Juno News - May 11, 2020


Conservative Leadership Series： Erin O’Toole


Episode Stats

Length

20 minutes

Words per Minute

172.94214

Word Count

3,578

Sentence Count

230

Misogynist Sentences

2

Hate Speech Sentences

4


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:00:06.740 This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
00:00:14.980 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.
00:00:21.420 Welcome to the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.
00:00:24.620 You may remember a couple of months back,
00:00:26.540 we set out to interview all of the candidates
00:00:28.640 seeking the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada.
00:00:31.840 In-depth, face-to-face, wide-ranging interviews
00:00:34.720 about why it is they're running,
00:00:36.120 their visions for Canada, for the Conservative Party,
00:00:38.840 the whole shebang.
00:00:39.980 Unfortunately, we had to hit the pause button on that series
00:00:42.660 because the global pandemic made it unadvisable
00:00:45.400 and actually illegal in some ways
00:00:47.700 for us to do the in-person interview filming that we wanted to do.
00:00:51.920 Nevertheless, the race is continuing.
00:00:53.960 It's been kick-started again by the party
00:00:55.740 and the cutoff for new members to sign up
00:00:58.260 if they want to vote in the leadership race is May 15th.
00:01:01.460 So we wanted to continue the series
00:01:03.160 and talk to the candidates we haven't yet talked to.
00:01:06.080 And with that, it is my great pleasure to welcome Aaron O'Toole,
00:01:09.480 longtime Conservative Member of Parliament
00:01:11.260 and former Veterans Affairs Minister
00:01:13.160 and also former leadership candidate to the show here.
00:01:17.040 Aaron, it's good to talk to you.
00:01:18.000 I know we had hoped to do this in person,
00:01:19.660 but nevertheless, I'm grateful you were able to take the time today.
00:01:22.220 Thank you.
00:01:23.180 It's good to be back, Andrew.
00:01:24.060 So let's talk about why you're running now.
00:01:26.480 Obviously, you had a formidable showing in 2017
00:01:29.380 when you ran for the Conservative leadership.
00:01:31.660 We've had an election since then.
00:01:33.460 I think we've had a fairly significant discussion
00:01:35.900 about where the Conservative Party fits into the national political landscape.
00:01:40.540 What's making your run this time?
00:01:41.940 I'm even more driven to run this time, Andrew,
00:01:45.800 because I've seen just the damage Justin Trudeau
00:01:48.800 and the Liberal government has done to Canada.
00:01:50.640 I often say, think back to when Stephen Harper was Prime Minister.
00:01:54.440 Last year of his government, I was in cabinet.
00:01:56.920 I was at the table for a lot of decisions.
00:01:58.760 We had a balanced budget.
00:02:00.220 We had low taxes.
00:02:01.220 We had investment coming.
00:02:02.400 We had three pipelines in various stages of development.
00:02:05.420 The Bloc Quebecois was not an official party,
00:02:07.600 and no one had ever coined a term named Wexit.
00:02:11.580 Look at what weak leadership does.
00:02:13.460 Five years later, all of those things economically
00:02:16.180 were already out the window before COVID-19.
00:02:19.820 The Bloc Quebecois, the third party in the House of Commons,
00:02:22.860 they're back again, a Quebec-based separatist party,
00:02:26.120 and there's 250,000-plus Canadians who've signed up
00:02:29.600 for a Western separatist movement
00:02:31.040 that is created because of Justin Trudeau's
00:02:34.640 anti-development, anti-energy policies.
00:02:38.380 It just shows how dangerous weak leadership can be.
00:02:41.560 So I'm a committed conservative.
00:02:42.940 I'm in the House.
00:02:43.820 I've been fighting the fight.
00:02:44.980 I fell into line and fought behind Andrew Scheer.
00:02:48.220 Sometimes you serve your general.
00:02:49.840 Now I think I'm getting promoted,
00:02:51.300 and I need to be the general on the battlefield.
00:02:54.900 You've positioned yourself in the race,
00:02:56.960 your campaign theme, as being a true blue conservative.
00:03:00.120 And I think that one of the big narratives
00:03:02.620 to emerge after the election
00:03:04.100 is that the party needs to move more to the centre.
00:03:07.520 You're saying the opposite,
00:03:08.920 but I'm curious why you think that's the case,
00:03:10.900 but also why you're an example of someone
00:03:13.140 who is the opposite of that knee-jerk reaction
00:03:15.900 to move to the centre.
00:03:17.520 Well, I think that's been Peter McKay's kind of narrative.
00:03:20.900 And that is making the biggest mistake
00:03:23.620 Conservatives can make,
00:03:24.580 which is listen to what the Toronto Star
00:03:26.620 and the CBC suggest we should do.
00:03:28.660 There are already tons of options in the mushy middle.
00:03:33.280 In fact, sometimes it's hard for me to distinguish
00:03:35.300 the Liberal Party from the NDP or the Greens.
00:03:37.800 It seems like Elizabeth May is an honorary Liberal most days,
00:03:41.720 the way Trudeau treats her,
00:03:43.160 and I think they work together.
00:03:45.460 There's lots of options there.
00:03:47.380 We have to take the principled approach
00:03:49.100 we had under Stephen Harper
00:03:50.260 and learn from our losses.
00:03:52.560 I think we need more conservative-minded policies
00:03:56.160 on issues like the environment and other things.
00:03:58.540 Get them out there, defend our principles,
00:04:00.580 but then show Canadians how our free market approach,
00:04:03.740 our public safety approach,
00:04:05.680 our principled foreign policy
00:04:06.960 is actually in their interest,
00:04:09.880 the interest of their family
00:04:10.960 or the single senior living in rural Canada.
00:04:13.700 So I think we've got a good background to run on.
00:04:17.740 I think a lot of people like
00:04:18.920 the effective governance of Stephen Harper.
00:04:21.240 We just need to reconnect with people
00:04:23.620 and we need to articulate our conservative ideas
00:04:26.360 in new ways,
00:04:27.160 and that's what I'm committed to.
00:04:29.480 I've always known you to be
00:04:31.540 or to strive to be somewhat of a consensus builder.
00:04:34.460 For example, I know when M103 came up,
00:04:36.420 you and I had a conversation on my show at the time
00:04:38.880 and you were trying to find a way
00:04:40.280 to work with the Liberals on that
00:04:41.780 instead of just saying no to it.
00:04:43.700 I know when other issues have come up,
00:04:45.040 you've taken a very similar stance.
00:04:46.940 So how does that background really jive
00:04:49.180 with what you're saying now,
00:04:50.300 which is, no, we've got to just stand firm,
00:04:52.380 hold the line and fight for that.
00:04:54.460 Again, to use your campaign's term,
00:04:56.100 true blue conservatism.
00:04:58.620 Well, sometimes there can be consensus.
00:05:01.200 My work on M103 was more about calling out
00:05:04.140 the politics of it.
00:05:05.980 I had followed that issue from the time
00:05:08.220 Tom Mulcair tried to do a stunt in the House
00:05:10.980 and seek unanimous consent for a petition.
00:05:14.060 Jerry Butts and the Liberals saw the impact that that had
00:05:16.920 and then they created M103.
00:05:18.900 I knew that because, you know, in politics,
00:05:21.340 I will call my adversaries.
00:05:22.800 I was texting with the foreign minister yesterday
00:05:25.240 on areas of disagreement.
00:05:28.000 And I'm tough, I'll hold my ground,
00:05:30.220 but I also call out BS when I see it.
00:05:33.060 And that's what had happened with M103.
00:05:34.900 That was designed to divide Canadians.
00:05:38.000 And I think we have to call out liberal conduct,
00:05:43.160 you know, misleading conduct.
00:05:45.260 We now see it with firearms, for example,
00:05:47.300 where they have to use words like military-styled
00:05:50.700 or assault-like weapons to scare and confuse people.
00:05:55.120 So I often think Conservatives, we let the Liberals play
00:05:59.940 on the playing field for far too long
00:06:02.140 before we call out their conduct.
00:06:04.740 But, you know, I'm tough but fair, Andrew.
00:06:07.540 And I think if you look at my Conservative credentials,
00:06:10.880 I kind of enjoy how people are kind of saying,
00:06:13.000 Aaron O'Toole's more right-wing this time.
00:06:16.020 Everything I said last time, or this time,
00:06:18.660 I said last time, including reform in the United Nations.
00:06:21.720 I ran on holding back our dues from the UN agencies
00:06:25.460 before Nikki Haley did it in the US.
00:06:28.440 So my bona fides are solid.
00:06:31.320 I also have a few dials on my switch.
00:06:34.020 I'm not always at the outrage 10 setting.
00:06:37.260 I can be, and you don't want to get me there.
00:06:40.260 But there's other times where I can show compassion,
00:06:44.420 show reason, show collaboration.
00:06:46.380 I think that's how we'll connect with suburban voters, Andrew,
00:06:49.100 because they like our principles,
00:06:50.940 but often they think we're a bit too harsh.
00:06:54.560 And so I think it's that kind of small-town,
00:06:57.840 suburban upbringing I have.
00:06:59.420 I know when to be reasonable.
00:07:00.680 I know when to kick some butt.
00:07:03.460 I know that the real battleground for a lot of people
00:07:06.640 has been on social issues.
00:07:08.320 And I don't want to get into these
00:07:09.360 because I know you've talked about your positions on them
00:07:11.280 at great length in the past.
00:07:12.620 But I do think there is a discussion about the place
00:07:15.340 that different factions of the party have in the party here.
00:07:18.540 You've got two of the four leadership candidates
00:07:20.680 that are running, I think,
00:07:22.000 very much on their social conservative credentials.
00:07:24.760 And you've said, listen, this is a part of our party.
00:07:27.340 Social conservatives are a part of the voter base
00:07:29.920 and the party base.
00:07:31.360 And I think we saw that in particular in 2017,
00:07:34.020 the previous leadership contest.
00:07:36.000 And I am curious, though,
00:07:38.040 for a lot of the people that are on the more moderate side
00:07:40.540 of the party that say,
00:07:41.560 I don't want to be a part of the party
00:07:43.240 that has those people in it.
00:07:44.600 How do you keep the one side without losing the other side?
00:07:48.540 Or is it a matter of saying,
00:07:50.160 if you're so far to the left of the conservative party,
00:07:52.740 maybe we don't need to hold on to you that much?
00:07:55.500 Simple answer, leadership, Andrew.
00:07:58.040 And leadership is built on respect.
00:08:00.440 I learned that in the Canadian Armed Forces
00:08:02.600 from the time I went to boot camp.
00:08:04.920 You can inspire as leader.
00:08:06.920 You can lead by example, be in the trenches.
00:08:10.020 But most importantly, it's built on respect.
00:08:12.320 And that respect is both ways.
00:08:13.740 So when I ran for leader last time,
00:08:17.180 more social conservatives supported Andrew Scheer.
00:08:19.580 So he kind of came up the middle.
00:08:21.660 But there was always respect.
00:08:23.060 And I've always said to people,
00:08:24.420 look, I've voted with my social conservative colleagues
00:08:26.900 on some issues, like equal parenting or euthanasia,
00:08:31.960 for example.
00:08:32.640 But I've always consistently voted on human rights.
00:08:36.300 And so I respect decisions of the courts,
00:08:38.720 even if I don't necessarily agree with them.
00:08:41.460 It doesn't matter what the issue is.
00:08:43.160 I respect and I will not just respect them,
00:08:46.940 I will defend rights.
00:08:48.900 That said, I also defend religious freedom,
00:08:50.980 freedom of speech.
00:08:52.180 I'm probably one of the few MPs
00:08:53.500 that have spoken on those issues
00:08:54.760 in the House of Commons.
00:08:57.080 I think that's the way to forge
00:08:58.960 going forward as a party.
00:09:00.380 Respect all views in our movement.
00:09:02.620 All of them are important.
00:09:04.340 And how can we make sure social conservatives
00:09:07.820 feel not just valued,
00:09:09.600 but see some of their ideas
00:09:12.120 and some of their values reflected
00:09:13.800 in what the party's doing?
00:09:15.000 I think Harper's Child Maternal Health
00:09:17.400 foreign policy initiative
00:09:18.460 was a great example of that.
00:09:20.780 It didn't include funding foreign abortions
00:09:23.240 like Justin Trudeau does.
00:09:25.320 I don't think that's appropriate
00:09:26.460 for a Canadian foreign policy
00:09:28.700 to use divisive policy like that.
00:09:31.580 What it did focus on
00:09:32.660 was helping pregnant mothers,
00:09:35.320 young children with nutrition outcomes
00:09:37.220 so they'd have more healthy,
00:09:38.460 successful lives.
00:09:39.680 I think that was a great example
00:09:41.300 of how the input of social conservatives
00:09:44.300 can actually make great
00:09:45.760 foreign policy output for the country.
00:09:48.220 So I, as leader,
00:09:50.440 will make sure everyone is part
00:09:54.780 of our movement and government.
00:09:57.460 I know you've got a lot of MPs
00:09:59.540 from the Conservative caucus
00:10:00.680 that are supporting your campaign
00:10:02.000 and you did last time as well.
00:10:04.260 But I do have to ask,
00:10:05.220 I've done a review of the caucus endorsements
00:10:07.960 you had last time versus this time.
00:10:09.700 And it looks like at least 20%
00:10:11.740 of the MPs that backed you last time
00:10:14.240 are now backing Peter McKay.
00:10:15.920 And I am curious what you think this says
00:10:17.980 about the direction the caucus
00:10:19.300 is looking to go.
00:10:20.340 If you two, you and Peter McKay
00:10:22.300 are putting forward
00:10:23.260 fundamentally different visions
00:10:24.760 for the future of the Conservatives.
00:10:27.000 Every single one of them
00:10:28.280 will be very happy if I'm leader.
00:10:31.120 You know, look,
00:10:31.840 I respect the fact that many of them
00:10:33.860 in January bought into the hype
00:10:35.920 of this coronation.
00:10:37.300 That's what Peter McKay's team
00:10:39.100 was trying to make it seem
00:10:40.620 like there was this inevitability.
00:10:42.900 I'm the co-founder of the party,
00:10:44.960 therefore I deserve the leadership,
00:10:48.560 even though I left five years ago
00:10:50.320 and even though I was quietly
00:10:52.400 working on my leadership
00:10:53.560 when we should have all been working
00:10:55.040 to defeat Trudeau.
00:10:56.560 A lot of people in politics early on
00:10:59.060 wanted to feel they were part
00:11:00.440 of a winning team.
00:11:01.860 They were promised many things
00:11:03.520 in some cases.
00:11:04.680 I don't operate that way.
00:11:06.500 I saw out there that our grassroots
00:11:08.780 were not clamoring for Peter McKay
00:11:11.720 to get back into public life.
00:11:13.060 They respected what he did.
00:11:14.980 Peter was a great defence minister.
00:11:16.740 I've said that publicly.
00:11:18.320 But he was not a safe set of hands
00:11:21.120 on the playing field ever as a minister.
00:11:24.240 And we're seeing that in this race.
00:11:26.440 He's never really identified
00:11:28.220 on policy or certain principles.
00:11:31.380 And I don't think in 2020
00:11:32.820 with the challenges we're facing,
00:11:34.400 we have to go back to the PC party leader
00:11:36.780 from 17 years ago.
00:11:38.120 I think Peter's not in the House.
00:11:40.520 He's not going to be there
00:11:41.260 for the most important debates
00:11:42.580 in the country's history in September.
00:11:44.960 So I think I have respect in caucus,
00:11:47.540 even from folks that went with Peter early on.
00:11:49.900 You might even see a few switch over.
00:11:52.300 We have the momentum.
00:11:53.960 I predict by the time the votes are cast,
00:11:56.560 we will have more support in caucus
00:11:58.260 than Peter.
00:11:59.900 But I will make sure as a leader
00:12:02.240 that I reach out and make sure we're united
00:12:04.380 because our real opponent here is Justin Trudeau.
00:12:07.160 It's not each other.
00:12:08.500 So I will make sure we bring the movement together,
00:12:13.040 including supporters.
00:12:14.360 Leslyn Lewis has some great support in caucus.
00:12:18.360 She's a very impressive Canadian.
00:12:20.820 I hope she runs for us.
00:12:23.580 And I think she'd be an important voice
00:12:25.540 for our movement.
00:12:26.620 I'll work with Derek's people,
00:12:28.900 with Peter's people.
00:12:30.140 I think that's part of that respect of leadership.
00:12:34.180 One of the big things, of course,
00:12:36.040 that's changed the political landscape
00:12:37.700 in the last few months
00:12:39.080 has been the coronavirus.
00:12:40.560 And now we have monumental,
00:12:42.160 not just public health challenges,
00:12:43.740 but economic challenges.
00:12:45.240 We don't know when the election is going to be,
00:12:47.500 but suppose that you're successful
00:12:48.900 in your quest for the Conservative leadership,
00:12:50.940 and then you're successful in your quest
00:12:52.840 for the Premiership of Canada,
00:12:54.340 and you become the Prime Minister.
00:12:55.560 How on earth can you enact
00:12:57.400 a fiscal conservative agenda
00:12:59.380 when we will have tens of billions,
00:13:01.940 hundreds of billions of dollars
00:13:03.360 of added debt and deficit spending
00:13:05.260 that you'll have to find a way from?
00:13:08.720 The same way Stephen Harper
00:13:10.300 and Jim Flaherty did, Andrew.
00:13:12.040 You have to have a plan,
00:13:13.540 and you have to be disciplined to stick with it.
00:13:16.080 Certainly this plan will be a longer time frame
00:13:19.460 than what Stephen Harper had in 2009,
00:13:22.180 because he was looking at budget deficits
00:13:24.800 in the $50 billion range
00:13:26.640 after a financial markets-driven recession.
00:13:30.520 We have a global recession
00:13:32.000 where the global economy
00:13:33.440 was essentially wound down,
00:13:35.500 and we're going to have
00:13:37.120 a quarter of a trillion dollar deficit,
00:13:39.580 give or take,
00:13:40.340 according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer.
00:13:42.800 Trudeau's slow response,
00:13:44.200 his confused response has made it worse,
00:13:46.080 and some of his latest spending
00:13:47.400 is out of control
00:13:48.860 and clearly just vote buying.
00:13:50.700 But we will be faced with that,
00:13:53.660 and we have to say to Canadians
00:13:55.280 that fiscal responsibility is important.
00:13:58.600 We will have probably a plan
00:14:01.620 that will be a decade long
00:14:03.320 to get spending back under control
00:14:07.380 and get the economy moving.
00:14:09.580 But the key thing, Andrew,
00:14:11.620 is our private sector recovery.
00:14:14.260 It has to be led by the private sector,
00:14:15.860 and I was talking about this before COVID.
00:14:17.780 The canaries in the coal mine
00:14:19.780 were the tech resources
00:14:21.440 withdraw of the Frontier Project,
00:14:24.280 a $70 billion project
00:14:25.980 to our GDP over three to four decades.
00:14:28.620 Warren Buffett withdrew
00:14:29.900 his $7 billion or so investment in Canada
00:14:33.220 following the illegal rail blockades
00:14:35.300 and the shutdown Canada movement
00:14:37.580 that Trudeau seemed to sort of accept for weeks.
00:14:41.060 I put out a policy
00:14:43.080 to end the illegal blockades.
00:14:44.600 Jason Kenney adopted some elements of it
00:14:47.700 on a provincial level.
00:14:48.980 We have to get our private sector fired up.
00:14:52.640 If we don't have everyone working,
00:14:55.040 we won't recover.
00:14:55.980 So I'm going to embrace all sectors,
00:14:58.280 including energy.
00:14:58.920 I think that's a big point here.
00:15:02.380 And one thing, however,
00:15:03.460 that I fear for the sake
00:15:05.360 of the future of Canada
00:15:06.380 is that when Justin Trudeau
00:15:08.020 won another mandate,
00:15:09.860 he had run on a platform of,
00:15:11.700 to use the carbon tax as an example,
00:15:13.460 going full steam ahead
00:15:14.540 with the carbon tax.
00:15:15.980 So when you have in your leadership platform
00:15:17.960 no to the carbon tax,
00:15:19.180 which is, I think,
00:15:19.760 something that conservatives
00:15:20.960 have been fairly consistent on
00:15:22.920 with a few exceptions,
00:15:24.440 is there not a natural retort to that
00:15:26.620 that Canadians have made their peace with it?
00:15:29.680 No, because my issue
00:15:31.780 with the carbon tax,
00:15:32.680 and I probably talked about this
00:15:33.760 on your show three years ago
00:15:35.040 during the leadership,
00:15:36.860 my issue was always
00:15:38.440 the uncompetitiveness of it.
00:15:40.100 I hate the tax itself,
00:15:41.980 but Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania,
00:15:44.520 we're competing with them for jobs
00:15:46.540 in the auto industry
00:15:47.500 and fabrication,
00:15:48.720 and they don't have an input price on carbon.
00:15:51.480 And we have an integrated economy.
00:15:54.380 So it was always dumb federal policy.
00:15:57.120 What the conservatives need to do
00:15:59.540 is two things, Andrew.
00:16:01.320 One, we respect provincial plans.
00:16:04.020 So if BC wants to do its carbon tax,
00:16:06.200 if there's cap and trade in Quebec,
00:16:07.600 if Jason Kenney's doing large emitter policy
00:16:10.180 with a form of a carbon tax
00:16:11.940 for large emitters,
00:16:13.440 great.
00:16:14.020 If they can get their emissions down,
00:16:15.380 they know their local economies
00:16:16.740 better than Ottawa does.
00:16:18.420 Where the federal government
00:16:19.440 then has to work
00:16:20.340 is the bigger picture issue.
00:16:22.440 Transportation,
00:16:22.960 we'd like to see less emissions
00:16:25.520 by making that maximize.
00:16:27.420 I've been a fan of cabotage
00:16:28.760 and a whole range of policies.
00:16:30.520 Support for carbon capture,
00:16:32.040 sequestration,
00:16:32.920 nuclear energy.
00:16:33.720 I've been big supporters of all these.
00:16:35.860 Pipelines to get LNG around the world
00:16:37.900 to get emissions down elsewhere
00:16:39.420 from using coal to generate electricity.
00:16:41.940 And wherever possible,
00:16:44.000 where can we bring innovation
00:16:45.220 or some tax reductions
00:16:47.280 for companies
00:16:48.260 that step their own emissions down?
00:16:49.880 I've been talking about that
00:16:50.920 for four or five years.
00:16:52.860 I think if the Conservatives
00:16:53.900 put our plan in the window,
00:16:56.900 many Canadians will say,
00:16:58.120 OK, they take it seriously.
00:17:01.040 We said 10,000 times
00:17:03.340 that we were against the carbon tax.
00:17:05.360 We never said what we were going to do
00:17:07.000 until a couple of weeks
00:17:08.020 before the election.
00:17:09.120 That doesn't cut it,
00:17:10.380 particularly in the suburbs of Ontario.
00:17:13.020 They want to know
00:17:13.600 we take the environment seriously
00:17:15.500 and we have serious policy.
00:17:16.820 That actually leads into
00:17:19.640 an important area
00:17:20.720 to end on here, Aaron,
00:17:21.960 which is the type of Conservative Party
00:17:24.160 that you'd like to lead.
00:17:25.300 And it comes down
00:17:26.220 to looking backwards
00:17:27.100 and forwards, I guess.
00:17:29.040 Is the Conservative Party's loss
00:17:30.780 in 2019 indicative
00:17:32.840 of a bad message itself
00:17:34.940 or just bad messaging?
00:17:36.760 And how will you counter
00:17:37.880 either or both of those
00:17:39.480 if you're the leader?
00:17:41.720 I think it was,
00:17:43.220 we didn't run a strong campaign
00:17:45.120 on the ground, certainly,
00:17:46.260 but we also didn't have a vision.
00:17:48.640 I think in many ways,
00:17:50.260 I think even Andrew realizes this now,
00:17:52.700 and he and I talk about it,
00:17:54.200 that they were lulled into a sense
00:17:56.340 that after SNC-Lavalin
00:17:57.980 and Jody Wilson-Raybould
00:17:59.300 and all that stuff,
00:17:59.980 the Liberals were going
00:18:00.660 to defeat themselves.
00:18:02.040 We can never, ever
00:18:04.000 take our opponents for granted.
00:18:06.440 We have to forge our own reason
00:18:09.320 for people to vote for us.
00:18:10.620 And I think that principled approach
00:18:12.420 to Conservatism is the answer.
00:18:15.240 I actually think the COVID-19
00:18:17.460 makes it even more compelling.
00:18:19.160 I've been talking about repatriating
00:18:21.600 some key manufacturing capacity
00:18:24.780 to Canada, certainly for PPE,
00:18:27.340 but also counterbalancing
00:18:29.400 China's world trade disruption.
00:18:32.180 I was supportive of us
00:18:33.360 working with the Trump administration
00:18:35.200 on their concerns
00:18:36.660 about steel and aluminum.
00:18:38.640 Not only did the Trudeau government
00:18:40.020 not do that,
00:18:40.900 we had tariffs imposed on us
00:18:42.940 for security reasons
00:18:44.740 as their only NORAD trading partner.
00:18:47.260 I may have even talked to you
00:18:48.460 on your show about this.
00:18:50.000 Why I was in favor of us
00:18:51.960 joining ballistic missile defense
00:18:53.540 was to remind the Americans
00:18:54.840 that we are their only
00:18:56.360 security partner in the world.
00:18:58.460 And so we should work with them
00:19:00.080 on Chinese disruption of world trade
00:19:03.100 and we should repatriate
00:19:04.600 some industries
00:19:05.740 that we cannot rely on
00:19:07.540 if they're in Communist Party
00:19:10.060 of China hands.
00:19:11.120 We should be united
00:19:12.100 against Huawei
00:19:13.500 as sort of the five eyes
00:19:15.360 countries together.
00:19:16.660 I've been talking about this
00:19:18.000 for many years, actually,
00:19:19.680 and I do think
00:19:20.440 now Canadians see
00:19:22.100 the value of that.
00:19:24.060 Two years ago on,
00:19:25.940 yesterday, I think,
00:19:27.800 I asked Trudeau about
00:19:29.380 Taiwan being excluded
00:19:30.980 from the World Health Organization
00:19:32.540 meetings on pandemic planning.
00:19:34.460 Two years ago.
00:19:35.820 Just yesterday, Trudeau
00:19:37.160 is now asking for Taiwan
00:19:38.440 to be there.
00:19:39.140 So in many ways,
00:19:40.740 I think the issues
00:19:41.420 I've been pushing on
00:19:42.220 for many years
00:19:42.860 are now issues
00:19:44.120 that Canadians see
00:19:45.080 are in our key
00:19:46.660 strategies.
00:19:51.420 I think that's a very good point
00:19:53.060 to end on here.
00:19:53.940 I really appreciate your time.
00:19:55.160 Aaron O'Toole,
00:19:55.720 Conservative Leadership Candidate.
00:19:57.420 Thank you very much
00:19:58.240 and good luck.
00:19:59.160 Thank you, Andrew.
00:20:00.180 The next part of the
00:20:01.420 Conservative Leadership Series,
00:20:02.920 hopefully we'll be able
00:20:03.620 to finish it off
00:20:04.400 by the end of the week.
00:20:05.620 Just one candidate to go.
00:20:07.120 My thanks to Aaron O'Toole
00:20:08.360 for coming on
00:20:09.220 and, of course,
00:20:09.660 all of you for tuning in.
00:20:11.100 We'll be back
00:20:11.540 in a couple of days
00:20:12.220 with more of
00:20:12.920 The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:20:13.980 Thank you, God bless,
00:20:15.080 and good day, Canada.
00:20:16.220 Thanks for listening
00:20:16.940 to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:20:18.360 Support the program
00:20:19.180 by donating to True North
00:20:20.420 at www.tnc.news.
00:20:23.600 The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:20:27.200 The Andrew Lawton Show.
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