The National Telegraph - Wyatt Claypool - September 18, 2025


Senior Carney advisor quits - Liberals walking back budget timeline!


Episode Stats


Length

14 minutes

Words per minute

179.68585

Word count

2,551

Sentence count

140

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Wyatt Claypool talks about the PMO and the PM's inner circle, and what it means for the future of the government. He also talks about some of the MPs who are considering stepping down from their seats to take up diplomatic roles.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey guys, Wyatt Claypool here. Later in the day yesterday, this news came out that former
00:00:06.880 Justice Minister and current Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Mark Carney is planning on
00:00:12.840 leaving the Prime Minister's office and trying to take some sort of a diplomatic role.
00:00:17.720 This is confirming all the reports that we are hearing about MPs considering resigning their
00:00:23.300 seats to also take diplomatic roles, or in the case of Nate Erskine-Smith, to go run for the
00:00:29.120 Ontario Liberal Party leadership race. Now, I want to be sort of like nuanced about this,
00:00:35.200 because I know some people out there will say, oh, there's a bunch of people resigning. Is this
00:00:39.160 Mark Carney's government falling apart? It is not. There's not going to be an election in three months
00:00:43.480 because of this or anything like that. If there's an early election, it's just because the NDP and
00:00:48.220 the block smell blood in the water, or because Carney thinks that he has the bandwidth to actually
00:00:53.120 be able to win a majority. But what I think is going on right now here is the old guard of
00:00:59.160 Justin Trudeau's government are fighting the new Mark Carney inner circle. Many of these people had
00:01:05.480 been kept around for the election for the sense of continuity. They were big names to run in many of
00:01:11.500 these ridings. And post-election, Mark Carney has shoved them to the side. Chrystia Freeland got a very low
00:01:18.580 level position as Minister of Transportation. It's not super low, but compared to Deputy Prime
00:01:24.880 Minister and Finance Minister at the same time, transportation is absolutely nothing. The most
00:01:31.620 egregious example of one of the people agreeing to run again and then getting screwed over is
00:01:36.580 Erskine Smith, who was planning on not running in the 25 election, but then was coaxed back with the
00:01:43.540 promise that he got to be housing minister, which technically Mark Carney did fulfill. He endorsed
00:01:50.140 Mark Carney. He campaigned with the guy to become housing minister between March and May. After the
00:01:57.640 election, within two weeks post-election, after Erskine Smith came back to win Beech's East York
00:02:04.400 riding, he then gets shoved not into like a principal secretary role or some lower level position
00:02:12.100 underneath the minister of housing, but he still has an effect. No, no, he got nothing. He got
00:02:17.400 literally nothing. And then he's been chirping Mark Carney from the corner ever since on the Erkanda
00:02:23.600 issue, saying he's been betrayed by them, saying that he thinks it's wrong that the government was
00:02:28.620 ending spring session so early and then just vacationing during the summer. He's obviously
00:02:33.840 disfrontal. And then he released that video the other day where it's clearly he's trying to prepare
00:02:37.840 himself to run for Ontario politics. But this is something that's been going on with a lot of
00:02:42.820 other people. Bill Blair is sitting at the back. He's a 71 year old man who has been in government
00:02:48.540 a long time. And although you and I know the man is completely incompetent, he is a notorious gun
00:02:55.480 grabber, but he's not even exactly good at it. You think you would give him something. No,
00:02:59.440 he's sitting at the back. Jonathan Wilkinson, I believe, has something. But again,
00:03:03.920 I think he's been kind of sidelined. And so they may actually throw him like Blair may become the
00:03:10.600 high commissioner in the United Kingdom and replace Ralph Goodale. Jonathan Wilkinson,
00:03:16.220 I think, wanted something. And then we also have Stephen Gilbeau leaving, probably because Mark Carney
00:03:21.280 is not moderating on green issues, but he's just not radicalizing at the speed that Stephen Gilbeau wants.
00:03:27.060 So I think they've not only taken him out of environment ministry, they've put him in like official
00:03:33.080 languages position, which is like a third tier ministry. And you can tell the guy is upset.
00:03:39.540 And so David Lemeny leaving from the PMO is sort of the confirmation that yes, all these rumors are
00:03:46.900 in fact true. This was coming from Kate McKenna from the CBC. And we will just read a bit of it here.
00:03:53.600 But before I go any further, and I've actually been talking quite a bit before even getting to the
00:03:57.560 plugs. Remember to like the video, subscribe to the channel, leave a comment on what you think about
00:04:03.020 all this. And then also if you live in British Columbia, I'm going to link the 1BC website down
00:04:09.460 in the description below. Make sure if you guys live in the area, check out the events page,
00:04:14.800 because there is going to be a town hall in Mill Bay as well as Penticton within the next few weeks
00:04:21.160 here. Check that out. I won't be able to make it to those events simply just because, you know,
00:04:25.680 I just don't have the time. I have a bunch of other stuff I have to be at. But I would encourage
00:04:29.500 you to show up, hear from Dallas Brody, the 1BC leader, and, you know, give your input, ask questions,
00:04:35.200 all that sort of thing. But now let's get back to this article. So it starts off saying,
00:04:40.800 former Justice Minister David Lemeny will be leaving his job as Principal Secretary to Prime
00:04:46.040 Minister Mark Carney after just a couple months on the job, sources tell CBC News. Sources suggest
00:04:52.060 that he is a contender for a diplomatic posting, possibly as a replacement for Bob Ray, who currently
00:04:58.200 serves as ambassador to the United Nations. Lemeny, who played hockey alongside Carney at the
00:05:02.920 University of Oxford, announced his appointment in July with a photo of himself with the Prime
00:05:07.900 Minister posted on social media. The position is one of the most senior in the Prime Minister's
00:05:13.080 office, considered key in the handling of Carney's political and policy agenda. Lemeny also served as
00:05:18.460 an advisor during the federal election. He was hired to replace Tom Pitfield, who had been
00:05:23.340 filling in on an interim basis, but has not yet left the PMO. Now, a lot of people don't really,
00:05:32.280 I think that a lot of people don't know what the Principal Secretary is. It's sort of like one of the
00:05:37.740 highest level advisors. The Principal Secretary is basically there to sort of advise the Prime
00:05:43.620 Minister on how best to be kind of moving his entire agenda downfield. Now, here's another rub
00:05:50.780 of what is going on here. Notice how we still haven't gotten a budget, and it's later September
00:05:58.140 at this point. We are in the second half of September. Now, I need to show you another article
00:06:05.360 that I think has something to do with this, with people leaving, with David Lemeny going. I think there
00:06:11.820 is a lot of issues with the Carney agenda right now, and people do not want their legacies implicated
00:06:17.860 into info, don't want their legacies implicated. So they're leaving early, because they don't even
00:06:24.140 like Mark Carney, or they don't get along, or Mark Carney doesn't like them, or he doesn't like how
00:06:28.300 they dress. Because I've heard Mark Carney is so petty, you will get mad at people for not having
00:06:33.960 like the exact right type of suit on when they go into work, which frankly, I do agree that people
00:06:40.020 actually, like, if you're a man working in the government, put on a pair of dress shoes, don't do
00:06:44.660 the stupid sneaker crap that, like, Mark Miller and Sean Frazier do. It's embarrassing. People like
00:06:50.980 Justin Trudeau showing up to when King Charles is in Parliament, and he's wearing these weird blue suede
00:06:56.800 loafers, it's horrible. They're like, no, they're like, they weren't even like suede loafers. They're like
00:07:03.020 neon blue and orange sneakers. It was horrible. But now we have this other headline from the CBC,
00:07:12.320 Carney government to table first budget on November 4. Government had initially signaled federal budget
00:07:19.020 would be introduced in October. This article from Darren Major here starts off saying the liberal
00:07:25.520 government will table the federal budget, the first under Prime Minister Mark Carney, in early November.
00:07:29.940 During Tuesday's question period, Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said the federal
00:07:34.840 finances will be introduced on November 4. The early November date is later than the government
00:07:40.760 had initially indicated. Carney said as early as May that the budget would come in October,
00:07:45.960 and the number of ministers had stuck to that date when talking about the budget in recent days.
00:07:51.000 This Monday morning, government house leader Steve McKinnon indicated the budget would be brought
00:07:55.160 for next month during a federal conference laying out the liberal's fall agenda. Quote,
00:08:01.260 the Minister of Finance, Mr. Champagne, will present a budget in October. I will not go into the
00:08:07.220 details of what to expect. The Prime Minister and Minister of Finance have both emphasized the
00:08:11.960 importance of this budget, McKinnon said. Now, the budget now being delayed by a month,
00:08:18.060 and the fact that we have all these people indicating they will resign as well as David Lamedi being
00:08:23.600 confirmed to be leaving feels like things are not going so hot. They're not going to be able to
00:08:29.420 deliver the budget with the deficits that they had promised initially that they were going to,
00:08:34.720 you know, spend less and invest more. So if you're Chrystia Freeland, who's already gotten in trouble 0.97
00:08:40.360 over a budget because of the meddling of Mark Carney when Trudeau was still Prime Minister,
00:08:45.840 and he also already doesn't seem to like you very much, despite the fact that I believe he's the
00:08:50.700 godfather to one of her children. Or it was like something like that. Or maybe it was it might
00:08:56.520 have been Carney to Trudeau. I don't know. But why not exit out the back door now while before every
00:09:03.520 single election promise starts popping loose and you start breaking them left and right. So I think
00:09:09.620 a lot of these people are effectively on a tactical retreat that they already don't like working with
00:09:16.600 Carney. He doesn't like working with them, especially in the case of Nate Erskine Smith.
00:09:24.700 And so why not now just kind of, you know, nope out the back door so that you don't get implicated
00:09:30.560 with all this stuff. And a lot of the people saying, well, you know, but they're giving diplomatic
00:09:34.940 roles. They must have some good relationship. No, in the media, these diplomatic roles are like
00:09:40.200 dumping grounds for past politicians. Goodale and Bob Ray are both in their late 70s or 80s. Of course,
00:09:48.440 you're going to end up replacing them with some new person. It doesn't mean that Carney has to like
00:09:53.300 that person. They get a cushy job on the way out. And it's kind of a it's kind of a like, what is it?
00:10:00.700 Your severance package to not slag the government constantly in the media. But now I just want to
00:10:07.460 jump over to peer poly in question period, because things tend to be going very well for the
00:10:13.680 conservatives. When I say going very well, did they lose the last election? Yes. And they should fire
00:10:18.700 tons of their advisors. But in terms of the rhetorical momentum in Canadian politics, it is
00:10:24.100 starting to swing back towards the conservatives. They had struggled around the election, finding a
00:10:29.580 foot, their footing on certain issues. But I think now that we've gotten past the Trump issue,
00:10:35.120 it's going back to sort of meat and potato type politics around the economy and crime and whatnot.
00:10:41.400 And that's not really a ground that the liberals want to be fighting on.
00:10:44.940 And the prime minister made the appointment of the parliamentary budget officer
00:10:47.960 temporary, so that he could hold a sword over his head and threaten him if he speaks the truth
00:10:52.640 about the financial mess the prime minister has made.
00:10:57.300 This video is oddly quiet. I don't know why they uploaded it like this. But you know,
00:11:01.620 we'll have to deal with it. You know, to a government that doesn't know how to count,
00:11:06.140 there is nothing more terrifying than a man armed with a calculator. And this prime minister
00:11:11.760 is wants to silence the parliamentary budget officer from telling the truth about the fiscal
00:11:17.660 mess that he has created under his watch. So will he, Mr. Speaker, legalize math, make the
00:11:24.280 parliamentary budget officer's position permanent, and tell us how big the deficit is?
00:11:28.040 Yeah, so the parliamentary budget officer's official term ended on September 1. So it's
00:11:35.420 not a actual position that must be filled right now. And they had never actually named if they
00:11:41.760 were going to have a follow on person once he steps down. So right now, the PBO, the parliamentary
00:11:48.000 budget office is like borderline unoccupied. Yeah, they're there, but they don't have any mandate
00:11:54.500 or power to do anything at the moment. And all this is like, you could say, well, who cares?
00:11:58.840 It doesn't, he could still be doing a good job without a PBO. Absolutely, he could. He's not.
00:12:04.580 And it makes you extra suspicious when he wants to get rid of this watchdog position. Here is another
00:12:10.780 clip from Parliament today, or that's a 19 minute clip, we're not going to watch that. But overall,
00:12:16.420 again, things are going pretty well when it comes to the conservatives ability to actually shift focus
00:12:22.660 back to just performance issues. And with the liberals not being able to deliver a budget and
00:12:27.040 people exiting out the back door, it feels like Carney really just thought things were going to
00:12:32.920 fall in place once he became prime minister. And we're all finding out that, you know, being on the
00:12:38.320 being like a Goldman Sachs guy, like being more like being the Brookfield guy doesn't actually mean
00:12:44.760 you're good at finances. It just simply means that you got to sit within elite, elite financial circles.
00:12:50.700 And you basically fed off of government subsidies and grants. That's Carney's entire career. It's
00:12:56.820 taking advantage of government subsidies and grants for the companies that Brookfield Asset
00:13:01.940 Management controlled or had interests in. They invested a lot in green tech, not because
00:13:07.060 green tech is profitable, but because the government will give you a lot of money to invest in green
00:13:11.800 tech. And so it doesn't matter if your company actually produces much of anything or not, you're
00:13:16.580 still making money. So anyways, that should be it for this video, guys. In a follow up, I will be
00:13:23.460 doing a follow up to this, but the next video today, I will be doing a video on the Calgary mayoral
00:13:30.660 polling. I want to talk about how basically liberals are trying to hijack this election. I don't mean like
00:13:36.620 big L federal liberals, but just liberals in general, trying to use a supposed conservative
00:13:43.140 as a Trojan horse to be able to take back the mayor's office. Because right now, Yoti Gondek is
00:13:49.460 obviously not very popular at all, and they need to swap her out with somebody else. And oddly enough,
00:13:55.580 the person they're swapping her out with used to be conservative, and now they're not. That would be
00:14:01.000 Jeremy Farkas. Please do not vote for him if you're a Calgarian. Anyways, so that should be it for me 1.00
00:14:07.520 today, guys. Thank you for watching the show, and I will see you guys all later.