00:02:16.480just over three weeks ago i was banned from flying to london england where i was going to attend
00:02:32.080tommy robinson's big rally i received a simple unsigned email from the uk home office the kind
00:02:40.160that you can't reply to. They also said that they were canceling my ETA, electronic travel
00:02:47.820authorization, and that was not appealable. But in the same letter to me, they said I was invited
00:02:54.680to apply for a regular visa. As you know, I took up that invitation and I paid the thousand pound
00:03:00.700super priority payment that apparently was going to give me a result within 24 hours. It's now been
00:03:07.520more than three weeks and I haven't heard back yet, other than their couple of emails confessing
00:03:12.860that they're running a little late. It reminds me of this funny scene from the kids movie
00:03:17.360Zootopia. Now, sorry, I'm going to play it at length, which is how it gets funny. So I'm dealing
00:03:24.240with a bureaucracy in the UK and they just keep on saying, oh, we're going, we're running a little
00:03:28.340behind. The 24 hour turnaround has now become more than three weeks. What do you think of this
00:03:33.440clip from Zootopia if you're not a parent of a small kid you might not have seen it but this
00:03:38.120makes me laugh. Flash is the fastest guy in there you need something done he's on it. I hope so we
00:03:43.360are really fighting the clock and every minute counts. Wait they're all slots?
00:04:03.440you said this was going to be quick are you saying that because he's a sloth he can't be fast
00:04:23.380i thought in zootopia anyone could be anything flash flash hundred yard dash buddy it's nice
00:04:28.880to see you nice to see you too hey flash i'd love you to meet my friend uh darlin i've forgotten
00:04:40.660your name officer judy habs cpd how are you i am doing just fine as well as i can be
00:04:55.740Yeah, that's what I'm dealing with here. I think they're actually avoiding dealing with things. They don't have a real reason to keep me out of the UK, and they don't want to admit that, so they're just delaying. I don't know if they'll go on forever like that.
00:05:11.840And as you know, I'm challenging this.
00:05:14.040I found some outstanding legal counsel in the UK.
00:05:16.460I think what they're doing to me is illegal.
00:05:18.340I'm not going to rehash that all now because I have another story for you today.
00:05:22.120I should tell you that when I was canceled, I got some support from, quote, my team, right?
00:05:27.420From Tommy Robinson, from a group I'm involved with called the Free Speech Union.
00:05:32.440I've been a member there for several years.
00:05:34.160I never thought that I would need their help.
00:05:35.420I really thought it was just my way of expressing solidarity with free speech.
00:05:39.560There were about a dozen of us who were banned all within a couple days to each other.
00:05:46.320As you know, I'm a journalist and a bit of an activist.
00:05:48.780And there were speakers and other journalists.
00:05:50.860There was a member of European Parliament.
00:05:52.460And there was a little bit of squawking.
00:05:55.140But most people said, oh, those are just Tommy Robinson's friend.
00:05:57.820But today comes news that two far-left Islamists were banned also, Hassan Piker and Cenk Uyghur.
00:06:08.480Now, you might not know those names because they're not that big in Canada, but they're really on the front lines of the radical left in the United States.
00:10:27.240like have an orgasm yes sorry to show you that obviously he's also anti-semitic anti-american0.99
00:10:33.600it said he's obsessed with jews now both uh of these men were immediately um on twitter which0.99
00:10:40.420is fair enough claiming that it was the jews who banned from the united kingdom here's a son piker
00:10:47.840he says the uk has revoked my visa as well all at the behest of israel oh oh really the west is0.78
00:10:55.740betraying liberal values for a genocidal fascist foreign government soon we will all become israel
00:11:01.120so do you count yourself in the west i mean he hates the west he's for every0.51
00:11:06.920enemy of the west whether it's radical islam or communists it's sort of funny to watch him try
00:11:13.680and position himself as an ally of the west but he just made that whole israel part up i'll come
00:11:19.120back to you um because i don't think he's being accurate there i don't think he ever actually had
00:11:25.140a visa i think like me he had sort of that express digital visa in canada it's called the
00:11:30.760electronic travel authorization in the states is a slightly different name really it's just more of
00:11:35.200an app that lets people come in from friendly countries without a visa um but he has been
00:11:41.140blocked i believe that on the eve of a conference like i was and by the way i'm not really for
00:11:46.320banning people from speaking i i think censorship is generally immoral and it usually is pragmatically
00:11:54.100foolish too you just maybe make someone with a boring bad idea into a dangerous sexy bad idea0.84
00:12:01.180i think that's what happens when you try and ban things so here's his relative chink weger who said0.97
00:12:06.780i've been banned from the uk i tried to get on a flight to london to attend south by southwest0.80
00:12:11.240london and give a speech at oxford i've been banned for criticizing israel are you sure mate are you
00:12:17.440just adding that part in are we free anymore this is oppression of western citizens by our own
00:12:23.400government on behalf of a different country. Again, suddenly he's wearing the garb of an
00:12:30.840American. His TV show is literally called The Young Turks, but suddenly he's for American0.95
00:12:36.260values. You'll notice that both of these men immediately blame the Jews, except that their
00:12:42.560notice didn't mention the Jews or Israel or anything specific. I received the same letter
00:12:46.860and it's actually infuriatingly vague. I think that for these guys, they're obsessed with Jews
00:12:52.920and they love to provide Jews as the universal explanation for why anything goes wrong in their0.94
00:12:58.540life. Both of them are millionaire celebrities. Not a lot has gone wrong in their life,0.72
00:13:03.160but Jews are the universal scapegoat for them. Oh, by the way, let me show you the woman who1.00
00:13:09.700actually sent them the letter and sent it to me too. Her name is Shabana Mahmoud and she is a
00:13:16.280pro-Palestinian Muslim woman. She literally attends anti-Israel rallies. She's the decider
00:13:23.220of who comes and goes into the UK. I don't think she was running errands for Israel,
00:13:29.280just going out on a limb there. But I see a huge hullabaloo for these two men. Mainstream media is
00:13:35.880gaga about this, absolutely unquestioningly repeating the Israel did this line. I didn't see
00:13:43.580that for me or the rest of Tommy's team that was banned? I guess because they couldn't very well
00:13:48.660blame it on Israel, could they? Now, I'm still fighting my ban in court. I applied the right way.
00:13:54.840We'll see what these guys do. I think that the banning of these two is a kind of political offset
00:14:00.160to distract from banning me and the other Tommy Robinson friends. I don't like people being banned
00:14:05.400for their ideas. I don't think it works. I mean, both of these men can appear in the UK via Zoom,
00:14:11.020for example you've heard of the streisand effect when barbara streisand tried to ban a particular
00:14:17.520photographer from taking pictures of her home um she brought an enormous amount of attention to it
00:14:23.680her she lives in malibu and there was a guy just taking pictures of all the homes in malibu and
00:14:28.180really only a handful of people looked at it until streisand sue and then everyone wanted to see what
00:14:33.440the fuss was about i think that could well happen here i don't think a ton of people know who chenk
00:14:39.180Uyghur and Hassan Piker are. They're sort of C-level celebrities. But now a lot more people
00:14:44.900hear about them and are listening to them. Now, if someone commits a crime, then charge them,
00:14:50.760as Hassan Piker might well face justice for being an illegal foreign agent without registration. But
00:14:57.400just being anti-Semitic, I don't think that's a crime, at least not in the United States or the
00:15:03.200UK. But in the UK, crime itself is very two-tier these days, isn't it? Stay with us. More ahead
00:15:11.900from our friends at the Taxpayers' Federation.
00:15:22.740Oh, hi, everybody. As you know, one of the most trusted sources of information
00:15:26.400on financial matters, fiscal accountability, government taxes, and debt is the Canadian
00:15:31.040taxpayers federation not only they're full of smart high energy guys and gals but the most
00:15:36.320important thing is they are independent by that i mean they do not take any government money i mean
00:15:40.960how could they possibly it would be like i don't know a doctor taking money from a tobacco company
00:15:46.560giving you advice on smoking by the way i'm pro-freedom on the tobacco file as you know
00:15:51.200but you see my point about a conflict of interest and in fact 99 of all pundits and commentators in
00:15:56.880in this country are in some way on the government payroll. It is therefore a pleasure and a duty
00:16:02.020to talk to our friends at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. And what a pleasure to welcome back
00:16:06.420the boss of the whole shop, our friend Franco Teresano. We had him on just last week,
00:16:10.520but there's more news I want him to talk about. Franco, welcome back.
00:16:14.120Hey, it's always a pleasure. Thanks for having me on.
00:16:16.380Well, you know, if you were taking 30 or 50 grand a year personally from the federal government,
00:16:22.680I mean, I love you as a guy, but I don't know if I could trust what you would say
00:16:26.060in that hypothetical scenario because and and i choose those numbers on purpose because about 35
00:16:32.240grand a year per journalist in the government subsidy so i just wish there was more disclosure
00:16:37.780of that and in your case you're one of the few guys who's not on the government dole and yeah
00:16:41.800let's talk about the substance of our of our purpose to meet today and that is there's news
00:16:46.200out of newfoundland and labrador tell me about it yeah so it's actually a bit of a taxpayer win
00:16:50.980right and i'm very happy that our legal team was fighting this so here's what happened folks
00:16:54.860uh the newfoundland and labrador government was suing the federal government essentially
00:16:59.760launching this court challenge trying to get the courts to force the uh federal government
00:17:04.780to increase the equalization handouts right to the province so it was going to court now newfoundland
00:17:11.100and labrador eventually dropped that court case so it's a it's a big win for taxpayers and look
00:17:15.700like i'm very happy that the ctfs lawyers like we were intervening in this because we were arguing
00:17:21.060like hold on a second right the constitution was never designed to let provinces to sue ottawa
00:17:27.360to get bigger handouts from taxpayers and you know it's good that newfoundland and labrador
00:17:32.320came to its senses and dropped this court case because if they were successful uh you know the
00:17:38.340bill for equalization could have ballooned by billions of dollars and really taxpayers especially
00:17:43.880in alberta british columbia and saskatchewan uh would be on the hook for all this what was it do
00:17:49.820you think that caused the change? Because that's, I mean, that is a dramatic reversal. Did they
00:17:54.720think they might lose? Is there a change of political direction? Why did they change?
00:17:59.320Well, to be quite frank, I'm not sure what is in the heads of the politicians in Newfoundland
00:18:03.660and Labrador. Now, what I will say, though, is, you know, we were interveners in this, right?
00:18:09.380And one of the reasons that we wanted to intervene is we thought we needed the voice of taxpayers
00:18:14.080in this court case, right? We weren't going to let it up to the lawyers in Ottawa of the federal
00:18:19.000government to try to defend Canadian taxpayers coast to coast to coast. So we had to jump in
00:18:23.560this fight. But Ezra, let me just say like this is a bit of a good news story for taxpayers here
00:18:28.700that Newfoundland is dropping this and that equalization bill isn't going any higher. But
00:18:33.080there's still a lot more work to do, Ezra, because equalization, as you know, not only does it hurt
00:18:38.080taxpayers in places like Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia who are forced to pay into
00:18:42.860this scheme but don't get any money back, but it also hurts these so-called have-not provinces,
00:18:48.180Right. Because equalization is essentially just a slush fund for these premiers in these other provinces who rely on tax dollars from other places rather than relying on good policies to grow their own economies.
00:19:00.140You know, I see that sometimes. I mean, when the third or quarter of your revenues come from the feds, it's like free money. So you're not really paying close attention to the will of the voters.
00:19:10.400Now, I see in your article on your website, Taxpayer.com, Newfoundland and Labrador are set to receive more than $180 million in equalization payments this year.
00:19:20.940Now, that's a lot of money, obviously, but it's actually not a staggering amount of money.
00:19:26.820And whenever I go out to Newfoundland, I mean, there is sort of a rustic, old-fashioned sense to some of it, but it's also a high-tech sense.
00:19:35.460there's the oil and gas offshore industry and the same thing i realize about a lot of the atlantic
00:19:40.740they have resources that they've just chosen not to develop i mean i remember new brunswick
00:19:45.520had a lot of natural gas i mean new brunswick is home to canada's largest refinery the big
00:19:50.940irving refinery is actually bigger than any refinery in alberta if you can believe it
00:19:55.160so they're they can and i think the problem is when when they're focused on 180 million
00:20:02.500in equalization maybe they're taking their eye off of a billion or whatever it would be if they
00:20:08.560really went all in on oil and gas and the world really needs oil and gas now more than ever i
00:20:13.780don't know it just it seems to me to be a ridiculous thing to focus on 180 million
00:20:18.980in equalization rather than so much more developing your economy freely which they've
00:20:24.020started to do by the way and look a lot of those provinces that you just mentioned out there in
00:20:28.860land of canada they're high tax jurisdictions right like you're punished if you're uh successful
00:20:33.840or want to start a business out there create jobs and this is why i say like equalization
00:20:38.620is obviously bad for taxpayers in like alberta saskatchewan or british columbia
00:20:43.180ezra you might remember a couple years ago right this uh equalization referendum in alberta i
00:20:47.920believe it was 2021 we crunched the numbers and equalization at the time was costing each albertan
00:20:54.000about 650 bucks right so for a family of four that's 2600 bucks that the federal government
00:21:00.340is taking you know from your family through taxes that are just being shipped off to other provinces
00:21:05.500but it doesn't just hurt uh you know places like Alberta it hurts these uh taxpayers in these other
00:21:11.720provinces because then you have these premiers these politicians out east uh who essentially
00:21:16.980are just relying on tax dollars coming in the door from other provincial taxpayers rather than
00:21:21.880actually cutting taxes cutting the waste cutting red tape to grow their economy and become more
00:21:27.380self-reliant one thing i'll also add ezra you look at all of equalization it's about a 27 billion
00:21:33.460dollar hit to taxpayers this year but there's other ways the federal government transfers money
00:21:38.060right you look at the social transfer you look at the health care transfer those two alone is like
00:21:42.80075 billion dollars so uh more work to be done here for sure you know what i pardon me
00:21:49.100can you edit out that cop please sorry franco you know franco i think listening to you maybe
00:21:58.740i understated the amount of dough that's being transferred out there and i think you're wise
00:22:02.780especially that so much of it comes from alberta and i think that is a a chronic source of
00:22:09.800unhappiness between alberta and the federal government you know i am i travel from time
00:22:14.860in time to ireland sometimes for free speech uh reasons and immigration reasons and there's so
00:22:20.000much commonality franco between ireland and newfoundland i mean and and they feel it too
00:22:25.640and let me just tell you a super quick ireland story ireland until about 20 years ago was sort
00:22:31.560of poor i mean it had a low per capita gdp was they didn't have developed infrastructure
00:22:37.100it certainly wasn't high tech but they have made a conscious decision to really reduce taxes to
00:22:43.020the point of being a kind of tax haven almost a tax dodge and because of that huge companies that
00:22:50.520you would never have guessed would move to ireland 20 years ago like google and so many high tech
00:22:55.200companies have moved there largely because of the tax situation it's almost like a haven like the
00:23:00.560isle of man or something like that or luxembourg and the reason i say this is culturally there's
00:23:07.200a similarity between ireland and newfoundland and it was only a generation ago where you could
00:23:12.340legitimately call ireland poor but on a per capita basis now it's almost as wealthy as
00:23:18.020luxembourg i don't know i just thought i'd throw that out there because you know if ireland can do
00:23:22.660it why can't newfoundland i mean it's because of the politicians right out east like that that's
00:23:28.340the problem you know it's um you don't need a phd in economics to understand that when governments
00:23:33.720take less money from businesses and investors you're going to have more businesses and more
00:23:37.760investors. Right. When governments punish success with high taxes, these success taxes, you have
00:23:43.220fewer Canadian success stories. Right. This is one huge problem. And, you know, what we said and my
00:23:49.140my colleague, Devin Drover, who's our in-house lawyer and our Atlantic director, he was very
00:23:54.360clear and to the point when he's like, look, if Newfoundland and Labrador, they still have more
00:23:58.380work to do, because if they want to become a have not province, which I think it should be the goal,
00:24:03.120then what they have to do is not go to court and beg for more taxpayers money from other places in
00:24:08.380canada no they got to cut taxes cut waste and cut red tape that is stalling uh their economic
00:24:13.800opportunities out there well one can only hope i mean it's possible for a country that's really
00:24:18.860set back to leap ahead i think of argentina under javier mille he really is doing it franco great
00:24:24.580to catch up with you send our best to devon drover your atlantic uh leader and lawyer and uh
00:24:30.080Congratulations to Newfoundland Labrador