crossers, Carney joked that he is “often the last to know.”
“I will tell you in all seriousness, what has been the case is in each of these circumstances is that the individuals have come to people they know well in the Liberal caucus and expressed an interest in joining,” he said. “And then a conversation evolved from that and near the end of the conversation is when I’ve met with those individuals. So I can’t tell you more than that, other than to describe the process.”
While Gladu may hold some beliefs at odds with those held by her new colleagues in the Liberal party, her views on climate change appear to be in line with Carney’s approach.
In 2020, Gladu called for a “science-based approach” to climate change and expressed support for a “regulatory and incentivized approach” instead of the Trudeau-era carbon tax.
Poilievre accused Carney of “fabricating a costly majority government through dirty backroom deals” at an unrelated news conference in Richmond, B.C., on Thursday.
“I feel badly for Ms. Gladu’s constituents, the majority of whom voted for our Conservative vision of an affordable and safe Canada,” he said.
He said constituents should be able to launch a petition for a byelection when MPs cross the floor to join another party.
“We need to put people back in charge of their country at the ballot box,” he said.
Political science professor Lori Turnbull said Gladu’s defection to the Liberals is “shocking” given her socially conservative positions, and the party’s previous practice under former prime minister Justin Trudeau of drawing a red line for candidate selection based on abortion and LGBTQ rights.
Turnbull said Carney’s approach appears to show the party moving away from hard ideological lines and toward who is willing to help build up the Canadian economy — something she said isn’t entirely surprising given Carney’s history in the private sector.
“From a little bit of a distance, it looks like good news for the Liberals. But look a little bit closer and it looks like you are growing the party in a way that is not carefully curated,” Turnbull said, adding that it could cause tensions among more progressive Liberal MPs.
Those tensions could also grow if Carney continues to be laser-focused on the economy and lets social issues slip, she said.
Rob Oliphant, an openly gay Liberal MP, said on social media Thursday he was “pleased” to welcome Gladu to the “big tent party.”
“We have discussion. We have debate. We have disagreement. But at our core is a commitment to both social justice and economic prosperity. This proves that there is room for all in building Canada Strong,” he wrote.
Other MPs, including at least one Liberal, have signalled discontent with Gladu joining the caucus.
Former environment minister Steven Guilbeault reacted with a laughing emoji to a meme on social media Wednesday of a woman pouring a large drink, with this caption: “Steven Guilbeault seeing Marilyn Gladu walk into the caucus meeting.”
— With files from Sarah Ritchie in Ottawa and Morgan Lowrie in Montreal