Pierre Poilievre flew up as Justin Trudeau was stuck on the ground

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Maybe Prime Minister Justin Trudeau should buy a WestJet ticket to return home from India.

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Or charter one of their reliable jets!

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While the prime minister was grounded with a broken RCAF plane on Sunday, opposition leader Pierre Poilievre was not only in high demand but also struggling for votes.

Trudeau’s government jet was grounded in New Delhi due to a component replacement, forcing the prime minister and his staff to stay an extra day abroad.

Poilievre, on the other hand, boarded a WestJet flight from Quebec City to Calgary and took full advantage of the captive audience by standing at the front of the plane and using the microphone flight attendants use to articulate safety procedures.

And like his speech at the Conservative Party conference on Friday night, he got off to a good start.

“That’s your captain’s warning about some turbulence,” Poilievre joked, then teased: “MeIt will only take about two years. At that point, we’ll have an entirely new crew and pilot directing the plane, flying safely through the clouds (and) landing at our home, the country we know and love, your home. Our home, let’s bring it home.”

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Needless to say, the packed plane cheered as if they had been offered free champagne.

What Poilievre offered was affordability.

“Who’s ready for a house they can afford? Who’s ready for some common sense? Who’s ready to say a big thank you to the WestJet pilots and crew?”

We definitely write about WestJet when things go wrong, so it’s more fun to cover the great Canadian airline when things are going well.

“Canada’s next prime minister is taking his fellow Canadians home on a scheduled flight from Quebec,” wrote Glenda McFarlane on X.

“It’s not every day you hear a speech like that on a plane,” added Jennifer Elle.

Of course, this was mainly symbolic. WestJet added this flight for delegates to and from the convention.

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But it was a winner. Unlike Trudeau’s plane, which unfortunately broke down just as the prime minister preferred to dodge after his heated exchange with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, this jet, as my colleague Brian Lilley has pointed out in great columns, got its passengers home.

While Poilievre, who was on the bus, wasn’t first class or on a private plane, it was smooth and on-time compared to the PM’s bumpy and delayed journey.

It’s an easy story to write, and it may mean nothing in a long journey to determine who will rule the country next, but in politics the symbolism is hard to resist. A federal election may not take place until 2025, and anything can happen in politics during that time.

But while Poilievre and the CCP political machine sped down the runway, Trudeau and the Liberals got stuck on the tarmac while Poilievre and the Liberals tried to reach their intended destination.

jwarmington@postmedia.com

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