“Not enemies, but friends”

A magnanimous Justin Trudeau borrowed some words from Abraham Lincoln for his victory speech this past autumn: “We are not enemies, but friends.”

Lincoln was a successful politician because he was able to balance his idealism with pragmatism, to the point that some of the things he said sounded downright cynical even by 19th-century standards. Trudeau might want to think about something an exasperated Lincoln said during the post-U.S. Civil War reconstruction: “Too many pigs and not enough teats.”

A lot of attention has been devoted to how Trudeau will be able to deliver on all his election promises. But unfulfilled election promises are nothing new in Canadian politics. A government is doing well if it is able to fulfil 70% of its election promises.

Trudeau made so many promises that even the most die-hard political junkie would be challenged to remember them all. All Trudeau has to do to deliver tax relief to the middle class (easy to do when you’re committed to running deficits), stick it to the top 1% of earners (who voted Conservative anyway) and legalize pot (the extra tax revenue will be handy).

Once Ottawa finishes basking in Trudeau’s sunny ways and celebrating the new Camelot, our new prime minister will have some interest groups to appease.

Chief among those is the Ottawa policy elite that consists of lobby groups, industry associations, arts and cultural organizations, non-governmental organizations, think-tanks and, most important, recipients of federal funding. Up until the Harper era began in 2006, the policy elite had a lot of clout in return for supporting and endorsing government policy. The policy elite were friends of the king.

All successful governments, regardless of stripe, need these people. Most of the policy elite rallied to help Brian Mulroney sell the Canada/U.S. Free Trade Agreement. They also showed up in force to help Paul Martin manufacture public consent for the draconian 1995 budget.

The Harper government, as part of its populist platform, cut the elite out of the loop, cut their funding, sicced the Canada Revenue Agency on them for audits of their charitable status and only called them when the government wanted something. The elite got back at the Conservatives by simply staying silent during the election even when the Conservatives did something that would benefit the policy elite.

A case in point was the dairy lobby. In negotiating the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal during the 2015 election campaign, the Conservatives kept disruption of the supply-management system to a minimum and even gave the dairy industry $4.3 billion in transition money. In response, the dairy lobby, consisting of several associations, for the most part stayed quiet and the Conservatives never got the bounce in the polls from the TPP the party had been hoping for. Ingrates.

The policy elite wants back in the loop, and the Liberals will be mindful of the damage those groups can do if not appeased. Trudeau also knows the business and economics branches of the policy elite are likely to criticize a Liberal government publicly.

Another group Trudeau knows must be appeased is the public service. Sure, employees at Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada actually cheered when he visited them after the election. But Trudeau will be mindful of the ongoing spat his father had with the public-service mandarins.

Government documents unearthed by the CBC indicate that deputy ministers held a private summit in May to discuss how the Harper government was politicizing the public service and what they would do about it. Under the Public Service Act, that was tantamount to a coup d’état.

Whether there was any connection between that meeting and two embarrassing leaks about the Harper government during the election campaign doesn’t matter. There had been so much hostility between the public service and their political masters, it was only a matter of time before that hostility would boil over.

Finally, there is the parliamentary press gallery. It may all be sweetness now between Trudeau and the media. But again, Trudeau knows from his father’s experience that feuding with the media is a lost cause. Expect major changes to the Access to Information Act soon.