The Ben Mulroney Show - Ben drills down on how we can entice businesses to invest in Canada again

Episode Date: January 27, 2025

Guests and Topics: -President Donald Trump trash talks Canada publicly with Guest: David MacNaughton, former Canadian ambassador to the US (2016–2019) -How do we entice businesses to invest in Canada again? with Guest: Tony Chapman, Host of the award winning podcast Chatter that Matters, Founder of Chatter AI 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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Great. That's 1% closer to being part of the 1%. Maybe, but definitely 100% closer to getting 1% cash back with TD Direct Investing. Conditions apply. Offer ends January 31st, 2025. Visit td.com slash DI Offer to learn more. Donald Trump has been, and will, it feels like like forever when he finds a microphone attack Canada. He just did it again in front of the World Economic Forum and it's got a

lot of us asking why why I saw a graphic on TV that said Mexico 25% tariff potential tariff Canada 25% tariff China 10% tariff potential tariff, Canada 25% tariff, China 10% tariff. And I'm asking myself, are we two and a half times the trouble China is to the United States? It doesn't make any sense. So to figure out why there's an out to figure out if there is a disconnect between what is being said publicly and what they're trying to achieve privately. We're joined now by David McNaughton, the former Canadian ambassador to the U.S. Ambassador, thank you so much for joining us today. Oh, no problem. It's a pleasure. So you were the ambassador from 2016 to 2019,

one of the most exciting times in Canadian U.S. recent history that led to significant achievements in trade. Yeah, it was quite the experience. I got to tell you, the people asked me about Trump and what's predictable, and the only thing that's predictable is unpredictability. So it was quite the experience, I got to tell you. So in your estimation, having witnessed him privately in a way that none of us have ever

seen, what is the purpose of the public disrespect at this point? Is it a tactic or is it a deep seeded resentment because he feels that our leaders here have disrespected him? Where do you think it comes from? Well, I think it's a combination of things. I mean, obviously, he has said that his favorite word in the English language is tariff. And he thinks he can bully people into giving the US more favorable trade terms. He exaggerates clearly all the time. But I think what is really important to understand right now is that he is feeling so sort of chuffed and so full of himself because he won this great victory and the House and the Senate are both Republican, even if it's narrow victory.

And all sorts of business people are running around, you know trying to kiss the ring and Tell him how wonderful he is. And so, you know his normal bravado is just is is is Exacerbated so what we've got to do is figure out. What is it that we can do that will I Guess feed the ego if you will that will, I guess, feed the ego, if you will, but not do it to the detriment of Canada. Do things that are actually things we should have been doing anyway, but that we can do and actually have him feel that he's won, right? Yeah.

But I think a lot of us are sort of pulling out our hair because on the campaign trail, he was leveling some accusations that a lot of us thought, you know, he's actually getting this right. We do need to start paying more attention to our military and to our borders. And because we haven't been, I'm sure there are some issues over border security. Those were concerns that people like myself have had for years and it did feel like our government was perhaps too late but at in the moment starting

to take those things seriously and then he pivoted from that to a trade deficit. So I got to wonder if if he doesn't have a an actual problem if or if the problem keeps migrating to the next thing is his problem just Canada? Well, I don't really think so. I mean, I think in the first instance, what happened was that he was focused on Mexico in terms of the, you know, the migration problem. And also Fentanyl. And then I think probably somebody said, well, you can't just single out Mexico, you should say some go Canada too, because they're part of the problem. And then when I think we started pushing back publicly,

I think he enjoys that, he enjoys sort of a boxing match. And so, my view on all of this, it's unfortunate, our political situation is what it is, but, you know, we shouldn't be talking a lot about what we're going to do. We should be just doing it and we should be having conversations with them in private and not trying to be boastful ourselves because I think that just, you know, feeds him into trying to do something more. So it's unfortunate.

I'm in conversation with David McNaughton, the former Canadian ambassador to the US from 2016 to 2019. Ronald Reagan was known for a number of things, but he was known for having bold vision, big sweeping vision, and then he would hire the right people to help him enact those things. He was a macro visionary. And I've got to wonder, having been in the room with Donald Trump, I wouldn't compare him to Ronald Reagan, but is he the same kind of guy? Does he have these big visions about levying tariffs

in order to exact behavioral change from his allies and enemies alike. And then he lets the details oriented people take over the negotiations. Is he present for a lot of this stuff as we're staring down the barrel at an existential threat? How much time is he actually spending on Canada? Well, I think in the first,

when I was there in his first term, there's no question that he hired some of the top talent that you could possibly imagine, some very, very competent people. I mean, Bob Lighthizer and I didn't always agree, but he was a very competent guy. H.R. McMaster was a great, you know. He had people top to bottom who were really first class. I think he's still got some around him. I think Mike Walz is a good guy. I think that Burgum is good in that whole energy space. So I think there are some people to talk to. I think what's happening right now is

there aren't a lot of people haven't been confirmed. He hasn't got his whole team in place. And so he's just sort of freelancing. Okay, and I just I think we should just you know, I can't remember which Blue J was but when he used to come to the plate he used to always play don't panic and I think We should take a little advice for that Lastly mr. Ambassador I'm not gonna ask you to make a political statement here, but I do want to get your take on Christia Freeland in that she may very well be the next leader who will be the Canadian

counterpoint to Donald Trump. And depending on where you fall on the political spectrum, you know that he has an antagonistic relationship with her. He doesn't like her. Now, that could be a badge of honor, or it could be a real problem. You were in the room with her. a real problem. You were in the room with her. Is she the effective negotiator that could prove useful in a situation like this? Or is that animosity so great that it could be more of a burden and a curse? Well, I was in the room and dealt with Christia almost daily. I think our success in the first go round and it'll be the same this time if we can do it is that it was a team effort. I mean, I remember one point Trump saying to me privately, I wish you would keep that

nasty woman out of here. And I phoned her up and said, I don't know what you're doing, but keep it up because it's working. But I'm not, you know, I don't think, you know, it depends. There are people that we're going to need to use effectively to deal with him. They're going to be, but the whole thing about what happened last time was everybody pulled together, the business community, labor, the provinces, the opposition parties. And unfortunately right now we're more fractured than not. And so hopefully we can get over that over the next few months and be in a position where we can have a strong team, regardless of who the prime minister is, it

is going to work effectively to, uh, to do some things. But, you know, as I said, at the outset, you know, there's some things we should be doing on defense and security. And it's not just a matter of setting a target or anything else. It's like we've been talking about NORAD modernization for years. We need to do more to protect the new threats that have arisen and do more in the Arctic and do a whole series of things. And I think if we start doing things like that, we'll find that his attention will go elsewhere, where he's going to have some big problems anyway. And Ambassador, I want to thank you so much for adding to this conversation.

And we really appreciate it. Have a great week. Okay. Thanks very much, Ben. A lot of announcements coming out of Trump's first week. Global car maker Stellantis announced it would be heavily focusing on investing in U.S. operations in the future. Saudi Arabia, oh, they plan to invest 600 billion in the US over the next four years. And Trump announced a massive $500 billion private sector AI infrastructure investment. That's that's a lot of investment in the United States, which is going to translate

he hopes into a lot of jobs. Meanwhile, in Canada, not so much. And we're going to talk about some of those things in a minute. But the question is, how do we entice businesses to do business in Canada? How do we spur investment? How do we make ourselves more productive? Well, joining us to discuss is Tony Chapman, the host of the award-winning podcast, Chatter That Matters, and founder of Chatter AI. Tony, great to talk to you.

It's not a subject we want to be talking about, but it's a subject we have to talk about. Oh, no question, Ben. My voice is a little off, but I should come back. Yeah, there's no doubt in my mind that Canada needs to get their act together when in terms of attracting foreign investment. And right now it's fleeing the country. Yeah, well, Justin Trudeau and the liberals,

I think they tried to show us half of the picture by saying that I think we were the third destination for direct foreign investment last year or the year before. But what they didn't count is how much money was actually leaving the country. When you factor that in, we were a net loser of investment. I'm a massive loser. You talk to our tech community and they're all looking at United States. We lose our tech group.

We lose our new economy. So we've got to figure out a way to say that that like in the past, it was easy. We're just as productive as United States. We happen to have Canada, universal health care, fresh water, our values, everybody wanted to come here. But now we've lost so many of our advantages, overtaxed, too much bureaucracy, too much government interference, too many problems. And so people are saying I got to capitalism's going, I'm going to go where there's least problems. And so people are saying, capitalism's going, I'm going to go where there's least resistance. And right now, Donald Trump's stuck up his hand and say, hey,

come to the States. We're going to make it easy for you versus come to Canada. We're going to make it impossible for you. And it's interesting because we've seen seasons in Canada with flurries of announcements where they're going to build this factory or they're going to start this business. But it almost always seems to be attached to some form of corporate welfare.

We're enticing them here with public money. And I'm not seeing that in the States. No, and we're enticing branch plants here. We're not enticing head offices. We're not growing in Canada. As soon as something gets critical mass, puts their hand up for capital, they can't find it so they go down to the States. That's the economy we want to invest in. And the United States doesn't have to because basically Trump said, we're going to give you the tax base

that Ireland does, low taxes. We're going to allow you as entrepreneurs to keep the value of your investment. All we want you to do is come here and create jobs and create enterprise. Okay. So Tony, I want you to present your vision. I want you to step inside the role of the prime minister of Canada. You are prime minister Chapman. What is your sales pitch to businesses? First thing we got to do is we're going to say we're going to have the same tax base as United States, number one.

Number two, we've got a free trade agreement with the United States that allows for the transfer of goods and services between the borders. So you can operate anywhere. Three, our dollar is more competitive. Four, our energy is gonna be more competitive. You know what's happening right now, Ben, is we are actually selling our surplus energy to the states, electricity,

and those border states are coming back to Canada saying it's cheaper to manufacture in the states because your electricity's cheaper here. So it's not hard to say what to do with prime minister. We got to set conditions up for business to succeed because if business succeeds, guess what? We hire people, we create a tax base, that tax base protects their social programs. The last 10 years, all we've done is borrow money to keep those social programs alive.

Anybody that runs a household knows that's not sustainable, but somehow or other every time we go back to the voting booth, we somehow think that there's a free prize inside that somehow is going to get paid for by this thing called deficit that has no impact on us. And it has an incredible impact. So Prime Minister of Canada cut interest rates. Number two, free education, university, continuous education all the way through because you're going to have to learn throughout your entire life. The third one, and I think this one matters most, is the fact you come to Canada for the next 100 years, we've got guaranteed fresh water, energy, a place to grow your family

for generations to come. And the fourth thing is we're absolutely pro-business as a country as opposed to what's happened over the last 10 years where some or other capitalists have been given this dirty word. And all of this to me, again, it's not rocket science. It's just running a country like you'd run your household. And Tony, you make a good point there. Like the Canadian brand of capitalism doesn't have to be heartless and it doesn't have to be cruel. I mean there are a lot of center-right people, if not every one of them that I know, wants us to have a robust

social safety net, but we're smart enough to recognize we can't pay for it with the economics that we've got right now. If we were to unlock our natural resources potential, get them to market, sell, diversify, you know, who we sell them to and get the most competitive price for those things and do so in an environmentally sustainable way. Just from that sector alone, we're not even talking about the AI revolution

and the tech revolution. If just from natural resources, we could fund so much of our social safety net that the other side of the spectrum values so very much. You know, Ben, here's a here's a comment I want every one of your listeners to listen to. Norway has a sovereign fund from their energy. They now control 3% of the world's stock market. Their people, their society has 3% of the world stock market to draw upon to fund education and health care, because they understand that they sell,

they sell their energy, but they take some of those profits and reinvest it in their country. It's not rocket science, but we've got to have people in power that understand that these are assets of ours, rare minerals, uranium, some of the most important things that the world's gonna need in the future we have in Canada, but we've got to unleash them, but unleash them with purpose

to create great social programs, to create a great entity so that your great grandchildren can say, and look at us and say, instead of you boring all this money on your watch, you set me up for the future. And isn't that the role of every generation to set the next generation up for the future?

So you keep talking, you've talked twice about the, of the Ireland model and you know, their corporate tax rate is what 12 and a half percent? Yeah, 12 and a half percent. And what is it in Canada? Yeah, I mean, listen, we are so taxed. If you add up all the taxes, corporate tax, even small business, all the payroll taxes and everything else, we're approaching 50%.

Yeah. I mean, it's like, you know, who's going to set up? I just started a new AI business, like, because I'm so patriotic to Canada, but I'm going, what am I doing here? Yeah, but you know that there are people who chirp from the other side who say, oh, trickle down economics. You just want to make the rich richer. No, but you got to make the rich richer because they're the ones that create the next generation of wealth that share.

Now, I agree with a lot of people right now. The disparity between the have and have nots is unsustainable. We've got a handful of tech people in the States that are worth what? The GDP of, I think, the top 11th country in the world. It's crazy. We've got to find a way to divide that. I've got an answer for that. We'll do it on another show. But it's not about taxation. It's about validating who they are, their legacy, and showing them ways that they can reinvest their wealth to better society to me That's ultimately the legacy will want to measure Zuckerberg will want to measure himself by not how many billions he died with but what he did with those billions when he was Alive and that to me will be another show for us

But there's also there's also the entire so the mountain of regulations the regulatory bodies that companies have to jump through in a country like Canada versus other places where, I mean, there's regulation, but it's nothing like it is here. You know, cap, they talk free enterprise for the word free is a reason, no dead ends. Free enterprise wants to flow without restrictions. They want it, they don't want to be held in sludge, they don't want to be held at tollbooths. And that's what Canada does.

It sets up so much bureaucracy and even just building a house in this country is complicated. Building a subway system takes decades versus years in other countries. And we allow this to happen because that's our status quo. And we do everything to protect the status quo.

The unions try to protect it. The people in power try to protect it. And one day that status quo is going to get shattered because we'll hit a fiscal cliff or we'll, as voters, we'll come in and say what Ireland's doing is right, what Venezuela's doing right, what the United States is doing right, unleash free enterprise, create jobs, create purpose, create happiness.

If people are working, they're not robbing. Tony Chapman, we're going to leave it there. What I'd like you to do is go get some mint tea, and we can talk again soon. All right. Apologize for the... No, no, no problem. Hey, thank you so much. It's the brain. Nobody knows. A new series coming to global and streaming on StackTV. I don't know who I am now. Inspired by the unforgettable true story. But I will be a doctor again.

Emmy nominee Molly Parker. I will do everything I can to get my life back. DOC, new series Tuesdays on global. Stream on StackTV.