Juno News - Carney's daughter wrote about receiving therapy at shuttered Tavistock clinic

00:00:00.000 Exclusive report reveals that one of Mark Carney's daughters attended the controversial

00:00:10.240 Tavistock Transgender Clinic for therapy. The Alberta government said it's hoping to put more

00:00:16.040 protections in place for free speech on university campuses. A new study shows that by 2023 Canada

00:00:22.860 was taking in five times as many immigrants than the number of houses being constructed.

00:00:27.660 Hello Canada, it's Tuesday, March 18th and this is the True North Daily Brief. I'm Cosmin Georgia.

00:00:34.000 And I'm Jeff Knight. We've got you covered with all the news you need to know.

00:00:38.060 Let's discuss the top stories of the day and the True North exclusives you won't hear anywhere else.

00:00:47.320 Mark Carney used his teenage daughter Cleo, a first-year Harvard student, to introduce him at

00:00:53.160 the recent Liberal Convention where party members voted to make him the Prime Minister.

00:00:57.660 But Cleo isn't Carney's only daughter. Carney and his wife, Diana Fox, have four daughters and the

00:01:03.680 eldest, 24, is a prolific writer and trans activist. In the alternative magazine Authenticity,

00:01:10.640 Sasha Carney penned an essay in April 2020 called Mumsnet and Transmasculine Childhood. In the essay,

00:01:18.080 Sasha talks about her experiences of feeling confused about her gender as a teenager and

00:01:23.620 receiving treatment at the discredited Tavistock Gender Clinic in London, England. The Carney family 0.51

00:01:29.860 moved from Ottawa, Canada to London in 2013 so that Carney could become the governor of the Bank of

00:01:37.200 England. According to an interview she gave for the Ottawa publication APT613, Sasha, then Sophia,

00:01:44.940 was 13 years old when the family relocated. Records show she moved back to North America to attend

00:01:51.140 Yale University in 2017. Sasha describes how one of her friends tried to game the system in order to

00:01:58.340 get, quote, top surgery, a double incision mastectomy meant to masculinize young gender-confused women. 1.00

00:02:06.440 The essay reads, quote, I felt a fierce surge of jealousy every time I walked into the Tavistock for

00:02:12.780 therapy and saw patients turn left towards the medical spaces I didn't feel trans enough to enter.

00:02:20.540 The Tavistock Clinic was ultimately shut down after years of controversy surrounding its treatment

00:02:26.120 methods, which critics say amounted to medical experiments on children. Tavistock's child transitioning

00:02:32.660 practice shuttered its doors in April 2024 after reporters revealed that minors were being rushed into

00:02:38.800 life-altering treatment with few precautions. Ultimately, years of concerns from whistleblowers,

00:02:45.460 clinicians, and detransitioners forced the UK's National Health Service to order the clinic's 1.00

00:02:51.300 closure. So Jeff, some of our listeners might not have heard of the Tavistock Clinic. This was a big

00:02:58.000 thing a few years ago when the closure was first announced. Can you give anybody listening a bit more

00:03:04.880 background on the Tavistock Clinic? Yeah, sure, Cosmin. The Tavistock Clinic was formerly known as the

00:03:10.920 Gender Identity Development Service in London, and it was the UK's sole gender identity clinic for

00:03:16.640 children, starting in 1989 with a focus on therapy to explore gender distress. Over time, it moved towards

00:03:24.000 medical treatments like puberty blockers, but by the late 2010s, it faced criticism for weak evidence,

00:03:29.780 insufficient mental health support, and hastening kids into irreversible procedures, especially as

00:03:35.960 referrals soared to over 5,000 by 2020-2021. The 2022 CAS review exposed these flaws, labeling its

00:03:44.020 approach unsafe and poorly tracked, which led to its closure by the NHS in April 2024, replaced by regional

00:03:51.860 hubs for a more cautious, holistic model. Controversy around Tavistock grew from whistleblowers,

00:03:57.660 ex-staff, and de-transitioners who argued it prioritized affirmation over scrutiny,

00:04:03.100 often sidelining complex issues like autism or trauma in its young patients. Its shutdown marked

00:04:09.120 a shift in UK gender care, sparking broader debates on balancing medical intervention with

00:04:14.220 psychological exploration for youth, a conversation still rippling globally as countries reassess similar

00:04:20.320 services today. The Alberta government has made it clear that it does not want post-secondary

00:04:27.640 institutions following the example set by UBC Okanagan Student Union, which recently banned a

00:04:34.120 conservative club from forming on campus before reversing the decision. Alberta's Ministry of

00:04:39.040 Advanced Education established an expert panel to review post-secondary school funding and

00:04:44.680 competitiveness. While the panel's report, due in late 2025, aims to make recommendations addressing the

00:04:51.060 impacts of federal immigration policies, the cost of administrative and regulatory burdens on post-secondary

00:04:57.380 institutions and more, it does not include a pledge to look into student union reform. The panel was

00:05:03.220 announced on December 2024. In March 2025, the UBC Okanagan Student Union faced serious backlash for

00:05:11.140 banning a conservative club, despite a liberal campus club operating freely for years. The student union

00:05:17.140 justified banning the club by claiming the conservative party's views would make black and LGBT students feel

00:05:23.300 unwelcome. After public pushback, the union reversed its decision, deciding to ratify the club. Alberta's

00:05:29.620 Minister of Advanced Education, Rajan Sani, told True North this is not the culture her ministry supports. Alberta's

00:05:37.140 United Conservative Party required all 26 publicly funded post-secondary institutions to endorse the Chicago

00:05:43.140 principles in 2019, a set of guidelines on free expression and academic freedom. Starting last

00:05:49.300 fall, institutions have been required to report their free speech policies, cancelled events, and free

00:05:55.300 speech-related complaints to the provincial government. While Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said she hadn't

00:06:00.740 seen student unions as a problem, she told journalist Kian Bexty that she'd raise the concern with the

00:06:06.500 advanced education minister. Cosmin, how are Alberta universities responding to threats against free

00:06:11.940 speech on campus? Yeah, Jeff, so we've actually seen a shift in particular against diversity, equity,

00:06:18.580 inclusion measures, at least the University of Alberta. President Bill Flanagan earlier this year in

00:06:24.900 January put out an op-ed in the Edmonton Journal explaining how the university was moving away from

00:06:32.660 implementing DEI measures, partially changing the approach to what he called access, community, and

00:06:39.380 belonging, with a concentration on intellectual freedom. So across not only the education sector but

00:06:48.100 also the private sector, companies as well have sort of shifted away from this ideology and DEI is a huge

00:06:57.060 part of what has happened in terms of the silencing of critics and the chill on free speech, especially on

00:07:06.420 campuses. Part of the different things we've seen unfold over the last few years go hand in hand with

00:07:14.100 how universities wholesale adopted this ideology and started to implement it through various policies,

00:07:21.380 setting up different administrative tribunals within their own structures to go after people who

00:07:28.340 who strayed or were seen as having off the beaten path views. So absolutely there has been quite a shift

00:07:36.260 and there are individual universities that are taking steps on their own part to address this beyond

00:07:43.140 what the Alberta government has done by mandating the respect of those Chicago principles.

00:07:48.020 Immigration has long exceeded Canada's housing supply for years but by 2023 the ratio surged to five

00:07:57.940 immigrants for every new home under construction. According to a new study from the Canadian think

00:08:03.060 tank the Aristotle Foundation from 2000 to 2015, housing starts and immigration levels were relatively

00:08:10.420 balanced. However in 2014 the ratio jumped to two to one and has continued to rise. The study reads quote

00:08:19.620 the total number of immigrants residing in Canada the total stock of immigrants rose from 643 853 people

00:08:27.780 or 2.1 percent of Canada's population in 2000 to over 3.6 million in 2023 or 9.1 percent of the population

00:08:37.780 that year. This dramatic increase occurred in tandem with the country's changing housing landscape. In

00:08:43.780 2000 62 percent of newly constructed dwellings were single detached homes which dropped to just 32 percent

00:08:51.700 by 2022. By 2022 52 percent of all home construction was being erected in the form of apartments up from just

00:08:59.940 over 20 percent in 2000. According to study author Mark Milky, immigration was done decently under former

00:09:07.220 Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government because quote they thought through how to do it

00:09:11.860 properly. Milky said the current Liberal government wanted to transform the country for their own political

00:09:17.940 benefit without considering the consequences. Jeff, what are housing completions looking like now? Are they

00:09:25.460 catching up to the population yet? Well right now Canada's housing completions have not yet caught up to its rapidly

00:09:31.380 growing population, driven largely by immigration. In 2023, the country hit a record of approximately

00:09:37.380 242,000 net housing completions with a continued upward trend into 2024, particularly in apartment

00:09:45.140 construction in major cities like Toronto and Calgary. Despite this, population growth has outpaced housing

00:09:51.380 supply with over one million new residents in 2023 alone and an estimated 770,000 more in 2024.

00:09:59.060 Projections suggest completions might reach around 255,000 units in 2024, but this falls short of the

00:10:05.940 400,000 to 483,000 units needed annually to match demographic demand and address the existing shortfall.

00:10:12.820 The gap between housing completions and population growth remains a pressing issue, while housing starts

00:10:18.180 increased by 2% in 2024, totaling about 68,639 units in the first half of the year across key

00:10:25.940 metropolitan areas, the per capita housing supply continues to lag. Federal efforts to boost rental

00:10:31.540 construction have spurred some progress, but the scale of population increase, still heavily influenced

00:10:36.500 by immigration, means the ratio of new residents to new homes remains unbalanced. Although slightly less

00:10:42.580 severe than the 5-to-1 peak in 2023, the housing crisis still persists. With affordability challenges

00:10:49.620 likely to continue unless construction accelerates significantly or population growth slows,

00:10:54.820 full resolution could take a decade without major policy shifts.

00:11:01.060 That's it for today, folks. Thanks for tuning in. You can stay on top of new episodes every weekday by

00:11:05.940 subscribing to The Daily Brief on iTunes and Spotify. Also, while you're at it,

00:11:10.420 make sure to hit us with a five-star rating and please leave a review.

Juno News - March 18, 2025

Carney's daughter wrote about receiving therapy at shuttered Tavistock clinic

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