Transcript
Steve: Many Canadians might be hard-pressed to know what it means to be the “Clerk of the Privy Council.” Well, Michael Wernick had that job, and his new book does much more than explain that the Clerk is the top job in the federal civil service. The book is called: “Governing Canada: A Guide to the Tradecraft of Politics.” Michael Wernick spent almost four decades in Canada’s public service, working at the highest levels with three different prime ministers. And he joins us now from the nation’s capital for this insider’s view. Michael Wernick, it’s good to have you on TVO tonight. How are you doing?
Michael Wernick: Thanks for inviting me.
Steve: Not at all. How would you characterize — let’s start very generally here — how would you characterize what the role of a prime minister ideally should be?
Michael Wernick: Well, as I go through in the book a little bit of what prime ministers do all day and what ministers do all day, I do unpack that a little bit. So I don’t want to give away everything that’s in the book, Steve. But it’s a job that involves wearing several hats. The one that I focus on the most is chairing Cabinet. You are the prime, you’re the first minister, it’s your Cabinet, and driving the process of Cabinet to take decisions on behalf of all of us is really one of the things that I focus on. But there are other aspects to being the prime minister. You’re first minister in the federation, dealing with premiers and other levels of government. You’re the head of government for Canada, and a lot of the prime minister’s time is involved in international relationships with other leaders and international organizations. You’re the chair of your caucus, and what prime ministers often do is tend to their team. They have a hundred or more MPs, and there’s a lot of caucus relations and bringing that team along and developing it. So, you know, there are different aspects to being a prime minister. If you’re overextended from the day you start to the day you leave, the mindful management of your time is really one of the key skills.
Steve: I want to follow up with one word that you just used there that I note over the years that political people use, but if I can use this expression, don’t take it the wrong way, but normal people don’t talk this way. You said politicians or the prime minister in particular takes a decision as opposed to makes a decision, which is, I think, what the rest of us do. Why is there that distinction in politics?
Michael Wernick: It’s just Ottawa vocabulary that I’ve been steeped in. Maybe a distinction without a difference. I mean, I think it does go to the point that the purpose of governing is to make or take decisions on our behalf. These are the people, 38 million of us, and we give about 35 of them in Cabinet and about 338 of them in Parliament a mandate to decide on legislation, policies, regulation, negotiations, and so on. And it’s not there to be a campus debating club or somebody’s perfect model of government, it’s there to take decisions and advance the country.
Steve: Okay. Let me get back on the path here, and that is, again, based on your experience, ideally, do we want a prime minister who sort of rolls up their sleeves and runs departments and really has the hand on the tiller, or is it preferable to have a prime minister who is more kind of a mouthpiece for the government and sort of conveys an impression of the kind of government he or she wants to run?
Michael Wernick: Well, I think the government — the face of the government is always the prime minister. It is the focal point of accountability, and Question Period is the one recognizable name for most voters. You are the brand, the reputation, the image, and the most effective spokesperson for the government, and that’s a lot of what prime ministers have to be good at. What I try to shed light on in the book is, apart from those two-minute clips in Question Period you might see on the news every night, the prime minister is very busy doing other things. And moving things through Cabinet and government is one of the important ones. It takes place away from the cameras, away from the spotlight, but it’s fundamentally important to our democracy.
Steve: One of the things you wrote that surprised me a little bit was that you said prime ministers ought to be feared from time to time by their Cabinet ministers. How come?
Michael Wernick: I think — it’s probably true of corporate CEOs and the heads of law firms and so on. I think to move a team along, you want to feel that there are consequences for underperformance or for behavior and that there will be sanctions. So I think it’s important to be liked and respected, you know, to run a team effectively. But I think you want other people to worry a little bit about what you think about them.
Steve: How common a phenomenon is it that the longer a prime minister is in office, the more he or she surrounds him or herself with sycophants and/or yes people who tell them what they want to hear as opposed to what they need to hear?
Michael Wernick: I think it’s a risk that you’re in a comfort zone of people that you trust and you’re used to working with, and what I say in the book is if your default will be to stay with the same circle probably longer than you should. But you and I know some of the political history, and previous prime ministers have made substantial changes. Prime Minister Harper went through several chiefs of staff and many, many members of his inner team. Certainly Brian Mulroney did. He didn’t finish with the staff that he started with. Pierre Trudeau, and so on. I think what I suggest is that once in a while you pause and take a look at both the processes that you’re using and the people that you’re working with and just mindfully think about it from time to time because each mandate is going to present new challenges in a new context.
Steve: The late, great Bill Davis used to say, and in fact he told this to Brian Mulroney when Mr. Mulroney was in deep trouble, he said the people who get you there are not the people who will keep you there. Do you find that to be the case?
Michael Wernick: Well, I certainly make the distinction that the people that are good at winning elections are not necessarily going to transfer in and be as effective at governing. There are people who are very good at the business of elections. Some of them come into government and find themselves in the prime minister’s office or the offices of cabinet ministers. A lot of them do take to governing. But some of them don’t. So I do want to draw a line between the skill set of winning elections, which I know nothing about, and the skill set of governing and getting decisions on behalf of the country.
Steve: Let me put you in a really squeamish position right now, which is to say, the current prime minister has had the same chief of staff since day one and he’s now in year 6. Should he be thinking about changing that position?
Michael Wernick: He should be thinking about what team he wants to use in his third mandate, and that goes all the way through the team.
Steve: Does that mean he should change Katie Telford?
Michael Wernick: That’s really up to the prime minister.
Steve: Yes, it is. All right. Let’s talk about politics and partisanship here. And I want to ask you about — and I know you get asked this all the time — about the independence of the civil service. Because, of course, there was that moment in 2015 when Justin Trudeau first became prime minister and he went to the Foreign Affairs Building, the Pearson Building, and — I mean, he got rock star treatment from public servants who are supposedly neutral. They cheered for him, they hugged him, did selfies with him, and that kind of thing. How concerned were you that that kind of situation confirms what too many people already believe, which is that public servants prefer to have the Liberals in and the Conservatives out?
Michael Wernick: I found those scenes really unfortunate and dismaying. I know where it came from. It came from the tone more than anything of the last few years of the previous government more than the substance, and the tone that ministers and their offices project to the public service has an impact on people’s morale and energy and dedication. That doesn’t make them partisan. I worked about equally for Team Red and Team Blue, and, you know, public servants come in and work really hard to deliver services and programs that the government of the day has a mandate for, and it was important that — and it remains important — that when there is a change of government, the incoming group feels that the public service is there to give them advice and support and help them deliver the mandate that they took to Canadians. So I was very pleased in 2015 that we went from Team Blue to Team Red in 16 calendar days with very little loss of traction.
Steve: Let me ask you about the things that get governments into trouble, and you, having been there in the public service for nearly four decades, would have seen the kind of thing that trips politicians up. What does it tend to be?
Michael Wernick: Behavior. It’s usually not a policy issue, it’s not bringing in some unpopular program or law or policy — that certainly can happen. It’s not always, you know, scandal. It’s just a question of projecting being out of touch, projecting being careless with public money is particularly corrosive, any kind of sort of being arrogant or feeling entitled to the job can be a problem, and we’ve obviously seen — and this is not just in politics but in other sectors — behavior, you know, personal conduct, harassment, bullying in the workplace, the way you get along with other people is really important. So it’s basically, you know, a profession of people, and what I’ve seen over the years in terms of which careers flourish and which ones don’t, it’s almost always about behavior.
Steve: Do you think one party suffers from it more than the other?
Michael Wernick: No, I think the only real difference between parties is, from my perspective, is the ones that are in and the ones that are out. Being in government brings with it certain, you know, constraints and connotations, and being in opposition does too. That’s really the fundamental difference.
Steve: Bob Rae said that to me once. He said we really overdo the analysis when we talk about Liberals versus Conservatives. It’s really ins versus outs. The outs want to get in, the ins want to stay in, and that rally motivates everything. Do you think there’s something to that?
Michael Wernick: I think that’s a principal driver, and that’s democratic politics. Governments want to remain in office so they can do the things that governments get to do. As I say in the book, sometimes the point of winning elections is to be able to govern. And if you get to govern two or three mandates, you bend the curve of history. A lot of the media coverage focuses on whether a particular law or policy decision is popular or will bring you up or down in the polls and win you the next election. But from my point of view, the point of winning elections is to be able to govern.
Steve: Let me pull a quote from the book here. You wrote: “Any whiff of it — criminality in government — is very exciting and is likely to generate a frenzy.” You say, “You can’t make use of a government aircraft or a chartered aircraft without bringing down scorn or theatrical outrage.” Is it your belief that government watchdogs and journalists often overhype or, I guess, sex up scandals that are really non-events at the end of the day?
Michael Wernick: I want to be really well-understood on this. A vigilant media and press and opposition and the institutional watchdogs, as we call them, are really important to effective government. They shed a light on things and force governments of all stripes to strive to do better. So we as Canadians are well-served now by having that accountability and feedback loop. The point I was trying to make is that Canada is actually very well-governed. If you look at any international index of transparency or corruption or effectiveness on all kinds of scales, I’d be happy to recite them for you. Canada has a very strong public sector, both at the federal and provincial and municipal levels, and these transgressions that you do see in other countries, such as outright nepotism and fraud and criminality and interference in the judiciary, they just don’t happen in Canada. And so even a whiff of it or an allegation of it is obviously a very serious matter, and I totally understand why they immediately create something of a feeding frenzy in the media. I’m not critical of that. I’m just saying if you’re a minister, you need to be very mindful of that and behave correctly at all times.
Steve: Now, what you just said is an empirically provable fact. If you go to Transparency International, you will find Canada very high up on the list. But we actually dropped a few places on the list last year because of three letters: SNC, which actually don’t appear in your book. And I wonder why not.
Michael Wernick: Well, I don’t talk about any specific incidents in the book. It’s a photomosaic of governing over several years. I worked closely with four prime ministers — three prime ministers and I got to see another one up close. I was a deputy to several ministers. So what I’m trying to do is give a composite picture of how Cabinet governments work and shed light on the “how.” As one of the reviews of the book said, it’s not a tell-all, it’s a how-to. And I think I’m in a unique position because of my cumulative experience to talk about the tradecraft and what these people actually do all day on our behalf.
Steve: You are. And it’s so rare for us to have somebody who has had your job on this program that I’m going to take advantage of it right now. I’m not going to rehash the whole SNC-Lavalin thing again. We’ve had Jody Wilson-Raybould, the former Attorney General, on this program a couple of times talking about the set of circumstances that ultimately led to her leaving politics and you leaving your job as the Clerk. So let me just play a little snippet here of what she had to say in one of her previous appearances here and then we’ll come back and chat. Sheldon, if you would?
[Clip plays: Jody Wilson-Raybould discusses her role as Attorney General and her stance on government interference.]
Steve: What do you make of how she has interpreted her mission as a cabinet minister?
Michael Wernick: It’s — I really don’t want to get into a she said/he said with Ms. Wilson-Raybould. Maybe some other time. I think as a member of Cabinet you’re in a unique position to have influence and to speak up. There are multiple, multiple opportunities. You’re at caucus every week. You’re at Cabinet. You’re at Cabinet committees. You’re sitting in Question Period. You’re in the government lobby. You have access to the Prime Minister, to other Cabinet ministers. As I said at the committee, you can pick up the phone, call the PMO switchboard, and connect with anybody and say, “You know, I need to speak to you about something.” So I’ve always wondered why, you know, the minister just didn’t take up that opportunity. She had many, many opportunities to speak up if she was concerned, and she didn’t do so. The matter was never raised at Cabinet other than two bookends: Deferred Prosecution Agreements, which are an entirely lawful thing for the minister to consider, were added to the Criminal Code on the recommendation and signature of that minister, and she spoke in favor of it at Cabinet and it became part of Canadian law. And the next time the matter ever came up inside the Cabinet room was after she had left as a minister.
Steve: She did feel you inappropriately pressured her to side with the Prime Minister on this issue. Do you think that’s an accurate characterization of your conduct?
Michael Wernick: Inappropriate is, you know, up to people like the Ethics Commissioner and others to judge. I am very comfortable that I was doing my best to do my job and, in fact, one of the things that I said at the committee, and I will repeat, is that people are trying to oversimplify what was going on. It is entirely possible to believe that I was trying to do the right thing, the minister was trying to do the right thing, her chief of staff was trying to do the right thing, PMO was trying to do the right thing, and it just led to the set of circumstances it did.
Steve: Let me ask one more thing on this and we’ll move on. She secretly taped your phone call. What did you think of that?
Michael Wernick: Well, what’s important is what the rest of Cabinet thought of that and what the Liberal caucus thought of that. I think it was an improper thing for a minister to do. I think it was an improper thing for a lawyer to do. And it certainly was a violation of trust in a personal relationship with her that in my case goes back to 2006.
Steve: Ever spoken to her since all that?
Michael Wernick: No.
Steve: Okay. Moving on… This is a particularly tempestuous time in our political history, and you garnered a lot of headlines a couple of years ago when you appeared before a parliamentary committee and you expressed a lot of concern that, “Someone is going to be shot in this country during a political campaign.” I mean, sure enough last week a British Member of Parliament named Sir David Amess was stabbed to death at a constituency meeting. And I guess my question is: Have you seen anything in the last several months that has made you less concerned about the nature of politics in this country today?
Michael Wernick: Well, I spoke up on the issue the day after the Yellow Vest rally in which people were walking around with signs about treason and traitor, and the rhetoric was starting to bubble up, and we had seen what had happened in France with the Yellow Vests and so on. I had access at the time to intelligence and police reports and knew what was happening. I knew some of the abuse, the vile things that were being sent to ministers, particularly to women and people of color, to political staffers, videos on how to commit suicide, racist, homophobic, and misogynist stuff. And the theory at the time was, well, let’s not talk about it because it will just encourage copycats. And I just felt, you know, I needed to call it out at the time. You know, since I left, I don’t have access to that flow of information. I’ve talked to a few politicians. They have spoken up on it. And it’s spread to people in other parties, it happens in other countries. So what I talk about in the book is there will be a price to this in the sense that I would think twice about coming into public life, you know, because of this, and certainly getting people to stay in public life. So, you know, over a course of years, there’s going to be adverse — and that’s not going to be good for democracy.
Steve: When the last election campaign you saw somebody pitch a handful of gravel at the Prime Minister when he was on the hustings, what went through your mind at that moment?
Michael Wernick: I was thinking that the personal protection detail would be extremely concerned because if you can reach somebody with gravel, you can reach them with other things. And I think that not just the Prime Minister but ministers and, as we’re learning, constituency MPs are putting themselves in harm’s way. It’s just a reality that people are going to have to be very concerned about physical
security of premises and buildings and vehicles and mindful of this going forward. What people see less of is the vile things that happen in cyberspace and the kind of just outrageous hate speech and abuse and bullying that goes on every single day.
Steve: Let’s finish up on this. Do you think, simply by doing their jobs the way that they think they need to do their jobs, and obviously that involves a great amount of interaction with the public, do you think our politicians are putting themselves in needless danger?
Michael Wernick: I wouldn’t say needless. I think it now is just part of the compact of going into public life and just to be smart about it. You do get briefings on personal safety and security. This happens in the private sector and diplomats and people going into other jobs. I just think it’s something — you know, my advice to a new minister is listen carefully to the security briefings and take them seriously.
Steve: And just finally for you, is there life after being the Clerk?
Michael Wernick: Of course! Like all Canadians, life was disrupted by a global pandemic, but I’ve been doing some teaching, some writing, some consulting, and trying to pass on some of that experience. And I hope the book is an effective way — I wrote it mostly for students of political science and public management, politics courses, and they keep growing new ones, so hopefully the book will have a bit of a shelf life. But anybody who wants to take a bit of interest in how our unique variant of democracy works, and it’s not exactly like the States or it’s not exactly like the British television series. I want to get across a bit of the Canadian variant of democracy and how it works and what those people that we choose, that will be sworn in, I gather next week, will be doing for the next few years.
Steve: We are happy to remind people it’s called “Governing Canada: A Guide to the Tradecraft of Politics.” And it’s brought Michael Wernick to our studio virtually from the nation’s capital. Michael Wernick, thanks for joining us tonight on TVO.
Michael Wernick: Thanks, Steve. And thank you for your interest.