Shaun Newman Podcast - #1103 - Jocelyn Burzuik Pt. 2

Episode Date: August 3, 2026

Jocelyn Burzuik is President and Senior Construction Manager of Sundance Construction & Safety Consulting Inc., a 100% Indigenous (Red River Métis)-owned general contracting firm she founded in Manitoba’s Interlake region in 2013. A design-builder and project management professional specializing in civil infrastructure—water and sewer systems, sewage lagoons, treatment plants, lift stations, and related works.Cornerstone Forum 26’https://shaunnewmanpodcast.substack.com/Silver Gold Bull Links:Website: https://silvergoldbull.ca/Email: [e-mail] Grahame: [phone]Bow Valley Credit UnionBitcoin: www.bowvalleycu.com/en/personal/investing-wealth/bitcoin-gatewayEmail: [e-mail] Get your voice heard: Text Shaun 587-217-8500

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This is James Lindsay. This is Vance Crow and you're listening to the Sean Newman podcast. Welcome to the podcast, folks. Happy Monday. How's everybody doing today? I wish you could see my view. I'm still, as I record this, sitting at Lake of the Woods at Carla Treadways, we just finished a spoiler alert.

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In our travels across Canada, we've ran into a lot of different people who've used Windsor plywood for their summer projects, Jamie Sinclair and his crew on their big concert they just had. Well, in Lloydminster, they are the builders of the podcast studio table. That's Carly Clossin and his team. They also supplied all the wood for inside the new studio. So whether we're talking mantles, decks, windows, doors, sheds, whatever your summer project is, stop into Windsor Plywood in Lloydminster, 3605, 51st Avenue, and I'd be, hey, if you've used Windsor Plywood in your community, why not shoot me a text? We can get that added in because it seems like Windsor Plywood is the place for quality wood all across Canada.

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If you're enjoying one of the shows you think would, or they'd enjoy, share it with them. That's one of the best ways we've been growing the show is getting you find folks to share it out to your, your community. That's what I got for you today. All right, let's get on to that tale of the tape. Today's guest is the owner of Sundance Construction. This is part two with Jocelyn Berziak. So buckle up, here we go.

Welcome to the Sean Newman podcast. I'm joined again by Jocelyn Berziac. We went for a marathon yesterday. We almost did three hours, but when we were leaving, we got talking about a few more things, and I said, whoa, can always just come back.

I'm here for one more day. And so that's what we're doing. So welcome back onto the show, Jocelyn. This is, I feel like I've done back-to-backs with people before, but it's not very often. But on the road trip, I'm like, well, I'm here. If you still won't have things to say, you know, like, when do we get to do this in person? Not very often. And so it's pretty rare.

So I thought I would come back and sit here. Now, I want to start. I was just saying this. And I keep saying it. about Manitoba in general and they're like my son got invited to a movie last night by a family

and I can't get over how friendly Manitobans are and Saskatchewan folk are friendly and Albertans are friendly and everything but not being from this province I just didn't I didn't know what to expect I guess and everywhere I go everyone has been extremely friendly

and then they said well we're living up to our moniker friendly friendly Manitoba but so to all Manitobans out there it's been super cool that way but we got talking about how dangerous Winnipeg is and they made it seem like I was sitting there talking to him I was telling you they're these weren't hardcore conservatives at least that is not what it came off as but the longer I kind of just slowly asked about Winnipeg and different things they brought up gangs they brought up drug use they brought up homeless and the longer I kind of just slowly asked about Winnipeg and different things they brought up gangs they brought up drug use they brought up homeless and the The guy who was probably roughly my age, I was saying, yeah, you know, like Lloyd, it's got some strange things, but I don't feel unsafe. And he looked at me. He's like, oh, no, no. You don't understand.

I feel unsafe. And I'm like, you feel unsafe. Yep. That's for a 40-year-old man, roughly, who wasn't a small guy. This wasn't a nerd. This was a pretty hefty guy. Like, I wouldn't want to tussle with him. He's like, no, no.

There's days walking down. where I'm like, I don't know, this has gotten strange. And I think, you know, I assume I'm going to find more of this further I go east. But your thoughts on Winnipeg and Manitoba, for that matter, not only the friendly part that I was talking about, but certainly the danger part. Well, the danger part is absolutely there. Like, you've met my son yesterday. He is also not a small guy.

Connor is 6'6, 280 pounds. He's a big guy. He's got all that strength behind him as well. And even he, and he's worked like out with headingly electric out on the other side of the city and worked through the city, worked with us through the city. And he is a pilot right now for trucking, like for moving houses into the states and across. Winnipeg is dangerous. He has concerns about that.

He has seen where people have been walking. And this is recently. People are walking down the street and then all of a sudden we have we have one They've just like one guy will come up to another guy and knock him We learned this lesson yesterday you know your puppy's coming right back in she's back in here because she wouldn't She wouldn't come when I called her and now she wants back in But so yeah so that that's the type thing so you know you talk about that seeing that violence where where people just walk up to another person and just knock them out most often newly arrived just yeah well that that was the that's a thing i've noted that has been a

trend doesn't matter what province i'm in yeah people are hesitant to describe you know well they're i don't know what how do you put it last name it's a different ethnicity it doesn't matter what ethnicity and you go i know exactly what you're talking about new immigrants yeah and then we have to justify it by saying we're not talking about all immigration we're just talking about a certain class of immigrants that are in and then he went on to talk about how there's like six major gangs in Winnipeg, right? And it's huge. It's absolutely huge.

And so where they, well, you can see this in some of the lawyer's offices in Winnipeg, you know, that were spread out in different areas all the way through the core. Well, now all those offices are starting to kind of congregate and they're moving out from the, from the downtown area. And they are kind of giving themselves a little. little bit more security and things like that because right where most of those legal offices sit in the Winnipeg, well, that's where you have a huge problem with meth, drugs, homelessness, people coming up to you on the streets, walking to catch a bus, things like that. There's areas of

the city where there are, like I said yesterday, no go zones. You just don't go. Well, and the other thing I was curious about, so then, you know, like to me it's one of the, one of the, the things that I stumbled into in Lloyd because I got an infection in my leg that had me in the hospital for roughly seven days earlier this week, a week, year. And then I got talking to all the nurses because I started to see something really strange, right? Like I've been into that of the Lloydminster Hospital, you know, for various reasons with family members or having children. And it was really strange because I've shown up every morning and there was passed out indigenous men on on the ground in the waiting room I was like what is going on oh well they're like yeah

no we we've kind of become the unofficial drunk tank yeah and then they're like and we've been pushing for what north battleford and saskatoon's doing and so I was bringing this up last night I was like do do the Winnipeg hospitals have metal detectors because like back home that's becoming a thing because of the stuff they're like and the two nurses were like well of course they have to yeah like of course they I have to? I'm like, we're going into a dark world where we think a hospital has to have, everywhere is going to have to have a metal detector of what's going on. And it seems that this has become a trend, you know, you sit in your little neck of the woods and you think, ah, maybe it's just happening here. Even though you see the news headlines and everything else,

then you get talking to everyday people and you're like, everybody can see it. We're not addressing the problem. We're not even bandening it up. It's like, well, I'll be talking to this is just the new normal and we're just going to carry on. And you're like, and I guess the other thing that kept coming out, you know, like was, there's nothing I can do about it.

I'm just one person. We're just one, you know, like what can we do about it? I'm like, yeah, except the problem is, is you're not just one person.

Yeah. You're in the vast majority of Canadians. Whether you vote NDP, liberal, conservative, green block, everybody's probably seeing roughly the same thing, which is like,

Like really strange. This isn't good. And they feel powerless to do anything about it. Because you're labeled as racist basically if you talk about immigration. And yet everybody can see it. Everyone's uncomfortable with what's going on. Like this, I just entered into it. And folks, I was just, I would just try to see what was going on in Manitoba.

There was a very nice family. And they had a couple different generations. their grandparents and everything and all of them were talking about it yeah you know and they weren't hardcore conservative i don't think i could be wrong maybe i i was very off my assessment but they were talking about the same problems you know like if we go back to our conversation yesterday we were talking about how we all have a lot of similarities and how we look at problems and then we get put into well let's fight about the the divisions it's like exactly yet when you talk to everyday people they're just like yeah we have these problems i don't know

how to talk about it because I you know like and you can tell there's a little bit of uncomfortable us even in a family you're like oh that's fair yes you know like it's okay to have a little bit uncomfortable us but when you get to the root of the problem it's like well we got gangs yeah we all know that it isn't uh the average day person that's in a gang it's there's there's circumstances being set up that allow for that you know and uh we were talking about the the truck drivers i believe that was yesterday yep and how winnipeg's a hub for that but then he went on to be like, yeah, but it's more than that. It's like it's, it's, it's all these different ethnicities have their gangs and they all meet it, you know, they all got dividing lines of

Winnipeg essentially. Yes, they do. Like that's, I don't know, that was crazy for me to hear. I was just sitting there. I'm like, this is, you know, like of all the conversations I've been having with different people I've been running into, running into a random family and having like a two-hour conversation around the fire. I was like, huh, this is going to be a trend I see. It's great. It's great. It's great because I'm glad that that happened because in everything we talked about yesterday, well, it just kind of fed right into it. So then we can talk about that. And so we were talking about yesterday about how, you know, all these different problems that are underlying in the impact that is happening on business in Canada, not just business in Canada, innovation in Canada, investment in Canada, all those, those different things that are there.

And, you know, when I started my career back in, and this is a fundamental problem, we talked about why why Canada may not make it and why, even though we have all these shared values, why we may not be able to fix things. And it comes down to just something that I have learned over the last, you know, 25 years in business. When I started my career, like I built my first business. I, I built my first business. I was in university. I was an engineering student and I built my first desktop publishing business to help support me when I was going to school, work and going to school, doing all those different things. Then I got out of university, got into, met my husband, my first husband. We had a farm. We had two farms. I was, you know, had my raspberry patches and all the berries and everything that.

I was building businesses as I went. So as I'm a young mom, I've got the farm, I've got all the, the, the, the, the, the, the U-Pixenat that I'm building out, my greenhouse business that I built out. And so my whole life, I have been building business in Canada, building platforms in Canada, then like I built out just recently, Barroot Botanicals, something that I have been working on for years to do. So I built a complete product line in for, like bare root botanicals.

And on bare root botanicals, just for a second, if people want it, can they get that online, or do they have to come here? No, no. I actually have a store. It's at a Shopify store that you can order it and do all of those. Maybe you can give me the link and I can stick it in the notes. That way, if anyone in Manitoba or elsewhere is interested in supporting you, but also maybe leaves in some of the products you got, they could try it out.

Yeah. And that's, and that's, so that's one part. So that we have, we have the idea of that in Canada, we have people that are entrepreneurs. They, they want to build business. It took me, after I got serious about building the wanting to build a business, it took me maybe a year to really build it out. And that goes right back to my career when I started in construction. When I started working construction, like, oh my goodness, 25 years ago, and doing what I was doing,

I was able to do things where I was helping smaller companies build and scale. So I learned really early on how to scale a business, grow a business, how to solve problems on the ground. I didn't come out of, you know, indigenous. I didn't come out of a government program. I didn't come out of, you know, any big institutional developer, any big large construction company. I learned from the ground up.

And there are a lot of people in Canada that are like me in terms of being innovative, not afraid to take risks, not afraid to put their own hard work into things, not afraid to make money, not afraid to lose money, and those types of things. But Canada doesn't seem to want to encourage that type of innovation where you have people that aren't afraid to take a risk. it not doing the things to support those types of risk-taking. You know, it's kind of, you see this in how we tackle trade. You see it how we, our housing problem yesterday, we're talking about how many housing starts does CMHC need, we say that we need, saying that we need 480,000 housing starts per year

in order to catch up to housing. and we need to continue that until 2035. So what happens in Canada is that we have all these gaps. And now we have to layer all these gaps on top of what we're already seeing. So you've seen first time now and heard about the crime, the immigration that is just out of control. And there's no way for the system to be able to absorb. all of that. The impact to our education, the impact to our schools, the impact to our health care,

the extended wait times for health care and things like that. Like I have one of my guys was two years ago I posted on X that I had to do stitches for him because he partially cut off his finger and we couldn't get into an emergency room. The weight was going to be, I think it was 18 hours. And I was like, hey, I can't leave this finger sitting here for for this long without doing something with it. So I asked the doctors, say, give me what I need to stitch it up and I'll stitch it up myself. That's supposedly we have the greatest health care in the world. And I did. Like I actually documented it.

I documented the healing process for her for him. And you met John yesterday, you know, and he's got all of us fully functional. Yeah. But so those types of things. So what I saw is that in Canada versus other countries like the United States is that, We have these gaps that have been exposed over the last 15 years, the last, and made it incredibly hard to grow a business successfully in Canada. We have the, well, we have the regulatory gap, right? And housing is really big for this one, is that in order to be able to build all the houses that Canada needs, we need every build.

We don't just need the large institutional builder and the large land developers. We need robust, flexible, smaller builders to fill in the gaps all the way through. We need that. We need basically all hands on deck. But right now, the government of Canada, just by policy alone, doesn't seem to be able to know what direction to take that into. Like, say, we look at, and this is, I'm going to talk about housing, but this pertains to every single business out there. Is that in terms of building a house, we have municipal, we have the federal authorities, we have provincial authorities, we have municipal authorities, and permitting that has to take place. We have building officials.

We have lenders. We have a number of people that are in the pie that have more control. over the actual build of a house than the builder. And none of those people have any skin in the game. They really, they impact the outcome, but they don't take responsibility or accountability for the build of a home. It all comes down to the builder and the homeowner

that to be able to do this. And this, this pertains to all business and care. Canada is that all of those outside entities that have so much impact on on business and delivering services effectively they're not taking accountability for their impact on it they look at delays and government delays they're like yeah it's going to take you six weeks well that's six weeks of payroll and interest and expenses and things like that I have to cover as I wait for a decision on something or I wait for a delayed permit and that is a a cost to a small business and to a large business. Smaller businesses can't absorb it.

A larger business can absorb it for a longer runway, but eventually they run out of runway too. And I'm talking about housing, but again, this pertains to everything. I just think of the energy industry and how many CEOs and people in large companies have been talking about you've got to cut the red tape. Yeah. Like you've got to get out of the way. and government is interesting because they're like, wow, yeah, we're making progress. You know, you think of Alberta, we got the MOU, we got this sign, we got that sign, and you're like, oh, you need to get out of the way and let the business and the entrepreneurs go and solve problems and build things. And they're not all going to build a pipeline.

But I live in an area where lots of innovation has happened in the oil and gas industry by small business members doing things that, like, Large businesses wouldn't even think to do because they're worried about different problems. That you're talking about, whether it's housing, oil and gas, media, everything. Like, it isn't the CBC that thinks, oh, a podcast is great. I remember when I first started this, and the guy that comes to mind is Jason Greger. That probably means nothing to anyone out east, but Jason Greger is a sports guy for Eminton. very, very, very talented. And I had him on my podcast in the first 100 episodes.

And I remember asking him, are you going to start a podcast? And he was on one of the local radio stations. He's like, a podcast. Why would I start a podcast? Well, I'm not starting a podcast. And then it was like, I want to say two years later, he had like that entire channel had been removed. And then what did he do?

He started a podcast. So sometimes being small maneuverable, you're going to try things that most people can't see or don't have to see because they have, you know, a large broadcast area. I'm talking about media. And I think of lots of the, like now everybody has a podcast. But that didn't start because Netflix sent, oh, a podcast is a great idea. We should start a podcast.

Now what does Netflix have? A podcast section. All these podcasts are on there. Well, that didn't come from big giants innovating. Netflix itself once upon a time was a small, innovative way of getting. movies and television to a large mass of people. Now you look at it, that's completely changed. How many people watch cable television?

I would argue none. Well, that wasn't cable television doing that innovation. That was this small thing called Netflix. And if you go back in that, it was, what was the video store? Oh, man, in the States, somebody's yelling at the radio radio radio. Oh, Blockbuster. Blockbuster. They couldn't see it.

Right? And then they go out of business because they couldn't see it coming. And when you don't allow for that, as Canada is putting a lot of roadblocks, it makes it very difficult. And I think that gets us to where we're talking about. So what do you do as a business person? Well, you go, is there a tax incentive to stay? Well, not really. Or not as lucrative as other places in the world for certain. Then you look at all the regulatory burden or the hindrances of, of being, and I'm just sticking on news for a second, right? Like the fact that, you know, on Facebook and different things like that, people can't find you because the government's, you know, put you in a position where you can't be found. And so people are finding their ways around that because that's what they do. But a ton of people are looking at it and going, why are we here if we're not allowed to do what we need to do to be successful?

And we've seen in my own world, I've seen, if they haven't left, They're setting up the steps in order to leave. And so we've seen this mass exodus of business owners in particular. And to me, they're talking about the numbers on how high they are. Well, this is just the start of the wave or the start of the storm. There's more and more figuring out there's just better opportunities in different parts. Not to mention, you know, like the size of the United States in particular.

Your clientele number goes from 40 million and then it's multiplied by. 10 and everybody can see while the opportunity the amount of people you could actually service just jumps exponentially yeah it's crazy like when I and this is a perfect example when I was uh I started um last year I wanted to start scaling growth for here I wanted to to really scale up our building model because what I had done with our housing project here was I had created not just a subdivision but a national housing strategy. That's what I built. I built a delivery platform for housing,

something that will solve problems. It's scalable. And this comes back to why businesses are leaving is that when I talk to a bunch of capital groups and things like that, you know, they all said to me is that, okay, Jocelyn, build out the first one for you. And once you've spent your capital, you've done, you've become low risk. you've done, you know, all these different things and you've sunk all of your own cash into this. Well, then we'll come in after the fact and we'll support this because, you know, you're slightly, you know, you're unique in your approach and you're unconventional.

I've had been told I was too indigenous at one point in time, which is probably a big problem because I sit outside the box of a lot of things. and all of these big private equity groups were coming back to me and saying the same thing. You know, we don't want to go outside of the urban areas and we like Calgary. We like to invest in, and you know, that part of the world or we like to invest in Toronto. We want to put more towers up and more condos and more dog crates. And I kind of looked at that. And it just struck me as that, you know, when you, you know, when you. you when you stop taking risk and you stop investing in that small innovative businesses,

it's not just an impact to this generation. We have less builders now. Every large builder, every large business started off as that small business as that small builder. That took risks. It took risks. And what they did is they built capacity. for the next generation. And what I'm seeing right now, and I have talked to so many different groups about that, and the narrow-minded viewpoint of private equity in Canada is, oh, mind-blowing, mind-blowing to the least.

I got to laugh about it because you can't do anything else, but do that, but it's mind-blowing. And I'm looking at it is that we have no risk takers. We've got no more risk takers. And that is our second and third generation of capacity building in Canada. So it's not just about the intellectual brain drain that is leaving the country. It is risk takers. It is innovation.

It is that kind of like that, the secret formula of what drives economic growth in a company, like in a country. It's all of that because you need all three to build a successful business. You have to be crazy as shit to start a business in Canada today. Or naive as hell. Yeah. You got to have a little bit of both. Well, growing up in Saskatchewan, we saw it firsthand because everybody left Saskatchewan. and went to Alberta.

Yeah. Because that's where everybody knew the opportunity was to start businesses, to, if you didn't want to start a business, good paying jobs were there. So the amount of people that left Saskatchewan and went there was astronomical, right? I mean, like, Saskatchewan for the longest time, didn't see influx of people moving there because why? There was nothing there to do, right?

I, I, you look at it, Saskatchew has, like, all the things to be uber successful. It's why I come back to Churchill and and like, okay, you have a world tourist attraction. Yeah. And deep water port and all these things. And we're not even talking about the mining and the and the key resources I guess that could make

Manitoba as successful as Saskatchewan and Alberta. We're just talking about one thing that when I keep thinking about it, I'm like, man, if you have a world attraction that is unlike anywhere else in the world, all you have to do is build that and people will come. They're already coming. It's just a certain class of people that have come forward to go do it. That's the thing. So you're trying to open up access so people can explore it. And if you never do that, then you hinder the province to stay where it is and never grow. And it's not that we're we certainly are losing risk takers and the innovation and everything. but although there's tons of people that want to be risk takers, it's just that the current political system is set up in a way that discourages it.

And if you discourage that, then you're just waiting 10 years, 20 years, whatever it is, people in Saskatchewan have their stories on how long it took to get to a point where people get fed up enough where somebody or a group of people come out and say, no more of this. And then they go speak the language that everybody's thinking anyways. to be like, we're done with us.

We're going to chart a different path. And I think a lot of Canadians, you know, are thinking, I certainly know what Albertans think or a large vast one. They're done with it. They want something different. They don't like the way the direction Canada's heading. Even if they want to stay in Canada, they don't like the direction Canada's heading. And the conversation last night I have with this random family,

you can already see it. It's they're done with what's going on. they just don't know how to fix it. And so it's kind of held in these invisible lines, these invisible rules that they've got to just, well, this is the way it is. And what happens with creatives, innovators, business owners, etc., they've always challenged the lines.

And now they're looking at the lines of Canada going, there might just be a better way. And a lot of people are moving to Florida, Texas. There's probably five other specific red states, I would say, where tax incentives, weather, you know, just rules in general, safety, like all these things. Right. Well, we were talking about Idaho.

Yeah. I actually brought it up last night because they were joking with me about moving to Minnesota. And I said, well, actually, I wouldn't move to Minnesota. I'm like, really? I'm like, well, I mean, family-wise, sure, that makes sense. But the state that has impressed me the most, and it's funny what I brought up to you, you're like, yep, we'd also agree is Idaho. Idaho is this beautiful state.

Like, you can't understand how beautiful it is until you go explore it. Yeah. And then you see how, like, you know, does it have his problems? I'm sure if I talked to a whole bunch of people from Idaho, they'd tell you all about the problems. But it's a beautiful state, family friendly. In my background, Christian, very, very strong in their faith. When COVID came, they were, I believe. the first state to have

no mandates. Yeah, protests and push against it. You know, like, they don't stand for stupidity from government. And you're like, well, that sounds kind of nice. It just, all that sounds really good. And then you brought up a point from a business side that I didn't know. Yeah. And so, the idea is that,

like, the state tax in Idaho, where we looked at it, It was like 5.3%. Oh my God. You're laughing. It's a flat tax. What does Martin Armstrong say about Alberta? If Alberta were to separate, you should just put a flat tax.

Exactly. Get rid of the income tax on the everyday person to have a consumer tax. And now people argue all about that. All the idea is is make it more lucrative for business to come in. And then in our wonderful wisdom, we go, well, all the rich will get richer.

It's like, no, what, I don't think me and Jocelyn are the rich, we're saying if you do that, it becomes where we can actually survive and make a, and maybe thrive on growing a business because the incentives are there. Yeah. And so this is where it, kind of the conversation led to. So when I was talking to different investment groups in Canada about the type of housing platform that I was doing, because, you know, Canada talks about, and we talked about,

this yesterday. They want housing that is affordable, age and place, climate resilient, energy efficient. We beat every efficiency standard across the country. Every efficiency standard. I was bringing, so they were asking last night, what do you, what do you podcast on? And I was explaining this week when all the episodes come out. And I was like, and I guess it'll be last week when this one airs, but I was explaining the bee farmer, missionary pastor. I, gonna call her a homeschooling mom but she's a badass homeschooling mom and then i brought you up and they're like oh what does she do and i'm like well she has this like subdivision of offgrid housing that is like i i didn't know how to put it i i said 55 plus but i'm like i actually don't know if that's it's just

these smaller homes for people who basically their kids have moved out and they want something that is still a home just not three stories and everything and you could tell from the older generation of sitting there like, oh, that sounds very interesting. And I'm like, yeah, it does. Like, it's really cool. The problem you have is that government has gotten in your way. Banks have gotten your way. Yep.

And are holding it back. And you're like, you know, like, you think about that. You're like, everything we need right now. More homes. Yep. Everything. And then they step in and they go, yeah, but Jocelyn, we're going to just put the chains on you for a bit.

Yeah. And so I'm talking to these private equity groups, and I'm explaining that. and I'd gone through like the the whole pitch deck and we are explaining everything else. I'm showing the performance metrics. Like not like not this isn't like our match. You've seen it. It's real.

So our performance metrics are actual performance metrics. 46% less energy use consumption. We have 40% less sewage produced. 40% less water actually consumed. That's how how we are impacting our environment. We, the maintenance costs are so low. Our average hydro bill for hydro and gases, $136 a month for utilities. You know, and I'm so going through all this, and we're talking about the overall life cycle, the maintenance costs, how we build it out really robust. Our homes are like tanks, all these things. They're off grid capable. They're solar ready. They're wind ready as well for backup power.

You could have any form of backup power that you want. And they are in the affordable dollar. they don't connect to any municipal infrastructure or any of those things. The Canadian equity groups, traditional lenders, everything about that, they're like, well, that looks really interesting and great on you, Jocelyn. Fantastic job getting this far. The American equity groups and they're like, holy shit, Jocelyn, when are you coming to the States? And I was like, what? Well, and I'll speak for a different province.

When are you coming to Alberta? Because Chase Barber with Edison Motors, when he was going through all the things with his engines and dealing with the government, I was like, you should be pitching the Alberta government on what you're doing. Because Alberta is, can they be better at it? Oh, for certain. But they want to be business friendly. They are trying. I would say Daniel Smith would welcome all these ideas. Now, whether they ever get to a point where it becomes the most friendly compared to Idaho or Florida, things like that, well, we're still in Canada.

So, you know, there's issues to work through there. But, like, from a province where I think I'm sitting there and I'm going, like, if our government didn't jump on these ideas, if our banks didn't jump on these ideas, I go, you know the guy you'd come talk to. And then there'd be a series of other people that would be pushing just as hard because, like, it sounds like a brilliant. idea. I've walked your completed unit. I'm like, man, like for where I sit, knowing my family, I'm like, this doesn't work for us. But that isn't the point. The point is like what you've built here, I think a lot of people are very interested in. Yeah. And what I've built here in terms of, you've seen the one subdivision, which I designed when I explained why I designed it in that, because I was solving a local demographic problem here. But it's not the build per se,

this build that it, for me, that was, is the end product. it's the delivery platform so that if I wanted to build out a subdivision of three-bedroom homes or four-bedroom homes or it's the delivery platform of where we can deliver housing to areas where municipal infrastructure is not available, it's not affordable, rural areas. I built out a housing platform and a housing strategy that can fill in the gaps of the type of demographic housing needed. I can design anything. You give me a piece of marginal land and tell me to put together, let's say, Jocelyn, design a subdivision that works with this piece of land, this population demographic, this available infrastructure. Oh, fuck man, I'll have that design for you in a month.

That's how fast I work. That's how my brain works. I build out delivery platforms. I'm may be a builder or I may be a bare root botanicals or I may do farming or I may do whatever it is. I don't care what I do. What I my the that part of me is I want to build something. I want to create something. That's that's my drive. That's what drives me everything. So the idea that that we could do some of that and not have the support that the government of Canada and the province of Manitoba and other provinces say that exists. It's a real disconnect. It's a real disconnect.

So then when you start as a business in Canada and I'm looking at my sons, my sons are 26, 28, and I'm looking at that, I'm like, I want them to be able to have a future. Like I want them to have a future. And when I was building this out, you know, I was like, this is, this is their future. This is, you know, we're going to build out the first subdivision. Then we're going to build out another one. And they're going to build out another one. And I'm going to partner with other groups.

And I'm going to partner with First Nations. And I'm going to partner with, you know, nonprofits and things like that in order to deliver a housing platform. Because the idea of when I was creating this housing delivery platform was I wanted. to build out a community that was safe. Our communities are gated. So we're gated. We're rural. So we're out of that area where the high crime areas,

we're in areas where if you have families coming in, your kids can walk around, they are safe. They can just go, right? And they can have that kind of idea that you're in a great safe spot. We've got 25 acres here where they can just give her. but the idea is that we wanted to be able to have long-term maintenance costs low,

we want to be able to fit multiple budgets, we wanted to be able to be zero chemical, zero discharge to local waterways, we wanted to take the idea that impacts municipalities and cities, drainage, green space, housing, infrastructure, utility costs, and independence and safety. Canadians talking about Winnipeg and crime, Edmonton and Crime, Calgary in Crime, Toronto in Crime, they don't want to be housed in side by sides where they don't know if their kids are going to come home or somebody's going to, or they're going to, yesterday, the link I sent you, it was about sex acts happening outside of hospital and emergency things on the picnic table.

That's what I sent you. you don't want to be taking your kids going into the emergency room seeing that and so i was trying to come up with solutions to that and so and and that is what i deliver um whether it's housing or in any form well i was uh walking around so you know walking around the campsite last night and it was big mustache al so a few weeks ago now in when when i was in saskatchew he didn't understand why people went camping. In his mind, he's like, you go camping to get away from everybody. And he was, he didn't understand why people went to campgrounds and, and you know, you're now next door, you're as close as ever to someone. And I didn't have a good answer. But last night, I'm walking around.

There's people, nobody's driving. Everybody's walking or riding their bikes and it is just busy. And everybody's smiling and saying hello and everything. And I'm like, people come here, not only to get away from the city, but it's the danger and all the things you just rowd off in a campsite you're like do you have the odd person in there maybe maybe but i'm like i'm walking around i'm like this is what people want yes what do people want they they want to be friendly with everyone they want to feel safe that their kids can ride their bike or their scooter or whatever and race around and not be hindered by traffic or dangers of homeless and drugs and everything and in at least in winnipeg beach and actually

actually ever other campsite we've been at so far. That's exactly what you find. The complete opposite of what is downtown Winnipeg, downtown Emmington, Calgary, etc. It's this pace of life where now, I mean, obviously people, for the most part, aren't racing off to their jobs. They're slowing down the pace of life. But it's all the things that the big cities aren't. Exactly. Right across the board.

And people want that. And I bet if. If you could offer that to them in cities, they'd be like, oh, this would be amazing. How do we get to that? It's like, well, we have to address the root problems. Yeah. We have to get to the big issues. Yeah.

And those big issues are tearing at the fabric of what Canada is. And so you go back to a statement you mean, like, I don't know if Canada can survive. It's like, well, under the current model, it probably can't. Yeah, there's so. And this is why, like, fundamentally under the surface is why I think that the fabric of Canada is being eroded is because, And actually, I'm going to finish it. I said probably can't. It can't. I'm going to be more definite than that.

Under the current trajectory, it can't survive. So if we're not willing to change, it won't survive. Yeah, and that's a perfect example. Like, I'll give you an example. One of the programs that we actually apply to to help accelerate and scale our growth is BCH is the Build Canada Homes program. And it's a building accelerator. Basically, it gives you access to capital.

and to low-interest loans and things like that in order to be able to scale housing. But the pace of government is that, I think, when did we apply? We applied, the portal came open in November or December is when it opened. Well, now we're in July of the, in halfway through the building season, and now it's just catching up to us right now. And we're like, if housing is a priority for provincial governments, federal governments, municipal governments, you have to demonstrate that it is a priority. Because right now the priority that I see is large-scale developers that are all going into multi-family rentals. So when I was looking at like this is coming.

So you're talking like multifamily rentals would be anything from condo complexes, apartments, fourplexes, fourplexes, etc. And that's what I think most everyday people see in the changing of zoning from this is going to be residential like single family homes. And they're trying to rezone all that land to have as many people jammed and there's, humanly possible. And so right now, CMHC, so CMHC, this is where traditionally builders, like myself, and that would go to, and we would apply to one of the programs, and we could get a low interest line of credit or low interest loans for scaling growth, expansion, things like that. And that has always been up until recently the go-to, in order to build out. Now, who's dipped their toes into CMHC?

private equity in Canada. Private equity groups in Canada have discovered CMHC, multi-family rentals, all of those things. So all these big private equity groups, what are they doing and how are they gaining their cash? And how are they making a ton of money? They have gone into, let's build out, multi-family, urban, and let's get into the rental business, because government in Canada seems to be on a trek of, let's make a housing affordable by putting everybody in a rental. And maybe it's a pretty rental. Maybe it's a small rental. But it's a rental. That is the overarching policy. And anybody can fact check me. Go on the CMHC website, go and look at all of the program available for funding and that.

It doesn't matter that there is, like on CMHC, there is a funding window for like indigenous, female, innovative, climate resilient. Oh, but it has to be multifamily rentals. And so I was talking to CMHC and I said to them, what happened to the idea of home ownership as a way for people to be able to be able to, to build equity, growth, grow their wealth, be able to have a stable environment for their kids to grow up in. You know, their kids growing up in one house or two houses, you know, over the period of their lifetime, putting down roots in one area. And they're like, yeah, no, where,

that's not the direction that we're going in. And I see the big push of this is that where They want to, you know, put indigenous into rentals and these lower income bills and things like that. And I'm like, I don't want to build like that. I don't want to build garbage. I don't want to build a box. I don't want to build things that are going to fall apart in four years and be molded out in four years. I want to build something that is going to last forever. I want to build housing that gives every.

single Canadian, the young guy who has got a girlfriend and they're in their 20s and they can't qualify for anything over $250,000. I want to build something that gives them a shot at starting off in life. I want to build for the downsizing seniors that want need something smaller. I want to build for the families that need something and want safety, stability. low costs that they're not going to go through energy poverty. I mean, look at all the people that have these big mass of houses and all these families that are stuck in this big house and their house poor and they cannot maintain their home because they can't afford the cost of maintenance and they can't afford the property taxes

and they can't afford any of that other stuff. I look at all of that and I say, where's our brain at? Where's our brain at in terms of innovation? And where's our brain at in terms of building out. the next generation of Canadians. The first thing Canadians need in order to build a business to do any of those things is they have to have a place to live. You need a place to live. You need a place that you can call home and where you can start to build your nest egg from. However, you're going to do that, you need something to give you a shot at life. And normally a home does it.

But right now those homes are becoming unaffordable. And there's no way people can get into a million home or even even a $500,000 house. Like how ridiculous is that? And so that's- Yeah, you talk about the million-dollar homes. I just, I'm like, I think a $500,000 in the stress that would put on anyone. Like to me, that's ridiculous. You see my home?

You see how big it is. You know what I bought this house for? $231,000, 17 years ago. My home has now doubled and valued at least in that we're like almost 4,000 square feet. And I have 11 people living in my house because my kids, my kids couldn't afford housing. I'm a builder and my kids couldn't afford housing. And so I've given them the shot and it came back during COVID and that and I'm, you know, and I'm helping them all get out on their feet and start a life and build out their own homes

and things like that. But holy crap, I am a home builder and my own kids have had to scale up with mom and dad to build out their own house and things like that. And I'm like, and they work. All my kids work. Like my kids all work and they work hard. My one son works with a disability like the older son, Thomas. and from an accident.

And so he has such a hard time doing anything. You know what? Fuck, he works. He just bite it. He works every single day. He presses the hell out of me. That even though he's in pain, he works. Well, you go back to the private equity firms.

You know, I sit here and I go, can't blame big business for figuring out where the money is. It's, and, you know, in such a house. losing shortage, you know, there's going to be a lot of people that go, you know, I'd live in an apartment and lots of us started out in an apartment. It's not a bad thing. It's just when you change your track of we're only going to build one thing. That's what we're going to fund. One thing. You're like, but why? Don't you want to solve? Don't you want to give people options? Because some people do want to have a lawn. Some people don't want the bother of it. You know, I had lots of friends start out in, uh, They called them condos, but the truth of the matter is, is it was just a larger apartment. It wasn't much over that, but it was the cost of it, right? It was, what did it cost? And the thing about the condos they were purchasing is they owned it, right? It was theirs instead of just a rental agreement.

And that to them mattered. And what it was was options. There was different levels of option. If you couldn't afford the $300,000 place, there was stuff in the range of $200, right? And now we're getting into this world when you talk they can't afford a house. You're talking, well, part of it is that's because houses are like, you know, I mean, are there options in 200? Well, maybe. There are.

But it's becoming less and less. Oh, yeah. And more and more of new builds are going astronomical. Yep. The buying a house is going astronomical across the board. And the options are shrinking. Yeah. And so you're like, do I care that a private equity?

firm, I probably should care more, but I'm like, well, they're building houses. And they're seeing that there's money there. So what do they do? They go and try and make money. They're just like any business. True. And so what they recognize is that, and so this is a goal is, this actually ties right into our conversation yesterday, too, about where is the root of the problem? And so the root of the problem is actually provincial and federal. Make your priority, housing platforms of every kind. Make housing the priority. Make innovative, flexible housing the priority.

And make sure is that you're funding mixed types of housing. Single family homes, condo builds, the housing where you've got your affordable entry, housing that is your rentals. And you know what did happen? I think is, so Jocelyn builds out her little community here. And if the population turned to that and then you had 40 of them that need to be built, the big firms would look at that and go, what is she doing over there? Yeah.

And then they'd start doing it because if that's what people are going to buy, they'll build it. Exactly. Right? Right now, they've taken, by sounds of it, a whole chunk of things off the plate. Unless you're going to pay huge dollars for it. And then you're going to need to have so much up front and all the things that are getting harder and harder. And they've just went, nope, all we're going to do is we're going to fund these builds that

have multifamily living. That's what we're doing. We don't want to hear about anything else. Exactly. And when you get into realms like that, that's where problems are found. And you're only creating more problems. Exactly. And who's been talking about this and screaming about this for years?

Ron Butler, the mortgage guy. how many times do we hear Ron saying the same thing and Ron and I have actually talked and we've talked about some of these issues and he's a he's a hilarious guy he's hilarious I love him um but he says it straight is is that the the government made their priority um these urban dense uh rental units condo units that's that's what they made and it's um it's just it doesn't make sense it doesn't make sense what they've done because they have now for the last 10 years squeezed out and reduced single family dwellings and took those starts down to basically nothing like it's negligible and we're talking about the cost of you know people would start off an apartment because it was cheaper um in the last 10 years my

experience has been is that rents have gone so high like in gimley there is no rentals available in this whole area you know what these poor kids are being forced to pay for for renting out here two thousand twenty five hundred three thousand dollars a month holy crap i can't even pay them enough to be able to afford a rental unit holy crap and it's like and then the lounters are like but i'm filling you know i'm that's what i can yet. So it's kind of like this. Well, I know, I know back home, because we rented our house before we left, right? Yeah. And I was kind of like, oh, man, I hope we can find a renter. And then everyone's like, you don't understand the rental market right now. Yeah. There's nothing out there. You're going to rent

your house. And they weren't wrong. We rented our house in a pretty short time, in my opinion. And you're like, okay, so there is a lack of rentals. People don't want to build right now because, you know, to build a new home in Lloyd. is six to 800 grand, you know. And, oh, could you build something smaller that? Sure, but a lot of the builders don't want to take it on. That's right. Yeah, and it's a problem.

And because they're the larger builders. The larger builders know where their bread and butter is. The larger builders want to do that. And then the small, innovative builder that wants to fill the housing gap and provide the product that people truly want, they're being squeezed out of the market. And so it's kind of like that. It's a backwards way to think, right?

You know, so we've been talking about housing, and we've been talking about, and there's other builders like me that are innovative and are able to fill the gap and are able to see what it is that Canadians want to live in. But the problem is that we don't have exposure and we don't have access to the resources that we need to be. able to do that. And then so going back to the groups that I talked to, the investment groups I talked to in

Idaho, as soon as I talked about the type of build that I was doing, we were like climate resilient, off-grid capable, everything, that, and they're like, holy. Well, you check all the boxes. Yeah. You know, like, I said this lots that if you want real diversity, just come listen to the podcast, because it's roughly merit based on the podcast. And I've talked to all different walks of life because diversity, there's lots of brilliant people.

The idea of it makes complete sense. But when you take away the merit part of it, then you're just getting what we see across the board. Exactly. Right? And so you come back to building things, trying to look at a problem. if you force everyone to look at the same way, COVID,

then you get the problems of COVID, right? Like, I don't think I was brilliant in thinking this back then of like, why do we just have one size fit all? That doesn't make any sense. And it only took a brief afternoon of exploring to find all these different countries that were approaching COVID way different. Yes.

And you go, so why wouldn't you just listen to what they're doing and go, oh, that's a good idea. And here you sit in Manitoba, and when you talk about being able to go into any plot of land and build something specifically for them that isn't tied into municipal, I'm like, well, I get it because I've looked at the map and I've seen how many isolated communities you have.

It's a solution built specifically for the area you live in. I'm like, that makes complete sense to me. Yeah. But we live in a world that wants one size fit all. while we live in a country that is so vast you like that doesn't even make sense and I'm sure there are people in government

that go that won't work but when they get their mindset of this is the way we're doing it and just get out of the way and shut up and only more problems are going to come on this and we're never going to fix the problem yeah and I've even seen this in terms of like the larger construction companies and things like that

like over the course of my career in that I've actually like done like for senior project management roles. I've actually been recruited by other companies where they wanted to see whether or not they could bring me on board for like contract basis or move into another company in that. And I've had companies ask me like,

you know, you've run your own company and that, would you ever consider making that move to doing that? And I said, you know what? I said, as my sons get older and that and maybe I want to transition the business to them, you know, maybe I would look at something, but I want to see what it's about, and I want to see kind of like

what the offers are that are out there, right? And, you know, maybe I would try something different. But every large firm that I talked to was actually, they were like, they were talking about, and this is indicative of Canada as a whole. We want leaders, we want innovation, we want, you know, people that can think outside the balls. Yeah,

And then that, but then what I realize is that I'm looking at all of these things. I said, no. Actually, what you want is somebody with a whole bunch of credentials, paper credentials that didn't work their way up from the start of the business and are compliant with your system. You don't want a leader. You want somebody that is highly educated and compliant with your internal system. And that is indicative of major corporations and corporate culture in Canada where basically a lot of our business has evolved into. And that, it was shocking to me because when I first started in construction, I was so new to it. Like, I was so new to it. And I was, I was, I was as green to it. And I started off as this project coordinator. I got hired. I was working at the Gimley Harbor in projects and planning, and I was building out the capacity of the Gimley Harbor.

And I was working at a – my second job was working at a service department, at a dealership. And so the guys that were starting a new company, construction company here, they met me. They got to know me and see how organized I was and how I was able to think outside the box and not afraid. just not afraid and they they hired me and they're like jocelyn you need to come work for us come get us organized and i started off in a little tiny office and all three of us sitting next to each other and by the year-end we went from zero to four million in in in projects and contracts i started off as being a project coordinator three weeks later became their first project manager because I could see the system that was required to build out that company.

I'm thinking, you need standard operating procedures. We need to be able to put all these things in place. We need a process. We need to be able to manage this level of work. We need to be able to bid the work. I hadn't done construction bidding prior, but they taught me. And within the first four days, I was bidding out my first job. And they walked me through all of it.

They said, is that you want to learn how to put pipe in the ground? come out to your jawson and you're going to actually see how pipe goes into the ground. You're going to learn what a coupler is. You're going to learn what a 90-degree bend is. You're going to learn what a thrust block is. You're going to learn what a manhole is. You're going to see how we put a mad hole in the ground. Holy shit.

I'm in my early 30s. I'm on the job side. I've got these fantastic guys that are all rough, rough men from the trades. And they are teaching me and they are downloading all of that knowledge into me. what a crazy experience. I mean, I don't know if they knew what they were creating. They were creating a monster is what they were doing. But I had fun. I loved learning. I realized that I love building. And then they're like, okay, yeah, we're going to build a lift station. I'm like, okay, that means I have to learn on the mechanical electrical systems and

figure out how to how to bid this building and everything else. So I started learning. Well, fuck a week later, I knew what it took to bid out. bit out a lift station and I started bidding on water treatment plants and sewagement plants. I was learning as I was going. I was running projects that were $8 million. I was like, what the hell? I don't even know what the system is. I got to teach myself and then I can go teach my guys how to do it.

Well, I think you speak for most entrepreneurs that have that fire inside and they don't know, you know, I don't know how many entrepreneurs I've ran into and at the start of their career of wherever they started. They have very similar story of like, I actually didn't know a whole lot. And my first bit, I screwed up. And then learned that lesson. You learn a lot of hard lessons.

And then you move forward and you, you know, if you don't falter and stop and be like, this just isn't for me. Then you get down 20 years and you're like, there's a lot of lessons in there. Yeah. We figured it out. And you know, it's funny,

all the projects you're talking about, I just keep coming back to Churchill. Because I'm like, you know, Manitoba, when you look at it, has a ton of water. Yes. If there's one thing Manitobans know all about

even when I was talking to the Mennonite community they talked about coming over, they were talking about their history of coming over from Russia and be given the swamp land

and they say, yeah, they kind of laughed. The government knew us Mennonites were hard working and we'd drain the swamp. And they were right. And, you know, we've made a life out of it

and I'm like, so all you got to do is implore Manitobans. We have a problem to solve. Yeah. We want to open up Churchill. We want to figure that out. And I bet you,

Manitobans could figure it out. Because you've lived in this, you've got, you know, you've already talked about all these different stations around not only probably Lake Winnipeg, but a whole bunch of other lakes and river systems. And it's kind of in your DNA of being from this area. It is. And that's what drives me, like, I've traveled all over the world. Like, and I took my kids lots of places.

And I've personally traveled. I've been traveling since I've 16 years old. And I, I always wanted to come back home. I loved other places and I always wanted to come back home to Manitoba. It's kind of like where my roots were. But it's also there's something is that it was home. And I always knew that no matter what happened when I came home,

I would be able to figure it out, to figure out a way and figure out. Well, isn't that what traveling teaches you? Yeah. Getting out on your own and exploring things is you have to problem solve because problems come up all the time. Yeah. And some of them are. are small, some of them are big, but usually when you're out traveling, nobody's there to save you.

I mean, people are there to help, but you don't have mom and dad sitting beside you all the time going all. They're just going to solve your problems for you. Yeah, and that's where I was. And I, you know, I was really blessed. So when I was 16 years old, my godfather gave me the opportunity to go to Europe. And he says, my godfather was in Switzerland and Dr. Gay-Doo. And he said, come, come see me. And come see your brother and that. My stepmother had gone over there. And they said, come here for the, come here for part of the summer. So my parents put me on a plane by myself and I flew to Europe by myself. And I was like, I'd only been on a plane once before. And I had to manage the airport and that. And I met people along the way that were great and they helped me and everything like that. I got

off the plane in Switzerland. But that's part of it. Is it just talking? Not being afraid to talk to people and be like, Dean, you know, like, where am I supposed to go? Where's customs? No person when they walk into a foreign airport with whatever language is there goes that's natural. It isn't. You have to problem solve. Exactly. And you have to learn how to look at things and be like, okay, well, that kind of means that.

And I see everybody walking that way. Oh, I kind of recognize that. You know, international travel has become a heck of a lot easier. And maybe it's always been a lot easier than my young mind remembered it. Yep. But certainly you go places. I was just in Panama. Everything's in English.

Or there's a dual language there. Or multiple might not just be two. It might be three or four. And they're telling you where to go. Their whole goal is to get you from where you are to the next spot. That's an airport. They don't want you to stand around and go, the heck am I doing? Because if you're doing that, there's a thousand other travelers doing me.

at the whole goal is to get you from point A to point B safely successfully to your stuff so they can move you on because it's a hub they don't want you to stand around yeah and that's and that's what I had to learn firsthand and it was really crazy because when I was in Europe I was in Europe the summer before the wall came down so I was in Germany and in France in Liegenstein in Switzerland and Austria right before the wall came down so I am 16 years old I am so impressionable. I am naive. I don't know shit about the world. And I'm here. And everything in Europe is changing. Everything was, there's just everything around me that was such, it was just like so much knowledge and so much, um, different viewpoint. And I could see the energy of people.

I got to stand on mountaintops. I got to look out at, at different things. And I'm 16 years old. and and and and just exploring and traveling and on trains by myself. I'm like, holy shit. And it kind of created that, that fire, right? So when you come home and I'm just this, this young girl from rural Canada and I come home in that excitement for life and that type of the idea of I want to be innovated, I want to create, I want to explore, I want to meet people. it never left me and I tried to instill that into my kids and things like that and then I think about

you know I think about Europe and why I raise about the wall coming down and the excitement that was in the in the air when people knew that it was going to happen people knew that that something was building to that explosion of being free of just something ending and we're talking about about Canada right now and the idea of where we're at and what it feels like, and maybe people don't understand this feeling, but it feels like the walls that surrounded East Germany are kind of circling around Canada, right? We're being closed in. We're stifling innovation. We're stifling investment. We are segregating ourselves from the market, from the ideas, from the people that create a country with the diversity to grow. And because I've experienced the one,

and now looking at the second, like looking at this is the last, you know, this part of my life, seeing the difference. I feel like I'm on the other side of it, right? I feel like I'm on the other side of the wall because we're like, and you think about it is that businesses and people and people with the means to leave in right now

and I think about Viva Friah how he just took his whole family during, and he just gone. Well, and the guy that always comes to mind for me is Drew Weatherhead. Yeah. They're just gone. Gone.

You just can't tell him that COVID was this nice time because you just look to his story for 10 minutes you're like wow yeah and he he's talked to me lots about how he doesn't like really coming back to canada anymore right like they have to do it for certain reasons and and it's a real sad you know like when people are like no we need to remain Canada right and they're all against what Alberta's doing yeah albertans i argue on per capita population no better than most what is capable what we are capable of and where this country is heading if we don't. Exactly. And so when you think about that and you think about the ability

of business and that right now, I think the people that have the means and if we're going back to when the wall in the East Germany was going up, people that had the means, the ability and the force like to see it, they got the help. And then what happens when all them get out is the capital controls come in. This is what Armstrong talks about once the government catches on to money flow, right we've already seen you know out of the what was it the liberal conference they had where the guy was just throwing out there an exit tax of 500,000 students who got their education in Canada and different things like that that's just the beginning yes because people have already been leaving there are more leaving and at some point the capital controls will come in that won't allow you to

leave exactly because you won't want to I mean people will still be leaving but less so because the cost of to do of doing so will be so high they'll be like well i've worked all my life yeah and this is what it comes to so that's so we talk about is that you know businesses in canada have really two options right now is that the idea of alberta um pushing back against um those types of controls so if you can't get out of canada you're going to go to alberta i got i can't even even tell you how many people that say to me every day, if Alberta separates, I'm going. Wow. So we will have that population moving to Alberta. And we already know that the businesses that don't want to relocate or can't relocate out of Canada, they're going to Alberta. So individual provinces

to better figure out how to stop the brain drain. Yeah, well, they're going to realize soon enough, right? With a couple minutes left. Any final thoughts? Because one of the things we agreed upon yesterday is like, okay, I'll come back, but we've got things, you know, it's funny being on the road. You think you got all this time, right? A year sounds like so much time.

But when you have to move and keep moving, it's funny how time is just a funny thing. You know, like I remember biking across this Canada, biking across this country, and remember I thinking, man, if I just had more time, if I did in a vehicle, I'd be able to see way more, well, now I'm in a vehicle. And I still feel like I'm just catching a sliver of, you know, you could probably, I would assume you would agree with this. If I spent a year in Manitoba, you could see the real Manitoba and you could go all the different places.

And even then you'd probably go at the end of it, you know, I got to see a lot of Manitoba, but there were still places I wanted to go. And our country is so big, like Saskatchewan is that. Alberta is that. You could have spent a year doing just a province. And yet we're undertaking, I'm like, it's funny, you spend a few days in a place and it's been wonderful, but then we have to move on. And so I guess I throw it to you. Any final thoughts before, you know, I end the conversation.

Well, I guess I wanted to maybe end it on a, like, we've talked about kind of like the walls closing in on us and all those. those other things. I guess my message out to other people that might be listening to the podcast or our other business people or even people that don't want us to fall into that dark path, reach out. I mean, I think that if businesses can band together and we can figure out how to help each other and we can promote growth and solutions and provide national strategies, maybe we make this a little bit easier. Maybe maybe we are able to stay off like the closing of that of that wall around us, right? And so that would be my message is that as difficult as it is and there are enough of us still here

where we can make a difference if we actually set out to do it. Appreciate you doing this. I'm glad we've got to do it again. It's really cool to be in your area, right? And I just look forward to running into more of the guests that I've talked to virtually because it hasn't disappointed yet. And I don't think it will disappoint. And I just, thanks for everything.

And once again, you have your other business because you're giving us a little care package. Yep. And forgive me, the name of that again is? Is bare root botanical. So everybody talks about the benefit of beef. tallow and and how amazing beef tallow is. We use bear oil. Bear oil is kind of funny. We actually hunter bears. We're Métis hunters. We're harvesters. We do hunt. We take about one bear a year. We eat the bear. We use the whole bear. So and the fat is rendered to our bear oils. And

bear oil is therapeutic. It's an anti-arthritic and it has natural healing properties. And it's why the Indigenous use bare oil as medicine. It is to us. It is medicine. So I created for the guys in the field and my kids and that over 10 years, I created all these different products, like sleepy time lotion for kids to help kids go to sleep at night, take away all those growing pains and things like that. I've done things where the pain saves and things like that for dealing with trauma, bruising,

all those different types of things. skin creams, hair oils, face oils, anti-aging creams. Like, I made this stuff for my family, and I've been using this on my family for years. And then somebody asked me, about a year ago, they said, hey, can you make me a batch? And I'm like, okay. And then I started making people a batch. And then, and then Jocelyn got her mind work on. I just like, why she's just put it in a can and put a name on it and then just start selling it.

people are going to start. Yeah, so I think it took me about a week to actually figure out what is the product line going to be? What is my marketing strategy? How am I going to put together the entire business? I probably, I built out the business system that supports the business in about a week, all of it, like start to finish packaging, marketing, pricing, build the product, design the product, the whole nine yards. I just built it. All of that stuff that you see in terms of like my, like all my signage and everything like that,

I created all of it. No outside group helped me do it. I just sat down. I built it all. And I love it. And I just, you know. Manitoba government. Just let Joss, unleash Jossum Berziac and you all have wonderful things happen.

Oh, yeah. And to me is that it doesn't matter. Like I've got the books that I'm writing into that. I've got the fourth book now that we're just, in the series for like the wellness books on that that we've done i actually call the the series of books is actually called my mission blueprints i figured out a little while uh about life is that what drives me and because i'm really rational in times in many ways and uh i i realize is that the drive behind my life is a mission blueprint i have like all of these ideas in my head and it's like they're they're

there are blueprints that are in my head. And it was about, I am going to do things that help people, whether it's building a house, creating a wellness product, writing a book, making them like a cancer protocols. That is what's in my brain. I want to solve a water problem and build a water treatment plant. It's in my head. I just need to be able to get all of that out.

And when I'm unleashed, holy shit, things fly. Justin, thanks for hopping on again and doing this. And it was just great to meet you. And I appreciate you sitting down with me. Oh, I had a blast. Thanks.