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Justin Trudeau has an array of public relations assets: he’s good looking, emotionally intelligent, from a famous family, and able to strike the right chord and stay “on message.” From Davos to Delhi, the prime minister has generated impressive international publicity and helped to boost the Canadian “brand.”

Yet, as someone who has spent 20 years in the communications business within Asian and American markets, I can say that Canada’s current public relations strategy is unsuitable to the task at hand: securing Canada’s trade interests with foreign governments who think differently than we do. The Trudeau government’s public relations framing has become way too obvious, and its rhetoric is now starting to crash against the rocks of international realpolitik.

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The government is currently pursuing free trade deals on three fronts: with the Americans (and Mexicans), where NAFTA hangs by a thread; with the Chinese, who just rebuffed our “progressive” trade deal pitch; and with a host of other Asian partners, many of whom were appalled by Canada’s recent decision to abruptly avoid attending a Trans-Pacific Partnership leaders’ meeting where an agreement-in-principle was supposed to be announced.