Juno News - A Christmas wish list for taxpayers

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's most irreverent talk show. This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:12.640 Coming up, we work our way through a Christmas wish list for taxpayers with our friend Franco Terrazzano of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

00:00:21.820 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.

00:00:25.340 Hello and welcome to Canada's most irreverent talk show, the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.

00:00:34.100 Just a few days until Christmas, and then we have a week after that, the New Year beginning.

00:00:39.920 So it is time for us to put all of our cards on the table and demand what it is that we want from our lawmakers.

00:00:46.080 Perhaps New Year's resolutions, maybe holiday gifts, you never know.

00:00:49.480 The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has done exactly that, a taxpayer wish list, courtesy of our friend Franco Terrazzano, the federal director for the CTF.

00:00:59.060 A dozen bills for MPs to introduce in Parliament.

00:01:02.560 Some good stuff on there from requiring transparency for corporate welfare, though I would say just perhaps ending corporate welfare.

00:01:09.760 And ending automatic MP pay hikes, ending the gas tax on tax.

00:01:14.460 Some good stuff, big and small here, but I thought it would be a good opportunity not just to talk about the taxpayer wish list for the coming year,

00:01:22.360 but even just some of the general themes that we've seen from the past year and the year ahead from a taxpayer perspective.

00:01:28.640 Franco, welcome as always. Good to talk to you, sir.

00:01:32.000 Hey, my pleasure. Thanks for having me on.

00:01:34.280 Now, do you think that you are going to get many of the things on your list from government,

00:01:38.640 or do you think you're getting the very expensive, heavily taxed coal?

00:01:42.500 Well, yeah. Well, I mean, of course we're hoping so.

00:01:46.220 I mean, the reason that we put these specific policies and potential bills out is because we were looking for something where we thought all politicians on all sides of the aisle can really get behind and move on.

00:01:58.140 And we also wanted to give opposition members, whether NDP, whether Conservative or whatever, an opportunity to put forward private members' bills.

00:02:07.120 Because sometimes we hear these opposition MPs throw their hands up and say, well, what do you want us to do?

00:02:13.000 Well, what we want them to do is to get off their butts and start pushing some good private members' bill forward. 0.51

00:02:17.220 Yeah, and I should say for context here, I mean, I think that if anyone were a fiscal hawk and they wanted to sit down and say, what are the, like, big sky, the sky is the limit ideas,

00:02:27.800 they would come up with a list of, you know, philosophical concepts that might be a little bit radical in the current political environment.

00:02:35.060 I'd say all of these are entirely attainable.

00:02:38.360 You know, as much as I would support you if you had said abolish the income tax, that's not the direction you've gone with this.

00:02:43.620 Well, that's exactly right. We're looking at the political climate and seeing where are some wins that we can do to make taxpayers' lives a little bit better, right?

00:02:52.200 Because taxpayers need some relief, need a little bit more affordability in our lives, and we also need to reduce some government waste.

00:02:58.600 And that's why we picked some topics here that we thought that all politicians, no matter where you are, can agree on.

00:03:04.560 And Andrew, you said, well, I would want to abolish corporate welfare.

00:03:07.280 Well, of course, that's the Canadian Taxpayers Federation's position.

00:03:10.380 But one of the reasons that we put forward a bill to improve transparency around corporate welfare is just to make sure that there's actually some type of fiscal guardrails over there in Ottawa.

00:03:22.360 Yeah, and I'm of the belief here, and perhaps this is overly idealistic, but I don't think it is, that if there were more transparency and accountability,

00:03:29.880 a lot of the things we'd see wouldn't happen because I think governments tend to take advantage of how clouded and opaque a lot of these mechanisms are.

00:03:37.680 And I think corporate welfare is a great example of that.

00:03:41.140 Well, that's absolutely right.

00:03:42.260 I mean, in that piece of, that bill that we put forward on corporate welfare, we want to require every single member of parliament to be forced to vote in parliament before they gave a bunch of taxpayers' money to businesses.

00:03:56.360 And we think that if they actually had to stand up with their names and vote on it, there'd be a whole lot less pork for certain hand-picked businesses.

00:04:04.420 One idea here that I think it's important to talk about, I mean, we've spoken about the carbon tax.

00:04:09.780 The Liberal government has doubled down and tripled down and quadrupled down on this.

00:04:13.500 So the carbon tax isn't going away.

00:04:15.860 But you've noted to end the gas tax on tax.

00:04:20.080 For people who don't know what that is, it's not like a new dance step.

00:04:22.840 What is the gas tax on tax?

00:04:25.280 Well, it's completely unfair, Andrew.

00:04:27.280 So what happens here is that you have the federal government that charges its sales tax on top of the price of gas, but also on top of all the per liter fuel taxes.

00:04:37.220 So you add up all the per liter fuel taxes on top of the price, and then they charge their sales tax on top of that.

00:04:43.100 So it's completely, completely unfair.

00:04:45.940 And essentially what it means is that when the price of gasoline rises or when the other fuel taxes rise, this tax on tax costs Canadian drivers more.

00:04:54.540 Yeah, and it compounds.

00:04:57.060 I mean, that's the whole nature of it.

00:04:58.460 So you've got governments that are profiting through the back door on this thing that isn't itself.

00:05:03.580 They claim a tax.

00:05:05.400 Well, that's exactly right.

00:05:07.340 And speaking on profiting through the back door, another one on our list was to end the escalator tax on alcohol.

00:05:13.900 So far, we've seen alcohol taxes go up twice during the pandemic.

00:05:18.220 They're getting ready to go up again in 2022.

00:05:20.560 Now, this escalator tax, it was brought in in the 2017 budget, and what it does is that it increases federal alcohol taxes every year by the rate of inflation.

00:05:31.580 Now, obviously, this reduces affordability, but there's even a more pernicious element here, right?

00:05:39.320 It allows our politicians to increase their tax take without actually voting in parliament.

00:05:45.100 It allows them to duck accountability.

00:05:46.800 Now, of course, at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, we are against higher alcohol taxes, but if you're a politician and you want to increase taxes, at the very least, you should have the spine to stand up in parliament and vote on it.

00:05:59.880 Yeah, and I mean, as I understand it, that's something that is constitutionally required.

00:06:05.600 Taxes have to be very transparently and directly put into place.

00:06:09.300 So the idea of an escalator tax, and I know that is a legal mechanism, but it certainly would contravene the spirit of the law, which is that governments have to be very clear in demarcating, yes, this is a tax.

00:06:21.220 Well, it certainly goes against that, the very important principle, which is no taxation without representation.

00:06:29.540 Yeah, very much so.

00:06:30.780 So let's, I mean, we'll return to the list in a moment, but I want to talk about some of the bigger picture themes here, because I think most people would agree that the pandemic has been a disaster for taxpayers.

00:06:41.000 And I know that there are probably some arguments, in fact, many arguments, in favor of the idea that if government's going to say you can't work, it has to fill that economic void in a way.

00:06:50.140 And I know that every country around the world has put forward billions and trillions of dollars of pandemic response mechanisms.

00:06:56.780 So some levels of big spending were inevitable here.

00:07:00.100 But I know that at the same time, that's no excuse for just not paying attention to fiscal restraint, which seems to be where we've gone as a country.

00:07:08.180 Well, let me just piggyback off that, right?

00:07:11.300 You've heard a lot of people who have said, well, you know, spending has gone up because of the pandemic.

00:07:17.140 Well, if you look at the spending in 2020, the vast majority of the federal government's spending is not related to COVID-19, even during 2020.

00:07:28.680 And then, Andrew, let's look back to pre-pandemic.

00:07:31.440 Well, in 2018, the federal government was spending all-time highs.

00:07:34.300 The Trudeau government was spending in 2018 more than in any single year during World War II when the federal government was spending that.

00:07:41.840 So we have to remember that context of the massive spending that was going on even before the pandemic.

00:07:48.300 Andrew, let's take a quick look ahead until 2026, which is what is covered under the last budget.

00:07:54.440 Well, the federal government is using the cloud of COVID-19 to go on a debt-fueled spending binge.

00:08:00.900 By 2026, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland wants to increase permanent federal government spending by more than $100 billion.

00:08:09.760 And that's in 2026.

00:08:11.280 That is years after COVID-19 first touched down.

00:08:15.760 And I know there was that report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer a little while ago that we were on track to run up deficits until I think it was like 2070 or 2072 or something like that.

00:08:25.900 Has there been any shift in that?

00:08:27.500 Well, yeah, I mean, 2070, five decades of deficits, it would end up costing us, what, $3.8 trillion just in interest charges on the debt.

00:08:38.220 Now, Andrew, that report was based off of Budget 2021, which means that report was before the last federal election.

00:08:46.400 And we just saw all major party leaders, what seemed to be them tripping over themselves, trying to promise even more spending.

00:08:53.820 So, if anything, I think the fiscal situation may be even looking worse.

00:08:59.200 Yeah, I mean, let's talk about that.

00:09:00.540 Not just the election platforms, but for a moment, the election itself.

00:09:04.740 This was the Seinfeld of elections, many people said.

00:09:08.080 The election about nothing kicked us right back where we started as far as seats are concerned and government's concerned.

00:09:14.820 But not an inexpensive endeavor.

00:09:17.260 Well, this could have been the most expensive election in Canadian history.

00:09:21.000 We saw estimates saying that this could cost us $600 million.

00:09:25.880 But, Andrew, that's not even the real full cost that taxpayers need to be worried about.

00:09:30.020 We need to be worried about paying for these election promises.

00:09:33.480 The Liberal Party, they wanted to spend $78 billion more than their last budget, which was a huge spending budget, as we just talked about.

00:09:42.820 So, what we heard from the Liberal Party was more borrowing, but we didn't hear a peep from them on when they're going to balance the budget.

00:09:51.300 And I think if you look at Trudeau's track record, remember back in 2014, he said the budget would balance itself.

00:09:56.880 Obviously, that didn't happen.

00:09:58.800 Then you look when he's running for Prime Minister first in 2015.

00:10:01.940 He said he would balance the budget by 2019.

00:10:04.620 Well, of course, he missed that target by a country mile.

00:10:06.980 So, I think if you look at the track record of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, then you look at his Liberal Party's promises in the last election, I think it's a good bet that the Liberals will never balance the books.

00:10:18.700 Yeah, and I know you had pointed out during the election that no party was really putting forward a solid vision that gave a clear path towards balancing the budget.

00:10:28.280 I mean, at least Aaron O'Toole and the Conservatives were talking about the importance of balancing the budget.

00:10:32.760 They said they would do it within 10 years, but not really a concrete plan on how to get there.

00:10:38.200 So, are you concerned that a lot of these things are just no longer relevant in the Canadian political discourse?

00:10:44.700 Well, let's talk about what the Conservatives put forward, right?

00:10:47.880 So, I guess a little bit of kudos for mentioning that they would balance the budget, but I mean...

00:10:53.560 Yeah, they at least pretended it mattered.

00:10:55.860 Yeah, it was in the platform, but even O'Toole's plan was not credible.

00:11:01.160 Like, we're talking about the largest amount of federal government spending pre-pandemic, and then this massively bloated budget.

00:11:10.200 O'Toole could barely find any places to save some money.

00:11:13.380 The reverse was actually true.

00:11:15.060 He wanted to outspend the Liberal budget by about $50 billion, right?

00:11:19.880 So, if we just heard from the PBO that we would not see a balanced budget until 2070,

00:11:26.600 then O'Toole comes around and wants to spend billions of dollars more,

00:11:30.500 well, how is he going to balance the budget decades sooner?

00:11:33.500 I mean, that math just did not add up.

00:11:36.360 And Andrew, you know, I'm concerned that politicians are trying to ignore the $1 trillion elephant in the room,

00:11:43.640 which, of course, is the federal debt, but I think Canadians are really concerned about it.

00:11:49.960 You know, a lot of people that I talk to have two real concerns.

00:11:54.140 The first one is just cost of living, the pocketbook stuff.

00:11:57.740 They say, well, how are we going to pay for this unprecedented amount of government spending?

00:12:02.800 And right now, we're feeling the pain of all this government borrowing,

00:12:07.400 all this government spending because of the inflation tax, okay?

00:12:10.620 So, I think a lot of Canadians are worried about cost of living.

00:12:13.560 But I think there's also a second concern,

00:12:16.100 and it's what kind of nation are we going to leave to future generations of taxpayers?

00:12:21.580 If the budget isn't balanced until 2070, per-person debt will balloon up to $67,000.

00:12:30.580 Now, think of that tab that we would be leaving to Canadian kids and Canadian grandkids to pay off. 0.63

00:12:36.580 So, I mean, these figures, I think, are very important.

00:12:39.160 And I think, certainly, as an economic metric, they're significant.

00:12:42.440 But is there a concern that a lot of them are too abstract for people?

00:12:46.300 I mean, for starters, it's the $16 orange juice phenomenon,

00:12:49.340 where people can resonate more and understand more clearly something like that,

00:12:54.940 a small number that you know is absurd.

00:12:56.720 If you were to say to someone, yeah, the debt per person is going to be $50,000,

00:13:00.180 or $60,000, $80,000, I mean, there's a response to that.

00:13:04.460 Well, what should it be?

00:13:05.500 Well, you know, I think you bring up a good point.

00:13:09.800 Certainly, when we talk about just how staggering the federal government's debt is, $1 trillion.

00:13:15.580 Andrew, let me just tell you a quick little story.

00:13:17.980 The Canadian Taxpayers Federation, we're known for bringing our debt clock from coast to coast,

00:13:23.540 showing how the government's debt is going up by the second.

00:13:26.720 Well, even we made a crucial mistake.

00:13:28.960 We underestimated just how much money, other people's money, that politicians could spend.

00:13:34.700 We didn't have enough digits for the $1 trillion Trudeau debt clock.

00:13:39.840 So, I mean, firsthand, I understand that, right?

00:13:43.800 Now, fortunately, we're getting a new debt clock.

00:13:45.980 Don't worry, everybody.

00:13:47.240 But I do understand that point.

00:13:49.040 And that's why we do try to break it down into per person debt.

00:13:52.740 Right now, each Canadian is on the hook for about $30,000 in federal debt.

00:13:57.600 And I think people understand that, I mean, who has money lying around to pay for these politicians' credit card bills?

00:14:04.900 But, Andrew, to your point, I think it is easy to explain the government waste when it's in more understandable numbers.

00:14:11.660 Let me give you a good example of government waste.

00:14:13.660 Taxpayers, we spent $8,800, so more than $8,000, on a sex toy show in Germany, right? 0.97

00:14:22.560 I mean, call me old-fashioned, but if the Germans want to put on their own sex toy extravaganza, just let them pay for it. 1.00

00:14:29.320 Yeah, back in my day, you had to pay for your own sex toy extravaganza. 0.97

00:14:32.800 That wasn't something you could get.

00:14:34.440 Like, I don't know if Germany paid for one at the Rideau Centre or something for Canada, 0.94

00:14:38.000 and it's part of some cultural exchange of, you know, German sex toys in Canada or Canadian sex toys in Germany. 0.95

00:14:43.380 I don't know. 0.87

00:14:44.220 Maybe they're made by Bombardier.

00:14:45.500 But the reality of this is that, for most Canadians, they are stuck with the bill.

00:14:51.420 And you talked about inflation.

00:14:53.280 You joined a great panel discussion we had on this show a couple of months back on inflation.

00:14:57.260 And I think that's a huge issue, where just the sheer disconnect between the government and the average Canadian household is massive.

00:15:06.300 Well, you know, first of all, thanks for having me on that panel.

00:15:09.360 I think one of the reasons that politicians are trying to turn a blind eye to the inflation problem is because, well, guess who's behind the inflation problem to a large degree?

00:15:20.100 These politicians.

00:15:21.920 Let's just talk about how the Bank of Canada is printing up new dollars to buy up all this Government of Canada debt.

00:15:27.600 The Bank of Canada has created $370 billion during the pandemic.

00:15:31.700 And if it sounds like a lot to you, well, it is.

00:15:34.480 That's a 300% growth in the Bank of Canada's assets.

00:15:38.460 And a lot of what the Bank of Canada is buying up with these newly created dollars is Government of Canada bonds, which is just federal debt, right?

00:15:47.620 So it sure seems like Ottawa is using the printing press to finance a good chunk of its deficits, which means that it's devaluing our money and our paychecks and our savings account.

00:15:59.640 Now, you can see why these politicians obviously don't want to talk about it, because they deserve a large part of the blame.

00:16:06.900 And for these politicians to really tackle the inflation problem, well, they're going to have to roll up their sleeves, they're going to actually have to make some tough decisions, they're going to have to show leadership, reduce their own pay, and they're going to have to take on the union bosses.

00:16:20.660 Yeah, and this is where you get into the big problem of this, because I would say, going back to your wish list for a moment, some of the things you're calling for here, transparency for corporate welfare, this should be an issue where the Conservatives and the NDP could work together.

00:16:34.380 The Bloc Québécois, maybe not, because they obviously, as a Quebec-based party, benefit significantly from a lot of these corporate welfare initiatives.

00:16:41.920 But, you know, an Auditor General for spending within First Nations communities, a lot of these things should not be partisan, but in so many areas, they are.

00:16:51.200 Well, it's really unfortunate.

00:16:53.060 And, like, when are we just going to have some politicians that really work for Canadians, rather than this business interest, this union boss interest, or their own interest?

00:17:02.360 Because on that list, too, Andrew, and we've talked about this before, is the fact that all Members of Parliament have received two pay raises during the pandemic.

00:17:11.380 Now, if these politicians were really working for us, it should have been a no-brainer to, at the very least, stop these pandemic pay raises for the MPs, right?

00:17:22.020 Your backbench member of Parliament is collecting a lot of dust right now, but he's also, or her, is also collecting an extra $6,900 since the beginning of the pandemic, which is just absolutely absurd when you think of just the carnage that has happened to so many people in the private sector.

00:17:39.020 Job losses, pay cuts, small business owners, right?

00:17:42.200 People who have done everything right their whole life, put money away so that they can reinvest in their community.

00:17:47.600 Well, they've been taking it on the chin, all while their supposed representative in Ottawa has been collecting bigger paychecks.

00:17:54.300 And we've even identified 31 jurisdictions across the world, there's probably more, that at some point had their politicians reduce their own pay.

00:18:01.920 I always like to point to New Zealand, because almost immediately, New Zealand's Prime Minister, ministers, and even top bureaucrats all took a 20% pay cut, because they wanted to show solidarity with their struggling taxpayers who are signing their paychecks.

00:18:16.620 There is no reason why we couldn't have seen that in Canada.

00:18:21.200 And just talking about accountability here, one of the items on your wish list we've talked about in the past in the Alberta context, because they moved forward with legislation on this,

00:18:30.320 implementing recall for federal politicians.

00:18:33.660 This is something the federal government could do.

00:18:35.640 The cost would be relatively negligible, because the cost is only triggered when there is a recall campaign.

00:18:42.900 But ultimately, this is something that we haven't heard any discussion about federally.

00:18:46.360 It wasn't in the Conservative platform.

00:18:48.280 Federal Conservative politicians, nor any federal politicians, are taking this up.

00:18:53.120 Well, that's why we're starting to talk about it, and we're pushing it, right?

00:18:56.420 And we have to remember, we've had recall and initiative in British Columbia since 1995, and we've seen some successes there.

00:19:04.500 Fortunately, we just had it passed in Alberta this year.

00:19:07.360 That's a big win for taxpayers and accountability in 2021.

00:19:11.020 Andrew, I'd just like to talk about one of the key things about Alberta's recall is that it also goes to municipal, so you can hold your councillors and mayors accountable.

00:19:18.240 So that's why we're creating, we are creating, trying to create some momentum to get it at the federal level as well, because I think we can all agree from coast to coast, one of the places that is lacking transparency and accountability is Ottawa.

00:19:32.700 Yeah, and you know, the further removed Ottawa gets from the people it represents, the less accountable and transparent government gets.

00:19:39.060 And I'd say the less representative policy passed in Ottawa is of the people it's supposed to be representing.

00:19:44.960 So hugely, hugely beneficial to put direct democracy on the table in that form.

00:19:51.300 Just looking, generally speaking, I know we've talked about the deficits that are going to be arising for the next 50 years and all the Liberal campaign promises.

00:19:58.880 What's the big story you're watching in the year ahead?

00:20:01.320 Well, the big story, and if I can say stories, is going to be spending, borrowing, government borrowing, and inflation.

00:20:09.860 And of course, they're all related.

00:20:12.100 We've seen inflation numbers quite high in Canada.

00:20:15.540 I think that might be the key economic issue for so many families, right?

00:20:20.920 We're seeing the prices go up in grocery stores.

00:20:23.680 We have seen very high gas prices here in Canada in the fall.

00:20:27.080 And I just think that, especially coming off of a time when so many people lost their job, many people took pay cuts,

00:20:33.880 I think a rising cost of living is really coming at the worst possible time for so many Canadians.

00:20:38.860 So I think that is going to be perhaps the key economic issue, and it'll likely also go into one of the key political discussions.

00:20:46.700 And, you know, I think it's very important to note here is that this inflation is showing all Canadians that there is no such thing as a free lunch when it comes to government spending, right?

00:20:57.260 This unprecedented amount of spending, this massive amount of borrowing has been driving up the cost of living.

00:21:03.240 And on that note is another thing we have to keep an eye out on, and that's the tax hikes that we're going to be seeing next year.

00:21:10.240 Alcohol taxes are going up again next April.

00:21:12.680 The carbon tax is going up again to 11 cents per liter next April.

00:21:16.700 And it turns out the joke is going to be on taxpayers again, April Fool's Day 2022.

00:21:23.380 One story as well that I'll be paying attention to, and I know you've done a lot of work on this, is the gun buyback.

00:21:29.360 So right now the Liberals have racked up huge expenses despite not actually buying a single gun back.

00:21:36.120 Now, my approach on this is as a firearms owner, whereas I knew you've come at this issue from a taxpayer's perspective.

00:21:42.680 But what's interesting here is that the government set, when it put this gun ban in place in May of 2020, a two-year amnesty period, which expires in May of 2022.

00:21:51.760 So that's less than six months from now.

00:21:54.080 Canadians were supposed to have that two years, or as much of that two years as possible, to turn in their guns to the government.

00:22:00.680 Right now, there's not even a mechanism to do that, yet the government's still spending money to administer this non-existent program.

00:22:07.800 Yeah, I mean, all the makings of a boondoggle.

00:22:10.540 It really does.

00:22:11.500 And I'm not an expert when it comes to guns at all.

00:22:14.020 And I'm not an expert when it comes to public safety.

00:22:16.360 But, you know, I do trust what the RCMP union is saying, right?

00:22:20.540 They're the ones who represent the people who are on the front lines keeping us safe.

00:22:24.020 And they say that this gun grab and buyback, it's not going to make Canada safer, right?

00:22:29.680 Because you're not targeting where you need to target the resources, like gang members, like illegal flow of guns across the border.

00:22:38.760 This gun buyback is targeting legal Canadian gun owners.

00:22:42.860 I mean, let's just think for a second.

00:22:44.620 How many gangsters do you think are going to be showing up to government offices to give back their guns?

00:22:49.220 Probably not many, right?

00:22:52.380 But it gets even worse than that because you also heard the RCMP union say that it could actually make Canada less safe.

00:23:00.940 And that's because it's going to divert resources from actually tackling crime to tackling law-abiding citizens.

00:23:09.300 So we hear that it's going to be ineffective.

00:23:11.940 But we also know that it's going to be extremely expensive.

00:23:15.780 And that's where the CTF comes into this, right?

00:23:17.920 Because the parliamentary budget officer says that, well, the cost just to reimburse these gun owners could be up to $756 million.

00:23:28.240 But even that cost leaves out the biggest cost driver, which is the administration cost, which is the staffing cost.

00:23:35.460 Now, fortunately, we've seen reports from the Fraser Institute that estimate, well, I say fortunately, thankfully, we're getting some numbers.

00:23:43.240 But unfortunately for taxpayers, the cost of administrating this whole thing could be in the billions and billions of dollars.

00:23:51.080 Yeah, fortunately, we know, not fortunately, that we have to pay for it.

00:23:54.280 Well, we'll certainly keep an eye on that.

00:23:55.880 And I know you will as well.

00:23:56.820 Well, Franco Terrazzano with his wish list for taxpayers.

00:24:01.320 All I can say about the things on that list is that we can all dream.

00:24:04.600 And I think we need to as we head into the year ahead.

00:24:07.000 Franco, always a pleasure, sir.

00:24:08.220 Merry Christmas to you.

00:24:09.680 Yeah.

00:24:10.000 Merry Christmas.

00:24:10.740 Happy holidays.

00:24:11.420 Thanks for having me on.

00:24:12.920 And we'll certainly have Franco back.

00:24:14.480 He's always been a great friend of the program.

00:24:16.640 And I wondered, I was like, you know, I've been having him on a lot lately.

00:24:19.140 But everyone seems to love him.

00:24:20.200 And I like him.

00:24:20.920 So you're stuck with him for the year ahead.

00:24:22.840 And I don't think anyone's going to complain about that.

00:24:25.420 With that, we have to bid you a jill.

00:24:27.380 We will be back later this week with more of The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:24:30.680 And then Christmas is just around the corner.

00:24:32.920 We'll talk to you soon, folks.

00:24:33.900 Thank you.

00:24:34.340 God bless.

00:24:34.900 And good day.

00:24:35.640 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:24:37.660 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

Juno News - December 22, 2021

A Christmas wish list for taxpayers

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