Ex-Government Whip Jay Hill on Federal Parliament’s Next Steps
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Summary
In this episode, we are joined by former government whip, former government house leader, and long-time member of parliament, Corey Horschig, who joins us to discuss the ongoing Conservative filibuster in the House of Commons.
Transcript
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So former government whip, longtime member of parliament,
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came out of so many years there still, mostly same.
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Thanks, Corey. It's great to be back on the program.
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finished up my service as the government house leader,
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So I had the privilege and opportunity to sit at the big table.
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And of course, 17 years, both in opposition and government
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to experience the house of commons on a day-to-day basis.
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I have never seen such a mess as we have currently in Ottawa.
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It's no wonder the reelected incoming president of the United States
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is teasing our prime minister about being the governor of the 51st state
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because we have zero respect at the international level
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so for a lot of people watching politics, and that's it,
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I mean, in your job as government house leader,
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you were immersed in, though, the procedures and things such as that.
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I mean, we've been in the midst of a filibuster for quite some time.
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And outside of, you know, political weenies like us,
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Like things are being hindered and hindered and bunged up in there.
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A lot of the things they do aren't all that great anyways.
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Well, certainly not supported in Western Canada and Alberta in particular.
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You know, so perhaps that, as I say, it's a very good thing.
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a filibuster is basically where one party uses the tools that they have
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They just put speakers after speaker up and speak to emotion.
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which we're debating now in the House of Commons
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the House of Commons has been completely stalled of any business
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other than debating the Conservative question of privilege.
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to take the time slot of the leader of the opposition,
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You can speak for, as long as you can keep talking.
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And, but this is unique because a question of privilege
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takes precedent virtually over everything else.
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And that's why the opposition, as long as they stay united on this issue, I might add, because Singh doesn't stay united with the opposition on much, then they can debate it till the cows come home, until basically Parliament is adjourned roughly a year from now for an election.
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And the Conservatives, at least, have indicated they intend to continue this filibuster until then, if necessary, or until the government and specifically the Prime Minister capitulate and hand over these unredacted documents that the House has ordered.
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I've never seen this, where a government has just refused for two and a half months to hand over documents to the opposition and by extension to the public.
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Yeah, and that's what I wanted to get to. I mean, they aren't just having a temper tantrum or holding up the House of Commons for the sake of holding it up.
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There is at least an ask, a demand, because we do have something bizarre going on.
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They've been ordered to say, these documents on these issues, I think it was the green energy contracts.
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Yeah, or as the opposition refers to it, the green slush fund.
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I think I have the right name down here somewhere. The Sustainable Development Technology Canada Fund.
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But the government, obviously, something stinks to high heaven. That's why they don't want to release it.
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I think that there would be some criminal charges from what I've read about this.
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It certainly lends itself because that's part of the demand from the House.
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And when I say the House, you remember that, ironically, we are in a minority government situation.
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If the opposition bands together, they can demand anything.
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And as long as they have the votes, because the Liberals don't have enough votes to outvote them like they would in a majority situation.
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So what we have here is that not only are they demanding these unredacted, that means, you know, not having entire sheets blacked out, but unredacted documents, but that they be turned over to the RCMP to see if there's a possibility that criminal charges should be laid.
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Well, it says something, though, that our system is somewhat broken then in holding a government to account when the only recourse, when it's been ordered.
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No, no, it's, you know, a waste of resources, as they say, roughly two and a half months.
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They're back on this today after taking a break for a couple of days to do bills that allowed for the appropriation of funds, because that's why I said earlier that there's a conflict there about which takes precedence.
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And they agreed that the supply bills that supplies the government with the funds to carry through to the end of the fiscal year, which is March 31st, are at least equal in precedent.
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So the Speaker ruled that they had to take a break.
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They had to get the remaining supply days, which are opposition days.
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That's why we had yet another vote on non-confidence by the Conservatives the other day, ironically or not.
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But it was defeated again because Singh, you know, and I got to say that Jagmeet Singh, to me, just sitting back and watching the shenanigans during the House of Commons, he has got to be the greatest hypocrite in the history of Canada.
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That last, you probably have referred to this, I haven't watched your program, but for the last while, but that last motion for the opposition motion for non-confidence in the government was actually crafted from the very words of Jagmeet Singh.
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I mean, it was forcing him, because he's always talked big, but backed off.
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But again, it's just, I think a lot of Canadians are just starting to tune it out, though.
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And, you know, left, right, center, it doesn't matter.
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Well, no one, unfortunately, certainly when it comes to Prime Minister Trudeau.
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We have disagreements all the time in the House of Commons.
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That's partly the purpose, right, is to have the different points of view.
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It's adversarial, you're across from each other.
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But you hope that at the end, I mean, if it's the will of the House,
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But, you know, this is not the first time this has happened.
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It happened under the early days of this government back in 2015, 2016.
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It happened under the SNC-Lavalin, you know, where the government ended up losing their
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I mean, who was forced to quit because her ethics didn't allow her to do what the Prime
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Minister wanted her to do and protect that corporation.
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And then we had the WE fiasco, you know, where they were going to give, I think it was over
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a billion dollars to that corporation and something stunk there to high heaven.
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And we ended up that the Prime Minister called an election over that, you know.
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And then more recently, we had the fiasco in Winnipeg with the health lab, you know,
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Again, the House was calling for unredacted documents showing what transpired there, and
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So this is a Prime Minister and a government that is constantly consumed by covering up
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And, Paul, and even the stuff that's going to come out, I mean, they're kicking every
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The one thing they've been able to get through all this time is money bills and spending,
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So the quarterly fiscal update, which is terribly late already, they've waited until the very
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They're going to drop it on Monday at the end of the session and hope everybody forgets
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Well, the media is already on to the fact that it looks like rather than a $40 billion deficit,
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it looks like 50% greater, perhaps as much as $60 billion this fiscal year.
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And you've got to throw into the mix on that, too, that Finance Minister Freeland has never
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hit a target yet in her whole time as finance minister.
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And when she's asked even a remotely tough question about the finances of the nation,
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So you throw that in the mix as well as a prime minister that's a laughingstock around
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the world, and indeed, I believe, across Canada now.
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I saw a recent survey that suggested 80% of Canadians want an election.
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They're still pulling off stunts, like orders in council, to ban guns and do other stunts.
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There's ways they can do things without actually running it through the House.
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But we're coming up on an unprecedented year, a crisis.
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I mean, we have President-elect Trump coming in, who, whatever people think, like or dislike
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He's also one of the most impulsive, you know, takes things personally, unpredictable presidents
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And the battle is coming with Canada, a trade war.
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I mean, we need, this is when we need our House to have their crap together more than
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And it's terrifying looking who we've got theoretically representing us going into that.
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And as I referred to already in the program, you know, you see it.
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I think every Canadian has an opinion about Donald Trump.
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But setting that aside, he is the incoming president.
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And he's going to be taking action because of that.
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And, you know, when you have a president threatening, whether it comes to fruition or not, threatening
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a 25% tariff across the board on every product that we ship to our greatest trading partner,
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it's absolutely frightening, especially for small businesses that access the American
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And, you know, we could see just an overabundance, unfortunately, of bankruptcies.
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Not that we're not experiencing enough as it is.
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I mean, we're speaking of somebody like, you know, a president-elect Trump.
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I mean, he is a man, a lot of talk about, he responds at least to Frank or somebody he
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Plus, Trudeau's not, you know, there's my bias coming.
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No, he's a fancy socks and tie and, you know, hairstyles and whatever.
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But, I mean, when it comes to competence, sadly lacking.
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I was reading an article, a column in the Toronto Star this morning.
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And not surprisingly, Heather Malick was saying he's one of the great five that she produced
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for a short list of important Canadians for this year.
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I mean, how they, there's people like her that will still support Justin Trudeau after
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Yeah, I think she might have sustained a head injury at some point in her life.
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There's those people who say, I will vote liberal until I die.
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It wouldn't matter who or what or however it was done.
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Another thing I'm worried about, like, I've written a column on it that'll come out a little
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But we know how the political game plays and the regional play.
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So, Premier Smith's been fantastic in developing relationships with governors.
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We've been doing the job Canada should have been doing.
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And that might shield oil and gas if tariffs start coming.
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He knows if you throw that tariff on Alberta oil and gas, the price of the pump on the states
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And people are going to be upset with him on the states, too.
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So, if he can find it out, maybe he'll carve out oil and gas.
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I would think there would be an exemption coming if it gets that far.
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But then the temptation on Trudeau's part would be, well, I'm not going to let that happen.
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He might do like his father did and throw an outgoing tariff on Canadian oil and gas
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I mean, hey, I'll sell more books than I ever have in here.
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But still, for the sake of the country in Alberta, that's not going to be a good development.
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No, and as you said earlier, Corey, especially not at this particular time.
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At this particular time, when it comes to negotiating with the Americans in particular,
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but the Chinese and any other entity around the world, we need to be unified on the international
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We're not going to be unified, obviously, in the House of Commons and on domestic issues
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like, you know, the carbon tax, for example, because Pierre has clearly staked his future
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But on an international front, and I have personal experience in this, I mean, when I
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was in opposition, I often traveled to foreign conferences with the minister that I was critic
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And, you know, trying to present a somewhat unified position by all political parts.
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And we're not the only democracy that does that.
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I mean, the UK, Australia, they all do that when they're negotiating or when they're interacting
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So this, as you said, is a really crucial time.
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There are so many huge issues, not the least of war in the Middle East, war in the Ukraine,
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where as much as possible, we need our parliamentarians to set aside partisan differences and really
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And Pierre has called for this, by the way, Pierre Polyev.
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He has called on the prime minister as recently as last week to form a unified front on these
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He was specifically speaking to opposition to the prospect of tariffs.
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But it could be on a multiple of issues at the international level.
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Well, then another challenge we have is our foreign affairs minister.
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You know, Trudeau has appointed his intellectual peers to high cabinet positions, and it's
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Especially, I would argue, the big two, our finance minister and our foreign affairs minister.
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I mean, Melanie Jolie is not commanding respect around the world.
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She's embarrassing herself and us, through extension, with her clear lack of knowledge whenever
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she's in a press conference or at a conference of any sort.
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I just, I guess I'll leave you off with a big question, though.
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I mean, you know, as we come into, I mean, election doesn't look like it's likely until
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Well, you know, because the conservatives have quite rightly.
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And I don't say that not as a conservative myself or a conservative yourself, but because
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they have really staked their ground on this question of privilege on these documents, right?
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Anybody that looks at that issue is going to say, well, what is going on here?
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If they're resisting, they, Prime Minister Trudeau and his ministers, including ministers that
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allegedly funneled money, according to the Auditor General, funneled money to their own
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If they're resisting to that extent, there must be something, as you said earlier, something
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So the only way I can see this resolved in January, February, whatever, going forward,
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is that there has to be some negotiation on that issue between the parties.
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Now, whether it will happen that, for example, if they would provide certain information and
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still withhold some redacted, in the past, they've said, you know, it's the issue of national
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I can't see that applying to a green slush fund.
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But however it is, I mean, it's sort of like the postal strike.
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At some point, you would think there has to be some negotiation where they can arrive
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Otherwise, as I see it, the House is going to be held up like this, as I said earlier,
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I mean, Jagmeet Singh, we used to think, OK, well, after he gets his MP pension near the
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end of February, perhaps then on the budget in March or April, perhaps the government will
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fall and we'll have a spring election instead of having to wait till October.
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But as of what he said the other day, when the Conservatives produced that non-confidence
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motion based on his own words, and he did a complete, ate himself alive, basically, and
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He said, no, no, I intend to honour the agreement that I made such, you know, a show of tearing
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So that kind of takes, if that's true, and we never know with him what is true, but if
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that's true, then we're stuck until summer, at least.
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Boy, and it's just not a, well, it's never a good year to have a hung parliament like that,
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I mean, many people have said, well, what is the problem?
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I mean, in a democracy, especially when you have poll after poll, never mind whether they're
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going to vote Conservative, Liberal, NDP, Bloc, whatever, but poll after poll showing the
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majority of Canadians want to exercise their right as citizens and vote.
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Either way, we'll try to leave on a bright note.
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I really appreciate you coming in to talk to us about this, and I hope we can get you
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back in the new year, maybe, and we'll see if we've had some progress to dissect.
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It'd be nice to certainly have a more cheery conversation.
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But if I could, just before I go, I attended an event with Leah, my wife, a couple nights
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ago, and it was the Allies for a Strong Canada.
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I don't know how many of your viewers are as concerned as I've been over the last year
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since the tragedy of October 7th with what happened in Israel.
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With the rise of anti-Semitism across our country, never mind around the world.
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I mean, it's not unique to Canada, but it's appalling that it is here and that our government
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And so there's this new organization, and I would encourage everybody watching, to go
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To show your support for our fellow Jewish citizens and communities across Canada during
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this time, when they're frightened to send their kids to school, they're frightened for
00:21:17.160
Some of them, unfortunately, tragically, are thinking about moving.
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It costs nothing, but it would mean so much to our fellow citizens.
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I mean, yeah, if a parliament can't do it, citizens groups have to at least get the messaging
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out there, and we've got to start taking care of things ourselves.