The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - April 28, 2022


Update on the Emergencies Act

Topics
cabinet confidence
Hosted by
Jamie Schmal
Mentioned
Jamie Schmael Raquel Dancho Aga Khan Bill Blair Bill C-63
Government Censorship How Trudeau’s Budget will further burden Canadian families

Episode Stats


Length

13 minutes

Words per minute

195.34

Word count

2,618

Sentence count

225

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this special Wednesday episode of The Blueprints, host Jamie Schmael is joined by Raquel Dancho, MP for Kildonan-St. Paul and Shadow Minister for Public Safety, to discuss the recent public inquiry into the use of the Emergencies Act by the Liberal government.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome once again to another edition of The Blueprints.
00:00:06.360 I'm your host, Jamie Schmael, Member of Parliament for Halliburton Corps, the likes of Brock.
00:00:09.960 We do appreciate you being here.
00:00:11.700 Usually we have shows for you every single Tuesday at 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time.
00:00:15.760 Instead, today we're bringing you a special Wednesday episode, so we do appreciate you hanging in there.
00:00:20.920 Again, as you might remember, if you can't watch or listen to the whole thing right now,
00:00:24.520 you can download it, listen to it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, you name it.
00:00:29.280 It is out there.
00:00:30.800 Don't forget to like, subscribe, comment, and share this program together.
00:00:34.960 We can push back against the ever-moving Liberal agenda because I guarantee you the content that we're about to talk about
00:00:40.660 right this second here on this program is not being shared amongst the mainstream media.
00:00:45.640 Let me bring in our guest, a friend of the show she's been on many times before,
00:00:49.040 Raquel Dancho, the Member of Parliament for Kildonan St. Paul, also the Shadow Minister for Public Safety.
00:00:54.100 We do appreciate you coming in.
00:00:55.540 My pleasure.
00:00:55.920 We're talking the Emergencies Act today.
00:00:58.000 And, of course, that was brought in by the NDP and Liberal government to deal with what was a parking problem
00:01:04.460 in a few square blocks of Ottawa.
00:01:07.500 And we've learned this week some pretty startling developments.
00:01:11.880 Yesterday, or I should say Monday, was the last day to bring in the public inquiry and start that process.
00:01:17.620 The Prime Minister waited to the last day to bring that in.
00:01:19.740 Not only that, the inquiry itself, I'm taking your thunder here, was meant to examine the government's train of thought,
00:01:28.100 its thought pattern, what evidence it had to bring in the Emergencies Act so it doesn't get used all the time.
00:01:33.720 This is a heavy-handed approach.
00:01:36.100 And the Prime Minister said, no, that's confidence of the Cabinet.
00:01:39.400 Yeah, it's been very sort of concerning how they've ruled this out.
00:01:43.800 There's a lot of smugness, a lot of arrogance.
00:01:46.220 Their initial messaging was, look at us, how transparent we're being.
00:01:49.660 We're launching this inquiry.
00:01:51.200 Well, Jamie, as you know, the inquiry is not a nice thing to do.
00:01:54.980 It's actually built into the legislation.
00:01:56.660 They had to do it.
00:01:57.880 So you don't get to do a victory lap saying, look at us being so transparent when you're just following the law of the land.
00:02:03.680 So I found that that tone that they've had is really permeated throughout all of their messaging and how they're approaching this.
00:02:08.820 As you mentioned, the scope of it, they're really focusing on the protesters.
00:02:12.660 Yes, exactly.
00:02:13.300 And the protesters, particularly the organizers we know, are going through the court system right now.
00:02:17.860 They are being held accountable for their actions.
00:02:20.380 The inquiry is supposed to hold the government accountable for their actions.
00:02:25.100 And yet the liberals are making it, don't look at us, oh, go look at the protesters again.
00:02:29.960 Remember them?
00:02:31.120 And so it's very concerning that this is how they're approaching this because, as you mentioned, this bill is a very powerful bill.
00:02:38.360 It's frankly a dangerous bill.
00:02:40.440 It infringes on charter rights, which is why the threshold needed to invoke this bill, this act, is so high.
00:02:47.280 Because otherwise, we could risk abusing Canadian charter rights.
00:02:50.320 The government could abuse them.
00:02:51.440 So what's in question and what the crux of the inquiry is, is whether the circumstances met the threshold and, therefore, the government was right or wrong to invoke the act.
00:03:03.380 That's the question that we need to know.
00:03:05.060 And they're clearly not interested in answering that.
00:03:07.740 Well, I think we know why, because a number of the pieces of evidence the government used to justify invoking the Emergencies Act, such as loaded firearms in Ottawa, attempted arson, dark money funding this whole protest, that turned out to be not true.
00:03:26.500 And conservatives pointed that out in committee through various means, and the experts themselves said, no, that isn't true.
00:03:35.260 So we would like to see those documents or at least understand what the government was thinking when it brought in the Emergencies Act or the legislation to invoke it.
00:03:43.660 Right.
00:03:44.040 I mean, the threshold is whether or not there's a threat to national security, whether it's a national threat to public safety or a national threat to economic security of the country.
00:03:52.780 It was neither of those things.
00:03:54.380 It was disruptive, yes.
00:03:56.120 Was it a national threat to public safety or economic security?
00:03:59.500 No.
00:04:00.280 And, in fact, the border blockades were already removed before the Emergency Act was invoked.
00:04:07.340 The police did not need the emergency powers to do their jobs.
00:04:10.620 They were successful in their own accord of doing that.
00:04:13.880 So that economic argument, out the window.
00:04:16.920 In Ottawa, as well, we saw that, just like you said, they were saying all this basically fake news,
00:04:22.940 using fake news to drum up this big, scary idea.
00:04:27.140 And, yes, we understand it was disruptive to the downtown residents of Ottawa.
00:04:30.780 No one is denying that.
00:04:32.160 But you and I walked through that protest every single day for three weeks.
00:04:37.320 If it was so dangerous to the level that it was a national security threat, how in the world were you and I and all of us able to walk through that protest at all hours of the day?
00:04:48.160 Good question.
00:04:48.900 Does it make sense?
00:04:49.700 And I asked the Minister of Public Safety this, and he couldn't answer.
00:04:52.540 I said, how could you have subjected us to so much, you know, threatening environment?
00:04:57.580 And he didn't have anything to say because the reality is we weren't in danger.
00:05:01.900 And if we were, we wouldn't have been able to walk through that protest.
00:05:05.160 But the last thing I'll say, though, Jamie, if we are wrong and there is something that they know that met that huge high threshold, then tell the public.
00:05:15.360 Right.
00:05:15.600 Let us know the whole story.
00:05:17.260 But we can't find out unless they waive cabinet confidence.
00:05:19.720 They're refusing to do so.
00:05:20.880 But if they want to back up, you're right, if they want to back up their narrative, they should have no problem discussing some of these.
00:05:28.400 Tell us the truth.
00:05:29.280 Exactly.
00:05:30.220 If you have evidence, let's bring it out in the open.
00:05:33.320 You're right.
00:05:34.080 Maybe we're wrong.
00:05:35.700 Let's have a conversation about it.
00:05:37.200 Happy to be corrected.
00:05:38.460 But that is the whole crux of it.
00:05:40.580 We're supposed to, as part of the legislation, look at the thought process of the government.
00:05:46.060 We do, you know, Canadians, the opposition, would like to know this.
00:05:50.520 Or else there will always be a crisis if the government can cover up their thought process.
00:05:56.940 Well, and you touch on something really important.
00:05:58.800 I mean, the reason that we're really hammering on this was the threshold met, this extraordinarily high threshold.
00:06:04.380 Because, as you know, the Emergencies Act has powers so powerful that they infringe on charter rights.
00:06:12.100 That's the whole, that's what the Act does.
00:06:14.460 That's right.
00:06:15.140 When there's, if your country's being invaded or if you have a mass economic or telecommunications collapse,
00:06:20.120 this is the bill you go to.
00:06:21.980 Because you may have to infringe on charter rights for the greater public safety, for example, in a worst case scenario.
00:06:27.400 So that's why the threshold's so high.
00:06:28.880 Because it's so dangerous in terms of infringement on charter.
00:06:31.560 The freezing of bank accounts.
00:06:32.880 This is what I mean with no court order, no due process at all.
00:06:36.140 Yes, you can go through it all.
00:06:36.900 These are, these are critical issues.
00:06:38.960 And so how this is determined, what comes out of that inquiry, will determine a precedent of how we can infringe on charter rights moving forward.
00:06:48.440 Can we just flippantly call and use the biggest sledgehammer in the land on charter rights whenever there's some disruption going on?
00:06:55.480 Is that what we're going to be seeing unfold in the next generation?
00:06:59.420 I don't know.
00:07:00.140 It really, that's why this inquiry is so important.
00:07:02.800 That's why we're hammering on them in question period for answers.
00:07:05.860 And that's why we think it's important enough that they waive cabinet confidence to let us know the full story.
00:07:11.000 Well, we've seen cabinet confidence and other measures used when they're, we're calling for the documents to the Winnipeg Lab, for example, as to the firing of two scientists.
00:07:20.020 What's going on there?
00:07:21.700 We would like to know that.
00:07:23.360 The, the, the Aga Khan trip to, to, to, that the prime minister took illegally.
00:07:30.360 And it turns out that the RCMP was contemplating issuing charges for that or investigating it.
00:07:38.420 And so this is just a culmination of decisions made by this government that aren't meeting that ethical bar.
00:07:47.800 Well, I think you're, you, you started the great list.
00:07:50.020 You know, there's the We Charity scandal as well.
00:07:52.180 And there's the SNC-Lavalin.
00:07:53.440 SNC-Lavalin, yes.
00:07:54.460 There's a, there's a lot of, as you mentioned, and as we know as conservatives, a lot of, a lot of ethical misbehavior from this government.
00:08:02.000 You know, we, we believe the prime minister should be leading by example, going above and beyond meeting the law.
00:08:07.840 But he thinks he's, he doesn't need to.
00:08:10.340 He doesn't, it doesn't apply to him.
00:08:11.500 He should be leading by example.
00:08:12.660 And he's just skating through breaking laws left, right, and center.
00:08:15.420 So, particularly ethics law.
00:08:17.280 So that's why we're not giving them the benefit of the doubt.
00:08:19.840 But there's certainly, they've been asking for it.
00:08:21.780 They've been saying, oh, just trust us.
00:08:23.600 We will make sure everything's in hand.
00:08:25.360 You know, Bill Blair, the minister, just kind of, oh, we'll take care of everything.
00:08:29.480 We'll make sure everything is up to par.
00:08:31.060 But you don't get to have the benefit of the doubt anymore.
00:08:33.980 You've proven that so many times over the past six and a half years.
00:08:38.060 So I'm not buying it.
00:08:39.500 We'll keep pressing on this.
00:08:40.780 And really, it's for the rights of Canadians.
00:08:44.300 You know, whatever position you're on, whether you agreed with the aims of the convoy and you sympathize with the traumas they've had or not, you should care about your charter rights and the future of what government can do to those charter rights.
00:08:57.420 So that's why we're like a dog with a bone on this and we want answers.
00:09:01.740 Well, you're right.
00:09:02.500 It does set that precedent.
00:09:04.000 If the government could just invoke it and then claim cabinet confidence on the documents and the decision-making, you know, thread that came with it, then they can just invoke it at will.
00:09:16.620 They don't like what you're doing at will.
00:09:18.520 We see with Bill C-11, they're trying to censor what you can see and watch on the Internet.
00:09:23.480 This is just a disturbing pattern here by this government.
00:09:27.380 Yeah, you know, I think we should be concerned.
00:09:29.760 And I think as the elections go, you may agree more and more Canadians are opening up to, oh, this government really doesn't put my interests first.
00:09:39.600 They're putting their own interests, their own power interests first.
00:09:42.460 And so that's why, again, I don't give them any benefit of any doubt that they're doing the right things here.
00:09:47.600 And we can see that in the news release and all of their messaging for this.
00:09:51.220 This is about what they want to study.
00:09:53.600 When the most powerful law on the land has built in safety mechanisms so that it holds the government who uses it accountable because it's so dangerous concerning charter rights.
00:10:03.980 So, again, we need to have an inquiry that looks at their actions.
00:10:08.360 What informed their decision?
00:10:09.440 And, again, like we've said, we're happy to be proven wrong.
00:10:11.280 If there is something that really was a national security threat, tell the public or tell us in a in-camera meeting.
00:10:20.240 There's so many options for MPs to understand this thought process.
00:10:24.380 And, frankly, the public deserves to know as well, given this is the first time this act has ever been called.
00:10:29.820 So this is not something that just happens every other Saturday, Jamie.
00:10:33.080 We hope not, Amy.
00:10:34.080 This has literally never happened before.
00:10:36.080 But, yeah, to your point, who knows?
00:10:37.520 Maybe it'll be every time there's a group of people that the prime minister doesn't agree with that are saying mean things to him that he doesn't like.
00:10:45.340 Well, just pull up the sledgehammer, freeze their bank accounts, take their assets, ruin their lives.
00:10:49.120 Ruin their lives.
00:10:50.020 And, you know, just crush our democracy along the way.
00:10:53.140 Sounds a bit dramatic, but that is what we're talking about.
00:10:55.640 Absolutely.
00:10:55.780 And that's why you and I are fighting so hard to hold them accountable on this.
00:10:59.720 And the other thing we're fighting about is the structure of the committee itself.
00:11:03.080 We had some issues about that.
00:11:04.960 We noticed there was the way the Liberals wanted who to vice chair, who to chair. 0.97
00:11:10.740 Like, it was just one thing after another with this government.
00:11:16.140 You know, I just think they'd like to do whatever they can that makes them look great.
00:11:19.980 I don't think that they really care too much about the spirit of our democracy, the built-in safeguards, the checks and balances.
00:11:28.200 You know, for any political science grads out there, you learn all about the checks and balances that our founding fathers built into our Constitution.
00:11:36.260 And I don't see the spirit of that reflected at all in their actions in the past couple of days.
00:11:42.240 When this is a time when we desperately need them to be respected.
00:11:45.920 Absolutely.
00:11:46.480 Pretty concerning.
00:11:47.320 Absolutely.
00:11:48.060 So we're going to wrap up here.
00:11:49.580 As always, as you know, the guest always gets the final thought, the final word.
00:11:53.660 So you can touch on what we talked about.
00:11:55.400 You can touch on anything you want.
00:11:56.760 You know the drill.
00:11:57.540 You know, Jamie, I'm really looking forward to the next, basically, nine weeks.
00:12:01.380 It's going to be a heavy nine weeks for parliamentarians.
00:12:03.540 It's four weeks on, one week back doing constituency work, and then another four solid weeks.
00:12:08.300 So I think those watching at home will have a lot of opportunity to see us hard at work, fighting for their values, fighting for their rights, and working like hell to hold these liberals accountable.
00:12:18.400 Absolutely.
00:12:18.720 Can I say that on the show?
00:12:19.220 You can say whatever you want.
00:12:20.640 You're Raquel Dancho.
00:12:21.560 There you go.
00:12:21.660 You can say whatever you want.
00:12:22.900 All right.
00:12:23.280 We do appreciate you coming on.
00:12:24.560 A good friend of the show.
00:12:25.440 I know your schedule is very busy.
00:12:27.440 We do appreciate your time.
00:12:28.540 My pleasure.
00:12:28.960 And we appreciate your time for being here as well.
00:12:31.020 That was Raquel Dancho, member of parliament for Kildonan St. Paul in the beautiful province of Manitoba.
00:12:35.880 Also, the shadow minister for public safety.
00:12:38.380 Great advocate.
00:12:39.280 And again, as I said the last time she was on, check out her social media content.
00:12:43.360 She has delivered some amazing speeches in the house and great work at committee.
00:12:47.600 They're holding these liberals to account.
00:12:49.180 It's a must see and a must watch.
00:12:51.940 So, I encourage you highly to do that.
00:12:54.480 So, as always, we will get back to Tuesday.
00:12:56.880 Every single Tuesday, new content here on The Blueprint, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time.
00:13:00.940 We ask that you like, comment, subscribe, share this program.
00:13:03.740 And if you can't watch or listen to it at the exact moment, download it, listen to it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play, and Spotify.
00:13:11.200 Thank you very much.
00:13:12.500 And remember, low taxes, less government, more freedom.
00:13:15.420 That's The Blueprint.
00:13:19.180 Bye.
00:13:19.700 Bye.
00:13:20.020 Bye.
00:13:20.700 Bye.
00:13:21.960 Bye.
00:13:22.460 Bye.
00:13:23.560 Bye.