This past January, The Hill Times’ Hill Climbers reported that Monique Lugli was leaving the chief-of-staff life behind. And now Heard on the Hill can report what she is up to next.

The longtime Liberal staffer—whose former bosses include Patty Hajdu, Ginette Petitpas Taylor, Anita Anand, and former MP and minister Maryam Monsef—has soft-launched a facilitation practice. She announced her new venture on LinkedIn late last month, and provided a few extra details to Heard on the Hill in an email interview on Aug. 26. 

After helping out with a local campaign during the 2025 election, Lugli said she began thinking about other ways to contribute her skills.  

“I hold a facilitative leadership certificate and always loved the work of community development. I felt that at this time with the experience I’ve gained over the past couple of decades, I could make a real contribution to the areas I feel most passionately about,” she said.

Those areas include the social determinants of health, public health, equity, gender, and social impact. Lugli said she anticipates working with non-governmental organizations, foundations, charities and private sector companies’ social impact teams.

Her facilitation practice will have her helping organizations with internal discussions, planning, brainstorming and problem-solving. 

“As a neutral participant, I can create opportunity for everyone in the room to focus on the discussion and not worry about the format, time, management of group dynamics, or structuring the dialogue to solve the problem at hand,” Lugli said. 

She described her new work as “a real privilege,” and said, “There’s a magic that happens when participants are led through a safe and inclusive session.”

As of Aug. 26, Lugli hadn’t officially registered a name for her practice, which formally launches on Sept. 2. But she is open to ideas and, like a true chief of staff, offered an assignment. 

“Your readers can certainly provide me with suggestions!” she said.

Get cracking, readers.   

​’I don’t think we’ll ever see him again’: Critchley lays down challenge to Pierre Poilievre

After coming in second to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre in the recent Battle River-Crowfoot, Alta., byelection, independent candidate and military veteran Bonnie Critchley spoke out about her experiences campaigning against Poilievre. 

On Aug. 21, she told Michael Higgins, host of CTV’s weekly political affairs show Alberta Primetime, that she was disappointed with her showing in the election, and that she thought she would receive more than the nearly 10-per-cent share of the vote that came her way. Critchley said that the Longest Ballot Committee protest “may have cost” her the election as residents sometimes assumed that she was a part of that movement. 

As for the riding’s new MP, Critchley told Higgins she doubted that residents would actually see Poilievre around town: “He is now my MP so he’s going to get all sorts of letters from me if he doesn’t show up. Yesterday, I said I challenge Monsieur Poilievre to actually come back to Battle River-Crowfoot and prove me wrong. Because I don’t think we’ll ever see him again.” 

Heard on the Hill reached out to Sarah Fischer, the Conservative Party’s communications director, and asked how often Poilievre plans on visiting Battle River-Crowfoot and whether he owns or rents a home in the riding. Fischer did not respond by deadline. 

The party may not be saying how much time their leader plans on spending in his new riding but some Conservative members, including its former MP Damien Kurek, have noted that Poilievre opened his riding office within days of winning the byelection. 

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Mark Carney (who has never lived in his Ottawa-area riding of Nepean) has not opened a constituency office four months after winning his first federal election.  

Jean Charest to join Chamber of Commerce mission to Washington, D.C.

Former federal cabinet minister and Quebec premier Jean Charest will head down to Washington, D.C., at the end of October as a part of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s trade-focused mission. 

Charest, currently a partner at Therrien Couture Joli-Coeur and a member of the Prime Minister’s Council on Canada-U.S. Relations, will be one of the participants at the event being held on Oct. 28 and 29. Other participants, as per a LinkedIn post from the chamber, will include Laura Dawson, executive director of Canada-U.S. Future Borders Coalition; and Michael McAdoo, partner and director of global trade and investment at Boston Consulting Group. Longtime politicos will likely recall that McAdoo was then-prime minister Jean Chrétien’s executive assistant in the mid-1990s. 

The Canadian Chamber of Commerce describes its missions as a “mix of roundtable discussions, panel conversations, and briefings from senior leaders—all under Chatham House Rules.” 

Each mission has a distinct theme, with the Washington event focusing on the “next phase of the Canada-U.S. trading relationship, and the future of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement.”  

PCO’s loss is AI minister’s gain

Now that Canada has a minister of artificial intelligence in Evan Solomon, the AI team that was a part of the Privy Council Office is now calling Innovation, Science, and Economic Development Canada home, according to a recent LinkedIn post by Andréa Rousseau, a member of the team. 

Calling Prime Minister Mark Carney’s decision to appoint an AI minister a “bold move,” Rousseau wrote: “To support the Minister’s ambitious mandate, our team has transitioned to Innovation, Science, and Economic Development Canada (ISED), and I couldn’t be more excited to continue in my role as chief of staff to the deputy. Working alongside brilliant, forward-thinking colleagues, we’re helping shape the future of AI policy, safety, and innovation in Canada.”

Rousseau’s LinkedIn account states that she is chief of staff to the deputy secretary of artificial intelligence, Mark Schaan, who was initially appointed to the role in July 2024. 

cleadlay@hilltimes.com

The Hill Times