Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said today that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau need to “step aside for the good of the country” over the WE Charity scandal.
Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said today that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Bill Morneau need to “step aside for the good of the country” over the WE Charity scandal.
Speaking to reporters in Regina, Sask., Scheer said their departures would “allow the government to move past these scandals” and would “improve the lives of Canadians.”
“These individuals need to do the right thing,” he said.
Scheer said Liberal MPs should push for new leadership so that the party can “rehabilitate its very tarnished image.”
Asked if it would be prudent for Trudeau and Morneau to resign while the country is in the grips of a pandemic, Scheer said their departures might actually improve the COVID-19 response because of what he called problems with the programs Ottawa has enacted to deal with the pandemic’s social and economic effects.
He said if the two men won’t go on their own, Liberal backbenchers should stage a caucus revolt to force them out.
“Liberal MPs have a choice to make. Are they prepared to sacrifice their integrity to protect a leader that is under investigation? If Liberals refuse to act, if they refuse to do anything, then they are implicitly approving of that behaviour,” he said.
But Scheer said he’s not prepared to trigger an election over this scandal.
He said Parliament is on a summer recess and there’s no mechanism to defeat the government and prompt an election when the Commons isn’t sitting.
He said it will be up to the next Conservative leader to decide how to proceed on that front. Scheer will be replaced at the end of August.
The weeks-long scandal — the botched partnership between Ottawa and WE to administer student grants, the conflict-of-interest allegations, the revelation that Trudeau’s mother and brother wer