00:07:50.400With all the issues going on, you'd think they'd be out en masse
00:07:53.220with the automobile sector and everything going on.
00:07:56.060So it's interesting because, you know, look, I think we talked about,
00:08:00.260you know the number of eligible voters in ontario you know being 11 million people and you look at
00:08:06.820the turnout rates it's unbelievable so toronto on the last 2022 election got 29 of the people
00:08:14.820turned out so the turnout rate mississauga was 21 london was 25 vaughn was only 27 kitchener 20
00:08:27.060oakville uh i was shocked at oakville which is 28.3 i thought given the demographics of oakville
00:08:34.260and the the you know the uh the nice homes the wealthier people more you know higher education
00:08:41.380uh i thought would be higher it actually windsor beat oakville and voter turnout at 31 and a half
00:08:49.780percent um richmond hill was 31 and a half percent uh 40 42 percent in sudbury better than i thought
00:08:58.340it would be uh berry 30 guelph 26 kingston 30 percent thunder bay 43 the smaller towns seem to
00:09:07.940get more people come out brantford 27 pickering uh 27 and niagara falls only 20 27 which i thought
00:09:17.940because they're border cities they'd have more interest in impacting what was
00:09:22.020going on in their borders so so again every every vote matters was my first
00:09:27.240reason because quite frankly there's if there's small turnout it doesn't get the
00:09:32.880Democratic voice so and that was the second thing I came up with so number
00:09:37.500three number two it holds leaders accountable
00:09:42.600It does. It does, because if you just allow somebody to become an incumbent, if you just allow your mayor to stay in for eight terms and you don't like what's going on, this is the number one way to hold them accountable and get them replaced.
00:10:01.040It's interesting. Brad Bradford is using this tactic on Olivia Chow in Toronto right now.
00:10:06.080He actually switched his course of direction about a month or so ago.
00:10:11.260He's roared back in the polls to actually be neck and neck on this election.
00:10:15.560And he did it by coming up with, I think it was a brilliant slogan, whoever came up with it for him.
00:10:20.640Is your life better than it was three years ago?
00:10:22.940So he asked this and, you know, we should keep the mayor accountable for that.
00:10:27.200And so elections allow you to reward mayors for doing a good job or a bad job, and he used that to his advantage.
00:10:35.080And I think, to me, that was a brilliant tactic, and I think it resonated with me because it made me think for a minute, yeah, no, it's not.
00:10:51.740Yeah. Being a numbers guy, number three on my list was democracy depends on participation. So, and what I mean by that is high voter turnout strengthens democratic system and prevents power from being concentrated in a small group.
00:11:13.780so that's where I was going with that just you know playing the odds so you
00:11:18.040know you think about it if you if you're running for office and you can go get a
00:11:23.740small group of people to support you because and get you elected because
00:11:28.660voter turnout is so low you're playing the it's the it's the law of numbers
00:11:34.240it's the law of odds quite frankly so if if voter turnout slipped to 20% and
00:11:40.60027%, quite frankly, and you're in a city or municipality or a riding that only has 50,000
00:11:48.740people, your odds of success, depending on the small group of people you can assemble,
00:11:53.940become higher. So if more people come out and vote and turnouts are higher, your ability to do that
00:12:01.700is weakened. Therefore, it doesn't consolidate power into people's or groups that can actually
00:12:10.380consolidate voter blocks. That's really true. I mean, if this goes all the way across the gamut0.77
00:12:19.460to the conspiracy theorists out there that think the world is being run by a specific group,
00:12:25.680I would wonder what the voter turnout for those people are. But having said that, if you want
00:12:32.680things to change, if you think that there's something going on that's untoward, that it's
00:12:37.800leaning toward a certain uh sect or a certain sector of business or anything that it it's likely
00:12:46.760that you could have stopped that by actually casting a vote and doing the research on the
00:12:51.800the candidates in your neighborhood yeah i agree mike yeah and it's so often you know having lived
00:12:58.280in different uh countries in my lifetime so often you've seen small groups of people control massive
00:13:04.600amounts of power because, quite frankly, they were able to assemble pretty minute blocks of people
00:13:10.640to actually get an election or sway an election. And quite frankly, I've always struggled with that
00:13:16.060because I understand the process. I understand how that can happen. It just never seemed totally
00:13:22.940fair to me if you totally play the law of numbers based on low turnouts. Next thing I had was
00:13:30.700rights are not guaranteed. And so, you know, this is one and I'm going to talk about the next one
00:13:36.720in a minute, which is Remembrance Day. But, you know, if you think about all the people and all
00:13:42.340the groups that fought for the ability to vote and how activism over the years have actually
00:13:48.480assembled and allowed people, you know, to allow those rights to be exercised and not eroded and
00:13:55.680not gerrymandered and not intimidated you know if if anyone respects the history of canada they
00:14:02.640understand how important is to maintain that right because that right in a lot of countries is taken
00:14:10.160away at times is actually deferred at times um so you know and if you come from another country
00:14:16.560where it was eliminated or deferred you'd think you would be the first one out there to actually
00:14:22.880vote. Yeah, I think that that's a really good point. If you come from someplace where you were
00:14:30.600oppressed in any way, voting at every level seems to have more importance to you. And, you know,
00:14:38.360this is your opportunity, if you're not taking it now, to build the country that you want to live in,
00:14:44.020really. I mean, there was when we were growing up, you know, Paul and I grew up in the same
00:14:48.420neighborhood, not too far from you, there was a burgeoning influx of the Italian community.
00:14:56.680Well, that integration of the Italian community quickly turned to political involvement as well.
00:15:04.820And so during the 80s and 90s, even during the 70s, we started to see the Italian community
00:15:11.600stepping forward. And, you know, it really made a difference to what was built in the
00:15:17.900neighbourhood, how the neighbourhoods were laid out. Many of the people in the area where we grew
00:15:23.640up were part of the construction industry that has made Ontario what it is today. They had ideas
00:15:29.420and so they recognised coming to Canada, they're going to have more rights and more opportunity
00:15:35.740to build their community. They got involved. This is the same thing and you see this as well
00:15:42.000in parts of Ontario, certainly in Brampton, Mississauga, you know, in Surrey is another
00:15:50.080place that we saw it. You start to see now the South Asian community getting involved.
00:15:55.380This is how you build the country you want to live in that you came to. This is how you
00:16:00.800integrate your ideas into your new society. And so to that end, Paul, I think it is really
00:16:08.500important that people remember that your rights are not guaranteed you keep them by keeping your
00:16:15.540government exactly mike you know and the next point i had on this was tied to it is quite frankly
00:16:21.780coming up to remembrance day you know it honors those who actually suffered and those who died in
00:16:28.100the name of the country to keep that democracy going there you go you got the poppy going yeah
00:16:32.820so and all of you all of you you know i i actually in all my businesses uh distribute poppies to
00:16:38.660every one of my team um and i talk about remembrance day and i talk about how people
00:16:45.700suffered and uh died in the name of democracy in order for you to vote and i you know you don't
00:16:53.380necessarily have to be from here to understand that so you you hit on it mike that a lot of
00:16:58.740of people come from away in different countries and they immigrate here and they bring those
00:17:04.020experiences with them where they've actually seen wars they've fleed from wars they've came here as
00:17:09.740immigrants they've seen communism they've seen different types of government um and how when
00:17:16.000they get here how voting for that democracy is so important and you know i just want to remind
00:17:21.580people that so if they if they've decided that you know things in canada are you know tough or
00:17:27.960they're not going the way they want it to go there's worse there's a lot worse quite frankly
00:17:33.620and a lot of the people that you meet uh from from other countries understand that so that's
00:17:39.100that's why i can never figure why certain groups don't vote and they come from countries where
00:17:44.700they've seen this yeah that is puzzling and and i i can make a general suggestion that maybe they're
00:17:54.120so jaded that they feel that what was happening in their own home in its own way happens in our
00:17:59.060democratic society and the people running are all bought off or connected in ways where they don't
00:18:05.840want to support any of them so they don't vote but that's not an answer well yeah i mean i think that
00:18:11.880that then becomes uh it behooves us to yeah to explain okay no this is really how you there's not
00:18:20.000of corruption at that level here. There isn't this fixing of votes that we know of. I mean,
00:18:26.780there have been. Well, but it is our duty really to say to new Canadians, new citizens here in
00:18:32.860Canada, here's how you register. Here's why. Here's all the precautions that we take to make
00:18:39.640sure we have fair elections. Because that could be true. If you come from a country that is corrupt
00:18:44.740and elections are are bananas you know uh yeah you might have that opinion
00:18:51.380yeah but then not participating that's just a weird response it is a weird response and
00:18:57.940whether it's direct or indirect uh you know i'm too busy or quite frank i just don't want to
00:19:04.180that's why i think you have to question paul the rationale and mike the you know what is your
00:19:08.580rationale and why do you believe that and is what you're believing true or are you just
00:19:13.620are you believing quite frankly that elections aren't you can't impact the elections are you
00:19:19.060believing that elections aren't you're in a country that has fair elections for democratic
00:19:24.420purposes and they're done you know there are mistakes of course there are there there are
00:19:30.500you know errors that happen in elections all the time are they in like in countries where you know
00:19:36.340we just did one where uh and i'm trying to remember the country it was in but quite frankly
00:19:41.620Oh, it was in, was it in, oh, it's going to come back to me.
00:19:50.300Well, the election that comes to my mind is, the election that comes to my mind is actually, it was a national election.
00:19:56.540It happened impromptu, and it was even, it was executed okay, is in Nepal.
00:20:02.620I mean, they actually, I think that they, you know, they use Discord to do it.
00:20:06.820we have an actual electoral system here that is, you know, certified and federally observed.
00:20:14.840Well, it was actually in India. Sorry. And it just came to me. It was the Indian election.
00:20:19.480And it was, you know, it's not verified yet, but the protesting group that's actually protesting now,
00:20:29.000the young students and that that are actually the Cockroach Party,
00:20:33.420they're actually making allegations that a hundred and forty two million votes
00:20:38.700were eliminated from the voting roll so that's not yeah now whether that's true
00:20:44.880or not it's it's we can't verify it but but if if even part of it's true that's
00:20:50.460that's shocking that that many people would be eliminated from a voting roll
00:20:54.600but that doesn't happen here so I just that's really true and it's a big it's a
00:21:01.960big thing. I'm glad actually, Paul, you brought that up because, you know, maybe this reaches
00:21:06.260somebody who's new to Canada and we can say to them, no, you know, by and large, we've got this
00:21:10.480thing, uh, democratized. Hey, before we go any further, please hit the subscribe button right
00:21:17.120now. If you want the raw debates, the full uncut conversations you won't see here, head straight
00:21:22.440to tplmedia.ca, subscribe and lock in your membership. Trust me, you don't want to miss
00:21:27.600what happens behind the paywall all right back to the show the next thing i had on my list was
00:21:32.620your voice shapes your decisions and policies that are decided affect your everyday life and
00:21:38.260you know this one it seems simple but it's just to explain to people that whether every you know
00:21:45.620government impacts uh schools health care transportation taxes job security public safety
00:21:52.940I'm probably missing about 10 others, you know, on the local level from, you know, garbage to waste disposal to water.
00:22:01.220There's all kinds of things that are impacted by governments and governments on a municipal level in different shapes or form, and they play into it.
00:22:09.780So, you know, voting lets your leaders, deciding on who your leader is, changes or directs what will happen in your life and alter whether your values and priorities are reflected in that leader.
00:22:24.300So you have to remember that because, quite frankly, you look at the policies of the person you vote for, you vote for them on the policies that impact you the most and the ones you want to see in your community.
00:22:36.360And if you decide not to, you can't complain that those policies are either shaped against you or formed differently than you would like.
00:22:44.540Because that's true, because they're not formed against you because you had no input.
00:22:49.620Yeah, you had the ability that that's being in a democracy.
00:22:55.460And those are the things that I, even to this day, you know, you mentioned why do people not vote?
00:23:01.100I just don't think they tie. And I do this with the different teams I have. I explain to them how business works and how it impacts them. And sometimes it sounds silly, but I sit down with my team at the beginning and I say, okay, if we give better customer service, if we provide a better product, if we do these things, it's going to increase our revenues.
00:23:25.200increasing our revenues will mean our business will grow. Incomes will grow for them. Tips will
00:23:31.420grow for them. And I walked them through and I said, okay, everyone needs to understand how this
00:23:37.180works because it doesn't work. This isn't a fully subsidized economy. This is a business. So we have
00:23:45.220to figure out how it works. Government, on the other hand, it's different, but it's business-like,
00:23:52.500but it's not a business it has deficits that it has policy decisions based on their accountability
00:23:59.700and their financial circumstances so you know we're about to go through a federal budget coming
00:24:05.380up on november 5th well already i don't know if you noticed over the weekend but the conservative
00:24:11.620party with pier poliev are asking for an inquiry into the budgets coming up so like finally by the
00:24:18.980way paul you and i and and all of us at tpl we were wondering when somebody would do this
00:24:26.660right i agree mike and on the municipal level it's just the same so um you know you're and the
00:24:34.340provincial level the provincial level in bc on the weekend you saw a huge snap election that turned
00:24:39.940into a huge defeat of the ndp party and the conservative party coming in um just another
00:24:46.100and a lot of it was based on a 14 billion dollar deficit that the province is carrying on the
00:24:52.100municipal level it's the same discussion so you should be asking today on your municipal votes
00:24:58.580you know is your city doing better or worse financially how's that impacting you potentially
00:25:03.940and where does that end up taking you as a taxpayer you know is that going to mean increased
00:25:09.620property tax is that going to mean less services like all these things are things that you have to
00:25:15.380be asking municipally to say okay you know how do i vote why do i vote and you know if i want less
00:25:22.100property taxes okay less property taxes am i okay with less services okay if that's my decision
00:25:29.220matrix from a person your individual then that is the decision i should be making picking someone
00:25:36.980who's going to give me less property taxes those are all the decisions that have to happen
00:25:41.780you know paul uh and paul we discovered uh while we were away voting online municipally was really
00:25:51.140easy to do yes yeah there's another there's another reason for why opt out when they've
00:26:00.740made it even easier i think oshawa went online because such of the you know a while ago because
00:26:08.100all the the terrible voter turnout coming into the show they were telling me they're trying to
00:26:13.540get more people it's the again it's the lowest turnout voter turnout in the province and so
00:26:19.620well i think that's why i think that we could be in a place paul where we do need to
00:26:25.060operate this as an online scenario uh mainly because canadians in my this is just my opinion
00:26:32.900yes it's important to get out and vote and i don't want to make excuses for people who don't
00:26:36.900but maybe it is time and and you guys can disagree with me maybe it is time that we
00:26:42.500modernize the process of voting at the municipal level maybe we even modernize uh the interaction
00:26:50.100at the municipal level ongoing throughout a four-year term so that there are many referendums
00:26:55.460so that there are the ability for people to uh uh voice in uh and and really make a difference so
00:27:03.140I think that that and I know we're all afraid of what can happen online.
00:27:07.400But, you know, in Alberta the other day, we were waiting for hand counted votes to sway an election that everybody had won the night before.
00:27:17.060So, you know, I think that might be to this end time to modernize a little bit.
00:27:23.240Take it online, make an app, you know, an encrypted app of some sort.
00:27:28.740if you look at the numbers that I just rhymed off, Mike and Paul,
00:27:34.520it really does indicate that some things needs to change because it is getting
00:27:39.460such a low number. I said the turnout is so low. The next thing,
00:27:44.240and it was one of the last things on my list. And if you haven't,
00:27:47.100just let me know, but it strengthens your community. So the, you know,
00:29:50.360What they're doing is they're trying to find large groups of people who will actually back them so they can get voted in based on low voter polls, low voter turnout.
00:30:00.540And so by doing that, they're focusing on only the people that are voting.
00:30:04.880So you're taking yourself out of the decision equation, not only for probably one voting cycle, you're probably taking yourself out of the voting equation for two to three voting cycles.
00:30:15.880And I really wanted to kind of end with that one.
00:30:20.360That math is a, that equation is really, really important.
00:30:24.960You have to make change now with your vote, because if you don't, the ripple effect of that is several years of potentially what you don't want.
00:30:37.020Yeah. Yeah, you're looking at a decade.
00:30:39.320You're basically, if you decide not to vote this election, and the election turnout is really low, and a small group of people basically capture the vote and get the nominee they want in place for whatever position, whether it be a councillor or a mayor, then you're probably forfeiting your ability to alter that decision for almost a decade, unless there's a real change election.
00:31:05.920I just bring that up because it's very important.
00:31:07.980Yeah, because a lot of times we see the name recognition of once someone new gets in through their people that they assemble in a low turnout vote, once they're in, they become, oh, re-elect.
00:31:22.300So four years later, that's the name, they become more familiar.
00:31:25.540So again, with the low turnout, it just naturally flows.
00:31:29.040Hazel McCallion, Frank Scarpetti, Stephen Del Duca, you know, we can do this across the province,
00:31:38.280certainly, and name the people that get in on name recognition. And it's on repeat,
00:31:42.720unless there's a severe severance society in the economy, it's just on repeat. You even get
00:31:49.660children, children of a person with a significant name. Remember Linda Jackson? Linda, Lorna
00:31:54.940it just goes down the line yeah yeah well and and yeah thank you guys because that that is a
00:32:03.180a really good example and you know we're a few hours away from the outcome of of the municipal
00:32:09.820elections in manitoba and ontario so i wanted to do this show because i wanted to get it out
00:32:14.940in the in the morning and you know before just around noon um and we hopefully can impact a few
00:32:21.900people that'll change their mind see it on social and head out and vote because if you don't you see
00:32:28.940all the impacts and quite frankly i appreciate you guys taking the time i know you had to pull over
00:32:34.060stop and you know it was interesting i want to tell this quick story but we're having some
00:32:38.940technical difficulties mike called me up and said you know what we're going to pull over it's going
00:32:43.900to delay us getting home and i appreciate because they've been on the road for a week and i appreciate
00:32:49.900they how much they probably want to get home um so taking the time uh very much appreciate it
00:32:55.580because hopefully we make a difference yeah this is important go ahead and post it guys thanks paul