Aaron O'Toole has served in the Canadian Armed Forces, worked as a lawyer, and became an MP in 2012, serving as a cabinet minister in the previous Conservative government. He joins us now to talk about his vision for Canada.
00:02:15.880the separation party from Quebec, was not an official party in Ottawa. Now it's the third party.
00:02:22.440It has more seats than the NDP. There were no separation movements in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
00:02:28.840There are now. There are literally people giving up on the country because of Mr. Trudeau's kind of
00:02:35.300Ottawa knows best, ideological approach. I often talk about my first public event when I was running
00:02:41.540for leader. My first question in Nisku, Alberta came from a Canadian Armed Forces veteran who thanked
00:02:48.460me for my service. And then he said, Mr. O'Toole, I've served 29 years for Canada and I'm giving up on
00:02:54.360the country because of what Mr. Trudeau's done to my province. Wow, that punched me right in the face,
00:02:59.420Anthony. A veteran who had Canada on his sleeve for his entire career was losing faith in our
00:03:05.140great country because of a politician in Ottawa. So we have to tackle this. I'm a patriot. I think
00:03:12.020Canada is a great country. We have our challenges. We have our inequities. But you have to love your
00:03:18.500country to dig deep to build it and to address those challenges. And I want to bring the country
00:03:24.660together. Canada's recovery plan will do that. And I'll tell you, national unity is a real risk
00:03:31.840if Mr. Trudeau wins again. So last time around, we did not have this new political party called the
00:03:37.620Maverick Party, where there are some people mostly in Central Canada, Western Canada, who are saying
00:03:42.260we're really upset because of Western alienation. What is your message to people who are very upset with
00:03:47.300Western issues? And you're saying, well, no, please, you know, we are the solution, the Conservative
00:03:51.120Party. Well, I'm upset and have been talking about this for years. In fact, my speech to that
00:03:58.980veteran in NISCU, Alberta, Anthony, was because I launched my campaign to lead the Conservative Party,
00:04:04.460not in Bowmanville, Ontario, where I'm very proud to have grown up, but in Calgary. I went to address
00:04:10.060those issues right away. My first phone call with Justin Trudeau, hours after I won the leadership,
00:04:15.660he tried to make it sort of congrats, hope the families well. I said, Prime Minister, there's something
00:04:19.660I want to talk about is Western alienation. And what anyone that is so frustrated like that veteran
00:04:26.500and NISCU, don't let your frustration lead you to make a dumb decision. And I said that dumb, because you'll
00:04:34.580help Mr. Trudeau. So the frustration comes from from Justin Trudeau's attacks on the energy sector, his kind
00:04:42.120of, you know, arrogance in terms of forgetting about Western Canada, even missing Alberta when he was celebrating
00:04:48.700Canada's 150th anniversary as a country. There's a sense that Mr. Trudeau doesn't care about large parts
00:04:56.840of the country. I do. I've lived and served in all parts of it. And so the way to tackle that is not to
00:05:04.440let your frustrations bubble over and incidentally help Justin Trudeau. It's getting behind our Conservative
00:05:11.720Party, Canada's recovery plan, and using our incredible democracy to get rid of a Prime
00:05:18.400Minister who is divisive, who is unethical, who has no plan for the future. And that's what I'm
00:05:23.720offering. What are some of the things in the platform in your recovery plan that will deal with
00:05:28.840a lot of those Western challenges, particularly, of course, the oil and gas sector, a lot of people
00:05:32.860very frustrated at the Liberal government's position towards that Justin Trudeau's gaffe, or maybe it
00:05:37.740wasn't a gaffe, maybe it was what he really feels about how you need to phase out that industry.
00:05:42.720Well, he's had several Cabinet members, either just before they were elected or since, talk about
00:05:48.520transitioning that entire industry, transitioning hundreds of thousands of people, taking away one
00:05:54.240of the biggest drivers of our economic success in the last few generations, Anthony. So my first trip,
00:06:00.740once COVID allowed me to travel again, I went out to Calgary and announced an equalization rebate
00:06:07.640type program by fixing fiscal stabilization. We need to make sure that the equalization process
00:06:16.440is fair by addressing the fact that when resource revenues drop off dramatically, you shouldn't have
00:06:23.000provinces like Alberta, Saskatchewan, Newfoundland, and Labrador continuing to overpay into that system.
00:06:29.560So I announced an equalization rebate. I've also said in our first 100 days, we will eliminate
00:06:36.360the ideological attacks Mr. Trudeau leveled on Western Canada, Bill C-69, making it impossible,
00:06:43.820not just to get a pipeline approved, to get any large project approved in any sector under this
00:06:49.860program. It's led to literally $160 billion in jobs and investment leaving Canada before COVID.
00:06:58.420We would reverse his point on the tanker van. We would stand up against illegal rail blockades that
00:07:04.420were targeting critical pieces of infrastructure, hurting working Canadians. So we have a very ambitious
00:07:12.980agenda to address some of the destructive elements of the economic policy of Mr. Trudeau that has led
00:07:19.140to division. I'm also very proud of our energy sector and its leadership on environmental social
00:07:25.620governance, ESG, and Indigenous partnership leadership. You know, Suncor, for example, spends about $900
00:07:33.620million a year through Indigenous-led supply chain companies. When Mr. Trudeau cancels willy-nilly projects,
00:07:42.500he's actually hurting Indigenous economic reconciliation. So I'm going to really try and
00:07:48.580talk about the positives of our national resource sector. And I think the world, if they want to
00:07:54.220consume any type of resource, energy, rare earth minerals for a Tesla, softwood lumber, Canada should
00:08:01.560be the ESG leader in the world. And I will stand up for that on global trade discussions.
00:08:09.020Aaron, let me also ask you, though, two issues here when it comes to division. We've got
00:08:11.920Canada's first peoples and prosperity, of course, you're referencing that. And then
00:08:15.600we have recently this Don't Celebrate Canada Day. We got a teardown statues of Sir John A. Macdonald,
00:08:20.980even one of the famous five, one of the ladies in the person's case. What is your message about that?
00:08:27.200Well, my message has been clear. I think you have to love the country if you're going to dig down and
00:08:32.400commit to making it even better to tackle these issues. I said this in a public speech. I invited the
00:08:38.200media into our last caucus meeting before the summer, where I said we should celebrate Canada
00:08:43.080Day. Canada, in my view, is the greatest country in the world. Are we perfect? No. But millions of
00:08:50.180people have come to build Canada based on the liberties we've provided, the opportunity we
00:08:55.420provide. And if you measure us up alongside any other country, I think we fare well. And we care
00:09:02.180to make ourselves better. So if we're really going to tackle the frustration and pain that the graves at
00:09:10.140former residential school sites evoke in us, in Kamloops and Cowessess, I visited Cowessess,
00:09:16.460I've spoken to the chiefs, we have to recommit to what our country truly is, which is a land of
00:09:22.680opportunity for everyone and make sure we're ensuring that it lives up to that. And I'll tell you,
00:09:29.080you know, Anthony, I've been talking about this, this idea of presentism, judging the past by the
00:09:36.300moral standards of today. That is a slippery slope. I said that years ago, when Mr. Trudeau took the
00:09:42.140name off of the Langevin building, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission itself said, you have to
00:09:48.500learn from your history in order to go forward and address wrongs and injustices of the past. In fact,
00:09:55.760at the core of reconciliation, Anthony, is reconcile past with present and future. So I love Canada, I
00:10:05.180want it to commit completely to Indigenous reconciliation. That's why my first question in
00:10:11.600the House of Commons was on one of the calls to action in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission,
00:10:17.640which is why after the horrific Kamloops grave discovery, I said, let's move immediately on
00:10:25.740calls to action 71 to 76 before Canada Day. Instead, Mr. Trudeau just wants to cancel Canada Day.
00:10:33.780It appears leave the flags at half-mast forever. That's not how you build up a country. We've got to be
00:10:41.900proud of who we are and recommit to address wrongs of the past and address the inequalities today. And
00:10:49.260that's why I'm in politics, not to tear down, but to build up. Speaking about evocative images,
00:10:54.220horrific images, we are seeing those images out of Afghanistan right now. People clinging to planes
00:10:59.600as they take off on the tarmac. Just a lot of human tragedy happening stories we're hearing.
00:11:05.220A lot of people afraid, particularly women in Afghanistan. How should this situation have been
00:11:12.060handled by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau? How should Canada be handling it right now?
00:11:17.260You know, Anthony, this has been heartbreaking to watch. Seeing people literally falling off of or
00:11:22.960out of aircraft that they're scrambling to get on to escape the coming horrors, the fear of the Taliban.
00:11:29.740Women and girls will likely be subjugated back to what we were there to fight. And it's heartbreaking
00:11:37.460for military families. And I've spoken to many veterans I know that served in Afghanistan that
00:11:42.920feel they left a part of themselves there. And sadly, this is another example of just Justin Trudeau,
00:11:48.760the hollow Prime Minister. He never shows leadership, never follows up, just reads things that are given
00:11:55.640to him. There's no sincerity in Justin Trudeau. This has been an issue that I've tried to advocate on for five
00:12:02.780years. You may know this, Anthony, your colleague, Joe Warmington, myself, several veterans of the military
00:12:09.120have been advocating for left behind interpreters that didn't know about the ability to find security in
00:12:15.760Canada. We got one gentleman, James Ackham, home, and that was due to the really the promotion of Joe Warmington.
00:12:22.760And the fact that I was able to deal with John McCallum, the first liberal immigration minister,
00:12:27.320I said, let's do this because it's right. Forget the politics. These people are at risk because they
00:12:32.780served us. Trudeau squandered five years, Anthony. And in the last six months, we knew the Biden pullout
00:12:40.120was going to lead to more uncertainty, put people at risk. We should have the back of anyone who helped
00:12:46.840our aid workers, our Canadian Armed Forces, our diplomats. If they're at risk because they had
00:12:52.040Canada's back, my goodness, we should have theirs. What should we be doing moving forward,
00:12:57.380given the fact that there's now a vacuum in this region, a security vacuum, something of a power
00:13:02.580vacuum? We already know that there's a lot of forces in the world paying attention, knowing,
00:13:06.320you know, looking at what they can do to maybe have a say in what happens in that region next.
00:13:10.960How should Canada be thinking about Afghanistan moving forward?
00:13:14.680Well, I think into that vacuum could emerge Canada and its allies. We have to work very closely with
00:13:20.300the United States, for example. But if we work closely with NATO, which had a presence in the
00:13:25.560Afghanistan campaign to provide a bit of certainty with respect to security for persecuted people that
00:13:33.040supported Canada and other NATO partners, making sure that assistance and aid is not diverted
00:13:39.560by the Taliban and the new regime coming in place. And I do think the US is reassessing how they can help
00:13:47.640because they realize this vacuum has led to some chaos.
00:13:51.940How do you do that, make sure the assistance and aid is not diverted if Taliban totally rules the roost?
00:13:58.000Well, you deliver it directly. And look, this vacuum is caused because of a withdrawal.
00:14:04.440But from an aid and a civil assistance level, countries could exert that pressure, either supporting through border locations or directly.
00:14:19.600The issue is Justin Trudeau's phone is not going to ring, Anthony, because none of our allies take him seriously.
00:14:25.580He goes to other countries for photo ops and to dance around.
00:14:29.400I will go to fight for our interests and our values. And I've served with other countries during my time in the military.
00:14:37.720I did some training and work with the US, with other NATO partners.
00:14:41.440I worked on international trade in the private sector.
00:14:44.020Wouldn't it be refreshing to have a serious prime minister that has real world experience,
00:14:48.320has a commitment and will actually get people calling us for our participation?
00:14:53.520So this is, I think, the contrast. Mr. Trudeau, always about himself, never about Canadians.
00:15:00.880I will be serving as a prime minister to bring people together and to make sure a serious Canada is once again there on the world stage.
00:15:09.200While we're on the topic of foreign affairs and also Canada sort of stepping up to an issue that it needs to,
00:15:13.460when it comes to China, I know a lot of our allies, a lot of people, experts in security, national security,
00:15:19.120have been calling on Canada to do things a little differently when it comes to China.
00:15:22.800At a recent G7 meeting in Cornwall, there was discussion over that.
00:15:25.840It did result in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau making a statement at the United Nations on, I think, on the weaker genocide issue.
00:15:34.060What do we need to do, though, with China moving forward? And what would you as prime minister do?
00:15:39.400Well, Justin Trudeau has been completely out of step with our allies and really with common sense for his six years as prime minister.
00:15:47.460He started off when he was running for prime minister saying China was the country he most admired when he was asked.
00:15:53.820The country I most admire, Anthony, is the country I've been serving since I graduated high school in one way or another,
00:15:59.08012 years in the military and then trying to work as a volunteer and later as a parliamentarian.
00:16:04.500That will be the big difference between the two of us.
00:16:07.660And on China, whether it's Huawei, I've been saying for five, six years now that Huawei should never be part of our 5G critical infrastructure.
00:16:15.460It was the conservative opposition, Anthony, that brought a motion in the House to declare the genocide towards the Uyghur minority population in Xinjiang.
00:16:26.440Justin Trudeau didn't even show up for the vote.
00:16:29.320So Canada has a proud record in defending human rights.
00:16:33.400It was the Mulroney government that led the Commonwealth on apartheid.
00:16:37.680And now we have Justin Trudeau not even showing up for votes on the dignity of people.
00:16:44.160So I'm going to make international human rights a major point of our foreign policy.
00:16:49.900I think Canada expects us to show respect for people at home and abroad.
00:16:56.520And we're deeply rooted in our values in terms of respecting democracy, the rule of law, human rights, equality.
00:17:05.720I think that needs to be a centerpiece.
00:17:10.000And the almighty buck that Mr. Trudeau seems obsessed with with China is not worth it at the sacrifice of our values.
00:17:18.660And Canadian workers have also been hurt by China in terms of steel, aluminum.
00:17:22.840So I created the Canada-China Parliamentary Committee before I became leader.
00:17:27.580It's been an area that I think Trudeau has been offside on for some time.
00:17:32.080So we need to get get on the side with our allies, stand up to communist China in a serious way.
00:17:38.580What sort of specifics in terms of China being involved in the Canadian economy would you do as prime minister?
00:17:44.280There's talk during the previous election about withdrawing from the Asian Investment Infrastructure Bank,
00:17:48.260concerns about whether or not there should be restrictions or just flat out legislation and rules.
00:17:52.840against Chinese state-owned enterprises making purchases in Canada?
00:17:57.280Yes, we have in our Canada, Canada's recovery plan, Anthony, a direct position on that.
00:18:02.240The default position will be no to any takeover by Chinese state-owned enterprise.
00:18:08.040And you'll have to, it'll be a default presumption that you'll have to actually reverse in order to do a transaction like that.
00:18:16.840We would, again, commit to withdrawing from the Asian Infrastructure Bank.
00:18:20.700The Belt and Road Initiative, various things that the communist regime in China does, is really an extension of its foreign policy.
00:18:30.520And we shouldn't be partnering on their infrastructure work as an extent to that.
00:18:35.060When we've got a lot of infrastructure that needs support here at home, Anthony.
00:18:38.680And Huawei, of course, the fact that Mr. Trudeau is the only leader within the Five Eyes group of countries,
00:18:47.580our closest allies, that hasn't said that Huawei can't be a critical part of our 5G,
00:18:52.900our Internet of Things economy of the future,
00:18:56.120just shows how deeply out of step he is with our allies and our security posture.
00:19:01.660Aaron, in your platform, in the recovery plan, there's also a lot of sections, of course, on the economy, on affordability issues.
00:19:08.660Inflation recently reports out from Statistics Canada saying inflation at about 3.7%.
00:19:13.620Lots of concerns about the price of groceries.
00:19:16.300Now, Justin Trudeau, as he's going around campaigning, he's saying he's making life more affordable for Canadians.
00:19:21.780But you beg to differ and you say you have a better option, a better plan.
00:19:25.200Yes, Canada's recovery plan is about getting wages up, getting people back to work in all sectors,
00:19:32.360and a downward pressure on prices and more really for Canadians.
00:19:36.740Recently, Mr. Trudeau said he doesn't sweat monetary policy, doesn't concern himself about it because it doesn't impact families.
00:19:44.240Wow, you know, totally disconnected by the fact that inflation is pricing families out of their home, out of their community.
00:19:51.920The rising price of groceries, of gas, of we're in a housing crisis.
00:22:47.240We need to use all those measures because we need to try and minimize any further disruption.
00:22:53.540I talk to small business owners all the time, Anthony.
00:22:56.400So many in hospitality and services and travel tourism are hanging on by a thread.
00:23:01.860So our recovery plan will give them some direct help.
00:23:05.460But we also need to avoid as much as possible any other further disruption.
00:23:10.740And I'm a firm believer I've been calling for a national rollout and ownership of the rapid test issue for over a year, Anthony.
00:23:20.360We need leadership and Mr. Trudeau has been absent.
00:23:24.260We've always been late throughout this crisis.
00:23:26.600But I think a year ago, I would have been fully with you there.
00:23:29.480Now we're talking about, okay, we're into 2021 and the fall of that.
00:23:33.640How long does one do this rapid testing for when we're at the point where
00:23:36.420we've got quite a few chief medical officers of health in provinces across the country saying we're in the learning to live with COVID phase?
00:23:43.500Do we live with rapid testing for many months to come?