Juno News - January 23, 2022Where's the pandemic exit strategy？
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Summary
Coming up, Canadian politicians are tweaking around and fiddling around with restrictions, easing them ever so gradually. But when are the vaccine passports going away? When are the masks going off? We ll talk about the lack of a pandemic exit strategy, plus Patrick Brown swings by. You don t want to miss this.
Transcript
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This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
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Coming up, Canadian politicians are tweaking around and fiddling around with restrictions,
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We'll talk about the lack of a pandemic exit strategy,
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Hello and welcome to a rare weekend edition of the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.
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No, I'm not having a stroke. I'm just trying to remember.
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I thought when I said the date that 22-22 would be more interesting than it ended up being.
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Basically, I'm at the point now that we are only 22 days into this year and I've already had enough of it.
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I don't want to say I want to go back to the old year because 2021 wasn't all that better.
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Although I feel as the politicians are telling us, the old normal is never coming back.
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They're not saying it like that, but they might as well be, and we'll talk exactly about why that is in the coming episode here.
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Later on in the show, however, we do have one of the politicians who's going the other direction with it, Patrick Brown, the mayor of Brampton, Ontario,
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who's been basically saying it's time to have a science-based approach.
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It's a nice little sequel to our interview the other day with Irvin Student, who's heading a committee that's basically laying out the roadmap.
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The government says it wants to follow the science.
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Here are scientists talking about all the ways you could quite easily and safely reopen.
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I'm going to try to weave a bunch of different things that are happening together in this show because I want to talk about the bigger picture
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and stop looking at individual stories and individual restrictions in a bit of a silo,
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which tends to be the pattern that I think a lot of media coverage takes without paying attention to how a lot of these things are interconnected.
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But first, I have to just point out on a somewhat amusing note,
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I had an email from one viewer and listener, Amy from V&A, who said,
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you know, I used to like when you did videos back in the day in front of a bookshelf.
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And she said, you know, it made you look smart like you had read them.
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And then I was like, I was at first like, oh, wow, thank you.
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And then I'm like, wait, so you're saying I look dumb doing the show now without the books.
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And then as it just so happened, as it just so happened, I got a bunch of books that I'm working through
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for a project I'm working on unrelated to the show, but you'll certainly get drips and drabs of it
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And I had a bunch of books and I just had them on my desk and I was about to move them out of the shot.
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Just because someone said books made me look smarter, I won't.
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I had like the stack was up there and I've gotten like only down there.
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And I still have to get, you know, all the way down.
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And there's another stack behind that one that you can't see, by the way.
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So if it makes me look smarter, I will take it.
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I don't, maybe I should make this a running gag actually.
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And eventually I'll be reading more and more books and the pile will get down.
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It's like the pile started here over Christmas and then I was down here and then up and just
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just basically it's like lockdowns now where just when you think you're chipping away at
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them, they heap more restrictions on top of it.
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One of the reasons this week is a little bit jumbled as far as when we're doing the shows
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is because I was in Florida last weekend and I'm not, okay, just bear with me here because
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what I'm telling you is going to sound like a complaint, but I realized that you'll all
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want to just kick me in the face if I complain about being stranded in Florida because I realized
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that the word stranded does not apply to a free warm province.
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I was supposed to come back or state, no, we have not annexed Florida just yet.
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I was in Florida for a conference, believe it or not, and I was supposed to come back
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And if you live in Ontario or Quebec, you'll no doubt be aware that Monday was just absolutely
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So there were a bunch of flight cancellations and my flight on Monday was kicked back to
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And I was like, oh, shucks, you know, another day in Miami.
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But I came back Tuesday and then I was supposed to be back like, you know, mid afternoon or
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And then my flight from Toronto to London, Ontario, which is a two hour drive and a 22 minute
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And at a certain point I could have driven from Toronto to London and back to Toronto,
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I think like three or four times before they finally canceled the flight.
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And it was at like 11 PM and I was in Toronto and they're like, well, we can get you back on
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So at which point it would have taken me, you know, 27 hours to go, two hours.
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So it ended up just messing up the show schedule because I wasn't back when I was supposed to
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But I appreciate your patience and your concern.
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And I should say about Florida, it's become synonymous with freedom now, which is quite
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And I've got to give major kudos to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, not just for a lot of the
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pandemic policies, but for rebranding Florida, because it used to always be that if you were
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Like if you ever meet someone, I met someone once at the Republican convention from Wyoming
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And the Wyoming delegates pride themselves on being from the most conservative state in the
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country, because I think like there's not a single Democrat in Wyoming.
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But Florida in the last two years has rebranded itself and it's become the place to be if you
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want to escape a big government, totalitarian, mask mandates, vaccine passport regimes, all
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And without a doubt, I'd say probably 30% of the people I met in Miami, and this is just
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one city that I was in for a few days, were from Canada.
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And a lot of them had brought their children down there to escape the lockdowns and the
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And again, I mean, obviously this is not something that everyone can do.
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Some people it's very costly to deal with the PCR testing if you travel to get back.
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But there were a lot of people that I met down there that were all just like-minded.
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They've basically made this pilgrimage to Florida because they wanted to be in a free
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And when I was on hold with Air Canada trying to rebook all the flight stuff to get back,
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there was a moment where I'm like, why am I fighting?
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Why am I arguing with someone about like trying to get home as soon as possible?
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But to come back to not just a freezing cold, snowstorm ridden province, but also a
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province that is still in lockdown was a lot less than ideal.
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And I want to talk about a little bit of this because on Wednesday, we had from Prime
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Minister Boris Johnson in the United Kingdom, the announcement that all restrictions are
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And a lot of people around the world, including in Canada, have been saying, yeah, Doug Ford,
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Jason Kenney, Francois Legault, John Horgan, why can't you be more like Boris Johnson?
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And the point I made on the last show is that we shouldn't be heaping praise on someone for
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doing what should have been a given and should have been done months ago.
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But nevertheless, I want to talk about how quickly things change because that was the story
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On Thursday, Austria's parliament enacts the much vaunted vaccine mandate that I've talked
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about on the show since I think November or maybe early December.
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Just one party, and this is in Europe, so they have a whole bunch of parties represented
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Just one party, the Freedom Party, had its members of the parliament vote no on that.
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History will look very favorably upon the 33 and very unkindly on the 137.
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And it used to be that countries that had experienced oppression, especially you'd see this in former
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bloc countries, countries that were under communist rule before the collapse of the Soviet Union,
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would in their free era have a yearning for freedom and a dedication to freedom that was
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superior to anything you'd see in the United States or Canada or the United Kingdom.
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Because it was recent memory for these people living in a country that was unfree.
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And Austria, we're not talking about a communist country in Austria, but we're talking about a country
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that has certainly lived under oppression and has lived under the Nazis for crying out loud.
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And while we get further and further removed from that history, I find it quite shameful how the Austrian
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This population that should be, because of its national DNA, more averse to any sort of heavy-handed
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government approach like this, is welcoming it.
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So Germany has this member, and I don't want to butcher the translation, but basically it's
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the person responsible for the Office of Protecting the Constitution.
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And again, I'm not translating it literally, but it's the Office of Protecting the Constitution.
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And the politician who runs that had the gall to say that those who are protesting vaccine
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So we talked about Justin Trudeau in September calling unvaccinated people or anti-vaxxers
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You are enemies of the state if you're standing up against a vaccine mandate, which is something
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that Germany is mulling, like as we see in Austria, they're going ahead with it, like we've
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Their program is essentially a vaccine mandate by another name.
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So all of this is connected to each other because right now, and again, I'm not talking
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I'm not talking about the shadowy cabal of world leaders hiding out in the mountains because
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No, I'm talking about just an ideology that is becoming far more pervasive.
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I just believe this is the ideology that's dominating in places like Canada, in places
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like Western Europe and Central Europe and elsewhere, in supposedly free societies.
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The point I've made a few weeks ago that actually I think bears repeating is that when governments
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have failed so hard, which they have when it comes to pandemic response, they have to
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So this narrative that we hear, and by the way, it's not limited to Canada of the pandemic
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of the unvaccinated, is a term that starts driving a wedge between the unvaccinated and
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the vaccinated citizens of any country and of the world.
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And it starts to drive a wedge that makes these two groups not like each other all that
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And it does seem very deliberate that as people finally start to wake up to the fact that,
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hey, perhaps these government policies and government science tables haven't been doing
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And they're choosing as their enemy, the unvaccinated, which is a term that, by the way, doesn't even
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Being unvaccinated used to be, OK, you haven't had two shots of COVID.
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Then it's, well, I mean, Quebec, you're unvaccinated if you haven't had three shots.
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And in some places, you're unvaccinated if you are fully vaccinated, but you happen to
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support people saying, yeah, maybe freedom's a good thing.
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If you oppose mandatory vaccination, you're just a dirty, stinking, rotten anti-vaxxer
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And the reason I don't feel we're seeing an end to it is because no one is prepared to
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So not only did we have on Thursday, Austria go the route it did, but we also had on Thursday,
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Ontario announced its supposed gradual, cautious, you know, tiptoeing, just, you know, dipping
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And they talked about how the next two months is going to have a series of rolling back,
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Oh, you can go from, you know, five people in your house to 10 to 20, and then we'll
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And again, do not give them any credit for this.
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Do not say, oh, thank you, dear leader, for letting me go into a restaurant at 50% capacity,
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especially if you talk to some of the restaurateurs who are trying to make back all their lost
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revenue when they can't fill the restaurant up to 100%.
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Don't thank them for this is the important point here.
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But I think beyond that, you look to the end of it, you look to the end of the Ontario
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Effective March 14th, 2022, lifting capacity limits in all indoor public settings.
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Proof of vaccination will be maintained in existing settings in addition to other regular
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Lifting remaining capacity limits on religious services, rites or ceremonies.
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Increased social gathering limits to 50 people indoors with no limits for outdoor gatherings.
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Now, you may think, OK, this is one step on this roadmap to reopening.
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I thought, oh, maybe the page isn't loading for me.
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What happens on, you know, March 28th or something?
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This is the end of the reopening plan as it's been presented to Ontarians now.
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So there are still going to be restrictions in place.
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And more importantly, there are going to be vaccine passports and mask mandates in place.
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So in Ontario, there is no roadmap to getting rid of vaccine passports and getting rid of
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mask mandates, which I think are both the most intrusive on a day-to-day basis.
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And again, if your business is being shut down or restricted to such an extent that you can't
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make a living, that's very much intrusive to you.
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But to the average person on a day-to-day basis being forced to wear a mask pretty much anywhere
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and being forced to be vaccinated if you want to engage in civil society, those are the most
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And just to give a little bit of contrast here, this was the last roadmap that Ontario laid out.
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And I want to draw attention to two dates in particular.
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The vaccine passport was supposed to lift at restaurants, sports and recreational facilities,
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So you are supposed to be able to go to the gym, go to the casino, and then go to dinner
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without your vaccine passport by January 17th, 2022.
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If you wanted to go to a nightclub or a strip club or a sex club, well, you would have had
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to wait a couple extra weeks, but by February 7th, you would have been able to do that.
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And by March 28th, all remaining public health and workplace safety measures lifted, including
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The latest guidance says we're still going to have a vaccine passport in March.
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We're still going to have masks in March and no prediction on when it will be or even
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what the process will look like, what are the metrics, how few people have to be in a hospital,
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how few cases do there have to be before governments will start talking about that.
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And the lack of communication on this has been absolutely abysmal.
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I want to turn to Alberta because Jason Kenney, he gave on Wednesday or no, he gave on Thursday
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And he talked about things that Alberta is doing to improve health care capacity.
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You raised, I think, a very important question and answered it earlier about how long we will
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But I'm hoping to get a bit more detail from you than just very soon for lifting them.
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We had in Ontario, for example, a roadmap updated today that has by March still no
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revocation of mask mandates, no revocation of vaccine passports.
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Realistically, how long are you prepared to keep those two things in place in Alberta?
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And to get more specific with it, what are the metrics that you'll use to inform when to
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Well, we won't consider lifting the current measures until we see a sustained decline in
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That would follow a sustained decline in new cases, of course.
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So, you know, I think it would be fair to say, Andrew, that if we expect to see hospitalizations
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peak towards the end of this month, beginning of February, that we need to see sustained decline
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in that hospital pressure before we could move forward with considering relaxation of measures
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Look, I would just point out, Andrew, that Alberta, like much of Western Canada, has maintained
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much less severe restrictions than parts of Central and Eastern Canada.
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And yet, we have so far been less severely impacted by Omicron.
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We have a bigger delta wave here that may have created more people with immunity from prior
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I am eager for us to be able to stop some of these incredible intrusions in people's lives.
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And increasingly, I think that that we're seeing around the world points, hopefully, to the ability
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But we've got to stick to our knitting right now.
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Now, we are at our, you know, we are expecting probably a few hundred more people in our hospitals
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So it's too early for us to plan for relaxation of measures at this point.
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So yes, Jason Kenney, Premier of Alberta, concedes that these measures are intrusive,
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And as you noted, part of my question was, what will the metrics be?
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All we got was the general, well, we need to make sure that downward pressure is sustained
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And this is true of pretty much every province in the country.
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Scott Mowen, Saskatchewan has been better as of late at resisting mandates.
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But even so, we still don't have the exit strategy that we need on when we will get out of these
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measures, when we will be able to shed these intrusions, as Jason Kenney rightfully calls them.
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Now, in Saskatchewan, their mask mandate and vaccine passport is on the books until February 28th.
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It's possible they don't renew it, but there's been no guidance given as to when that will go away.
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So if you're a Canadian right now, you should be asking your politicians, what is the exit strategy?
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If you aren't going to give me a precise date, that's fine.
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But what can you tell me about what will inform that?
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And that's how we get it out of this dichotomy of we're open, we're closed, we're open, we're closed.
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We have to say, what are the science going to be?
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Because again, earlier on in the pandemic, I lose track of which lockdowns were which,
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but we had a pretty clear guidance of when cases go to this level, we'll do this.
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And you can haggle over whether it was right, but at least it was clear.
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Now it's all just at the mercy of the political class.
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And I said I was going to tie this all together.
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And here's why I think the permanence is an important dimension of this.
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I don't speak German, but I had a friend who does help me out with this.
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And I ran it through a couple of translation programs just to make sure I got it right.
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The Austrian government's legislation on this has the vaccine mandate in effect until January of 2024.
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Their vaccine mandate is in effect for the next two years, which means that if the government extends to four doses,
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five doses, whatever the case may be in that time, you will be in Austria unvaccinated
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unless you've gone along with that for the next two years.
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Now they could revoke it, of course, but government is not in the business of taking away its own power,
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So why this is so important, if it's not self-evident,
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is that governments are giving themselves regimes that will outlive the COVID pandemic.
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And in the Austrian bill, not in the bill, but it's in the commentary, the text accompanying the bill,
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they say, well, even if the World Health Organization, this is true,
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there could still be a situation in Australia, in Austria, rather, where there's an epidemic.
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So even if there's no global pandemic, we could still have an issue here.
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So that's why we need to keep this on the books until 2024, for two years,
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And their whole thing is they want to keep getting their vaccine uptake increase and increase.
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And there's been virtually no political opposition, just one party in Austria.
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And we actually have an invitation outstanding to the leader of that party,
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because I want to talk to the Austrian Freedom Party.
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If I've said Australia, I apologize, but it's just they're so easy to mix up,
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They're easy to mix up phonetically and also in terms of the way they're running the show
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But Austria, we've reached out to the leader of the Austrian Freedom Party to see if he'll come on,
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because again, they're carrying the weight of freedom-loving people right now for Europe
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And I think we should be all the more grateful that they are,
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and I think be asking, where are the other politicians doing the same thing?
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So when we see this on the books, it makes us question all of these other measures
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I mean, the old joke about the income tax in Canada being a temporary war measure act,
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these are jokes, but they're rooted in a fundamental truth,
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which is the governments are not in the business of dismantling institutions they've created.
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They're not in the business of breaking apart regimes they've created.
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It's not surprising to me that someone might next year say that the vaccine passport is going
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to be revived, if it's even gone away, to include the flu shot.
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All of these things that you'd say to people, it's a conspiracy theory.
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No one ever gets to call anything a conspiracy theory ever again related to the pandemic
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when this is happening in a Western liberal country.
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No, you don't get to call anything a conspiracy theory when this is happening.
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When Quebec is proceeding with fining people for their personal health decisions for not being
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vaccinated, no one gets to say that something is off the table.
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Because things that are previously off the table are mysteriously finding their way back onto the table.
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And that was at that Jason Kenney press conference, another question I raised.
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Because Jason Kenney has been, to his credit, very clear that he does not want to go anywhere near what Quebec is doing.
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At the same time, he was also unequivocal about vaccine passports.
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You've been very clear, Premier, that you will not advance the vaccine mandate.
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You've been very critical of the Quebec government's attempt to exact a health contribution,
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Yet you were also unequivocal when it came to criticizing the idea of vaccine passports
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So where's the accountability measure to ensure that if things don't get bad,
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this may not be something that is on the table in Alberta?
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I would point out that every Premier, including the Prime Minister,
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were opposed to proof of vaccination requirements in the spring.
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Our collective experience on Delta hit us hard.
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And for us, the alternative to shutting down businesses was a proof of vaccination program.
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When it comes to the Quebec policy, I spoke very bluntly about that last week.
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I would just point out, Andrew, that our government, through the legislature last year,
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repealed the power for the government to force mandatory vaccination on people.
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And that's the power that had been in the law since, I gather, 1910.
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We no longer have the power, should any government in the future want to, God forbid,
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to take away people's bodily autonomy in that way.
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In terms of the health care levy, or whatever Quebec is calling it,
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again, I just think this is, what can I tell you?
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I'd be happy to propose a law in the legislature this spring
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to say that this is not legally possible in Alberta.
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To me, the idea of sending people a bill effectively,
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even if it's indirectly doing that, for their health care,
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is a total violation of the universality of our publicly funded system.
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And, you know, when we have people who make bad life choices,
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who, when we have people with drug addictions who show up in the emergency ward frequently,
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we don't ask for their credit card, we don't send them a bill,
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we do the compassionate thing, we don't judge them, we care for them.
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When a drunk driver shows up at the hospital, the same thing.
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When, you know, a criminal gets into a fight and gets injured,
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they show up at the hospital, we don't judge them because of the choices they made,
00:26:50.380
So, that's the Canadian system, that's certainly the Alberta system,
00:26:53.400
and as long as this government's an opposite, it will continue to be.
00:26:57.620
So, again, he's giving a level of clarity that I appreciate,
00:27:01.100
but I do not let my guard down, and that's not a slight at Jason Kenney,
00:27:04.560
I don't let my guard down for anyone at this point.
00:27:07.800
As I've often remarked, yesterday's conspiracy theory is today's public policy.
00:27:12.960
So, there needs to be an accountability measure here
00:27:15.340
that politicians are not going to, if they're facing the next variant.
00:27:19.400
What's the next one? Is the next one tau or rho?
00:27:30.500
You lose your sense of taste and smell with all the other variants,
00:27:33.360
but with the pi variant, everything just smells like pumpkin or cherry,
00:27:38.400
So, the pi variant will be great when it comes along,
00:27:43.280
you don't want politicians starting to go the same road
00:27:49.620
which is this baseless panicking and re-imposing restrictions,
00:27:55.240
all because the doctors that have been wrong on a lot of other things
00:27:58.760
are telling them they've got to lock stuff down again.
00:28:03.620
is that all of these times we've been told we're out of the woods,
00:28:06.560
we end up having to somehow reckon with being back in the woods again.
00:28:10.580
So, if we accept that governments are not going to be consistent on this,
00:28:17.880
we turn back to Canadians who must be asking what the exit strategy is.
00:28:28.820
If they have one and aren't telling you, that is just as bad.
00:28:34.820
it's like, well, that means you're a passenger.
00:28:37.720
It means you don't actually know what you're doing.
00:28:40.800
Something Irvin Student mentioned on the show the other day stood out to me,
00:28:51.340
When we come back, we'll talk to Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown
00:29:04.680
Welcome back to The Andrew Lawton Show on True North.
00:29:07.300
I've had a lot of more critical things to say about politicians.
00:29:10.900
I was going to say in the last show, but it's really been the last two years.
00:29:14.200
But I always try to give credit where it's due.
00:29:17.320
And there's been in Ontario, one mayor who's been standing up
00:29:20.920
and speaking out in very clear terms about a lot of the lockdowns.
00:29:26.540
when the Omicron panic I mentioned in the previous segment started up,
00:29:33.680
but the science and the numbers are not supporting this idea of panic,
00:29:40.220
They're certainly not supporting the idea that we have to start
00:29:43.960
He's been a very good advocate for his constituents,
00:29:48.840
about being able to stay open and get back to normal through the pandemic.
00:29:52.900
And that is Brampton, Ontario Mayor Patrick Brown,
00:29:55.860
formerly the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party.
00:30:07.180
if we go back to the very beginning of the pandemic,
00:30:09.240
we had a fairly unified approach between federal leaders,
00:30:15.600
Everyone wanted to work together, cooperate, and get through this.
00:30:21.200
we've started to see, certainly among Canadians,
00:30:25.700
with how some of the public health guidance and advice has come down.
00:30:29.440
And I know you actually were one of the more vocal ones a few weeks back
00:30:35.040
we saw there was a pretty big gap between, on one hand,
00:30:38.560
this level of panic that we tended to be getting from some people
00:30:41.580
and the story that was actually taking place on the ground,
00:30:44.580
specifically in hospitalizations and in case counts.
00:30:47.780
A lot of people are starting to talk more about it now,
00:30:51.060
this distinction of being in hospital because of COVID and with COVID.
00:30:55.280
But you actually got a fair bit of pushback when you made
00:31:02.740
everyone was unified because we didn't know what we were dealing with.
00:31:07.100
And when faced with adversity, Canadians rallied together.
00:31:17.240
I've always said, follow the science, follow the data,
00:31:19.720
be as transparent as possible and don't treat the public like children,
00:31:27.720
And, you know, where there's times I've been frustrated
00:31:30.320
is where I feel we're trying to spin a narrative
00:31:36.400
An example of the hospitalizations for me was something that I felt
00:31:42.160
because it wasn't being included in the media narrative.
00:31:49.140
and I get briefed every week by the hospitals here locally
00:31:52.040
that half the COVID cases in the hospital were incidental.
00:31:56.960
So if someone went to the hospital with a broken arm,
00:31:59.040
had no symptoms, weren't being treated by COVID,
00:32:07.880
the COVID hospitalization numbers were being used
00:32:16.440
And then I found out that it wasn't just my local hospitals
00:32:21.160
that had incidental COVID as 50% of the hospitalized cases.
00:32:25.760
It was at a similar level in every other hospital I spoke to.
00:32:30.120
And, you know, I have to give Premier Ford credit
00:32:33.560
when I put this out there and made this request
00:32:38.460
Literally within a day, the health minister and the premier
00:32:40.840
responded and said that they would correct the reporting.
00:32:49.740
But for the lockdown crowd that wants to continue
00:32:53.160
justifying lockdowns, this was what I was suggesting
00:33:01.320
How dare you give the public the unvarnished truth?
00:33:04.920
I just really believe, Andrew, if you want to instill confidence
00:33:09.440
in government institutions, you can't spin them.
00:33:15.280
And if you give them the truth and you have to make a tough call,
00:33:22.860
is when you try to spin them and alter the reality of the picture.
00:33:30.040
Yeah, I think one big example of that is earlier on when,
00:33:39.820
when even some outdoor recreation and outdoor gatherings,
00:33:43.120
which we know are very, very safe, were being clamped down.
00:33:47.240
And I know this has been a big thing for you personally.
00:33:50.820
You were a big fan of hockey and all these other sports.
00:33:59.720
And certainly I think there's been a bit more of a trend
00:34:03.480
But a lot of Canadians, I think, just tuned out advice
00:34:06.060
when it just wasn't aligning with what we knew was safe in other ways.
00:34:10.560
And as you know, I spoke against this last spring,
00:34:14.660
they were closing playgrounds, outdoor recreation,
00:34:18.000
I went to my medical officer of health, who was very cautious.
00:34:29.460
And I said, is there any science or data that supports this?
00:34:40.840
So let's do something to make them less worried.
00:34:46.180
Leadership is not making an announcement for the sake of PR.
00:34:50.680
It has to be grounded on principle and conviction and data and science.
00:34:55.700
And there was no reason to shut down outdoor recreation.
00:35:07.280
Can you imagine the unlikelihood of transmitting COVID 76 feet apart outdoors?
00:35:15.160
And for kids who already had to be out of school,
00:35:21.020
They weren't getting exercise, which is integral to their, you know, physical wellness.
00:35:25.980
To being told they couldn't even go to the playground, it was preposterous.
00:35:29.580
And, you know, in that case, as much as the government made a mistake,
00:35:33.740
I have to give them credit with this pushback they heard from physicians
00:35:37.460
and public servants like myself, they corrected course.
00:35:41.180
And I much prefer a government that's willing to admit they made a mistake
00:35:44.340
and correct course than a government that will stubbornly follow the same course.
00:35:51.260
because obviously regions have some level of autonomy,
00:35:54.220
but most of the overarching restrictions and measures are being driven by the province.
00:35:59.620
And in that sense, any municipality in the province is on that train as well.
00:36:04.380
Where would you like to see things now or in the coming weeks?
00:36:07.180
Because we know that we are moving towards some lifting of restrictions,
00:36:10.220
but the vaccine passport was supposed to be gone in January.
00:36:15.880
Mask mandates, again, we had earlier, I think months ago,
00:36:19.180
heard that they could be lifted as soon as March.
00:36:22.940
Where do you think we should be headed right now on that roadmap to reopening?
00:36:26.560
I think if you look around the world, economies are reopening.
00:36:36.440
I get a phone call every few days from a business that's struggling to stay afloat.
00:36:42.180
I just got a call last night from a very popular gym in Brampton,
00:36:50.080
And, you know, I think of the consequence for the community in that area of the city
00:36:56.560
We're going to lose a level of physical wellness.
00:37:04.840
And I don't support the continuation of lockdowns.
00:37:11.900
We've had two years to build capacity to handle any increase in COVID cases.
00:37:19.560
And even during this Omicron wave, which was intense, there was a lot more cases, our ICU
00:37:29.560
And, you know, I just feel that we're missing the bigger picture.
00:37:35.000
You know, we are having extreme broad-based lockdowns.
00:37:41.560
And, you know, it's like putting a cast on a leg for someone that has a small cut.
00:37:50.620
You know, you could have put a bandage on that cut.
00:37:53.600
And I think we're missing, there are huge repercussions in our society.
00:38:02.520
There's a mental health and an economic consequence to that.
00:38:05.160
In terms of closing recreation, you know, one of our greatest challenges is rising rates
00:38:14.460
I actually think there is a consequence to public health by lockdowns that are too harsh.
00:38:20.160
And so if it was up to me that I've shared this advice, you know, I want to give the premier
00:38:26.180
credit because he is one of the most accessible premiers that I've dealt with premiers for a
00:38:31.540
while, and I've been elected for it since 2000.
00:38:34.300
You can pick up the phone, you can talk to Doug Forn.
00:38:36.340
And I've had some very direct conversations with him about this.
00:38:41.500
And, you know, I just really believe that there's no justification to continue these lockdowns.
00:38:51.100
And I believe they're going to make some movement.
00:38:54.680
I just hope it's not small tinkering around the edges that we're actually going to see
00:39:01.320
When we're talking about restrictions, I want to make clear I understand your point here.
00:39:05.460
Obviously, you'd have kids in school and you wouldn't have lockdowns on businesses.
00:39:09.380
But things like the mask mandate and the vaccine passport, do you think those could be lifted
00:39:20.300
One, on schools, we've lost more school days than any other jurisdiction in North America.
00:39:26.120
There's no justification for losing more school days.
00:39:29.160
In terms of closing businesses and recreation, I think it's time to reopen them.
00:39:35.000
In terms of masks, I do believe that, you know, indoors, that masks can be useful tools
00:39:46.820
But with everything, there needs to be a level of reasonableness.
00:39:50.500
You know, I'll put a photo of myself outdoors and someone will say, why are you not wearing
00:39:55.800
You know, Andrew, I have two children and my son is two and a half years old, Theodore,
00:40:04.000
and I signed him up for soccer lessons, little kickers.
00:40:07.700
And I got a note from the organizers that the provincial requirements were that they had
00:40:16.980
It is impossible to have a two-year-old wear a mask.
00:40:20.900
And so that's why I say there needs to be a level of reasonableness and where it's
00:40:27.440
appropriate that wearing a mask can limit transmission, do so.
00:40:32.160
But where it doesn't make sense, there needs to be that level of reasonableness.
00:40:37.560
And talking about the business impact here, because I know that one thing that you have
00:40:42.100
always done very well in the years that I've known you is try to have relationships with
00:40:47.380
I think one time I had a meeting with you and you had, you know, just become from like,
00:40:51.900
you know, 17 and you probably had like 20 more in the rest of the day or something like
00:40:55.440
But the reality is businesses are hugely, hugely suffering.
00:40:59.920
You've touched on it earlier with the lockdowns and also I think the unpredictability of it.
00:41:03.900
And I know there have been a number of restaurants that just personally that I've been to in the
00:41:08.560
past couple of years that they made it through lockdown one, then some closed down in lockdown
00:41:13.500
two, some made it through that and closed down in lockdown three.
00:41:16.800
So just in Brampton and in Peel region, what's the story here?
00:41:21.020
I mean, what's happening with these businesses?
00:41:41.100
And businesses that thought they could handle one lockdown struggled on the second.
00:41:50.000
And this last wave of lockdowns has been devastating.
00:41:57.320
There'll be people that are on unemployment because of these lockdowns.
00:42:01.440
So let me just ask you here, because obviously in a parallel universe, it could have been
00:42:13.660
But just looking forward, I mean, you're in Brampton.
00:42:19.660
Is jumping to federal or provincial politics still something you're open to?
00:42:26.180
And what I've learned in life is that God has a reason for everything.
00:42:34.040
I certainly didn't understand some of the false accusations that I had to go through.
00:42:46.900
And the beauty of being a parent almost makes anything else you do trivial.
00:42:51.960
And so I love my responsibility as being mayor of Brampton.
00:42:57.440
My wife loves the fact that I'm in the same city every night.
00:43:01.260
You mentioned I used to go to 30 events a day across the province.
00:43:05.760
That's not, you know, you can't do that and be a present active parent that I love.
00:43:13.680
And so, yeah, I'm loving my current task in Brampton and not looking for a career change.
00:43:21.460
I want to make Brampton the best that it can be.
00:43:24.380
I want to make us an example for other municipalities.
00:43:27.240
And I would note on that note, Andrew, we are the only big city in Canada that has run four consecutive tax freezes.
00:43:40.840
And I'm proud of the example that we're setting in Brampton.
00:43:45.980
So I might start looking up places in Brampton if you keep up that record.
00:43:52.440
Brampton is open for every investment, every resident.
00:43:55.860
And we're trying to, you know, I think on a lot of issues, actually, it's been interesting in Brampton.
00:44:05.500
And we started, you know, on property taxation, we're challenging the orthodox of how municipalities approach property taxes.
00:44:17.480
On some important provincial and federal conversations, I think we're leading the charge.
00:44:21.820
You know, I lead a community that is probably the most diverse in Canada, over 70% visible minorities, a mosaic of faiths.
00:44:30.140
And we've led a campaign across the country on challenging Bill 21, which is an attack on religious freedom.
00:44:36.960
And so, you know, I look at some of the exciting work that I get embarked upon here in Brampton, and I feel very fortunate to be able to really dive into these issues.
00:44:46.220
And so, you know, I love being in Brampton, and there's a lot of rewarding work you can do on the municipal level.
00:44:55.060
Well, I appreciate you joining to share about some of that work and also some of the bigger picture things affecting people in communities across the province and also the country.
00:45:10.520
Like I said, I've known Patrick for many years.
00:45:12.660
I hadn't had him on this version of the show, so it was good to have Patrick here.
00:45:18.040
We will be back next week with more of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:45:21.880
We'll try to get back on a regular schedule for you.
00:45:27.760
Some people maybe binge through them on the weekend.
00:45:29.500
I am going to say, though, if you value the content we're putting out, please do consider donating, whether you want to join one of our monthly clubs or just chip in a few bucks as a one-time donation.
00:45:43.640
I'm not getting any of Justin Trudeau's $600 million.
00:45:46.540
So the money that we get comes from people like you that actually value the work that we're doing.
00:45:55.200
But if you want to counteract it, you can throw a few dollars our way.
00:45:58.000
Anyway, with that, we'll talk to you next week.
00:46:02.300
Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:46:04.380
Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.