‘We will never be part of the United States’: Mark Carney takes office as Canadian prime minister
Mark Carney points his finger toward the lens in front of a gray building with a flagpole bearing the flag of Canada
Mark Carney was photographed shortly before being sworn in at Rideau Hall, the prime minister’s residence in the Canadian capital Ottawa
Mark Carney has officially taken office as Prime Minister of Canada and assured that his country will “never, in any form, become part of the United States”. He is expected to announce an early election soon, but so far Carney has not done so.
Canada’s next election is due no later than Oct. 20, but Canada’s political system is similar to Britain’s and the prime minister has the right to hold it earlier.
On Friday, Carney and his government ministers took the oath of office in English and French and thus took office. BBC sources said Carney was privately congratulated by King Charles III, who is head of state in Canada too.
Carney, who has led the central banks of Canada and Britain in the past, won a landslide victory in the election for the new leader of the ruling Liberal Party.
The post of party leader was vacated on January 6 with the resignation of Justin Trudeau, who led the party since 2013. Trudeau finally left the post of Prime Minister of Canada on Friday.
Trudeau himself and his party were deeply unpopular in January, trailing the opposition Conservatives in the polls by dozens of percentage points. However, Donald Trump began his U.S. presidency with a trade war with Canada and threats to annex it. Trump’s hostility toward Trudeau and the Liberals has provoked an opposite reaction in Canadian society, and the Liberals are now well within reach of competing with Pierre Polievre’s Conservative Party in the polls.
In his intra-party election victory speech on Monday, Carney made it clear he was taking Trump’s threats seriously.
In the past, Canadian prime ministers have made their first foreign visit to the United States, but sources for BBC correspondent Liz Doucette, who was herself born in Canada, say Carney will instead visit Paris and London on Monday.
“We will never, in any form, be part of the United States,” Carney said Friday at his first news conference. “We are fundamentally a completely different country,” he added, noting that he ‘expects respect’ from America and Trump.
Why is Carney expected to announce early elections in the coming days?
Pierre Polievre, wearing a blue suit and tie, spreads his arms in front of the Canadian flagAuthor photo,Reuters
Photo caption,The opposition in Canada is led by Pierre Polievre. He doesn’t impress Donald Trump either, who wrote that Polievre “isn’t MAGA enough” (referring to his “make America great again” slogan)
Mark Carney has every reason to call an early election as early as possible.
The Liberal Party does not have a majority in the House of Commons of the Canadian Parliament. Carney himself is not a member of the House of Commons at all, so he has to delegate all speeches there to other members of his cabinet.
The patriotic upswing in the country amid Trump’s threats and tariffs gives the Liberals a chance if the election comes soon. That said, there are risks, based on the fact that Carney has never been elected to any office and his abilities as a candidate have yet to be tested.
Still, on Friday, Carney dodged questions about when the election would be. “Before November,” he said, which was taken as a joke.
“There will be other news in the coming days about how we will push for a stronger mandate,” the prime minister said.
Carney also declined to answer a question about which constituency he would run for parliament.
Opposition Leader Pierre Polievre has sought to tie him to the deeply unpopular Trudeau in his statements about Carney.
“87% of Carney’s ministers were ministers under Trudeau. And 100% of Carney’s ministers were in Trudeau’s caucus – helping him raise carbon taxes, double the debt, housing prices and lines at food distribution points. A Liberal is a Liberal,” Polievre wrote on the X network on Friday.
