Juno News - Woke corporate virtual signalling month begins

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's most irreverent talk show.

00:00:05.040 This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:14.960 Hey, welcome along. This is the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.

00:00:19.380 Happy beginning of Pride Month. Sorry. No, I got it all wrong.

00:00:24.140 It's not Pride Month anymore. I just learned today, believe it or not,

00:00:28.900 It's extended and has effectively colonized the rest of the season.

00:00:34.100 This is a page from the Government of Canada, the Department of Women and Gender Equality.

00:00:39.660 It is no longer Pride Month.

00:00:41.440 In fact, it is Pride Season. 0.86

00:00:44.140 Yeah, right there.

00:00:45.660 And if you read it, it's a Pride Season is a term that refers to the wide range of Pride events that take place over the summer, June to September.

00:00:55.340 when 2SLG, I don't know all the letters here,

00:00:59.940 and it's too small for me to read,

00:01:01.040 communities and allies come together to spotlight the resilience,

00:01:04.780 celebrate the talent.

00:01:06.080 May to September, that's longer than summer, actually.

00:01:09.680 So that is basically the entire, a third of the year,

00:01:13.600 May, June, July, August, September, more than a third of the year,

00:01:16.040 pushing half of the year.

00:01:17.540 And this is now what it is.

00:01:19.500 I remember when I was younger, I think it was Pride Week,

00:01:22.660 and then it was Pride Month and now it's Pride Season.

00:01:26.000 In fact, give it a couple of years and it'll just be Pride Year 1.00

00:01:28.680 where instead of watching the ball drop, we'll just have a progress flag hang

00:01:33.380 and it'll be the whole year until we get around to January 1st again.

00:01:37.480 We'll talk about that in just a moment.

00:01:39.620 Let me first off, though, talk about this video that was making its way around the Internet,

00:01:44.780 partly because of me and True North yesterday,

00:01:47.260 of Pierre Polyev and Justin Trudeau going at it with each other

00:01:51.300 in the House of Commons yesterday.

00:01:53.860 Pierre Polyev, you know, talked about Justin Trudeau being a drama teacher.

00:01:57.660 Trudeau had, I'd say, a fairly good response.

00:02:00.800 He said, yeah, I was a teacher before,

00:02:03.700 but I'm having trouble remembering what Pierre Polyev did

00:02:06.540 before entering politics.

00:02:08.040 You know, Polyev's been in politics his entire adult life,

00:02:10.900 so that's a good joke. I'll give him that.

00:02:12.740 And then Polyev just, like, comes out swinging, 0.69

00:02:15.500 shots fired, hits the red button and says, I'm having trouble remembering why Justin Trudeau

00:02:22.420 left in the middle of the semester. Cue the, oh, from the House of Commons. Now,

00:02:29.960 if you were watching this thinking that the House of Commons is a place where matters of state are

00:02:34.520 discussed, you were sorely disappointed. I mean, exchanging barbs is great for clips. It's not

00:02:39.040 exactly good for democracy but it has also spawned huge huge huge waves of speculation rumor and

00:02:49.680 discussion online about what it is that people are saying Pierre Polyev was intimating or alluding to

00:02:56.560 about Justin Trudeau and I don't want to talk about this for a long period of time here because

00:03:00.840 this was actually a fairly poignant and potent discussion in 2019 during the election campaign

00:03:07.720 when a lot of people were talking about Justin Trudeau's time teaching at the West Point Grey Academy in BC,

00:03:14.060 which he did, by all accounts, abruptly depart and has given very conflicting reasons as to why.

00:03:21.340 But I have to, in having this discussion, say that anyone who is definitive and speaks as though it's fact

00:03:29.940 about the existence of an NDA, about sexual misconduct allegations,

00:03:35.660 about you know oh Justin Trudeau spent 2.5 million dollars to silence a former student

00:03:40.880 there is no evidence supporting any of it and I'm very serious about this I believe facts matter

00:03:46.240 you can think Justin Trudeau is creepy you can think he's a bad prime minister you can think

00:03:50.840 all of these things about him but in all of the time that was spent on this story in 2019 there

00:03:57.680 was never anything even remotely resembling proof a lot of the allegations came back to

00:04:04.080 stories that were published in something called the Buffalo Chronicle, which is not

00:04:08.420 a legitimate news organization by any stretch. And I don't mean that, you know, I don't like

00:04:13.380 their bias or their standards. I mean, it's literally just a clickbait mill. There's no

00:04:17.900 journalistic rigor to anything they do. And I put questions about this to Justin Trudeau directly.

00:04:23.900 I said, you know, look, you've talked about people experiencing things differently. Have you

00:04:28.960 ever done anything that looking back, you might think maybe could have been construed differently?

00:04:34.380 He said, no. Marika Walsh from the Globe and Mail, she questioned him about this and said,

00:04:38.920 point blank, are there any NDAs with anyone that you have? And he said, no. Now, obviously you

00:04:44.240 can't prove a negative. You can't go up and say, I can 100% affirm that nothing like what people

00:04:50.580 have rumored about has ever happened, but there is zero evidence that anyone has put forward

00:04:56.420 suggesting it has. And I have to say that anyone saying otherwise is making it up or is reading

00:05:05.800 someone who made it up. So I believe facts still matter. And you know me, I'm not one to carry

00:05:10.420 water for Justin Trudeau, but I think that people need to be honest about this sort of stuff.

00:05:13.900 And yeah, I'm all for, you know, little fun barbs that are sent on across the aisle in the House of

00:05:19.780 Commons. But, you know, I've been seeing so many people on Twitter saying, oh, Andrew, are you going

00:05:22.960 to focus on this story and talk about this there is no story there and if someone presents evidence

00:05:27.420 of something great I'll look into it but it's not been there but all that aside I want to talk about

00:05:32.800 the beginning as I said at the outset here of pride season which is now extended from the week

00:05:39.600 to the month to the entire May to September period and we'll soon probably just creep out from there

00:05:45.880 because we are now in the midst of the great rainbow washing of western civilization which

00:05:52.460 means everywhere you look you're going to see not even the old school rainbow flag which like a year

00:05:57.360 ago was replaced by this other thing called the progress flag because the rainbow flag which has

00:06:02.760 the colors of the rainbow was deemed insufficiently inclusive so they had to add they had to add like

00:06:08.360 a triangular insert that had colors for transgender people and black people and other groups as well

00:06:16.180 and at a certain point I mean we'll have a belief that this is probably not sufficiently inclusive

00:06:21.460 and we'll add an insert on the other side

00:06:23.140 and it'll be an abomination of graphic design.

00:06:26.100 But the reason I bring this up is to say

00:06:28.680 that all of the corporations who right now

00:06:31.100 are washing their logo in rainbow colors

00:06:35.440 are only interested in doing it in some markets.

00:06:39.460 They're going for the low-hanging fruit

00:06:41.380 of pride observances here.

00:06:43.540 And I want to just focus on a couple of the highlights here.

00:06:46.220 Take a look at the Mercedes-Benz Twitter page.

00:06:49.700 Oh, look at that.

00:06:50.740 A little rainbow hue around the Mercedes-Benz logo.

00:06:53.740 A global brand, a luxury car.

00:06:56.220 Obviously, this is something they are very passionate about.

00:06:59.000 They want everyone to know that you can be who you are and be proud of who you are and celebrate it.

00:07:03.780 And they must be doing this on all of their brand pages, right?

00:07:07.240 Let's look at another one.

00:07:09.480 Weird.

00:07:10.720 Weird.

00:07:11.200 The Mercedes-Benz Middle East social media manager doesn't seem to have gotten around to fixing that up yet.

00:07:18.800 All right, let's try another one.

00:07:20.000 Cisco's a big tech company.

00:07:21.200 Let's look at Cisco's Twitter page.

00:07:23.700 Okay, yeah, the little waveform there, rainbow.

00:07:27.060 Let's look at Cisco Middle East.

00:07:30.560 Strange.

00:07:31.220 I don't see any multiple colored things there.

00:07:33.880 All right, this must just be a mistake.

00:07:35.700 How about General Electric?

00:07:37.000 This is, again, another big global brand.

00:07:38.940 How's General Electric bringing in Pride season,

00:07:41.660 the arrival of it starting June 1st?

00:07:44.200 Oh, wow.

00:07:44.920 See, they've gone the full progress flag there.

00:07:47.260 Every minute of every day, GE rises to the challenge of building a world that works.

00:07:52.480 A global brand.

00:07:53.360 Well, they must want progress and pride around the world, right?

00:07:56.520 How's GE Saudi Arabia's Twitter account looking?

00:08:01.120 Huh.

00:08:02.040 That is as grab and gray as it gets, but still committed to building a world that works.

00:08:08.940 My goodness, it's almost as though these big giant corporations

00:08:13.080 that want to just cloak themselves in the rainbow flag of the progress

00:08:16.760 like don't actually care about it.

00:08:18.900 Perhaps it's just because they're scared of being bullied

00:08:21.160 if they don't change their colors for the month of June.

00:08:24.620 Maybe it's like what happened with Black Lives Matter 1.00

00:08:27.120 where any company that didn't do the blackout of its social media 0.94

00:08:30.980 was deemed to be a Haiti hateful, white supremacist, racist, bigot and all that.

00:08:35.800 Or maybe some of these companies only care until it's difficult. 0.83

00:08:40.700 And that is why I think it's such a problem here.

00:08:43.520 Right now, you have this culture in which people will go for the lowest hanging fruit possible.

00:08:49.400 What's easier than changing your Twitter profile picture?

00:08:53.180 That is the easiest thing you can do to say, I stand with you.

00:08:56.360 If you really wanted to take a stand, you'd stand up for gay rights in places like, oh, I don't know, Uganda, 0.92

00:09:02.280 which a couple of days ago passed stricter laws restricting homosexuality.

00:09:07.220 You could even have the death penalty in Uganda if you are guilty of quote-unquote aggravated homosexuality. 0.63

00:09:14.680 Whatever that means. Does it mean being gay and angry at the same time? Who knows? 0.97

00:09:18.120 But this is what Uganda believes passes for justice. 0.68

00:09:21.220 Now, five years ago, when Uganda had similar restrictions on homosexuality,

00:09:26.600 Justin Trudeau sat down with him in New York, the head of state of Uganda, and oddly didn't bring it up.

00:09:34.400 It didn't come up when Justin Trudeau was talking to his counterpart in Uganda,

00:09:37.940 perhaps because Trudeau was courting votes for his United Nations Security Council seat,

00:09:42.820 and all of a sudden it didn't matter who in the world, 0.53

00:09:46.500 which of these African tinpot dictators had these horrendously antiquated 1.00

00:09:51.000 and offensive and bigoted views on homosexuality and other things 0.96

00:09:55.140 and how they wanted to throw the arm of the state against these people,

00:09:58.980 but that doesn't come up.

00:10:00.120 We don't get condemnation of gay rights violations in the Middle East from these big corporations.

00:10:06.380 They just stick to the old standard logo there.

00:10:09.700 But in the West, say, we stand with you.

00:10:12.340 People are being lied to and pandered to by these corporations who are doing the bare minimum.

00:10:19.280 If they actually cared, they would take a significant stand.

00:10:23.080 So the problem that we have is that there is a mob-like effect here.

00:10:27.340 Take a look at Anthony Bass, who I don't cover sports often.

00:10:31.120 I'm told he is a baseball player.

00:10:33.260 I don't know if he's a quarterback or a defensive end or anything like that,

00:10:37.000 but those are baseball positions, I think.

00:10:39.100 But Anthony Bass made the mistake of sharing a Christian influencers video on YouTube

00:10:44.960 that had nothing to do with gay rights.

00:10:47.320 It was about the boycotts taking place in the U.S. of Target

00:10:50.380 over its embrace of gender ideology, including for children.

00:10:55.060 And he shares a video saying,

00:10:56.700 you know what Christians it's biblical to not want anything to do with Target and here's why 1.00

00:11:01.200 it's an inoffensive video people may disagree with it he then has the mob descend on him to

00:11:07.500 such a point where he has to give this horrible apology that the Toronto Blue Jays trots out in

00:11:13.500 which he apologized commits himself to re-education whatever that means and then he comes out and

00:11:20.120 yesterday his first appearance since this whole controversy he is booed now all the media that 0.99

00:11:25.780 reported on that, said Anthony Bass was booed because he was a big, dirty, homophobe transphobe. 0.95

00:11:31.220 I think, you know, knowing sports fans, and I've met a few of them, he may have been booed because 0.96

00:11:35.820 of his apology, which seems to have angered far more people than the initial so-called infraction

00:11:42.140 did. But all of the people that get outraged about the Blue Jays and Anthony Bass, the people

00:11:46.900 that get outraged about a Twitter account not having a rainbow flag, these are the people who

00:11:52.000 oftentimes are turning a blind eye to real injustice around the world and neglect as one

00:11:57.520 gay friend and colleague of mine said to me earlier today that Canada is one of the best

00:12:02.400 places in the world to be a member of the LGBT community which is why people from around the

00:12:08.620 world who face real bona fide oppression for their sexual identity like places in Iran in Chechnya

00:12:15.880 Russia in African countries why they all risk life and limb to come to Canada so anyone who 1.00

00:12:22.680 says Canada is the problem here needs to look in the mirror and look around and see are you taking

00:12:29.080 the easy stand or are you going after the real injustice here Sue Ann Levy my colleague who has

00:12:34.680 been a very outspoken member of the gay community herself a lesbian woman joins me and I normally

00:12:40.140 don't introduce anyone by their sexual identity except in this case I think it is relevant

00:12:44.760 because suanne you see companies all the time uh in your name and in the name of of other people

00:12:50.500 in who are lesbian gay bisexual transgender say we're with you but only when it's easy to do so 1.00

00:12:56.640 i'm wearing my rainbow watch so in honor i mind i see i'm doing like the saudi arabia thing i 0.59

00:13:06.060 just have the black you're blacked out yes well you know it's interesting because you're you're 1.00

00:13:13.140 absolutely right. I was listening to your narrative and you're absolutely right. And this is exactly

00:13:19.520 what I wanted to talk about is that, you know, particularly radical queer people who are trying

00:13:27.700 to foist either gender ideology or any other, you know, the numerous letters in the acronym LGBTQIAST,

00:13:40.280 You know, they are just willfully blind, I think, to the human rights abuses in many countries where gays and lesbians are thrown off roofs. 0.67

00:13:53.580 They could suffer the death penalty. You named some. Uganda is a most recent example. 1.00

00:13:59.980 Yemen, Nigeria, many Muslim countries in the Middle East.

00:14:03.420 And this is the thing that always got me, is that Israel is always picked on for its human rights abuses.

00:14:10.880 Meanwhile, all the Arab countries around it do not tolerate homosexuality in the slightest, including Saudi Arabia.

00:14:21.460 And many of the gays and lesbians from those countries will find safe refuge in Israel or in Canada or wherever.

00:14:29.160 It's a huge democracy.

00:14:31.300 But, you know, these, these companies, I mean, I think I'm rather sick of all the, you know, the virtual signaling that they've, you know, the comments on Twitter, the comments on social media. You know what it's all about, Andrew? It's about appealing to the pocketbooks of gays and lesbians. 1.00

00:14:51.580 because you know you've heard of dinks double income no kids although that's changing because 0.72

00:14:56.140 many gay and lesbians have children now but they see a huge resource there i saw it in the pride

00:15:02.380 parade many many years ago in toronto pride parade where all the corporate sponsors would be marching

00:15:07.740 handing out freebies uh beer companies banks whatever one of the banks that actually i find

00:15:15.820 most obnoxious about oh this is the one i bank at td bank okay i know you are accepting but

00:15:23.740 everybody forgets about all the abuses around the world and that's what we should that's the fight

00:15:29.580 we should be having right now because when 70 countries don't allow homosexuality in some form 0.99

00:15:36.060 we've got a problem yeah i agree and and the problem with that argument i i realize is that

00:15:43.260 you know, there are gradations in injustice.

00:15:47.400 You know, you can have a smaller injustice in Canada

00:15:49.640 and a larger injustice in Uganda.

00:15:51.140 And I don't think you should have to turn a blind eye

00:15:53.120 to the smaller one just because there is a larger one.

00:15:55.660 But I also do think context is important.

00:15:58.340 And I've heard stories, I've heard interviews

00:16:00.500 with people who literally faced the death penalty

00:16:03.720 because of their sexual identity in another country.

00:16:06.920 And Canada was the place that welcomed them with open arms,

00:16:09.600 that gave them asylum,

00:16:10.540 that gave them the right to have, you know, to marry, to live their lives.

00:16:15.880 And people who do this, I think, have a lot more insight than those who look around and

00:16:23.240 say that the big problems are if a company doesn't, you know, put up the pride flag or

00:16:27.900 if a school, a Catholic school doesn't put up the pride flag.

00:16:30.860 And that's why I don't like the idea that everyone has to have the exact same lockstep

00:16:36.640 view on this thing.

00:16:38.900 Yeah, you know, it's interesting.

00:16:40.120 I think there's a big divide because the big divide in the community now, certainly in Canada,

00:16:45.320 and I live a charmed existence here in Canada. I married my wife in 2009. We have no issues.

00:16:52.440 We're accepted as a couple at our synagogue, wherever. In fact, my synagogue just invited

00:16:58.000 me to a pride service on June 17th to mark Pride Month. I mean, that's how far we've come. But

00:17:04.600 But there are, I mean, I'm in my 60s, and there are people in my age group and older who had to fight for incredible rights way back in the 80s and 70s and 80s.

00:17:18.480 And I lived in the closet for 20 years, so I know, I mean, I wasn't fighting, I was hiding.

00:17:24.360 But the ones who are now gay and living in a very accepting environment, they are the ones who get their noses out of joint with all this stuff. 1.00

00:17:33.920 they're the ones who engage in mob rule about flags and about you know flags not being flown

00:17:41.480 at a catholic high school i think people of my generation who had to fight the good fight or

00:17:46.440 lived in the closet or were afraid to come out they understand the difference they understand

00:17:52.040 they're more understanding of the it's a complicated you know that complicated decision

00:17:58.240 sometimes about the intricacies and i absolutely hate the mob rule when it comes to you know

00:18:05.080 foisting this down people's throats you and i have talked about this in other contexts than just

00:18:10.640 you know issues to do with sexual orientation and identity but the one thing that strikes me here is

00:18:16.340 that there is a subset an activist subset whose goal is not just breaking down barriers to civil

00:18:23.400 rights and general discrimination and even systemic discrimination. But there's a group who

00:18:28.620 seems they will never be satisfied until every single person doesn't just tolerate, but embraces

00:18:35.260 every single aspect of this. And by that, I mean, you know, there are people that will never be

00:18:40.640 comfortable with the fact that, you know, some Christian denominations, Jewish denominations,

00:18:45.300 Muslim denominations don't respect gay marriage, may view same-sex relationships as sinful. And

00:18:50.700 And I'm curious what you think about that, because my view, and I say this as someone who's not a member of this community, is that, you know, if you have all of the legal rights available, and generally speaking, I've seen people walking around, even in Calgary last week, you know, gay couples holding hands that didn't seem, to my view, they were being harassed, that if there are individual people in society that are intolerant, that is never really going to go away.

00:19:17.120 Like, there are still some people, I believe, that are probably uncomfortable with interracial relationships, even though those, I think, have been legal and widely accepted.

00:19:25.800 And am I being too accepting of intolerance, or do you agree that there's always going to be that, and our goal can't be 100% complete tolerance in society?

00:19:35.480 Well, there are people who, there are religions, for example, the Orthodox sect of the Jewish religion still doesn't accept really gay marriage.

00:19:46.120 I couldn't get married in an orthodox synagogue. Islamic religion, most Muslim people do not accept gay marriage. And, you know, this particular Catholic high school you're talking about, our Catholic education center, the York Region Catholic Board, they, you know, they have children who've come to their schools to get a religious education.

00:20:11.000 it's not that they're not accepting they just don't have to beat the drum about it and I think

00:20:16.160 the activists expect everybody to beat the drum about it well I the way I feel is I walk with my

00:20:24.620 wife we do our we live our lives like very normal people like we fight like you know heterosexual

00:20:32.340 couples we have you know make up like uh heterosexual couples and the fact that no one 0.55

00:20:38.600 bothers us and no one says anything and no one cares no that's the operative word no one cares

00:20:45.860 like i don't understand these activists why they have to make a big deal about it they want to yeah

00:20:51.240 yeah because that to me is the very definition of tolerance if people go around and they don't

00:20:58.320 care people who say well you know i you know maybe i don't like uh you know this or that but i don't

00:21:02.700 really care live your life be who you are i mean that because that ideally should be the goal but

00:21:07.060 but you are right i mean the mob has basically made it where unless you're out there waving the

00:21:12.140 progress flag you're a bigot well i thought we had reached that you know i thought we had gotten 0.54

00:21:18.440 over all of that the big fight see what's happened and you know i alluded to it is that i think

00:21:24.180 there is a real divide between mainstream members of the gay community like myself and my friends

00:21:30.760 and the radical activists who now are espousing queer theory and much of that relates to gender

00:21:39.880 ideology and the trans ideology and the organization for example a gal which is right 1.00

00:21:47.660 across canada and fought for my rights and i'm very appreciative appreciative of what they've

00:21:53.200 done have now they they have no more fight for lgbt lgb rights now they have to find another

00:22:01.220 cause and that's what's happened is that all these queer activists they don't have a fight because

00:22:06.700 you know most of these gays and lesbians uh have rights so it's people of color are more oppressed

00:22:14.060 trans people are more oppressed i mean you know screaming and shouting uh to me is just

00:22:22.600 unpleasant it really is unpleasant yeah when you're and the intersectionality you're right 0.51

00:22:28.540 about here i mean now the idea of you know an upper middle class white gay male couple like

00:22:34.900 they they're barely they're barely less oppressed than me to some of the activists that say no we

00:22:39.920 need to prioritize black trans lives indigenous two-spirit lives and all of that and i do think

00:22:45.820 and you and i have talked about this before adding the t to the lgb has has really muddled this for

00:22:51.760 a lot of people because it is a very distinct issue with different political consequences

00:22:56.580 certainly when you're talking about you know gender affirming care for children about women's

00:23:00.440 only spaces definitely definitely and i think that's the pendulum has swung so far on that

00:23:07.240 um i mean we could talk for an hour about our feelings about that and i certainly think that

00:23:12.700 you know what's happening with ramming gender ideology and pronouns out kids throats at the 0.96

00:23:19.440 age of five, six, seven, I've written a number of stories about that, which is happening in the

00:23:24.100 school system, is just so inappropriate. It borders on obscene, I think. And, you know, so that,

00:23:31.500 and many of the mainstream gay people would agree with me, would feel the same way. So

00:23:37.140 you've got this bunch of activists who are very loud and are making noise and holding everybody 0.92

00:23:47.500 up to these ridiculous and impossible standards. 0.57

00:23:51.760 And, you know, it's a bad time, I think, 0.99

00:23:55.740 because of the division in the gay community.

00:23:59.240 Sue Ann Levy, my colleague at True North,

00:24:01.220 thanks so much for coming on and enjoy.

00:24:03.120 You don't get a month now.

00:24:03.860 You get a whole season, the government of Canada says.

00:24:05.640 Oh, my God.

00:24:06.620 I'm going to be wearing my stripes for months.

00:24:10.340 All right.

00:24:10.760 Well, I'm still sticking with the black watch band.

00:24:13.500 It's the only one I have.

00:24:14.380 Thanks very much, Sue Ann.

00:24:15.520 Thank you very much. We are going to turn away from the culture wars for a moment here and go

00:24:22.380 back to Alberta politics. We talked about this last week. I talked about it for hours and hours

00:24:27.100 and hours on Monday night in Calgary, where the UCP was crowned victorious in this year's Alberta

00:24:34.980 election. Danielle Smith returns to the Alberta legislature with another majority government,

00:24:39.980 albeit a bit more narrow than the one the UCP heading into the election. I want to welcome

00:24:44.640 into the show here, Chris Sims. She is the Alberta Director with the Canadian Taxpayers

00:24:49.700 Federation and obviously has been covering this extensively. We saw her with my colleague

00:24:54.980 Rachel Emanuel on True North. Chris, what are your first thoughts on the election results?

00:25:01.740 Nice to be on here and it was nice to see you on Monday night, of course, during our

00:25:05.500 big election coverage. We're pretty pleased with the policies that the UCP was promising

00:25:11.940 during the campaign. So to back up a little bit, even before the election, the UCP government

00:25:18.280 passed a law saying that they would have balanced budgets and that they would rein in their spending

00:25:24.600 and tie it to the rate of inflation and population growth. Now, that's a big deal. It sounds kind of

00:25:31.400 dry, but it's a really big deal because that keeps the government from just splurging. If they get a

00:25:37.220 big surplus, if oil is good that year, it keeps their spending in check. It's something that the

00:25:42.240 CTF has been asking for since the 90s. Like the Backstreet Boys were topping the charts when we

00:25:47.220 were last asking for this. So we were super happy to see that. They also agreed to seriously pay

00:25:52.480 down the debt in a big way. So again, this is all law. This wasn't even something they had to

00:25:56.780 campaign on. They're going to put 50% of their surplus down on the debt every year. That's

00:26:02.820 really similar to what the late Premier Ralph Klein did when he put 75% down. That's how he

00:26:07.860 held up that paid in full sign. And so we're really pleased to see the promises that now that

00:26:12.800 they've made during this election, including things like strengthening the Taxpayer Protection Act

00:26:17.120 by saying, hey, you know what? If we want to increase your personal income taxes or business

00:26:22.500 taxes, you need to have a referendum on it first and the government needs to win it. So there's

00:26:29.280 some pretty serious promises we're seeing so we're pretty happy with that yeah let's talk about the

00:26:33.740 referendum aspect because stuff like this i i find it is useful in some ways but not in others

00:26:40.060 because governments that want to get around it can get around it i mean it's not a constitutional

00:26:44.020 requirement so theoretically a future government could say we're just going to change the law

00:26:48.160 requiring the referendum and pass the tax on our own but i guess my hope would be that it either

00:26:53.340 reflects or creates a culture where governments in Alberta do not look at the taxpayers as ATMs.

00:27:00.880 Exactly. And I think especially in Alberta. Now, I'm a transplant. Our family moved out here in

00:27:07.820 the summer from British Columbia. And I will say one of the biggest differences I've noticed here

00:27:12.880 in Alberta is the grassroots activism and how engaged people are. I mean, you can send out an

00:27:20.060 email with a heads up of like a few days saying, hey, come to this pub in Red Deer if you want to

00:27:25.740 hear about balanced budget legislation, like the cost of just transition, and 200 people will show

00:27:32.800 up. Like, it's really remarkable. I've never seen anything like it. And apparently, it's just par

00:27:37.760 for the course here in Alberta. And what's interesting is that right now, the Taxpayer

00:27:42.940 Protection Act in Alberta is the reason why we have no PST. It's currently the only element of

00:27:49.740 the Taxpayer Protection Act. It is that you will have to win, government, a referendum before you

00:27:55.180 put in a sales tax. Good luck with that. So that's why we have no PST. So we're hopeful that it'll

00:28:01.940 have that same level of sharp teeth when they expand it. Well, and just on that note of direct

00:28:08.040 democracy here and of citizen engagement, the Kenney government also passed, I think it was

00:28:12.560 Bill 52, if I'm not mistaken, which allowed for recall of politicians. And I think even of specific

00:28:18.760 bills, if I'm not mistaken. So again, you know, there's another level of democracy. If a politician

00:28:23.620 goes against their word, goes against their promise, there's a very high bar. But there is

00:28:28.260 a bar nonetheless that groups of people that get together in Red Deer and across the province can

00:28:32.300 say, no, we are recalling you because you have failed to uphold your mandate to us as an MLA.

00:28:37.980 That's right. And before that, the only jurisdiction in Canada that had that rule

00:28:41.960 was British Columbia. And it was used almost successfully one time. Basically, the MLA

00:28:47.560 realized he was going to get recalled and then quit. And so it worked well that way. And so

00:28:52.220 Alberta, not to be outdone, did pass that law. But what's really interesting is that they did BC1

00:28:57.800 better. It's extended to city level too. They did it as a two banger with that law. So now

00:29:04.960 municipal city councils can get recalled as well. It's a really important tool. Like you said,

00:29:11.060 the threshold is high. It's not as if you get a couple of disgruntled people in Red Deer somewhere

00:29:16.600 that they're going to pull down the whole government, but it's that tool in the toolbox.

00:29:21.640 It's that little tap on the shoulder so that if an MLA or a premier or whatnot, or a city

00:29:26.780 council or a mayor starts messing around. Exactly. Or exactly. Or a school trustee starts messing

00:29:32.700 around and getting into hot water. There's that extra, oh man, I could lose my job. But there's

00:29:38.020 a flip side too, which I find really interesting and fair. It doesn't just fire them. It holds a

00:29:44.000 by-election so that say there were some group that was really mad about whatever reason and a lot of

00:29:51.600 people perceived it as being unfair and they fomented this big campaign and they said let's

00:29:56.520 have a by-election hey if that person's voters and that riding says you know what bob did a good job

00:30:02.980 we still like bob he can keep his job he just needs to win the by-election and that's happened

00:30:07.860 in the states in a couple instances so it's a really interesting tool yeah that is actually

00:30:13.640 an interesting point. And I think it's actually quite a valid one. I mean, there have been

00:30:18.080 arguments in favor of anyone who crosses the floor should have to be reelected under that party's

00:30:23.840 banner. And again, I mean, whether there's a legal mechanism that should do that or not is something

00:30:27.940 that other people can decide. But I don't think there should ever be a case where MLAs lose sight

00:30:33.180 of what they're there to do. And I feel oftentimes, especially in minority governments, where you

00:30:38.140 don't have like the sort of Damocles over your head, there can be a very easy way for an MLA

00:30:43.620 to get there. They've got a four-year blank check. They know that voters aren't going to

00:30:47.160 start paying attention for maybe another three years so they can do what they want. And certainly

00:30:51.420 at the federal level, we've seen that. I mean, what's happened when we've given the government

00:30:54.660 the credit card without a spending limit? Yeah, exactly. It's that, you've probably

00:31:00.000 seen that cartoon where this, the couple is standing there and Justin Trudeau is running

00:31:03.800 around flinging money everywhere. And one of them's happy. And then the wife is telling the

00:31:07.960 husband, he's got your wallet because he's flinging it everywhere. Yeah. I got my climate

00:31:13.340 action is sent of a few weeks back too and i was like oh money i was like wait wait i already paid

00:31:17.660 them this is my money exactly it's your money that having been washed through levels of bureaucracy

00:31:23.420 thank you very much for your donation um but here in alberta we have those swords built in now at

00:31:29.260 every level of government and so we're really happy about it and you know the reason why we're happy

00:31:34.380 about it is because the taxpayers federation we're grassroots you know we take you know non-refundable

00:31:39.340 you know non-receidable donations we don't take money from taxpayers you know we have thousand

00:31:43.680 supporters across the country most of them are you know small town farmers those sort of folks

00:31:48.540 and they often will email us with things like you know i i want lower taxes i'm worried about

00:31:54.920 my neighbors because they're using a food bank like really direct stuff and so to see this kind

00:32:01.620 of direct democracy and these tools being put in the hands of the people of alberta it's just a

00:32:06.520 very good thing. I know conservatives, some conservatives, and I use that with the capital

00:32:11.840 C here, not the lower C, have come to fear the CTF because the CTF is unafraid to call out when

00:32:17.720 so-called conservative politicians go against their pledges. You know, Aaron O'Toole comes to

00:32:22.960 mind, you know, running as the big true blue conservative and then all of a sudden find some

00:32:26.980 weird like air miles carbon tax hybrid to run on in 2021. I know you, like anyone else in media,

00:32:34.180 has come across Danielle Smith on many, many avenues over the last several years,

00:32:39.300 when she was in media, when she was a business advocate.

00:32:41.860 As premier, has she been receptive to the issues that CTF has tried to put forward?

00:32:47.240 Very much so.

00:32:48.780 So like you, yes, of course, we've interacted with Danielle personally over the many, many years.

00:32:53.260 I think actually you were there when Danielle and I were like concocting plans for world domination at Red Lobster or something.

00:32:58.360 I was sitting right there at the table.

00:33:00.520 I happen to remember that conversation. And here she is. Premier, can I just take my CTF hat off for just a second? And just as like a human being, it's pretty remarkable. Like this political comeback. She was, you know, all that stuff that happened with Wild Rose, the floor crossing. She lost her seat during that time. And now here we are one year from when I think you and I were talking about this.

00:33:27.140 And she's elected to a majority as premier. It's a pretty remarkable comeback. And I would say the same thing if she were wearing like a red or orange jersey, just objectively speaking. It's a pretty remarkable comeback politically here in Canada. And so to put the CTF hat back on, yes, she has been very receptive.

00:33:44.760 Interestingly, one of the first things we did is we asked all of the UCP leadership candidates to sign our pledge, promising, if I'm premier, never, ever a PST.

00:33:55.320 Uh-uh, not going to happen.

00:33:56.620 And she signed it right away.

00:33:58.480 And what's interesting is during the signing, and I hadn't mentioned this to her at all.

00:34:02.500 It was just her kind of nerding out, as she would put it.

00:34:05.380 she's signing it and she says hey I really liked the paper you guys did like 15 years ago where

00:34:11.700 you said if you put enough money into the heritage savings fund we could get rid of an income tax

00:34:16.440 like wouldn't that be neat in the future I'm just like yeah that would be neat did she write that

00:34:22.720 on the pledge as well because that might have been a good appendix to uh to try to bring up with

00:34:26.760 I should have called her on it and said put a writer on that you know yeah yeah exactly but

00:34:30.940 yeah to you know yes the short answer is yes and even during the election campaign they agreed to

00:34:37.540 a lot of things like opening up the taxpayer protection act and before that they agreed to

00:34:42.560 balance budget legislation debt repayment saving money in the heritage fund a lot of the meat and

00:34:47.640 potato things that the ctf has been asking for there's one little thing if we could push it for

00:34:52.720 one more thing we would really like to see put in the taxpayer protection act and that's the carbon

00:34:57.360 tax. So it's going to sound weird, but of course, right now, there's just a federal carbon tax.

00:35:04.140 What happens if that gets scrapped? What prevents whatever provincial politician is here in Alberta

00:35:10.560 from creating a provincial one here again? It was awful when Premier Rachel Notley had sprung one

00:35:16.580 on Albertans, but they got their say-so on that. Now we're forced to pay Justin Trudeau's

00:35:23.020 mandatory minimum carbon tax. And people here really don't like it. And so we would like one

00:35:28.220 more change to the Taxpayer Protection Act. And that is to put a provincial carbon tax shield

00:35:34.300 in there. Yeah, that would be, I think, a very, very good one. And if I have the chance to sit

00:35:39.720 down with the Premier in the coming months, I'd like to ask that. So do remind me if you get wind

00:35:43.660 that she's coming on the show. I will. Before I let you go, Chris, I want to ask you about that

00:35:47.620 Ralph Klein paid in full? Because I think that it's very difficult to unwind government, which

00:35:54.200 is why putting a PST in place, for example, would become permanent. I just know it. I know that it's

00:35:59.940 going to become very easy for a government to look at the numbers when something like that was in,

00:36:04.220 if it were ever in and say, you know, to roll this back would just be too costly. Is it possible to

00:36:10.060 get back to that paid in full? Or has debt just become such an accepted part of doing business

00:36:16.460 now as government that there's no real appetite to make those tough calls anymore that's a great

00:36:21.180 question and again i would say the same thing if the numbers were there for an ndp or liberal

00:36:26.940 government but here in alberta the debt clock is going backwards like i've never seen it happen

00:36:34.160 before so rewind about six or eight months or so ago uh the government at the time before the

00:36:40.700 election, put down the biggest one-time payment on the debt. So they got a surplus, they had some

00:36:46.780 savings, they had some money to actually use. And instead of just blowing it, now I'm sure they

00:36:52.240 wasted money on the margins here and there that we haven't found yet, but they put a big chunk

00:36:57.100 down on the debt. And so now the debt, again, it's an astronomical number, it's around 73 billion

00:37:03.480 dollars, but it's going down. They're reducing the debt. And they already passed legislation saying

00:37:09.220 50% of the cash surplus must now go down on the debt, or they'll penalize themselves, or, you know, we're allowed to chase them around in a fibra costume, or I can bicycle lock my neck to their leg. Like, you know, we will make them keep their promises. And so here, debt is on the radar. I don't think that's quite broken through at the federal level yet.

00:37:34.320 like the the folks in the parliamentary press gallery aren't really paying attention to that

00:37:38.980 yet but i'll tell you when that debt servicing cost also known as your interest payment on the

00:37:45.400 federal debt eclipses line items like national defense or health care or something like that

00:37:53.060 they'll start paying attention then do you guys have i you lived in ontario previously i know so

00:37:58.760 you may know this do you guys have the uh an alberta equivalent of the ontario opportunities fund

00:38:03.620 which is this stupid thing in ontario where you can like voluntarily donate your tax refund to

00:38:08.540 pay down the provincial debt oh which is like mike harris did it and apparently it gets like 0.94

00:38:14.240 i don't know forty thousand dollars a year or something but i'm like but in alberta i might

00:38:18.340 actually trust that the government would be responsible with that in ontario i don't i was

00:38:22.480 never going to give kathleen winn my tax refund or anything here's a bag with no no hole on the

00:38:28.400 end of it right yeah um but yeah yeah promise but probably um but in all seriousness anyone can make

00:38:36.600 a donation they would just have to contact the treasury board yeah it's for real find out their

00:38:42.440 direct deposit or their mailing address and give money to them in fact i don't recommend that ever

00:38:48.600 no no i'm not but it's like i really believe in alberta and i want alberta to be able to do that

00:38:53.080 again because it sets the standard for every other province in the country that you don't get to just

00:38:57.360 run your government and run your affairs on debt and pretend that that's the only way of doing

00:39:01.860 things. Yeah, exactly. And it's an example I actually give to a lot of folks when I'll be

00:39:06.260 online or whatever and post something like, hey, we've got tax cuts or reductions here. And they're

00:39:10.660 like, I'm happy paying more taxes. And I'm like, well, here's the address of Revenue Canada.

00:39:14.760 Feel free. You know, take my portion. And so we're very hopeful, but we're also practical.

00:39:22.340 They made a lot of big promises during this campaign. So we're going to have to work really

00:39:27.000 hard on the ctf side of things to hold them accountable for those promises and we will 0.91

00:39:32.400 all right chris sims from the canadian taxpayers federation good seeing you monday thanks for

00:39:37.380 popping in today really appreciate it thank you all right that does it for us for today we've got

00:39:43.020 to wrap things up there tomorrow we will have a special interview with aaron gunn that you won't

00:39:48.420 want to miss that's going to be in depth about his new documentary canada is dying which again

00:39:53.480 has been making waves

00:39:54.800 and I think is a very important one to watch,

00:39:56.660 plus Fake News Friday,

00:39:57.980 and then we'll be back

00:39:58.960 with regular programming next week.

00:40:00.880 So thanks to all of you

00:40:01.840 and have a lovely, lovely afternoon.

00:40:04.200 God bless and good day to you all.

00:40:07.300 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:40:09.880 Support the program by donating to True North

00:40:11.940 at www.tnc.news.

Juno News - June 01, 2023

Woke corporate virtual signalling month begins

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