The Ben Mulroney Show - Ben asks are we heading to a two party political system?

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Are we heading to a two party political system? with Guest: Marcel Wieder, Liberal Strategist, President and Chief Advocate of Aurora Strategy Global 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

BedMGM, authorized gaming partner of the NBA, has your back all season long. From tip-off to the final buzzer, you're always taken care of with a sportsbook born in Vegas. That's a feeling you can only get with BedMGM. And no matter your team, your favorite player, or your style, there's something every NBA fan will love about BedMGM. Download the app today and discover why BedMGM is your basketball home for the season. Raise your game to the next level this year with BedMGM. Download the app today and discover why BetMGM is your basketball home for the season. Raise your game to the next level this year with BetMGM. A sportsbook worth a slam dunk. An authorized gaming partner of the NBA.

BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Want to own part of the company that makes your favorite burger? Now you can.

With partial shares from TD Direct Investing, you can own less than one full share, so expensive stocks are within reach. Learn more at td.com slash partial shares. TD, ready for you. Welcome to the Monday edition of the Ben Mulrooney show. I am the aptly named Ben Mulrooney. Thank you so much for joining us on CFPL in London. Thank you so much for joining us on 640 here in Toronto. And of course, you may be listening on a streaming app like the iHeartRadio app, or you may find us in podcast form on your favorite podcast platform. Thank you so much. And let's kick off this Monday with a bang, or with a boo, rather, because well, actually, before we go into that, let me tell you about

my weekend. I told you on Friday, I had a great conversation with my brothers as we reminisced about my father as we were approaching the one year anniversary of his passing. It was so great to have them on the show. Thanks, Mark. Thanks, Nick.

Really appreciated it. And then as soon as the show was done, I got in the car and I drove to Montreal because that Saturday was the anniversary of his passing. And I went to his condo, his apartment that he shared with my mom. And his den is still exactly as it was. And I walk in there and I imagine him sitting

in his chair, he was always on the phone, always calling somebody, always connecting with somebody. TV was always way too loud. And I sat at his desk and I actually had a great interview with Aaron Mullen. Aaron Mullen was the Australian Sky News presenter who went viral months ago for her impassioned, very reasoned and measured defense of Israel and the hostages.

And over the course of months, she really rose to the top of the voices of allies of the Jewish community globally and Israel specifically. She ended up leaving Sky News to take a job on X and she had me on her show. And it was lovely to actually meet her for the first time and have what I thought was a great conversation. If you want to see it, just go check out Aaron underscore Mullen or me, Ben Mulroney on X.

And so that was wonderful. One of my best friends from Montreal came over and we reminisced about my dad had some great Chinese food. And then the next morning my sister came over and we reminisced about my dad, had some great Chinese food. And then the next morning my sister came in and I hadn't seen her since her election. And you know, we have to wear many hats in the Mulroney family. Like one day you are focused on your kids in the morning

and later on that night you are representing your father's legacy at an event, and the next morning, you're moving furniture for your mother, and you just gotta be prepared to pivot. And Caroline went from being successful in her third run for the PC party, they won their third majority, she was part of that team, very happy for her, and she came in Saturday morning

so that we could remember my dad. And we had such a wonderful day together from going to light a candle for him and praying for him in the church where my sister got married, where my dad was so very proud of her. We drove around our neighborhood looking at all the different places that mattered to him,

his favorite restaurant, his old house. It was really nice. And then we went to the cemetery and spent some time with him there. And then we went to his favorite restaurant and had brunch. And then we went to visit my grandmother. And then we drove home. And it was a really, really nice, it was a nice visit with my dad. And as I told my family, I said, you know, I'm, there's obviously gonna be sadness associated with remembering my dad for a very long time. But there was one thing I learned from him. He never missed an opportunity to tell us

what we meant to him ever. Not once, I could have a phone call with him and he would end the call saying he loved me. And then I would remember that I had something to tell him and I'd call him back and he'd tell me again that he loved me. That was the rule he lived by. And I think he's imparted that into us

and I don't miss an opportunity to say that to anybody. So I don't have any regret as it relates to my time with my father. We squeeze every bit of juice out of that orange. And so I think he'd be proud of his kids. And I think he would be happy that we've come together in such a close knit way, far more than we ever were. I thought we were close before,

and we are far more close now. And that's due to the example that he set and the sustained example that my mother sets each and every day. All right, so that was my weekend. Some of you were at the Rogers Center for a massive wrestling event. And you know, when these big sporting events happen,

there will be a national anthem. And you gotta ask yourself, what's it gonna be like? Well, it was predictable. And you see by the dawn's early light. Yeah, we don't have to lose the whole thing. That was just a little taste. Now, from what I understand, I've been in the Rogers Center, the audio does not do it justice. Apparently, if you were in the Rogers Center, you could not hear that anthem. That's how loud the

booze were. So this is this is where we are as a nation in terms of our relationship with our closest trading partner and our best friends. Thank you to, well, there's a lot of people to thank for that, but we won't get into that. We have been trying on this show for months to get Christy Freeland in the hot seat, to have what I feel would be a respectful, but deep dive into her political past and her ambitions for her future.

We still have not gotten her here, but thank goodness that expert in Canadian politics, Bill Maher in Los Angeles was able to secure that interview. Let's listen. With the prime minister, I think every politician has their sell-by date, and that's part of what happened. But I think the other thing that happened is my party, we're actually called the Liberal Party,

and I am an old-school Liberal. And Liberals in Canada win when we are focused on people and on what they need in their lives. And we lose when people think that we're focused on virtue signaling and identity politics. Okay, there's so much wrong with that. And we're gonna talk about it over the course of the day. Bill Maher doesn't know anything about Canadian politics.

Nothing. He's an American. And so he is informed by his American worldview. And in the United States, you vote for a president. In Canada, you vote for a government. So you vote for your representative. So for example, I, Christia Freeland would be on my ballot

because she is my MP. But you vote for a prime minister the same way you vote for your MP. They represent you and then the government is formed. And so in his mind, Trudeau is the end all be all, not knowing that actually the way Christian Freeland had as much to do with his legacy and his woke ideology and worldview and had as much to do with helping him achieve it as anyone. It's not just about Trudeau.

And so there was no pushback on that whatsoever. And when she says, I'm an old school liberal, had I been in that chair, I was like, where has that old school liberal been for nine years? As you have been going around gleefully taking over people's bank accounts and trying to throw people in jail and, and, and, and, and he wouldn't do that. Where has that person been for nine years? And to what do we attribute this 11th hour conversion? These are pretty, this is low hanging fruit for even the most green Canadian journalists

or Canadian interviewers. But it's not even on the radar of someone like Bill Maher. And I'm getting a little sick and tired of these people who wanna be Canadian prime minister, who think that the way to get there is by being interviewed by popular Americans who don't know squat about this country. It is an insult to all of us here who will have to live with these people as our leaders who feel that they can circumvent us to get what they ultimately want, which is to retain power.

It's time now for us to take your calls because I want to hear what you have to say about our next topic 416-870-6400 or one triple eight, two to five talk. Okay, so Toronto is now debating whether or not businesses should be able to open on statutory holidays. Apparently, this is I mean, it's 2025. So I mean, it's about time. But there are certain parts of the city where businesses can be open on say Canada Day and Labor Day and Christmas Day and New Year's Day and other parts of the city where they can't. For example, the Eaton Center is allowed to be open because that's technically a tourist area,

so they get a carve out, but Yorkdale Mall is not allowed. And if you're a small, and there's plenty of areas around town where you're not allowed to open on those days. So you have people who are sitting at home, wondering what they should be doing with their time and their disposable income,

and they cannot come to your store. They cannot come and spend their money in your store on these days where they are free all day. They can browse, they can window shop, they can go from place to place. So it's, restaurants are allowed to be open, but these places are not. And I got to wonder, should businesses have the option to

decide this for themselves? I mean, by and large, businesses are run by adults. I think they should have the right to do what they want. Where is the where is the social ill that they are trying to protect us from by depriving these businesses from the ability to make money. 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. Are you a small business owner? What do you think about this? I'm not saying you have to open, but don't you think you should have the right to open? This is another example of the city feeling they know better than us.

They have to protect us from ourselves. They're babysitting us. I prefer to look at it like they are getting in the way. Consistently, I believe there's a view at city council and city hall that people and businesses are hurdles that need to be overcome for City Council to achieve its goals. Rather than we work for you the people. What do you want? What do you need? How can we help you get to where you need to get to? What are your goals to the people of Toronto, the business of Toronto? What do you need from

us so that you can live out the greatest fullest expression of who you are? Jim, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Happy Monday. Good morning sir. How you doing? I'm well, thank you. That's good. I grew up in a generation and small town. We didn't have Sunday shopping. Yeah. Till probably maybe the early eighties. Oh yeah. I remember when it happened. I was living in Ottawa. It was a God,

let me know this, this, the sky was going to fall with Sunday shopping. Absolutely. And the reason they got away with it then is because they made religious exceptions. If you, you know, it was based on a voluntary basis. And if people want to volunteer to work, I have no problem with that. If a company wants to be open, yeah, but they have to be able to look after those employees properly, make sure they have the proper people there. Well, yeah, of course, that that's what happens when you open up on a holiday. Yeah, you ever

have an issue, you can never get it rectified. And that's the downside. Yeah, I mean, there's holiday pay, there's overtime, there's time and a half. There's all sorts of ways to make sure that the employees are properly remunerated. And if you as a business feel that you can make a go at it and make some money, then do it. Who is the government to tell you you can't open on a day where there are customers out there probably looking for something to do? The

fact that we are even debating this, the fact that is even a conversation and not a rubber stamp let's fix this right now is insane. Well no, it would be insane if it wasn't Toronto. It is absolutely par for the course for this city. I've said many times, Canada's biggest problem is Canada. But if you drill down to Toronto, it's even more true here. The biggest impediment to success in this city, oftentimes, are the people in charge of running it. Because the businesses want a business and the people want to be people and the tourists want to be tourists.

And the government seems to come in, City Hall seems to come in and ask themselves, how can we slow this train down? How can we slow down the success of our businesses? Oh, let's study some way of mucking up their their flow. 416-870-6400 won a triple 8-225 talk. These shopping laws are I think ludicrous, ludicrous. But par for the course in a city like Toronto, like that we should have, there should be a values test I want to hear the next time an election comes around,

that whoever is running for city council, the litmus test for me would be one of them, there's a lot of them, but one of them would be that if you elect me, you're gonna elect a representative for this city who wants this city to be the most business friendly city in the world. Want it to be the easiest place to open a business. Lower all the fees and bylaw and all the taxes on businesses.

We want to make it so, you know, maybe you can park outside that business. Call me crazy, but wouldn't that be great? Hey, let's talk to Fred. Fred, what do you think? Hey, Ben, how are you today? I'm well, thank you. Happy Monday. Yeah, you as well. Um, I'm gonna have to totally disagree with you on this. I think that we have our statutory holidays. Yep. You know, they reinvented family day for a reason. Just I don't know how many years ago that it came through. It's not about small business.

I think the larger businesses will force their employees to work. My wife works retail. She's a manager and I know very well that she would be forced to work. And I think it cuts into a lot of family time, especially if you get into, you know, if you're going to make one statutory holiday where you can, if you're gonna make one statutory holiday, or you can shop, you're gonna make them all, including Christmas. Well, you know, like, look, there are there are ways to ensure that if they want if they want people to come in, they

got to pay them for it. If it's if it's a stat holiday, and you're saying, we want you to come in, okay, it's, it's, it's double, double time, like whatever my salary is or my hourly rate is, it's twice that. And there are ways to word the municipal bylaw that says that it's entirely optional. I mean, there are ways to protect people against this sort of thing.

God knows we've got a lot of people, I mean, that is a focus. Workers' rights. Is it a slippery slope? Maybe Maybe but let's explore it. Dave, welcome to the show. Hey, Ben, how are you? I really enjoy your show. Thank you very much. I'll make a quick two pointer here. So one I do remember when Sunday shopping was brought to fruition. I drove

by the mall with my father for the first time and he yelled at me because I said, Oh, cool, I can go to the mall on Sunday. And he totally went up and down me. And he said to me, and I'll never forget this, this is the end of family life. You will see. Yeah, I didn't know what he meant by that. Yeah. And it wasn't necessarily a religious thing. It was once you start it, it's not gonna stop. And the other thing I noticed about, I love being Canadian and everything like that, but you go to different parts of the world

and you see how they enjoy their national holidays, how their government's like, nope, shut it down, let's all relax. We don't have that here. They're always just constantly looking for excuses for you to go to work. I worked in a casino, we worked 24 seven holidays, this that we never closed.

And it's depressing as an employee. So- And I get it, I get it. That would be the flip side to the argument. And thank you for the call. I don't, I haven't seen a dissolution in my family because of our ability to shop on Sundays. And I get it, I'm one.

But generally speaking, I don't know that the fear justifies the mandating that people can't open if they don't want to. Anyway, I appreciate all the calls. Thank you very much. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. And there's an RBC report that found that nearly a quarter of Canadians

have asked relatives for money. Nearly three in five parents said they expect to financially support their children into adulthood. Now, full disclosure, I've had a lot of help from my family over the years. And you know, it's that every family is different. And that's, I've been very fortunate. Try to do it all myself now.

Glad to have had the help. It certainly has put me in a far better position than I otherwise would have been in. But, and in the case of my father and my mother, they expected nothing in return. That's not always the case. And so I want to hear now from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK.

What are the rules on lending money in your family or to your family? Have you ever had to ask a relative for money? Have you been asked, did it end well? I mean, I've loaned money before to friends and I'm no longer in a position to do that, but I have loan money in the past. And very early on, I realized,

I'm just gonna have to write this off because the expectation of getting paid back is gonna be what kills this friendship. And so what started as a loan ended as a gift. And I'm very glad I did that. I'm glad I was able to do that. Not everyone's able to do that. But give us a call, 416-870-6400,

1-888-2400-1888225. Talk. I mean, I think this really does speak to where we are as a country. The fact that, you know, maybe traditional lending institutions are just not in your wheelhouse. You might not be eligible for a loan because you don't have the collateral. You don't have what the bank is looking for. And so you're going to go to somebody who's slightly more forgiving, i.e. a parent or a sibling or a grandfather or a rich uncle. But this is this to me speaks to how unhealthy we are as a nation, but also how wonderful family can be. And for some people

it's not a problem at all. So let's know 416-870-6400. I mean, nearly a quarter of Canadians have asked relatives for money. And I've done many stories, especially when I was doing the weekend show, we talked a lot about the bank of mom and dad helping with a down payment for a condo or a first home. And because the parents said to themselves,

look, I am gonna be, I'm gonna be kicking in for my kid one way or another. So I'm either gonna have them living in the basement, rent free, or I'm gonna take a little bit of my retirement and I am going to, I'm gonna help them get their own place and get them set up so that they can at least begin, get in on the bottom rung of the real estate market and eventually move up to

from a starter home or a starter condo to ultimately their forever home. And that will be my gift to them that will keep on gifting because I don't want them living in my basement and there's no return for them on that. There's no return for them and therefore no return for me on that investment. And now to hear that nearly a quarter of Canadians have asked for a loan from, or have asked for money. I mean, it's not even a loan. Sometimes it's outright give me money. Yeah, I've never, I haven't seen the toxicity

of what can happen when money is injected into a family dynamic mercifully. But I think that's, it was because my dad was generous not to a fault, I do not fault him at all. I was very, very pleased that he was able to help me with the goals that I had set forth. And, you know, I look at the home that I'm in now, I was able to afford it.

I remember the conversation I had with him on the phone. I had everything set up with the bank. I was able to afford it. And he called me and said, I don't want you worrying as much every day as, I don't want you being cash poor. And so he helped with the down payment on my house and very, very fortunate that he did. Hey, let's say how to Rob.

Rob, what do you think of this? Do money and family mix? Yes and no. I would never lend money to family. I will give money to family. Yeah. I have been, you know, I've helped my sister out before and it was just one of those things. If I couldn't afford it, I wouldn't do it. but I think lending money and the expectation to get it back just can create fundamental problems in itself. So if I love you and you need a couple grand, there you go. Exactly and I have to assume based on just the way you're speaking about it, yeah and I think the key is if you can afford it,

give it so that it doesn't poison the well. Like there's, you weren't expecting anything, like there was no reciprocity here, I'm going to give you this money, but you're going to be accountable to me. Yeah, yeah, it's your money. Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly right. It's just all a relationship loaning. I've seen other people loan money to family members. Yep. Oh, I think not well more than once.

Hey, Rob, thank you for the call. I appreciate it. I'm glad that was the first call because I think that's to me it's it's that clear. If you if you don't want to let money muck up a relationship, then you don't let money muck up the relationship you take the power out of it. So here's the money. It's now yours. Not mine anymore. You said you need it for X. I hope you spend it on X if I've, you know, I hope I don't hear that you spend it on something different. Hey, Sam, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Hey, Ben. Yeah, I, um, way back in the seventies, I'm 70 years old now. Way back in the seventies, I lent my parents money to pay off their mortgage,

interest free. Well, it worked. Okay. They paid me back. Well, fast forward to today. I lent my son some money for a new house that they have. And I don't think I'm ever going to see it, especially now that she's pregnant. So what are you going to do now? Are you at a fork in the road trying to figure out how to square that circle? Because you loan them the money. You don't think you're going to see it back. So are you wrestling with just turning it into a loan, into a gift or where's your head at? Well, I'm going to keep very silent on it. And hopefully says one day soon, uh, here's the money. You let me, dad, thank you very much. I don't know. These millennials spend money like no tomorrow. And I don't think,

I don't think it was a good investment on my part. Sam, can I give you a recommendation? Don't sit on your feelings on this because that's when the anger grows, right? Like you might grow resentful and you might accidentally lash out in an unproductive way. I would definitely, if I were you, at least have a quick chat about it in a casual sort of low temperature sort of situation, just to level set. Right, that's a good idea. But I have another partner, it's my

wife, and she thinks differently than me, she thinks it's gone, and be happy about it. So well, but think about it, like, if you if you have that conversation, Sam, and your son says that money's gone, well, then, one, you you know for sure and two you also know you'll never gonna lend them any more money and and you have the piece of knowing that you could shut the book no but more importantly Sam he knows that all right thanks Sam thanks so much I appreciate it hey Rob welcome

to the show my wife and I about 40 40 years ago, her parents lent us, I think it was about $40,000 to buy our first house. And it was a loan. We understood that. And we paid them back on a regular basis every month. And the gift to us was the interest. It was an interest-free loan. And I think it teaches you responsibility and the knowledge that you have to

learn how to pay back the money that you borrow. So it allowed us to get our first home at about 80,000 bucks, we sold it and now enjoy our fourth home. And, you know, very thankful to her parents for doing that for us. Yeah. And it taught us a really good life lesson. No, I listen, I, I think if done properly and if done deliberately and with forethought, then a gift can be a lesson, a loan can be a lesson,

an interest-free loan can be a lesson. Every single one of those scenarios, when you're injecting money into the relationship, turns the relationship into something it wasn't before. So if you do it with deliberate forethought, everybody can learn from it. But you have to get everybody needs to know what the rules of engagement are when they when they enter into that agreement.

I think we got time for one more call right now. Let's add a David. Hello. Hey, David. Hi, how are you? Thank you for taking my call. No problem. I have three kids and I believe that as parents we are obligated to help out our kids, right? Yeah. My kids know that when it's a loan, it's a loan. When it's a gift, it's a gift. So they do pay back, but I've heard plenty of parents who say they're not going to help out their kids beyond the educating years. Once they're done with university, or if they want to continue on for a master's or a PhD or med school, then they want their kids to focus exclusively on their studies, and therefore they're going to make sure that they don't want for anything.

Help them with rent, they'll help them with, you know, an allowance or something like that, so they can focus on their studies. And once that's done, they're not going to see anything until the parents kick the can. Every parent is different. It depends on what values they want to impart and how they impart those values. So I will never sit in judgment of anyone who decides that they want a parent in one way or another. But I think certain universal truths can be talked about. And the one that we've been talking about here is so long as everybody understands the rules of engagement and what the rules of the game are going into it, then there should be no problems. That's at least how I feel. Oh, do we have time? Yeah, we have time for one more. Sonia, welcome to the show. Hi, Ben. I'll make it quick. I was a law clerk. And when I

met when we bought our first house, we're borrowing money from my parents. And I made my husband, husband sign a promissory note was not happy. He goes, What happens if I don't sign it? I said, You don't get the money. And it saved me because when we divorced, that promissory note came back to my parents. Really? Look at that. Well done. Yep. Well done.

Right? You know what? Like if people are grifters and want to take and don't have the, the bank doesn't lend you money, why should everybody else? I mean, if you've got it, but you know what? You have the, to give it back. Yeah, well, well done. Listen, the cautionary tale. I appreciate that. Well done. And it's a nice point to end on. Welcome back to the Ben Moenishow. Thank you so much for joining us on this Monday in March. I'm joined now by a friend of mine and colleague of mine, Marcel Weider,

liberal strategist, president and chief advocate of Aurora Strategy Global. Marcel, happy Monday to you. And thank you. So we watched, I watched, let's start with Bonnie Cromby, right? Let's start with Bonnie, because I was part of the global news coverage.

And a lot of us were watching the vote tally come in. We're like, my goodness, almost a third of Ontarians are voting for the liberals. This is, and then to see that it only translated to 14 seats. I've never seen a less efficient vote, sort of the way it's spread out than I saw with the liberals in that, in that election. It was quite disappointing for liberals across the province to see that the results didn't match what the vote tally ended up. If you look, there were so many close races

which only were separated by a couple hundred votes or less. And so if it had been one more point, if it would be, let's say, 31%, there would have been 20 plus MPPs on the liberal benches. It's that close. And it would have helped take the sting out of Bonnie not winning her seat. She could have potentially have won her seat with an extra point or so. But she was up against a very difficult situation where two mayors were working against her, where she was up against a very difficult situation where two mayors were working against her, where she was traveling across the province and couldn't spend time in Mississauga. So very

difficult for a leader to do that. But wouldn't she have home field advantage regardless having been the mayor of Mississauga? I mean, and the cache of being the liberal leader, I mean, I think cuts both ways. It does. But, you know, one of the things about Bonnie is, is that when she's in Mississauga, she's all over the place. And so she has the, you know, that home court advantage is only when she's actually there. Once she's removed from there, it's somewhat difficult to translate into actual votes. Talk to me about the strategy involved here, because you and I have talked about this.

I thought it was a strategic error not to seek a seat in Queens Park earlier. And I've told Bonnie as much to her face. And then, so now she's still on the outside looking in. What is the party to do? What's the strategy here? She's got 14 seats, 12 for you need 12 for official party status. Congratulations on getting over that barrier. But what is she to do now? Does she ask one of her

people to step down with no guarantee that she's going to win and then you're down to 13 seats and your leaders lost twice? What's the play there? So first of all, we're not sure if the status will stay at 12. Who knows, Doug Ford could bring it to 15. It's not unlike him. But I'll have your listeners recall that John Tory was the leader of the PC party for two years and didn't have a seat at Queens Park. Yeah. Oh no, listen, I concede that,

but in the here and now, as Bonnie's trying to rebuild the party, and we're going to talk about that in a second, don't you think it behooves her to be in the seat of power? Okay, it would be, you know, in an ideal situation, yes, it would be nice to have her in the house and being able to lead off question period, et cetera. But this is the reality. And so it will give her more time to go out to the grassroots, to talk to people, to be able to build up the party infrastructure.

Remember what she inherited was a morbid party. There was nothing, no organization. Uh, writing associations were flat or dead and, you know, she's been able to recruit candidates, build up the party, raise money. And so now she'll have that opportunity to continue doing that over however long until there's an opportunity for her to gain a seat in

the, in the house. I don't think she's going to ask any of her MPPs to fork over their seat. Right. Uh, you know. They just all came through a very tough election. And so who wants to say, okay, I got elected three weeks ago and now I'm giving it up for the leader. When she gave her concession speech, she said she was going to stick around. And a lot of us watching thought, well, if she's gonna leave, she's not gonna say it tonight. She's not gonna rain on the parade.

She's gonna take the wins. She's gonna highlight the positive. And the negative could be for another day. But now it does look like she's sticking around the party. Executive unanimously said they want her to stick around. But I've got to ask, and this is not me being ageist, it's just numbers. She'll be 69 at the next election.

The next four years are gonna be, it's gonna be a slog'll be 69 at the next election. The next four years are gonna be, it's gonna be a slog of rebuilding and running around, as you said, going to the grassroots. You know her and I'm not asking you to put words in her mouth, is she built for a rebuild? Absolutely. Now, this is a lady at 65 who goes rock climbing,

who's in the gym every day. Most people, if you asked her how old she is, would peg her in her 50s. She is so energetic, we nickname her the energetic bunny. You know? So, you know, I don't see that being an issue. And she loves politics, she loves meeting people, she loves advocating on issues.

I want to move on to this story that there's a liberal MPP that's asking. No NDP. Oh NDP and sorry NDP MPP asking the liberals and the NDP to stop quote vote splitting the anti-Ford vote and look my take on that is the is the left side of the spectrum never seemed to mind when they were chasing more votes. So maybe the issue is not vote splitting. Maybe the issue is they are not appealing to enough people. That what they're putting in the window is not attracting enough voters to them.

Well, and to your earlier point, the liberals ended up with over 30 or close to 30% of the popular vote, the NDP at 18%, the actual number is somewhere around 600,000 more votes than the NDP. This really is an idea that's being flogged every once in a while and so it's not going to go anywhere. I'll remind your listeners that in Eglinton Lawrence, the NDP candidate withdrew at the very last moment so that there couldn't be a replacement NDP candidate.

The liberal came within 144 votes of winning that seat, but lost out because a lot of those votes ended up, the NDP votes ended up in the Green Party. And so, you know, it didn't solve the situation. And that to me is probably the biggest sticking point, is this assumption by the powers that be, the Liberal Party and the NDP, that if you, that we are so close on the political spectrum

that we know what your intention would be. If the Liberal bowed out, you would vote NDP and vice versa and you don't get to make that choice for the voter the voter has to be able to make that choice you're absolutely right and I'll let you know that for example the Ontario Federation of Labour which is one of the largest constituents of the NDP at their convention voted that they would only support NDP candidates, not the best candidate, strictly the

NDP. And so, you know, it would go against what the OFL has a mandate for. And so I don't see this happening. The cultures are so diametrically opposed that I don't see either liberals wanting to support NDP candidates or NDPers supporting liberal candidates. Yeah it's just one of those things after you lose an election you start looking at the rules of the game. It's a pipe dream. Marcel Weider thank you so much always appreciate our chats thanks so much. Thank you. At Desjardins, we speak business. We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans.

We've mastered made-to-measure growth and expansion advice, and we can talk your ear off about transferring your business when the time comes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do, business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us and contact Desjardins today. We'd love to talk business.