The modern Senate is increasingly presented as ‘independent,’ expert-driven, and above politics. But democracy is not supposed to be above politics. Politics is how citizens assign responsibility. When governments fail, Canadians can vote them out. When parties overreach, the public can punish them. Visibility matters.
Canada does not need a reimagined Senate. It does not need constitutional experimentation disguised as reform. And it certainly does not need an Upper Chamber that contributes to legislative backlog while criticizing the government for doing the same. It needs a Senate that understands its role and has the discipline to perform it.
History will write that Chrystia Freeland did something very few political figures ever do: she stepped in and ended Justin Trudeau’s story before he took the party down with him. As she told me the night of the 2024 Liberals’ Christmas party, ‘He crossed a red line,’ a line one can interpret a million and one ways.
Nostalgia for 2015, 1993, and 1930, won’t win the next election. The party needs humility, and hard and patient work: person to person, policy by policy, riding by riding.
