King Charles will visit Ottawa to deliver the speech from the throne at the end of this month, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Friday.
Speaking at the National Press Theatre, Carney said Parliament will be recalled on May 26, and the King will read the speech outlining the new government’s priorities on May 27.
The prime minister said he invited King Charles and Queen Camilla to launch this session of Parliament as a show of sovereignty in the face of U.S. President Donald Trump’s talk of annexation.
“This is a historic honour which matches the weight of our times,” Carney told a Friday morning news conference — his first since Canadians voted the Liberals back in for a fourth mandate.
Carney said that in a Tuesday call with Trump, the president did not bring up the prospect of Canada becoming a U.S. state.
The prime minister said he wants to work constructively with other parties and praised Canadians for sticking with the democratic process as democracies face strains elsewhere. But he said the Liberals will not enter into a formal pact with the NDP to maintain the minority government.
Carney said his legislative priorities include a middle-class tax cut that would take effect by July, an expansion of the dental-care program to eight million people and a number of measures to tackle the housing shortage.
The prime minister said he will travel to Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, May 6, to meet with Trump for the first time since the April 28 election.
Carney said he intends to use the G7 leaders’ summit next month in Alberta to advance Canadian interests on the world stage.
“We will strengthen our relationships with reliable trading partners and allies,” he said. “Canada has what the world needs, and we uphold the values the world respects.”
When asked whether he wants to poach MPs from other parties to build a majority government, Carney said his party already has a strong mandate, with seats in each province and a large share of the total vote.
He also said he would not seek a formal agreement with the NDP to avoid a snap election. Carney’s predecessor Justin Trudeau had a confidence-and-supply agreement with the NDP, and parties can also form coalition governments.
“In order to do what we need to do as a country … we will need to work in partnership with all the provinces, with Indigenous peoples,” he said.
Carney said he had very constructive conversations recently with Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet.
He also said he’ll call a byelection to allow Poilievre to run for a seat in Parliament if and when the Conservatives ask for it.
“No games, nothing. Straight,” Carney said.
Elections Canada now reports the Liberal party won 168 seats, down one from the total on Monday, after a validation process showed the winner in the Quebec riding of Terrebonne was the Bloc Québécois.
The Conservative party won 144 seats, while the Bloc Québécois holds 23, the NDP has seven and the Green Party has one.
In the days since the election, Carney has spoken to multiple international leaders, including King Charles, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, European Council President Antonio Costa, Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, and United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres.
-The Canadian Press-
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