Western Standard - Alberta cabinet kerfuffle. Minister Peter Guthrie walks

00:00:00.000 good evening and welcome to the pipeline

00:00:30.000 I'm Western Standard columnist Corey Morgan.

00:00:32.160 This is our weekly panel show where we pick a number of issues and analyze them, chew them up,

00:00:38.460 and try to give our thoughts and views on them for the viewers.

00:00:41.560 Boy, there's just an embarrassment of riches when it comes to stories to try and cover and talk about.

00:00:46.900 So on the lineup today, I'll start on the far end.

00:00:49.780 We have our energy, business, and general reporter Sean Polzer here to add his view today.

00:00:55.320 So welcome, John.

00:00:56.340 Thanks, Corey.

00:00:57.260 And as always, the opinion editor, Nigel Hannaford, in the middle there.

00:01:01.840 As we shake up our lineup, you're a good, consistent buddy there.

00:01:05.000 Always good to be here, Corey.

00:01:06.420 Great.

00:01:06.900 Well, and I'll let you get to the business out of the way to begin with, though.

00:01:10.020 And it's important.

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00:01:43.900 All right, well, where to begin?

00:01:46.600 I guess we will start with Alberta.

00:01:49.780 It's a familiar turf with us.

00:01:51.800 We've got a budget coming down, and we'll talk about that after budget, I guess.

00:01:55.360 But for now, I mean, the legislature has been dominated as it comes into its opening by a budding Alberta Health Services scandal.

00:02:02.700 I mean, we've got allegations.

00:02:04.360 And that's what I mean.

00:02:04.860 Lots and lots of allegations.

00:02:06.700 No proof quite yet on anything.

00:02:08.760 But of procurement issues, battles between the former head of Alberta Health Services, which is the bureaucracy running it.

00:02:16.360 She was fired.

00:02:17.460 Now she's suing the government. 1.00

00:02:19.320 But now kind of a bombshell hit.

00:02:20.800 A senior minister, Peter Guthrie, a minister of infrastructure, has resigned suddenly and said he can't function within cabinet any longer.

00:02:32.600 I mean, over this scandal, though, he again left with a bunch of allegations of things that, you know, hints at impropriety, but nothing specific and is on the back bench.

00:02:43.060 I mean, Nigel, how do you think this kicks off against the start of a legislative session?

00:02:48.160 This is a pretty rough beginning.

00:02:49.080 Well, it certainly is.

00:02:50.800 The rough thing about it, though, is that nobody really knows what it is that is rough.

00:02:57.480 I mean, all we have as allegations and innuendos and suggestions,

00:03:02.500 I mean, there's this idea that somebody has resigned on a matter of principle,

00:03:06.820 and Guthrie, I believe, was one of Daniel Smith's early supporters,

00:03:10.880 so people are drawing significance from the fact that an early friend has become an early deserter.

00:03:15.720 Well, okay, but what is his point?

00:03:19.120 he has not said we can only guess going to the larger issue of the the scandal again I'm not

00:03:30.280 sure what the scandal is in any detail there's the implication that perhaps contracts for for

00:03:37.840 certain medical procedures which by the way there was a huge demand for this is this is knees and

00:03:45.340 hips and things like that. If you need a new hip, if you need a new knee, you're cursing

00:03:53.180 if you can't get one. And with an 18-month waiting list, you can see why the government

00:03:58.700 that was committed to providing more and faster service for people who had health issues would

00:04:06.520 be looking in a way. But the issue seems to be that maybe there's some impropriety about

00:04:11.580 who allocated what onto which clinic but nobody's actually come out and said it

00:04:17.880 was this clinic and that person did the wrong thing and that person needs to be

00:04:23.140 accountable so all we have is Danielle Smith has asked for the

00:04:30.000 provincial auditor general to get right on it expedite the report and I guess

00:04:36.020 when we have that we'll we'll know more at the moment it's just kind of smelly specific there's

00:04:43.320 a lot of smoke but we just don't know what the heck's going on and it's frustrating because i

00:04:46.620 mean i i think mostly on board having alternatives private facilities that could hopefully you know

00:04:52.180 the principle of having those ease the pressure on these specialized procedures it's fantastic

00:04:56.580 conservatives have supported that but if they blow the process it could actually set the development

00:05:01.420 of these alternatives back and that's what i'm most fearful of yeah well i i guess if you had

00:05:06.020 a procedure in the last couple of months you're probably saying well at least i got mine before

00:05:09.800 the everything went wrong yeah no well the premier had a press conference on monday and um you know

00:05:16.140 i've kind of been on the edge of this because i've sat in on a few of these uh pressers and

00:05:20.640 this is about the extent of my familiarity with it but uh she made the point that um you know

00:05:27.420 they've been increasing the health budget since she was elected precisely to 0.57

00:05:32.420 eliminate that backlog of procedures and I think the I don't quote me on this

00:05:38.980 number but I think she said it was something like six billion dollars that

00:05:42.000 has gone to AHS and the number of procedures that have actually been

00:05:46.260 formed in a hospital has not you know hasn't moved very much whereas the only

00:05:53.520 increase has been through these uh private clinics and um you know she made a comment on the

00:05:58.680 procurement end of the contracts that uh ahs was bidding them wrong uh that it was equivalent of

00:06:04.740 buying a car without the engine and having to pay extra for the tires you know uh that it wasn't an

00:06:10.300 apples to apples comparison so uh i i think it's like you said nigel uh you know the jury's still

00:06:15.840 out and until somebody actually gets a good auditing and pours through those line items

00:06:20.260 in those books we're probably not really going to know yeah well there is definitely some some

00:06:25.140 bad blood between the smith government and alberta health services bureaucracy i mean they're

00:06:30.080 resisting that the reforms i mean she's broken it up i mean part of what smith was talking about

00:06:34.040 that conference was ahs was saying well the procedures for say i think it was knee replacements

00:06:39.100 were only four thousand dollars with us but they're eight thousand in the private facility

00:06:42.600 but it sounds like they were leaving out a whole lot of the other expenses the implants the

00:06:46.860 Diagnostics.

00:06:47.860 Incurs.

00:06:48.860 Yeah.

00:06:49.860 So now we've got, you know, misrepresenting the figures being batted back and forth.

00:06:54.540 We've got an ideological battle going on with our health system, I think is kind of what's

00:06:58.860 happening.

00:06:59.860 Well, it's completely ideological.

00:07:01.020 The idea of performing surgeries in private clinics, it was ideological and political

00:07:05.460 even before the present government was elected.

00:07:09.400 I mean, this is an issue that's gone back years.

00:07:11.980 Well, there were always some medical procedures that were performed in private facilities

00:07:18.000 and nobody had a problem with it.

00:07:19.540 Eye surgeries.

00:07:20.500 Surgeons, for example.

00:07:21.720 Okay.

00:07:22.220 You know?

00:07:22.740 Hockey players, I was thinking, you know, MRIs on knees and things like that.

00:07:28.140 And, of course, they're outside the system.

00:07:29.840 You know, anything that smacks with a workman's compensation claim or the RCMP or the military

00:07:36.880 or indigenous, you know, all of these things fall outside the, can fall outside the provincial

00:07:44.280 health system.

00:07:45.960 No, I mean, I'm one of the lucky guys who just reads about knee replacements.

00:07:51.260 If I needed one, I would be highly motivated to go deep into this, but the fact of the

00:07:56.540 matter is that a lot of people, thousands of people, need these operations.

00:08:02.080 The waiting list has been historically anything up to two years

00:08:05.840 from the time of seeing the specialist,

00:08:08.260 not from the time that your actual consulting physician says,

00:08:13.560 you know, I'm going to refer you on.

00:08:15.840 And when you finally see the specialist, then you get,

00:08:18.700 well, it's going to be 18 months, it's going to be two years.

00:08:21.360 So the idea of taking a chunk of money and saying,

00:08:25.160 let's get these caught up because we actually do have the facilities

00:08:29.140 in the province to do this.

00:08:30.820 And we have physicians who are capable of doing it who don't get any OR time because it won't be funded by Alberta Health.

00:08:40.500 The Premier brought that issue up as well.

00:08:43.180 Yeah.

00:08:43.660 The fact that some of these physicians are only limited, surgeons are only limited to like two days OR time a month.

00:08:50.740 This is how the bureaucracy controls health costs.

00:08:53.760 They ration service.

00:08:54.780 Well, that's not actually the way to provide a health service.

00:08:58.440 Well, and Premier Smith has always been against the concept of rationing health care.

00:09:03.020 I mean, this is an issue that goes way back to our time at the Herald when she was on the editorial board.

00:09:07.440 Twenty years ago, having these very same discussions with her.

00:09:11.460 Social medicine is rationed medicine.

00:09:13.600 We know that.

00:09:14.440 I mean, it's always been the nature of it.

00:09:16.680 Well, and the idea that even if you throw more money at it, you know, it doesn't seem to be, the backlogs don't get any shorter.

00:09:23.500 The bloke just eats it up.

00:09:24.920 Right.

00:09:25.060 So going further, I mean, something that's kind of distressing coming out of this,

00:09:29.500 though, you know, back to Peter Guthrie again.

00:09:31.760 Now, he's a prickly sort.

00:09:33.380 He had some big clashes when he was in Premier Kenney's caucus as well.

00:09:37.340 He's just not a good team player.

00:09:39.700 That's his name.

00:09:39.980 It doesn't mean he's a bad person.

00:09:41.080 Just some people do better in gelling with the crowd,

00:09:43.240 and some just are quick to call out the leadership.

00:09:48.720 So something happened with him.

00:09:50.140 He put a note forward calling for the resignation of Health Minister Adriana LaGrange, and that got leaked.

00:09:58.380 But it wasn't leaked by Peter Guthrie.

00:10:01.000 And part of where Peter Guthrie lobbed a bunch of his bombs on the way out the door was actually at Cabinet itself.

00:10:06.640 He sounds like he's not getting along with them.

00:10:09.380 And again, we get to speculating, but it gets worrisome because the worst enemy of Alberta Conservatives are Alberta Conservatives.

00:10:14.380 They love ripping themselves apart within their own parties.

00:10:16.900 Do you think that might be signs that we've got some chafing going on in Daniel Smith's cabinet right now?

00:10:23.760 Or is it just perhaps Guthrie?

00:10:25.640 It sure seems to me.

00:10:26.800 You know, I'm not entirely familiar with Mr. Guthrie.

00:10:30.840 He takes a pretty low profile.

00:10:33.500 I do know that the infrastructure portfolio is a very large money portfolio.

00:10:38.980 Typically, the person who has been in that portfolio has a considerable amount of power within the cabinet

00:10:46.720 just by virtually the amount of dollars that gets spent on a capital budget.

00:10:50.700 And, you know, that was my first thought.

00:10:54.460 And talking with some colleagues said, you know, Jason Kenney's biggest problem was, you know, caucus unity.

00:11:02.980 And Premier Smith up until now has been able to keep the party fairly well unified.

00:11:07.780 But, you know, we know how fast these can get out of hand and get away from her. 0.90

00:11:15.880 And it seems to me that this could be the sign of some cracks, some internal dissent.

00:11:21.820 Let's hope it's, you know, just a small conflagration that can be put out quickly and hope for the best.

00:11:26.900 I mean, again, we're left speculating, but when you see so much smoke, you can't help but worry.

00:11:30.520 Now, that's right. But, you know, you could also go down the list of things that she seems to have done right and which are broadly approved of.

00:11:39.680 I mean, she reacted very well to the initial Trump tariffs threat.

00:11:44.460 You know, actually, you want people on the border? We'll put people on the border.

00:11:48.000 You know, like it was done. Ottawa, they were still talking about it.

00:11:52.580 You know, I guess there are different opinions about the efficacy of putting.

00:11:57.580 I know we're going to talk about this later, but the idea of taking people off the street who clearly are not responsible for themselves

00:12:07.240 and putting them in a treatment center seems like something everybody can get behind, especially if it's your kid who you're taking off the street.

00:12:17.680 You know, and the whole approach that she has taken to fighting drug addiction seems to have been very much more successful than what they're doing across the border in B.C. or back in anywhere else in the country.

00:12:34.620 You know, 39% reduction in the death rate compared to our peers.

00:12:40.620 These are things that she can take credit from.

00:12:45.060 Let's see whether we're still saying this after we see the budget tomorrow, but so far, so good. 0.75

00:12:51.240 So this could be just one of those dumb bureaucratic bubbles that goes up.

00:12:56.740 And when we know the whole story, we won't be so concerned.

00:12:59.300 Well, even on your example, though, with the Drug Treatment Center, you're talking two facilities, basically, $189 million.

00:13:06.440 Those are the kinds of things that Mr. Guthrie would be signing off on in terms of the contracts and the procurement to actually build those.

00:13:14.260 So this is kind of how, you know, it all intersects, right?

00:13:18.200 And that segues into where I wanted to go with this.

00:13:20.820 That is a big capital project and its health.

00:13:23.240 And it's another category of the HS that's broken up because that'll be under the mental health and addictions, which used to be all under one umbrella.

00:13:29.920 And Premier Smith, I think, is on the right track.

00:13:32.260 She's doing the right things and she does take aggressive action rather than just twiddling her thumbs on this issue or more studies or more inquiries, which is great.

00:13:40.940 Absolutely.

00:13:41.460 And you know what else is it's also a border issue.

00:13:44.260 So this is how the public health issues kind of coincide with some of these tariff issues as well, right?

00:13:50.680 Because taking the drugs and the people that are addicted off the streets ultimately ties back into our economy.

00:13:59.040 Yeah, so let's look at this.

00:14:00.300 So $189 million, let's call it even $180 million.

00:14:03.260 So $90 million for two facilities, you know, one each.

00:14:07.620 We've got a recipe for a lot of potential trouble if they screw this up.

00:14:10.900 That's where we get into procurement again, right?

00:14:13.240 there's going to be some people very eager to get those contracts to build maintain operate those

00:14:17.760 facilities please keep it clean please don't mess this up please make sure it's a good robust bidding

00:14:25.000 process uh you know and that we really have the best interests of the patients and the taxpayers

00:14:31.260 in mind that's that's where maybe we should look at the smoke that's going on right now

00:14:35.060 and give extra scrutiny to the move on these centers just to make sure it's done right

00:14:39.320 Yeah, that's an excellent point, Corey. But I mean, it is very unlikely to be the

00:14:46.120 Premier or any of her close associates who would be out there to take a profit from the

00:14:53.560 building of those facilities. The place where you've got to keep your eye is on those people

00:14:58.080 handling the forms and the paperwork.

00:14:59.600 It's the bureaucrats down below.

00:15:00.880 You bet.

00:15:01.880 And in BC, some of that's been breaking with the enablement centres, and I'll call

00:15:06.120 them that you know the place where they're handing out the free drugs and and it turns out a lot of

00:15:09.880 those operators were making some pretty darn good money from the government feeding these addicts

00:15:15.880 and and uh even if the initial people with those centers were well-meaning uh and and that's what

00:15:21.880 i mean is that and i don't want to see premier smith's government directly dealing with that's

00:15:25.800 where the problems come as well they're there for oversight just make sure that try to make sure

00:15:31.480 As you said, the later stages don't go into the wrong road, I guess.

00:15:37.320 Well, I think those are separate issues.

00:15:40.760 I was at the press conference on Monday announcing the centers, and I couldn't help but recall, you know, during the election campaign, the premier had a couple.

00:15:52.040 you they were very emotional um media briefings with uh talking with some of the families and

00:16:00.160 some of the victims and you know so i definitely think that um her heart is in the right place on

00:16:06.440 this that uh you know drug addiction is not a choice and that um you know the whatever you

00:16:13.080 want to call it forcible confinement um you know to get these people in to force them into treatment

00:16:17.640 basically is is the the right approach but what also was struck me was basically just the

00:16:25.880 implementation of the policy and all the various levels and how many hoops and things that you have

00:16:31.800 to go through with you know capital budgets and operating budgets bureaucracy um now we've split

00:16:37.400 it up into different departments and there's a whole reorganization going on there and it seems

00:16:42.920 to me that that is probably the biggest most complicated piece of of the whole puzzle to

00:16:51.960 like you said actually making it work and and showing results and some of the other discussion

00:16:56.440 is is i guess ideological but the taking of somebody's liberty if they haven't committed a

00:17:01.800 crime this has already got precedent in under the mental health act if a person's going to harm

00:17:05.800 themselves or others it's not easy to do but a person can be you know constrained in a facility

00:17:12.280 Or maybe they ought to.

00:17:14.320 Well, it could go either way.

00:17:17.080 And I mean, I believe in this.

00:17:18.640 I believe it would be an action of last resort.

00:17:20.620 I've already heard the naysayers, the Smith haters out there saying, oh, they're going to be snatching people up and locking them up.

00:17:24.900 Look, there's only 300 beds.

00:17:26.060 We've got a heck of a lot of addicts.

00:17:27.420 It's only when they hit rock bottom before that kind of intervention.

00:17:29.840 And I do believe that somebody has to ask for it.

00:17:33.160 The parents, maybe.

00:17:34.180 Yes, or police.

00:17:35.460 There's a few health care professionals.

00:17:37.540 You know, Corey, contrary to what you may think, and I actually read your columns.

00:17:42.280 Well, you know, it's good. It would be easy to sort of click, click, and they're published,

00:17:49.800 you know. But I remember one you put out about 18 months ago. You were addressing this very

00:17:55.600 subject, and you said it is not an act of kindness to walk past somebody who has just passed out on

00:18:04.300 bench in a pool of their own urine. You can't use the argument while they have a right to do that

00:18:12.540 because they're past making rational decisions. At what point do you step in and help somebody

00:18:18.460 without actually identifying that very point? You pointed out that that particular person

00:18:23.820 needs help and needs help now. Exactly. And that's part of why I'm as unvarnished as I am with it.

00:18:27.980 They're not in a position to ask for it. Because some people too say, oh,

00:18:30.700 oh, we've got to maintain their dignity.

00:18:32.460 The dignity is long gone.

00:18:34.380 That ship sailed.

00:18:35.140 Yeah, that just struck me.

00:18:38.260 It's not a dignified thing to allow people to.

00:18:42.500 And I do recall that column.

00:18:44.040 That was when I started here.

00:18:46.380 Here he lives.

00:18:47.120 Some people, we've got two readers.

00:18:50.680 But it is a frustrating issue.

00:18:53.180 And again, it would only be last resort.

00:18:54.800 These are parents or siblings or, again,

00:18:57.060 I read that the legislation

00:18:58.620 or where they're proposing for it,

00:18:59.800 know health professionals i mean if they've had somebody's in for their 10th overdose

00:19:04.040 they can apply and say maybe we should put this person somewhere controlled and see anyways and

00:19:08.520 try and people say well the failure failure rate's so high there's an interesting thing where because

00:19:13.960 i haven't seen this done anywhere i've been searching there aren't centers like this anywhere

00:19:18.280 so that may not work i sure hope it will but people keep saying it doesn't work well how are

00:19:22.760 you saying when you don't have a basic example to draw from i i can't see how even if it's a low

00:19:28.280 success rate if you've taken them from that point as you said where they've lost control of their

00:19:31.720 functions and they're on a bench and bring them in get them fed detox a couple of weeks so that

00:19:38.200 their mind is at least a bit clear even if there's only a 10 chance that they're going to respond to

00:19:42.760 treatment at that point boy that's 10 more than if you left it out there well and most rational

00:19:46.920 people would choose to be better don't you think i think so yeah but you've got to you've kind of

00:19:51.640 got to force them in and dry them out to hit that point of thinking about it i am told by those with

00:19:57.880 greater exposure to this that after an extended period of time on drugs your ability to actually

00:20:04.520 want your own best interest is somewhat diminished but it it people who say this won't work somehow

00:20:16.120 so often leave me with a feeling that they don't want it to work and so why would that be the case

00:20:24.840 and what would be in it for them for it to say ah you see we told you it didn't wouldn't work now

00:20:29.480 we now we're going to is this back to safe supply you know well it's it's frustrating where it gets

00:20:35.160 to that ideological thing like if the safe supply was working honestly if it was working if they

00:20:40.120 were handing it out and it led to these people being stabilized and then seeking treatment and

00:20:44.600 getting clear i'd say carry on keep giving it to them by all means whatever works i don't care yeah

00:20:50.600 And I still believe in perhaps offering safe consumption sites to try and reduce the overdoses,

00:20:55.880 not giving them the drugs, but at least giving them a safe spot and also where they can have

00:20:58.840 a counsellor handy and try and snatch the man and get them treated. But I just want what works.

00:21:03.880 And yeah, as you said, people are dismissing this. It hasn't even been tried yet.

00:21:08.600 There was the point made at the press conference on Monday, there was,

00:21:12.440 I forget who the other minister was, his name, but they mentioned a fellow who had overdosed

00:21:20.360 something like 17 times in the last month which you know i was thinking oh my god like that's just

00:21:26.200 that's every other day this this fellow's overdosing and and they were saying you know

00:21:30.440 if we can prevent that 18th time you know that potentially kills this fellow right because one

00:21:37.400 of them will be the final one then then you know maybe it's worth it to you know to at least say

00:21:42.200 that you tried yeah well maybe some people need to see it another column maybe a human life is worth

00:21:47.000 that much yeah like way back when the standard first started i wrote that column that got that

00:21:51.480 award that first year and it was just actually writing on experience because i walked i walked

00:21:55.160 through the park over from here and i encountered an overdose a young man he didn't make it and

00:22:03.400 to look down like we tried cpr and naloxone and it didn't you know until the paramedics got there

00:22:09.160 and it was too late and you know i just wrote on it because i i wanted to share the horror

00:22:15.800 the helplessness the frustration like this is happening because i think a lot of people who

00:22:21.600 don't come downtown people who don't go into these areas yeah could look down at a guy who

00:22:26.140 couldn't have been more than in his early 20s you know dead pointlessly you know i mean i don't know

00:22:34.240 if anything could have saved him prior i don't know but we can't dismiss this i mean it really

00:22:39.840 it's a moral issue and it's part of why it's a pet issue that drives me so much these days on it

00:22:45.880 they're like experience it guys go have a look and understand how deep and tragic this is you're

00:22:53.060 always going to ask yourself or ask people who are against it if this was your kid what would

00:22:58.160 you want well that's what i kind of said online i mean i said if it's your daughter your son

00:23:02.120 who's living behind the dumpster doing unimaginable things to get their next fix

00:23:06.360 would you really be against just taking that last resort and that's the thing that people have to

00:23:12.100 understand this is a last resort but snatching them up putting them into a center yes against

00:23:16.960 their will but just trying and we actually without giving too much detail we actually

00:23:23.660 kind of had an incident here with a staffer and his son who went through something kind of similar

00:23:29.400 where he didn't know whether his son was, you know, alive or dead,

00:23:36.640 and it turned out that he was in police custody.

00:23:39.220 Yeah.

00:23:39.720 So.

00:23:40.300 No, it's more common than people think.

00:23:43.040 It's not a typical discussion people have.

00:23:45.320 And it happens in the births, too, but you just, I think it's more visible downtown.

00:23:49.820 Yeah, it's not exclusive, too.

00:23:52.140 Again, people say, oh, it's from broken households or things.

00:23:54.440 I mean, those are contributing factors, but this could happen to anybody.

00:23:56.880 It can happen to anybody.

00:23:59.240 And either way, let's hope for success.

00:24:02.020 I mean, you know, that's the thing.

00:24:02.900 I'm rooting for success.

00:24:04.340 You know, get off the ideology.

00:24:05.980 The money's going to be spent.

00:24:07.180 Let's hope these centers go up and save some lives because it's certainly not working otherwise.

00:24:11.820 All right.

00:24:12.660 Let's go federal.

00:24:13.700 Something a little more upbeat.

00:24:15.540 You were talking about the leadership debate, an upbeat in the same center?

00:24:19.160 Well, at least we can make light of some of these things or maybe.

00:24:23.360 I mean, I haven't talked to one person who sat through the whole thing except for maybe Jen.

00:24:26.980 and she was assigned this is the liberal party leadership debate for the contenders the the

00:24:33.560 love in i mean you gotta understand it's an internal uh battle so you don't really want

00:24:38.300 to cut to the core on it necessarily i i see it when it gets this boring though it means that

00:24:43.120 they've already kind of conceded that carney's gonna win so i'm not gonna shoot too hard because

00:24:47.960 i want to be in cabinet when he gets there or or they don't want to shoot themselves in the foot

00:24:52.760 given the precarious situation that they already kind of find themselves in, it seems.

00:24:58.780 You've got the story right there.

00:25:00.760 Surely this story suggests that they're not so precarious.

00:25:06.680 The Liberals take the lead for the first time since 2021, says Ipsos Reid.

00:25:12.420 Would you want to screw that up?

00:25:14.160 You certainly wouldn't, but in my opinion, a couple of them almost did.

00:25:20.980 But, you know, just to say what this story is saying, after nearly four years of conservative dominance in the polls, the Liberal Party of Canada has taken a two-point lead among decided voters.

00:25:35.860 They were 26 points behind just six weeks ago.

00:25:39.020 Obviously, what has happened is that they have seized upon the opportunity afforded them by President Trump.

00:25:46.200 A certain, you know, American gentleman.

00:25:49.680 a certain american gentleman who said we're going to apply some tariffs one day

00:25:53.600 it was going to be february then it was going to be march now it's going to be april but one

00:25:56.640 day tariffs are coming well it was more than that it was a it was a hockey game it was uh

00:26:01.920 a lot of provocative statements a lot of stuff so so here we are um and you know for those of us on

00:26:11.440 the conservative side of uh of things you look at it through the conservative lens it's quite

00:26:18.000 It's quite appalling that the Liberals should profit from this when the things that Trump

00:26:22.640 has pointed out are mostly the consequences of their own maladministration for nearly

00:26:28.580 10 years.

00:26:29.580 Absolutely.

00:26:30.580 Listening to them say, well, we're going to fix the defense, we're going to fix productivity,

00:26:35.000 we're going to fix the economy, well, you've been in government for 10 years.

00:26:42.640 My wife put it beautifully as she was cooking a dinner there, I'm watching this out of one

00:26:46.760 eye.

00:26:47.760 every admission every promise is an admission of guilt right it's a good way to put it very

00:26:55.040 good it was a good way to put it you know so uh you know i i'm giving her the credit for that one

00:27:01.520 but like there's no good saying we're going to fix productivity when productivity is tanked on

00:27:05.840 your watch do it you're the you're still the government it's open to you what frustrates

00:27:11.280 with the canadian voters then like how so you just cut the head off of this 0.99

00:27:15.040 ugly monster and put a new head on it and apparently that's enough you know and at first 0.98

00:27:21.580 i was dismissing these you know frank graves and eco's okay he's he's frank graves but no we've

00:27:25.980 seen a number of polls now from a number of pollsters that are showing a pretty distinct

00:27:29.980 trend that canadians are embracing the liberals again i think it might be soft when it grows that

00:27:35.340 fast it's reactionary it's you know quite a difference between after an election campaign

00:27:40.120 and making up your mind and making x on a ballot but it's real and well you could argue though

00:27:45.020 that the last two years have been kind of out of whack because it's when has a Conservative Party

00:27:50.460 ever had a 25-point lead over any incumbent government, no matter how unpopular,

00:27:56.540 even going back to the days of Mulroney and, you know, the first Trudeau.

00:28:01.060 Exceptional, but a 25-point recovery in a matter of a few weeks.

00:28:03.960 Well, you know, and I didn't sit through the whole thing, but I watched enough of it last night

00:28:09.300 to know that, you know, Carney is not a very good speaker. And when you get on to an election

00:28:15.060 trail, some of these points that you've just made that, you know, they've, they're the authors of,

00:28:21.180 you know, their own demise, there was a reason why they were 25 points down in the polls.

00:28:25.440 And you have to think that, you know, Pollyov is, he's very fluent in French, he's very quick on his

00:28:31.360 feet, he's sharp, he's, he's got a good wit. And, you know, quite frankly, a lot of their policies

00:28:37.940 These are probably more in line with mainstream Canadian views at this point.

00:28:44.320 So I think that once we get out into an election and on the trail, you know, the Krista Freelands

00:28:49.660 and all the lesser lights of the Trudeau era are, you know, they're going to be falling

00:28:55.380 over themselves and stumbling.

00:28:57.060 Well, you know, I think maybe Krista Freeland has already committed a fairly major stumble. 0.92

00:29:02.740 I wonder if we could just run that clip.

00:29:05.580 Let's run that up.

00:29:06.580 Oh, yes.

00:29:07.580 Yeah, this is something to behold.

00:29:10.460 It is critical that we spend that money here in Canada on Canadian companies,

00:29:16.440 and we need to be thinking about the next generation of warfare.

00:29:19.680 As we're seeing in Ukraine, drones, AI, these are really important.

00:29:24.780 Our 2% should not be about sending checks to the United States.

00:29:28.980 Critically, we need a plan to defend our own borders, very particularly the Arctic,

00:29:35.000 and we need to be working with our Nordic and EU-NATO partners.

00:29:40.620 They have nuclear weapons.

00:29:42.080 We need to say to them,

00:29:43.420 we need a plan to protect and defend our shared Arctic without the U.S.

00:29:50.500 And Canada will step up because it's our sovereignty that's at stake as well.

00:29:57.760 So we have actually gone from talking about trade

00:30:00.720 to deploying nuclear weapons to defend the Arctic.

00:30:03.740 And this is somebody who seriously wants to be prime minister.

00:30:08.920 She is, you know, something I said long ago on one of her shows,

00:30:12.240 we were speculating about who might replace Trudeau before he'd even stepped out.

00:30:17.020 And I dismissed her off the beginning because I said, Freeland's just too weird.

00:30:21.340 And she is.

00:30:23.720 But, I mean, that is a dangerous sort of conversation.

00:30:26.440 Thankfully, it's just a leadership contender and not a leader talking about these sorts of things.

00:30:29.640 By the way, you have to ask you, did she check with Sir Keir Starmer in Great Britain whether our nuclear weapons would be available?

00:30:38.860 You know, the old Valiant-class submarine on patrol at Canada or Macron in France.

00:30:45.900 That they left the hats open on and catch us fire.

00:30:50.440 I've worked in the Arctic and, you know, when I'm out on the ice, look, we can see land when you get these odd...

00:30:56.020 It's interesting when you get the right air pressure and you can see islands in the distance.

00:30:59.440 and i can see alaska she seems to be forgetting that the americans are an arctic nation as well

00:31:05.840 if we're going to be talking about arctic sovereignty we got to be talking about it with

00:31:08.560 them not saying oh we're going to reach out to uk and put nukes there to stop the big bad americans

00:31:13.840 you nutcase what i find appalling about that clip and about her uh i mean what she was what she was 1.00

00:31:20.800 saying was that america has become predatory therefore we have to have an alternative alliance 0.81

00:31:26.240 to america and we got to get we didn't play the whole thing but uh we got to get japan and

00:31:31.680 australia and then she went on about denmark and the nordics and got to get france and britain

00:31:37.040 because they got nuclear weapons yeah great and meanwhile in washington in the basement

00:31:44.720 of the boiler room there is somebody sitting there with a pc and a coffee machine and they've

00:31:50.640 They've been told to watch the liberal debate and report back upstairs if anybody says anything interesting.

00:31:58.060 And they're kind of sitting there like this.

00:31:59.900 And all of a sudden she started talking about an alternative nuclear alliance to the United States.

00:32:07.320 We have yet to see what Mr. Trump will make of this.

00:32:10.720 But if he is advised of it and mocks it, then be it on her head for bringing it forward.

00:32:18.040 That was the craziest thing in that whole two-hour session, and there were some other crazy things.

00:32:24.240 For the most part, I mean, they were just campaigning against their own record, though.

00:32:27.780 That was the more outstanding thing of the bunch.

00:32:30.440 So, I mean, I think, again, even most liberals will realize, wow, Freeland, you're just here whatever you are.

00:32:36.460 Carney's got this probably in the bag, but something that hasn't been mentioned enough was the French debate,

00:32:40.880 because it really exposed one fatal flaw the liberals have right now, which they rarely have ever gotten out of leaders.

00:32:46.600 But Kearney can't speak French to save his life.

00:32:49.960 I mean, he speaks it better than I do.

00:32:51.400 I'll give him that.

00:32:52.300 But even as an English speaker, I can recognize a guy speaking with a very thick English accent,

00:32:56.640 and he couldn't understand the questions, which is, you know,

00:32:59.520 one thing to be able to respond slowly in French.

00:33:01.560 But if you can't understand the question coming at you,

00:33:04.060 Quebec will not vote for a leader who can't speak French.

00:33:08.120 That's just, and Polyev is very fluent in French.

00:33:11.920 And, of course, Bonchette's just going to love mopping the floor with Kearney. 0.93

00:33:16.320 They will, you know, the Liberals, as much as the Poles seem nice now,

00:33:19.420 let's run a campaign when your leader can't speak good French.

00:33:21.760 Well, he wasn't very charismatic in English either.

00:33:24.100 No, no, at least he was understandable.

00:33:25.680 You know, he was kind of dry, boring.

00:33:27.280 Grouchon wasn't understandable, and he still won it.

00:33:29.140 Kind of academic, you know, what you would expect from a banker.

00:33:33.520 You know, when he launched his campaign in Edmonton, what was that, about a month ago?

00:33:36.760 But when I watched it, I thought, well, compared to Mr. Trudeau, this man sounds mature.

00:33:45.840 He's projecting good judgment.

00:33:47.800 He's not an exciting speaker, but at least he's not trying to be an exciting speaker

00:33:51.700 when that's not his natural pose.

00:33:54.440 I mean, it would have been a little crazy.

00:33:56.100 I couldn't help thinking of Michael Ignatius back in 2011.

00:34:01.640 Michael Ignatius is a really nice guy.

00:34:03.960 He's a good man.

00:34:05.040 He's smart.

00:34:05.720 He's fun.

00:34:06.040 He's smart.

00:34:06.760 the thing is he's not a campaigner no and never was and somebody should have

00:34:11.920 told him and he he dropped down to 34 seats right so and then he resigned and

00:34:18.340 mr. Trudeau became the leader of the opposition I see Kearney and Ignatia

00:34:23.860 for the same thing you can't it seems that you can't pull experts in from

00:34:28.120 outside and say all right you save us because we politicians have failed which

00:34:33.160 obviously they have uh oh yeah well i don't take that on i mean mr mr carney was uh claiming in

00:34:40.440 the debate last night that he's an expert in economics and a good negotiator have no doubt

00:34:46.240 about it we will see how good but that was that was the difference with trudeau though is that

00:34:52.040 uh uh you know the prime minister was a good debater like in the debate against uh you know

00:34:57.380 harper when he was on the anniversary of his father's death and he wore the black suit and

00:35:02.200 And he, you know, he hit back or whatever.

00:35:06.140 You could say, you know, he's a little empty up here.

00:35:10.400 He knows how to perform.

00:35:12.460 Yeah, but he did present himself fairly well.

00:35:16.180 If Mr. Carney ends up getting elected as leader and then as prime minister,

00:35:21.640 he is going to need to be a good negotiator.

00:35:25.440 But let's face it, Trump made his billions on being a good negotiator.

00:35:31.180 negotiator while dealing with people like carney in the banks you know it's a big discussion read 0.97

00:35:37.940 the damn book you know i do the deal yeah i read your column about how you picked it up at the 0.97

00:35:42.740 church said yeah it's been around for 40 years now this should be a surprise no so i mean just 1.00

00:35:48.980 to close on the federal issue though uh assuming carney wins now do you think he's going to make

00:35:53.820 the quick leap and pull for a quick snap election or is he going to try and throw the dice

00:36:01.000 cut a deal with Singh because I mean there should be a confidence vote shortly after parliament

00:36:05.500 resumes so he's not going to have a choice unless he cuts a deal with Singh which is very possible 0.98

00:36:09.820 do you think we're in for a spring election pretty quickly here or yeah I do I don't think

00:36:14.620 he can cut a deal with Singh I think that's toxic and most of the gain in the liberal support is

00:36:19.880 coming at the expense of the NDP you know my partner's from Italy and they have these coalition

00:36:24.840 governments and things you know and I was explaining to her she was saying like why would

00:36:29.000 these people jump from the ndp to the liberals and it was well if you didn't think that the liberals

00:36:33.240 were going to win and you're kind of on that kind of left extreme then maybe you'd throw your vote

00:36:38.360 for singh right but now that they seem to have a chance then you come back home right so i i don't

00:36:45.240 think that he will cut a deal i think there will be a spring election i think you'll go right into

00:36:49.240 it he'll pull the carbon tax so okay i think i agree with you but if i was going to be argumentative

00:36:56.600 for the sake of it. In opinion, that's what we do. If I was going to be argumentative for the sake

00:37:04.360 of it, I would say, well, Mr. Carney can barely order coffee in French. Wouldn't he want to use

00:37:12.840 the excuse that he needed time to hone his language skills? So let's stay with the October date that

00:37:21.240 has been. We will look after things with Mr. Trump in the meantime. And although you're correct in

00:37:29.880 saying, or at least Epsos Reid is saying, that the support that has gone to the Liberals has come

00:37:35.560 from the NDP, nevertheless, as we speak at this moment, the NDP do have the seats. And I can see

00:37:42.840 how Mr. Singh might say, well, you know, when we said that we were not going to support them any

00:37:48.760 longer mr trump hadn't threatened tariffs this changes everything so as a as patriotic canadians

00:37:55.040 we will support the government through this time of crisis and trial you know i could i could see

00:38:01.880 that say more than honing up on his language skills you know as an attempt to maybe put through

00:38:07.440 an economic platform and and throw out some dog bones to the ndp but then why wouldn't if you were 0.82

00:38:13.880 an NDP supporter that would be leaning liberal basically just to vote against

00:38:18.020 Pollyov why would you vote against saying if you if he was you know racking

00:38:24.860 up these kind of victories times are bizarre though I said everything's

00:38:28.400 believable now that I mean so I'll kind of turn to to the man south at the

00:38:32.900 border the man and so Trump again is mixed messaging you know this is over

00:38:40.280 and over we don't need Canadian oil we can do without Canadian oil oh yeah we

00:38:43.700 got to get the keystone going well it's it's it's not uh japanese oil coming through it would come

00:38:48.660 through that thing not that i see a lineup of private investors wanting to dive back into the

00:38:52.660 keystone anyways but he's talking about now the importance of bringing in canadian oil

00:38:57.940 while the other next day he's talking about the lack of need for canadian oil this would make

00:39:02.500 him so difficult to negotiate with because you don't really know even what the heck he wants

00:39:05.940 right but the keystone is this thing alive again or what well to your point about you don't know

00:39:11.860 what you're dealing with. That's part of the negotiation strategy. Just when you've got your

00:39:16.320 talking points lined up, he says something different. It seems to work for him. Now, we'll

00:39:24.500 see. The question that I would have is, is that pipe that was laid for Keystone four years ago,

00:39:31.560 five years ago, is that still in the ground? Nope. It's been completely ripped out. And the

00:39:37.180 pipe itself has been sitting out in the field in the middle of Saskatchewan, rusting. It would have

00:39:41.600 to be recast recoded everything you'd have to start over completely from scratch so i would

00:39:48.400 say unless he wanted to build it south going north and then have to deal with our government

00:39:54.080 it's probably a moot point at this point now that said there are some things that they could do that

00:40:04.040 maybe don't require these regulatory hurdles like you can do line looping and you can increase

00:40:09.800 pressure on certain line segments so you can alter the spec of the oil so that

00:40:16.900 flows through with less friction and you wind up with more barrels and as a

00:40:22.640 short-term solution you might be able to increase the capacity you know maybe by

00:40:30.240 something close to a million barrels a day which is still like about 25% which

00:40:34.640 is still fairly significant you know it gives you a little bit of running room

00:40:37.400 maybe for a few years until you could actually come up with a longer term more viable solution but

00:40:43.480 uh ramping production that much too i mean that's a big investment on the the parts of

00:40:47.400 producing to get the production that you're going to have the it's just you've got to get the wells

00:40:52.520 you've got to get the reserves you've worked in the oil patch yes you know it's not an overnight

00:40:56.520 thing and you have to book it and you have to get the financing and you have to have all your ducks

00:41:00.840 in a row and that's what i i guess my frustration i i know you're talking about trump using as a

00:41:05.240 negotiating tool but as we know too the business particularly oil and gas hates instability i mean

00:41:10.920 they just want to know what they're dealing with and we don't know what we're dealing with i just

00:41:14.680 can't see private operators saying yeah you know what i'll dive into this well and trans canada

00:41:20.040 just got burned here back in october for what was it 15 billion dollars so it was their claim under

00:41:24.840 the old nafta you know and it got rejected alberta is still on the hook for one and a half and then

00:41:31.080 then I think there's another two like it's almost three and a half million

00:41:33.900 dollars billion. The problem for Ken when he got in and back stocked. Yeah when

00:41:37.500 Kenny was gonna put his money where his mouth was, our money where his mouth was.

00:41:43.380 So how many miles of Canadian Keystone would have to be rebuilt? All of it.

00:41:50.220 Well yeah but is that 150, 300? What are we looking at? Yeah well I think it's

00:41:55.700 1900 kilometers all the way down to Oklahoma. As Nigel's saying it'd be a

00:42:00.420 couple hundred kilometers up on our end yeah i suppose the smallest the smallest portion of it

00:42:04.740 yeah and it is prairie i mean it's not the worst area to put pipe it if we had the will on the

00:42:09.860 part of both governments and somewhere a private investment it could be done in an expedite it's

00:42:13.940 not like we're crossing mountain ranges no no it's not like the transbound well we'll see yes

00:42:18.980 we're burning the time rate there's just again so much to cover maybe we'll just kind of hit on some

00:42:23.060 lighter notes while we go because we don't know with a lot of these airlines they're dropping

00:42:27.220 from the skies like oh yeah you know there's raining raining cats and dogs and airliners

00:42:32.180 hey um you know i i actually did do a little bit of background work on this one and here's what

00:42:38.020 happens um something bad happens and something bad did happen yes uh immediately the newsrooms

00:42:44.980 of the nations go around and look for comparables they all want to be first to spot a trend

00:42:50.980 and i understand that that's that's we're in the news business that's what we do

00:42:54.820 However, when you actually examine the statistics, you find that there is not a trend that

00:43:05.700 actually, overall, if there is any trend, it's downwards and in the best possible way.

00:43:14.180 You know, in Canada, the NTSB, that's the American organization, the Canadian equivalent,

00:43:22.020 actually tells us that we've oh where are my notes damn it that's it here we go all right

00:43:31.000 you're the one that uses the transportation safety board received a thousand and twenty

00:43:35.340 reports of air occurrences in 2023 182 actual accidents this is canadian numbers it's 2023

00:43:42.960 an 838 incident and that number is higher than the previous year but it is below the yearly

00:43:50.900 average of 220 accidents reported in the prior 10 years and we're talking to

00:43:56.900 all everything right we are talking that is specifically airplanes crumpled up on

00:44:02.000 a little aluminium bull right there are necessarily commercial oh no that's

00:44:06.800 that's that includes general aviation and that is where most of the most of

00:44:11.420 the sadness is usually the small ones yeah they divide between general

00:44:14.900 aviation and commercial and commercial is pretty bloody safe my stepdad was an

00:44:18.460 inspector yeah yeah well after either can we get him on the show well he's dead but

00:44:25.980 but not in a plane crash no he investigated the plane crashes all right the same pattern

00:44:30.380 in the united states so just a note before we get to our parting shots then folks don't cancel

00:44:33.900 those trips your flights will probably be fine i'm still going to take my fifth wheeled arizona

00:44:37.420 i feel more well i was just going to make the point you know when raiden came in one of his

00:44:40.940 first things you remember he fired something like 15 000 air traffic controllers right and there was

00:44:46.620 and there was a major accident that happened right after that but nobody you know nobody went out of

00:44:51.180 their way to blame him no specifically for it so either way yes it's a it seems to be and it wasn't

00:44:56.300 dei i don't think thankfully and yeah the dei is another all right so parting shots on our way out

00:45:02.540 i'll start with you sean well you know uh i was just going to go back on to the keystone because

00:45:07.900 there seems to be a lot of wishful thinking uh not just on the part of trump but here in canada that

00:45:13.980 somehow this thing's gonna be built but you know like i was saying to nigel before the show like 0.90

00:45:19.500 you know would you put up 15 billion dollars of your own money to you know try to get something

00:45:24.780 into the ground where it might take 10 or 12 years it might be another 30 billion over budget and you

00:45:29.980 have absolutely no idea whether or not it's ever going to actually get built it's a leap of faith

00:45:35.740 so you know chances are you like you and like you said corey the oil patch is very risk averse

00:45:41.100 so chances are you're just gonna wind up leaving that oil in the ground i hate that foot all right

00:45:47.100 so the um yeah i i was relieved i think like everybody else that the asteroid isn't going

00:45:54.620 to hit the earth after all yes and um but i it made me look things up and it turned even

00:46:01.740 in a story like that they managed to drag elon musk into it and try to smear him the the issue

00:46:10.380 is remember six or seven years ago that he put a tesla into orbit uh and this thing is out there

00:46:17.820 is buzzing around if it's somewhere between mars and the sun and people forgot about it you know

00:46:22.940 and then there was a keen little amateur astronomer i see something i see something

00:46:27.180 you know it's a tesla and well he didn't know he just said i see something he definitely

00:46:33.100 covered an asteroid he thought he discovered a new asteroid anyway mr musk you know very

00:46:38.620 irresponsible putting a sports car in space that's just crazy stuff have you ever seen the tesla array

00:46:44.300 now that you've brought it up no it uh passes over and uh you can actually google it and find

00:46:49.820 out when it's going to pass over oh yeah but the first time i saw it was right after the ukraine

00:46:54.060 war and i seem to think that it was the russians are shooting missiles it's actually quite a sight

00:46:59.020 to see you see about 13 of these things oh the starlink yeah yeah starlink yeah yeah that's

00:47:04.060 Starlink. We've wrapped our time. I hope a lot of people are watching on their Starlinks. I know

00:47:08.520 that's what I use down in Pritis anyways. So we've run the time up. I'll leave just with my

00:47:13.920 final quick shot. A trade deficit isn't a subsidy. Look it up, people. I'm tired of this discussion.

00:47:20.360 Okay, well, we've covered a lot of issues. Thank you very much, Nigel. Sean, it just wasn't enough

00:47:24.860 time to cover them all. There's so much to go on about. And your little statement there is

00:47:29.220 very apt as well. Yeah, so thank you all for tuning in, guys. Be sure to take out a subscription

00:47:33.880 and that's how we pay the bills around here.

00:47:35.320 It's very important.

00:47:35.980 We appreciate you following and watching.

00:47:38.800 So thank you all again,

00:47:40.640 and we will have this discussion next week

00:47:42.340 with a whole new bunch of issues to break down.

00:47:45.360 What does success mean to you?

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Western Standard - February 27, 2025

Alberta cabinet kerfuffle. Minister Peter Guthrie walks

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