The Ben Mulroney Show - Ben speaks with Premier Scott Moe about how Tariffs are hurting Saskatchewan

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

Guests and Topics: Guest: Scott Moe, Premier of Saskatchewan 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

One of the premiers in this country, whom I respect the most, actually has one of the toughest jobs these days because he's dealing not only with American terrorists, but unlike a lot of other jurisdictions, he's got Chinese terrorists to deal with as well. And he's got a burgeoning separatist movement afoot in his province. And we're going to talk to him about all of those things right now. Please welcome to the show, the Premier of Saskatchewan himself, Scott Moe.

Mr. Premier, welcome. Thank you so much, Ben, for taking time this morning and an exciting time it is. It is exciting. And it was nice to hear your perspective following the election of Mark Carney. I've been very candid about who I supported in that election. It didn't go my way, but I'm wishing him well

as he embarks on trying to enact his vision of Canada. And it seemed that when he got elected, you too took a hopeful, positive stance. Yeah, there's a lot going on. There's a lot of emotion even up to and leading to the always and the results in the most recent federal election we had. But you know at the end of the day it's no secret I had put out you know who I was supporting in the election as well as many did across Canada. But we you know

with the results as they come in we're faced from Saskatchewan's perspective and it's no secret at all that we've had challenges, know, with the results as they come in, we're faced from Saskatchewan's perspective, and it's no secret at all that we've had challenges, policy challenges with the Liberal government the last, you know, eight, nine, ten years. But in saying that, we always have to make efforts, and I think in particular people in leadership positions have to make efforts to ensure that we are putting our best foot forward in every opportunity for Canada to succeed as a nation. And that's, I think, what you saw us do and myself do from Saskatchewan's perspective. We have a great belief that there is an opportunity to move forward here. There's going to have to be maybe a little more frank dialogue and

some changes in direction. But it's there, and it's there for all of us. Well, you know, Mark Carney got elected by saying, I'm going to do things differently. I am not my predecessor. So is it fair to say that, you know, Saskatchewan probably has the expectations saying, OK, now prove it. Exactly.

And I think that's precisely where not only Saskatchewan residents are, but maybe many Canadians across Canada as well. We do here, you know, we have the same party, but a new leader. And I think a fresh new leader as well, a new Prime Minister. He's off to represent Canada in Washington DC and we wish him very well and support him in those efforts. But he is a new leader and he is saying some

things and he has made some changes to policy as well and he will be required to make some more in order for us not only to move forward and feel included across this nation, but for us to really advance and accelerate the economic growth in our nation as well. There are some policies in place that are hindering economic growth from coast to coast to coast, and they do need to be changed in order for us to catch up to some of the rest of the world and really achieve what I know we can achieve as Canadians. So he's saying the right things and to your point, now prove it, is what I've been saying is we're going to have to see some action behind those words.

And I'm hopeful that we do and if we do, I think Canada will be in a much better space in two to three years than maybe it is today. So you had your first call with him. You've invited him to Saskatchewan as Prime Minister. What was the, what were some of the bullet point key takeaways from that call? Well it was a good call and you know what I had really covered in the call and I offered the Prime Minister to cover any points that he had and many of them were similar but what I wanted to cover in that call was a number of sensitive points and then we would get into the details of each of them and how we can work through them

in subsequent calls. But I wanted to give them really a frame of or a snapshot of you know where our head is at in this province and what we're working on, what's a priority for us moving forward to either change or to support the federal government in many ways. And it started off you know we have the traditional issues, which I maybe get to in a moment, around resource development and such. But, you know, our relationship with the US, Saskatchewan's a force for good when it comes to international markets. And so, you know, allow us to work together in this space

and we'll support, you know, the Canadian effort in this space. China, as you mentioned, Saskatchewan might be experiencing the Chinese tariffs a little bit differently than other areas of Canada. But this is not the first time that we have had to work through that situation with China or India or other countries. Saskatchewan maybe is not unique,

but a little bit more often do we have to deal with, you know, counter tariffs that come from places like China. In fact, about every four to six years we work through this. So we have some deal with uh... you know counter-terrorist that come from places like china and i thought every four to six years week we work through this so we have some experience in this space is not our our first time on you know one thing i raised aside from the resource spectrum development spectrum was uh... around keeping our community safe work work we're making uh... tremendous efforts in saskatchewan investing in recovery opportunities, but also enforcement opportunities and getting the drugs and the drug dealers, more importantly, out of our communities.

And we're going to need some help, some help in the way of changes to the criminal code of Canada to ensure that those people that are bringing this poison and that the drugs of today are not the drugs of yesterday, they're just simply poison, is to get that product out of our streets in any way that we can and we're going to need some help in that space to keep our community safe moving forward. So those are three things out of, maybe out of the spectrum of what you might have expected from Saskatchewan that we had raised along with Bill C-69, Bill C-48, the emissions cap, the industrial carbon tax, all of those things we talked about as well.

And I was hopeful that I think we'll be able to at least have a conversation and find a path to a better spot in many of those files. We'll see. That's where the action comes in. Now, Mr. Premier, this next point that I'm bringing up is actually, I think, intimately tied to everything you just said, because observers from the outside looking in would say, if Saskatchewan doesn't get the recognition that these things are important to the people of Saskatchewan,

then this next point of sovereignty movements in Saskatchewan in Alberta taking root in a meaningful way is a, could be a knock-on consequence of that. Has that been made clear to the Prime Minister? Yes, and I think he's fully aware of, you know, I'll call it a feeling of alienation or being not included in a number of policies, and it's built over the last number of years. And policies have been layered on, you know, one on the other,

on the other, on the other, that really do have an impact on, quite honestly, how we create wealth in Saskatchewan communities, whether it be the energy industry, the mining industry, the ag industry, or trying to climb the value chain in all of those industries by attracting that international investment. So there's a real feeling of alienation in this province. And you know, just feeling a long ways away from decisions that have been being made by, yes, the Liberal government in Ottawa over the last decade or so. Same government, a new leader.

I think there is a willingness to provide a chance to change direction on some of these policies and to, you know, really bring Canadians together. And what brings Canadians together might be a little bit different view in the rural areas of Saskatchewan and Alberta versus maybe a Toronto or a Montreal. And that is important for our national leaders to include everyone in that conversation. We want to be a productive part of that conversation.

And Mr. Premier, what do you say to critics who suggest that simply acknowledging, as you have and as Danielle Smith has, although she's I think she's gone a lot farther, but just saying that this is a possibility, you're emboldening those people, you're validating them, you're normalizing it. It's the truth. There is a significant number of people that I see are feeling quite alienated with the decisions that are being made.

Now there's a certain degree of emotion, myself included, you know, with the results of, and all that's happened in the last three months in the lead up to a national election here and the changes in the polling and the changes in the outcome. So there's a lot of emotion in this as well. But it's not validating in any way, it's actually recognizing as fact that there is a real feeling, a significant feeling of alienation in many parts of Canada. Now the opportunity that our new Prime Minister has is to in some way listen to maybe folks like myself and Danielle Smith and others, as well as other premiers across the nation and address some of those policies

that have created some of that indifference or some of that frustration really with the federal government. The opportunity is his and so what I tried to do in our call the other day and what we'll work on for the next number of weeks and months is to provide the best guidance we can for Prime Minister Carney to make some,

I think, pretty significant decisions in bringing this nation back together. And not by forcing the nation back together, but by providing an environment where everyone wants to support one another from coast to coast to coast. We work for this nation. So, strength, man. Mr Premier, I wish we had more time. I want to get into the Canola tax, the canola tariffs, but perhaps you'll come back sometime soon and we can drill down specifically into that issue. But thank you so much for joining us today. I'll be back as soon as I can be.

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