CMS： It's time for the West to help Quebec find the door
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Summary
Corey has a rant about Quebec separatists and why a referendum on independence is a bad idea. And a look at why a successful referendum in the West would be a good thing for Canada. Corey is joined by retired paramedic Don Sharp to talk about that and much more.
Transcript
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I start these with just the weather small talk while you guys get on board and get ready
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for a bunch of ranting, raving guests and all that good stuff.
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I almost froze to death in yesterday's global warming, but it's supposed to get nice in
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another week and we'll have another snowstorm for at least a May long weekend to look forward
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Eventually though, we're going to be out of winter.
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Yes, this is my weekly rant show and it's live for those who are on live.
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I see Doug Jordan, Sean and Vision all saying hello, checking in.
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Just stay civil with each other if you're going to have some discourse between each other.
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I got later in a bit here going to have retired paramedic Don Sharp on the show.
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He's been on before and he's been like a dog with a bone on health care reform, particularly
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when it comes to the paramedical services in Alberta.
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He's watching the bureaucracy fighting so hard against Premier Smith and against people
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like Don to avoid and just stop any productive change from coming.
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It's a real micro version of what the bigger monster is with health care reform that we need
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And Don's always great to talk to on those subjects.
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He gets out on the ground and just gets on their case.
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So, let me talk about something that's a little less divisive right now.
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And the independence movement in Quebec, I mean, it's never been gone.
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And the secessionists within the Bloc Québécois and Parti Québécois, they've just been biding
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their time and working to create the conditions for a successful independence referendum since
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And you look at the other parties within Quebec, whether they're liberal or whatever they
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might be, ADQ, soft separatists within other parties in Quebec have been doing the same
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They've been building the conditions for a successful referendum.
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And I know I've talked to lots of people, many in the West, who dismiss the movement saying
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They think Quebec separatists just want to use the threat of secession to squeeze more concessions
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And while politicians in Quebec certainly shamelessly use the threat of secession for
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Quebec's benefit, you're making a really grave error if you think that threat isn't
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I mean, I had the opportunity to meet with some Bloc Québécois members back in the late
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90s when I was leading the Alberta Independence Party at that time.
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And it didn't take long talking to them to realize, no, they really want a fully independent
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They don't care about the fiscal costs or the challenges in leaving the Federation.
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Now, the Parti Québécois is poised to win a majority in the next provincial election
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The third-place party in the polls is Quebec Solidaire, which is also a separatist party.
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I mean, more than half of Quebecers support one separatist party or another.
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Parti Québécois leader Paul Saint-Pierre Plamendon has now promised another referendum on
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independence will be held if his party takes power.
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If there's one thing that the separatists of Quebec learned in 1995 is that they can't
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pull the trigger on another referendum until they're confident they're going to win it.
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A referendum loss sets back independence efforts by decades, even if it's on a narrow loss
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Some Western independent supporters pushing for a referendum in the West would be well
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So if Plamendon is promising a referendum, it means he's confident that the independent
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After decades of chasing non-French speakers from Quebec through oppressive policies coupled
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with antagonizing the rest of Canada to disrupt national unity, Quebec could finally have the
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winning conditions it sought for an independence referendum.
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I remember watching the Quebec referendum from afar, of course, as a young Albertan in 1995.
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Politicians, personalities, and legacy media all worked overtime in begging Quebec not to leave.
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Delegations crossed the country to wave flags in Quebec and at rallies and let Quebecers know
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It was an almost humiliating sort of groveling at the feet of Quebecers.
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It was successful, though, as Quebecers chose to stay within Canada with a meager 1% margin.
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Now, as another Quebec referendum is looming, Canada's in a different place.
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Legacy media, they don't have that stranglehold on information anymore, and Western provinces
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aren't as solidly federalist as they used to be.
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The reaction to another referendum in Quebec can, and should, be much different.
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We should loudly come out and encourage them to leave.
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We can't hold a referendum to kick Quebec out of a confederation, but we can certainly
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The federation slanted in favor of the Laurentian provinces, and even then, Quebec still wants
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The Charlatan and Meech Lake Accords from 30 years ago, they failed to change the constitution.
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The only way we can change this system is to tear a province free from it, and Quebec
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If a referendum on independence was to be held in Alberta or Saskatchewan today, the
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independent side would be lucky to garner 25% support.
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If the same referendum was held six months after Quebec voted to go, though, I think
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There's little sense in staying within a federation that is no longer figuratively broken, but has
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Provinces will work to break free and seek their own deals and destinies.
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This can be a positive evolution for Canada, Quebec, all the West, all of us.
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So let's not decry Quebec's efforts at independence.
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Quebec is the linchpin, and once it's pulled, Western independence will be soon to follow.
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So yeah, I'm probably going to mispronounce it, but viva le Quebec Libre.
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Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out, guys.
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That's what I got to say about Quebec and their independence efforts.
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Actually, I was kind of behind you last time, too.
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All right, let's see what else is going on out there.
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We've got Jen Hodgson checking in from the newsroom, telling us what's dominating the
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You guys bring the food in once my show starts.
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I'll try and save you some for when we finish up here.
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So what do we got dominating the new scroll right now?
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Well, our top story is the budget that the federal government just introduced yesterday.
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So Christia Freeland, the finance minister, her midterm spending deficits are up 95% with
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And so there's a number of introductions to this budget, including capital gains taxes are
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So we see a lot of money being filtered in there.
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We also see taxes on tobacco as well as money going towards immigration.
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So that means hospital care for asylum seekers, for asylum holding places, as well as lodging.
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So we have a lot of money going into sustaining asylum seekers and refugees.
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And only about $8 million is going towards managing smuggling of goods that are coming
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And another one that's hot this week is what's going on with the Canadian security and intelligence
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So we have the CSIS director testifying that China is actually an ongoing problem and CSIS
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is working relentlessly to deal with Chinese Communist Party infiltration in Canadian institutions.
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So we saw this through the China inquiry, the Commission on Foreign Interference, where CSIS
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director Vigneault testifies that actually he told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about these
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warnings and they had documented evidence that this was going on in the elections from
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However, the Prime Minister denied that he was ever told this to such an extent that the
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Commission called the CSIS director back to the stand after the Commission was supposed
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to be over, who reaffirmed that he did tell Trudeau this.
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And actually, a lot of this information came out in a late night dump Sunday evening.
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I think it was the 7th of April after the CSIS director had already testified.
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So we've got a lot of murky water going on there, and that's not the only scandal that
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the Trudeau government is embedded in with CSIS investigating.
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So this comment about relentlessly trying to get in the way of Chinese infiltration in
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Canadian politics is something that the CSIS director is focusing on, and this came out
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in the wake of the two Chinese spies that were working for the Winnipeg lab, and they have
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They're fired about a year after it was revealed that they were compromised, actually.
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So we've got a lot going on with our intelligence agency and our federal government.
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I'm sure our listeners are familiar with the online harms bill that was proposed in recent
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She hosted a private symposium for people that are in support of this online harms bill.
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And it's worth noting that the Governor General of Canada is actually expected to be nonpartisan,
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We have a comment from Riddle Hall insisting that this is the case, even despite the event
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We also have our federal environment, our environment minister, Stephen Gilboa, he told the House
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of Commons this week that he's met many farmers from Alberta to Nova Scotia and everywhere in
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between Quebec, and farmers are allegedly more worried about climate change than they are about
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this carbon tax, according to the environment minister who claimed this in the House of Commons
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And to top it all off, we have some more information on the great gold heist that went down at the
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So it turns out that Air Canada employees have actually been found to be involved in this.
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We have two present and a former Air Canada employee that has been snagged in relation to this
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$20 million worth of gold bars, $2.4 million in cash, and about a half mil worth in jewelry.
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So, I mean, this budget, I mean, they've been saying it's supposed to be fair for all generations.
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You know, Trudeau's borrowing so you don't have to.
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So, you're of kind of a, you know, a younger vintage than I am.
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Do you feel confident that this budget is going to serve your future?
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As far as I can see, it's tax upon tax and debt upon debt.
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So, the government is just trying desperately to fill in the holes that it's made with the gross
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spending and borrowing more specifically over the last several years and trying to patchwork it in
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Looking forward to seeing some changes in our federal government very soon.
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Well, I guess in the meantime, we can count on you to keep shoring things up.
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We're going to put things on your credit card, you know, my generation will, and leave you guys to cover it.
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So, get ready for those cuts, I guess, when it's time for them to hit.
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You know, I think CSIS has been going a little wrong with things as well when it comes to Prime Minister Trudeau.
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I mean, as you said, your stories keep pointing out and you rate them great.
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And Justin's been told over and over and over again about all these things and he denies it.
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But he said before, too, he doesn't read all these things.
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Prime Minister isn't like other ones, you know.
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Show the Winnipeg Lab and a pop-up book that has a big virus popping out of it.
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Maybe then you would understand the significance of it.
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Yeah, he seems quite laissez-faire about these issues, Corey.
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And that's highly concerning, I think, to a lot of Canadians.
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Just the lack of, really, interest or any kind of investment into these issues.
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As if someone else can do the reading and just give the Cole Notes version.
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Well, we know what happens to those students in high school that just reads the Cole Notes versions of the books, right?
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We can't educate the Prime Minister, but we can educate the public.
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The reason we can do that, guys, is because you've subscribed.
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So if you haven't subscribed yet, guys, it's $9.99 a month, $100 a year.
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And if you've subscribed already, I really appreciate it.
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You know, it's how we keep these things going, how to keep the truth out there.
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So, I mean, the subject, I appreciate it because, I mean, it's one facet of healthcare.
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Unfortunately, it's a monstrous animal, a huge bureaucracy, a lot of areas that need
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But one that I think a lot of people can relate with, EMS.
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I mean, it's such an important part of the healthcare services in an emergency situation.
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And if we can't fix that, how on earth are we going to fix the giant monster?
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Well, I'm glad to come in and help keep track of progress or lack thereof or what's actually
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happening in this one small area of healthcare.
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You would think that EMS by itself would be easy to fix, but it's so intertwined with the
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rest of healthcare now, not the way it used to be.
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So, we have some real struggles right now that we're dealing with.
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We have a more receptive Premier than we've had for quite some time.
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Even Premier County was a bit receptive on some of this.
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Like, that's why I say with EMS, there's some good common sense solutions.
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You know, you've been pointing out, others have been pointing out, we're using a lot of
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ambulances to transport patients that just don't need to be used in that sense when it
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So, they've been draining from rural populations, you know, taking the rural ambulances into
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the cities and leaving other areas under covered.
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You know, paramedics have been used to maintain patients.
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So, we know the simple solutions that a lay person can see, yeah, that doesn't make sense.
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Yet, it's like pulling teeth, getting Alberta Health Services to cooperate with changing
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Our Premier understands very well exactly what's wrong with EMS.
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She came to one of our town hall meetings in Airdrie before she was elected when we were
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And Alberta Health Services has certainly dragged its feet on this transfer issue.
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It's been more than a year since they put out that RFP looking for contractors.
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You know, in northern Alberta, north of Red Deer, 90% of patients interhospitally, and
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many of them by air, are moved by private contracted services.
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And there are private contractors here in southern Alberta.
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There's Air and Paramedical, Genesis MediShuttle, MedSource.
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I mean, all of these qualified private operators that use registered paramedics on their ambulances
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And in fact, Air and Paramedical is moving patients almost weekly, still with a phone
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They put out the RFP, but then they put a whole bunch of roadblocks and the usual bureaucratic
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I think for us dealing with Alberta Health Services and EMS, now it's not just the fact
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that they've failed to fulfill their primary mandate, which is the emergency care and transportation
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They've integrated us into healthcare a lot, including putting us in the hallway, right?
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An ambulance service can't survive when half your fleet's in the hallway.
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And let's talk about this latest contract debacle.
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I mean, as you said, I mean, the things like even talking to the counties, they've been
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putting things in camera or trying to get the counties to hold meetings in secret.
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But you've been a thorn in their side because you're attending and you're just exposing what's
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And again, we've done this before on the show, talking about the number of transfers, non-urgent
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transfers that are being done from the rural communities using the emergency ambulances,
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taking an emergency ambulance out of the community for a long time.
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So this new contract provider in Calgary and Edmonton was supposed to solve those problems,
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but they're only going to reach 50 kilometers outside of the cities.
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So if you're in a community outside that radius, this new transfer protocol is not going to
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Well, they've got this new EMS standing committee, which I wasn't qualified to be on and frankly
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They'll meet and then they'll come up with an idea and then it'll take another year to
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Meanwhile, today and tomorrow and the next day, non-urgent patients need to be moved for
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So you mentioned AHS doing in-camera closed confidential sessions with municipalities.
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We caught them last week and kudos to the Foothills County Council who, when AHS showed
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up and said, we want to hold our meeting with you in camera, in confidence, Foothills County
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Council said, no, we have a group of citizens outside who deserve some transparency.
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They've asked that this be a public meeting and we think they deserve it.
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So AHS was forced to, and they've held a number of these closed sessions in Claire's home
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And so we're very concerned with what they're actually talking about and why they want to
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Well, so these non-immersion transfers, I mean, and it's going to be more acute when you get
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to more rural areas because you have smaller hospitals with limited amounts of specialists.
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You might have a, again, see a senior who's in mobility challenge, needs, can't just hop
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But at the same time, it doesn't need a fully staffed ambulance as well.
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It's like taking a limousine to the grocery store.
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If you're a non-urgent patient who needs to go for a cast change to get orthotics, to get
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an MRI because you've got a back problem and you just need a stretcher to lay on, taking
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the only emergency ambulance for 1,200 square kilometers is foolish.
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Let's put these reputable, capable, registered paramedics in these private contractors to work.
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It's not odd or different or bad to hear some of the people that object to private enterprise
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And I mean, the why when it comes to the public a little bit, I think, is because we've had
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that Canadian training, just anything private in health care, even though they don't realize
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But the private in health care is inherently bad.
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And they oppose it just on principle, immediately.
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I remember actually a town hall meeting you held down in Okotoks a couple of years ago
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And I think that these private contractors in instances like this can give us that.
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And certainly north of, again, north of Red Deer, most of the patients are, especially
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You know how different EMS is in northern Alberta.
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Most patients, if they're going farther than 250 kilometers, they go by air.
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And we haven't had any concerns or complaints just because they're private.
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And it's a red herring that people who want to keep the government involved and in control
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for reasons that I don't think are responsible can't defend.
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So getting on to that why then, the why is AHS resisting this so much?
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I mean, some of them have got to think, I want to see better services getting to Alberta.
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The Calgary Zone for AHS EMS now has 70 managers.
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That means that between Didsbury and Claresholm and Lake Louise and Strathmore, there are 70
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people employed by HSEMS who are executive directors or managers or supervisors or assistants.
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And it's my belief, having worked there for a long time, that probably half of them spend
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their whole day trying to fix problems they themselves created by micromanaging and implementing
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policies and procedures to mitigate problems like hallway waits, like short staffing, like
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These are most of the problems in EMS these days were created by the people that run it.
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And there's no transparency and there's no accountability.
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And as I said, I mean, it is all tied together and it is part of that big, though Premier
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Smith is working on breaking up that bureaucracy, which is fantastic.
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But I mean, it's an example of what's going to happen with attempted reforms in pretty
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much every other department within that giant bureaucracy.
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I mean, these people shuffling a piece of paper from one desk to another desk and making
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So if we start the domino falling in one area, though, I think that's important.
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You know, EMS seems to be the one that would be easiest to fix, because if you can just separate
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them from the hospitals, I really believe that if you don't fix hallway waits, you're
00:24:19.100
We have to get our trucks out of the hospitals and back on the road.
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And we're not the answer to hospital wait times.
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So once you separate EMS, fixing it should be pretty straightforward.
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Look, community care is something we can do, but stop asking us to solve hospital problems.
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That's not our, we're not good at it, and we're not able to do it.
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I mean, it's just as absurd as, say, we should then perhaps take the nurses and doctors out
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to an accident scene to treat them on the spot.
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I mean, they could certainly help, and they've got some training, but they don't know how
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to quickly bundle somebody up, stabilize them, and get into the hospital.
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So sometimes paramedics in the hallway will hear from hospital staff, you know, we're
00:25:13.160
And I go, well, I only ever hear that in the hospital.
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I never see it at 3 in the morning at 40 below on the side of the highway at an overturned
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I don't see anybody from the hospital on my team there.
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But they're using it as an overlap within the hospitals to make up for other problems.
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And so when AHS gets broken up, though, is that going to ease some of that?
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Like EMS is going to kind of fall into a different one of the four.
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I think the goal, and I'm not speaking for the UCP or the Premier, I have no axe to grind.
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I have no interest in that, in being part of that.
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But I think what is going to happen is if you separate them, you can make them more accountable
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I mean, you talked to some of these managers last week or the week before about who was
00:26:03.120
getting the contract, they'd all say, oh, we don't know.
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Well, how can you be a senior or an executive director for EMS and really not know what's
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And the secrecy, the lack of accountability, very frustrating.
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And that's why we started the Where's My Ambulance campaign.
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And I'm going to get to that for the final part in chatting with you because you're
00:26:23.660
I mean, you're not just putting out the problems.
00:26:24.940
You're putting pressure on in areas, bringing awareness to this so that they can push for
00:26:31.340
And, you know, if you can't get it through the bureaucracy of AHS, the municipalities, I
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And getting them engaged, getting them pressuring or getting the people living in them realizing
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just how badly served they are, maybe that'll bring some things about.
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So, well, I'm not a big fan of raising awareness.
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I like getting things done and fixing problems.
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But municipalities, as we've talked before, that's where you start.
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Your municipal elected officials are there to protect you a lot from other levels of
00:27:04.280
So, again, kudos to Foothills County who said no to AHS having a confidential closed session.
00:27:12.540
And, again, there's always conversations that these organizations perhaps need to have,
00:27:18.680
But to have your whole presentation, your PowerPoint on response times, number of out-of-service
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ambulances, and especially the Q&A from counselors.
00:27:28.100
You know, we have a group of us, retired paramedics and some other knowledgeable citizens who have
00:27:34.840
offered now to spend some time with counselors who have questions about how the ambulance service
00:27:40.120
runs because when these people show up in their uniforms, with their slick presentation, they
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And I think in a lot of cases, counselors aren't sure exactly what questions to ask.
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And even when we give them questions, they're not sure how to follow up.
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So, if you're a counselor in a municipality in Southern Alberta and you want to have a conversation
00:28:01.680
about what the ambulance service is really doing, feel free to call us.
00:28:06.000
Well, then, for people on the ground, I see you've got your sign here.
00:28:09.660
Again, I'm just talking of the raising awareness thing.
00:28:13.160
This is something in a website you've got on the go there.
00:28:26.380
And, again, we go out now to town council meetings and we show up and we ask questions
00:28:30.820
and we encourage citizens in these communities to ask questions.
00:28:34.300
And we showed up, again, down in High River last week.
00:28:40.960
And a lot of people who stopped, it was funny because they'd look at the sign and they'd go,
00:28:44.800
are you guys here because there's no ambulance in town?
00:28:48.500
Well, that's what I was talking about with awareness, too, though, because a lot of people,
00:28:51.540
I mean, they aren't necessarily paying attention.
00:28:53.480
I live in Prittis, so as we said, our ambulance is getting sniped all the time.
00:28:59.900
I mean, it's the default is our ambulance isn't in the bay servicing our area.
00:29:04.140
But your average citizen doesn't know that until they try to call one.
00:29:07.040
The medics have a special name for the Prittis ambulance, and it's not very polite because
00:29:15.340
Well, yeah, because you don't feel like, you know, you joined or you got employed there
00:29:19.760
to work that area and you find yourself in an urban environment all the time.
00:29:23.900
You know, and it's heartbreaking for some of these medics who work in communities like
00:29:26.820
Okotoks and High River as when they get sent to the city or when they get given a non-urgent
00:29:31.200
transfer and as they leave town, they see on the map that somebody in their community is
00:29:35.960
having a critical medical emergency and they're leaving town.
00:29:39.800
And that's heartbreaking for these medics to work in an organization that seems to not care
00:29:45.580
about the people where they live in their rural communities.
00:29:49.300
And the more populated areas where I live in Prittis area, Hawks Landing, Prittis
00:29:53.060
Greens, throughout that area, all within about five minutes of the fire station where the
00:30:00.380
So, I mean, their question of where's my ambulance comes when they phone and 911 says,
00:30:11.140
But you, so that's why they should be asking now, not when you're bleeding or when your
00:30:17.640
spouse has had a heart attack or when the issue is going on.
00:30:20.900
We should be asking now because people don't realize it.
00:30:25.600
That's why your ambulance should be in your community most of the time.
00:30:28.400
The only reason it should be leaving is to take somebody to the hospital who needs to
00:30:41.780
I mean, your work prior as a paramedic, but now just shining a light on this because it's
00:30:44.960
one of the areas of health care that, as I said, a lay person can kind of understand.
00:30:47.980
I mean, they can't take part in it, but they know, okay, there's an urgent situation.
00:30:51.120
We need to stabilize somebody and get them to care as fast as we can.
00:30:56.400
And yet we can't connect those dots without having to fight a giant bureaucracy.
00:31:02.340
So I appreciate you coming in to share a bit of that with us today.
00:31:05.040
And again, you got the site, where's my ambulance.com.
00:31:07.420
Is there other areas where people can see what's going on?
00:31:13.400
We did a number of town halls in these small communities a couple of years ago.
00:31:16.560
We've started some EMS citizen action groups in these various small towns.
00:31:22.460
They hosted a first responder appreciation day on the weekend.
00:31:27.520
I mean, it was just nice to recognize the group.
00:31:29.300
So that group of citizens is doing a great job.
00:31:31.180
If anybody has questions about how to start a citizen action group or become more active in this, you know,
00:31:37.700
we have a lot of service clubs now that are curious too, Lions and Rotary, that want to get involved.
00:31:48.060
So, yes, if you've got questions or you want to get things going in your neighborhood, guys,
00:32:06.080
And, yeah, he's fun on Twitter and all those social media areas and that as well.
00:32:14.760
You know, I'm going to make the call out right now.
00:32:18.000
I've had a family member who's been, you know, ailing.
00:32:20.720
I've spent time at the hospital lately visiting, things like that.
00:32:24.640
Now, I do understand that the nurses and doctors are harried and they're working very hard and everything.
00:32:28.680
But I also noticed that 90% of their time they're sitting in front of a computer.
00:32:35.540
So, if somebody can explain to me why it's so integral to deal with the paperwork, with the computer.
00:32:43.320
There's computers all the way through the hallways.
00:32:47.360
You've got a few people moving around, dealing with them, doing what they can, moving them, checking on them, you know, bringing medication.
00:32:53.900
But I see them, most of the time, staring at a screen.
00:33:01.620
I mean, I understand you have to have a degree of administration and paperwork to deal with a large system in a hospital and things like that.
00:33:09.480
But when they are spending, these trained professionals who are supposed to be trained for the care one-on-one with patients,
00:33:16.880
and it looks like they're spending 80% of their time staring at a screen, something isn't working.
00:33:22.380
I mean, going farther back to, I remember Paul Heman used to bring that up in his speeches all the time when we were at the Alberta Alliance.
00:33:32.140
But, you know, to show some of the bureaucratic problems at the hospitals and things like that, and it's true if you go to them.
00:33:37.060
Go to a hospital Monday to Friday, 9 to 5, and try to park.
00:33:42.880
You know, I don't want to even start on how much you have to pay for parking.
00:33:58.240
People don't stop being sick on the weekends and evenings.
00:34:01.020
Well, it's because the parking was jammed with bureaucrats.
00:34:08.020
The ones working the ground, working the wards, they're there, all those other shifts.
00:34:15.080
And when you're having a heart attack, a form isn't going to save you.
00:34:19.500
Somebody typing on a computer isn't going to save you.
00:34:24.720
You need a doctor later who's going to find out why your ticker is going off on you and
00:34:31.460
But it's hard to do when they're constantly mired in administration.
00:34:34.820
That gets back to, again, this is the nature of government-run businesses, of bureaucracies.
00:34:45.200
But I tell you, if there was competition, if there really was, even if it's universal, I'm going to say the blasphemy.
00:34:59.660
I want to see them advertising, trying to get you to choose them as the place to go to, even if you're not paying out of pocket.
00:35:08.420
And I tell you what, it'll get better a lot faster.
00:35:10.240
Down in the States, when I was working down there, I remember in Hobbs, New Mexico, driving on the highway,
00:35:16.220
there was a billboard for a hospital, and it had a digital readout actually showing what the emergency wait times were.
00:35:21.920
It would say, come to our hospital if you need to, because they're competing.
00:35:25.900
And the emergency wait times are, on average, and it tended to be 10 minutes.
00:35:35.180
And it's free to die on a gurney because you're waiting 23, 48 hours.
00:35:41.440
I mean, the numbers are obscene what you have to wait for emergency service now in Canadian hospitals.
00:35:47.420
So set aside that instinctive opposition to private involvement.
00:35:56.100
And if you were running a private facility and you're walking up and down and your professionals are mostly sitting in front of computers all the time,
00:36:03.940
you're not going to get patients coming back because they realize they're not getting the best service they can.
00:36:08.860
And as an operator, you're going to change things.
00:36:11.240
Is it the person sitting in front of the computer is not doing a good job?
00:36:13.780
Or is it your management that's putting too many administrative tasks on the professionals who should be working on the ground?
00:36:22.400
But when you're in a giant, monolithic, bureaucratic system, there's only one system, there's no incentive to fix that.
00:36:34.300
And again, it keeps coming down to throwing more money out.
00:36:37.220
Canada is one of the highest spending countries in the world when it comes to health care spending.
00:36:48.280
I mean, one of the areas, too, some of the blasphemy.
00:36:55.420
Not the nurses themselves, but their bloody union.
00:36:57.420
And they support that union, though, a lot of them.
00:37:01.800
If you want to look up a story, look at Alberta.
00:37:06.100
The sunshine list, as they call it or whatever, the ones who get over $100,000 a year.
00:37:13.980
There was one in Alberta, I believe, that nurse got over $400,000 because they play an interesting game.
00:37:25.640
You see, the way it works is they automatically get overtime the second they work a shift that wasn't scheduled for them.
00:37:39.300
But then you sign up for all the other shifts that come along.
00:37:42.280
Even though you're only working 40 hours a week, you can end up having half of your hours being overtime.
00:37:45.860
And nurses' overtime isn't like our overtime with its time and a half.
00:37:50.360
And then if you work on a holiday, oh, they can get up to quadruple time.
00:37:53.620
And you work in the evenings, you get an evening premium.
00:37:55.540
And you work on the weekends, you get a weekend premium.
00:37:57.340
And you can work as a part-time nurse and end up pulling in well into over $100,000 a year.
00:38:04.100
If you're going to work over 40 hours a week, every week, change it.
00:38:10.820
If you're working overtime, you're getting overtime fine after 44 hours like the rest of us or even 40.
00:38:20.660
And I tell you, the unions get worked up every time that's brought up.
00:38:22.800
That's one of their little secrets they love going on about.
00:38:32.200
But if they're screwing us, I can only support so far.
00:38:37.400
A private operator is not going to put up with that crap.
00:38:39.680
They will pay a high price for good professionals in their institution, but they're not going to put up with them gaming them on it, are they?
00:38:48.120
Either way, you know, one of the first steps, which I think was great, is, yes, Premier Smith is breaking up the AHS,
00:38:55.200
yes, the Alberta Health Services for people who are outside of Alberta, in a separate unit.
00:38:59.660
So there's going to be three or four, I believe.
00:39:04.140
You know, she's biting it apart a little to fix it up.
00:39:06.960
And as Dawn was talking about, we can look at little areas of it, such as EMS.
00:39:13.220
We can show that there can be improvements on some of these things because it's ridiculous right now.
00:39:19.420
Speaking of ridiculous, this is one of the things that Jen mentioned earlier.
00:39:21.820
So, you know, this is going to some federal stuff.
00:39:24.860
The Governor General, yeah, she's had an online harm symposium she's hosting.
00:39:32.440
She basically came out in favor of a liberal government bill.
00:39:37.600
Now, people who aren't political wieners like myself might not really understand just how egregious this is, just how bad this is.
00:39:44.500
This is the king's representative taking a stance on political policy, becoming political, becoming partisan.
00:39:54.020
She's supposed to be nothing more than a rubber stamp.
00:39:56.340
I know people talk about the office of it and she'll be respected.
00:40:03.860
At least just be the ribbon cutter you are, the celebrity you are, the patronage appointment you are, the token you are.
00:40:15.460
Take your six-figure income, take your servants, take your flights.
00:40:26.700
It would be the same as King Charles getting in or Queen Elizabeth in the past and actually starting to take part in the policies happening in Parliament.
00:40:40.360
And King Charles doesn't seem like the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he's been well enough trained.
00:40:44.940
It doesn't mean they can never speak to a policy, but you don't get right in on bills and talk about how you should support one or not another.
00:40:54.520
We've had nothing but crappy governor generals for a while now.
00:40:58.260
And this line, you know, it's not making enough news.
00:41:01.560
It's gotten overshadowed, unfortunately, by the budget.
00:41:11.840
But she checks off the boxes that Justin wanted, and that's why she's in there.
00:41:23.040
So how are they going to pay for all of this spending, this massive spending, right?
00:41:30.300
Capital gains taxes are economic killers, guys.
00:41:36.200
You want to drive investment and innovation and enterprise out of your nation, there's no better way than a capital gains tax.
00:41:44.860
And increasing it is only going to make it worse.
00:41:46.320
They think, they think they're going to screw a $20 billion over the next few years out of people by raising that capital gains tax.
00:41:53.640
It's not going to work because people move their money.
00:41:58.460
They won't get the money they think they're going to get.
00:42:02.040
Because when these investments, these enterprises pull out of Canada, they lay people off.
00:42:28.320
Not a billion-dollar enterprise, but it was incorporated.
00:42:32.700
If it had gained over a certain amount of value over the years of slaving and toiling and working and building the business,
00:42:38.480
and if I'd sold it for a certain amount over what I bought it for, I'll be punished for that.
00:42:44.200
Yes, actually, that's what a capital gains tax is.
00:42:48.400
Your local doctor is probably incorporated with his clinic.
00:42:51.840
He's going to be thinking, maybe I'll just move my clinic south of the border, or I'll go to Europe, or I'll go to Vietnam.
00:42:59.500
Why do I want to sit here and get punished for success?
00:43:05.700
So they keep talking about, oh, it's just on this ultra-rich.
00:43:18.120
So, dingbats who don't understand how pensions work talk about how bad corporate profit is.
00:43:25.460
If you don't want your pension to grow, okay, then maybe you are opposed to corporate profit.
00:43:30.720
Do you think it grows like a freaking daisy, just on its own?
00:43:34.860
That pension fund is invested, and guess what it's invested in?
00:43:40.080
And if that corporation doesn't profit, your pension doesn't grow.
00:43:44.200
You are a corporate shareholder, even if you don't realize it.
00:43:55.380
So, don't go down the idiotic, liberal, now NDP, socialist rabbit hole of constantly demonizing
00:44:03.940
corporations, businesses, people who are productive, people who are building an asset,
00:44:10.940
because it hurts all of you, even if you don't realize it.
00:44:15.360
Because that's the game the liberals are playing.
00:44:17.340
They segregate who they're going to hit with the extra taxes.
00:44:22.440
It is hitting you, even if you don't receive the path of how it does.
00:44:30.760
People's eyes glaze over when we talk about it, but it's important.
00:44:33.200
I keep bringing it up, look at it, the debt, or maybe not the debt, the GDP to per capita
00:44:44.080
In the United States, GDP per capita is over $70,000 American.
00:45:03.240
That's how much less you have than our Americans south of the border.
00:45:22.540
Meanwhile, we're kicking our economy in the balls.
00:45:34.020
That's just going to cycle our per capita GDP share even lower, guys, while he digs us
00:45:41.540
And that dingbat is going to be on a tropical island someplace, retired with his trust fund,
00:45:47.980
while the next generation pays the frigging bill.
00:45:53.460
And while he sits up there prancing around as he did yesterday, oh, this is fairness for
00:46:02.320
It's screwing the current generation and is robbing the next one.
00:46:08.480
You know, Jagmeet Singh, biggest pussy in parliament.
00:46:12.820
Oh, I don't know if we're going to support them.
00:46:14.320
Of course, you're going to support the budget, you clown.
00:46:18.240
God, it's going to be embarrassing being an NDP member these days.
00:46:30.340
You don't have the money or the brains to fight another election.
00:46:32.960
You know, this is as close to power as you're ever going to get.
00:46:38.480
Yeah, so I see the commenter, Bruce Leslie, saying,
00:46:40.620
it's amazing how few people understand how the pension plan is invested.
00:46:45.920
And if people think they're doing the world a favor when they attack businesses,
00:46:52.620
They're important to you, even if you don't realize it.
00:46:55.300
Either way, that's all the time I got for today.
00:46:57.940
We're going to have a lot to talk about on the pipeline a little later,
00:47:02.040
And, again, take out a subscription if you haven't already.
00:47:04.700
There's lots on the go, lots to cover, lots to talk about.
00:47:11.340
Get to the westernstandard.news to catch all of this stuff directly, guys.
00:47:18.400
At this time, I'll have a whole bunch of new stuff to complain about.