Dr. Leslie Lewis, Conservative Party of Canada Leadership Candidate, joins us on the show to talk about his time as a candidate and his thoughts on the recent spate of violent crime in the downtown area of Calgary. We also talk about the protests in Ottawa that are going on again as they did last weekend and his update on that and other stories.
00:09:05.400Our website is currently leading off with two of our colonists.
00:09:09.600Linda Slobodian has the latest on the UCP leadership campaign.
00:09:16.340She says that Jason Kenney likes to pretend there's nobody else in Alberta that can lead the party and unite Conservatives except for him.
00:09:27.300So Linda says he may be wrong on that one, and she goes into some depth on that.
00:09:32.200Our military affairs correspondent, Dave Makachuk, has a really interesting look at the F-35s that Canada's in the process of purchasing from Lockheed Martin down in the States.
00:09:46.340These are like hugely expensive aircraft, but the toys that they come with would make you want to be young again and become a fighter pilot.
00:09:55.880Speaking of the city of Calgary, Corey, the first poll on Mayor Gondek is out today, done by Think HQ, and her polling numbers are in the tank.
00:10:08.400And the Think HQ people say this rarely happens in a mayor's first term, and it's got to be worrying for the new mayor.
00:10:19.120Speaking of polls, we've got a story on a Nanos poll that shows Jean Charest is favored by most Canadians, conservative voting Canadians, as their next leader.
00:10:31.040He's heavily favoured down in Ontario and Quebec.
00:10:34.860On the prairies, it's Pierre Paglia, who's already been out here a time or two during the campaign.
00:10:42.640We've got an update on the Saskatoon masking bylaw from our Saskatchewan correspondent, Christopher Oldcorn.
00:10:52.640He's got the results of last night's meeting on how the city will continue with their mask mandates.
00:10:58.520What else have we got, Corey? The big emissions today, the big story this afternoon that
00:11:06.420you'll be talking to Matthew Horwood on is the climate change announcements by
00:11:13.420radical environment minister, Stéphane Galbault. He's got oil companies have to cut their emissions
00:11:20.880by 42% over the next eight years to meet targets. So that's certainly something that the patch is
00:11:27.980going to be have considerable their eye on today. So it's more fun and games in Ottawa and lots of
00:11:35.480good stuff coming from this afternoon. Right on. Yeah, another full busy news day. At least,
00:11:40.580you know, a quiet, peaceful, friendly world makes for slow news copy, but it does make for a better
00:11:45.040living. But I guess we have to report on it, whether it's good or bad. Yep. Hundreds of planes
00:11:50.360land every day safely, but it's not one that crashes and makes the news. You bet. Well, thanks,
00:11:56.080Dave. I'll see you after the show and see what else is breaking. Thanks, Corey. So yeah, just
00:12:02.740that reminder to everybody, all those stories and more are constantly going up on the site.
00:12:07.380We've been getting so busy lately. It's been great. We've got so many contributors, columnists,
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00:13:09.680outlets that unfortunately insist on being beholden to the federal government. This is the future,
00:13:15.140guys. Get on and subscribe if you haven't already. And again, thanks to those who have.
00:13:19.040Just look at some of the commenters. I love seeing all those comments. I've seen people all over.
00:13:21.960is the great thing with new news, you know, being able to reach out all over like this on a new
00:13:26.360media outlet. We got Ken Schack from Forest Lake, Minnesota. That's a good long haul. Scott in Fort
00:13:32.680McMurray, Debbie in Saskatchewan, Kathy in Rocky, and yeah, lots of people from all over on this.
00:13:40.540What's somebody saying? There should be free bars for alcoholics. Yeah, I know. That's what it gets
00:13:43.940to the point of, right? We talk about addiction and talk about things like that. And I do point
00:13:48.120out, you know, we've got Beth in Michigan, by the way. Wow, we're getting some good
00:13:52.200international attendees, and I appreciate that. But, you know, people call me heartless or get
00:13:58.500upset sometimes when I talk about the addiction problem downtown, and I do. I sympathize. I want
00:14:02.500these people to recover. I want them to get treatment. I mean, that's the best outcome for
00:14:08.360everybody. You know, as long as they're addicted, they're going to be going in and out of health
00:14:13.260facilities. They're costing money. I mean, aside from looking at the humanity and the person
00:14:16.900themselves. You want to be just a cold, hard capitalist. Well, the costs of having untreated
00:14:23.580people with mental health issues or addiction are massive. In health care, in prison, the amount of
00:14:28.920people who are in jail that probably could have avoided it if they'd had treatment of some kind
00:14:33.320to get off of whatever they're addicted to or whatever their challenges are mentally. I mean,
00:14:37.400a lot of people can live perfectly functional lives if they have medical treatment and are
00:14:43.760medicated and keep straightforward. I've talked about that before. We don't want to demonize
00:14:48.140people with mental health challenges. It's a sickness like anything else. But we also can't1.00
00:14:53.060pretend that's the problem. We're pretending that people who are untreated and in that state are
00:14:58.500harmless and they are not. Downtown Calgary at the city hall, they put this thing up, you know,
00:15:05.800over the, when the grave sites were found on residential school areas and there was a fenced
00:15:11.100off area, a bunch of teddy bears and shoes and everything were put up from people expressing
00:15:14.880concern over the whole thing. And it was a display. It's still there, I believe. They're not sure what
00:15:18.800to do with it. And they fenced it now because it was getting vandalized. When it first got vandalized,
00:15:22.680somebody had lit it on fire a couple of times. And there was, of course, outrage expressed. This was
00:15:29.060about a year ago, maybe a little less. And they were saying, oh, I see it's clearly these white0.93
00:15:33.120nationalists and racists going out there and burning this memorial. And then they suddenly
00:15:37.400quietly discovered with the video footage, oh, no, it's a, and again, they use their term,
00:15:41.520vulnerable person who was doing it and actually looked like the person was probably a First
00:15:45.340Nations heritage. So, again, it's that denial, guys. You know, you just want to point to things
00:15:51.520you don't like but don't like facing the hard realities, that there's some very distressed
00:15:54.960people, and it's leading to a bigger problem. And we hear about it in Edmonton, as Claudette's saying,
00:16:00.460you know, it's good to see Don there from Nova Scotia. We're going to talk some maritime stuff
00:16:04.260later with Crystal. This is a problem everywhere. This opioid epidemic is everywhere, and it's a
00:16:11.020big, big problem. I've got two friends now. No, three. Three friends whose sons have died
00:16:18.380from overdoses or poisoning or whatever way you want to put it. This is awful. This stuff
00:16:24.100is eating people up, but it doesn't mean they're coming from broken homes or bad environments or
00:16:28.980anything like that. They get on the wrong crap, particularly that fentanyl and stuff like that.
00:16:32.340it just eats them alive but we're never going to get better until we start addressing where the
00:16:38.220issue is and and we haven't been doing that so far so i'm going to talk about uh before i get
00:16:43.480to the lesl and lewis interview as well uh one of our sponsors and that's bitcoin well
00:16:47.400this is the other way we pay our bills of course we advertise we get it out there hey we're good
00:16:51.920capitalists and you know you guys subscribe the more subscribers we got the more advertising we
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00:17:03.680We'll see if we can't set something up. Either way, Bitcoin Well, these guys have got a great
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00:17:43.240These guys are there for you every step of the way. So, I mean, if you're curious about
00:17:46.440digital currencies, you want to safely get involved in them. You want to get your money,
00:17:50.640some of your money away from the reach of the federal government, which we've seen with recent
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00:18:17.880them out all right and uh what do we've got uh studies out of lisbon and portugal yeah showing
00:18:23.560that addicts recover quicker if given a roof over their head first yeah you know there's a lot of
00:18:27.880uh that's from marianne wilson and uh more decades of work have shown that uh let's see here the
00:18:33.240connection to trauma uh not teenage recreational use well yeah there's a lot of research and things
00:18:39.960going on we'll see i mean a a troubled teen is going to be far more likely to experiment in some
00:18:45.160some of the harder things like fentanyl and so on than others but recreational use is a large part
00:18:48.900of it uh it's i mean the thing is with some of these powerful things like uh fentanyl and that
00:18:54.880i mean it doesn't take much to get yourself hooked i mean just a short experimentation time
00:18:59.880uh the studies out of portugal and that if given the roof over their head you see there's the some
00:19:04.620of the chicken and egg problem we have with with uh homeless people because yes they're not going
00:19:09.940to recover if they're out on the streets it's not going to help but at the same time a lot of them
00:19:13.360aren't in condition to be in a regular house yet. They're out of control. They're in the
00:19:17.600throes of addiction. They need a treatment center. They need a secure facility to get treated. And
00:19:22.460even then, with treatment, I believe the odds are about 40% will stay clean for the next two years
00:19:28.020after that. But I mean, the odds are darn near zero if they don't get treatment. So expanding
00:19:32.120that treatment. But some people say, you know, we hear that from the progressives a lot. They just
00:19:35.760need more housing, need more housing. Well, that's an element. That's more of post-treatment. You
00:19:39.380will need a house. You'll need a home. You won't be able to get into the working market and build
00:19:42.440a life without a home. But until they're treated, they're not in condition to get into a home. So
00:19:47.740we've got a big, complicated problem. And part of it makes us squeamish. We're uncomfortable with it.
00:19:53.680We feel bad about it. We know it's complicated. So we deny it. We hide from it. And that's a lot
00:19:57.660of what happens. And that's what gets me ranting about our provincial and municipal politicians.
00:20:04.060Because they just, they throw out other things that, you know, fluffy things and ideas, and then
00:20:09.160just dodge the issue altogether because it's too complicated, too difficult to cope with,
00:20:13.920and they'd rather avoid it altogether. And that's not going to solve it. So yeah, that's why I keep
00:20:19.220going on about it because I get to see it every day when I come downtown and there's no single
00:20:23.700answer. I mean, addiction treatment's a lot like anything else with people or even with kids in
00:20:27.760school. If you think not everybody responds the same way to different means of recovery. It's a
00:20:33.500tough, tough area, but we're all going to do better with the more people we can break away
00:20:38.040from that horrible crap that they're consuming all the time. Okay, but enough on that. I'm going
00:20:43.080to get on to Dr. Leslyn Lewis. We're going to run that interview. She is, again, definitely one of
00:20:48.060the leading contenders for the Conservative Party of Canada leadership race coming up here. I spoke
00:20:53.600to her this morning. It was a fantastic discussion, and I'll let you guys run through it. Talk through
00:20:58.060the comment section while we're at it, and I'll see you in a little while.
00:21:01.340thank you very much for joining us today dr lewis we've been uh looking forward to it your uh run
00:21:12.720for the leadership the last time around while while you didn't win it was very impressive you
00:21:16.780certainly made a mark and and you're an automatic contender coming into this one so it's going to
00:21:22.440be very interesting watching this race developing yes it's exciting to be here again yeah
00:21:30.960Well, you've got your work cut out. This is a very long campaign going on until September. There's going to be a lot of issues to cover. Maybe I'll start on one. And we are a predominantly Western publication here at the Western Standard and an area of big concern for us.
00:21:45.980course it often focuses around energy and some of the attitudes towards energy from ottawa our
00:21:51.100environment minister uh stephen gilbo has set and and come out today as well as prime minister
00:21:56.460trudeau with some some very aggressive emissions reduction targets that are probably going to
00:22:01.580pressure the alberta oil field very heavily uh what kind of response do you have to that sort
00:22:06.700of planning and and uh rejection i guess well i think it's very important that any policy that
00:22:13.260we implement takes into account the regional uniqueness of of the west and just how reliant
00:22:20.700they that economy is on oil natural gas lng production and so i think that we have to take
00:22:29.100that into consideration and any any policies that are implemented should also look at what are how
00:22:36.540much of this product are we importing and if we're not dealing with uh the importation of that
00:22:43.260then again what we're doing is we're creating policies that's just going to stymie
00:22:47.660production in certain areas it's going to create alienation exacerbate the already existing
00:22:54.780alienation because if you look at the policy of the regulation bill c48 and bill c69
00:23:02.220we know that those regulations favored foreign production and it really crippled our local
00:23:10.940industries and so we we witnessed corporations fleeing canada going to other places that had
00:23:20.380more enabling legislation and that's really really problematic and so we have to make
00:23:26.220sure that our environmental policies are all-encompassing and look at our natural gifts
00:23:32.460and our natural resources and and our natural endowments such as the accessible oil reserves
00:23:38.940that we have so uh in getting further with infrastructure because i mean there is quite
00:23:44.460a demand for oil at this time and gas and and ethically produced canadian products but we're
00:23:49.740having a very hard time getting it to market our pipelines have been stopped in almost all
00:23:53.900directions whether keystone to the south or northern gateway to the west or energy east of
00:23:59.100course to the east would a government under you be examining more ways for canadian products to
00:24:05.180get to tidewater absolutely i think it's very essential and i look at the environment from
00:24:12.060a holistic perspective so i look at the entire life cycle of products whether they be electric
00:24:19.100cars or solar panels or wind generation i look at the entire life cycle from the day it's created
00:24:27.180to how do we dispose of it after we're done using it and so when you do do that you'll see that
00:24:34.060um certain things are not as environmentally friendly as we actually think they are and the
00:24:40.860building pipelines are the most that is the most efficient way to transport um lng and and our our
00:24:49.740oil and gas it's very very important it's that we build these pipelines it's more efficient than
00:24:56.540trucking and and um rail transportation and i think it's very important that we get
00:25:02.620our product to Tidewater because we will be able to offset some of the dependency on Russian oil
00:25:12.300that we see in Europe. And it will also bring revenues into our country and assist us with some
00:25:18.780of the issues that we're having with the high rates of unemployment that we're facing post-COVID.
00:25:25.820Great. And then getting into more governance issues, I guess, and such an area of concern
00:25:30.300for us has always been equalization we held our referendum on that recently in alberta
00:25:34.860we do understand it's constitutionally entrenched it's not easy to address but
00:25:38.940the formula is in within the the ability of the federal government to set and determine
00:25:43.980a lot of people in the west feel that perhaps the formula hasn't been fairly treating out like
00:25:47.980provinces would you be looking at reviewing the formula and how equalization has been applied
00:25:52.540i think it's important that we look at some way of making the formula more equitable and if you
00:25:59.740take for example what's happened in co with covid you'll see that the current formula there's a
00:26:05.260three-year lag period and because of this three-year lag period in times of real hardship just
00:26:13.420that that we've experienced in covet the west have been paying provinces like alberta have been
00:26:20.300paying uh equalization payments based on days of prosperity and right now it's days of famine
00:26:29.180basically and and the formula has no mechanism of being altered to account for that current reality
00:26:38.860so we have to i think even though it is constitutionally entrenched i think canadians
00:26:44.620are fair and that when they recognize that something is not uh working in the best interest
00:26:51.260of of say a particular province and that it's unfair in in certain respects i think they will
00:26:58.060come to the table and find ways to modify the formula so that it's more equitable.
00:27:06.300Great. Your leadership competitor, Pierre Polyev, the other day put out a release talking about
00:27:12.540digital currencies and facilitating the expansion of those within the Canadian market. Have you
00:27:19.500determined a stance or looking at those sorts of things going forward as we have something of a
00:27:23.420new developing whole kind of industry and and means of uh commerce uh on our hands right now
00:27:30.220well um many people are concerned about digital identification and just the infrastructure that
00:27:38.380blockchain will bring in for facilitating that digital id so i think it's um it's very early
00:27:48.380to to say that that is something that you're going to implement without knowing whether or
00:27:54.140not this is something that the people want i think it's it's a little bit presumptuous and it's not
00:27:58.700something that um is in our campaign uh at this present time although we haven't put out fully
00:28:06.540our our policies yet we will be putting out our policies but we're also very sensitive to the fact
00:28:11.900that people are very concerned about the digital id and and the um repercussions of of the blockchain
00:28:20.220on altering how we do things great um something i've been asking each candidate as i get them on
00:28:27.980something we have a tradition in alberta since the late 80s has been we at least go through the
00:28:32.220motions of electing senators to nominate and propose towards ottawa and often if we have a
00:28:37.420favorable government they will appoint the ones we've chosen would you commit to appointing
00:28:41.740senators of a province should elect them well to be honest with you i i actually like the way that
00:28:47.900alberta does this because it's not uh patronage it's the people it's grassroots and so the said
00:28:56.540the uh senator in waiting um campaigns that took place last year i found them very very interesting
00:29:05.740because the candidates were out meeting with the people engaging seeing what the response was and
00:29:16.060then the the members were able to vote on who they wanted and so in such a process the the person
00:29:24.700that is most connected to the community is the one that represents it and and not someone that's
00:29:30.700handpicked by the government because of past favors or because of of connections so i think
00:29:37.580that the alberta system is very very good i support it and absolutely if if the people have said that
00:29:45.420this is who they want to represent them i think that that should be honored by by whichever prime
00:29:51.580minister is in place great um economically we've got inflation of course has been a a very strong
00:29:59.660issue all over the world now a lot of it's been related to the pandemic related to overseas
00:30:04.380conflicts but i mean a lot of it's been probably you know can be directly related to the amount of
00:30:08.940government spending and borrowing we've done is there a plan to rein in borrowing and spending
00:30:14.620and some of the the output from the bank of canada i think what's important is that we have to make
00:30:20.620sure that we bring our supply chains home and that we up our manufacturing production and so we we
00:30:28.780want to start being more of a production economy where we're producing things we're generating
00:30:35.420wealth rather than uh the government just basically indebting future generations and
00:30:44.140creating a debt society so we we want to change that the only way that you could really do that
00:30:50.140is to bring back confidence in the economy by either incentivizing or promoting and encouraging
00:30:58.380small and medium-sized businesses who employ over 80 percent of the population to start
00:31:05.020reinvigorating uh re-employing people and taking chances again and once we are able to get the
00:31:13.420economy kick-started again up our production then you will see a reduction in inflation because
00:31:21.100because you'll have real dollars, real dollars, not just debt in our economy.
00:31:30.060And people will have real money that they can buy products rather than fewer products out there being chased by lots of debt dollars.
00:31:42.180Another thing that's put pressure on a lot of consumers when it comes to staples like foodstuffs is Canada's supply management system.
00:31:50.740It always has been, but it's one that certainly comes with a cost.
00:31:54.680Is there any consideration of possibly reforming or moving away from that system?
00:31:58.740Well, the problem is that our production, our products that we get from supply management,
00:32:07.340I actually enjoy the fact that we have a superior production and output.
00:32:13.360and if you look at some of the the the things that the the enhancements that are used by say
00:32:22.520in the United States like BST on on their cows and the just the amount of pus that you would get in1.00
00:32:31.360milk and I just find that those products are not on the same level as our Canadian products and so
00:32:38.680you have to pay for quality and when you look at some of the industries worldwide and you ask our
00:32:45.640smaller producers to compete with them they would be they would be completely overshadowed that we
00:32:52.760would not have independent industries and so while i am a free market person and i do believe in in
00:33:00.920free market and i think it's um i would i would still think that we would need supply management
00:33:09.240to to assist our farmers or else they would be overtaken by foreign production okay i'll pivot
00:33:17.400a little i mean something that's quite new on the scene for us unfortunately but it's in foreign
00:33:21.800affairs you know we the world certainly has changed now with the ukraine russia conflict
00:33:26.440uh it seems to have expedited the prime minister to in finally getting forward to uh buying the
00:33:31.240the f-35s for for canada that they've sort of shelled for quite some time but where do you
00:33:36.280land on canada's military spending in force or where would you envision canada's military being
00:33:41.000in the future well uh it's it's been years since they they should have bought those f-35 jets
00:33:51.240years ago and it's i'm glad to see that they're making some commitment to do that now um i think
00:33:58.840that our military has been underfunded and this government has failed to provide for our military
00:34:06.760and to make sure that they were properly equipped i think that we had a lot of wasted time and there
00:34:12.280was a lot of vulnerabilities there but when you see the recent acts of russian aggression and
00:34:18.600you realize that we technically share a border with russia so our arctic our arctic coast um
00:34:26.280is something that is very very fragile uh and and we we have to make sure that we we have the
00:34:35.160capacity the military capacity to protect our borders um even beyond that even beyond the jets
00:34:41.640I think that we, Russia has over 40 icebreakers and we have zero.
00:34:48.860We need to up our military capacity and invest in making sure that we can defend ourselves.
00:34:56.040Great. Well, I think we've already, it goes fast.
00:34:58.460The time we'd allotted to sit down with you, I hope we get more chances before the end of the campaign.
00:35:02.460But is there more you'd like to add before we let you go, Dr. Lewis?
00:35:05.340Well, I will be in Alberta and Saskatchewan and Manitoba in the next week. I start my tour on Friday. So I look forward to perhaps popping in if you have a studio or meeting various people out there. So it should be a very good tour. I look forward to meeting the people in that region next week.
00:35:29.960Great. And well, we did expand actually into a nice larger new studio. So I hope we can
00:35:34.440get you in here for an extended interview at that time. I look forward to you coming
00:35:37.920out and wish you the best as the campaign develops. So thank you very much for joining
00:35:42.260us today, Dr. Lewis, and I hope we can talk again soon.
00:35:44.580Awesome. It was great. Thank you so much. Take care.
00:35:49.080Great. So that was Dr. Leslie Lewis, one of the, I would think, leading contenders in
00:35:59.580the Conservative Party of Canada leadership race. As I said, this is going to be a really long one.
00:36:03.880They're going all the way till September 10th on this. I believe there's almost 10 people now
00:36:08.420have declared. The entrance requirements for that race with the party, though, are $300,000.
00:36:16.320$100,000 of it's a deposit, but you need another $200,000. I suspect that number is going to get
00:36:21.460a lot smaller by the time they close off nominations coming in. Not everybody's necessarily
00:36:25.500going to be able to raise that amount of funding or want to invest that much in pursuing the race
00:36:30.920but for now there are a lot of contestants and as I said Dr. Lewis is our fourth one
00:36:36.500and I hope to talk to every one of them tomorrow actually I'm going to have another one Joseph
00:36:41.000Bourgo he's one of the only ones who's not a member of parliament actually who's making a run
00:36:44.760for it he's he's from Saskatchewan and he's coming from a different perspective on things
00:36:49.280very much has established himself on the opposing vaccine mandates and things such as that which we
00:36:55.020haven't seen a lot of out-of-the-leadership contenders.
00:36:58.200Though, again, whether Mr. Bogo makes the bar
00:37:01.460and gets that $200,000 and so on, time will tell.
00:37:21.400So it's saying Jean Charest, most Canadians feel he can,
00:37:25.020Now that doesn't mean most members feel they would want to vote for Jean Charest in the leadership, or even that most members feel that he's the one who's going to win it necessarily. It just means most Canadians think he will be the one who could win if he was the leader of the Conservative Party. So we're getting a long way down a road of speculation with that. But I mean, polls are always interesting. They give us a snapshot. Somebody's saying, Roman Babber, yeah, he's an Ontario one. I've reached out multiple times. I've never heard back from him. So if anybody wants Roman to come on the show, I'm trying.
00:37:55.020plan. Some of these campaigns, I think, are a little more developed than others, but it's going
00:38:00.940to be a long and well-competed one, which is good. I mean, I like to see competition, whether it's in
00:38:06.640the private market or whether it's in these races and things like that. If you don't have a number
00:38:11.320of them with some different points of views coming forward, you're not going to get a better candidate
00:38:15.340out of it. I mean, it doesn't guarantee you're going to get a good candidate, but it increases
00:38:18.960the odds. You know, acclimations, coronations, they don't do us any favors whatsoever. Some people
00:38:24.620have also said, you know, that I've been on some of these interviews a little soft on them. I'm
00:38:30.040asking very basic questions, mostly Western-focused, regional, because it's an area, of course, for a
00:38:34.540lot of our viewers, though. I mean, it is national. We've got a lot of people across the country
00:38:38.620watching. I'm hoping to get them back. You know, that's the thing. We'll settle in, give them the
00:38:44.540basic questions now. And as I said, this race is going on into the summer months and into fall.0.93
00:38:49.920We'll get a lot of these candidates back to talk again. And then perhaps we'll have a little more
00:38:54.020developed campaigns to be able to take more specific discussion points rather than the broader
00:38:58.600issues that I keep addressing with them. And I'm asking a lot of them the same questions too,
00:39:03.480because I want to pin each one down on where their stances are going to be on these things.
00:39:07.820One I've been disappointed with, with every one of them so far, not a single one is willing to
00:39:12.380take on supply management, not a one. We haven't had a senior federal Canadian politician really
00:39:21.500tried to take on supply management since Maxime Bernier when he lost to Scheer in the leadership
00:39:28.000race by one percent. And a lot of people agree, if they watch that race closely, Canada's dairy
00:39:32.620lobby is very effective. They're very strong and they get straight to these candidates. There's
00:39:38.060no getting around that. And Scheer sold his soul to the dairy lobby and Bernier didn't. And that
00:39:45.140was enough to get that one percent to win. None of these candidates for so far have had the courage
00:39:51.080to go up against that dairy lobby they're scared to death of them and it's mostly quebec
00:39:54.840based and it's unfortunate you know because it supply management if you look it up is an odious
00:40:00.120soviet style policy and it was interesting listening to uh uh dr lewis when she spoke and
00:40:08.040she talked about the lack of quality in american dairy products versus canadian those are talking
00:40:13.160points right out of the dairy commission's website and it's not true guys it's not true
00:40:17.480So look into some of these things, but welcome to the nature of politics. That's why we got to
00:40:23.120keep asking about these things. And I'll keep hoping somebody can actually take down that
00:40:28.380odious system. To give the analogy, and a lot of people aren't necessarily familiar with supply
00:40:32.280management. I've used it over and over, but I'll use it one more time. My wife, Jane, grew up in a
00:40:35.940small dairy farm in Alberta. They just had a small number of cows. They had a quota where they were
00:40:42.720allowed to sell some degree of cream, not allowed to sell milk. You milk the cows, you skim the
00:40:47.460cream, you pour the spare milk down the ditch if you can't feed it to your family or pigs or
00:40:52.400something, because you're not allowed to, it is illegal to sell that milk. That's why, and I know
00:40:57.700some people get upset when I use it, Soviet style, because that's exactly what it is. You made it1.00
00:41:01.360illegal for a person to sell their product. That's how stupid and ridiculous and regressive and
00:41:07.340communist supply management is. And none of our politicians so far to date have the courage to go
00:41:13.120against it. And it's very disappointment. So let's talk about a sponsor though. Speaking of,
00:41:19.080I didn't get to ask Leslyn about that. Darn it. Firearms, Canada Shooting Sports Association.
00:41:24.500They've been a great sponsor for us for some time now. And their name sort of says what they are.
00:41:30.360They're an association for people who enjoy shooting sports, whether it's target shooting,
00:41:34.700hunting, collecting, whatever. It's your business. You're a legal law-abiding citizen. You have the
00:41:40.340right to have firearms is not entrenched like it is in the United States, unfortunately, which means
00:41:44.540our government is coming after your right to enjoy those pieces of property all the time.
00:41:50.140And we have to keep fighting back, pushing back, or they will take these away. They do not,
00:41:54.420this is not a government that likes freedom. They don't like free speech. They don't like
00:41:57.680free association. And I can assure you, they don't like you having the ability to have a firearm.
00:42:01.900So they're constantly recategorizing them and suddenly turning law-abiding firearm owners
00:42:07.780into criminals. It's a terrible trend. It's bad for all of us. And they're going to get away with
00:42:12.160it if we don't push back. So these guys give you the resources. They've got a number of legal
00:42:16.440challenges out on your behalf, and they're pushing back against the Liberal government. Because if
00:42:21.460we don't, they win. Check them out. Join them. Take out a membership. They need your help.
00:42:26.680Canada Shooting Sports Association. And it's not just for the legal pushbacks. They've got other
00:42:30.920resources, videos on safe utilization of firearms, whether for target shooting and things like that.
00:42:36.320They got links to trade shows that are going on, and they keep you up to date on lots of other firearms issues.
00:42:43.060It's an association just like the name sounds like, Canada, Canadian Shooting Sports Association.
00:53:06.960Well, that's an important point you brought up was, I mean, projected demand for world petrochemical products.
00:53:12.240I mean, there's an area of delusion, unfortunately, among a lot of people who just seem to, they set these targets and they feel that the world is just going to move beyond using hydrocarbons.
00:53:22.800And they start acting and enacting policies under the assumption that that's going to happen.
00:53:27.020But no economist or energy expert worth their salt is saying that we're going to get off of petrochemical usage anytime soon.
00:53:34.360We're going to need it for some years to come.
00:53:36.320yeah exactly and i mean we can look at the current situation where um you know energy
00:53:43.360security in europe and they've been struggling over the past couple of months especially the
00:53:48.480past couple of weeks as we know you know that the situation with russia and ukraine and everything
00:53:53.840like that and so we need to think about how we can be displacing some of these more um
00:53:59.840less friendly oil sources, or in this case, Russian oil. Canadian producers are currently
00:54:06.280looking to hike their production of oil and gas by about 300,000 barrels per day by the end of
00:54:12.500the year to start and continue to displace Russian oil products. But this unfortunately
00:54:19.100is only a small percentage of the Russian oil imports to Europe. But I mean, it's a start. So
00:54:24.840if we're thinking long term, there's places that also are developing their oil reserves and their
00:54:31.960oil products that are not doing it as safely, as I mentioned, as us. And so it just, it seems like
00:54:40.000we're constantly stuck in the same conversation of the negatives that could come from developing
00:54:45.760it here, when we need to really also bring in that there's so much benefit, not only economically,
00:54:52.120but you know to our our greater ecosystem um by displacing some of these other countries and their
00:54:59.820sources yeah and this project looks really interesting like i i spent 20 years in the
00:55:04.840field and exploration but it was always land-based uh well except when i was on the beaufort it was
00:55:08.860frozen underneath us so i still couldn't quite compare it with uh with offshore stuff um but
00:55:14.600this so this would be a ship that is going to bring on oil and even process to a degree and0.68
00:55:18.660how does this work? Do tankers, I guess, would nurse off of that site and then they could
00:55:22.860deliver the product elsewhere? I mean, if that's the case, it's quite ideal for export as well,
00:55:27.420if not bringing in more domestic supply. Yeah. My understanding is pretty much what you kind
00:55:33.720of just laid out there. I'm not super in tune with all the technical details that's above my head
00:55:39.640when it comes to those sorts of things at this stage. But I'm more focused on the policy relevant
00:55:45.660aspect of this and sort of a greater benefit to Newfoundland and Labrador um and and greater
00:55:52.220exports as you mentioned as well not just you know the province but to more you know the federal
00:55:57.460sphere um of the entire country. Well and environmentally I mean something we seem to be
00:56:02.940yelling into the wind quite often but there are a number of tankers always moving back and forth up
00:56:07.220the St. Lawrence River delivering oil to eastern Canada well if we're gonna do that anyways let's
00:56:14.220run it from Newfoundland over rather than all the way from Saudi Arabia or Venezuela
00:56:18.460from more distant ports. I'd imagine even though the risk is low in shipping oil by tanker,
00:56:23.180the more you're out there in the middle of the open ocean, the higher your risk. So if we're
00:56:26.220bringing that domestic supply from nearby, it can only be safer for things in general.
00:56:31.340Yeah. I mean, I would agree with that assessment and I would think that
00:56:35.260you know, if we're going to talk about risks, like we kind of have been chatting about throughout
00:56:39.820our talk here we need to consider those risks as well not just the risks that fit a certain narrative
00:56:45.740the risks overall of all the little moving pieces and the bits of things that maybe don't jive with
00:56:52.860like i said a certain narrative around the whole thing so is that i i really as i said before i
00:56:58.780looked at some maps it looks like that's part of a larger field though right would there potentially
00:57:02.700be more developments surrounding that if this project was a success i'm not entirely sure on
00:57:08.540that at this time um i haven't heard of any you know slated for um approval or anything like that
00:57:16.140i mean this project itself has been sort of in the the works for a number of years now
00:57:21.340trying to even just get the approval uh so it's hard to say whether or not others might arise
00:57:28.540um but nothing that has you know crossed my radar at this moment that's not to say it it doesn't
00:57:34.540exist yeah well if there was any time i think that would be most ideal at least as i said we
00:57:39.980have a federal government that's pretty ideologically opposed to petrochemical development
00:57:44.540but right now i mean the world has gotten a very hard reality check on how dependent they really
00:57:48.700are on conventional energy sources still whether they want to be or not due to the russian ukraine
00:57:53.580conflict between that and our economy and a number of things this might be the time that
00:58:00.220the government will just say well look we don't like these things but we've just got to approve
00:58:03.740it because we need it and there's no getting around it well exactly um and and i fully and
00:58:09.660completely agree with your sentiment there and when we're talking about you know a smaller economy
00:58:15.580like newfoundland and labrador the oil and gas industry there accounts for 25 of the province's
00:58:21.180gdp and 41 of its exports over the past 20 years so it's it's not small in the amount of space it
00:58:29.100takes up for an economy like that and like i mentioned you know they have crushing unemployment
00:58:36.700uh crushing debt all of these issues that something like this project could really help
00:58:42.780smooth some of those pieces it doesn't need to be that you know a project like this happens
00:58:47.660in isolation in the sense of you know it's not all or nothing it's not oh we're going to abandon
00:58:54.300any other you know renewable energy alternatives or anything like that but we need to see with
00:58:59.980what what's the best things we can be working with at the present time and what makes the
00:59:04.220most sense in in a balanced way of of going about it yeah and in chasing that uh what's become a
00:59:11.100holy grail in alberta of economic diversification one of the things that does help is having a
00:59:16.460favorable local business climate and an affordable one and a lot of people actually don't realize but
00:59:21.980Well, Alberta's economy is very diverse. We have a lot of industries. The oil and gas sector,
00:59:26.720of course, is a great advantage, but we've blossomed into all sorts of things. And it
00:59:30.480wasn't so much from direct subsidies or government treatment. It was just because thanks to the oil
00:59:34.660and gas, we've been able to maintain a low cost of operation and taxes. So it's encouraged new
00:59:41.120businesses to come out. And Newfoundland could have that opportunity if they did it wisely.
00:59:45.640That's a big if I know with governments, but still, I mean, if they get all those royalty
00:59:49.340revenues from a good developed energy field, that's where you could bring in new innovative
00:59:54.280companies, whether even alternative energy generation. Exactly. And I mean, the province
01:00:00.160of Newfoundland and Labrador is in favor of this project. So it's not that, you know, industry is
01:00:05.760pushing it and it's meeting some sort of opposition. That's not the case here. It's that
01:00:11.800this federal decision continues to be delayed, you know, needing more time to decipher the
01:00:17.580information or, you know, look over these impact assessment results or whatever it might be.
01:00:24.140But those have been in place and been released since August of 2021. So, you know, buying more
01:00:31.200time for whatever reason, it doesn't seem to be making sense anymore, especially when we're seeing
01:00:38.980the situation with Russian oil. If anything, that makes this so much more, you know, a powerful
01:00:47.500reason for this project to move forward, in my opinion.
01:00:51.160And dragging it out comes at a cost, a big cost, and it harms the whole country. A lot of people
01:00:55.820don't realize that. I mean, when they step on a project in Western Canada, or if they're delaying
01:01:00.800on this, it's sending a message to investors for pretty much anything that we're not a safe place
01:01:05.380to invest in. We can't get our projects done in a timely manner. We can't get an approval or an
01:01:10.900answer. I mean, it's almost, and I'll only say almost, almost worse when they will sit there
01:01:15.800not giving a thumbs up or a thumbs down, then a thumbs down, because at least then the investors
01:01:19.660can move on to something else. But when they keep it dragging out like this, it just shoots the
01:01:23.300cost through the roof and makes us all look terrible as a place to invest. Exactly. I look
01:01:28.460at it kind of in comparison to pharmaceutical industry, for example. We in Canada have such
01:01:34.840lengthy reviews on the regulatory side of things, not safety in terms of clinical trials and that
01:01:40.800sort of thing. I'm talking just strictly the regulatory approval of, you know, applications
01:01:45.760and so on. Our regulatory approval is so much slower than other countries. And as a result,
01:01:52.740we get less innovative medicines that are introduced here first. We have less variety
01:01:59.100in the medicines and the medical devices that are introduced as a result of this.
01:02:03.800So, you know, just speaking kind of broadly, this is sort of something that touches a number of
01:02:08.580sectors in that, you know, it's kind of starting to not look good in a certain number of areas
01:02:14.200if we continue to, you know, just drag these regulatory processes on, you know, while also
01:02:21.040still respecting the robust and rigid nature of them at the same time. Yeah, well, and people
01:02:27.020who haven't been in business for themselves don't necessarily understand just how expensive and
01:02:31.640odious bureaucracy and red tape is for your operations. I mean, even as a pub owner on the
01:02:37.720small scale where I was in the past, the amount of hoops I had to jump through to be a licensed
01:02:41.780operation. And I mean, I understand there's going to be a degree of regulation that's realistic,
01:02:45.500but I'm dedicating a large percentage, not a huge, but a good percentage of my time and work
01:02:51.480and funds into just being in compliance with regulation. And that's just a micro scale of it,
01:02:56.940but it's very real and it has a very real impact. And then we've really got to work on shaving that,
01:03:01.660particularly when it comes to these mega projects.
01:09:49.020And when he's not doing that, he's flying on government subsidized airlines to go around the world and embarrass himself at European parliamentary functions.
01:09:58.320And all of these people, there's a giant subgroup of these people.
01:10:01.560You want to see a lot of where your money gets pissed away by these guys?
01:10:04.480Look at the groups that go to these international summits.
01:10:07.240Look at the groups that go to these conventions.
01:10:09.560Look at the accommodations they stay in.
01:10:11.740And I assure you, they don't fly squished into coach like you and I do when they go to these places.
01:20:17.060I had Leslie Lewis on earlier, and I had spoken to Jean Charest.
01:20:21.720Most conservatives feel that he might be the man to win the next election.
01:20:24.960Yeah, it appears so. Jean Charest, it's interesting, you know, obviously he's more left-leaning in the Conservative Party, but I think he might have a better chance on the national scene to win the election.
01:20:42.800I think Pierre, you know, he would be my candidate of choice, but the question is whether the rest of the Canadian population is going to go for somebody like Pierre, somebody who's more libertarian-minded, who talks about the freedom convoy and is more supportive of, you know, more right-leaning policies.
01:21:04.440Yeah, well, I mean, personally, I think kind of the question is, I mean, you know, Jean Charest is very liberal.
01:21:09.600I mean, maybe not, you know, to the NDP far left of the liberal spectrum, but he's quite liberal.
01:21:15.240But people got to ask, well, do we want to forever be in opposition with classical conservatives or do we just continue to liberalize ourselves until we become winnable in, you know, Toronto and Montreal?
01:21:26.020But I mean, it is possible for a principled conservative to win.
01:21:31.160In voting for Sherey, I think you're just giving up and voting for the same thing in a smarter package than the current liberal leader anyway.
01:21:37.940yeah i think so too it's and it's really a battle for the soul of the conservative party what's
01:21:43.200going on right now um what we'll see what uh direction we end up going in and if it's if we
01:21:49.140can get uh you know get a winner on the in the next federal election hopefully it's before 2025
01:21:54.120we will have to see yeah it's going to be an interesting process to watch and it's such a
01:21:58.860long race so we'll see what develops you know they're all just kind of putting out their0.99
01:22:01.740platforms and policies right now i got a feeling they'll start taking some more unique stances
01:22:06.140That's a frustration I've had in interviewing them so far.
01:22:08.560I mean, they've been good, but very broad in their answers and not taking many direct