Trudeau Averts Election With Ambitious Plan to Weather Covid

(Bloomberg) -- Prime Minister Justin Trudeau managed to pass an ambitious economic plan to get Canada through a second wave of Covid-19, averting an election at least until a fiscal update scheduled for later this fall.

Known as the Throne Speech, his most anticipated economic recovery agenda since taking office in 2015 won a 177-to-152 vote in parliament on Tuesday. It amounts to a vote of confidence in his government, which lacks a majority and needed the backing of at least one of the three opposition parties to have enough seats to maintain power.

Trudeau’s plan is to continue spending to support the nation through the second wave of the pandemic and longer-term items such as a national daycare system and environmental programs. Exactly how much that will cost will only be disclosed when the governments updates its spending plan.

The Conservatives and the Bloc Quebecois, the country’s two largest opposition parties, both voted against the Throne Speech.

The Liberals had to maintain Covid-19 unemployment benefits at a weekly payment of C$400 to C$500 ($300-$375), as well as broaden access to a national paid sick leave plan, in order to receive support from the New Democratic Party, Canada’s social democrats.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.