The Ben Mulroney Show - Best of the Week Part 1 - Scott Moe, Max Fawcett, Tony Chapman

Episode Date: May 10, 2025

Best of the Week Part 1 - Scott Moe, Max Fawcett, Tony Chapman Guests: Scott Moe, Max Fawcett, Tony Chapman, Dr. Nadia Alam, Selina Robinson 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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through NCF conditions apply see nissan.ca for details. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show best of the week podcast we had so many great discussions this week including premier Scott Moe laying out his hopes for Mark Carney as it pertains to sketch one enjoy. One of the premieres in this country, whom I respect the most actually has 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 tariffs, but unlike a lot of other jurisdictions, he's got Chinese tariffs 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, I There's a lot going on. There's a lot of emotion even 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 to put out who I

was supporting in the election as well as many did across Canada. But we with the results as they come in we're faced from Saskatchewan's perspective and it's no secret at all that we've 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, 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 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, we have the same party, but a new leader. And I think a fresh new leader as well and 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 what was the what were 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 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 is 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 right about 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, you know, 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. Mr. Premier, this next point that I'm bringing up is actually, I think, intimately tied to everything you just said because, you know, 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 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 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 really bring Canadians together. 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 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 and 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. And 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 the 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. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. Thank you so much for joining us. And look, one of the

conversations that has been bubbling up for quite some time is the concerning rise and possible mobilization of a sovereignist, separatist movement in places like Saskatchewan and Alberta. But the difference that I'm seeing between Saskatchewan and Alberta is the language being used by their respective leaders. And, well, let's listen to what Danielle Smith had to say about Albertans feeling frustrated. We are well aware that there is a large and growing number of Albertans that have lost hope in Alberta having a free and prosperous future as a part of Canada. Many of these Albertans are organizing petitions to trigger a citizen initiated referendum,

as I mentioned earlier. The vast majority of these individuals are not fringe voices to be marginalized or vilified. They are loyal Albertans. They are quite literally our friends and neighbors who've just had enough of having their livelihoods and prosperity attacked by a hostile federal government. They are frustrated and they have every reason to be. I want to talk directly to those Albert be. I want to talk directly to those Albertans. I know how frustrated so many of you have become with our country and the feeling of having politicians living thousands of

miles away passing laws and rules that have cost you your loved ones, jobs, careers, dreams and opportunities for a brighter future. All right, well I'm joined now by Anal Burton himself, who is a frequent critic of the woman you just heard, Premier Danielle Smith. Please welcome to the show again, Max Fawcett, lead columnist for Canada's National Observer. Max, this is a, I suspect that you and I,

where we don't agree on much, are gonna probably agree that Danielle Smith, it feels like she's playing with fire here. It feels like she's saying that you don't support separatism and then laying the groundwork to make it easier for those separatists to do what they want to do are two different things. Absolutely. And I think we are going to agree. So let's, let's, let's enjoy that for the moment. we are going to agree. So let's enjoy that for the moment. I have never had any love in my heart for Separatists. One of the four foundational moments of my life was the 1995 Quebec referendum that sort of got me into politics in a lot of ways. But at least the leaders of that movement

had the courage of their convictions and were willing to say what they believed in. Danielle Smith does not have that. She pretends that she's not a separatist. She pretends that she isn't moving this train down the tracks. While as you note, she's made it far easier to get a petition to put this question to Albertans in the future. She talks about separatists in glowing, loving terms. She feeds their misconceptions about the country.

She feeds their anger, their frustration, and she's doing it for her own political purposes. This is about distracting from the scandal that is quietly consuming her government. She's already lost two MLAs over it, over the management of the healthcare system here. This is entirely about keeping Danielle Smith in power. It is not about helping frustrated Albertans.

You know, I wish she would at least have the courage of her convictions to come out and say what she believes. You know, the separatist movement in Quebec, obviously I was linked to it as well. And I always believe that, like, you should make the job of a separatist harder, right? Not easier because once you have a separatist movement and it's it's institutionalized It's entrenched then I know they get today is just a no for today until they get there. Yes, right? So they're there forever once once they take root

They are there forever and I like it if you don't want your car stolen Then you don't leave the car running with a sign over the car that says, come take me. And it feels like Danielle Smith, who's saying these things, who's saying that she doesn't support separatism. And you're right in the language that she just used, it was very warm and empathetic and almost God, I don't want to say it because I got a lot of time for Danielle Smith, but it almost felt like a call to arms. Yes, without actually saying it, of course. It's all couched in the language of, you know, we have to respect the will of the people and people, you know, we have a democratic process here and fair enough.

But when you're clearly gerrymandering that process to make it easier for these people to be heard, you are picking a side. I just want to ground this conversation quickly in some facts. She talked about how there's a growing number of people who are interested in Alberta separatism. Nano did a poll right after the election asking people about this. 22% identified as primarily Albertans, 78% identified as Canadian or Canadian from Alberta. And that's the number of people who are primarily Albertan is lower

than it was in 2020 when it was 28%. So this is not a growing movement. And if it is growing in any meaningful sense, it's because the premier of Alberta keeps giving life to it. That's the problem had I had former Premier Jason Kenney on the show last week when when Daniel Smith's government lowered the threshold that would be required to trigger

one of these citizen led referenda. And and he said that you know, that law was the brainchild of his government. And he said, you know, it was instituted because if citizens ever felt like the government wasn't prioritizing what was important to them, they could take steps to have that issue dealt with. But he said, we kept the threshold for that trigger high because we didn't want, as he said, the tail wagging the dog. And so implied in that is this thing could go sideways

very quickly. If with such a low threshold, you could end up with some crackpots making some crackpot ideas, a ballot issue. Absolutely. And we've seen this movie before too. The argument coming out of Daniel Smith's universe is that by giving a voice to these people, by validating their concerns, it takes

the heat off. It gives them an outlet to express their frustration. But we saw this in Great Britain with Brexit, right? David Cameron thought he could sort of lance the boil of growing anti-Europeanism in his own party and his own country by having a referendum on leaving the EU and lo and behold, they left. He didn't want them to, he didn't think they would vote that way, but you know like you said once the car is running it's really hard to predict where it's going to go and you know to folks in Alberta who who just want access to to markets for their resources for their products look I share that concern I think that concern has been addressed by two new pipelines the Tidewater but you know we

saw over the course of the election over the course of the last few months a growing consensus in Quebec in Ontario in BC that we should do this together and Danielle Smith is destroying that consensus with this behavior. Do you think people, I mean, her speech might've played well in High River in Chester, here in Alberta, but do you think it played well in Montreal or in-

It didn't play well at Queens Park. Doug Ford slammed Danielle Smith over this language and this rhetoric, and said that it's actually detrimental to the prime minister who's down in Washington. I mean, it really, it undercuts him. What do you think of what Doug Ford said? I find myself in a strange position

of agreeing with both Doug Ford and Ben Mulroney on the same day. But no, look, he's right. There's never a good time to open the same day. But no, look, he's right. Like there's never a good time to, you know, open the door to separatism, but there couldn't be a worse time than right now, you know, when the prime minister is going into one of the probably the most difficult meetings of his life today with Donald Trump and Daniel Smith, you know, less than 24 hours before he does that, tries to cut his legs out from underneath them. It just defies

any sense of sort of rational politics. And I've seen people suggest that she's trying to help Trump, that she's trying to set up some sort of relationship. And look, I don't think that's the case. But it does open the question to that because her speech was just so unhelpful to the cause of Canada. Well, let's look at one more thing. Yeah, let's look at one more thing that she said. In that same speech, she talked about equalization payments. Let's listen. The federal government must provide to Alberta

the same per capita federal transfers and equalization as is received by the other three largest provinces, Quebec, Ontario, and British Columbia. We have no issue with Alberta continuing to subsidize smaller provinces with their needs. But there is no excuse for such large and powerful economies like Ontario, Quebec, BC, or Alberta to be subsidizing one another. That was never the intent of equalization, and it needs to end. Max, I want you to give me the counterpoint to what she just said in about 20 seconds.

I don't necessarily disagree with her here. I think that there are ways to reform the equalization program that makes sense, and I do think that that is a place that Mark Carney can do some work. It is worth noting really quickly that TMX and its impact on provincial royalties here has given Alberta or is giving Alberta now two to three billion dollars in a year extra in royalties. So that that demand has effectively already been met. So you can cross that one off the way. All right, Max, we're gonna leave it there. But thank you so much for joining us today. Look at that. We got we agreed. Let's not make a habit of it though.

Don't worry. Next time we'll be it will be back to where we normally are. All right. 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. Very happy to welcome Tony Chapman, the host of the award-winning podcast, Chatter That Matters, as well as the founder of Chatter AI into studio. Always love being able to look my guests in the eyes, Tony. It's great being here. Such great energy in your studio. All right.

Let's talk about this. The stories that we're going to be breaking down today are all dealing with some of the biggest brands in the world. And let's start with probably the biggest of them all, Amazon. They're going to spend $4 billion to expand into small town delivery. So I don't live in a small town. I didn't know the limitations of Amazon in small towns. What problem are they trying to solve?

Well, they're trying to put the world within arm's reach of desire. They did that with their app in terms of putting it on your phone, making it a vending machine. But the last mile is everything. How fast can they get that product to you? So what they're doing is taking on Walmart, said we'll build a big Walmart, and people will leave their small town in Main Streets and drive to Walmart. Now they're basically saying you don't have to do that,

we'll just deliver it to your door, and we'll do it the same kind of speed in big cities. What I really wonder is why antitrust hasn't looked at Amazon. They now control half of online shopping in the United States. And more importantly, online shopping is growing double digit. So if you do the math, they're going to continue

to grow with that growth. They're going to ultimately be in the point where we're going to be doing business just with Amazon or their sort of what I call trap lines, like diapers.com and baby.com and all the other Zappo that they have out there. Yeah, and they've just, they've launched a lower cost version of Amazon to, I guess, compete with the T-moos of the world.

Absolutely. Call hall.com. Yeah, I completely agree. At some point that's going to hurt, but this could hollow out sort of the mom and pop shops on those small main streets. Well, again, it was a small town. You got to say how important is my circular economy? How important is the people that work in the jobs they employ?

How much do I value the energy on my main streets? Because you're going to have to vote with your consciousness, because convenience is what Amazon wants you to vote with. So if you're willing to get out of your lazy boy and go up to Main Street, I think you're going to do well for the town. But again, Amazon, choice. They have it. Price, convenience. three big tiebreakers in retail.

All right. From Amazon, we move to another juggernaut, McDonald's. And apparently they've suffered the worst US sales decline since 2020 in their warning of an anti-American sentiment abroad. I always thought they were bigger than that. Yes, they are an American brand and yes, they are Americana, but to me, they don't wave the stars and stripes the way other brands might.

But they're known as that. They're an iconic American brand and I think you're going to see every time that Trump chirps and is bigger than a chirp, tries to bully, command, demand, you're gonna see a backlash in the way individuals can do is vote with their wallet. So I think a lot of American companies, including Apple, are looking around saying, we're attached to Trump where we used to benefit being attached to America.

And I think that's the issue. Look at the movie, the terrorists on the movie industry, the rest of the world will basically say, well, we'll put a tariff on American content. Yeah, this is, I... And they own 90% of the content around the world. It's one of the world will basically say, well, we'll put a tariff on American content. Yeah, this is... And they own 90% of the content around the world. It's one of the stupidest tariffs I've ever heard of. Because he wants to bring movies back to America?

That's... I'm thinking this doesn't make any sense. I don't think he's thought this one through. Oh, well... Yes, that implies he thought the other one through. Fair enough. I knew it was wrong as soon as I said it. No, I think you're right. But some of it has to do with the cost of food as well, right? McDonald's used to be the low cost place

where you could feed your family for $30, and now 30 bucks barely feeds one person. Well, McDonald's for a decade survived on the dollar meal into $2 mail. They can't do that anymore because there's inflation. It's not just the cost of food, it's the cost of labor, transportation, everything that goes into it, cost of real estate, taxes in the local city. So McDonald's is now caught becoming an expensive affordable gut-fill brand. All right. And then from McDonald's, we moved to Target.

And Target, so we saw a push for self-checkout and it's almost everywhere. That's ubiquitous, right? But now they're dialing it back because they've noticed what? They've noticed that there's more loss. Shoplifting. Shoplifting. And the issue is, and we've got to be very open to this, the fact of the affordability crisis, not only are you getting ready of self-checkout, in a lot of major cities, they're

closing stores. They're saying, I can't afford to have an open store because the shoplifting is more than the profit I'm making. So it's places like San Francisco downtown, there's no stores. So I think the issue we're dealing with is including that technology, which was let's get rid of the labor, we can make more money.

Now realizing if we don't have labor, people are just gonna steal us blind. Well, because I remember at one point there was a push and I saw it on social media that there was one target where they used to keep like the razor blades behind plastic and you had to get someone to use a special key to open it up. But in this one store, everything was behind gates. And who the heck wants a retail experience like that?

You know, if you go to a store for that tactile thing, you hold the product, you read the instructions, you read the ingredients, you decide whether you want one versus another. And if that was the direction of retail, it's like you might as well close up shop because the one place I can't touch things, but it's a lot easier, is Amazon. Exactly, we go back to the Amazon story, all rivers point to Amazon because I totally agree,

CVS, in there, everything was locked but the coffee and I saw somebody walk out with a bag of coffee, security guards, didn't even chase him. Same thing at LCBO. Have you been in LCBO? People are walking out with free booze because they're not allowed to approach these people. We don't start fixing retail.

We will not have retail. I actually was in an LCBO just a few days ago, and there was a security guard there. And I don't know why, but I asked him, I said, hey, have you seen those videos online of people just like stealing the booze? He goes, oh yeah, has that happened here? He said, Well, today's my first day. I was like, because I guess the security guards are told not to do anything. And he's a young

guy who goes, I would do something. I saw literally as LCBL person take out a book. Okay, what did he take this time? Oh, he had a bunch of scotch in this and they wrote it in the book. Yeah. And I went, so do I have to pay? Can I just walk out? And we heard we heard Lululemon, I guess it was six or eight months ago, Lululemon said explicitly in their employee handbook that you are under no circumstances to stop a shoplifter. If they're gonna leave, you're gonna let them leave. If you get in their way, that's cause for, I think, dismissal.

Yeah, there's no, and because of the liabilities with it. So again, retail, if they don't solve this, there will be no more retail because you can't afford to offer you that experience of touching and feeling the brand. All right, last story. Mark Carney's first week on the job after being elected prime minister,

elected to form government. Early days. Early days. But I like it. Yeah, so yeah, let's talk about the communication strategy. Let's talk about what went right. I like it, his acceptance of speech. I like this first press conference,

although he took a few days to have it. I love the fact that he's going and getting King Charles and people go, why? Because it's saying to Trump, I have contacts too, I have power. I like the fact that he's going to see Trump. And more importantly, he reached out to the West. His predecessor would never have done that.

If predecessors would have said, it's, I'm the one, the world revolves around me. And he's saying, if I don't win over the West, I'm gonna have the biggest crisis. I'm going to be the prime minister that sees Canada separate. Well, here's what's benefiting Mark Carney, on top of having to win in his sales from being elected. He's being compared to a guy who did a lot of stuff wrong. And one of the things that made me want to pull my hair out was he, at least in the last five years, I never saw Justin Trudeau answer a direct question. Any question that was posed to him,

he would pivot to a talking point. And in that press conference that we saw on Friday, he answered every question. Now, you might not like the answer, but he gave you something. There was substance there. And that was so refreshing. So again, Barr pretty low, but he definitely cleared it.

Yeah, Barr low, but he cleared it. Early days, the second he starts moving that brand and politics back to where it was, where the NDP used to occupy, my love for him will disappear. But if he focuses on the center, then I think we, at least we are a much better option than we had in the past. Also, I thought it was quite magnanimous of him.

And also, cause he's the guy who won, he said, I'm going to trigger a by-election so that Pierre Poliev can come into the House of Commons as quickly as possible. He said, I'm not playing games with this. I think that's him saying, I want him to know I'm the prime minister and I can do this and I'm doing this for him. So it's definitely a power play. Here's what I would do on that.

I'd say I'm not gonna run anybody against him. Yeah, well that's been traditional. But think about what that does. It says, I don't care about you. Yeah, exactly. Hey, Tony Chapman, thank you so much for being here. I'm glad you came in the studio. We'll see you every Monday.

Thank you so much for starting your Monday with us. It's gonna be a long week, and so let's start fresh, and don't forget to limber up up because you might pull a hammy that's that's my medical advice but here with who knows a thing or two about that that I don't is dr. Nathie Allam a family doctor and past president of the Ontario Medical Association doctor welcome to show happy Monday so a number of stories that I want to broach with you. The first very sad story about a Montreal woman who passed away at 32 of breast cancer after being told she was too young for breast cancer.

And it's a really nervous, like it's a nerve-wracking trend that breast cancer is affecting women younger and younger. Correct. And we have seen this trend. The research certainly bears it out. It's a worrisome trend for sure. What this means though, is that the medical system is gonna have to catch up and medical technology has to catch up.

The traditional teaching has been that as women get older, particularly after the age of 50, their risk of breast cancer spikes higher because they're post menopausal, all of that. There's a bunch of risk factors involved. So that's why we generally used to screen women who were the age of 40. In Ontario, we've now started to screen women who are the age of, who are the age of, sorry, before we used to screen over the age of 15, now we screen over the age of 40. So for any listeners out there, women,

whether you have breast lumps or not, you can now qualify for a mammogram. And well, that's something. I just, my heart goes out to this woman's family. I mean, being told by a medical professional, you're too young for breast cancer and then finding out you got it. My guess is she then found out you got it. My guess

is she then found out too late. That's that's and I guess they didn't test for it. Which is part of it is, yeah. Part of what we'll have good tests for it. Part of it is that we don't have I thought we had I thought the mammogram was the test. I thought that you put the it's like, I thought that was the thing. It's one of our tests that we can use to screen for breast cancer or diagnose breast cancer. It's not that great in women who are younger.

That's been the problem. Why not? Is there something about the tissue that makes it harder to spot cancerous growth? Really? So women who are young and women who are around the age of when they're having kids, so in their 20s and 30s, they have very dense breasts that have a lot of ducts in them, a lot of glands in them.

When you look at a mammogram itself, the picture that it produces, it's shadows upon shadows. So sometimes those shadows are just glands. Sometimes those shadows are just glance. Sometimes those shadows are actual cancer and it's very hard to detect between the two. I see. So for young women, we say MRIs, but even an MRI, a breast MRI done in a center where they're trained in doing breast MRIs, it's also not a perfect test. This is what I meant when I said medical technology has to catch up. We have to get better at diagnosing it, particularly in a woman who notes a breast lump.

Right? Because then that's different from women who have nothing in their breast. Who feel nothing, feel fine. But for a woman who has a breast lump, that is a symptomatic woman where the symptoms, the lump has to be sorted out. Right.

All right. Well, let's move on to a story that I, listen, if this doesn't improve the stock of these already massive companies, I don't know what will, the World Health Organization is set to back the use of weight loss drugs like the Wigovies and the Ozempics to treat obesity in adults globally. This is according to a memo.

So like this is, welcome to a new world, right? This is not, obesity is not to be treated with diet and exercise or alone anymore, but this is now a valid option that is endorsed by the World Health Organization. So first of all, are these weight loss drugs completely trustworthy? And is this the cure all? I mean, are we gonna solve obesity as a medical issue?

The obesity medically defined as a BMI. So your your weight to height proportionality is that is a very challenging illness. Other elements of some of it it you can do something about. You can control your diet, you can control your exercise, you can control to some extent your stress and you can control your sleep. Those are the four things that can contribute to obesity that you can control. You can control your alcohol intake, you can control whether or not you choose to smoke. All of those things are really important but there's a lot about the illness that's outside of your control. Your genetics are

your genetics. You can't control those. These drugs work really well in some people for the non-modifiable risk factors to treat the illness itself. Much like blood pressure pills do or diabetes medications do, These medications for obesity can help control an illness that's often very difficult to treat and can have significant consequences. I mean, we were just talking about breast cancer. Obesity raises your risk of breast cancer by two and a half times.

Wow. Like that's wild. It's like more than two times, more than double the amount just by being obese alone, even if you don't smoke or do anything else. But what do we do, Doc, about those studies that show that so many people who, once they get off of these weight loss drugs, they put the weight back on. I mean, unless we have a workflow that enables these people to take advantage of the weight loss and keep it off,

then we're just throwing... all we're doing is enriching these drug companies. Yeah, we're just spinning our wheels in that instance. The thing is, I think we need a cultural mindset shift where we're looking at obesity not as a lifestyle decision. It is an illness and much like high blood pressure, much like diabetes, if you come off any of those medications, your illness will become uncontrolled. The risk here though, and this part makes me nervous too, we're learning more and more about these drugs as time goes on, right? It doesn't mean that these drugs aren't. Yeah.

Oh, doctor, you still there? Doc. For some people, and we're learning that they're not suitable in all conditions. So we have to balance that. Yeah. We want to treat the illness, but we need to be careful that the treatment isn't going to cause problems either.

Agreed, absolutely. And we've got, my, what I've heard about it is that it also, doesn't it, like there's different qualities of fat in different parts of the body. When you lose weight naturally, your body knows when, where to take it from at the right times and in the right proportion.

But these drugs accelerate fat loss in such a way where you're taking it off in places that it shouldn't be leaving you first and people get ozempic face, I think is what it's called. If you're right, there's different kinds of fat all over your body. They do different things. We know that fat itself is almost like an endocrine organ, right? So endocrine has to do with all the hormones in your body. Fat is a part of that because it releases certain hormones. The challenge with medications, medications do not come with a pamphlet that tells them where to go. They go all over the body. And in this instance, in some people, the fat that we need them to get rid of, so the fat that's around their liver, around their bowels, around their gut, that central obesity, that can be the problem. That's a bigger problem than say the fat on your arms. Right. Right. Yeah. And so the drugs

do not know to target that as opposed to the ones that are in places where there's no, it's not a big deal. But it still helps. It's still better than nothing. No, and listen, and I take everything you say as fact. The one thing I would dispute with you is when you compared it to diabetes, for example, you said if you get off your diabetes pills or medication, then you can be, you can get sick again. But in the case of these drugs, if you get off the drug, you should be able to be okay if you maintain a healthy lifestyle. No. No?

No, because obesity is so much more complicated. My point is if you're trained, Oh, I see what you mean, if there's a genetic component to it, for example. Yes, exactly. But are we able to, is there a test? Is there a test that can be done? And we only have a few seconds left. Is there a test to be done that can tell someone,

your obesity is triggered primarily by your genetics? No, but what we can do is look at the family. If there is a family history of obesity, the person has a higher risk of obesity, all else being controlled, right? If they've controlled everything else about their lifestyle, they've managed their medications, they're active, all of that stuff,

and they're still obese. That oftentimes has a lot to do with family history. There are certain cultures where people are more prone to obesity. Yup, we're going to have to leave it there. But it doesn't mean that they're unhealthy. Thank you, Doc. It's a lot of fun. Okay, take care, Doc.

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with anti-Semites. I think that we're living in a time where anti-Semitism in Canada is no longer exceptional. It has been normalized. It is something that people just say, Oh, it's it's, it's, it is what it is. Despite politicians saying this is not who we are, sadly, increasingly, this is who we are. And it is incumbent upon people like myself to call it out when I see it to push back when it is offered up. And to do everything I can to remind the world that there was a time where Canada was a far more, it was a far better version of itself than it is today, especially on our treatment of Jews and our fellow Canadians who are of the Jewish faith. I'm joined now by a former minister in the British Columbia government, Selena Robinson, who is in Toronto,

who at an event yesterday at the Truth Be Told event, describing her experiences with anti-Semitism in government. Selena, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Thank you for having me on, Ben. So what was the event like yesterday? So after I was fired from cabinet by David E.B., I was, of course, devastated because I had described

Palestine pre-Israel, pre-modern state Palestine as a crappy piece of land with nothing on it. They couldn't grow an economy. And there was outrage, certainly on social media channels and- I remember that outrage. I remember as well. Yes. So I wrote a book about the experience and I wrote a book about that detailed the double standard by which I was judged. I had colleagues who had engaged in anti-Semitic comment, insulted the Jewish community time and time and time again comment, insulted the Jewish community time and time and time again. And my job as the Jew in the crew, the Jew in David Eby's government, was the

mediator. I would try to make sure that people understood why they said what they said was anti-semitic, try to heal, try to educate, and that was acceptable for me to have that role. But I was treated differently. I was treated differently. I was treated very differently, which is the double standard of antisemitism that we see so often right now. And I was fired and I wound up leaving the party

because this was no longer, it no longer felt like my party that fought for peace, that fought for justice, that treated people equally. I was being judged by a different standard because I was a Jew. And so I wrote a book about it called Truth Be Told and I've been traveling around talking to groups, Jewish, non-Jewish groups as well. I'm going to Rotary Clubs, I've went to church groups and talking about what the impact has been like trying to educate people that being Jewish is more than a faith. We are a people, we are a nation

that has survived for thousands of years and that we are being treated very harshly right now. It's very, very frightening. I see what's happening here in Toronto and it's horrifying. Well, yes, I mean, I saw just a few days ago, yet again, protesters had been entering Jewish neighborhoods, saying the most vile, disgusting, barbaric things, shouting people down in the communities

where they're supposed to feel safe. And when a Jewish member of that community deigns to push back and counter-protest, those people are told by the police, either stop, remove yourself from this position, you're antagonizing these people, or we're going to arrest you. And in some cases, they have been arrested. That to me is such a disgusting version of the double standard that you're talking about.

Again, it's the double standard. So I, again, I think that you opened up the segment by talking about normalization. and that's what it feels like. Our campuses are not safe places for our Jewish students. And when I was the minister of post-secondary education, I told all of our university presidents, there's 25 of them in British Columbia, and I said, I expect you to enforce your policies. You have harassment policies, you have safety policies. And I'm not just talking about physical safety, emotional and spiritual safety, social safety. These are elements of safety for all students. How is it that we're okay that Jewish students are terrorized? They're terrorized on campus. They're afraid. And all you can do is saying that's not who we are.

Oh, to me, I've got to tell you, when I hear a politician say that's not who we are. All right, to me, I've got to tell you, so when I hear a politician say that's not who we are, that to me is the Canadian version of when a politician in the United States says thoughts and prayers following a gun attack. Exactly, exactly, exactly, exactly. And we are not seeing courageous leadership. After I was fired from cabinet, I stayed on as an MLA. I thought okay I'm a government MLA. How can I use my role as a Jew, as a the Jew and the

crew of our of our government? I thought okay I'm well connected with the Jewish community. I committed to reaching out to the Arab Muslim community. I said I would do that and so I went to the premier and I said listen I'm reaching out to the Muslim Arab community in British Columbia. I think as a government, can't we just bring the Jewish community and the Arab Muslim community together to talk about the pain?

I don't wanna suggest that there isn't pain in the Arab Muslim community right now. What's happening in Gaza is horrible. People are dying. War is terrible. Can we talk about how hard it is right now to be here and to see what's happening there, be afraid for our family, for our friends? And I was told that that work is just too political.

Oh yeah. And when my premier told me that, I thought my work here is done. Is done. Yeah. This is not why I signed up to be in government. Selena, let me ask you a question then. What do you make then,

and perhaps you see it as a good thing to be in government. So Lena, let me ask you a question. Then what do you make then, and perhaps you see it as a good thing, that in the last federal election, there were over 300 candidates from across a number of parties that signed what was called the Palestinian platform. And some of the points that they were espousing were quite ludicrous. The continued funding of the terrorist group, UNRWA, as well as demanding the recognition of a Palestinian state without

any preconditions for Hamas. To me, that's a bridge too far, twice over. But 93% of the candidates who supported this platform did not get elected. Is that a sign of something good? Well, I hope so. I hope that Canadians recognize that that's, it was ridiculous. It was a ridiculous platform. No, they didn't, they didn't call for hostages. It's like, really? You're not going to call for the 59 people who are still hostages. I went to the Nova

festival. I want to urge all of your listeners. It's here in Toronto till early June, please go. I went yesterday. Yes. The NOAA Festival experience. Yeah. The people need to see what happened. That's not to say, again, I think Israel, their government has some work to do. There's, you know, it's not a perfect country by any means. Neither is Canada. Neither, like, there ain't one. There ain't one in the world. There isn't a single perfect country in the world. Yes. Exactly. And so I, you know, I, I, I, I, there's work. There's work for that government in particular.

I'm not a fan of their current government, but I do think that people need to remember what happened on October 7th, 2023, how this particular element of a conflict has continued. There are hostages and those people who signed on, they were not talking about peace, Ben. They were not talking about peace. That is not going to deliver peace and that's the part that frustrates me about New Democrats right now in this moment. They

are not advocating for peace. They are not doing the work of peace. And I think those are the conversations we have to be having. Yeah. Well, yeah, who's right, who's wrong? Well, yes, it's not good. So we only have about a minute and a half left. But you know, what do you make of the crossroads of the federal NDP finding themselves below the threshold for official party status? In my humble opinion, as someone who is not a member of that party, it feels like they were overly consumed by the struggles in Gaza versus the struggles of, you know, the working people of Canada. And it was so and I don't know what they do next. Well, in 2021, I saw their, their convention, and they are obsessed with Israel.

There is an obsession. I called them out on it. I've reached out to Jagmeet over the years to say, your obsession is problematic because why are you so obsessed with this one country, the one Jewish country, when there's so much other challenge with Iran, with North Korea, with China, with Russia? There's a lot of other challenging nations. But they lost sight, they lost the plot. I mean, from my perspective as a former New Democrat, but still a progressive,

poverty is the number one issue, affordability is the number one issue. And they got consumed by other things, by identity politics, which I think have a role to play, but not, they're so vociferous about it, but really they lost the plot. It's poverty, poverty, poverty folks. That's where we should be focusing. That's where it's going to make a difference in people's lives. All right. Selena Robbins, a former senior minister in British Columbia. The book is Truth Be Told. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for your voice. And the book's available on Amazon and Audible. Wonderful. Thank you very much. All right. Bye-bye. Take care. Bye-bye. Thanks for listening to the Ben Mulroney Show podcast. We're live every day nationwide on the Thank you very much. All right. Bye-bye. Take care. Bye-bye.

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