The Ben Mulroney Show - Best of the Week Part 4 - Iddo Moed, Stephen Lecce, Regan Watts

Episode Date: June 8, 2025

Best of the Week Part 4 - Iddo Moed, Stephen Lecce, Regan Watts Guests: Iddo Moed, Stephen Lecce, Eric Kam, Regan Watts 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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Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. Thank you so much for spending a little bit of your Thursday with us. In the war between Israel and Hamas, there are many fronts. And on most of those fronts, Israel has the upper hand in terms of military firepower and capacity to prosecute the war on its terms, despite it going on for far too long. It should have, Hamas should have put down their arms a long long time ago. That being said, on one particular front Israel is a decisive disadvantage and that is on the media PR front where so many false stories, unverified claims get parroted out into the ether for all of us to consume. And when those things are, it turns out that they are lies,

the retraction is quiet. The retraction is timid, but not before the damage has been done. To talk about this, we're joined by Edo Moed, the ambassador of Israel to Canada. Welcome back to the show, Ambassador. Thank you for having me, Ben. It's a pleasure.

So you've written, I think, a very concise prosecution of the point I just made in the National Post. False narratives about Israel have violent consequences. I remember, Ambassador, at the beginning of this war, the simple fact that journalists, well, what were at the time to me established respected, respected sources were using the Gaza health ministry, which is the propaganda arm of Hamas to, to, to relay how many people were dying in this war. And they were taking those

words as gospel, to me was the height of irresponsibility. And yet, it just became par for the course. of irresponsibility and yet it just became par for the course. It is it is astounding that people not just people, you know, the general public, but also sometimes even government use this information and act on it. And that's extremely dangerous. Because right now, when we are speaking here, you know, it's the fifth of July, June, it's it's a very dangerous time. And I'm very, very concerned

because we are witnessing something that I call a perfect storm where so much disinformation and misinformation is brewing around us. And I think it is the responsibility of the government to come out and say very clearly to the public where things stand in this in this this information and misinformation war that you just mentioned is dangerous because we saw what happened in Washington we saw when two embassy employees, Israeli embassy employees were shot gunned down We saw what happened in Boulder, Colorado when a terrorist attacked People who were actually calling for the release of the hostages. So it's a very dangerous and volatile time. And therefore, all of us, including the media, including the political level, should really

fact check before we do something and say something. Yeah. And it's some of it is patently false. We had a scenario early on in the war where there was a completely false claim that Israel had bombed a hospital. It turns out it was a faulty Hamas rocket that had hit that hospital. And that information went out not by anonymous trolls online, but you had our, you had Mila Nizholi of the Liberal government parroting that out with no proof that it ever happened.

And by the time that lie had gone around the world, the damage was done, even though it was corrected in certain places. I still I still have people referencing it today on my social media feeds. Yeah, absolutely. That's a good example. Because if I haven't checked recently, but that that tweet stood for a very, very long time afterwards, even after RCMP performed their own investigation and came to the conclusion that it was a Palestinian Islamic Jihad missile that was fired and landed in a parking place of a hospital, Al-Hali

Hospital. So it's a great example. Now, you've been very careful in this article. You're very careful not to say that those terrorist attacks that happened in the United States, both in Boulder and in Washington were due to the press. But you also say, the press isn't making life safer for Jews. I mean, I don't know what it takes to push somebody

to be violent towards another person. But I have to believe if you are of a certain mindset, if you do believe, unlike me, that Israel is the aggressor, Israel is a genocidal colonialist, imperialist power, a warmonger, they don't care about the innocence in Gaza. If you believe all that stuff, you are going to hear these stories that are misrepresentations of the truth, sometimes flat out lies. And who knows, that could be the straw that breaks your back.

That could be the thing that tells you, I need to do something. I need to take action. And this is me wearing a white hat, coming to the rescue of the people of Gaza. And the fact that these organizations have been so cavalier with the truth, it's irresponsible. I agree. I mean, whatever triggers somebody's mind will never know. But people take action and very quickly and people feel emboldened when they don't

see any counter reaction around them. So they hear those repeated messages. But I want to highlight one thing, all of us can check it today, this very minute. We heard earlier today of the fact that IDF, the Israeli Defense Force, were able to retrieve the remains of Judy Weinstein Hagi and her husband, Gaddi Hagi, from Gaza. And you know, who she was and what she did, I don't think that anybody, she's a Canadian, she was a Canadian. And I'm not sure that many people understand this and not many people really care what happened to her

on the 7th of October. Actually, she and her husband were the first victims of this attack. They were walking outside the kibbutz, outside the boundaries of their kibbutz, along the border with Gaza when they were gunned down and they were laying there wounded for hours until they were shot dead and then taken into Gaza. I wonder, when we are talking about what people see and understand of the conflict, how much attention is paid to a Canadian that has suffered and her family

that has suffered for so long. Oh Ambassador, that's where I wanted to finish up our conversation. You know, as the Ambassador to Canada, you interface with the Canadian government often. As you just said, there was a Canadian citizen who was gunned down by terrorists. Her body only now reclaimed, hopefully being able to come home to her family, where they can finally have some peace. And yet, like this should have let, this should have been an outrage that the leadership of our country should have been spearheading. And yet, you see what happens when our prime minister signed some sort of communique with the Prime Minister of the UK and France, sort of taking the opposite position to the point that they got thanked by Hamas. How do you make sense of this dynamic?

I'm very worried. I'm very concerned because it's not only that he was thanked by Hamas, it's the second time that Hamas meets Canada. And I think that's a very important moment to pause and think for everyone, where do we stand and what do our actions mean on the ground in Gaza? So there's one thing to cater for political issues at home, but if you don't make the connection between what you're doing here and what you're doing there, then that's a cause for concern.

And of course, I'm raising that concern with the Canadian authorities all the time. The last time your name popped up on my Twitter feed, you were being called, you were being summoned. That was the word, summoned by Anita Anand to her office in Ottawa. And just a few short hours later, we saw the horrific attack on the two innocents in Washington, DC.

What was that meeting about? Can you tell me? The meeting was about an incident that took place in Janine, where a group of foreign diplomats, including Canadians were walking, led by Palestinian authority into somewhere around Janine. It was and still is an active combat zone because there are Hamas terrorists there that IDF was acting against. And so the Palestinians led them around. They coordinated the tour with them, but they went off the coordinated path that was coordinated

with child. Oh, that's right. Ambassador, I remember all of a sudden I see all of these, these fact checking journalists online saying the IDF fired on Canadians. Yeah, not none of it, of course, took place. IDF shot some shots in the air. You can see the footage that nobody was under fire. Nobody was in any kind of danger situation.

They just ended in the wrong place, and they were led there by, most probably by Palestinians, intentionally. We're still investigating this, but we released all the information prior to the meeting with the foreign ministry. So when I was called, actually, they already had the information that we released before that. But I was then asked formally to, to check into this, which is of course always what we do. And yes, of course. Ambassador Moed, thank you so much for spending time with us today. I wish you the very best. You've got a big job and I thank you. I thank you for your time. All the best to you too, our listeners. Thank you.

Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. Before we get to our guest, I want to back into this conversation with a little story for context. Back when Eglinton was under construction, it was a war zone. I was up there almost every day. And I noticed all these condo buildings going up all these condo towers. God knows how many people now live up there that didn't live there 15 years ago, hundreds, thousands. And I was at at a park where my kids were playing soccer. And next to me was a person who was very high up in the city government. And I said to this person, I said,

listen, while you got the street ripped up, like, why don't you fix the pipes? Because you're going to have an issue with all these new toilets in these buildings. You got thousands of people flushing waste that those pipes were not built for. So while you have the street ripped up, why don't you fix the pipes?

And he said, ah, Ben, you don't know anything about how government works. You don't fix a problem until it becomes a problem, because otherwise you don't get credit for fixing it. All you get credit for is the cost of adding or expanding the pipes. You got to wait till there's a crisis, and then you get credit for fixing it.

And I want to tell that story because we're being joined now by Ontario's energy minister, Stephen Lecce, whose actually his government is being proactive as it relates to how much energy the city of Toronto uses. Minister, welcome to the show. Good morning, Ben. Good to be back. So yeah, so you, unlike my friend,

is looking to be proactive and deal with the problem before it becomes a problem. So, so you, unlike my friend, is looking to be proactive and, and deal with the problem before it becomes a problem. Why don't you tell me about it? I know this is a radical concept, Ben, for some, but I mean, here in our government, we're really trying to think about the future and build for our kids. That intergenerational lens is what's missing in government. So we're building transmission, announcing a third transmission line for the people of Toronto because the city's grid, like the amount of power it will need

is gonna double by 2050, massive amount of power. What does a third transmission line means to people of Toronto? It means we could literally energize 285,000 homes. It means we can support increasing population and condo development. It means we can support increasing population and condo development. It means we can support industrial development and trend and expansion, which as you know, very energy intensive.

Yeah. If we don't like people say, well, what happens if we don't do this? We're going to start deterring investment. International investors will not be able to come here because we won't have the power. So yes, proactivity is a strength. It is about time we're thinking long term and planning ahead. And that's what I think is a

cornerstone of our energy policy. Energy is economic policy today. We just passed introduced legislation that requires our energy planners have economic development as their foremost priority. So we create jobs, Minister, I I've been living in Toronto long enough to remember the blackout I've we've seen rolling brownouts. If with this expansion of the grid, will those things be a thing of the past? Yeah, because our reliability reliability will be protected with a significant amount of voltage capability to bring that power into the downtown core. There's three options are being considered.

But the bottom line is, yes, it is reliable power. It means it's clean power, Ben, because right now the liberals didn't plan. Like talking about like case studies, lessons learned, the liberals when they were there didn't plan ahead ever, always short-term, always electoral cycle, opposed to long-term 10, 20, 30 year big doll lenses. So what happens? We don't have

power for the downtown core. To your point, rolling brownouts and the lack of a liability, they have to put a natural gas peaker plant in the downtown core. This transmission line allows us over time to phase that out with clean, non-emitting power that comes from hydro and our nuclear fleet. So it's a good thing for the environment, but perhaps more than anything else, it's just good economic policy. Let's build for the future, be it nuclear power, critical minerals, like whatever we're doing is all about the long-term prosperity of Canada. This will obviously be valuable in the future, but it's going to come with a, I'm sure a

significant price tag off the bat. Has this been costed out? Do we know what's going to cost the taxpayer? Yeah. So in August, those options are going to be profiled, the costing as well. There's definitely a cost to build transmission. As you know, these are not inexpensive investments, but obviously there's a cost of inaction too, when it comes to deterring investments. So we're going to release that all the details of it. And of course, fully funded the promises committing to stepping up to make sure we've got the power to build our to drive our growth and to make sure we never say no to an investor that wants to create jobs and obviously opportunities for Canadians here. dealing with the the back and forth of tariffs and dealing with Donald Trump and he and he said recently that everything is on the table when asked about whether or not Ontario would surcharge on outgoing electricity has that been discussed?

Look, I mean, the premier is right, of course, everything's on the table. But I mean, the objective is for the federal government to lead by looking at a suite of retaliatory action the premier has said he does believe we need to hit them back and hit them hard dollar for dollar in this moment just because it sends a signal that we're going to stand by our steel and our workforce. So right now we're working with the feds. They're leading the renegotiation of the Canada US trade deal. There's intensive dialogue happening in real time. And so we are going to tuck ourselves into the broader plan and obviously not get ahead of them. We want to be aligned with the prime minister to maximize impacts on Americans and minimize impacts on Canadian workers and families. Lastly, minister.

I mean, this, Ben, I just say when this was happening, when he imposed this threat, this, this doubling of the tariff, the legislature was dealing with two bills before the house. The first was to end inter-provincial trade so we could become one strong Canadian economy, $200 billion of economic growth. And the second thing was a bill to unlock our critical minerals. It doesn't take 15 years to build a mine. The second slowest in the world. Well, that's what I want to talk to you. Lastly, Minister, I want to talk about the passage of Bill 5 and sort of the reaction by some, especially in in First Nations quarters, who are saying out loud that direct action against and these sorts of developments are on the table. What's your government's position on that? Look, we brought forth legislation to get our critical resources to market. If Ontario and Canada doesn't end the needless delay, the fact that it takes 15, 20 years to do anything. Like if we don't have ambition,

if we don't step it up, we are literally enabling the most oppressive regimes on earth to win the day. I mean, honest to God. Oh, listen, I co-sign that. Minister, I co-sign that. I'm just, if there's a landmine in front of you, I'm asking how do you sidestep it? Or how do you turn somebody who is currently in opposition to this into an ally? How do we get there?

I think there's two things. I mean, the first is the understanding of the problem that's before us. Because not all politicians in this province are able to accept the problem that it takes too long. We got to move with speed. Even the federal liberals accept that premise. The second thing is we got to do it in partnership. So you ask how we ensure there's equity, sharing, royalties on the table. We put a program in place that ensures $3 billion for indigenous communities to buy in to help own the projects.

We've committed to respect fully the duty to consult. And the Minister of Indigenous Affairs, the Premier, all of us are committing to consulting as we build out the action plan. I understand change is difficult and I appreciate their perspectives. It is the duty of governments to listen and to meaningfully consult.

We're gonna do that. But what we're not going to do is allow delay to continue to paralyze Ontario and Canada's resource sector that has sat on the sidelines for too long. I want to create 250,000 jobs. Our premier is determined to give us that competitive advantage. And if we want to fight Trump, we want to have soft power in these negotiations, we've got to have a credible plan to get our resources to market. So you're right.

Yeah, we've got to do it in battle in partnership. And we really see that as a strength. So what is your message to First Nations groups, environmental groups who have been critical, those who've said the duty to consult should have happened before the passage of the bill, not after our is is the message today that your door is open? And how, again, specifically on if they have any issues with the bill itself, is the government open to opening it back up and tweaking it in ways that would satisfy

whatever their criticisms might be? I think the principle message is we wanna build in partnership, we wanna do these things together. And we recognize how important partnership is. We know the consultation is fundamental to getting any of these projects, right? Everything we've done in the ministry of energy mind, let me speak for my own little, my own world, every transmission line, all the nuclear, the small

modular, we have everything we are doing. We're doing it in partnership with indigenous leaders. Those big transmission lines, 50-50 partnership, we're talking billion dollar investments. They own it. And so I just think like, look, I understand it's a, you know, a challenging moment. We're going to get through this. We're going to work with them in good faith. We're going to listen. We're going to spend the summer consulting because the way the system works is you, you, you graph legislation that you consult on it and make sure the government, the crown discharges.

Well, we're going to minister. I hope you're able to, I hope you're able to get everybody on board, on side, because like you, I believe that it's time to get this, this province firing on all cylinders and, and bring every community along in that success. So thank you very much for your time today. So much. your time today. Thanks so much, guys. Now that the warm weather is here, is it time to get rid of your old car? Oh, sure, it's served you well, but you know, it'd be kind of nice to have something new. Maybe a convertible. Maybe something with a sunroof.

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Vodka. Soda. Natural flavors. So what should we talk about? No sugar added? Neutral,hingly simple. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. There is a lot of economic news out there. We follow it very, very closely because as you know, Canada's economy kind of been in the toilet

for a while and a lot of us are hoping that regardless of who was going to win the election, that whoever won was going to get us out of it. And so here to take a snapshot of where we are today is our good friend, Eric Kam, from Toronto Metropolitan University. Eric, welcome to the show. Good morning, Benedict. How are you? I'm well. I'm not somebody who has a depth of knowledge

as to the Bank of Canada, the ins and outs, what it means when they make a decision, when they don't, you know more than I. What does it say to you that for the second consecutive, when they could make a decision on changing the interest rate, they did nothing? What does that say to you? Well, it's a positive sign to me that they're learning

about actually how to run monetary policy because the previous prime minister didn't care about it. There was no reason to reduce the rates anymore. They are already, they're not historically low, Ben, but they're really low. And they are not preventing anybody now from getting a mortgage. I mean, now, if you don't qualify for a mortgage,

all due respect, you probably don't deserve one. So the only reason to cut the interest rate any lower would be to stimulate consumption, but they don't have to do that. They've already done that over the last post pandemic years. And they've also wanted to cool the housing market to some extent, and the data shows that it's cooled. So there was really for the first time in a long time, no good reason to drop the rate

any further. And all that could happen if you did it was possibly push in some inflationary pressure. So I actually think the Bank of Canada was right this time to hold. All right. Well, that's good. That's good to hear. But are there things that you're looking for from them in the next, like the next time this comes up? Well, sure. I'm looking like everybody does at all of the macro economic indicators. Oh, I'm looking at all that macro data too. Yeah. I mean, because there are a lot, too much of it is trending down and we need more of these things trending upwards.

So we got to keep our eye on the housing markets, the bond market and especially the labor market. And I have real concerns about the labor market, which again, as we said on your show last week, I think it's important to say again, is that in this personal economist opinion, the three biggest problems in Canada today are housing affordability, government spending, and on the supply side, the lack of productivity in Canada. And none of those three things, Ben, are helped by just exogenously dropping the interest rates. So I want to see if any of those three things, Ben, are helped by just exogenously dropping the interest rate. So I want to see if any of those things improve before we start fiddling with the interest

rate again. All right. Well, let's cast our eyes south of the border. I think a lot of us on social media grabbed our popcorn for what looks like a bitter breakup between Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Elon Musk is livid, stark raving mad over the one big, beautiful bill that promises, you know, $5 trillion in additional spending. And Donald Trump hasn't said anything yet, but I think rather than talk about the international war inside the Republican party, maybe you could give us a sense of what is in this bill that makes Elon Musk

so upset. Well, I wouldn't want to get into either of their heads, to be honest with you, but he's mad because he was brought in into Doge to effectively get rid of government overspending and government inefficiencies. And if you look at this one big, beautiful alliteration, it is very, very sweeping. But the bottom line is that the budget office projects that this bill is going to add approximately two and a half trillion dollars to the national deficit. Now that was what he was brought in. Musk was brought in to prevent things like that. So, I mean, if you want to go through this quickly, it's a massive bill in terms of tax reform. Anything that Donald Trump did in 2017 becomes permanent, MAGA savings accounts. So new babies get a thousand dollars and things like take tips,

take taxes off tips and overtime. So there's some positive there. Yeah. Healthcare is savage. You have work requirements for Medicaid. And if you don't come in and get tested and get shown that effectively, like you're looking for work, you lose your unemployment. If you don't come in and show that you are working on your health, you lose your benefits. And that's huge. We know about the budget increases on defense, an additional $150 billion on defense, $70 billion for border advancements, and $3.7 trillion in tax cuts. Now, again, you say, well, that's not bad, $3.7 billion in tax cuts. Yeah, the problem is that when you do that, Trump becomes like every other leader in the West, especially who says, you know what, if I'm going to give on something, let's just let the debt go. And so he's not really

concerned anymore about how much money he borrows on that governmental credit card. And I guess to use an economic term that pisses off Elon Musk. Yeah. Well, let's all right, let's come back to Canada for a second. And you know, when a politician says something like a record high immigration is impacting productivity and housing affordability, that's one thing. But when an organization like the OECD, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development says it, that's a different beast, isn't it? Well, it is. And what they're not saying, and again, I've said this before in your show, what you will never hear a Jewish person say is that we should just lock the borders because we all still

have PTSD over the 1930s but what I think the OEC is trying to get across which is an excellent point is that while you have to have some targeted immigration especially refugees Ben yeah immigration as an economic growth strategy doesn't work it has never worked and it will never work because all you do is you take all of your per capita economic indicators and you push them downward. And so that's part of the problem, right? Not to mention again,

I know we're gonna get to the labor market, but if you take all of your statistics and you just bring in more and more and more people to the tune of about a half a million a year, all of those per capita variables, right? You raise the denominator, the whole fraction falls and you make everything worse. So it's not a growth driver. It does nothing for things like productivity, for research, for innovation, for competition. In fact, it hurts all of those things and it's detrimental to the economy. Well, that's why I was shaking my head.

I was befuddled at the beginning of this week when the immigration numbers came out. 817,000 people were brought in in the first four months of this year. It's such a huge number. I thought the liberals had fallen on their sword, admitted that they had gotten it wrong on immigration and were backtracking. I thought that was a whole, I thought that was a plank in the Carney platform.

And to be sure he's not responsible for the entire year, but what the heck's going on here? I don't know. I don't know if it is being staged as a humanitarian effort. I don't know, but I know that it is as an economist. And again, I guess I'm a humanitarian, I'm a human. But as an economist, and you bring me on to talk about trying to stimulate a stagnant economy, I can guarantee you this will do nothing positive. All right. Well, let's finish up by talking about sort of the sad number for so many young

Canadians that summer job postings are down sharply from this time last year. What does that as an economist indicate to you? Well, as an economist and as a father, it really can bring tears to your eyes because the last domino to fall is the labor market. You and I have been talking about it for a year. And what it tells me is two things.

Number one, you have people that are taking part-time jobs that were usually earmarked for students. You have people now trying to take those jobs just to pay rent and food for their families and that's a little bit sad. And then number two is when you look at young people and I have one in, well I have two, but I have one almost 21 year old in my house. They are

job hunting through the internet and the internet alone and that is not going to be sufficient. If you want to get a job young people coming out of high school or university you have to do what they used to call pound the pavement. Get your CV, print it and go out to retail stores and go into each and every one and ask if they're hiring because not everybody hiring, you know, there's about 300,000 jobs posted right now, but a lot of those jobs don't make it to mainstream internet. So go in, knock on doors the way they used to do and try to find work. But know that some of those jobs are not being stolen by your fellow students. They're being taken by parents who are not for those jobs, won't be able to pay

the rent. And that's really sad. It's sad. And it feels like the whole system is upside down. Every time we talk about one of these things in isolation, it's sad. But when you realize that when you pile these crises on top of each other, you know, Mark Carney's got a Herculean effort on his shoulders to fix these intertwining crises that he inherited. You know what, Ben? No economic growth means no job growth, and no job growth means

no jobs. And now you have to put aside being an economist, and you have to be a person and a father. These are people who are not going to have summer jobs, not be able to pay tuition or go into further debt to do it. And then the debt crisis just keeps growing and growing and your spiral story is correct. All right, my friend. Thank you so much for joining us. We'll talk to you soon. Stay healthy, my friend. Are you crushing your bills? Defeating your monthly payments? Sounds like you're at the top of your financial game. What's better than a well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue?

A well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue that was carefully selected by an Instacart shopper and delivered to your door. A well-marbled ribeye you ordered without even leaving the kiddie pool. Whatever groceries your summer calls for, Instacart has you covered. Download the Instacart app and enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over deliver. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show and thank you so much for helping us grow the Ben Mulroney Show on radio. If you're listening on radio, if you're listening on a streaming app, if you're

listening on Amazon, if you're listening on Apple podcasts or on Spotify. And now if you find us on YouTube, we say thank you. We take you where we get you. And we really appreciate you helping us build this community. And one member of that community who joins us quite a bit to talk politics and various other things is Regan Watts, the founder of Fratton Park Inc, former senior aide to Minister of Finance, Jim Flaherty. Regan, I was calling this segment Around the Horn with Regan Watts, the founder of Fratton Park, Inc. former senior aide to Minister of Finance, Jim Flaherty.

Regan, I was calling this segment Around the Horn with Regan, and you had a better name. What's up, Wednesday? How are you doing, buddy? Good to be with you. I'm good. So we've got some political stories to talk about, and typically I don't like talking about procedure

and I don't like talking about sort of how the sausage is made, but the fact that the throne speech was adopted without a vote in the House of Commons, it surprised me. I just assumed confidence vote required a vote and it didn't happen. So explain this to me. Cause I think a lot of people

are scratching their heads today. So it's good to be with you, Ben. And before I get into the politics, I should acknowledge, even though he's not listening, my son Henry turns 11 today. Happy birthday to King Henry to King Henry for to his fans into the press. So on procedure, sorry, I just need a sidebar. He's not listening to the show. What kind of kid are you raising? Well, look, I'm just getting to the Ben Morini show on podcast, not live guys better be in school. Fair enough.

So, on procedure, I do not want to bore your listeners with the intricacies of Parliament. I'll just say this. The throne speech passed in a legitimate way. There is no backdoor legislative trick that the Liberals pulled on this. I think there was a recognition in the House on by all parties that Canadians certainly do not want an election right now. And I think the parties that felt that the most were the NDP and the conservatives, because I think if we went to an election, Canadians would be so angry that they would throw a majority to the Liberals. There are many ways that votes are counted in the

House. One of the ways that votes are counted is by members getting up and answering the vote. Other ways that votes are counted are on division, which is a legislative term. So these things can get passed in many, many ways. And sometimes it's legislative spook, and sometimes it's not. But the throne speech was always going to pass. And how it passed is less of a story than the fact that the prime minister and the liberals have had some issues in terms of counting votes in the house and they lost a motion,

which I know we're gonna talk about. The one thing I'll say, Ben, is a motion on tabling a budget, pardon me, not the throne speech. One thing I will say, Ben, is that if I know Mark Carney, and I do, and I like Mark Carney, is that that man does not make the same mistake twice. So he will have seen some of the legislative challenges that they're having in the House

and have a very quiet but firm meeting with his House leader, Steve McKinnon, who's a wonderful man and an excellent minister and an excellent parliamentarian, and the human incarnation of a Twitter troll named Mark Gerritsen, who neurodivergence aside, should be able to count to 173. And Mark garrison's going to get a lashing from the prime minister and rightfully so because it's their job to count the votes his job to count the votes and he messed that one up. So right because they won't make the same mistake

twice. The throne speech that effectively passed is not the throne speech that we all heard because the conservatives were able to win a vote by adding an amendment to the throne speech that we all heard because the conservatives were able to win a vote by adding an amendment to the throne speech that calls on this government to give us at least an economic update before the house rises for the summer. And so my question to you is, if this has been passed,

does that mean that that amendment has the same force of law as the throne speech? Well, yes and no. Again, sorry to be, I don't want to get into that. No, no, I think our listeners need to know this stuff because I don't know it and I want to learn it. Look, in our in our in our democracy, the House of Commons, the representatives of the people reign supreme. And so when the House of Commons demand something, and in this case, they have demanded by virtue of voting for this motion, an economic update in the fiscal situation of the Government of Canada, it is incumbent upon the Government of the day to table that motion that and the House can, by the way, request documents on anything

it wants or any update it wants. That is a prerogative of the house. That is the nature of our system. And so I can't believe, and I'm very surprised the liberals decided not to table a budget or to take this issue proactively, because it's a good way for them to say the new guys are different than the old guys. It's a tale as old as time that when a new government gets elected, and in this case, Carney's government does feel like a brand new government, you table a fiscal update and you show the country just how bad the previous guys were at managing the books. They didn't do that this time. So maybe they'll take advantage of this demand from the House to table a fiscal update.

But again, it goes back to the inability of Mark Gerritsen to count to 173, because they should not be losing boats in the House at this point. It's just unacceptable. No, they should. When I woke up to that news, I was gobsmacked. Every person I've talked to points to one person and one person only for why that happened. It's Mark Gerritsen. Hey, look, Regan, we always want, ideally, we want the best people to present themselves in politics, we want the best people to want those jobs. And one of the best people in a very long time, we lost. And that was Mark Garneau. He was the first Canadian in space. He was not of my political ilk, but he was a gentleman of the highest order. And I think

represented the an example of, an example of those best people trying to do good for Canadians. I completely agree. Then Mr. Garneau incidentally has a connection to your father. Shortly after your dad got elected in 1984, Mr. Garneau was that first Canadian in space. And he helped usher in an era alongside your mom and dad

and the government that was elected in 84, a hopeful, optimistic era in Canadian life. Regan, in my, listen, growing up in my bedroom, on the wall right by the door that led to the hallway was a frame and in it was the Canadian flag patch that he wore on his space suit. was a frame and in it was the Canadian flag patch that he wore on his space suit. And there was a picture of him, I believe on a space walk. And there was a lovely note that he had written to my dad.

And that was, I looked at that every single time I came into my room or left my room. And it was such a point of pride as a kid growing up that I had this piece of history in my room. I no longer have it. I believe it's in the archive somewhere now, but he meant something to me. And to see that he found, I mean, when you go into space,

the fact you come back from space and you say to yourself, the next achievement, the next hill to climb, the next rocket ship for me is politics. That's somebody who definitely felt the calling of politics. Well, he and Mr. Garneau represented the absolute best of us. And I was speaking with our friend Sharon Carr yesterday, and we both agreed that his loss is a tremendous loss for the country. He was a naval captain. He was an astronaut. You talked

about him being a cabinet minister. I'm not sure politics was for him, but he was certainly there for the right reason. Yes. And he ran the Canadian Space Agency and, you know, Canadian heroes like Chris Hadfield and Roberta Bond are, yeah, were in the media yesterday talking about what Mr. Garno meant to the country. And, you know, I believe Ben and I don't care. And this is partly why I am as bullish on Mr. Carney as I am. We need more people like Mark Garno and Mr. Garno, pardon me, and Mr. Carney in public

life if the country is going to reach its full potential. Now, I hope they, and wish for them to run on the blue team, but that's my own preference, but we need the best of Canada if we are gonna reach our full potential. Okay, we don't have a lot of time left, but you did say something before that Mark Carney doesn't make the same mistake twice,

but his cabinet ministers don't seem to have that same compunction. Another cabinet minister who had to sort of reverse course and apologize for something he said this time, it was a cabinet minister who said no First Nations veto on projects quickly had to backtrack. And I got to think Mark Carney doesn't like this. It doesn't look serious. Well, so I think you're right.

And I think but at least it's only one mistake this time and not several cabinet ministers. Yes, he's getting the number down. Yeah, so, you know, as I say, Mr. Carney doesn't make the same mistake twice. I suspect the cabinet minister in question was on the receiving end of a telephone call from the prime minister's office, ensuring that they understood the gravity

and the importance of the issue, hence the apology. I do suspect as well that as the Prime Minister's office gets staffed up, we will likely see fewer of these mistakes. Now look, it's Canadian politics and Canadian public life. And we referred to and talked about neurodivergent Mark Gerritsen previously. There's a House of Commons filled to 338, 343 people who represent all walks of life in Canada. Inevitably, there's going to be mistakes. And as Canadians, we should allow for a little bit of flex. But the political management is something that Mr. Carney is going to have to wrap his arms around

and his PMO. They're getting better at it, but there's still a lot of room for improvement. And we'll see what it looks like in the coming weeks. Regan Watts, my friend in What's Up Wednesdays, thank you so much for being here. Have a great day day and happy birthday. See you on YouTube. Okay, talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to the Ben Mulready Show podcast.

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