Juno News - Why Canada needs to have a ‘grown-up’ discussion about immigration

00:00:00.000 We've spent a fair bit of time on the show in recent weeks talking about immigration.

00:00:13.460 Now, this was something that came up when I sat down with Conservative leader Pierre

00:00:16.980 Paulyev for a year-end interview, which was, well, I guess, as the name would suggest,

00:00:22.020 near the end of the year last year.

00:00:23.900 And I was asking about immigration, and I said, listen, we have a housing crisis.

00:00:27.280 You've talked about this.

00:00:28.240 Here are the immigration numbers.

00:00:30.080 Are those inflaming the housing crisis?

00:00:32.480 And he basically said, well, yeah, you have to do the numbers.

00:00:35.700 There are only so many houses being built.

00:00:37.420 There are this many people coming into the country.

00:00:39.320 But he would not commit to what his number would be.

00:00:43.000 Although he said that when he forms government, if he forms government, his immigration target,

00:00:48.400 which for the Liberals is 500,000 a year, but is truthfully higher than that when you take

00:00:53.000 into account foreign students, temporary foreign workers, and so on, that the number would be

00:00:57.940 tied to economic metrics.

00:01:00.020 It would be tied to housing.

00:01:01.420 It would be tied to labor force availability, and so on. 0.97

00:01:04.780 Now, I think there is a bit of an issue when we only look at immigration on the narrow economic

00:01:11.200 grounds.

00:01:11.700 While these are important, it is not the totality of the immigration issue.

00:01:16.140 There are issues to do with culture and integration.

00:01:18.660 These were very controversially discussed in the 2015 election.

00:01:23.020 But as a result, it's become this big no-go topic that no one is allowed to bring up.

00:01:29.080 Well, if there are issues here, and we're going to take an honest, high-level view of

00:01:33.320 immigration, can we have a grown-up conversation?

00:01:37.360 Aaron Woodrick, who is the Domestic Policy Program Director for the Macdonald-Laurier Institute,

00:01:42.440 had a fantastic piece over at The Hub about this.

00:01:45.460 Let's see if we can kick off this grown-up conversation.

00:01:49.060 Aaron, always good to talk to you.

00:01:50.380 Thanks for coming on today.

00:01:52.120 Always a pleasure, Andrew.

00:01:53.440 So let me just first ask you why this gets so narrowly pigeonholed into being an economic

00:01:59.980 issue, when obviously immigration is going to be more complex than that.

00:02:05.420 I think it's because it's safe turf for people, right?

00:02:07.860 If we're talking about economics, if we're talking about the obvious thing, which is that

00:02:11.660 we have a housing problem, and immigration as arithmetic, that I think is safe turf, I 1.00

00:02:17.580 think it starts to get a little more uncomfortable for people when they're starting to imply that

00:02:22.000 they're uncomfortable with large numbers of people who are not like them coming here.

00:02:27.240 And look, I understand why this is a minefield.

00:02:29.840 Some people can interpret this as just being hostile to people who aren't like you or racist.

00:02:34.860 I mean, there are people who are like that.

00:02:36.140 But a lot of it also is just human nature, right?

00:02:38.260 Like we are more comfortable around people like us who speak our language, who practice

00:02:42.920 our religion, who have the same cultural tastes as we do.

00:02:46.460 That's just human nature all around the world.

00:02:48.660 And so I think it is fair to have a conversation, especially in a country like Canada, which is,

00:02:53.640 as I make the argument in the piece, largely been built by immigration and fairly successfully

00:02:57.860 at that.

00:02:59.340 You know, what is the rate of immigration that we're all comfortable with?

00:03:03.680 That's optimal for Canada, that gives Canadians who are already here the most benefits, the

00:03:08.140 newcomers the most benefits, and that ensures that we can all continue to get along.

00:03:12.280 You know, this is a problem that a lot of countries are struggling with, and Canada is

00:03:15.100 no exception.

00:03:15.860 But we need to have this conversation out in the open, because pretending that it doesn't

00:03:19.900 matter and pretending that it's not creating any tension does not do us any favors.

00:03:25.140 I think there have been waves of this discussion, and I wouldn't say they've always been constructive

00:03:29.680 or productive.

00:03:30.460 I think post-9-11, certainly a lot of people were talking about the integration aspect of

00:03:35.160 immigration.

00:03:35.980 I think we're seeing another wave now.

00:03:38.140 And in Canada, you see this on a number of fronts.

00:03:40.600 I mean, you have ethnic tensions on the Khalistan Sikh separatism issue, especially out in some

00:03:46.740 parts of British Columbia.

00:03:47.860 You've got now the wave of anti-Semitism.

00:03:50.800 And again, I'm not going to broadly, in broad strokes here, malign any individual group.

00:03:56.140 But you have a lot of people that are immigrants from Arab or Muslim countries that have views

00:04:00.580 on Israel that don't align with, I think, where a lot of Canadians are.

00:04:03.280 And we see this in some of these protests.

00:04:04.920 You have, then on the other side, the gender ideology fights that were taking place in the 0.87

00:04:10.880 fall, where you had some of those same people, Muslims, saying, well, hang on, my values don't 1.00

00:04:14.900 align with these things.

00:04:16.000 So no one can say there isn't a conversation there.

00:04:19.920 But as we see, the longer you don't talk about it, the more hot it gets.

00:04:25.540 Yeah, you know, and that's a problem.

00:04:27.780 You know, we have to recognize that, you know, when we talk, for example, about integration,

00:04:33.000 right, about the idea that when you come to a country, you're kind of joining a national

00:04:36.800 project, right?

00:04:37.580 And nobody expects you to, you know, you move to Canada and the next day, suddenly you're

00:04:41.560 pouring maple syrup on your cereal and you've got the toque on.

00:04:45.400 And I mean, but what they do expect is that over time, you know, you kind of, if not

00:04:50.060 assimilate, which is a dirty word in a lot of quarters, integrate, sort of at least merge

00:04:54.280 your past with our future together.

00:04:56.600 I think most people think that's a reasonable compromise.

00:04:58.800 And there's all kinds of things that impact how that happens.

00:05:01.540 It's how many people from your home country are here when you get here?

00:05:05.320 Are you able to live in Canada, essentially amongst the community from your home country

00:05:09.400 entirely?

00:05:09.940 What does that impact, does that have on your integration?

00:05:12.400 You know, government, whether the government is signaling to you that there's an expectation

00:05:17.360 that you're supposed to start to adopt or integrate Canadian ways, you know, respect

00:05:21.380 Canadian laws, Canadian values, or whether it's sort of, you know what, you come here

00:05:25.440 and you can just do your own thing and you don't need to pay any attention to the national

00:05:28.380 project.

00:05:29.060 So there's a bunch of different factors at play here.

00:05:31.120 But I think most Canadians, I, you know, look, I, again, I think there are some who are just

00:05:36.280 genuinely, if someone has a different skin color, they don't like them.

00:05:39.060 I don't think that's most Canadians though.

00:05:40.360 I think most Canadians, it's what's more important to them is that people come here and they want

00:05:44.500 to be Canadian.

00:05:45.160 They want to feel Canadian.

00:05:46.200 They want to live together with other Canadians rather than side by side. 0.79

00:05:50.600 And I think that's the, I think that is the sort of general consensus that's really there.

00:05:54.240 We just have to figure out, you know, what's the right level of immigration that allows 0.99

00:05:57.440 us to get there.

00:05:58.720 Yeah.

00:05:59.120 And I would also say, even if someone views immigration purely as an economic calculation,

00:06:03.820 if there's enough space and there are enough jobs and enough resources, I don't really

00:06:07.520 care about anything else.

00:06:08.400 Let's just accept that premise for a moment.

00:06:10.720 There is a threshold that will exist for Canadians as how many is too many. 0.99

00:06:15.680 And it's not to say that they're right or wrong, but it's that people are going to have

00:06:19.040 their own threshold.

00:06:19.840 And once you push above that, whatever it is, you start to have Canadians turn on immigration

00:06:26.080 and turn on immigrants themselves, which I don't think anyone wants.

00:06:29.960 And I mean, it's an unpleasant conversation because we can say, well, Canadians shouldn't have 1.00

00:06:34.380 an issue with it if there's enough space and there are enough jobs.

00:06:36.940 But if they do, any government that overextends that is naturally going to, as you talk about

00:06:42.800 in your piece, erode that consensus around it.

00:06:46.400 Yeah.

00:06:46.540 And I think it's a sliding scale.

00:06:47.660 And I think what's important is that, you know, it's okay for some people to be uncomfortable

00:06:52.280 with people that aren't like them.

00:06:54.080 That doesn't necessarily make them racist.

00:06:55.780 And I really, really like to reserve that term for people who sort of are very explicit

00:06:59.720 in saying they think lesser of people who, you know, have a different skin color and

00:07:03.660 things like that.

00:07:04.220 Being, you know, just being more comfortable with people who speak your language or practice

00:07:07.740 your religion or things like that.

00:07:08.740 That's normal.

00:07:09.560 I don't begrudge people that.

00:07:12.060 And I think, you know, I think we need to allow for that roommate.

00:07:15.580 To me, the analogy to me, Andrew, is kind of like some people, they like to try different

00:07:19.820 kinds of food all the time.

00:07:20.980 That's just their personality.

00:07:22.200 They find it interesting.

00:07:23.260 They like the adventure.

00:07:24.480 Other people know what they like to eat, right?

00:07:26.640 And they want to stick with what they know.

00:07:28.020 And it's just that maybe it's a handful of things.

00:07:30.120 And there's nothing wrong with either of those.

00:07:31.420 Those are just different personality types.

00:07:33.140 And I think we need to be careful with Canadians when they express that preference that we're 0.99

00:07:37.300 not really making.

00:07:38.340 And I think that's the reason we don't have this conversation a lot of the time is people

00:07:41.260 are afraid that if they even say something remotely, like, you know what, I, you know,

00:07:45.400 in my own town, sometimes I feel like there's no one like me, even though I was born

00:07:50.080 in Canada, you know, people are wary of being called racist for saying that.

00:07:54.180 And I don't think that's fair to treat people that way.

00:07:57.660 And even on the economic side alone, you have, you know, basically what's an inherent

00:08:02.520 contradiction here.

00:08:03.440 You have, you know, some jobs that just, you know, we don't have enough people to fill

00:08:06.780 in Canada.

00:08:07.300 So we say, okay, well, we need to bring in all of these immigrants to fill those jobs. 1.00

00:08:10.840 And then, oh, well, we don't have enough houses to house the immigrants. 1.00

00:08:14.240 So we need to build more houses.

00:08:15.660 Oh, we need to build more.

00:08:16.620 Okay.

00:08:16.820 Let's bring in more immigrants to build. 1.00

00:08:18.300 Like, and it's this cycle that no one has really found an answer to yet.

00:08:23.160 Yeah.

00:08:23.700 And, you know, this is a problem that exists in a lot of countries where you kind of have

00:08:27.060 this almost imported labor for underclass.

00:08:29.340 You know, I've lived in different places, you know, places like the Middle East in Dubai,

00:08:33.380 where you have basically a whole imported class of slave labor.

00:08:37.880 I call it short of nothing short of slave labor, indentured labor almost.

00:08:41.800 And in a lot of other countries, it's the same thing.

00:08:43.920 Canada, we've had a bit of that.

00:08:45.040 We're seeing a lot more of it now.

00:08:46.840 I think that's why it's attracting more attention.

00:08:49.080 And a lot of cases, you know, employers will say, well, we can't find Canadians to do the

00:08:53.220 work.

00:08:53.920 In some cases, they could by raising wages.

00:08:57.480 That, of course, would lead to higher prices.

00:08:59.120 And I think Canadians might not love that part.

00:09:02.200 But part of it also is we don't talk about our entitlement system, right?

00:09:05.340 Especially with seasonal workers in Atlantic Canada.

00:09:07.840 Some employers, for example, have had a hard time trying to find people to work.

00:09:11.600 That's why they import foreign labor. 1.00

00:09:13.740 But that would, you know, if we reformed our entitlement system in Canada, things like

00:09:17.800 EI, you know, you would remove that disincentive to work.

00:09:20.640 So part of this is systemic, too.

00:09:22.420 And I think a lot of governments are just taking a shortcut.

00:09:24.440 The easy thing to do is just say, oh, yeah, we'll just kind of let people in through this

00:09:27.880 channel.

00:09:28.240 And that solves the problem.

00:09:29.320 It goes away.

00:09:29.760 But as we can see now, it creates a whole different set of problems when it comes to discussing

00:09:34.140 immigration.

00:09:35.240 Just on another note here, one of these issues that it's kind of like supply management in

00:09:39.860 that you have like nine people in Canada that really care about it from a policy perspective.

00:09:44.060 But those nine people really care about it, which is telecom regulation.

00:09:47.380 And I would say more people should care about it because, you know, it affects everyone.

00:09:50.820 You know, price of dairy, price of your phone plan.

00:09:53.200 I'm a Rogers customer.

00:09:54.760 I am on a contract right now.

00:09:57.440 So I think I'm a little bit safe.

00:09:59.000 But anyone who's not on a contract is going to find an increase, which I know will affect

00:10:03.060 me when it comes up for renewal.

00:10:05.200 Here we have an issue in which the conservatives previously tried to do a little bit with it.

00:10:10.740 They tried to basically allow Verizon.

00:10:12.840 And you'd think it was, though, like we were being invaded by Germany.

00:10:16.460 It was just like, how dare we let a foreign telecom company in? 1.00

00:10:20.380 The liberals say the right things.

00:10:22.000 They say, well, yeah, you know, competition we need.

00:10:24.300 But they aren't doing anything, as you pointed out, to allow competition.

00:10:27.600 What's going on here?

00:10:29.420 Yeah, look, and it's not just telecoms or supply management.

00:10:31.920 It's banks.

00:10:32.620 It's airlines.

00:10:33.340 There's a raft of sectors in this country where the reason there's no because we don't

00:10:37.480 allow it.

00:10:38.380 We have rules around foreign investment and foreign ownership.

00:10:41.000 And that is the reason for the lack of competition.

00:10:43.060 So I say to people, you have to pick a lane you can have on one side.

00:10:46.480 If you absolutely insist that all these companies be headquartered in Canada, be owned by Canadians, 0.82

00:10:51.680 by controlled by Canadians, you're not going to have enough competition. 1.00

00:10:54.560 You're going to pay high prices for things like telecoms.

00:10:57.120 The other alternative is you let in foreign competitors. 0.71

00:11:00.100 You'll see more competition.

00:11:01.440 You'll see price wars.

00:11:02.480 You'll probably get better customer service to boot.

00:11:04.440 The tradeoff will be some of our companies will not survive.

00:11:06.980 Some of our corporate giants are titans.

00:11:09.420 They are coddled.

00:11:10.160 They are protected.

00:11:11.140 They don't want competition, Andrew.

00:11:12.920 They're afraid of it.

00:11:14.520 And, you know, I made this remark elsewhere.

00:11:15.820 When it comes to trade and business, anytime there's talk of a new trade deal or loosening

00:11:20.200 restrictions, you see Canadian business divides into two camps.

00:11:23.380 One camp is excited.

00:11:24.840 They're ambitious.

00:11:25.580 They say, you know what?

00:11:26.160 I can go out there.

00:11:26.880 I can take over the world.

00:11:28.140 You know, I can dominate.

00:11:29.120 And then you have the other half, which are terrified.

00:11:31.400 They do not want competition.

00:11:32.620 They're afraid of global competition.

00:11:34.480 Why?

00:11:34.660 I want to know why our governments always side with the terrified group and never double down

00:11:39.540 on the ambitious entrepreneurial group that see, you know, competition as an opportunity

00:11:43.740 and a challenge, not as an existential threat.

00:11:47.080 Yeah.

00:11:47.480 And I think the, I mean, I remember you and I first met, I don't even know if you remember

00:11:52.120 this, but it was a Fraser Institute student seminar, however many years ago, back when

00:11:56.880 they used to do those and they bring in a bunch of, you know, rambunctious young students

00:12:00.940 to talk about policy.

00:12:01.920 I don't know if they still do them, but they were great fun.

00:12:04.100 And, you know, at the time I was a bit of a rabble rouser.

00:12:06.440 And I remember at university, I sat in through this one session that you all had to do if

00:12:11.880 you were part of a club on campus and the head of the club's program, as always, who's

00:12:16.340 like a raging lefty, gave this big, long lecture about how we're not allowed to sell food as

00:12:20.920 clubs because there are vendors on campus that sell food.

00:12:24.140 And she used the line and everyone knows competition makes prices go up. 1.00

00:12:29.480 And I was like, I don't know if I could agree on that, but everyone, like it's the opposite.

00:12:36.120 I mean, even like raging Marxists, I think, concede that competition will, except for this

00:12:40.180 one, will lower prices.

00:12:42.000 They may say it's not good to do so, but no one can argue that competition wouldn't be

00:12:46.260 better for consumers here.

00:12:48.240 No, but the problem that the government has from a stakeholder standpoint is it's not

00:12:51.840 good for the incumbents, right?

00:12:53.140 It's not good for Rogers and Bell and Rogers and Bell, I mean, we see this over and over

00:12:58.560 in other sectors.

00:12:59.320 What they do is they start trying to spook the public with job losses, right?

00:13:03.000 They say, oh, well, if we had a competitor in here, we're going to have to lay off all

00:13:06.060 these people and then governments don't want the bad headlines.

00:13:08.080 So they back off.

00:13:09.120 And of course, they never want to tell you the other half of that is that, you know,

00:13:11.980 someone else is going to be doing that job.

00:13:13.700 I mean, when, you know, when Walmart moved into Canada, that wasn't good for certain

00:13:17.340 Canadian retailers that were their competitors, but a lot of people work at Walmart in Canada

00:13:21.360 now.

00:13:21.680 So they created jobs on the other side of the ledger.

00:13:23.580 So, you know, I think it's disingenuous.

00:13:25.620 It's self-serving.

00:13:27.400 Obviously, any business that's doing well wants to keep doing well, and they're going to pull

00:13:30.840 all the levers they can, including trying to pressure governments into not allowing

00:13:34.660 more competitors, I think as consumers, as voters, we need to be very, very aware about

00:13:38.600 that.

00:13:39.260 They're not looking out for our interests.

00:13:40.640 They're looking out for their own self-interest.

00:13:42.640 And really, if we're really interested in competition and lower prices, it shouldn't

00:13:46.660 matter, you know, which company is delivering that.

00:13:49.080 What should matter is that consumers are getting lower prices and better service.

00:13:52.960 Yeah.

00:13:53.180 And telecom is probably a great example because everyone's had a terrible customer service

00:13:57.540 experience with every one of the companies.

00:13:59.300 And everyone's had at a certain point, a call drop on every one of them.

00:14:02.540 But they all claim to have, like, the fastest network, the largest network.

00:14:05.900 So they're all the same.

00:14:06.760 It's purely a matter of which one has your business at a particular point in time.

00:14:10.900 And I think, you know, anything that would change that, I would be all for.

00:14:13.880 So an opportunity for the Conservatives, possibly.

00:14:17.000 Aaron Woodrick, thank you so much as always, sir.

00:14:19.520 Thanks a lot, Andrew.

00:14:20.360 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:14:22.820 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

00:14:28.480 www.tnc.news.

00:14:30.480 www.tnc.news.

00:14:32.540 www.tnc.news.

00:14:36.440 www.tnc.news.

00:14:48.260 www.tnc.news.

00:14:49.220 www.tnc.news.

00:14:50.060 www.tnc.news.

00:14:50.900 www.tnc.news.

00:14:51.920 www.tnc. Evident.

00:14:52.880 www.tnc.news.

00:14:54.040 www.tnc.news.

00:14:54.820 www.tnc.news.

00:14:56.960 www.tnc.news.

00:14:57.620 www.tnc.news.

Juno News - January 14, 2024

Why Canada needs to have a ‘grown-up’ discussion about immigration

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript