Only Justin Trudeau can fix this now. No one else but the prime minister himself can stem the damage being done to his government in the unfolding SNC-Lavalin affair.

So far the prime minister has failed to present a robust counter-narrative to the damning story about political interference in judicial matters told by his former attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould.

Instead, he and his ministers have been touring the land, repeating canned lines about the importance of fighting to protect jobs.

But the resignation of Jane Philpott, one of his most respected and accomplished ministers, makes clearer than ever that this is a far from adequate response.

It won’t be enough for Trudeau’s former principal secretary, Gerald Butts, to tell his version of events, as he is scheduled to do before the House of Commons justice committee on Wednesday morning.

Or for the Clerk of the Privy Council, Michael Wernick, to go back to the committee and respond to Wilson-Raybould’s assertion that multiple government officials pressured her to give SNC-Lavalin a break in its corruption and bribery case.

Philpott did not wait to hear these surrogates for the PM before she exited his cabinet. Clearly she did not expect that either of them would have anything convincing to say that would shake her belief in Wilson-Raybould’s narrative.

No, if Trudeau wants to rally his government and party and reassure Canadians that he and his colleagues acted properly in handling the SNC-Lavalin affair, he must do it himself.

He must find a venue, perhaps the justice committee itself, and lay out the government’s case. He must stop trying to hide behind slogans and catch-phrases and actually answer Wilson-Raybould’s story, what she called “my truth.” We now need to hear the prime minister’s truth, at length and in detail.

That’s how important Philpott’s resignation is. It may turn out to be even more important than Wilson-Raybould’s departure itself. In her case, it was possible to argue that the former AG was simply wrong in how she approached the SNC-Lavalin matter, and wrong to stay in cabinet even after she was shuffled out of justice into veterans’ affairs in mid-January.

But in her resignation letter as President of the Treasury Board, Philpott makes plain that she is troubled by the implications of the government’s behaviour for the “independence and integrity of our justice system” — specifically for the independence of the attorney general from political interference.

As a result, she said, she has lost confidence in “how the government has dealt with this matter in how it has responded to the issues raised.” Although she did not specifically mention the prime minister, it’s hard to conclude anything other than she has lost confidence in Trudeau himself — and more specifically in how he has fumbled the fallout from Wilson-Raybould’s resignation.

Philpott’s departure is important also because of her well-deserved standing within the government. Early on in this affair, there were clumsy attempts by Liberal sources to discredit Wilson-Raybould as “difficult” and hard to work with.

Nothing like that can credibly be attempted with regard to Philpott. She served as Trudeau’s first health minister, then was named minister of Indigenous services in 2017 when it became apparent that the government’s agenda in this vital area was running into the sand.

As recently as January, Trudeau entrusted her with the Treasury Board portfolio. She has been a stalwart of his cabinet and cannot be dismissed as anything but a principled minister and Liberal.

It’s notable that both ministers who have departed Trudeau’s government are women and both are deeply involved in Indigenous affairs. Wilson-Raybould’s involvement is obvious, as Canada’s first Indigenous justice minister. Philpott’s experience as Indigenous services minister plainly touched her; she mentioned the importance of these issues in her resignation letter.

It’s plain that Trudeau’s commitment to a gender-balanced cabinet and to making progress on Indigenous affairs had significance that eluded him at the time. He ended up with ministers at the cabinet table who took his rhetoric about change seriously and weren’t prepared to compromise their principles just to get along. There is abundant irony in how Trudeau’s professed principles have come back to bite him in unexpected ways.

The loss of two ministers is a hard blow, and if there are more departures on the way it may not be possible to stop the unravelling. But at this point it need not be fatal —if the prime minister takes charge and pushes back. If Trudeau can come up with a strong counter-narrative to the story told by Wilson-Raybould, he has a good chance to stanch the bleeding and rebuild confidence.

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It’s worth saying, too, that the prime minister is right that even amid such chaos voters should not lose sight of the fact that there are bigger issues involved — including jobs and climate change and much else where his government has made serious progress.

It would be tragic if the accomplishments of his government were tossed aside because of mistakes in handling the SNC-Lavalin case, and more specifically in how it has botched the fallout from Wilson-Raybould’s departure.

But at this point those achievements can’t be protected by ignoring or downplaying the substance of Wilson-Raybould’s story. Trudeau has no choice at this point but to confront it directly.

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