Juno News - July 23, 2024


Jagmeet Singh says Trudeau has ＂failed＂ – but won't do anything about it

Topics
grilling Justin Trudeau on the beach unemployment for temp residents
Mentioned
Grilling Justin Trudeau Jagmeet Singh Andrew Lawton Show Andrew Lawton Ken Paxton Darcy McGee Dexter Macken Christine Van Gein Siavash Shikarian Asher Honickman Justin Trudeau Pierre Poilievre Mark Miller Josh DeHaas Ivan Gino Canadiana Lululemon Sean Line
Biden's out; Trudeau's in Tofino Who is Canada’s new Chief of Defence Staff General Jennie Carignan？

Episode Stats


Length

43 minutes

Words per minute

172.54

Word count

7,520

Sentence count

272

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Toxicity

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

15

sentences flagged


Summary

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

On this episode of The Andrew Lawton Show, the Canadian Prime Minister is on a family vacation in Tofino, and the country is getting ready for the Olympic Opening Ceremonies. Plus, a look at Team USA s new uniforms, and a look back at the Canadian Olympic outfits.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00 Transcription by CastingWords
00:00:30 Thank you.
00:01:00 welcome to Canada's most irreverent talk show
00:01:15 this is the Andrew Lawton Show
00:01:18 brought to you by True North
00:01:20 hello and welcome to you all
00:01:26 Canada's most irreverent talk show
00:01:28 the andrew lawton show on true north great to have you tuned into the program on this tuesday july
00:01:35 23rd hope you're having a great week so far and i we the olympics are coming up now i will be
00:01:41 perfectly candid i do not care about the olympics from time to time i watch the opening ceremonies
00:01:47 but i say from time to time i'm now wondering if i did it like at all since 2012 which i believe
00:01:54 were the Olympics in London and I think I only watched because the Spice Girls were performing so
00:01:58 take from that that's the most embarrassing thing I've ever said on the show but anyway they did a
00:02:03 bang-up performance and the Olympics are coming up anyway on the 26th so you're going to get that
00:02:07 barrage of Canadiana from time to time now this year I did note that Hamas has said it's going
00:02:13 to be attacking the Olympics now I'm assuming this is just bluster but I trust the security
00:02:18 will be taken as seriously as it deserves and I hope the security at the Olympics is taken
00:02:23 more seriously than wardrobe is by the Canadian Olympic Committee. Now, I just want to give you
00:02:29 some contrast here. No, Sean was worried because he just told me he thought Hamas was going to have
00:02:36 an Olympic team. So it would be basically, I'm trying to think of a quick joke that's not
00:02:42 horrendously offensive. I don't have one. So no, no, Sean, there's no Hamas Olympic team this year. 1.00
00:02:47 But you know what? There is a team for the state of Israel and good for them for rising up above
00:02:53 what's happened to that country since October 7th. There was one year, I'm trying to remember when it
00:02:58 was, I saw the clip, because sometimes the sports stuff penetrates into my world. It was an
00:03:03 Olympic wrestling match, and I want to say it was Israel versus Iran, and the Iranian wrestler
00:03:11 wouldn't shake the Israeli wrestler's hand. And I imagine we're probably going to see more displays
00:03:16 like that from several athletes that get just their asses handed to them by Israelis and don't 0.98
00:03:22 want to be sportsman-like about it. But anyway, what I was going to say is that I hope that more 0.96
00:03:26 thought has been given to the security of the Olympics than the Canadian Olympic team wardrobe.
00:03:32 Now, I want to just give you a sense of contrast here. This is Team USA. So this is what the
00:03:37 American athletes are wearing. This is their official getup. I don't know if it's intentional, 0.61
00:03:42 but it looks very astronaut-like. It looks like they could be leading some mission to the moon,
00:03:48 some mission to outer space. Good on them. And then you look at the contrast. This is the
00:03:53 Lululemon-inspired Canadian Olympic outfits, which I'm confused. I mean, the dog looks all right,
00:04:02 because the dog just has the red handkerchief. Some of them look like blood splatters. I saw
00:04:06 someone on social media say they reminded him of something you'd see on the show, Dexter. Dexter
00:04:11 was the blood spatter analyst at whatever it was, Miami Metro Homicide. But then I just couldn't
00:04:18 help but see this familiar scene from cinema history yeah that's uh that's carrie who's
00:04:24 actually an olympic pole vaulter in paris 2024 for team canada so uh good on you carrie we look
00:04:30 forward to seeing you take home the gold there uh anyway all that notwithstanding i mentioned
00:04:35 yesterday justin trudeau was taking a beach holiday he was off to his favorite spot tofino
00:04:41 usually he goes there on the national day for truth and reconciliation this time he got a bit
00:04:46 of an early jump on it, having a little family vacay, which I do not begrudge him. I said
00:04:52 yesterday, and I've said in the past, if he were to spend all his time on vacation, Canada would
00:04:57 be in a better place. But he was not entirely away from the prying eyes of the media. Kian Bexty,
00:05:04 who is a fellow independent journalist in this country, Kian Bexty, I don't know if he was just
00:05:09 on vacation in Tofino, or if he hopped on a plane and went there knowing Trudeau would be there.
00:05:14 But Kian Bexty tracked Justin Trudeau down on a beach in Dofino.
00:05:19 Trudeau has had me arrested for the crime of attending a press conference.
00:05:23 Kian writes, his officers have pushed me into traffic and I've had to sue to gain access to election scrums.
00:05:28 This time he couldn't get away.
00:05:30 I mean, he could have run fast, but maybe Kian could run as fast. 1.00
00:05:33 For 10 minutes, I grilled him on the beach publishing tomorrow.
00:05:37 There's a beach barbecue for you.
00:05:38 Grilling Justin Trudeau on the beach.
00:05:40 So I haven't seen the interview yet.
00:05:42 I don't know.
00:05:42 I mean, it looks like he's actually responding.
00:05:44 It looks like Trudeau is not just giving him the cold shoulder.
00:05:47 That was, he's taken yesterday.
00:05:49 Now, all of the conspiracy theorists online, I find it hilarious because I've met Kian
00:05:53 a number of occasions and all the conspiracy theorists that think he's like some Trudeau
00:05:57 plant, some controlled opposition, people saying that basically Trudeau and Kian had
00:06:04 arranged this so it looks like Trudeau is facing scrutiny.
00:06:07 And I'm thinking like, is this really where collaboration has gotten now?
00:06:11 that Justin Trudeau and Kian Bextie are secret BFFs partying it up on Tofino saying,
00:06:17 I know what we can do to make people think we've really pulled the wool under their eyes. But
00:06:19 anyway, the thing that has come up here, which is interesting, is that all of the people online are
00:06:25 like, how do you get close to him? You would be astonished at how lax security is in Canada. Now,
00:06:31 I believe that is a feature and not a bug. I like that in Canada, political assassinations are not
00:06:36 the norm, that assaulting politicians is not the norm. It's happened. You know, Darcy McGee was
00:06:41 assassinated, but we're going way, way back now, you know, about 140 years, I think, for the
00:06:46 assassination of Darcy McGee. And, you know, Trudeau, despite the hatred and animosity directed
00:06:52 towards him, the worst he's ever endured was having some gravel thrown at him. Now, there was,
00:06:57 again, someone who tried to bring a truck and firearms to Rideau Cottage, but didn't get anywhere
00:07:01 near him thankfully so in canada the fact that you can just walk up to your prime minister
00:07:07 is a hallmark of a free and accountable country and it says something that justin trudeau lets
00:07:13 his guard down when he's on his beach vacations what's interesting to me is that trudeau will as
00:07:19 kian writes there ban all journalists he doesn't like from covering him he will have police remove
00:07:25 journalists he doesn't like but uh sometimes you can catch him off guard so i look forward to seeing
00:07:29 the interview i will be watching it when it comes out tomorrow i don't know if there are going to be
00:07:32 any good answers in it or not but good on kian for going there and doing that when no other
00:07:38 journalists were and you know you could talk about the ethics of harassing someone on vacation but i
00:07:43 don't view it as that when it's a public figure walking out on a public beach and i will also
00:07:48 point out how amusing it is that if you were to like tell me don't give me any information
00:07:54 oh apparently they had like a romantic moment on the beach you're saying sean
00:07:58 there was this beauty oh that's beautiful look at that nice silhouette there uh in the shadows i'm
00:08:03 assuming that was at the beginning of the entered uh the exchange not the end but you never know
00:08:08 anyway that's a nice that's a nice little memento kian should have that framed his one and probably
00:08:13 only interview with justin trudeau but uh anyway the thing i was gonna say there before sean told
00:08:19 me we had that photo well i forgot what where was i going with that i had something else i was gonna
00:08:23 say it would have been great it would have been the best thing i ever said and you'll never get
00:08:27 to hear it now. Thanks, Sean. Hope you're happy about that. Oh, arrested. No, no, it wasn't about
00:08:31 the arrest. Anyway, we'll move on. The one point I'll raise here is that Justin Trudeau is still
00:08:38 in government. He is there probably until the next election. It seems like this momentum from his
00:08:44 caucus that we had hoped would be there to have a leadership review to get rid of him hasn't been
00:08:49 there at all. It was one MP and the rest were just former cabinet ministers and such. But the NDP
00:08:55 remain the most underutilized political force right now. Jagmeet Singh, if he wanted,
00:09:02 could be the most powerful man in Canadian politics. That would require having a bit of a
00:09:07 spine. It would require having a bit of courage. These are not things he's been able to find.
00:09:12 The story I've told, I don't like reusing jokes, but everyone laughs at it. So I should reuse it
00:09:17 until people stop laughing. I saw Jagmeet Singh leaving Parliament Hill once riding his bike.
00:09:21 And my first thought was, I didn't know you could do that without a spine. So I was impressed
00:09:25 I was impressed that he could do that, that he could stand upright and wasn't just like flopping
00:09:29 along as he was going down Wellington Street. But Jagmeet Singh had some very harsh words for
00:09:35 Justin Trudeau's government at a press conference yesterday. When it comes to housing, the North has
00:09:41 always felt neglected, ignored, like it doesn't matter. And now we've got a housing crisis,
00:09:47 all that negligence means people are really feeling that. You can't find a place that's
00:09:52 affordable. If you've got a place, you live in constant fear. If you lose it, you'll have nowhere
00:09:56 to go. And we know that Justin Trudeau has been in power for nine years, has ignored the door,
00:10:00 hasn't solved these problems. And I want to be very clear. He has had the opportunity to take
00:10:05 on corporate greed with corporate grocery stores, failed to do so. He had the opportunity to build
00:10:09 homes that are affordable for people, failed to do so. He has failed. Oh, he has failed. He's had
00:10:17 the opportunity to build homes. He's failed the opportunity to take on corporate greed. He's
00:10:21 failed. He's failed. He's failed. He's failed. These aren't my words. This is Jagmeet Singh,
00:10:27 the leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada, talking about Justin Trudeau's record as prime
00:10:32 minister. Well, one of the journalists who was at this scrum asked what I would say is,
00:10:37 no offense to the journalist, the obvious question in light of such a profound declaration of failure.
00:10:43 a lot of talk has been talked about uh your opposition the the uh the governing party
00:10:51 sounds like we are close to an election so are you ready to i guess end your uh partnership with
00:10:59 the liberals and put the words to action at the polls well either way we're ready we're getting
00:11:05 close to an election election is scheduled for the the by-law election date is going to be in 2025
00:11:11 So either way, we're close to an election.
00:11:13 We want people to know the choice.
00:11:14 That choice is really important.
00:11:15 We'll be ready to find an election whenever that happens.
00:11:18 And we want people to know what their choices are.
00:11:20 You got a choice between an out-of-touch liberal government that has let you down and a Justin Trudeau who has failed you on taking on corporate grocery prices,
00:11:29 failed you on building homes that people can afford.
00:11:32 He has failed.
00:11:32 he reiterates the failure message but the question was hey will you pull your support from the
00:11:40 liberals and Jagmeet Singh's like well what support there's already an election coming up
00:11:45 what are you talking to me about it for yeah we've got an election next year who cares what's
00:11:49 your rush what's your hurry so when Jagmeet Singh says this what he's saying is that there isn't
00:11:54 actually a choice that the NDP and the liberals are indistinguishable because his record is Justin
00:11:59 Trudeau's record. Jagmeet Singh would love to tell you that he has a record that stands apart
00:12:05 from the Prime Minister's, that his party has a record and a history and an identity that is
00:12:09 separate from that of the Liberals and that of the Liberal government. It's just not true. Jagmeet
00:12:15 Singh has not achieved anything. His greatest accomplishment could be holding out, pulling out
00:12:22 his support and taking down the most unpopular government in my lifetime anyway, certainly the
00:12:27 most unpopular government of the last 20 years. And he could do this very easily. One vote in the
00:12:36 House of Commons and Canadians will effectively be going to the polls because Justin Trudeau
00:12:41 would have stopped having the confidence to govern. So unless you imagine some scenario in
00:12:51 which the Bloc Québécois flip or whatever it is, that's not going to happen. So Jagmeet Singh could
00:12:56 do it. He could do it and is choosing not to. He is choosing not to. And this is to me where we as
00:13:04 Canadians have to put a lot more scrutiny and skepticism towards Singh. Now look, Justin Trudeau
00:13:09 is the guy who's in power right now. He's the guy that has to ultimately bear responsibility
00:13:13 for what the government of Canada has done that has been so problematic and troubling.
00:13:18 That being said, Jagmeet Singh cannot pretend that he is not a part of this. He cannot pretend
00:13:23 that he is not a quintessential part of this government and the fact that he didn't even get
00:13:28 a cabinet post out of it is hilarious like this is literally a coalition government by another name
00:13:34 the supply and confidence agreement which means that he is supporting the government and getting
00:13:39 nothing for it oh oh yes but we got pharma care we got national pharma care no you didn't you got
00:13:44 some diabetes drugs covered and the liberals were already promising those but good for you little
00:13:48 buddy good for that good for you you played hardball and you got something they were offering
00:13:53 anyway congratulations my goodness uh it's a wonder like jagmeet singh should be the one on
00:13:58 the beach in tofino uh you know going down and finding trudeau and trying to take him to the
00:14:03 carpet but instead he is basically just another limb to the trudeau government right now and not
00:14:08 a particularly useful one i want to shift from the political side of things to the judicial side
00:14:15 although increasingly there is a bit of a blurred line between these two bodies there was a supreme
00:14:21 court decision that came down on friday which is on the surface something that people might be
00:14:28 supportive of it's the supreme court saying the federal government does not have absolute immunity
00:14:32 from liability when parliament enacts laws that are later later overturned as unconstitutional
00:14:39 if you are a legal scholar which i don't pretend to be you might find some issues in this and if
00:14:44 you look more closely at the implications of it there are some big big problems that come about
00:14:50 from this and i want to talk to our good friend christine van gein who is the litigation director
00:14:54 for the canadian constitution foundation knows the law far better than i and i would say far
00:14:59 better than most judges in canada too but uh that's another discussion christine good to have
00:15:03 you back thanks for coming on today thanks for having me on andrew so you know you could look
00:15:08 at this and not be familiar with the context and say oh wow yes you know the court saying that
00:15:13 the government can be found liable if there are unconstitutional laws that sounds great
00:15:18 uh you know we don't want the government to skirt from this but there's a bigger
00:15:21 problem in this and i was hoping you could just explain what that is
00:15:25 so i actually don't think that it's a problem i think that it's a good thing
00:15:29 we interview okay i'm interested in this because a lot of your colleagues are saying the opposite
00:15:34 not my colleagues but there is a group who who on you know in canada who wants sort of unfettered
00:15:41 parliamentary power. And I think that Canada's history has shown that Parliament enacts laws
00:15:49 that can be abusive, can be enacted in bad faith. And while I am generally a skeptic of judicial
00:15:56 power, I'm also a skeptic of parliamentary power. And I think that the case power that we're
00:16:02 discussing, RRV power, gets that balance right. So for your listeners, for the context,
00:16:09 The question in power involved a man who had been convicted of some indictable offenses.
00:16:17 He had sought a pardon, but then there was a law that prevented him from getting this
00:16:22 pardon.
00:16:23 And the result was that he lost his job.
00:16:25 And he wanted to sue the government because that law that prevented him from getting the
00:16:31 pardon ended up being found to be unconstitutional.
00:16:34 So he did suffer damages.
00:16:36 He lost income.
00:16:37 He lost his job.
00:16:38 and he wants to sue the government for damages for this. Now, I don't think that this particular
00:16:44 case is an especially compelling one, maybe. I don't know that I'm convinced that he is eligible
00:16:51 for damages in his set of circumstances. But what the government had argued, the federal government
00:16:59 had argued, was that they have absolute immunity for ever being sued for damages for an unconstitutional
00:17:07 law. And the sort of dispute here is about the difference between parliament passing an
00:17:14 unconstitutional law, the act of passing the law, versus the executive action of perhaps
00:17:21 enforcing the law or a government acting in a particular way. So I'll give you two examples
00:17:28 to try to explain this. We all know that if you are subject to police brutality, if a cop beats
00:17:36 you up for no reason at all, you're minding your own business, and suddenly a police officer
00:17:41 assaults you, you can sue the state for damages. But what if instead of, and that's considered
00:17:48 executive state authority, but what if instead of a police officer beating you up,
00:17:55 Justin Trudeau, Parliament, passed a law that said Andrew Lawton is a terrible man. No one
00:18:01 should ever give Andrew Lawton a job. Andrew Lawton's neighbors should stop speaking to him.
00:18:06 In fact, maybe Andrew Lawton should be executed. Now, that is a law called a bill of attainder. 0.58
00:18:16 And they used to pass these in England that led to the execution of quite famous people in England.
00:18:22 And the question is, even if, say, maybe you aren't executed, but you suffer all kinds of
00:18:27 other damages. Because of this law, people stop speaking to you, you lose your job, you become a
00:18:32 social pariah, all because of this bill that was passed, this legislation that was passed by
00:18:37 parliament. Should you be able to sue for that? That is what the power case was about. And we
00:18:42 think that when there are laws that are enacted in bad faith, that are an abuse of power or
00:18:48 clearly unconstitutional, and that there are damages that flow from that, we think you should,
00:18:54 in those very exceptional circumstances be allowed to sue. We tend to, in conversation,
00:19:00 view the government in a more encompassing sense than it actually is. There is a difference between
00:19:07 the government and parliament, between the legislature and the executive. And one of the
00:19:11 criticisms I've seen of this is that this effectively blurs those lines. This is all of a
00:19:16 sudden the executive, which is, again, despite how we tend to view it as Canadians, it is a different
00:19:21 organ from the legislature is now accountable for what parliament is doing. Yes. So the criticism
00:19:28 of the case is that parliament has absolute immunity, that parliamentary supremacy and
00:19:34 sovereignty allows parliament to enact bills, including bills that we know have caused great
00:19:41 harm. And Canada's history tells us we have bills like this. We've seen the internment of Japanese
00:19:47 Canadians, the sterilization, forced sterilization of Indigenous women in Canada. We know that 0.97
00:19:54 we have passed laws as a country that have hurt people. We think that there should be
00:20:00 damages that can flow from that, even if it's different from an executive act, like, for example,
00:20:06 a police officer assaulting a member of the public. We do think in those very, very high
00:20:12 and very exceptional circumstances, you know, by shielding the government of those most egregious
00:20:19 things, it would actually subvert the values and principles of government accountability. And
00:20:27 allowing people to sue for damages in those exceptional cases is a measure of accountability.
00:20:33 So let's talk about this dialogue, which I, you know, I'm getting triggered even thinking about
00:20:39 having studied this in school, this dialogue between courts and the legislature. It was one
00:20:43 of the theories advanced to kind of try to come up with an answer to this, which is supreme,
00:20:49 truly, the court or the legislature. And it was not the most convincing argument because at the
00:20:53 end of the day, someone has to have the last word here. And we can look at the flaws of judges in
00:20:59 the judiciary, and we can look at the flaws of politicians, but at least one is democratically
00:21:04 accountable. So why should, if we're giving one the final say, should it not be parliament?
00:21:10 Look, as I said, I'm also a skeptic of judicial power. I think judges get it wrong. Judges are
00:21:15 cloistered. Judges often don't understand real individuals' lives' experiences.
00:21:24 But on the other hand, as I said, I'm also a skeptic of government power, whether that's
00:21:29 legislative power or whether it's executive power. And as I said, we have a history of getting it
00:21:34 wrong as a, we have a history of parliament getting it wrong. That bill of attainder example
00:21:40 that I gave you, by the way, that, you know, I said that these were things that happened back
00:21:47 in England and in, you know, like the 1500s, I think 1542, there were a number of bills of
00:21:53 attainder passed in England, but we have a history of them in Canada too. Twice parliament has tried
00:21:59 to pass bills of attainder against specific individuals. Now, they were individuals that
00:22:05 I think we would all condemn. They were people who were notorious murderers. But still, we have
00:22:13 seen a willingness of parliament to go there. And I think that this is a limited check on the power
00:22:22 of parliament when they're doing something that's clearly wrong or abusive or in bad faith.
00:22:27 this is an appropriate and very limited check on that power. Look, Andrew, I'm a skeptic of all
00:22:35 power. I just do not want anyone telling me what to do, whether it's our legislature,
00:22:42 whether it's the executive, or whether it's the judiciary, and especially if it's the Senate.
00:22:47 Yeah. And to be fair, I mean, I would be inclined to side with, you know, if I have to pick judicial
00:22:53 supremacy or legislative supremacy, I would be inclined to say judicial supremacy if courts were
00:22:58 a lot more restrained in where they tend to go. And one of the challenges in Canada is that you
00:23:04 have a court that has historically liked to manufacture rights that do not exist and
00:23:09 manufacture interpretations of the constitution that there isn't really a basis for. And that's,
00:23:15 I guess, my concern that I have on this is that it is really the court, it seems like, expanding
00:23:19 its own view and or expanding its own mandate in judicial review so actually that's not what
00:23:26 the criticism is here of the power case i i'm very familiar with carrie son it was carrie son
00:23:32 made that point in the national post so i'm lifting his work in part i think that the main
00:23:36 criticism is actually more of a floodgates criticism than a criticism about um expanding
00:23:41 rights violations so typically we would have to no i was being in general about an issue i have
00:23:48 of course, but in this case, it's a valid point. Let me explain the criticism so I can address
00:23:53 it. I think that the main criticism of this decision is that it will open the floodgates
00:23:59 for litigants, class action lawyers to start suing the government for laws that they pass
00:24:07 that people don't like. And that is not what this case does. This case actually is an affirmation
00:24:13 of a pre-existing case that has already been in force for more than I think about 20 years. It's
00:24:20 a case called Mackin that set the threshold for when you can sue for an unconstitutional law
00:24:25 passed by parliament. And that case put that threshold high at clearly wrong,
00:24:31 clearly unconstitutional and abusive power and bad faith. And I mean, we have seen that precedent
00:24:38 enforced for 20 years. The floodgates did not open then. They have not been opened. This is
00:24:44 just an affirmation of the existing state of the law. The court talked about there is no need to
00:24:51 revisit Macken, that, you know, principles of negligence, for example, would not be enough
00:24:58 for you to be able to sue for damages for an unconstitutional law. So I think there's two
00:25:03 issues, one that you pointed to, you know, um, the judiciary taking an expansive view of rights
00:25:09 violations. Look, I share the concerns with, with that problem. Um, but it's a different issue from
00:25:15 what's it's what, what power is really about. Um, the issue in power was, I mean, it's, I think
00:25:23 your, your viewers might be more interested in, in the debate about whether that law that denied
00:25:29 power, his pardon should have been found unconstitutional or not. This was a person
00:25:35 who had been convicted of indictable offenses. Should he be eligible for a pardon? The issue
00:25:41 of the expansive court interpretation was whether that law was unconstitutional, not necessarily
00:25:47 the decision about whether or not he can sue for damages. I actually don't think under the
00:25:52 threshold in either Macken or this new case power that that threshold is actually met. I don't think
00:25:59 he'll be successful in his claim for damages. It's just that now he can pursue it. It's affirmed that
00:26:04 he can pursue it. What do you make of how close this was? Now, not that closeness necessarily
00:26:10 means anything more than who's on the bench at a particular time. I remember your right to tell
00:26:14 an offensive joke in Quebec was also a 5-4 decision, but 5-4, were you surprised by that?
00:26:20 uh based on watching the hearing no I think we saw where where Justice Rowe was going he was in
00:26:27 the dissent in this case I was not surprised that he was in the dissent um it looked like he was
00:26:32 going to dissent uh I I was not surprised we've seen this the court split uh a number of times
00:26:39 before this was a a split decision where there was a majority then a in part um dissent and then
00:26:45 there was a full dissent. So I encourage your viewers to read the online article. The online
00:26:54 publication, The Line, has run two competing op-eds, one by me and my colleague Josh DeHaz,
00:27:00 and another by lawyer Asher Honickman, where we kind of debate in public these kind of issues
00:27:06 that we're grappling with here today. But yeah, we intervened in this case, and the court sided
00:27:12 with our argument. So we're happy with that. I think that as a skeptic of state power, I come
00:27:18 down on the side of limiting state power. All right. Christine Van Gein, do read those pieces
00:27:23 in the line as well. Read everything in the line. They do some great stuff there. Christine from the
00:27:29 Canadian Constitution Foundation. Always good to talk to you. Thanks for coming on today.
00:27:32 Thanks for having me on. All right. Thank you. I wanted to turn from one issue to another that has
00:27:39 become quite significant in Canada in the last little while, and that has been the immigration
00:27:45 system in this country, which has been under strain. Now, I should just say a couple of
00:27:50 months back, maybe six, eight weeks ago or so, Justin Trudeau himself acknowledged
00:27:53 the immigration system has become more than the country can handle, the volume of people coming 1.00
00:28:00 in. We've had Mark Miller, the immigration minister, talk about this in a very similar
00:28:03 context with an influx in international students. And you have to look at Pierre Polyev, for example,
00:28:10 the Conservative leader has said in response that he wants to really go back to basics here and have
00:28:14 a number that is tied to workforce, the labor market, housing market, social services, so that
00:28:22 the number of people that you admit into the country every year is in some way tied to that.
00:28:27 I'd be remiss to not point out that there was a recent report showing that the unemployment rate
00:28:32 for temporary residents in Canada hit 11% in June. Now, unemployment for temporary residents,
00:28:39 this includes foreign workers, international students, asylum seekers, is double the national
00:28:45 average. Now, some of these people are educated, qualified, skilled people that can't find work
00:28:50 in this country. What do you do about that? I want to welcome to the program immigration lawyer.
00:28:56 Well, I should point out not just an immigration lawyer, but also the chair of the Business
00:29:00 Immigration Committee for the Canadian Immigration Lawyers Association, Siavash Shikarian. Siavash,
00:29:06 thanks for coming on today, good to speak to you. Hi Andrew, glad to be here. So let's just start
00:29:12 with that gap there. Why is that unemployment rate so different for the national standard that we see
00:29:19 and doubling that what we get for temporary residents in your view? Well it can have many
00:29:26 different different reasons but at the very least it's an indication that we're doing immigration
00:29:31 wrong like it's an it's an indication that our immigration system in general but in particular
00:29:37 immigration selection policy is broken and by broken i mean it's not working the way we want
00:29:42 it to work um and that discrepancy has a lot to say to that right um we if if we really want to
00:29:50 root cause this we have to go in deeper and look at the unemployment rate among high skill the job
00:29:57 vacancies low skill job vacancies but for the time being let's just stay general that's an indication
00:30:02 of a broken selection policy we do have a system i mean people often talk about the point system
00:30:10 we try to ensure that people who are coming to canada have you know a certain number of
00:30:14 aptitudes and capabilities education level skills we fill job vacancies specifically but you're
00:30:22 saying that that in and of itself is a flawed starting point on this of trying to fill individual
00:30:27 gaps in the labor market why yeah because okay so here's the thing we have this point system
00:30:34 which we wanted it to bring in the sharpest and the brightest and the best matches for what we have
00:30:40 on the ground and for our labor needs. I'm going to give you an example of how the system is flawed
00:30:47 in design. So we say we give candidates a score based on human capital factors. Age is there,
00:30:53 education is there, language proficiency is there. But let's take education, for example.
00:30:58 So we give points for education, but the system doesn't distinguish between a top school like
00:31:04 University of Waterloo, University of Toronto graduate, and a paper mill college. That's a 1.00
00:31:09 catastrophe because the employability of a top school graduate is radically different from the
00:31:15 employability of a paper mill college but nonetheless they get the same points same thing
00:31:19 happens with work experience we reward work experience but we thought we don't distinguish
00:31:24 where the work experience comes from right we don't even interview candidates anymore right
00:31:30 it's just a system nobody sees so we decide about the future of our country and the future of our
00:31:34 new immigrants just based on papers explain that i wasn't aware of that so work experience
00:31:41 is not distinguished based on what you've done can you just elaborate yeah work experience we
00:31:47 don't distinguish so if you're coming so if you work on this um highly highly sophisticated line
00:31:53 in nasa or google you get the same amount of points that if you really worked you know for
00:31:57 for your cousin's modest uh for your cousin's modest operation so the system doesn't really
00:32:02 distinguish the same thing that is happening in education right as i gave you an example regardless
00:32:06 of where you're educated from we just look at that degree but there's a lot more to say behind
00:32:11 the scenes that we don't look at so that's why you you you see other than this new report that says
00:32:16 okay we're looking at unemployment rate but a bigger catastrophe is the underutilization rate
00:32:23 right so you come to this country you say oh i'm a mechanical engineer at least on paper
00:32:27 right but i realized that you know the degree that i got is really not a good match for the
00:32:32 sophisticated market that we have in canada for high skill work therefore we see that the statistics
00:32:36 canada says that our stem um education that our stem graduates are 50 underutilized or in the
00:32:45 healthcare system too right 60 of them are underutilized so 60 of the people who have
00:32:50 health-related education are not working in that sector so we're doing something wrong yeah and
00:32:55 there are two issues i mean we've all seen the videos especially from the gta where some grocery
00:32:59 store will have a job fair and you've got you know a lineup for blocks and blocks and blocks
00:33:03 and blocks of people a lot of them immigrants new canadians temporary residents uh that are looking
00:33:08 for you know what's to be frank lower paid service uh service industry work but you're talking about
00:33:14 another aspect here which is people who are qualified educated you know people with engineering
00:33:19 degrees still can't find work themselves and and that to me is the ultimate in setting those people 1.00
00:33:24 up for failure if we as a country are admitting the guy with an engineering degree or the woman with 0.96
00:33:29 uh the medical degree or nursing degree and we can't find a job for them then what's the point
00:33:32 of it exactly there are two sides to this to this story right one side is you see queues
00:33:39 for low paid low skilled jobs you see a gig economy that is just you know booming and and
00:33:46 the on the other end of the spectrum you see qualified on paper under qualified in practice
00:33:52 crisis right so we're doing we're we're um i'm sad to say but we're doing we seem to be doing
00:33:58 everything wrong right because if you look at the low skilled one there's the that there's a
00:34:03 catastrophe there because if you look at the statistics right we say there's this there's
00:34:08 this topic okay what are we going to do about the the work the canadians are not willing to do right
00:34:13 now that that that's a that's a topic of interest when we get to these we're saying okay so for
00:34:18 those kind of work we have to bring in people who are willing to do the work but if you look at the
00:34:22 statistics we see that the temporary foreign worker program that we have at least based on
00:34:27 the most recent announcement that ircc had on curtailing the temporary residence we see that
00:34:32 only nine percent are coming from that program sixty percent are international students their
00:34:38 spouses and international students who are on pgwp so here in reality is what we're doing we're
00:34:46 promising prospective international students is like come to canada get top of the line education
00:34:52 find the best work possible they come here we exhaust them of their resources and i mean mental
00:34:58 and financial only for them to realize that the education that they got is is not going to get
00:35:05 them anywhere so they have to go to the economy to the gig economy or do a low skilled job so they
00:35:12 become depressed angry resentful and we hear stories that unfortunately we're sending coffins
00:35:19 back so we broke your dream we didn't give you what we promised you to do and end up process
00:35:25 we are also breaking on our our own system so the easy response to that and i don't want to
00:35:32 oversimplify just to look at it and say okay the number's too high lower the number problem solved
00:35:36 is it that simple of course not of course not we've been doing this all wrong i think from day
00:35:42 one, because we looked at it from a quantitative perspective, quantity is easy to understand,
00:35:49 right?
00:35:49 If I'm minister, I can say, oh, number, the more, the better.
00:35:52 So the higher the number, you know, I get to congratulate myself a lot and it's easy
00:35:56 to understand, but it's much, much more complicated than that.
00:35:59 Immigration is not a numbers game, right?
00:36:02 It's a very, very complicated issue that quantity, I think, is...
00:36:07 How is it not in a way, though?
00:36:09 because a lot of the economic problems you're describing can be quantified you have available
00:36:13 housing available jobs uh you know number of immigrants that that is a new i mean they're
00:36:18 humans but it is a numerical issue there is it not sure let's let's talk about it so you're saying if
00:36:24 if we were to say let's quantify immigration where does that number come from and let's agree 1.00
00:36:30 that for canada immigration is not a privilege right it's not saying oh this is an add-on that
00:36:35 we prefer to have it's our lifeline right 90 98 almost 100 of our population growth comes from
00:36:41 immigration so we have to do it so that's there and now that we have to do it how many is good 0.99
00:36:47 like who came up with one percent of the population where did that number come from are we compensating
00:36:52 for our birth deficit like i don't know we need to get 2.1 per mother with getting 1.3 or something
00:36:58 like that so there's a deficit there we are seeing people retiring in droves like 340 350 000 a year
00:37:06 so do we need to replace that so there's 350 000 there and if you start thinking about it from a
00:37:12 purely numerical way you see that oh we need a lot more people that we are currently bringing in but
00:37:18 it's not a numbers game because we are seeing the crisis right now does our can our healthcare
00:37:23 system handle the number we're bringing does our housing can handle the number that we're bringing
00:37:29 in so the the dilemma is we need them but do we want them and by wanting them i mean because we
00:37:38 want everybody to win you know we don't want bringing people here so they're sad they can't
00:37:42 find jobs they can get good health care they can find housing right well there's also a paradox
00:37:47 there and that you you have the government saying well we need immigrants to fill construction jobs
00:37:53 to build the houses that we need to house the immigrants and you're like well hang on 1.00
00:37:57 there's a circular logic you hear in that and you're right so so that's fair the numbers just
00:38:01 don't add up if you look at it purely in that perspective no they don't and then that's that's
00:38:06 why i'm saying that it's it's a much more complicated issue than just the numbers right
00:38:11 i'm going to give you another example uh houses are not just built by workers right you need
00:38:16 entrepreneurs developers that can come here and then you know they bring their ingenuity and they
00:38:21 They bring in their innovation to kind of revolutionize our current status of the industry.
00:38:27 But if you look at our selection system, we are completely, almost completely ignoring entrepreneurs, right?
00:38:34 We're focused on bringing in the workers.
00:38:36 But why are we not focused on bringing in the job creators?
00:38:40 That's like an issue that is so understated and nobody really talks about as often as we should.
00:38:46 because how many workers do you really want to bring to the economy
00:38:51 that has an entrepreneurial crisis?
00:38:54 And this is not me saying it.
00:38:56 BDC report after report.
00:38:58 First of all, they call us a nation of entrepreneurs.
00:39:02 The bedrock of our economy is small and medium-sized businesses.
00:39:05 So it's entrepreneurs, right?
00:39:07 And we see that their rate is on decline.
00:39:11 We have, they call it succession tsunami, right?
00:39:14 Our baby boomers are retiring. 1.00
00:39:15 they want to get rid of the businesses they don't have buyers immigration can be an obvious solution 1.00
00:39:20 but we're not using it so this is another misguided selection thing that we're doing we're not
00:39:25 we're not um we're not doing our immigration policy based on the reality on the ground that we see
00:39:31 i i know that the us has done this historically as i understand it quite well uh there are
00:39:36 problems with their approach canada does have entrepreneurial streams though they're just as
00:39:40 you were saying that i i looked up and i see different provinces have their own guidelines
00:39:45 where you can come to canada and start a business and get a work permit what's wrong with that that
00:39:50 or what is inadequate about the status quo in your view well let's take ontario for an example right
00:39:55 ontario had an entrepreneurial stream for business uh for entrepreneurs they closed it down december
00:40:01 2023 with no notice the reason they said it was the unsuccessful um appeal of the program it was
00:40:08 too complicated for no good reason why is that because the policy makers lock themselves behind
00:40:13 closed doors right they don't look at the they don't look at the reality of the ground they
00:40:17 don't appreciate that being an entrepreneur being a canadian-born entrepreneur in today's canada
00:40:22 is already a difficult difficult difficult task let alone if you're coming from a different
00:40:30 economy and let's be honest we're not the top destination for advanced economies right let's
00:40:35 not kid ourselves we are the top destination usually for economies that are much worse off
00:40:40 than we are so that gap must be filled in an economy that is already hard for canadian borns
00:40:48 to fill and if we are sitting behind closed door and making policy that doesn't take into
00:40:52 consideration all these real nuances we end up with what we have right now and i i gave you
00:41:00 ontario as a good example because it's the most popular and the most populous uh province that
00:41:05 we have in canada so by extension you can think about because all the other pmp entrepreneurial
00:41:10 streams those programs that are designed to target entrepreneurs were kind of modeled after the
00:41:16 ontario program is too much of a burden over the shoulders of a poor immigrant that is coming here 1.00
00:41:22 with all their votes their money and their resources with too little security right we
00:41:28 it's it's the way we do immigration at least on the entrepreneurial stream on the provincial level
00:41:35 is extremely selfish without regard to the reality on the ground again.
00:41:40 So it's not just a federal government's problem,
00:41:42 it's a provincial government problem as well.
00:41:45 What a contrast.
00:41:46 We bring in people through all of these streams
00:41:48 that end up having trouble finding work
00:41:50 and then shut down the one that lets people come in to create jobs. 0.92
00:41:53 A great set of priorities from our government here.
00:41:56 Well, it's great to talk to you.
00:41:58 A lot to unpack here, and I'm sure we'll revisit this in the future.
00:42:02 Siavash Shikarian, thank you so much for your time, sir.
00:42:05 my pleasure enjoy the rest all right thank you that does it for us for today we'll be back
00:42:10 tomorrow with more of the andrew lawton show here on true north thank you god bless and good day to
00:42:15 you all thanks for listening to the andrew lawton show support the program by donating to true north
00:42:21 at www.tnc.news
00:42:35 We'll be right back.
00:43:05 We'll be right back.