Juno News - Grocery prices are out of control

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.

00:00:05.740 This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:09.240 See, you think sometimes that you're a seasoned broadcast veteran

00:00:33.620 and then you miss that critical piece of unmuting yourself

00:00:38.020 at the beginning of the show so my best material was in that five seconds that you just missed but

00:00:42.820 uh hello and welcome to you all after that little bit of a false start this is the Andrew Lawton

00:00:48.180 show here on True North on this Tuesday December 6th and I want to just get right into it because

00:00:54.020 the story I want to tackle today in this lead segment is one that a lot of the time I think

00:00:59.280 Canadians might be well aware of before academics and journalists start to pay attention to it and

00:01:06.480 that is grocery store pricing which as we know has been at just record levels in this past year

00:01:12.160 anecdotally and we've got data to back this up and unfortunately I'm not really going to be the

00:01:18.440 bearer of good news here because it sounds like things are going to be getting worse next year

00:01:23.920 the report that came out just yesterday Canada's food price report finds that we're looking at

00:01:29.920 about another five to seven percent on average increase next year which could add i mean in some

00:01:36.580 cases over a thousand dollars to a family of four's grocery bill and if you want to talk about

00:01:41.440 some of the numbers here uh they're very very stark uh the upper estimate that i'm seeing here

00:01:46.260 is a sixteen thousand two hundred and eighty eight dollars in food costs for a family of four

00:01:52.360 over the course of 2023. That's an increase of $1,065 over this year for a two adult household,

00:02:00.760 about $7,711, which is an increase of about $500. So these are not insignificant increases,

00:02:08.440 especially when you bundle them up with other cost of living increases that are taking place

00:02:13.000 in other sectors as well that we all have to find a way to pay for. I want to discuss this

00:02:19.000 in a bit more depth with one of the researchers involved in this report, Professor Stuart Smythe,

00:02:24.060 who is from the University of Saskatchewan. Professor, good to talk to you. Thanks for

00:02:28.660 coming on today. Good afternoon, Andrew. Pleasure to join you. So when we talk about inflation,

00:02:34.380 a lot of the times I think people try to find a simple explanation for something that might have

00:02:39.520 a few different inputs to it. When we're talking about food prices here and the increases that

00:02:46.120 you're identifying in this report, are we seeing the product of a number of phenomena or are we

00:02:51.240 seeing one or two major drivers? I'd say it's probably three or four, Andrew. So we've got

00:02:58.620 the war in Ukraine that's creating a rise in commodity prices, which pushes up the cost of

00:03:04.660 ingredients for all of the various food products. We've got the fact that OPEC's still capping

00:03:10.340 production pushing uh oil and gas prices higher we're you know even though prices have come down

00:03:16.500 from the peak in the summer we're still 40 higher than last year at this time and and you're right

00:03:22.580 with inflation and the decline in the value of the canadian dollar that just pushes up the cost to

00:03:27.860 to impart the fruits and vegetables over the coming winter months from the southern us and

00:03:32.820 then the last one i throw away there is the labor shortage um the trucking industry estimates they've

00:03:37.460 They've got 15 or 20,000 vacancies right now, and they expect that could rise to possibly over 30,000 by spring.

00:03:45.180 So just the longer uncertainty in transportation, all of those really come together and are sort of the evil four that are driving food price increases.

00:03:56.940 Three of the four things you identified there are, by and large, things that are problems outside of Canada that we obviously have to deal with because of the global supply chain here.

00:04:09.200 But, I mean, the obvious thing that jumps out to me not being an expert in this field is that is this the product of not doing enough to shore up domestic production?

00:04:17.100 or is the nature of food supply and production that we just as a country don't have the domestic

00:04:22.480 capacity for that given how interconnected and how globalized food supply is?

00:04:28.760 So that sort of spread throughout the grocery store, Andrew. We do a fantastic job on the meats

00:04:35.300 and the dairy and the breads, those aspects. And in the summer, we can do a little bit of the fruits

00:04:41.140 and vegetables but but come the winter months then we're starting to to import um you know the

00:04:47.220 vast vast majority so it's somewhat commodity specifically you know we've got potatoes that

00:04:53.380 will be distributed across canada for months because of just the massive amount of potatoes

00:04:58.900 that are produced in pei um so but you know apples and pears and those kinds of things we we tend to

00:05:05.620 to run out of those into you know not too long after harvest so we're bringing in apples from

00:05:10.760 from various parts of the world right yeah that's fair and I know that certainly there are people

00:05:16.660 that probably grocery stores have a level of seasonality to them you know everyone gets excited

00:05:20.980 when you know this product's in season or that product's out of season but I think generally

00:05:24.520 speaking consumers kind of like being able to buy whatever they want year-round we've been

00:05:30.120 I don't know spoiled a little bit because of the global supply chains that you know if you want to

00:05:37.580 pay enough for asparagus you can eat it virtually any month of the year regardless of whether we

00:05:42.860 produce any in Canada in January or not right so so so yeah I think we've you know previously when

00:05:48.840 when food prices were a little bit more stable um consumers were a little bit less discerning as to

00:05:56.740 you know what they were going to buy for any particular meal and and and now you know you

00:06:02.120 go and look at a package of lettuce that's eight nine maybe ten bucks you know consumers are sort

00:06:07.340 of second guessing whether or not they they actually need to buy that product um for for

00:06:11.700 this coming week i know when you start moving the the phenomena you're describing here into

00:06:17.380 the political realm there there's a lot of finger pointing here the conservatives have

00:06:20.900 raised issues about the carbon tax exacerbating, not necessarily causing this. Does that kind of

00:06:27.320 trip your radars here as a meaningful increase to this? I think it's certainly getting factored in

00:06:35.600 and will be more so in come April when the carbon tax jumps by 30% from 50 to $65. So that impacts

00:06:44.280 every mile of food transportation and and we're a big country so transportation costs are

00:06:51.880 a significant component of food prices yeah and and that's i mean fuel prices uh and grocery

00:06:58.760 prices are i think the two main things that canadians are seeing uh as far as symptoms of

00:07:04.440 this inflationary period we're in and and obviously that you know the fuel price you're paying for it

00:07:08.920 when you fill up your own tank and then anything you buy that was shipped to where you bought it

00:07:12.040 from you're you're paying a little bit downstream there so we we look at these numbers in 2023

00:07:17.640 is there anything that's looking better or at least markedly not as bad as other things or is

00:07:24.500 it kind of painful across the board across uh different sections of the grocery store

00:07:28.680 the one bright spot i see is there's a there's a global indice that looks at supply chain

00:07:34.480 disruptions and it peaked in sort of late january early february of this year and it's down 75

00:07:41.860 percent now so so what that says to me is that things that were causing problems in the distribution

00:07:48.900 of food products has has greatly eased now we may not be seeing much evidence of that just yet in

00:07:55.380 in canadian grocery stores but i think over the the first three to six months of 2023 that will

00:08:00.900 become more noticeable so that the supply of products is going to be more consistent and and

00:08:06.180 I think that removing some of the uncertainty in distribution of products is going to have

00:08:13.860 a ripple effect on the prices that we may see a bit of a plateauing of prices as we move towards

00:08:19.940 spring. On that note, are grocery prices a bit of a lagging indicator in some ways? If some of those

00:08:27.860 problems you identified earlier were to resolve or at least get better early on,

00:08:32.500 how long does it take for those changes to trickle down to the grocery store price tags

00:08:38.580 that sort of is dependent on specific products so the the grocery stores are going to put purchase

00:08:45.460 contracts in place maybe up to three or four months in advance and and so as the variability

00:08:53.220 on those prices affects now so the things that retail grocery chains are buying right now will

00:09:00.820 actually show up in grocery stores february march april so so you're right those legs will

00:09:08.100 have an impact and we may be paying a higher price now due to things that happened in

00:09:12.820 july august and september so um that's part of that uncertainty and as as i as you know

00:09:19.860 as i think that uncertainty gets reduced then that that helps contribute to stabilizing the

00:09:25.140 the price is fingers crossed a little bit more i i shudder to ask this because i i know that

00:09:31.220 this is a very painful uh trend that we're seeing for a lot of canadians but on the production side

00:09:37.620 for uh farmers and industry that are exporting these things are they actually seeing any upside

00:09:43.060 from this right now or is any upside in their price getting swallowed up by their increased

00:09:48.260 operating costs yeah i mean certainly commodity prices have been higher this year but but fertilizer

00:09:56.020 prices have probably been equally as high and in talking to farmers you know and my students over

00:10:02.580 the past number of months they said that the crop that they put in the ground in in april may june

00:10:08.100 of 2022 was the most expensive crop they ever planted so so that certainly indicates that

00:10:14.740 yeah the rest of the ag input sector realized that commodity prices were up

00:10:19.860 but supply chains also restricted the availability of fertilizers and chemicals that were equally

00:10:26.900 important so so i don't know that the margins of profitability margins for farmers are going

00:10:32.020 to be significantly different this year than maybe in past years how about on the grocery

00:10:37.780 store side because i know i think it was two weeks ago or three weeks ago loblaws third quarter

00:10:43.140 profits were up about 30%. And I know they've been criticized of, you know, perhaps padding

00:10:48.340 prices and using inflation as a bit of cover, but I don't know what, you know, would normally be

00:10:52.940 expected from them at this time of year. Loblaws is a bit tricky, right? Because they've purchased

00:10:59.720 London drugs. And when they report all of that financial information, they're not separating

00:11:05.680 the London drugstore component from the Sobeys grocery store. So we don't know

00:11:12.240 the the difference between say a bundle of carrots and a bottle of facial cream so

00:11:17.320 that's what makes their numbers a little tougher to to to really get a good grip on whereas a lot

00:11:25.020 of the other you know the grocery stores are reporting just just the actual grocery the

00:11:31.620 aisles kind of things not um the pharmaceutical side of things right okay no that makes a lot of

00:11:37.500 sense. I guess just to put this and perhaps a little bit of a hopeful end on this discussion

00:11:42.940 here. I mean, Canadians are having to make decisions when they go to the store and if they

00:11:47.520 can't afford products, they're having to work around that. Is there a fix or a band-aid that

00:11:53.120 governments could apply here? Or is this really, in your view as a researcher, a ride it out

00:11:58.840 situation? Maybe the one area that the government needs to, I think, would be a timely reassessment

00:12:06.260 is whether there's value in having supply management

00:12:08.980 in our food system in 2022.

00:12:12.540 Supply management was put in the dairy poultry industry

00:12:15.340 in the 1970s when markets and the size of farms

00:12:18.560 were vastly different than they are today.

00:12:21.420 I'm not saying we should or we shouldn't get rid of it,

00:12:24.180 but I think it's a perfect time to do a reassessment

00:12:27.820 of the need and the benefit to consumers

00:12:30.700 of supply management, particularly in the dairy sector.

00:12:34.700 I am completely 100% on board with you, and I am completely 100% sure I'm going to get the angry onslaught of emails from dairy farmers every time I or a guest make that point.

00:12:44.380 But I think you're very much correct, and I think obviously, you know, if we were to see that happen, I'd want to make sure they were compensated for it.

00:12:51.040 But, you know, Canadian consumers can benefit from the choice and the competition there.

00:12:55.640 So I think you're right to raise that as far as what we could be doing here.

00:12:59.940 Professor Stuart Smythe from the University of Saskatchewan.

00:13:02.960 And thank you so much, Professor, for your insights.

00:13:04.960 It's good to talk to you.

00:13:06.440 My pleasure, Andrew.

00:13:07.280 You have a great afternoon.

00:13:08.600 All right.

00:13:08.940 Thanks very much.

00:13:10.140 And look, let me just say here that I think it's important to get the numbers.

00:13:13.680 It's important to get the context.

00:13:14.940 What's bothered me is how people were raising alarm bells about this for months before politicians

00:13:23.560 were even acknowledging it.

00:13:24.820 To his credit, when I sat down in the federal election campaign of 2021, so this was a year

00:13:32.620 actually yeah it was a little over a year ago and it was with Pierre Polyev who was at the time just

00:13:37.700 the conservative candidate for Carleton and we were sitting down and I remember it was like a 40

00:13:42.600 it was like actually it was like 57 degree it was like just a really really hot day

00:13:46.340 and we were sitting on a at a park picnic table outside doing the interview and he was talking

00:13:53.160 about inflation and this was when Justin Trudeau was sort of like rolling his eyes being like oh

00:13:58.040 I don't think about monetary policy that's not my job and and you know Canadians were saying wow

00:14:02.600 I think it should be your job as the prime minister of Canada when my family is struggling

00:14:07.440 to buy groceries. And now you're looking at $16,000 a year. Just let that sink in. $16,000

00:14:17.220 a year for a family of four to have groceries. That is money that has to come from somewhere.

00:14:24.840 You take a family where perhaps only one of the parents is working, and that is a pretty

00:14:31.180 significant chunk of what they need to bring in. A $1,000 increase. So that is $1,000 more

00:14:38.540 than existed last year that has to be spent without necessarily coming in. If someone makes

00:14:44.020 $50,000 a year, that is almost one week's salary. It's actually more than one week's salary. They

00:14:49.960 make $50,000 a year. So these are not numbers that exist just on a balance sheet without having very

00:14:57.120 real world consequences for people. And I appreciate what Professor Smythe was saying,

00:15:01.500 that we're talking about a number of different inputs here. We're talking about, yes, the war

00:15:06.120 in Ukraine. We're talking about, yes, the labor shortage. The carbon tax also plays a role. Supply

00:15:11.000 management plays a role. General cost of living tends to be filtered down and people are forced

00:15:17.000 to deal with it at every stage in the process. So if your employer can't give you a raise because

00:15:23.820 of the cost of living issues and then your cost of living is going up that money has to come from

00:15:28.380 somewhere and even when the economy has been doing better you get reports that come out periodically

00:15:33.900 on how close people are to not being able to make their monthly expenditures and sometimes the

00:15:39.980 line is that well people are within 200 of having to go into debt just to keep the lights on just

00:15:45.740 to pay for groceries and housing and their rent or mortgage so you take that that was two years

00:15:51.420 ago that it was 200 a month on average was what people made that's 2400 a year so almost half of

00:15:57.820 that buffer has been eaten up by inflation on one particular expenditure alone and that is groceries

00:16:05.660 you throw gas in the mix and it is almost entirely gone this doesn't happen without there being

00:16:12.940 serious consequences and i'm not going to look at trudeau and say trudeau has caused inflation

00:16:18.400 I will certainly look at him and say he has contributed to it and his policies have contributed

00:16:23.100 to it. And he has had the opportunity to offer even a nominal reprieve and has not done it.

00:16:29.080 And I think this is important because when the government talks about the carbon tax,

00:16:32.640 they say, oh yeah, it's just, you know, it's just a couple hundred bucks a year and we're,

00:16:35.420 we're giving it back to some people. And, you know, when the price of your grocery bill is

00:16:41.340 going up $1,000 in a year, a $200 carbon tax payment is actually quite significant.

00:16:47.300 That is one fifth of what you're getting hosed for by increased grocery costs.

00:16:52.180 One fifth doesn't cover it all.

00:16:54.220 But at the end of the day, would you rather have that $200 in your pocket or would you

00:16:57.720 rather Justin Trudeau have it to give it to someone to retrofit their Prius with a bit

00:17:02.260 of tofu or whatever?

00:17:03.400 I don't understand how the green retrofits work, but you know what I mean. 0.98

00:17:07.520 And that's the whole point is that government has inserted itself in the middle of this

00:17:11.300 as a supposed solution, but is only adding to the problem.

00:17:17.300 And I want to play a clip for you here of this being brought up in the course of the House of Commons.

00:17:23.420 And, you know, interestingly enough, Garnet Jenis, who is a Conservative MP we've had on the show, decided that poetry was the answer to this.

00:17:31.480 Take a look.

00:17:32.720 It was the night before Christmas and no one could afford a house.

00:17:36.680 Some people were blaming a fellow named Klaus.

00:17:39.440 The Prime Minister said he would have people's backs, but it turned out his real plan was to triple the tax.

00:17:45.420 The holidays are here.

00:17:46.500 There's a gift-shopping tradition, but things are more expensive, thanks to the costly coalition.

00:17:52.020 So instead, just rest, stay home, take a nap, try to forget about the Arrive Can app.

00:17:57.040 If you hear the sound of a reindeer's hoof, then it's Santa, not Stephen, up on the roof.

00:18:03.060 Santa reaches down inside of his sack.

00:18:05.560 He knows what the people want is to have their freedoms back.

00:18:08.500 But if you hear the sound of a convoy truck, then the message for Liberals is, end the mandates.

00:18:13.720 Jesus was born with the hope to save every sinner, even the ones who attend the press gallery dinner.

00:18:19.720 At Christmas, we celebrate the joy that we find and proclaim peace and love to all people kind.

00:18:25.720 This might not be as good as Cousner's last riff, I just hope it won't get me shot by Giorno Dale Smith.

00:18:31.720 To us, the night before Christmas, inflation is the worst.

00:18:34.720 The Conservatives have a leader who will put the people first.

00:18:38.720 you know i think his meter was a little off i i think you know he could have done a little bit

00:18:49.180 better on the pacing i think some of the rhymes were good i'm gonna give i'm gonna give garnet

00:18:53.880 an 8 out of 10 for that poem i i think i think 8 out of 10 some christmas generosity i'll say

00:18:59.860 seven and a half but you know we like to round up on the andrew lawton show so i'll give garnet

00:19:04.780 an 8 out of 10 on that and if he wants to like drop a beat next time he's on the show we'll give

00:19:09.080 him some backing there uh you know i was actually hoping phil lawrence behind him was going to do up

00:19:13.520 and start doing the go-go dancing behind him get leanne rude and marilyn gladu to do it do the can

00:19:18.500 can have a whole little music party there he covered a lot he covered the convoy he covered

00:19:22.680 inflation he covered the world economic forum and in the end canadians are still forced to deal with

00:19:29.200 the government that is not taking this nearly as seriously as it could and nearly as seriously as

00:19:34.800 it should. And perhaps it's because the government is so focused on trying to do things that have

00:19:40.660 nothing to do with any public policy outcome that is at all relevant to Canadians, such as going

00:19:46.180 after law-abiding firearms owners. Yeah, this has been a fascinating turn of events. We spoke

00:19:52.840 a couple of weeks ago on the show with Rod Giltaka about the Liberals' efforts to pivot

00:19:58.700 their firearms ban to a ban on virtually every semi-automatic rifle out there, including some

00:20:04.940 non-semi-automatics, including even .22 caliber bullets, which again, they're still real bullets

00:20:10.420 and they could do some damage, but they're like the tiny, tiny bullets that are used for shooting

00:20:15.420 tin cans. And the government now seems to be admitting, at least to some extent, that they've

00:20:22.400 stepped in it. So what happened was the firearms community really just ratcheted up its opposition

00:20:29.440 to this and said, when you say that you're just going after the so-called killing machines and

00:20:33.760 not the hunters, how do you justify these bona fide hunting firearms being on the banned list?

00:20:40.220 And of course, the gun community talks about this. I talk about it. The straw that broke the camel's

00:20:45.520 back, was a guy that I had never heard of talking about it. His name is Casey Prost. Now, sorry,

00:20:54.480 what's that? Carey Price. Carey Price. Okay. Now, Carey Price, is that a woman, man? No, 0.51

00:21:03.440 man. Okay. So apparently he is a goaltender for the Montreal Maple Leafs. And no, what? Sorry.

00:21:10.400 Montreal Canadiens okay the I didn't know there were any patriotic Canadians in Quebec so the

00:21:18.260 Montreal Canadiens and I'm teasing I know very little about sports but I do know that the

00:21:23.080 Montreal Canadiens are one of the original six hockey teams so I don't want you to take me too

00:21:27.160 too seriously on this but that is like the extent of my knowledge of sports and whenever I try to

00:21:32.200 do a sports segment I have no idea what I'm talking about but supposedly Carey Price is a

00:21:37.580 relevant figure in the world of hockey i don't believe that the montreal canadians have done all

00:21:44.480 that much in terms of winning stanley cups i'm told uh so i don't know if he's good or not i

00:21:49.520 don't know if they're good or not i just i'm i don't even have a team and people are going to

00:21:53.640 hate me for this so uh let me just okay what were we talking about we were talking about guns let

00:21:58.920 me get back to that so carrie price the uh supposed um defensive tackle for the montreal

00:22:04.500 Canadians, comes out and says he's a law-abiding gun owner and takes aim at Justin Trudeau for

00:22:12.480 going after people like him. And this was, I'd say, actually very relevant because he permeates

00:22:20.700 beyond just the world of standard gun owners, sport shooters, hunters. He has an audience that

00:22:28.600 is broader than that. And I think he put a human face on firearms ownership, which doesn't really

00:22:33.180 exist a lot of the time in the debate and it was fascinating and you fast forward to yesterday

00:22:40.380 and Justin Trudeau says no no no we're going to actually take a look at this and consult on this

00:22:46.720 take a look at the clip we made a commitment to continue to move forward with strong smart gun

00:22:53.780 control in this country to keep communities safe to keep Canadians safe and we're going to continue

00:22:59.660 to do that we move forward with a national freeze on handguns and a few years ago we banned military

00:23:07.900 style assault weapons uh sorry banned uh assault style weapons we're going to continue to do that

00:23:17.500 now we've just put forward uh a list and we're consulting with canadians on that we're hearing

00:23:22.620 a lot of feedback around concerns that uh hunters are saying about guns that they use more for

00:23:29.100 hunting or hunting rifles or shotguns and that's what we're listening to feedback on now to make

00:23:35.740 sure that we're not capturing weapons that are primarily hunting weapons but we all know that

00:23:43.580 we need to make sure that guns that are designed to kill the largest number of people as quickly

00:23:48.940 as possible have no place in canada and we're going to continue to move forward with that

00:23:54.540 in a strong and smart way we'll continue to listen to canadians we're not going after

00:23:59.100 We are targeting the most dangerous weapons, the weapons that were used in places like Ecole Polytechnique or recently in South Simcoe or in Portapic that have caused far too much tragedy over the past many, many years.

00:24:17.460 So we're moving forward in a responsive way.

00:24:20.800 Some conservative politicians at the federal level want to restore military-style assault weapons.

00:24:29.320 We're not going to let them do that.

00:24:30.840 We're going to continue to keep communities safe in a smart way that respects law-abiding gun owners.

00:24:36.280 i'm told that my plan to start the true north sports hour is not a plan that has been approved

00:24:45.820 by true north management so i believe it was all set to happen and then you come out and make one

00:24:51.540 crack about the montreal canadians and it all goes to hell in a hand basket but justin trudeau's

00:24:57.480 clip there was a fascinating one because he says oh no no we're just consulting we put out this

00:25:03.540 list just so we could consult and hear from people no you put out the list because you wanted to ban

00:25:08.920 them you wanted to ban bolt action hunting rifles now if you don't know anything about guns that's

00:25:14.520 fine a bolt action rifle is a rifle that you need to manually reload by pulling back the bolt the

00:25:22.040 action every single shot on it is not a mass killing machine it could kill if in the wrong

00:25:29.060 hands like any firearm could kill if in the wrong hands and in the right hands could save a life or

00:25:34.380 at the very least cause no risk to public safety whatsoever so there were guns that were undeniably

00:25:41.880 hunting guns on that list this was not a consultation this was not the liberals saying

00:25:47.380 we'd like to hear your feedback this was the liberals thinking they could sneak in yet another

00:25:52.720 ban that does nothing to stop gun crime when was the last time there was a i should have pulled it

00:25:58.480 for the show there was a picture that the toronto police posted of a mass seizure of illegal handguns

00:26:04.340 and when you look through you can actually scan them there are a few dozen guns in the picture

00:26:07.880 and not a single one of them is a bolt-action hunting rifle there's no 22 caliber a rifle on

00:26:14.320 there there's no weatherby mark 5 there's nothing in there that it all resembles the firearms that

00:26:20.140 the federal government is trying to ban now because they're already illegal and even if the guns

00:26:25.760 themselves were not prohibited the application of them people buying them illegally carrying them

00:26:31.420 illegally and doing so under the purposes of organized crime is already captured by the law

00:26:38.300 it's already captured by the law i believe we actually have that picture now can we throw that

00:26:43.340 up so that's that's the photo and you can look through that list every single one of those

00:26:50.400 firearms illegally owned not a single one is bolt action not a single one is a shotgun not a single

00:26:57.360 one of those guns was taken off the streets by canada's gun laws now i say absolutely throw the

00:27:04.560 book at the people that sold those guns trafficked them the people that use them throw the book at

00:27:10.000 them and every law-abiding gun owner in this country would stand behind me when i say that

00:27:15.680 because gun owners are the safest demographic group in this country if they are law-abiding

00:27:22.560 licensed gun owners we are background checked we are screened we take safety very seriously because

00:27:29.920 we know that you are more likely to hurt yourself if you mess around with firearms than you are to

00:27:36.240 hurt someone else so that's why gun owners take this stuff so seriously gun owners are the most

00:27:43.680 tough on firearms crime people you will find, except they're actually interested in real

00:27:50.480 firearms crime, not these paper crimes that exist because the government one day says, 0.95

00:27:56.120 we don't like those dirty, stinking conservative gun owners. We want to make them overnight 0.96

00:28:01.100 criminals. We want to ban their property. We want to make it illegal for them to go to the range.

00:28:06.800 We want to make it illegal for them to pass down family heirlooms. We want to make it illegal for

00:28:11.120 them to do something that brings them joy or in the case of hunters and ranchers that does something

00:28:15.920 that is central to their lives and this liberal government doesn't get to hide behind oh we're

00:28:22.760 just consulting with you no you are trying to once again criminalize a segment of the population

00:28:29.300 because you know that group is not going to vote for you anyway we got to end things there my thanks

00:28:35.340 to all of you for tuning in and my sincere condolences to sports fans that had to listen

00:28:40.020 through my interpretation of the sports angle to what I think is a politics story through and

00:28:45.080 through. That's why we did it here. But I thank all of you for tuning in. We'll talk to you tomorrow

00:28:49.240 with more of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show. Thank you, God bless, and good day to you all.

00:28:55.320 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:28:57.360 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

Juno News - December 06, 2022

Grocery prices are out of control

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