Off the Record - Liberal MPs want Trudeau OUT!

00:00:00.000 what do you guys decorate your house with oh my goodness lights and pumpkins and inflatables and

00:00:05.840 but um my main rule is that it's not like scary like i really don't like kind of ghastly looking

00:00:10.780 halloween decorations it's all cartoony and so because we have lots of little kids that go by

00:00:15.900 in the neighborhood so i love hearing the little kids like oh it's the spooky house they love it

00:00:19.940 so is it part of the fun of halloween just scaring the kids no i i like them delighted

00:00:26.000 and a little bit intrigued but i don't actually want to scare them scare them i'm not really like

00:00:31.040 a big fan of halloween decorations myself so i'm glad to hear that you uh keep things at bay i'm

00:00:36.220 not like going for my evening walk and like crossing the other side of the street to get by your house

00:00:40.380 there's like some zombie crawling out of my garden no i don't do that because i think that's yucky

00:00:44.900 no my even my witch is happy she's smiling and she's making a potion yeah she's not like some

00:00:50.040 scraggly thing so no that is the most fun thing that i've done so far this week there's been a lot

00:00:54.680 less fun in politics uh which is why we're gathered here today friends and neighbors do

00:00:59.680 you want to get started let's do it let's get it started

00:01:03.020 hey there i'm chris sims i'm with the canadian taxpayers federation i'm here with my good friends

00:01:16.140 at true north for our off the record show so we got started chatting about halloween and whether or not

00:01:21.660 we'd like to be scared um some of these moments for prime minister justin trudeau as far as his

00:01:27.360 leadership goes have got to be scary he might be having an out-of-body experience because his

00:01:32.860 members of parliament are having a i'm out of here experience i don't know who wants to take the lead

00:01:37.540 on this either rachel or noah um but it looks like more and more mps are saying you know what

00:01:42.420 i'm kind of out of here including cabinet ministers that have played some pretty uh tense roles over the

00:01:48.780 last few years who wants to start with that yeah i can start with this i covered this a little bit

00:01:53.300 on the rachel parker show earlier this week in which also your colleague chris joined the show

00:01:59.580 to discuss the latest of the carbon tax that was of course franco terrizano the federal director of

00:02:05.580 the ctf he kind of came and broke down the numbers for us but essentially you know the pbo report the

00:02:11.220 parliamentary budget officer report this does all tie together revealed that canadians are getting less

00:02:17.140 in carbon tax rebates that they pay out oh i know such a shocker all of you at home are like wow

00:02:22.280 i'm just learning that for the first time obviously not this is par for the course at this point we know

00:02:28.620 we all know that we're getting absolutely screwed by the carbon tax it is making life harder and more

00:02:34.800 difficult for canadians and so even at this point liberal mps are picking up on the fact that this

00:02:41.480 policy is very unpopular among their constituents and that it is causing a lot of problems then we

00:02:49.060 had sort of an exclusive report from althea raj at the toronto star in which she covered a meeting

00:02:56.540 among liberal mps and they are now talking about submitting a letter calling on prime minister

00:03:03.140 justin trudeau to resign they had about 30 to 40 mps according to the report that would be willing

00:03:08.940 to sign such a letter which is not half yet they need about 75 for it to be half but that is still

00:03:14.260 quite a large number of liberal mps who are willing to put their name to a letter calling on the leader

00:03:20.220 of their party and the prime minister of canada to resign and to allow for leadership race to select

00:03:26.320 someone new who might be a little more popular and might win back some of the constituents that they've

00:03:31.380 already lost and some of the votes that they will be likely to lose of course these mps don't actually

00:03:36.540 care about the carbon tax per se but they do care about is their jobs and they recognize that they

00:03:41.380 are likely going to be losing their seats and their jobs in the next election which should come maybe

00:03:45.800 within the next year and so this all ties back to the carbon tax because then there was also another

00:03:51.300 report from david aiken of global news who said that some liberal mps are even calling on the prime

00:03:56.240 minister and saying that it's time to do away with the carbon tax one of them was even quoted as saying

00:04:00.340 we might as well get rid of it because we know that once pierre polyev is prime minister he's going to

00:04:04.920 scrap it anyways and so all of this ties together because canadians are so frustrated with the

00:04:10.900 liberal government with their policies and with the constant seeming corruption and now even liberal

00:04:15.700 mps are turning their backs on trudeau i think it's a little too little too late if you will um you know

00:04:22.340 nothing liberals do at this point could i think really win back those votes i think they've betrayed

00:04:26.860 canadians for too long and so i think these whisperings now years into this carbon tax crisis

00:04:33.760 of maybe it's timing to turn the page i just don't think it's going to do enough for these

00:04:37.340 constituents who are looking to hold on to their seats now i think you're right on that in politics

00:04:42.440 uh how is it everything happens gradually until it happens all at once and so this could be one of

00:04:48.580 those moments where everything suddenly happens all at once i'm old enough to have been on the hill

00:04:53.600 back when then finance minister paul martin mused out loud that maybe he wasn't so confident in

00:04:59.320 jean cretchen during a press conference all hell broke loose so everything the wheels fell off they

00:05:04.860 had to have a leadership all this other stuff happened so everything was tickety-boo on the

00:05:08.800 surface and then all of a sudden everything jumps out uh noah what was your take on this for me

00:05:14.400 i think it really boils down to these members of parliament are taking a lashing every time they go

00:05:21.180 back to their constituents every time they go back to their riding they don't live next to the

00:05:26.120 governor general in a mansion they live primarily out in their ridings and they're just taking it on

00:05:31.120 the chin from their constituents who are fed up from not being able to afford anything and so it's

00:05:35.880 easy for the for the prime minister to insulate himself with trusted staff and just pretend that

00:05:41.280 everything's fine and the carbon tax doesn't cost people money even though all of the report shows

00:05:45.520 that it does and i think this really shows this could be a linchpin of caucus revolt what would

00:05:50.540 your take on this noah yeah i think it's pretty interesting that the atlantic caucus is some of

00:05:56.460 the is the mps that are pushing forward for the trudeau to step down most stringently because

00:06:02.320 they are the ones who are probably hearing it most at the doorsteps and i'm pretty sure all liberal

00:06:08.180 mps are hearing it when they go to mps in atlantic canada that actually makes a lot of sense because

00:06:15.300 you know you might think that oh the atlantic caucus might be a bit happier because of trudeau's

00:06:20.520 exemption on home heating oil however it is the atlantic provinces that are hit hardest by the cost

00:06:26.540 of living crisis because these are some of the poorest uh provinces in the federation if you look

00:06:33.240 at the uh provinces listed by gdp per capita it is new brunswick nova scotia and pei that is at the

00:06:40.440 bottom and newfoundland and labrador is a bit above them but they are still some of the one of the

00:06:45.360 poorest regions in the country so any cost of living crunch that hits canadians is going to hit the

00:06:51.100 poorest provinces first so it is no doubt that the atlantic mps are telling trudeau that hey you know

00:06:57.900 our constituents they are feeling the pressure from the carbon tax more than anyone in the country

00:07:02.260 we need you to do something about uh your the carbon tax and the incessant messaging that this is

00:07:08.260 something that is benefiting canadians that canadians are getting more out of the carbon tax

00:07:12.400 than they actually are paying into the system which is not true once you look at the parliamentary

00:07:17.200 budget officer and the calculations that they made with the fiscal and economic impacts of the carbon tax

00:07:23.200 and you know liberal mps right now especially in atlantic canada they are looking to keep their job

00:07:28.480 um that some of the people in for example newfoundland and labrador who uh the liberals they hold six out of

00:07:34.680 the seven seats in that province uh they're most of them are probably going to lose a re-election or

00:07:39.820 um 338 canada projects that only two of the seven uh liberal mps that are currently elected in newfoundland

00:07:47.500 labrador would keep their job only eight only three liberal mps would get elected in nova scotia down from

00:07:53.900 eight uh they would lose all of their seats in pei currently the liberals have all four seats in pei they

00:08:00.300 would lose all of them uh and just in general the unemployment rates in these provinces are going

00:08:06.000 up and up so i think that it is no doubt that not only are canadians atlantic canada feeling the

00:08:12.540 pressure uh but canadians all over the country are but especially in atlantic canada where the

00:08:18.080 liberals are you know imposing policies that are harming canadians the most and you're not hearing

00:08:23.360 that sort of pushback from you know albert mps or saskatchewan mps because they have none they only

00:08:28.380 have one uh in alberta and you know it's not like you know conservative mps haven't been vocal

00:08:33.960 in their opposition to the carbon tax to begin with so i think we are really seeing uh the sea

00:08:38.760 change and the carbon tax definitely is having an impact on these mps's concerns yeah for sure uh

00:08:44.800 so we have we have one mp uh who's a liberal mp in calgary george chahal and we have one liberal

00:08:51.920 cabinet minister up in edmonton randy bosano people might remember him from some pretty infamous

00:08:57.800 committee appearances in the last few months and so i know for a fact that angry taxpayers are

00:09:03.580 filling their inboxes right now leading up to this caucus meeting and i just wanted to nerd out a

00:09:09.040 little bit because i know that our viewers here at true north um there are a few steps above when it

00:09:13.760 comes to political analysis they they know how the game works and so they know they like to know how

00:09:18.480 these different machinations happen in ottawa so the reason why a caucus meeting is super important

00:09:24.300 is one they happen on wednesdays so if you notice that the question period on wednesdays

00:09:31.140 is feistier and louder and more rowdy that's because they've just finished a three hour long

00:09:37.000 rah rah yelling morning meeting on those wednesdays now the key about caucus meetings is that one they're

00:09:44.540 supposed to be off the record not including this show two they're supposed to be a time for the lowly

00:09:51.820 backbenchers to be able to speak truth to the power of their party they are supposed to get an open mic

00:09:58.120 and be able to raise concerns of their constituents even with the grand poobah the boss of the party the

00:10:04.000 leader of the party in this case the prime minister and so that is why these meetings are key and that is

00:10:10.860 why if these stories that were coming out the last few days about a document signing pledge signing all

00:10:16.200 that stuff goes that's why that is so important because then they're trying to get enough people

00:10:22.320 imagine you're in school and you're having a fight with the rival gang of kids and you're trying to

00:10:27.720 get more kids over to your side to over topple the bully or the most popular kid it's just like that

00:10:33.180 except they're using your money so it this is what's key so leading up to this coming wednesday

00:10:38.840 this could be the start of a caucus revolt now i don't know what form that takes

00:10:43.180 because they as far as i know rachel or noah you may know this better they don't have the same

00:10:48.460 mechanism that the conservative party did when they ousted erin o'toole so they can't just take

00:10:54.760 him down as far as i know within the caucus for an in an in caucus vote as far as i understand

00:11:00.260 but what would be curious is what if they sat by themselves so back when enough uh canadian alliance

00:11:07.440 mps for example again i'm dating myself in the early 2000s were unhappy with the leadership of

00:11:11.940 stockwell day uh former alberta treasurer they went and sat by themselves the democratic representative

00:11:18.520 caucus if i remember them named correctly and so that caused a lot of upheaval and they had to have

00:11:23.280 a new leadership race and so i'm curious do either of you think that it could go that far

00:11:27.720 that they could say you know what i'm not sitting with you in class anymore go eat your lunch by

00:11:32.420 yourself i don't know that i trust the liberal caucus to have enough courage to do something like

00:11:38.880 that as i already mentioned i think they've really left this to the 11th hour it's too little too late

00:11:44.860 you're not going to be able to win back the trust of canada or your constituents by these half-hearted

00:11:49.640 efforts to remove prime minister justin judeau i mean at this point liberal mps aren't even willing

00:11:53.700 to put their name this is all just stuff that's been leaked to the media anonymously um and so no one's

00:11:59.040 even really put their names to these accusations or to publicly voice you know their concerns with

00:12:04.880 prime minister justin judeau and yes i understand that when you're a member of a caucus you're really

00:12:09.040 risking your neck when you come out and speak against the leader but there's some reports saying

00:12:13.380 there's as many 30 to 40 of liberal mps who are unhappy with prime minister justin judeau so the

00:12:18.560 best thing that they could do for themselves right now is to start speaking about that publicly

00:12:21.760 get the momentum behind you get the ball rolling have more liberal once one person comes out and start

00:12:27.900 saying it publicly usually there's a chain reaction of more people who are willing to speak up once that

00:12:32.700 initial it's sort of like one police this is a maybe a bit of a bizarre comparison but you know

00:12:38.220 if a if police arrest someone and they say this individual is being charged with with sexual assault

00:12:43.700 we have reason to believe that there might be um there might be more victims and at that point the

00:12:48.200 police kind of put out the call and say if there's any more victims please come forward and a lot of

00:12:51.960 times what you'll see is you'll see a whole bunch more people come forward because one person was willing

00:12:55.920 to speak up and and to make those first claims i think that's generally true for most things in life

00:13:00.940 if one person is willing to have the courage to speak on their convictions it'll kind of get the

00:13:05.460 ball rolling and that's really what we need to see coming out of autobody now we need to see these

00:13:09.020 liberal mps coming forward and being vocal and i'm sure there's many many other mps within the

00:13:15.080 caucus who are unhappy with prime minister justin judeau's leadership um but it would be a fairly

00:13:19.620 simple thing to get that going forward right now especially considering reports that up to 40

00:13:24.240 members of the caucus are unhappy with with trudeau that's nothing to sneeze at it's more than three

00:13:29.460 dozen people well well maybe a bit more pessimistic but i think there's a few problems that pollutes

00:13:36.060 the liberal caucus and that is self delusion self-interest and there's a collective action

00:13:41.840 problem so i i think the liberal mps are pretty delusional uh because they've been down in the

00:13:47.960 polls for a quite a long time now i think it's been a year and a half since the liberals have been

00:13:52.440 trailing the conservatives in the polls by double digits and they've only really woken up to that fact

00:13:57.240 after the loss in toronto saint paul's i think a lot of liberals thought that they not only would

00:14:02.100 win that uh by election but they would perform pretty well in that by election and you know

00:14:06.680 reality hit them right in the face and it only took until then for them to really start to you know pipe

00:14:12.360 up and you know here we get into the collective action problem where uh a lot of liberals they don't

00:14:18.880 want to speak up because they fear that they're going to face retribution uh and you know it's in their

00:14:24.700 self-interest in order to stay in the liberals because they are delusional they think that you

00:14:29.480 know they're going to either win the next election and they would be able to maybe get a parliament be

00:14:34.120 a parliamentary secretary or get into cabinet or you know they think that you know pierre is just

00:14:38.680 going to be some one-term prime minister and if they just stay in the liberal caucus for a long

00:14:42.980 long enough they're going to be able to dethrone pierre and you know 2029 and then then you know they

00:14:48.180 get their parliamentary secretary position or you know get included in cabinet and you know i don't know

00:14:54.340 g uh john yves to close um cabinet or whatever i don't know who would become the liberal prime

00:14:59.620 minister or leader after this but you know there's they're delusional and they are just acting within

00:15:06.260 their own self-interest they want to be you know big shots in the liberal party uh especially if you're

00:15:11.780 a backbencher who recently got elected in 2019 or in 2021 you want to you know be a big shot and you

00:15:18.660 and you know sitting as an independent isn't going to get you down that path so i think you know

00:15:23.760 they're a bit too delusional they're acting way too much in the self-interest and all that is

00:15:28.040 contributing to a collective action problem in which liberals they don't want to show that court

00:15:32.300 courage a few months ago wayne long he spoke out basically said trudeau should step down and every

00:15:37.280 every uh liberal mp kind of looked at him it's like yeah you know you go buddy you know you you you

00:15:42.920 speak out on on your own terms and we're not going to follow you you know they sort of hung him out to

00:15:47.820 dry which is a bit of a shame but it just goes to show that you know like these liberals they

00:15:51.880 they they are looking out for themselves and that's about it a couple of things and we'll

00:15:56.420 move on to our next delightful topic uh one before anybody starts pitying these members of parliament

00:16:02.500 for their fear about speaking out number one they're literally members of parliament they're paid to talk

00:16:10.740 they're paid to speak on behalf of constituents who elect them to parliament that's literally why they're

00:16:17.080 called that two they're paid more than two hundred thousand dollars per year with pretty much every

00:16:22.560 single expense that you could imagine paid for i'm talking travel a lot of their housing is covered

00:16:27.860 their food is covered when they're in ottawa for goodness sake they have three hot meals a day

00:16:32.200 given to them right in the lobby of the house of commons so before you start fearing for the feelings

00:16:37.840 of these backbench members of parliament who are too chicken to stand up and speak for their constituents

00:16:43.180 i'm looking at you george tahal you should remember that you're paying their wages and that you are

00:16:49.240 their boss lastly i do find it really interesting that by and large the liberal mps who are the ones

00:16:56.200 speaking up on this as you pointed out earlier guys are often from the atlantic caucus and in my

00:17:02.900 observation that is often because one there's a cultural difference when it comes to politics

00:17:08.160 especially with the older set in atlantic canada i've got family from there i lived out there

00:17:13.180 um especially with the older set who vote and who are members of parties it's like a cultural

00:17:19.740 representation for them it's like are you anglican or are you catholic or are you protestant it's like

00:17:26.220 are you a liberal or are you a tory like they talk like that like you're born into it in some cases so

00:17:31.840 they take that kind of identification really seriously and what that does is that it makes you look at

00:17:38.340 whoever the leader of the party happens to be as some johnny come lately because your great granddaddy

00:17:43.640 used to be a part of this party and you're not taking any tips from him so i find that really

00:17:48.520 interesting that some of the more courageous stances that we've seen coming from liberal mps

00:17:53.600 have come from the atlantic caucus which is also why they got that concession out of trudeau to give

00:17:59.920 an exemption on the carbon tax for furnace oil because almost all the furnace oil used to heat

00:18:04.460 homes in canada is located in nova scotia and in prince edward island and to a lesser extent in new

00:18:10.500 brunswick fascinating fascinating times okay another this was riveting but i didn't get a chance

00:18:16.560 to actually watch it because it's not exactly in the taxpayers federation wheelhouse so i was busy

00:18:21.400 writing my alberta pre-budget report which i'm sure you'll just really love to hear about rachel

00:18:25.340 over lunch um so there was this whole inquiry going on about alleged foreign interference

00:18:31.240 in our democratic system and what's happening in canada and we actually saw prime minister justin

00:18:37.280 trudeau give testimony for lack of a better term in regards to this and now there's a full-on fight

00:18:44.900 between prime minister justin trudeau and leader of the opposition pierre poliev basically trudeau

00:18:51.020 saying uh i have information i'm paraphrasing showing that there are conservative mps who could

00:18:57.260 have been compromised by foreign influence and foreign interference and now pierre poliev is shot

00:19:02.900 back saying okay name them noah did you want to give a breakdown of you know the blow by blow that

00:19:07.700 happened this week yeah sure so uh you know i saw all the chaos on twitter like everyone else yesterday

00:19:14.640 and i was like you know what's going on so you know this is what happened so basically trudeau was

00:19:19.540 called to testify at the foreign interference inquiry and you know he's supposed to testify about

00:19:24.380 what he knows and what the canadian what he can disclose to the canadian people but instead of you

00:19:30.060 know keeping it as a serious non-partisan affair that affects our democratic institutions he decides

00:19:35.280 to make it political he decides to make it a partisan affair by accusing the conservative leader of

00:19:40.960 basically being derelict in his duties to ensure that his party is not you know holding people who or

00:19:48.060 are not you know keeping people who have participated in foreign interference especially with china or

00:19:53.340 with the indian government however you know this is prime minister just to choose job he knows all

00:19:59.060 the names uh in the uh report that came out a few months ago that lists about a thousand not thousand

00:20:05.680 eleven uh elected mps or candidates who had participated in foreign interference he knows all the people on

00:20:12.580 that list jagmeet singh does uh elizabeth may of the green party also does uh pierre poliev has decided

00:20:19.080 not to read the report because if he does so he's not allowed to speak on what he has read and it will

00:20:25.600 limit his ability to hold the prime minister and the government to account so he has chosen not to

00:20:31.800 read the report however his chief of staff is given the security clearances necessary to read the report

00:20:37.980 and he and his chief of staff has been in contact with prime minister justin trudeau's national security

00:20:43.540 advisor in order to give them updates and give them uh some findings from the report whether or

00:20:49.320 not conservative candidates for mps have that are currently sitting in parliament have participated

00:20:54.900 in foreign interference uh the national security advisor did not disclose any conservative politicians

00:20:59.680 who have participated in foreign interference so it is incumbent upon the prime minister to let the

00:21:06.360 party leaders know if there has been people in their parties who have been participating in foreign

00:21:10.140 interference and that is not what the prime minister has done yet he has been putting the blame on to

00:21:16.880 pierre poliev so uh it really just goes to show that prime minister justin trudeau is pretty desperate

00:21:23.000 he is trying to hang on to power and he's trying to uh flip a scandal that you know he bears

00:21:29.740 responsibility for onto the party that is not even in government onto the party that you know doesn't even

00:21:35.980 have access uh and the permission to disclose uh classified information like is in that report

00:21:43.420 so pierre poliev he released a statement laid out the facts that his chief of staff is has the security

00:21:49.280 clearance and that um that he has not been given that information from the the liberal national

00:21:55.740 security advisor and he is calling on prime minister justin trudeau to release the names of all the mps

00:22:01.900 who have participated in foreign interference or has been a victim of foreign interference um they

00:22:08.380 have demanded this stringently and i think that a lot of canadians are really concerned uh with

00:22:13.540 members of parliament that have participated in foreign interference going into an election perhaps

00:22:18.200 next year we don't want to be voting for someone who has participated in foreign interference what do

00:22:23.600 you think uh about this chris i think uh rachel lost her connection but what do you think about this uh chris

00:22:28.260 so it's pretty serious um and for people who haven't read up on this uh so i highly recommend uh the

00:22:36.640 investigative journalism work of sam cooper so if somebody has not read about this yet go read the

00:22:42.500 work of sam cooper i think he's originally from bc he did a lot of his work out in british columbia

00:22:47.640 um and he was on this case years ago because there's a lot of foreign interference and influence

00:22:55.200 especially in the west coast of bc coming from the chinese communist party so when it comes to

00:23:01.080 accountable government which is a key element of the canadian taxpayers federation um we always want

00:23:06.300 accountability we always want transparency so we think inquiries like this are really important

00:23:10.540 um what i found key here this is my take so having i worked in ottawa i lived there for 20 years

00:23:17.260 what i think has gone on here apart from all of the allegations of foreign interference

00:23:22.320 is this is a kind of a a turf war between pmo and its privy council and csis so anyone who's worked

00:23:32.680 in like the little terrarium that is the ottawa bubble knows who the big dogs are so that's like

00:23:39.700 pmo with its privy council and csis slash rcmp that's a big doghouse there too for sure when it

00:23:46.760 comes to who calls the shots and when um we saw at a previous inquiry i believe it was into whether

00:23:53.340 or not the emergencies act should have been invoked um we saw some kind of flare-ups happening then

00:23:59.760 with then prime minister justin trudeau's testimony as well uh disputing who had what power to say what

00:24:06.840 is what between him or csis it was shortly after that if i recall correctly that bob fife and stephen

00:24:14.380 chase both of whom i worked with very well they're now at the globe and mail um got information

00:24:19.340 allegedly from someone at csis about these allegations and these allegations are super

00:24:25.380 important they're allegations of things like potential uh election interference uh potential

00:24:31.700 threats or bullying of members of parliament or potential members of parliament and their families

00:24:36.460 like across party lines potentially like these are really serious allegations and so that is my

00:24:42.240 understanding why we are having this inquiry what i found really compelling is that prime minister

00:24:51.060 justin trudeau instead decided to say oh well uh i've also seen conservative names on that list too

00:24:58.200 but yet we haven't seen this list so my question is why haven't we seen this list is this some key

00:25:04.780 element of national security that we're not allowed to see it why haven't we seen the list what's also

00:25:09.520 interesting is how aggressively pierre polyev is coming out defending this saying you know what man

00:25:15.600 you know paraphrasing put up or shut up like release the list and him having confidence in his chief of

00:25:22.240 staff like that is really important as well ian todd is one of the most respected staffers on parliament

00:25:27.540 hill i think he got his start under preston manning when he was leader of the official opposition

00:25:32.340 so this is this is getting more tangled up as the days go by rachel did you want to jump in on this as well

00:25:37.800 yeah i would just say chris to your point as to why we haven't been given the list to me it's fairly

00:25:44.260 simple i don't think the government works for us anymore the government really exists to serve and

00:25:49.360 protect its own interests of course canadians have every single right to know who was on that list who

00:25:54.700 was working with foreign governments it is it's it's it's it's treachery it's treachery to your nation

00:26:00.060 and to the people of your nation if you were knowingly working with foreign agents while being a

00:26:04.760 member of the canadian government or even cerking or even seeking to be a member of the canadian

00:26:09.700 government canadians have every right to know who was on that list and these people should be

00:26:13.620 charged criminally and the fact that we don't know is actually an abomination and it just speaks to the

00:26:18.220 fact that we have fallen so far from what our government was created and what canada was created

00:26:23.060 for and what our government was set out to do we've fallen so far from those goals and those interests

00:26:27.840 and i do hope that we as a canadian people can get back to demanding more from our elected officials

00:26:32.780 we need so much more accountability for the record i wanted to play the clip it's long and it's kind of

00:26:40.060 hard to listen to at times and it's prime minister justin trudeau at this inquiry i want folks to really

00:26:46.600 pay attention to the language he's using here and how he's responding to the questioner take a listen

00:26:51.500 i am prime minister and privy to all these informations i have the names of a number of

00:26:58.660 parliamentarians former parliamentarians and or candidates

00:27:03.440 in the conservative party of canada who are engaged or at high risk of or for whom there is clear

00:27:17.680 intelligence around foreign interference and i have directed cesus and others to try and

00:27:26.940 inform the conservative party leader to

00:27:33.080 be warned and armed to be able to make decisions that protect

00:27:41.540 the integrity of that party of its members from attempts at foreign activities around foreign

00:27:49.720 interference and the decision by the leader of the conservative party to not get those classified

00:27:58.000 briefings means that nobody in his party not him um nobody in a position of power knows the names of

00:28:10.760 these individuals and can take appropriate action

00:28:14.520 quite the answer so again it was i think it was that answer that prompted poly of to release that

00:28:25.360 letter which was very strongly worded and like calling saying that the prime minister is lying

00:28:30.240 like using the word lying so really fascinating i don't think i don't think we're going to see the

00:28:35.420 end of this uh guys do you think there's going to be another couple of manila envelopes being

00:28:39.000 trotted across elgin over to the media road anytime soon yeah i i think that we are going to see some

00:28:47.660 more leaks uh like we have been seeing especially in 2023 when there's just leak after leak after

00:28:53.140 leak uh on the foreign interference issue but you know what really like irks me is that trudeau said

00:28:58.560 that like oh yeah nobody in a position of power uh no you know it can take action against these

00:29:03.840 conservative uh mps or candidates i mean like you are in a position of power you're literally the

00:29:09.080 prime minister why why why can't you do anything why can't you stick the rcmp or csis onto these

00:29:14.800 people who are engaging in foreign interference allegedly and you know get them arrested uh we

00:29:19.340 know that conservatives have been the victims of foreign interference if you look at kenny chu and

00:29:24.040 michael chong who have been harassed uh and potential uh election shenanigans uh was happening

00:29:30.040 to get uh to prevent them from being elected uh kenny chu in that case successfully uh so we have

00:29:36.240 evidence of conservatives being targeted uh but do we have evidence of liberal mps uh being targeted

00:29:42.900 not really we have evidence of handong participating in foreign interference um and we think that there

00:29:49.500 are probably more liberal mps who have participated in foreign interference because trudeau has not

00:29:53.520 released the names uh if he just releases the names we'll have confirmation of who and who did not

00:29:58.300 uh participate in foreign interference but it really just looks like trudeau is trying to protect

00:30:03.040 uh a certain uh cadre of liberal mps who have participated in foreign interference to protect his

00:30:09.140 chances of getting re-elected you know i think this was probably one of the most egregious examples of

00:30:17.380 trudeau acting in bad faith obviously we've seen sort of an unhinged version of the prime minister

00:30:23.900 in the last oh i don't know two to three years i would say but to me this was just he really he

00:30:31.000 really doesn't care anymore he doesn't really have any standards of ethics or morality anymore

00:30:35.460 he is feeling the pressure of his bad polling numbers and he's willing to throw anything out

00:30:41.640 the door he's willing to throw anything at the wall in hopes of something might stick you know he's

00:30:45.040 really thrown in the last little sliver of credibility that he had with this because it was

00:30:49.920 just such an obvious and disingenuous attempt to peg the whole thing on the conservatives um meanwhile

00:30:56.020 he knows that he's not really going to be held to account for what he said because for whatever

00:31:00.540 reason we are not being told the names of the people that have actually been embroiled in this

00:31:05.140 national scandal well definitely not the end of that story uh but i wanted to shift to something in

00:31:10.440 case people uh metaphorically need a drink after listening to all of that let's talk about taxpayer

00:31:17.060 funded booze okay so our investigative journalist uh ryan thorpe and uh the investigative journalist

00:31:23.900 before him uh james woods at the canadian taxpayers federation we sent in freedom of information

00:31:29.560 requests ages ago and as anybody who's done it knows these things take in some cases years to come

00:31:35.040 up so turns out quite a humdinger so global affairs canada which used to be called foreign affairs canada

00:31:42.520 it's a department and a ministry within the government of canada they have spent 3.3 million dollars

00:31:50.700 on alcohol just since 2019 so again one department within the trudeau government spending more than 3

00:32:00.640 million bucks on booze since 2019 if you work out the math that's around 55 000 per month and before you

00:32:12.900 already start getting nauseous um sorry but there's like 200 different crown corps agencies departments

00:32:22.120 within the federal government and this is just one of them that we have the booze tab for um at the

00:32:28.320 taxpayers federation we obviously think this is disgusting like the booze tab for bureaucrats should

00:32:33.660 be zero like it should be zero people are paid enough if they want to go out to drinking they absolutely

00:32:39.360 should do that on their own dime if we need to make exemptions in some rare circumstance where we have

00:32:45.700 to you know traditionally gift a bottle of wine to a head of state in exchange for a bottle of scotch

00:32:51.420 like from somebody from scotland that can be accommodated but this is just in some cases just

00:32:57.440 booze fests like some of the explanations we saw on these forms were things like bulk alcohol purchase

00:33:04.700 or trivia night it is yeah we know that you're buying alcohol in bulk there's no reason that

00:33:10.640 we should be paying for this even most private entities don't allow their workers or their employees

00:33:17.540 to rack up alcohol costs most places of work you can even submit expenses for a meal but a lot of

00:33:23.820 places won't accept alcohol charges because it doesn't want to a promote a culture of drinking

00:33:29.020 which is already rampant in politics and government to begin with so many people come out of government

00:33:33.720 saying i really struggled with alcoholism in those years because there's such a heavy culture of

00:33:37.780 drinking and in addition it's just yeah exactly if you want to enjoy a drink you know maybe you're

00:33:42.560 working sure we'll cover your meal pay for your drink on your own dime because it's so expensive

00:33:47.260 especially when you're out and there's no reason that we should be paying we should be paying for

00:33:51.580 these um government workers essentially they work for us actually we should not be paying for their

00:33:56.420 rowdy and partying lifestyle and if 55 000 a month they're obviously living the high and you know

00:34:04.260 honestly sounds a bit like they're living a life of debauchery if that's how much alcohol

00:34:07.840 they're partaking in even at work that's it it's such a ton of alcohol yeah go ahead noah

00:34:13.800 i have a really easy solution byob bring your own booze you know like if you want to get drunk you

00:34:21.860 know in company time you know bring your own booze don't you know put the taxpayer on the uh to foot

00:34:27.560 the bill i mean this is 3.3 million dollars worth of booze in five years that that's a lot that's like

00:34:33.000 a lifetime more than a lifetime supply uh worth of booze you know they spent 1.9 million uh on a program

00:34:40.040 to send canadian alcohol overseas you know fair enough so if they spent even just 1.4 million

00:34:45.180 dollars of booze on themselves in five years do you know how much alcohol that could buy that that

00:34:49.560 could buy a lot of alcohol how much i know you sat and did some math so you know i didn't really do

00:34:57.860 that great of math in high school but i think this is basic basic arithmetic uh if you want to just buy

00:35:02.780 some six packs of heineken's with 1.4 million dollars you could buy 82,352 packs of heineken

00:35:10.580 six packs so it's not just you know 82,000 heineken's it's six packs these are government

00:35:15.960 workers so we know that they were buying bud light

00:35:18.360 how much bud light can you get for 55,000 a month probably a lot it's always on sale these days

00:35:27.800 yeah you could yeah you could yeah you could probably get more because it's on sale if you

00:35:31.920 want to buy tequila you could buy 35,000 bottles of 750 milliliter jose cuervo and you know like

00:35:39.440 that's i think that's about 16 shots in a bottle so you know if you stretch that out you know amongst

00:35:45.780 like each employee gets a bottle uh yeah that's 16 shots but that's a lot you know there's only

00:35:50.980 7,400 uh employees at uh gac and back in 2019 there was 6,500 so it's not like you know there's

00:35:59.040 hundreds of thousands of employees to serve you know with 35,000 bottles of tequila you know if you

00:36:05.900 say say you don't want spirits so you don't want beer let's go for some wine you know a bit more

00:36:10.180 classy it's 73,684 bottles of 19 wine so we're not looking at you know the bottom shelf jackson triggs

00:36:20.040 you know or you know the niagara or my box of wine no hey hey don't be attacking niagara wine come

00:36:25.600 on now no no i love niagara wine but you know there's the good ones and the bad ones and you

00:36:31.300 know we're more expensive ones and the less expensive ones just because of wine and white

00:36:36.820 doesn't make it bad okay rachel yeah i gotta stand up for my niagara wineries

00:36:43.500 listen uh niagara wine is great and if you buy a 19 bottle of wine you're probably getting some

00:36:50.640 good wine so so it's not like the 15 stuff so this is all just to say this is an exorbitant

00:36:57.360 so 75,000 bottles of wine is that what you worked it out to 73,684 bottles of wine it is insane how

00:37:07.720 much booze they're buying a GAC it's nuts i feel bad for their their livers because people need to

00:37:14.060 go on a serious detox so this is this is one of the one of the benefits of uh you know GAC employment

00:37:19.800 should be free liver transplants you know no kidding i'm gonna read this to you because it's

00:37:23.340 just so weird some of these things so on march 19th 2019 bureaucrats in san jose california

00:37:29.440 why do we have canadian bureaucrats in san jose california i don't know but they expensed

00:37:34.820 eight thousand one hundred and fifty three dollars worth of booze just 12 days later those

00:37:41.940 bureaucrats spent another two thousand one hundred and ninety six dollars on booze like i think we need

00:37:49.100 an intervention yeah these people are always actually pretty sad if you think about it from

00:37:54.560 the taxpayer perspective but also from the perspective of these individuals who are consuming

00:37:58.920 so much alcohol like sounds like every day yeah it's gross just really go ahead noah

00:38:04.380 yeah one more thing that's infuriating is like you know we're all dealing with the cost of living

00:38:09.180 crisis right i was just about to say yeah so if normally you're you want to get you know the high

00:38:15.660 price the tequila you know maybe you want to get the cost amigos or whatever a lot of canadians at

00:38:20.480 the cut back you know some jose cuervo but these government employees are more than likely you know

00:38:25.900 they're getting the champagne they're getting the moe they're getting that you know the hennessy you

00:38:29.980 know they're getting the cost amigos they're getting all the expensive liquor probably you know

00:38:33.940 that's the only rational way that they're racking up these you know overpriced bills and if that's

00:38:39.500 the case that's disgusting and if it's the case that they're getting all the bottom shelf beer

00:38:43.720 and all the bottom shelf booze and they're still spending that much that's just degenerate it's crazy

00:38:49.060 yeah they shouldn't be spending it at all uh like i think people all are already living this but it's

00:38:54.860 important to go over the point sometimes we are seeing record demand for food bank use from working

00:39:00.980 families so again that means that a parent who's holding down a job is nonetheless relying on

00:39:06.540 donated jars of peanut butter to feed their kid so that's in canada this is the same place where

00:39:12.560 these bureaucrats pull their bloody tax dollars from and then spend 50 something thousand dollars

00:39:17.500 per month on booze that is totally unacceptable further about half of canadians are now within

00:39:24.980 two hundred dollars of not making all their bill payments minimum bill payments meaning like you're

00:39:30.820 just doing your minimum monthly payment on whatever bill that's also known as barely scraping by half

00:39:36.820 half of canadians are in that position right now so it is reprehensible for any bureaucrat to think

00:39:43.440 of writing off or charging a taxpayer with their booze bill and the government needs to be held responsible

00:39:49.800 for this we should have it so that no booze is covered period um did we want to go into do we

00:39:55.620 have time to get into the uh ucp agm that's coming up if that sounds like alphabet soup it's the united

00:40:00.660 conservative party having their annual general meeting and it's coming up in just a few weeks

00:40:04.580 time did you want to get into that for us rachel we'll just really quickly let you guys know the

00:40:09.440 united conservative party annual general meeting is coming up first weekend of november true north will be

00:40:14.400 there to do coverage daniel smith will be facing a vote on her leadership um we'll have lots of

00:40:19.860 coverage on this on the site and i'm sure isaac will be covering it pretty closely on the elberto

00:40:24.120 roundup so if you guys want to find out more about that that would probably be the best place to do

00:40:28.560 that but i'm going to leave it there for today just given the time yeah yeah so i'm going to try

00:40:32.980 to get there um canadian taxpayers federation we're non-partisan i'm not a member of any party nobody in the

00:40:38.780 team is allowed to be a member of a party but we do follow this very closely so i would like to be able

00:40:43.080 to observe what is going on because this is obviously involving taxpayers money and accountability

00:40:48.160 so i'll see if there's a way for me to just be there as an observer but it's super important to

00:40:53.360 pay attention to this especially here in alberta for our viewers outside of alberta it's hard to

00:40:58.280 really understand but alberta has got such a grassroots hold them to account let's start a new

00:41:06.200 party if we feel like it spirit it is unmatched anywhere else in canada and i've lived across this

00:41:12.160 country so if you want to talk about direct grassroots democracy this is the place for it

00:41:16.860 and so that's why a party's annual general meeting is super important it's why they sell memberships

00:41:23.280 it's why they get people going it's why they get delegations going it's why they have these massive

00:41:27.000 votes so it's definitely something to keep an eye on uh speaking of premier smith uh as far as i

00:41:32.760 understand she is confirmed as a speaker coming up at the true north nation event which will be

00:41:39.720 happening in calgary in the heart of alberta on october 26th so in just over a week's time guys so

00:41:47.720 next saturday it's an all-day event canadian taxpayers federation will be there we're going

00:41:53.600 to have a booth set up with a table i'm trying to get defund the cbc bumper stickers printed in time

00:42:01.540 they're supposed to be printed in time for my table and uh i don't know what i'm talking about yet

00:42:06.840 probably uh defunding the media and uh scrapping the carbon tax so folks if you want to participate

00:42:13.480 make sure you look up how to participate in true north nation get together with lots of good like-minded

00:42:18.920 folks listen to a lot of really fun speakers and meet a lot of new friends but for now remember

00:42:24.280 all of this is off the record

00:42:34.360 that was really fun guys yes great job everyone i need to go eat lunch before my stomach keeps growling

00:42:40.520 i'm so hungry you're gonna have a sugar faint i am yes i'm gonna go get some cheese

Off the Record - October 18, 2024

Liberal MPs want Trudeau OUT!

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