Juno News - Liberals SCRAMBLE for Canadian oil as global crisis hits

00:00:00.000 The Governing Liberals have welcomed another floor crosser to their caucus, this time from

00:00:09.760 the NDP side of the aisle.

00:00:12.840 When asked, a member from Nunavut, Lori Idlut, wouldn't say why she took the offer to join

00:00:22.480 the Liberals.

00:00:23.480 Lori, what did the government say to get you to cross the floor?

00:00:26.280 Did they tangibly promise you more consultations, specific asks?

00:00:30.780 Like, what incentivized you?

00:00:32.880 Like with any complicated issue, it wasn't just one thing that happened.

00:00:36.980 There were a variety of many things that have allowed me to really reflect on this.

00:00:42.160 And I'm very thankful to be so warmly welcome.

00:00:50.160 Now, just last September, Adelutz said she was disgusted with Prime Minister Carney.

00:00:56.280 over the elimination of food vouchers she was quoted as saying the Liberals

00:01:00.700 would rather dig for critical minerals than ensure Inuit have food to eat 1.00

00:01:07.160 Liberals are now just two seats shy of a majority in Parliament NDP interim

00:01:12.940 leader Don Davies questions the liberal tactics we know I'm becoming

00:01:17.460 increasingly concerned by the way that mr. Carney is trying to stitch together

00:01:21.760 a majority government in this country once again to us whether or not there's

00:01:26.240 majority government is fundamentally a decision of the Canadian people at the ballot box and it

00:01:31.680 should happen that way not through backroom deals cut behind closed doors in Ottawa. Meantime

00:01:38.980 Conservative leader Pierre Polyev says the Liberal government policies bear some responsibility for

00:01:44.360 the shooting incident at the U.S. consulate in Toronto. Let's listen. Ten years of liberal

00:01:49.960 immigration, weak liberal borders, catch-and-release liberal crime policies, and divisive liberal

00:01:59.380 governance has led to that violence spilling onto our streets. We now have synagogues that 1.00

00:02:07.660 are being shot. We have Jewish places of worship and community centers firebombed, children's

00:02:14.940 schools having bullets fly through the window in the middle of the night. This is not the

00:02:19.620 Canada that we knew and the Canada that we want. We want a country that is safe and secure and we

00:02:26.260 need the government to crack down on this political violence, to identify anyone visiting this country

00:02:32.500 that is not a citizen or a permanent resident who's engaging in it and immediately have them

00:02:38.860 referred for charges for criminal penalty and ultimately deportation.

00:02:44.360 If you're investigating, that incident is possibly linked to Iranian sleeper cells.

00:02:50.360 Prime Minister Carney called it a national security matter.

00:02:53.360 The synagogues, what are your thoughts on those places?

00:02:56.360 Well, they're extremely concerning.

00:02:59.360 We convened the incident response group on the weekend because of the situation in Iraq,

00:03:05.360 but also to ensure that all forces and resources of the federal government are cooperating

00:03:10.360 with local police and provincial police,

00:03:14.100 obviously with respect to the shootings at the synagogues.

00:03:17.860 I have had conversations with members of the Jewish community.

00:03:21.400 We're coordinating, as you saw from the RCMP,

00:03:25.300 deeming the shooting at the U.S. Consulate National Security Incident.

00:03:30.620 And we'll use the full weight of resources

00:03:33.720 and ensure that the perpetrators feel the full weight of justice.

00:03:37.920 after years of blaming the oil sector for destroying the planet the liberal government

00:03:44.240 wants canadian oil producers to ramp up production and bring it to market as soon as possible

00:03:50.160 this headline from the globe and mail energy minister tim hudson has asked canadian oil

00:03:56.640 producers how much crude they can get to market the u.s and israeli attack on iran has choked

00:04:03.040 off delivery of oil through the Strait of Hormuz, hurting global supply.

00:04:09.600 And joining us today is Vess Sobad. He is Executive Director of the Coalition of Concerned

00:04:14.320 Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada. Also spent 40 years in the plastics industry as an engineer

00:04:20.160 and business executive. Welcome, Vess. Thanks for having me on, Mark.

00:04:24.560 All right, so we've had apparently a change of heart by the Liberals. I mean, we've heard

00:04:29.360 nothing but how bad oil and gas is for the environment and how it's destroying the planet

00:04:35.520 but now we have energy minister tim hodgson asking the canadian oil producers how much

00:04:41.280 crude they can get to market obviously the crisis involving the strait of hormuz and the war

00:04:48.080 in iran has precipitated this but why do we have to wait for a crisis to happen before these people

00:04:53.280 act on the energy file boy that is the perfect question uh we should be have been ahead of this

00:05:00.000 of course um everybody has known for many many many years that uh or in iran might happen well

00:05:07.120 truly 47 years since they took the hostages and uh and canada helped get some of those hostages

00:05:15.120 out of course if you recall uh ken taylor and uh all those great folks back then um

00:05:21.360 So we should have been ahead of this. We should have been able to provide the energy necessary right now at this point in time so that, you know, we didn't see that $120 spike a couple of days ago. Now it's come back down since then. And that's good. And to me, that's an indication that things are in hand, that America has control of the oil and the flow of oil in the Middle East.

00:05:48.540 However, this also points out to Americans that Canada is an important ally to them.

00:05:57.380 They don't need to worry that much about Middle East oil because they have us to the north of them.

00:06:03.340 And I think this is going to be good for us as we sit down and negotiate KUSMA or USMCA, whatever you want to call it.

00:06:12.080 because this is a wonderful reminder to everybody that, what are we, Mark, the third or fourth largest oil reserve in the world?

00:06:20.420 I think they were third, but whatever the number, it shows how if we ally with the Americans,

00:06:31.140 they don't have to worry that much about energy security around the world.

00:06:37.640 We have it. They need it.

00:06:40.920 The rest of the world needs it.

00:06:43.020 I'm so glad that Carney is starting to see that he needs it too.

00:06:48.720 So, Mark, what would you suggest?

00:06:50.940 Should I throw out my Mark Carney values book?

00:06:54.300 Because obviously it's obsolete now.

00:06:56.940 Everything he talked about in here, he seems to be flip-flopping on.

00:07:00.580 So I sense this is for historical purposes only, no?

00:07:05.360 Yeah, he had several flip-flops on Canada's position on the war to begin with.

00:07:09.380 And now I guess he's flip-flopping on energy, but at least he's coming around to the idea that we need to produce more.

00:07:17.640 Go ahead.

00:07:18.840 What worries me is when he made a statement, and I think it was in Australia, correct me if I'm wrong.

00:07:26.000 He spoke against the war in Iran while previously speaking for it.

00:07:31.940 And President Trump then, I hope, joked that he's going to increase our tariffs by 100%. Those are the kind of quips that are extremely expensive.

00:07:46.080 And, you know, it would be wonderful if we were more ambassadorial and we kept those negotiations behind the scenes and didn't quip in public.

00:07:56.680 I've shared this story with you a couple of times.

00:07:59.160 Back in 2009, 2010, when we had a trade dispute with America, Buy America was written in and all Canadian goods that were being sold to the American government were stopped, essentially.

00:08:12.560 uh harper uh did a wonderful job working uh behind the scenes and sending all his ministers

00:08:19.360 to the united states to talk to all his counterparts all their counterparts uh so that

00:08:25.820 we can make our points make our arguments and remind them why trade with canada is in their

00:08:30.960 best interest as well as ours and uh we had a essentially a canadian exemption to buy america

00:08:37.400 in record time. That's what I want to see happen now. I'm not seeing any of that right at the

00:08:43.680 current moment. But I mean, how quickly can the oil sector, you know, ramp up production? You know,

00:08:50.500 that takes time. You can't just snap your fingers. And of course, we still don't have

00:08:55.120 the infrastructure, the necessary pipeline infrastructure to ship as much oil as we

00:09:01.300 would like, say, to Asia or to Europe, for that matter, nothing to Europe that I know

00:09:06.120 of, but, you know, how's the industry going to react?

00:09:10.860 I mean, there must be a sense of, oh, you like us now, you want us now, that this issue

00:09:17.360 in the Gulf or the, you know, in the Strait of Hormuz, now you need us, you come, you

00:09:22.680 know, cap in hand, demanding that we ramp up production.

00:09:26.160 I mean, what must be the attitude there?

00:09:28.800 Well, your point is very well taken.

00:09:31.660 There's a bottleneck in the bottleneck is called pipelines, and the bottleneck is called approvals.

00:09:37.240 The bottleneck is called the federal government.

00:09:40.120 And, you know, it takes 10 years for a pipeline to actually come into being and to actually produce.

00:09:48.620 And there's no way we can turn on a dime like that.

00:09:51.240 But this is a great example of how we should be thinking 10 years ahead, not 10 years behind.

00:09:57.120 Like I say, in this book, Mark Carney argues that we should decarbonize.

00:10:03.640 It's over for oil.

00:10:05.120 Well, the truth is decarbonized is not a real word.

00:10:10.240 You cannot decarbonize.

00:10:11.900 It's impossible to decarbonize oil.

00:10:15.360 I'm so glad that now that he's sitting in the prime minister's chair, he's starting to taste a bit of reality.

00:10:22.460 I think that's going to be a good thing for all of us.

00:10:25.360 Well, you know, he's going to run into some bottlenecks in his own caucus, I suspect,

00:10:31.080 because of course he's got radical environmental advocates, you know, the Stephen Gilbos of the

00:10:38.400 world in caucus and others are going to be pushing back. But here he has now a new member

00:10:45.980 of his caucus, the member from Nunavut. She has crossed the floor from the New Democrats.

00:10:53.240 I doubt that the NDP will be attacking the NDP, or that the media will be attacking the NDP's

00:10:58.840 leadership, such as it is, saying, there you go, it's their fault, like they would say if another

00:11:04.540 conservative were to cross the floor. But they're inching closer. So now they're two away from a

00:11:09.940 majority. And we've got, what, three by-elections coming up and very safe seats. So it looks like

00:11:17.400 he's going to get there. And not everybody is happy about it. What's your take on that?

00:11:22.580 It sure looks like he's going to get there.

00:11:24.680 Of course, Scarborough Southwest looks very liberal.

00:11:28.080 Tatumbo, even if it goes block, you know, that might be a wild card there.

00:11:36.300 The only one by one vote, I believe, last time out.

00:11:41.460 I really am of two minds on floor crossers. 1.00

00:11:48.020 um the floor cluster up in in the yukon there um was uh i believe given uh uh you know uh housing

00:11:57.900 uh there's a big housing project that's going up there and i think that was the carrot that was

00:12:02.200 put in front of uh none of it yeah in none of it um but but the truth is the electorate votes for

00:12:10.180 you based on your party um that's really the majority vote it's for the party it's not for

00:12:16.700 the person, 5, 10, 15. If you're a star, 20, 25% of the vote comes in because of you. But it's

00:12:23.140 really the party that they're voting for and the leader that they're voting for. And these floor

00:12:27.580 crossings, I think, make a majority, I believe, an illegitimate majority. So it'll be interesting 0.99

00:12:36.100 to see what happens April 13th. But does it reduce the chances of an election? I mean,

00:12:42.520 everybody's been talking about the likelihood of an election maybe not in spring but maybe by fall

00:12:49.480 and so if they get that majority even if it's razor thin with the speaker you know it was

00:12:57.560 deciding vote they may decide not to go is isn't that a possibility or are you thinking that it's

00:13:03.400 still a likelihood that we're going to go sometime a year yeah and i uh when we spoke last i thought

00:13:09.560 that uh we're likely to go sooner rather than later so uh just around the corner you know after

00:13:14.680 the ndp convention after the liberal convention um if the polls are correct uh it's in carney's

00:13:22.200 best interest to pull the plug right now and if he did so at this moment uh the by-elections would

00:13:28.360 just roll into the general election so there wouldn't be a problem there um but uh if the

00:13:34.840 polls are not right then carney's going to drag his feet he's going to wait until he's confident

00:13:43.320 that the polls uh are on his side i personally believe the polls aren't correct at this point

00:13:48.600 i think they're they're uh uh they're they're leading opinion rather than um counting opinion

00:13:55.960 and uh and i i believe his reluctance to pull the if if we see that he doesn't pull the plug

00:14:02.920 in the next couple of weeks. That'll tell us that the polls aren't true.

00:14:08.920 Yeah. I mean, these polls are suggesting that the liberals will win handily. Some polls have

00:14:14.520 them up 14 points, others quite not. I mean, there's been a number of polls. There's not just

00:14:19.880 one. You had the Leger folks that have the liberals ahead handily. You had Abacus. You've 1.00

00:14:28.200 had others as well you know reputable polls others that you don't hear about very often

00:14:33.080 but they all kind of say the same thing that the uh that the liberals are headed for a big victory

00:14:39.240 which has me questioning why even bother bringing people over why offering little bits of uh trips

00:14:46.680 to the asia or you know other posts excellent observation yeah why bother why bother because

00:14:55.480 then that's confirmation that the polls might not be right i'm always reminded donald trump

00:15:01.320 on election night in 2016 the poll said 93 for hillary and seven percent for donald trump i'm

00:15:09.640 always reminded of that uh um it's hard to believe the polls now in this era yeah it just is it just

00:15:20.920 is it's hard to believe the media and that's there it just is you know you feel like they're

00:15:27.320 all pulling in the same direction and of course and now with uh the revelations uh on the hill

00:15:33.720 yesterday that uh cbc uh um told uh one of their one of their uh talents one of their journalists

00:15:42.600 that they couldn't interview pierre pauliev uh that sort of says it all doesn't it really

00:15:48.360 Yeah, Travis Donraj, that was amazing because he was also suggesting that they're violating the

00:15:55.560 Broadcast Act by not allowing equal time for the conservatives. And you really get the sense that

00:16:01.880 they, I mean, we've all known it based on their programming and based on their editorial direction

00:16:07.480 that they don't like conservatives. And now we know from the inside where you have people coming

00:16:12.920 out of there saying they really hate conservatives, wouldn't allow me to interview Pierre Polyev.

00:16:18.440 And I mean, that must be a real embarrassment for the CBC.

00:16:22.220 But sometimes you think they're just so shameless over there that they just don't care what people think.

00:16:26.600 They don't care.

00:16:27.160 Just keep the money flowing.

00:16:28.660 That's their one and only priority.

00:16:30.400 But oddly enough, you know, I would like to hear a little bit more from the conservatives on this because they would obviously be the ones who pay the price for that bias.

00:16:41.160 You know, the party should come out and be firm about this and say, you know, this cannot be allowed to continue.

00:16:46.360 Of course, when you've got a party that's pushing the idea of defunding the CBC, I can understand why that might create kind of a bunker mentality over at the public broadcaster, you know, where it's like circle the wagons and keep those guys out.

00:17:03.420 That's probably a big part of the reasoning for what they're doing and why they're doing it.

00:17:08.720 But it doesn't, it's no excuse.

00:17:10.640 You know, you still have to do your duty and you have to be fair.

00:17:14.080 And so when you look at the fact that so much of their support of viewers are hemorrhaging, have been hemorrhaging for years, that's the reason.

00:17:23.420 You know, people know that they're not getting fair, balanced, and objective reporting.

00:17:28.040 They don't want that.

00:17:29.440 They don't want just a mouthpiece for the Liberals, despite the fact that they're so solidly in favor of Carney and the Liberals.

00:17:36.580 So that's what's going on over there.

00:17:39.000 But we'll have to see how that plays out in the weeks ahead.

00:17:42.420 anyone have any more thoughts last thought on that the cbcb has been a problem for

00:17:49.140 uh the other political parties since 2015 truly um but uh i think if the cbc was fair i.e equal time

00:17:59.460 to the parties um there wouldn't be a policy of getting rid of the cbc wouldn't you agree

00:18:05.060 I mean, the reason the policy is there is because it has been so biased.

00:18:11.900 It has been so blatant.

00:18:14.060 So hopefully things will change after this testimony.

00:18:19.480 The lawyer, Catherine Marshall, was very successful in adjudicating another case for Jamil Giovanni recently against Bell Media.

00:18:30.540 And I put my money on her winning this time again.

00:18:33.980 I've got to ask you as well, while we have a few minutes,

00:18:37.740 Pierre Polyev's planned trip to the United States.

00:18:41.600 Yes, I've heard.

00:18:42.680 I've heard.

00:18:43.400 What are your expectations for that, if any?

00:18:45.940 Well, again, we spoke earlier about how when By America happened 29-2010,

00:18:53.220 Stephen Harper sent all his ministers into the United States to talk to their counterparts.

00:18:57.520 I think that's a brilliant idea.

00:18:59.680 This is, and I think the more Canadians talk to Americans, the better off we're going to be in these trade negotiations. The more politicians talk to their counterparts in the United States, the better off we'll be.

00:19:12.680 I recall a story of when Vic Fidelli, now the Minister of Economic Development in Ontario, was the mayor of North Bay.

00:19:20.660 He sent a letter to every one of the mayors that he was buying product from in the United States.

00:19:25.020 And he said, look, I love your product. I love your fire trucks. They're great.

00:19:28.220 But I can't buy anything more from you because you've adopted this Buy America policy and you're hurting us.

00:19:33.440 So until that reverses, so sorry. Just want to let you know.

00:19:38.640 that changed everything the mayors talked to the congressmen and senators the senators talked to

00:19:43.940 the president and all of a sudden um you know in due course canada got an exemption to buy america

00:19:50.920 the more people that talk to our friendly american neighbors the better off we'll be so i'm expecting

00:19:56.760 a lot quite frankly from pierre i hope he has a long list of people that he's going to see

00:20:02.060 and uh from both sides from both stripes democrats republicans everybody and i hope he represents as

00:20:08.900 well like i know he will yeah compare fidelli's approach with doug ford's yeah yes very good

00:20:18.160 point very good point yeah very good point and in fact uh we should deploy uh minister fidelli

00:20:25.960 down to the United States, too.

00:20:28.000 I think he would have done a better job

00:20:29.540 calling Trump than Doug.

00:20:32.480 Anyway, Vest, thank you so much for coming on the show.

00:20:34.440 We really appreciate it.

00:20:35.940 Thanks for having me on.

00:20:38.140 If you enjoyed this show,

00:20:39.620 consider supporting independent journalism

00:20:41.540 by becoming a premier member of Juno News.

00:20:44.480 Go to junonews.com backslash straight up.

00:20:48.280 It helps keep us doing what we do.

00:20:50.680 Thank you so much.

00:20:51.320 We'll see you next time.

00:20:55.960 You

Juno News - March 11, 2026

Liberals SCRAMBLE for Canadian oil as global crisis hits

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