Juno News - Is Mark Carney already being lobbied by Brookfield？

00:00:00.000 Soon after the liberal election victory entities associated with Prime Minister Mark Carney's

00:00:10.780 previous company, Brookfield Asset Management sought his help.

00:00:15.060 Initial skepticism towards proportional tariffs by business leaders like Shopify's Toby Lutke

00:00:20.980 and Rumble's Chris Pawlowski has proven correct now that the Carney government has

00:00:27.080 exempted most U.S. goods from its levies.

00:00:30.760 In an initiative aimed at, quote, confronting anti-Black racism, the City of Toronto is establishing

00:00:37.480 a separate homeless shelter exclusively for Black Canadians.

00:00:41.980 Hello Canada, it's Friday, May 30th, and this is the True North Daily Brief.

00:00:46.640 I'm Cosmin Georgia.

00:00:47.980 And I'm Clayton DeMaine.

00:00:49.120 We've got you covered with all the news you need to know.

00:00:51.740 Let's discuss the top stories of the day and the True North exclusives you won't hear

00:00:56.420 anywhere else.

00:01:01.160 Within days of the liberals' election win, companies linked to Brookfield Asset Management,

00:01:06.900 the former employer of Prime Minister Mark Carney started requesting his assistance.

00:01:12.240 Two Brookfield-owned oil and gas firms were among 38 signatories of an open letter to Mark

00:01:17.360 Carney on April 30th, requesting accelerated resource development through eased regulations

00:01:23.080 and faster approvals.

00:01:24.580 According to the Investigative Journalism Foundation, federal records show that Brandon

00:01:28.980 Anderson, CEO of Brookfield-owned North River Midstream Incorporated, contacted the Prime

00:01:35.320 Minister for the first time in his lobbying career.

00:01:38.080 North River later reported that its outreach was aimed at, quote, asking the government to

00:01:42.960 consider North River in their investment decisions.

00:01:45.540 The company told reporters that the open letter was its only communication with Carney.

00:01:50.340 Before the election, Anderson's appeal likely wouldn't have reached Carney through Brookfield

00:01:55.040 networks.

00:01:55.900 But as Prime Minister, Carney's past connections with Brookfield and its subsidiaries raised

00:02:00.800 questions.

00:02:01.660 Until January, Carney chaired Brookfield, which manages more than $1 trillion in assets, including

00:02:07.560 ownership of North River through Brookfield Infrastructure Partners.

00:02:11.340 Clayton, obviously Carney's ties to Brookfield were a huge issue during the election campaign.

00:02:18.260 That seems to have died down a little bit.

00:02:21.340 But here he is as Prime Minister.

00:02:23.940 Has Carney disclosed his financial assets yet, including investments he has with Brookfield?

00:02:30.440 And when will Canadians get a full picture of his invested interests now that he's leading

00:02:35.860 the country?

00:02:36.420 In a way, yes, Carney disclosed his financial assets to the Conflict of Interest and Ethics

00:02:42.200 Commissioner during the election campaign.

00:02:44.740 And according to Canada's Conflict of Interest Act, public office holders are required to submit

00:02:50.400 their confidential report with their assets, liabilities and income within 60 days of assuming

00:02:56.300 office.

00:02:57.020 You won't find an exact dollar figure when those records are released to the public.

00:03:01.800 But if there are any public holdings, they will be in the report.

00:03:05.660 After that, the ethics commissioner sends back a summary of his disclosure and Carney,

00:03:09.860 along with every other elected official, must sign the summary.

00:03:13.420 After that, the ethics commissioner sends back a summary of his disclosure and Carney must

00:03:19.020 sign the summary, which is then released to the public.

00:03:22.700 The problem is that his publicly traded assets went into a blind trust.

00:03:28.120 So when the public does see his Conflict of Interest summary, they won't even see what

00:03:32.540 assets he's invested in.

00:03:34.380 If the commissioner finds something that he thinks Carney needs to divest from or sell due

00:03:39.280 to a conflict of interest, the commissioner may ask Carney to do so.

00:03:44.560 The ethics commissioner can also inform Carney that he needs to recuse himself on certain

00:03:49.380 files, which would mean the prime minister would have to leave the room any time certain

00:03:53.500 topics were discussed by his government.

00:03:55.460 If you recall, during the campaign while in the UK, Carney snapped at reporters flippantly

00:04:01.720 saying what possible conflicts of interest could there be.

00:04:05.780 The next day, and none of it, Carney admitted that there would probably be some topic the

00:04:11.300 commissioner tells him he'll have to recuse himself from.

00:04:14.360 What began as a bold show of economic nationalism in the form of tit-for-tat retaliatory tariffs

00:04:25.340 against the US has ended in a quiet retreat for Prime Minister Mark Carney and his government.

00:04:30.800 Today, voices initially critical of dollar-for-dollar retaliation, like Shopify's CEO Toby Lutke and

00:04:37.640 Rumble CEO Chris Pawlowski are vindicated.

00:04:40.900 Retaliatory tariffs were a harebrained idea from the start.

00:04:44.900 When Carney stood at a podium in February 2025 and declared that Canada would hit back dollar-for-dollar

00:04:51.860 against US tariffs, many Canadians applauded.

00:04:54.620 Just a few months later, the smoke has cleared and political posturing has given way to economic reality.

00:05:01.280 During his inaugural question period yesterday as Prime Minister, Carney faced sharp criticism

00:05:06.940 from Interim Conservative Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer.

00:05:11.040 Scheer accused Carney of misleading Canadians by lifting most retaliatory tariffs during the April election

00:05:17.080 without public disclosure until May.

00:05:19.540 Carney's response, that remaining tariffs had, quote,

00:05:22.320 maximum impact on the US while sparing Canadians, rang hollow when Oxford Economics revealed

00:05:29.120 on May 15th that exemptions had nullified nearly all levies and the Canadian economy was still headed for recession.

00:05:36.360 Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne scrambled to defend the policy on May 17th,

00:05:42.440 insisting on X that 70% of the $60 billion in tariffs imposed in March remained active.

00:05:49.760 Yet Oxford's report contradicted this, showing exemptions for manufacturing, health, and safety goods

00:05:56.840 had gutted the tariffs' impact.

00:05:58.640 These developments didn't come out of nowhere.

00:06:01.000 Many warned against this course of action from the beginning, not from a position of weakness,

00:06:05.800 but out of economic realism that was obvious to all except those hoping to score political goals.

00:06:11.940 Shopify CEO Toby Lutke, as early as February 1st, blasted the initial counter-tariff plans, saying,

00:06:19.940 leadership is about doing what's right, not what is popular, and hitting back will not lead to anything good.

00:06:26.760 America will shrug it off. Canada will decline.

00:06:29.760 Chris Pawlowski, CEO of Rumble, offered a similarly blunt assessment, writing, quote,

00:06:36.580 Canada has leaders that want to pretend to be tough. Trump will outplay all of them and already has.

00:06:43.640 So what changed for Ottawa?

00:06:46.000 Carney met with Trump on May 6th at the White House, soon after the order to nullify tariffs went public, Lutke wrote.

00:06:54.300 So, Cosman, you wrote this analysis piece.

00:06:56.920 As the election period elbows up nationalism, fizzles away with Carney's approach and policies,

00:07:03.300 looking back, were there other voices warning that retaliatory tariffs were not the right way forward for Canada?

00:07:10.500 Yeah, in the political field, I would say without a doubt that Alberta Premier Danielle Smith

00:07:15.160 was the most clear-headed about this from the start.

00:07:19.900 As early as January, she was advocating for diplomacy over retaliation.

00:07:25.480 She recognized that the American economy was way larger than that of Canada's,

00:07:32.640 and it would cause irreparable damage to Canada's economy to go towards dollar-for-dollar tariffs,

00:07:41.600 retaliatory tariffs against U.S. President Donald Trump's measures.

00:07:46.740 And if we recall back, she was actually facing enemies on both sides of the spectrum

00:07:54.080 because on the one hand, Donald Trump put a tariff, it was a lower tariff than the other tariffs,

00:08:01.880 it was a 10% tariffs on Alberta's oil industry.

00:08:06.020 And on the other hand, you had people in Ottawa, you had Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the time,

00:08:11.720 as well as Ontario Premier Doug Ford, suggesting to use Alberta's energy industry as a bargaining chip

00:08:19.960 to pressure the U.S. to walk back on some of its tariffs.

00:08:24.300 So instead, Danielle Smith stood firm, and she opposed any use of Alberta's oil and gas industry

00:08:32.100 to counter U.S. tariffs.

00:08:34.420 But she also engaged directly with U.S. officials.

00:08:38.360 She was one of the first people to go out there, first political Canadian leaders to go out there

00:08:43.700 and meet with the U.S. administration and try to negotiate better terms

00:08:49.160 and to ease the trade pressures that were going on.

00:08:54.140 Additionally, she promoted a positive vision for Alberta, Canada as well,

00:08:59.520 and promoted economic cooperation with the United States instead of retaliation and the trade war.

00:09:06.120 And in many ways, she too has been vindicated because a lot of the things she stood for

00:09:11.940 are clearly turning out to be true when it comes to the situation we're in right now.

00:09:17.660 And Carney's tacit admission that the tariffs didn't work,

00:09:23.060 and they really do just seem like a political ploy for popularity.

00:09:27.780 And as I mentioned in the article, it wasn't only Carney who was endorsing dollar-for-dollar tariffs.

00:09:33.360 It was Pierre Polyev as well during the campaign.

00:09:36.480 He put out a statement calling for dollar-for-dollar tariffs.

00:09:40.020 This was a slogan that was really, you know, a few weeks into that campaign,

00:09:44.820 everybody was talking about dollar-for-dollar tariffs.

00:09:47.420 But what good have they done for Canada?

00:09:50.360 Not very much.

00:09:54.420 The City of Toronto is in the process of establishing a segregated homeless shelter

00:09:59.640 only for black Canadians in an effort to, quote,

00:10:03.160 confront anti-black racism.

00:10:05.000 City staff are given, quote, black-mandated non-profit organizations until May 30th

00:10:11.100 to apply to operate a homeless shelter for black Torontonians.

00:10:15.380 These, quote, black-mandated or B3 organizations are defined as having a majority of paid staff

00:10:21.540 and board members who identify as black,

00:10:23.960 an organization whose mandate explicitly seeks to serve black communities

00:10:28.200 and whose organization primarily services black people.

00:10:31.760 Non-profits with no experience running a homeless shelter are welcome to apply,

00:10:36.180 merely having to demonstrate to the City that the organization has experience serving homeless black people.

00:10:41.680 However, applicant organizations are evaluated based on their capacity

00:10:46.140 to operate a homeless shelter for black people,

00:10:49.160 including possible past experiences operating a shelter.

00:10:53.020 The City requires the successful applicant to provide a number of, quote,

00:10:56.900 culturally appropriate services to shelter clients.

00:10:59.860 These supports include culturally appropriate hygiene products,

00:11:03.900 culturally appropriate food and nutrition,

00:11:06.560 culturally safe spaces,

00:11:08.660 and culturally appropriate health care.

00:11:11.200 The successful applicant is also required to work from, quote,

00:11:14.500 trauma-informed and equity-focused lenses in providing services to clients.

00:11:19.280 The City will hold the shelter's operators to certain quality standards,

00:11:23.020 requiring the facility to operate 24 hours a day,

00:11:26.460 365 days a year,

00:11:28.180 maintain a 1-to-20 staff-to-client ratio,

00:11:32.480 provide free Wi-Fi access for staff and clients,

00:11:35.180 and include an outdoor space for pets and service animals.

00:11:38.640 While the shelter is slated to serve those who self-identify as black,

00:11:42.320 referring to black Canadians,

00:11:44.280 African Canadians,

00:11:45.360 and people of African descent,

00:11:47.020 it is unclear whether the shelter would be willing to accept homeless people

00:11:51.100 who are not black or cast them aside instead.

00:11:54.580 Once a location for the shelter is secured,

00:11:57.740 the facility will be scheduled to open within three to five years

00:12:01.680 and accommodate between 70 to 100 homeless clients.

00:12:05.740 True North reached out to the City of Toronto for comment,

00:12:08.680 though no response was given.

00:12:10.640 Clayton, I would say it's not unusual for Toronto to have services for, quote,

00:12:16.140 black identifying people, these exclusive services.

00:12:19.340 I recall there was even theater performances that were in the news that mandated

00:12:24.040 black identifying only audiences.

00:12:27.660 Now, how legal is this?

00:12:30.860 Because you would think that this violates human rights laws in Canada at large,

00:12:37.300 but also perhaps Ontario.

00:12:39.660 What's the legality of specifying specific spaces like this on exclusionary grounds,

00:12:48.280 preventing people who are of other races or don't identify as black from accessing?

00:12:54.040 Well, Cosman, you're right to bring up the Human Rights Code 0.68

00:12:57.240 in both the National and the Ontario Human Rights Code.

00:13:01.220 Discrimination based on race and skin color is, of course, not allowed,

00:13:05.820 not acceptable in Canada.

00:13:07.660 And there might be a case to be made if any civil liberties groups

00:13:11.400 were keen on taking the City of Toronto to court based on this,

00:13:14.960 but it would likely have to be challenged to the courts

00:13:17.160 in order to prevent it from happening.

00:13:19.200 The reality is racial discrimination

00:13:21.280 in the pursuit of social justice has become normalized in Canada.

00:13:25.760 Just last year in Toronto, the Toronto Metropolitan University

00:13:28.900 set out quotas vowing to accept 75% of its new medical students

00:13:34.740 from what it called equity-deserving groups.

00:13:37.440 People from these groups, including black, indigenous, people of color, LGBT,

00:13:42.160 identifying people, and people from impoverished backgrounds

00:13:45.280 weren't required to achieve the same 3.3 grade point average

00:13:50.460 that people from the general stream of applicants had to.

00:13:53.880 All they would have to do is write an essay about how their particular background

00:13:57.840 disadvantaged them and led them to not being able to achieve

00:14:01.500 the same academic success as those non-equity-deserving people.

00:14:05.560 After lots of media attention and public discourse,

00:14:10.160 the premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, eventually criticized the school publicly,

00:14:14.420 and the school said they would no longer enforce the quotas,

00:14:17.820 though those segregated streams would remain available.

00:14:21.120 Before I started working at True North,

00:14:22.760 I was actually sent an email from a worker

00:14:25.360 at the City of Toronto in a homeless shelter.

00:14:28.360 He, of course, didn't want to be identified,

00:14:30.180 but it was an article that was being sent out to staffers

00:14:33.820 that said, decolonize the sidewalks,

00:14:36.600 and it advocated for pushing white people off of the sidewalk

00:14:39.600 if they didn't move out of a person of color's way. 1.00

00:14:43.540 But we've seen race-based tree planting programs in Ottawa

00:14:47.340 and higher price tickets for white people

00:14:50.240 at family-friendly dances in Montreal.

00:14:52.500 I suspect the City of Toronto would follow in the footsteps

00:14:55.880 of one librarian in British Columbia

00:14:58.200 who actually got an exemption to the Human Rights Code

00:15:01.300 so that she could hire only persons of color, 0.71

00:15:05.280 and she even bragged that she threw out 0.97

00:15:07.020 any resumes from white applicants.

00:15:09.280 So you'd think racial discrimination was banned in Canada,

00:15:12.460 but if public businesses can become exempt from human rights,

00:15:17.140 it's unclear what is actually permissible in Canada

00:15:20.420 in that regard anymore.

00:15:24.800 That's it for today, folks.

00:15:26.440 Thanks for tuning in.

00:15:27.400 You can stay on top of new episodes every weekday

00:15:30.440 by subscribing to The Daily Brief on iTunes and Spotify.

00:15:34.460 Also, while you're at it,

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Juno News - May 30, 2025

Is Mark Carney already being lobbied by Brookfield？

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