I too have felt the full beam of the Justin Trudeau charm – and watched it wane.

Ten years ago, when the suave heir to a political liberal dynasty burst on the scene, he was the poster politician of centrists far beyond Canada – a confident heir to the consensus of free-trade and social progress. He was soon highly placed in the panoply of global centrists – and for Brits and fellow Europeans looking anxiously to the rise of one Donald Trump, a contrast to his dark magnetism.

Now he leaves office in Ottawa, a pallid figure and drag on his party’s fortunes – abandoned by both loyalists and his scrappy socialist coalition partners and battered in the polls by a populist new right under Pierre Poilievre, who is likely to end up as prime minister when elections are held this year.

Pierre Poilievre is a populist in his mid-forties, wielding right-wing banners of cutting back costly diversity and inclusion initiatives, and slimming the complex federal Canadian state. In style, tone and outlook, he is about as far from Trudeau as it is possible to get.

This, said the outgoing PM, looking uncommonly bleary in a chilly outdoor interview, was “not in Canadians’ best interests”. Canadians beg to differ, however, just as many other voter populations are determinedly turning their........

© iNews