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We is once again a touchy subject in Justin Trudeaus Liberal party.

While the hits just keep on coming about Trudeaus connections to the WE charity, the controversy has touched off grumbling in Liberal circles about the lowercase we as in, how exactly did we get into this mess, and who is we anyway in the decision-making circle around the prime minister?

Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, the Liberal MP for the Toronto riding of Beaches-East York, says he was on the phone immediately after the news emerged about WE being chosen to hand out nearly $1 billion in pandemic relief to students. He placed a call last week to the office of Diversity, Inclusion and Youth Minister Bardish Chagger whos now gone silent with the media to get an explanation.

I was struggling to understand why it was being done this way, said Erskine-Smith, a rare MP willing to go on the record on Friday about his concerns with the entire WE affair.

He made the call before he knew all the details, which have been emerging daily, about how closely WE had been working with Trudeaus family, including nearly $300,000 in speaking fees paid out to Trudeaus mother and brother.

Had I known what I know now, I would have said this was too close to the prime minister, Erskine-Smith said.

Other MPs, preferring to talk off the record on Friday, said there has been a lot of chatter in the caucus over the past week about how this WE controversy has revived concerns about team culture or lack of it in Trudeaus government.

There arent a lot of relationships between the PM and caucus, one MP said. Now, he said, with most of caucus relations taking place remotely during the pandemic, there are even fewer opportunities for MPs to have contact with the PM and the tight team around him.

It is either ironic or fitting that WE has made the Liberal we annoyed and nervous.

One MP said he was surprised to learn from news reports first in the Star, as it happens that WE had been given a contract to do work that would normally be done by the public service.

This is a real head-scratcher for me and several of my colleagues, the MP said. I like to consider myself plugged in but the first time I heard of the WE contract was when I read the controversy in the papers. I know for a fact that I was not alone.

What baffled many MPs was why the government needed to do any contracting out at all, especially after months of proving that it was nimble and adaptable enough to get COVID-19 aid directly to citizens.

This was Erskine-Smiths main concern at first: the government has generous and effective programs in place already for students and summer jobs. MPs themselves, of all stripes, are often helpful in steering that help toward where its most needed in their ridings.

So, while Erskine-Smith didnt put it this pointedly, not only was the WE decision made without input from MPs, the plan itself which has now been reversed also kept MPs out of the loop.

Its just so frustrating, he said, citing all the good work the government has been doing to provide help to citizens in this crisis. Now this is taking up so much of the conversation. Erskine-Smiths own mother asked him on Friday why this was going on, though he says his office is not being inundated with complaints, at least not yet.

The exquisitely bad timing of this controversy has Liberals frustrated too. Not only is it happening during a pandemic, but also still in the shadow of the humbling the government received during last years election.

From all accounts, Trudeau had been making genuine efforts after the election, also after last years SNC-Lavalin saga, to forge some greater connections with the Liberal team. Just this week, Trudeau handed a major ambassadors appointment to former interim leader Bob Rae a decision seen as a symbolic olive branch to Liberals who had been kept at arms length from the PMO.

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But the WE controversy is viewed by some Liberals as being about how easy it is for Trudeau and his team to lapse back into old habits of keeping to themselves and giving access and benefits only to the small number of people they trust. Many MPs chose to speak off the record on Friday precisely because they were worried about reinforcing that outsider-insider culture.

None of the MPs or Liberals I reached were calling for Trudeau to resign, as his official opponents are. But there were suggestions that the PM had to surround himself with people who ask harder questions, who would have immediately spotted that WE would hurt the Liberal we.

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Blindsided by the WE scandal, Liberal MPs wonder: How did Justin Trudeau get us into this mess? - Toronto Star