Juno News - Climate Capitulation

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show. This is The Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:12.860 Coming up, Aaron O'Toole unveils the Conservative Climate Plan, Is It Just a Carbon Tax by Another Name?

00:00:19.200 Also, the latest in the perpetually moving goalposts of public health and the never-ending lockdown.

00:00:24.680 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show. This is The Andrew Lawton Show here on True North on Friday, April 16th, 2021.

00:00:42.240 Very great to have you aboard the show today, albeit under not the best of circumstances.

00:00:48.400 We've talked on this program many times about the carbon tax and how even though it was declared constitutional a few weeks ago,

00:00:55.860 it became a political issue then, one for the voters to decide, rather than the courts, whether Canadians should be stuck with it.

00:01:04.500 And it was very important, along that vein, for there to be opposition to the carbon tax, to Justin Trudeau's carbon tax,

00:01:11.860 but even to a carbon tax more generally, heading into the next election. That moment is over.

00:01:19.720 Conservative leader Aaron O'Toole has come out with a carbon tax that rivals that of Justin Trudeau.

00:01:25.160 He says it's not a tax, but that's also what the Liberals said about theirs.

00:01:28.800 It is the Conservative Party of Canada's 15-page climate change platform, which, and I'm going to try to explain this,

00:01:36.380 but I was reading it and thought it sounded ridiculous. When I tried saying it out loud to a friend yesterday,

00:01:41.720 it sounded more ridiculous. The premise of it is that every time you buy something like fuel or maybe natural gas,

00:01:49.300 every time you buy hydrocarbon-based fuel, money that you are putting towards the carbon tax, basically,

00:01:56.760 instead goes towards a personal carbon savings account, which you can draw from. It's not the government's money, necessarily.

00:02:06.960 You can draw from it, but only when you want to buy green things. So if you want to go and use the money in your personal

00:02:13.800 low-carbon savings account to buy gas, you can't do that, but you can buy a bus pass, you can buy an electric car,

00:02:21.240 you can buy a bicycle, you can buy something to retrofit your home and make it more green.

00:02:26.840 So it's basically the government taking your money, putting it into an account that it says is yours,

00:02:33.120 but not one that you are allowed to use as though it's your money. And one of the things,

00:02:39.260 if you look at how the Conservatives have defined this, they actually compare it to a loyalty or rewards program.

00:02:46.580 So for lack of a better term, we're going to call these things O'Toole bucks. So the Conservative government,

00:02:52.420 under Aaron O'Toole, would, when you're at the gas station and you're filling up your car, would take a percentage

00:02:58.320 of what you pay, but it's not taxes. No, no, no. You are instead just putting your money into your O'Toole bucks account.

00:03:06.000 And when you decide you want to buy a Tesla because you're so tired of having to pay for O'Toole bucks,

00:03:10.620 you can withdraw your O'Toole bucks and then you can put them towards your Tesla.

00:03:15.260 Now, I don't know how much people are going to be making over the course of a year.

00:03:18.840 I know that the carbon tax rebate that Justin Trudeau gives you is money that you actually,

00:03:24.340 for whatever flaws you think the Trudeau carbon tax has, the rebate money they give you is yours to spend however you want.

00:03:32.920 And I think when I got my first climate action incentive, I think I went and used it to fill up my car,

00:03:38.160 partially for irony and partially because, hey, I drive, my tank is empty, I need to fill it.

00:03:42.720 That is how normal people are in Canada.

00:03:45.600 Now, one of the problems with the Trudeau approach to carbon taxes is that if you live in a part of the country

00:03:50.880 where you absolutely need to use your car and you need to use high carbon emission things

00:03:56.380 or what the government claims are such, you are then disproportionately penalized.

00:04:00.840 Whereas if you're someone who lives in a small apartment in downtown Toronto, you don't drive anywhere,

00:04:05.760 you're not paying that much into the carbon tax, you get the same amount.

00:04:09.540 Now, Aaron O'Toole's plan is tied to usage, but the perverse aspect of this is that with the Aaron O'Toole,

00:04:18.880 the O'Toole bucks plan for carbon taxing, you are getting more money back the more money you spend in carbon tax.

00:04:27.220 So the more gas you buy, for example, the more you have to do your green retrofits, to buy your Tesla, to do whatever you want.

00:04:35.640 So in a lot of ways, and this is what the liberals are latching onto,

00:04:38.960 it is rewarding the very behavior that it claims to be disincentivizing.

00:04:43.560 Now, here's the thing, I mean, Aaron O'Toole is saying that this is going to do exactly what the Trudeau plan will do

00:04:50.500 as far as reducing emissions, but it's not going to come with the economic cost.

00:04:55.840 This is what Aaron O'Toole said when he was announcing the plan on Thursday.

00:04:59.440 Canada must not ignore the reality of climate change.

00:05:03.500 It is already impacting our ecosystems, hurting our communities, and damaging our infrastructure.

00:05:10.060 Canada's Conservatives will meet our Paris climate commitment and reduce emissions by 2030

00:05:17.200 to fight climate change and protect our environment.

00:05:21.460 But we won't do it on the backs of working Canadians or by hurting our economy.

00:05:28.740 Canadians can't afford Justin Trudeau's carbon tax hike, and we must rebuild our economy.

00:05:36.000 So Aaron O'Toole says that, yeah, he's still jumping headfirst into this.

00:05:40.840 He wants to tackle the Paris climate targets.

00:05:43.020 He wants to tackle climate change, but he wants to do it in a responsible way.

00:05:47.160 And the O'Toole Bucks model, he thinks, is that way.

00:05:51.700 Here's the thing, though.

00:05:52.780 The government has not acknowledged that its carbon tax is a carbon tax.

00:05:57.780 When the Conservatives were saying it was a tax, the government was saying,

00:06:00.540 no, no, no, it's a regulatory charge.

00:06:02.220 And this is kind of the same thing that we're seeing from the O'Toole plan.

00:06:06.180 The Conservative defense of this is that it's not a tax because the government isn't able to spend it.

00:06:12.740 They're saying it's not a tax because they're putting it in your personal low-carbon savings account.

00:06:17.880 But I don't really think that adequately neutralizes the tax allegation.

00:06:23.220 Any money that you have to spend on top of the market price of something because the government has made it so that that happens is a tax.

00:06:33.000 And maybe I'm taking too simplistic a view here, but I think if you have to spend more for something than you otherwise would if government hadn't put it in, it's a tax.

00:06:42.740 That's the reality.

00:06:43.600 So the other problem with this, and I was hoping to talk about this with Aaron O'Toole,

00:06:47.980 is that he's previously said that he wants to put the provinces front and center.

00:06:54.360 This is a bit of a lengthier exchange, but I want you to hear it in full because Aaron O'Toole and I actually fleshed this out

00:07:00.860 at considerable length back in the summer during the Independent Press Gallery fireside chat that I moderated

00:07:07.620 because Aaron O'Toole's plan in his platform had said that he wanted to put a large industrial framework in to go after industrial emitters.

00:07:15.860 And I was wanting to make sure this was not, in fact, a carbon tax.

00:07:19.620 And it took a little bit of pressing, but he gave a very unequivocal answer ultimately,

00:07:24.240 which was that, no, the carbon tax is over.

00:07:26.440 It's done.

00:07:27.420 And moreover, he said that provinces would not be forced to play ball if they didn't want to with the federal scheme.

00:07:34.740 I want you to listen carefully to this exchange.

00:07:38.160 One of the things that most conservatives, I think, can agree on is that the carbon tax is a job killer.

00:07:43.160 I think this is something that everyone on the right tends to get, even many people not on the right.

00:07:47.640 You say in your platform that the carbon tax is gone.

00:07:50.840 You also say you want a national regulatory and pricing scheme on industrial emitters.

00:07:56.920 And your rationale for this has been that you don't want to target individual Canadian families,

00:08:01.500 but rather target the companies themselves.

00:08:04.740 We all know that any cost that a company has to bear gets filtered down.

00:08:09.760 So any tax that's put on a manufacturer or distributor is something that Canadians are paying.

00:08:14.380 So how can you say you're against the carbon tax when your plan seems to just move the tax to another payer?

00:08:19.660 No, there is no tax.

00:08:21.540 There's no federal carbon tax.

00:08:23.280 I will eliminate the carbon tax completely, Andrew.

00:08:26.340 What I've said in terms of the national framework, we have to respect what the provinces are doing now.

00:08:34.000 In B.C., there's been their provincial carbon tax started by Gordon Campbell.

00:08:38.640 I've talked to him about some of the challenges and problems that were caused, but he explained to me his rationale there.

00:08:44.980 Quebec has a version of a cap-and-trade system.

00:08:47.760 Alberta, Ontario, my own province has a large emitter strategy just working with emissions of the larger emitters.

00:08:54.440 We need to follow the provinces here because guess what?

00:08:58.100 They have shared jurisdiction on the economy.

00:09:00.400 I've been saying this for years.

00:09:02.140 The Court of Appeal in Alberta in February just supported my view when they said Trudeau's carbon tax is unconstitutional.

00:09:08.380 We actually have to say on the federal government, how can we make sure we respect the different approach within a national framework and say this is how we're going to reduce emissions?

00:09:19.800 Not with a tax, but with partnering with the provinces to get their emissions down.

00:09:24.900 But does your platform or does it not say pricing?

00:09:28.680 Because the provinces are pricing.

00:09:30.520 But you say national pricing.

00:09:31.940 So can you say that there is not going to be any federal price on carbon at a federal level for anyone, whether it's a family or an industrial emitter?

00:09:41.780 The provinces will be in the driver's seat.

00:09:44.020 So I will respect what they do.

00:09:46.400 But what if a province says they don't want any part of it?

00:09:48.740 A provincial government in some provinces says we don't believe that we need to deal with emissions, we don't believe in a carbon tax.

00:09:54.800 Does inaction fit into that national framework if that's what a province chooses?

00:09:58.740 If that's what the province chooses, yes.

00:10:00.360 So again, and I gave him a scenario, which may not be a realistic one, but it still is nonetheless a possibility that a province says we don't want to play ball.

00:10:09.040 We don't want to have this carbon tax or this framework in any way.

00:10:12.720 And he said, yeah, if that's what a province wants, that is its right.

00:10:17.260 Well, the new plan, and I looked through it considerably.

00:10:20.020 I've read it, I think, about three times now.

00:10:21.700 It makes repeated references to working with provinces and having provinces' interests represented.

00:10:27.840 But this is a national program.

00:10:30.360 This is a national plan.

00:10:32.260 It's very difficult to see how a province could opt out with what the Conservatives have said about this plan.

00:10:39.320 And the Conservative Party of Canada sent some additional information to media about it.

00:10:44.000 And they said this, it will, quote, be a national program, but provinces will be able to apply to have a program of their own considered equivalent.

00:10:56.020 Considered equivalent.

00:10:56.900 So the best thing that a province could do is hope that if it has a made in Alberta or made in BC or made in Saskatchewan approach to the carbon tax, that the Conservatives under Aaron O'Toole would allow it to exist.

00:11:11.320 This is a complete reversal from what's available now of what Aaron O'Toole said in the summer about how provinces will have the right to do this.

00:11:22.760 And I want to see some more clarity on this.

00:11:26.320 I have asked Aaron O'Toole's office for an interview.

00:11:28.560 I want to hear about this plan.

00:11:30.040 I want to get all the details about it.

00:11:31.480 That invitation is standing still.

00:11:33.720 I would happily talk to Aaron O'Toole at any point about this or other things.

00:11:37.260 But in particular this, because I have not seen a single message of support for this from a Conservative supporter in the last 24 or however many hours since it was unveiled.

00:11:48.720 I've seen some caucus members defend it, but I've not seen a single grassroots Conservative say, yeah, you know what, I think this is a good idea.

00:11:56.280 Some people are resigned to accept that, well, Conservatives might need to have a climate change plan.

00:12:02.120 And therein lies the question, if this is just about neutralizing the issue so that the Liberals can't say they don't have a plan, then this is, I think, a pretty brazen way of doing that, not a particularly good way.

00:12:14.220 If it is actually about running into the election with gusto, saying we're the people that are going to cut emissions while not damaging the economy, you're never going to win on the left's turf.

00:12:24.000 You're never going to win if the election is about the environment.

00:12:27.600 The Liberals have that in the bag.

00:12:28.840 There are four other parties that are running to be the same voice on that.

00:12:32.880 The only way you can win as Conservatives is by bringing the argument to a different terrain.

00:12:39.440 And this is a mistake that Conservatives make time and time again.

00:12:43.140 So now we have Erin O'Toole saying he's running on this plan that is not a carbon tax and that the actual carbon tax that Trudeau is doing, which has the same functional effect, is gone.

00:12:54.480 I want to break this down with Erin Woodrick, who is the federal director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and joins me now.

00:13:01.220 Erin, good to talk to you.

00:13:02.160 Thanks very much for your time.

00:13:03.680 Yeah, thanks for having me, Andrew.

00:13:04.980 You and I spoke a couple of weeks back, I think it was, when the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Trudeau carbon tax was, in fact, constitutional.

00:13:13.740 And I think the prevailing sentiment of our discussion and other areas in which I discussed this on the show was that now it is a political issue.

00:13:21.560 So you need a strong opposition from a political party.

00:13:24.700 And the only party that's been saying no to the carbon tax is the Conservative Party under Erin O'Toole.

00:13:30.380 Does this plan that Erin O'Toole put forward yesterday, consequentially, in your mind, mean an end to the carbon tax?

00:13:38.000 No, not at all.

00:13:40.540 I mean, if anything, he's essentially saying he has now taken the side of every other party in supporting a carbon tax.

00:13:48.820 I mean, this is a man that explicitly promised that he would not have a carbon tax.

00:13:53.880 They're playing the same kind of word games that the Liberals are, saying, well, it's not a tax, it's a levy.

00:13:57.940 Look, you can call it whatever you want.

00:13:59.680 If you are taking money from people by forces of government, so they can't spend it on what they want to spend it on, that's a tax.

00:14:05.580 So they can give it whatever name they want and use euphemisms just like the Trudeau Liberals.

00:14:10.500 But the reality is they flip-flopped on this.

00:14:12.560 They have now switched sides.

00:14:14.480 And, you know, they've got some explaining to do, given they have for years railed against exactly the sort of thing they're now proposing.

00:14:20.940 The tax definition is interesting.

00:14:23.580 And this actually came up with the Trudeau carbon tax.

00:14:26.220 Because in that case, the Trudeau government said in court and said in the media that it wasn't a tax.

00:14:32.140 And the Conservatives said it was.

00:14:33.840 The Conservatives at the time said, we don't buy that, you know, verbal gymnastics that you're doing here.

00:14:38.800 If you're taking money from people, it's a tax.

00:14:40.840 But that doesn't seem to be the case anymore.

00:14:43.540 Well, people are getting really caught up in these semantics.

00:14:47.220 But again, the point I always make is a lot of people try and focus on what the money is used for in sort of determining whether or not it's a tax.

00:14:55.340 I don't view it that way.

00:14:56.420 I think a lot of people, the relevant point for most people is that was money I had that I could spend on whatever I wanted.

00:15:02.000 And now I don't have it.

00:15:03.220 So it doesn't matter if I'm getting it, you know, back in toolbox or if I'm getting, you know, services or if I'm getting something else.

00:15:12.740 I don't have that money to do what I wanted with.

00:15:14.400 So that's the relevant point.

00:15:16.300 I think it's too cute.

00:15:17.820 It was cute when the Liberals did it.

00:15:19.440 And now it's the same with the Conservatives.

00:15:21.160 I think most people roll their eyes at the idea that you can just not label it a tax and somehow it will not function as a tax on people.

00:15:28.360 I should, you know, put so many asterisks in front of this to establish that I'm not defending the Liberals.

00:15:34.120 But one thing I will say is that with the Trudeau carbon tax, the climate action incentive rebate that they gave, which I summarily mocked when it was introduced because you're trying to bribe people with their own money.

00:15:45.620 But at least when I cashed my climate action incentive check, I could spend it on whatever I wanted.

00:15:51.140 O'Toole bucks are not fungible in the same way.

00:15:53.880 Well, that's frankly the danger that I think Mr. O'Toole has raised here is that he suddenly, for some people, made the Trudeau rebates look nice by comparison, right?

00:16:03.300 If they were struggling to come up with a way to compete with Mr. Trudeau and they basically landed on coupons or loyalty points instead of cash.

00:16:11.520 I mean, look, people like loyalty points, but they rather have cash given the choice.

00:16:15.960 And again, I know that Mr. O'Toole says, well, you know, Mr. Trudeau may keep that money.

00:16:21.380 Well, guess what? You just broke a promise too.

00:16:23.860 So how do we know that you might not change your mind on things later on as well?

00:16:28.280 I want to go back to, and you mentioned that he made a promise.

00:16:31.480 He didn't just say it in interviews with me, but I know actually signed a pledge with your organization, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

00:16:38.580 And I want to put that photo up on the screen for people to see.

00:16:41.480 I know you can't make out the text of it, but basically what was that pledge?

00:16:45.260 Yeah, the pledge was to scrap the Trudeau carbon tax and to not introduce a similar carbon tax or cap and trade system.

00:16:54.180 So, you know, this is a pretty explicit that he has reversed himself on that.

00:16:58.900 He's broken that pledge.

00:17:00.600 And look, I think that's something that he's going to have to answer for with the people who supported him and support him now.

00:17:05.620 I know the loyalty program is, if you can even call it that, is the main impetus behind this plan.

00:17:12.600 But there were some other things buried in there that I thought were equally concerning.

00:17:16.540 One that jumped out at me, and partially for personal reasons, because, you know, covering the election campaign had me flying all over the country in 2019, back when that was allowed.

00:17:26.200 It says, studying the potential for introducing new taxes on frequent flyers, non-electric luxury vehicles, and second homes to deter activities that hurt the environment.

00:17:36.740 Now, obviously, this is kind of a wink-wink in a way to the left, because these are activities that are associated with wealth and elite status and all of these things.

00:17:45.500 But at the same time, this is a very ostentatious usage of the word tax.

00:17:50.360 So they're quite open about the fact that if you have a second home, which sounds like something that is a privilege for the 1%, but there are a lot of middle-class families that have family cottages or people that may have a condo that they rent out and are not by any means wealthy, they may be facing new taxes.

00:18:07.480 Yeah, well, and that's our concern as an organization that fights for lower taxation, is that they've opened the door wide open to all kinds of potential new taxes and new increases for people.

00:18:17.880 Look, we never got into these debates because we're against fighting climate change.

00:18:22.780 What we're against is crippling people and businesses and families with higher costs, with newer taxes.

00:18:28.760 So we're not fussy.

00:18:30.440 You know, if the end result of a new measure is that it hammers families or businesses with higher costs, then we're against it, because we think that's damaging.

00:18:40.860 And frankly, especially in the case of these carbon taxes, we're not seeing the upside.

00:18:45.100 I mean, everybody points to British Columbia as the sort of golden example.

00:18:50.620 Well, they've had a carbon tax there for years and emissions have not gone down.

00:18:54.560 One thing as well that was a problem with the national carbon tax, in addition to the tax part, was the national part.

00:19:00.780 And this was something that was rammed down the throats of provinces, which was really the thrust behind the challenges in court, one of which ended up being found unconstitutional in Alberta.

00:19:11.320 But I have to ask about this because I've read through this and there are numerous references to working with provinces, but it still is a national program.

00:19:19.780 And I think in a lot of ways, even more national than the Trudeau approach, the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, because that act says if a province meets this emissions reduction standard, the federal one doesn't kick in.

00:19:31.700 Whereas all that I'm seeing here is that provinces can apply, basically, to have their programs recognized as equivalent.

00:19:40.660 And I don't know if you've had any conversations or have looked into this and found any areas where provinces do have explicit autonomy within this plan.

00:19:48.200 No, I mean, I do recall Mr. O'Toole saying, you know, that it's going to be a partnership and then it's, you know, they're going to work with the provinces.

00:19:56.120 So it sounds like they want to be flexible on it.

00:19:58.060 But, you know, that's the same thing that Mr. Trudeau said and he put in a backstop.

00:20:02.080 So if he's going to simply replace one backstop, the rebate backstop with the loyalty points backstop, I mean, it's essentially the same.

00:20:10.600 It is still Ottawa dictating terms to the provinces.

00:20:13.400 Aaron Woodrick, Federal Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

00:20:17.840 Not the greatest day for people like you and I who have been advocating against the carbon tax for some time, you especially.

00:20:24.640 But I appreciate you joining me nonetheless.

00:20:26.900 Yeah, thanks for having me, Andrew.

00:20:28.560 Thanks again to Aaron Woodrick for coming on.

00:20:31.360 And like I said, I mean, the more I talk about this, the weirder it sounds.

00:20:34.600 Because as Aaron said, this is not just about giving people cash.

00:20:39.020 I mean, the Conservatives are couching it in that language with this low carbon savings account.

00:20:43.680 But this is a loyalty plan.

00:20:45.360 So everyone's going to have an O'Toole Bucks card of some kind.

00:20:49.460 And I want to say, by the way, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and I came up with that separately.

00:20:56.540 So it works out well for a nice synchronicity that we both naturally ended up on O'Toole Bucks is the name for this plan.

00:21:02.900 But the whole point of this is that you are, when you go and buy gas, going to have to somehow find a way to tell the government that you've amassed O'Toole Bucks that are then going to convert to your account.

00:21:14.340 So like literally, is everyone going to just have to like walk around with like an O'Toole Bucks card?

00:21:18.740 I have no idea.

00:21:19.960 And then when you want to redeem them, now all of a sudden we have to have a government bureaucracy that is defining what constitutes a green purchase.

00:21:29.720 So if you want a bicycle, well, that's a green purchase.

00:21:33.680 If you want a Hummer, it's not.

00:21:34.900 If you want to do a home renovation and you want to buy energy efficient windows, that might be one.

00:21:40.300 Or an energy efficient furnace, they gave it as an example.

00:21:43.720 But now all of a sudden that means that you're going to have individual business owners like some, you know, local HVAC technician in, you know, Lloydminster, Alberta or Lloydminster, Saskatchewan for that matter,

00:21:53.980 that has to find a way to redeem O'Toole Bucks.

00:21:57.340 And I can see like a black market for this forming very easily where someone says, well, you know, the O'Toole Bucks are non-fungible currency,

00:22:05.780 but I'll give you, you know, 80%, you know, I'll give you eight Canadian dollars for 10 O'Toole Bucks.

00:22:11.500 And, you know, I'll say that I put some windows in.

00:22:13.740 Like, and it's not to say that you want to define a program's infrastructure or logistics by the worst examples of it.

00:22:22.020 But you have to think this through, and I have no idea how this is going to be enforced.

00:22:26.820 Right now, when I swipe my credit card at the gas station, my credit card company knows and gives me points based on buying gas that are different than points based on buying something else.

00:22:38.380 But the problem with that is that it doesn't know how many liters I'm buying.

00:22:41.740 It just knows the dollar value.

00:22:43.180 So how are the consortium of financial service providers that the conservative plan says could run this going to know how many liters you're buying and therefore how many O'Toole Bucks you are eligible for?

00:22:57.240 And again, I don't want to get hung up too much on the details here because the big picture is that this is money that the government is taking from you.

00:23:06.420 It is a tax, even if they're putting it in loyalty points in a separate account that you can use.

00:23:12.080 If you can only use that for things they tell you you can use it for, it is in fact a tax.

00:23:17.780 And if it is a tax, the conservatives have to own it and explain why they have so drastically changed their mind from what wasn't just a mild opposition they had, but something that in a previous time they would go to war over and now are just going along with.

00:23:35.280 When we come back in a couple of moments, more of The Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.

00:23:39.320 Stay with me.

00:23:42.200 You're tuned in to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:23:47.780 Welcome back to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:23:53.120 Just on an amusing note, CBC had done up a story about the conservative climate plan.

00:23:58.560 CBC actually broke it before the conservatives did, which goes down that road of why conservatives always leak things to CBC.

00:24:06.240 You know they're hostile, but this is, I think, the problem here is that the conservatives were trying to show off to the CBC types that they had this big progressive climate plan.

00:24:16.440 And CBC said, this story, this is in the corrections section, this story had been updated from an earlier version, which stated the liberals' carbon tax is $30 per ton.

00:24:27.260 In fact, the price went up to $40 per ton April 1st.

00:24:31.440 So my response to that was, well, it's okay, CBC.

00:24:34.360 It's hard to keep up with the Trudeau tax grab.

00:24:37.160 And yeah, when I mentioned earlier that I haven't seen any grassroots conservatives support the conservative climate plan, Gerald Butts has.

00:24:44.300 So when you've won Gerald Butts over, you are sure to win over the bulk of the conservative base.

00:24:50.080 That's how it goes, right?

00:24:50.940 Well, in any case, back to the things that have been dominating Canadian news for the last few weeks, but seem to be getting worse and worse.

00:24:59.420 The never-ending lockdown continues.

00:25:02.440 I'm in Ontario, which is basically ground zero of the never-ending lockdown.

00:25:06.760 We don't have a curfew like our friends in Quebec do just yet, although it's something that seems to be perennially on the discussion table among Ontario's conservative government.

00:25:17.100 Even places like Alberta, which have in the past been saying that we're open for business, are drifting back into lockdown mindsets and restriction mindsets.

00:25:26.160 And the carrot that the government has been dangling in front of voters since the very beginning of this pandemic, well, not the very beginning.

00:25:33.740 At first, it was two weeks to flatten the curve, and then two weeks more, and then, hang on, let's just get past Easter, and then it was, okay, until there's a vaccine.

00:25:41.840 Well, the vaccine's here.

00:25:42.860 And even if it is coming pretty slowly, and even if a lot of people still have questions about when and how they'll be able to get it,

00:25:49.300 the vaccine was promised by the government as being the antidote to lockdowns and restrictions.

00:25:56.060 Well, enter Justin Trudeau.

00:25:58.540 I think it's really important that we work from facts and understanding of the science around things.

00:26:05.280 We know, for example, that the UK is ahead of just about everybody else on vaccinations, and yet they maintain very strong restrictions and are facing a very serious third wave.

00:26:17.960 Vaccinations on their own are not enough to keep us safe.

00:26:21.640 We need to engage in the right kinds of behaviours, do things that the Conservatives aren't always good at, like wearing masks, keeping distances, and obeying public health rules.

00:26:29.380 Now, that clip of Justin Trudeau has been summarily mocked all around the world.

00:26:34.100 Tucker Carlson did a lengthy segment on Justin Trudeau's mishandling of this, in which he played that clip, and again, raised the obvious question of what is then the point?

00:26:45.640 What is then the point?

00:26:46.480 If you say that Canadians are doomed to a life with mask mandates and lockdowns and other restrictions, even with being vaccinated, what is the whole point of getting a vaccine?

00:26:55.940 You're either saying that the vaccine is ineffective, or you are saying that it doesn't matter, and that you like exacting this control over the population,

00:27:05.140 which is precisely what anti-lockdown advocates have been saying since the very beginning of this.

00:27:10.660 And I do believe that the people who are open to lockdowns that aren't dogmatically in favour of them are very much moving away from that position.

00:27:21.560 I've seen, as governments plunge people into third lockdowns, more and more people who are not conservative or not even political start to say,

00:27:29.760 Hang on, this isn't right.

00:27:31.360 I have done my part.

00:27:32.440 I've done everything you've asked of me.

00:27:34.160 I've, you know, gotten the vaccine if I'm eligible.

00:27:36.460 I've closed my business once.

00:27:37.800 I've closed it twice.

00:27:38.660 And people are saying, what gives?

00:27:40.660 So now when they hear the government, remember that some businesses cannot exist with the restrictions.

00:27:47.400 Restaurants cannot turn a huge profit when they have to take out half the tables in them.

00:27:51.980 Church attendance is already something that is under strain.

00:27:55.360 Churches cannot make a lot of money in contributions if people are not in the pews and actually contributing and putting into the collection plates.

00:28:02.220 There are lots of other examples of where businesses, institutions, agencies cannot survive under their modified reopenings.

00:28:09.220 That's if they're even allowed to be open in modified form, which is not something that can be taken for granted in this day and age.

00:28:18.180 So when everyone is looking at the government and then Justin Trudeau gets up there and says, well, even with the vaccine doesn't really matter.

00:28:24.560 Now, I think part of that is that he's trying to deflect from the fact that most people in this country are not fully vaccinated.

00:28:31.340 I think Canada's like Canada likes to look at the percentage of people that have their first dose of a vaccine, which is in and of itself not worth writing home about.

00:28:40.760 But for fully vaccinated, Canada is sitting at, I think, like 2.2%, maybe 2.5% as of the time this comes out.

00:28:49.120 And that means that 97 plus percent of Canadians are not immune in the sense of what the government has previously stated is its target for immunity.

00:29:02.820 And what in the United States the CDC is saying means you can go around and walk free.

00:29:07.280 What's allowing the United Kingdom to open up?

00:29:09.660 So when Trudeau says that the UK is heading into a dangerous third wave, even with vaccines, well, that's not what the numbers are saying.

00:29:18.760 No, just look at that chart.

00:29:20.460 And Boris Johnson has claimed that lockdowns, not vaccines, were what saved people, which is in and of itself a load of bunk.

00:29:27.560 But the UK has people out in pubs, partying in the streets, hanging out, and they are very safe if you look at the numbers.

00:29:34.780 So the reason I bring all of this up is because there's more and more, I think, of a shift towards a lot of the concerns that anti-lockdown advocates who were derided as fringe were bringing up months ago.

00:29:47.580 The End the Lockdowns Caucus, a movement of federal, provincial, and municipal current and former politicians, I've talked about it before.

00:29:56.120 They had a press conference on Parliament Hill Thursday in which Independent MP Derek Sloan, Independent Ontario MPP Randy Hillier, Pastor Michael Thiessen, and former MP and now PPC leader Maxine Bernier talked about what they see as being the greatest threat to Canadians right now.

00:30:14.060 And it wasn't just, by the way, COVID, but the lockdowns that governments have imposed as a response to COVID.

00:30:22.220 And I asked a question that I thought yielded a very interesting response, which was, this is something that affects everyone.

00:30:28.840 It's not just people on the right that are upset with lockdowns.

00:30:31.780 Why are we not seeing more of a shift towards embracing the End the Lockdowns Caucus from people who aren't conservatives?

00:30:40.320 This was the answer I got.

00:30:41.380 Good morning, gentlemen.

00:30:42.200 And one of the things that I'm seeing just from ordinary Canadians is that there's a lot of opposition to lockdowns coming from people who are not partisan conservatives or not even particularly political.

00:30:55.160 And we're seeing this across the spectrum.

00:30:57.160 But I noticed that in the End the Lockdowns Caucus, it's not just politicians who have been identified with conservatism or with right-of-centre movements, but even a smaller subset of that.

00:31:09.820 So I'm wondering why you're not seeing more support for your cause from politicians that disagree with you on other things, but may agree with you on ending lockdowns.

00:31:20.120 Thank you for that question.

00:31:24.120 You know, a lot of it has to do with a lot of it has to do with party discipline in this country.

00:31:29.120 Actually, the majority of people in our federal and provincial parliaments belong to a specific party.

00:31:35.980 And we have a very we have we have strict discipline here.

00:31:38.540 There's there's an understanding, either implicit or explicit, that you, you know, you told the party line and none of the party leaders have decided to, you know, be against the lockdowns or message on these things.

00:31:51.900 And so I think a lot of people that that have issues or maybe questions are afraid to to to color outside of the lines.

00:31:59.020 You know, overall, I think by leaders and others, it's a it's a it's a failure of courage, a failure of being willing to perhaps stand up and say, hey, we made some mistakes.

00:32:08.900 We've learned we want to move on.

00:32:10.820 But it's a it's a failure of courage.

00:32:12.820 And I think that that's what Canada needs right now is more courage.

00:32:15.860 I think what Derek gave a good encapsulation there, I'll just maybe flesh that out a tiny bit.

00:32:26.480 The problems that we're facing in our society of the need to conform within society, our political environment is much the same.

00:32:38.460 But in a smaller microcosm of the of the distortions and the perversions, that's what's happened, what's happening.

00:32:48.080 And people in elected office, especially at the federal and the provincial level, many of them understand that their path to reelection is only through a registered political party.

00:33:06.480 And they will not jeopardize their path to reelection, even if it means forsaking their children's and their grandchildren's future.

00:33:18.620 They are going along, many of them, knowingly knowing that what we're doing is wrong and cast a significant darkness for our future.

00:33:31.700 The same thing happens, although not quite as clearly identified at the municipal level.

00:33:38.400 But we've seen what has happened with members of the end of the lockdown caucus at the municipal level who have joined.

00:33:46.860 Stephen Van Leeuwen was ostracized and attempted to be and faced much scorn for joining the end of the lockdown caucus.

00:33:57.920 He was removed from the position as deputy mayor.

00:34:02.660 We've seen others, Mayor David Blisma from West Lincoln, was removed from the COVID health committee for joining the end of the lockdown caucus.

00:34:17.520 We see this everywhere.

00:34:19.260 COVID is being used to beat people into submission and into conformity.

00:34:29.560 That you, anybody knows, if you want to have honest, truthful, public discussion and discourse, you will pay a price.

00:34:41.520 I'm very thankful that the end of the lockdown caucus are strong men and women across this country who know what it is to be Canadian and know that they will, whatever the price that we were asked to pay, that we will pay it.

00:35:02.760 Because our children and our grandchildren, their future is worth it.

00:35:11.320 Thank you.

00:35:12.680 I thought that was a valid enough answer.

00:35:14.720 There is more than one way to skin a cat, as the expression goes.

00:35:17.720 Although I believe cat skinning has been declared a non-essential service in most provinces.

00:35:21.760 So no cat skinning today and not until we flatten the curve or whatever the case is.

00:35:25.660 And the problem is that you get a lot of people that want the debate to be had in their area and under their concerns specifically.

00:35:33.680 So there were a couple of Alberta MLAs that departed the end of the lockdown's caucus because they didn't like that Randy Hillier shared a comparison to the Nazis.

00:35:43.040 And then you have Roman Baber in Ontario who's trying to do his own thing and taking the government to court.

00:35:47.820 And he doesn't want to associate with these people.

00:35:49.840 And you've got some left-wing voices that are speaking out against it that don't want to be aligned with conservatives.

00:35:54.640 And ultimately, I would love to see a cross-partisan array of lawmakers who say,

00:36:00.060 Yeah, we may disagree on taxes, on climate change.

00:36:02.940 We may disagree on abortion.

00:36:04.800 Sure, we may disagree on everything.

00:36:06.960 But we believe that we need to have an evidence-based approach and we want to reopen.

00:36:12.000 I would love to see that.

00:36:13.140 And if the anti-lockdown movement were not fractured in the way that it is now,

00:36:17.980 I think there would be a huge market and a huge appetite for a group like that,

00:36:23.120 that no one would be able to ignore.

00:36:25.700 When you've got the call coming from inside all of the houses,

00:36:29.700 not just a group of people that are maligned or cast off by the media and political elites as fringe,

00:36:34.680 but you've got liberals, new Democrats, conservatives, Greens, Bloc Québécois people that are all coming together saying,

00:36:40.340 You know what?

00:36:40.980 We think these lockdowns are not keeping people safe.

00:36:44.220 We think they're causing more harm than good.

00:36:45.940 How could party leaders avoid and ignore that?

00:36:49.820 Because that's a more authentic representation of where Canadians are.

00:36:54.920 To Canadians, just going back to normal life is not a left-right position. 0.97

00:36:59.600 So the fact that we've allowed the media to hijack that and make that out to be reckless and fringe is absolutely asinine. 0.57

00:37:06.860 And I think what's pushing more and more people to oppose these are stories. 0.63

00:37:11.500 Just to give a couple of examples, in Ottawa, the medical officer of health is doing an end run around the province

00:37:16.820 and trying to expect masks at city parks.

00:37:21.400 So if you're outside, you're in fresh air where transmission is virtually impossible,

00:37:26.020 you're going to need a mask.

00:37:27.560 And in Ontario, in Toronto specifically, they are putting up caution tape around Trinity Bellwoods Park.

00:37:34.100 The cherry blossoms are about to come to bloom, but oh well, cherry blossoms have also been declared non-essential.

00:37:39.780 So they don't want people enjoying themselves outside having a picnic at this park in Toronto.

00:37:44.740 That has become, in a lot of ways, one of the most desirable outdoor locales in Toronto,

00:37:49.320 as we saw last year, because it is so picturesque.

00:37:51.800 But no, that is no longer allowed as well.

00:37:54.900 It's not going to be that long until government bylaw officials are picking off the cherry blossoms,

00:38:00.680 because that's the only way that no one is going to be enjoying them.

00:38:04.360 This is what's happening in Ontario.

00:38:06.620 And as egregious as these stories are, I know that every time one of them comes out,

00:38:10.800 it pushes more and more people into the sensible disobedience column

00:38:15.860 about what are quite insane restrictions that do nothing for public health,

00:38:20.340 but only embolden the state's control of its citizens.

00:38:24.460 We have to end things here.

00:38:26.060 My thanks to all of you for tuning into the program.

00:38:28.560 We'll be back next week with more of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.

00:38:32.400 Thank you, God bless, and good day.

00:38:34.320 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:38:36.420 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

00:38:41.620 Monte ancestors' keynote.

00:38:45.920 .

00:38:52.220 Thank you.

00:38:53.860 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:38:53.980 Thank you.

00:38:58.300 Bye.

00:38:59.180 Bye.

00:39:00.780 Bye.

00:39:06.520 Bye.

00:39:08.060 Bye.

00:39:10.260 Bye.

Juno News - April 16, 2021

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