Western Standard - September 10, 2024


Nastiest election ever coming, but maybe not just yet.

Topics
end of confidence and supply agreement with Mr. Singh confidence votes money in Canadian politics election and political season
Hosted by
Nigel Hannaford
Mentioned
Yaroslav Baran Jagmeet Singh Stephen Harper Pierre Poilievre Justin Trudeau Ted Byfield Polyev Smith Preston Manning Toasting Ted Paliyev Morale Biden
Jagmeet & Justin breakup Giant cat kills family's feline, tries to get in their house west of Calgary

Episode Stats


Length

21 minutes

Words per minute

167.01

Word count

3,599

Sentence count

114


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Yaroslav Baran is a political consultant and the founder of the Pendulum Group in Ottawa. He keeps an eye on what's going, and is here to explain it to Western Standard viewers. He's had the end of the deal with Mr. Singh, and a senior staff member has resigned.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.800 Good evening, Western Standard viewers, and welcome to this week's edition of Hannaford,
00:00:05.120 a political show of the Western Standard.
00:00:07.480 With me today, I have Yaroslav Baran returning to the show.
00:00:12.200 Yaroslav Baran is a political consultant and the founder of the Pendulum Group in Ottawa.
00:00:17.600 He keeps an eye on what's going and is here to explain it to Western Standard viewers today.
00:00:23.640 Good to be back.
00:00:25.240 Big developments, Yaroslav.
00:00:27.320 What do you say?
00:00:28.340 He's had the end of the deal with Mr. Singh.
00:00:32.780 He's had a senior staff resign, campaign director.
00:00:36.840 Kind of important, I guess, when you're looking at an election a year.
00:00:40.640 There's still the legacy of that awful by-election result in Toronto.
00:00:45.500 And I get the impression that it wasn't that friendly at the cabinet retreat.
00:00:51.000 So, how is the end of the confidence and supply agreement with Mr. Singh going to affect how Mr.
00:01:03.380 Trudeau goes forward from here?
00:01:06.020 Well, it is a significant development.
00:01:08.940 First, I want to be clear not to overstate it.
00:01:13.420 It does not mean there's going to be an election this fall.
00:01:16.280 There will not be an election this fall.
00:01:18.740 So, anybody living in the area and trying to think, oh my god, yeah, it changes everything.
00:01:22.440 No, it doesn't change everything.
00:01:24.260 It doesn't mean we should get, you know, we should start working out our forearms to get ready to pound lawn signs in.
00:01:30.360 In the short term, there's not going to be an early election, at least a very early election, but it does change the dynamics significantly.
00:01:41.360 First of all, the government is now going to have to be careful and avoid unnecessary confidence votes.
00:01:49.780 So, the NDP liberal agreement was basically the NDP pledging, we will keep you guys afloat until the statutory next election, October 2025.
00:02:02.140 We will vote confidence.
00:02:03.740 In exchange, you will give us the following things.
00:02:06.180 Dental care, you know, the pharma care, et cetera, et cetera.
00:02:10.080 So, we will sustain you.
00:02:11.760 You implement part of our platform.
00:02:13.220 That was a deal.
00:02:14.140 That's now gone, which means confidence cannot be taken for granted.
00:02:17.880 Now, make no mistake, the liberals do not want an early election.
00:02:24.120 Their polling is in the toilet, and it has been for a year and a half.
00:02:28.340 So, the liberals will do whatever they can to avoid an election.
00:02:33.520 They're not going to take risks.
00:02:34.740 They're not going to roll any dice.
00:02:36.340 So, that means minimizing confidence votes as much as they can.
00:02:40.300 What does that mean practically?
00:02:41.220 Things like, you know, when you're at government, especially a fairly long-in-the-tooth government, which I think is fair to say that this one is, and you're going into your last year, the last season before an election, it would have made sense to prorogue parliament, open with the new throne speech.
00:03:00.200 You know, the trumpets, the red carpets, the governor general reads the government's agenda.
00:03:04.920 You get a monopoly on media coverage.
00:03:07.160 So, you get to set the conversation.
00:03:09.300 That's probably off the table now because that leads to a confidence vote.
00:03:13.260 You know, parliament votes.
00:03:14.520 Do we accept this agenda or not?
00:03:16.380 So, that's one practical example of the kinds of confidence votes the government is going to try to avoid.
00:03:23.260 There's a fall economic statement every year, and sometimes it's a statistical update.
00:03:29.900 Here's the inflation rate.
00:03:32.100 Here's unemployment.
00:03:32.980 Here's what's going on.
00:03:33.920 Sometimes it's basically a mini budget, and usually it's a mini budget.
00:03:37.680 So, there are new measures, confidence votes that come out of that.
00:03:41.000 So, these are the kinds of things the government is going to be thinking, hmm, okay, we've got to be really careful here.
00:03:46.660 We want to minimize all risks that the government could fall because they know that if the government falls and there's an election, they're toast.
00:03:53.900 Not just toast, but they're going to lose two-thirds of their seats minimum.
00:03:58.040 I hear a talk of maybe being knocked down to 25 seats.
00:04:02.000 That was somebody's poll last week.
00:04:04.440 Yeah.
00:04:05.820 We're knocked down to 34 in 2011 by Mr. Harper.
00:04:10.020 Is that really feasible they could go that low?
00:04:12.140 I'd be surprised if it hit the 20s, but there are very sophisticated systems that do algorithmic seat projections based on available polling.
00:04:23.020 So, this is not just somebody kind of fantasizing about what they'd like to see.
00:04:27.020 Really sophisticated stuff doing this kind of modeling.
00:04:29.260 And the latest modeling that I saw from 338canada.com, which is somebody I put a lot of credence in, has the Liberals projected to win about 48 seats right now.
00:04:43.220 Okay.
00:04:43.560 And that's a huge drop.
00:04:45.640 And, I mean, back at the beginning of summer, the projections were 60 seats, 64 seats.
00:04:50.540 So, even a significant drop just over the course of the summer.
00:04:55.320 So, it's going to be, I mean, the polls are showing that the Liberals are in for a serious bruising.
00:05:00.940 So, what do you think has done that?
00:05:05.560 It's, oh boy.
00:05:08.460 Where to, I mean, where to begin?
00:05:10.120 You ask anybody and they've got their own reason why they no longer have confidence in this government.
00:05:17.340 Why they don't like the Prime Minister anymore and whatever.
00:05:20.220 And I'm going to say, I'm not going to say he's universally derided, but you can feel it in the air.
00:05:25.960 Even among Liberal supporters, lifelong Liberal voters, we're starting to hear more and more, gosh, I just can't vote for the guy anymore.
00:05:34.900 I just can't vote for them.
00:05:36.280 Or Liberals themselves saying, the signs are all there.
00:05:41.000 The writing is on the wall.
00:05:42.000 The best thing we could do, the best thing we can do is get a new leader because then they'll have a fighting chance.
00:05:49.300 So, is there a normal conversation?
00:05:52.040 Or is there policies of this problem here?
00:05:55.060 It's, you know, every, in fairness, every government eventually wears out its welcome.
00:06:00.160 It's a fact of like, you can't reign forever.
00:06:03.200 And nine years is a pretty, it's a pretty healthy run.
00:06:06.480 But the question then is, what does a party do about that?
00:06:11.380 You either try to remake your image, you try to adjust to the mood of the country and toggle and reposition your policy, or the leader resigns and you elect a new leader to put a fresh face on things.
00:06:27.600 But we're not really seeing any of those things.
00:06:30.420 And that is why we've seen this sustained, sustained drop in popularity for the Liberal government, because they've been offering more of the same in response to a clear signal from the public that they're not buying it anymore.
00:06:45.620 Isn't there actually still time for the Liberal Party to replace its leader?
00:06:50.880 If there's a will, there's a way.
00:06:54.100 Look at what just happened south of the border.
00:06:56.620 There was a very quick consensus that, oh, my goodness, Mr. Biden can't be at the helm of the ticket again.
00:07:05.920 And they figured out a very quick way to do it.
00:07:08.340 And there's way more at stake in American politics than there is in Canada.
00:07:11.440 There's way more money involved.
00:07:12.640 There's way more interest involved.
00:07:15.120 There's way more global significance involved.
00:07:17.840 So if they can do it, anybody can do it.
00:07:19.520 It comes down to what the caucus thinks is the right thing to do, what the chief advisors, what the fundraisers, they need to make those decisions.
00:07:30.400 And right now there's a lot of grumbling, especially after that Toronto by-election that the Liberal Party has no business losing ever.
00:07:39.340 And they lost.
00:07:40.720 So that started a lot of grumbling.
00:07:43.020 But that grumbling has not taken the next step of the whole caucus saying, come on, like, you've got to go.
00:07:50.000 Now, you've made it very clear that you couldn't have been more emphatic that there won't be an election soon.
00:07:57.040 And you've said why it wouldn't be in the interests of the Liberal Party to push it that way.
00:08:03.780 But then, I mean, they're not a majority in the House.
00:08:06.800 If the other three parties ganged up on them, it could happen.
00:08:11.040 So you're still very sure that it is not going to happen.
00:08:14.660 So why isn't that?
00:08:15.880 Why is that?
00:08:16.840 I'd be really surprised.
00:08:18.560 We want to.
00:08:19.980 Yeah.
00:08:20.560 Look, the Conservatives want an election.
00:08:22.380 I'm a Conservative.
00:08:23.200 You know that.
00:08:24.880 The Conservatives want an election.
00:08:26.380 They're high in the polls.
00:08:28.100 They've got a, depending on the poll, between a 14-point and a 21-point lead over the Liberals.
00:08:34.040 That's a really nice place to be.
00:08:35.820 All the modelling, all the polling suggests a resounding majority for the Conservatives if they're an election to be held today.
00:08:44.320 So, obviously, the Conservatives want one.
00:08:46.180 And that's why they've been baiting Jagmeet Singh.
00:08:49.280 That's why we saw public challenge from Mr. Paliyev to Mr. Singh to tear up his deal.
00:08:54.840 And then he took the bait.
00:08:56.380 But what about the other parties?
00:08:58.740 The NDP, their challenge, they've got, they're a complex bag.
00:09:03.760 Their fundraising is not strong.
00:09:05.740 It's the weakest among all the, you know, sort of mainstream parties, all the national parties.
00:09:10.400 It's consistently fairly weak.
00:09:11.960 They finally clawed their way out of debt, but they're basically starting at zero.
00:09:15.760 So, any election essentially means borrowed money.
00:09:19.440 So, they want to push that off as much as they can to give them time to fundraise.
00:09:24.680 Their polling is also volatile.
00:09:26.740 They've spent most of the last year with the polling projections suggesting at best status quo.
00:09:34.700 So, you don't want to spend a whole bunch, like, millions of dollars of borrowed money just to, at best, win as many seats as you currently have.
00:09:43.100 Over the last couple of weeks, the polling suggests maybe they'd pick up seats.
00:09:46.780 So, they're going to be keeping an eye on that.
00:09:48.320 But you don't want to roll the dice over one good poll.
00:09:52.340 So, the NDP are still cautious because it's still basically status quo for them if there's an election or works.
00:10:00.980 The Bloc Québécois is the most indifferent to an election.
00:10:04.960 They can't form government.
00:10:06.040 They never will form government.
00:10:07.760 They only run candidates in one riding.
00:10:10.940 So, they are the most indifferent.
00:10:12.380 They operate less on politics and political expediency and more on policy.
00:10:19.340 What can we get out of, you know, liberal government, whatever.
00:10:22.000 Conservative government, whatever.
00:10:23.500 What can we get out of you?
00:10:24.760 That's how they operate.
00:10:25.960 That's how they think.
00:10:27.360 And that's why, interestingly, ironically, the Bloc Québécois is now going to be the easiest potential dance partner for the liberals.
00:10:37.040 Because liberals know, election, take it or leave it, the Bloc Québécois won't care either way.
00:10:43.320 So, they are the most likely to support, for example, a federal budget that the liberals put forward.
00:10:51.000 So, what you're saying is that the separatist party is the one that's going to keep the most unpopular government we've had in decades in office.
00:10:59.300 Interestingly, that's the way it's shaping up.
00:11:01.040 If the liberals survive the next budget, it's probably going to be with the support of the Bloc Québécois because they've larded up the budget with a whole bunch of stuff that the separatist party is asking for.
00:11:11.860 So, isn't that going to be an interesting dynamic?
00:11:14.460 Mind you, for the conservatives in the NDP, that's a godsend because they can then go to the election next summer saying,
00:11:21.820 Okay, so these guys, whom the country does not like anymore at all, are being propped up by whom?
00:11:30.620 The party that wants to tear up the country.
00:11:32.840 Not a great way for the liberals to start an election campaign.
00:11:35.800 It certainly isn't.
00:11:37.380 I'm sure the conservatives have thought of that.
00:11:39.720 But, you know, in case they didn't, we're going to send them your comments.
00:11:44.600 We'll send them a recording.
00:11:45.980 Look, can Justin Trudeau actually hang on?
00:11:54.360 I know we kind of went near there.
00:11:56.820 Do you think that there is the right people within the party who could pull him down?
00:12:03.460 It's really tough to say.
00:12:08.060 The general impression that one gets in Ottawa these days is that he can hang on for as long as he decides to hang on.
00:12:18.500 Well, what about this low morale within the government that you were speaking of?
00:12:22.360 What does that look like in practical terms?
00:12:24.920 Morale is low and they're getting trouble having volunteers.
00:12:28.200 They're having trouble recruiting new people.
00:12:29.860 The star staffers are always the first to leave.
00:12:33.680 You know, whenever any political ship starts to sink, it's always the best people to leave first because they've got the most options.
00:12:40.840 They're the most attractive on the labor market.
00:12:42.960 So then you're stuck with less experienced people and holes in staffing and it just kind of starts to feed on itself.
00:12:49.640 But the general consensus appears to be that he took the Liberal Party out of the wilderness.
00:12:59.560 He's earned the right to stay for as long as he chooses to stay.
00:13:03.200 Now, many Liberal MPs are privately, quietly saying, but I hope he does go.
00:13:10.500 But publicly, they're saying if he chooses to stay and fight one more election, that's his right.
00:13:17.200 He's earned it.
00:13:18.080 Well, that is what they would say.
00:13:19.400 But I mean, if you think of what you just said there, Yaroslav, he brought them out of the wilderness and he's going to take them back into it.
00:13:26.740 If you want to use the biblical analogy, it's like Moses bringing the Israelites out of the promised land.
00:13:34.040 And then back into the desert.
00:13:36.140 Well, that's a pretty damning thing.
00:13:40.620 Yeah, but Nigel, you know, also traditionally, the different levers of forcing a party lever out are largely gone in Canadian politics overall, but especially in the Liberal Party.
00:13:53.520 He hasn't left any independent power bases left.
00:13:57.480 He no longer has an official Senate caucus.
00:14:01.440 You know, the group of elders who can tap you on the shoulder and say, young man, it's time to go for a while.
00:14:05.840 I can have a little chat.
00:14:06.820 They're gone.
00:14:08.440 He's broken down the regional power brokers.
00:14:11.940 They're gone.
00:14:13.180 He's eliminated them.
00:14:16.140 Fundraising law in Canada means that there's not really any influence of big money anymore.
00:14:22.060 Like in the States, in Washington, when the big donors say it's time to go, you have no choice.
00:14:28.140 In Canada, corporations can't donate, unions can't donate, and individuals can only donate, what, 1700 bucks.
00:14:36.460 So money doesn't talk in Canadian politics.
00:14:39.480 It doesn't have the kind of ejection button leverage that we see in other countries.
00:14:46.880 So there's not really anybody to force them out.
00:14:50.460 There's no mechanism to do that.
00:14:51.900 It's basically if the caucus got together and said, look, this isn't working anymore.
00:14:59.880 We're all going to lose our jobs if you stay at the Liberal Party.
00:15:03.740 Maybe, maybe.
00:15:05.020 And it's heading in that direction, but it's not quite there yet.
00:15:07.360 You know, it's interesting.
00:15:08.840 You and I are both old enough to remember when that legislation came in, and we all thought that it would be a good thing if money didn't talk in Canadian politics.
00:15:17.620 Well, right now, maybe I could make a case for it.
00:15:23.300 Look, I want you to just sort of go in under the dome here and imagine, imagine that you were,
00:15:31.060 they made you an outrageously rich offer to advise them on how to get through the next election.
00:15:38.220 Mr. Baran, put your conservatism on one side.
00:15:41.120 You are the man.
00:15:42.020 Tell us what to do, and we will do it.
00:15:44.740 What would you tell them?
00:15:46.360 Well, I mean, until this Jagmeet Singh thing happened, I would have advised him, start the new year with a throne speech.
00:15:54.060 You want to reset the agenda and a monopoly on communicating your vision?
00:15:58.300 That's kind of off the table now, but that would have been a good place to start.
00:16:02.380 But most importantly, it's got the, I mean, the government is going to have to start to pay attention to the reasons why they're unpopular.
00:16:13.740 In fairness, they've started to do that.
00:16:15.600 They've figured out why, you know, cost of living, cost of housing.
00:16:21.420 So that they finally, they finally included.
00:16:23.840 The other parties have been talking about it for years.
00:16:25.660 The government is finally clued in, and they're trying to do stuff there.
00:16:30.480 The problem is it's too little, too late.
00:16:32.560 They no longer have the credibility anymore.
00:16:34.720 At least that's what appears to be the case in the eyes of the public.
00:16:38.720 So I'm not sure that there is any magic recipe to bring it back.
00:16:44.080 They've started to do some of the, some of the only things available to them, which is borrowing policy proposals from the people who are popular.
00:16:53.260 So, so they see Mr. Polyev surging in the polls, and what is he been saying about housing?
00:17:00.780 Well, maybe we cannot be increasing the population of Canada more quickly than we're building houses in Canada.
00:17:08.260 The rules are starting to say, hmm, maybe that makes sense.
00:17:11.240 Mr. Polyev is saying we've got all kinds of surplus federal lands that are mothballed, just, you know, collecting cobwebs.
00:17:17.280 Why don't we repurpose some of those for housing developments?
00:17:22.340 Liberals have started to say the same thing.
00:17:25.440 So they're starting to borrow the policies of the parties that are popular.
00:17:30.440 But again, is it too little, too late?
00:17:33.500 And there's always a risk, very fair risk, that voters are going to say, hmm, these guys actually believe that.
00:17:42.560 That was their idea.
00:17:43.680 You're kind of nicking that idea.
00:17:46.720 Why would I vote for you if I can vote for the people who genuinely believe it and aren't just trying to emulate popular, smart, common sense ideas in a panic at the 11th hour?
00:17:57.760 Actually, that's not to the degree that the problems you've just mentioned are consequences of their own explicit policies.
00:18:06.260 You know, borrow money, you get inflation, you get inflation, you find that, you know, you have problems in the home market.
00:18:14.100 Well, these are things, even people who aren't really interested in politics can put that together.
00:18:21.180 But what about a good old-fashioned lie that Pierre Polievre has a secret agenda, and they're going to make abortion hard to get, and they're going to, oh, you know, all the usual things are funded by the Russians.
00:18:33.880 It doesn't have to be true.
00:18:35.940 Yeah.
00:18:37.340 Brace yourself, Nigel.
00:18:38.520 We're going to hear a lot more of that over the next year.
00:18:42.640 So it doesn't go dirty.
00:18:44.060 Yeah, it's going to get really dirty.
00:18:46.160 It's going to get nasty.
00:18:47.020 It's going to get very nasty, probably nastier than we've ever seen it before.
00:18:50.120 And real quick, because that's fear-mongering sometimes is the only card you have left.
00:18:57.200 And in politics, parties play whatever cards they have.
00:19:01.260 If you're a government and you desperately want to cling to power and you see yourself going out, you're going to play whatever cards you have.
00:19:08.840 That is basically their only card left.
00:19:11.700 They're going to portray Mr. Polievre as an alt-right, far-right, you know, whatever, you name it.
00:19:18.600 Anti-this, anti-that, anti-the other thing.
00:19:20.820 I've seen all these monikers come up against my party over the years.
00:19:23.680 I've been involved in politics for 30 years.
00:19:25.320 As you know, I've seen it all leveled against us over the years, and we're going to see it all again.
00:19:33.160 So get ready for it.
00:19:34.620 And there's some new dimensions, too.
00:19:36.080 I mean, I'm used to allegations from other parties of, you know, anti-this, anti-that, or whatever.
00:19:40.920 But now we're going to see new dimensions about foreign interference.
00:19:44.720 He's a front for this foreign hostile government or that foreign hostile government or whatever.
00:19:49.720 Brace yourself.
00:19:51.100 It's coming.
00:19:52.100 And it's going to be a not very pleasant political season between now and either late spring or fall of next year when the election is.
00:20:00.920 Well, on that unhappy note, I guess we should conclude because we're out of time.
00:20:04.940 And it's great to see you again, Yaroslav.
00:20:07.300 Always a pleasure, Nigel.
00:20:08.420 I think we'll be seeing quite a lot more of you in the days and months to come.
00:20:14.020 So thank you for this.
00:20:16.260 All right.
00:20:16.980 Take it easy.
00:20:17.860 For the Western Standard, I'm Nigel Hannaford.
00:20:34.020 If the name Ted Byfield brings back fond memories,
00:20:36.920 well, we've got a party coming up for you guys.
00:20:39.180 On September 25th, Toasting Ted is what it's called.
00:20:41.940 It's going to honor a great conservative who published Alberta Report News magazine.
00:20:46.360 It's going to be bagpipes, singing, live auction stakes, speeches by Premier Smith, Preston Manning, Stephen Harper.
00:20:51.780 Quite a lineup.
00:20:52.820 The Western Standard is the final incarnation or the latest incarnation of Alberta Report that Ted Byfield founded.
00:20:59.580 And I mean, he was a great Albertan.
00:21:01.280 He really made his mark on this province and this evening of celebration for him is really going to be outstanding.
00:21:06.160 Get there.
00:21:07.200 Toastingted.ca.
00:21:08.320 That's the website.
00:21:09.380 You can get your tickets.
00:21:10.260 This one's going to sell out.
00:21:11.360 I mean, again, if you want to see Smith, Manning, Harper, all in one spot, one night.
00:21:16.160 Be sure to get there.
00:21:17.040 You can get there.