Juno News - September 16, 2020


Ep 12 | Pierre Poilievre | Holding Trudeau to account


Episode Stats

Length

1 hour and 6 minutes

Words per Minute

165.06636

Word Count

11,031

Sentence Count

406

Misogynist Sentences

5

Hate Speech Sentences

14


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 I think he said to himself, I can do anything I want.
00:00:03.800 You know, no one questions anything.
00:00:07.420 It seems that the normal parliamentary accountability mechanisms are obliterated.
00:00:14.020 So I think the group of them around Trudeau said,
00:00:16.420 we now have unfettered access to the public purse with no scrutiny.
00:00:21.740 And anybody who asks us a question about it,
00:00:23.880 we'll simply accuse them of nasty partisanship in the middle of a pandemic.
00:00:27.660 And we'll assert our pure motives and we'll do whatever the hell we please.
00:00:32.980 That's what I think, that's where I think their headspace was.
00:00:36.160 And frankly, I think if the media had been doing its job,
00:00:39.360 he probably would have been on his toes
00:00:40.960 and he probably wouldn't have been so sloppy in this corruption.
00:00:43.700 How can Canadians hold the minority liberal government to account?
00:00:47.160 Prime Minister Justin Trudeau shut down Parliament
00:00:49.400 just as he shut down the economy in response to COVID-19,
00:00:53.920 choosing instead to hold daily press conferences
00:00:56.520 with hand-selected, friendly journalists from the mainstream media.
00:01:01.120 There was no oversight, no accountability, and no transparency.
00:01:04.860 Just daily propaganda sessions with liberal journalists
00:01:08.100 lobbying softball questions at their favourite liberal celebrity.
00:01:11.900 Can you describe specifically what your self-isolation means
00:01:15.320 both for you and your family and your wife?
00:01:18.180 You're outside right now.
00:01:20.160 Is your wife still going outside?
00:01:21.720 Is your family still going outside?
00:01:22.840 What does self-isolation actually mean for your family?
00:01:24.920 And what are you telling your children about the heightened sense of concern
00:01:28.680 in the country?
00:01:29.800 And also, how are you explaining some of the political decisions that you're making?
00:01:33.580 Okay, that is the Prime Minister of Canada on this Tuesday morning.
00:01:37.040 And I'll just say what everyone is thinking
00:01:38.840 before we get into the meat of what he said.
00:01:40.780 Yes, he did get a haircut.
00:01:41.700 When Canadians began to learn about the damage that Trudeau had done during his time,
00:01:46.540 racking up half a trillion dollars in debt,
00:01:48.820 handing out the doomed $900 million We Charity contract,
00:01:52.700 and the mysterious case of 20,000 missing infrastructure projects,
00:01:57.880 Trudeau shut down the investigations by proroguing Parliament.
00:02:00.940 On today's episode of the True North Speaker series,
00:02:04.860 I sit down with one of the few figures in Canada
00:02:07.200 willing to challenge our Prime Minister
00:02:09.260 and hold him accountable for his scandalous ethics violations
00:02:13.080 and the disastrous fiscal policies
00:02:15.620 that put our entire economy, our entire country at risk.
00:02:19.440 Pierre Polyev is the Conservative Member of Parliament
00:02:22.200 for the Ottawa-based riding of Carleton,
00:02:25.060 where he's been the MP since 2004.
00:02:27.260 Paulieff serves as the Conservative Party's finance critic,
00:02:31.380 and he was instrumental in drawing out new information
00:02:34.100 and exposing the many contradictions and changing narrative
00:02:37.800 Trudeau offered during the We Scam testimonies.
00:02:41.280 I really enjoyed watching him hold Trudeau directly accountable
00:02:44.780 during his parliamentary committee hearings,
00:02:46.960 and I really enjoyed sitting down with Pierre
00:02:49.180 to talk about all of the problems facing Ottawa
00:02:52.200 and how a Conservative government would offer a better vision for Canada.
00:02:56.680 I hope you enjoy our conversation.
00:02:58.880 Let me know what you think in the comments section,
00:03:00.560 and please share this video with friends and like-minded Canadians.
00:03:15.360 Pierre, thank you so much for joining us.
00:03:17.180 Thank you for coming on to the Speaker Series.
00:03:19.060 It's great to have you today.
00:03:20.720 Great to be with you.
00:03:21.600 Well, so before we get into all of the politics
00:03:24.920 and everything that's going on in Ottawa these days,
00:03:27.280 I want to talk a little bit about you and your background.
00:03:30.340 So you are an Ottawa-area MP.
00:03:32.960 You've been representing the people of Nepean for, what, 15 years now?
00:03:38.600 Since 2004.
00:03:40.660 And it was Nepean-Carleton.
00:03:43.680 I unfortunately lost Nepean in the redistribution,
00:03:46.080 so I'm now on the Carleton area, which is sort of southwest Ottawa.
00:03:50.600 Okay.
00:03:51.420 Interesting.
00:03:52.040 But before that, you are from Alberta,
00:03:54.760 which I was just reading your background, your history.
00:03:57.320 It seems like you really cut your teeth in Alberta politics.
00:04:01.520 You were just mentioning off camera that you work for the Byfields,
00:04:04.800 who were the founders of the Alberta Report.
00:04:06.580 So why don't you tell us about young Pierre
00:04:08.420 and the early days working in politics?
00:04:10.800 Well, when I was a teenager, I went to a few meetings
00:04:16.100 for Ralph Klein's Progressive Conservatives
00:04:19.640 and Preston Manning's Reformers
00:04:21.880 and met Preston Manning when I was 16 years old.
00:04:24.820 He represented my southwest Calgary neighbourhood in Parliament
00:04:28.580 and got an intern working for a local Calgary MP
00:04:34.040 when I was 16 or 17 years old
00:04:36.400 and made 600 bucks a month.
00:04:40.380 And it was an hour and a half bus ride each way.
00:04:45.280 So that was how I started off in politics.
00:04:48.120 It was not glamorous,
00:04:49.360 but I was thrilled at that age to get involved.
00:04:52.340 I then became Jason Kenney's intern
00:04:54.120 when I was 18 or 19 years old.
00:04:57.780 And he was one of my great mentors.
00:05:00.440 When I was in my early 20s,
00:05:01.740 I moved to Ottawa to work for Stockwell Bay.
00:05:03.780 And not long after that,
00:05:06.580 I decided to take a crazy gamble
00:05:10.020 and run for a Conservative nomination
00:05:12.080 for the newly merged party
00:05:14.000 in an Ottawa seat that we hadn't won since 1984.
00:05:18.840 And I've been elected six times since.
00:05:21.940 So tell us a little bit about the riding that you represent,
00:05:25.400 because I think a lot of people in Western Canada,
00:05:28.340 you know, they think of Ottawa
00:05:29.300 as a very left-wing kind of government town.
00:05:31.780 And yet you seem to represent a Conservative stronghold.
00:05:35.240 So tell us a little bit about the riding that you represent.
00:05:38.720 Well, it is basically south of the airport.
00:05:42.700 Then it goes west all the way to
00:05:45.020 where the Ottawa Senators Stadium is
00:05:48.960 on the 417 Highway.
00:05:51.600 I'm going to estimate about 75% of my residents are suburban
00:05:55.760 and about 25% are village or semi-rural.
00:06:00.260 All of my riding is in the city of Ottawa.
00:06:03.380 There are a lot of government workers,
00:06:05.280 a fair amount of high-tech employment as well.
00:06:08.740 There is a small farming population
00:06:11.400 that sort of shrinks a little bit each year, unfortunately.
00:06:14.860 But, you know, it had not been Conservative since 1984.
00:06:20.600 The Conservatives had lost it in 88, 93, 97, 2000,
00:06:26.380 before I won it in 2004.
00:06:30.200 So it can be a bit of a swing riding.
00:06:32.460 It's gone both ways.
00:06:33.600 And right now it's the only blue riding
00:06:35.580 on the federal map in the city of Ottawa.
00:06:38.420 We've got seven Liberals and one Conservative.
00:06:40.320 So I'm the chair of the Ottawa Conservative Caucus.
00:06:44.280 Well, good for you.
00:06:45.400 I mean, I think that the Conservatives
00:06:46.900 definitely have their work cut out for them
00:06:48.820 in Ontario in general.
00:06:51.320 I think that's one of the other questions
00:06:52.780 that I wanted to ask you is that
00:06:54.220 it really feels like the country is divided.
00:06:56.560 I saw some polling that came out last week
00:06:58.820 that basically showed that the Liberals
00:07:00.740 are more favourable everywhere west of Ontario
00:07:04.780 and everywhere, or sorry, everywhere east of Ontario
00:07:07.240 and everywhere west,
00:07:08.100 the Conservatives are up considerably.
00:07:10.320 And there seems to be that divide.
00:07:12.480 So, you know, for Western Canadians
00:07:14.780 watching this podcast here,
00:07:16.520 what is it that Western Canadians don't know
00:07:19.380 or don't really understand about the Ontario voter?
00:07:24.140 Well, you know, I'm in a unique position
00:07:27.140 because my riding is in Ottawa,
00:07:29.520 which is the nation's capital,
00:07:30.880 and it's right on the border with Quebec.
00:07:32.420 So, you know, from where I'm sitting
00:07:33.940 in my basement here,
00:07:35.600 I've got five provinces west of me,
00:07:37.780 five provinces east of me.
00:07:39.340 And it gives me a bit of an insight into both sides.
00:07:44.000 You know, I think that the differences
00:07:46.720 are not as great as they seem.
00:07:50.460 We have right now is an extremely divisive prime minister.
00:07:55.060 You know, we've had,
00:07:55.960 we have a conservative provincial government
00:07:57.800 in Ontario,
00:07:58.540 just like people do in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
00:08:00.400 Saskatchewan.
00:08:01.500 So at a provincial level,
00:08:03.180 we're, you know,
00:08:03.800 pretty much have the same governing philosophy
00:08:05.940 in charge and victorious
00:08:07.520 in this province as, you know,
00:08:10.580 the Western prairie provinces do.
00:08:13.520 But the difference is that
00:08:15.480 we have a prime minister who's decided
00:08:17.500 to mercilessly wage economic warfare
00:08:20.520 against Alberta, Saskatchewan,
00:08:23.800 parts of Northern and Interior British Columbia
00:08:27.580 with his hostility to the resource sector.
00:08:31.480 So in Ontario,
00:08:32.840 the big population centres,
00:08:36.020 Toronto, Ottawa, etc.
00:08:37.800 are not directly resource-driven economies.
00:08:43.080 They haven't felt the brunt yet of that war.
00:08:46.280 They will.
00:08:47.260 I mean, look,
00:08:47.820 Toronto's financial sector
00:08:49.100 has made billions of dollars
00:08:51.720 investing quite rightly
00:08:53.340 in the energy sector.
00:08:56.300 So Torontonians will feel the pain
00:08:58.320 if this idiocy goes on.
00:09:02.360 Ottawa residents will feel the pain as well
00:09:04.960 because, of course,
00:09:06.520 the public service work relies
00:09:08.500 on the tax revenues
00:09:09.580 that the resource sector has paid
00:09:12.440 so consistently over so many decades.
00:09:15.740 So the whole country
00:09:16.660 will ultimately suffer
00:09:18.040 from this anti-resource agenda.
00:09:21.280 But Albertans and Saskatchewanians
00:09:23.780 are just the first to feel it
00:09:25.540 and thus the first
00:09:26.840 to be justifiably angry about it.
00:09:29.580 You know, I read a lot of
00:09:31.440 the sort of Laurentian elite commentary
00:09:34.300 in the major newspapers
00:09:35.820 and it seems like the consensus
00:09:37.680 is basically that, you know,
00:09:40.120 the oil sands are bad for the environment
00:09:42.360 and it's just inevitable
00:09:44.100 that we have to phase them out
00:09:45.500 and that's just the role
00:09:46.520 of the federal government.
00:09:47.640 And also that a government
00:09:49.860 cannot win power,
00:09:51.500 they cannot get votes
00:09:52.640 in specifically Quebec
00:09:54.260 but also Ontario
00:09:55.400 without, you know,
00:09:57.480 a green agenda
00:09:58.340 and a very ambitious
00:09:59.480 sort of green environmentalist plan.
00:10:02.340 Do you accept that premise
00:10:05.160 or what do you make
00:10:06.140 of the elites that say that?
00:10:09.040 Well, they're not talking
00:10:10.080 to ordinary people.
00:10:10.980 I can say in my riding,
00:10:12.300 I overtly campaign
00:10:13.740 in favor of pipelines.
00:10:15.020 The Energy East pipeline
00:10:16.000 was going to run
00:10:16.660 right through my riding
00:10:17.560 and I was happy to support it
00:10:20.160 from the very beginning.
00:10:21.760 In fact, my liberal opponent
00:10:23.580 tried to pretend
00:10:24.360 he was for pipelines as well
00:10:26.160 because he knew
00:10:27.720 that that's where
00:10:28.280 the population was.
00:10:29.320 Everyday people understand
00:10:31.780 that pipelines make sense.
00:10:34.020 In fact,
00:10:34.880 what a lot of conservatives
00:10:35.940 miss is Trudeau doesn't
00:10:37.820 overtly or publicly
00:10:39.600 oppose pipelines.
00:10:41.060 He does it
00:10:41.860 in all of his actions.
00:10:43.200 He pretends
00:10:43.700 that he's trying
00:10:44.160 to get them built
00:10:44.820 but in reality
00:10:46.320 he uses all the levers
00:10:47.620 of the state
00:10:48.200 to stop it from happening.
00:10:50.040 So he wouldn't be doing that
00:10:52.060 if pipelines weren't popular.
00:10:55.060 If you look back
00:10:55.760 at his statements
00:10:56.620 in the House of Commons,
00:10:57.520 he very rarely
00:10:58.420 confesses his real opinion
00:11:00.580 on pipelines.
00:11:01.620 He always says,
00:11:02.320 oh, we're trying
00:11:02.860 to work together
00:11:03.580 with all the different groups
00:11:04.760 and make it happen
00:11:05.640 and we're going
00:11:06.600 through all the steps
00:11:07.360 and gosh golly,
00:11:08.740 darn, I'm trying so hard
00:11:10.000 it just doesn't seem
00:11:10.700 to work out.
00:11:11.560 Meanwhile,
00:11:12.100 he's using all
00:11:13.240 of the bureaucratic machinery
00:11:15.000 to stop it from occurring.
00:11:17.100 But my point here is
00:11:18.380 the population
00:11:19.680 overwhelmingly supports pipelines
00:11:21.240 in every region.
00:11:22.780 There's even strong support
00:11:23.780 in Quebec for pipelines.
00:11:24.860 We know that there's
00:11:26.600 a $14 billion
00:11:27.360 natural gas pipeline
00:11:29.040 and liquefaction project
00:11:30.640 that awaits federal approval
00:11:31.960 in the Saguenay
00:11:32.700 for which there's
00:11:33.740 overwhelming support
00:11:34.660 by the Quebec government.
00:11:36.140 So there is public support
00:11:37.620 everywhere.
00:11:38.080 And in fact,
00:11:38.540 the province
00:11:39.680 that was most devastated
00:11:41.000 to learn
00:11:41.440 that the Energy East project
00:11:43.300 was killed
00:11:44.000 was actually not
00:11:45.480 Alberta or Saskatchewan
00:11:46.520 though they were
00:11:47.060 justifiably outraged.
00:11:48.400 It was New Brunswick
00:11:49.200 because New Brunswickers
00:11:50.920 were going to refine
00:11:52.740 all of that Western petroleum
00:11:55.420 had the pipeline
00:11:56.720 gone ahead.
00:11:57.520 A million barrels a day
00:11:58.480 would have arrived
00:11:59.080 from Alberta
00:11:59.780 in New Brunswick.
00:12:02.260 So we have national support
00:12:04.040 for pipelines.
00:12:05.020 Where we have failed
00:12:06.100 is in properly exposing
00:12:07.600 the fact that
00:12:08.260 there is a single obstacle
00:12:10.080 to pipelines
00:12:10.700 in this country
00:12:11.340 and his name is
00:12:12.500 Justin Trudeau.
00:12:13.620 That's a really interesting point
00:12:15.000 and I hadn't really thought of it
00:12:16.220 but now that I do,
00:12:17.200 you know,
00:12:17.880 when you're looking for
00:12:19.080 examples of how
00:12:20.560 the Liberals oppose pipelines
00:12:22.240 it's usually like
00:12:23.140 something that Gerald Butts
00:12:24.380 said like 15 years ago
00:12:25.880 or something that Trudeau
00:12:27.280 said sort of sneakily
00:12:28.460 in a French language debate
00:12:30.080 that they don't sort of
00:12:31.300 overtly come out.
00:12:32.040 And I recall even
00:12:32.740 at the sort of beginning
00:12:33.560 they sort of
00:12:35.080 beat their chest
00:12:35.920 and said,
00:12:36.380 look,
00:12:36.600 we've actually had
00:12:37.240 more pipelines approved
00:12:38.200 than the Harper government
00:12:39.140 which wasn't true
00:12:41.320 but that was sort of
00:12:42.120 the line that the Liberals took.
00:12:43.480 But it does,
00:12:44.480 Pierre,
00:12:44.720 seem like there is
00:12:45.380 a shift going on.
00:12:46.260 We saw it
00:12:46.840 with Christia Freeland
00:12:48.340 in her sort of
00:12:49.300 first press conference
00:12:50.180 as finance minister
00:12:51.920 stating that the
00:12:53.520 regrowth
00:12:54.740 or the recreation
00:12:55.740 of the economy
00:12:56.480 after the COVID lockdowns
00:12:57.780 here was going to be
00:12:58.980 built on green
00:13:00.380 you know,
00:13:01.840 plans and schemes
00:13:02.700 and there's been
00:13:03.340 a lot of speculation
00:13:04.160 about what's to come
00:13:05.660 in the upcoming
00:13:06.380 throne speech.
00:13:07.720 So,
00:13:08.140 do you think that
00:13:09.360 perhaps the Liberals
00:13:10.820 are taking that shift?
00:13:12.080 That they're going to do
00:13:13.220 a sort of
00:13:13.960 far left shift
00:13:15.120 as what is sort of
00:13:16.500 being implied
00:13:17.400 in the media
00:13:17.800 these days?
00:13:18.360 Yes,
00:13:19.700 I expect a radical
00:13:21.460 new experiment.
00:13:24.360 Gerald Butts
00:13:25.240 who effectively
00:13:26.220 is running the government
00:13:27.280 put together
00:13:28.460 a group of people
00:13:29.980 to write a report
00:13:31.160 on what
00:13:32.220 the post-COVID
00:13:34.280 Canadian economy
00:13:35.000 should look like.
00:13:36.740 And surprise,
00:13:37.380 surprise,
00:13:38.300 they came up
00:13:38.880 with a
00:13:39.220 $49.9 billion
00:13:41.100 green plan.
00:13:42.820 I love how it was
00:13:43.820 $49.9 billion.
00:13:46.040 You know,
00:13:46.700 it's kind of like
00:13:47.380 when you're buying
00:13:48.340 a t-shirt
00:13:48.940 at the store,
00:13:51.760 they don't want
00:13:52.440 to charge you
00:13:52.960 $50,
00:13:53.800 they charge you
00:13:54.380 $49.99
00:13:56.200 so that you think
00:13:57.600 it's a bargain.
00:14:00.140 And,
00:14:00.440 you know,
00:14:00.840 for the very
00:14:01.580 low price
00:14:03.920 with this limited
00:14:04.500 time offer,
00:14:05.340 if you just call
00:14:05.800 this 1-800 number,
00:14:07.960 Gerald will sell
00:14:08.900 you a green economy
00:14:09.860 for $49 billion.
00:14:12.640 But,
00:14:13.160 you know,
00:14:13.800 I can tell you
00:14:14.540 the first thing
00:14:15.100 is if you are
00:14:16.380 a liberal insider,
00:14:17.280 you are going
00:14:17.840 to get
00:14:18.200 fabulously wealthy
00:14:19.880 off of this.
00:14:21.200 There will be
00:14:21.600 many millionaires,
00:14:22.500 maybe even
00:14:22.840 a few billionaires
00:14:23.680 that will
00:14:24.780 result
00:14:26.360 from
00:14:27.380 this plan
00:14:28.380 if it goes ahead.
00:14:29.960 There will be
00:14:30.340 subsidies
00:14:30.760 for phony
00:14:32.100 renewable programs,
00:14:35.040 fake windmill
00:14:35.940 projects,
00:14:37.120 fake solar
00:14:37.860 projects
00:14:38.460 that produce
00:14:39.040 very little
00:14:39.540 electricity.
00:14:40.160 There will be
00:14:41.500 all kinds
00:14:42.000 of funky
00:14:42.960 new science
00:14:44.080 fiction schemes
00:14:45.020 that don't
00:14:46.400 actually produce
00:14:47.300 energy or output
00:14:48.440 but that are
00:14:49.760 dressed up
00:14:50.340 with all the
00:14:50.760 right public
00:14:51.280 relations.
00:14:52.700 Basically,
00:14:53.500 you know,
00:14:53.940 if you want
00:14:54.340 to sell
00:14:55.280 a pig
00:14:56.060 in Ottawa
00:14:56.760 over the next
00:14:58.360 several months,
00:14:59.460 paint it green
00:15:00.080 and bring it
00:15:01.360 to Ottawa
00:15:01.820 and Justin Trudeau
00:15:02.760 will buy it
00:15:03.240 with Canadian
00:15:03.740 tax dollars.
00:15:05.220 We saw,
00:15:05.740 we've seen this
00:15:06.200 before,
00:15:06.620 of course,
00:15:06.940 in Ontario
00:15:07.480 where they had
00:15:07.980 a Green Energy
00:15:08.560 Act
00:15:08.940 and they
00:15:09.780 were paying
00:15:10.280 90 cents
00:15:11.000 a kilowatt
00:15:11.640 hour
00:15:11.920 for something
00:15:12.900 that was
00:15:13.220 worth 3 cents.
00:15:14.620 So you can
00:15:15.060 imagine going
00:15:15.580 to a grocery
00:15:16.140 store and paying
00:15:16.740 90 cents
00:15:17.380 for an item
00:15:18.020 that's worth
00:15:18.420 3 cents.
00:15:19.000 Well,
00:15:19.140 obviously,
00:15:19.640 you're going
00:15:19.880 to bankrupt
00:15:20.680 yourself pretty
00:15:21.440 quickly and the
00:15:22.020 result was it
00:15:22.700 doubled electricity
00:15:23.540 prices.
00:15:24.320 It created
00:15:25.060 something that
00:15:25.580 the Ontario
00:15:26.600 Association of
00:15:27.500 Food Banks
00:15:27.940 called energy
00:15:29.680 poverty,
00:15:30.660 a phenomenon
00:15:31.200 where poor
00:15:32.260 working class
00:15:32.920 people were
00:15:33.440 literally walking
00:15:34.280 into the food
00:15:34.960 bank with
00:15:36.080 their power
00:15:36.680 bill and saying,
00:15:37.520 I can't keep
00:15:38.940 the lights
00:15:39.300 on and feed
00:15:40.020 myself so I'm
00:15:40.900 going to have
00:15:41.260 to come here
00:15:42.120 for some canned
00:15:42.780 goods.
00:15:44.260 And meanwhile,
00:15:45.640 well-connected
00:15:46.980 Liberal insiders
00:15:48.320 managed to land
00:15:49.700 these monstrous
00:15:50.520 contracts.
00:15:51.780 So you have
00:15:52.200 millionaires on
00:15:53.040 Bay Street
00:15:54.100 making a fortune
00:15:54.980 off of little
00:15:55.660 old ladies
00:15:56.260 who can't afford
00:15:57.020 to turn the
00:15:58.580 lights on in the
00:15:59.280 morning.
00:16:00.020 And this will
00:16:00.660 happen on a
00:16:01.260 grand scale
00:16:02.020 if the Liberals
00:16:03.340 go ahead with
00:16:04.040 the schemes
00:16:04.520 they've been
00:16:05.020 speculating and
00:16:05.840 hinting at in
00:16:07.180 the media over
00:16:07.880 the last several
00:16:08.520 months.
00:16:09.700 You know,
00:16:09.920 it's wild to
00:16:10.640 me, Pierre,
00:16:11.320 that after living
00:16:12.200 through the
00:16:12.660 Green Energy
00:16:13.080 Act and living
00:16:13.740 through McGinty
00:16:14.620 and Wynn and
00:16:15.080 what happened,
00:16:15.660 I mean, I
00:16:15.960 remember there
00:16:16.760 were news
00:16:17.080 stories every
00:16:17.700 week of
00:16:18.340 someone's
00:16:18.960 energy bill
00:16:19.640 where it
00:16:20.220 was like
00:16:20.540 $1,200 a
00:16:21.580 month and
00:16:22.440 there was
00:16:23.060 just nothing
00:16:23.520 that they
00:16:23.800 could do.
00:16:24.220 It was
00:16:24.420 devastating to
00:16:25.200 so many
00:16:25.500 people across
00:16:26.740 Ontario.
00:16:27.840 And at the
00:16:28.420 same time,
00:16:28.880 we were seeing
00:16:29.300 manufacturing plants
00:16:30.380 shut down,
00:16:31.320 the affordability,
00:16:32.900 not able to
00:16:34.040 compete against
00:16:35.540 organizations like
00:16:38.240 manufacturing groups
00:16:39.060 in the United
00:16:39.540 States.
00:16:40.480 How is it that
00:16:41.440 we get ourselves
00:16:43.000 to this place
00:16:43.500 where we're going
00:16:44.020 through it again?
00:16:45.180 How is it that
00:16:46.420 people in Ontario
00:16:47.080 aren't like,
00:16:47.600 hey, wait a
00:16:48.000 minute, I
00:16:48.760 recognize this,
00:16:49.680 I've seen this
00:16:50.240 before, maybe we
00:16:51.800 should be a
00:16:52.660 little bit more
00:16:53.120 cautious before we
00:16:53.900 jump in onto
00:16:55.020 this green planet?
00:16:56.960 I mean, I don't
00:16:57.720 know if you can
00:16:58.100 answer that question,
00:16:58.960 but isn't there
00:17:00.260 prevailing common
00:17:00.980 sense that we've
00:17:01.600 tried this, it
00:17:02.420 failed massively,
00:17:03.600 let's not do it
00:17:04.220 again?
00:17:06.520 Well, the
00:17:07.180 government is
00:17:07.700 making the same
00:17:08.420 mistake all over
00:17:09.320 again.
00:17:09.840 It reminds me of
00:17:10.660 Kipling's poem in
00:17:12.940 which he said that
00:17:13.820 just as the dog
00:17:14.480 returns to its
00:17:15.260 vomit and the
00:17:16.000 sow returns to
00:17:16.920 her mire, the
00:17:17.620 burned fool's
00:17:18.320 bandaged finger
00:17:19.060 goes wobbling
00:17:20.080 back to the
00:17:20.620 fire.
00:17:21.780 You know, we,
00:17:22.280 you're right,
00:17:23.380 we know exactly
00:17:24.440 how this ends.
00:17:25.780 It ends in tears,
00:17:27.580 but it ends,
00:17:29.920 there's a very
00:17:30.580 happy ending for
00:17:31.520 a small group of
00:17:32.260 highly influential
00:17:32.980 people that will
00:17:34.740 dress up their
00:17:35.900 latest scheme as
00:17:38.520 green and they
00:17:40.120 will get monstrous
00:17:41.920 grants and subsidies
00:17:43.140 and handouts from
00:17:44.240 various federal
00:17:44.960 departments.
00:17:46.820 And it will all be
00:17:47.900 called investments,
00:17:50.400 although in the
00:17:51.800 real world, if you
00:17:52.640 have a viable
00:17:53.680 investment, you don't
00:17:54.480 need a government
00:17:55.000 handout because it
00:17:56.080 will pay for itself
00:17:57.020 through its resulting
00:17:57.960 revenues.
00:17:59.220 But again, it
00:18:00.380 will, it will
00:18:01.200 vaporize tens of
00:18:02.620 billions of dollars
00:18:03.460 of hard-earned
00:18:04.160 money and make a
00:18:05.840 very small group of
00:18:06.700 privileged and
00:18:07.280 well-connected people
00:18:08.160 extremely rich.
00:18:09.460 Well, that's, that's
00:18:10.760 the liberal story, I
00:18:11.820 think, in a nutshell.
00:18:13.400 We've been talking a
00:18:14.340 little bit about how
00:18:15.260 Trudeau alienates
00:18:16.360 Western Canadians and
00:18:17.680 how the country is
00:18:19.040 very divided, but we've
00:18:20.240 also seen a rise in
00:18:21.740 separatism, the
00:18:22.840 separatist sentiment
00:18:23.600 over in Quebec, that,
00:18:25.900 you know, the Bloc
00:18:26.860 Quebecois was
00:18:27.380 basically decimated and
00:18:29.400 then hardly won any
00:18:30.260 seats whatsoever in
00:18:31.260 2011, we saw the
00:18:32.520 surge of the NDP over
00:18:34.000 there, but in the
00:18:35.480 last decade, they've
00:18:36.320 sort of creeped back.
00:18:37.460 So maybe you can help
00:18:38.920 us understand, like,
00:18:39.840 what is it about
00:18:40.500 Dustin Trudeau that
00:18:41.900 has led to the rise of
00:18:43.440 a separatist party in
00:18:44.880 Quebec as well?
00:18:47.760 Well, I just think
00:18:48.820 this centralized
00:18:49.820 approach to
00:18:51.040 governance, where you
00:18:52.520 got a big, powerful
00:18:53.540 PMO in Ottawa that
00:18:55.960 runs the economy,
00:18:57.380 and tries to run
00:18:58.600 everybody's lives, is a
00:19:00.620 very divisive force.
00:19:03.060 Ironically, the purpose
00:19:04.600 of it is to pull power
00:19:06.320 inward, but what it does
00:19:07.820 is push people away,
00:19:10.060 because, you know, humans
00:19:11.720 want to have control of
00:19:12.880 their own lives.
00:19:14.200 That's why Quebec has
00:19:15.320 always been focused,
00:19:17.440 rightly so, on protecting
00:19:18.660 its own jurisdiction and
00:19:20.640 keeping the federal
00:19:21.340 government out of its
00:19:22.940 affairs.
00:19:24.020 So in a sense, I think
00:19:25.140 there's a common cause
00:19:26.280 between Albertans, Western
00:19:28.760 Canadians in general, and
00:19:30.180 Quebecers in the desire to
00:19:32.800 keep the federal government
00:19:34.120 out of their backyard and
00:19:35.860 allow people the popular
00:19:39.600 sovereignty over their own
00:19:41.880 local and provincial
00:19:42.900 decisions.
00:19:44.300 So again, in a heartbeat, I
00:19:45.780 think it's a prime minister
00:19:47.340 who is obsessed with
00:19:49.340 controlling people's lives,
00:19:51.140 and there's a similar
00:19:52.420 backlash in Quebec to the
00:19:54.380 kind that we witness in other
00:19:55.980 parts of the country.
00:19:57.260 That's interesting.
00:19:58.360 Okay, let's walk through
00:19:59.700 sort of Justin Trudeau's
00:20:01.180 prime ministership, because,
00:20:03.720 you know, obviously he was
00:20:04.700 sort of swept in.
00:20:05.960 He's a famous guy.
00:20:07.060 He had a famous last name, a
00:20:08.240 famous father.
00:20:08.820 His father, you know, for
00:20:10.720 all the criticism about
00:20:12.220 him, you know, he was a
00:20:14.120 socialist and he destroyed
00:20:15.420 so much of the Canadian
00:20:16.640 economy.
00:20:18.000 But at least he was sort of
00:20:19.360 an accomplished individual.
00:20:20.740 He was a lawyer.
00:20:21.740 He was well-educated.
00:20:23.320 He had, you know, obviously
00:20:25.400 thought a lot about Canada
00:20:27.000 and the kind of country that
00:20:28.240 he wanted to lead.
00:20:30.660 Justin Trudeau, not so much.
00:20:32.900 You know, he sort of came in
00:20:34.580 on this sort of celebrity
00:20:35.920 style, you know, famous guy,
00:20:38.280 charismatic, articulate or
00:20:40.520 whatever.
00:20:42.160 You know, what has the impact
00:20:44.840 of his prime ministership
00:20:45.820 been?
00:20:46.120 He's been in office for about
00:20:47.940 five years now.
00:20:49.740 You know, what has changed
00:20:50.600 over those five years?
00:20:52.660 Well, you know, first of all,
00:20:53.620 it's interesting observation
00:20:54.680 with the left, you know, that
00:20:55.860 the modern left is very
00:20:56.940 elitist and intellectually
00:21:00.100 stuck up.
00:21:01.100 Their whole kind of narrative
00:21:03.700 is that they're smarter than
00:21:05.000 everyone else.
00:21:05.560 That's why they should be
00:21:06.260 running everyone else's
00:21:07.080 life.
00:21:07.400 And they love to denigrate
00:21:10.440 the intellect of conservatives.
00:21:13.540 You know, oh, you must be a
00:21:15.100 simpleton if you think that
00:21:16.300 way, we're told.
00:21:18.940 A knuckle-dragging
00:21:20.720 Neanderthal, as Bill Morneau
00:21:22.900 once said, right?
00:21:24.060 Right, exactly.
00:21:24.940 You must not be very
00:21:25.980 sophisticated.
00:21:26.620 But then they elect this guy
00:21:27.760 who, you know,
00:21:28.900 confuses decimal with
00:21:31.620 decibel, who has a,
00:21:34.420 who is a gaffe machine,
00:21:35.900 who accidentally admits that
00:21:39.140 China is his,
00:21:40.660 the dictatorship in China
00:21:42.000 is his favorite model of
00:21:43.540 governance, who thinks
00:21:44.500 budgets balance themselves.
00:21:45.680 Things that everyone agrees
00:21:46.960 or should agree are utterly
00:21:49.480 ridiculous.
00:21:51.200 And I think that the
00:21:52.300 pathology here on the left
00:21:54.340 is that they'd say, look,
00:21:56.120 you know, he might be a dummy,
00:21:57.320 but he's our dummy.
00:21:58.140 Um, and, um, and ultimately
00:22:01.120 he's not running the country.
00:22:03.340 Uh, other people
00:22:04.660 who share, uh, the agenda
00:22:07.620 of the, of the far left
00:22:09.320 are running it for him.
00:22:10.560 And he's simply a puppet, uh,
00:22:13.240 to, to the Gerald Butts, uh,
00:22:15.120 establishment.
00:22:16.100 And so I think that's why
00:22:17.320 he's been able to, the left,
00:22:19.380 which is so intellectually
00:22:20.580 pretentious, um, is happy to
00:22:23.700 have someone as unsophisticated,
00:22:25.680 uh, as Mr. Trudeau is
00:22:28.380 because they, they know
00:22:29.180 that he's ultimately being
00:22:30.480 run, uh, by those who share
00:22:32.760 the left wing agenda.
00:22:34.480 Um, what is the result of
00:22:36.260 this?
00:22:37.020 Uh, it means that a small
00:22:38.460 group of people are getting
00:22:39.840 richer and power, more
00:22:40.960 powerful, uh, using the state
00:22:43.240 as their instrument.
00:22:45.260 Um, and, uh, they have him,
00:22:48.580 uh, fronting it all, a
00:22:51.000 friendly face, um, a, a
00:22:54.400 handsome, modern, open-looking
00:22:57.100 fellow, um, is sitting at the
00:23:00.180 front of this, this, this
00:23:01.300 whole apparatus, but behind
00:23:02.980 the scenes, uh, a very well,
00:23:05.380 um, a very sophisticated group
00:23:07.420 of insiders is pulling all the
00:23:09.320 levers and running the
00:23:10.240 government to their own profit
00:23:11.720 and to their own benefit and to
00:23:13.160 everyone else's detriment.
00:23:15.280 Well, you, you sort of seeing
00:23:16.320 that now with the, uh, you
00:23:17.960 know, just another scandal.
00:23:19.280 I mean, it seems like scandal
00:23:20.520 on top of scandal with this
00:23:21.500 government, but the idea that
00:23:23.200 the, uh, prime minister's
00:23:24.540 chief of staff's own husband
00:23:26.460 was lobbying the government
00:23:27.700 and ended up walking away
00:23:29.280 with a contract for $84
00:23:31.520 million or something that,
00:23:32.780 that, that, that, that's
00:23:33.380 sort of, you know, to, to,
00:23:34.800 to the Canadian out of work
00:23:36.780 who's lost their small
00:23:37.780 business or something like
00:23:38.720 that, you know, you look at,
00:23:40.440 you look at this sort of
00:23:41.200 insiderness of Ottawa and you
00:23:43.520 kind of just scratch your
00:23:44.760 head and wonder like, you
00:23:46.220 know, what, what, what is
00:23:46.940 this all for?
00:23:47.620 But to me, Pierre, the thing
00:23:49.720 that I worry about and I, I
00:23:51.240 honestly don't know what the
00:23:52.360 answer to this question is,
00:23:53.200 is you look at the deficit.
00:23:54.700 I mean, I, I, I, I, someone
00:23:56.480 who, uh, you know, very opposed
00:23:58.340 running deficits.
00:23:59.100 I think government should be
00:23:59.920 run like businesses or like
00:24:01.680 households and that the idea
00:24:03.440 of even a modest $10 billion
00:24:04.800 deficit isn't good for the
00:24:06.180 country, that, that, that,
00:24:07.580 that even though interest rates
00:24:08.660 are low, you know, we're still
00:24:10.140 paying about 10% of, of total
00:24:12.340 revenue that the government
00:24:13.980 collects just to, you know,
00:24:15.400 service the debt and, and to
00:24:16.880 bondholders, uh, the, the idea
00:24:19.480 of, of, of, of a $400
00:24:21.220 billion deficit is quite
00:24:23.460 frankly, terrifying.
00:24:24.380 And I have no idea how any
00:24:26.180 government would erase that
00:24:28.180 deficit, let alone work
00:24:29.820 towards paying off a trillion
00:24:31.200 dollar debt, uh, that, that
00:24:32.800 the surely will get dumped on
00:24:34.640 the, on the shoulders of our
00:24:36.400 children and our grandchildren.
00:24:38.800 Uh, how is Justin Trudeau even
00:24:42.000 going to continue governing in
00:24:43.600 this fashion?
00:24:44.180 I mean, he's talking about
00:24:45.260 continuing to have, to have a
00:24:46.820 10% of, of GDP, uh, deficit
00:24:50.220 rate, uh, you know, how, how
00:24:52.360 is it even structurally fiscally
00:24:54.240 possible without a massive
00:24:55.940 increase in taxes?
00:24:57.740 Or is, is there something like
00:24:59.000 that coming?
00:24:59.560 Is there, is there a wealth tax
00:25:01.300 coming?
00:25:01.660 Is there a massive increase in
00:25:03.400 taxes?
00:25:03.820 I mean, the top tax rate in
00:25:04.860 Ontario is already over 50%.
00:25:06.580 It's hard to imagine how much
00:25:08.420 higher you can go, but I, I, I
00:25:10.620 just, I just wonder, you
00:25:11.820 know, for you as an elected
00:25:12.920 official and someone who is in,
00:25:14.400 in government, I mean, you're
00:25:15.360 opposition, but you're still
00:25:16.820 representing Canadians, you
00:25:18.980 know, what do you, what do you
00:25:19.960 tell people about the, the, the
00:25:21.680 fiscal situation in Canada right
00:25:23.800 now?
00:25:25.580 Well, let me just share some, some
00:25:27.840 basic facts that are actually
00:25:30.100 quite startling.
00:25:31.220 So the government will say, well,
00:25:32.980 we've got a crisis.
00:25:33.820 The COVID shutdown is the reason
00:25:35.660 we have this monstrous deficit.
00:25:37.240 So let, let's compare the deficit
00:25:39.060 to other crises.
00:25:40.100 In World War One, our debt, our
00:25:43.540 deficit to GDP was 9%.
00:25:47.540 In the Great Depression, it was
00:25:51.620 about 6%.
00:25:52.760 In the Great Recession of 2008-9,
00:25:59.240 it was about three and a half
00:26:01.220 percent.
00:26:02.280 Right now, our deficit sits at
00:26:04.520 around 17% GDP.
00:26:06.640 So in other words, our deficit as
00:26:08.640 a share of our GDP, so this is
00:26:10.200 automatically adjusted for
00:26:11.460 inflation and for the changed
00:26:13.520 size of our economy.
00:26:15.480 Our deficit is now twice what it
00:26:18.640 was in World War One.
00:26:20.760 It is approximately six times what
00:26:25.300 it was during the Great Global
00:26:26.980 Recession.
00:26:28.580 It is three times higher than it
00:26:30.820 was at its peak in 1932 in the
00:26:33.440 Great Depression.
00:26:34.800 The only time we've ever had a
00:26:36.640 deficit this big was back in
00:26:39.040 1943 when we had a 23% of GDP
00:26:42.240 deficit.
00:26:42.980 And that was, of course, right
00:26:43.960 smack in the middle of World War
00:26:46.240 Two.
00:26:46.720 But the difference there, by the
00:26:48.060 way, is that by 1947, Canada was
00:26:51.380 running monstrous surpluses.
00:26:54.180 Our soldiers came home with all of
00:26:56.060 the wages they had earned and
00:26:57.480 weren't allowed to spend.
00:26:58.960 And they spent it in the economy
00:27:00.660 and they bought homes and they
00:27:01.980 built a great generation thereafter
00:27:05.440 and they gave birth to the baby
00:27:06.640 boomers, et cetera.
00:27:07.700 And we had this surge of revenue
00:27:10.580 and the government didn't spend it.
00:27:12.420 In fact, spending went down.
00:27:14.400 And so we paid off huge amounts of
00:27:16.160 debt.
00:27:17.100 We had surpluses of 5% of GDP in
00:27:19.500 1947, which would be like, imagine
00:27:21.740 today if we had $120 billion
00:27:24.120 surplus.
00:27:25.300 That's how big their surpluses were in
00:27:27.100 the post-war period.
00:27:28.320 So yet people say, the liberals say,
00:27:30.140 oh, yeah, but in the war, the
00:27:31.220 deficits were a little bit bigger.
00:27:32.880 Yes, but they paid them off quickly.
00:27:34.700 As soon as the crisis was over, they
00:27:36.880 quickly went back into surplus, paid
00:27:39.720 it off, and we had another 30 years
00:27:42.660 of prosperity as a result.
00:27:44.140 So I'm just giving that as a
00:27:45.380 perspective.
00:27:46.780 So right now, our debt, our debt now,
00:27:50.120 move to the debt, is it's well over a
00:27:53.680 trillion dollars.
00:27:54.460 We've gone from a debt that was a
00:27:56.520 third of our economy, 30% of GDP, to
00:27:59.280 50% in just six months.
00:28:04.040 So 30% of GDP to 50% of GDP in six
00:28:07.760 months.
00:28:08.360 To put that in perspective, we hit a
00:28:10.620 debt wall in Canada in 1996 where the
00:28:13.700 world wouldn't lend us any money
00:28:15.160 anymore, and it was basically a
00:28:17.120 financial collapse.
00:28:18.440 The IMF put up warnings about us.
00:28:21.100 The Wall Street Journal called us a
00:28:22.860 Third World Fiscal Basket Case.
00:28:25.420 That happened when the debt to GDP
00:28:27.180 ratio was 66.6%.
00:28:29.720 So we've eliminated more than half of
00:28:33.560 the buffer between our previous debt
00:28:37.100 level and the maximum debt we can
00:28:40.280 sustain as a government.
00:28:41.340 We've eliminated more than half of that
00:28:43.240 buffer in six months.
00:28:45.260 So I know I'm throwing a lot of
00:28:46.380 information out, but I just want to
00:28:48.400 give a perspective on how truly massive
00:28:51.380 these deficits are.
00:28:52.640 They are orders of magnitude bigger,
00:28:56.520 many orders of magnitude bigger than
00:28:58.220 anything we've seen outside of the
00:29:00.020 World War II period before or after.
00:29:02.600 So what's going to happen?
00:29:04.160 I believe Trudeau will try to get a
00:29:05.820 majority, and once he does that,
00:29:07.800 there'll be massive tax increases.
00:29:09.240 You ask what a wealth tax?
00:29:10.880 That's nothing.
00:29:12.020 The wealth tax raises $6 billion,
00:29:14.440 according to the parliamentary budget
00:29:15.880 officer.
00:29:16.660 They might claim that that's their big
00:29:18.440 solution.
00:29:19.260 We've got a $380 billion deficit.
00:29:21.660 You're not going to get rid of that
00:29:22.520 with a $6 billion tax.
00:29:24.520 They would need massive new income tax,
00:29:28.860 GST increases, business tax increases,
00:29:33.400 increases in every tax you pay in order
00:29:35.920 to keep spending like this.
00:29:37.480 There is no mathematical way to go on
00:29:39.960 doing what we're doing.
00:29:42.520 And the parliamentary budget officer says
00:29:44.880 you don't just have to believe the
00:29:46.400 conservative finance clinic.
00:29:47.760 Just the other day,
00:29:48.520 the parliamentary budget officer said,
00:29:50.200 we've got one, maybe two years like
00:29:53.580 this before we collapse.
00:29:56.240 So it is a crisis situation,
00:29:58.980 and we're the only party that has
00:30:02.040 foretold this problem,
00:30:03.240 and we're the only party that can get
00:30:04.880 the country out of it.
00:30:06.160 Well, you know,
00:30:07.320 it's kind of interesting when you talked
00:30:08.600 about the Second World War, Pierre,
00:30:10.380 because the spending initiatives and the
00:30:12.640 programs that the government would have
00:30:13.860 introduced at the time were by their very
00:30:16.200 nature temporary.
00:30:17.620 You know, the idea was to go and fight a war
00:30:20.020 and stop the Nazis and protect freedom
00:30:22.340 around the world.
00:30:23.640 But what we saw with the Great Recession,
00:30:26.640 or the Great Recession 2008-2009,
00:30:29.920 the Harper government at least tried to make
00:30:32.000 it so that the programs were temporary,
00:30:34.560 that the stimulus spending that they
00:30:36.260 introduced and some of the bailouts
00:30:37.780 were temporary in measure.
00:30:39.500 I think that that's easier said than done.
00:30:41.440 And, you know, certainly what we saw in the
00:30:43.720 United States was just a proliferation of
00:30:45.980 bureaucracy, and that's what tends to happen
00:30:48.400 during these sort of so-called crises when
00:30:50.880 government has to grow to fill the need.
00:30:53.660 So, you know, with the CERB, I mean,
00:30:55.840 first of all, the numbers themselves are
00:30:57.900 incredible.
00:30:58.600 I saw in the Globe and Mail last week that I
00:31:00.640 think that household income during COVID fell
00:31:03.600 by $21 billion, but during the same period,
00:31:06.920 government transfers increased by $54 billion.
00:31:09.580 So Canadians might have hardly even noticed.
00:31:13.080 They actually might have been better off
00:31:14.500 during COVID than they were working, you know,
00:31:17.620 night and day to try to pay the bills.
00:31:19.880 A lot of people have suggested that perhaps
00:31:22.180 it's time for the government to introduce
00:31:24.600 some kind of a universal basic income or
00:31:27.020 to transition that CERB benefit over to a
00:31:30.400 universal income.
00:31:31.600 It doesn't really sound like that's sustainable
00:31:33.540 financially, though.
00:31:35.360 Is there a concern on the Conservative side
00:31:38.420 that a lot of the programs that Trudeau has
00:31:40.380 introduced are permanent?
00:31:42.420 And if a Conservative government were to win,
00:31:45.100 that they would be criticized for, you know,
00:31:47.440 the same vicious line of attacks you get,
00:31:50.080 oh, bringing in austerity and cutting and all
00:31:53.400 these kind of accusations that we see over and
00:31:56.120 over again?
00:31:56.660 Okay, there's a lot in your question.
00:32:00.780 Let me start quickly with your comments
00:32:02.940 on the Harper-era stimulus.
00:32:06.220 So the Economic Action Plan was worked out
00:32:09.420 to about 2% of GDP, and we had a deficit
00:32:13.240 of 3.5% of GDP.
00:32:16.300 So again, right now we're at 17% of GDP in a deficit.
00:32:19.900 So we're just talking orders of magnitude
00:32:23.460 difference, almost six times bigger deficit
00:32:26.920 in relative terms, again, adjusted for inflation
00:32:29.600 and the size of the economy.
00:32:31.200 Secondly, we did lapse those programs.
00:32:33.880 Every single stimulus program we brought in
00:32:36.240 during the Great Global Recession ended in 2011.
00:32:40.580 And we had real reductions, no, not just real,
00:32:43.880 nominal reductions in spending in every single year
00:32:47.620 that followed in the 2012, 13, 14 and 15
00:32:51.240 federal government spending actually went down.
00:32:54.180 And we did that without, by the way,
00:32:55.560 cutting health care or education,
00:32:57.160 both of which went up.
00:32:58.320 So it is possible to manage down the cost
00:33:01.140 of government and relieve taxpayers of their burdens.
00:33:04.960 And finally, one last point, we never once raised taxes
00:33:07.860 in the entire 10-year period.
00:33:09.440 We were in office.
00:33:09.960 So all of these things are possible.
00:33:12.740 Now on the basic income.
00:33:15.320 So we've had, I've had the Parliamentary Budget Officer
00:33:18.100 cost out various models of a basic income.
00:33:22.220 And there is no model that comes in below $73 billion a year.
00:33:28.020 The cheapest model anyone has been able to put forward
00:33:31.560 was Kathleen Wynne's approach,
00:33:33.940 which she did a basic income pilot project in Ontario
00:33:37.620 that would pay an individual $17,400
00:33:41.380 and a couple $24,000.
00:33:45.120 That would be 75% of the poverty rate.
00:33:48.960 So, and it would be phased out at a rate of 50 cents
00:33:51.780 for every dollar a person earned.
00:33:55.360 And so that was the model that she designed.
00:33:57.920 I said, hey, Parliamentary Budget Officer,
00:33:59.560 if we did this federally, how much would that cost?
00:34:01.840 And he said that would be about $73 billion.
00:34:03.700 So that is a lot less generous than the serve, by the way,
00:34:08.120 which is $2,000 per person and $4,000 for a couple.
00:34:13.880 So the high end, we're looking at $200 billion or higher
00:34:18.300 for a program of that nature.
00:34:22.700 So that would be half of the typical budget
00:34:24.440 of the government of Canada.
00:34:25.500 It would be five times what the federal government
00:34:28.080 spends on healthcare transfers.
00:34:29.520 It would be 10 times what we spend on the armed forces.
00:34:33.800 It would be, one last thing,
00:34:37.240 it would be six times what we collect in GST revenues.
00:34:40.760 So there's no one out there that has any explanation
00:34:43.860 of how you pay for it.
00:34:45.100 And the difference between this idea
00:34:47.580 and so many liberal spending ideas
00:34:50.360 is most liberal spending schemes are undesirable.
00:34:54.360 This is mathematically impossible.
00:34:56.860 Unless you're prepared to eliminate
00:35:00.180 whole departments and programs
00:35:03.940 and multiple levels of government
00:35:06.640 to find the fiscal space to pay for it,
00:35:09.580 which nobody is proposing, by the way,
00:35:11.860 then it is mathematically impossible to pay for it.
00:35:15.660 And interestingly, I have not yet heard
00:35:18.640 the liberals openly advocate for a basic income.
00:35:22.080 So it is possible that someone at finance
00:35:24.900 sat them down with a calculator
00:35:26.300 and very slowly walked them through
00:35:28.900 what I just mentioned.
00:35:31.960 But listen, every day I'm shocked.
00:35:35.860 Like, I always knew I was more fiscally conserved
00:35:39.940 than these guys are.
00:35:40.880 But every day it blows me away,
00:35:43.500 the amounts of money they're willing to spend
00:35:45.980 and the things they're willing to spend on.
00:35:48.460 So nothing would surprise me.
00:35:50.720 Well, it's funny because, you know,
00:35:53.380 we just had Bill Morneau as a finance minister
00:35:55.580 for five years.
00:35:57.440 And during that time, you know,
00:35:59.080 we saw a bunch of reckless spending decisions.
00:36:01.020 We saw growth of debt, growth of deficits.
00:36:04.120 We saw, like I mentioned,
00:36:05.580 the top income tax rate in Ontario go above 50%.
00:36:09.420 But now as soon as he's gone,
00:36:11.440 all of a sudden it's like he's being remembered
00:36:13.460 as this like fiscally conservative blue liberal.
00:36:16.540 I don't really remember seeing that very much
00:36:19.100 while he was doing the job.
00:36:21.600 But Pierre, you mentioned that you think
00:36:22.900 that Justin Trudeau is going to try
00:36:25.080 to get a majority government.
00:36:26.560 Do you think with this throne speech coming up here
00:36:29.080 that we are headed into election season?
00:36:31.200 Because it does feel like Trudeau
00:36:32.580 is doing a lot of sort of election style announcements.
00:36:36.120 And it almost seems like they're kicking
00:36:38.200 into election mode here.
00:36:40.020 What do you think?
00:36:41.320 I think he needs an election.
00:36:43.120 And there are, I will say,
00:36:45.840 two reasons why he needs an election quickly.
00:36:49.320 One, he needs an election before the money runs out.
00:36:53.340 As I mentioned, the debt levels
00:36:55.820 and the spending levels are unsustainable.
00:36:58.060 The parliamentary budget officer says
00:36:59.440 he's got one, maybe two years.
00:37:01.420 So he needs the election done
00:37:02.680 before the financial collapse occurs.
00:37:05.140 So that he can run on this fairy tale
00:37:09.100 that money will continue to fall out of the sky
00:37:11.500 and everything's free
00:37:12.580 and we'll just put it on the credit card
00:37:14.440 and we won't ever repay that credit card.
00:37:17.380 And he thinks he can swindle an election victory
00:37:20.280 off of that fantasy one last time.
00:37:23.920 And then the brutal hard truth
00:37:25.240 will kick in a year and a half later,
00:37:27.000 but he won't care because he'll have a majority.
00:37:29.340 So that's the first reason.
00:37:31.680 Second reason he needs an election
00:37:33.280 is because there are some very ugly truths
00:37:37.160 that are being, that he's hiding
00:37:38.900 that will become known soon.
00:37:42.200 One, the ethics commissioner,
00:37:44.980 the lobbying commissioner,
00:37:46.060 potentially the RCMP
00:37:47.220 and the auditor general
00:37:48.480 are all investigating the Wee scandal.
00:37:51.420 That will not only produce guilty verdicts
00:37:53.640 and in the case of the lobbying commissioner,
00:37:56.420 outright criminal charges in some cases
00:37:58.700 for certain people,
00:38:00.560 but it will also produce reports
00:38:03.100 that will show what went on behind the scenes.
00:38:07.000 And I'm sure there's much more there
00:38:09.440 than we know of.
00:38:10.640 The commissioner has the power
00:38:12.180 to call documents and people
00:38:14.040 and it's instruction of justice
00:38:15.880 to lie to the commissioner.
00:38:17.600 So that's going to come out.
00:38:21.020 There is an investigation
00:38:22.500 into the prime minister's chief of staff's spouse
00:38:25.680 lobbying for government contracts
00:38:29.420 and subsidies,
00:38:31.260 lobbying his spouse's office.
00:38:33.840 That is likely to be under investigation,
00:38:36.440 at least by the lobbying commissioner.
00:38:38.980 Finally, the auditor general
00:38:41.760 is investigating what I think
00:38:44.240 is a brewing scandal
00:38:45.420 that no one has noticed,
00:38:46.900 which is that there are 20,000
00:38:48.600 missing infrastructure projects.
00:38:50.900 So the government has said,
00:38:52.040 we have funded 52,000 infrastructure projects.
00:38:54.920 And I said, okay, great.
00:38:56.000 Give us a list.
00:38:57.660 So they gave us a list with 32,000.
00:39:00.780 So we have said,
00:39:01.720 so where's the rest of it?
00:39:03.360 And they say, oh, we can't tell you.
00:39:05.720 You know, so these are secretive.
00:39:07.560 It's impossible to build
00:39:09.060 an infrastructure project in secret.
00:39:11.100 They're big, loud, noisy affairs.
00:39:13.080 There's guys in hard hats and machines.
00:39:15.420 Bumping away.
00:39:17.200 You know, if there's an infrastructure project happening,
00:39:19.240 it's not a secret, right?
00:39:20.340 And there would be a list of where,
00:39:22.160 when, how much it costs
00:39:23.680 to build these projects.
00:39:25.740 But they don't have the list,
00:39:27.220 which means that the money
00:39:28.300 went somewhere it shouldn't have.
00:39:29.720 And the auditor general
00:39:30.560 is looking into exactly that.
00:39:32.560 And I think that report
00:39:33.520 will come out in late spring.
00:39:35.160 Long story short,
00:39:36.860 Trudeau needs an election
00:39:37.960 out of the way
00:39:38.640 before any of this stuff comes out.
00:39:40.560 And that's why I think
00:39:41.360 he's going to push for one in the fall.
00:39:42.700 So you said that
00:39:44.400 that report's coming out late spring.
00:39:46.160 Why is it going to take so long?
00:39:48.760 That's the nature
00:39:49.700 of Auditor general examinations.
00:39:52.740 You know, they have to track
00:39:53.760 billions of dollars of spending.
00:39:57.100 The purported infrastructure spend
00:39:59.280 is something like $9 billion a year.
00:40:01.880 And so the AG has to go
00:40:05.380 through all the departments.
00:40:06.720 These are spread out
00:40:08.000 of all these departments.
00:40:09.220 And in Ottawa,
00:40:10.080 they're also involving the provinces
00:40:11.600 and the municipalities.
00:40:13.020 So it just takes a long time.
00:40:14.920 By the way,
00:40:15.640 the auditor general is underfunded.
00:40:18.280 The AG's office is short
00:40:19.620 about $11 million.
00:40:21.800 So one thing Trudeau
00:40:22.860 doesn't want to spend money on
00:40:23.960 is auditors.
00:40:25.360 It's yes to everything else.
00:40:27.020 He doesn't, you know,
00:40:27.660 doesn't care who you are
00:40:28.700 or what you're asking for money for.
00:40:30.100 The answer is always yes,
00:40:31.560 unless you're an auditor.
00:40:32.740 In which case,
00:40:33.380 the answer is a firm no.
00:40:35.600 The only person in Ottawa
00:40:37.000 who hears that, no.
00:40:40.560 He believes in austerity
00:40:42.080 for one office,
00:40:43.040 the auditor general.
00:40:45.260 Well, okay,
00:40:46.380 so let's talk about the WE scandal
00:40:48.000 because we all watched it
00:40:49.800 with a lot of interest.
00:40:51.500 I feel like you're right
00:40:52.620 that there was a lot of liberal MPs
00:40:55.180 and people that were testifying
00:40:56.400 sort of alluding to the fact like,
00:40:58.480 oh, you know,
00:40:58.860 we were just working so hard
00:41:00.140 and it was so crazy
00:41:01.040 and we're just doing our best
00:41:02.540 to try to help Canadians
00:41:04.880 during this difficult time
00:41:06.000 and sort of setting up the idea
00:41:07.560 that, sure,
00:41:08.420 we didn't do all the due diligence
00:41:10.060 that we probably should have
00:41:11.320 in, you know,
00:41:12.240 shipping $400 billion out the door
00:41:14.360 in just a matter of a few months.
00:41:16.180 But for people who maybe
00:41:18.420 haven't been glued
00:41:19.540 to their computer screens
00:41:21.320 watching parliamentary committee
00:41:23.520 testimonies all summer,
00:41:25.140 Pierre,
00:41:25.240 maybe you can just kind of give us
00:41:26.520 a brief overview
00:41:28.060 of the WE scandal.
00:41:29.460 So tell us what happened,
00:41:30.880 how did it happen,
00:41:31.640 and where are we now?
00:41:33.920 Well, what we know now
00:41:35.200 is that in the early part
00:41:37.380 of the pandemic,
00:41:38.500 early April,
00:41:40.020 the Kielberger brothers
00:41:41.320 began aggressively pitching
00:41:43.960 key decision makers
00:41:46.080 in the cabinet,
00:41:47.900 the staff,
00:41:48.560 and the bureaucracy
00:41:49.420 on this idea
00:41:51.600 of a social entrepreneurship program.
00:41:54.640 This was going to apparently
00:41:56.480 teach young people
00:41:58.200 how to be entrepreneurs
00:42:00.180 in the social sector
00:42:01.540 and, you know,
00:42:03.900 they went around the hill
00:42:05.000 and no one was really interested.
00:42:07.720 But then,
00:42:08.800 and this was going to be
00:42:09.580 a small program,
00:42:10.520 you know,
00:42:10.660 I think it was $20 or $30 million.
00:42:13.440 But little did they know
00:42:14.540 that there was a much bigger price.
00:42:15.920 And so the government said,
00:42:18.740 well,
00:42:18.820 we might not be interested
00:42:19.840 in your social entrepreneurship program,
00:42:21.800 but we've got this way bigger initiative
00:42:23.720 called a paid volunteer program.
00:42:27.460 Of course,
00:42:27.780 that's an oxymoron.
00:42:29.860 If you're a volunteer,
00:42:30.960 you're not paid.
00:42:31.480 If you're paid,
00:42:31.940 you're not a volunteer.
00:42:33.840 But, you know,
00:42:34.680 Orwell warns
00:42:35.920 that whenever there's
00:42:36.920 an abusive language,
00:42:38.300 there are other abuses at work.
00:42:40.600 And so anyway,
00:42:42.180 the WE brothers say,
00:42:44.940 you know,
00:42:45.160 great,
00:42:45.460 forget about this stupid
00:42:46.660 entrepreneur program
00:42:47.720 we had last week.
00:42:49.040 We'll do a paid volunteer program instead.
00:42:52.480 And,
00:42:53.360 you know,
00:42:54.040 we were originally trope
00:42:54.940 by the liberals
00:42:55.560 that the whole thing
00:42:56.220 was cooked up
00:42:56.860 by a bunch of bureaucrats
00:42:58.320 in a Gatineau
00:42:59.860 departmental building.
00:43:02.000 But we learned later
00:43:03.380 that no,
00:43:03.780 no,
00:43:03.880 no,
00:43:03.980 no,
00:43:04.080 it was not cooked up
00:43:04.900 by them at all.
00:43:05.880 It was initiated
00:43:06.620 by Bill Morneau,
00:43:08.180 who had been on
00:43:08.800 an illegal $41,000
00:43:10.440 vacation
00:43:11.760 with the
00:43:12.740 WE brothers.
00:43:13.680 It was cooked up
00:43:15.320 by
00:43:15.680 Vardyf Chagur,
00:43:16.940 who had telephone
00:43:17.940 conversations
00:43:18.620 with Mr.
00:43:19.460 Kielberger
00:43:19.880 and told him
00:43:20.900 to put together
00:43:22.340 a proposal
00:43:23.300 on the subject.
00:43:24.660 It was cooked up
00:43:25.560 by,
00:43:25.940 there were two
00:43:26.560 senior staff,
00:43:27.940 policy advisors
00:43:29.220 in the PMO,
00:43:31.060 one of whom
00:43:31.800 Kielberger
00:43:32.660 credits
00:43:33.580 with having
00:43:34.240 played
00:43:34.840 an important role
00:43:35.840 in designing
00:43:36.500 the whole initiative.
00:43:37.420 So it was cooked up
00:43:39.460 by politicians
00:43:40.200 and their staff.
00:43:41.700 It just so happens,
00:43:42.440 this is the crux
00:43:43.200 of the matter,
00:43:44.060 it just so happens
00:43:44.820 that this is
00:43:46.200 a prime minister
00:43:47.300 whose family
00:43:48.040 had received
00:43:48.600 a half a million
00:43:49.360 dollars from
00:43:50.340 this group.
00:43:51.740 So the group
00:43:52.880 pays the Trudeau
00:43:53.840 family a half million
00:43:54.840 and the Trudeau
00:43:55.480 government pays
00:43:56.260 them a half billion,
00:43:57.420 which is a phenomenal
00:43:58.240 return on investment.
00:44:00.020 They should really
00:44:00.520 be advising
00:44:01.160 Warren Buffett
00:44:01.920 on how to get
00:44:03.480 an ROI
00:44:03.920 because I don't
00:44:05.300 think he's ever
00:44:05.940 produced any kind
00:44:06.860 of return like that.
00:44:08.740 And of course,
00:44:09.740 so here we are now,
00:44:11.440 the matter has been
00:44:12.280 before parliamentary
00:44:13.340 committees that have
00:44:14.100 now been shut down
00:44:15.000 due to Trudeau's
00:44:16.120 prorogation,
00:44:17.380 but worry not,
00:44:18.480 we're going to
00:44:18.880 reconvene those studies.
00:44:20.640 We're also going,
00:44:21.200 we also have
00:44:21.860 investigations by
00:44:23.160 the lobbying commissioner,
00:44:24.920 the ethics commissioner
00:44:27.760 and potentially
00:44:28.460 the RCMP,
00:44:29.360 though they never
00:44:30.020 confirm what
00:44:30.700 they're investigating.
00:44:32.240 The liberals
00:44:33.020 have this weird ability.
00:44:34.060 I mean,
00:44:34.180 I remember during
00:44:34.720 SNC-Lavalin,
00:44:35.580 Gerald Butts
00:44:37.100 resigned and
00:44:37.840 presumably he resigned
00:44:38.940 as an admission
00:44:40.040 of some kind
00:44:40.660 of guilt or
00:44:41.100 responsibility,
00:44:41.640 but during his
00:44:42.860 resignation,
00:44:43.200 he sort of insisted
00:44:44.300 that he had done
00:44:44.860 nothing wrong
00:44:45.540 and lo and behold,
00:44:46.460 a couple months
00:44:46.940 he's back working
00:44:47.780 for Trudeau again.
00:44:49.000 This time around,
00:44:49.580 we saw Bill
00:44:50.360 Morneau resign,
00:44:52.680 but sort of
00:44:54.080 inexplicably,
00:44:54.900 he said that it
00:44:55.760 had nothing to do
00:44:56.620 with this Wee scandal
00:44:57.720 that he was at
00:44:58.660 the center of,
00:44:59.280 that he just
00:44:59.660 happened to have
00:45:01.300 wanted to go
00:45:02.080 pursue an international
00:45:04.080 career with the OECD
00:45:06.620 instead of leading
00:45:08.180 the finances
00:45:09.840 of a G7 country.
00:45:12.160 So at this point,
00:45:13.360 has there been
00:45:14.180 anyone who has
00:45:15.360 taken responsibility
00:45:16.800 on behalf of the liberals?
00:45:18.480 Is there anyone
00:45:19.160 that's admitting blame
00:45:20.100 or are they still
00:45:20.840 insisting that they've
00:45:21.980 done nothing wrong?
00:45:24.660 You know,
00:45:25.160 Trudeau has admitted
00:45:25.940 that he should have
00:45:26.400 refused himself,
00:45:27.200 but I think
00:45:28.440 that's a complete
00:45:29.120 distraction.
00:45:29.880 It suggests that
00:45:30.600 he was a passive
00:45:31.380 player and that
00:45:32.580 something was brought
00:45:33.460 up to his desk
00:45:34.200 and that he should
00:45:34.800 have got up from
00:45:36.220 his desk and
00:45:36.860 walked to the room.
00:45:37.680 In fact,
00:45:38.100 I think he and
00:45:39.320 his team were
00:45:40.700 the ones who
00:45:43.160 initiated it all.
00:45:45.020 So he's cleverly
00:45:47.620 apologizing for
00:45:48.980 the smallest part
00:45:50.340 of the offense
00:45:51.680 while trying to
00:45:53.420 distance himself
00:45:54.940 from the biggest
00:45:55.400 part,
00:45:55.700 which is that he
00:45:56.480 and his staff
00:45:57.220 actively participated
00:45:58.700 to extend a half
00:46:00.300 billion dollars
00:46:01.180 to a group
00:46:01.960 than it paid
00:46:02.860 his family
00:46:03.380 a half a million
00:46:04.100 dollars.
00:46:05.440 It just sort of
00:46:06.700 defies logic
00:46:07.840 as to why
00:46:08.560 they would even
00:46:09.060 want to get
00:46:09.560 involved in this.
00:46:10.200 It seems to me
00:46:10.720 as soon as
00:46:11.880 the decision
00:46:13.460 that the funding
00:46:14.240 proposal became
00:46:15.400 public,
00:46:16.560 it was immediately
00:46:17.840 a scandal.
00:46:18.540 The media
00:46:18.780 immediately said,
00:46:19.520 well,
00:46:19.600 wait a minute,
00:46:20.460 you know,
00:46:20.720 all of these
00:46:21.540 ties to liberals,
00:46:22.700 all of these
00:46:23.100 family ties to
00:46:23.920 Trudeau and
00:46:24.400 Morneau.
00:46:25.360 I mean,
00:46:25.960 you just sort
00:46:26.880 of wonder
00:46:27.280 who's running
00:46:29.080 things at the
00:46:29.980 PMO,
00:46:30.500 who's running
00:46:31.080 things in this
00:46:31.460 government where
00:46:31.900 they wouldn't
00:46:32.580 even acknowledge
00:46:33.400 the appearance
00:46:34.660 of what would
00:46:35.280 obviously be a
00:46:36.320 conflict of interest
00:46:37.020 in trying to
00:46:37.840 ship,
00:46:38.520 like you said,
00:46:39.360 I think it was
00:46:39.900 half a billion
00:46:40.760 dollars in
00:46:42.760 money and then
00:46:44.340 an additional
00:46:44.880 couple hundred
00:46:45.880 million dollars
00:46:46.420 to actually
00:46:47.280 administer this
00:46:48.120 program.
00:46:48.580 So it was
00:46:49.020 912 million
00:46:50.740 dollars total.
00:46:52.340 I mean,
00:46:52.660 did they not see
00:46:53.400 that this was
00:46:53.840 going to be a
00:46:54.440 scandal in the
00:46:55.420 making?
00:46:56.700 No,
00:46:57.180 and I'll tell
00:46:57.540 you why,
00:46:58.140 and the book
00:46:58.800 of Proverbs
00:46:59.420 could tell
00:46:59.880 you why.
00:47:00.860 Pride precedes
00:47:01.700 destruction.
00:47:03.080 Remember,
00:47:03.920 Justin Trudeau
00:47:04.680 was the
00:47:05.140 master of
00:47:05.780 the universe,
00:47:07.280 running the
00:47:08.000 universe from
00:47:09.500 his cottage,
00:47:11.180 from his
00:47:12.420 cottage front
00:47:14.240 steps in
00:47:15.680 April and
00:47:16.460 May.
00:47:17.380 And this is
00:47:18.240 where I think
00:47:18.940 the media should
00:47:20.100 apologize to
00:47:21.020 Justin Trudeau
00:47:21.740 because they
00:47:22.520 filled his
00:47:23.180 head with
00:47:24.040 all this
00:47:24.420 hubris.
00:47:25.880 They were
00:47:26.660 going around
00:47:27.380 Ottawa.
00:47:27.640 It's hard to
00:47:28.100 remember this
00:47:28.600 now, but in
00:47:29.340 April, May,
00:47:30.040 and even June,
00:47:31.200 the media had
00:47:32.020 basically taken
00:47:32.840 the position that
00:47:33.620 no one should
00:47:34.200 be allowed to
00:47:34.740 criticize Justin
00:47:35.660 Trudeau.
00:47:36.180 Here we are in
00:47:36.780 the middle of a
00:47:37.160 pandemic.
00:47:38.040 To criticize him
00:47:39.060 would be to be
00:47:39.540 playing politics
00:47:40.440 and to be
00:47:42.300 putting lives on
00:47:43.320 the line.
00:47:44.440 Anyone who
00:47:45.220 criticizes Trudeau
00:47:46.440 is effectively
00:47:47.440 committing treason
00:47:49.000 and endangering
00:47:49.820 public health.
00:47:51.360 They beat up
00:47:52.120 Andrew Scheer.
00:47:53.160 They said,
00:47:53.560 oh, Scheer wants
00:47:54.380 to bring back
00:47:54.920 parliament.
00:47:55.500 What the hell
00:47:55.860 do we need
00:47:56.220 parliament for?
00:47:57.780 Don't we all
00:47:58.700 realize that now
00:47:59.600 is the time to
00:48:00.300 just gather
00:48:00.860 around the
00:48:01.760 footsteps of
00:48:03.660 Rideau Cottage
00:48:04.720 and let the
00:48:05.200 prime minister
00:48:05.660 come out and
00:48:06.900 bestow wisdom
00:48:08.220 on us daily?
00:48:10.420 And I was
00:48:11.420 regularly attacked.
00:48:12.640 I would go on
00:48:13.280 Twitter and I
00:48:13.840 would tweet
00:48:14.320 something critical
00:48:15.060 and there would
00:48:15.540 be these piranhas
00:48:17.560 in the press
00:48:18.320 gallery would
00:48:18.980 come at me
00:48:19.500 and look at him
00:48:20.700 he's gone off
00:48:21.160 the deep end
00:48:21.680 he's Italian
00:48:22.200 everyone else
00:48:22.920 is rallying
00:48:23.560 around our
00:48:23.960 prime minister
00:48:24.460 now and here
00:48:25.060 you have this
00:48:25.680 black sheep
00:48:27.040 who's out here
00:48:27.800 standing all by
00:48:28.900 himself.
00:48:30.080 And you know
00:48:30.580 what I think
00:48:30.980 he said to
00:48:31.520 himself,
00:48:32.080 I can do
00:48:32.820 anything I want.
00:48:34.380 You know,
00:48:34.720 no one questions
00:48:36.120 anything.
00:48:38.020 It seems that
00:48:38.820 the normal
00:48:39.360 parliamentary
00:48:40.040 accountability
00:48:40.960 mechanisms
00:48:41.720 are obliterated.
00:48:44.560 So I think
00:48:45.080 the group of
00:48:45.600 them around
00:48:46.040 Trudeau said
00:48:46.800 we now have
00:48:48.380 unfettered
00:48:49.100 access to
00:48:49.760 the public
00:48:50.160 first with
00:48:51.120 no scrutiny
00:48:51.800 and anybody
00:48:52.740 who asks us
00:48:53.420 a question
00:48:53.920 about it
00:48:54.380 will simply
00:48:54.940 accuse them
00:48:55.620 of nasty
00:48:56.160 partisanship
00:48:56.840 in the middle
00:48:57.600 of a pandemic
00:48:58.200 and we'll
00:49:00.440 assert our
00:49:00.900 pure motives
00:49:01.540 and we'll
00:49:02.280 do whatever
00:49:02.620 the hell
00:49:02.920 we please.
00:49:03.540 That's what
00:49:03.960 I think
00:49:04.360 that's where
00:49:04.960 I think
00:49:05.300 their headspace
00:49:05.900 was and
00:49:06.780 frankly I think
00:49:07.840 if the media
00:49:08.660 had been doing
00:49:09.220 its job
00:49:09.800 he probably
00:49:10.420 would have
00:49:10.740 been on
00:49:10.960 his toes
00:49:11.500 and he
00:49:11.880 probably
00:49:12.240 wouldn't have
00:49:12.620 been so sloppy
00:49:13.380 into corruption.
00:49:14.660 Well maybe
00:49:15.260 the media
00:49:15.980 is doing a
00:49:16.440 service to
00:49:17.020 Canadians
00:49:17.360 after all
00:49:18.160 then by
00:49:18.620 letting him
00:49:18.980 have his
00:49:19.240 guard down.
00:49:19.880 I totally
00:49:20.660 remember that
00:49:21.160 because I
00:49:21.480 remember a
00:49:22.160 couple columns
00:49:23.460 coming out of
00:49:24.000 the Toronto
00:49:24.320 Star basically
00:49:24.880 saying why
00:49:25.680 do we need
00:49:25.940 question period
00:49:26.640 the government
00:49:28.340 gets held to
00:49:29.500 account every
00:49:30.080 morning by
00:49:30.600 these reporters
00:49:31.260 asking questions
00:49:32.540 and it's like
00:49:33.100 True North did
00:49:33.980 an analysis of
00:49:34.840 those questions
00:49:35.400 that were asked
00:49:35.960 more than half
00:49:36.600 of them were
00:49:36.940 coming from
00:49:37.380 the CBC
00:49:37.960 you know
00:49:38.700 they were
00:49:39.000 positive in
00:49:39.960 nature
00:49:40.180 they weren't
00:49:40.560 asking questions
00:49:41.380 about you know
00:49:42.600 anything that
00:49:43.340 was serious
00:49:43.860 about government
00:49:44.560 it was always
00:49:45.240 like you know
00:49:46.120 hey how was
00:49:46.940 your weekend
00:49:47.340 how are you
00:49:47.800 coping
00:49:48.140 did you get
00:49:48.700 a haircut
00:49:49.100 you know
00:49:49.640 these kind
00:49:50.060 of questions
00:49:50.580 so one
00:49:52.120 last question
00:49:53.640 about the
00:49:54.020 Wiescat
00:49:54.300 it seems like
00:49:54.860 a lot of
00:49:55.260 times with
00:49:55.860 these scandals
00:49:56.680 that the
00:49:57.480 cover up is
00:49:58.100 worse than
00:49:58.560 the crime
00:49:59.020 and I think
00:49:59.820 what we saw
00:50:00.460 right before
00:50:01.060 parliament was
00:50:01.700 probed
00:50:02.540 there was a
00:50:03.380 document dump
00:50:04.060 so I think
00:50:04.580 you got 40
00:50:05.260 or 50,000
00:50:05.920 emails
00:50:06.400 most of them
00:50:07.280 were heavily
00:50:07.700 redacted
00:50:08.380 and you
00:50:08.940 made that
00:50:09.320 point that
00:50:09.960 you know
00:50:10.440 we don't
00:50:11.480 really know
00:50:11.840 what's in
00:50:12.160 these documents
00:50:12.580 but of the
00:50:13.180 things that
00:50:13.540 weren't redacted
00:50:14.280 the timeline
00:50:15.080 kind of came
00:50:15.680 into place
00:50:16.220 and it
00:50:16.460 seemed like
00:50:16.920 there were
00:50:17.260 some major
00:50:17.760 contradictions
00:50:18.540 between what
00:50:19.380 the liberals
00:50:19.840 had said
00:50:20.600 and what
00:50:21.640 really happened
00:50:22.180 particularly
00:50:22.740 your point
00:50:23.680 about how
00:50:24.080 the civil
00:50:24.440 service
00:50:24.760 wasn't
00:50:24.980 really the
00:50:25.240 one
00:50:25.360 recommending
00:50:25.800 it
00:50:26.080 it seemed
00:50:26.720 like it
00:50:27.020 was more
00:50:27.360 something
00:50:27.620 that was
00:50:27.920 led by
00:50:28.260 Minister
00:50:28.720 Chagher
00:50:29.860 but you
00:50:31.220 know
00:50:31.380 part of
00:50:31.980 the issue
00:50:32.460 is that
00:50:33.840 by the time
00:50:34.640 Justin Trudeau
00:50:35.240 came and
00:50:35.820 testified
00:50:36.300 he kind
00:50:37.620 of was
00:50:37.800 giving a
00:50:38.160 different
00:50:38.420 answer
00:50:38.740 than he
00:50:39.060 had been
00:50:39.440 for the
00:50:39.720 previous
00:50:40.080 few weeks
00:50:40.660 all of a
00:50:41.020 sudden
00:50:41.180 he was
00:50:41.620 telling
00:50:42.160 something
00:50:42.980 new
00:50:43.820 and it's
00:50:44.200 like
00:50:44.340 why is
00:50:44.980 the prime
00:50:45.240 minister
00:50:45.400 saying
00:50:45.800 new
00:50:46.180 information
00:50:46.740 now
00:50:47.200 when this
00:50:47.860 has been
00:50:48.200 in the
00:50:48.600 press
00:50:48.940 for a month
00:50:49.900 do you
00:50:51.220 think
00:50:51.480 the liberals
00:50:52.740 were sort
00:50:53.140 of trying
00:50:53.440 to be
00:50:53.700 too cute
00:50:54.240 that if
00:50:54.560 they had
00:50:54.780 come out
00:50:55.240 from the
00:50:55.860 get-go
00:50:56.180 and just
00:50:56.500 explain what
00:50:57.000 would have
00:50:57.220 happened
00:50:57.520 Canadians
00:50:57.940 would have
00:50:58.200 forgiven
00:50:58.460 them
00:50:58.620 but it
00:50:58.860 was because
00:50:59.280 of the
00:50:59.620 evolution
00:51:01.020 of the
00:51:01.620 storyline
00:51:02.080 and the
00:51:02.560 evolution
00:51:02.900 of when
00:51:03.820 did Justin
00:51:04.300 Trudeau
00:51:04.580 find out
00:51:05.040 when did
00:51:05.400 the civil
00:51:05.740 service
00:51:06.080 recommend
00:51:06.460 this
00:51:07.060 contract
00:51:07.860 that that's
00:51:08.820 ultimately
00:51:09.180 what's going
00:51:09.720 to get
00:51:10.580 them in
00:51:10.860 trouble
00:51:11.060 here
00:51:11.400 I think
00:51:12.320 so
00:51:12.640 I mean
00:51:12.980 look
00:51:13.440 the story
00:51:15.100 the truth
00:51:15.680 is ugly
00:51:16.160 in this
00:51:16.520 one
00:51:16.760 I mean
00:51:17.100 whenever
00:51:17.440 you have
00:51:17.900 a prime
00:51:18.900 minister's
00:51:19.480 family
00:51:19.800 getting
00:51:20.100 paid
00:51:20.420 half a
00:51:21.040 million
00:51:21.260 dollars
00:51:21.740 and then
00:51:22.100 he turns
00:51:22.480 around
00:51:22.740 and hands
00:51:23.080 half a
00:51:23.540 billion
00:51:23.800 to the
00:51:24.160 group
00:51:24.440 that paid
00:51:25.680 them
00:51:25.920 you've got
00:51:27.360 a serious
00:51:27.900 scandal
00:51:28.440 potentially a
00:51:29.700 criminal one
00:51:30.260 so there's
00:51:31.120 no doubt
00:51:31.620 they had
00:51:32.020 big trouble
00:51:32.600 based on
00:51:33.620 the facts
00:51:34.120 but you're
00:51:34.520 quite right
00:51:35.120 covering up
00:51:36.560 things that
00:51:37.060 were ultimately
00:51:37.740 going to come
00:51:38.460 out has
00:51:39.340 just made
00:51:39.680 it worse
00:51:40.160 you know
00:51:40.460 you look
00:51:40.760 at Chagher
00:51:41.680 she comes
00:51:43.020 to our
00:51:43.300 committee
00:51:43.640 denies that
00:51:45.400 she ever
00:51:45.780 met with
00:51:46.300 or spoke
00:51:46.980 with the
00:51:47.640 Kielbergers
00:51:48.360 about the
00:51:50.360 Canada Student
00:51:51.300 Service grant
00:51:52.000 and it turns
00:51:52.480 out she
00:51:52.920 did
00:51:53.180 we have
00:51:54.880 the prime
00:51:56.240 minister
00:51:56.600 saying his
00:51:57.380 office wasn't
00:51:58.080 involved in
00:51:58.540 the decision
00:51:58.920 well we have
00:51:59.640 correspondence
00:52:00.180 showing that
00:52:01.020 two of his
00:52:01.540 senior advisors
00:52:02.340 were directly
00:52:03.760 involved
00:52:04.140 one of them
00:52:04.960 helped design
00:52:05.640 the very
00:52:06.040 program that
00:52:06.720 we're talking
00:52:07.200 about
00:52:07.520 you know
00:52:08.640 we have
00:52:09.180 Bill Morneau's
00:52:10.440 office
00:52:11.040 Bill Morneau
00:52:11.760 saying basically
00:52:12.680 oh it had
00:52:13.320 nothing to do
00:52:13.820 with me
00:52:14.140 I was just
00:52:14.740 the minister
00:52:16.280 responsible
00:52:16.980 but it was
00:52:17.620 all the
00:52:17.900 bureaucrats
00:52:18.360 well now we
00:52:18.840 know that
00:52:19.720 by the
00:52:20.180 bureaucrats
00:52:20.740 own internal
00:52:21.360 correspondence
00:52:21.940 that they
00:52:22.400 said that
00:52:23.600 he was
00:52:24.280 that the
00:52:24.780 minister's
00:52:25.280 office was
00:52:25.740 insisting on
00:52:26.440 it and that
00:52:26.780 they were
00:52:27.060 quote besties
00:52:28.180 besties
00:52:29.160 his office
00:52:30.860 was besties
00:52:31.560 with the
00:52:32.000 we brothers
00:52:32.960 and that's
00:52:34.260 a quote
00:52:34.660 you know
00:52:36.160 the bureaucrats
00:52:37.100 who were
00:52:37.340 supposedly
00:52:37.960 enamored with
00:52:39.200 this program
00:52:39.880 called it a
00:52:40.460 quote
00:52:40.740 shit show
00:52:41.780 that's a
00:52:42.460 quote right
00:52:42.940 out of the
00:52:43.300 email
00:52:43.720 correspondence
00:52:44.420 the
00:52:45.760 you know
00:52:46.940 Trudeau
00:52:47.340 said oh
00:52:47.860 the
00:52:48.140 bureaucrats
00:52:48.700 told me
00:52:49.080 there was
00:52:49.420 no other
00:52:50.120 organization
00:52:50.640 with the
00:52:51.040 capacity to
00:52:51.780 run this
00:52:52.640 program
00:52:53.200 except for
00:52:53.980 we
00:52:54.240 well we
00:52:55.220 now have
00:52:55.540 treasury board
00:52:56.140 secretariat
00:52:56.800 bureaucrats
00:52:57.380 who said
00:52:57.720 they didn't
00:52:58.120 believe we
00:52:58.660 could run
00:52:59.180 the program
00:52:59.680 so it's
00:53:00.740 just all
00:53:01.260 of these
00:53:01.660 lies
00:53:02.300 that are
00:53:02.880 so obviously
00:53:03.780 contradictable
00:53:04.820 for which
00:53:05.680 there's
00:53:05.940 documentary
00:53:06.600 evidence
00:53:07.440 I don't
00:53:08.500 even I
00:53:08.860 don't know
00:53:09.220 why they
00:53:09.660 bothered telling
00:53:10.420 all these
00:53:10.820 lies
00:53:11.220 they should
00:53:11.680 have just
00:53:12.040 come out
00:53:12.460 and said
00:53:12.920 from the
00:53:13.280 get-go
00:53:13.720 look
00:53:14.060 we got
00:53:15.600 excited
00:53:16.020 we did
00:53:17.060 something we
00:53:17.540 shouldn't
00:53:17.820 have
00:53:18.220 there was
00:53:18.880 an obvious
00:53:19.260 conflict of
00:53:19.900 interest
00:53:20.300 it was all
00:53:21.200 our fault
00:53:21.720 you know
00:53:23.180 give us a
00:53:23.940 good
00:53:24.120 licking in
00:53:25.180 the press
00:53:25.600 for a
00:53:26.340 week
00:53:26.560 and then
00:53:27.200 we'll try
00:53:27.520 to move
00:53:27.820 on
00:53:28.100 that's
00:53:28.500 I think
00:53:28.860 the better
00:53:29.220 it would
00:53:29.420 have been
00:53:29.600 the better
00:53:29.940 strategy
00:53:30.500 they still
00:53:30.860 would have
00:53:31.020 been a lot
00:53:31.360 of trouble
00:53:31.740 they would
00:53:32.060 have been
00:53:32.260 found guilty
00:53:32.880 but at
00:53:34.660 least there
00:53:35.120 wouldn't be
00:53:35.460 this whole
00:53:35.840 series of
00:53:36.660 lies that
00:53:37.360 have been
00:53:37.600 exposed
00:53:38.240 little by
00:53:39.160 little each
00:53:39.600 day
00:53:39.880 so that
00:53:41.600 leads me to
00:53:42.080 another thought
00:53:43.060 that I have
00:53:43.840 and I hear
00:53:44.380 from a lot
00:53:45.060 of Canadians
00:53:45.520 about this
00:53:46.160 it seems like
00:53:47.480 Justin Trudeau
00:53:48.080 really is above
00:53:48.860 the law
00:53:49.180 he acts like
00:53:49.980 he's above
00:53:50.340 the law
00:53:50.680 he has
00:53:51.040 this sort
00:53:51.300 of arrogance
00:53:51.720 that he is
00:53:52.420 he has
00:53:53.080 repeated
00:53:53.640 ethics
00:53:54.720 violations
00:53:55.340 he repeatedly
00:53:56.160 gets
00:53:57.240 told by the
00:53:58.620 ethics commissioner
00:53:59.300 that he has
00:53:59.780 violated
00:54:00.400 the conflict
00:54:01.200 of interest
00:54:01.720 act
00:54:02.040 and yet
00:54:02.740 there doesn't
00:54:03.720 really seem to
00:54:04.200 be any
00:54:04.560 repercussions
00:54:05.220 he has
00:54:05.800 a slap
00:54:06.120 on the
00:54:06.360 wrist
00:54:06.660 a minor
00:54:07.120 fine
00:54:07.600 even if
00:54:10.180 he is
00:54:10.480 found
00:54:10.720 guilty
00:54:11.060 of
00:54:11.720 violating
00:54:12.360 the
00:54:13.480 conflict
00:54:13.900 of interest
00:54:14.300 act
00:54:14.560 with this
00:54:15.080 we
00:54:15.500 scandal
00:54:16.120 it won't
00:54:18.140 lead to
00:54:18.560 him
00:54:18.760 losing
00:54:19.660 his role
00:54:21.280 as prime
00:54:21.680 minister
00:54:21.940 so what
00:54:22.840 can the
00:54:23.240 government
00:54:23.540 do to
00:54:24.100 hold
00:54:24.560 Trudeau
00:54:25.180 accountable
00:54:25.680 is it
00:54:27.300 creating
00:54:27.760 another
00:54:28.160 set of
00:54:28.680 laws
00:54:29.080 is there
00:54:30.280 anything
00:54:30.580 that can
00:54:31.200 be done
00:54:31.620 to actually
00:54:32.160 stop
00:54:32.640 an
00:54:33.100 individual
00:54:33.480 who is
00:54:33.940 a repeat
00:54:34.640 offender
00:54:35.160 of these
00:54:36.160 acts that
00:54:36.880 are designed
00:54:37.440 to hold
00:54:38.140 these
00:54:38.340 politicians
00:54:38.800 accountable
00:54:39.420 well
00:54:41.360 look I
00:54:42.240 was the
00:54:42.740 parliamentary
00:54:43.100 secretary
00:54:43.620 who passed
00:54:44.380 the
00:54:45.100 accountability
00:54:45.480 act
00:54:45.980 it was my
00:54:46.620 job to
00:54:47.060 take it
00:54:47.420 through
00:54:47.780 committee
00:54:48.660 and through
00:54:49.220 the house
00:54:49.520 of commons
00:54:50.120 in 2006
00:54:51.220 so all of
00:54:51.980 the laws
00:54:52.380 we're talking
00:54:52.920 about right
00:54:53.500 now
00:54:53.740 the lobbying
00:54:54.280 act
00:54:54.640 the conflict
00:54:55.120 of interest
00:54:55.560 act
00:54:55.940 they were
00:54:57.120 all
00:54:57.560 partly my
00:54:58.780 creation
00:54:59.240 and so I
00:55:00.440 support them
00:55:00.980 but here's the
00:55:01.740 thing is you
00:55:02.340 can't at the
00:55:03.640 end of the
00:55:03.920 day you can't
00:55:04.960 replace the
00:55:06.040 what Churchill
00:55:07.400 called the
00:55:07.980 mighty power
00:55:08.960 of a little
00:55:10.200 man walking
00:55:11.340 into a little
00:55:12.060 room with a
00:55:13.280 little piece of
00:55:13.840 paper and putting
00:55:14.940 it in a little
00:55:15.420 box and that
00:55:16.840 of course is the
00:55:17.440 voter
00:55:17.680 the voter has to
00:55:19.600 decide that they're
00:55:20.280 not going to put up
00:55:20.900 with it anymore
00:55:21.520 at the end of the
00:55:23.480 day you can have
00:55:24.880 all of the law
00:55:25.920 enforcement bodies
00:55:26.820 you want coming
00:55:27.780 out and making
00:55:28.540 findings of guilt
00:55:29.660 but if the voter
00:55:30.960 is not going to
00:55:31.960 hold them
00:55:32.380 accountable for
00:55:33.240 it then he
00:55:34.000 is has
00:55:36.360 impunity
00:55:36.820 there is a
00:55:39.120 weird psychology
00:55:40.560 among the
00:55:41.240 political class
00:55:42.060 in Canada
00:55:42.540 that Justin
00:55:44.420 Trudeau is
00:55:44.920 special
00:55:45.300 that yes of
00:55:46.820 course if any
00:55:47.400 other junior
00:55:48.440 candidate had
00:55:49.560 worn blackface
00:55:50.400 they would have
00:55:50.900 been not even
00:55:51.860 been allowed to
00:55:52.380 run the party's
00:55:53.080 ticket let alone
00:55:53.660 lead it
00:55:54.360 that if anyone
00:55:57.280 else had been
00:55:57.820 found guilty of
00:55:59.100 trying to stop
00:56:00.680 a criminal
00:56:01.120 prosecution
00:56:01.720 they'd immediately
00:56:02.660 have to resign
00:56:03.480 from cabinet
00:56:04.120 many have resigned
00:56:04.960 for much less
00:56:05.720 that there would
00:56:08.020 be criminal
00:56:09.100 charges and
00:56:10.420 there should have
00:56:10.940 been criminal
00:56:11.380 charges for
00:56:12.300 taking a
00:56:13.360 $200,000
00:56:14.140 vacation from
00:56:15.340 someone who
00:56:17.140 was at who
00:56:17.880 was successfully
00:56:18.960 lobbying you for
00:56:20.260 a $15 million
00:56:21.460 grant it's right
00:56:22.600 in the criminal
00:56:23.020 code it's I
00:56:23.880 think it's one
00:56:24.220 section 122
00:56:25.240 it's a criminal
00:56:26.200 offense but the
00:56:27.700 RCMP
00:56:28.200 didn't pursue
00:56:29.720 it and I
00:56:31.260 think it's for
00:56:32.260 Justin it's like
00:56:33.280 you know he's
00:56:33.760 the son of a
00:56:34.560 former prime
00:56:35.140 minister and
00:56:36.520 he's youthful and
00:56:37.440 bashful and
00:56:38.600 there's something
00:56:39.660 kind of
00:56:40.800 something there's
00:56:44.120 sort of an
00:56:45.000 instinct to
00:56:45.960 protect and
00:56:46.480 forgive him
00:56:47.200 among the
00:56:48.040 political class
00:56:48.800 that exists for
00:56:49.540 no other
00:56:50.260 political figure
00:56:51.080 in this country
00:56:51.760 and you know
00:56:53.340 I think it
00:56:53.800 would take an
00:56:54.220 actual psychologist
00:56:55.560 to do an
00:56:56.760 examination of
00:56:57.780 how it is
00:56:58.620 that the
00:56:59.700 system has
00:57:00.720 been so
00:57:01.140 forgiving of
00:57:02.560 the many
00:57:03.400 scandals and
00:57:06.980 in some cases
00:57:07.560 crimes that he's
00:57:08.600 committed
00:57:08.880 that's a really
00:57:10.800 interesting
00:57:11.520 perspective I
00:57:12.660 know now I want
00:57:13.320 to interview a
00:57:13.980 psychologist and
00:57:14.780 find out what
00:57:15.600 what's going on
00:57:16.280 I think so I
00:57:17.120 mean there's
00:57:17.580 something there
00:57:18.220 there's something
00:57:18.760 there yeah there
00:57:19.880 is well I do
00:57:20.800 want to ask you a
00:57:21.500 little bit about
00:57:21.960 the 2019
00:57:22.620 election and
00:57:24.140 the new
00:57:24.760 conservative
00:57:25.480 leader Aaron
00:57:26.100 O'Toole so
00:57:26.800 you know to
00:57:28.060 me the
00:57:29.160 conservatives won
00:57:29.880 the 2019
00:57:30.600 election you
00:57:31.360 guys got the
00:57:31.840 popular vote you
00:57:32.660 increase your
00:57:33.220 vote count your
00:57:34.220 seats in every
00:57:35.200 region Andrew
00:57:36.580 Scheer did a
00:57:37.020 hell of a job
00:57:37.480 standing up to
00:57:38.060 a media that
00:57:38.540 was pretty
00:57:38.860 biased against
00:57:40.100 him but the
00:57:42.000 sort of consensus
00:57:42.800 in the media was
00:57:43.900 that the
00:57:44.120 conservatives lost
00:57:44.780 and that Andrew
00:57:45.600 Scheer needed to
00:57:46.140 go and he
00:57:46.640 sort of agreed
00:57:47.500 with that and
00:57:48.020 stepped down
00:57:48.600 from your
00:57:49.720 perspective why
00:57:50.900 do you think
00:57:51.900 that Justin
00:57:52.960 Trudeau got
00:57:53.520 re-elected and
00:57:54.220 why do you
00:57:54.480 think the
00:57:54.700 conservatives
00:57:55.040 failed to
00:57:55.520 ultimately really
00:57:56.820 sort of win in
00:57:57.780 terms of at
00:57:58.420 least getting a
00:57:58.880 minority government
00:57:59.560 well you're
00:58:02.420 quite right
00:58:02.940 I think Andrew
00:58:03.860 Scheer deserves a
00:58:04.540 lot of credit
00:58:05.060 for the successes
00:58:05.820 you enumerated
00:58:06.680 when he became
00:58:07.260 leader no one
00:58:07.960 gave us a hope
00:58:09.340 of even reducing
00:58:11.280 Trudeau to a
00:58:11.960 minority there
00:58:12.460 was a talk that
00:58:13.280 he would have
00:58:13.700 the biggest
00:58:14.040 majority ever
00:58:14.920 after the longest
00:58:16.100 honeymoon ever of
00:58:17.640 any prime
00:58:18.080 minister look he
00:58:20.860 got 33% of the
00:58:22.380 vote it's the
00:58:22.900 lowest share of
00:58:23.800 the vote of any
00:58:24.540 prime minister in
00:58:25.620 Canadian history
00:58:26.420 many prime
00:58:28.560 ministers have been
00:58:29.300 defeated with by
00:58:30.780 getting a larger
00:58:31.480 share of the vote
00:58:32.220 than he got
00:58:32.820 winning it so he
00:58:35.960 had an incredibly
00:58:36.940 efficient distribution
00:58:39.060 of votes I don't
00:58:40.900 think any party in
00:58:42.320 Canadian history has
00:58:43.260 gotten so many
00:58:44.000 seats with so few
00:58:45.080 votes and I don't
00:58:47.140 say that you know
00:58:47.880 as an excuse
00:58:48.660 it's obviously a
00:58:50.720 tribute in part to
00:58:51.680 their strategy and
00:58:52.660 how they allocated
00:58:53.620 the resources but
00:58:55.440 you know this is
00:58:56.520 not a popular
00:58:57.220 prime minister and
00:58:58.880 he returns to
00:59:00.420 office with an
00:59:01.100 extremely weak
00:59:02.120 mandate and but
00:59:05.040 that said no
00:59:06.440 majority prime
00:59:07.380 minister had been
00:59:08.080 defeated after just
00:59:09.980 one term since
00:59:11.320 R.B.
00:59:11.760 Bennett in the
00:59:12.240 middle of the
00:59:12.540 great depression
00:59:13.160 administration so
00:59:14.120 history the math
00:59:16.720 the media and
00:59:17.740 a whole series of
00:59:18.360 other things were
00:59:19.020 against Mr.
00:59:20.380 Scheer at the
00:59:21.120 time and I wish
00:59:23.580 we had done better
00:59:24.220 as does he but I
00:59:26.220 think we can take
00:59:26.840 solace in the fact
00:59:27.660 that we didn't
00:59:28.280 reduce them to a
00:59:29.000 minority and
00:59:29.900 hopefully we can put
00:59:30.880 an end to the
00:59:31.460 government before they
00:59:32.300 do too much damage.
00:59:33.120 So Aaron O'Toole is
00:59:35.820 out to a really
00:59:36.440 good start I would
00:59:37.420 say he's come out
00:59:38.180 strong I would argue
00:59:40.340 that he's probably
00:59:41.040 not as conservative
00:59:42.060 as Andrew Scheer in
00:59:43.020 terms of his social
00:59:43.920 views but he seems
00:59:45.300 like he really has
00:59:46.660 hit a populist
00:59:47.560 note we saw that
00:59:48.240 with his Labour
00:59:48.760 Day message and
00:59:50.080 his new Canada
00:59:51.180 first economic
00:59:52.540 strategy so I was
00:59:54.320 wondering if you
00:59:54.620 could describe the
00:59:55.320 ways that you think
00:59:56.000 that Aaron O'Toole
00:59:56.740 is different than
00:59:57.880 Andrew Scheer and
00:59:58.720 how the sort of
01:00:00.260 strategy would be for
01:00:01.460 Aaron O'Toole to
01:00:02.200 become the next
01:00:02.740 Prime Minister?
01:00:04.820 Well I think Aaron
01:00:06.360 has a lot of
01:00:07.140 strong attributes
01:00:07.860 he's a veteran
01:00:09.540 a businessman
01:00:10.640 he has strong
01:00:12.640 roots in the
01:00:14.060 parts of the
01:00:14.540 country we need
01:00:15.240 to win in order
01:00:16.180 to form a
01:00:16.760 majority government
01:00:17.520 I think you're
01:00:18.740 right he has
01:00:19.540 struck the right
01:00:20.300 tone I've always
01:00:22.360 believed that the
01:00:23.260 free market is the
01:00:25.160 best way to serve
01:00:26.300 the working class
01:00:27.620 and the poor
01:00:28.340 and by contrast
01:00:31.480 we have is
01:00:32.180 government controlled
01:00:33.120 corporatism that
01:00:34.960 enriches those who
01:00:36.120 have the most
01:00:36.720 political influence
01:00:37.640 at the expense of
01:00:38.560 everyone else
01:00:39.180 we can campaign
01:00:41.480 against that and I
01:00:42.420 think it will be
01:00:42.880 very popular and
01:00:43.760 yes populist to do
01:00:45.460 so so I agree with
01:00:47.300 you he's off to a
01:00:48.100 good start and if
01:00:49.400 he can continue with
01:00:50.280 that momentum he'll
01:00:52.220 be the next Prime
01:00:52.880 Minister.
01:00:54.240 One of the
01:00:54.820 interesting things
01:00:55.500 we're seeing again
01:00:56.740 speculation with this
01:00:57.920 throne speech but
01:00:59.060 the idea that the
01:00:59.740 Liberals have moved
01:01:00.420 so far to the left
01:01:01.400 that the NDP doesn't
01:01:02.740 really have a place
01:01:03.560 anymore and you see
01:01:05.280 Jagmeet Singh I mean
01:01:06.380 he was the real
01:01:07.220 loser in the 2019
01:01:08.300 election they just
01:01:09.240 got decimated in
01:01:10.160 Quebec and reduced
01:01:12.280 in British Columbia
01:01:13.280 and a lot of other
01:01:14.320 strongholds it feels
01:01:15.880 like there's not
01:01:16.540 really a lot of room
01:01:17.460 on the political
01:01:18.260 spectrum for Singh at
01:01:19.880 this point and then
01:01:20.720 you have Aaron O'Toole
01:01:21.920 sort of putting forth
01:01:23.320 this Canada first
01:01:24.460 strategy and when I
01:01:26.680 say populist I mean
01:01:27.600 sort of speaking more
01:01:28.860 to working Canadians
01:01:31.060 blue-collar Canadians
01:01:32.060 and people that might
01:01:32.940 traditionally be part
01:01:34.020 of that NDP voting
01:01:36.000 based union members
01:01:37.820 and that kind of
01:01:38.360 thing do you think
01:01:40.020 that that is part of
01:01:40.740 the Conservative
01:01:41.160 strategy is to
01:01:42.220 capture some of
01:01:44.220 those voters that
01:01:45.140 may feel not
01:01:47.240 represented by a
01:01:48.220 sort of cosmopolitan
01:01:49.480 environmentalist NDP
01:01:51.320 movement?
01:01:53.600 Yes and that has
01:01:54.700 been a problem for
01:01:55.540 the NDP for a long
01:01:56.740 time now you'll
01:01:57.700 recall that the NDP
01:01:59.860 used to be very
01:02:00.600 strong in Saskatchewan
01:02:02.180 in rural British
01:02:05.300 Columbia in parts
01:02:08.100 of Manitoba and they
01:02:11.220 lost that because
01:02:12.500 they became an ultra
01:02:14.740 urban white-collar
01:02:17.480 elite socialist party
01:02:21.080 faculty club socialist
01:02:22.360 party and they forgot
01:02:24.960 about working-class people
01:02:26.220 and farmers and so
01:02:28.440 where the roots of the
01:02:29.420 party were among
01:02:30.160 farmers and workers
01:02:31.380 they're now among
01:02:32.720 activists and loudmouths
01:02:36.660 and protesters and
01:02:38.500 people who get paid to
01:02:40.460 go around screaming and
01:02:41.800 hollering and smashing
01:02:42.620 things and theorizing
01:02:44.820 all day and that's not
01:02:46.660 a particularly big market
01:02:47.960 to pursue and that's why
01:02:50.200 I think you see more and
01:02:51.320 more working-class people
01:02:52.480 are attracted to the
01:02:53.700 conservative message and
01:02:56.160 we're winning we win in
01:02:57.500 places like Oshawa and in
01:03:00.660 rural Saskatchewan and in
01:03:04.520 the north in northern
01:03:05.680 Ontario so a lot of mining
01:03:09.820 towns and assembly line
01:03:12.200 constituencies where that
01:03:14.000 you the NDP used to take
01:03:15.800 for granted are now
01:03:16.800 becoming conservative
01:03:17.680 because they see us
01:03:18.700 representing their working
01:03:20.340 class family values
01:03:22.340 interesting so do you
01:03:24.940 have any any predictions
01:03:26.020 for the fall it's going to
01:03:27.200 be an interesting time
01:03:28.780 with throne speech
01:03:30.040 potentially going into an
01:03:31.740 election and and sort of
01:03:33.180 more uncovering things
01:03:34.700 from your committee the
01:03:35.540 finance committee with the
01:03:36.480 we scandal any any
01:03:37.960 predictions for the fall
01:03:38.840 here
01:03:39.120 yeah I think Trudeau is
01:03:43.000 going to do as much
01:03:43.600 do anything he can to get
01:03:44.800 an election if he can't get
01:03:47.000 the proposition parties to
01:03:48.280 vote down his speech from
01:03:49.660 the throne or his fall
01:03:51.680 update then he might just
01:03:53.860 go to the governor general
01:03:55.360 and say I'm calling an
01:03:56.460 election the challenge for
01:03:58.080 him will be that people
01:04:01.100 will say okay why are you
01:04:02.220 calling an election if
01:04:03.060 you've passed your throne
01:04:04.060 speech you passed your
01:04:05.280 update you passed all of
01:04:06.600 your COVID spending what
01:04:08.520 would a majority give you
01:04:09.780 that you don't already
01:04:10.500 have and of course the only
01:04:12.260 answer is it would allow
01:04:13.440 him to lock in power
01:04:15.860 before people find out how
01:04:17.280 broke we are and before
01:04:18.400 the scandals become fully
01:04:19.920 public and that's not a
01:04:21.980 very good justification to
01:04:23.500 ask people for a majority
01:04:24.680 you know please give me a
01:04:26.480 majority so I can cover up
01:04:27.820 scandals liberal scandals
01:04:30.420 I doesn't sound like much
01:04:33.320 of a slogan so I think he's
01:04:35.080 in a he's in a bind and the
01:04:38.100 only thing that can help him
01:04:39.060 is if Jagmeet Singh really
01:04:40.240 jumps in and tries to defeat
01:04:41.560 him which would be irrational
01:04:43.080 for the NDP and we know that
01:04:46.100 might be the reason they do
01:04:47.160 it interesting and then just
01:04:49.280 final question for you
01:04:50.160 Pierre what do you think the
01:04:51.120 biggest challenge for
01:04:52.620 conservatives is conservatives
01:04:54.520 are in this country and in
01:04:56.580 bringing down this Trudeau
01:04:57.620 government well I think the
01:05:01.640 biggest challenge is telling
01:05:03.420 people the warning it's not a
01:05:06.120 fun job but warning people
01:05:07.300 about the fiscal catastrophe
01:05:08.580 that's coming and being you
01:05:11.580 know sounding that alarm before
01:05:14.300 everyone realizes there's a
01:05:15.680 fire you know and people say
01:05:19.140 well why are you pulling the
01:05:20.000 alarm well it's because there's
01:05:21.860 a fire well we don't see the
01:05:23.020 fire yet well believe me it's
01:05:24.880 there and it's coming and
01:05:25.980 you're going to see smoke and
01:05:27.000 flames very soon and so we have
01:05:30.100 to be you know the bad guys who
01:05:31.680 come and explain that things
01:05:33.280 cost money and that we're
01:05:35.160 eventually going to run out of
01:05:36.340 it that is a very difficult job
01:05:39.040 to play at some point what we've
01:05:40.540 indicated and everyone will say
01:05:41.860 oh they were right all along but
01:05:43.080 by then it's too late the damage
01:05:45.920 is already done so that is the
01:05:48.060 biggest challenge but you know
01:05:49.420 we have to be happy warriors and
01:05:50.940 get out there and make the case
01:05:52.040 it's the right thing to do and the
01:05:54.020 country will be better off for us
01:05:55.220 doing it well you you certainly
01:05:57.540 have your work cut out for you
01:05:59.000 especially considering you know
01:06:01.180 all the things we talked about how
01:06:02.320 the sort of media adoring Justin
01:06:05.520 Trudeau and seeing that he can do
01:06:06.760 no wrong and the sort of liberal
01:06:08.700 stronghold that exists in Ottawa but
01:06:10.720 Pia we really appreciate your time
01:06:12.720 thank you so much for coming on
01:06:14.020 and explaining all these concepts
01:06:15.700 to us and help breaking down
01:06:17.480 everything from an insider
01:06:18.940 perspective we really appreciate
01:06:20.120 your time thank you so much for
01:06:21.480 joining the true north speaker
01:06:22.760 series great to be with you thank
01:06:24.660 thank you so much
01:06:31.660 you
01:06:33.660 you
01:06:35.660 you
01:06:37.660 you
01:06:41.660 you
01:06:45.660 you