EZRA LEVANT ｜ Nigel Farage takes on banking cancel culture： A turning point for free speech in the UK
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Summary
A British bank called Coots debanks Nigel Farage for having the wrong political opinions. But he fights back. What will this mean for Canada? Ezra on the road in Alberta, covering the Coots case, and the fallout from it.
Transcript
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Tonight, the other coots, a British bank called coots, debanks Nigel Farage for having the wrong
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political opinions, but he fights back. What will this mean for Canada? It's July 26,
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Well, hi, everybody. I am literally on the road. Forgive me for the wind sound and the microphone
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and the fact that I'm not in the studio or really on location. I'm traveling. It's funny. For the
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last few days, I've been in Coots, Alberta, well, actually in Lethbridge, at the hearing of four
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men who were arrested for their role in the coots blockade a year and a half ago. So coots has been
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on my mind, and I've been searching the word coots online, and it shows up for the case in Alberta.
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But it also has been in the news because there's a bank in the United Kingdom called coots. Same
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exact spelling. In fact, I was in London about a month or two ago. I was walking by on the street,
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and I saw this word coots with no explanation of what it was. I stood in front of it to take a
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selfie. I thought that's sort of unusual. Coots is not a common name. I had no idea what it was at
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the time. And then fairly recently, like within the last week or so, Nigel Farage, the conservative
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populist politician in the UK who led the Brexit movement, led a party called UKIP, the UK Independence
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Party, to a smashing success. This was, if you recall, in early 2016. He won a national referendum
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for Britain to remove itself from the European Union. The European Union, of course, is sort of a
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mini version of the UN just for Europe, but it had much more power. There was a European Union currency
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called the euro. Luckily, the Brits didn't give up their pound. There's European Union courts and
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parliaments and budgets. So it was an awful organization, sort of a little empire run out of
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Brussels. And Nigel Farage fought and won, beating the entire establishment, the entire media, all the
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banks, of course. Every institution and establishment in the UK was for the European Union, except Nigel
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Farage, the people and the people. And he won. And it was a shockwave. And it was a premonition of what
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was to come in the United States a few months later when Donald Trump upended the establishment, too.
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2016 was quite a year for populist conservatives. Anyways, it took years for that Brexit to take
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force. And Nigel Farage was the man of the hour. Anyway, since then, he has dabbled in politics,
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including with the Brexit party. But he has found a home in one of my favorite TV networks in the
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world called GB News, which is a freedom-oriented TV station in the United Kingdom that's on real TV,
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as well as the internet, as well as radio. And Nigel Farage has a show there, along with other
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amazing talent, including Neil Oliver, one of my favorite guys, our friend Calvin Robinson. If you've
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never heard of GB News, you really should check it out. You can watch it on their app or just on
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YouTube or whatever. So Nigel Farage does a great job of his show. And the other day, he, I'm going
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to say he admitted something, because I imagine it was embarrassing to do so. Because I went through
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something similar myself. Nigel Farage said that his bank, called Coots, had written him a letter
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firing him as a client. Nigel Farage had been a client of Coots for decades, he said, in good
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standing. Nigel Farage is a wealthy man. He was a successful stockbroker or other financial
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officer. I don't know exactly what he did. And then he was in politics, and now he's making money in
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media and giving speeches. He's not a poor man. He's had his money with Coots. He's been a customer in
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good standing. And they debanked him. Here, here's how he revealed the matter on GB News. And I can
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imagine it was a little bit embarrassing for him to do so, because there's an implication
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that he was wrong and or morally wrong in some way. And the fact that he has been marginalized
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from society, that must have hurt. Here's Nigel Farage announcing the news.
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Two months ago, I received a phone call from my bank. Now, bear in mind, I'd been with the same
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banking group since 1980. I've had my personal account there with that group ever since that
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date. I ran my business through there when I worked in the city in the 1990s into the noughties.
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And today, I have my personal and business accounts there. But two months ago, I get a phone call out
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of the blue from a personal manager, a new personal manager, not one I'd ever spoken to before, who
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simply says on a phone call, we are closing your accounts. I asked why. No reason was given.
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I was told it would all be explained in a letter that would arrive in a couple of days' time.
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The letter just told me the accounts are closing and please, by the date they gave me, make sure
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you've moved to another bank. I did inquire further within the group. I sent an email to the chairman
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and I got someone ring me up and say it's purely a commercial decision. Hmm, I thought.
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So I've tried for two months to get another bank account and I've spoken to seven different
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banks and they've all said no. And the reason is it would seem to be political. I don't know
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precisely what the reason is, but there is a category of person called a PEP, a politically
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exposed person. It was a term that came into our law as a result of our membership of the
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European Union. I'm told that the city minister and the government are thinking about redefining
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it, but that may take some time. So it could be purely political. It could be, of course,
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prejudice. After all, I'm pretty used to prejudice, prejudice that comes from the establishment
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against me. Um, but I also worried, I also worried very much that what was said in the
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House of Commons last year by Chris Bryant, Member of Parliament for South Wales, Labour
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Member, Chairman of the Privilege Committee, who used parliamentary privilege to say that
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in a calendar year I'd received half a million pounds from the Kremlin. This was done under
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parliamentary privilege. I appealed to the Speaker, I appealed to Mr Bryant, but there
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had been no retraction whatsoever. There have also been extraordinary headlines written
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about me in all of the newspapers, some suggesting that on the night of the Brexit referendum, I
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engineered a coup along with the hedge funds where we pushed the pound up, shorted it, and
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we all made a fortune. Well, I'm afraid that isn't true either. But whatever reason, it's
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become clear to me that I cannot get a bank account. Well, what does that mean? Well, it means
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that basically you've become a non-person. It's rather like living in Germany or Russia
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80 years ago, or perhaps even communist China today. I wonder, are we living in communist China
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today in this country? Are we akin to communist China? Love your thoughts on that, please.
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Faraj at GBNews.com. Well, all of this has been quite stressful and quite difficult, because
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without a bank account, you simply can't exist, you simply can't live. But what's even worse
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is that over the course of the last few months, some of these ridiculous rules and closures have
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been extended to my immediate family. And whilst I'm sad and annoyed about where I am, I'm absolutely
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incandescent that members of my family should be singled out and targeted just because I
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campaigned for and pushed a Brexit campaign for all of those years. This is truly and utterly
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disgusting. But it isn't just happening to me. I know of people going back nearly 10 years
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who were UKIP candidates, UKIP MEPs, others in prominent positions in the Brexit party who
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also had their bank accounts closed. But none of them had the, really had the voice to speak
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out. And I feel that I do. There are other people in media too, who've had their media accounts
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closed down. And it seems to be all one way. It seems to be all against people who have traditionalist
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or conservative views. There is something totally outrageous going on here. So I've been considering
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over the course of the day my options. I've spent time talking to lawyers. I've been considering
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legal action. I've been asking myself whether, frankly, it's even worth staying in this country.
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I could go to one of the fintechs and I could get the ability of at least a payments mechanism.
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But it's not a bank account. It doesn't have a debit card. It wouldn't pay you interest on money.
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And you certainly wouldn't be able to borrow any money or get a mortgage if you wanted one in the
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future. So I've been seriously considering my options. And I said earlier on today that at seven
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o'clock tonight, I'd tell you what my next steps were. Well, you could not be down with a feather
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because the phone rang at quarter to seven. And it was the bank that wants to close me down
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completely in a few weeks time. They claim there's nothing political at all in what they're doing.
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It's purely a commercial decision. And it was said to me on the phone a few minutes ago,
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they could get me a personal account with another bank that is part of the same group.
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But that doesn't apply to the business account. So, frankly, isn't of much use to me.
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I'm used to battling against the odds. I'm used to being prejudiced against in the most
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extraordinary way. And I'm generally pretty tough in fighting through these things. But just for once,
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I'm really pretty thoughtful. Pretty thoughtful about whether it's actually worth living in this
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country right at the moment. So what I am going to do is take some time off, take a week or two off,
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maybe more, to consider what my next steps are going to be. This is going on in our country.
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It's happening to plenty of people. I just happen to be one of them. But you know what? Unless this
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rot is stopped, in time to come, you at home may say things on Facebook or Twitter that may result in
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you losing your bank accounts, too. That, I think, is how scary this whole thing is.
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Now, Coots is a very fancy bank. I'm told it's the bank that Queen Elizabeth herself used to bank
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with. They have a one million pound minimum, they say, to invest there. That's quite something.
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The hilarious thing is that their ad campaign features young kids and teenagers, none of whom
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would have a million pounds to invest. It's sort of weird that way. Coots is part of the NatWest
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banking group that got into financial trouble and had to be bailed out by the government, which still
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has a 40% stake in them. So it's doubly wrong that a bank that is 40% owned by the government
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is now firing clients for having the wrong political views. Now, the bank didn't talk about
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Nigel Farage's policies because that would be illegal. A bank cannot blab about your confidential
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banking matters. It's sort of like a doctor can't go on TV and talk about your ailments. It's
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private. But the BBC, the state broadcaster over there, ran a story saying their sources
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said the real reason Nigel Farage was debanked had nothing to do with his politics, but rather
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it was because Nigel Farage didn't have enough money. And that was posted in the BBC. But
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it was a lie. Now, the world didn't know that. And we had two competing stories. You had Nigel
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Farage, who was the advocate, the protagonist of the story. And then you had the state broadcaster
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saying, no, no, no, we know the truth. That's a lie. Well, there goes Nigel again. But Nigel
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says he had the money, I believe. Remember, this is a woke bank. They're deep into environmentalism,
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deep into climate change. They're trying to get their DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion stats
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up. And you could tell they sort of hate Nigel Farage by nature. But in the United Kingdom,
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they have a law that allows people to request internal records about themselves from any
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institutions. It's sort of like our access to information laws in Canada, except it applies
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to other agencies too. So Nigel managed to get all the internal documents, including a lengthy
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report on his political hygiene. Nigel Farage managed to get the internal bank report that basically
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condemned him, unpersoned him, said he was not worthy of having a bank account at Coutts.
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So I put in what's called a subject access request to Coutts, the bank, who decided they
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wanted to close me out. I wanted to find out why. What was the reasoning behind them closing
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the account? Now, as you know, they had briefed the BBC that it was to do with lack of funds and
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nothing else. Well, here's the document. It is an incredible 40 pages. It reads rather
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like a brief that you'd give to a barrister ahead of a serious criminal trial. I mean,
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from the tone of this document, I must be one of the worst human beings ever to have inhabited
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this planet. But I guess if you were, you know, upper middle class, wealthy London metropolitan
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elite, then that's perhaps how you would view me. Although quite what this has to do with
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banking and commerce, I don't really know. Let me give you just a few pointers as to what's
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in this document. Word search is really interesting. Brexit is mentioned 30 times. Well, I think
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it's quite very easy to understand that. I don't think the globalist establishment, I don't
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think the corporates ever forgave anybody directly involved in the Brexit movement. They didn't
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accept the result of the referendum, and I guess they never ever will. Russia is mentioned 22 times
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with links to a whole series of articles that appeared in The Guardian and elsewhere attempting
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to link myself and Aaron Banks to Russia and indeed to Russian funding. All of that has been
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disproved, with Aaron Banks winning his court case, his libel action against Carol Cabweller,
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the journalist involved, who wrote these things. But that's fine. All these people do is take every
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negative press article about me they possibly can and collate it in this document. Twice in this
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document, Sir Chris Bryan is mentioned. I hinted a couple of weeks ago, I thought this could be behind
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it. And sure enough, twice, the accusation made under parliamentary privilege that I'd received
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over half a million quid in one year from the Kremlin is mentioned in this document and constitutes
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quite a big part of their conclusions. Donald Trump, well, of course, he gets a mention 14 times.
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Donald Trump is mentioned. The fact that I support Donald Trump is again, part of this charge sheet.
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Racist is mentioned nine times, well, I thought it might be. And politically exposed person five times.
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Let me just give you one or two quotes from this that might be instructed.
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The client's financial position is now sufficient to retain on a commercial basis. The decision to close
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me down was made at a meeting on November the 17th last year on the Wealth Reputational Risk Committee.
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They got together and decided that once the small mortgage I had with them expired in 2023, they would
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get rid of me, even though I met the financial criteria on a commercial basis, contrary to what
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was spun to the BBC. They haven't told the truth on this, and I'm pretty blooming angry about it.
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But now we get into what this report's really all about. One, it is accepted that no criminal convictions
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have resulted. Gosh, they sound disappointed, don't they? Commentary and behaviours that do not align
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with the bank's purpose and values have been demonstrated. So the bank has a series of values.
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The bank has a series of political positions. And as for purpose, well, I thought the purpose
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of companies was to act ethically, yes, of course, but to return to their shareholders dividends.
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And in this case, folks, do you know who the shareholders are? It's you and me. This bank is part
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of the RBS group. It's 38.6% owned by us because we bailed them out in 2008 after their greed and
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short-sighted stupidity. We are the shareholders, but they're more bothered. They're more bothered
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about putting up rainbow flags and being popular at dinner parties in Chelsea than they are about
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actually making money. When considering our stance, our stance, this is the bank stance,
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specifically on ESG, diversity and inclusion, the comments and articles are not in line with our
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views or our purpose. That word purpose, coming back again. I go on. He is seen as xenophobic and
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racist. Oh, charming. That's nice, isn't it? That really is lovely. Thank you so very much indeed for
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that. And here's the final one. In making the decision, risk factors, including accusations
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of links to Russia and controversial public statements, which are felt to conflict with
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the bank's purpose. So let's be clear. The decision to get rid of me wasn't financial. It was done
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because somehow I don't fit with their values. They were bailed out by us. They have a duty to run
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at a profit as a commercial business. But no, they are to be the moral guardians of all. And that's
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because the march through the public and private corporate sectors of left-wing institutions who
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want to change the way the world is, organisations like Stonewall has led us exactly to where we are.
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And I guess it's not just coups, because I've been refused by 10 other banks. I will not get a UK
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bank account. That is done, dusted over. Mercifully, in the modern world, there are fintech solutions
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where I can receive and pay money. I won't be able to earn interest on that money. I won't be able to
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borrow money. It won't be a full bank account, but I will be able to exist and survive. So is this all
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about me? No. Since I broke this story, the number of people who've been in touch with me, who've been
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summarily closed down by the banks, because you see, the banks don't have to give any explanation.
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There's something called the tipping off rule, which means they don't have to tell you,
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for example, if the police are investigating your affairs. I'm not sure they've ever been
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challenged fully, publicly, over closure of bank accounts the way that I've done. The number of
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people running little businesses, window cleaners, taking cash. No, we don't want your business anymore
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as we move towards a cashless control society. Worst of all is this. Above our banks are a series of
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international agencies. The biggest of them be a firm being called Refinitiv. Banks go to that firm
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to see what our credit worthiness is, whether we are an acceptable risk to lend money to, for example.
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Now, I don't blame the banks for protecting themselves, but Refinitiv are now going to work
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with banks so they'll be able to check your social media posts. What has happened to me can very soon
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happen to you. And if it does, we start to move towards a China-style social credit system where
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our freedoms are gone. Our liberty is gone. Our ability to exist as ordinary human beings is gone
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unless we obey the accepted wisdom of the day. This is completely against free speech,
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completely against liberty, completely against democracy. And whilst I am absolutely fuming,
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at least with this document, I have got the truth.
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The dossier proved that the BBC was lying, or at least that the BBC was lied to. Nigel Farage
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had the money to qualify to be Ian Coutts. It was the Coutts Internal Political Hygiene Committee
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that stabbed him in the back. And the BBC reporter had participated in the lie. And then it came out
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that the night before the BBC ran that story, the reporter at the BBC had had dinner with the CEO of the
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Bank, Alison Rose, who obviously leaked that banking smear or lied to the BBC. This was incredible.
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Not only did the bank fire Nigel Farage for plenum reasons, not only did they work up a dossier against him,
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but then they leaked internal talking points to the BBC that ran with it. The bank was engaging in a smear.
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And although the data they released to the BBC was obviously false, they were disparaging their own
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client, violating, surely, laws of banking privacy. Now, obviously, Nigel Farage had the support of
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GB News. And all of GB News started to weigh in on the subject. That was very powerful, because GB News
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is growing in popularity. Here's a sample of some of the videos that they did.
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GB News, do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with codes?
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Do you think it's bad that Coutts have been briefing the BBC and FT?
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GB News, do you think it's right that Nigel Farage doesn't have an account with Coutts?
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Do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Coutts?
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Do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Coutts?
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Do you think it's right that Coutts have been briefing the press?
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GB News, do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Coutts?
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Hi. GB News, do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Coutts?
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Do you think it's right that Coutts have been briefing the BBC and FT?
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Do you think that Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Cootes?
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GB News, do you think that Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Cootes?
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Do you think it's right that Cootes have been briefing the press on Nigel Farage's personal bank information?
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Do you think Nigel Farage should have a bank account with Cootes?
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Do you think it's right that they've cancelled his bank account?
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We have cultural Marxism embedded in all of our institutions now.
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This is the long march through the institutions that has been happening since the 60s.
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It started with educational institutions, then political and media institutions.
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So they are fully on board with the equality, diversity and inclusion agenda.
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But the thing is, it's not inclusive to people like Nigel Farage and thousands of other people who don't have the right view.
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So I would support a bank that says we are not going to follow the equality, diversity, inclusion and environmental social governance, ESG program that they've got going on.
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But here's where things got interesting from my point of view.
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Nigel Farage is a counter-establishment figure, an anti-establishment figure.
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But he is, I don't know if Maxime Bernier would be the equivalent because Maxime Bernier did not win a big electoral battle.
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He would be more establishment than Bernier, more establishment than Preston Manning, but he's certainly an insurgent.
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And a lot of people in the establishment hate Nigel Farage.
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They hate what he achieved and they hate his style.
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But here's what became incredible from my mind is various newspapers across the political spectrum in the UK, various media channels, various commentators took Nigel Farage's side in the map.
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Some of them prefaced their remarks by saying, well, I don't like Nigel, but, or whatever you think of Nigel, let me tell you.
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But even with that disclaimer, they came to his aid.
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I guess they could see that if you can debank Nigel Farage for his political friends, you can debank anybody.
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And the pressure on the bank, the bank surely would have been able to withstand pressure just from Nigel Farage and even just from GV News.
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But when the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail and other huge newspapers, both the tabloids and the respectable broadsheets started literally doing front page stories about this, the pressure on the bank ramped up.
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And the bank was in trouble because they had obviously broken the law by disparaging their client and lying about him and tipping off the BBC.
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The BBC, by the way, ran an apology saying they were misled by their source.
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Good evening. I told the world about three weeks ago that Cootes had closed my business and my personal accounts and had not given any reason whatsoever.
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I also said that I'd struggled to open bank accounts literally anywhere else.
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But this began to really matter on the 4th of July when the BBC ran this headline.
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Now, it came from their business editor, Simon Jack, Nigel Farage bank account shut for falling below the wealth limit, which led, of course, to much hilarity among political commentators in the media.
00:26:53.320
And of course, me saying the whole thing was political was clearly some sort of crackpot conspiracy.
00:26:58.320
But once I got my subject access request back from Cootes and goodness me, I didn't really expect 36 pages of bile, vitriol and actually quite a lot of it, frankly, just outright libelous.
00:27:11.320
The only way that I could disprove the BBC story was to publish it in full.
00:27:18.320
And there are many things in that report I did not want to put into the public domain, so vile were they, but I had to do it.
00:27:26.320
And this all emerged last Thursday when, of course, I got a letter of apology from Dame Alison Rose, who is the CEO of the entire NatWest group.
00:27:37.320
I felt that the BBC, frankly, were being a little bit slow in correcting the story and changing the headline.
00:27:46.320
And I thought the hurt the story had caused me was such that actually I really, really, really wanted an apology.
00:27:54.320
Well, BBC apologies are very, very rare. They only happen once every few years.
00:27:59.320
But today I got that apology and it began with Simon Jack, the BBC's business editor.
00:28:06.320
And he says the information on which we based our reporting on Nigel Farage and his bank accounts came from a trusted and senior source.
00:28:13.320
Hmm. Interesting. However, the information turned out to be incomplete and inaccurate.
00:28:18.320
Therefore, I would like to apologise to Mr Farage.
00:28:22.320
On top of that, I got a letter this afternoon, which I was pleased to get, and it came from Deborah Turness, the CEO of BBC News and Current Affairs.
00:28:33.320
And I'm going to put the letter up on your screen now.
00:28:39.320
She made very, very clear that it repeated that the information turned out to be inaccurate.
00:28:46.320
And at the bottom of that paragraph, she says, I would therefore like to apologise to you on behalf of BBC News.
00:28:59.320
I know some will say it took too long, but thank you.
00:29:02.320
A fulsome apology from the BBC is not something that happens very often.
00:29:09.320
But when we go into the detail of this letter, it's really, really interesting.
00:29:13.320
Because, again, she repeats that a senior and trusted source had put this information out.
00:29:20.320
But what was really interesting, and what I learned from this letter, was that, she says, we went back to the source to check they were happy for us to publish the information.
00:29:39.320
Which points the finger back to Cootes Aminat West Banking Group.
00:29:47.320
The great political interrogator, Andrew Neal, started publishing lists of questions that he felt that the bank had to answer.
00:29:57.320
And Andrew Neal, there is no equivalent to him in Canada.
00:30:02.320
But if Peter Mansbridge was universally respected by left and right alike as an interrogative journalist.
00:30:09.320
Andrew Neal, probably the most senior journalist in all of the United Kingdom, started really putting specific questions to the bank, which clammed up.
00:30:19.320
It was incredible to watch the entire journalistic community ask tough questions of the most prestigious bank in the UK.
00:30:27.320
And of Alison Rose, who incredibly was making five million pounds a year, even though the bank was 40 percent owned by the government.
00:30:36.320
Now, Alison Rose put out a non apology apology.
00:30:45.320
She didn't say the Cootes would take Nigel Farage back and she didn't admit to do any doing anything wrong.
00:30:53.320
The board of directors had an emergency meeting and they said, we stand by Alison Rose.
00:31:07.320
But she obviously broke the banking laws and obviously felt she had to resign.
00:31:11.320
During this whole process, Facebook groups popped up of other people saying they were debanked.
00:31:17.320
Other political candidates said they were debanked.
00:31:20.320
Ten thousand people came forward from various banks saying it was happening to them.
00:31:25.320
And soon you started to see members of parliament and even cabinet ministers tweeting their support for Nigel condemning the bank.
00:31:34.320
And then the prime minister himself, Rishi Sundak, tweeted the same thing.
00:31:39.320
And then just today, the leader of the Labor Party, who must hate Nigel Farage with every fiber of his body, tweeted the same thing.
00:31:49.320
That whatever you think of Nigel Farage, it is wrong to have a political hygiene test for banking.
00:31:56.320
This is the most astonishing thing I've ever seen.
00:32:00.320
I think by the time this is done, the entire board of the bank will be sacked.
00:32:04.320
It's unthinkable in Canada that a bank CEO quits or is fired or pushed her a bit of that.
00:32:13.320
As you might recall, Rebel News applied for a mortgage we were approved by the Royal Bank of Canada, their Calgary branch.
00:32:21.320
But then their national office said that we failed their political hygiene test.
00:32:26.320
Here's my recording of the Calgary mortgage officers telling me that I knew something was fishy.
00:32:36.320
The Royal Bank, with whom I personally banked for my own entire adult life, said my credit was fine, but they wouldn't give us the mortgage for political reasons.
00:32:46.320
It's just about the nature of the business altogether.
00:32:50.320
Because the bank has been, I'll be blunt with you, the bank has been trying to pry away from certain clients where they're kind of out there in the media and very strong opinionated, which is your business in a way.
00:33:08.320
So we're just clearing some internal hurdles to make sure that the bank is okay to kind of onboard you as a client internally.
00:33:23.320
We went back and forth, but that was their decision.
00:33:32.320
Even our government debanked over 200 people during the trucker convoy.
00:33:36.320
Why did the entire British political media establishment stand by Nigel Farage?
00:33:41.320
But in Canada, there's a general shrug, not just in my case, but of the 200 people who were debanked because they were trucker convoy supporters.
00:33:50.320
First of all, our banks are few in number, and they're completely colonized by the government, highly regulated.
00:33:56.320
And there's sort of a revolving door between our banks and the government.
00:34:00.320
So I think they're really effectively government agencies.
00:34:04.320
I think cancel culture is really the Canadian way, a passive, aggressive way of silencing people without debating them.
00:34:11.320
I think also our media has been undermined and colonized by Justin Trudeau and his subsidies.
00:34:21.320
Whereas in the UK, the British press, especially the newspapers are still very independent.
00:34:26.320
I think Nigel Farage fighting back against the Coots Bank political blacklist and the fact that other media and other politicians got on board is one of the most significant pushbacks against cancel culture in years.
00:34:44.320
Perhaps even eclipsing Jordan Peterson resisting the attempt to silence him.
00:34:51.320
In fact, I think it is much more important because it goes to these banking institutions.
00:34:55.320
Who would have thought that when Coots Bank badmouth and blacklisted Nigel Farage that they would actually be firing their own CEO?
00:35:09.320
Not just the truckers, but I bet there are thousands of people who are being debanked like they are in the UK.
00:35:16.320
I understand that there is consideration in the British Parliament to bring in a law banning this political test for banking.
00:35:24.320
I hope that happens and I hope that becomes the new norm for banking and it applies to banks here.
00:35:30.320
It's a very exciting story and it's a victory and it's just fascinating to me that it all happens at a place called Coots.
00:35:39.320
That's my monologue for today. I am traveling so a colleague of mine will provide the guest interview for today.
00:35:49.320
And I was on the road in Hungary, Romania before that, but I'll be back home tomorrow.
00:36:05.320
And folks, I'm standing near North York Centre subway station.
00:36:16.320
It shocked the world thanks to a video going viral.
00:36:24.320
And before we get into his story and show you the now viral footage,
00:36:31.320
Can you please go to our new website, fixourcities.com.
00:36:39.320
So many wonderful cities in our great dominion are just devolving into hell holes and we have to take a stand.
00:36:47.320
Please go to fixourcities.com, sign the petition.
00:36:50.320
And if you're able to, kindly make a small donation.
00:36:53.320
Now, before I get into the nitty gritty with what happened to Derek last month,
00:37:08.320
But check out the video evidence of what happened to Derek on a TTC subway car that day.
00:40:08.320
and that's important because you are a construction
00:40:18.320
oh no absolutely i'm also an amateur arm wrestler
00:40:44.320
entered the subway here at north york center i was on my
00:40:54.320
he looked me right in the eyes and started to walk right
00:40:58.320
rap music on his cell phone holding it right to his
00:41:08.320
i just turned and i said hey man do you mind turning
00:41:10.320
that off you're not supposed to be playing that on
00:41:22.320
maybe if you turned it down you could right i'm just trying to have a
00:41:24.320
dialogue with him i can tell he's being you know
00:41:30.320
right off the bat just for the sake that he met eyes
00:41:32.320
with me as he walked up and then sat directly behind me
00:42:04.320
july 4th is when i had finished with all those things and this occurred
00:42:12.320
and the both times he said it he just gave me the
00:42:28.320
a look at him and as i looked his hands were reaching
00:42:36.320
a knife or whatever or do i start trying to defend myself
00:42:44.320
didn't have a knife in his hand so i thought he was bluffing
00:42:50.320
and sure enough that's when he pulled out the knife
00:43:12.320
i don't want to go to jail so i was kind of just
00:43:14.320
trying to pepper him until the train would come to
00:43:40.320
it was about two inches deep two inches wide i could see
00:43:42.320
right through my forearm to the ground it was a
00:43:56.320
the blood start to soak through my shirt at that point
00:43:58.320
i still didn't even know i'd been stabbed i thought it was just a really
00:44:08.320
he would open the door let me in maybe he had seen what was
00:44:10.320
happening on the cameras but he was right on my
00:44:16.320
uh when he caught up he had stabbed me several more times
00:44:34.320
uh and he was quite hesitant uh he was like i don't know
00:44:36.320
what to do and i just said put pressure pressure he's like i don't
00:44:38.320
have anything i actually have to take off my own
00:44:44.320
all and i'm like harder harder harder right and then
00:44:54.320
so um i was just on the ground trying to breathe for my
00:44:58.320
you wouldn't believe how dehydrated you get when you lose that much
00:45:24.320
yeah so after he stabbed me i'm sure he thought
00:45:26.320
i was gonna die with all the blood pouring out of
00:45:28.320
me so once he figured he finished me off he walked back
00:45:30.320
casually took my bag and walked off the train with
00:46:00.320
he doesn't take our legal system seriously i mean he's clearly
00:46:02.320
gotten away with potentially murder a million times
00:46:06.320
comfortable going out in broad daylight i mean this
00:46:08.320
was at noon hour on a train with tons of witnesses
00:46:26.320
some woman came who said she was a doctor or a nurse
00:46:28.320
she's like well you're gonna be okay with your name i could barely answer
00:46:36.320
and she uh she basically just comforted me saying
00:46:40.320
the driver also came out and said paramedics are on the way
00:47:12.320
knife i had a nurse michelle's actually her name
00:47:20.320
you know coming to explaining to another colleague
00:47:24.320
up on this guy for no reason and he had to pull
00:47:26.320
out a knife to defend himself and a lot of them there
00:47:28.320
were against me you could tell i mean the first time
00:47:34.320
because they put the tube down your lungs to breathe
00:47:36.320
and then they put a suction tube in your in your mouth
00:47:38.320
so they had placed that tube right on the back of my throat
00:47:40.320
and that's what had woke me up is that i couldn't breathe
00:47:42.320
and i woke up saying i can't breathe you gotta move
00:47:46.320
and they're saying no it's fine whatever and i had six
00:47:54.320
and pull it right out of my mouth one of the things
00:47:56.320
was i don't eat microwave food right uh the first
00:48:00.320
and my friend had said how that fish looks kind of
00:48:06.320
from now on they said sure i didn't know the veggie meals
00:48:08.320
are outsourced they explained to me later so they're all
00:48:10.320
microwaved right i don't eat out of a microwave
00:48:14.320
sent psych people to talk to me one of their questions
00:48:16.320
was do you think we're trying to poison you here in the food
00:48:18.320
and i'm like no it's just gross and then they're
00:48:20.320
like uh you know they asked me a few more questions
00:48:24.320
essentially in the hospital when you pull a tube out
00:48:26.320
they give you an observer to watch you because they think that
00:48:30.320
right but after three days and i didn't have any
00:48:32.320
more incidences like that they took my observer away
00:48:34.320
and then weird things would happen to me in the
00:48:36.320
middle of the night like the room that they put me
00:48:40.320
nurses would come and tell me this is the stuffiest hottest
00:48:50.320
yelled at him and they were with him all in the middle
00:48:52.320
of the night so i couldn't sleep and that's another
00:48:54.320
question the psych ward had for me well the psych
00:49:00.320
paranoid schizophrenic so i can't sleep i'm like
00:49:02.320
no i've got people yelling in my room all day and
00:49:04.320
night there was also another patient there poor
00:49:06.320
guy suffered a brain injury so he's yelling at the top
00:49:16.320
officer came in i can't remember his name but uh
00:49:24.320
and made them chase him and they tackled him down
00:50:06.320
i used to play guitar in the subways for a living
00:50:08.320
so i know their security system they had about 10
00:50:14.320
at the time bill was his name i don't know if he's retired
00:50:18.320
car at any given day they'll have up to three fair
00:50:24.320
but they can't afford to put one security guard on each train
00:50:50.320
my apartment out i'm not usually in that neighborhood
00:50:54.320
were plowed there wasn't much room in the sidewalk
00:50:56.320
i moved to the right as far as i could as he was approaching
00:51:02.320
black frame glasses same guy it was the same guy
00:51:08.320
and i knew he wanted to shoulder check me i couldn't move over
00:51:14.320
um i turn around i say buddy what's your problem you walk on
00:51:16.320
that side i walk on this side like do you want to go or
00:51:18.320
something what's your problem and all he did was just smile at me
00:51:48.320
is criminally insane right i mean at this point
00:51:56.320
and make sure that these people are off the streets
00:51:58.320
and they have failed miserably at that and definitely
00:52:18.320
when you're on a subway car you're trapped right
00:52:26.320
course it would have been better to just get up and leave
00:52:30.320
of women around and they looked very uncomfortable
00:52:32.320
and nervous about him being there too and i just
00:52:34.320
didn't feel like much of a man if i were to get up and abandon
00:53:04.320
at this point because i don't know when or if i'll ever be able
00:53:12.320
and um any any compensation i can get for what's happened here i'm gonna
00:53:18.320
the first day i was out of hospital i went to the
00:53:22.320
i had a friend with me so it made me feel a little more
00:53:30.320
until they do something about taking care of their
00:53:32.320
passengers i mean they're more worried about their profits
00:53:34.320
and they are their patrons and it just goes to show
00:53:36.320
you know why why protect the peasants when we can
00:53:42.320
want to thank god for giving me the strength to
00:53:44.320
survive that i don't think i would have done it with
00:53:50.320
i really owe them i don't think my lungs have been
00:53:56.320
type of training so i i just strongly recommend
00:54:04.320
while doing deep breathing it's it's one of the hardest