Juno News - January 23, 2022


Where's the pandemic exit strategy？


Episode Stats

Length

46 minutes

Words per Minute

182.32367

Word Count

8,416

Sentence Count

508


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:00:06.540 This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
00:00:12.880 Coming up, Canadian politicians are tweaking around and fiddling around with restrictions,
00:00:17.720 easing them ever so gradually.
00:00:19.600 But when are the vaccine passports going away?
00:00:21.660 When are the masks going away?
00:00:23.300 We'll talk about the lack of a pandemic exit strategy,
00:00:26.180 plus Patrick Brown swings by.
00:00:27.720 You don't want to miss this.
00:00:30.000 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.
00:00:37.320 Hello and welcome to a rare weekend edition of the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.
00:00:43.940 It is Saturday, January 22nd, 2022.
00:00:48.080 What is that? 0122-2022.
00:00:51.980 No, I'm not having a stroke. I'm just trying to remember.
00:00:53.940 I thought when I said the date that 22-22 would be more interesting than it ended up being.
00:00:58.540 Basically, I'm at the point now that we are only 22 days into this year and I've already had enough of it.
00:01:05.280 I don't want to say I want to go back to the old year because 2021 wasn't all that better.
00:01:09.160 I want to go back a couple of years to 2019.
00:01:12.480 Although I feel as the politicians are telling us, the old normal is never coming back.
00:01:17.740 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.
00:01:24.800 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,
00:01:32.620 who's been basically saying it's time to have a science-based approach.
00:01:37.280 The science is saying reopen.
00:01:39.080 Why are we not reopening?
00:01:40.440 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.
00:01:47.200 The government says it wants to follow the science.
00:01:49.620 Great.
00:01:49.960 Here are scientists talking about all the ways you could quite easily and safely reopen.
00:01:55.060 I'm going to talk in this show.
00:01:56.160 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
00:02:01.800 and stop looking at individual stories and individual restrictions in a bit of a silo,
00:02:06.960 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.
00:02:14.640 But first, I have to just point out on a somewhat amusing note,
00:02:19.400 I had an email from one viewer and listener, Amy from V&A, who said,
00:02:25.480 you know, I used to like when you did videos back in the day in front of a bookshelf.
00:02:29.040 And she said, you know, it made you look smart like you had read them.
00:02:31.760 And then I was like, I was at first like, oh, wow, thank you.
00:02:33.820 And then I'm like, wait, so you're saying I look dumb doing the show now without the books.
00:02:37.240 I don't think that was her intent.
00:02:38.600 And then as it just so happened, as it just so happened, I got a bunch of books that I'm working through
00:02:44.520 for a project I'm working on unrelated to the show, but you'll certainly get drips and drabs of it
00:02:49.140 about Canadian foreign policy.
00:02:51.620 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.
00:02:56.440 And then I realized, no, no, no.
00:02:57.700 Just because someone said books made me look smarter, I won't.
00:03:00.720 However, I haven't read any of these yet.
00:03:02.660 I had like the stack was up there and I've gotten like only down there.
00:03:07.360 And I still have to get, you know, all the way down.
00:03:09.700 And there's another stack behind that one that you can't see, by the way.
00:03:13.520 So if it makes me look smarter, I will take it.
00:03:16.160 I don't, maybe I should make this a running gag actually.
00:03:19.300 And just every episode, see where the pile is.
00:03:22.360 And eventually I'll be reading more and more books and the pile will get down.
00:03:26.580 But then I'll add more to it.
00:03:27.800 That's the problem with this thing.
00:03:28.880 It's like the pile started here over Christmas and then I was down here and then up and just
00:03:32.900 just basically it's like lockdowns now where just when you think you're chipping away at
00:03:36.940 them, they heap more restrictions on top of it.
00:03:40.520 One of the reasons this week is a little bit jumbled as far as when we're doing the shows
00:03:45.220 is because I was in Florida last weekend and I'm not, okay, just bear with me here because
00:03:51.480 what I'm telling you is going to sound like a complaint, but I realized that you'll all
00:03:55.160 want to just kick me in the face if I complain about being stranded in Florida because I realized
00:03:59.640 that the word stranded does not apply to a free warm province.
00:04:03.740 I was supposed to come back or state, no, we have not annexed Florida just yet.
00:04:08.380 I was in Florida for a conference, believe it or not, and I was supposed to come back
00:04:13.300 on Monday.
00:04:13.880 And if you live in Ontario or Quebec, you'll no doubt be aware that Monday was just absolutely
00:04:18.560 crazy for the weather.
00:04:20.500 So there were a bunch of flight cancellations and my flight on Monday was kicked back to
00:04:25.080 Tuesday.
00:04:25.600 And I was like, oh, shucks, you know, another day in Miami.
00:04:28.240 But I came back Tuesday and then I was supposed to be back like, you know, mid afternoon or
00:04:33.500 so.
00:04:33.880 And then my flight from Toronto to London, Ontario, which is a two hour drive and a 22 minute
00:04:40.840 flight was delayed, delayed, delayed.
00:04:43.920 And at a certain point I could have driven from Toronto to London and back to Toronto,
00:04:48.140 I think like three or four times before they finally canceled the flight.
00:04:52.620 And it was at like 11 PM and I was in Toronto and they're like, well, we can get you back on
00:04:56.480 a flight tomorrow that leaves at 5 PM.
00:04:58.800 So at which point it would have taken me, you know, 27 hours to go, two hours.
00:05:02.700 So I'm like, you know what?
00:05:03.640 I'll make my own arrangements.
00:05:04.800 So it ended up just messing up the show schedule because I wasn't back when I was supposed to
00:05:09.040 be.
00:05:09.980 But I appreciate your patience and your concern.
00:05:12.840 And I should say about Florida, it's become synonymous with freedom now, which is quite
00:05:18.620 interesting.
00:05:19.240 And I've got to give major kudos to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, not just for a lot of the
00:05:23.700 pandemic policies, but for rebranding Florida, because it used to always be that if you were
00:05:29.140 a conservative, Texas was the place to be.
00:05:32.660 Texas was like the utopia for conservatives.
00:05:36.120 And I mean, there are other states as well.
00:05:38.080 Like if you ever meet someone, I met someone once at the Republican convention from Wyoming
00:05:42.060 and I met a couple of people actually.
00:05:44.600 And the Wyoming delegates pride themselves on being from the most conservative state in the
00:05:50.380 country, because I think like there's not a single Democrat in Wyoming.
00:05:53.780 So they take great pride in that there.
00:05:56.060 But Florida in the last two years has rebranded itself and it's become the place to be if you
00:06:02.360 want to escape a big government, totalitarian, mask mandates, vaccine passport regimes, all
00:06:07.980 of these things.
00:06:08.820 And without a doubt, I'd say probably 30% of the people I met in Miami, and this is just
00:06:13.900 one city that I was in for a few days, were from Canada.
00:06:17.200 And a lot of them had brought their children down there to escape the lockdowns and the
00:06:22.580 school closures in Ontario and Quebec.
00:06:25.060 And again, I mean, obviously this is not something that everyone can do.
00:06:27.960 Some people can't board planes.
00:06:29.560 Some people it's very costly to deal with the PCR testing if you travel to get back.
00:06:33.820 I get all that.
00:06:34.680 I'm not trying to be insensitive here.
00:06:36.560 But there were a lot of people that I met down there that were all just like-minded.
00:06:40.280 They've basically made this pilgrimage to Florida because they wanted to be in a free
00:06:44.600 place.
00:06:44.940 And when I was on hold with Air Canada trying to rebook all the flight stuff to get back,
00:06:49.940 there was a moment where I'm like, why am I fighting?
00:06:52.360 Why am I arguing with someone about like trying to get home as soon as possible?
00:06:56.700 I have a life here.
00:06:57.680 I do like it here, believe it or not.
00:06:59.420 But to come back to not just a freezing cold, snowstorm ridden province, but also a
00:07:04.400 province that is still in lockdown was a lot less than ideal.
00:07:08.280 But I mentioned earlier the bigger picture.
00:07:10.200 And I want to talk about a little bit of this because on Wednesday, we had from Prime
00:07:15.080 Minister Boris Johnson in the United Kingdom, the announcement that all restrictions are
00:07:19.480 basically lifted.
00:07:20.600 There's no mask mandate.
00:07:21.780 There's no vaccine passed.
00:07:23.240 There aren't going to be these restrictions.
00:07:24.900 No one's being told to work from home.
00:07:26.640 And a lot of people around the world, including in Canada, have been saying, yeah, Doug Ford,
00:07:30.980 Jason Kenney, Francois Legault, John Horgan, why can't you be more like Boris Johnson?
00:07:37.700 Why can't you do that here?
00:07:40.040 And the point I made on the last show is that we shouldn't be heaping praise on someone for
00:07:44.260 doing what should have been a given and should have been done months ago.
00:07:47.320 But nevertheless, I want to talk about how quickly things change because that was the story
00:07:51.320 of the day on Wednesday.
00:07:52.300 On Thursday, Austria's parliament enacts the much vaunted vaccine mandate that I've talked
00:08:01.200 about on the show since I think November or maybe early December.
00:08:04.120 They passed that and it was shameful.
00:08:07.200 Just one party, and this is in Europe, so they have a whole bunch of parties represented
00:08:11.620 in the legislature.
00:08:12.840 Just one party, the Freedom Party, had its members of the parliament vote no on that.
00:08:19.240 Just one.
00:08:19.740 Well, 137 voted for it, 33 voted against it.
00:08:25.380 History will look very favorably upon the 33 and very unkindly on the 137.
00:08:32.640 And it used to be that countries that had experienced oppression, especially you'd see this in former
00:08:38.860 bloc countries, countries that were under communist rule before the collapse of the Soviet Union,
00:08:43.600 would in their free era have a yearning for freedom and a dedication to freedom that was
00:08:49.500 superior to anything you'd see in the United States or Canada or the United Kingdom.
00:08:54.260 Because it was recent memory for these people living in a country that was unfree.
00:08:59.060 And Austria, we're not talking about a communist country in Austria, but we're talking about a country
00:09:02.920 that has certainly lived under oppression and has lived under the Nazis for crying out loud.
00:09:07.220 And while we get further and further removed from that history, I find it quite shameful how the Austrian
00:09:12.760 population has forgotten that.
00:09:16.280 This population that should be, because of its national DNA, more averse to any sort of heavy-handed
00:09:22.680 government approach like this, is welcoming it.
00:09:27.180 And Germany.
00:09:28.340 Germany is welcoming it as well.
00:09:30.220 This is so disgusting.
00:09:31.760 So Germany has this member, and I don't want to butcher the translation, but basically it's
00:09:36.840 the person responsible for the Office of Protecting the Constitution.
00:09:41.420 That's some job there.
00:09:42.800 And again, I'm not translating it literally, but it's the Office of Protecting the Constitution.
00:09:47.320 And the politician who runs that had the gall to say that those who are protesting vaccine
00:09:53.400 mandates are enemies of the state.
00:09:57.960 Enemies of the state.
00:09:59.280 So we talked about Justin Trudeau in September calling unvaccinated people or anti-vaxxers
00:10:04.600 racist and misogynist.
00:10:06.340 In Germany, they're going beyond that.
00:10:08.280 You are enemies of the state if you're standing up against a vaccine mandate, which is something
00:10:13.200 that Germany is mulling, like as we see in Austria, they're going ahead with it, like we've
00:10:19.020 seen in other places like Greece and so on.
00:10:22.420 And Quebec, basically.
00:10:23.820 Their program is essentially a vaccine mandate by another name.
00:10:27.420 So all of this is connected to each other because right now, and again, I'm not talking
00:10:32.560 about global coordination.
00:10:34.200 I'm not talking about the shadowy cabal of world leaders hiding out in the mountains because
00:10:38.560 Davos was canceled this year.
00:10:40.300 No, I'm talking about just an ideology that is becoming far more pervasive.
00:10:45.500 I don't believe there's a conspiracy here.
00:10:47.220 I just believe this is the ideology that's dominating in places like Canada, in places
00:10:52.460 like Western Europe and Central Europe and elsewhere, in supposedly free societies.
00:10:58.040 The point I've made a few weeks ago that actually I think bears repeating is that when governments
00:11:04.200 have failed so hard, which they have when it comes to pandemic response, they have to
00:11:08.700 find someone else to blame.
00:11:10.020 So this narrative that we hear, and by the way, it's not limited to Canada of the pandemic
00:11:15.340 of the unvaccinated, is a term that starts driving a wedge between the unvaccinated and
00:11:22.100 the vaccinated citizens of any country and of the world.
00:11:24.880 And it starts to drive a wedge that makes these two groups not like each other all that
00:11:29.680 much.
00:11:30.580 And it does seem very deliberate that as people finally start to wake up to the fact that,
00:11:36.280 hey, perhaps these government policies and government science tables haven't been doing
00:11:40.140 all the things they're supposed to do.
00:11:41.380 Perhaps all of that stuff being what it is.
00:11:45.800 Maybe we shouldn't trust these people.
00:11:47.520 So they have to start blaming someone else.
00:11:50.040 And they're choosing as their enemy, the unvaccinated, which is a term that, by the way, doesn't even
00:11:56.520 mean what it used to mean.
00:11:57.600 Being unvaccinated used to be, OK, you haven't had two shots of COVID.
00:12:01.060 Then it's, well, I mean, Quebec, you're unvaccinated if you haven't had three shots.
00:12:04.300 And in some places, you're unvaccinated if you are fully vaccinated, but you happen to
00:12:09.080 support people saying, yeah, maybe freedom's a good thing.
00:12:12.200 If you oppose mandatory vaccination, you're just a dirty, stinking, rotten anti-vaxxer
00:12:17.320 like the rest of them.
00:12:19.960 That's the direction we're headed here.
00:12:22.680 And the reason I don't feel we're seeing an end to it is because no one is prepared to
00:12:27.280 say when the end is going to come.
00:12:29.480 So not only did we have on Thursday, Austria go the route it did, but we also had on Thursday,
00:12:37.680 Ontario announced its supposed gradual, cautious, you know, tiptoeing, just, you know, dipping
00:12:43.820 the toe in the water reopening plan.
00:12:45.740 And they talked about how the next two months is going to have a series of rolling back,
00:12:52.120 a series of rollbacks of these restrictions.
00:12:54.180 Oh, you can go from, you know, five people in your house to 10 to 20, and then we'll
00:12:58.720 have restaurants reopen to 50% capacity.
00:13:01.740 And again, do not give them any credit for this.
00:13:03.580 Do not cheer for them.
00:13:04.480 Do not say, oh, thank you, dear leader, for letting me go into a restaurant at 50% capacity,
00:13:09.520 especially if you talk to some of the restaurateurs who are trying to make back all their lost
00:13:13.820 revenue when they can't fill the restaurant up to 100%.
00:13:17.040 But I digress.
00:13:18.960 Don't thank them for this is the important point here.
00:13:21.220 But I think beyond that, you look to the end of it, you look to the end of the Ontario
00:13:26.340 government's roadmap.
00:13:28.860 And this is what it says.
00:13:31.640 Effective March 14th, 2022, lifting capacity limits in all indoor public settings.
00:13:38.740 Proof of vaccination will be maintained in existing settings in addition to other regular
00:13:42.780 measures.
00:13:43.800 Lifting remaining capacity limits on religious services, rites or ceremonies.
00:13:47.400 Increased social gathering limits to 50 people indoors with no limits for outdoor gatherings.
00:13:53.840 Now, you may think, OK, this is one step on this roadmap to reopening.
00:13:57.240 What happens next?
00:13:58.800 Nothing.
00:13:59.800 This was the end of it.
00:14:01.240 I thought, oh, maybe the page isn't loading for me.
00:14:03.780 Surely there's got to be something below here.
00:14:05.440 What happens on, you know, March 28th or something?
00:14:07.820 No, nothing.
00:14:08.560 This is the end of it.
00:14:10.100 This is the end of the reopening plan as it's been presented to Ontarians now.
00:14:14.580 So there are still going to be restrictions in place.
00:14:19.860 And more importantly, there are going to be vaccine passports and mask mandates in place.
00:14:26.600 So in Ontario, there is no roadmap to getting rid of vaccine passports and getting rid of
00:14:32.240 mask mandates, which I think are both the most intrusive on a day-to-day basis.
00:14:38.180 And again, if your business is being shut down or restricted to such an extent that you can't
00:14:42.460 make a living, that's very much intrusive to you.
00:14:44.900 I'm not diminishing that at all.
00:14:46.320 But to the average person on a day-to-day basis being forced to wear a mask pretty much anywhere
00:14:50.640 and being forced to be vaccinated if you want to engage in civil society, those are the most
00:14:56.080 intrusive measures.
00:14:58.200 And there's no end in sight for those.
00:15:01.360 There is no end in sight.
00:15:03.240 And just to give a little bit of contrast here, this was the last roadmap that Ontario laid out.
00:15:09.300 And I want to draw attention to two dates in particular.
00:15:12.220 One is January 17th.
00:15:13.820 So that was five days ago.
00:15:15.660 The vaccine passport was supposed to lift at restaurants, sports and recreational facilities,
00:15:21.260 casinos, bingo halls.
00:15:22.360 So you are supposed to be able to go to the gym, go to the casino, and then go to dinner
00:15:27.180 without your vaccine passport by January 17th, 2022.
00:15:32.600 If you wanted to go to a nightclub or a strip club or a sex club, well, you would have had
00:15:37.280 to wait a couple extra weeks, but by February 7th, you would have been able to do that.
00:15:41.620 And by March 28th, all remaining public health and workplace safety measures lifted, including
00:15:48.080 masking.
00:15:49.260 So that was supposed to be March 28th, 2022.
00:15:52.800 The latest guidance says we're still going to have a vaccine passport in March.
00:15:56.720 We're still going to have masks in March and no prediction on when it will be or even
00:16:02.640 what the process will look like, what are the metrics, how few people have to be in a hospital,
00:16:07.980 how few cases do there have to be before governments will start talking about that.
00:16:12.520 And the lack of communication on this has been absolutely abysmal.
00:16:16.540 I want to turn to Alberta because Jason Kenney, he gave on Wednesday or no, he gave on Thursday
00:16:22.200 night a COVID update as well.
00:16:23.900 And he talked about things that Alberta is doing to improve health care capacity.
00:16:27.660 But the same thing comes up.
00:16:30.200 What is the exit strategy?
00:16:33.020 What is the exit strategy?
00:16:34.460 And in Alberta, he doesn't have one.
00:16:36.720 Take a look.
00:16:37.940 Good afternoon, Premier.
00:16:39.300 You raised, I think, a very important question and answered it earlier about how long we will
00:16:45.280 be saddled with restrictions.
00:16:46.420 But I'm hoping to get a bit more detail from you than just very soon for lifting them.
00:16:51.140 We had in Ontario, for example, a roadmap updated today that has by March still no
00:16:57.240 revocation of mask mandates, no revocation of vaccine passports.
00:17:01.500 Realistically, how long are you prepared to keep those two things in place in Alberta?
00:17:06.400 And to get more specific with it, what are the metrics that you'll use to inform when to
00:17:11.160 lift those?
00:17:13.780 Well, we won't consider lifting the current measures until we see a sustained decline in
00:17:22.740 pressure on hospitalization.
00:17:24.740 That would follow a sustained decline in new cases, of course.
00:17:29.280 So, you know, I think it would be fair to say, Andrew, that if we expect to see hospitalizations
00:17:37.040 peak towards the end of this month, beginning of February, that we need to see sustained decline
00:17:43.420 in that hospital pressure before we could move forward with considering relaxation of measures
00:17:48.600 prudently.
00:17:49.740 Look, I would just point out, Andrew, that Alberta, like much of Western Canada, has maintained
00:17:55.320 much less severe restrictions than parts of Central and Eastern Canada.
00:18:01.900 And yet, we have so far been less severely impacted by Omicron.
00:18:08.140 There may be a lot of reasons for that.
00:18:09.760 We have a bigger delta wave here that may have created more people with immunity from prior
00:18:15.080 infection.
00:18:15.560 There may be a lot of reasons for it.
00:18:17.600 But what I can tell you is I am eager.
00:18:20.600 I am eager for us to be able to stop some of these incredible intrusions in people's lives.
00:18:33.000 And increasingly, I think that that we're seeing around the world points, hopefully, to the ability
00:18:38.240 to do that.
00:18:39.280 But we've got to stick to our knitting right now.
00:18:41.620 Now, we are at our, you know, we are expecting probably a few hundred more people in our hospitals
00:18:46.640 with COVID.
00:18:47.180 So it's too early for us to plan for relaxation of measures at this point.
00:18:51.440 So yes, Jason Kenney, Premier of Alberta, concedes that these measures are intrusive,
00:18:56.320 concedes that people want them gone.
00:18:58.400 But it's too early to say when that will be.
00:19:01.620 And as you noted, part of my question was, what will the metrics be?
00:19:05.400 All we got was the general, well, we need to make sure that downward pressure is sustained
00:19:09.540 and the health care system and all of that.
00:19:11.400 But that's all we get.
00:19:13.600 That's all we get.
00:19:15.700 So there is no end in sight.
00:19:18.080 And this is true of pretty much every province in the country.
00:19:21.820 Scott Mowen, Saskatchewan has been better as of late at resisting mandates.
00:19:25.560 But even so, we still don't have the exit strategy that we need on when we will get out of these
00:19:31.940 measures, when we will be able to shed these intrusions, as Jason Kenney rightfully calls them.
00:19:37.060 Now, in Saskatchewan, their mask mandate and vaccine passport is on the books until February 28th.
00:19:42.820 It's possible they don't renew it, but there's been no guidance given as to when that will go away.
00:19:49.480 So if you're a Canadian right now, you should be asking your politicians, what is the exit strategy?
00:19:55.300 If you aren't going to give me a precise date, that's fine.
00:19:58.000 But what can you tell me about what will inform that?
00:20:01.900 And that's how we get it out of this dichotomy of we're open, we're closed, we're open, we're closed.
00:20:05.840 We have to say, what are the science going to be?
00:20:08.000 Because again, earlier on in the pandemic, I lose track of which lockdowns were which,
00:20:12.200 but we had a pretty clear guidance of when cases go to this level, we'll do this.
00:20:17.160 When they go to this level, we'll do this.
00:20:18.640 And you can haggle over whether it was right, but at least it was clear.
00:20:22.320 At least it was transparent.
00:20:24.940 Now there's none of that.
00:20:25.980 Now it's all just at the mercy of the political class.
00:20:30.000 And I said I was going to tie this all together.
00:20:32.300 And here's why I think the permanence is an important dimension of this.
00:20:36.180 I don't speak German, but I had a friend who does help me out with this.
00:20:40.240 And I ran it through a couple of translation programs just to make sure I got it right.
00:20:43.940 The Austrian government's legislation on this has the vaccine mandate in effect until January of 2024.
00:20:53.740 That is two years from now.
00:20:55.840 Their vaccine mandate is in effect for the next two years, which means that if the government extends to four doses,
00:21:04.580 five doses, whatever the case may be in that time, you will be in Austria unvaccinated
00:21:10.060 unless you've gone along with that for the next two years.
00:21:13.700 Now they could revoke it, of course, but government is not in the business of taking away its own power,
00:21:19.120 as we've seen in the last two years.
00:21:21.540 So why this is so important, if it's not self-evident,
00:21:26.560 is that governments are giving themselves regimes that will outlive the COVID pandemic.
00:21:32.320 And in the Austrian bill, not in the bill, but it's in the commentary, the text accompanying the bill,
00:21:37.280 they say, well, even if the World Health Organization, this is true,
00:21:40.540 even if they declare the pandemic is over,
00:21:43.020 there could still be a situation in Australia, in Austria, rather, where there's an epidemic.
00:21:48.580 So even if there's no global pandemic, we could still have an issue here.
00:21:51.540 So that's why we need to keep this on the books until 2024, for two years,
00:21:56.760 literally two years to flatten the curve.
00:21:58.820 And their whole thing is they want to keep getting their vaccine uptake increase and increase.
00:22:03.140 And there's been virtually no political opposition, just one party in Austria.
00:22:08.060 And we actually have an invitation outstanding to the leader of that party,
00:22:11.760 because I want to talk to the Austrian Freedom Party.
00:22:14.760 If I've said Australia, I apologize, but it's just they're so easy to mix up,
00:22:18.760 especially as of late.
00:22:20.360 They're easy to mix up phonetically and also in terms of the way they're running the show
00:22:25.840 insofar as pandemic response is concerned.
00:22:28.860 But Austria, we've reached out to the leader of the Austrian Freedom Party to see if he'll come on,
00:22:34.760 because again, they're carrying the weight of freedom-loving people right now for Europe
00:22:39.040 in a way that no one else is.
00:22:41.460 And I think we should be all the more grateful that they are,
00:22:44.140 and I think be asking, where are the other politicians doing the same thing?
00:22:48.960 So when we see this on the books, it makes us question all of these other measures
00:22:54.840 that we've been told are temporary.
00:22:56.320 I mean, the old joke about the income tax in Canada being a temporary war measure act,
00:23:01.020 these are jokes, but they're rooted in a fundamental truth,
00:23:05.540 which is the governments are not in the business of dismantling institutions they've created.
00:23:09.900 They're not in the business of breaking apart regimes they've created.
00:23:12.940 It's not surprising to me that someone might next year say that the vaccine passport is going
00:23:18.660 to be revived, if it's even gone away, to include the flu shot.
00:23:24.280 All of these things that you'd say to people, it's a conspiracy theory.
00:23:27.740 In Austria, they're mandating vaccination.
00:23:30.860 No one ever gets to call anything a conspiracy theory ever again related to the pandemic
00:23:36.200 when this is happening in a Western liberal country.
00:23:39.560 No, you don't get to call anything a conspiracy theory when this is happening.
00:23:45.280 When Quebec is proceeding with fining people for their personal health decisions for not being
00:23:50.900 vaccinated, no one gets to say that something is off the table.
00:23:56.200 Because things that are previously off the table are mysteriously finding their way back onto the table.
00:24:01.200 And that was at that Jason Kenney press conference, another question I raised.
00:24:05.540 Because Jason Kenney has been, to his credit, very clear that he does not want to go anywhere near what Quebec is doing.
00:24:11.300 At the same time, he was also unequivocal about vaccine passports.
00:24:15.340 So how do you square those two?
00:24:16.760 That was what I asked him.
00:24:17.920 I do.
00:24:18.480 You've been very clear, Premier, that you will not advance the vaccine mandate.
00:24:22.820 You've been very critical of the Quebec government's attempt to exact a health contribution,
00:24:27.860 as they call it, a fine on the unvaccinated.
00:24:30.580 Yet you were also unequivocal when it came to criticizing the idea of vaccine passports
00:24:35.020 before you implemented those in Alberta.
00:24:38.040 So where's the accountability measure to ensure that if things don't get bad,
00:24:42.260 this may not be something that is on the table in Alberta?
00:24:47.000 Fair question.
00:24:47.860 I would point out that every Premier, including the Prime Minister,
00:24:52.640 were opposed to proof of vaccination requirements in the spring.
00:24:56.700 Our collective experience on Delta hit us hard.
00:25:00.420 And for us, the alternative to shutting down businesses was a proof of vaccination program.
00:25:07.640 When it comes to the Quebec policy, I spoke very bluntly about that last week.
00:25:12.280 I would just point out, Andrew, that our government, through the legislature last year,
00:25:19.420 repealed the power for the government to force mandatory vaccination on people.
00:25:26.280 And that's the power that had been in the law since, I gather, 1910.
00:25:29.940 So we took that out of the law.
00:25:31.320 We no longer have the power, should any government in the future want to, God forbid,
00:25:36.480 to take away people's bodily autonomy in that way.
00:25:39.660 In terms of the health care levy, or whatever Quebec is calling it,
00:25:47.240 again, I just think this is, what can I tell you?
00:25:52.960 I'd be happy to propose a law in the legislature this spring
00:25:55.980 to say that this is not legally possible in Alberta.
00:25:59.580 To me, the idea of sending people a bill effectively,
00:26:07.180 even if it's indirectly doing that, for their health care,
00:26:10.320 is a total violation of the universality of our publicly funded system.
00:26:15.460 And, you know, when we have people who make bad life choices,
00:26:18.540 who, when we have people with drug addictions who show up in the emergency ward frequently,
00:26:25.840 we don't ask for their credit card, we don't send them a bill,
00:26:29.160 we do the compassionate thing, we don't judge them, we care for them.
00:26:32.820 When a drunk driver shows up at the hospital, the same thing.
00:26:37.120 When, you know, a criminal gets into a fight and gets injured,
00:26:46.320 they show up at the hospital, we don't judge them because of the choices they made,
00:26:49.700 we care for them.
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?
00:27:21.960 I get the Greek letters mixed up.
00:27:23.540 Maybe it's phi or pi. Who knows?
00:27:25.400 Then, I think it's the pi variant.
00:27:26.900 I've actually been waiting for the pi variant,
00:27:28.700 because it's like the most delicious one.
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,
00:27:37.100 depending on which strain you get.
00:27:38.400 So, the pi variant will be great when it comes along,
00:27:41.480 but whatever the next variant is,
00:27:43.280 you don't want politicians starting to go the same road
00:27:46.700 that they went down with Omicron,
00:27:49.620 which is this baseless panicking and re-imposing restrictions,
00:27:53.920 increasing 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.
00:28:00.680 So, that's the fear here.
00:28:02.780 That's the fear,
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.
00:28:25.600 And if they don't have one, it's bad.
00:28:28.820 If they have one and aren't telling you, that is just as bad.
00:28:32.300 There's no excuse.
00:28:33.440 If there's a, well, we can't know,
00:28:34.820 it's like, well, that means you're a passenger.
00:28:36.860 That means you're a passenger.
00:28:37.720 It means you don't actually know what you're doing.
00:28:39.420 You're not in the driver's seat of this.
00:28:40.800 Something Irvin Student mentioned on the show the other day stood out to me,
00:28:43.800 which is that the virus is not in charge.
00:28:45.900 People have autonomy.
00:28:46.980 Political leaders have autonomy.
00:28:48.740 They get to make their choices.
00:28:51.340 When we come back, we'll talk to Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown
00:28:54.140 here on The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:28:55.560 Stay tuned.
00:28:59.280 You're tuned in to The Andrew Lawton Show.
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.
00:29:24.540 And certainly even a couple of weeks ago,
00:29:26.540 when the Omicron panic I mentioned in the previous segment started up,
00:29:30.580 he started to say, well, hang on.
00:29:32.280 I mean, yes, we have to be cautious,
00:29:33.680 but the science and the numbers are not supporting this idea of panic,
00:29:38.740 this knee-jerk reaction.
00:29:40.220 They're certainly not supporting the idea that we have to start
00:29:42.600 closing everything down again.
00:29:43.960 He's been a very good advocate for his constituents,
00:29:46.300 and I'd say for Canadians at large,
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.
00:30:00.100 Patrick, it's good to talk to you again.
00:30:01.540 Thanks very much for coming on today.
00:30:03.760 Yeah, great to join you today.
00:30:05.380 Now, I think generally speaking,
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,
00:30:13.800 provincial leaders, municipal leaders.
00:30:15.600 Everyone wanted to work together, cooperate, and get through this.
00:30:19.540 But the longer it's gone on,
00:30:21.200 we've started to see, certainly among Canadians,
00:30:24.580 a great deal of frustration
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
00:30:33.380 when in the Omicron wave,
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
00:30:57.520 what was a fairly obvious point, I thought.
00:31:00.740 Well, I think at the beginning of the crisis,
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.
00:31:11.220 But as we've learned more about this virus,
00:31:14.780 you know, we have to adapt based on knowledge.
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,
00:31:24.740 tell them the unvarnished truth.
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
00:31:33.760 and not give the full picture.
00:31:36.400 An example of the hospitalizations for me was something that I felt
00:31:40.940 that I needed to push out there
00:31:42.160 because it wasn't being included in the media narrative.
00:31:45.320 I found out just through my own briefings
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,
00:32:01.680 they were counting in the COVID numbers.
00:32:05.740 And the COVID numbers were being used,
00:32:07.880 the COVID hospitalization numbers were being used
00:32:09.960 as a justification for lockdowns.
00:32:12.900 And I just felt this was dishonest.
00:32:15.480 It was disingenuous.
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
00:32:36.040 that they be reported accurately.
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.
00:32:44.820 And as of now, they've done that.
00:32:47.200 We now get a more accurate picture.
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
00:32:57.660 was treason.
00:32:59.040 How dare you give the public the truth?
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.
00:33:12.560 You can't spin the public.
00:33:13.780 Just tell them the truth.
00:33:15.280 And if you give them the truth and you have to make a tough call,
00:33:18.540 they'll understand and appreciate it.
00:33:20.560 I think when you see more people get skeptical
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,
00:33:35.520 and I don't mean at the very beginning,
00:33:37.000 I mean just as recently as a year ago,
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.
00:33:48.960 I know you're a very active person.
00:33:50.820 You were a big fan of hockey and all these other sports.
00:33:53.640 And again, we had people that were being told
00:33:55.280 that they weren't allowed to gather outdoors,
00:33:58.020 to do things that are fairly safe.
00:33:59.720 And certainly I think there's been a bit more of a trend
00:34:01.780 towards opening up on that.
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.
00:34:09.620 Well, let me give you an example.
00:34:10.560 And as you know, I spoke against this last spring,
00:34:13.080 but last spring when the government announced
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.
00:34:21.220 I went to the top infectious disease doctors,
00:34:23.560 who are very cautious.
00:34:24.840 And I said, has this been recommended
00:34:27.580 to the provincial government?
00:34:28.640 And they said, no.
00:34:29.460 And I said, is there any science or data that supports this?
00:34:32.640 And they said, no.
00:34:34.300 And that made me feel that at the time,
00:34:37.040 those announcements were really based on PR.
00:34:39.520 The public was worried.
00:34:40.840 So let's do something to make them less worried.
00:34:43.960 But that's not leadership.
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.
00:34:59.020 Let me give you an example.
00:35:00.620 You know, I love tennis.
00:35:02.180 In tennis, you're 76 feet apart.
00:35:04.080 At one point last year, we shut down tennis.
00:35:07.280 Can you imagine the unlikelihood of transmitting COVID 76 feet apart outdoors?
00:35:13.320 It's absurd.
00:35:15.160 And for kids who already had to be out of school,
00:35:18.460 they weren't getting fresh air.
00:35:20.040 Recreation was closed.
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.
00:35:49.120 So let's talk about where we are now,
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.
00:36:13.360 And that, as of now, remains in place.
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.
00:36:21.520 I don't know if that's going to happen.
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.
00:36:31.620 It's time we reopen in Ontario.
00:36:34.040 And, Andrew, there are real stories.
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,
00:36:46.700 small business, and they're going under.
00:36:50.080 And, you know, I think of the consequence for the community in that area of the city
00:36:53.940 where there's no other, you know, gym.
00:36:56.560 We're going to lose a level of physical wellness.
00:36:59.440 There are restaurants that have gone under.
00:37:01.340 This isn't just a health pandemic.
00:37:02.600 It's an economic tidal wave.
00:37:04.840 And I don't support the continuation of lockdowns.
00:37:08.940 The data and the science doesn't support it.
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
00:37:25.860 capacity wasn't threatened.
00:37:27.780 It wasn't threatened.
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.
00:38:00.160 We're going to lose businesses and jobs.
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
00:38:10.800 of obesity, cardiac issues.
00:38:13.300 We're going to contribute to that.
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
00:38:59.160 these restrictions lifted.
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
00:39:13.200 right now safely as well?
00:39:15.980 Yeah, I think we're getting to that point.
00:39:17.900 Let me touch upon each of these.
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.
00:39:33.040 I think we can do so safely.
00:39:35.000 In terms of masks, I do believe that, you know, indoors, that masks can be useful tools
00:39:43.260 to help limit transmission.
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
00:39:54.100 a mask?
00:39:54.640 It's because I'm outdoors.
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
00:40:15.720 to wear a mask.
00:40:16.980 It is impossible to have a two-year-old wear a mask.
00:40:20.040 It is impossible.
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
00:40:46.200 as many different people as possible.
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
00:40:55.160 that.
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?
00:41:23.580 You know, people have gone into their savings.
00:41:27.380 They have gone into debt.
00:41:30.220 And there's a huge consequence.
00:41:32.000 Every lockdown we lose businesses.
00:41:34.340 People have lost their life savings.
00:41:37.580 There's a huge toll.
00:41:39.380 You can't underestimate that toll.
00:41:41.100 And businesses that thought they could handle one lockdown struggled on the second.
00:41:48.620 Every wave gets harder.
00:41:50.000 And this last wave of lockdowns has been devastating.
00:41:54.220 We've lost businesses.
00:41:55.360 People have lost jobs.
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
00:42:08.160 you as premier right now.
00:42:09.680 And I don't want to rehash that.
00:42:11.400 I know you've had to do that as well.
00:42:13.660 But just looking forward, I mean, you're in Brampton.
00:42:16.920 You're doing a lot of work there.
00:42:18.320 I see your updates all the time.
00:42:19.660 Is jumping to federal or provincial politics still something you're open to?
00:42:23.940 I'm very happy in Brampton.
00:42:26.180 And what I've learned in life is that God has a reason for everything.
00:42:29.920 And I look back to 2018 at the time.
00:42:34.040 I certainly didn't understand some of the false accusations that I had to go through.
00:42:39.620 But everything honestly has worked out for me.
00:42:43.100 Personally, I've got two beautiful children.
00:42:44.980 I got married.
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.
00:43:11.840 And I love that responsibility.
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.
00:43:35.860 And we're doing a lot of incredible work.
00:43:39.140 We're thinking outside of the box.
00:43:40.840 And I'm proud of the example that we're setting in Brampton.
00:43:44.140 I just got my property tax bill.
00:43:45.980 So I might start looking up places in Brampton if you keep up that record.
00:43:50.020 Well, we want to encourage people.
00:43:51.540 Brampton's open.
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.
00:44:02.200 We've really started a conversation.
00:44:05.500 And we started, you know, on property taxation, we're challenging the orthodox of how municipalities approach property taxes.
00:44:12.620 Everyone said you can't freeze taxes.
00:44:14.600 We ran value for money audits, and we have.
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.
00:44:54.700 Good, good.
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.
00:45:03.480 Patrick Brown, Mayor of Brampton.
00:45:05.360 Thanks so much, Patrick.
00:45:06.080 Always a pleasure.
00:45:07.180 My pleasure.
00:45:07.540 That was Patrick Brown.
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.
00:45:16.680 And that does it for us for today.
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.
00:45:24.240 But it's a podcast.
00:45:25.280 It's not appointment listening.
00:45:26.460 You listen whenever you want.
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.
00:45:39.700 It truly does go a long way.
00:45:41.660 I've been checking my mailbox every day.
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.
00:45:51.440 I can't get you a tax refund on CBC.
00:45:53.720 You're still going to have to pay them.
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.
00:45:59.880 Thank you.
00:46:00.300 God bless and good day to you all.
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.