Juno News - December 08, 2025


Documents EXPOSE Carney government’s quiet push for digital ID


Episode Stats


Length

21 minutes

Words per minute

159.22287

Word count

3,382

Sentence count

254

Harmful content

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Could this be the digital ID we ve been warned about is coming? The government is looking at the possibility of bringing in a digital passport that doubles as a national ID. President Trump says he ll try to get trade talks back on track with Canada.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Could this be the digital ID we've been warned about is coming?
00:00:09.200 The Kearney government is looking at the possibility of bringing in a digital passport
00:00:13.620 that doubles as a national ID.
00:00:16.560 BlackLock's reporter has obtained documents under the Access to Information Act.
00:00:21.400 This headline, Fed's eye domestic passports.
00:00:24.520 The Department of Immigration is quietly looking into the enforcement of a national digital ID system.
00:00:32.040 MPs have, so far, rejected any national ID scheme as costly and dangerous.
00:00:38.220 Some say it opens the door to privacy violations and more state control over individuals.
00:00:44.260 So far, the government has not commented on the story.
00:00:47.620 Well, we'll see, says President Trump.
00:00:50.040 If you're looking for any kind of positive sign of trade talks between the United States and Canada
00:00:55.360 getting back on the rails, well, that'll have to do for now.
00:00:58.700 The president was asked about it after his meeting with Prime Minister Mark Kearney.
00:01:03.280 On Friday, here's what he said.
00:01:04.940 Will you restart negotiations with Canada?
00:01:08.000 Oh, look, I have a great relationship with Canada.
00:01:10.880 They're very tough traders, but I have a very good relationship with the Prime Minister, Edward Kelly.
00:01:16.020 And you had said you would halt those negotiations earlier after the tariff.
00:01:19.840 Well, I have halted that, actually.
00:01:20.820 And so will you restart that?
00:01:22.340 Yeah, we'll see.
00:01:23.040 I mean, you know, the problem is that Canada makes a lot of things that we don't need because
00:01:27.920 we make them all soon.
00:01:29.180 But we'll work it out.
00:01:30.580 Look, Canada's a special place.
00:01:32.160 And they really are good at ice hockey, aren't they?
00:01:36.000 Trade talks broke off on October 24th after the release of anti-tariff ads that aired on
00:01:42.640 U.S. network television.
00:01:43.960 Well, Conservative Party leader Pierre Polyev says if the Liberals really do support a
00:01:49.380 pipeline, it's time for them to stand up and be counted.
00:01:52.640 His party, the Conservatives, will table a motion tomorrow to force Liberals to put up
00:01:58.160 or shut up on oil pipeline support.
00:02:00.900 It calls for government to support oil pipeline construction and to adjust the current B.C.
00:02:06.780 oil tanker ban.
00:02:08.120 This post by Polyev on x.com.
00:02:10.900 On Tuesday, the House of Commons will vote on a conservative motion for a new oil pipeline
00:02:17.500 to the Pacific coast, overriding the tanker ban to ship bitumen to Asia.
00:02:23.320 Bring home jobs.
00:02:25.160 Canada first.
00:02:27.500 Well, former Liberal Cabinet Minister Stephen Gilbo says Albertans' dreams of building another
00:02:33.100 oil pipeline is fueling Quebec separatism.
00:02:35.980 He says separatists are exploiting the energy accord signed between Prime Minister Kearney
00:02:41.580 and Alberta Premier Daniel Smith to boost the independence movement in Quebec.
00:02:46.940 Let's listen.
00:02:47.780 There is clearly a sentiment by some Albertans that they don't see themselves in the federation.
00:02:54.080 But we also have to be careful because we have a very strong separatist movement in Quebec.
00:02:59.060 And it's not just a movement.
00:03:00.160 It's a political party.
00:03:01.160 It's won elections.
00:03:01.820 And there is a feeling right now that by abandoning our climate goals, we are fueling
00:03:06.860 this separatist movement, which is using this, and we can see it in the House of Commons this
00:03:11.980 week with many questions from the Bloc Québécois, but also comments here in Quebec.
00:03:16.040 We are fueling the Quebec separatist movement.
00:03:19.340 Now, earlier this month, Bloc Québécois leader Blanchet held a meeting with B.C.
00:03:24.680 Premier David Hebe.
00:03:25.700 Blanchet is worried that forcing an unwanted pipeline through British Columbia will set
00:03:31.660 a precedent that could see the same thing happen to Quebec somewhere down the road.
00:03:36.480 We are now joined by Vess Sobot, who is an engineer.
00:03:40.100 He spent 40 years working in the plastics industry.
00:03:43.020 He's also executive director of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of
00:03:47.680 Canada.
00:03:48.080 Welcome, Vess.
00:03:49.320 Great to be on your show, Mark.
00:03:50.820 Well, what do you make of the story of Black Locks Reporter, which they obtained through
00:03:54.400 access, through information, this idea that the government is quietly looking into the
00:04:00.280 possibility of bringing in a digital passport as a form of national ID?
00:04:06.680 Well, you know, I'm a hat tip to Black Locks, as always.
00:04:11.620 They do such great, great work.
00:04:13.060 I understand that they first approached the federal office and asked them for information.
00:04:18.800 And, of course, they were not forthcoming.
00:04:21.060 So Black Locks, as its practice, did a Freedom of Information Act request and found this information
00:04:29.620 out.
00:04:31.120 You know, kudos to them.
00:04:32.320 Just terrific.
00:04:33.340 Now, national passport.
00:04:36.240 I find this quite fascinating.
00:04:38.260 You know, when you called and you said you wanted to talk about this, I just wanted to
00:04:44.200 see in my wallet how many identifiers I have.
00:04:48.440 I have a license.
00:04:50.580 I have a health card.
00:04:52.640 I have a nexus card.
00:04:55.280 I have an old citizenship that was issued to me back in 1976.
00:05:00.660 I have a real passport.
00:05:03.940 I have a social insurance number.
00:05:06.320 How many identifiers does the government need to track us?
00:05:12.020 I just don't understand what the real purpose of this would be.
00:05:17.100 Why do we need a national passport?
00:05:19.980 We don't need it now.
00:05:22.960 How would that make their lives easier?
00:05:25.380 I often think back, you know, we elect the government.
00:05:29.300 The government works for us.
00:05:30.820 But it seems that things are backwards right now.
00:05:33.820 The government is not working for us.
00:05:35.920 They're working for somebody else.
00:05:37.440 And they are doing everything possible to make our lives more difficult.
00:05:41.860 I just, for the life of me, I can't understand why they need this.
00:05:46.040 For years, there's been talk about a digital ID.
00:05:48.960 We thought Arrive Can maybe was sort of the first inkling that we were headed in that direction.
00:05:55.140 But we now see that after withdrawing Arrive Can under the scandals that took place over
00:06:01.500 the amount of money that was spent on that app, here it is.
00:06:04.440 The government kind of going right back into that direction.
00:06:07.240 They're not going to let it go.
00:06:08.360 And the fear is obviously more government control, more surveillance, and the use of this really
00:06:14.500 to monitor everything and everything that you do.
00:06:17.860 I mean, I don't think one has to be paranoid to be a little concerned that the government
00:06:24.480 is going in this direction.
00:06:25.660 What do you think?
00:06:27.060 Well, you know, it reminds me of the time I went up to the truckers convoy to see what
00:06:32.520 was going on up there.
00:06:33.860 And, you know, Mark, I had such a fantastic time.
00:06:37.160 It was like a wonderful outdoor party.
00:06:39.060 There was free food, there's free drinks, there's free speech, and the sidewalks were
00:06:45.160 immaculate.
00:06:45.860 Everybody was shoveling the snow off the sidewalks so we could all walk around without any encumbrances.
00:06:51.420 And then I went back to the hotel that night and I turned on the TV to see what kind of
00:06:55.980 coverage the convoy was getting.
00:06:58.900 And I found out that I was a bad guy.
00:07:02.900 I was a guy that was disrupting downtown Ottawa.
00:07:07.300 I was the guy who was making all sorts of trouble for the residents of downtown Ottawa.
00:07:13.160 And I thought to myself, this isn't where I was all day.
00:07:17.720 The media was painting a totally different picture than what the reality was on the ground.
00:07:23.960 And when I saw a national passport initiative this morning, thanks to the Black Locks article,
00:07:32.260 I just thought more intrusions, more oversight, more twisting of reality, more subjugating its
00:07:42.680 people, and more, I would say, not riding in their lane.
00:07:52.760 They've totally forgotten what their job is.
00:07:56.820 So I would be very against this.
00:07:59.120 I don't think we need more identification.
00:08:02.020 I think what we need is the government to focus on our economy, to bring jobs to Canada,
00:08:07.600 to make Canada one of the most competitive places in the world, because right now we're
00:08:12.340 not, and we're seeing the huge sucking sound going down into the United States because the
00:08:17.320 government is focusing on the wrong things.
00:08:19.660 They shouldn't be focusing on subjugating their people.
00:08:21.840 They should be focusing on creating opportunities for their people.
00:08:27.180 They can't help themselves.
00:08:28.200 And that's why they push this sort of thing.
00:08:29.960 They push censorship bills, bills that potentially target religious freedom.
00:08:37.240 It's like anything they can do to shut people up and prevent them from criticizing them, I
00:08:41.740 think they're going to do it.
00:08:42.980 These people are just obsessed.
00:08:44.740 You're right.
00:08:45.260 They should be focusing on the economy.
00:08:46.780 You know, good things about the economy, but they can't because ultimately their only goal
00:08:51.700 here is power, holding it forever if need be.
00:08:55.560 And if that means shutting people up, then so be it.
00:08:58.620 And I think this is maybe one of those things.
00:09:02.020 I mean, China has a social credit system and we know how much this government loves the
00:09:08.100 Chinese model.
00:09:09.680 And so who knows?
00:09:11.260 I'm fascinated.
00:09:12.520 Yeah, I'm fascinated what's going on now with the EU and Elon Musk and how they're trying
00:09:18.320 to shut down free speech there.
00:09:20.340 And of course, you'll recall that we were trying to do that before, before the Americans said,
00:09:25.400 hey, stop that.
00:09:26.080 And we're still trying to do that within Bill C-9, I believe.
00:09:31.060 But it's very, very important for free speech to continue.
00:09:34.580 It's very important for the people to still have freedom.
00:09:39.040 I look at the EU and I look at our government trying to saddle up to the EU.
00:09:45.060 I think that's a terrible mistake.
00:09:46.660 I think the EU and America right now are going to come to, well, trade blows because of the
00:09:54.460 censorship position that they're taking.
00:09:57.900 And I think it's not going to end well for the EU.
00:10:00.520 And we would be very wise to step away from the EU and focus on our best trading partner
00:10:06.420 in the United States, America, and see how we can synergize with them and see how we can
00:10:10.940 make sure that we can provide everything that they need, especially in this
00:10:16.440 atmosphere where trade is very uncertain all around the world.
00:10:21.360 Speaking of which, there were conversations on the weekend of Friday, actually, between
00:10:26.720 Prime Minister Carney, the President of the United States, as well as Claudia Scheinbaum,
00:10:32.800 President of Mexico.
00:10:34.140 I guess those talks lasted for about half an hour.
00:10:37.500 And when Trump was asked about it, he said, well, the possibility exists that trade talks could
00:10:44.500 get back on the rails.
00:10:45.620 What's your feeling about that?
00:10:47.500 I mean, we haven't heard Carney talk too much about what took place during that conversation.
00:10:53.720 But I mean, if you're looking for any bit of optimism around getting talks back on the
00:10:59.140 rails, at least that's something.
00:11:00.580 What do you think?
00:11:01.820 I do believe there should be a little bit of optimism.
00:11:04.300 And I really appreciated hearing that from him.
00:11:07.300 Remember, the President needs to reduce uncertainty right now.
00:11:10.200 The midterms are just around the corner for him.
00:11:13.160 Their economy in the United States is starting to fire.
00:11:16.780 Things are starting to get rolling, which is really terrific.
00:11:21.760 But it's going to need another couple of months.
00:11:23.840 He needs to reduce the uncertainty for the midterms.
00:11:27.420 And one of the ways to do that is to nail down a deal with Canada and the United States.
00:11:32.420 When President Trump says that he really doesn't need any goods from Canada, I would just say
00:11:39.080 that that's the art of the deal.
00:11:41.420 He knows that's not true.
00:11:43.220 We know that that's not true.
00:11:45.360 Remember, our supplies of oil are just extraordinary.
00:11:50.080 Our supplies of natural gas are extraordinary.
00:11:52.960 We're making America very rich right now.
00:11:54.940 They're buying our natural gas at $3 and selling it at $15 to the Europeans.
00:12:01.280 There is a symbiotic relationship between Canada and the United States.
00:12:07.400 Canada has always served as the relief valve to the U.S. economy.
00:12:11.220 And I think the more we can serve as that to them, the better off we'll be.
00:12:17.420 For example, it would be very simple, I think, to get Trump to re-sign an agreement.
00:12:26.100 Remember, he started by saying, this is reciprocity.
00:12:30.120 We just want reciprocity.
00:12:31.880 Well, all we have to do is drop our tariffs and ask him to do the same.
00:12:36.440 And if we did that, I bet you, I bet you any money, we would have a deal in very, very short order.
00:12:45.320 That's all he asked for right from the beginning.
00:12:47.140 We have not been listening.
00:12:49.480 Well, the chances of us doing that are flint to none.
00:12:52.620 I mean, if we had another government, then maybe.
00:12:56.060 But these guys, they're all in on protecting certain industries.
00:13:00.000 I mean, we still have supply management.
00:13:02.020 And we protect industries that we think are worth protecting.
00:13:06.600 And as a result of that, reciprocity is unlikely.
00:13:11.500 And so what do you think?
00:13:13.440 I mean, do you think that Carney will go back and revisit some of these protected industries,
00:13:19.320 whatever they happen to be, whether they're on the cultural side or farming or whatever,
00:13:24.100 and try to start tearing down these trade barriers that are sort of proving to be a barrier
00:13:31.960 in terms of ourselves and cutting a deal with Trump?
00:13:35.860 I think it's the only responsible thing to do.
00:13:39.040 I think the job number losses that have been coming have been quite significant.
00:13:46.500 And if you recall, Mark, just a couple of days ago, there's job numbers that came out that
00:13:50.240 sort of looked like we're making jobs, but they're all part-time jobs.
00:13:53.680 Most of those jobs that were full-time jobs were being made in Alberta, not in the rest of Canada.
00:14:01.120 So he's also in a pickle.
00:14:03.280 He has to somehow fix this very, very slow economy right now.
00:14:09.240 This morning, I was just talking to a realtor who said in London, Ontario, the banks have had an unbelievable number of power of sales of late.
00:14:20.700 And a lot of the houses are heavily under water.
00:14:24.700 He cited an example of $1.2 million in mortgages.
00:14:28.720 And the bank is demanding that the house be sold for $700,000 right now.
00:14:33.180 That's a $500,000 haircut.
00:14:35.300 That, many times over in the Canadian economy, is going to suppress the Canadian economy in a very, very big way.
00:14:44.400 So next time we go to an election, and listen, we have a minority government, right?
00:14:48.140 Even though Carney is pretending he has a majority, it's really a minority government.
00:14:53.520 He's going to have to show some results.
00:14:55.980 And you can only fool people so many times.
00:14:58.920 So I think he has no choice but to act responsibly and see if we can come to an agreement with the Americans and see if we can drop a lot of those tariffs that we have.
00:15:12.180 Remember, you know, we are not lily white.
00:15:14.840 And I've cited this example a couple of times.
00:15:17.740 Canada has induced a plastics registry for all manufacturers in the United States.
00:15:22.460 If they want to sell into Canada, they have to fill out a form that says how much plastic their product contains.
00:15:29.380 Well, every product contains plastic that is exported pretty much.
00:15:34.980 So that's sort of like a gun registry or that's like a sex offender registry.
00:15:38.660 The Americans have taken great offense to that.
00:15:40.960 And there's a list of 100 other items like that that we've breached USMCA on over the couple of years.
00:15:48.260 So they know we're not lily white.
00:15:52.760 They want to have a better trade deal.
00:15:55.380 I think we can do that by fixing some of the problems that exist out there and take advantage of this unique opportunity right now.
00:16:04.760 But you saw what happened with Algoma. 0.94
00:16:06.520 And we pretty much had a deal.
00:16:09.260 It was right there.
00:16:10.760 It was close to being ratified, I think, according to people like Pete Hoekstra and so forth.
00:16:17.460 But then the ads came out, the anti-tariff ads.
00:16:21.680 Trump took offense and basically pulled the rug out.
00:16:26.040 Fast forward a few weeks and Algoma announced its layoffs.
00:16:29.880 I mean, that deal was aimed at steel and aluminum.
00:16:34.460 And so isn't it possible that if that deal had been ratified, that maybe all, if not at least some of those layoffs might have been averted?
00:16:44.780 What do you think?
00:16:45.360 Well, I would agree.
00:16:47.300 But remember, too, that the liberal government is pushing for green steel.
00:16:53.640 So they essentially gave Algoma steel grants to convert their ovens to electric arc ovens.
00:17:02.760 Well, they are not that efficient.
00:17:06.060 They don't work that well.
00:17:08.060 And what's happened is the greening of Algoma steel has led to a terrible, terrible malfunction in their operations.
00:17:18.440 So a little bit of this, too, was government policy on the environmental side as well as the trade side.
00:17:26.460 So, again, when Reagan said, we're here from the government and we're here to help facetiously, this is a case in point, very much so.
00:17:41.500 The government has really led to Algoma's downfall, I believe, because of their woke environmental policies that make no sense and drive, literally, business out of Canada. 1.00
00:17:52.780 Yeah, we didn't hear too much about that reasoning provided by the CEO of Algoma when he did his interviews with CBC.
00:18:02.440 All he talked about, for instance, was, well, it's about the tariffs, it's about the tariffs, it's about the tariffs.
00:18:08.340 But he didn't talk about the hard time that Algoma was having with the transition.
00:18:13.140 In fact, they had ended coal, their supply of coal had dried up because they ended it.
00:18:20.060 They thought they wouldn't be needing it anymore.
00:18:22.340 And they could only get half of their operation going in terms of the number of these facilities that, you know, make the steel.
00:18:30.540 And so that's what I suspect was the real reason for the layoffs, was that it was a botched transition to electric.
00:18:40.740 And, you know, they're going to blame Trump, obviously, but now they're screwed because, as I understand it, I stand to be corrected, you know, once you've made the transition, there's no going back to the old, you know, arc ovens, right?
00:18:55.480 The blast furnace. And so they're in trouble.
00:19:01.060 And their only recourse now is just to go for even more money, which explains why they have since come out and basically been shilling for the carbon tax.
00:19:12.980 You know, somebody asked, Mark, Michael Garcia, I think that's his name, you know, whether or not the carbon tax was proving to be a problem.
00:19:21.360 And he said, oh, no, you know, it's not a problem for us.
00:19:24.340 In fact, it'll be a good thing.
00:19:25.960 You know, I'm thinking, well, this sounds like a guy who's getting ready to angle for even more government money and he knows how the game is played.
00:19:33.260 That's my take on it for what it's worth.
00:19:35.500 What do you think?
00:19:36.440 Totally agree. Totally agree.
00:19:37.520 Remember, Mark, you mentioned that I'm with the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses.
00:19:43.080 We have billboards across the country right now that read Ottawa is more detrimental to Canadians than Washington, D.C.
00:19:52.400 And I can't get that message across loud enough.
00:19:56.020 We have the ability to fix our own problems.
00:19:59.560 We shouldn't be blaming others for our own problems.
00:20:02.840 We have the second most oil in the world, the third most natural gas in the world.
00:20:07.340 We've got the most uranium in the world.
00:20:11.140 Remember, the Americans and Hillary Clinton sold that uranium to Putin and Russia.
00:20:16.860 So they have to now import their uranium from Russia.
00:20:20.080 We have the biggest source of uranium right here in the world.
00:20:24.160 We should be the richest country in the world.
00:20:26.240 It's because of mismanagement that we are not.
00:20:28.460 We are, we, if we managed our resources better, we would be the most richest country in the world.
00:20:40.020 And that's what I'm hoping to see.
00:20:42.420 Instead, we get a couple of million people going to food banks.
00:20:46.040 I mean, it's just the state of this country compared to what we have.
00:20:49.380 It's all about the leadership.
00:20:51.180 It's all about people sabotaging our economy for nefarious reasons.
00:20:56.900 Anyway, Vest, thank you so much for coming on the show.
00:20:59.240 I really do appreciate it.
00:21:00.860 My pleasure.
00:21:01.460 And I do think people are waking up.
00:21:03.380 Keep up the great work.
00:21:05.000 Thank you.
00:21:05.980 We'll do our best.
00:21:07.420 Best so but.
00:21:08.560 And that's it for this edition of Straight Up.
00:21:10.500 Appreciate you tuning in, my friends.
00:21:11.960 Let's do it again soon, shall we?
00:21:13.840 Bye-bye for now.