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Who can say? Trudeau’s intentions are as opaque as his comments were ambiguous. But if he wants to allay suspicions that he is trying to pull a fast one, he should at least say as much; that he has thus far declined to do so — in question period, he did not directly respond to Tom Mulcair’s accusation that he was “backing away from his solemn promise to Canadians” — is alarming, to say the least.

Understand that this was no ordinary promise, not only because of the unusually forthright language in which it was expressed, but because junking one electoral system for another is, by definition, a big change. Trudeau has, it is true, no mandate for any particular model of reform, but he absolutely has a mandate for reform.

He should clarify whether, in musing about the “motivation” for reform being “less compelling” now that his blessed self is in power, he is describing the public’s opinion or his own

I say mandate, not in the sense of a majority — for the Liberals, like the Conservatives before them, like every majority government but one since 1958, took a majority of the seats with the support of a minority of the voters — but in the sense that that was the offer they made to the public. Regardless of how many people voted for the Liberals expressly on that basis, it was part of the deal, a pitch to NDP-leaning voters, a display of the Liberals’ progressive credentials: that’s why it was in the platform.

The prime minister should immediately make clear, then, whether the promise is still in effect, or whether, having safely delivered the Liberals into power, the status quo is now back on the table, if not the only item on it. Otherwise many voters may conclude that they have once again, as they have on so many previous occasions, been had; that “this will be the last election under FPTP” was only the new “zap, you’re frozen.” At the same time, he should clarify whether, in musing about the “motivation” for reform being “less compelling” now that his blessed self is in power, he is describing the public’s opinion or his own.

For to argue, as the Liberals have done, that the system that elected Stephen Harper with the support of just 39 per cent of the voters was unfair and unrepresentative, only to argue that the same system was made miraculously fair and representative by virtue of having elected the Liberals — with the same support — is the kind of hypocrisy that would be fully deserving of former NDP leader Ed Broadbent’s description of it: outrageous.