Calgary Lougheed MLA Eric Bouchard on what COVID restrictions did to small businesses & how they are
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
170.05408
Summary
In this episode of the Western Standard Podcast, I sit down with the CEO of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce to talk about the impact of government policies that were introduced in the late 2000s and early 2010s on Canadian small businesses.
Transcript
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I mean, the only business I see booming is dollar stores.
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But it's because people can't afford to shop anywhere else.
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And I've, you know, I feel all levels of government.
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The people who were in charge, I guess, you know, from the advocacy for small business,
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which should have been there in 2020 and 2021, wasn't there.
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You know, they, in my opinion, you know, I believe it was the, I'll get a direct quote
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from the president of the chamber, Calgary Chamber of Commerce.
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You know, they're, they're, they say they exist to help businesses reach their potential.
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And as an independent nonprofit, nonpartisan, nonpartisan organization, they build their
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history to serve and advocate for business of all sizes and all sectors across the country.
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And I'm going back to, uh, would have been 2021, uh, the president of the Calgary Chamber
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of Commerce, you know, uh, her comments were today's announcement on the immediate removal
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of all pandemic measures and restrictions ignores the importance of consumer confidence in our
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Well, their, their role was to represent businesses, you know, clearly veering out of, out of their
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And just for, for context, that's Deborah Yedlin.
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And I've written a couple of columns ripping into her for that in particular, I was furious
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because I mean, no matter where you stand on things, if you know anything about business,
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that those restrictions were harming businesses.
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They were slowing people down from coming into them.
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It was limiting the amount of people who could dine there, who could work there, that the
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vaccine passports were reducing your customer base, uh, again, to come out and say that
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it would be bad for business to lift those restrictions was completely absurd.
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And, uh, contrary to what any person in business would have told otherwise, yet she's still heading
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And, and, uh, the Western standard, just as a side note, before I let you go, we're a member
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of the Strathmore chamber of commerce, cause we just don't want to waste our time and money
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Uh, I, yeah, just for another, I used, um, media corporate media, I believe it was 2017
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or 2018 when times were tough, you know, the NDP government, uh, there's oil recession.
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I used one of the corporate media to get my message out, how small businesses were affected,
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uh, 2020, late 2020, I had reached out to all corporate media and I won't name them all
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here, but, uh, each one responded saying that they weren't interested in telling my story
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And I was, you know, wasn't waving the white flag just yet, but there was a tsunami coming
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of small businesses and we haven't, we haven't even scratched the surface.
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I don't think of, you know, bankruptcies, insolvencies, uh, we could go on talking about
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mental health issues and how, you know, small business owners are proud people as you know,
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But, you know, when you, you have to put up this facade for your staff, for your family,
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and just to keep the sense that everything is okay, you know, and there, that guy can
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There's, there's a mental, mental toll to that.
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