Juno News - November 04, 2025Carney’s $50B conflict of interest？
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Summary
Canadians still have no answer as to whether the federal government got a jobs guarantee from Stellantis before the Liberals committed to giving that company $15 billion in government investments, and Prime Minister Doug Conacher has some concerns.
Transcript
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and welcome to straight up with mark patrone appreciate you tuning in my friends well it's
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budget day in canada the carney government is about to unveil its long-awaited first budget
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prime minister carney has promised to spend big on capital projects with an aim towards
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spurring economic growth a key spending commitment has leaked to the globe and mail a 50 billion
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dollar local infrastructure fund and that will include money for things like hospitals and
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transportation and housing there will have to be money allocated to the health care sector including
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emergency services also big spending in military upgrades the budget will also announce plans to
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retire aging military fleets to make way for a wide range of new equipment that will be purchased
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through billions of dollars in increased defense spending now all those so-called investments will
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push the deficit way up meaning the cost of servicing the interest on the debt will also go way up
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canada's debt stands at about 1.28 trillion dollars and climbing now will the pm personally benefit from
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those investments well that's a loaded question his substantial holdings of brookfield stock options
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almost guarantees it depending on which corporate entities get a slice of those government investments
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duff conacher has some concerns and uh he's going to answer the question you know what guarantees do
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canadians have that this that the decisions made by our government are in the best interest of
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taxpayers and not the prime minister that's coming up shortly well canadians still have no answer as to
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whether the federal government got a jobs guarantee from stellantis before the liberals committed to
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giving that company 15 billion dollars i mean earlier this month the company announced it is shifting
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production of the jeep compass from its brampton ontario plant to a facility at illinois 3 000 jobs are
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affected by the move asked repeatedly if the government secured a guarantee from stellantis before it handed over
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the money industry minister melanie jolly deflected you should be able to tell us if there is a jobs
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guarantee for the 3 000 jobs i think you're falling into the trap of trying to find a problem where
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there's none well the problem is that because the thousand people were laid off the government
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and your government committed thousands millions and billions in fact of dollars and we're trying to
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understand whether you want this to be a monologue are you this you want to meet you because the
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question i'm asking you is very clear i don't need to be here jolly did say that her government is
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looking to recover tax dollars given to the company that was supposed to use to grow production in
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canada manitoba premier wab canoe took a shot at the supreme court ruling last week that a one-year
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mandatory sentence for those convicted of possessing child pornography is unconstitutional let's listen
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child sexual abuse images and video this is like one of the worst things that anyone can do
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not only should go to prison for a long time they should bury you under the prison
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you shouldn't get protective custody they should put you into general population if you know what i
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mean skinners this is the worst i know my friend doug ford has spoken out against this i know premier
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smith uh the federal leader of the opposition peer polio have all made comments on this and uh yeah i
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think i'm on the same page as as they are i think the average person out there hears an announcement
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like this it just kind of shakes their head well the supreme court's five to four ruling found that
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a one-year mandatory sentence infringes on the canadian charter of rights and freedoms which prohibits
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cruel and unusual treatment or punishment ontario premier doug ford contradicted the prime minister of the
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the controversial anti-tariff ads carney said he expressed reservations before those ads were
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released to the public but ford says it didn't happen that way prime minister says he had to
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apologize and he said that he asked you specifically not to run the commercial well again i'm not going
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to go back and forth i had a different recollection recollection of our conversation but that's you know
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people don't need that they want to move forward are you able to share your recollection premier again
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again i'm just i'm just not going to go down that avenue i'm not jumping into that bear trap
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uh we have a great relationship uh i'll tell you one thing what he did do uh he uh called me from
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asia a couple times and said pull the ad and i said i wasn't going to do it until we're going to
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pause the ad on monday and that's exactly what we did what was the prime minister's tone when he
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asked you a couple of times to pull the ad was he personally angry with your actions no he
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wasn't he wasn't angry at all do you think he should have apologized or do you are you upset
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that he apologized well that's up to the prime minister uh i'll tell you what i do i'd never
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apologize to donald trump the prime minister apologized to president trump for the ads but
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ford says as you heard him it was the right thing to do and duff conacher is with democracy watch he
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says the current ethics rules in canada were never intended to deal with a very wealthy prime minister
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so heavily invested in a company like brookfield duff welcome to the show thank you very much
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okay so here we have now uh an announcement a budget line that is worth 50 billion dollars
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an allocation of uh just a huge amount of money towards infrastructure or the construction of capital
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projects so we're talking about transportation uh projects uh talking about hospitals um
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all sorts of you know innovation involved in that um what guarantees do we have with a guy like
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prime minister carney who's heavily invested in brookfield that that money isn't shifted
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to that particular company with an aim towards enriching further enriching our prime minister
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we don't have any guarantees we have a loophole filled sad joke of a law it's called the conflict
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of interest act and it doesn't prevent prohibit or penalize conflicts of interest it's truly orwellian
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and uh as a result uh mark carney and every other cabinet minister is allowed to have
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secret investments uh in the case of carney we know that he has stock options in brookfield at least
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until 2033 and that creates conflict of interest for about a hundred companies within the brookfield
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conglomerate uh and he is allowed to uh secretly participate in decisions that further the interests
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of brookfield which furthers his interests in terms of those stock options going up in value and
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as a result he's allowed to secretly profit from his uh his own policies and decisions as prime minister
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so you take no comfort on the fact that it's in a blind trust
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no the blind trust is a sham facade it was recommended by uh two inquiries into conflict
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of interest the star sharp report back in the mid 80s and then uh the justice parker commission
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back in 87 both recommended that blind trusts be prohibited because you know what you put into the
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trust you're allowed to choose your own trustee and you're allowed to give them instructions such as
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don't sell anything which means you'll continue to know what's in the trust and with brookfield
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and the prime minister in particular uh he owns stock options in brookfield and it's been confirmed
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that those stock options cannot be uh what's called exercised sold by him until 2033 2034
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and so uh he he's not blind to the fact that he owns shares in the brookfield conglomerate
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and as well trustees rarely according to our own federal ethics commissioner who's a real lapdog
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on this and is trying to facilitate the prime minister and other cabinet ministers actually
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having investments and conflicts of interest instead of preventing them our own ethics commissioner
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said trustees rarely do anything with the portfolio they're handed by a politician because they don't
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want to lose money for the politician and the politician is actually allowed to get updates from the trustee
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as to the value of the trust uh regular updates so it's not a blind trust at all it's a total sham
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and the uh the whole law is just a sad joke doesn't prevent prohibit or penalize conflicts of interest
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and allows cabinet ministers and top government officials to profit secretly from their own decisions
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isn't he supposed to be out of the room when those types of decisions are made i can recall from my days
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at the crtc that if there's any suggestion that you might have a personal stake in any of the
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proceedings that people would have to leave the meeting is you just don't participate i mean
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doesn't that provide canadian taxpayers with some protection i wish that was true but it's not true
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because there's a gigantic loophole in the law uh that it really should be called the almost impossible to
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be in a conflict of interest act because of this loophole what the loophole says is you can't have
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a private interest so there's no conflict of interest possible when you're dealing with a matter that
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applies generally or that applies to a broad class broad group of people or entities businesses
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other types of organizations well 99 of the decisions that prime ministers cabinet ministers and
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top government officials make apply generally like a budget he's creating a fund and brookfield and
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dozens of other companies will be able to apply to that fund if he does a tax credit tax credits apply
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to a whole industry and so it applies generally uh all laws apply generally there's no royal bank act
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there's a bank act that applies to all banks and so pretty much uh every time that uh you're making a
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decision as a cabinet minister it's something that applies generally so he's allowed to sit at the
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table even though he has a direct financial interest in the outcome of the decision and could profit from
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it and what's worse is the law says he's supposed to declare that publicly every time that there is a
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conflict and he's supposed to step aside but uh the past ethics commissioner created these things
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called ethics screens and what they are is really a smoke screen because he states once that i will not
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participate in decisions that affect brookfield and the other he's invested in 550 other companies
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except all i will take part in decisions that apply generally or apply to a broad group of people
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again exploiting the loophole and he just declares that once and then after that what he actually does
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is kept a secret so uh these screens actually violate the requirement in the law to uh declare
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publicly when you have a conflict and that's why the whole system is just set up to hide and allow
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cabinet ministers and top officials to secretly profit from their decisions and he will be at the
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table 99 of the time the only time that he would have to step aside is if he handed a contract to
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brookfield he wouldn't be able to take part in that because that would be a specific decision that
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only benefits brookfield but every other decision applies generally and he's allowed to be there
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yeah i mean his very presence as prime minister was probably going to affect the stock price of the
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value because of course he's in a position to allocate billions of dollars to that company
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and so essentially and not only an inside lobbyist for the company because he's invested in it but he's
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also the decision maker so he's lobbying himself has a conflict of interest direct financial conflict of
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interest and he may say oh it's not going to affect me but really your investments for your retirement
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don't affect how you make decisions of course it does he's not human if he says that because
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every study that's been done worldwide shows that financial conflicts of interest are the most serious
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ones that create the greatest conflict within someone's mind about what decision they should make
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and so again it's just a sham facade a sad joke and uh it's going to allow him uh to secretly
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profit from his decisions uh and it's it's really really bad situation and we need the law changed and
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thankfully a house committee is reviewing the law now and it looks like conservative mps and block mps
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are going to recommend uh closing some at least some of these loopholes which would be an improvement and
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hopefully they'll pass them through the house if the government refuses to make those changes
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yeah he should have been forced to divest himself and all of all those investments i mean that's
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yeah which was recommended you sell off you you collapse your funds your investments with brookfield
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and then there's no question you've got cash i mean you can you're certainly welcome to put it into
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you know a stock like a stock portfolio of some kind where you're you've got all sorts of
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investments in that but you know where you've got so much of this guy's personal wealth
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invested in one company and that company stands to gain huge as a result of its association with
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the government of canada that just stinks to high heaven and yeah in 1987 the parker commission
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recommended selling now if you had a family farm or a family business you don't force your family to
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sell just because you've become a politician what would happen then is you would just have to step
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aside every time there was anything that directly or indirectly affected your family business but
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otherwise sell it all invest in gic's government bonds they don't cause conflicts of interest and
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you'll get a nice rate of return while you're serving the public as long as you're invested in the stock
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market you're serving yourself and it's amazing that he is so really just uh his attitude is i'm fine
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everyone should just trust me um he's created a horrible situation for himself because literally
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every time he makes a decision that affects any business sector in canada he's he's very likely in
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a financial conflict of interest which means the opposition parties can raise it every time did you
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make this decision to profit yourself or or to uh do something in the public interest and it's going
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to haunt him and uh but it just shouldn't be allowed and and that's hopefully that's the law is going to
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be changed by opposition mps who have a majority in the house if the liberals refuse to change the law
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it's it's being reviewed as i mentioned by a house committee right now yeah he bristles when he's asked
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about it now he really doesn't want to go there well too bad for him because didn't he meet with
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officials from brookfield shortly after he became prime minister i heard that do you know if that's
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true uh well it was confirmed by the the registration of of brookfield that uh there there was lobbying
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of carney after it and uh we don't have full disclosure of uh who ministers uh communicate with trudeau
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broke a promise that he made in 2015 to require minister's office to be subject to the access to
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information act which would have brought out some of those details but the lobbyists do have to
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disclose uh some of their communications and and that has been confirmed and it's not surprising at
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all i mean uh brookfield is in multiple industries in canada and that's why i say carney is very likely
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in a financial conflict of interest can profit from his decisions when when he ever he makes a decision
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that affects any business sector in canada and also international you know making decisions about trade
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and things like that as well because he's invested in a lot of companies that are multinationals from
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other countries as well yeah i mean even in the housing sector for instance where brookfield is
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major investor i believe owner of a manufactured home uh company you know if you're putting in
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billions of dollars in the manufacture of homes you know you want to roll these things out i mean
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brookfield is going to be a beneficiary of that and through that alone i mean so is this so is
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we've asked the federal cabinet office um okay you have this ethics screen and and the ethics
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commissioner is allowing you to hide whether you're actually stepping aside from any decisions okay so you
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do have to disclose to us the numbers though how many times has that screen been activated to say to
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carney you can't go to that meeting you can't participate in that discussion or that decision
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or vote and uh we requested that for his initial screen because he initially had a screen when he
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was prime minister uh uh before the election and running up until mid-july and then he had a second
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screen put in place by the ethics commissioner he never disclosed what the first screen said actually
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and prevented him from doing so we've asked for that and we've asked for the number of times he's been
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prevented from participating in discussion decision or vote and also who's administering the screen and
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those kind of details and what came back uh these are simple numbers right they should know them if
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they're actually using the screen they would know how many times they've done it and that's all we've
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asked for is the number not all the details but just the number and they said oh we're not we're going
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to give ourselves an extension they were supposed to disclose it by the end of september and they're not
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going to disclose it now till january and i'll expect more delay in january because he doesn't
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want this to come out what it's going to show is he's at the table all the time he's maybe stepped
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aside once or twice and uh that means he's there every time there's a decision that affects brookfield
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and the 550 other companies he's invested in he's there at the table making decisions where he can
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secretly profit from the decision yeah so we're going to keep on digging and get it out uh they can delay
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they can run and hide but uh the information has to be disclosed under the federal access to
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information act there's no excuse for it they're making excuses now that are illegal they're actually
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violating the act right now but uh as i say they can run and hide but we're going to keep digging and
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we're going to get that information out yeah in the meantime mark carney stands to become even richer
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than he is i mean yeah again again crazy crazy because according to reports uh people added up
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what his investments are likely worth 10 million dollars could have invested in a gic government
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bonds got you know set three five percent interest rate while he was prime minister that would have
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made him a significant amount of money through that time period and then when he goes back out start
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serving himself again instead he's trying to serve himself and while claiming to serve the public
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and it just doesn't wash he's a walking talking conflict of interest now you also want to talk
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about the federal government's weak and vague proposed measures on bank account fraud and financial
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crime talk a little bit about that yes so budget bills should stick to just budget matter spending
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but they often throw in other measures and one of them that's going to be in there are changes to
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the federal bank act uh to finally do something uh the liberals promised in 2021 about this rampant
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problem of bank account fraud and and canadians uh the estimate last year lost more than 640 million
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uh to fraud a lot of people being fooled by spoof websites spoof phone calls people call pretending to
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call from the cra or from their bank and asking them to move money out into certain accounts 640 million
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this has been a problem that's been well documented for almost a decade liberals made promises in 2021
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didn't do anything and uh now here we are in 2025 and the finance minister francois philippe champagne
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announced on october 20th these really weak vague measures uh far far weaker than what's been done in
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australia and in england what's been done in those countries is they've said if if a bank or a
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telecom company that's hosting a spoof website or allowing spoof phone calls uh over their lines if
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they can't prove their did their due diligence to protect financial consumers then they have to repay
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them the amount of money that they lost and uh reversing the whole onus and making the banks and
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telecom and internet companies prove that they've actually protected people because they set up this
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whole online system and if they didn't put in the safeguards and the guardrails then they're the ones
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at fault for people getting fooled by spoof websites and spoof phone calls so uh what unfortunately the
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federal liberals promised was just a rehash of the hot air promises they made in 2021 really weak vague
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measures is saying banks are going to have to have procedures in place to protect customers well they
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put in 2018 they put a provision in the bill that said banks have to have procedures in place to protect
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customers and unfortunately we have this lapdog agency called the financial consumer agency of canada
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that just doesn't enforce those requirements uh effectively at all far weaker than the consumer
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watchdog groups in the us and the uk and almost never goes after the big banks and so of course
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they don't have procedures in place because they know that's not required they're not even if they're
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caught they're not going to get fined or prosecuted and that's all they're proposing again now is for
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anti-fraud that you have to have procedures in place and that's not going to change anything if the
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banks aren't required to have those procedures in place and also required to pay customers if they're the
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ones uh the banks or the telecom or internet companies are the ones that are really at fault
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for someone getting fooled and losing all their life savings duff conacher democracy watch how do
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people support your organization democracy watch.ca they can see all the campaigns for uh government
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ethics straight strengthening those standards as we talked about and also uh some key bank
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accountability measures to protect people from gouging fraud and abuse by our big banks thank you so
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much for coming on the show appreciate it thanks we'll be interested to see what's in the budget
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bill and and happy to talk again about the details when they come out absolutely thank you duff
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and that is it for this edition of straight up appreciate you tuning in my friends let's do it