Front Burner - Hanukkah event shooting // Liberal majority watch

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

First, the latest on the massacre at Bondi Beach in Australia. The mass shooting targeted the Jewish community on the first day of Hanukkah.We speak with Sean Tarek Goodwin, a reporter with ABC News, who was one of the first to arrive on the scene.Second, a surprise defection on Parliament Hill.Late last week, just hours after Parliament wrapped for the year, the Liberals welcomed another floor crosser into the party. With 171 seats, they are now just one MP away from holding a majority.Aaron Wherry is a senior writer with CBC’s Parliamentary bureau.He’s here to talk about all that, and look back at Prime Minister Carney’s first sitting.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

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Donate at lovescarbro.cairbo. This is a CBC podcast. Hi, I'm Jamie Poisson. This was an attack deliberately targeted at the Jewish community on the first day of Hanukkah, which of course should be a joyous celebration. And the Jewish community are hurting today. Today, all Australians wrap our arms around them and say we stand with you. So that was Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

he was speaking, of course, about the horrifying mass shooting on Sunday at a popular beach where a Hanukkah event was happening. At the time that we are recording this on Sunday evening, 15 people are dead, including a child, a Holocaust survivor, and a rabbi. One suspect is also dead, the other injured and in hospital. This is where we are going to start today's show. Speaking to a journalist with ABC News, Australia's public broadcaster, Sean Tarrick Goodwin.

He was one of the first to arrive on the scene. And then, a bit later, we will continue with the episode that we had planned before this shooting took place, a conversation with my colleague Aaron Wary about some significant political developments in Ottawa that raise serious questions about the future of the Conservative Party. Sean, hi, thank you so much for making the time. Hello. So I wonder if you could take us back. Can you describe what we now know.

happened on Sunday. So this was in many ways a summer's Sunday evening at Bondi Beach. Prior to this, an idyllic day, one of the first warm beach days of the summer. That's a place where many people gather, people travel to Sydney to enjoy a sunset at Bondi, and it was the first day of Hanukkah. There was a celebration there of the Jewish community coming together to share in their cultural foods and activities, families there at the park just behind the sand, enjoying and celebrating the first day of Hanukkah. The contrast between that and what then unfolded is absolutely extreme to gunmen, standing on a nearby bridge above a parking section, slightly elevated,

opening fire into that crowd. The people I spoke to there who were in that crowd described it as 10 minutes of absolute hell on earth, witnessing people being shot, trying to render assistance, people fleeing, screaming. It was scenes of absolute extreme devastation until police and good Samaritans were able to apprehend and disarm the two shooters. At this point, 15 people are dead and in addition to that, one of the gunmen is also dead. As I said, you were one of the first reporters of the scene of the shooting. I just wonder if you could tell me a little bit more about what you yourself saw and what you

heard from more about what you heard from witnesses. That afternoon I was actually about a suburb away when I heard what sounded like fireworks followed by sirens and that was accompanied by a sense of dread and then we had confirmation that there was an active shooter scene down at Bondi and when I arrived the people who were running up from the beach with tears in their warning people there's a shooting don't go to the beach turn away and arriving down to a massive group of people a large number of civilians and then also emergency service people paramedics and police attending to people lying on the ground people in stretches being ferried into ambulances and taken away there was a cordoned off police section just behind from the beach as those

people were trying to help provide assistance. I mean, the majority of them were civilians, but there was also just a sea of flashing lights along the street behind the beach there as a massive number of ambulance and police units were there trying to move people on, trying to provide assistance there. We know that police officers were getting behind the wheel of ambulances so that paramedics could attend to people in the back and ferry them out to hospitals. in the area. Wow. I know that this number is changing, but do we have a sense of just how many people are in hospital injured right now? It's quite a lot, right? It is. A total of 42 people were

hospitalized. Many of those remain there and many in a critical condition. The death toll announced yesterday evening was 11 up to 12, and then further people have died in hospital that's elevated the death told to a total of 16, including one of the shooters, which was a 50-year-old man. Police have confirmed with us this morning in a press conference that these two people, a 24-year-old man and a 50-year-old man, were a father and son. We've confirmed the name of the younger man as Navid Akram, that 50-year-old man was shot dead by police, but the younger man was taken to hospital under police guard in a critical condition.

And do we know anything else about the investigation so far? Police have told us that the father, the 50-year-old man, was a licensed gun owner and owned six firearms, and those, among those were the firearms that were used in this incident. So the father was shot dead by police and a home in Sydney's western suburbs, which was connected to these two individuals, was raided by police last night. An Airbnb in another part of the city where it's believed that those two people had been was also raided by police. and police has formed part of their investigations. Police and security officials have told us that one of the two was known to the Australia's security intelligence agency, but only in a minor way. So the details as to the investigation will start to come as time comes.

It's only about 12, 13 hours from this incident as we're speaking. Yeah, middle of the day for you. There was a question at some point about whether there was a third shoot. at this moment. What do we know about that? Police have now confirmed that they don't believe there was a third person involved or a third person at the scene. There was some investigation at the time about reports of a potential third person, but police have now confirmed that they don't believe that that was the case. They're investigating whether these two people acted in an isolated way or

were connected with other individuals or networks. But the idea of a potential third person, and has now been essentially ruled out by police. One of the things that they were dealing with at the scene was an improvised explosive device that was in a car quite close to that bridge, and it took police some time to neutralize that threat and remove that device from the area. You mentioned earlier that the police.

but also good Samaritans neutralized or ended up taking out the shooters. And there is this extraordinary video of a man who tackles one of the gunmen after he came down from the bridge, right? And he manages to overtake him and to steal the gun away. And he is, of course, now being called a hero. And what do we know about that man's story right now? That man, we understand, is a father from Sydney. southern suburbs, who owns a fruit shop with his family and the messages of praise of the

bravery of that man to approach and neutralise that threat. He runs up to this shooter and sort of grabs him from behind, wrestles his gun off him and points the gun towards him as the man retreats. The Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese, the Premier of New South Wales, have both praised his bravery saying that if he hadn't done that, we'd be dealing with more victims and more fatalities and he should be credited as a hero. And just among the victims, I know I mentioned in the intro there, there is a child that has now been confirmed dead.

A rabbi, a Holocaust survivor is just terrible. What do we know right now? Could you tell me a little bit more about the victims of this? We haven't confirmed the identities of all of the victims, the ones that we know a 10-year-old child, a girl, another identified victim, British-born Rabbi Eli Schlanger. We do know that these shots were being fired towards this gathering of Sydney's Jewish community. And we understand that a number of those victims were within that gathering and the sense of shock and grief in Sydney's Jewish communities just beyond work. today. The Jewish leaders that we've been speaking to have been talking about the complete disbelief among them and the fear and the shock and the immense mourning in the Jewish

community in Sydney, as they've lost many of their own, many loved family members, community figures, young people, older people. It's an immense sense of sense of grief. The scale of this tragedy is large, particularly for Australia. This is our most deadly shooting incident since the Port Arthur incident some years ago. I also, as I understand it, there's been a series of anti-Semitic attacks in Australia recently. I think people are absolutely shocked by this. But what kind of events led up to this attack? What we know is that the Jewish community in Sydney and in other parts of Australia has been feeling a rising sense of fear amid a rising sense of anti-Semitism in the community.

We've seen a number of incidents, particularly targeting areas of Sydney, where there's a high Jewish population with graffiti attacks. We've seen swast tickers. We've seen slurs being spray painted on various Jewish institutions, cars, satellite. light. We've also seen synagogues fire bombed and damaged. The sense of fear of a rising sense of anti-Semitism among the Jewish community has been very extreme in Sydney and in Melbourne in other parts of Australia where some of these incidents have taken place. The fears were

and what community leaders were saying was that this ends with violence, that rising incidents of intimidation, anti-Semitism. Their fears and their warning was that this could only end in violence. The absolute tragedy is that a very extreme example of that violence has unfolded in Sydney. And it's something that I think was beyond even the fears of what people were concerned of. It's something that is just so extreme targeting an open gathering in Sydney's iconic Bondi Beach on the first day of Hanukkah, families, community members of all ages, gathering there, and many of whom now have lost their lives. Sean, thank you very much for this and for all of your coverage.

Take care and thank you for making the time. Thank you very much. Okay, so before we move to the second part of this episode, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney spoke Sunday. at an event to mark the beginning of Hanukkah. Here's a bit of his remarks. The government will always stand with you. It is not enough to protect the Jewish community.

It is not enough for Jewish Canadians to live without fear. This is about thriving. This is about taking the light and spreading it today across our country and through generations so that this is the last generation that has to struggle against hate.

Right now we are going to take a break and then we'll be back with Aaron Wary from our Parliamentary Bureau. You need grit to climb this high this often. You've got to be an underdog that always over-delivers. You've got to be 6,500 hospital staff, 1,000 doctors, all doing so much with so little. You've got to be Scarborough. Defined by our uphill battle and always striving towards new heights.

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Find an agent today at dejjardin.com slash business coverage. All right. So now we are moving on to part two of this episode. Late last week, just hours after parliament rose for the winter break, the liberals got another floor crosser. With 171 seats, they are now just one MP away from holding a majority. This is all very bad news for the conservative leader Pierre Pollyov, who now has lost two MPs to the liberals and a third who announced his resignation. So Aaron Werry, for the conservative leader, Pierre Pollyov, who now has lost two MPs to the liberals, and a third who announced his resignation. So Aaron Wary from our Ottawa Bureau is here with me today to discuss this. Also, we thought it would be a good time to look back at Prime Minister Carney's new government over the last half year or so. Erin, hey. Hey. So Thursday evening, we got this press release from then conservative Markham Unionville MP Michael Maugh. He is crossing the floor to the liberals. He has decided, according to him, that, quote, Prime Minister Mark Carney is offering the steady practical approach. We need to. to deliver on the priorities I hear every day while door knocking and, quote, I entered public service to help people to focus on solutions, not division. Did you see something like this

coming? What do we know about how it all went down? So I definitely didn't see it coming. I mean, there'd been obviously the rumors, you know, back a month ago, there'd been all sorts of rumors that, you know, multiple conservative MPs were going to cross the floor to liberals. But those had kind of died down to a certain degree. And it felt like things had sort of stabilized, I guess, for the conservatives. And then, you know, comes this news release on Thursday evening. You know, we now know it was a pretty sudden move because Michael Maugh maybe became the first MP in parliamentary history to attend two different parties' Christmas celebrations. He, you know, went to the Christmas Party for the Conservatives one night and then showed up at the Liberal Christmas

Party the next night. Some of you apparently came back from the dead to be liberals here tonight. Others may have just joined our party. Like literally, just joined our party. So let's give a warm welcome to our newest member of the Liberal Party, Michael Ma. Wow, such a big welcome. Thank you. Thank you.

All I want to say is, Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and a great 2026 coming to all of you. There do seem to have been sort of long conversations happening between him and Tim Hodgson, the Natural Resources Minister, who represents a riding that neighbors Michael Maas. But it does seem to have come together fairly quickly. so much so that Michael Maugh was in the Conservative Party secret Santa and seems to have apparently bailed on his Secret Santa and not delivered a gift. And then wasn't somebody complaining over the weekend that they got him a gift? Yes.

Yes. Yes. So the conservative MP were riding near London had purchased Michael Maugh a gift and delivered the gift to Michael Maugh, but then Michael Maugh apparently did not deliver his gift to conservative MP Jamil Giovanni. Can you just explain the Secret Santa thing? Oh, yeah. We had a Secret Santa. I

purchased my gift for my dear friend Mel Arnold. And when we were all giving out gifts, I didn't have one given to me. And I thought, wow, maybe someone forgot, you know, no judgment. And then when Michael Ma crossed the floor, I wondered, hmm, maybe

I didn't get a gift because he decided not to give one. And maybe he decided to give it to a liberal instead. So I did inquire as to who was supposed to be my secret Santa and it turns out it was Michael Ma. And I did not get a gift. So just wanted noted for the record. Will you be asking for one or? I just went on. I don't know. I don't know if I would trust whatever he wants to send me. There was also a suggestion that that Michael Maude didn't pay for his ticket, I guess, to the Christmas party, the conservative Christmas party and said something about, yeah, I'll get you later.

So I would not hold my breath on him paying for his ticket. This is very funny. Okay, just continuing on this Christmas party theme for a little while longer here. I think it's probably worth us talking about how last year at the liberal Christmas party, Christopher, had just resigned in a letter very critical of Trudeau. Addressed to the prime minister from finance minister, Christopherelan, we'll bring it up so you can read it along. But I'm going to read it through.

For the past number of weeks, you and I have found ourselves at odds about the best pass forward for Canada. Our country today faces a grave challenge. The incoming administration in the United States is pursuing a policy of aggressive economic nationalism. We need to take that threat extremely seriously. That means eschewing costly political gimmicks, which we can ill afford and which make Canadians doubt that we recognize the gravity of the moment. That means pushing back. It was a pretty seismic story at the time. the party itself was headed towards a massive defeat.

Trudeau was clinging on to leadership, essentially refusing to go. Big difference this year. Yes. It is a remarkable bookend to the last 12 months because the last, you know, the last Christmas party for the liberals was a day after, as you say, a day after Freeland's resignation,

you know, Justin Trudeau went and delivered a speech and tried to talk about, oh, well, you know, lots of families argue over the holidays. Like most families, sometimes we have fights around the holidays. But of course, like most families, we find our way through it. You know, the Liberal Caucus chair who spoke it before Mark Carney at this year's Christmas party, he even brought this up to say, like, hey, remember what it was like here last year?

Do you notice a difference? It is, like, it's quite incredible that you could have a situation a year, you know, after what happened at the last Christmas party that would look like this, because I just don't think even maybe the most optimistic liberal would have ever imagined that they would be still standing and in government 12 months later, let alone, you know, having conservative MPs defect from Pierre Polyov side to join them. Let's talk about Polyev. So this time last year, he was headed for a majority. And now he has lost Michael Mon. Then before that, Nova Scotia MP Christantremant. And also Alberta MP Matt Jenneru, who was rumored to be thinking about floor crossing, but then he just chose to resign next year. And he really hasn't shown up for anything, any kind of votes since. So this is to state the very obvious. not good for Polyev, but I would be interested to hear your thoughts on how bad people in Ottawa

I think it is for him. Yeah, I think I think it's quite bad. You know, I think the, what was the headline in Campbell Clerk's column for the Globe Mail, potential disaster looms for Pierre Poliav. Like, it's hard to see this as anything other than a real setback for him, and it puts him in a very difficult position. MP Chris Donchermont crossed the floor to the liberals in November, citing Pollyev's leadership as a reason why. And now Michael Maugh. Pauliev responded saying, today he chose to endorse the very policies

that he was elected to oppose, the same policies driving up food prices and making life more expensive for all. The people he let down the most are the ones who elected him to fight for an affordable future. He'll have to answer to them. He has this leadership review coming up in January.

That is a vote of the party membership, the Conservative Party membership. And I think there's a general belief that, you know, amongst the most enthusiastic conservative party supporters, he still has a fair bit of support so that, you know, he could probably win that vote, you know, somewhat easy. Although I think at this point, you would have to wonder how many conservative party members, even amongst the most enthusiastic, are starting to wonder whether this can still hold itself together. And at what point, you know, do other conservative MPs start to say, you know,

even if they don't want to cross the floor, do they necessarily want to stick behind Pierre Pollyup? Because the thing that's looming over all of this is if the liberals get one more, one more MP, they're up to 172. That's a, you know, a narrow majority in the House of Commons. And at that point, their chances of making it a full four years start to look pretty good. And, you know, at that point, does it sort of cross not only a kind of mathematical threshold, but a psychological threshold for conservatives where they say this just isn't working.

You know, I think it's useful to remember that this crumbling unity on the conservative side really started with Pierre Polyev talking, you know, didn't interview and suggested that there was this, you know, RCMP orchestrated cover up on behalf of Justin Trudeau. Many of the scandals of the Trudeau era should have been involved in jail time. I mean, Trudeau broke the criminal code when he took a free vacation from someone with whom he had government business. It's just like it's right there in the criminal code. If the RCMP had been doing its job and not covering up for him, then he would have been criminally charged. And that just brought back all the questions about, you know, is Pierre Pauly of the right leader for this moment? Is he the

right leader that Canadians are going to support? And if the liberals get to a majority, you know, Pierre Polly is going to say, oh, it's underhanded in backroom deals and this sort of thing. But I, at that point, his argument for staying on his leader, I think he's going to have a hard time making that argument. We just heard him make some of that argument. Hey, he was just on our colleague Rosie Barton's show. And what kind of response did you hear from that interview? Yeah, so he's, so a couple things. One, he's trying to turn the argument back on Mark Carney to say, you know, Mark Carney didn't get a majority in the election. And now he's trying to sort of manufacture a majority by getting people to cross the floor. He is trying to manipulate his way

through backroom deals to get that majority. He's allowed to do this, though, right? Forecrossing is allowed. You've benefited from it. But he's trying to take a majority, a costly majority, that would drive up the cost of living, enrich liberal elites, of course, but not through democratic means. My message to Mark Carney is that if you want a costly majority government to drive up taxes and deficits, then you have to go to the Canadian people and have them vote for it, not do it by. I think it is, you know, it is interesting to see whether, you know, at some point Canadians start to view floor crossings as particularly cynical or maybe think it doesn't reflect well on Mr. Carney. But, you know, it's hard to get away entirely from the fact that

they're leaving Pierre Polyeuf's party and the questions that raises for Mr. Polyeuf and his leadership. The other part of it is that, you know, our colleague, Rosie Barton, tried to press him on what does it say about your leadership. Are you reflecting on your leadership? I mean, I know you don't like it. And we can talk about the merits of floor crossing and whether it should be allowed. But it is allowed. So back to my question, is this a sign of a weakness in your leadership that two members of your caucus have left? No, it's a sign of backroom dealings that will drive up the cost of living.

And don't take my word for it. Take Mr. Moss word. This is what he said a few weeks ago. And, you know, it doesn't do him any good to reflect publicly, but he doesn't seem to be reflecting on his leadership. And he doesn't seem to be changing his style. And I think, rightly or wrongly, I think he sort of is who he is. And he sort of said that from the start. I think the question at this point is, at what point do, you know, conservative MPs just decide this isn't working? And, you know, regardless of whether there's someone else waiting in the wings, they need to make a change. If there was someone waiting in the wings, if like you were hypothetically a person who was interested in challenging Pollyev, would you want to do it soon before this leadership vote?

Or would you want to kind of wait to see how it plays out and see, you know, maybe if he doesn't get a, if he wins, but he doesn't get a very large share, right? Like under 80% and then kind of come in when he's vulnerable there. Yeah. I mean, I think in these kind of leadership tussles, there's always some risk to coming out strong and trying to topple your leader because if it doesn't succeed, you've maybe alienated yourself from the political party and maybe wounded your political party in the process. And we also know that these things, you know, going back to 12 months ago, they take a long time sometimes to play out. You know, Christian Freeland's resignation may have effectively ended the Trudeau government, but it was months in the making. And the reason it sort of finally pushed things over is because he was so weakened at that point. I think, you know, so I don't know that this is going to be resolved quickly. I don't know that someone's going to come out of the shadows and say they want to be leader or directly kind of challenge Pierre Pollyov. And I think that's the other risk for the concert is that this could carry on for months and month before it ever gets resolved. Let's switch gears a little bit here.

So, as we mentioned, Parliament has now gone on winter break. They're back on January 26th. It's been a bit over half a year since Corny was elected PM. So I think it's a good time to kind of take stock here. What would you say are the big accomplishments from this government that stand out to you? I mean, first, I guess we have to say getting elected, given where we were 12 months ago. in terms of the agenda, in terms of the policy and legislative agenda, a few things. There's the major projects legislation, C5, the past in the spring, controversial, but got it

through the House of Commons, you know, seems to be having some impact, you know, they're moving projects forward. A major budget bill in the, or a major budget in the fall that included some pretty big moves. Canada's jobs minister is urging all MPs to back a budget that includes more money for housing and infrastructure and a major cash injection for the military. And then the memorandum of understanding with Alberta which again a major move

that had a lot of moving parts. Both governments have agreed to a set of commitments for the idea of a pipeline that would run from Western Canada to BC's coast. Now some of the things agreed to in this MOU are that Canada will exempt Alberta from some

federal environmental laws including oil and gas emission caps and that Alberta has agreed to expand its carbon capture program to reduce emissions. The pipeline would be built and funded by a private company and have indigenous co-ownership. I think those are kind of the three big policy moves of this government. There's a lot wrapped up in each of them, but I think that's sort of the core of what the Carney government's done. Obviously, the trade war with the U.S. has been the backdrop of Carney's time and office. Trade talks are now suspended and Carney has gotten some criticism for not having a deal or promising a deal back in the

summer, you know, maybe giving up some stuff for nothing in return like the digital services tax. We have talked about how Canadians generally are giving him runway here to deal with a very unpredictable and mercurial leader down south. But I do think it's worth us talking about the recent news that our ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman is stepping down. And the guy rumored to take her place is Mark Wiseman, a financier and friend of Carnies. And what do we know about Hillman's resignation and this reported push to put Wiseman in that role? Yeah, so it looks like the Hillman departure. It's nothing terribly controversial. I don't think it's, you know, when the government and soon to be former ambassador, I guess, say, you know, this was sort of a natural.

point for her to move on. I think that's a fair argument. She'd been there for a while. You don't really hear any complaints about how she handled the job. You know, most people seem to praise the job she did there. It doesn't feel like she was pushed out or that there was a conflict between her and Carney. But I think there's sort of a natural tendency for a prime minister to want to have an ambassador there who they feel very connected to or very close to. You know, if you go back to the Trudeau government, his first ambassador to Washington was David McNaughton. And there was some concern at the time that, you know, he didn't have ambassadorial experience and, oh, maybe he's just a friend of the prime minister. And that's why he's being sent to Washington.

But I think, you know, the argument that Trudeau people made at the time was, well, the friend part is like, is the key part because you want people in Washington to know that when they talk to the ambassador, they're talking to someone who has the year. the prime minister who knows the prime minister who is directly connected to the prime minister so that there's a real connection there and and they can have faith in the person they're talking to and not that people didn't necessarily have faith in christian humann but i think the wiseman connection bolsters probably that office in terms of it being connected to the prime minister and you know i think it probably also speaks a bit to the sort of people that carney sort of gravitates to right, which are business-oriented, lots of private sector experience. And, you know, you can sort of imagine, I guess, hypothetically,

how that could come in handy as we move into this next phase, potentially of real trade renegotiations. Let's talk now about what hasn't. been accomplished. I know that you have made a bit of a list. What stands out for you as the notable ones? Yeah. So as you say, there's obviously still the trade deal piece that's lingering out there, or at least some kind of agreement on the tariffs. But I think in terms of legislatively, you saw a bit this fall that the government is having not the easiest time getting legislation through the House, let's say. Well, the House of Commons has risen for the winter break

without passing the government's budget bill. MPs won't be back for another six weeks. And speaking earlier today, government house leader Stephen McKinnon said he's disappointed. There hasn't been more collaboration with opposition to get bills passed. I thought that the times called out for greater seriousness. And we've been systematically disappointed over the course of the fall. And then in particular on the justice and crime agenda, bail reform, hate crime legislation, and there's going to be some new legislation on mandatory minimums,

although that's just sort of reached the House. But some of these pieces have gotten bogged down in the House. And, you know, look, there's a lot of politics around crime and justice issues. It's an issue that the liberals have to play a lot of defense on. In terms of signaling change and in terms of signaling a new approach, they're pretty important, I think, politically to the Carney government. This government is committed to reforming the criminal code to ensure that organized crime, crime with handguns, home invasions, auto theft,

that the individuals who participate in those crimes pay the price, they should, with consecutive sentencing, that they are not... But they aren't moving quickly through the house. The conservatives are, you know, contesting elements and are happy to continue having fights. And this is, you know, I understand that people don't want to, you know, necessarily the Carnegie doesn't necessarily want us to repeat what. what the Trudeau government did, and for lots of reasons, you know, other parties might not want to get into what the Trudeau government did in terms of a confidence and supply agreement, you know, a formal agreement to help you move things through the House. But you're sort of seeing what happens when you don't have an actual agreement, which means that you don't have a sort of guaranteed way to get legislation through the House, through committees. There's all these sorts of bottlenecks. And if in a minority parliament, you don't have a dance party. you know, they can really hold you back.

Of course. Yeah, no. I guess being one closer to and perhaps even on your way to a majority, you know, if you believe money of the pundits out there will help. Yes. Yes. You were going where I was going. I mean, I guess if you can't, if you can't find a confidence in supply partner,

you can sort of make one yourself by just getting a few more. And you're right. If they do get, you know, one or two. more MPs to cross the aisle, suddenly this gets a lot easier for them. Okay, Aaron, you and I have talked a lot this year through this calendar year, and thank you for that. It's always so great to have you on. Actually, I should say the podcast that you and I and David Colletto recorded it 2 a.m. on election night was our number one episode of the year on Apple. From my perspective, this has been the most remarkable year that I have ever covered

in Canadian politics, but you do this every day, and you always have more of like a historical perspective on all of this than I do. And just as a student of Canadian political history, what stands out to you about this last year? How would you characterize it? Yeah, you know, look, actual historians might be able to fight me on this. But I think you would be hard pressed to find a more remarkable year in terms of Canadian political history, given And, you know, just where we were 12 months ago and where we are now. And, you know, look, the easiest answer for that is that Donald Trump happened and he sort of upset the apple cart and, you know, everything kind of changed after that. And I think that's really true in a number of ways and in ways we're still probably processing.

I think the next year is also going to be about sort of this big change we're going through in this new world we're facing. the Canadian political actors in the situation it's not like they were sort of innocent bystanders and they're just sort of dealing with the world as it comes I think the change that Donald Trump brought changed what Canadians were looking for it changed how they were judging their political leaders I think it tested Canadian political leaders

in terms of answering the moment, answering the challenge and I think we're still going to see that play out over the next, you know, years to come, potentially. I think the other thing it underlines, like, on a smaller point is, I think we sometimes assume that the current state of politics is just the way it's always going to be. Or, you know, an election happens, and we're like, ah, politics has been fundamentally altered and it's going to stay this way forever.

And I think we've seen not only in the past year, but even in recent elections, that trying to predict political features is silly and assuming that the status quo is going to go on forever or for the foreseeable future is also a mistake. And so this is why I always stay away from predictions, but I think the past year really underlines that things can change pretty quickly and pretty dramatically. Erin, I feel like I've set this up to say goodbye to you until the new year.

And then watch, you're just going to be back on later this week. Yeah, we still have a few days left. So, like, we got time for a cabinet shovel and probably, like, two more four days. Totally. But thank God we got to go through that Secret Santa stuff. That is really. The perfect end to you. Extremely fun.

But if I don't talk to you later this week, happy holidays. Happy New Year. And we'll talk soon. All right. for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you tomorrow.