Full Comment - Episode 1： Celina Caesar-Chavannes

00:00:00.000 Hi, I'm Anthony Fury, and welcome to the first episode of Full Comment, Postmedia's newest

00:00:17.600 podcast. We're going to be bringing you new shows every week where we talk to fascinating guests

00:00:22.500 and ask tough questions about politics, news, culture, the pandemic, and so much more.

00:00:27.340 Like today's episode, where we have a great discussion with Selina Cesar Chavan. In 2019,

00:00:33.040 she had a falling out with Justin Trudeau and quit his liberal caucus in a very public way.

00:00:37.660 So remember to keep watching for new episodes, and if you like us, tell your friends to subscribe.

00:00:42.080 Okay, let's get started. I'm really excited about our first guest because of the breadth of scope of

00:00:48.440 her story, a story, well that is her personal story, it's very unique to her, but I think it

00:00:52.540 also touches upon a number of issues that society, that Canada, that we've been discussing

00:00:57.700 the past couple of years. Some of them are hot-button issues, sometimes uncomfortable conversations

00:01:02.060 about gender, about race, about honesty in politics, and well so much more. And now for those of you

00:01:08.580 listening in Canada, when you hear me sort of list off those phrases, you might think that Prime

00:01:12.400 Minister Justin Trudeau is the rightful champion of those issues, or perhaps you think he is a bit 0.99

00:01:17.800 of a hypocrite. Well, I'm curious to hear what our guest Selina Cesar Chavan has to say about that. 0.96

00:01:22.400 Selina is a businesswoman, an entrepreneur, and was a liberal MP from 2015 to 2019. She's also now an

00:01:28.540 author with a recently released book out titled Can You Hear Me Now? Hey Selina, thanks for joining us.

00:01:35.800 Thank you for having me. How are you?

00:01:37.960 I'm doing great, thanks. How are you?

00:01:39.680 I'm good, thank you.

00:01:40.920 Yeah, I'm really looking forward to the conversation, and I think to get us started, the first kind of thing

00:01:46.260 that came to mind. You've got this new book out, and congratulations on it. And I was really

00:01:50.480 wondering about the title, Can You Hear Me Now? And I wanted to ask you what's behind that title.

00:01:56.520 Like, who is the you in that title, Can You Hear Me Now? And I guess also, you know, is it saying that

00:02:02.500 people weren't listening to you before, and they should have been? Was it that your voice was not,

00:02:08.060 you know, as loud as it should have been? Unpack the title for me, and what went into that?

00:02:11.940 Yeah, so I'll unpack the title in reverse order of the book, because I think people most recognize

00:02:17.840 me for my role in politics. So when I say, Can You Hear Me Now? That is really directed to,

00:02:23.840 you know, the prime minister, the, I think, politics in general. I mean, I was talking about

00:02:31.140 race and racism in 2018. You know, you fast forward to 2020, and everybody's talking about it. I think

00:02:39.200 that the capacity for our government during that time to show their mettle, to stand up for their

00:02:45.980 budget, to actually speak about racism in a way that wasn't performative, to speak about equity in

00:02:52.000 a way that wasn't performative, they could have done it then. And now, you know, the book is released,

00:02:57.200 it is serendipitous that it's released, you know, post 2020. And the question is, Can You Hear Me Now?

00:03:03.140 Now, the whole world is talking about something that you should have been able to be to take some

00:03:08.520 leadership on. But I think broader than just the political lens, this book is about everyone who

00:03:14.740 has been silenced, who speaks up in whispers, and is afraid that people are not going to receive their

00:03:23.340 message in a way that's impactful. And for people that are often marginalized and pushed aside,

00:03:28.460 you know, that that universal you is a nod to them to say, I feel your pain, I see your hurts,

00:03:36.280 I've experienced them. And now I'm putting them on the pages of the book. Can you hear? Can you hear

00:03:42.040 me now? So you say it's universal. I mean, I know you're particularly interested. You talk about issues

00:03:49.920 related to race, women's issues. But I think I could take what you said there about, you know, people

00:03:55.360 feeling that their voice isn't being heard, and so forth. And there's probably a whole lot of people

00:03:59.380 who for a whole variety of different reasons say, No, that's me. That's me.

00:04:03.680 Yes, yes. Yeah, for sure. You know, right now, I am I'm a senior advisor of equity, diversity and

00:04:10.060 inclusion at Queen's University. And to understand, you know, the scope within an institution like

00:04:16.400 Queen's, you hear students that are struggling, you hear, you know, staff members, faculty, parents,

00:04:23.140 students, especially during a pandemic, you get a whole scope of individuals across the age

00:04:28.600 continuum, all kinds of backgrounds that are just, they just want to be heard. And I think when you're

00:04:34.920 when we're looking at a government or our democracy to actually hear people to bring that equity to bear,

00:04:41.400 in fact, all of our institutions, it's important that we start listening and listening from a perspective

00:04:47.560 of empathy, and understanding and respect. I'm really happy to speak with you in particular,

00:04:53.340 Selena, because you and I, I'm much more conservative minded. You're obviously you were a liberal MP. And I

00:04:58.540 don't know if you consider yourself more a bit on the left end of the liberal spectrum. I won't,

00:05:03.460 of course, speak for you on that. But you know, and here we are talking, and I'm looking forward to

00:05:06.620 talking through some issues as well. But when when you say people coming to you and talking about,

00:05:11.280 you know, being heard and their voices and so forth, I mean, are, are, are people hearing each

00:05:17.320 other more right now? Are people talking to each other more right now? Are they talking to each

00:05:22.000 other less now? You know, those those opinion polls we heard from a couple years ago, I would

00:05:25.820 never have a Hillary supporter over for dinner, I would never have a Trump supporter over for dinner,

00:05:29.400 you know, that that kind of stuff. Yeah, that's a very good question. I, you know, I,

00:05:34.320 I'm hoping that the pandemic has given people a perspective of not taking that ability to have

00:05:42.880 people over for dinner for granted. Right? So so we're living in a global pandemic, we're now cut

00:05:49.200 up for cut off from everybody, we are now forced to put down those fences that we had up before

00:05:55.280 against our neighbors, and talk to them, because they might be the only people we're going to be

00:05:59.700 talking to for a while, right? You know, the little the backyard over the fence conversations

00:06:04.980 where you have to know people. So I'm hoping I'm, I'm, by nature, a very pessimistic person.

00:06:11.480 But I'm hoping that through these challenges of 2020 2021, that we start to have those more genuine

00:06:19.280 conversations, we now have the former president of the United States out of government, he was driving

00:06:24.920 a lot of that conversation, I think. And I'm not just putting the blame on him. But you know,

00:06:30.080 when you have someone in the highest power seat of power, and kind of feeds or fans the flame of

00:06:37.720 that polarization, people tend to follow suit. And I'm certainly hoping that a number of different

00:06:43.360 factors play into the fact that people start to, you know, just be a little bit kinder to each other,

00:06:48.920 it might sound simple, but I really think that that is the first step in creating equity in our world.

00:06:54.040 All right, let's go back a bit and talk a bit more about your story here, and some of the stuff

00:06:57.720 going on in the book. As you said, your experiences as a liberal MP, those four years are sort of the

00:07:02.500 the time you're most kind of publicly known for. Before that, you were accomplished as a business

00:07:07.440 woman, entrepreneur, you'd won some awards and so forth. And then you decided, I'm going to enter

00:07:12.120 politics. What was behind that decision? Because it seemed like you had some good things going on as

00:07:17.380 well. But you said, I'm going to make a change, I'm going to go in this direction now.

00:07:20.000 Yeah, so at the time that I entered into politics, I was actually running Canada's first national

00:07:28.460 epidemiology study on neurological conditions. And we were looking at the scope impact health

00:07:34.460 services and risk factors for 14 priority conditions, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, epilepsy,

00:07:41.900 you name it across the age continuum. And what we were finding, there was hundreds of researchers

00:07:48.460 across the country. But we also married into that research, the lived experience, people who had

00:07:54.000 neurological conditions and their caregivers. And what we were finding was that people had to leave

00:07:59.700 their home province, actually move out of their province, because one drug wasn't covered under one

00:08:04.860 formulary or another, or they had to get a divorce, because their income was just just high enough that 0.97

00:08:11.140 certain services weren't covered. And I thought, you know, if I get into politics, I could perhaps

00:08:18.220 create the equity that is required for people to be able to live lives without having to make such

00:08:25.000 painful decisions. And that was, I think, that impetus to get involved, you know, taking my background

00:08:33.380 in business and research and putting it together with a political lens, with a policy perspective to help

00:08:40.460 people. Okay, so you get into office 2015 majority victory for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, you're

00:08:47.020 part of this very, a lot of people celebrating that and the, you know, the because it's 2015 line

00:08:52.580 that Justin Trudeau said when we all remember him standing in front of Rideau Hall after the cabinet

00:08:57.100 being sworn in and so forth. And that that seemed like a very optimistic time. At that point, shortly

00:09:02.040 after the victory, were you optimistic that the things that you've just said now that you were going

00:09:06.420 to be able to play a major role in bringing apart, bringing about those goals?

00:09:11.980 You know, Anthony, I might sound really jaded, but right from the beginning, I started to see sort

00:09:18.940 of flaws in what I envisioned or what I was sold as a new government, government doing things

00:09:26.400 differently, bold, transformative, sunny ways. You know, they add women change politics and diversity 1.00

00:09:32.720 is our strength was our, was our, was our mantras. And even in that moment, when, you know, the because

00:09:38.620 2015, there was an opportunity to talk about things differently, even during that moment to say,

00:09:46.500 you know, it's not just because it's 2015, it's because we have really great candidates. And the second

00:09:52.720 thing was, at that moment, the Liberal Party put out a message that said that this cabinet is the face of

00:09:58.780 Canada. And I looked at it, and I thought, well, there's a lot of races, people's backgrounds that

00:10:05.620 are missing from those, you know, 30 something people that were from cabinet. So it can't possibly

00:10:11.080 just be the face of Canada. And, and most importantly, there was no black representation. 1.00

00:10:16.540 So how is that the face of Canada? And it might seem like it's something small. But for me,

00:10:20.780 standing there and watching that, you know, it's 2015, and this is the face of Canada, I thought,

00:10:25.640 no, I need to say something. And I, I, I said something publicly about it at the time.

00:10:31.360 And I realized at that moment, or somebody told me later on that that was the first strike that I

00:10:36.700 had against me. I wasn't supposed to be speaking out, I wasn't supposed to talk about these things.

00:10:42.720 But I started to see that right from the beginning.

00:10:45.020 And did somebody come back to you, like from the PMO, or somewhere in the party apparatus saying,

00:10:48.440 Selena, we heard you say this thing, can we have a word?

00:10:50.540 Yes, yes. Yeah. So, so, you know, the more I started speaking up about things, the more

00:10:57.220 it was brought to my attention, that I needed to figure out what kind of liberal I wanted to be.

00:11:05.140 The one thing, the one thing I'd credit the Prime Minister for in 2015, is there were a lot

00:11:09.940 of impressive people who who quit their day jobs or pause their day jobs to go and run for politics.

00:11:15.940 And, and, you know, you can be cynical. And there's a lot of staffers who say, okay, this is just a

00:11:20.020 gateway to get into office and so forth. But no, 2015, there was a slate of, of, of, of all of you

00:11:24.940 who were very credentialed people who ran for office. And as you said, you were doing some really

00:11:28.900 impressive research at the time. And I remember reading about all the different profiles of

00:11:32.960 people. And to your point about there being no black cabinet ministers, one liberal MP in the

00:11:37.740 Montreal area, Emmanuel de Bourg, I read his resume, and I'm like, this guy is like, super hyper

00:11:42.380 accomplished. And I think most Canadians still have not. In fact, I must confess, I'm not even

00:11:46.900 sure. I assume he ran for re-election in 2019. I don't even know the answer to that question.

00:11:50.500 And I remember saying, this is kind of an amazing resume. Maybe he doesn't do retail politics or

00:11:55.680 whatever. But I thought this guy's like, this guy's like Bill Morneau level in terms of his field and

00:11:59.380 so forth. I think most Canadians have never heard of him before. And I always thought that was kind of

00:12:02.580 odd. Like there were people who were just not a part of the decision making table.

00:12:06.080 Yes. And you know what, Emmanuel de Bourg, who was reelected, was really part of the infrastructure

00:12:13.960 that helped solidify some of the policy perspectives in that campaign. And so, you know, not seeing him

00:12:25.840 named in cabinet, he was one of the first calls I made after that, this is the face of Canada. And I

00:12:32.340 didn't really know him, but I read his resume as well. And I, I apologize. I just said, I'm so sorry

00:12:38.480 that this has happened to you. You should be there. And, and, and again, from a perspective of this is a

00:12:45.720 highly qualified, if it's just based on merit, it's a highly qualified individual who should have been

00:12:52.120 there. Granted, he wasn't. And, and I think the point is, is that if you have that self-awareness

00:13:00.200 enough to know that as a party and the people that are around you should be able to say, no,

00:13:05.160 we probably shouldn't say that this is the face of Canada because it's not. And we should, we should

00:13:11.100 try therefore to understand and to make things a little bit more equitable.

00:13:17.700 But it also, from a sort of political strategy perspective, whether it was true or not,

00:13:22.680 didn't it work? I mean, isn't that the narrative across the world that Justin Trudeau is, is sort of

00:13:27.940 the inclusion, the diversity prime minister, and all those conservatives, they're just all against

00:13:31.800 that and so forth. He gets reelected. As we speak right now, the polls suggest that he would probably

00:13:37.060 be reelected, not just with a minority, but with a majority government. So, you know, maybe not

00:13:42.680 entirely accurate, but as, as narrative, as sell, it's, it's, it's working out for them.

00:13:47.160 Yeah. And that, I think that's the challenge though, that the challenge isn't just to sell

00:13:52.920 rhetoric. That is not the job of our democracy of a G7 country. It's not just to sell rhetoric. It

00:13:59.220 should be to create policy that is going to help people. And at the end of the day, you know, like

00:14:06.080 you said, a lot of really good people quit their jobs to, to get there and to be a part of that

00:14:11.640 infrastructure. And not only were they, they selling a rhetoric around feminism and diversity,

00:14:18.440 they also had a majority government. There were things that, that were promised in that campaign

00:14:24.260 that could have been done and weren't. And we, we cannot continue to just sell rhetoric and call it

00:14:31.120 democracy. That's, that's not what this should be about. It should be about saying, look, we want to

00:14:37.800 change the way that we vote. We promise that we have a majority government. Let's make it happen.

00:14:43.280 We know that mandatory minimums are unconstitutional. They don't make Canadians any more or less safe,

00:14:49.460 but they disproportionately impact negatively black and indigenous people. Let's repeal them. 1.00

00:14:55.900 The rhetoric is not leadership. And let's unpack some of that. You're referencing electoral reform

00:15:02.020 there. I mean, personally, in my writing, my views, I did not support that campaign promise,

00:15:05.600 but I appreciate that Trudeau made it quite emphatically and many times. And then he got

00:15:10.240 the majority mandate. And I think that was probably for a lot of people, a lot of people are very

00:15:15.500 passionate about that. And on the left, I know Jack Layton was talking about that for years. So

00:15:18.560 people wanted to see it happen. Why did it not happen? Why did Trudeau abandon something that I

00:15:25.140 think he's done things that he did not have a mandate for? This is a thing as much as I don't support

00:15:29.020 that policy. He had a mandate for that. Right. And I don't really support it either. Right. Let's just be

00:15:34.700 clear. But when we talk about electoral reform, and when we talk about something that I really did

00:15:41.660 support, which is the repeal of mandatory minimums, that decision, in my opinion, and I really don't

00:15:50.140 say things that I don't have a lot of evidence on, was made because it was politically expedient.

00:15:57.500 You know, can I get reelected? Can we hold the majority? Can we still retain the power that we

00:16:04.780 have if we don't do some of these things? And I think instead of doing what they had a mandate to

00:16:11.740 do, what they promised Canadians to do, what was right by many Canadians, or what would have been

00:16:16.960 right, they thought, well, how will this poll? How will I get reelected? Is this going to work out

00:16:22.340 in my favor? And if the answer was no, then it wasn't done. And that's unfortunate.

00:16:28.980 I mean, is some of it just that while there were some highly credentialed people at the cabinet table,

00:16:33.720 the prime minister himself, and the people around him, I know they had experience, I guess,

00:16:37.860 working in Ontario government with Dalton McGinty. But these were people who perhaps just,

00:16:41.480 just, you know, made some grandiose promises and claims, and government doesn't always work that

00:16:46.280 way. So they had a problem on that. What's that term that Dominic Barton did the press conference,

00:16:50.220 did the sort of conferences on the deliverology, they had a problem with the deliverology of it.

00:16:55.400 Well, you know what, I, again, we could give the, the government of the day, especially in the 42nd

00:17:04.340 parliament, as much sort of pass as we want. But again, if these things were fundamental to the

00:17:12.420 government and fundamental to the prime minister, they would have been done. I think the buck stops

00:17:19.640 with him, he is the elected official, irrespective of who is around him, in terms of PMO, the buck

00:17:26.040 stops with him, in terms of making those decisions. And quite frankly, I don't think he had or has the

00:17:33.040 leadership capacity to, to do to have done so.

00:17:36.080 What is fundamental to Justin Trudeau? I've noticed that he used to say, women's issues when he did his

00:17:42.400 statements about any sort of debate or press conference, he'd bring women's issues to the

00:17:46.980 four. And he talked about that quite a lot for quite a few years. Now the phrase green usually

00:17:51.740 comes first, we're going to make a Canada that is greener, and then he goes on fair and whatever

00:17:55.440 the phrases are, but greener is usually the first one. What are those the things that is core to him?

00:18:02.460 I don't even know if it's core, if you're able to flip flop on, you know, the issue of the day.

00:18:07.640 You know, if, if, if the issue of if the issue is, you know, feminism, one minute green in the next, 1.00

00:18:14.640 all of those are related to a foundational principle of equity. We know that people are who are

00:18:20.400 disproportionately impacted by, by, you know, a pandemic by climate change by inequality,

00:18:28.300 are often women, children, racialized individuals, people with disabilities,

00:18:33.640 different sexual orientation. If his baseline principles are about equity, he would be

00:18:40.340 speaking to that all the time, he wouldn't just jump back and forth related to what is the flavor

00:18:46.020 of the day. And again, I'm going to use the word performative. That is what happens when somebody

00:18:51.860 does not have the leadership capacity to be grounded in something that will carry them forward, no matter

00:18:58.320 what. One thing that I always remember Jason Kenney saying a year or two ago, and he got in big trouble

00:19:04.320 for it, is he said that Justin Trudeau was never considered the brightest bulb in parliament when

00:19:08.680 he was an MP said something along those lines, you know, and it's true before he became liberal

00:19:12.220 leader, he never actually introduced any private members bills. He never gave any of those, you know,

00:19:16.160 great speeches, one gives it a security conference or a think tank or, or what have you. And he didn't

00:19:20.900 serve, I think he was the critic for sport or something under, I guess, Bob Ray's brief leadership.

00:19:25.420 Other than that, he didn't really serve in any sort of weighty critic positions. And I guess,

00:19:30.320 you know, that drives me to think, well, it drives me to think, how did he become, you know,

00:19:33.680 prime minister in the first place, but I guess, you know, what are those core issues that were

00:19:37.860 driving him in advance of that? What was the kind of, whatever term you want to use, political

00:19:42.140 perspective, foundational principles, ideology, what was brought to the table? What did you feel was,

00:19:47.080 was, was the thing that brought all the candidates together in 2015?

00:19:50.980 Well, I mean, we were sold a really good bag of goods around, you know, doing politics differently.

00:19:58.960 And I really think for me, anyhow, that was a really strong message. Can't Canadians were tired 0.90

00:20:06.020 of Harper, whether that's true or not, it clearly was with a majority mandate, we wanted to do politics

00:20:13.300 differently, we were going to be bold and transformative. It seemed like something where I could use my skill

00:20:19.200 set to be able to influence and transform government and to transform the outcomes of government. And

00:20:26.920 when you think about this, Anthony, I want you to think about when we introduced those small business

00:20:31.180 tax credits, those tax changes, and the absolute fiasco that was, you know, Bill Monroe ended up having

00:20:38.820 to backpedal on some of it, he had to change it around, you have 180 plus bright individuals around

00:20:46.220 the in your caucus, and you introduce those kinds of tax changes. I want I want you to really think,

00:20:52.500 do you think that those tax changes actually went through caucus with all of those business

00:20:57.200 entrepreneurs, all of those people in a way that was deliberate and intentional? I don't think so.

00:21:04.060 And I could tell you that it wasn't. So when when we talk about, you know, Kenny saying that he's not

00:21:09.560 the brightest bulb, I'm not sure if it's the brightest bulb, because I do think he's see smart.

00:21:13.580 I don't think that he has the capacity, the leadership capacity to be able to say I am not

00:21:19.940 the smartest guy in the room. And therefore, I'm going to leverage other people that are with that

00:21:26.000 are with me. So that's, that's a leadership skill. That's a emotional intelligence skill. That is the

00:21:32.080 capacity to have self awareness. And in my opinion, that is lacking. And you know, people might listen to

00:21:39.960 this and say, Oh, my God, she spent so much time criticizing him. He is the leader of a g seven 1.00

00:21:44.720 country. He is not the barista at the coffee shop. He is the leader of a g seven country. So you better

00:21:50.960 believe I'm going to push him to have some self awareness to create some policy that is going to

00:21:55.460 actually help people. Speaking about using your skill set, then you were after getting in after

00:22:00.140 winning in 2015, you became a parliamentary secretary on on two different portfolios. What, what did you

00:22:07.420 think that experience would be going into it? And what did it prove to be?

00:22:14.060 So the first one was the parliamentary secretary to the prime minister, I went in, and the first

00:22:21.840 meeting I had with the prime minister was in December 2015. And I said to him, let me be clear

00:22:27.920 on a couple of things. I don't want to be appointed to your to tap this appointment to fill any racial or

00:22:34.940 gender gaps. I am, I have business background, I research background, I'm smart. And therefore,

00:22:41.560 I would like to be leveraged for that capacity. That was not the case. I developed a framework,

00:22:48.220 I developed milestones, initiatives that I wanted to complete, objectives that were in line with the

00:22:55.180 principles of the government. And none of those were taken into account. And in fact, the three times

00:23:02.400 that I was tagged to represent the prime minister at an international and international events, they

00:23:08.160 were all black focused, I was told I was not to speak in the House of Commons to answer questions

00:23:15.080 during question period that were directed to the prime minister or any questions related to that

00:23:20.100 portfolio in general. There was, there was a lot of tape over my mouth and handcuffs on my wrist.

00:23:29.140 And so that position was one that I was more than willing to, to let go of.

00:23:35.840 So he only wanted you or the prime minister's office only wanted you to go to events and speak

00:23:41.000 at things that were directly sort of black community occasions and activities.

00:23:45.020 Focus. Yes. And it wasn't, I wasn't speaking at anything. I was just showing up. I did not have,

00:23:51.980 aside from the trip that I took to Ghana, which was in 2016, at the beginning of 2016,

00:23:59.020 which I believe because they knew that were switching me to international development,

00:24:02.860 I was sent there. But the other two events, there were no meetings. There were no outside

00:24:08.700 meetings other than attending the state visit to Washington, in which I was not invited to the

00:24:14.200 state dinner or any other meetings, just the meeting with the president on the South Lawn

00:24:18.580 and the opening of the African American museum in Washington. Again, no other meetings are tied to

00:24:25.460 that itinerary. It was a fly down, sit in the seat, get up, fly home.

00:24:30.680 So you said to him in December, 2015, I don't want to be a token basically. And they said,

00:24:35.260 okay, we still want you in this role. And then they proceeded to do just that.

00:24:40.000 And then they proceeded to do just that. Exactly.

00:24:42.940 And I understand you called him on it. I called him on it a few times. Yes. It is the most

00:24:51.120 embarrassingly hurtful feeling to know that you are as skilled, you're smart, you're able to think

00:25:00.360 strategically, and to then be diminished to a sitting bobblehead and at taxpayer's expense.

00:25:08.580 And so the message I sent was, this job isn't worth the $16,000 extra that you're paying me,

00:25:15.540 get rid of it. And in fact, after I left the position, it wasn't filled until, I mean,

00:25:21.080 a couple of weeks ago, when Greg Fergus was appointed as his parliamentary secretary.

00:25:28.180 Now, let's move forward a good few months here. The thing that, you know, is kind of the main

00:25:33.020 meat and potatoes, the main drama of your book, and of course, your story,

00:25:36.080 that very, very vibrant confrontation that you and the prime minister had, where you finally,

00:25:41.840 well, you called him out on all of this, but you explained it had gotten to a point where you had to

00:25:45.000 say, sorry, I'm gonna have to sit as an independent, and I'm not going to run again as a liberal.

00:25:50.200 Right. Yeah, you know, in as much as I had many examples, so 2016 was the year I was tokenized.

00:26:00.580 I could sum them up. 2017, I was excluded from every single conversation related to domestic

00:26:10.180 investments in Black communities. I was not invited to a single meeting related to the 2018 budget or

00:26:17.780 to the recognition of the UN decade for people of African descent. Of course, in 2018, everybody knows

00:26:24.300 I was gaslit for talking about racism. Again, my party did not step in to offer any assistance.

00:26:32.100 And so by 2019, I, you know, you would think that I wasn't naive about the ways of the prime minister,

00:26:38.800 the PMO. And I called as a courtesy call to let them know that I wasn't going to be running again.

00:26:45.100 Clearly, I wasn't fitting into a liberal framework. So I thought, you know, let me just leave kind of

00:26:51.740 quietly. I got on the phone. And, you know, he starts off by saying that I can't make an announcement

00:27:00.660 that I'm leaving, because he cannot have two powerful women of color leave on the same day, 0.98

00:27:06.900 Jodi Wilson-Rainbolt resigned that same day. And I thought, is he kidding? And then he went on to say

00:27:14.220 that, you know, I didn't appreciate him. I didn't, I keep, you know, people keep talking to him about

00:27:20.860 his privilege, which I never did in that phone call, literally just said, I'm going to announce

00:27:26.420 that I'm not running again. And then this, this, you know, outpouring of, of his resentment to that

00:27:34.540 came out. And yeah, I actually thought that Anthony, during that call, he was going to say,

00:27:41.880 Selena, thank you for the work that you've done. I wish I could convince you to make a different

00:27:46.040 decision. I wish that you would stay. None of that. No gratitude. I was, it was the most,

00:27:52.280 it was one of the most hurtful things. And I say that because, you know, people should, you know,

00:27:56.820 I'm sure most people would say, Selena, you know, just get over it. But it was, it was hurtful. You 0.91

00:28:02.040 work for years, you're talking about issues that normally are not spoken up about. I'm speaking up

00:28:08.680 about issues. Clearly the liberals are getting a following in, you know, the conversations that I'm

00:28:14.920 having, cause I'm gaining a following. You're thinking, I'm thinking that this is beneficial.

00:28:19.480 They're still not, they're helping me. And then I get, you should be grateful to me as if I didn't

00:28:27.700 work for four years. And that was, I think the worst part of the, the four years that I was there.

00:28:38.280 What happened then with you and your colleagues in caucus and the other cabinet members? Did they,

00:28:42.980 how many people reached out to you and, and, and said, you know, we acknowledge your work and we're

00:28:47.480 sorry to see you go. How many sort of, okay, the PMO is not crazy about it right now. Let's kind of

00:28:52.080 give her the cold shoulder, that sort of thing. How did that equation balance out?

00:28:56.020 So, you know what, I actually kept that really quiet. Nobody knew anything about the phone call.

00:29:01.540 Nobody knew about my decision to leave. The first, the first call was made to the whip and to the,

00:29:07.260 to the prime minister. So I kept that quiet. And most of my colleagues didn't know anything.

00:29:12.980 And I was very clear to say that my issues for leaving were not the same as Jody Wilson-Raybould's.

00:29:19.620 The, the, the tipping point for me, Anthony, was when, when it did get mixed up with Jody Wilson-Raybould

00:29:29.100 was when, you know, there were these anonymous messages and reports that said, you know,

00:29:35.980 Jody wasn't a team player. She was, you know, whatever. I found it very interesting that our,

00:29:42.220 our party had spent so much time being feminist, so much time talking about, believe her. We had

00:29:50.480 just come through a Me Too movement, right? Believe her, believe women when they say they're bullied 0.98

00:29:54.760 and harassed. And I found it interesting that, you know, they could believe her when it was convenient

00:29:59.940 and leave her when it was not. And I speak about, you know, my, you know, principles and values that

00:30:07.760 drives me. My values of the things that I stand for, when I say that I'm a, I'm a feminist, I, I believe

00:30:15.280 in intersectional feminism. It is a foundational principle of mine. And when I saw that I was part

00:30:21.480 of a party that claimed to be feminist, but didn't actually practice it, that is when, when things 1.00

00:30:29.100 were exposed. That's when I spoke up about what was happening. And that's when I chose to then sit

00:30:34.880 as an independent.

00:30:36.360 My guest today is Selena Cesar Chavan, author of the newly released book, Can You Hear Me Now?

00:30:41.040 Selena, you know, really interesting stuff that brings us here to, I guess, March 2019, when you

00:30:46.400 made that decision to run as an independent and then, sorry, not to run, but to stay as an independent

00:30:51.440 up until the next election. There's about six months from March until that election. And a lot

00:30:57.720 of things happening that time, including during that election, suddenly news drops one night,

00:31:02.580 Justin Trudeau, look at this picture. Here he is in blackface, not as a 14 year old when people do 0.91

00:31:08.720 really stupid things or an 18 year old or 28 year old, one picture, two picture, three pictures. How many 0.97

00:31:13.600 prime minister? I don't know, not exactly sure, maybe three rounding up, who knows? What did you

00:31:18.460 think about during that whole affair as really the world was weighing in on that?

00:31:24.700 Yeah, you know, what I thought, I shouldn't have been surprised. I still was, I still was surprised.

00:31:34.040 Again, he was an adult, and he's also the leader of a G7 country. However, my thoughts weren't

00:31:41.300 directly to Justin Trudeau. As I said, I don't think he has a self awareness to actually figure

00:31:46.900 that out and the impact of that. So I actually was thinking about my community, the black community

00:31:55.080 in particular, and to individuals who are allies who are going to be completely devastated by this,

00:32:03.360 this news. And so, Anthony, you know, I sent a letter to PMO. And I said, that I said, you cannot

00:32:13.780 just, you cannot have the prime minister just apologize for this. That would be that that is

00:32:20.800 not the way to go. What he needs to do is not only apologize, but do what you do with children.

00:32:25.660 Say, what did you learn? And how are you going to make this better? So he was in Manitoba at the

00:32:31.120 Museum of Human Rights at the time, I said in the in the email, what you can do is have the prime

00:32:38.020 minister say what he's learned, meaning talk about the fact that minstrel shows were rampant in the

00:32:44.760 prairies in Canada. And start that learning moment that everybody was like, this is a learning moment

00:32:51.220 for everybody. No, start that learning moment for Canadians who don't know, including the prime

00:32:56.420 minister. Start there. Talk to Canadians about how how prominent they were. Talk to Canadians about

00:33:02.960 how they dehumanize black bodies by doing that. And then say what you are going to do to fix it.

00:33:09.380 Hold yourself accountable for your actions. He did neither of those. And again, naively enough,

00:33:17.780 thought that maybe this was the turning point. Maybe this was the moment where he would show his

00:33:22.100 medal. And it did not happen. This is one of those issues. I think it frustrated so many people

00:33:30.160 who yes, thought it was a bad thing to do. But also, it frustrated them that they knew if it had

00:33:36.900 been them, they would be out of a job for it. They would be toast. Now, Justin Trudeau doesn't answer

00:33:42.960 to anyone except the voters who chose to reelect him. And there was a major frustration around that.

00:33:48.320 And I guess that brings us into and in your book and things you've advocated for issues around,

00:33:54.040 you know, gender issues and race issues and so forth. There's a lot of, I guess I'll just say

00:33:58.880 cancel culture around the periphery in terms of, you know, if people say the wrong things,

00:34:02.720 if they misstep in that, I mean, those are landmines, they're walking on eggshells and so forth.

00:34:07.220 What does it mean that that other people certainly would have been persona non grata

00:34:11.980 after that had happened? Is it right for that? Was it if Justin Trudeau had just said,

00:34:16.500 I did something really bad? And we will, he did say that part, but then also went on to say the

00:34:20.320 teachable stuff, as you said, does that it doesn't make the original thing? Okay, of course, but

00:34:24.540 is that how society should be heading? Should people be be losing everything because of these

00:34:30.980 really dumb juvenile things they do? Well, he didn't lose everything. 0.98

00:34:35.720 But but but but other people as well. I mean, taking us from the Trudeau conversation

00:34:39.060 to I know these broader issues that that I know you also speak about.

00:34:42.320 Right. So yeah, so I actually had a Instagram conversation about this within the last 24 hours

00:34:48.180 and said, No, I certainly don't believe that that people should lose everything for the mistakes that

00:34:55.040 they made. I mean, read my book, I give a whole lifetime of mistakes in my books, things I feel

00:35:00.460 guilty about shameful hurt about, I should have been canceled a long time ago. I but I think we should

00:35:06.920 enter these things with a degree of grace and empathy. And I always operate from that space.

00:35:12.980 And hence the reason sending that note to PMO, irrespective of all the stuff I'd been through

00:35:19.360 the years before, still saying, Look, your community needs you to understand how this works.

00:35:24.440 I want to take a moment, though, to talk about the other side of cancel culture, when we talk about,

00:35:29.740 you know, black history or indigenous history, you know,

00:35:34.700 when we think about how certain cultures have been canceled, we do need to talk residential schools,

00:35:44.960 erasing, you know, indigenous culture from from indigenous communities, the fact that our textbooks

00:35:51.260 have very little about the contribution of black communities to this country. I think when we when

00:35:56.940 we if we're not having a comprehensive conversation about cancel culture in a way that's empathetic in

00:36:04.860 a way that we could say, how do we correct this? How do we do this? Right? How do we hold people to

00:36:11.700 account without destroying them completely? I think that's a different conversation to be having.

00:36:17.560 Um, I've never really heard the term used that way before. So so you're saying cancel culture is a

00:36:23.420 bigger thing than usually it's lamented that sort of conservatives or politically incorrect people,

00:36:27.880 you know, say something, okay, you said the homophobic joke, you know, you probably shouldn't say that.

00:36:31.880 But you know, guy doesn't need to lose everything for it kind of thing. But more that there's there's

00:36:35.560 a much broader spectrum of cancel culture going on.

00:36:38.360 There's a much broader spectrum. And we're we're focusing in on these,

00:36:43.040 these issues that I'm sure if everybody were to record their actions on a daily basis,

00:36:49.760 we would all be canceled. Like that's the that's the common denominator, there is there is broader

00:36:55.820 issues here. And I don't really get into these debates about cancel culture, because clearly it

00:37:02.260 works for some and it doesn't work for others. And some people are protected. And some it's it's it's

00:37:07.420 a nonsense game. It's a you can't win in this game. Let's have a more broader a adult conversation

00:37:14.680 about this and and not do we really need to demolish people's careers?

00:37:20.460 That was the whole that was the whole blackface photos, though. It was obviously that somebody had

00:37:24.800 dug all this up, got it to media. And I guess what was it Time magazine or whatnot was the one who

00:37:28.400 first posted it and so forth. And it's the same thing, whether it's Prime Minister or whoever,

00:37:33.140 you know, I'm sure when you ran for office, the local conservative campaigns,

00:37:36.620 oh, we're gonna go back on her Facebook and see if she said this rude word or that rude 1.00

00:37:39.580 word I run for office, they're gonna do the same for me, I go back on all your columns

00:37:42.640 and so forth. I mean, that's just kind of the game. And it kind of it gets like, I feel

00:37:46.480 like it gets weaker sauce more and more. It's now like things people because you know, now

00:37:50.160 we're at the age where people had Facebook and Twitter when they were like 14 and so

00:37:54.380 forth, because it's been around for 10 years. So we can get those things they said there

00:37:57.620 and people now we have the young lady. She's the editor of what was it Teen Vogue? She was a 0.86

00:38:02.020 young black lady. And she made some inappropriate remarks when she was a teenager. I guess 1.00

00:38:05.560 she'd already apologized for them. And I just look at this, I go, good grief. Like, you

00:38:09.860 know, everybody's dropping like flies over this stuff.

00:38:12.640 Yeah, yeah. And is that what we want, though? And it goes back to that conversation about

00:38:18.180 empathy. Like, do we do we can we not see ourselves in making these mistakes? Can we not

00:38:24.200 see ourselves in possibly doing something that was dumb? You know, and again, I guess I think 0.96

00:38:31.760 I'm pretty sure that this is why I sent that note to the prime minister. Look, I'm not going

00:38:36.880 to further indict you, nor do I need to accept your apology. I mean, I don't have to do either

00:38:41.900 of those. But what needs to happen is that you need to hold yourself accountable. That is it's not

00:38:48.460 should he be canceled? Should he be the next prime minister? Should he not? That's not the question.

00:38:53.560 The question is, again, you are the leader of a G7 country. Can you use this moment to do something

00:39:00.420 bigger than just say, I'm sorry? And and for for him not to do that, it says to me that you lack

00:39:10.040 the self awareness, you lack the leadership capacity to be able to do something. And that

00:39:15.860 doesn't sit well with me. The bigger question on that front is, should you still lead? And my answer

00:39:23.720 to that is, is no. I want to go back, I want to go back to last summer. And I know you've written

00:39:30.740 about this a lot. You've talked about it a lot, where there were obviously a lot of conversations

00:39:34.140 about race going on the killing of George Floyd, which obviously became much bigger than just that

00:39:39.360 one, one incident became a flashpoint for so much more. And there were many things going on, I guess

00:39:45.220 my way into this, although let's talk about, you know, all different angles of it. But when we talk

00:39:49.200 about having empathy and so forth, well, there was a lot of, you know, there's a lot of cancel going

00:39:53.240 on. There's a lot of eggshells. I still remember Stockwell Day going on CBC. And there is a panel

00:39:59.060 conversation, I guess he was regularly on this panel. And they said, is the RCMP systemically

00:40:02.800 racist? And I guess most panelists said yes. Stockwell Day said no. And then he's off CBC

00:40:07.680 permanently, I guess. And then he lost a board of directorship or something like that. I'm sure he's,

00:40:12.320 you know, got a lot of money. I'm not feeling sorry for the guy in that regard. But still,

00:40:15.500 as someone who's who's out and about in, you know, the public airwaves, I go radio and television,

00:40:19.200 and that whole thing, it made me kind of like, what? What, you know, what is going on here?

00:40:23.620 We're not allowed to talk about, you know, this or that. I mean, he didn't do something

00:40:27.380 outrageously offensive, or maybe, you know, you think he did. What are your thoughts on,

00:40:31.660 I guess, specifically that incident, but how that relates to the macro, how that relates to

00:40:36.160 us actually being able to honestly have these conversations?

00:40:39.780 Well, that's the key word, honestly have these conversations. So, I mean, I think there's a

00:40:45.480 certain degree of responsibility that goes when you have a certain degree of privilege and power.

00:40:50.940 And if you're going to use that privilege and power to further create inequity within a system,

00:41:00.100 then do you really need it? Like, you know, it's an interesting conversation.

00:41:07.240 You have the capacity to be on the airwaves to use your power and your privilege to create something

00:41:15.580 that is right, that is meaningful, and you're dismissing it.

00:41:19.720 Well, they asked him a yes or no question. Are CMP systemically racist? And he went for the no

00:41:24.460 kind of thing. It's like, well, don't ask him the question if you're going to can the guy based on,

00:41:28.420 you know, giving one or two of the answers kind of thing.

00:41:32.120 Right. Well, I mean, I, my answer to that would, based on a number of different testimony,

00:41:40.260 a number of different incidents that have come forward is, is yes, sexism and racism exist

00:41:46.720 in that institution. I cannot speak to, to, to Stockwell Day and, you know, him believing the,

00:41:55.900 the opposite to that. And again, I, I believe that when you have that power and that privilege to,

00:42:03.920 to investigate something and look into it to make it right, or to hopefully change the tide that you

00:42:11.500 would do that. How do we then approach those conversations without people being, having so

00:42:20.760 many kinds of filters and, and again, walking on eggshells that they go, you know what? I don't want

00:42:25.500 to, I just don't want to, I'm not going to talk about it. I'm not going to let, I just want to

00:42:28.860 ghost away from it. Cause I don't know what's going to happen to me kind of thing.

00:42:31.920 Yeah. Well, we need to realize that people are going to in this work. So I do this, as I said,

00:42:37.020 I do this work with Queens. And one of the things that I say is we are going to make mistakes in

00:42:41.660 this work. It is a thankless job. When we're talking about pushing for equity, we're going to make

00:42:46.660 mistakes. I may, may have made, you know, 10 to 15 in the last 45 minutes that somebody will call me

00:42:52.600 out on, you know, you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't. And so I, again, I,

00:42:58.900 I think it boils down to just having that understanding that we're going, if we are

00:43:04.540 striving towards this, if we have the intention is to strive towards equity and we're acting on

00:43:10.860 that in good faith, there are chances that we're going to make some mistakes. Again, does that mean

00:43:16.100 that people need to be crucified at the stake? I don't think so. I actually, I really don't.

00:43:23.300 Otherwise I would have said, burn them at the stake, leave the prime minister. Like I would 0.98

00:43:28.100 have come out swinging. I didn't really say anything publicly during that time because I knew the

00:43:35.120 influence that that could have. I really wanted the prime minister to make that, that moment,

00:43:40.120 something real for communities. And I know you're talking about Stockwell Day here. I don't really

00:43:44.460 have an opinion one way or another. I just don't think that people should, should have to lose their

00:43:50.760 everything because of a comment that they made. Again, if people read my book, they would say Selina

00:43:59.020 should have been canceled a long time ago. She should have never been in politics, let alone the 0.69

00:44:03.180 parliamentary secretary to the prime minister. You know, people make mistakes, good grief, get over it.

00:44:09.320 And speaking of the book, you can find Selina Cesar Chavan's new book, Can You Hear Me Now? It's

00:44:14.200 available now and online everywhere and in, in bookstores. Selina, before we go here, well, where

00:44:19.780 do we go now in terms of these conversations, in terms of the prime minister getting, getting more

00:44:25.340 honest about these things that you've critiqued him for maybe being a little bit of a phony on? How do,

00:44:29.640 how do we have these conversations where, where people are walking on eggshells over some people,

00:44:34.680 you know, I don't know about that. I'm nervous about it. Other people, you know,

00:44:37.720 very passionate in their activism for it. How do people sort of come together? And how do you get

00:44:42.160 that, that, that productive path forward? Because there's obviously a lot of people sometimes quite

00:44:45.940 literally out in the streets at loggerheads with each other these days. Yeah, you know what,

00:44:50.600 Robert Livingston, who's a professor at Harvard Kennedy School, put out a report in September of

00:44:56.460 2020. And I hate to make this academic, but it really boils down to something quite simple.

00:45:01.200 That's, that looked at how to create racial equity and just racial equity in the workplace,

00:45:07.320 right? And he said, you know, we have to understand, he uses a program called the press

00:45:12.180 model, P-R-E-S-S. The P is understanding the problem. The R is understanding the root of the 0.98

00:45:18.340 problem. I'll skip the E for a second. The first S is putting together a strategy. And the second S is

00:45:24.760 saying, you know, put some sacrifice into it. Of course, there's going to be resources.

00:45:27.800 The middle of that, the E on that is empathy. And again, it seems really simple and really

00:45:34.240 intuitive. But we cannot expect to come together on an issue as divisive as racial inequity is,

00:45:45.200 if we continue to say, well, it's them and us, what, you know, it's, it's us and them. Well,

00:45:51.120 I don't see anything that they have that I have. What the thing that is common to all of us is our

00:45:56.440 capacity to be empathetic. So I'm actually, Anthony, looking to, to, to change my, my,

00:46:03.980 to study my, my PhD thesis on equity and, and empathy, because I think it is so fundamentally

00:46:12.940 critical to how we move forward, how we think about equity in a different way. And it is common

00:46:20.460 to everybody. And it's, again, it's quite simple. But if we really think about putting ourselves in

00:46:25.940 each other's shoes, just even for a moment, I think we could do a lot, a lot of good.

00:46:31.420 To what degree is there an agree to disagree kind of component, but still forging ahead? For instance,

00:46:36.720 you know, when I see people protesting in the streets about their very earnestly felt experiences

00:46:41.160 and emotions about injustice and so forth, I'm, I have no problem with that. I support them. I,

00:46:45.400 you know, I want, I want good things for them, but I also knowing the sort of specific requests of

00:46:50.940 Black Lives Matter as a formal organization and around, you know, defunding the police and so

00:46:55.260 forth, those requests they've made, I do not support those requests. So I support a lot of the, you know,

00:47:00.380 a lot of the broader sort of issues and passions behind it, but there's also some of the more

00:47:04.260 organized stuff that, that, that I don't support, but I don't want that to mean then, you know,

00:47:08.900 baby out with the bathwater, let's just not talk about these things.

00:47:11.660 Right. And that, that's the challenge, right? So how do you say I support, but I don't support

00:47:16.840 this. And because there isn't that capacity to say, look, we're going to agree to disagree.

00:47:22.640 And if we get to a point where we cannot say that Anthony, we are doomed because we need to have all

00:47:30.500 of those conversations at the table to put forward good policy, to put forward good legislation, or to

00:47:35.400 have critically thinking people in conversations. So we should be able to do that. And again,

00:47:43.400 we've come through an era of, of, of hyper-polarization in our political world that I

00:47:49.760 think has spilled over into our everyday practices. And we need to realign that back that needs to come

00:47:56.580 back. And it needs to come back in a way that everybody sees themselves as part of a solution,

00:48:01.840 as opposed to us versus them anymore.

00:48:05.560 Selina Cesar-Chavan, businesswoman, entrepreneur, liberal MP from 2015, 2019, author of the new book,

00:48:11.360 Can You Hear Me Now? Thanks so much for joining me today. I really appreciate it, Selina.

00:48:15.100 Thank you, Anthony. And thank you to your listeners as well.

00:48:19.240 Full Comment with Anthony Fury is a post-media podcast. This episode was produced by Andre Pru with

00:48:25.120 theme music by Bryce Hall. Kevin Libin is the executive producer. Thanks to our guests,

00:48:30.140 author and former MP, Selina Cesar-Chavan. The host is Anthony Fury. Thanks for listening.

Full Comment - April 26, 2021

Episode 1： Celina Caesar-Chavannes

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