Juno News - Carney's blowout budget + floor-crossing betrayal

00:00:00.000 I appreciate you tuning in, my friends. I am your host.

00:00:08.560 Well, the Carney government's budget has been tabled, but all the talk of out-of-control

00:00:13.080 spending and carbon taxes has taken a backseat to a political realignment today. The conservatives

00:00:19.840 have lost their only member from Nova Scotia, Chris Dantremont, who crossed the floor to

00:00:24.820 join the Liberals. Dantremont became disgruntled after being denied a prestigious post with

00:00:30.420 the party, but says there's no place for a red Tory in a party led by Pierre Polyev.

00:00:36.040 What was the deciding factor in crossing the floor?

00:00:39.600 You know, I would think over the last number of months, I wasn't feeling that I was aligned

00:00:45.240 with the ideals of what the leader of the opposition had been talking about.

00:00:50.660 I know you just spoke of Mr. Polyev and the direction he was going, but I'm just wondering

00:00:54.160 whether the conservative leadership style perhaps pushed you out of caucus.

00:00:58.600 Well, I think that's probably a part of it. I didn't find I was represented there.

00:01:03.140 My ideals of an Easterner, of a red Tory, I mean, quite honestly, of trying to find ways

00:01:10.000 to find solutions and help your community rather than trying to oppose everything that's happening.

00:01:16.280 So I guess he wanted the leader of the opposition to stop opposing. Anyway, conservative Michael

00:01:21.980 Cooper says Dantremont needs to answer his constituents who voted for a conservative

00:01:26.420 just last April, only to end up with a Liberal member of Parliament.

00:01:29.900 All the questions should be for Mr. Dantremont this morning. I would encourage you to look

00:01:34.240 at his own words about his Prime Minister.

00:01:37.620 Canadians are hurting. Families are being forced to cut deeply into their grocery budgets just

00:01:43.620 to get by. And frankly, that makes me a little bit angry and a little bit sad.

00:01:48.020 We warned that Liberals, that their out-of-control spending and massive deficits were irresponsible.

00:01:53.740 But of course, they didn't listen. And now, after six months under a new Prime Minister who promised

00:02:00.140 financial discipline, Canadians are still waiting. He said he'd be judged by the cost at the grocery store.

00:02:08.940 Well, Mr. Speaker, Canadians are judging him, and they are not impressed.

00:02:13.660 Here we have, as a member of Parliament, Mr. Dantremont, who said one thing, and is now doing another,

00:02:19.080 who said one thing to his constituents, that he would fight for an affordable budget

00:02:23.020 to provide affordability for Canadians. And that's certainly not what we've seen.

00:02:28.320 I can tell you that, along with my Conservative colleagues, that what we've said we wanted,

00:02:34.060 we were very clear with the Prime Minister, gave him the opportunity to consult and to make adjustments

00:02:40.640 where needed, if we truly are at this turning point. Well, I'll tell you what the turning point is.

00:02:46.260 It's more Canadians turning towards food banks because they can't afford to feed themselves.

00:02:51.020 Well, that puts the governing Liberals just too shy of a majority. And there are questions as to whether

00:02:55.920 other Conservatives might also decide to make the jump. Prime Minister Carney was evasive when asked

00:03:02.040 whether he's courting other potential floor-crossers.

00:03:04.840 How many Conservatives has your caucus approached about joining the Liberal Party?

00:03:09.320 Well, I'd say the following. First, I want to underscore what I said at the start,

00:03:13.720 how much I admire Chris Dantremont, appreciate his joining the government caucus,

00:03:21.060 and will speak to anyone, publicly or otherwise, that can support us.

00:03:26.980 How personally involved have you been in the floor-crossing discussions?

00:03:32.040 And I'll have conversations with anyone.

00:03:35.060 I know you're willing to talk to anyone, but I'm wondering, are you or any members of your team

00:03:39.680 actually in conversations with other members of the opposition to try to get them to join the

00:03:43.520 I'm in conversation with you right now, so I can't be talking to anyone else.

00:03:47.340 Meantime, Conservative Party leader Pierre Polyev took direct aim at the budget,

00:03:52.060 which posted a deficit of, well, it was 86% higher than the Liberals said it would be.

00:03:56.940 Let's listen to that.

00:03:57.960 The Liberals have introduced the most costly and largest budget deficit in history outside of COVID.

00:04:05.260 The cost of this Liberal budget will drive up the cost of food, housing, and everything else that Canadians buy.

00:04:12.080 And the Prime Minister has broken every single promise he made just seven short months ago.

00:04:18.340 He promised a $62 billion deficit.

00:04:21.060 He delivered nearly an $80 billion deficit, $16 billion bigger than he promised,

00:04:26.560 and twice the size that his predecessor left behind.

00:04:29.860 He promised to spend less.

00:04:31.220 He's spending $90 billion more, costing $5,400 per family in Canada.

00:04:40.200 And that $90 billion, to the Prime Minister's heckles, is above and beyond the promised $16 billion that he says he will one day find.

00:04:49.040 And if he doesn't find them, it will be over $100 billion in brand new spending.

00:04:52.920 This costly budget forces Canadians to spend more on debt interest than on health care transfers.

00:05:00.340 More than the government collects in GST.

00:05:02.980 That means every dollar Canadians pay in GST will go to bankers and bondholders instead of to doctors and nurses.

00:05:11.400 Well, despite pushing the nation's debt to an eye-watering $1.35 trillion,

00:05:17.320 Prime Minister Carney says the budget is prudent.

00:05:19.640 We've put forward to the House a plan that meets the moment,

00:05:25.600 that manages the federal finances in a prudent, responsible, pragmatic way,

00:05:32.800 gets spending down, and creates this prospect of investment on a scale that we haven't seen for generations.

00:05:40.680 And now it's up to Parliament to pass the document.

00:05:43.200 We'll see if Carney has the votes to do so.

00:05:45.760 And joining me now is Jonathan Wellam, who is CEO and President of Rocklink Investment Partners.

00:05:51.920 Welcome to the show, Jonathan.

00:05:53.560 Thank you very much, Mark. Good to speak with you.

00:05:56.280 Well, it's the day after the budget.

00:05:58.680 Why don't we just get your blanket impressions of it?

00:06:02.560 What do you think?

00:06:03.700 Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, I'm not surprised.

00:06:05.760 I mean, Mark Carney has already signaled that he thinks that Canada is going to develop by top-down government,

00:06:12.640 more state involvement, less private sector, more regulation and taxation.

00:06:18.160 And he's going to direct the economy because he knows best.

00:06:20.940 So that's what we're really getting here.

00:06:22.600 We're getting more and more government spending, more bloated government, bigger deficits.

00:06:27.600 We've got deficits now approaching, in terms of their revelation, $80 billion, more than double what was originally inherited by him.

00:06:37.980 And our overall debt is going to be $1.3-plus trillion.

00:06:43.560 I mean, this is outrageous.

00:06:45.140 We can't afford this.

00:06:46.600 Our interest costs, as you know, are also skyrocketing.

00:06:48.600 They look like they could top $75 to $77 billion going out a couple more years.

00:06:57.740 And that's if interest rates stay low.

00:06:59.840 That's if we don't get a credit rating change by the credit agencies and our cost of money doesn't go up.

00:07:05.560 I mean, it's almost impossible for our cost of money not to be going up.

00:07:10.300 So these numbers are all low.

00:07:12.360 I suspect our debt is going to be higher.

00:07:14.100 Our cost of funding is going to be higher and is going to just really crimp our economy, and we aren't going to be creating any wealth.

00:07:21.620 Well, there's some talk of savings.

00:07:23.600 I guess they're going to phase out, what is it, 28,000 civil servants by 2028.

00:07:31.060 I think that's not a bad start.

00:07:34.080 But, you know, it's all going to be done through attrition.

00:07:36.580 So this is something that's going to take time to happen.

00:07:39.060 And according to their own forecast, you know, by fiscal year 2930, we're still going to be running a $56 billion deficit.

00:07:48.680 So we're inching closer to a $2 trillion debt.

00:07:52.500 These are structural deficits.

00:07:54.940 These are deficits that are now embedded in the fundamental, you know, spending arrangements of the government.

00:08:01.860 And, you know, given the amount of revenue that can come in, we're going to have these shortfalls unless we substantially change the structure of government.

00:08:10.060 So, you know, he's fiddling around and saying he's going to shrink the public sector.

00:08:14.440 Well, of course the public sector has to be shrunk.

00:08:16.480 You have to take a chainsaw to the public sector.

00:08:18.480 It's much too large.

00:08:19.740 It's bloated.

00:08:20.540 It's been bloated now for the last 10 years.

00:08:22.540 It was probably too large when Stephen Harper was there.

00:08:24.860 And now we've got – so now he's going to just cut it by attrition.

00:08:28.940 These are safe from his perspective.

00:08:31.280 He's not going to jeopardize his public sector vote.

00:08:34.440 And that's why he's doing it this way.

00:08:36.320 But it's not enough.

00:08:37.460 It's too little, too late.

00:08:39.740 We're in a serious financial position and we're not having the wealth come into the country.

00:08:43.900 The capital is not being attracted.

00:08:45.400 It's going south of the border and it's leaving.

00:08:47.980 And so the private sector is increasingly getting just strangled by this massive public sector, which gets bigger and bigger and bigger.

00:08:56.780 And if he thinks he knows how to allocate capital in our economy, then we're in big trouble if that's the way he's going to go about it.

00:09:03.940 We need private sector businesses allocating capital based upon return on equity, return on invested capital.

00:09:10.100 And we need to get the government out of the way.

00:09:12.480 Yeah, I mean, if you believe the fawning coverage in the pages of the Globe and Mail or maybe the CBC, you know, he's made his pitch to private industry to stay in Canada, to invest in Canada.

00:09:24.680 But there's very little in this budget that actually provides any incentive for companies not only to invest here and stay here, but just not leave.

00:09:34.820 You know, because some of these companies, as you know, I mean, Canada has been hemorrhaging tens of billions of dollars in capital over the years.

00:09:44.000 And so you would think there'd be a sense of urgency here.

00:09:46.300 So, you know, we've got to keep companies here and we're competing against the United States.

00:09:50.860 Jurisdictions down there have lower taxes than we do up here, have lower regulatory burdens.

00:09:57.920 You know, they don't have the environmental, the green stipulations that you have to stick to, the rules.

00:10:05.200 And all of that costs money.

00:10:06.320 All of that eats into the profit margin of these companies.

00:10:09.660 There's nothing in this budget in the way of regulatory relief or tax relief, is there?

00:10:14.540 Yeah, absolutely.

00:10:16.240 And then the thing is, I mean, I did a study on this just recently and published some work on this.

00:10:20.600 So over the last 10 years, there were six dangerous regulatory changes implemented by the Liberal government, which basically chased capital out of the country.

00:10:29.920 And even the best forecasts say that we've missed out on 670 billion plus in capital that would have developed in our resource sector, which is over 1.5 trillion in GDP that we've foregone.

00:10:42.940 Another 670,000 jobs.

00:10:45.580 That's already behind us.

00:10:47.680 Now we're looking at what's going ahead.

00:10:49.260 None of that's changed.

00:10:50.800 These regulations are all in this, all remain.

00:10:54.220 And they put a stranglehold on businesses.

00:10:56.460 And if you can't get something, you know, done in five years or six years or something like that, and it's 10, 15, and you're not even sure you're going to get your resource permits and so forth so you can dig in the ground and get your resources out of the ground, money's not going to come.

00:11:10.560 And so we look at this budget, all he's doing is giving, you know, accelerated depreciation and so forth on his crony projects.

00:11:17.560 These green projects, these green projects, these ones that are going to be so-called, you know, carbon capture.

00:11:22.760 He's still all caught up in the whole green agenda and, you know, net zero 2050.

00:11:29.680 I mean, Trump has already passed that.

00:11:31.360 He's gone.

00:11:31.960 He's left that one long behind him.

00:11:34.500 They're developing their resources down there, and we're sitting on our hands.

00:11:37.720 And so if we think we're going to get capital into this country, there's just no way businesses are going to invest in any significant way, given the little tinkering around the corners, around the edges that he's done in this budget.

00:11:48.960 I mean, even some of the climate zealots out there, the Bill Gates of the world, I mean, here was a guy who was pushing to have the sun blocked out, you know, to save the planet from climate change.

00:12:00.160 I mean, you see countries like the United States, but others, too, just backing away from the lunacy around this whole net zero agenda.

00:12:07.980 And yet here in Canada, we're diehards when it comes to that sort of thing.

00:12:11.540 And it's just terrible news for anybody looking to invest here.

00:12:14.700 So I don't see how this pitch to private industry to continue investing in Canada is going to work.

00:12:22.020 I just don't see how.

00:12:24.140 Well, it's not going to.

00:12:24.760 We're in the investment business.

00:12:25.860 We talk to companies all the time.

00:12:27.220 I'm heading out to a conference on precious metals and resource companies.

00:12:31.320 And I'm telling you right now, they are not interested in investing more in Canada under these current situations.

00:12:37.660 And so it's going to be very difficult to attract more capital.

00:12:41.360 I mean, it's interesting to see the shift, you know, Bill Gates and so on.

00:12:44.400 And again, it shows you that what these guys are concerned about is their own pocket and their own power.

00:12:50.480 So it's money and power.

00:12:51.780 Bill Gates now realizes that if we're going to digitize and have EVs and data centers and electrification and all of this, we need more power.

00:13:01.280 We need more energy.

00:13:02.880 And so he can make more money now shifting to developing the energy necessary to digitize and to have all these data centers and develop AI than he can on the green agenda.

00:13:12.820 So now we shifted over to that.

00:13:14.420 So, again, he's gone from one to the other because at the end of the day, the green agenda was overhyped.

00:13:19.220 We don't have a CO2 problem.

00:13:21.520 This is, again, something that's made up by the globalists.

00:13:25.240 And to get more power, we see this.

00:13:27.100 And this has been Carney's pitch from his book until and also in his last 15, 20 years of his professional life.

00:13:35.360 And yet there's also a certain amount of unease around this agenda as far as Carney's ongoing relationship with Brookfield, huge company, one that he still has invested heavily in in the form of stock options and so forth.

00:13:50.940 And you get the sense that when you're looking at this huge $50 billion allocation of money for infrastructure projects, hospitals, transportation, infrastructure, that some of that money is going to end up in the pockets of Brookfield.

00:14:08.100 And by virtue of his investments with that company, that Carney himself would be in a position to profit as well.

00:14:15.720 I mean, does any of that make you uneasy?

00:14:18.060 I mean, it doesn't.

00:14:19.460 I mean, I've followed Brookfield for many years.

00:14:22.080 I've met Bruce Flatt.

00:14:23.240 I've, you know, I've interacted with him on a number of occasions.

00:14:26.540 I have a great respect for him.

00:14:28.460 Brookfield is a very, very powerful infrastructure company.

00:14:31.640 I mean, they've got over a trillion in assets.

00:14:34.240 They've grown rapidly.

00:14:35.760 They're very good at what they do.

00:14:37.220 They're very shrewd, very sophisticated company.

00:14:39.740 So it's almost impossible if there aren't infrastructure projects being offered up in Canada that Brookfield is not going to be on the short list just because of the size.

00:14:47.420 But that does introduce a conflict.

00:14:50.000 And I think that's an unfortunate one from Carney's perspective.

00:14:53.040 And he needs to, again, put some protections around that.

00:14:57.040 Otherwise, it will look like he's just lining their pockets.

00:15:00.040 And that is consistent with what we've seen out of Ottawa, especially the Liberal Party.

00:15:04.640 I mean, Trudeau, the scandal after scandal after scandal when money was going to individuals that were supporters of their party.

00:15:11.000 We saw that with the SNC-Lavalon situation.

00:15:13.600 On it goes, right?

00:15:14.600 So, again, we're concerned about that.

00:15:17.020 We're going to be obviously critical of that and watching for that as Canadians.

00:15:22.180 Is our tax dollars going to the right businesses?

00:15:24.580 Are they being responsibly managed?

00:15:26.680 Is there good stewardship going on in Ottawa?

00:15:28.720 And we've seen very little of that, especially with the Liberal government.

00:15:32.160 So it's very disappointing.

00:15:34.500 And given the lack of cuts in program spending, I mean, to me, it looks like they're just kind of tinkering.

00:15:41.960 You know, they're not taking an axe to spending the way some of us think should have happened.

00:15:47.740 I mean, inevitably, will the government have no choice but to raise taxes on Canadians?

00:15:52.540 I mean, I don't see that that's going to be avoided.

00:15:55.780 I think, well, if it continues down this road, we're going to, again, we've seen this movie before in Canada not that long ago in the 90s.

00:16:05.300 I mean, after we had this massive buildup of debt, starting with Pierre Trudeau and then through the Mulroney years and then ending in sort of the mid-90s where we had our credit downgraded, our cost of debt skyrocketed, our dollar went to 61.

00:16:18.600 We referred to our dollar as a northern peso, and I think that's going to be a good expression if we continue down the road that Carney wants to take us.

00:16:26.880 It will be the northern peso and it won't be worth much, even to a crummy U.S. dollar.

00:16:31.500 I mean, the U.S. dollar has got problems too, but even compared to that piece of paper, we're going to look even worse.

00:16:37.300 And so we can expect this to continue, and if we can't raise the money in the bond markets because we've got too much debt, that's what happened before our debt costs went up.

00:16:49.640 Yeah, taxes have to go up, and then they really have to slash the size of government and take this seriously.

00:16:53.960 But until that point, I don't really see them doing this.

00:16:57.700 They just believe they can just continue wallowing in the debt, increasing the deficits, increasing our overall debt, and putting future generations at risk.

00:17:06.200 This is crazy for our own generation, but in particular, again, our kids and our grandkids.

00:17:11.780 This is not forward-looking at all.

00:17:13.580 This is actually continuing to destroy the wealth production of Canada and the great nation that we are.

00:17:20.820 We've been endowed, as you know, with massive resources, that we should be one of the wealthiest countries in the world.

00:17:26.840 But we've been hamstrung by terrible politicians on the federal and in many of our provinces also for decades, and this is the result.

00:17:35.740 Now, we have yet to hear from the bond rating agencies, the Moody's of the world.

00:17:41.340 Are you expecting any word of warning from them or possibly even a credit downgrade for Canada?

00:17:49.240 We're going that direction.

00:17:50.820 We're going that direction.

00:17:51.900 I'm not sure how fast that will happen.

00:17:53.660 Our debt to GDP at the federal level is still much less than some of our other countries.

00:17:58.880 But you have to be careful in Canada.

00:18:00.320 You have to include our provincial debt.

00:18:03.320 The United States, the states, are not allowed to run large deficits and accumulate debt unless it's for infrastructure projects, for big capital projects.

00:18:14.740 And so what's happened in Canada, like we take Ontario, for example.

00:18:18.460 Ontario has well over $400 billion debt.

00:18:21.220 Our debt to GDP in Ontario is like 50% debt to GDP.

00:18:25.380 Ontario is one of the most indebted subsovereign states in the world.

00:18:29.500 It's in terrible shape.

00:18:30.540 So when you add that to our federal debt, that's when you really get a sense of the indebtedness of Canada is well over 100% debt to GDP when you include the provinces.

00:18:41.060 Alberta, of course, is somewhat better.

00:18:43.000 But most of our provinces are similar to Ontario.

00:18:45.100 They're in horrible shape.

00:18:46.760 They've been trying to fund, you know, social welfare programs, overpriced hospital systems.

00:18:54.060 Our health care systems are all breaking down.

00:18:56.780 And our education, our educational systems are also horrible.

00:19:00.500 I mean, they're not doing the job that they need to be doing.

00:19:02.700 So when you think about on the provincial level across our country, 60, 65% of the provincial budget goes to two things, health care and schools.

00:19:11.860 And what do we have to show for it, Mark?

00:19:13.500 I mean, it's just horrible.

00:19:15.240 The spending, the bureaucracy, the inefficiency, ineffectiveness of our politicians.

00:19:20.340 It's amazing Canadians are not demanding more and changing these folks and throwing them out of office. 0.60

00:19:25.180 But we continue down this road.

00:19:27.660 Hopefully, God have mercy on us.

00:19:29.560 If we continue much longer down this road, we're going to really feel the impact.

00:19:34.520 Yeah, absolutely.

00:19:35.460 How do people find out more about Rocklink and the services that you provide over there?

00:19:40.620 Yeah, we're doing our best to manage around all of this craziness and make sure people's money are in great companies and in the right spaces.

00:19:49.520 And so we enjoy doing that.

00:19:50.700 Best place to get us is our website, rocklink.com.

00:19:53.860 That's R-O-C-K-L-I-N-C, link with a C. 1.00

00:19:57.400 And you can just blast us an email and info at rocklink.com.

00:20:00.560 And we will respond and love to talk to you.

00:20:02.860 So by all means, reach out to us.

00:20:05.560 Thank you so much for coming on the show, Jonathan.

00:20:07.080 We appreciate it.

00:20:08.200 Great.

00:20:08.400 Thank you very much, Mark.

00:20:09.260 It's great information and keep up the great work.

00:20:12.080 Thank you.

00:20:12.680 Jonathan Wellham, Rocklink Investment Partners.

00:20:15.420 And we are joined by Alex Brown, who's a commentator right here on Juno News.

00:20:19.780 And he's also with the National Citizens Coalition.

00:20:22.100 Welcome, Alex.

00:20:23.080 Mark, thanks for having me.

00:20:24.180 Busy, busy time for everybody here after the budget.

00:20:26.760 It really is.

00:20:27.680 Now, all the talk was supposed to be about the budget, and yet some of that has been pushed

00:20:34.040 aside in favor of political talk, this realignment that we're seeing.

00:20:38.360 Not a major one at first, but it could get worse in terms of four crossings.

00:20:43.180 We see Chris Dantremont, a conservative member, the only one in Nova Scotia now, has vacated

00:20:49.660 and joined the liberals.

00:20:51.760 How big a blow is that to the conservative party?

00:20:54.520 And could we see more of that sort of thing in the days ahead?

00:20:58.680 Well, yeah, it's a big blow if there is more to come.

00:21:02.020 And from what I'm hearing from sources and from, you know, if one were just to go online

00:21:06.620 right now and engage in the Canadian political discourse, there's rumors of one or two more.

00:21:12.120 And so that's obviously making the minority situation particularly precarious.

00:21:17.560 And so the party has to really thread a needle here to make sure, you know, you're best, you

00:21:23.020 know, advocating for your people and doing right by your principles.

00:21:26.000 But you don't want to take on too much water right now because this government was elected,

00:21:31.900 you know, with a check on its power.

00:21:34.140 This is a minority situation.

00:21:35.860 And I can tell you from speaking to people in Ottawa, this budget isn't entirely presented

00:21:42.960 out of benevolence.

00:21:43.960 It has all kinds of problems.

00:21:45.300 But much of these policies being put forth and some of these line items, this has more

00:21:51.740 to do with them paying lip service to the fact that they are indeed in a minority situation.

00:21:57.240 If you were to lose that, you could go right back to some of the worst of the Trudeau years

00:22:01.200 very quickly.

00:22:01.920 All right.

00:22:03.240 So what does Pierre Polyev do here?

00:22:05.920 I mean, he knows who the possible, you know, MPs are that have one foot out the door.

00:22:13.860 You know, is there something that he can do to, you know, keep them in place?

00:22:18.260 Is that happening?

00:22:19.600 Or is their attitude more like, you know, look, if you want to go, go?

00:22:24.140 It's a mix of both.

00:22:25.500 What I can speak to, and I'm not in the room, president of the National Citizens Coalition,

00:22:31.460 Peter Coleman put out a release this morning, where he is encouraging them to broaden the

00:22:36.060 voices in the party engaging with media right now beyond just Pierre, to hammer home the

00:22:41.060 budget's glaring omissions, such as no real affordability, relief, no serious growth strategies.

00:22:47.160 There's wisdom in showing some patience here, particularly under the threat of these additional

00:22:52.300 floor crossers. 0.74

00:22:53.400 So it is not, there's so much to oppose.

00:22:56.220 There's much to be angry about, much to be frustrated about.

00:22:59.360 But I think that, you know, if one were to try to keep a steady head, you can continue

00:23:04.060 to dominate on policy and on the policy front and dragging the liberals a bit closer back

00:23:09.520 to the center and then wait and see how 2026 unfolds.

00:23:14.440 You know that the media has not been particularly kind to Pierre Polyev.

00:23:17.380 They do seem to have it in for him.

00:23:18.740 So this, I think, puts a bit of a target on his back with the media raising the issue of

00:23:25.940 his leadership.

00:23:26.700 You know, that's the reason why people are leaving.

00:23:28.640 They just can't stand the guy.

00:23:30.220 He's just too conservative.

00:23:31.920 We heard it there with some of the comments by Chris D'Anthromont.

00:23:34.960 You know, there's no place for me here as a red Tory.

00:23:37.920 You know, is this a case where leadership is going to come under scrutiny and maybe some

00:23:45.240 of the people around Pierre are going to have to talk to him about how he's doing his

00:23:49.460 job?

00:23:50.020 Or do you think he should just keep doing what he's doing?

00:23:52.760 I think on the youth front, you absolutely keep doing what you're doing because you've

00:23:56.120 built this unique and unprecedented voter coalition of young people who are really concerned

00:24:01.260 about the direction of the country and who were not addressed in this budget.

00:24:05.380 There's no way around it.

00:24:06.280 Housing is a disaster.

00:24:07.600 Even liberal housing policy experts are saying it's as if the middle class isn't even supposed

00:24:12.660 to exist in this country anymore.

00:24:14.140 They just want to build these purpose-built sort of Khrushchevkas, these forever rentals 1.00

00:24:19.560 and, you know, public housing.

00:24:21.400 They don't actually want to build homes, get out of the way on homes, lower development

00:24:24.980 costs.

00:24:25.660 But tough needle to thread because there is a red Tory camp right now.

00:24:30.520 We can see it in media.

00:24:31.560 You can hear from these guys every morning.

00:24:34.620 You know, you open up the paper.

00:24:35.620 However, it's in some ways similar to the federal election dynamic that we witnessed

00:24:39.700 coming from the Ford camp against the Polyev camp and these sort of warring tribes of consultants, 0.54

00:24:45.900 which, you know, it doesn't serve the Canadian public well in any way, that there is a let's

00:24:51.140 go back to maybe a more O'Toole approach.

00:24:53.520 But we also see that these generational problems in the country are so urgent.

00:24:58.600 They're so frustrating for so many people.

00:25:01.540 The conservatives are putting together such a young team that that is going to be communicated

00:25:05.900 in a different way, a less stately way than the public has seen before.

00:25:10.600 And maybe you have to strike a better balance there.

00:25:12.680 Yeah.

00:25:13.680 Yeah.

00:25:13.880 I mean, people forget that Pierre Polyev did very well in the last election.

00:25:18.760 The fact that he didn't win, that was really due to the collapse of the NDP.

00:25:23.780 If that hadn't happened, if you had the traditional splits there between the liberals and NDP,

00:25:29.360 I think you'd be looking at Prime Minister Pierre Polyev.

00:25:32.540 But the Tories got 41%.

00:25:34.340 I mean, election after election in Canada, you get 41%.

00:25:38.980 That gives you a pretty solid majority.

00:25:41.220 In this case, it wasn't enough because all the left wing votes, or a good chunk of them,

00:25:47.640 certainly from the boomers, coalesced around Mark Carney.

00:25:51.300 I guess they were expecting something different.

00:25:53.960 I say it all the time where Canada strikes me as a gerontocracy now.

00:25:58.740 Where it's, there's such a, those numbers, that 41% is borderline unprecedented, but it wasn't enough.

00:26:07.300 And so now you have to, winning is obviously the most important thing.

00:26:12.020 We've also seen that sometimes when winning is the most important thing to you,

00:26:15.600 as with justified criticisms of, say, again, a government in Ontario,

00:26:19.520 you have to make sure you also govern with principles and you,

00:26:22.420 and you do right by your folks and affordability metrics and all kinds of things like that.

00:26:26.520 And so it's, it's a real concern that they have now.

00:26:28.860 And I just worry, and I don't want them to, I don't want them to give up on this young voter coalition.

00:26:33.460 I don't want them to go back to just speaking tepidly, socially,

00:26:37.800 and, and just sort of preaching this kind of lukewarm austerity, this,

00:26:41.900 this incrementalism that increasingly to young voters looks more like managed decline.

00:26:47.240 Yeah. I mean, you make a great point about younger voters gravitating towards the conservatives.

00:26:51.740 I mean, when has that ever happened?

00:26:53.620 Bizarre. They won the campus vote.

00:26:55.540 Mark, have you ever heard of them winning the campus vote?

00:26:57.500 When I was on campus, I'm in my mid thirties now, increasingly less young.

00:27:01.200 If you mentioned you were a conservative, you'd be hit with, you know, rotten produce.

00:27:05.140 Now I was speaking at UBC last week and it was a packed lecture hall of, of young conservatives

00:27:10.520 who were proudly, you know, more traditional in their values, proudly, you know, sick and tired

00:27:17.120 of, of some of the excess of the last 10 years and the, the, you know, the, the lack of upward

00:27:21.700 social mobility. And they weren't, they weren't hiding from it. It's changed so much. So recently.

00:27:27.680 Where do you stand on the possibility that we could be headed for a Christmas election?

00:27:33.180 I mean, I don't think, I don't think it's going to happen. I, I, I don't think the parties are

00:27:38.460 well positioned. I think fundraising is not in a terrific place for either party coming out of

00:27:43.680 the election. I don't see war funding, uh, on online spending, uh, Cole Hogan, a great, uh,

00:27:49.200 conservative politico, uh, he, he did, he tracks the, the, the meta spending and that's often like

00:27:55.800 a bellwether for where we're headed. The liberals are not spending big right now. The conservatives

00:28:00.280 are spending what you'd sort of expect from their, from their digital. Uh, I don't know

00:28:05.120 if it would be any, in anyone's best interest, uh, it could potentially backfire. And if anything,

00:28:10.000 it would potentially best serve the liberals who might be able to continue to focus on Trump

00:28:14.480 as opposed to the myriad of domestic crises that this budget did not even address.

00:28:20.400 I'm just wondering if the liberals might stumble and bumble their way into an election

00:28:24.360 a la 1979 with Joe Clark. I mean, they don't quite have the, I mean, they're close a couple of,

00:28:30.680 a couple of votes, but the NDP has kind of served notice that they don't like the budget. Now that

00:28:36.040 may mean absolutely nothing considering what we saw under Jagmeet Singh. They, they said they hated

00:28:41.760 the budget, they had problems with it and voted in favor of it time and time again. I just don't think

00:28:46.000 that the NDP can get away with doing that anymore given the shellacking they took in the last

00:28:50.880 election. So I think they're very aware that they need to, uh, oppose, you know, not just

00:28:58.040 pitch their wagon to the liberals or else they're going to be finished as a party. And we know that

00:29:02.620 the conservatives and the block are not going to vote for them. My understanding is that even the

00:29:06.560 Greens, I think, I don't know how many votes they have, but they are not going to be supporting the

00:29:12.380 budget either. Well, Elizabeth May has come out against it. So that's something. Yeah. Anyway,

00:29:18.260 we'll have to see what happens. And of course there's the other thing about just the ongoing

00:29:22.100 issue in committee. And I know people don't talk a whole lot about that, but the liberals are getting

00:29:27.740 shellacked in committee because they don't have the votes. You know, they don't have the liberals

00:29:31.380 or the NDP voting with them in committee anymore. And they're getting beat in vote after vote and vote

00:29:35.980 inside committee. So you've got the block and NDP teaming up here and slicing, they're going to slice

00:29:43.420 and dice this budget to the point where it's hardly recognizable from the document that was tabled

00:29:48.900 yesterday. So there's a lot of ifs, ands, and other possibilities in terms of what could happen

00:29:54.900 in the days ahead. What do you think? I just think it's such a precarious time and it's a tough time

00:30:00.520 to forecast where we're headed, which is this is a budget that, you know, over-promised and under-delivered.

00:30:06.380 It is not a complete disaster. Obviously that deficit number is a millstone. There are allusions

00:30:13.280 to more reasonable immigration numbers, which are still far too high considering we're not building

00:30:18.900 homes and considering our, our infrastructure is backlogged beyond belief, but it's, they have to

00:30:26.320 navigate some tricky waters here. Maybe they can grab two more floor crossers, but as you said, they, 1.00

00:30:32.180 they are still for this moment. And I think fingers crossed for those who are worried about

00:30:37.300 accountability, they have to work with the other parties. They are, you know, at the behest of the

00:30:42.260 other parties and they are going to be keep, you know, continue to be carved up in committees. And

00:30:46.760 that is a good thing because this is a moment where we cannot repeat the last 10 years. The, and

00:30:52.260 from looking at this budget, it sure looks a lot like the last 10 years, which is, which is a big

00:30:56.920 concern. Absolutely. Alex, I know you have to run. We really appreciate you coming on the show.

00:31:02.100 Thank you. Mark. Thanks so much. Alex Brown, Juno News, National Citizens Coalition. That is it for

00:31:08.080 this edition of Straight Up with Mark Paterini. Appreciate you tuning in, my friends. Let's do it

00:31:11.480 again soon. Bye-bye for now.

Juno News - November 05, 2025

Carney's blowout budget + floor-crossing betrayal

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