The Ben Mulroney Show - Donald Trump is flirting with destroying the Canadian Film Industry

Episode Date: May 6, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Donald Trump is flirting with destroying the Canadian Film Industry with Guest: Ravi Kahlon, Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs in B.C., and chair of the provincial committee co-ordinating the whole-of-government approach to protect B.C.’s workers, businesses and economy against ongoing tariff threats 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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The PC Insider's World's Elite MasterCard, the card for living unlimited. Conditions apply to all benefits. Visit pcfinancial.ca for details. Value is for illustrative purposes only. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. And yes, we record this show. We produce this show from Toronto,

but we are having a national conversation on the Ben Mulroney Show. And I'm very pleased to welcome our next... Oh, so as I was saying, it's a national show, but I like to get a snapshot from different parts of the country to see how things are. Life in Alberta and Saskatchewan is certainly not the same as in Toronto. Life out east in Atlantic Canada.

Different pressures, different issues, different values. But we are one big Canadian family and to have a conversation across this country is so important. And as you know, during the tariff threats of Donald Trump, before he levied any of them, all of our premiers, it was an all hands on deck situation, going down to Washington, talking to the American press, doing everything that they could to stave off those tariffs, which ultimately came into effect more or less. And so I think it's important now for us to have a conversation about what's going on in British Columbia. So please welcome to the show for the first time Ravi Kalan, Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs in B.C.

He's also Chair of the Provincial committee that's coordinating the whole of government approach to protect BC's workers, businesses, and economy against those ongoing tariffs and tariff threats. Ravi, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for joining us. Hi, Ben, thanks so much for having me. So just generally speaking, talk to me about your job as working on the tariff threat,

it seems like every single day, there's another, there's something else to worry about coming from Washington. So how do you deal with it? What's it like? Stressful. Yeah. It's stressful Ben, you wake up in the morning

and you think, when you open your eyes, you think, I wonder what the president posted on social media this morning. And really it's that. And yesterday we woke up to hear the president say, he's gonna bring a tariff, a hundred percent tariff on the film industry. And we have 77,000 people working in the film industry.

We have got one of the best, cruise film industry crews in the world. And so, you know, waking up for all those people with additional stress of what does that mean going forward for them. And that's why I've been I'm really realistic about what to expect from the meeting today. I just think that, you know, a president that was the one who signed the agreement with us, the trade agreement with us many years ago, is ripping up his own trade agreement and wakes up every morning, you know, with different social media posts. I think we got to be realistic of what can possibly come today. But we are watching

it closely. Well, that's it. I think we got to be realistic, but we have to be hopeful as well. With a guy like Donald Trump, as mercurial as he is, there's always the possibility that the meeting could go sideways and we could end up in a worse position after the fact than we did before. And so, yeah, hopeful, but road weary, I'm sure. But your premier as the leader of the province seems to have to, despite being incredibly stressful, the pressures of these tariffs, has to be very

measured and come out as calm. He referenced these US tariff threats on movies and saying, don't panic, we can get through this. Is there a plan to deal with this if it ever comes to pass, or is this just so new and so out of left field that you're just playing as it lies? Well, again, our message to the Prime Minister and the team that's coming in and soon the new cabinet is, yes, we want you to continue to build those relationships in the US and find a resolution. But it's more so let's get to work on doing the things that we need to do here in Canada, in British Columbia, to ensure that we're not in a vulnerable situation anymore. That relationship

with the U.S. is fundamentally changed. It will not be going back to where it was before President Trump kind of blew it up. And so what do we do in the meantime? You know, we have in British Columbia not been sitting in waiting. We've got, we've announced 18 major projects that we're expediting, anything from natural gas to clean energy to mining opportunities, $20 billion worth. And so we have some things right now where we can get going to support people locally to support our economy. You know, we eliminated environmental assessments for all of our wind energy projects. We just brought in legislation to say that we're going to fast track all provincially led infrastructure, schools, hospitals, the trade corridor

investments that we need. So those are the types of actions we want to see from the federal government. So yes, continue to build those relationships, continue to find some avenues to be able to address it. But more so let's invest in our country, let's invest in our infrastructure so that we have a stronger base to go into those discussions with the US with. Now we've heard from both Premier Danielle Smith and Scott Moe about unhappiness in some parts of Western Canada that possibly a separatist movement or multiple movements could take place and the seeds that were planted years ago could bear fruit and now Premier David Eby he's thrown cold water on any separatist movements but he did say during the election

campaign that he was concerned about British Columbia's share of federal funding. Is that sort of code for saying, there are people here who, if things don't change, could want to go their own way? Well, I think in British Columbia, people, of course, have different opinions and different views. And if you look at election results, it's always a mixed bag. But the reality is, is people are very proud Canadians. And I can tell you, despite what you hear from Premier Smith, I've got a lot of family and friends that live in Alberta. And I can tell you that there's nowhere more, there's nowhere in the country where there's

more patriotism and more proud Canadians than in Alberta. And so yes, there's maybe frustration and yes, the premier may be saying things, but I can tell you that the people understand that we're stronger together. And yes, premier Edie's highlighted in the past, I've certainly spoken about in the past, we need more attention from the federal government.

We need to ensure that we're working together, that infrastructure is dollars are distributed in a more equitable way. And quite frankly, now then, as we go into this new environment, we're going to need to be sending a lot more of our goods to Asian markets. And that means it's going to come through BC. We need to invest in that critical infrastructure so we can have goods flowing. And those are infrastructures we've been asking for for a long time. And now I believe it's a national priority.

Now, when you're not worried about the whole of government approach to protecting the economy from tariffs, you're also the Minister of Housing. And, you know, a lot of promises were made from everyone, but the promises that the people said they wanted delivered on were the liberal promises on housing. Have you had any discussions thus far

with the incoming government about how they are going to put in practice this massive mobilization to build more homes in a short period of time than we've seen since the Second World War? Well, not yet. I had an opportunity to speak with the prime minister prior to him becoming the prime minister and heard some preliminary ideas at that point. But I'll be watching very closely. In fact, I can't wait for them to appoint someone

because we have work to do. You know, when we talk about recovery, we talk about strengthening housing essential housing is central to is central. Housing is central to our economy, housing is central to our health care, health outcomes. You know, right now, we know employers, we need to be able to track the workforce in our communities, but if housing is just way out of reach for people, and that's going to really inhibit our growth. So the two things that I'm watching really closely for from the federal government is this promise to reduce the DCCs or development costs from local governments by 50%. That is, if it can be rolled out in an effective way, that it's going to be game changing in

DC because we know a lot of projects are being reconsidered because they don't pencil at this point. And of course, the changes to MIRBs because we need to have more purpose-built rentals being built. So those two in particular will be things that I'm watching closely and of course, looking forward to meeting with the new Minister of Housing, whoever that person may be, as soon as possible. Well, listen, Ravi, I want to thank you for coming on the show. I know I know you have your hands full with with the work of government and the work of you know, tamping down on the on the on the threats and on the worry that comes from these these tariffs.

So I want to thank you so much for joining us and giving us the lay of the land as you see it in British Columbia. And I hope you know, you've always got to you'll always be welcome here at the Ben Mulroney show. I really appreciate it Ben. I look forward to coming back and thanks for having me. Absolutely. Want to transform your space and your Sundays? Well, Home Network is giving you the chance to love your home with $15,000. There can only be one winner. Tune in to Renovation Resort every Sunday and look for the code word during the show. Then enter at home network dot CA slash watch and win for your chance to win big. Amazing! The small details are

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