Why did Canadian commanders and troops not make nearly as much a contribution to Operation Torch (which landed in Morocco and Algeria) plus to the subsequent Tunisian Campaign as they did to the Sicilian and Italian Campaigns, the Normandy landings, and so on?
The 1st Division of the Canadian Army was deployed to Great Britain in 1939. There was not enough shipping to move them to North Africa until April 1943. By that time, the Axis forces in Tunisia had been forced back to a constricted area around Cape Bon. There just wasn't enough room for the Canadians to take part in the closing stages of the Tunisian campaign. The Canadian First Infantry Division was well placed to take part in the initial landings of Operation Husky and that Canadian Division fought all the way up the Italian peninsula, as part of the British Eighth Army until the end of the war.
Canadian troops did form the bulk of the troops used in the Dieppe Raid in the summer of 1942. Two Brigades from the 2nd Canadian infantry division far out numbered the British commandos and US Army Rangers that were used in the Dieppe raid.