EZRA LEVANT ｜ Danielle Smith concedes to teachers' union — here's why that's bad for Conservatives
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Summary
In Alberta, the labor union there is on the back foot. They were ordered to go back to work and not strike. And now they re talking about a general strike. Would you believe me if I told you it was in 1976, a one day general strike against Pierre Trudeau? Do you think that s going to happen in 2025 in Alberta? I ll give you my thoughts and explain what Danielle Smith could do to make sure that these union radicals do not have power over the government.
Transcript
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Hello, my friends. In Alberta, the labor union there is on the back foot. They were ordered
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to go back to work and not strike. And now they're talking about a general strike. When was the last
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time there was a general strike in Canada? Would you believe me if I told you it was in 1976,
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a one-day general strike against Pierre Trudeau? Do you think that's going to happen in 2025 in
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Alberta? I'll give you my thoughts and I'll explain what Danielle Smith, the premier, could do
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to make sure that these union radicals do not have power over the government. I'll give you my
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thoughts on that. But first, let me invite you to get a subscription to what we call Rebel News Plus.
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That's the video version of this podcast. Just go to rebelnewsplus.com, click subscribe,
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Tonight, tips for Alberta in fighting against the deep state. It's October 30th and this is
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Alberta just offered its teachers a double-digit pay raise that would make them the highest paid
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in Western Canada, more even than in the costly city of Vancouver. There's quite something. It's
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weird to me. The teachers are unionized as if it's some factory jobs, dangerous work or something like
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a coal miner. In Canada, the bulk of unions are in fact in the public sector, not blue-collar workers,
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not even white-collar workers, pink-collar workers, they call it, including nurses and teachers,
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The problem with government unions, though, is that they typically have a monopoly in their
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workforce, as in you have to pay, you have to be either a member of the union or even pay union
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dues if you're not a member of the union in order to even work. And the government has a monopoly in
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its own way too. So neither side is really using its own money in these negotiations. The taxpayer's
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interests are usually subverted. Even conservative governments are tempted just to throw money at a
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government union just to avert a strike. Now, Donald Trump is different. In some ways, I think he's
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enjoying the current government shutdown in the United States. I think he means to use it to make
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some deep permanent spending cuts to sort of trap the Democrats in their shutdown. Here's his director
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of management and budget proposing to permanently let go around 10,000 staff. Now, that's a drop in
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the bucket in the size of the U.S. workforce. But still, they're talking about shutting down the bulk
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of the health department and the education department and using the shutdown as the opportunity
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to do so. But in Canada, I think most conservatives are far more timid. Anyways, Alberta has made this
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super generous offer to government teachers, which in its own way is outrageous. Why should government
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workers with pretty much guaranteed job security get a double digit pay raise at the expense of the
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rest of the workers in the province? But the teachers union, which really has become an extension
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of the NDP opposition, has made radicalized, has radicalized the teachers over the extremist issue
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of transgender policy in the schools. What I mean by that is the provincial government wants age
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appropriate books in young classes, not extreme sex content. And there's been a lot of books just
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just crazy. I'd even call them pornographic for really young kids. So the government wants to
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stop that. They also want to end the secrecy of many of these transgender sex student clubs,
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where kids were encouraged to change their names from a boy to a girl and to identify
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as the other sex. And teachers promised to keep all that a secret from their parents. So these were
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secret clubs where kids would transition and the school would promise to keep the parents out of it.
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Just crazy, crazy stuff. Smith has taken steps to ensure that parents are kept informed of these
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things. And she's also taken steps to ban men and boys from competing in women's and girls sports and
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going into their changing rooms. By the way, these are enormously popular positions, far broader than
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just the conservative party base. I haven't seen a poll in recent months, but I'd hazard a guess that 80%
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of Albertans support these common sense moves on transgenderism, but not the union or at least the union
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leadership. So anyways, the teachers were threatening a strike. Smith ordered them back to work and
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Smith preemptively used the notwithstanding clause to preempt leftist judge shopping, where the unions
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would find some NDP judge who would agree to throw everything that the government did out. That's
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basically the problem that Donald Trump has, doesn't he? So the unions are big mad and they're talking
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about a general strike. Now, a general strike, you know, that is where everybody just goes on strike
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across the economy. That has not happened in Canada, according to my research, since 1976.
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Actually, a protest against Pierre Trudeau, if you can believe it. That was a one-day general strike.
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Actually included some private sector unions too. Now, of course, most government sector unions would
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probably be radicalized enough to join a general strike, though I think they would be punished by the
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courts if they did so in violation of their contracts. That's the thing about contracts. You have to abide
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them. But I think it's unbelievable or unlikely or even unthinkable that hardworking private sector
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union members would strike out of sympathy for government teachers, not over any money issue, but
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you know, I mean, typically teachers work eight months a year and are the highest paid in Western
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Canada now. And I just don't see it that, what, some hardworking oil and gas union member is going
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to go on strike to support government workers. I just don't see it, especially if the real issue
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is political ideology, especially on transgender issues. So I think the unions will blink here,
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but they're obviously seething. And the problem for Alberta Premier Daniel Smith and her United Conservative
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Party is that they may win, they may have won the election last time, and they may represent the bulk of the
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province, which I believe they do, especially on things like transgenderism. But they are sitting atop a
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mountain of civil servants, many of whom are neutral, but many of whom are radicalized, and will do anything to
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undermine the government despite its democratic mandate. I think a lot of civil servants consider themselves the
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permanent government, the keepers of the province, the deep state, if you will. And they're sort of
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resenting the fact that a conservative is in power. And so I've been thinking, what can Premier Smith do to
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reign in the rogue deep state? How can she take power away from extremists who haven't won elections, but
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are burrowing into the government and thwarting her plans? Now, I used to think the best politician in
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North America doing this sort of thing was Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. When he won his election
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in Florida, it was just by a few thousand votes. Oh my God, it was so close. But now it's not even
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close. Florida is so firmly in the Republican camp, and it's largely due to the fact that DeSantis
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has used every lever, pushed every button, used every power, every tool, every staffing appointment
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he can to purge the permanent ruling class from the state and replace them with his own men and women.
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In short, he governs like a Democrat in that he wasn't meek. But wow, has Donald Trump ever eclipsed
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that? Starting from his very first day in office, actually starting before he was inaugurated with
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pronouncements, but literally on day one of him being officially the president, he started issuing
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executive orders. I think he must have issued 20 on the first day. And he has also sacked entire
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boards and commissions, firing people who aren't on board with his mission. Like I say, acting like
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a Democrat, but in pursuit of his own Republican agenda. Now that's how Canadian liberals and NDPers
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act in power. They spend everything, tax everything, they appoint every one of their friends, politicize
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everything. I gave the example of the debates commission the other day, where Trudeau just put his
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personal friends. But that's the least of it. I mean, one of my main criticisms of Stephen Harper's
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term is that he didn't make any permanent changes. The CBC being an example, the unfilled Senate seats
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being another example. You could add to that the Human Rights Commission. Why didn't he shut that down?
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Or at least stack it. So many government NGOs, entire bureaucracies. So back to Alberta, Premier Daniel
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Smith surely knows that the government bureaucracy she runs would fire her in a second if they could find a
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way and they'll leak against her and they'll slow walk her policies that they hate and they'll push
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back and they'll they'll basically work to rule as any union would do in resistance. Basically, the
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Trump's like Trump's first term before he realized that personal loyalty wasn't about vanity. It was
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about stopping unelected bureaucrats from thwarting the democratic will of the people as expressed in
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their vote for the elected government. So what might Daniel Smith do not only to survive
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this latest eruption by the NDP, but also future attempts to undermine her.
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Now, Florida's Ron DeSantis did a few dramatic things. For example, he replaced state attorneys,
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that is prosecutors who work for the state, who had made the foolish mistake of publicly announcing
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their decision not to enforce state laws that they thought were too right-wing, even though they were
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passed by the legislature. For example, Florida has rules against transgender surgery for minors,
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et cetera. And prosecutors who said they were above the law, they weren't going to prosecute,
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DeSantis sacked them. And that stopped the prosecutors rebelling. Now, I'm not sure if that's a major
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problem in Alberta. I don't think the problem is individual prosecutors going rogue. I don't know.
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I think it said the Justice Department could and should more powerfully communicate the government's
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priorities, say, as opposed to, you know, massive trials against the truckers at the Coutts-Alberta
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border. I give Alberta's Justice Department some credit, though. They've done pretty well on firearms
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laws, basically telegraphing that the province just isn't going to waste their time and money pursuing Mark
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Carney's gun grabs. And they've also said similar things about castle law. You know what I'm talking
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about? When someone breaks into your home and you defend your home and you hurt the break-and-enterer,
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you don't get charged. I understand that the province has basically said,
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we will not prosecute. So that's good. But I think there's so much that Smith can go further. For
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example, DeSantis in Florida suspended members of school boards that were acting contrary to law,
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something that was actually done to the Calgary school board on which Danielle Smith sat as a
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trustee more than 20 years ago. If there are school boards that are not getting with the program,
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that are breaking the law, that are too radical, that are slow walking Danielle Smith's policies,
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Smith should just take them over, put them under direct control from the ministry as happened to her 20
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years ago. Florida's Ron DeSantis enacted some stop woke legislation. In fact, I think that's what it's
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called. Stop woke act limiting teaching of race, race and gender Marxism in schools, basically getting
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those BLM flags and transgender flags out of school. What are they doing in primary schools? Why are you
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propagandizing children? So DeSantis did that at the lower like children's school level, but he also did that
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at the university level banning DEI initiatives and basically saying to the universities, if you want
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funding, you will stop promoting racial division. Now this isn't just important in terms of neutralizing
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radicalism in those schools and in those universities. It cuts off funding and personnel for the broader woke
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movement. There are thousands of people in Canada who for a living are racist, who are for a living
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transgenderist. They are paid six figures to be part of this department or that department in
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a lot of government institutions, actually in private companies too. Ron DeSantis said we're
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going to cut that off and he has. Another thing Florida did under DeSantis is to demand that no state
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investment funds were invested in companies that promoted DEI or other woke policies like a lot of
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black rocks programs. Alberta has massive investments. I don't know if you know this,
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more than a hundred billion dollars in pension funds for its workers and the massive heritage fund.
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Now it's important that those funds are invested in the fiduciary interests of Albertans, that is to
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make money. But just as those funds wouldn't be invested in, say, slave labor companies operating in
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Xinjiang province in communist China, maybe they shouldn't invest in companies that take a
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radical view on race either that promote racism or sexism or transgenderism. I'm just brainstorming
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here. But this is all about thinking about, well, what would a Democrat do to get rid of any Republican
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moles that were blocking their agenda? I think it's time our side started acting this way, the way Trump
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did. Look at Trump. Look at DeSantis. One of the reasons both are successful is because they act and they
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cause others to react. They're not just drifting. They choose their controversies. They're hyperkinetic,
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in fact. They spent a lot of time thinking about what underlying conditions have just been accepted
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because we always do things that way. And then they decide just not to continue to do things that
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way out of inertia. Sometimes it looks symbolic only. Here's a funny example, like when Trump fired the
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board of the Kennedy Center for the Arts. I mean, you think, well, what does that have to do with
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anything? I don't know if you know what the Kennedy Center is. It's basically a gorgeous building
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with a huge budget and they put on concerts and theaters. It's basically the major house for the
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arts in Washington, D.C. It's a government institution. Yeah. And it was totally politicized by
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the left. It was an enormous pot of money for all these cronies to hire each other and pay each other.
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But more than that, it was funding a political elite that blackballed conservatives in the arts
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and weaponized the arts against any Republicans or any government initiative. Go do that on your own
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dime, Trump said. Trump appointed, fired them all and appointed his allies to that board. Very symbolic
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of what he is doing in the rest of the government. Trump and DeSantis are the two leaders in actually
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using the powers they were elected to use. For some reason, our side doesn't like to do that.
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One last example, and you might think this is the goofiest yet. Trump renamed
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the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America. Now, you may say that's goofy or quirky or trivial.
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Okay. But just think about it for one second. Why is renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America?
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Why is that silly? But, I mean, I'm here in Toronto. How about renaming Toronto's big,
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young Dundas Square? It's like the Times Square in Toronto. Renaming it Sankofa Square after some
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obscure African tribe. Why is that not goofy? So many places are being renamed in Canada too,
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to purge any trace of history and to replace it with a new fake history. Heck, they're doing that
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to Sir John A. Macdonald. They've torn down Sir John A. Macdonald's statues, Queen Victoria statue.
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They've purged Sir John A. Macdonald from the $10 bill. So don't tell me about defacing historical
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things. Why can't our side strengthen historical things and rename things in a positive way? I think
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Trump was making that point there. Why not go on a spree of our own, rebuilding our real history instead
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of the fake revisionism? If the left can do it, I think the right can also. By the way,
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this is the only way to have a chance of making permanent changes, purging things, shutting down
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whole boards and commissions. Everything else can be undone the morning after Alberta's conservatives
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lose an election, whether that's in 2027 or 2031 or whenever. Just some thoughts. Stay with us for more.
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In 2021, you said that Richmond couldn't engage in land acknowledgements because of the cases,
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the claims involved. So how come citizens didn't find out then about their property's title being
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at risk if you were aware? Well, the reason that we don't do a land acknowledgement is mostly because of
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the lawsuit by the Musqueam over the Garden City lands. That's the biggest factor. This case was a factor
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as well. But just remember that at the beginning, before the trial, the court was asked to make an
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order saying that all the landowners in the area had to be notified. And they said no. And then application
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was made at a later stage, the very same asking that all the landowners be notified. And the answer
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was again, no. So that's why all these people woke up one day and found that there was their property
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was subject to the Aboriginal title. They don't know what it is. They don't know what it means,
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what the implications are. They didn't know how it got there and they don't know where it's going
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from here. So it's really a disaster. You know, a lot of public meetings used to start with
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the singing of the anthem. Some would start with the Lord's Prayer. These were things that united us
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all and had a reference to our history, where we came from. These days, those are typically banned
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or at least replaced by ever more progressive sounding land acknowledgements. At my own kids' school,
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there was a land acknowledgement that went so deep and heavy, it felt like a prayer in itself. It felt
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semi-religious. I was the only person, by the way, in the entire auditorium who did not stand for this
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quasi-religious ceremony. And the reason for that is because I don't think it's honest. If you really
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think you are standing on stolen land, then shouldn't you do something about it? Shouldn't you give it up?
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Shouldn't you return it? It's a bit much to say, I've stolen this land. I acknowledge that. Now,
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let me keep on going. Now, I don't believe that the land is stolen. I think that the vast majority
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of land in Canada was properly ceded. And I hate to use the word, but through conquest,
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it's a terrible sounding word when we're talking about our First Nations brothers and sisters,
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but that is historically what happened. And many of the treaties, the very first words are,
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you know, that the First Nation representatives surrendered the land. I don't mean to
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be rough in my language, but if you actually read any of the treaties are fairly blunt
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in their description of what happened. There are some places in Canada where treaties did not happen.
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And so a question arises, if you built a house in Canada somewhere and you thought you owned your
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house and the bank thought you owned your house because they gave you a mortgage that was secured
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against your house. And if for your entire life and for your entire memory of our history,
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you own that land. But then suddenly activist judges said, well, hang on a second.
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And amorphous claim might be made to your land that no, it's not yours. There's a preexisting
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aboriginal title that someone else, some Indian band, some aboriginal activist may actually own
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your land. If not outright, at least some of it, what would that make you say or do?
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Suddenly it's not just about being politically correct, like putting your pronouns in your email
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signature. Now it's actually put up or shut up time. Well, that's what's happening in British
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Columbia when a court case suggested that indigenous title or aboriginal title could in fact impose
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itself on millions of people who think that they own their property. This is a shocking
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thing. And it led to a very rambunctious town hall meeting two nights ago in Richmond,
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a suburb of Vancouver. Joining us now to talk about this is our BC bureau chief,
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Drea Humphrey, who was there in Richmond at the meeting. Drea, great to see you again. Thanks for
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being there. Good to see you. Thanks for having me. Did I properly describe what's going on?
00:21:07.180
Help me out. Cause I acknowledge I didn't read the full court ruling myself, but it seems serious
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enough that mayors of BC cities are writing to their landowners saying, Hey, heads up
00:21:21.100
this just in, you might not own your land. Like they really are sending out those letters on mass,
00:21:25.740
aren't they? Well, it's an 800 page decision. So don't feel bad about not getting through
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it yet. And it was handed down in August. That is the Cowichan tribe versus Canada, a G case. And for
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the first time in Canada's history, we saw aboriginal title be granted over private fee, simple property
00:21:50.300
lands. So that's never happened in Canada before. There have been other aboriginal title claims before.
00:21:57.020
So this is very unprecedented. And so the shocking part, in addition to that is that the private land
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owners who are affected, it's not millions of people in Richmond, I would say probably hundreds
00:22:11.660
of landowners because it's a certain strip at this moment. Okay. Thank you.
00:22:15.660
No worries. They were not told anything about this case. It was filed originally back in 2013.
00:22:23.500
And then of course, it was argued over the last five years or so. And they didn't get a knock on
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the door. They didn't get a letter. They didn't get a phone call and tell aboriginal title was already
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deemed over their land and their own title was deemed defective and invalid by the B.C. Supreme Court.
00:22:46.220
Oh, my goodness. So first of all, thank you for the correction that this doesn't apply everywhere.
00:22:50.780
It's just on certain parcels of land that I guess did not have a treaty. And the bulk of those are in
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British Columbia, in Ontario and Eastern Canada, even in Alberta. I think all the land was covered by
00:23:01.900
treaty. So just to be clear, is the property in question the places where there is no
00:23:08.220
treaty? Is that why you say it's hundreds as opposed to millions?
00:23:12.220
It's just a certain section. So, so far, aboriginal title has been given over approximately 7.5
00:23:18.780
kilometers of land. Now, here's the thing. The case is an appeal by all parties, which again,
00:23:25.020
are not the property owners. And that includes being appealed by the Cowichan tribes, which is saying,
00:23:30.380
no, we should have more, much more than what you've given us, because we picked blueberries and we fished
00:23:37.260
back there, according to oral stories. So everybody is concerned about what this actually means. And may
00:23:45.180
I remind you, in 2023, we saw something similar happened in Haida Gwaii, where David Evey didn't even
00:23:54.460
wait for the courts. He just made a deal with the Haida Gwaii nation and gave them aboriginal title.
00:24:00.780
And the promise was there, there was, don't worry, it's not going to affect private owned lands. But
00:24:05.820
the fact of the matter is, even though that was not over private property title, it means that people
00:24:14.380
who live there are now ruled under a government that they can't elect close to half of that, you know,
00:24:20.700
those islands population. Wow. You know, the fact that people who weren't in that small lawsuit were
00:24:29.180
not advised of it. I was reading that one of the reasons is that the courts didn't want all these
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interveners. The courts didn't want all these severely normal British Columbians to say, hey,
00:24:40.140
you're talking about my house. I have an interest here. Can I be an intervener? I got something to say,
00:24:45.980
judge. And it sounds to me like the judges purposefully did not ring the alarm. And like
00:24:52.860
you say, the decision went ahead and the people who were affected by it weren't even
00:24:58.380
given notice. Am I accurately reflecting what happened? Absolutely. Both the province as well
00:25:04.700
as the city of Richmond said, hey, we should probably tell these homeowners and the judge, Judge Young,
00:25:10.540
Justice Young ruled, no, we're not going to do that. Or it's normally it would be Cowichan
00:25:16.940
tries responsibility. And she ruled that they do not have to notify. But here's the thing,
00:25:21.420
the citizens understandably are not happy with the fact that the city didn't let them know anyways.
00:25:26.780
It wasn't unlawful for them to send a letter and let them know so that they could start advocating
00:25:33.340
on their behalf. Wow. Now, I understand that. First of all, tell me a little bit about the
00:25:39.500
town hall meeting a couple of nights ago, because I saw your Twitter feed. It looked huge. And
00:25:44.540
Richmond is a very diverse place, ethnically speaking, large Chinese community, large South
00:25:50.300
Asian community. What's interesting about that is that these folks, you know, I mean,
00:25:54.860
there's been a large multicultural community in Vancouver for, I'd say, 50 years,
00:25:58.780
50 years, certainly since the 1980s. This pits newcomers who thought they were coming to like,
00:26:06.700
I saw one speaker say this is reminds me of Hong Kong, where the communist government says you don't
00:26:12.380
really have title to your land. And I, and all these folks who believed in the Canadian dream,
00:26:17.900
the Canadian system, poured their life savings, bought a house. Now they're, they're terrible. It's
00:26:22.860
just very strange to see. Tell me a little bit about what the meeting was like, who was there?
00:26:27.340
What were the sentiments? Who was there on behalf of the government? What kind of questions were,
00:26:31.660
but give us a little bit of background and then maybe we'll show some clips.
00:26:35.420
Well, first we'll start with the fact that the meeting had to be relocated. It was originally
00:26:40.140
planned for Richmond city hall, but because so many people wanted to attend, they had to move it to the
00:26:46.380
Vancouver Sheraton hotel, which is located inside of Richmond. And so that alone was probably different
00:26:53.660
for them. And there was hundreds who showed up. At one point, there were many people standing as
00:26:57.900
there were no seats available. And it began with Mayor Brody, Malcolm Brody, addressing them and
00:27:05.740
saying, here's what's happened. We have a lawyer here today. We'll also have the attorney general,
00:27:11.260
Nikki Sharma speaking today as well. And so everybody sort of waited and heard the spiel from the lawyer.
00:27:17.740
What stood out to me about what the lawyer said is because of course, everybody there is going,
00:27:22.140
what does this mean to us? Not even just the owners, but tenants too. Also businesses. There's
00:27:28.620
a couple of golf courses that are being claimed as well. And so one of the things that stood out to me,
00:27:35.580
and I had actually spoken and interviewed a realtor, Matt Brevner, our Rebel News alumni before,
00:27:41.580
and he had raised this as well, was that because it has been ruled that the Aboriginal title is outside
00:27:50.220
of BC's Land Title Act, which was supposed to be our most secure property rights. That means the
00:27:57.100
provisions that are inside of that to normally protect you from having your land taken, perhaps
00:28:02.700
there's a scam somehow, which apparently can happen to take your title. Those are, you know,
00:28:08.780
not within that ruling. The title goes over and that's called your indefeasibility protections.
00:28:16.540
So that is raising a huge unknown. The lawyer confirmed that and said, you know what? You
00:28:22.460
don't have those protections. The other thing the lawyer raised, and you know, it was interesting
00:28:27.980
because I had already caught Nikki Sharma, our attorney general with the NDP,
00:28:32.140
on her way in and asked her, why on earth is it that your government has blocked government lawyers
00:28:42.860
from arguing for extinguishment of Aboriginal title? They were actually blocked by the NDP from bringing
00:28:50.380
up that argument. I had asked her about that. Then when we got into the meeting, Richmond's lawyer brought
00:28:55.740
that up several times. He was really calling on the public to demand from the NDP government that they
00:29:04.300
remove whatever barrier they've put on as the attorney general and allow the province to go ahead and
00:29:11.820
pursue that argument in the appeal, which apparently they suspiciously, in my opinion, did not do during
00:29:17.660
the case. But the city of Richmond, of course, wanted to. Ms Sharma, the BC Conservatives say that the NDP was
00:29:25.260
involved in making it, making our government lawyers unable to argue against Aboriginal title extinguishment.
00:29:33.980
What is your response to that claim? Yeah, it's simply wrong. And I would ask the Conservative leader what his
00:29:42.540
position was in 2014 when he was in government and received the first claim that was filed in this
00:29:50.940
matter and what his arguments were when he was in government. Ms Sharma, in 2021, Mayor Brody said that
00:29:56.700
they were unable to engage as a city in land acknowledgements because of the legal implications
00:30:01.740
that the Musqueam Ban is claiming. What is your response? Are there any legal implications to land
00:30:07.260
acknowledgments that see that we are on unceded territory? I think I want to say very clearly
00:30:12.940
that the work of reconciliation is very important. We work with First Nations across this province
00:30:19.100
and we work with cities and we work with people across this province to lift all boats, to come up
00:30:23.740
with resolutions to sort through past wrongs and move forward in a way that respects all people. And I
00:30:30.780
think that's an important way to look at this. What about the Indigenous people who think land
00:30:34.060
acknowledgments are empty, like people don't actually want to give up the land when they
00:30:37.180
say that? You know, I think this is a question that is a little bit not related to the issue
00:30:44.620
that we're speaking today, but I will say that it's our position as a government that reconciliation
00:30:49.980
is an important part of the work of the province. And I think all British companies expect us to sit
00:30:55.260
down at a table together and try to resolve issues that are important to them. Well, boy, she doesn't
00:31:00.460
want to answer any questions at all. Look, either it's merely symbolic and it's like being polite and
00:31:06.780
being, you know, sensitive. And we could all be polite. We could all be sensitive and maybe that
00:31:11.820
makes for a happier and harmonious world. And British Columbia is a very diverse place,
00:31:16.380
especially the greater Vancouver area. Yeah, I get it. But all of a sudden, a judge is saying,
00:31:20.300
no, it's not just about symbolism. It's not just about a nicety. It means something real.
00:31:26.700
And it means you may not actually own your house, your business, your golf course. So I think Nikki
00:31:32.460
Sharma is trying to have it both ways. I mean, when she says reconciliation, what is it to reconcile?
00:31:37.340
Everyone loves to reconcile with someone with whom they've fallen out. There's nothing sweeter than
00:31:42.300
making up with an old friend that you split from. I get it. But that's not what we're talking about
00:31:47.100
here. We're talking about billions of dollars worth of property being given to people who
00:31:52.460
suddenly have been given the rights to it. Absolutely. My first report against land
00:31:59.020
acknowledgement was years ago here on Rebel News. But what I said there at the beginning
00:32:03.260
of that question is very important. The mayor of Richmond in 2021, after the false claims of
00:32:09.820
discovering bodies at residential schools spread the country, he was being pressured for his city to
00:32:16.060
engage in land acknowledgements. And he responded to that pressure by saying the city could not
00:32:21.180
because, we now know, he said, because of legal cases that the city was wrapped up in.
00:32:27.500
Now, I've also since learned that Port Coquitlam also does not do land acknowledgements for the exact
00:32:33.740
same reason. They are also in the courts over Aboriginal title. So there is a very real legal implication to
00:32:42.140
doing these land acknowledgement mantras where your elected officials are claiming on behalf that you live
00:32:48.940
on unceded and stolen territory, especially now when we know that you don't even find out
00:32:54.780
if your property, your land is at stake. So the other thing I would add to that is, of all people,
00:33:01.660
First Nation banned governments should know that reconciliation doesn't come from taking land.
00:33:09.260
No, that causes resentment today. Wow. Isn't that the truth? And I see that
00:33:14.780
based on this breakthrough in British Columbia, there are now people talking about a similar
00:33:19.660
litigation in Quebec. And I tell you, when you start giving property rights and other rights based
00:33:26.460
on race and things like that, you remove certainty. We are in for all sorts of trouble, economic trouble,
00:33:34.300
because who would invest in land that they don't own? And I believe you're going to have cultural
00:33:38.780
trouble. And frankly, I think this will build resentment towards Indigenous people. It will
00:33:46.460
not reconcile. It'll make people more hostile. I think this is a terrible path. Now, this is the
00:33:52.380
kind of thing that Rebel News reports on. And I'm really glad you were right in there in that press
00:33:57.340
conference. And it makes me feel great to see Rebel News and our microphone. And you were asking the best
00:34:02.860
questions. So thank you. So we're reporting the facts. We're giving our opinions. But this feels
00:34:08.860
like the kind of thing where Rebel News every once in a while, we don't just tell the story,
00:34:12.380
we stop and get involved. Tell me what's on your mind about maybe a petition or maybe even,
00:34:18.300
I don't know if it's possible, participating in some way to give British Columbians some access to
00:34:25.740
the courts, because it sounds like they've been kept out of the courts deliberately.
00:34:29.180
Well, absolutely. I am, you know, watching this very closely. I found out in August,
00:34:34.620
like most people did. And I've been on it ever since. So of course, journalistically,
00:34:39.820
we're going to bring that to you. But we also at times like this, when there is a great risk to the
00:34:45.100
freedoms of Canadians, we take action. So we actually have a petition that I strongly encourage you to sign
00:34:51.580
and share. It's at a website called endlandgrab.com. And in there, I go through some of the three
00:34:59.500
factors that I think have influenced where we are at now. One is, of course, land acknowledgements,
00:35:05.260
as we've discussed. The other is a UN aspirational framework. It's called the United Nations Declaration
00:35:12.620
on Rights for Indigenous Peoples, not all people. And British Columbia was the first jurisdiction in the
00:35:19.020
entire world to adopt that aspirational framework, and commit to conforming all of our laws to it,
00:35:29.660
that put 5% over and above 95%. So that needs to be addressed. And of course, we need to call
00:35:36.620
on our legislatures, our city officials, all of them to bring forth security for property rights. We
00:35:46.220
thought we had that. We're learning. We don't. That needs to change. So again, that is at
00:35:51.820
endlandgrabs.com. Great. Well, I'm so glad to see you on this. There's so much news out of British
00:35:58.220
Columbia. Boy, you're covering it, whether it's sort of dissident news with the ostrich farm or serious
00:36:04.220
constitutional challenges to property rights in Vancouver. You're there. It's great to see,
00:36:10.860
All right. There you have it. Dre Humphrey, our BC Bureau boss. Stay with us. Your letters to me next.
00:36:26.460
Hey, welcome back. Your letters to me about Sudan and the massacre that the left suddenly doesn't
00:36:32.620
really care about. Frank Uxbridge says, our foreign minister is a disgusting disgrace to this nation.
00:36:38.860
Well, it's not just the foreign minister. Where's the CBC? Where is the media party? Where are the
00:36:43.900
college clubs? Where are the boycott this and sanction that people? Like the whole
00:36:51.180
political industrial complex, the media, the professors, where are they? They couldn't care
00:36:57.820
less. It's what I said when I quoted that Haviv Retigur. It's an unusual name he has. The guy who says,
00:37:04.380
look, no other violence, no other horrific crimes or wars have ever or will ever be protested in this
00:37:12.780
way. Like what is Russia doing in Ukraine without even taking sides on that? Like the death toll there
00:37:18.220
is so much larger than what happened in Gaza. Sudan's death toll is a multiple, but no one cares because
00:37:25.420
Israel isn't involved. I just think it just, I mean, it's a shame what's happening in Sudan. Now,
00:37:30.620
of course I'm against it, but I'm not the guy who's been marching against for a ceasefire for two
00:37:36.700
years. Where are those people? Next letter is from Hiker X who says, what about supporting the
00:37:43.020
people of Canada from violent immigrants? You know, I saw an amazing thing today. At first, I didn't even
00:37:47.580
believe it till I checked the source. According to the Federal Register, which is basically where
00:37:51.900
Trump announces regulations, the United States has announced that it will take 7,500 refugees
00:37:58.380
this year, not 75,000, not 750,000, but 7,500 grand total. And they will take primarily from white
00:38:08.700
South African farmers who are being victimized by the black political extremists in South Africa,
00:38:15.180
who have basically declared war on these white farmers. Very interesting, isn't it? And just
00:38:20.780
causing such a tizzy on the left, but you can't deny that those farmers are being discriminated based
00:38:26.380
on race. They're being ethnically cleansed. And you know that those farmers would adapt immediately
00:38:32.540
and perfectly to America, and you know none of them would go on welfare, and you know none of them
00:38:37.100
would commit crimes. I'm not saying none, but I just think that that clarity of purpose, I mean,
00:38:45.500
thank God for Trump. Our next letter is from R.T. Missia who says, those millions, referring to the
00:38:53.260
millions Canada's giving Sudan, are going to be pocketed by the terrorists. We could use that money
00:38:57.900
in Canada. Yeah, if you look at the structure of that tweet yesterday from Anita Anand, the foreign
00:39:03.740
minister, it was almost perfunctory. Oh, we're really sad to see 2,000 people killed. Yeah, that's
00:39:09.340
not good for Sudan. But, and then the bulk of the tweet was boasting about how much money she was
00:39:15.020
spending. She didn't even say who the terrorists were. It was such a weird tweet. And it was so
00:39:19.420
obviously about pandering to people of different diaspora groups in Canada by talking about how much
00:39:25.660
money will be spent. It's really crazy. Well, it's our show for the day. Until tomorrow, on behalf of all
00:39:31.260
of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night, and keep fighting for freedom.