This article originally appeared in the Hamilton Spectator.
By Jerome Gessaroli, July 18, 2025
Canada’s new government is making the same mistakes as the old one—literally. The feared return of Trudeau-era policymaking is now reality.
Two recent moves make that clear. The first is a botched attempt to enforce a digital services tax on big tech companies. The second is a legislative gesture toward banning protests near schools and places of worship. Together, these moves point to a deeper issue where the government is not charting a new course but is instead governed by institutionalized memory.
Take the digital services tax (DST). Originally introduced in 2020 under the Trudeau government, the DST was meant to ensure that large U.S. owned digital platforms, such as Google, Meta, and Airbnb, pay taxes on revenues they earn from Canadian users. From the start, this policy was hotly opposed by the former United States Biden administration, and its implementation was postponed repeatedly. It wasn’t until June 2025 that the Carney government moved to enforce it. That’s proven to be a serious miscalculation, drawing international headlines and political embarrassment for Canada.
The reaction from the United States was swift. On June 27, U.S. President Donald Trump suspended all trade talks with Canada and threatened retaliatory tariffs. Just two days later, François-Philippe Champagne, currently the finance minister and a longtime DST proponent as a Trudeau-era cabinet minister, announced the tax’s suspension.
A better example of a high-profile self-inflicted policy failure is hard to find. The New York Times called Canada’s reversal “an important victory for Mr. Trump.” The Washington Post noted that Canada had “bowed to his demands.” Either way, the conclusion is that the government misread the moment, pushed forward a dormant policy and got burned.
Then came another move, less dramatic but just as revealing. The government floated the idea of new legislation to ban protests near places of worship and schools. It was presented as a way to protect vulnerable communities and ensure public order. On a closer look, this is unnecessary. Canada already has laws covering mischief, public nuisance, and disruption of religious services, providing the legal tools to address such conduct. But the gesture follows a familiar pattern from the Trudeau era, favouring policies that signal virtue more than they solve real problems.
This sort of symbolic policymaking reflects continuity with the previous government. Justice Minister Sean Fraser, who held the housing portfolio under Trudeau, appears determined to govern with the same instincts. That government often chose symbolic actions over structural reform and that approach is now being revived under the veneer of new leadership.
This isn’t about party politics. It’s about how governments inherit and often fail to escape the instincts and structures of their predecessors. During the last federal election, there were credible concerns that a Carney-led government would be filled with Trudeau-era ministers. Indeed, many of the same figures remain in cabinet today. As a result, policymaking is often shaped less by present needs than by inherited thinking that continues to guide decisions despite changes in leadership.
French historian Pierre Nora observed that memory, when institutionalized, becomes a form of governance. That insight has never felt more relevant. In Canada’s case, policies and instincts from the Trudeau era haven’t just lingered, they’ve resurfaced to shape decisions, even when circumstances have changed. What we’re seeing is not simply the same personnel in power, but the same geopolitical misjudgments and symbolic policymaking carried forward under a new prime minister.
Canada is facing serious decisions. A strategic China, an assertive U.S., rising security threats in Europe, growing federal debt, and tougher global trade demand focused leadership. Canada needs leaders who meet today’s needs, not repeat the missteps of a decade defined by drift and ineffectual policy.
Jerome Gessaroli is a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and leads the Sound Economic Policy Project at the British Columbia Institute of Technology.
