‘Trudeau May Be A Flop, Or Great’

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31658, 19 April 1968, Page 13

‘Trudeau May Be A Flop, Or Great’

(From

MELVIN SUFRIN,

N.Z.P.A.

special correspondent) TORONTO, April 16. After five years in office as a minority Government, Canada’s Liberals feel they have found a winner in Mr Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the man picked to succeed Mr Lester Pearson as Prime Minister. The 46-year-old millionaire lawyer, a swinging representative of the “go-go” generation, lias stirred intense excitement throughout the land since the Liberals chose him as their new leader on April 6. He is expected to take over from Mr Pearson on Monday and the betting is that he will go to the country later this year. The Opposition Conservatives are guessing it might be as early as June. If Mr Trudeau can maintain the momentum built up by national television coverage of the Ottawa leadership convention, he will stand a

good chance of winning a clear majority—something Mr Pearson was unable to do in 10 years as party leader. The latest public opinion polls show the Liberals with 42 per cent of the popular vote, compared with 34 per cent for Mr Robert Stanfield’s Conservatives and 16 per cent for the Socialist New Democrats. This could change in the next few months, depending on how well Mr Trudeau performs in his new role, but if he can maintain his hold on the national imagination it could spell success at the polls. His chances seem good at the moment because Mr Stanfield, who won the Tory leadership and succeeded Mr John Diefenbaker last September, has been far from exciting since he was elected to Parliament. It took Mr Trudeau four ballots to defeat his opponents for the Liberal leadership, and there are undoubtedly scars in party ranks. For example, the Secretary of State (Mrs Judy Lamarsh) has left the Cabinet, declaring she will never serve under Mr Trudeau.

But the Minister of Trade (Mr Winters) the man Mr Trudeau defeated on the final ballot—may agree to remain in the Cabinet, along with other unsuccessful leadership candidates. Perhaps more important than presenting a solid front in the Cabinet will be Mr Trudeau’s success in convincing Canadians generally that he is not simply a radical or a political opportunist. As recently as the 1963 General Election he was supporting the Socialists and describing the Liberals as “idiots” for agreeing to allow the United States to station nuclear arms on Canadian soil. He has studied political economy at Harvard, the Paris School of Political Science and the London School of Economics. He taught at the University of Montreal, has worked as a labour lawyer, and has served the Federal Government as an economic adviser. He was a champion skier at college, learned to fly a plane, took up scuba-diving under the instruction of Mr Jacques-Yves Cousteau, and

paddled a canoe 400 miles through Canada’s Arctic. With money from the estate of his late father, a multi-millionaire oil dealer, he had the freedom to travel the world in the post-war years, spending time in gaol in Jugoslavia and being held as an Israeli spy by the Palestine Arabs. At 46, he remains a funloving bachelor, a witty, urbane, fashionably-dressed intellectual with the energy to match his intelligence. In short, he is an exceptional and exciting man. He could be a flop, but he could also be a great Prime Minister. \ But in the three years since he was elected a Liberal member of Parliament and was named Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister, Mr Trudeau proved himself a hard-working poli-tically-sensitive reformer. As Minister of Justice he attracted national attention with his deft performance in piloting through the House bills liberalising the laws on abortion, homosexuality and divorce acts of political courage for a Roman Catholic.

He also fashioned a Federal Constitutional policy aimed at putting an end to the conditions that tend to make French-Canadians feel like foreigners whenever they venture far from the province of Quebec. At the same time, he won wide support in Englishspeaking Canada for his resolute stand on national unity —his opposition to those who would make Quebec a separate State. A French-Canadian, Mr Trudeau is the first fluently bilingual Prime Minister Canada has had since Mr Louis St Laurent left the scene a decade ago. His impeccable French will be a useful weapon in dealing with the French President (General Charles de Gaulle), who has stirred lively controversy with his repeated calls for Quebec’s “freedom.’' There are some who suggest that Mr Trudeau, as a relative newcomer to formal politics lacks the experience needed to be an effective Prime Minister; but his background provides compensations. •