What part of funding education for girls around the world doesn’t Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer like?

When G7 leaders, prompted by the Trudeau government, pledged $3.9 billion to promote girls’ education at their Charlevoix summit in June, we don’t remember the Conservatives condemning it as a waste of money.

And for good reason: just about everyone agrees that empowering girls and young women is the most effective way of spending aid dollars.

Yet when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted out an announcement this week that Canada was contributing $50 million to a global charity for children’s education, Scheer chose to misrepresent the entire situation. In a tweet of his own, he accused Trudeau of throwing taxpayers’ money around just to ingratiate himself with a TV host, namely Trevor Noah of The Daily Show.

In fact, as Scheer knew or could easily have found out, none of this was true. The money is part of Canada’s $400-million pledge for girls’ education made at the G7 summit, and the contribution to the education fund was decided weeks ago. Noah, a South African citizen, came into the picture because he was hosting a festival honouring the late Nelson Mandela where contributions to the fund were being announced.

Scheer and the Conservatives chose to ignore all this and mock Trudeau’s decision to make the announcement with a tweet rather, say, in yet another dull government news release.

We get it: it’s part of their effort to portray the prime minister as a shallow publicity hunter willing to use your tax dollars to buy attention from a medium-grade celebrity. It’s a predictable political tactic; no doubt it will ring true to some already inclined to dislike Trudeau.

But the Conservatives should at least get their facts right. And if they have a problem with Canada putting its money where its mouth is on girls’ education, they should say so. If not, they’re the ones looking shallow.

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