As Prime Minister Mark Carney gets set for his second circumnavigation of the globe in as many months, his chief political opponent will also head overseas, Global News has learned.
Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre will be in London, England, on Sunday and will then head to the German capital of Berlin, a senior official in Poilievre’s office said late Wednesday.
Details on Poilievre’s itinerary will be released shortly but the source says he is scheduled to give several speeches in addition to meeting with unnamed European officials.
It will be Poilievre’s first official overseas travel as Leader of the Official Opposition and comes while Carney is travelling to India, the first leg of a 10-day trip which will see him touch down in Australia and Japan before returning home.
It is rare — but not unprecedented — for an Opposition leader to travel abroad. In 2018, Andrew Scheer, then the Opposition leader but now the Conservative House Leader, travelled to India in the wake of a trip by Justin Trudeau to that country that produced significant controversy.
Scheer spent nine days in India and, at the time, his office said that travel was important and that “a Conservative government will dramatically expand the strategic relationship between our countries and our peoples and advance our shared security, prosperity and values. Unfortunately, Justin Trudeau’s disastrous trip to India damaged this key relationship and we must now work to repair it.”
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Carney’s trip to India will include stops in Mumbai and New Delhi, but Carney’s office is stressing that the visit will be about the Canada-India defence and security relationship.
Carney, like any Canadian prime minister, travels at taxpayers’ expense and usually, though not always, travels on a Royal Canadian Air Force plane.
There is no allowance for a leader of the official Opposition to travel abroad at taxpayer’s expense, so it is assumed — though his office has not yet confirmed — that Poilievre and his staff will travel on commercial aircraft paid for by donations to the Conservative Party of Canada.
MPs are allowed, under some circumstances, to accept “sponsored travel” — travel paid by a third party — though all sponsored travel must be disclosed and is subject to review by Parliament’s Ethics and Conflict of Interest Commissioner.
Global News has reported that Carney, in his first year, has spent significantly more time on the road than either of his two predecessors, Justin Trudeau and Stephen Harper. Within his first week in office, Carney flew to London for meetings with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and, in August, he was in Berlin to meet with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
Merz, Starmer and India Prime Minister Narendra Modi travelled to Canada last June to participate in the G7 summit in Kananaskis, Alta.
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