Tight Corner for Trudeau

The Prime Minister fights for his political life

In the wary phrase of a political rival, Pierre Elliott Trudeau embodies the attributes of "a philosopher and John Wayne." That dynamic combination has helped Canada's Prime Minister fight his way out of tight corners before, and after eleven years in power, Trudeau has held office longer than any other Western head of government. Last week he was embroiled in the toughest fight of his career as Canada embarked on a federal election campaign that Trudeau described as "the most vital in my lifetime." On May 22, Canadians will decide whether to give Trudeau, 59, a fourth mandate, or turn the country over to an ordinary Joe--Progressive Conservative Leader Joseph Clark, 39.

The election marks the first time since Canadians were caught up in the tides of Trudeaumania a decade ago that the Liberals have entered a race running behind. Along with his eloquence and intellect, Trudeau is carrying into the campaign the weight of considerable baggage--notably an economic record that has managed to combine sluggish growth with 9.2% inflation, an unemployment rate of 7.9% and a $12 billion government deficit.

Trudeau also entered the campaign bearing up under an unusual cross for a Canadian Prime Minister: competing for newspaper space with serialized tattletale excerpts from Beyond Reason, the memoirs of his estranged wife Margaret, 30. As he has since their separation in 1977, Trudeau maintained a dignified silence about Margaret, whose revelations about their life together are unlikely to affect the election either way.

What may influence the voters' judgment is Tory criticism that the Trudeau years failed to resolve the alienation of the newly resource-rich Western Canadian provinces, which feel that their growing economic clout is not matched by commensurate political influence in the central government. The Westerners served for decades as a captive market for high-priced manufactured goods from Eastern Canada. Now that they have come into their own, oil-producing Alberta and Saskatchewan are resentful that the Trudeau government has claimed a slice of their petroleum revenues to subsidize the price of imported oil, on which most of Eastern Canada depends.

In Trudeau's home province of Quebec, the government of Premier Rene Levesque is determined to end the minority status of French-speaking Quebeckers in predominantly English-speaking Canada by achieving independence for the province. As a first step, the Levesque government is preparing to call a plebiscite as early as next fall, asking for a mandate to negotiate a vaguely defined formula of political sovereignty for Quebec and an economic association with the rest of Canada. A few years ago, Trudeau declared that "separatism is dead." Now he is trying to rouse attention to the threat of separatism by pointing to the determination of Levesque's Parti Quebecois as "a stark, cold reality." Since Trudeau could hardly assert that his stewardship has brought Canadians prosperity and tranquillity, he chose to launch a broadside offensive. He portrayed the country as imperiled by "a growing spirit of egotism and selfishness" and declared in Montreal: "It's impossible to have a united Canada without a strong central government." Dismissing Clark as a "feeble echo" of provincial Premiers who are hungry to expand their powers at Ottawa's expense, Trudeau cast himself as the champion of a government strong enough to defend the national interest from the provinces or anywhere else. Said he, by way of illustration: "The energy needs of Canadians are too vital a matter to be left in the hands of the Exxon Corp. of New York or the provincial government of Alberta."

The Liberals consider national unity to be Trudeau's strongest ploy but at least in the early going, he had difficulty using it. When told on a Toronto hot-line radio show that the voters were more worried about inflation and unemployment, the Prime Minister unguardedly blurted out that he found it "almost treasonable" for anyone to suggest that national unity was not an important issue.

"At the risk of being called a traitor," as Joe Clark tartly put it on a swing to Quebec City, the youthful Tory leader concentrated on the Trudeau economic record and pledged a passel of policies to Get Canada Working Again. The son of a newspaper publisher in High River, Alta., Clark has proved himself an adept parliamentary leader in his three years as Conservative chief. Many Canadians, however, worry about his relative inexperience, particularly in foreign affairs. After a somewhat nervous start on the hustings, Clark found his stride, advancing himself as a consensus seeker as opposed to "Mr. Trudeau's campaign of uniting Canada by attacking everyone in it."

With six weeks of campaigning to go for 282 seats in the next, enlarged House of Commons,* a new Gallup poll had the Liberals and the Tories running in a dead heat, each with 41% of the popular favor. Since the Liberals' support is disproportionately concentrated in Quebec, this suggested that the Tories would enjoy a thin overall margin in the race for parliamentary seats, although an unusually high percentage of voters remain undecided. Just as the Liberals are expected to sweep Quebec, the Tories are overwhelmingly dominant in the Western provinces. Thus the election will probably be won or lost in the industrial heartland of Ontario, which has a third of Canada's population. With the two major parties running so evenly, the leftist New Democratic Party, which has a strong Ontario base, could end up holding the balance of power in the new Parliament.

* At dissolution, the party standings were Liberals 133, Conservatives 98, New Democrats 17, Social Credit 9, Independents 5, two vacancies.

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