The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - Mandates, Democracy and Unity

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome once again to The Blueprint. This is Canada's Conservative Podcast. I'm your

00:00:08.280 host, Jamie Schmael, Member of Parliament for Halliburton, Kawartha Lakes, Brock, with new

00:00:11.740 content for you every single Tuesday, 1.30pm Eastern Time, give or take. We ask that you

00:00:16.840 like, comment, subscribe, share this program, help us push back against the ever-moving

00:00:20.900 Liberal agenda. And do we ever have a great program for you, a fiery program, in our brand

00:00:25.920 new studio? We have a couple of guests for you. They're going to talk about mandates,

00:00:29.380 we're going to talk about getting back to normal, and we're going to talk about people

00:00:32.660 pushing to have their message heard. So, if you can't listen or watch it all right this

00:00:37.860 second, please download it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, you name

00:00:43.400 it. It is out there. Two returning guests here for this fiery program. We have Raquel Dancho, 0.96

00:00:48.180 the Member of Parliament for Kildonan St. Paul in the beautiful province of Manitoba. She's

00:00:52.660 also the public safety critic for the Conservative Party. And we also have Stephen Ellis, Dr. Stephen

00:00:58.580 Ellis, Cumberland Colchester. It's his writing. He's also the Special Advisor for COVID-19.

00:01:03.780 We welcome them both back on an important topic. A lot has been happening in Ottawa.

00:01:08.500 I just don't even know where to start.

00:01:10.020 Wow, it's been overwhelming, Jamie.

00:01:11.700 So, we have Joel Lightbound coming out today, saying that the government needs to ease restrictions.

00:01:17.060 We need to talk about a plan to give people hope for the future. And maybe we'll start with you,

00:01:22.420 Raquel, because you had a fiery speech yesterday in the House of Commons. I think anyone who has not seen that

00:01:27.540 speech needs to go to our Facebook page and listen to that speech. It is amazing.

00:01:32.740 Basically, what you said yesterday is what Joel Lightbound, the Liberal MP from Quebec,

00:01:36.900 is repeating today.

00:01:37.780 Yeah, so two things on Mr. Lightbound. Number one, I applaud his courage. He put a lot on the line,

00:01:43.460 and I wonder, I hope he stays in Liberal Caucus, but based on Trudeau's track record of dealing with

00:01:48.260 those who don't agree with his very narrow vision of what diversity means, I fear that he may not be

00:01:54.580 long for that Liberal Caucus. But I really applaud his courage. And the second thing is,

00:01:59.460 is I think we've heard what he said before. I think Conservatives have been saying for quite some

00:02:04.340 time that we need to come forward with a real plan. We need to see the government bring forward

00:02:09.060 thresholds, metrics to give Canadians hope that we are going to get out of this, that these

00:02:13.460 restrictions are going to end, that these divisive policies are going to end. I know Michelle Rumpel-Garner, 1.00

00:02:19.140 which she was held critic over well over a year ago, she was talking about please present a plan

00:02:23.300 to give Canadians hope. And Dr. Ellis, I know that you have particular expertise on this. I'm not

00:02:27.700 sure if you'd like to pick up about what kind of, you know, we need a plan. I think that's a valuable

00:02:31.540 and reasonable thing to ask two years into this. I agree 100%, Raquel. You know, it's very disappointing

00:02:36.660 to have this lack of leadership that has plagued this country for many years now, and certainly been

00:02:41.860 magnified over the last two years. And it has, as Jamie said, taken away the hope for Canadians as to what the

00:02:48.740 future is going to bring for all of us. And now that we begin to see these lifting of restrictions

00:02:54.260 and mandates and lockdowns, Canadians can begin to have plans for their future and to have some

00:02:59.060 excitement back in their life. You know, as we were speaking beforehand, it's so liberating to think

00:03:04.980 that, hey, you don't have to have a pass or a mask, those kinds of things, and to get back to that life

00:03:11.060 that we've all been used to. So it's an exciting day for Canadians, absolutely.

00:03:15.140 So the province of Saskatchewan announced today that they're lifting restrictions on the vaccine

00:03:19.460 passports as of this coming Sunday. By the end of the month, all other restrictions will be lifted.

00:03:25.300 And so I think that is giving people some hope, some renewed vision that we can get back to normal.

00:03:31.300 And some of these measures are temporary, but in terms of the federal mandates, when travel,

00:03:37.140 that kind of thing, nothing seems to be moving.

00:03:40.020 I think Trudeau in his remarks yesterday doubled down.

00:03:42.100 Yes.

00:03:42.500 He doubled down on legitimizing his approach to this, which, I mean, it was only two,

00:03:47.220 two and a half weeks ago that what sparked this entire movement and demonstration across

00:03:52.340 the country was his new mandate. And so this is two years into the pandemic, and he's still using

00:03:57.700 the same tools that he's been using all along. And we know that all these tools are important,

00:04:01.540 but we see other jurisdictions across the world moving forward and at least giving their

00:04:05.940 constituents and their citizens hope. Here's a plan. This is how we're going to go about doing this.

00:04:10.340 And I think it's perfectly reasonable for Canadians to expect that two years into this,

00:04:14.820 two years of trauma, two years of hardship and job loss and mental anguish, and we can go on and

00:04:20.260 on and on. Every Canadian has felt different levels of trauma. I think it's reasonable for Canadians to

00:04:25.940 say, okay, enough is enough. We need to know how this is going to end. And we need to see a positive

00:04:31.860 move forward. And I was so disappointed. Last thing I'll say, so disappointed sitting across from the

00:04:36.020 prime minister, 20 feet away from him. He's been silent on this large, other than to come out

00:04:41.300 of hiding and name call and raise the temperature. He's been silent. And he takes this massive platform,

00:04:47.300 the world is watching, and just doubles down. No compassionate leadership, no bridge building.

00:04:52.580 I was incredibly disappointed. I think a lot of Canadians were. And even his 0.85

00:04:55.700 chief medical advisor, Dr. Theresa Tam, is saying, we need to rethink these mandates. We need to rethink

00:05:01.700 provincial and federal ways of doing business, which I think has been our message for a long time.

00:05:07.460 Absolutely. You know, and I think when we look at other jurisdictions around the world, we realize

00:05:11.620 that the UK's vaccination rates are much lower than those here in Canada and other countries like

00:05:17.860 Denmark, et cetera, again, lower than Canadian standards. Canadians have done their part for

00:05:23.140 everybody. You know, they've had each other's backs. Let's be honest. It's Canadians who've had each

00:05:27.140 other's backs. And the prime minister has showed this lack of leadership over and over and over again,

00:05:33.140 being very divisive. I can't understand it. That's certainly not any style of leadership that anyone

00:05:38.020 that I know could possibly understand or support. And, you know, I think it's exciting that we want to

00:05:43.380 bring forward this message of hope for Canadians and unifying Canadians and that obviously the government

00:05:50.580 in waiting is that of the Conservative Party. And we're ready and willing, able to move forward and

00:05:56.340 govern this country in the way it should be. And isn't it concerning that the prime minister and

00:06:01.140 Joel Lightbound spoke to this, and we've been talking about it forever. That's the other frustrating

00:06:04.660 part. A lot of the stuff that Joel Lightbound was talking about just in his press conference

00:06:08.900 this morning, we've been talking about for months, if not years. And the division, you know,

00:06:14.740 this was not a polarized topic. The idea of mandates and vaccines was not polarized prior to going into

00:06:19.780 the election. But when the election was called, the prime minister's poll numbers started to go

00:06:24.820 downhill. He needed a new victim, right? We had east versus west, rich versus poor, urban versus

00:06:29.620 rural. Those were all the visions that were sowed before the election. Then it became vaccinated versus

00:06:34.820 unvaccinated in order to win the election. That seems to be his go-to, the way that he operates in

00:06:41.460 elections is to divide and conquer, I guess, is the way that he does that. Rather than presenting a

00:06:46.420 unifying vision for the country that people can really get excited and get behind and move forward

00:06:51.140 together as a united country, which we know is not easy in Canada. This is a lot of hard work to

00:06:55.860 keep Canada united as a country for so many different historic reasons. And we're just seeing

00:07:01.220 him take the divisions and use them to his advantage and just sort of twist this evil knife

00:07:06.980 to further divide Canadians. And again, I think it was not the case that his government this time

00:07:12.340 around, this minority government, his second minority government, won the lowest percentage of the

00:07:16.740 popular vote in the history per capita in the history of Canada. So they have a very weak hold

00:07:22.100 on power, relatively speaking. And yet he's just doubling down on this divisive rhetoric. And I

00:07:27.220 think your average Canadian, and we're seeing this in the polls, over 50% of Canadians now are saying,

00:07:31.780 you know what, I've had about enough of this. I've done everything I was told. This is too hard on my

00:07:35.380 kids, too hard on me, too hard on my elderly parents. Let's move forward. And yet the prime minister

00:07:40.020 has completely been disconnected from that. So I think his speech was tone deaf. The world was watching.

00:07:44.340 It was an opportunity to show, you know, almost, you know, a prime ministerial level of leadership,

00:07:48.980 so to speak. And it fell very flat and tone deaf. And we're seeing a massive shift, I think,

00:07:53.300 within even media in Ottawa, saying, okay, this isn't, this isn't working. This is not deescalating.

00:07:58.740 Where's the leadership? You know, and I think Canadians, as you said, Raquel, they readily and easily

00:08:04.340 recognize that enough is enough. You know, people have given up everything, you know, the fact that you

00:08:10.420 couldn't, and some places still cannot visit your loved one in a nursing home. That's very,

00:08:15.780 very traumatic for people. And you think back to the times where, you know, people, they're not even

00:08:20.820 hugging each other, they're missing out on birthdays and bar mitzvahs and weddings and funerals.

00:08:26.580 This is unacceptable. I really think and believe that it's important that we understand that

00:08:32.260 our lives are not simply about COVID. We have to think about our financial health, our social health,

00:08:37.300 our mental health, and our physical health. And when we look at that, that's the idea of a government

00:08:42.420 is to take all of those things into consideration to not be one minded and exclusionary. And as you

00:08:48.580 said, Raquel, divisive. And that's what we've seen from this government. And that's intolerable to all

00:08:53.540 of us. And just think of this, the measures that the government has put in place that have really

00:08:58.260 punished those for differing views. You think about the fact that those who aren't getting vaccine for

00:09:05.220 whatever reason, they're now ineligible for employment insurance, like, that's their money

00:09:10.180 that they put in, they paid into, and now they can't even access it. Because this, this prime

00:09:14.420 minister just wants to divide and conquer. Yeah, and I think, you know, our party has been very loud

00:09:19.060 and clear right from the get go, when vaccines were first being procured, our support for vaccination,

00:09:23.300 and the hard work we put in to deliver that option for Canadians at a massive scale. Of course,

00:09:27.700 we were very slow to get those vaccines at first, which I believe, still to this day led to the third

00:09:31.860 wave of the pandemic. But once we got them, it was great to see. And we had a huge uptake.

00:09:36.260 And we also know many, many thousands of Canadians have died of COVID, have long COVID,

00:09:39.780 delayed surgeries, the trauma is real, and some people will never take their masks off,

00:09:43.220 will never travel. And that's important to acknowledge. Absolutely. And, but that being said,

00:09:48.260 just like you said, we need to, we need to have a prime minister who's going to bring us together

00:09:52.900 and move forward. It's almost as if this, for him, he's happy if this never ends. He seems to just

00:09:58.900 enjoy, as you said, punishing people. And the policies aren't changing at all. There's,

00:10:03.940 there's just no, um, no collaboration. And our, our, our leader had brought forward yesterday,

00:10:09.300 showed real class and leadership and said, wrote him a letter and said, let's meet all parties

00:10:13.780 together. Let's sit at the table and talk about solutions. It is time. And, um, well,

00:10:18.660 we saw his response to that in the speech yesterday, no change. He might as well have stayed at home

00:10:22.500 in hiding for all the good that speech did. So I'm, I continue to be disappointed, but I have hope.

00:10:27.940 I've hoped the, the winds are changing and we'll see increasing provinces, uh, opening up and

00:10:32.580 hopefully the federal government will catch up. I hope so too. So, uh, Dr. Ellis, do you think

00:10:37.140 it made sense at this point in time for the government to implement some of these mandates,

00:10:41.380 hang on to some of the travel mandates that are in place, hang on to some of these border mandates

00:10:45.380 that are in place? It's, it's, is it time or is it not time to start relaxing some of this?

00:10:49.540 You know, Jamie, yeah, you know, I, I certainly can't see why we know that, uh, the Omicron variant is,

00:10:55.940 is in the United States, for instance, it's in Canada. We all know many people who have had it

00:11:00.740 now. Uh, we know that it's, it's relatively, relatively ubiquitous and given that sense,

00:11:06.420 you know, and also given the idea that Canadians have the right to reenter their own country.

00:11:11.220 How can we block their reentry by saying you need a test or you need to go isolate? And,

00:11:15.620 and we also know the terrible stories that we've heard from people being randomly selected to have

00:11:20.500 another test and having to wait at home many, many days for the answer as to whether you're

00:11:25.220 positive or negative and be in isolation and not be able to be a productive member of society.

00:11:30.100 That type of punishment, again, is absolutely and utterly inappropriate. So I, I think that,

00:11:35.220 you know, some of the things that we need to look at as Canada's Conservatives, being the voice of the

00:11:38.900 people, is how do we move forward with those things? And I think, Raquel, you, you have some things

00:11:43.460 to say with respect to that as well. Yeah, Dr. Ellis, very level-headed response there that I think a lot of

00:11:47.460 Canadians are connecting with. And, and one thing I want to say on travel, what I heard from a lot of

00:11:50.900 my constituents was the reason they got them actually, well, to do their part. That was the

00:11:54.020 message from governments, for sure. But a lot of it was a motivating self-interest. Like, I want to

00:11:58.740 travel. I want to travel. Yeah, I want my life back. Governments have said, we promise to give you

00:12:03.620 your life back if you do this. And then Omnicrom came along and we know it was, you know, this is,

00:12:08.100 we're learning things as we go. I recognize that. But people had been promised their lives back. People have

00:12:13.220 been promised to go deal with their businesses across the border, or their properties,

00:12:17.220 or take their kids to travel to get some relief from all of this chaos. And that opportunity was

00:12:22.660 shut down. And now if you try to travel, the policies are so vindictive in a way that it

00:12:27.220 punishes you, shame on you for traveling. But they were promised they could travel if they stepped up.

00:12:32.340 And so in, in some, what I'm saying is, I think that we, people lose trust in government at a time

00:12:38.100 that we need to have trust. And it's things like that, that make people not trust their governments.

00:12:43.300 And so I think it is really time for this national discussion to happen. You know, timing is

00:12:48.820 everything. And I'm glad to see it happening finally after two long years. Absolutely. It's a

00:12:52.900 great conversation, our brand new studio. Usually I give the guests, it is kind of nice, isn't it?

00:12:57.620 It is hopefully the one of many. I usually give the guests the last word, but we do have to cut away

00:13:02.580 because we have question period coming up. We have the leader that's going to take over on this channel.

00:13:06.820 So please stick around for question period. Candice Bergen and the rest of the team, uh,

00:13:10.580 holding the Liberal government to a town. We do appreciate you joining us here today. If you like

00:13:14.420 the content, I think it was really good. Please like, comment, subscribe, share this program. Together,

00:13:19.220 we can give a narrative that is not being talked about on the mainstream media. As always, new content

00:13:24.020 every single Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. Low taxes, less government, more freedom. That's the blueprint.

The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - February 08, 2022

Mandates, Democracy and Unity

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript