Rebel News Podcast - Alberta conservatives divided on new Flames arena deal (William McBeath of Save Calgary)

00:00:00.000 Hello Rebels, you're listening to a free audio-only recording of my show, The Gun Show.

00:00:05.520 My guest tonight is William Macbeth from Save Calgary. If you like listening to this podcast,

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00:01:07.000 Calgarians love their hockey team, but do they love the Flames enough to build them a brand,

00:01:12.280 spanking new, multi-million dollar arena? I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed, and you're watching The Gunn Show.

00:01:22.800 The city of Calgary has just struck a new deal to replace the aging Saddle Dome Arena. Now,

00:01:42.220 conservatives are divided on the issue. For example, Franco Teresano from the Canadian Taxpayers

00:01:49.080 Federation is staunchly against the new arena deal. He says, Calgarians shouldn't be forced to fork over

00:01:57.020 hundreds of millions of dollars to the wealthy owners of a professional hockey team, especially

00:02:02.980 when other Canadian teams built their own arenas. We all want to support the Flames, but with tickets,

00:02:10.820 not taxes. Now, on the flip side, Municipal Watchdog Save Calgary is in favor of the new arena deal.

00:02:19.060 While at the same time taking issue with the manner and speed in which the city came to the decision

00:02:24.200 to support the arena with tax dollars. So, here we have two different groups of fiscal conservatives

00:02:30.980 with two very different opinions on the new Calgary arena deal. But the arena is not the only thing

00:02:38.140 happening in Calgary political news, no siree. Supervised injection sites are still creating a

00:02:44.880 policing black hole, just sucking up resources and police manpower from all over the city.

00:02:50.780 And an LRT deal is approaching a $5 billion fiasco. So, I need an expert in Calgary. Joining me in an

00:02:59.060 interview we recorded last week is William Macbeth from Save Calgary.

00:03:03.120 Joining me now from Calgary, from Save Calgary actually, is my friend William Macbeth. We've got so much to talk about happening in Calgary.

00:03:28.980 And then, I guess, federally, this is, whether the Liberals like it or not, election silly season.

00:03:35.480 William, thanks for joining me.

00:03:37.540 Oh, thanks. It's always a pleasure.

00:03:39.880 So, big news. Calgary's getting a new arena. Edmonton got theirs a few years ago.

00:03:46.800 You guys at Save Calgary, normally staunch critics of the public sector spending and the wasteful ways that go on at the city of Calgary.

00:03:57.040 You guys have made the conservative case for the arena. I'm an open-minded person. I would love to hear it. I think our viewers would love to hear it. So, let her rip.

00:04:07.840 You know, it's so interesting. For our position on the arena, we've been asked for, you know, several years now, ever since before, in fact, the last election, where we stood on an arena deal, a new arena.

00:04:19.960 And we said, well, we'll have to see what the deal actually says, because, as in everything, you know, you can't judge something until you actually get a look at what's being proposed.

00:04:29.880 So, for us, our issue, you know, when we opposed the Olympics, wasn't because we're just inherently against, you know, elite sports, but because we, when we saw the deal, we saw what was being proposed, we thought it was a bad deal for Calgary taxpayers.

00:04:44.020 So, in the case of the arena, this is the second deal that's been put forward by the negotiating team.

00:04:51.600 And so, this time, it's a 50-50 split between the Flames and the city for putting in the money to build it.

00:05:00.120 The city taxpayers retain ownership of it.

00:05:02.720 The Flames have to pay rent every year in the form of a facility fee.

00:05:08.040 The city gets a ticket tax back from patrons who use the facility.

00:05:14.720 And even though economic development numbers are always anyone's best guess, the city is arguing that it will help spur economic growth in that region in downtown, at the edge of downtown, which has been an area that they've been focusing on.

00:05:29.760 So, leaving that aside, because, of course, we have some questions about how they've done their math on economic benefit.

00:05:36.660 But looking at the other side, it seems to be a pretty reasonable deal for getting a new arena, which will ensure the Flames remain in Calgary for the next 35 years.

00:05:48.760 I think one of the things that was concerning for, say, Calgary was, what would Calgary be if we lost our home hockey team?

00:05:58.620 Well, we'd be Winnipeg, as it was back in the day.

00:06:01.740 And that did not seem like an appealing option for us.

00:06:05.720 So, we said, look, if we're going to have an arena, in order to have a sports team, can we at least work out a deal where taxpayers aren't being overly burdened for the next 30 years of cost?

00:06:18.900 Which is actually, you know, was the deal we had with the Saddle Dome.

00:06:23.780 We weren't getting any payments from the Flames organization for their use of that facility.

00:06:29.080 Now we are.

00:06:30.140 Is the deal perfect?

00:06:31.020 No, I don't think it is.

00:06:33.140 And we have strong objections over how little consultation time there was for Calgarians to provide their feedback and their opinion to their city councillors.

00:06:42.880 They moved, they really rushed this through quickly.

00:06:45.580 But if the argument is going to be, do we want to make sure the Flames stay in Calgary and we have an arena that's going to support that,

00:06:52.240 and can we work out a deal that doesn't put taxpayers on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars year after year after year,

00:06:58.660 it seems to us that this deal was pretty reasonable.

00:07:02.560 Now, how does this deal compare to what Edmonton got?

00:07:08.340 Do you know that?

00:07:09.720 I mean, I can't tell you the specifics of the Edmonton deal, although I was an Edmontonian at the time it was being discussed.

00:07:15.660 What I can say is that it looks like Calgarians are getting a bit of a better deal for their arena.

00:07:24.220 We're not putting in as much money as Edmonton ended up putting in across the whole range of things that Edmonton actually invested in,

00:07:31.600 which included things like extending an LRT system linkage to it and a few things like that.

00:07:37.660 So I think it's a pretty reasonable fee.

00:07:40.200 We, of course, fully understand why some people are concerned about it and why they're questioning,

00:07:47.340 you know, is this a good use of the money?

00:07:49.860 Certainly, in our opinion, Calgary has tremendous fiscal problems,

00:07:53.760 and we've made it clear that we think we need structural reform.

00:07:57.640 We thought maybe there were other places to try and figure out better financing and better options than this arena.

00:08:04.500 We thought, actually, that the negotiation was pretty reasonable.

00:08:09.020 But at the same time, why aren't we having a good hard look at city spending?

00:08:13.420 We know that one out of three city employees earns over $100,000 a year,

00:08:17.880 that the average cost to the city for one of its employees is over $115,000 a year

00:08:23.920 when you consider pension and benefits and all of those other things.

00:08:27.820 We haven't taken any real action to cut those costs.

00:08:32.040 So for us, rather than not having an arena, maybe losing the flames,

00:08:37.060 losing having a major concert venue for us in the heart of our Scampi country,

00:08:42.440 our Scampi grounds, wouldn't it be better to take a lack of trying to fix the out-of-control spending

00:08:48.360 and out-of-control salaries down at City Hall?

00:08:51.280 You know what?

00:08:52.220 That's a great trade-off, isn't it?

00:08:53.880 Now, you pointed out something that makes a great segue into my next thing that I wanted to talk to you about.

00:09:02.720 Edmonton had to put out money for an LRT as part of their arena deal.

00:09:09.440 Calgary's got a serious problem with their LRT system and the cost of the Green Line.

00:09:18.680 It's turned into a $5 billion debacle, and there seems to be no end in sight.

00:09:24.180 What is going on there?

00:09:26.640 No, Sheila, you're absolutely right.

00:09:28.600 I mean, I think, you know, my family lives in Edmonton, and I've, you know,

00:09:33.680 talked to them about all of the challenges Edmonton has faced with its LRT system,

00:09:37.460 from a signaling system that never fully worked to trains having to run so slowly

00:09:43.420 that it's actually faster to take the buses on the same route than it is to take the trains.

00:09:49.440 So to me, those are not good signs.

00:09:51.600 But Calgary is well on its way to beating Edmonton and to making worse LRT decisions.

00:09:57.040 We've been planning this Green Line for years, years and years and years.

00:10:02.640 It's designed to create a new LRT line that goes from the deep, deep south of Calgary to the far,

00:10:08.840 far north, connecting all of those new communities with transit.

00:10:14.220 But in the space of just a few years, the wheels really have come off this project.

00:10:20.100 First of all, the head of the project quit and quit quite suddenly.

00:10:24.500 And the city really doesn't disclose why that is, but they're gone.

00:10:28.600 And then, you know, a few short months later, the deputy head of the project quit and said,

00:10:34.180 look, you know, again, we don't know why, but just simply said, no, I'm not going to be involved anymore.

00:10:39.360 You've seen senior Calgary business people come out and say that the plan,

00:10:44.180 the plan that we were following, and we're going to start putting under construction

00:10:48.180 in just a few months up until very, very recently, that said this plan is totally unfeasible,

00:10:54.060 that you cannot complete the project as is being envisioned.

00:10:58.000 One of the things they wanted to do was build a super deep tunnel through the downtown core 0.51

00:11:04.020 and then under the Bow River.

00:11:06.120 And when we say super deep, you know, at least seven stories underground deep,

00:11:12.380 you know, sort of core of the earth deep for this tunnel.

00:11:16.400 And then have it go under a river until, you know, and this was the official plan.

00:11:21.120 And all the city council, you know, nodded their heads and said, absolutely,

00:11:24.260 this is, you know, we want to get it right the first time.

00:11:26.440 Have a lot of bridges?

00:11:27.800 Sorry to interrupt, but there's these things called bridges.

00:11:30.320 Well, indeed.

00:11:33.720 And what is the cost of that tunnel?

00:11:35.480 Well, the cost of the tunnel meant that instead of being this long,

00:11:38.580 the green line was going to end up being that long, but still cost the same amount of money.

00:11:42.700 So it was going to be $5 billion to build the green line from here to here.

00:11:46.780 And it was going to be $5 billion to build the green line from here to here,

00:11:49.760 but with this tunnel underneath it.

00:11:52.280 And then they simply said, look, we've looked at it.

00:11:54.280 We cannot build this tunnel.

00:11:55.940 There's too much stuff already happening underneath of downtown Calgary.

00:11:59.820 You know, sewer lines and power lines and parkades and structural engineering and all

00:12:04.720 of this stuff.

00:12:05.520 We can't build the tunnel.

00:12:06.520 And to me, the question is, well, wait, because Safe Calgary's waved the flag a couple

00:12:10.300 of times saying, we have some issues with this green line.

00:12:12.820 And city council wrote back and said, no, no, we've done our homework.

00:12:15.940 This is the right way.

00:12:17.420 This tunnel will ensure that this project is, you know, meets the needs.

00:12:21.180 And finally, it took getting to the eve of construction before city council said, wait,

00:12:25.500 maybe this technically impossible tunnel that's going to cost $5 billion to the LRT isn't something

00:12:32.060 we can actually achieve as a city.

00:12:34.500 So I don't know where they're going to go with this.

00:12:38.380 They've now paused to have a conversation about the green line.

00:12:43.280 And to us, it's like, why wasn't this conversation held years ago when this ridiculous plan was

00:12:50.300 first put forward?

00:12:52.560 It seems to me the only success of the green line so far is its ability to allow politicians

00:12:58.060 to re-announce funding to it.

00:13:00.200 I mean, how many times have we seen politicians, all the way back to Stephen Harper, keep re-announcing

00:13:07.360 how they're supporting the green line and they're throwing more money at the green line?

00:13:10.620 That actually seems to be the only thing that has been a successful aspect of this whole

00:13:16.660 project.

00:13:17.140 You know, you're right.

00:13:18.900 I mean, I've seen a half a dozen at least government announcements about money.

00:13:23.300 It really is the only thing about the green line that seems to be there is the green the

00:13:26.760 governments have announced they're putting into taxpayer dollars into this project without

00:13:30.820 a single piece of track being laid down anywhere along the route.

00:13:35.700 So, you know, in other cities, Edmonton is just one, but other cities have major problems

00:13:42.580 with their LRT construction.

00:13:44.160 Ottawa has built, you know, has been building an LRT.

00:13:46.860 It built a tunnel through heading into its downtown and the tunnel caved in over and

00:13:52.800 over and over again.

00:13:54.580 And then, of course, when they were, you know, finally getting to the point of putting trains

00:13:59.360 on it, well, turns out the trains they had chosen don't work so well in either the snow

00:14:04.100 or the cold.

00:14:05.600 Both things, by the way, that you find in an Ottawa winter.

00:14:08.860 So those train cars, by the way, made by Canadian engineering firm SNC-Lavalin.

00:14:14.820 Isn't that interesting?

00:14:16.600 Yeah, it seems like the only green in this line is coming right out of taxpayers' pockets.

00:14:22.500 Now, another thing in Calgary I want to touch on.

00:14:25.380 Rick Bell had a great column on it in the Calgary Sun, and it's about the horror show.

00:14:32.840 Those are his words, not mine, although I'd probably use them also.

00:14:35.920 With regard to the Beltline supervised injection or supervised consumption site.

00:14:42.340 He has the statistics for the police calls to the area.

00:14:47.740 They're up 452 percent, while the rest of the city's up 9 percent, which is, I suppose

00:14:56.340 that's counterintuitive to the reason these harm reduction activists say we need to have

00:15:02.720 these supervised injection sites all over the places because it will reduce the amount

00:15:08.140 of police calls and take pressure off police resources if we have these places where people

00:15:15.640 can inject their illegal drugs safely.

00:15:18.900 It's a tremendous problem.

00:15:20.460 I mean, Rick Bell lives in Beltline, and, you know, our little Safe Calgary crew work

00:15:26.460 out of Beltline, in fact, only about a block and a half from the safe injection site.

00:15:31.920 You know, it's so interesting.

00:15:33.480 It's hard to have a real conversation about this problem.

00:15:36.600 I mean, first of all, it's hard to even get consensus that there is a problem, but there

00:15:41.540 really is.

00:15:42.360 Anybody who owns a business or who has a home or parks a car in this region knows that there's

00:15:49.440 a problem because they've seen their cars being broken into by addicts looking for things

00:15:55.820 they can steal and then pawn or trade.

00:15:59.100 We've seen people who are passed out in the streets, in alleys, from overconsuming.

00:16:05.520 The area has become littered with syringes, used syringes.

00:16:10.840 And all the people that the advocates of the safe injection sites are coming back with is

00:16:16.240 the argument about harm reduction.

00:16:18.900 Well, I don't think that's good enough.

00:16:21.280 When we come to think about drug addicts, simply allowing someone to continue living a miserable

00:16:29.520 drug-addled existence, but for many more years than they might otherwise, isn't good enough.

00:16:36.860 In fact, in my opinion, it's morally just wrong.

00:16:40.160 We need to be talking about how we're going to help these people get better.

00:16:43.420 We need to be talking about treatment.

00:16:45.120 We need to be talking about the rights of property owners and families who live here.

00:16:50.320 Calgary has invested significant dollars into Beltline revitalization.

00:16:54.600 We've been trying to make this community a place where young working professionals want 0.96

00:17:00.620 to live and work and spend their leisure dollars on going into attractions.

00:17:08.620 But if you fill the area with people with crimes and with people who are addicted to drugs

00:17:13.620 and just dropping syringes, you're underdoing all that hard work that the community in the

00:17:19.180 city did to try and make this a better community.

00:17:20.820 So for us, our answer is look at some of the jurisdictions who have grappled with this problem

00:17:26.460 and then also look at some of the jurisdictions who have ignored this problem and not done

00:17:32.740 anything to fix it.

00:17:33.900 And I'm thinking, for example, of Seattle, which has such a tremendous problem on their hands right

00:17:41.360 now.

00:17:41.980 The police have basically just given up on trying to do any form of community safety enforcement

00:17:46.800 in those zones.

00:17:48.040 I mean, we don't even have to look that far.

00:17:51.940 We just have to look at Vancouver.

00:17:53.160 And actually, I misspoke there from Rick Bell's article.

00:17:58.540 It's actually even worse.

00:17:59.980 I said that police calls are up 452 percent while they're only up 9 percent in the rest

00:18:05.480 of the city.

00:18:06.000 It's actually that they're down 9 percent in the rest of the city.

00:18:10.540 So it's actually even worse.

00:18:12.380 But going back to my point about Vancouver, Vancouver, what has it been two decades that

00:18:16.780 they've had these supervised consumption sites, they promised us that people would that this

00:18:23.200 would be a pathway to treatment somehow, that this constant contact with health care

00:18:27.480 officials of health care professionals would be a pathway to treatment.

00:18:32.180 But that's not the case.

00:18:33.400 They said that it would reduce the amount of property crime if we're giving people drugs

00:18:41.100 and needles.

00:18:41.720 Well, that also is not the case.

00:18:43.260 And that's clearly not the case playing out in Calgary.

00:18:46.180 We have a lot of evidence that this doesn't work for the addict and for the community it's

00:18:51.140 placed in and for the taxpayers of the city as a whole.

00:18:53.820 And yet still, we have these people who claim to be advocates for the drug addicted and advocates

00:19:01.280 for these inner city poverty stricken communities continuing to advocate for this.

00:19:07.820 I guess it's corralling of drug addicts in certain neighborhoods.

00:19:12.200 And people will say stuff like, oh, you know, the opioid crisis, the opioid crisis.

00:19:17.700 Well, I think statistics are playing out that the opioid crisis is affecting all demographics.

00:19:23.940 It's affecting people in suburbia and affluent neighborhoods, affluent families are being

00:19:29.080 hit by this and rural communities are being hit by this.

00:19:32.060 So what good does it do to hold people up in low income communities and concentrate the 0.98

00:19:37.880 violence and the property crime there when this is a society wide problem?

00:19:43.720 No, I think you're absolutely right, Sheila.

00:19:45.320 And to be honest, for the advocates who say safe injection sites solve the problems, I

00:19:51.260 mean, I don't think they spend enough time talking to people who actually live and work

00:19:56.120 in these communities, because when you see crime spike, when you see cars being broken into

00:20:02.100 and windows and homes being broken into and drug addicts leaving syringes everywhere, all

00:20:06.360 you're doing is actually eroding community support to try and meaningfully fix this problem.

00:20:12.460 Eventually, it just turns into we want it out of here, just move it somewhere else.

00:20:17.140 NIMBYism, right?

00:20:18.080 Well, no, because the problem with that is it just moves the problem to another location,

00:20:22.120 whereas we need to really think about how we're going to solve it.

00:20:25.040 And simply prolonging suffering, which is what I think a lot of these safe injection sites

00:20:30.220 do, isn't enough.

00:20:32.400 It's not enough to just condemn people to these lives.

00:20:36.120 We have to be real about it.

00:20:38.360 And that, I think, means a combination of more treatment options, a combination of better

00:20:43.220 police enforcement and of having a zero tolerance policy for people who commit property and other

00:20:49.940 crimes of that nature.

00:20:51.120 And I think it means, you know, taking a hard look about what are we doing to cut off the

00:20:56.300 supply of illegal drugs into our cities.

00:20:59.460 Right now, drug dealers set up shop a block away from the safe injection site.

00:21:03.440 And to me, how on earth can that be helping addicts when you're allowing the people who

00:21:08.780 make money off this evil to be setting up shop right down the street?

00:21:12.800 Well, especially when, you know, it seems to be a black hole around these communities of

00:21:17.600 policing.

00:21:18.140 Police just, like you say, they throw up their hands and say, look, it's too much.

00:21:22.640 It's just it's too much the property crime.

00:21:25.780 And so the drug dealers know that there need to be stiffer penalties for people who are peddling

00:21:29.860 these poisons in our communities.

00:21:32.360 Um, but I this is a topic I could literally talk about all day.

00:21:37.520 Um, but I wanted to move to the federal election.

00:21:40.700 You are, you know, you're at Save Calgary and you're, you know, very adept in Alberta

00:21:45.720 provincial politics, but you are also a wise, wise man when it comes to federal politics.

00:21:50.540 And that's one of the reasons I wanted to have you on the show.

00:21:53.380 Uh, Justin Trudeau was just found guilty of another ethics violation in the SNC-Lavalin

00:22:00.100 scandal.

00:22:00.720 And it is, you know, we've got a real problem here when the ethics commissioner is numbering

00:22:06.400 the Trudeau ethics reports.

00:22:09.340 Um, that's unusual.

00:22:12.580 Um, with regard to a prime minister, we certainly didn't see that sort of thing with Stephen Harper

00:22:17.280 now, did we?

00:22:18.980 No.

00:22:19.380 Uh, in fact, Justin Trudeau, uh, broke ground.

00:22:22.200 He, he made history when he became the first prime minister to break sitting prime minister

00:22:27.760 to break conflict of interest rules.

00:22:29.300 And he's just made history again, by being the only prime minister to break those same

00:22:33.980 rules twice in his same mandate in office.

00:22:36.960 And you're right.

00:22:37.900 The, the ethics commissioner has to label which Trudeau ethics report this is because again,

00:22:44.420 there's been more than one.

00:22:46.040 And, you know, the arguments coming from Mr. Trudeau and his team are that they've never

00:22:51.140 done anything wrong that in the, and not just on this issue, they've never done anything

00:22:56.260 wrong ever in their time in office.

00:22:59.040 It's only us poor folk who aren't clever enough to understand what they're trying to do and

00:23:05.580 what's the, you know, uh, what the, if we were just a little bit more sophisticated, we

00:23:10.340 would be able to see that the great good of this prime minister and his team outweighs

00:23:15.580 all petty considerations like breaking rules and violating the law.

00:23:19.860 So, I mean, I hope that Canadians do take a really good hard look at the fact that this

00:23:25.860 is a prime minister who's been sanctioned several times for breaking law.

00:23:29.580 This is a prime minister who claims to be a feminist, but then drummed two of his most

00:23:35.400 senior women ministers out of office for raising, as it turns out, entirely legitimate concerns 1.00

00:23:41.400 about his actions on this file.

00:23:43.880 This is a prime minister who claims that First Nations reconciliation is his top priority.

00:23:48.900 And yet, when the justice minister, the first First Nations justice minister raised concerns

00:23:54.980 about his interference in an impartial investigation and prosecution of a corporate villain, he totally

00:24:03.680 overruled her and then shoved her to the side and has now even suggested, well, she just,

00:24:08.000 she just never was on our side.

00:24:09.620 She really wasn't one of us.

00:24:11.140 So to me, I hope voters really do take a good hard look at this prime minister.

00:24:15.680 You know, the federal conservatives under Andrew Scheer have been running this campaign

00:24:19.740 saying not as advertised, well, Justin Trudeau.

00:24:23.060 And I think that's really spot on.

00:24:25.100 He's not a feminist. 0.77

00:24:26.240 He's not a consultative leader.

00:24:29.700 He's not a champion for First Nations people. 0.93

00:24:32.880 He is a preening bully who, if he doesn't get his own way, will throw everybody else under 0.89

00:24:38.900 the bus. 0.97

00:24:39.480 And he's not sorry because in his mind, he couldn't possibly ever do anything wrong.

00:24:43.560 You know, it's funny, the conservative election ads or rather the attack ads from the last

00:24:50.160 election cycle, they really eventually turn out to be like a crystal ball when they said

00:24:58.240 that Ignatieff, he didn't come back for us.

00:25:01.400 And then right after the election, Ignatieff left when they said Justin Trudeau just wasn't

00:25:07.520 ready.

00:25:07.880 Uh, yeah, still four years later, he's just not ready.

00:25:13.020 It's, it's funny how, uh, people thought those election attack ads were silly and, uh, sort

00:25:18.780 of childish, but they turned out to be, uh, a glimpse into the future.

00:25:23.440 And a lot of people probably should have listened.

00:25:25.600 Do you think this, um, elections violation or sorry, this, this ethics violation finding

00:25:33.740 is going to affect, um, votes?

00:25:37.400 Do you think people who are committed Trudeau voters care?

00:25:41.080 That's really the question here.

00:25:43.900 You know, it's, it's tricky, right?

00:25:45.880 Because I mean, I think for some people, they will love Justin Trudeau regardless of what

00:25:51.840 he says or does there, you know, for them, if this isn't a question of leadership, their,

00:25:57.280 their devotion to him is fanatical.

00:26:00.560 So no, I mean, I think that this, in that case, if you're one of those people, then no,

00:26:05.240 I don't think this ethics report is going to make a difference.

00:26:07.740 If you're an everyday voter, typical voter living in say, suburban Toronto, um, what I'm

00:26:14.780 really hoping is you're going to have a think and say to myself, is this really a leader,

00:26:18.800 a prime minister who understands the difficulties, the challenges me and my family have this

00:26:24.260 prime minister, this millionaire prime minister born into a trust fund into an elite family

00:26:28.840 of celebrities and, and business and the political elite.

00:26:32.860 Does he really understand what it's like to try and pay the mortgage bill or to try and

00:26:37.260 pay the power bill or, you know, to try and afford to send your kids to hockey practice

00:26:41.800 and, and, or, and the answer, I think, I hope that Canadians are going to come up with

00:26:46.400 is no, in fact, this prime minister has absolutely no idea what it's like to try and struggle

00:26:51.420 and make ends meet.

00:26:52.380 He took a vacation on a billionaire private Island, uh, with it from his friend, the Aga

00:26:58.420 Khan, uh, someone who lobbies the government.

00:27:00.620 And so that was by the way, why he was found guilty, uh, the first time of an ethics violation,

00:27:05.380 but no, that's not an everyday experience for, for Canadians.

00:27:09.300 And so to me, I'm hoping what this latest thing does is help create more of the picture

00:27:15.620 of who Justin Trudeau really is.

00:27:17.440 And when his government tries to say he's on the side of middle-class Canadians, I really

00:27:23.520 hope that the facts point to a very different story in the minds of voters.

00:27:27.440 I mean, it'll be hard to say, we know what's coming.

00:27:29.940 We know that Justin Trudeau will accuse his opponents, Andrew Scheer and the Conservatives,

00:27:35.020 of everything under the sun, of being misogynists, of being bigots, of being racist and homophobes 0.52

00:27:42.580 and of supporting white supremacy, uh, you know, ad nauseum claims of hatred that simply 0.75

00:27:49.380 aren't borne out by the facts.

00:27:50.980 So to me, uh, I'm hoping that anybody who pays the slightest bit of attention knows that

00:27:55.480 those liberal attacks are nothing but lies and smear.

00:27:58.280 And that when Justin Trudeau talks about being on your side, he can't because he's really

00:28:01.860 not on your side.

00:28:02.700 Yeah, I, I think back to a couple of weeks ago when Justin Trudeau tweeted out about how

00:28:08.780 he understands how hard it is to save for your first home.

00:28:12.300 And he touted this liberal, you know, plan to help with, uh, your down payment.

00:28:17.440 And it's like, uh, excuse me, didn't you get gifted, uh, a mansion that's now a Canadian

00:28:24.080 heritage site once your dad passed away?

00:28:27.320 Like he, he thinks that we don't know his history, that, that we're just, we're incapable

00:28:34.120 of plugging into Google search, you know, what did Justin Trudeau inherit?

00:28:38.720 Um, but I, I do think you're right about, uh, the tenor and tone of the coming election.

00:28:46.360 Um, I think it is going to be really tough on conservatives.

00:28:50.620 And I don't mean conservative MPs and conservative candidates.

00:28:54.140 I think generally conservative voters are in for a tough go of it.

00:28:59.580 This next little bit, they're going to be called all manner of names, malicious, libelous

00:29:06.040 names, things they aren't.

00:29:07.400 I can only hope that after putting up with those same names for the last four years that

00:29:12.820 our hides are a little thicker and we don't take it personally.

00:29:15.980 We just shrug it off and vote, uh, the way our hearts and minds compel us to, um, I want

00:29:22.700 to give you a chance, um, to let everybody know where they can find the great work that

00:29:28.640 you do at Save Calgary and how they can support you, um, in your efforts to hold city council,

00:29:34.340 uh, accountable and to force a little bit of transparency down there.

00:29:38.780 Oh, well, thank you so much, Sheila.

00:29:40.840 I, you know, um, it, we are the little engine that could, uh, municipal watchdog groups.

00:29:46.600 We, you know, we, we started off because there just wasn't anybody else really take, you know,

00:29:51.360 trying to hold city council to account.

00:29:53.320 And I think as a whole conservative sometimes ignore municipal politics and to their own

00:29:58.120 detriment, uh, that they do because so many bad decisions can get made at the, at the municipal

00:30:03.480 level.

00:30:03.900 Um, and then, uh, you know, those people go on to become MPs and MPPs and MLAs and bring

00:30:10.680 their bad government with them.

00:30:12.140 So Adam Vaughn, Adam Vaughn, who, uh, I had really never heard of until, uh, yesterday when 0.98

00:30:19.300 I discovered, uh, he apparently is a complete raving lunatic.

00:30:22.020 So that's an exciting, exciting development in my book.

00:30:25.720 Um, so for Save Calgary, there's a couple of things you can do to help us out.

00:30:28.980 That would be great.

00:30:29.720 The first is please, um, sign up to our weekly email list.

00:30:33.620 We, we put out a weekly email, even right now when city council's on summer vacation,

00:30:38.560 we're still putting out our weekly update emails and you can go to savecalgary.com and

00:30:44.320 sign up there to, uh, to keep on top of what our issues are.

00:30:48.120 Uh, if you have the means increasingly difficult under this municipal and under this federal

00:30:53.800 government, but if you have some extra money, we would very much appreciate a donation to,

00:30:58.420 to keep going.

00:30:59.040 We don't receive taxpayer money, uh, unlike so many other groups do.

00:31:03.160 Uh, and, uh, and we never will based on our highly critical position of, uh, of municipal

00:31:08.900 government, but we think it's an important message and that the voice is important to

00:31:13.080 be heard.

00:31:13.460 And the third thing is, you know, give us a follow on our social media.

00:31:16.020 We're both on Facebook and on Twitter, uh, you know, facebook.com slash savecalgary,

00:31:20.540 twitter.com slash savecalgary.

00:31:22.120 And we're, we're on there pretty actively.

00:31:24.080 And if you have any leads for us on these things, you know, we have some great, great

00:31:28.600 supporters who tip us off about some of the things happening in and around the city.

00:31:32.860 So those are three things you could do that would be really helpful to us as an organization.

00:31:37.260 And certainly think about that next municipal election coming up in 2021.

00:31:41.980 It's happening sooner than we think.

00:31:43.520 There's a real opportunity to make some change if we can get ourselves organized and if we

00:31:48.120 can lay the groundwork right now to make, uh, Calgarians vote for change.

00:31:52.420 Yeah, the process to identify candidates and get them some name recognition in advance

00:31:58.360 of the election starts now.

00:32:00.200 It starts immediately.

00:32:02.060 Um, if Calgarians are tired of, um, Lord Nenshi, now's the time to, uh, put some money

00:32:09.500 where their mouth is and maybe throw a little support behind save Calgary.

00:32:12.280 And I got to tell you, those emails that you send out are pretty well written.

00:32:17.000 And I get a lot of emails from a lot of political groups and advocacy groups in the course of a

00:32:21.820 day.

00:32:22.220 And I got to tell you, save Calgary's are probably the only ones that I open.

00:32:28.100 Well, we appreciate that, Sheila.

00:32:29.520 I'll tell the team you said so.

00:32:31.260 Okay, great.

00:32:32.300 William, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show and being so generous with your

00:32:35.680 time.

00:32:36.040 Um, and we'll check back in, um, periodically.

00:32:40.040 And of course, as the federal election approaches, um, because even the federal election affects

00:32:46.940 municipal politics and we're going to see a lot of funding dumped Calgary's way to

00:32:51.780 try to save some liberal seats in that city.

00:32:54.400 I think, uh, I think you could well be right on that.

00:32:58.060 I'd be interested to know if they're going to be able to announce their support another

00:33:01.200 time for the green line before election day.

00:33:04.680 Here's hoping.

00:33:05.500 William, thanks so much for coming on the show.

00:33:07.720 Thanks, Sheila.

00:33:08.300 I appreciate it.

00:33:08.820 Agree or disagree with William on the arena deal.

00:33:24.440 There's beauty in the fact that conservatives can hold different opinions and not be excommunicated

00:33:30.020 from the conservative fold.

00:33:31.940 You see, instead of acting like a bunch of liberals and marching in ideological lockstep

00:33:36.400 with each other while also simultaneously proclaiming that diversity is our strength,

00:33:42.240 conservatives can actually engage in debate and discussion and reasoned, rational arguments

00:33:48.280 with each other.

00:33:50.160 Fancy that.

00:33:50.860 Well, everybody, that's the show for tonight.

00:33:52.940 Thank you so much for tuning in.

00:33:54.700 I'll see everybody back here in the same time, in the same place next weekend.

00:33:58.520 Remember, don't let the government tell you that you've had too much to think.

00:34:02.220 I'll see everybody back here in the same time.

Rebel News Podcast - August 22, 2019

Alberta conservatives divided on new Flames arena deal (William McBeath of Save Calgary)

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