The Ben Mulroney Show - A government report paints a pretty grim picture of life in Canada in 2040

Episode Date: April 22, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Government report predicts 2040 dystopia: Collapsed economy, hunting for food with Guest: Bryan Passifiume, National politics reporter for the Toronto Sun -Government subsidies for Canada’s media were supposed to be temporary, but they keep on growing—and could be here to stay with Guest: Dave Snow, Associate professor in political science at the University of Guelph and a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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10 piece chicken McNuggets and apple pie? You got it. Every single order helps. Join us at McDonald's for McHappy Day on Thursday, May 8th. Do good, feel good. A portion of food and beverage sales will support RMHC chapters Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. And as I was getting ready for this next segment, there was a story that popped in my head that I hope applies here. And it's a story that I think we've all heard before that if you throw a frog into a boiling

water, he will immediately jump out. But if you put a frog in regular water and then turn on the heat, he'll he'll cook to death because he won't notice that the temperature has changed until it's he's way way past expired. And and I and I was reading a story in the hub about government subsidies for Canadian media. And it didn't occur to me until I read this, that that the media subsidies were supposed to be temporary, but, but they've grown to the point that there's a quote here right off the top of the story, Peter Menzies noted in the hub, this election isn't quote about whether news organizations get government support or not.

Instead is about how they get it. And it occurred to me these things have been happening sort of in drips and drabs for so long that I didn't notice that this is a pretty tectonic shift in our media, its relationship to the government, how they are funded. And so to do a deep dive into it, we're joined now by Dave Snow, associate professor in political science at the University of Guelph. He's also a senior fellow at the MacDonald Laurier Institute. Dave, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, I mean, in my mind, I didn't, I don't know, I guess it happened so incrementally

and quietly, I didn't realize how much had changed on the media landscape as it relates to funding. I think that's exactly right is that it's sort of crept up on these programs and slowly piled on top of one another. And part of what my deep dive does is just sort of explore, okay, what are all the different pieces here? How much do they cost? And, and now what now that they are in place, what are the major organizations, News Media Canada, the major lobby,

what are they arguing for now? And it won't surprise you to know that they're, they sort of, no one ever says, okay, that's great, we're happy with our funding, nothing more. They sort of always request for more and more. Okay, yeah, so tell me, Dave, in your deep dive, what were some of the big points that came out?

So one of the big points that came out that surprised me, and it doesn't have to do with the money, but was just the the sort of publicness and I dare say shamelessness of News Media Canada's lobbying, particularly in the National Post, arguing, you know, having having having its CEO and having its chair write articles saying, this is what you should ask your local candidate for in the election in terms of how they're funding media. So I traced five articles over the last year and a half from the CEO or the chair of News Media Canada saying, this is what we've got and government needs to do more.

And sort of using the newspapers who are their members as the perch from which they they lobby the public, as they also lobby the government for more and more government funding. And of course, that means more and more taxpayer dollars. So that part really surprised me just how how public how brazen how obvious this has become for what was supposed to be one at one point, a brief, single, temporary program to help news media out. Have we done a disservice to ourselves as it relates to how our critical eye that we should have about our media, its relationship to the government, we've done a disservice

to ourselves because we focus so intently on the CBC. They're the big bad that get 1.X billion dollars. They're in line to get 150 million dollars more under Mark Carney. On the other flip side is Pierre Poliev says he's going to defund them. Because we've been focused almost, I wouldn't say exclusively on them, but because we're looking at them so intently, have we not looked at other pieces of the puzzle that deserve attention? Yeah, I think that's really well put. And I certainly, I don't think you're saying that we should sort of ignore CBC because I think there's there's good reason that we look at it.

It's our public broadcaster. It's the institution we want to most be unbiased. There's a lot of evidence and sort of progressive leaning in CBC and that we're not getting our value for money. And one point four billion dollars is a lot of money. It's a lot more than these other programs. So there's good reason to look at the CBC. But you're absolutely right that we sort of missed these other programs. So there's good reason to look at the CBC, but you're absolutely right that we've sort of missed these other programs creeping up. And I think that, you know,

there are different arguments for and against the CBC, but I think that when people find out, okay, the Toronto Star is sort of an explicitly progressive newspaper. It has principles baked in that are progressive. The National Post is an explicitly conservative newspaper. Is that what we want our public dollars going towards? Funding newsrooms from newspapers that, whatever your perspective, have a clear ideological orientation. I think that's snuck up. Part of the reason I'm biased here because I'm a Hub reader, subscriber, and occasional contributor, but I think venues like the Hub have been an individual journalist's substacks, have been the places where we had to find out more about this information because there's an inherent

conflict of interest in the legacy news media focusing on the money that they're getting from government. Well, yeah, and that's sort of something I've always believed as well. Like, look, if the CBC went away tomorrow, that doesn't mean that the best people working there wouldn't work ever again. That the voices that matter, the voices that people want, there are places that exist today where we could find them. And you said it, you said it perfectly. You got the hub, for example, you've got the line, you've got the walrus, you've got, and sub stack just writ large as a place where you

can, you can create your own bespoke newspaper based on the voices that you want to pay for. And so is there a solution that has almost been created from whole cloth just by virtue of technological advancement that if we really wanted to we could we could strip down the current system, peel away some of this funding and the solution exists if we're just willing to look for it. Yeah I think there's a lot of merit to that point. funding and the solution exists if we're just willing to look for it. Yeah, I think there's a lot of merit to that point. I'm sympathetic to the idea that actually funding sort of news from journalistic outputs is a little more difficult

sort of inherently. There might be a bit of market failure built into the idea of funding journalism. But at the same time, I see journalists like Paul Wells, who've developed an amazing stuff stack, who are both doing opinion columns and outright news journalism shows that it can be done. And I think what we're seeing right now is venues like the CBC, especially crowding out a lot of that news seeking. So we haven't gotten to the point where we can actually see what happens if you, I don't know, get rid of the CBC or get rid of a portion of it and allow those individuals to work elsewhere. I have no doubts that it wouldn't be perfect. But I also think there's lots of evidence right now

that the CBC in particular, and these legacy media outlets are sort of preventing this evolution from happening or at the very least slowing it down. You know, I saw a tweet this morning that stuck with me and I'm glad I saw it because I can bring sort of preventing this evolution from happening or at the very least slowing it down. You know, I saw a tweet this morning that stuck with me and I'm glad I saw it because I can bring it back into this conversation. As someone pointed out, you know, a lot of critics of the CBC point to, you know,

Power and Politics and David Cochran and the posts that they see on social media as the reason to get rid of the CBC, forgetting that there's all this great content that they make that keep that binds the country together. I don't know about you, but I'm getting a little tired of being told that the CBC is nation building when when when they are doing things that are completely analogous to what what I do and what people at private broadcasters do. There's nothing inherently special about what they do just because they do it at the CBC.

Yeah, I totally agree. And I think part of it is that the CBC has conditions surrounding it that enable it to do that work more effectively. They have this huge subsidy, but they also have advertising. Nothing frustrates me more. I went to watch the French language debate the other night on my phone temporarily. And I had to watch two ads before I got to, you know. Oh, you're lucky. I normally have to watch three. Normally I gotta watch three, Dave. Exactly. But the idea of what a public broadcaster ought to be doing is just so divorced from this. I think you're absolutely right that there's, you know, that when you see, I was speaking with an old friend a few weeks ago and who said, I really like the CBC because

I'm a progressive and it gives me a sort of progressive worldview. And whatever the merits of that position, that's not what you think of what a public broadcaster ought to be doing. So I think there's merits there. I would just add as well that we talked about the 1.4 billion and what the CBC is doing. So much of it is not journalism. I watched the great Canadian baking Show and I like it. I don't think that's what my taxpayer dollars are best are best served for.

And so I think there's a lot of things that the CBC is doing that aren't related to journalism that the public interest case just really isn't there for in 2025. So real quick, in about 30 seconds, we already know that Pierre Pellier wants to defund the CBC. But what do you make of Mark Carney's doubling down of investing an additional $150 million a year? Well, I'll say this, and I'm not going to sort of, I have, I know no one's motivations, and I'm not going to say this, but this speaks exactly to the problem with government-funding journalism, whether it be the CBC or whether it be these private news outlets, because a skeptical

public will rightly say he's doing that so he can get positive news coverage. Or a skeptical public will rightly say the Globe and Mail is going to inherently favor Party X because they're the ones who have offered to keep their funding. And it speaks to the conflict of interest. We're going to leave it there. Thank you very much, my friend. Okay. Thank you so much, my friend. Okay. Thank you so much.

Hi, I'm Donna Friesen from Global National. Life moves fast these days and we want to make it even easier for you to get the news you need. That's why you can now get Global National every day as a podcast. The biggest stories of the day with analysis from award-winning global news journalists. New episodes drop every day so take this as your personal invitation to join us on the Global National Podcast. You can find it on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music and wherever you find your favorite podcasts. Welcome back to the

Ben Mulroney Show. There is a government report that is looking forward in time to 2040 about what the state of Canadian society, Canadian economy will be and it is not good. A collapsed economy, people hunting for food, it is not good. There's a warning of a decline social mobility. We could revert to a society of land-born aristocracy. And this is coming from the government itself. And the man who took that study and made it readable is Brian Passifum of the Toronto Sun. Brian, welcome to the show. Hey, good morning. How are you? I'm great. So yeah, this is not fear mongering from one side of the aisle or the other. This is the call is coming from inside the house.

Exactly, you know, when I was reading this report yesterday, like the one thing that kept popping into my mind is like, who wrote this? Is this like, Alia's people, right? Is this the, you know, some sort of conservative fear mongering? But no, this is coming right from the government. This is a foresight brief entitled Future Lives, Social Mobility in Question, and it's produced by Policy Horizons Canada, which is an internal government, I guess, think tank for a better term, that it's overseen by the Privy Council office. So this is an internal government document that is based on, I guess, the past decade of government policy. And when you read it, it's just bone chilling as to what this predicts.

And we'll dig into it in just a moment, but I saw a tweet about two minutes before coming to air where somebody said, look, no one's suggesting that this is gonna fully realize in the future, but one has to ask oneself, would something like this have been written 10 years ago? And the answer absolutely is no.

And so we find ourselves today with somebody looking at reading the tea leaves and saying, look, this is, these are, these are the trends that we're seeing. Oh, absolutely. Like you said, this is a decade ago. People would just dismiss it as pointless fear-mongering, you know, trying to, you know, do, do whatever,. Like you said, this is a decade ago, people would just dismiss it as pointless, fear-mongering, trying to do whatever, whatever. But yeah, this is kind of the thing that also popped into my mind reading this report and writing the story was that,

this is kind of how things are already. Like it talks about how a dystopian future of wealth and property ownership is entirely generational. And that really is the way things are today, you know, unless you have, you know, some sort of intergenerational wealth or, you know, parents with a couple of bucks willing to find some money for a down payment, like, you're not buying a house. No, no. Yeah, it's scary in that it already looks like it's coming true.

So, Brian, why don't you pull back the veil and let the listeners of the Ben Mulroney show know, not what's being predicted, but what could be on the horizon? Yeah, for example, post-secondary education. It's already becoming unaffordable now, and even then just trying to find a place to live. And the report predicts that, you know, pursuing post-secondary

education is no longer considered a reliable path to social mobility. You know, when I was in school and I'm sure you, same thing you went through too, you know, guidance counselors are always telling you, university education is the way to go, university. But the way this report is predicting is that university is going to be a place where the elite can establish their place in society. You know, only the rich will be able to afford tuition and the housing that belongs with it. So, you know, post-secondary education will, you know, it won't be the key to social mobility the way it was. In fact, this report says that social mobility will be impossible. If you're born a serf, you'll die a serf pretty much.

And one of the lines from your article, I think, is really quite chilling. Societal classes will also become increasingly isolated both in real life and online. Algorithmic dating apps filter by class gated metaverses like real life offer few opportunities to even meet people from different backgrounds. That, that to me, really does sound like something out of a dystopian film about the future. And you're already seeing that now you're seeing people you know into their respective echo chambers when it comes to things like politics and stuff like anybody who's you know deep into the conservative or the liberal echo chambers won't have you know want anything

to do with anybody outside of that. So we're already seeing that kind of societal segregation and you know this report sees that just getting worse. Dating apps, you know using AI to make sure that you only meet people that you're at your social level. It's terrifying. And then but it goes on to talk about the implications that would occur for the Canadian economy and they're not good. No, no, it says that, you know, that, you know, the economy is basically going to collapse or at the very least, people will lose lose confidence in the government, lose confidence in big business. We'll see both as kind of the, you know, the trigger that brought to this point.

So people will be less likely to trust a relying government. And the reports predicting you'll see things like people stepping outside of government programs for assistance, people hunting wildlife for food. I don't know what a Canada goose tastes like, but between that and your family starving, I'll go for it. Well, I hope you get really good with a slingshot

because every gun's gonna be illegal, so good luck hunting for food out there. And we talk often these days about class warfare, but typically class warfare exhibits itself by way of tweeting at each other really in a nasty way. I would have to surmise that in a reality like this in 2014 where it's come to pass, that class warfare would take on very real,

dangerous and violent implications. Oh, exactly. You know, they're predicting things like, you know, with the government and the economy collapsing, you're going to see a lot more damaging activism from labor unions, you know, work stoppages that damage, and labor action that damage economies. And, you know, we're starting to see a little bit of that. You know, that, and probably the most interesting, or not interesting, but terrifying thing is that Canada is gonna become a less attractive destination for migrants. Workers and professionals, we're already seeing that now,

will be fleeing Canada and the people who are left will be, you know, stuck in this, this is virtual serfdom where, you know, social mobility is impossible and you are who you are. You're born a Dalit, you're done a Dalit. I mean, if this started 10 years ago and this study is looking forward 15 years, the fact that we could be talking about,

and again, I'm not trying to fear monger, I'm just reading what the government put out there, and I'm not even reading between the lines, I'm reading the words that they're putting on the page. In 25 years, Canada goes from having the most successful middle class on the planet to a failed state, speaks to an ineptitude of government, the likes of which I don't think we've ever seen

in a Western democracy. No, it's eye-opening the fact this is coming from the government and they're basing this on government policy for the past 10 years. It's saying that, you know, the status quo stays the way it is. It's really going to turn into feudal Europe or maybe Mad Max or something. Brian Pasifium, how the heck did the government allow this report to be published? Well you know these you know it's you know the public service is a vast and exciting place you know. You know people think, the public service is a vast and exciting place, you know

You know people think that the public service is just people answering the phones and we call CRA or people who process paperwork for You know when you apply for passport but you know they have people in governments whose job it is to do this kind of thing to look at the current government policy and portend from that and Just the fact that you know, this isn't the first time that that policy horizon has issued reports like this. Have you ever read a report like this before? No, not nothing this dire. No, I think this dire that comes from comes from the government. Yeah, I can't believe that. Again, like, if if if I had read this on the dark web, that would have made sense. Or if I'd read if this was some web, that would have made sense.

Or if I had read it, if this was some sort of some person's fan fiction of a movie they wanted to write, that would make sense. But the fact that using government data and government statistics, they are pushing forth 15 years and saying this is a version of Canada that could be on the horizon. This isn't't conspiracy. This is out of the preview Council, man. Yeah, scary stuff.

So what are people supposed to do with with with a study like this? Well, these these studies are meant to guide policymakers and future policy. Unfortunately, it seems that just reading the liberal policy, it seems that nobody in the whoever created this the current liberal platform, which is we found out was made for Trudeau, but it's kind of you know, been around for Carney. It seems that the policymakers aren't reading the warnings, they aren't reading

the writing on the wall. And it's the wall. The scary thing is that we're seeing a lot of what's in this report coming to fruition already. And if things don't change, who knows? In 40 years, we'll be deciding what wine cooler matches with Canada Goose. You'll be able to harvest for your food. Brian Passifium, National Politics Reporter for the Toronto Sun. It's a heck of a story. It's a heck of a story. It's a heck of a report. Yeah, this is who we are. This is where we are. I appreciate it. And I hope to talk towing powerhouse. Or the all-new, boldly redesigned Kicks.

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