Western Standard editor Nigel Hannaford and senior Alberta columnist Corey Morgan join me to talk all things Alberta politics. We talk the Chinese spy balloon, the Pembina Institute, and much more. Plus, we have a story on the links between two Alberta NDP candidates and an anti-oil think tank.
00:00:00.000Good evening, I'm Derek Fuldebrand, publisher of the Western Standard, and you're watching
00:00:29.240the pipeline. Today is February 8th, 2023. Thank you all very much for joining me. I'm joined as
00:00:36.460usual by the Western Standards opinion editor, Nigel Hannaford. How are you, Nigel? Great to be
00:00:41.680here. Doing good. And also joined by, sometimes nice to have, Western Standard senior Alberta
00:00:49.640columnist, Corey Morgan. I'm somewhat happy to be here. Thank you. All right. Well, we've got a
00:00:56.940somewhat good show for you today. Some work done by the Western Standards, one of the Western
00:01:04.960Standards reporters here in our Calgary Bureau has found links between two NDP candidates, the
00:01:11.900Alberta Provincial NDP candidates based in Calgary and an anti-oil group, the Pembida Institute,
00:01:17.460which does kind of think tank work and whatnot against what they call the tar sands and various
00:01:24.020other evil Alberta industries like that. So some controversy ginned up about it. We're going to
00:01:30.300get into it as well. Miss Smith goes to Ottawa. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has finally met
00:01:36.760Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau face to face during the first ministers meeting dealing
00:01:42.440with the ritual Canadian premiers begging Ottawa for healthcare dollars meeting.
00:01:49.300And hijinks ensue. Very interesting things. I'm sure you've all seen the handshake felt around the world by now. Funny things like that. We're also going to talk about this weird Chinese bi-balloon that floated its way all the way across America.0.99
00:02:09.020Some of you are probably wondering, why didn't the biggest military on the planet, in the history of the planet, just shoot down the balloon?
00:02:20.020We're going to talk about the kind of the bizarre response to the Chinese spy balloon from the Biden administration.
00:02:27.280Before we get going, though, I want to thank, or maybe Corey wants to thank my favorite sponsor, the Canadian Shooting Sports Association.
00:02:34.120Sure. I mean, if you own firearms, if you like using them for any sort of all, like the name says, shooting sports, target shooting, hunting, collecting, it's really your business, whatever you want to do with firearms. You've got a government that's coming after them. And the Canadian Shooting Sports Association is there for you standing up to make sure you maintain those rates. And they offer all sorts of resources like any other association. I mean, if you own firearms, you really should be a member of them. All sorts of resources online.
00:02:59.040I think they've even got a confiscation insurance. I'm not positive. I was talking to them and
00:03:05.520either they were working on it or they have it. They have insurance for if the government tries
00:03:09.760to confiscate your guns. Like most insurance, I hope you never need it, but it's an interesting...
00:03:14.800But can you claim the confiscation insurance if the government says they're confiscating it,
00:03:18.640but you refuse to give them up? Oh, well then starts getting convoluted.
00:03:23.200Either way, we're going down a rabbit hole, but it is the Canadian Shooting Sports Association
00:03:27.600with Tony Bernardo running it, and they're a fantastic group. And if you want a firearm,
00:03:31.120you really got to be a member of them. It's affordable, and it's worth it.
00:03:34.080You're at the cssa-cila.org, or as we always say, it's easy, just Google them,
00:03:39.520Canadian Shooting Sports Association, and you'll find your way right there.
00:03:42.480Beautiful. Okay, well, we're going to turn to the story here. As I said,
00:03:47.040story done by the Western Centre's Jonathan Bradley, one of our reporters here in the Calgary
00:03:51.040Bureau. Yeah, he did some work and found that two of their
00:03:56.500candidates a sim and forgive my pronunciation here. Samir
00:04:02.260Kayandi is the NDP candidate in Calgary elbow. And Nagwan
00:04:08.800Al Gunid is the NDP candidate in Calgary Glenmore. These people
00:04:16.180have been nominated by the NDP to carry the NDP's banner in
00:04:19.240those constituencies in the next election. But both of them have worked for the Pembina Institute.
00:04:26.300For those of you who don't know, the Pembina Institute is a think tank in Alberta that's
00:04:31.020kind of like our own homegrown anti-oil lobby here. All green all the time. Yeah, they refer0.86
00:04:39.960the oil sands as tar sands. That's kind of the biggest litmus test right there. Call them tar
00:04:44.440there's probably a 95% chance you don't like them very much. And they do all sorts of stuff trying to push governments to do things that are not pro oil and gas. And they are funded in large measure by governments. They get money from Ottawa. At various times, they've gotten money from the city of Calgary under Nenshi. They got money from the province of Alberta under Redford. These guys get a lot of government money over various times.
00:05:11.940So, obviously, some NDP folks on Twitter, not very happy about the story. Not that their candidates are affiliated with this anti-oil group, but the reporter has made a deal of this at all.
00:05:30.040Now, the NDP have been going to lengths, and I think to their credit, have somewhat succeeded in recruiting a better quality of candidate than they maybe had in 2015.
00:05:39.320The NDP were not expecting to win the 2015 election, and that's why you had, you know, people, you know, flipping burgers, essentially, or working as baristas elected into the government.
00:05:58.580You know, it's up to voters to decide what they want. I don't think it's a good idea if every politician has to have a PhD and, you know, have made millions of dollars. That's not necessarily a good thing. But, you know, we want a little bit of resume, I think, to people who are electing.
00:06:16.140The NDP have tried to, and they were kind of stuck with those people pretty much in 2019 because, well, they were incumbents.
00:06:22.140And it's pretty messy to get rid of incumbents and not have them go against the leader.
00:06:27.140So this time they're making a concerted effort to try and get a higher caliber of candidates.
00:06:32.140Some of these people have impressive resumes.
00:06:35.140It's more of an ideological question if this is a thing.
00:06:39.140I'll start with you, Nigel, does this, you know, how do you think this thing is going
00:06:45.820to play in Calgary, because both the NDP and the Pemba Institute have dismissed this saying,
00:06:49.960oh, it's not anti-oil, we just support green energy.
00:06:52.900Well, first of all, it would probably have been harder to find two NDP candidates who
00:07:01.580were not of that persuasion, right, I mean, this is, this goes with the territory.
00:07:09.140be fair, the Fraser Institute has informed a lot of conservative candidates. So it's
00:07:16.160no surprise that the NDP would go to the Pembina Institute because they are fundamentally
00:07:22.740an anti-oil organization. That is not the main point. The main point is that we need
00:07:31.580to know that the NDP is a fundamentally anti-oil organization
00:07:38.140and that if you are working in the patch,
00:08:48.880But we are entitled to know and put the NDP on the spot and say, is this what you really think?
00:08:54.740And do you really want what the Pembina Institute says it wants?
00:08:58.460Corey, Nigel said that the NDP is fundamentally anti-oil. I wrestle with it. I mean, there's obviously elements of the NDP that are clearly anti-oil and gas.
00:09:13.180But, you know, when the NDP was elected in 2015, no one was more surprised than them, and they were saddled with all these promises they made, like, you know, royalty review, and they're like, shit, we are expected to do these things, and then they found out very quickly, even they knew they were bad ideas, so they kind of went through the motions of a royalty review and whatnot, and they did a bunch of things that were bad for the oil patch, emissions caps, and carbon taxes, and all this stuff that bought
00:09:43.100wonderful pats on the back from Justin Trudeau. But do you think it's fair to call the, because
00:09:49.860the NDP seem to walk this line where they're trying to take these kind of green anti-oil
00:09:55.440measures to make their base happy, but they weren't dumb. They know that the oil industry,
00:10:01.980gas industry is the golden goose in Alberta. You kill that, you can't afford any of the
00:10:05.620social programs. So they're trying to do maybe two different things at once. Do you think
00:10:09.960it's fair to call the NDP anti-oil? I think in general still is fair. I mean, it's in their
00:10:15.140ideology. They're just trying to figure out how to walk that tightrope. And I mean, when you look
00:10:19.980at the overtly anti-oil was like Berman, the mistake when they, you know, when Rachel Notley
00:10:24.940appointed her in any sort of position. Yeah, there's no, and you know, Pembina really reflects
00:10:30.780that though, because them as an organization, I really have a distaste for them because they're
00:10:35.060disingenuous. I mean, Sierra Club, you know what they're about. Ecojustice. Pemida Institute
00:10:40.120pretends to be, oh no, we're just a green organization. We support it. We just want it
00:10:43.580cleaner. No, no. In fact, they're a member of, I looked it up, that Strathmere group,
00:10:47.48014 members of which are the Suzuki Institute, Greenpeace. I mean, these guys are hardcore
00:10:54.560anti-oil. They're anti-nuclear. They are, as well, they tried intervening, shutting down
00:11:00.860in situ oil sands project. So these are an anti oil and gas organization that tries to cloak
00:11:06.800themselves as something else. And that bugs me. And they get donations from Shell and other
00:11:12.020companies following their ESG garbage, which is a separate discussion altogether. But it does make
00:11:16.780them the ideal sort for the NDP to tap. This is the kind of person you can put out there and say,
00:11:21.040no, no, I'm not anti-energy. I just want to be a little greener. I just want to make the world a
00:11:25.720little prettier, when in reality underneath, they are just as vitriolic. But either way,
00:11:31.460I wouldn't say they're all anti-oil. I mean, Margaret McQuaid Boyd really embraced some
00:11:36.000pragmatism when she got in there. I wouldn't call her anti-oil. I think she did things that0.98
00:11:39.000were bad for the past, but I don't think she was fundamentally anti-oil. But they're going to have
00:11:43.420to watch what they're doing. Calgary Elbow, those big houses down there in Britannia,
00:11:46.920they weren't built through hemp farms and windmills. That's energy bucks down there,0.80
00:11:54.460One of the things that you've been quite emphatic about over the past few months is the link between the provincial NDP and the federal NDP.
00:12:03.680So when we say the NDP is anti-oil, what do we think of Jagmeet Singh and the leadership that he is giving to the entire national party, of which this is just local branch office?
00:12:14.360Yeah, they can't depart too far from the federal guidelines.
00:12:17.140That's another tightrope for them to walk.
00:12:19.480They're in a difficult position trying to win Alberta.
00:12:21.420Yeah, so I think it's fair to say there. I'm not sure it's fair to say the NDP is outright anti oil. There are they can't be because they've got, you know, union members of whatnot that who support they at least need to get in the next election.
00:12:39.200to form a government or come anywhere close to it, who are working in the oil patch. But then there are, I'd say, very powerful groups within the NDP that are clearly against it. But this kind of thing, you know, two candidates here who have worked for a anti oil group like Pemba Institute.
00:12:59.200Institute. I don't know how much traction you think this kind of thing is going to get when there's, you know, some kind of right leading candidate and they say there are two genders, you know, that's front page news. That's, that's, that's a big thing. And then, you know, the leaders force you to defend them or fire the candidates or something.
00:13:19.200something. Do you think this kind of thing is going to catch on and affect the NDP negatively?
00:13:25.000Because everybody knows it's cliche to say by now, but it's it's quite true. Calgary is the
00:13:30.300battleground of this coming election. The NDP have got in Edmonton sewn up. UCP has got pretty much
00:13:37.200everything outside the two big cities with a few minor exceptions sewn up. It's gonna be Calgary,
00:13:41.700and there's a two Calgary candidates in writings that are currently held by the UCP. Elbow, I can,
00:13:47.160I can definitely see going NDP if things go their way.
00:13:54.820They won it by about a dozen or so votes in 2015,
00:13:58.260and that was with a Wild Rose PC split.
00:14:01.600Glenmore, NDP are only taking Glenmore if the UCP are getting wiped out in Calgary.
00:14:06.200But bring this back to Battleground Calgary.
00:14:09.880How big of an effect do you think this kind of thing is going to have?
00:14:13.340Well, I think it's got to have an effect, and it's got to be a measurable one.
00:14:17.160I'm not alarmed by people going out and talking, by the way, about two genders.
00:14:22.600At the time, people, I think, have had it with the woke gender bending and the woke everything else.
00:14:32.980Party leaders may have to make a decision as what they say, but ordinary voters are just going to say, you know, it's the emperor's new clothes.
00:14:40.560Let's go back to are these people going to be good for what I do?
00:15:13.780then that's gonna hurt according to think they're able to thread this needle
00:15:21.460though that because I think for a lot of people the centrality of the oil
00:15:30.220industry and to a lesser extent agriculture in Alberta is not direct
00:15:34.480people drilling and servicing rigs feel know it's direct people who are
00:15:40.060engineers and buildings in downtown Calgary here, they know it. But people a step removed from it
00:15:46.720who are not in the industry, I feel like, you know, every step removed from it, it's getting
00:15:52.860weaker and Albertans don't quite understand their personal interests in the success of the oil and
00:15:57.500gas industry. And, you know, these NDP candidates aren't coming out holding no more pipeline signs
00:16:05.200And that's been haunting Notley for some time. These guys aren't as overt or over the top like those past protests were. And I guess it depends on how it's played. I do think Calgary Elbow, at least localized with these particular candidates, this can hurt. That's a swing riding. Elbow can certainly go either way. But at best, it's a center left.
00:16:27.180I mean, when Alberta party took it, for example, you know, there was a pragmatic, not a hard left candidate who took that.
00:16:33.600But likewise, they're just as happy to come in and take a very conservative candidate.
00:16:37.420So how they present themselves down there really have an impact.
00:16:41.120And the taint of potentially, though, being anti-oil and gas can very much hurt, though, as I said.
00:16:48.840I mean, a lot of there's some very staunch or very involved energy people in that spot.
00:16:53.840But whether it's a game changer for the whole election.
00:16:55.700So, you know, there's also like, you know, dregs along 4th Street there that are kind of hipster.
00:17:01.220Oh, and there's champagne socialists who don't understand where that money came from in the first place.
00:17:05.080I'm not sure how much this hurts them there.
00:17:07.220They're not holding no more pipeline signs.
00:17:09.480They're just, you know, going to be able to kind of pass it off, float it off as Pemida did here and just saying, oh, well, we're just trying to find green solutions to make the world better.
00:17:17.320Part of it will be making this disappear.
00:17:19.180You know, if they don't have to address it, then they can probably get away with it.
00:17:23.440But if they come out and say, no, no, I'm fully for oil and gas, well, they will lose that fourth street touch.
00:17:28.460Well, so far, the Western Standard, as far as I know, the only media that's touched this.
00:17:32.600So, I mean, it's not like the CBC and the Herald and the Sun are touching this yet.
00:17:38.080So the ball's kind of in their court right now.
00:17:39.700And as Nigel says, as long as the UCP doesn't blow it, I mean, if they don't overplay it as well and so on,
00:17:43.600they can use that as a little bit of a knife to twist.
00:17:45.560But it's not a break the party sort of issue yet either.
00:17:49.100So, yeah. Okay, well, let's, we're gonna move on to Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, just traveled to Ottawa, I think she just came back from Ottawa now. And she met there, she was there for the first ministers meeting where, you know, every few years, the premiers, actually, every single year, the premiers get together on their own. And every single year, they beg daddy Ottawa for more healthcare money, seeming to forget that Ottawa was not supposed to have anything to do with
00:18:18.800health care under the Canadian Constitution. But the Canada Health Transfer Accord is coming
00:18:26.160up for renewal. That's always a time to try and squeeze more money out of Ottawa for it.
00:18:31.920The federal government, I don't know why they went to Ottawa for this. The federal government
00:18:36.240clearly decides these things before anybody gets there. So I'm not really sure what the
00:18:39.520point of going to Ottawa is. But they're going to do $196 billion over 10 years. That's a $46
00:18:45.840billion dollar increase to the baseline that was already slotted for that. That wasn't the
00:18:53.760interesting parts though. Smith's interactions with Trudeau were much more interesting.
00:19:00.160Particularly the handshake that was that was awkward. Some have said that, you know, maybe
00:19:08.400Trudeau really leaned into trying to be intimidated by squeezing you know when you see it zoomed in
00:19:15.200There's a very clear white mark surrounded by red
00:19:18.180where it appears as maybe his thumb was pressing.
00:23:13.280It's not secret. How would they know? Unless they're a Freemason.
00:23:15.100There we go. I didn't think he, again, intended to have that weird. But now once they were locked, now it's time to stare at the cameras no matter what. And he wasn't letting her hand loose. It was just a bizarre thing. I think he was a bit upset that she'd pulled that with him too. And that's part of why he gave that squeeze. And I think in hindsight, he's probably thinking, oh, God, I should have known better than that.
00:23:34.180I do, I remember, you know, Kenny and Trudeau got their photo, and I think Kenny got it pretty right, you know, he looked like stern, it was like, it looked like if, I don't know, George Bush met Kim Jong-il, like, fine, we're going to meet, but they don't like each other, and, you know, I think Kenny got the photo he was looking for, he was looking stern, and, you know, back in the era before we realized it, I'll just be angry letters sent to Ottawa.
00:24:03.560It was kind of the photo he was looking for.
00:24:05.800I'm not sure either of them got the photo they were looking for here.
00:24:09.020I think it was just awkward and weird.
00:24:11.340Speaking of awkward and weird, let's look at this video of, you know, this is kind of a new thing, you know, kind of like a diplomatic meeting.
00:24:24.500You know, you see this in the White House.
00:24:26.220Now the president will have the president of Ukraine over, the Canadian prime minister, UK prime minister.
00:24:32.180Let's look at this video of Justin Trudeau and Danielle Smith sitting down, having some pictures taken of them, just chilling.
00:24:40.380And remarks from Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.
00:24:44.100I'm delighted to be able to have an opportunity to talk about some areas of common interest, maybe some areas of diversion, to see if we can find some common interest.
00:24:54.040We have, I think, a lot of shared goals in addressing issues of Indigenous health care and health addiction, home care, community-based care as we transform our health care system, so I'm pleased that we'll be meeting with all of our help, all the other bringers today.
00:25:10.240But, of course, I did write a letter to the Prime Minister a couple of weeks ago expressing concern about some of the major initiatives that have been announced without much consultation with Alberta that stand to have a huge impact on our province, the just transition of our legislation, which is the impression that the energy sector is going to be phased out and it's not going to be phased out.
00:25:35.340We're transforming away from high-intensity emissions to lower emissions, and we have some shared priorities on that.
00:25:43.340LNG export to reduce emissions using the green transfer mechanism to get credit here.
00:25:50.340That would also help British Columbia, working on critical minerals, hydrogen, geothermal.
00:25:56.340I think there's a lot of opportunity for us to find some common ground.
00:26:00.340I'm also concerned about the green electricity regulations. Our province has 90% of our electricity grid on natural gas and so a fairly phase out of natural gas is just that we're not going to result in a reliable and affordable option for our province and so we had also a proposed emissions cap on the energy sector. We've said very clearly that an aggressive emissions cap such as was initially proposed would really be a production cap.
00:26:29.340Yeah, because there isn't a feasible way for us to achieve that within eight years.
00:26:34.140So with that, I think we'll find some common ground on some of those issues today.
00:26:37.560Sometimes it's going to be for all of Canada that we need to find common ground
00:26:43.600so that we can continue to move forward on the rest of the issues.
00:26:48.200Well, as we saw there, I actually haven't seen this with premiers and the prime minister before.
00:26:54.020Maybe it's been done before, but I've generally only ever seen it at the White House
00:26:57.200where they sit sit together and they answer and you're it's kind of like a very casual press
00:27:04.400conference it's postal but you're but you know when you're standing beside the leader you're
00:27:11.040with here the opposing leader you're expected to be kind of in very good your best manners you
00:27:17.360know danielle smith slams on trudeau trudeau has nasty things to say about smith the sovereignty
00:27:22.760act and stuff and but you know you're side by side with each other you're always more friendly to
00:27:26.900That's why everybody's a tough guy behind the wheel of a car behind the keyboard. Meet them in real life. It's different. But, you know, Smith was trying to walk off a fine line here. She's trying to be friendly, be personable with Trudeau because he's right beside her in the chair. But she's also talking about just transition stuff. But I did notice her language was much softer than it normally is.
00:27:56.880expect that because you know she can't sit you know i i wouldn't sit here and say you know nigel0.99
00:28:02.160is you know these bloody english bastards uh you know i wouldn't say nasty things in front of you0.98
00:28:07.520you know if i'm gonna say nasty things i'd probably want to i'll say it in my car behind a keyboard
00:28:11.440right it's a little harder face to face get out of reach we'll talk about this later yeah yeah
00:28:15.840you know what he says about you oh yeah you don't even know i saw it scrolled in the washer yeah
00:28:20.400uh so let's start with you you corey um how about you think she walked the line on this one because1.00
00:28:25.120it's tough. She's expected to be tough and oppositional with Trudeau. But at the same time,
00:28:30.080she's sitting beside him. How do you think she handled it? It was a bit awkward. I think she
00:28:35.100did okay. I mean, there wasn't anything really resolved or settled. So there weren't big things
00:28:39.100you could speak to. I mean, they've made their statements. She wants to look as if she's standing
00:28:44.180strongly for Alberta, but you still have to be diplomatic. You don't want to, nobody wants to
00:28:48.360see her go there and put the finger right into the prime minister's eye. I mean, there's no sense0.64
00:28:52.380bringing on more fight than we've already got. We've got plenty of fight. I think a lot of people
00:28:55.440do want to see that. I'm not sure. I think a lot of people want to see at least. A certain segment
00:29:01.260wants to see that. And I wouldn't lose a lot of sleep seeing it. But realistically, if you want
00:29:06.100to be an effective government and representing the whole province, you still have to be diplomatic.
00:29:10.380And she did what she could with it, as did Trudeau. I mean, he didn't bring up a start a fight while
00:29:16.380he was there either, which I don't think would have served either of them well. So it was kind
00:29:19.960apart from the, for the course, for what we would expect aside from the handshake, which shows
00:29:24.140just how much underlying tension there really is there. I don't know, how do you think she
00:29:28.760handled it, Nigel? Because it was awkward. No, it was. Well, look, obviously, you have,
00:29:36.320you save your, you save your strongest arguments and your most vociferous statements for behind
00:29:42.500closed doors when only the staff see it. It's not recorded. It would not have played well in the
00:29:49.300rest of the country. I mean, the national press is just waiting for a chance to jump on Danielle
00:29:55.220Smith and say, well, she's, look at her, she's just a something from Alberta and we don't need1.00
00:30:02.000to pay this person any respect or take her seriously. You walk in there with your boxing
00:30:07.620gloves on, that's the treatment that she would have got. I thought that she laid out Alberta's0.98
00:30:41.380It's kind of like equalization. They can lobby
00:30:43.040They can lobby for these things publicly and privately, but at the end of the day, it's the federal government.
00:30:48.660I was surprised not to see much from Alberta and Saskatchewan against increasing the health care transfer because people don't understand this.
00:31:02.760Now, they're not as bad as equalization because we do get some.
00:31:05.620Alberta gets some, Saskatchewan gets some, but it's not on a per capita basis.
00:31:09.400But taxes to Ottawa are not paid on a per capita basis. They're based on our incomes. And our businesses pay more in tax than places outside of Alberta and less than Saskatchewan. And our people pay more income tax than people outside of Alberta and a lesser degree Saskatchewan.
00:31:25.680So we're paying way more per capita in taxes to Ottawa. Then Ottawa kicks some of the money back to the provinces per capita. Also, we have a younger, healthier population than most other provinces and Saskatchewan to an extent as well.
00:31:39.320So the fact that there is any health care dollars going from Alberta or Saskatchewan to Ottawa and then back to the provinces is never in our interest.
00:31:49.380I don't recall seeing Scott Moe, I don't recall seeing Danielle Smith saying cut health care transfers because that would have kept more net wealth in Alberta and Saskatchewan than doing this.
00:32:01.360So this seems actually to be a big loss for Alberta, even though Alberta and Saskatchewan
00:32:08.980get more money, net based on what we're paying in, we're getting less.
00:32:50.460That works out to something like, there's about 1% increase, which is not even worth
00:32:57.880fighting over. So Alberta presently spends $22 billion a year on health. That's more than a
00:33:07.540third of the provincial budget. So this is not going to change the way anybody lives.
00:33:13.200So I don't see that there's a lot of incentive for Alberta or any of the provinces, frankly,
00:33:21.040to step up and say, yeah, give it to us and we'll do whatever you want. Because don't forget the
00:33:25.940deal here is that if you take the money you also are signing on for your full support for the
00:33:34.420Canada Health Act which is translated in Ottawa ease as no private health care where that is
00:33:45.380actually the solution 60% according to a recent poll 60% of Canadians are now prepared to say
00:33:53.220As long as it's a single government pair, let's by all means use anybody who's got a surgery and a clinic and who can push people through.
00:34:01.240This is actually what the government of Alberta is presently doing is they've expanded, I believe, 3,000 extra surgical procedures, mostly for orthopedics.
00:34:13.900These are the people who've been waiting years, not months.
00:34:19.820If they take the money, that is going to be harder to do.
00:34:24.340So I can readily appreciate, well, they just sat there, let the Prime Minister say his piece.
00:34:31.040And when we get back to Alberta, when we get back to Toronto, when we get back to Regina,
00:34:38.800you know, we're going to move ahead with our solutions to fix our problems, not Ottawa.
00:34:44.880Corey, do you think, you know, so Nigel's talking about, you know, this money comes with strings attached from Ottawa, even though the federal government has no role whatsoever for health care in the Constitution, the Supreme Court of Canada throughout the history of Canada has much more often than not sided with not just federal power, but federal executive power.
00:35:04.520And with that comes the so-called spending power, which was not something granted to the federal government under the Constitution, just something given to the federal government constitutionally by the Supreme Court, where, yeah, I was not allowed to control health care directly, but they can indirectly control it by putting out money with strings attached to it, like it was foreign aid, essentially.
00:35:26.720This new money comes with strings attached, just as all the existing money in the pot comes with strings attached.
00:35:31.740but you know the premiers were all saying they wanted more money
00:35:36.520do you think it was possible for say smith and mo if they wanted to
00:35:41.300politically to say no stop giving us health care money or would that just
00:35:46.100create too many enemies with the other provinces and isolate them
00:35:49.480because clearly they'd probably just be the two and not just with the provinces
00:35:52.520but with their own voters like what you spoke of before with how it works you
00:35:55.800know if the provinces declined it yes technically it would mean more for us
00:35:59.680but try and sell that to the person when Rachel Notley is up there saying they're passing up on
00:36:03.940healthcare dollars while our patients are waiting in waiting lists. Like it would be very difficult
00:36:09.040to sell. It's kind of like you say, if you're explaining, you're losing. And you know, you had
00:36:12.700to speak for a couple of minutes to explain how that works. And of course, but so politically,
00:36:17.160I mean, it would be a terrible stance to take a very difficult one anyways. As Nigel said too,
00:36:23.400the amount isn't that high. I mean, where the battles will go, there are strings, but the only
00:36:27.860And there hasn't been a lot of talk about that, though, very directly, as much as Jagmeet Singh's been demanding it and others to crack down on Ford or Smith for expanding things.
00:36:36.400All Trudeau kept saying was it's going to stay within the Health Act.
00:36:38.900And if you look within the Health Act, there's nothing stopping private provision, actually.
00:36:42.240That's just a matter of, you know, interpretation at best.
00:36:47.240It's only private payment that's illegal, which still sucks.
00:37:39.880Every leader always wants more money, but they're not looking for a battle right now.
00:37:42.980You know, Corey, maybe they should just take what's offered and go home.
00:37:46.000It's not as if the federal government has got such wonderful finances
00:37:49.280that they can afford to give the provinces all that they would like if they had the chance.
00:37:53.420Well, just really quickly, the federal conservative critique of this, so lame, it was so lame.
00:38:01.660They just said, they weren't saying necessarily that the federal government should have spent more money,
00:38:07.380but they were saying, well, Trudeau spent the cupboards bare, so there is no more money.
00:38:12.100Okay, yeah, Trudeau did spend the cupboards bare, but take a firm position.
00:38:16.680Should the federal government be involved in areas outside of its jurisdiction or not?
00:38:20.240Jake Mead seeing it is at least consistent. Yes, it should be. It should absolutely be outside of its jurisdiction. The NDP's policy for a long time has been more or less, Canada should be as close to a unitary, centralized state as possible, with the exception of Quebec, which gets to do whatever it wants.
00:38:37.260So the NDP have been consistent, but the conservatives are just kind of sucking and blowing on this one.
00:38:43.660Just, you know, if you're not going to have a good reason, thoughtful criticism of the government, shut up and don't make a criticism.
00:38:50.020There's enough to criticize the government on.
00:38:53.260Speaking of sucking and blowing, Joe Biden and the balloon.
00:39:05.860The Chinese spy balloon that made its way over the somewhere, I guess, around the Pacific and gently drifted all the way across America.
00:39:18.860And, you know, by the time we found out about it, you know, I'm sure the American military and intelligence establishment had probably known about it for a long time.
00:39:28.100By the time we find out about it, it's, you know, it's old news.
00:44:01.480Some of you I tease more than others because some of you I get a better rise out.
00:44:04.420Honestly, you know, picture yourself out in your back 40, you've got a double-barreled 12-gauge shotgun, and there's somebody's full drone going over.