Poilievre lays out plan for first 100 days of a Conservative government

SASKATOON — If the Conservatives form government in this election, members of Parliament can expect to be in the House of Commons all summer long as the Tories pass three laws meant to crack down on crime, boost resource production and tackle affordability, Pierre Poilievre said Friday.

“I have some good news and bad news: The good news is Canadians can elect a government that will bring change. The bad news for the politicians is your summer vacation is cancelled,” Poilievre said at a news conference in Saskatoon.

He also pledged that if he becomes prime minister he will waste no time in calling U.S. President Donald Trump.

“We will obviously call President Trump and tell him that the tariffs are destructive and they should be lifted, on Day 1, and a new deal negotiated,” he said.

“But what we will not do is put Canadian taxes, effectively Canadian tariffs, on Canadian industry. That is the exact kind of economic Liberal insanity that got us into this mess over the last 10 years.”

Poilievre attacked Liberal Leader Mark Carney’s plan to keep the industrial carbon price in place, saying his party will end the industrial price.

The Conservative leader said his government will pass three laws in the first 100 days called the affordability for a change act, the safe streets for a change act, and the bring home our jobs for a change act.

Poilievre laid out the main planks of his platform in those three categories on Friday.

The affordability law will “deliver urgent relief to Canadians,” he said. That will $54 billion worth of cuts to “bureaucracy, consultants, foreign aid and other waste” as well as an income-tax cut, Poilievre said.

The Conservatives refer to this as a 15 per cent cut to income tax. What they have proposed is a reduction in the tax rate on the lowest income bracket from 15 per cent to 12.25 per cent — a drop of 2.25 points — that their platform said will be phased in over four years. It won’t take full effect until 2028-29.

Earlier in the campaign, when they first announced the income tax cut, Poilievre’s team said it would be fully implemented by 2027-28 and would cost $7 billion in each of the first two years and $14 billion after that. The party’s platform now says it will cost just over $1 billion in the first year, rising to just shy of $14 billion by the fourth year.

“We’ll pass a massive omnibus crime bill that will be the single biggest crackdown on crime in Canadian history,” he said, outlining the tough-on-crime policies he has spoken about throughout the campaign.

When asked whether the change would require more resources for the prison system, Poilievre said “there are vacancies in a lot of our prisons right now because the soft Liberal laws allow the most rampant offenders to go free.”

Data obtained by The Canadian Press in March 2024 through freedom-of-information laws showed that the majority of correctional facilities in Ontario were well over capacity in 2023.

Maplehurst Correction Complex in Milton, Ont., had an average of 1,188 inmates, putting it at 134 per cent capacity. It’s designed to hold 887 people. Unions representing correctional officers cited issues with inmates double- or triple-bunking in cells.

Poilievre said he isn’t worried about capacity in prisons because of what he called a “revolving door” of people who reoffend, and said his policies will keep those people behind bars.

“We basically have to reserve a room for them now because we know they’re going to be back within a few days,” he said. “It’s like the Hotel California. They check out, but they never really leave.”

The third plank of his 100-day plan includes legislation to repeal Bill C-69, which Poilievre called the “no development law,” and changes to the capital gains tax that would cut the tax on amounts reinvested in Canadian companies.

The Conservative leader’s tour was in Saskatoon on Friday as the election campaign enters its final weekend. The party held every riding in Saskatchewan in the last Parliament but polls suggest there are tight races in Saskatoon and Regina this time.

Poilievre was joined by candidates from across Saskatchewan, including former Conservative leader Andrew Scheer, in his first appearance in the province during the campaign at a Thursday rally at a warehouse near Saskatoon’s airport. He was interrupted twice by protesters, including a pair of young men who waved an American flag before being escorted out of the room.

The leadership campaign was set to stop in Calgary on the way to Vancouver Island Friday, and will end in Poilievre’s home riding in Ottawa on Sunday.

— Written by Sarah Ritchie in Ottawa and Jack Farrell in Saskatoon

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 25, 2025.