Juno News - September 07, 2019


Canadian values should drive the China file


Episode Stats

Length

4 minutes

Words per Minute

193.37277

Word Count

959

Sentence Count

1

Misogynist Sentences

1

Hate Speech Sentences

3


Summary

Dominic Barton has been appointed Canada's new ambassador to China. Is he a good choice or a bad one? What does he bring to the role and what does he lack? And is he the right choice for the role?


Transcript

00:00:00.000 soon all the talk on the Canadian political scene is going to be just the
00:00:12.840 federal election but there are a number of big picture issues that should play
00:00:16.440 a big role in the election they probably won't and they are going to continue no
00:00:20.640 matter who becomes the next Prime Minister the biggest one of all a foreign
00:00:24.240 affairs issue and one that really speaks to the heart of the future of our
00:00:27.180 country and where we are headed is the ongoing spat with China as the
00:00:31.800 communist authoritarian regime basically tries to push us to be more like them
00:00:35.880 and to play the game according to their rules not our rules ever since earlier
00:00:41.520 this year we have had no ambassador in the post Canada has not had an ambassador
00:00:45.540 to China after John McCallum vacated that post that's caused a bit of a vacuum and
00:00:51.360 it's led a number of people including myself writing in a column to say we
00:00:54.840 need a China policy we need to sit down and say what is it that's really
00:00:59.760 happening both with this current spat and with our general broader relationship
00:01:03.460 with China what do they want what are their long-term goals for for the world
00:01:08.400 for their direction and in human history where do we want to place ourselves in
00:01:13.020 response this a really big picture conversation about all of that and you
00:01:16.920 can't really do that if you don't even have an ambassador in place well now we do
00:01:21.420 Dominic Barton has been appointed Canada's new ambassador to China and if
00:01:26.340 you look at his resume you go wow that's a guy who's done a lot of stuff okay hats
00:01:30.060 off to him fair enough he was head of global global consulting firm McKinsey he'd
00:01:34.440 been a professor at a university in China he had spent a lot of time doing
00:01:38.460 things in the Asian region and in China in particular okay he knows the file he
00:01:43.500 knows the beat is this a good choice or is this a bad choice well some have
00:01:48.120 pointed out that Dominic Barton made a financial contribution to Christy
00:01:51.600 Freeland's election campaign when she was running to be a liberal MP in
00:01:55.080 Toronto that's obviously a bit of a problem in and of itself but let's go
00:01:58.580 bigger picture here because conceivably he could be a donor there and still be a
00:02:02.240 good ambassador even though you you gotta wonder about that contribution is he
00:02:06.060 going to be good in the role well how about I don't answer that question how
00:02:10.400 about we leave it up to China to answer that question and we can see what
00:02:14.280 their response tells us well there is already something of a response the very
00:02:18.060 day after Dominic Barton was named and appointed to this post China gave a
00:02:22.260 press conference Geng Shuang their foreign ministry spokesperson saying Canada
00:02:26.640 needs to do the right thing smarten up and release Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou just
00:02:32.580 drop her release her from the current situation she's in right now allow her to
00:02:37.260 head back to China oh really why would you suddenly make that announcement
00:02:41.280 right now at this point why do you suddenly feel like your request has a
00:02:45.460 greater chance of being taken seriously clearly they're looking at the deck being
00:02:51.460 reshuffled here with Dominic Barton put in and they feel like it has been
00:02:55.200 reshuffled in their favor now Dominic Barton being someone in senior consulting
00:03:00.920 and business circles who has done a lot of stuff in Asia probably one of those
00:03:05.700 people who's part of that old guard view of people who sort of first got their
00:03:09.700 thoughts on all of this back in the 90s where they said China they're they're
00:03:13.460 gonna get into the world trade organization their economy is growing
00:03:17.140 they're opening up to business we got to get in on the ground floor we got to do
00:03:20.740 whatever we can to increase relations with China increase trade with China and
00:03:25.600 just give it a few years and they will become just like us they will ask most to
00:03:28.980 become exactly like us now a lot of people made that mistake many people left
00:03:33.520 wing right wing they all kind of thought that was the direction China was
00:03:37.220 headed not so fast Xi Jinping said we're going back to the old way he's been
00:03:42.320 described by a lot of people as the toughest fiercest leader since Mao and he
00:03:46.640 is sending it in a very defiant still authoritarian communist direction now
00:03:52.460 people like Dominic Barton they don't show too much of awareness of the new
00:03:56.420 reality of China under Xi Jinping they still feel like it's like it was back in
00:04:00.620 1999 now everything is gonna be rosy that ain't the case who we really need in
00:04:06.320 this role to be an ambassador to China is a hawk is someone who is naturally
00:04:11.840 critical reticent and concerned about China not someone who's gonna downplay
00:04:16.940 all of these concerns or almost spin them into positives as John McCallum seemed
00:04:21.440 to be I hope I'm wrong about Dominic Barton I hope he can he can broker things
00:04:25.100 sort of favorably but we really need to head in the direction of making sure that
00:04:29.360 Canadian values are what's driving every single decision we make on the China file
00:04:34.220 not that they were constantly willing to turn a blind eye anytime China does
00:04:38.460 anything negative towards us and boy they've constantly been doing a lot of
00:04:42.320 them so all eyes on Dominic Barton how he actually performs great resume looks
00:04:47.460 like someone who would certainly perform well in this role but you've got to ask
00:04:51.320 about the underlying philosophy and it doesn't look positive