Justin Trudeau Loves Outsourcing Government Work to Neoliberal Cutthroats
Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government has outsourced billions of dollars’ worth of contracts, including $100 million to McKinsey. Instead of shoveling money into the private sector, the Liberals could make the novel choice of investing in state capacity.
Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau during the North American Leaders’ Summit in Mexico City, Mexico, on January 10, 2023. (Alejandro Cegarra / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
You would think that a G7 country of over 38.6 million people with a public service boasting 335,957 employees could manage to govern itself without constantly turning to the corporate consultant class. In Canada’s case, you’d be wrong. CBC-Radio Canada broke the story earlier this month on the government’s Can$100 million in contracts to McKinsey & Company since Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party came to power in 2015. A parliamentary committee is now looking into the matter.
The committee is calling over a half-dozen cabinet ministers as well as the company’s former global managing director, Dominic Barton, who was Trudeau’s ambassador to China from 2019 to 2021. Barton also cochaired former finance minister Bill Morneau’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth.
Pro-Market Spin Merchants
Beyond the fawning headlines in corporate news pages, McKinsey & Co. is notorious. In When McKinsey Comes to Town, Walt Bogdanich and Michael Forsythe lay out in detail the company’s sketchy history. As Michael Bobelian puts it in his review of the book:
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