Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will step down soon. How much has he changed Canada?

When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was elected in 2015, he promised sunny ways and “a real change.” 

Over the last nine years, there’s no doubt his government has focused on fighting climate change, advancing Indigenous reconciliation and lifting some Canadians out of poverty. 

But critics argue the Trudeau government has damaged Canada’s international reputation and the consensus around immigration.

As Trudeau prepares to step down, CBC’s The House spoke to experts and analysts about the legacy he leaves behind — and whether Trudeau’s transformation of Canada will outlast his government.

The economy

Shortly after Trudeau and his Liberals won the 2015 election, they passed a “middle-class” tax cut and then rolled out the Canada Child Benefit, the latter of which contributed to a sharp decline in child poverty in the years after the benefit was doled out.

But the Trudeau government also never balanced its budget. According to the latest economic update, tabled in December last year, the federal deficit has ballooned to $61.9 billion.

Sahir Khan, vice president of the Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy at the University of Ottawa, said the Trudeau government “changed the nature of government to the extent that it’s bigger.”

There was “significant poverty alleviation” for children, seniors and Indigenous Canadians, Khan said, but he added it came at the cost of economic policy that pushed for competitiveness.

“I think the Trudeau government, probably pushed along by the NDP, just chose an emphasis that focused on wealth redistribution and social policy. And that’s probably going to be his legacy,” Khan said.

“But if you’re at the other end of this, and you’re worried about competitiveness and how we’re prepared for a Trump administration and an increasingly difficult geopolitical environment…. He probably didn’t put the same level of emphasis on that,” Khan added.

When asked if Trudeau’s social programs could be rolled back by future governments, Khan said “a lot of these entitlement programs get a little bit hard coded.”

“As much as people might object to say, the average level of spending of this government…. You still get attached to the programs if you’re a recipient,” Khan said. “[It’s] a lot harder for governments to roll that back later.”

Indigenous reconciliation

When Trudeau announced his plan to step down on Monday, he said his government fought over the years to “advance reconciliation” with Indigenous communities in Canada.

Perry Bellegarde, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, said the prime minister did “really embrace reconciliation” while adding there’s still work to be done on the file.

Bellegarde cited the federal government’s “unprecedented” investments to address Indigenous priorities, including education, housing and drinking water safety.

According to the federal government’s 2024 budget, annual investments in Indigenous priorities have tripled. The figure rose from $11.4 billion in 2015-16 to $32.9 billion in 2022-23.

“With these key strategic investments, it helped close that [socioeconomic gap],” Bellegarde said. “That’s the strongest form of reconciliation. We’ve got to get to the same starting line as the rest of the Canadian people.”

But Trudeau and his government have also been criticized for not ending all long-term drinking water advisories — a promise the prime minister made before taking office — and for spending millions of dollars fighting First Nations advocates in court.

Bellegarde credited Trudeau and his government for lifting several advisories and said the work is “ongoing.”

Bellegarde also highlighted how the Trudeau government passed bills affirming Indigenous peoples’ jurisdiction over child and family services and implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

When asked whether Trudeau’s progress on reconciliation could be walked back in the coming years, Bellegarde said Trudeau’s landmark pieces of legislation are “not programs, so these cannot be repealed at the whim of a minister or cabinet.”

Fighting climate change

The prime minister also highlighted his government’s work to combat climate change during his resignation speech on Monday.

Catherine Abreu, director of the International Climate Politics Hub, said there’s “really no questioning the fact that Justin Trudeau is the prime minister that has put the most focus on supporting climate action [than] any Canadian prime minister.”

“The level of profile that the climate issue has been given by this government and by Trudeau himself is significant,” Abreu said.

While in power, Trudeau passed laws mandating the federal government come up with emission targets every five years and strengthened regulations for evaluating the environmental implications for major resource projects.

But Trudeau’s government has also been criticized for not meeting its 2030 target to cut carbon emissions by at least 40 per cent below 2005 levels. One report argued Canada’s only significant drops in emissions came during the 2008 financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Abreu said some of Trudeau’s policies have been delayed, “and that means the resulting emissions reductions from those policies have also been delayed.”

“It would have been probably really helpful had they been able to get those policies up and running sooner and have that evidence of their success a lot quicker,” she said.

She also said there’s a “major contradiction” between the federal government championing climate action while also purchasing the Trans Mountain oil pipeline, which she said is an example of “maintaining the status quo when it comes to oil and gas.”

One of Trudeau’s signature achievements — the carbon tax — has also become a wedge issue, as Conservatives vow to repeal the legislation if they form the next government.

Abreu said Trudeau and his government “chose to make carbon pricing its flagship climate policy, and I think we’ve seen that perhaps was not the right choice.”

But Abreu says she doesn’t think Trudeau has killed carbon pricing as a politically viable strategy. Instead, there are lessons to take away “around communicating about carbon pricing,” she said.

“I think there’s potential for a lot of these [climate] efforts to continue, in particular when it comes to protecting nature and pursuing adaptation as the impacts of climate change mount,” Abreu said. “I think we’ll continue to see a lot of demand from Canadians to keep those policies in place.”

Canada’s international image

When Trudeau and his Liberals won the 2015 federal election, the prime minister issued a clear message to the world — “on behalf of 35 million Canadians, we’re back.”

Thomas Juneau, an international relations professor at the University of Ottawa, disputed that message as Trudeau prepares to step down.

“Overall, there is no doubt in my mind that no, Canada is not back — whatever that meant,” Juneau said.

Juneau said Trudeau’s rhetoric was “never followed” by action or investment, including more money for Canada’s military and diplomatic services.

Canada has increasingly been scrutinized by NATO allies for not meeting its commitment to spend two per cent of GDP on defence. Trudeau said last summer that Canada will meet that target by 2032.

“Canada’s military was simply not a priority for this government,” Juneau said. “Overall, the Canadian military was broadly neglected in the past 10 years, as it was under previous governments, and that has again not fundamentally changed.”

Juneau did credit the Trudeau government for its ongoing support for Ukraine — an achievement the prime minister highlighted in his resignation speech.

But overall, “Justin Trudeau is leaving Canada unprepared to deal with an increasingly dangerous, unstable and unpredictable world,” Juneau said. “Our foreign policy lacks strategy, lacks vision and lacks resources.”

Immigration

One of Trudeau’s most significant moves early in his tenure was welcoming 25,000 Syrian refugees, with an additional plan to help the refugees find permanent arrangements, jobs and language training in either French or English.

Under Trudeau, Canada’s immigration levels also grew year-over-year until the federal government announced last October it would cut the projected number of new permanent residents, in part to relieve pressure on the housing market.

At the time, the prime minister acknowledged that “as a federal team, we could have acted quicker and turned off the taps faster.”

Mireille Paquet, director of the Institute for Research on Migration and Society at Concordia University in Montreal, said Trudeau initially tried to “reinvent the linkage” between Canada being a country that’s open to migration and Canadian identity.

But Paquet said the immigration surge may have changed Canada in unintended ways as it “called into question a lot of what we took for granted as the Canadian consensus around immigration.”

More than 80 per cent of newcomers to Canada feel the country is bringing in too many people through its immigration system without proper planning, according to a poll commissioned by CBC News.

A separate poll from the Angus Reid Institute last September found Canadians’ concerns about immigration have risen fourfold in the last two years. 

“So a lot more people feel anxious now at the end of Trudeau’s tenure when it comes to the number of immigrants admitted, and when it comes to what they perceive to be the impact of immigration in the country,” Paquet said.

“That is a big change because Canadian views on immigration had been trending in the positive for the last 15 to 20 years,” she said.

Legalizing cannabis

Trudeau and his Liberal government officially legalized cannabis in 2018. At the time, the federal government argued legalization would take money away from organized criminals and protect vulnerable children from being put at risk.

Paul McCarthy, president of the Cannabis Council of Canada, told The House host Catherine Cullen that the “social experiment” of cannabis legalization has gone well, but “the economic side of it is a different story.”

McCarthy, who represents licensed cannabis producers, said the sector is still not profitable and “the regulatory tax burden is too high.”

Last summer, Canadian cannabis retailer Tokyo Smoke closed some of its stores and filed for creditor protection — a move that some experts attributed to an unpredictable industry grappling with high overhead costs and ultra-low retail prices.

McCarthy also argued the federal government has failed to displace the illegal cannabis market and cited a 2023 report from Deloitte that found illicit players’ share of the cannabis market ranges from 25 to 52 per cent.

“If you have a legal market and criminal forces control the single biggest piece of that market, do you have a properly regulated market?” McCarthy said.

Polarization

Lisa Young, a professor of political science at the University of Calgary, argued that “a lot” of Trudeau’s policy legacy is “really quite vulnerable,” and his time in office had moments of conflict between the federal government, provinces and some Canadians.

Young referenced the carbon tax and COVID-19 vaccine mandates, which prompted the Freedom Convoy that blocked large swaths of Ottawa’s downtown and only ended after the federal government invoked the Emergencies Act for the first time ever.

“I think he certainly has been a flash point,” Young said. “And so I think his departure takes the temperature down a bit.”

Trudeau himself has acknowledged he thinks about the angry messages some Canadians send his way, including flags reading “F–k Trudeau” and what impacts those messages — and his job overall —  will have on his children.

Young said the anger toward Trudeau could be redirected toward the next leader of the Liberal Party, “particularly if they pursue some of the same policies.”

“I don’t think [the polarization] simply goes away with his departure,” Young added. “But over time, assuming the government changes…. I think we may see some decrease in the really heightened polarization of this moment.”