Western Standard - December 07, 2022


The Chamber of Commerce has lost its way

Mentioned
Deborah Yedlin Danielle Smith COVID-19 Kenny
MPC Daily Market Update Dec 6, 2022 MPC Daily Market Update Dec 8, 2022

Episode Stats


Length

5 minutes

Words per minute

191.53

Word count

1,077

Sentence count

85

Harmful content

Toxicity

4

sentences flagged

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Calgary's Chamber of Commerce has become so woke, they aren't even worth joining anymore, much less counting on them to bring their message to governments in order to advocate for their interests. The Calgary Chamber has become a woke advocacy organization, and now they want to turn the city into another Toronto.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.560 Businesses need to abandon these chambers of commerce.
00:00:03.380 I mean, it's been a tough few years for Calgary businesses.
00:00:05.540 And while COVID-19, of course, played a large part in the pressures,
00:00:08.980 businesses have been struggling due to bad governance
00:00:10.900 on all levels of government for years.
00:00:13.020 I mean, typically, businesses can expect their local chamber
00:00:15.520 to advocate on their behalf when they're in trouble.
00:00:17.540 In Calgary, though, the chamber has gone so woke,
00:00:20.280 they aren't even worth joining anymore,
00:00:22.060 much less counting on them to bring their message to governments.
00:00:25.340 I mean, so let's get some history.
00:00:26.320 The first Canadian Chamber of Commerce, I didn't know this,
00:00:28.080 was formed in 1750 in Halifax.
00:00:30.940 And now they have branches, of course, in every community in the country.
00:00:33.400 And their initial mandate was pretty simple.
00:00:35.100 They were speaking for businesses and providing networking opportunities.
00:00:38.000 Now, those days are long, long gone.
00:00:40.560 I mean, in Calgary, in 2019, businesses were being crushed
00:00:43.220 by double and even triple business tax increases
00:00:46.480 under the Nenshi administration.
00:00:48.200 The chamber was nowhere to be seen on this issue, however.
00:00:50.300 They were busy pursuing bike lanes.
00:00:52.060 It was only when hundreds of business owners actually protested
00:00:54.420 in front of City Hall at an unprecedented demonstration
00:00:57.280 that the city administration took notice.
00:00:59.220 Business owners aren't prone to attending protests.
00:01:01.560 This indicates, though, how desperate they'd become
00:01:03.200 and the lack of representation they had,
00:01:05.460 despite a very well-funded Chamber of Commerce in the city.
00:01:08.200 Unfortunately, most businesses simply cut a check to the local chamber
00:01:11.120 as a matter of habit every year, and they ignore it after that.
00:01:13.780 They know the organization's of little value to them.
00:01:15.880 But the problem is this apathy allows bad elements
00:01:18.140 to slip into what was once a good group.
00:01:19.820 And the apathy of chamber members has allowed Calgary's chamber
00:01:23.340 to morph into a woke advocacy organization.
00:01:26.520 It was bad enough when the chamber was useless,
00:01:28.400 but now they're actually becoming a detriment to enterprise in the city.
00:01:32.040 Since Calgary Chamber appointed CBC commentator Deborah Yedlin
00:01:35.380 as its CEO, things have gone from bad to worse.
00:01:38.620 Yedlin has no experience in running a small to medium business,
00:01:41.420 and it shows.
00:01:42.200 The stances she's taken in the last couple of years have been absurd.
00:01:44.680 I mean, Yedlin's clear dislike for the UCP has been shining through.
00:01:49.300 That was well-programmed into her during her CBC time, I'm sure.
00:01:52.360 I was gobsmacked, though, when she vocally declared
00:01:54.960 that the removal of vaccine passports was going to harm businesses in Calgary.
00:01:58.900 Yes, she said that.
00:01:59.800 She claimed that customers would stay home out of fear
00:02:02.120 if businesses didn't continue to scan people's phones
00:02:04.540 and deny entry to the unvaccinated.
00:02:07.260 It doesn't matter where you stand on the vaccine issue. 1.00
00:02:09.520 Yedlin's statement on this were just stupid. 0.99
00:02:12.000 And it's clear she didn't talk to the business owners 1.00
00:02:14.040 she claims to represent at all.
00:02:15.680 No right-minded business wants to dedicate an employee
00:02:18.140 to stopping and scanning every customer entering the establishment.
00:02:21.480 It costs money, it interferes with the customer experience,
00:02:24.960 and while the majority of the people are indeed vaccinated,
00:02:27.460 excluding the minority still shrinks your customer base.
00:02:30.580 Thankfully, at least, Kenny, who was premier at the time,
00:02:33.060 ignored Yedlin, and when the mandates were dropped,
00:02:35.140 business unsurprisingly grew.
00:02:37.300 Lo and behold, it sounds like Yedlin didn't know
00:02:38.780 what the hell she was talking about. 0.51
00:02:40.140 The chamber, in the meantime, has been advocating for equity laws.
00:02:43.240 It's a code word for socialism, guys.
00:02:45.500 And it speaks of vibrancy and other buzzwords.
00:02:48.660 Businesses, though, particularly downtown Calgary,
00:02:50.800 they're dealing with crushing taxes, high crime,
00:02:53.200 and an empty transit system because nobody wants to ride on there
00:02:55.420 with the addicts.
00:02:56.620 Where's the chamber on this?
00:02:57.520 Well, we don't hear a thing.
00:02:58.740 The chamber now has recommended that the city
00:03:00.900 dump its cowboy hat and western image.
00:03:02.820 Yeah, you heard that right.
00:03:04.220 Calgary enjoys local branding and an image
00:03:06.500 that hundreds of cities would kill for.
00:03:08.460 And the Calgary chamber wants to dump it
00:03:10.180 and turn the city presumably into another Toronto. 0.73
00:03:12.980 Again, toad and deaf and no business sense. 0.97
00:03:15.500 Now, the head of the chamber is on an anti-UCP crusade
00:03:18.640 as Yedlin's attacking Premier Daniel Smith at every turn.
00:03:22.020 I guess her hopes of returning the NDP to power
00:03:24.060 are pretty evident.
00:03:25.680 While Yedlin is certainly welcome to her political views,
00:03:27.940 her responsibility should be to the business community.
00:03:29.960 And let's not pretend socialism
00:03:31.080 is in the interest of businesses.
00:03:33.500 The only way to fix the chamber now
00:03:34.960 is to starve it back into common sense.
00:03:36.540 It's spoiled by easy money from the energy companies.
00:03:39.560 I mean, the Western Standard,
00:03:40.360 we have a membership with the Strathmore Chamber of Commerce.
00:03:42.940 It bounds on Calgary and offers many of the same services
00:03:45.260 and it isn't hopelessly woke.
00:03:47.500 Calgary businesses need to examine their options
00:03:49.580 and seek them out.
00:03:50.720 Why keep funding an organization
00:03:52.060 that actually works against your business's interest?
00:03:55.420 So I'm just reaching out, guys.
00:03:57.160 I'd say don't renew your membership
00:03:58.980 with the Calgary Chamber.
00:04:00.200 Teach these guys a lesson
00:04:01.020 because they are not doing you
00:04:02.040 or your business any favors.
00:04:03.680 The current Lethbridge feed grain prices
00:04:07.820 are unchanged with cash barley at $4.45,
00:04:10.820 feed wheat at $4.56,
00:04:12.820 and corn at $457 per tonne.
00:04:16.200 In the milling wheat markets,
00:04:17.600 March Minneapolis futures are up $0.06 at $9.02
00:04:20.380 with local hard red spring bid
00:04:22.340 for December movement at $11.45 per bushel.
00:04:26.640 In the oil seeds, nearby canola futures
00:04:28.640 are up $11.70 at $851.40 per tonne
00:04:33.120 with delivered values for December
00:04:34.620 at $19.08 per bushel.
00:04:38.020 In the pulse markets,
00:04:38.980 nearby red lentil prices remain at $0.33 per pound
00:04:41.940 and yellow peas are trading at $12.75 per bushel.
00:04:46.140 In the cattle markets,
00:04:47.520 February live cattle are unchanged
00:04:49.300 at $153.62.5 per hundredweight.
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