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Andrew Cohen is a journalist, a professor at Carleton University and author of Two Days in June: John F. Kennedy and the 48 Hours That Made History.

Ten days into the invasion of Ukraine, the senior parliamentary reporter for CBC News accompanying Justin Trudeau to Europe posed a junior reporter’s question. Why, asked Travis Dhanraj, in an exchange with Chrystia Freeland and Mélanie Joly amplified on Twitter, were the Prime Minister and three senior ministers travelling abroad “on the taxpayer dime” rather than addressing “pressing domestic issues” at home?

It was an exquisitely Canadian line of inquiry, pillorying politicians on a junket. The grandstanding (they “clearly did not like my question,” Mr. Dhanraj tweeted afterward) said more about the journalist than the story.

Still, given Mr. Trudeau’s purée of platitudes and bouquet of gestures, challenging his effectiveness abroad speaks to a home truth. In six and a half years in office, Mr. Trudeau has shown little real interest in the world beyond socks, celebrity and self-congratulation. And while he has an obligation to visit foreign capitals, especially now, it is fair to question what he brings to the table. If little, why go?

As the longest-serving leader in the G7, Mr. Trudeau could aspire to be a statesman, like Lester B. Pearson or Pierre Elliott Trudeau; indeed, the experience of his eminent Liberal predecessors might advise and encourage him. By and large, though, the Trudeau fils has no such aspirations. Perhaps he’s decided his legacy lies at home after all.

The new power-sharing agreement between the Liberals and New Democrats isn’t about foreign policy. The focus is domestic. If the arrangement lasts until June 2025, as expected, it will give Mr. Trudeau more time than any other minority government since Mackenzie King in the early 1920s.

Mr. Trudeau knows the shoals and shallows. After winning a majority in October 2015, he won a minority in October 2019, and a second in September 2021. Falling short of a real majority last year, he forged a de facto majority this year.

Is he serious about doing big things with it? It’s hard to know. He pleaded for a third mandate but didn’t move with urgency afterward. It took five weeks to announce his new cabinet, and two months to recall Parliament. Inexplicably, the government dawdled.

Had Mr. Trudeau wanted to declare “60 days of decision” as Mr. Pearson did in 1963 to advance the party’s priorities, he could have. But he was notably absent during the siege of Ottawa, before he invoked the Emergencies Act.

Now the Liberals can govern without fear of a vote of non-confidence. If Mr. Trudeau truly wants to champion social reform, he can implement dental care and pharmacare, long-discussed ideas.

In strategy, Mr. Trudeau can channel Mr. Pearson, whose two minority governments between 1963 and 1968 were the most productive in our history. Mending and extending the social-safety net would sow a real legacy – assuming the cost is manageable.

What else? Certainly combatting climate change and advancing the green economy, although given events abroad, we’ll have to produce more oil and gas. Certainly reducing the cost of housing, bridging the digital divide, narrowing income inequity, pushing stronger gun control and honouring promises to Indigenous communities.

All this is plausible. Less likely, though, are bigger, tougher things, such as Mr. Pearson’s adoption of a new flag and introduction of Medicare. Or bringing home the British North America Act with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as Mr. Trudeau’s father did. To become a nation-builder, to strengthen the state and shed our lingering neo-colonialism, Mr. Trudeau would have to show ambition and courage.

Would he, should the Queen die while he is still in office, propose jettisoning the monarchy, as Barbados has recently? He could use the succession to embrace the governor-general as de jure head of state.

Would he advocate for minority rights in Quebec, courting a fight with the provincial government? Would he introduce proportional representation, as he promised? Would he construct a true economic union to strengthen the federation?

Would he create great institutions such as the long-promised national portrait gallery, restore or rebuild 24 Sussex Drive and finish the southern quadrant of the parliamentary precinct? Would he deliver high-speed rail, long overdue, trumpeting its environmental and economic benefits?

Lastly, would he reimagine Canada on the world stage? This begins with seriously rearming the military to meet our failing commitment to NATO (which Mr. Pearson proudly helped found) and revisiting peacekeeping for the 21st century. It means meaningful developmental aid (which his father believed in) and investing in modern diplomacy, understanding the uses of culture in foreign policy. It means asking Canadians, in word and deed, to be worthy of their history, geography, diversity and bounty in this convulsed world.

Suddenly, Mr. Trudeau has a rare gift: a license to govern with a relatively free hand for three more years. To think imaginatively, free of an election, about the country Canada can be.

And then, having been in office a decade, to depart with a sense of achievement, leaving behind a fairer, better Canada.

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