Varcoe: 'Keep calm': How Carney can deal with Trump factor to ensure successful G7
For those heading into the Rocky Mountain backcountry, 'don't feed the bears' is always sound advice.
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For Canada's leader hosting the G7 summit in Kananaskis in the coming days, 'don't poke the bear' might also apply — as Premier Danielle Smith told a Postmedia colleague earlier this year when discussing U.S. President Donald Trump and Canada's approach to tariffs.
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Former prime ministers, cabinet ministers and international experts say a low-key approach with behind-the-scenes discussions is the best strategy for Prime Minister Mark Carney when he talks with Trump next week about an array of complex geopolitical issues, while U.S. tariffs continue.
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'Trump is obviously a wilder card than has been at a lot of these sessions before,' former prime minister Joe Clark said Thursday on the sidelines of a G7-related conference hosted by the University of Calgary's School of Public Policy.
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'The constructive management of this conference is what we want to be looking for, rather than home runs . . . One is more likely to make progress with Trump away from the cameras. We'll never get him entirely away from the cameras.'
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A major clash, such as what unfolded in 2018 after the G7 summit in Charlevoix, Que., highlights the risks of a meeting that doesn't go smoothly.
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In June 2018, Justin Trudeau criticized American tariffs on steel and aluminum during a wrap-up news conference. Trump, who'd left early, fired back on social media that Canada's prime minister had acted 'meek and mild during our G7 meetings,' but was 'very dishonest and weak' by later telling reporters he wouldn't be pushed around.
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And that was years before the annexation and '51st state' talk.
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As Business Council of Canada CEO Goldy Hyder put it on Friday: 'This cannot be a headline of the president feels ganged-up on. That would be a bad outcome. This has to be: reasonable people have met, they agreed to disagree about some things, but here are some things they agreed on.'
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