Juno News - November 06, 2025
Carney CAUGHT PARTYING while Canadians “make sacrifices”
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Summary
After tabling a deficit of $70B, the Liberal government throws a party for all of us. And it's hosted by Liberals, Lobbyists, and select members of the media. What do you expect when your last name is Champagne?
Transcript
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And welcome to Straight Up. I am your host, Mark Bertrand. I appreciate you tuning in,
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my friends. Well, Prime Minister Carney has called on Canadians to make sacrifices, but
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he doesn't seem to be setting much of an example. On the very evening, after tabling a budget that
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added $5,400 in new spending on the backs of every Canadian family, the Liberal government
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threw itself a party. That's right. Liberals, lobbyists, their friends in the media. Well,
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you and I were not invited, of course. And it was all courtesy of lobbyists. It featured appetizers
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and addled beverages at the Metropolitan Brasserie and French Restaurant, touted as a taste of Paris.
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Savor the best Parisian brasseries have to offer. Delish. Based on the pictures, MPs took full
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advantage of the food and drink. Prime Minister Carney was there, of course, along with select
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members of the media. No wonder they love the Liberals so much. But you know who seemed to
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be having the best time of all? None other than the Finance Minister. That's right. But
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what do you expect when your last name is Champagne? If these were the best of economic times for
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Canadians, you could almost forgive the indulgence. But they're not. In fact, 2 million Canadians rely
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on food banks every month to feed themselves and their families. Throwing a party after you just
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racked up a $70 billion deficit is beyond tone deaf. It's a middle finger in the face of all those people
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that the government insists make sacrifices for the good of the country. Here's Prime Minister Carney
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himself just two weeks ago calling on Canadians to tighten their belts. We won't transform our economy
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easily or in a few months. It will take some sacrifices. Right. Sacrifices. Well, here's a post
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by Conservative Member of Parliament Michelle Rempel-Garner. Because nothing screams government
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fiscal responsibility like a champagne party hosted by lobbyists in the media outlet. During question period,
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Conservative Party leader Pierre Polyev ripped the government's spending. Let's listen.
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This budget, with its record deficit outside of COVID, is a deficit twice as the size the one
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Trudeau left behind and $16 billion bigger than the Prime Minister promised. It has, in this spending,
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$5,400 of extra costs for every family in more expensive government. While Canadians are already unable to
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eat, heat and house themselves, why is this Prime Minister's costly budget making them pay
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even more? Mr. Speaker, this budget has 75 percent of the measures are for our sovereignty to protect
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our borders, to protect our communities, to protect our way of life. And the balance is for affordability,
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a middle-class tax cut that the member opposite missed because he was not here. Mr. Speaker,
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this budget invests in Canada at twice the rate as any budget during this millennium. We believe in Canada.
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We believe in Canada, says the Prime Minister, suggesting that, what, anyone who does not
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believe in this particular budget does not believe in Canada? Now, Dan McTague spent 18 years on
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Parliament Hill as a Liberal member of Parliament, and I'm pretty sure he wasn't invited to that little
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shindig yesterday either. Dan, welcome to the show. Good to be here, Mark. And no, definitely,
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when I was in Ottawa yesterday, I wasn't invited to any Liberal event at any time. And you know what,
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I really don't care if I get the invitation or not. Frankly, I would never go.
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Now, you were in Ottawa during the 90s. There were some pretty tough times when we were running
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massive deficits. You were there during the tabling of budgets. Do you ever remember a time
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when the government, on the government side, had a little party for itself after tabling a budget in
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which there had to be tens of millions of dollars in cuts? And billions of dollars in debt,
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the likes of which this generation, the next generation would not be able to pay. And with
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cuts that will, it's obviously perhaps not deep enough, but won't meet the standard of a viable
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economy in the days to come. And of course, waiting that maybe somehow, maybe they were cheering the
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idea that bad news for us is good news for them. It's a little bit like dancing on the grave of
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those who've fallen. This seems to be terrible optics. But of course, you know, the woke types
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out there, the albozos, think this is just normal way of doing things. But maybe they should have
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celebrated the number of people heading to food banks in this country, or maybe the people who are
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losing their homes. Maybe perhaps they could even look at the number of young people who can't find work in
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this country and the very grim economic future that lies ahead for Canada, given 10 years of
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recklessness. So not a lot to dance about, but I guess they may be cheering the fact that so many
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Canadians were ignorant enough to continue these very bad policies, which seem like they're going
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to continue today. Maybe perhaps they were more importantly celebrating the fact that some people
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are going to fall for the line that the CPP, which is used for our pensions, can somehow be used as
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collateral to pay for this massive, obscenely large debt. And I'm not just talking about the federal
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one deficit of 78 billion, one point near 5 billion for the federal accumulated equivalent, provincial
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and municipal and personal. I mean, when a country owes five or six trillion bucks, its economy is only
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worth half of that. It's called debt to GDP. We're in really difficult times, hardly a reason for celebrating.
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Yeah. And the idea of asking people to sacrifice just two weeks ago, especially young people.
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I mean, he's directed his message towards young people where you have in Ontario, for instance,
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an unemployment rate of what, 15, 16%. I mean, to ask for sacrifices and then do this,
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it's kind of a slap on the face, I would say. What do you think?
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Oh, it's arrogance and hubris because, you know, we know young people were sacrificed for the interests of the
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boomers who by a large majority voted liberal and want to preserve what's good for them while the
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rest of the country falls to pieces. So, yeah, it's their own constituency. It's their own support
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level or their own support base that I suppose cheers mediocrity. But, you know, a decade of
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recklessness is going to hit far more than just, you know, people who didn't happen to support them.
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It's not going to come to really bite those who actually went along with the idea that elbows up and
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we don't like Pierre. He talks too mean to us. Someone who is a tough voice, a strong voice
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in difficult times has been rejected and they want to celebrate this. I think this goes to show you
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just how tone deaf the liberal cult really is when it comes to the very grim destiny that they've
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created for Canada. That's why they're not the same liberals I was once part of that worked very hard,
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didn't celebrate, was involved with a lot of austerity when it came to a debt situation that was about
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to cripple the country. We acted decisively and that helped save not only programs,
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but a lot of Canadians from the hardship that this generation is going to now experience thanks to
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its arrogance, its hubris and its ignorance. I bet you want to weigh in I'm sure on the floor
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crossing that we just saw and of course rumors there may be others as the liberals try to get the
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majority that they need in order to have no problem, you know, passing this budget. Chris D'Entremont,
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months, six, seven months after the election. I've spent weeks blasting the liberals over their
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policies and touting the conservative ones, you know, just flippantly decides he's had enough and
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goes over to the government side. Does this bother you? Well, it bothers me because these are difficult
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times. He's expressed them very well and eloquently in the past. Suddenly there has to be a personal
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reason for why he's doing these things and it can't be because he was supporting, you know,
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Aaron O'Connor a few years ago. It has a lot to do with the fact that there's probably better
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opportunities for him and, you know, maybe there's something in the weight for him. Regardless,
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if this was about his inability to run as Speaker of the House of Commons because the
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Conservatives needed every single vote, this is a terrible way of pointing out just how disloyal you are.
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So if he did it to the Conservatives, I'm pretty sure he could probably do it to the Liberals and
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will wind up going somewhere else in the next few years if he's given the chance to win the next
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election. My bets are that he's finished. Interesting. You know, we have a government
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and the Globe and Mail is outside here. It seems to be they're fawning over this budget.
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They're talking about investment coming in to Canada in the neighborhood of a trillion dollars.
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You know, based on what exactly? I mean, they haven't tackled the core issues with Canada
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right now as far as investment goes. That's why so many billions of dollars have left the country for
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greener pastures in the United States generally where they have lower taxes. They have less of a
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regulatory burden. Energy costs are lower. So the idea that by, you know, committing huge amounts of
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money, you know, and spending that that is somehow is going to be a magnet for investment. You know,
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it might attract some companies because some companies that's basically will say, well,
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sure, you know, you've got some money, you're dangling some cash. I'd be happy to
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relieve you of some of it, but it's not the way to create a long-term economy, is it?
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It isn't. And it does suggest that the Globe and
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Mails and other papers and other those who've indulged themselves very much with financial support
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to keep themselves going have pushed the Liberal narrative, especially the dangerous
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one on climate change and, of course, on the nonsense surrounding net zero. One by one,
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these things are falling like dominoes. No electric vehicle. That dream is gone with billions of dollars
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in public money. The carbon tax is gone. They're going to try to play around and dance around the
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idea of emissions caps. Look, we've had 10 years of their handiwork, of their wokeness, of their idea that
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somehow we can wish away the things that make Canada prosperous in favour of nonsense that,
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frankly, has now lost favour around the world. Look, Greta Thunberg doesn't believe it anymore.
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Neither does Bill Gates. That should be a sign to the Globe and Mails and other media grifters and
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apologists that it's not time to celebrate something that says, hey, we can, what they call an investment,
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which is actual debt accumulation that is likely to lead to even more higher interest rates supported
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by our CPP. So I want everyone to understand you pay for the Canada pension plan. It's meant for you
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when you retire. They want to use this as collateral against the massive debt that they're incurring right
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now to pay boomers and others who think that this is a wise thing to do. At the end of this,
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we're going to continue to see the Canadian economy slide. It doesn't take Donald Trump to make a bad
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situation. This was still been a dog breakfast with or without tariffs. But as Tiff Macklin has said,
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the bank governor, you know, it's get ready, get used to a declining standard of living. You voted for
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it. And the Globe and Mail helped grease the rails towards that end. In the meantime, the dollar
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continues to languish. It's down at 71 cents. Five years ago, it was at 75 cents. And so if you want to
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keep rates low as well, I mean, that means that our daughter is just going to buy it less and less.
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And so consumers are going to continue to suffer, Dan. And so, I mean, they're going to look at this
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budget and say, well, what exactly is there for me besides sacrifice, you know? And frankly, there isn't
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really all that much, but was there anything else about this budget that stood out for you?
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What stood out for me was the falsehood that we could use the Canada Pension Plan, Quebec Pension Plan,
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CPP, QPP, to offset this debt. Think about it. They're saying we can have all this massive
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crushing debt that would have killed us in the 1990s, that we turned things around,
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but we can absorb these things and pretend that somehow we can fool the bond rating agencies,
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the credit rating agencies, and they believe in Canada should maintain its credit worthiness because
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now they can read the CPP. The CPP, your pension has now been collateralized. Your pension has now been
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used as leverage against an ever-increasing debt. And guess what? If one bond rating agency declines
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and reduces Canada's credit rating, well, not only does that become a falsehood, you're going to see
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higher interest rates, not lower interest rates, and the government will have to borrow money at a
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much higher rate. So that which it's assuming now will be the projection of debt for the years to come
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will be even higher. And this is the problem we've had many years ago, where as rates, interest rates
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went up, so did the cost of borrowing money, not just for the private sector, consumers and business,
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but for the government. So we may not have a $78 billion debt. If bond rating agencies change their
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mind, you better hope they don't. That could be easily another 10, 15 billion bucks. So, you know,
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you've, we've pooched the economy. We've destroyed the energy, the oil and gas sector. We've pretended
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we've taken, you know, the caps, emission caps off that. We've threatened the automotive sector that
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isn't given the protection of our big banks and financial institutions and other woke organizations
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that think that they can virtue signal and stuff. They're not being given a challenge to compete
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by American financial institutions. They're protected as a supply management. But when it comes to the
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auto sector here in Ontario, it's under real threat. And I can tell you with the way things are going
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right now, we're going to lose our oil sector or natural gas sector, and we could be losing our
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automotive sector. All those things combined, well, we're looking down the abyss and we're now starting
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to realize that maybe it wasn't such a bright idea to have people who pretend they know how to deal with
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the economy, can stand up to Donald Trump, pretend they can do all these things, having been the ones
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still with the ball peen hammer in their in their hands after vandalizing the Canadian economy,
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running the show. I don't want to say Canadians are crazy, but I can tell you a lot of people
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are probably very shocked and they're going to forget what I say. Wait till next month when your
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mortgage rates have to come up for renewal. Wait till you lose your job or, you know, they scale back
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the amount of hours you have. How are you going to meet, you know, the needs of your family? The reality is
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that these guys have spent the silo bare and now we're running on fumes.
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Paul Jay And they haven't given up on net zero. I mean,
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we've got a potential here to build infrastructure that would allow us to ship a lot more oil and gas
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to Asia and to Europe. But of course, we've got the regulatory constraints there and legal
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constraints in terms of rolling out more pipelines. And so you have this blind spot as far as the
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government goes, even as you've got, you know, people like Bill Gates bailing on the whole idea
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that, you know, climate change is an existential threat to the, to the planet. These guys are
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holding fast to that same failed ideology. It's already cost us hundreds of billions of dollars.
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This is absolute folly, Dan. And, uh, I guess these guys are never going to give up on this con, are they?
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They're not, and they won't give up until Canadians are, uh, crushed into the ground so that they don't
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walk around pretending that, uh, they've got a guy who lied about what he did in 1998, as far as
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balancing the budget. He wasn't even Canada. A guy who said he had something to do with the 2008
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economic downturn and preventing us from going to recession. He didn't. That was Jim Flaherty and
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even Paul Martin's work before. Uh, and a guy who said he could handle Trump. Can't do it. Look,
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if we're going to continue down this idea that net zero has to stay in place, no change on the
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electric vehicle, uh, what I call a availability standard, which is a baloney statement, by the
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way, they're still continuing with that. There's no tanker band that's been removed. They're going
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to continue to, uh, you know, make this impression that they're somehow going to get some kind of
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energy superstructure or kind of energy, uh, corridor. Nothing's happened. They've been there seven,
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eight months now. And all we're seeing is falling further and further and further into debt.
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What will it take? Will you have to lose your home, lose your ability to make enough money to
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put food on the table? Uh, will it be a question of your kids fleeing to another country? Is that
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what's going to finally convince you of, uh, of your woke ways and having made a dumb decision
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for the fourth time? I'm not sure what it will take, but my God, and I've said this before,
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I know we all love the tragically hip and those of us who don't know it, they wrote a great song
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called 100th Meridian. And one of the quotes in that is very apt to the Canadian electorate today,
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because I've been knocking on doors since 1978. I can say this. It is now a generation
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Yeah. Unbelievable. Now there is some talk that the liberals, I mean, they're too shy of a majority.
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And do you think that they're a little nervous that they don't have the numbers to pass the budget?
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I mean, the NDP has caved before. There's no reason to think that they won't again, but
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it just stands to reason that, you know, maybe that's why they're so desperate to attract people
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to their party and, you know, uh, lure others in order to get that, then the numbers they need.
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Is it possible that the, that they might, that the government might fall in a confidence motion
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around the budget? I'm less convinced that'll happen. I think the NDP wants a leadership race and
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they, uh, they might have a few of their members not show up. Um, but I, I made a statement the
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other night at a conservative meeting. I don't get invited by liberals to speak anymore. I wonder why,
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gee, I was their consumer guy. I was their consular guy. I was their veterans affairs guy,
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but, uh, they, those aren't, those aren't things they care about. Even the beautiful week,
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like remembrance, uh, we can, hopefully we'll celebrate that on the 11th. But I said to the
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conservative said, thank your lucky Spurs, you didn't form government. I think the best thing
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of the conservative, all the shenanigans and all the little tiny little games being played in
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tactical games, rather strategic games played by the liberals, let them play it out. I used to play
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goalie, not a very good one, by the way, in hockey. It was always let the other guy make the first move
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and the liberals are basically giving themselves enough rope to hang themselves because the economy
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is falling to pieces. And thank goodness, the conservatives won't have to wear this. This will be
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completely on liberals, liberal supporters, and those who still fantasize that these people are
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somehow have their best interests at heart. They don't. It's all about themselves. They're grifting
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friends and their willingness to try to humiliate or to try to admonish others who don't agree with
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their ideas, which have nothing to do with the liberal party that I belong to far longer than
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those that are in there now. Dan McTague, hard hitting stuff as always. Thank you so much
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for coming on the show. Always a pleasure, Mark. Thanks for having me. Enjoy.
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And that is it for this edition of Straight Up. Appreciate you tuning in,
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my friends. Let's do it again soon, shall we? Bye-bye for now.