OTTAWA -- Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland is pushing back after Conservative MP Gerry Ritz suggested she needs adult supervision when it comes to the Canada-EU trade talks.
On Monday, the Conservative international trade critic said Freeland is incapable of doing her job, and told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to "grab some adult supervision."
Freeland initially ignored the jab, but on Tuesday responded directly to Ritz's comment.
"As it happens, I am 48 years old. I think I have the wrinkles and the grey hair to prove it, and I’m proud of the things I’ve accomplished in my life, from growing up in a small town in Alberta, to raising my family of 3 kids today in Toronto," she said following a cabinet meeting.
"It was surprising to me to hear a member question whether another member of the house was an adult. We’re all adults in the House of Commons and I think it diminishes us all to suggest otherwise."
Ritz said Monday the previous Conservative government, in which he was the agriculture minister, had left the Canada-EU trade agreement ready to go and alleged the Liberal government was turning its back on Canadian jobs.
Ritz also criticized Freeland for an emotional interview she gave in Europe as the talks collapsed last week, calling it a "meltdown."
Freeland said it was necessary for her to walk away from the negotiating table because "it's up to Europe to solve its problems and come back to Canada with a solution."
"As for my visible emotion, I do take this deal very personally. I am all in for Canada when I am at the negotiating table. I was disappointed and sad but also tough and strong. I think those are the qualities that Canadians expect in their minister."
'Her line, not mine'
Trudeau was supposed to go to Brussels this week to sign the trade agreement, which has taken seven years to negotiate. All 28 EU countries have to sign on, and Belgium's Wallonia region is so far refusing over fear its agriculture industry will be crushed by Canadian competition.
A spokesman for Ritz said he was referring to a comment by Freeland during a Sept. 24, 2014 debate in the House in which Freeland referred to the Liberals as adults.
"On CETA, we in the Liberal Party are adults and we understand and respect the fact that, if trade agreements are going to be done, they need to be done behind closed doors," she said in response to a question from a New Democrat MP.
"That is particularly true when it is a complicated agreement, as it necessarily is with the 27-member-state European Union. We get that. From the start we have been supportive of CETA in principle, and I am proud that we have been."
Ritz wasn't in the House for that exchange, but Freeland's quote was in a package of research prepared for him when he became trade critic. A staffer in his office also posted the 2014 line on Ritz's Facebook page last week.
The reaction to Ritz's comment in question period seemed to frustrate Conservative staffers, according to messages inadvertently forwarded to CTV News.
"We made this [2014 comment] public a few days ago on Facebook, not our fault none of the Liberals in the media picked up on it," Ritz's staffer wrote in an email.
"Female reporters snarky about Ritz on Freeland. 'She had a meltdown,' etc. Expect that to be part of it [questions on Tuesday]," said Gary Keller, interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose's chief of staff.
Ritz returned to the subject on Tuesday in question period, arguing it was "her line, not mine."
Freeland 'clearly competent'
Green Party Leader Elizabeth May said Ritz's comment wasn't appropriate.
"I oppose CETA and I think we should renegotiate it and take out the investor state provisions," May said. "But Minister Freeland is clearly competent and she has an enormously strong background."
This isn't the first time Freeland has dealt with criticism seemingly aimed at her gender.
When she was first elected, a journalist tweeted at her to use her "big girl" voice in the House. He later apologized.
Status of Women Minister Patty Hajdu said Ritz's comment shows the difference in perception of different emotions.
"When a man gets mad and storms off or bangs his fist on the table or yells in question period, no one asks him to act like a grown-up," Hajdu said outside of question period.
"So there is still a bias that emotions that are considered feminine emotions - frustration, sadness - these kinds of emotions that somehow less grown-up than anger or rancour."
New Democrat MP Niki Ashton said there's no room for sexism in the House. She encountered a similar remark in 2013, when then-aboriginal affairs minister Bernard Valcourt told her to "listen to your father," who was a provincial politician in Manitoba and who supported the policy the MPs were discussing at the time.
"There continues to be no room for sexism in the House," Ashton said after question period. "It's unacceptable that men and women MPs feel using condescending language is okay."
This story has been updated to correct a typo in the date of Chrystia Freeland’s 2014 comment.
