Conservatives lived through this same party drama before and emerged victorious
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Summary
Former Chief of Staff to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Ian Brody talks about dealing with floor crossers in the early days of the Conservative Party of Canada and what it was like to be part of a government with a minority government.
Transcript
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As I've said before, well, Parliament Hill can be a bit like high school with salaries.
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There's a lot of gossip, there's a lot of drama, and it's never ending, especially if
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your name is Pierre Paulyevre and the Conservative Party of Canada.
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We've been talking about this issue for a couple of weeks now.
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The floor crosser that happened on the day of the budget, Chris Dantremont, Matt Genreux
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resigning or announcing that he would resign at a later date to be confirmed.
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From the Conservative Party of Canada, lots of speculation about more floor crossers,
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now speculation about whether Pierre Paulyevre can survive his leadership.
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A headline in a column in the Toronto Sun by Amanda Galbraith says,
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Pierre Paulyevre's Conservatives don't need a new leader, just a Valium.
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Let's talk about this in depth with someone who knows what it's like to come close to winning
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power, dealing with floor crossers, eventually getting power.
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He is the former Chief of Staff to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
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He's been an academic at the University of Waterloo, the Calgary School of Public Policy.
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He's now with U.S. Public Affairs and joins me now in studio in Toronto.
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I couldn't think of somebody better to talk about this than you, because when you look
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at what has happened to Pierre Paulyevre over the last little bit, I was like, well, you
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You were an academic who decided, well, let's go test these theories I've got, and went into
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So he was still leader of the Canadian Alliance at that point.
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I mean, I had known Mr. Harper for several years before that, but when I went, and you
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know, you talk about motivation, at that point, the objective was just to hold the party together
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to not fall apart until we could get to an election campaign.
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Kretchen had won three big majorities in a row.
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They were still division between the Canadian Alliance and the PC party.
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I'd been working on the ground in by-election in Perth Middlesex, leading up to moving to
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The PC party came from behind and won that by-election after the Alliance had poured
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And so at that point, the idea was really just, can we keep the place from falling apart
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And things turned out a little bit better than that, but that was the vibe that we had
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So 2004, the Conservative Party and the PC party have merged.
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Stephen Harper is leader, runs for, in the 2004 election against Paul Martin, loses.
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And then you were facing issues about, you know, can the party stay together again?
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Spring 2005, you thought you were going to defeat the government.
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So what was it like back then dealing with, you know, both Belinda Stronick crossing the
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floor, Chuck Cadman standing up to vote to save the government, all of those things?
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I have to take me back to your tough days of...
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You know, the 2004 campaign for the Conservatives was winnable.
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I guess we consoled ourselves that going into that election, Martin's people sort of advertised
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There's a whole book about it called Juggernaut.
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I was like reminding everyone that they were going to win the biggest majority ever, is what
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I have a remaindered copy of Juggernaut, and I left on the cover of the $1.99, you know,
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We won't name the author, but from time to time, when I ran into her, I reminded her that
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So we consoled ourselves with having reduced Martin to a minority.
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I think that wasn't an accomplishment, but, you know, victories within reach, and it kind
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But I would say it took Mr. Harper and the team probably a year to get over that.
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It was really kind of losing an election that you think you have a good chance of winning
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And so we were just starting to kind of get our feet underneath ourselves again when,
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as you say, you know, Harper had gone out of his way to court the NDP, had gone out of
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his way to consolidate all the opposition parties against Martin, had deliberately not
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polarized the electorate in order to drive, you know, keep New Democrats voting NDP instead
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And we thought we'd put together the parliamentary coalition to defeat the government, the Martin
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And as you say, Belinda Strana crossed the floor, and there were some other developments
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And that was, I was at home that morning that she crossed the floor.
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I was on paternity leave because our daughter had just been born.
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And we were supposed to have, Mrs. Harper was supposed to come over that day to see the
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I pretty much concluded this was terrible news.
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And then, you know, you walk into a caucus meeting and people are like, she's abandoned
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And the party, which had been a bit, you know, it was new, bolted together, kind of
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Frankenstein's monster at a certain point, kind of congealed in hostility to her crossing
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It turned out to be the caucus meeting was quite, I don't want to say upbeat, but was
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And Mr. Harper had warned people that he thought that Belinda would cross the floor in advance.
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So that helped, you know, he had sort of set the scene for this in advance.
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He sort of had this sense that something else was going on.
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He could, I don't think he had a very, I don't think he had any definitive evidence
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And so he told several people he thought she might go.
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And so when she ended up going, the people that supported her during the previous leadership
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race, you know, they'd supported her because they were opposed to Harper.
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You know, I mean, there's a coalition around her, not particularly because of her, but to
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It was quite a remarkable caucus meeting, I remember.
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Overhaul in the office, overhaul of the campaign team, overhaul of the policy team.
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And at the end of November of that year, we succeeded in toppling the government and pushed
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Before we get to that, I just want to ask you about something that I recall happening.
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And that is that there was a confidence vote that the Martin government lost in the spring
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Was that a legit confidence vote, or was it too cute by half?
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At the time, I was upset because I thought it was pretty clear cut.
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In retrospect, you look back and think, if you're going to precipitate an election campaign,
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it really has to be on something that's pretty definitively a confidence vote.
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So this was someone had moved an amendment to a committee report that was being voted on.
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There was a straight up and down confidence motion that you lost because of Belinda crossing
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the floor and Chuck Cadman standing up in his jeans.
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And then by the fall, things were good, and Stephen Harper won.
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So what's your advice looking at what Pierre Polyev's doing?
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I don't know if you chat with him and his team, but if you were chatting with them now,
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what would you be saying in light of Chris Dantremont crossing the floor and Matt Jenneru
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It's advice I've given to a number of party leaders in similar types of situations.
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There's two things that in the media circuit we want to comment on that, nonetheless, you
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You know, you get into a party, you lose a couple of by-elections in a row, but it's
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like, oh my God, we've lost two or three by-elections in a row, the sky's falling in.
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Whether you win them or lose them, they're sui generis.
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There are particular cases that may have no bearing on the next election campaign.
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It's a mix of personal animus, some enticements offered by the other side.
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Somebody's in a weak situation and they're riding, maybe they're getting pressure from
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Look, I was sad to see Chris Dantremont cross the floor.
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I was sad to see him go, but again, like don't overreact to a single floor crossing.
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Um, if there are others, uh, that's a more serious, uh, situation, but one I don't think
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is, uh, you know, don't, don't make any rash decisions based on a single floor crossing.
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I mean, if the liberals did when you recruited, uh, recruited Wajid Khan.
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Um, and, and right now there's an awful lot of people listening who are saying, who is
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And yet I remember, uh, well, uh, there was him, there was the gentleman from Thunder
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I mean, I remember standing in the foyer, the house of commons is a very, um, you know,
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happy Stephen Harper looking like the, the cat that ate the canary welcoming these people
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into his party, but in the grand scheme of things, again, don't overreact.
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No, Joe Kamuzzi was a great guy, but, uh, don't, you know, uh, he was at the end of his
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Uh, he was making a move just before the election campaign, you know, uh, a great guy.
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I was happy to have him on the team, but, uh, again, I hope the liberals didn't, uh, overreact
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David Emerson was a worse, uh, loss, uh, for them and a bigger pickup for, uh, for the conservatives.
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But, um, well, let's talk about that because I was at Rideau Hall, uh, believe it was February
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I just got sent, uh, a notice that you guys are having a big party on that day.
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Um, and so the, uh, we're all assembled, uh, at Rideau Hall as the media is to cover the
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And David Emerson shows up who has been the liberal trade minister.
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Now I, I never looked at David Emerson as a particularly liberal guy or a particularly
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He was a bureaucrat for a time who just wanted to serve his country.
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So, I mean, it was a good pickup for you, but most of these are not as significant as
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that or as consequential as Belinda Strawn at crossing the floor to save the day in a vote.
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So, Chris D'Entremont, you know, compared to those two, kind of small potatoes.
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I mean, David Emerson was a big deal because one, he's just a uber confident cabinet minister.
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And, and as you recall, um, um, uh, was, was the liberal industry minister, went to trade
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And then when Maxime Bernier blew up his career as foreign minister, stepped into the foreign
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And it's hard to imagine somebody else who could have handled that situation better than
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But at the same time, taking David, uh, from the liberal side, it was the end of the kind
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of the business guy's wing of the BC federal liberal party.
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And in fact, they've never recovered from that.
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They kind of, that kind of liberal party connection to the Vancouver business community had never
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Um, at the time I knew that that was a possibility.
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It was one of the reasons why I was eager to have David.
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But at the time I thought, yes, if we, if we entice him across the floor, that leaves,
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you know, Hedy Fry will be the senior liberal in British Columbia.
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And I like that situation for the conservatives, uh, with all great respect to Dr. Fry.
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Um, and, uh, so that was, but that was uniquely consequential.
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Uh, I don't know whether Don Tamar is going to play, you never know, uh, whether this is
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going to play a big, uh, uh, a big role in the future or not.
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More difficult is when several people go to create kind of a dissident caucus, which has
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happened a couple of times, uh, in, uh, politics.
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My friend Monty Solberg was part of that against, uh, Stockwell Day.
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I don't really think of that as a floor crossing so much as going to, uh, create a new political
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party or a new, uh, Monty Solberg and Chuck Strahl and several, I think there were a dozen
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of them that formed what they call them that Democratic representative caucus.
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Um, do you, you know, I'm having some people whisper to me that they think that's going to
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happen with, uh, Polly Eve and the conservatives.
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Um, but maybe people are only the people who are talking to me are only the ones who are
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Um, but I've spoken to conservative MPs in the past couple of weeks that I don't normally
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Uh, and I'm not picking up that there's going to be another bunch crossing or a, a group
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go sit as their own rump and, and leave the party.
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The closest I've heard, and it's all from liberals, uh, is that they will feed you names
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Um, or, you know, one name that they floated to me, I talked to the MP, he said, I don't
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Uh, and, and, you know, you can get a sense when someone is telling you the truth or BSing
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Um, you know, one liberal was saying, well, there's a group of conservatives that won't
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cross the floor, but we'll vote for the budget.
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Yes, but let's put this, let me take a step back and put this into a slightly bigger picture
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Cause I think there's a context here that a lot of different strands going on at the
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Carney's a little bit short of a majority and he's introduced a budget without doing much
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of the groundwork to ensure that one of the opposition parties is okay with it.
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If I were in his position, I would have done the same thing, by the way.
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So I'm not, that's not a criticism of Carney, just an observation that he didn't go through
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the normal process of sitting down with all the opposition leaders and giving them each,
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you know, a bone in the budget to earn their support.
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So there are, there are smaller bones for individual ridings, individual ridings, but not
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So, you know, that's a tough, that's a tough hand.
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He's very close to a majority and none of the parties can really afford an election right
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So I think that was the right, uh, uh, chance, chance to take.
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And now he's in sort of a stare down with the opposition parties to see whether someone
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of them is going to trigger an election campaign.
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On the other side, we forget, but it's, uh, easy to forget a year ago, Mr.
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Polley was 25 points ahead, 26 points ahead in the polls and lost the election.
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Again, that creates unhappiness, discontent, confusion inside the conservative caucus.
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Uh, whether they think Mr. Polley has taken full responsibility or has made all the changes
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that are needed to make sure that doesn't happen again.
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There's a whole variety of different opinions there.
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That's normal in opposition caucus, by the way, I've been through many opposition caucuses
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that are like this, that that is normal, especially after you use the election.
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And I assume it's normal after you blow a 25 point lead, uh, which doesn't happen too
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So, you know, we're going through some political bends on that.
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As a old professor of mine used to say, you go up and down as you do when you're scuba
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And so I don't think anybody's going to see anybody else cross the floor or sit in some
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kind of rump, but there's obviously a debate going on inside.
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Polley faces a leadership review at the convention in January in Calgary.
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And you can never take those sorts of things for granted.
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Uh, I know he's got a campaign going on to secure the leadership review for him, which
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Uh, in the end, I think the question will be, you know, uh, a year ago, Pollyev's personal
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support outstripped the conservative party support.
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And so he pulled the conservative party up in the polls as it were.
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Now he's a drag on the party's support in the polls.
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I think that's fairly clear across all the polls.
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If there was an election, you don't know who'd win.
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The conservatives are within striking distance in most of the polling.
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So I, I'd agree with you on, on personal popularity.
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Uh, but, but on, but on the party support, you know, there is a narrative among some in
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the media that, well, you know, the, no one wants to vote for the conservatives.
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That's not, that's, that's not accurate at all.
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But the, the political coalition that brought Pierre Pauli up to 43%, or 42% in the last
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It's the people who don't own anything, would like to get ahead in life, are going to have
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And the people who supported Carney and made him prime minister at 44%, 45% or whatever
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it was, the people who own a house and want to protect what they have from Trump and
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My, my read of the polls and I've been at this a long time like you, uh, is that if an
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election were held, we're in the same position that we were April 28th.
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And depending on what the ballot question is, either side could win most likely a minority
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Um, and so all this chatter in my view, and I, I, I agree that there is a real dissension
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within some parts of the party, but I'll say this, um, it's not a red Tory, it's not
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the old, well, the PC and the Alliance are pulling apart.
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Those, those divides don't exist in this modern day party.
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As far as I can tell, um, I have talked to folks in the party, both MPs and activists
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from various factions, cause every party has factions and you know what they're all upset
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I mean, uh, in particular, cause for three years there are two years, it looked like it
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And I think between here and the leadership review in January, we're kind of waiting for
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Mr. Polly have to say, okay, we get, you know, cost of living, good issue, uh, debt
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Um, he's going to have to put together the, the picture of, of, of how he wins, how he takes
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Well, if those are the ballot questions, I think he wins.
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This is why I think, you know, all the kerfuffle about an election campaign, it's not in anybody's
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It's not in anybody's interest right now to have an election because it's not clear enough
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Did he have to do anything after that loss and the floor crossing?
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We've all heard that he's deep and dark and brooding and goes off, you know, I'm sure those
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Um, but did, what kind of reflection did he do and, and did he make changes internally?
00:21:04.540
Was there a change in how we manage caucus or how we approach the media, how we dealt with
00:21:11.500
Um, I don't think there was a big change in the way he handled caucus because at this point
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the caucus was, was pretty united after blowing across the floor, very united.
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And so in a sense, he always had a good ear for what individual caucus members were saying
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about his leadership in the direction of the party.
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I know he doesn't get credit for it, but he's a very good listener.
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No, no, he, he paid close attention to what people were saying and tried to make sure that
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he had 80% support in caucus for everything he did and by and large exceeded that.
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The difference was if I'm going to go back into an election campaign, I need a team that
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cannot just win an election campaign that can govern.
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Having a campaign team, having a team that can govern and having preparations to govern
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takes the pressure off of you while you're campaigning of doubt about what if this ends
00:22:02.600
So he brought people on board to help with that.
00:22:11.140
I can't do all the speech writing and political marketing myself.
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So Patrick Muttard and a bunch of other Patrick's folks came, uh, on board and overhauled that
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And then I need a campaign manager who can bring together a broader group of people, uh, across
00:22:31.840
That's Doug, Doug filling came on board as the campaign.
00:22:40.040
Yeah, I know Tom's a, Tom's a friend of mine, but, uh, Tom, Tom left, uh, Doug moved up
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Uh, Phil Murphy was chief of staff left and I stepped into the chief of staff's job.
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Uh, there were several, you know, uh, Jim Armour left and a number of, you know, a couple
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And then, uh, uh, Patrick came on board on the kind of the big picture marketing stuff.
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Just decided he needed a different group of, and Marjorie LeBreton came on as a kind of
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I can't leave out Marjorie who played a huge role and just.
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And I remember when she was wearing a black armband because Stephen Harper had taken over
00:23:20.260
I think I put it on the record before, uh, before the merger, I might've said some unkind
00:23:24.740
things about Marjorie LeBreton myself, but it turns out we got along great and, uh, she's
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And so, um, uh, you know, he just decided I needed, I need a different team here.
00:23:40.440
And look, um, maybe this is advice that so much you give to Pierre Polyev that he needs
00:23:47.420
a team that can help him win, that he can't do all of this himself, but that that's an
00:23:55.120
If you want to be prime minister, you can't do it all yourself.
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Carnegie making a good effort at it, but that, but that runs out.
00:24:10.160
What does Pierre need to do based on your lessons that you learned that Stephen Harper
00:24:18.540
Because I think we could be heading for a spring election.
00:24:22.480
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00:24:25.240
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So just before we broke, you said, uh, Pierre Polyev should pick up the phone and call Doug
00:24:55.260
Um, I have said since before the election, he should have been dealing with Doug Ford.
00:25:07.100
He should be, uh, should have worked with Jean Charest, you know?
00:25:11.760
Well, look, you beat him soundly in the leadership, bring him in, you know, have him help you in
00:25:18.760
There really was a, it's all about this guy, uh, even candidates and MPs were not showcased
00:25:27.780
I, and I'm sure you, you've heard from some of them about that, how big is important is
00:25:34.340
Because I remember Steven Harper bringing in, you know, after Oh four was on a radio panel,
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uh, with Michael Harris, the journalist from down east.
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And he said, their biggest problem is they don't have bench strength.
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And I think Pierre's got to show that he's got a team and it's not just him.
00:26:04.880
I mean, certainly I think the team will come to the floor now because in defense of the
00:26:09.800
campaign strategy at the time, uh, as I said, Pierre's, uh, support was ahead of the parties.
00:26:20.260
Now that that's not the case anymore, it would be, uh, uh, an odd election, uh, strategy
00:26:26.640
not to feature the team rather than the leader who's now a net drag, uh, on the party support.
00:26:32.360
But above and beyond that, he's campaigning to be prime minister of the country, right?
00:26:39.660
If there's a campaign in the spring, you get the job you auditioned for, you get the job
00:26:43.300
And you know what, you know what, who the prime minister of Canada has to deal with the
00:26:47.900
Uh, the premier of Nova Scotia doesn't matter who it is.
00:26:49.920
So I'll tell you something that, that I was told, and this was not by someone on Ford's
00:26:55.340
This was from someone on, uh, Polioff's team is that someone went to him and said, shouldn't
00:27:05.220
Because when you become prime minister, at this point, they're still in the, it's a
00:27:13.480
I like to say Canada and the U S each had January 6th.
00:27:18.240
Um, that someone said, when you become prime minister, you're going to need to have a good
00:27:24.700
And his response was, no, when I'm prime minister, he'll need to have a good relationship with
00:27:34.560
Um, break bread, go fishing, something, whatever it is.
00:27:39.000
Look, uh, uh, I don't live in Ontario anymore, so I don't pay, you know, day to day close
00:27:46.620
So one thing I know is that, uh, Doug Ford's won three majority governments in a row and
00:27:51.620
that's not an accomplishment that's easy to achieve in Ontario hasn't since whatever the
00:27:56.260
Um, so obviously there's something there, there's some skill there, there's personal
00:28:00.360
connections back and forth between the two teams.
00:28:04.260
It doesn't have to be, look, uh, Mr. Harper had dealings with provincial premiers, not all
00:28:17.260
Um, it turns out some of those relationships worked out pretty darn well.
00:28:21.080
Uh, uh, one of them, not a conservative, uh, ended up as Mr. Harper's, uh, ambassador
00:28:26.220
in Washington and another one, not a conservative, ended up as a side commissioner in London.
00:28:30.080
Um, those are people he didn't know, uh, at the time, but made an effort to get to know
00:28:37.780
So, you know, you're going to have to have like, we're all adults here.
00:28:42.440
I know out West Doug Ford is not popular and there'd be a lot of conservatives in the West
00:28:46.500
saying, well, well, he's just a liberal anyway and ignore him.
00:28:52.440
I think that you've got to work with people that are at least partly on your team.
00:28:56.400
The old someone you agree with 80% of the time isn't your 20% enemy.
00:29:00.920
Look, I know there's people here in Ontario who think that Daniel Smith, my premier is
00:29:04.260
some kind of crazy severist, which she's not, uh, I've said so.
00:29:08.020
Yeah, that's not, that's not true, but you know, guess what?
00:29:10.980
The prime minister has got to have a relationship with the, with the premier of Alberta as well,
00:29:14.460
regardless of who it is, regardless of what party it is.
00:29:18.240
Uh, you don't need those stories anyway, uh, during an election campaign.
00:29:21.820
So make the phone call and that's, that's the end of the story that you never taught,
00:29:25.480
you know, I've never, I spoke to Pierre Polyev on the Thursday before the election was called
00:29:29.080
or whatever Ford said during the election campaign.
00:29:36.060
So in terms of where Mark Carney's going, I'd like your assessment of that as someone
00:29:41.340
who's been at the center of these big decisions.
00:29:44.440
Um, he does appear to be running a near solo government.
00:29:51.280
Uh, there's a couple of ministers out there, you know, uh, Frankie Bubbles with the budget.
00:29:55.960
Um, you've got, uh, Tim Hodgson, but beyond that, do you get a sense he trusts his cabinet?
00:30:04.620
Um, look, there are part of Mr. Carney's challenge here is that he didn't come up through the party,
00:30:10.780
I mean, he's dallied in and out of the party, knows people inside the party, but it's not
00:30:14.820
like he has a long career inside the liberal party.
00:30:19.300
He didn't live in Canada for many of those years.
00:30:21.800
And so he doesn't have the normal political team that you come to that job with, even
00:30:25.680
if you've never been in government before, you know, Mr. Harper had a team of people,
00:30:29.620
like a press secretary, you know, speechwriters, uh, uh, an executive assistant.
00:30:34.580
Um, Mr. Carney's team is, uh, Tim Hodgson, the natural resources minister with whom he has
00:30:45.120
So he's, he's apparently got a 30 year friendship with Jonathan Wilkinson, but he's trying to
00:30:55.480
He brought, uh, uh, Krista Friedland into his cabinet and then that didn't work out.
00:31:00.180
And so now she's off to some job with Ukraine or something.
00:31:03.380
So sort of a slow motion separation from the liberal party.
00:31:05.980
And we're led to believe there may be other, uh, cabinet, uh, uh, departures coming.
00:31:11.480
I think he's putting together a government as he goes along here because he doesn't have
00:31:15.400
a big, long political tale of, uh, of, uh, friends and allies that he can depend on.
00:31:21.120
I think that's part of the problem of this government is that it really is, uh, three or
00:31:25.980
four guys at the center who all sort of think like Carney and, uh, come from Carney like
00:31:31.660
And they don't really have much of a sense of what the country looks like from, uh, you
00:31:37.280
know, blue collar, Hamilton, uh, Saskatchewan, uh, New Brunswick perspective.
00:31:42.500
Uh, and the, and the, and the, and the haven't encountered that in their careers for quite
00:31:47.700
You know, Mark starts with humble origins, but that's an awfully long time ago.
00:31:52.020
And, uh, it's not like he's got some trusted folks around him who have a very good sense of
00:31:58.880
So you have a budget that looks like, um, you know, it was written by the IMF for the
00:32:07.780
Uh, you know, the, the text is a little hard to parse.
00:32:15.740
Not clear to me that anybody stopped, you know, hold the presses.
00:32:19.000
What are we going to, what are we going to tell people at the sun and at the national
00:32:24.560
It's not clear that anybody sort of pressed stop and said, what's the retail part of this?
00:32:28.420
I was listening to Scott Reed who spent years on, on the other side with the liberals saying
00:32:34.140
he's never seen such a bad budget rollout in terms of pre positioning, in terms of having
00:32:39.640
a storyline, you know, the, the Martin guys perfected it.
00:32:42.760
You guys picked it up and ran with it when, when you were in yet a couple of stinker budgets.
00:32:48.320
Um, but you know, there was generally some kind of a storyline.
00:32:52.320
And in this one, if Chris Dantremont hadn't come along and crossed the floor, well, it,
00:32:58.540
all we'd be talking about is $78.3 billion deficit.
00:33:03.940
Assuming for a moment that the Dantremont thing didn't just unfold to the last minute
00:33:07.820
because, you know, part of the story was out and once part of the story is out, the whole
00:33:13.840
So he actually, I wrote my first piece about this is that the Dantremont floor crossing story
00:33:20.840
not only shocked the conservative party and the gallery, it shocked Dantremont because
00:33:26.220
he didn't realize that he was telling someone on the record.
00:33:29.040
And so it broke before he, before it was supposed to.
00:33:33.820
Planning a floor crossing to occur on the day of the budget, after you've presumably put
00:33:38.560
some time and effort into designing the budget, rolling out the budget, pre-announcing parts
00:33:42.580
I think that was supposed to happen the next day.
00:33:45.300
No, I, uh, so it's, so all we've talked about or all the people have talked about instead
00:33:49.640
of what's in the budget is the Chris Dantremont crossing and problems inside the conservative
00:33:53.540
It has saved Carney from having to talk in human terms to actual main street Canadians
00:34:01.280
And, you know, it's, it's a, it's a earth changing budget with generational decisions
00:34:08.240
It's actually hard to tell you the next, what's the next sentence in that story.
00:34:11.640
There's, there's nothing that's generational transformation that I found in this budget.
00:34:15.480
There's a lot of money set aside for future commitments.
00:34:18.380
Like, I mean, an extraordinary amount, like an almost obscene amount of money, all of which
00:34:22.940
And there's a lot of claims that they will cut spending in the future.
00:34:27.580
And I'm sorry, I don't believe any of you when you say that.
00:34:31.040
No, cutting spending requires some decisions that is difficult.
00:34:34.980
Uh, it's just hard to not only to make the decisions, but to sell them to people and to
00:34:42.500
The problem is that we all believe because he looks competent and we're told he's competent,
00:34:48.120
that Mark Carney has a plan for dealing with Trump and for rebuilding Canada for the
00:34:52.940
When is the speech coming in which he fleshes that out?
00:34:58.100
Usually he did one and he said, you're all going to have to sacrifice.
00:35:03.860
Um, how does the budget fit into that plan for the rebuilding of Canada of the future where
00:35:09.720
Uh, is he, is he, is he able to put together a half hour discussion, uh, sit down with the
00:35:17.560
editorial board at one of the newspapers or do it with some YouTube host or, or come to
00:35:24.580
Uh, we haven't seen that part of Carney's skillset yet.
00:35:27.380
And I'm, I'm not entirely convinced that it's, that it's there.
00:35:31.140
He's done better at retail politics than I expected.
00:35:34.420
He's did better at campaigning than I expected.
00:35:36.360
But you said, you know, will he be able to, um, explain this and sell it to the average
00:35:42.980
And well, my time covering him as bank governor, you really have to poke and prod him to get
00:35:50.120
And it should to a central bank governor, you know, a retail touch for a central bank governor
00:35:56.980
They're all used to dealing with like Theo from Bloomberg and Paul from the wall street
00:36:01.760
And then I show up and like, can you tell me something basic for the news talk 10, 10 crowd?
00:36:08.860
Uh, but yeah, your quick assessment, and then I'll switch back to asking you about Pierre,
00:36:14.460
your quick assessment of this major projects office and, and how it's going.
00:36:19.540
Like my, my big complaint I keep saying is that I want Mark Carney to live up to his own
00:36:24.520
words of think big, act bigger, move at speeds, not seen in generations.
00:36:32.580
Look, there's a series of projects in that window that looked like they were surefire bets
00:36:36.860
anyway, and some projects that are years away from having a proposal.
00:36:40.080
Well, the Sisson-Tungsten mine in New Brunswick, they made a big deal about approving it in
00:36:44.580
Yeah, yeah, no, we're now eight years into the not constructing it, uh, phase, phase of
00:36:49.860
Um, look, uh, Bill C-5 and the major projects office was designed to unlock some of the petrochemical
00:36:56.280
wealth of the country for international markets.
00:37:00.460
Um, I think, uh, the, the, the legislation was rushed through the legislative process,
00:37:07.300
which is unfortunate, a good way of making a lot of mistakes on a big senior piece like
00:37:13.060
And now major project proponents are sitting back just to see how it goes.
00:37:16.640
Nobody wants to be the first, the first one through that loop.
00:37:20.080
And, uh, uh, uh, Carney has said he wants to hear from project proponents first and then
00:37:30.540
I think if those big projects are going to get done, he has to lean into that more.
00:37:37.120
I mean, he, he came to Toronto, told the Canadian club that there's no problems with the regulation
00:37:44.280
Enbridge and TC energy were holding calls, uh, on their third quarter results talking about
00:37:50.060
the problems with the regulatory, uh, situation in Canada.
00:37:54.220
They're investing billions in the U S look the, the emissions cap, uh, the fuel regulations,
00:38:00.160
the tanker ban and the environmental impact assessment legislation as a combination is a
00:38:07.160
bullet aimed at the heart of private sector investment in Canada.
00:38:12.960
And if there's going to be anything moved, so that legislation is going to have to be repealed
00:38:17.200
and replaced with something that's a lot easier for investors to deal with.
00:38:20.060
Well, I'm glad you said repeal and replace, because when I spoke to premier Smith a couple
00:38:23.720
of months ago, people just kept saying, well, she wants to repeal the law.
00:38:27.180
And she said, no, there are valid parts within it.
00:38:30.140
But as a whole, C 69 is makes life inoperable for an awful lot of businesses and not just oil.
00:38:38.120
I mean, why is that tungsten mind that's been approved since 2017, not move forward?
00:38:45.240
Because there are so many regulations that make it difficult, if not impossible to go forward.
00:38:57.760
Um, you know, in, in terms of, you know, it's one thing if it's just me saying Carney doesn't
00:39:03.780
live up to his own hype, but if Susan Delacorte at the Toronto Star is saying that if Andrew
00:39:07.940
Coyne at the Globe and Mail saying that if people on the street are talking to me about
00:39:15.540
I used to call it when my kids were little, I'd called it like what breaks through with
00:39:19.220
the other parents at the school bus while you're waiting.
00:39:21.820
And this appears to be breaking through a little bit that he promises a lot, but doesn't deliver.
00:39:28.140
Um, I think a six month, two pieces here, a six month effort on what's he delivered, what's
00:39:35.300
he delivered, what's he delivered, what's he delivered.
00:39:36.900
It's a nice slogan, uh, that you want to push through enough that kids start chanting it
00:39:42.240
in the back of the minivan while mom's driving them to school or while dad's driving them
00:39:46.420
I think it's easy enough to understand and people can read the stories themselves about
00:39:50.920
all the things, you know, generational investments, blah, blah, blah.
00:39:56.260
And then on the other piece, has he fixed the immigration issue that the Trudeau government
00:40:01.880
Not clear to me yet that that, that the effect of that has been felt.
00:40:04.980
That there's still, uh, people trying to get established in the labor market, including
00:40:09.840
especially here in Southern Ontario, uh, facing, you know, major employers that want to advertise
00:40:15.660
for, uh, temporary foreign workers to take their jobs, to, to fill their, their need for
00:40:20.840
labor instead of Canadian kids or Canadians are getting started in, uh, in life.
00:40:25.420
Uh, Mr. Pahliv was on that in September and then kind of backed away from that issue.
00:40:30.500
I think that's an evergreen issue as well and could come back.
00:40:32.960
Those two are in effect, the two potential very weak points that are easy to explain
00:40:39.600
They're easy to explain to somebody, um, in Milton, Ontario, uh, of what's going on and
00:40:45.680
a certain amount of, uh, patience for the public opinion to follow up to what I think
00:40:53.560
If you were part of Mark Carney's team, I'm hearing the chatter of spring election.
00:41:00.580
Replace some of his Trudeau holdovers, bring in his own team, run an election in the spring.
00:41:09.560
I think you want, I think at this stage, he wants to have the option of doing that.
00:41:14.140
Uh, the economic situation could be, look, if we lose, um, a big Southern Ontario auto
00:41:20.200
plant, you know, one a month from now until April, do you want to have an April election
00:41:25.920
Uh, if there's God forbid, uh, you know, a hundred thousand unemployed auto workers
00:41:31.720
I mean, I hope this does not happen, but that's a possibility that we have to confront.
00:41:35.160
And then all the upstream and downstream jobs from parts manufacturers and service providers
00:41:41.200
I mean, I lived in London for six years, you know, um, yeah, I know what the impact of that
00:41:48.900
If that's the future that we have to confront between here and April, hard to see an election
00:41:53.840
campaign, uh, based on that in particular, because it's hard for, for me to imagine in
00:41:58.840
April, Carney comes out and says, here are five pages from my budget in November that deal
00:42:04.140
with the economic pain that we just went through.
00:42:06.000
I don't see that, you know, there's not an election campaign advertising, uh, uh, program
00:42:12.320
But, um, if there's a pretty good deal with Mr. Trump, better than expected, uh, if the
00:42:19.100
economy is starting to recover at that point, if some of the major projects are starting
00:42:23.920
You want to go at that point, um, uh, to catch a new NDP leader, you know, the liberals did
00:42:29.600
well because of, in part because of the collapse of the NDP vote.
00:42:32.420
You want to get the NDP before they have a chance to come back and chew a few more points
00:42:36.740
out of the liberal party support and, uh, catch Mr. Polyev before his, uh, uh, you know,
00:42:45.060
show me the beef, uh, on the major projects catches, catches wind.
00:42:51.960
Polyev, uh, faces leadership review in January until the drama, uh, of late.
00:43:02.480
Now I think, well, still pretty good, but it depends on how he deals with the next month.
00:43:08.340
Um, do you see him winning it and should he get another shot at an election, whether it's
00:43:15.220
Um, I think that's always a good idea to let a party leader learn something from an election
00:43:19.460
loss, uh, and to let them, uh, try again, see what, see what they've learned.
00:43:24.120
I mean, it's a risk, but, um, uh, your first election campaign as a national party leader
00:43:29.600
It's always tougher than you think it's going to be.
00:43:31.520
And so the second time around, at least he'll be prepared for that.
00:43:35.340
Um, a leadership review and I was involved in a leadership review myself for Mr. Harper
00:43:41.880
Um, you could never take a leadership review for granted.
00:43:46.120
There's always somebody out there campaigning against you, no matter how implausible the
00:43:49.280
case is, there's some people out there working against Mr. Polyev.
00:43:52.300
And I know Mr. Polyev's team is taking that possibility seriously.
00:43:55.580
The question is, how does he motivate people to get to Calgary in the third week of, unless
00:43:59.080
you're planning to go to Lake Louise afterwards for ski?
00:44:02.420
I just assumed that they picked Calgary at the end of January to make sure that nobody
00:44:10.540
And of course, Doug Ford's having his convention at the same time.
00:44:12.900
So there's a counter-programming here in Ontario.
00:44:15.360
But you've got to get enough people there that, uh, that he secures that.
00:44:19.720
And that's leadership campaigns and leadership reviews are always full of plots and counter
00:44:24.920
plots and surprises and people come out of the woodwork and so forth.
00:44:28.020
I don't think they're taking any of that for granted.
00:44:31.360
Um, I think, uh, at the, yes, we come to the year end interviews and then into the pre-convention
00:44:37.420
interviews, a picture of what, uh, Polyev takes from the spring election campaign and
00:44:42.440
what's going to be different about the next election campaign to put the party on
00:44:46.780
That's the piece that I don't, I haven't quite seen yet.
00:44:49.180
It is coming to be time for him to put some of that on the record.
00:44:54.520
Um, what does he need to do in terms of building that team?
00:44:58.120
Does, you know, the leader is going to be the same as campaign manager, going to be the
00:45:08.000
I think some of the criticism is, yeah, warranted.
00:45:13.580
But I think some of it is over the top, but does she get another shot?
00:45:18.300
Well, I think she's already announced she wants to step back.
00:45:23.680
So, uh, look, uh, Jenny Burnham, Pierre, probably over in effect, sort of a box set.
00:45:30.660
I expect she'll be around and involved in the mix, but, uh, uh, uh, a bigger, broader
00:45:37.580
election team, I think is, is part of the, the, the formula for turning, uh, uh, a disappointing
00:45:45.680
And there's lots of people around that can help with that.
00:46:02.060
Please help us out by giving us a rating, leaving us a review and hitting that subscribe
00:46:20.380
Castro would end up occupying a space in the Trudeau family, similar to that of a beloved
00:46:32.920
Informal talks at an island hideaway intensified their respect for each other and their mutual
00:46:42.120
In addition to a well-publicized 1976 summit meeting, Trudeau took three separate vacations
00:46:48.140
to visit Castro after his time in politics had ended.
00:46:51.180
I can make, you know, just one reference to Pierre Trudeau's sons to show the closeness
00:47:02.660
The nickname that the Trudeau sons had for Fidel Castro was Papa Fidel.
00:47:07.040
So that gives you an indication of the closeness of the bond that existed between a communist
00:47:14.840
dictator, you know, thorn in the side of every American administration for the past 50 years
00:47:23.100
When Trudeau's youngest son, Michel, died in an avalanche in 1998, Castro called the family
00:47:31.300
As an eight-year-old, Michel had referred to Fidel Castro as his best friend.
00:47:37.140
When Pierre died, Fidel declared three days of mourning in Cuba and flew to Montreal to
00:47:43.940
Every time Trudeau went down to Cuba, all the people in South Florida, the exiles were thinking,
00:47:52.320
why is this Western leader giving comfort to a murderous dictator, you know, who is oppressing
00:47:59.680
their people in Cuba and saying, you know, good things about Fidel Castro?
00:48:03.800
And as I've mentioned, to have him in the pew at Trudeau's funeral in the front row as a dignified
00:48:13.500
person when he had been such a brutal leader says more about Pierre Trudeau than it does
00:48:24.040
Here's where we should probably touch on what Castro had done and what he was continuing
00:48:28.420
to do while going on beach vacations with the Trudeau family.
00:48:31.340
If you want to hear the rest of the story, make sure you subscribe to Canada Did What