The Ben Mulroney Show - Carney adding to the national debt and fixing a flawed Stadium in Toronto

Episode Date: July 4, 2025

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Bold meat shwarma. Go get it. Welcome to the Ben Mulrooney Show. Thank you so much for joining us on this Friday, July 4th. Happy Independence Day if you are an American who may be listening to the Ben Mulrooney Show or you may be watching on YouTube. I have a number of American relatives, and I hope that if they have America in their heart that they are celebrating the

republic on this day. All right, we got to talk about we got to talk about Canada's deficit, right, we already know that Justin Trudeau increased the debt in Canada between, it was at $616 billion and he raised it to somewhere between $1.2 and $1.3 trillion. So essentially over the course of his 10 years, we all know this, he spent more than every single government prior to him combined. prior to him combined. That to me is such a monumental failure given what we have to show for it. You know, we talk often on this show

about the healthcare system. And I like to say that never before in the history of Canadian healthcare, have we put more money into the system and have we had worse outcomes. Well, let's look at what we've put into the Canadian economy. Let's look what we put into Canadian society and what have we gotten worse outcomes? Well, let's look at what we've put into the Canadian economy. Let's look what we put into Canadian society and what have we gotten out of it?

Are we twice as good today? And I remember saying during COVID, I said, I think we're spending money like a drunken sailor, but if the outcome is all the bridges have been repaired, everybody is working and every public service is funded at a level we've never seen before, then we can right size everything afterwards. But that will be a net benefit.

I never occurred to me that the profligate spending by the liberals would lead to nothing to show for it. As a matter of fact, a diminishment of this country, its institutions and its infrastructure. Like I never thought that would happen, but that's the world we're living in. Higher debt load than we've ever had before in the history of this country. its institutions and its infrastructure. Like I never thought that would happen, but that's the world we're living in. Higher debt load than we've ever had before

in the history of this country. So then you go to the election campaign and Mark Carney promises to be a different kind of liberal. And he promised it and he got elected on it. But he also promised about $130 billion in new spending. So right then and there, that was a red flag. A lot of us said, okay, what are you going to do? What are you going to do to,

you're gonna have to make choices, right? You can't just spend. We don't have any money to spend. We are in debt in a way we've never been before. So you're gonna have to make cuts and you're gonna have to make choices and you're gonna have to make priorities and act on those priorities. So that was during the election

campaign, but he got elected on it. Okay. So that's the path forward. But upon getting elected, he started doing a lot of things that a lot of us wished governments prior to him had done for years, which was invest in our military. And I think as a way to show the Americans and as a way to show NATO that we were finally serious about joining the community of nations who are willing to put their money where their mouth is and put their people and their armed forces in a position to project our values

and our priorities on a military level, he said he was willing to get us to our 2% of GDP commitment to NATO this year. And with a promise to increase that to 5% using some very fluid math over the course of the next few years, that I like. But that is on top of the $130 billion of commitments, which now a lot of people believe

is going to add, what is the average? $77 billion to our spending every year for that, on average, every year for four years. Where is this money going to come from? This is going to get added to the deficit, this 100%, it will. We are gonna be running massive deficits for the foreseeable future

with no path to get out of it. You'll remember this all started with Justin Trudeau promising modest, quote, modest deficits over two years. COVID happened so you could give him a pass that the world stymied his plans, but he had no plan to get us out of it. In fact, he used that excuse to just shoot the lock

off of the wallet and just, you know those guns that they have you see in hip hop videos where they put money in the gun and it just shoots like, I think it's like for strip clubs, right, and it shoots like singles out into the world. I mean, we don't have that for loonies, so that would be a, that's a weapon. We don't have that for loonies, but it got to the point when every time

that Trudeau took a trip, you expected, oh no, who's he gonna give money away to next? Right. Yeah. But even if Mark Carney shuts off that valve of the pet project, the look how magnanimous Canada is, look how generous we are, look how involved we are, and look how caring we are about other countries, that we're just going to sign a check anytime somebody asks

for one, and probably when they don't, before we leave a party, we're gonna just drop a hundo. Even if he just turns off that tap, that's a rounding error in terms of how much money we are on the hook for. Like we as a generation don't have any more money. My kids don't have any more money. Our grandkids probably don't have any more money. But how much richer are we today?

Take a look at the numbers. Yep. They're right in front of you. How much richer we are? How much richer? Okay. So let's see in December. This is GDP per capita. Yeah.

So December 31st, 2015, we are GDP per person was 43,500 bucks. And in December 31st, 2024, the most recent number available, 44, that would let the most recent number available, $44,402. So a grand total of $900 richer. That's but but we're spending the per capita increase in spending. It is about 35% more debt per person. And that's equivalent to roughly Mississippi, by the way. Yeah, you know, we are not a productive country. The productivity gap between Canada and the United States

has been growing since 2015. They are just more efficient at building things and making money. Each person generates more income than we do. And that didn't used to be the case. By and large, since the World War II, the productivity between our two countries was generally on the same track.

And at one point we even surpassed them. 2015 happened and that switched off and the chasm began to grow. So this is a problem that was created under the previous liberal government that has been inherited by the new liberal government that this prime minister said he came into office to solve. He is smarter than me.

He's smarter than most of us. I am not saying that he will not pull a rabbit out of his hat, but he has said, I have been in a seat of power and have influence during crises before. I know how to handle this sort of thing. Okay. Now, remaining calm during a crisis doesn't mean you solve the crisis. It just means you don't pull your hair out. So this is something that he asked for. He asked to solve. He knew that Donald Trump was the prime, the president. That's why he said

he came back, that he was the Churchill of our times. I am, I'm willing to defer judgment. I really am. I am not sitting here in judgment of Mark Carney. I'm simply pointing out that the deck is stacked against Mark Carney. And again, he will get credit for solving a lot of our problems. But that credit has to come with a caveat that the problem he solved is due to the incompetence of the person who preceded him. These are not problems that were created in a vacuum. This is not a war that broke out somewhere in the world that messed up a supply chain and screwed up our economy. That's not what this is. These are self-inflicted wounds. This is Canada getting in its own way.

This is people we elected who screwed this country up that he now has to fix. And I'm simply pointing out that the circumstances that he inherited and the circumstances and the choices he's made are making it that I don't see a path forward. But fortunately, he's smarter than me. And I know he's smarter than me

because he says so. And so I'm genuinely hoping that he is what he promised us and that he is smart enough to tackle this problem and get us to a place where we can improve healthcare. We can improve infrastructure. We can build homes. We can solve our productivity gap. We can reduce taxes. And we can build an environment where business wants to flourish. We can be a leader in AI. We can take care of those

who need our help the most in society. We can do all of those things, all while building out a military that has been for far too long anemic by choice. These are all things he said he was going to do. And he said he was going to do it at a pace we've never seen before. So the clock is ticking, Mr. Prime Minister. It is a hole that I cannot get us out of, but I hope to God you are a man of your word and you can do it. All right, we've got a lot to get to,

including after the break, there was a massive problem here in the city of Toronto with Rogers Stadium, 50,000 people saw a great concert, but the experience was cockeyed. Could it be improved in time now for Coldplay to show up this weekend. That's coming up next on the Ben Mulready show. The 2025 Nissan Sentra isn't just another compact car. It's Consumer Reports top pick

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