Juno News - 700,000 students locked out as Alberta teachers STAY HOME + Libs attack speech & privacy rights

00:00:00.000 Welcome to The Candice Malcolm Show. My name is Chris Simms. I'm the Alberta Director for the

00:00:07.760 Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Filling in for Candice today, we've got a great show for you.

00:00:13.840 Hey, do you like being able to express yourself on the internet? Do you like being able to hold

00:00:18.960 government to account by speaking out against them? Possibly even protesting against them?

00:00:24.880 Maybe even embarrassing them a little bit? We here at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation,

00:00:28.960 we do that every day. We hand out golden pig statues to politicians and bureaucrats who waste

00:00:34.500 your time while dressed in a pig suit, okay? We protest in front of MPs' offices in chicken suits, 0.94

00:00:42.600 calling them chickens, okay? So yeah, we can get in your face and you might get your feelings hurt a

00:00:47.940 little bit. What's happening with some of these laws that are being proposed right there in the

00:00:53.480 House of Commons? There's so much going on. We're going to be speaking with John Carpe about that

00:00:58.220 in a couple of minutes. But first, I wanted to update you folks on what's going on on the ground

00:01:02.900 here in Alberta. I know we have a lot of viewers and subscribers in the province of Alberta.

00:01:08.980 Thank you very much. But this also affects everybody else across the rest of Canada because

00:01:14.300 government union strikes spread, okay? They all talk amongst themselves and they all take ideas from

00:01:21.980 each other and they spread. Alberta, as of today, is in the middle of a huge teacher strike. This is the

00:01:29.540 first teacher strike in the province of Alberta in 23 years. Put another way, there are kids who are

00:01:38.580 locked out of school today, Monday, with their teachers out on the picket line, not able to go to

00:01:43.940 school, whose parents never had to go through this, never had to endure this. So, we've got hundreds

00:01:52.900 of thousands of families whose lives have been disrupted. There's around 700,000 students,

00:01:59.320 700,000 students in Alberta who are out of school right now. There's approximately 50,000,

00:02:06.380 50,000, 50,000 teachers who are now on strike, okay? So, look at it this way. So, depending on how old

00:02:15.240 the kids are, we've got kids in grade 12 who are now missing out on important elements of their

00:02:22.440 graduation year. These are kids who already went through being locked down out of school a few years

00:02:28.620 ago, remember? And we've got little kids, so kids in kindergarten or grade one or something,

00:02:34.120 who are suddenly now in a brand new babysitting situation or childcare situation that they may

00:02:40.720 have never experienced before. Why? Because their routines have been totally disrupted by this

00:02:46.000 teacher strike. Now, this is what's going on. As far as we understand, they're not talking. The two

00:02:53.540 sides, as far as you've been told, the Alberta government and the Alberta teachers unions are not

00:02:58.520 speaking. The latest deal that was offered from the Alberta government and Premier Daniel Smith

00:03:05.500 that was rejected by the teachers would have reportedly made Alberta teachers the highest

00:03:13.140 paid teachers in Western Canada. Yeah. So, this is a dead deal. They aren't going through with it,

00:03:22.520 okay? They said no to this. And this is something that we brought to you on the show last week. So,

00:03:27.660 just reading right off the grid, again, they said no to this. Starting in September of 2027,

00:03:33.360 okay? So, not long from now, say you've got five years of experience and you've got five years of

00:03:39.880 teacher's education. So, you took one extra year just to bump it up. You're already making over,

00:03:45.280 you're making about $100,000 a year. Like, it's all there that was in that offer that they said no to.

00:03:51.980 So, this is where people are scratching their heads and they're like, okay,

00:03:55.700 if you were offered 12% increase over four years, so 3% pay hike per year, plus they were offering,

00:04:04.160 reportedly, to hire 3,000 new teachers plus 1,500 new classroom assistants and you'd be the highest

00:04:12.760 paid teachers in all of Western Canada? And they said no to that. So, what's going on?

00:04:19.740 We don't actually know. But there's something going on, okay? A few things I'm hearing. I'm

00:04:27.340 hearing through various grapevines because I have two kids who are out of school, okay? And I talk to

00:04:31.380 lots of people all the time. I'm hearing a few things. I keep hearing the term, it's about classroom

00:04:36.600 complexity. Folks, if you're a teacher and you're watching this and you're on the picket line, number

00:04:42.400 one, buy some snow boots, okay? Because you got out there for a long time. Two, if you're a teacher

00:04:48.880 and you're listening to this, nobody knows what you're talking about when you use euphemisms and

00:04:54.280 buzzwords like it's about classroom complexity. If there's something going on that is really

00:04:59.440 important in your classroom that is making you not be able to do your job, you have to be crystal

00:05:04.700 clear with the government about that and offer solutions that the government can offer back to

00:05:11.180 you, okay? Because I'll put it this way. There can't be more money. There can't be. Alberta is in a

00:05:18.060 massive debt. We are on track to have a provincial debt of more than 84 billion dollars this year.

00:05:27.980 The interest payments alone that all of us taxpayers are coughing up this year on Alberta's provincial

00:05:34.140 debt is more than three billion dollars. Gone. Poof. To give you an idea of how much money that is,

00:05:42.460 build three brand new hospitals. Shiny, chrome, glass doors, all that stuff. Burn it down. Burn it down.

00:05:51.260 That's how much our interest payments are costing us on Alberta's debt. So,

00:05:56.140 Alberta Premier Daniel Smith can't be giving you more money than this. We already thought of the

00:06:00.620 Taxpayers Federation that that offer was pretty darn generous. If they'd consulted us about it,

00:06:05.900 we'd be like, why are you spending this much money on this government union? What are you doing?

00:06:10.700 Figure out a way for teachers to be able to do their jobs that won't break the bank of taxpayers.

00:06:17.500 Lastly, we are encouraging Alberta Premier Daniel Smith

00:06:21.740 to be strong on this. Okay? Because she came out and she announced how much money the teachers just 0.94

00:06:28.140 turned down. And she announced how much extra teachers they were going to hire and educational

00:06:34.380 assistants they were going to hire. And they still voted, apparently, 89.5% rejection. That is a huge no vote

00:06:44.860 to what looked like a very generous offer. So, there's something going on here. It could be

00:06:51.980 something internal that most normal people don't understand that's going on in the classrooms.

00:06:57.420 Or, this could be a whole lot of politics. And if this is a whole lot of politics,

00:07:04.860 the folks in the teachers union who are pushing this, okay, it's not all rank and file teachers.

00:07:09.820 We know most rank and file teachers just want to go to work and do their job. But if there are folks

00:07:14.780 who are agitating politics within the Alberta teachers, don't use kids as pawns. And Premier

00:07:23.420 Smith did the right thing. When she came out immediately, it was within 12 hours of the Alberta

00:07:29.100 teachers rejecting what, again, reportedly sounded like a really generous offer. Okay?

00:07:34.380 She came out very quickly and said, okay, so the money that we're saving right now, as of today,

00:07:40.060 by not paying teachers their salary, because they're not paid their salary when they're out on strike.

00:07:45.020 Okay? That money that we're saving, we're handing it back to parents, which is the right thing to do.

00:07:51.740 She took a page out of the British Columbia playbook. I think it was back in 2014 they did this. So,

00:07:58.140 this is an important public service announcement. If you know people who have kids in Alberta,

00:08:04.220 apparently a lot of them don't know this. Tell parents this. If your kid is under the age of 12,

00:08:10.540 and he or she is locked out of school due to the teacher's strike, you can get $30 per child per day

00:08:18.780 for the duration of the strike. So that's like $150 bucks a week per kid.

00:08:25.260 This is to help you with childcare, babysitting, day camps, maybe some tutors that can come over

00:08:31.980 and help your kid here and there. I know that a lot of people's lives have been upheaved. Like,

00:08:36.700 they're scrambling. There's so many single parents out there. There's so many two-person

00:08:40.540 working families who are outside the home that we're counting on school being in session.

00:08:44.300 And I'm sorry. Okay? But Alberta Premier Daniel Smith is doing the right thing by saying,

00:08:49.660 you know what? We're saving money here. So we're giving it back to parents. And before somebody

00:08:54.460 says, oh, well, why would the government hand out money to parents? Blah, blah, blah. That's the

00:08:58.460 parents' money. So the parents are taxpayers. They've paid their taxes for those schools to be open

00:09:06.060 and for teachers to be at work. If the schools are closed and the teachers are refusing to work,

00:09:11.260 you better believe those parents deserve a refund on that money.

00:09:14.940 So folks, if you have kids who are under the age of 12 and they're in the Alberta system and they're

00:09:19.820 locked out of school, go to the Alberta government website and make sure you can get at least some

00:09:24.780 compensation for your kid being out of school. Also, a note, there's also apparently a curriculum

00:09:31.580 help button there. So if you're somehow trying to teach your kid from home, all of a sudden, there's

00:09:37.020 apparently a week-by-week guide that you can click on there and download that will try to keep them up to

00:09:42.380 speed for the duration of this strike. Okay. That is the update on the ground here in Alberta.

00:09:47.340 And the reason why I'm highlighting this is twofold. One, we got a lot of viewers in Alberta and two,

00:09:53.900 these government union strikes have a way of spreading. And this is a big one. First one in

00:09:58.700 23 years. And their friends and neighboring provinces are probably getting some pretty squirrely ideas. So go

00:10:04.860 check that out. We're going to shift gears now to the importance of the ability for you to express

00:10:10.620 yourself and hold government to account. But first, let's check in with our sponsor.

00:10:16.780 I want to give a quick word from our sponsor, Albertans Against No Fault Insurance. So did you

00:10:22.220 know that the Alberta government is overhauling its auto insurance system? Under a new model called

00:10:26.700 CareFirst coming into effect in 2027, most Albertans injured in car accidents will no longer be able to

00:10:31.420 sue the at-fault driver. Instead, decisions about your care and compensation will be made by the

00:10:35.900 insurance company, not your doctor, not the courts. Critics say this system puts insurance companies

00:10:40.860 first and removes key rights from victims and their families. Okay. There are three bills that are in

00:10:48.380 front of the House of Commons right now. There's another one coming to apparently, but let's just focus

00:10:53.100 on the three, okay, which could affect your privacy and your ability to express yourself online. Let's

00:11:02.700 listen to a short clip here. This is a member of parliament, new member of parliament, Matt Strauss,

00:11:07.980 with the Conservatives in opposition, highlighting some of his concerns about this new law.

00:11:13.580 I am concerned, as I say, by the following sections. 15.1 and 15.2 give the minister the unprecedented,

00:11:21.820 incredible power to kick any private Canadian citizen off the internet, to cut off their phone

00:11:26.620 line, to turn off their cell phone. That sounds pretty alarming. But what is actually happening?

00:11:33.660 Does this mean that if you, you know, upset the minister, or if you say something the government

00:11:39.180 doesn't like, like for example, you shouldn't ban people from buying normal gasoline and diesel-powered

00:11:45.660 vehicles and anti-car zealots shouldn't be making up laws as to how much we need to spend on our

00:11:53.020 vehicles or where we can park or what kind of fuel we can put into them, et cetera, et cetera,

00:11:57.900 would that run afoul of the government? What happens to our freedom of expression? Because if we can't

00:12:03.820 express ourselves freely, how are we supposed to hold the government to account? How would this affect

00:12:09.180 regular people? Let's find out. Joining me now is John Carpe. He is the president of the Justice

00:12:16.540 Center for Constitutional Freedom and a friend of the show. John, thank you so much for taking time

00:12:22.140 to join us today. Glad to be with you and your viewers and listeners. There is a whole kettle of

00:12:28.300 fish that is at the House of Commons right now. The Kearney government has dumped it back over,

00:12:34.700 left over from the previous Trudeau government, different incarnations of this stuff. But suffice

00:12:39.660 to say, there are a lot of proposed law changes right now in the House of Commons that would deeply

00:12:46.380 affect our ability for freedom of expression and privacy. And unless people forget, I have to remind

00:12:54.780 them, if you cannot freely express yourself, you cannot hold government to account. So this is a really

00:13:02.380 big deal, John, and that's why we've got you on. Where did you want to start with this? You want

00:13:06.540 to start with the cyber issues that are being changed or the fact that now it looks like our

00:13:11.340 mail can be opened without a warrant? Where do you want to go first? Well, let's do them in numerical

00:13:16.540 order, C2, C8, C9. The terrifying thing about this, Chris, is that the average citizen, like I'm full-time

00:13:24.380 working in public policy and, you know, and I have other responsibilities as well, and I am spending

00:13:31.660 hours and hours and hours. These bills are 100 pages long. They amend various acts, they create new

00:13:37.820 pieces of legislation. So there's no way the average citizen, you know, unless you're working full-time

00:13:43.660 maybe as a university prof or, you know, working for public policy organization like the Taxpayers'

00:13:49.980 Federation, it's just next to impossible. So that's really scary because in terms of government

00:13:57.340 accountability, if they're bringing forward, like Bill C2, I'll give you, I'll rattle off just a few

00:14:02.700 points. Okay, it's 140 pages long, 140 pages to read through the entire bill. It authorizes Canada Post

00:14:10.700 to open letter mail without a warrant. It criminalizes the use of cash in amounts of 10,000

00:14:17.100 or higher. It creates this new piece of legislation called the Authorized Access to Information Act,

00:14:23.660 whereby the government can demand information from an electronic services provider. When you look up

00:14:30.620 the definition of electronic services provider, it is anybody sending out an email. So every church,

00:14:36.460 every business, every nonprofit, every advocacy group, even if you were sending out emails to a bunch

00:14:42.780 of buddies for monthly guys, poker night, you're all, you're an electronic services provider.

00:14:49.100 So Bill C2 is a massive privacy violation that authorizes the government also to demand from

00:14:56.300 corporations that they turn over their subscriber lists and IP addresses. It's a massive privacy

00:15:04.860 violation. Now, it also has tucked in there some provisions to strengthen our borders and changing

00:15:10.540 the refugee policies, changing immigration policies, some of which may or may not be legitimate,

00:15:17.100 but it should be split up. I mean, this is just wrong, right? To have your strong borders act, they

00:15:23.100 call it, right? Where only a fraction of the bill is about the borders and that should be debated separately.

00:15:31.020 And then we should have a separate bill on whether to create this brand new Authorized Access to

00:15:36.220 Information Act. So that's Bill C2. This reminds me of last time when they brought forward the so-called

00:15:45.980 Online Harms Act. And of course, part of that law was what any decent person would want to do was to

00:15:53.420 strengthen penalties for people who victimize children on the internet. Like every sane person

00:15:59.100 would vote in favor of that. But stuck in there was a whole bunch of crazy censorship laws.

00:16:05.900 And I can't help it, man. I'm not new to this game. I have a feeling that they're purposefully

00:16:12.300 like train carring these issues together so that they can drive a political wedge in the House of 0.96

00:16:17.900 Commons. And then it makes it look like, well, why would you vote against strong borders? Don't

00:16:22.140 you want strong borders? It's like, no, I just value people's privacy. Is that what's going on here,

00:16:27.180 John? Yes, definitely. And I was really pleased to learn that apparently the Conservative Party has

00:16:34.860 said that in regards to Bill C2, they're going to vote against it if it's not separated. Because

00:16:41.180 there are parts of the Strong Borders Act that apply to borders that would be supported by the

00:16:47.340 Conservatives. The Conservatives said, no, we're voting against the bill. There are so many other bad

00:16:53.420 things in there that don't need to be there that that could be debated separately just by splitting

00:16:58.300 it up. Right. So C8 is the cybersecurity. And I always say governments never take away your rights

00:17:09.740 and freedoms. They never violate your privacy without providing a nice sounding pretext. And so

00:17:15.580 the language in there over and over again is we have to protect cybersecurity from terrorists,

00:17:20.940 from hackers, from people that would seek to destroy our, you know, oil and gas pipelines, roads, bridges,

00:17:27.900 banking, we got to protect you against terrorism, so on and so forth, all of which is laudable. I agree

00:17:34.380 100%. You know, we need to protect our infrastructure and so on. The solution is law enforcement,

00:17:42.940 figure out who these people are, I'm assuming that they would always be operating under an assumed name.

00:17:48.380 So what does the bill do? C8, ostensibly to protect us from cyber threats and its cybersecurity,

00:17:56.220 it gives a blanket power to the federal cabinet to kick any Canadian off the internet if the minister

00:18:03.980 deems that Canadian to be a threat to security. And threat can include manipulation, degradation. 0.98

00:18:14.460 There's nothing in the bill that expressly says that your freedom of the content of what you say

00:18:21.820 is protected. So if this passes in current form, if the government thinks that, you know,

00:18:26.300 the Taxpayers Federation or the Justice Centre is spreading misinformation, well, then we are a threat to

00:18:32.620 cybersecurity. So they could kick Chris Sims or John Carpe or Scott Hennig, kick individuals off the

00:18:40.060 internet to protect us from, to protect the cybersecurity. So it's a huge power grab where,

00:18:47.420 again, the minister can demand information without a warrant, the minister can order companies to do

00:18:52.700 anything or refrain from doing anything if the minister decides that it's a threat to cybersecurity.

00:19:01.260 And the court process, you are, some of the orders can be secret. So, Chris, if you were kicked off the

00:19:07.500 internet, then the order might specify that you're not allowed to tell anybody that you're kicked off

00:19:11.900 the internet. And penalties of up to a million dollars a day for individuals, up to, for each day. And

00:19:20.380 penalties up to $15 million for corporations. So a very, very aggressive, heavy handed approach to

00:19:28.700 silencing people. And if you do manage to go to court, remember, unless you've got $100,000 sitting

00:19:36.700 in the bank for, you know, my spare cash for litigation, practically speaking, Canadians, they 1.00

00:19:43.180 don't have $100,000 in the bank to go to court, and the court action would take two or three years.

00:19:47.580 So if the minister kicks you off the internet, theoretically, you can go to court and get a

00:19:52.860 court ruling to reverse that, theoretically, but only if you've got $100,000 and you're willing to

00:19:59.020 be off the internet for the two or three years that it's going to take for the court action to proceed.

00:20:03.820 I just need you to specify something here, which I think, you go past it real fast, you miss it.

00:20:10.700 Are you saying that this isn't, so I wouldn't have to be convicted in a criminal court of law,

00:20:16.540 and then sentenced, like with cyber terrorism or something awful, right? In order for this to be

00:20:22.540 part of my sentencing punishment, are you saying that the minister or the cabinet would have the

00:20:27.420 power to kick an individual off of the internet or deny their access to the internet without a

00:20:33.020 conviction? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. That's it. Because currently, the state of the law currently,

00:20:39.660 if you were, let's say you're, you know, a terrorist or trafficking in child pornography or,

00:20:44.780 you know, threatening children online, if you were convicted of a crime, then part of your

00:20:49.580 conditions could be, if you're in prison, you're not going to have access to the internet anyways,

00:20:55.180 as far as I know. But if you're out on bail, the judge might say, we're kicking you off the internet,

00:21:00.780 you're not allowed to go on it at all. That would be an extreme sanction, but that could be done

00:21:05.340 currently. But if you're out on bail, or if you've been convicted of a crime, right now, the minister,

00:21:11.900 if he has, you know, reasonable grounds, as determined by the minister himself in his own head,

00:21:19.420 okay, and that's just way too, we always do and say what we ourselves think is reasonable. So that's

00:21:27.740 a pretty broad standard. But if the minister on reasonable grounds, as determined by the minister in

00:21:33.180 his own head, thinks that you are a threat to Canada's cyber security, then he can order you,

00:21:40.460 he can kick you off the internet and order every, you know, whoever's providing it, that you no longer

00:21:46.700 have access to the internet.

00:21:48.700 I wanted to highlight something here for people who are thinking, okay, guys, like your slope is

00:21:52.940 pretty steep and too slippery, and you're kind of imagining things here. This is only about, you know,

00:21:57.500 cyber terrorism or something. Well, remember before, when you former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was in

00:22:04.540 charge, and I'll give you an example from the Taxpayers Federation, we were pushing really, really

00:22:09.820 hard against things like the carbon tax. And at one point, we found in one of the government's own

00:22:15.820 reports that they had commissioned, it was on the Environment Canada website. In that report, they were

00:22:22.540 suggesting that the Trudeau government implement a pickup truck tax, straight up. That was a

00:22:29.340 recommendation to the minister. Now, that was right there in the study that they posted on their own

00:22:35.420 website and the government website. So it's like, hey, let's have a special tax just for SUVs and pickup

00:22:40.940 trucks, because the environment, etc, etc. It was right there in black and white. We reported on it,

00:22:46.620 we put it all over the internet. And the minister was so upset that he was calling it either

00:22:52.780 misinformation or disinformation, like directly on the internet. Whoa! Like, this is your point,

00:23:00.140 I think your point exactly, John, is that our interpretation of what is harmful or threatening

00:23:06.940 can vary based on our own judgment. Is that what we're getting at here, where we could then be muzzled

00:23:14.220 for saying, for example, you know, the carbon tax is wrong. They could turn around and say,

00:23:19.340 well, you're harming our environmental, you know, goals. Isn't that part of this?

00:23:24.620 Yeah. Well, what I see more and more frequently these days is that a simple criticism of a politician

00:23:32.940 or a government official, bureaucrat, non-elected, whether elected or unelected, get a criticism

00:23:39.660 of a person or a policy. And then you hear this accusation that this is bullying, harassment,

00:23:48.780 intimidation. It's like, no, it's nothing of the sorts. It's just that, you know, there's cabinet

00:23:55.100 minister Smith and some citizens are saying that the bill that he's introducing is a very bad bill.

00:24:01.500 Or whatever school trustee, you know, votes in favor of such and such a policy. And the next thing you

00:24:08.380 know, and then she gets criticism or he gets criticism. And then it's like, oh, well, you know,

00:24:13.900 I'm the victim of bullying and harassment and intimidation. What, because somebody criticized

00:24:19.340 your policy? Yeah.

00:24:20.940 And so the point is with loaded words, right? The minister could very easily say that

00:24:27.180 something that somebody's saying is, is disinformation and disinformation threatens all of us.

00:24:33.180 You know? Yeah, I can see where this is heading. The puck is going in the bad direction. Speaking

00:24:39.020 for the tax, like Taxpayers Federation, I mean, we do stunts all the time. Like we hand out golden pig

00:24:45.180 statues in a pig costume for politicians and bureaucrats who waste your money. Politicians who are refusing

00:24:52.940 to stand up for taxpayers and vote to lower their taxes or on critical other votes and bills.

00:24:59.020 Like we have chicken suits that we dance in front of the office with the protest sign. Like

00:25:04.140 if their feelings get too hurt over that kind of stuff, A, you shouldn't be in politics, but B,

00:25:10.460 they could try to extend something like this down the road, couldn't they? To try to say,

00:25:14.380 you know what, you're no longer allowed to speak.

00:25:16.380 Well, that ties right in with Bill C-9. If we can get back to C-8, I'm happy to do so,

00:25:23.020 but this is so on point. So Bill C-9 takes the current hate speech provisions, which already allow

00:25:31.340 a Canadian judge to impose a more severe sentence. If somebody is convicted, let's say of robbing a

00:25:38.140 grocery store. And so they came in there with a knife or a gun or a baseball bat, and they threatened

00:25:43.900 the clerk and said, give me all your money, otherwise I'll kill you. If there is hate involved,

00:25:49.100 and let's say that the grocery store clerk is Somali or Korean or East Indian or whatever.

00:25:56.380 And so the perpetrator there is, you know, what the judge can do on sentencing, if the person's

00:26:01.980 convicted of the crime, the judge can increase the penalty. If the judge finds that hate for the,

00:26:09.660 like racial hatred or hatred based on gender or sexual orientation, if hatred was a motivating

00:26:15.740 factor, the penalty can be stiffer. Now we can agree or disagree on that. Some people would say

00:26:20.460 the crime is the crime and it doesn't matter what was in your heart. But the point is this law is

00:26:24.540 already on the books right now. Canadian judges have under criminal code section 718, they have the

00:26:30.380 power to impose a stiffer sentence within the range of whatever, whether it's a maximum two years crime,

00:26:36.860 maximum five years crime, maximum 10 years crime. What Bill C-9 does is it puts this on steroids by

00:26:45.500 increasing the maximum penalty. So if let's say that robbing a convenience store carries a maximum

00:26:51.900 penalty of five years, okay, if there was hatred, the maximum penalty becomes 10 years. So it's actually

00:26:58.940 the entire sentence gets increased if the judge finds that there's hate. So a two year sentence can become a

00:27:06.620 five year sentence, five can become 10, a 14 year sentence can become a life sentence. That's the,

00:27:12.940 that's the first change. The other change is that hate speech prosecutions, we've had these laws on the

00:27:18.700 books for, for 30 years, but the reason you don't see a lot of hate speech prosecutions, well, one reason

00:27:26.460 is that maybe the chilling effect, but the other reason is the attorney general of the province has to

00:27:31.740 give a thumbs up, has to give a green lights to proceeding with the prosecution. Every other crime,

00:27:36.620 it's the local police, local crown prosecutors, they decide in that city, you know, if you commit

00:27:41.820 a crime in Lethbridge, it'll be the Lethbridge police, crown prosecutors decide whether to prosecute or

00:27:46.460 not. For the hate speech, if they want to prosecute, they have to run it by the attorney general of the

00:27:52.940 province for review. And in some cases, the attorney general of the province thinking about it, maybe

00:27:59.020 more dispassionately. Anyway, they're scrapping that. So the local police and crown prosecutors can decide

00:28:07.260 on whether you've engaged in hate speech. Hate speech, hate is an emotion, you cannot define it. And

00:28:14.140 it's almost ridiculous what they do in Bill C-9. They actually say that to dislike and disdain is not hate

00:28:21.340 speech. But detestation and vilification is hate speech. So to be very clear there, you can dislike

00:28:29.740 somebody, but just don't vilify them. They also say that it is not hate speech to humiliate, discredit,

00:28:37.740 offend, or hurt the feelings of people. That's not hate speech. So my chicken suit is okay for now?

00:28:43.900 Your chicken suit is not hate speech. You can discredit, humiliate, hurt the feelings of, and offend people.

00:28:48.860 It's not hate speech. But don't cross into this detestation, vilification, because then it's hate

00:28:55.500 speech. So it's just, it's going to have a big chilling effect. But now the local police and local

00:29:02.060 crowns can just decide on their own whether to proceed with the prosecution. And what these people

00:29:08.220 sometimes do is they will prosecute and say, well, you'll get a fair day, you'll get a fair hearing in

00:29:13.900 court. And if our case wasn't strong, then you'll be acquitted. So nothing to worry about. It's like,

00:29:18.860 yeah, but the accused person, you've got to spend tens of thousands of dollars on lawyers to defend

00:29:24.780 yourself. And you've got this public criminal charges hanging over you for a year. So anyway,

00:29:33.260 so that's C9 is kind of a further attack on free speech is what it boils down to.

00:29:40.700 I know you don't have a crystal ball and you can't see inside their heads,

00:29:45.900 but why remove that kind of emergency break or sober second thought or signals check,

00:29:51.740 whatever term you want to use. Why remove the attorney general step here? What would be

00:29:57.660 the government's reason for doing that? Like usually I'm for, you know, taxpayers federation.

00:30:03.260 We want streamlined government. We want less, you know, less delays. But in this case,

00:30:09.500 where you're dealing with things like potential in freedom of expression, expression implications,

00:30:15.180 why would they remove that speed bump?

00:30:18.780 Because you're going to see a whole lot more prosecutions for hate speech than what we've

00:30:22.700 ever seen before. Because sometimes it's even the existence of the review makes you think twice,

00:30:28.780 okay, are, is this, does this really qualify as hate? Are we really going to get a conviction?

00:30:34.940 Is it really in the public interest? Just knowing that the attorney general of the province is going to

00:30:40.460 review it already gets you to slow things down, which is why off the top of my head, I'm only aware

00:30:48.380 of, of one hate speech prosecution in the last decade, or maybe it was 15 years ago. There was

00:30:53.580 some Aboriginal leader in Saskatchewan made a anti-Semitic comment and, and you know, but this,

00:31:01.340 this happens once per decade. That's going to start happening once a year, once a month, once a week

00:31:08.060 just without that review process in place.

00:31:14.300 So would you say then the three bills that people need to really be aware of at this moment, because

00:31:20.460 it could change tomorrow in the House of Commons, when it comes to things like privacy, freedom of

00:31:25.100 expression, right, would be C9, C8, and C2, they have to watch all of these?

00:31:30.540 All three of them, there are hundreds of pages each. However, the good news is that doesn't stop you from

00:31:35.660 contacting your MP and saying, you know, even if it's just an email, a phone call,

00:31:41.260 I want you to vote against Bill C2, C8, C9, 289, which are serious threats to privacy and freedom of

00:31:49.500 expression, sign yours truly, your constituent, you know, can even write in your street address if you

00:31:56.300 want your postal code to make it clear to your MP that this is an email they're getting from their

00:32:01.740 own constituent. So nothing stops you from contacting your MP and say, vote against Bill C289.

00:32:11.820 And then we've got the Online Harms Act from the previous parliament, which hasn't even been brought

00:32:15.980 back. But the word on the street is that it will very likely be brought back. So it'll get a different

00:32:22.220 number, it won't be C63 anymore. But that's also horrific, it can have people placed under house

00:32:27.980 arrest wearing an ankle bracelet, based on a neighbour fearing that you might commit a speech

00:32:33.100 crime in future. Like it actually has, you can get punished, not punished with jail time, but punished

00:32:40.060 with house arrest and an ankle bracelet, and a strict order about who you can and cannot talk with,

00:32:46.140 without having been charged with a crime, had a trial, convicted, nothing, you can get conditions

00:32:52.460 placed on you already. So supposedly, that's coming back. But for right now, at this moment,

00:32:59.020 it's Bill 289. C2, C8, C9 are the huge problems.

00:33:04.140 Wow. Okay, before I let you go quickly, I know that we're going to have some sentencing hearings

00:33:10.940 in Ottawa. It's tomorrow, correct?

00:33:12.940 Yes, Tuesday, October 7th, Tamara Leach, Chris Barber. They are on their way to Ottawa. I mean,

00:33:21.100 they're probably arriving on Monday the 6th at some point. And the Crown is demanding eight years jail

00:33:28.700 time for Chris Barber, convicted of mischief, and seven years jail time for Tamara Leach, convicted of

00:33:35.100 mischief. And we get a ruling on Tuesday the 7th. There was a very important federal court judgment

00:33:43.580 that said the invocation of the Emergencies Act was wrong. I'm using layman's terms, of course,

00:33:50.140 and that that shouldn't have been done. And that, of course, was during that protest,

00:33:54.060 the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act, bank accounts were

00:33:59.580 frozen. Suffice to say, the federal court judge at that level said, you know what, that was

00:34:05.580 unconstitutional, shouldn't have done that. So we saw that that was a big win for the CCF.

00:34:11.020 Do you think that that is going to factor into this? Go ahead.

00:34:15.340 Oh, sorry. No, the Justice Centre was involved in that case as well. We provided lawyers for

00:34:19.900 Canadians that put forward affidavits, and the CCF, Civil Liberties Association as well.

00:34:26.300 Yes. I would say a lot of people in what I would describe as the freedom movement who want freedom

00:34:31.900 of expression and ability to hold government to account, and you can't do that if you're worried about

00:34:35.420 your bank account be frozen. We're happy to see that ruling. Do you think that that will factor

00:34:41.980 in to the judge's sentencing at all when they're thinking about this and weighing the consequences?

00:34:47.260 Because I was a long-time court reporter, and just speaking as a former court reporter,

00:34:53.420 eight and seven years, in my experience, was a pretty hefty sentence for those convictions.

00:34:58.540 Oh, yeah. There's people convicted of manslaughter that are getting less than seven years, eight years,

00:35:07.420 and this mischief is a pretty minor crime. I don't think that the fact that we got this court ruling

00:35:17.100 that declared that the federal government under Trudeau violated the Emergencies Act and wrongfully

00:35:25.420 declared state of emergency when there was no national emergency. It's not directly relevant on

00:35:32.300 sentencing. What is relevant though, and I think the lawyers for Chris and Tamara have brought this up,

00:35:40.380 is that both individuals were continually in touch with police and with their own lawyers,

00:35:47.900 striving around the clock to be law-abiding. The Justice Center had lawyers on the ground during all three

00:35:54.540 weeks. The lawyers, as well as Tamara and Chris themselves, they were always talking with police,

00:36:00.220 being very open and transparent, what we're doing. Chris and other truckers, they parked their truck

00:36:06.220 where the police told them. Hopefully, the judge will take that into serious account, that Tamara and Chris

00:36:17.740 were striving 24 hours a day to comply with the law. There was an initial court ruling pertaining to

00:36:25.980 an injunction against horn honking, where a judge said in his ruling that this is a lawful protest.

00:36:34.460 So we've got to hope for the best, but it's pretty scary because there's a double standard

00:36:39.340 that is at play here. When you see, for example, the aboriginals protesting against residential 0.61

00:36:46.460 schools at the Manitoba legislature, and then vandalizing, tearing down a statue of Queen Victoria,

00:36:53.420 which is committing a crime in broad daylight. The police were watching, nothing was done. Crown

00:36:57.740 prosecutors announced that nobody would be prosecuted. That's a double standard.

00:37:01.420 I support peaceful protests, 100%. But when you start vandalizing a statue, you're committing a crime.

00:37:09.580 And yet, because these people were the right people protesting for the right cause, being sarcastic,

00:37:17.980 there's no criminal charges. So that's a double standard that is terrifying, because it really

00:37:23.500 undermines the rule of law and our democracy. When how you're handled by prosecutors,

00:37:31.420 depends on what cause you're advocating for.

00:37:35.020 We definitely live in interesting times. John Carpe, thank you so much for your time today.

00:37:41.020 Thank you.

00:37:42.380 Once again, that is John Carpe. He is the President of the Justice Center for Constitutional

00:37:47.420 Freedoms. You can go check out their work on their website. They're typically known as the JCCF.

00:37:55.100 Folks, it has been wonderful sitting in for Candace Malcolm. I've been guest hosting,

00:38:01.180 for Candace, off and on for the last few weeks. Thank you so much for making us a big part of your day.

00:38:07.340 I wanted to let you know that I get to host my own show, which is really exciting. I'm super happy

00:38:14.300 about it. And it's going to be right here on Juno News, backed up by the good folks at True North,

00:38:19.980 and it launches tomorrow. So be sure to check back here on the same bat channel to watch it then.

00:38:26.860 Thank you so much for joining us. And remember, make sure to like this video and share it with people

00:38:33.100 who need to know.

Juno News - October 06, 2025

700,000 students locked out as Alberta teachers STAY HOME + Libs attack speech & privacy rights

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