The Ben Mulroney Show - Has "Sassy" been shut down in Toronto? Trade upheaval in the auto industry

Episode Date: October 15, 2025

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Starting point is 00:01:10 What? And I'm sitting in the backseat. The whole way? The whole way. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you've been following the news, like really following it, you know how exhausting it can be politics conflict uncertainty it's a lot to carry and for many men there's this expectation to stay calm stay in control and not talk about how it's affecting you but the truth is you're allowed to feel overwhelmed you're allowed to say i'm not okay right now and trust me i have been there whether it's the state of the world stress at home or just feeling like you've got to have it all together and have all the answers you don't have to hold it in better help is here to help with the world's largest network
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Starting point is 00:02:05 slash Mulrooney today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P.com slash Mulrooney. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. We made it to the middle of the week. We made it to the middle of the month. It is Wednesday, October 15th.
Starting point is 00:02:31 I am the host of the aforementioned Ben Mulroney show. Thank you very much for joining us. And yesterday, after the show, I made my way to a luncheon where Doug Ford, the Premier of Ontario, laid out the vision for his government for the fall sitting at Queens Park. And as soon as that speech was done, I sat down with him for a fireside chat, about 30 minutes of conversation. It was a lot of fun.
Starting point is 00:03:01 He answered all of my questions and then gave us a story about vigilante justice at the hands of our Premier at Home Depot, we believe, in Bracebridge. We'll be breaking down that as well as some of the high points and some of the some of the high, some of the quotes and conversation that we enjoyed yesterday at the Empire Club. And I thank the Empire Club for inviting me to participate in what was a very, I think, important moment for the government as well as for our province. I like to believe that this show starts conversations. Every now and then, there is something that you hear for the first time on this show.
Starting point is 00:03:50 And we do our very best to help grow those conversations and push the ball down the field so that we are always giving you something of value. And hopefully, as we talk about it, more people will talk about it and the conversation grows from there. One of the conversations that I believe that we started in July, in July, was the conversation about what are referred to as sassy machines. And the sassy machines are vending machines that offer up drug paraphernalia. And we, I don't know how you feel about it, but I pretty sure you know how I feel about it. I find this to be an insane normalization of drug use when we have done absolutely nothing to offer meaningful pathways to recovery.
Starting point is 00:04:52 So we are essentially as a city have gone all in on keeping drug addicts addicted and we have no pathway to allow for them to say, you know what, I've hit rock bottom, I want a new path. And the sassy machines are a way of normalizing drug use and facilitating drug use. And we were very glad to be what we think were the first people in media in Toronto to highlight this example of Toronto, as far as I'm concerned, getting it wrong. Well, last week, Greg Brady broached the topic with Olivia Chow on his show. And she appeared, despite us talking about it in July. Not that she listens to our show necessarily,
Starting point is 00:05:39 not that I would expect her to, but somebody, somebody at City Hall. She appeared to have no idea the machines existed. What is that? Run that one by? Is it outdoor? It's inside, right?
Starting point is 00:05:51 There are harm reduction vending machines. There are at least five in the city. There's one near Casey House, which does such great work with HIV and AIDS. That's right. I remember Casey House when they first started. I'm that old. So there's a machine right beside there.
Starting point is 00:06:04 There was a story in the Toronto Star in August, and I drove past there, and I saw exactly what they're talking about. And it's got the neighborhood residence concern. That's like right now that seems like that city policy to provide these vending machines. Let me go take a look. We don't want people to get bad drugs and die because that's what happened, right? But we can't just have them have drugs and not help them on their addiction. So that was last week on Greg Brady's show. And as of today, if you drive by the sassy machines in front of Casey House, which
Starting point is 00:06:43 is just south of Bloor, they're boarded up. They are boarded up, completely shut off, no way to get to them. Now, that doesn't necessarily signal that they are being closed down, shut off. It just means as of right now, no one has access to them. And there are a few others around the city. Look, I laid out the problem for you. Like, clean drug kits, fine. But unless you're offering a real and meaningful pathway to recovery, you're ignoring the actual problem.
Starting point is 00:07:17 And the neighborhood, for what it's worth, has been furious about these things because they attract addicts, they attract crime, they attract drug waste. We've heard stories of addicts essentially standing guard in front of these things. things because in the mind of an addict, perhaps, they want to control these things. So there's a whole, there's a whole weird dynamic that comes with just putting one of these machines in. It's not, you don't drop a machine like that and nothing happens. There are knock on effects that the neighborhood has been furious about. Now, let's level set with you.
Starting point is 00:07:57 Do staff at consumption sites want to help addicts? Of course they do. But you cannot ignore the massive impact on the community. and what incentive is there to get clean when drug kits are so easily accessible. That's really the question. And I'm glad to see that at least temporarily these sassy machines have been closed down.
Starting point is 00:08:23 I'm not somebody who wants people who are in the throes of drug addiction to use dirty needles or anything like that, but it's how easy it is. to get these things. How easy it is and how the city is subsidizing these things on such a level
Starting point is 00:08:40 again without having a pathway to recovery that will allow them to say, okay, you know what? If you're going to use, use, but by the way, can we offer you
Starting point is 00:08:50 this pathway? We don't have that. And we do want to recognize the New Toronto Initiative and Integrity T.O. They've been pushing this story as well. I want to thank them.
Starting point is 00:09:02 But I remember you, Mike Droulet, you're the one who brought this forward to me. Yeah, I couldn't believe the story to begin with. We've seen them out in BC. They had them out there and we didn't know that they were here in Toronto and it was in fact the New Toronto initiative that flagged it to us
Starting point is 00:09:18 and we looked into it and yeah, we were blown away so we talked about it and we spoke about it a number of times. Started a story Alex Pearson ended up covering it a few times a number of times and Greg Brady did as well and when he got the mayor on and who knows
Starting point is 00:09:34 what happened. Yeah, we don't know what happened. We're not suggesting that the mayor was on Greg's show and this is a result of that. But, you know, it does follow the timeline. Anyway, we're happy to have done it. We will keep our eye on this sassy machine story, as well as the broader story about what this city is doing in terms of drug policy. Yesterday, as I said, I talked with the mayor, with the mayor. I talked with the Premier about all sorts of issues facing this province, and one of them was obviously the headwinds facing our automotive sector. One thing that I didn't know at the time, the Premier probably knew, was the Stalantus Brampton Assembly Plant, has been shut down since early 2024 for retooling, but that was put on pause when the terra fight started. And last night, a voicemail was left
Starting point is 00:10:23 on every Brampton Auto Plant worker's phone. Let's listen. This is plant manager, Alice Pississ. I'm calling today because I want to share some important news that involves our plant. Our CEO, Antonio Pelosi, just announced the largest single investment in our company's 100-year history, $13 million over the next four years to grow our business in the U.S. What does this mean for Brampton Assembly? As part of this announcement, we will be transitioning the Jeep Compass production from Brampton to the U.S. We understand this is incredibly difficult news, and we want to acknowledge the impact it has on you, your families, and the entire Brampton team. Our leadership has plans for Brampton and will share them upon further discussions with the Canadian government. Canada remains an important market for Solantis, and we are committed to working closely with all stakeholders to explore every possible path forward.
Starting point is 00:11:22 For now, this means that those on layup will reach us. on way up will remain on way off. We recognize the uncertainty this brings and will be working closely with Unifor to develop a plan that supports you through this transition. Well, Unifor President Lana Payne blasted the move saying
Starting point is 00:11:39 Canadian auto jobs are being sacrificed on the Trump altar. This is a five-alarm fire, and we're going to dig in, obviously, a little later in the show, but this is not good news for Brampton, this is not good news for Ontario, this is not good news for the automotive sector here
Starting point is 00:11:55 in Canada and yeah more on that a little bit later but we're going to take a deeper dive into that but first could Fred Hahn's days with QPie be numbered this is the Ben Mulroney show all right let's talk unions the biggest union in Canada the Canadian Union of Public Employees Largest union representing workers in public services like health care, education, municipalities, transportation, 800,000 members across the country, has a Fred Hahn problem.
Starting point is 00:12:35 Who's Fred Hahn? Well, you probably know his face. He looks like the dad in So I Married an Axe murderer. That's what he looks like. I will take that to my guy. Absolutely. It's a well-known fact that the world is controlled by the five richest families known as the Pentavre.
Starting point is 00:12:54 Anyway, he's a disgusting human being whose rabid anti-Semitism is overshadowed whatever work Kupi has been trying to do on behalf of its membership. You'll remember that he spoke at an anti-Israel rally where Taliban flags and Hamas posters were displayed. He posted a link of an Israeli diver to Gaza bombing. He was condemned as insensitive. his anti-Israel rhetoric, his support of the BDS movement, has overshadowed whatever his job was. He decided his job was to be an advocate against the state of Israel. And despite that, he was rising in the ranks of QP. Well, now it looks like he has been stripped of his position.
Starting point is 00:13:44 He just was defeated in the election for General VP for Ontario. and we're joined now by Jamie Claru, who's been in Cupy since 2009. He's president of Local 3987 for the last eight years. And he just got back from the convention where he believes there's a glimmer of optimism for what Cupy was and could be in the future. Jamie, welcome to the show. Oh, hi. Thanks for having me. Yeah, so listen, I'm no fan of Fred Hahn.
Starting point is 00:14:13 I think he's a horrible human being, and I think he's done a disservice to your union, both in terms of the membership and in terms of the reputation of what I think is a vital organization. How have you seen it being on the inside, in the trenches, amongst the membership? I've seen divide. Divide amongst members, amongst delegates at conventions. It's concerning, but I think there's a shift happening. and I see a bit more unification, and there's definitely a movement happening within Cupy. And it's a movement towards what? Because, you know, I think as an outsider, an outsider, but also somebody who believes that Cupy has a very vital role to play,
Starting point is 00:15:08 it feels like, you know, when I read that less than 10% of the resolutions at the last, convention dealt with wages or workplace matters while most focused on ideology and foreign policy i'm trying to figure out what's going on there well the movement is i mean it's moving back to union issues yeah um i heard from a lot of people a lot of delegates at convention that want to move back to you know benefits wages health and safety yeah issues that are uh fundamentally part of our union foundation. Yeah. And so you were there.
Starting point is 00:15:51 You talked to me about you. You ran for a position, didn't you? I ran for national president off the floor of convention, really to put my name out there and to see where I stood with the delegates at convention. You were unsuccessful. You did get 11% of the vote. Congratulations. Anyone who puts their name forward for any sort of elected office.
Starting point is 00:16:16 I have a lot of respect for. What, as a candidate for national president, what were, what were you trying to achieve? Had you won, what would you want to do with Cupy? I just want to make it, I want to go back to our equality statement and our code of conduct and respect everybody. I think that we all have our own personal opinions, and that's fine. but I think we need to be respectful when we speak when we put pen to paper
Starting point is 00:16:50 or now it's more email I think we need to respect one another and we need to have a common goal of the foundation of what unions were created for I understand international solidarity I get that but I think at the core
Starting point is 00:17:10 we need to work towards those things I mentioned before, wages and safe working conditions and benefits and other agenda items like that. So, Jamie, when 25 Jewish QP members filed a human rights complaint against Fred Hahn saying his actions created a hostile environment within the union, was that a, was that a, I mean, did something break within, so the membership when they said, oh, my God, like the people are actual members, our brothers and sisters within CUPY, who are dues-paying members, are saying that this man is making them feel unsafe. Was that a bridge too far for a lot of people? Well, I think it was for a lot of members within Cupy. and it was it was sad really to see people feel that way and to hear in their voice that they felt unsafe.
Starting point is 00:18:17 Yeah, yeah, and look, I think it's important to hammer home the point that we need to take care of worker issues here. And QPie is that voice on so many fronts and so many labor disputes and so many issues and so many sectors. But if if QPi itself loses the plot, then I don't know who's supposed to be there to pay attention to workers' issues. If the leadership is consumed by and focused on issues half a world away, you know, time is binary, right? For every minute you spend on one thing, that's a minute you're not. spending on something else. And every minute spent on Gaza is a minute you're not focused on workers' rights and safe working conditions and so on. I would say the same thing about the NDP as well, federally, who've focused on Gaza to their detriment. And so you think,
Starting point is 00:19:17 you believe that perhaps this was a pivot point, that perhaps QPie is waking up and realizing that they have a, they actually have a pretty big job and they haven't been focused on it? Well, yeah, in certain ways, yes. There are some of us that are more focused on the things I mentioned and others that are focused on other issues that are international, such as Gaza. Yeah. The situation over there obviously was deplorable. It's very unfortunate that this whole thing happened.
Starting point is 00:20:01 But I really believe that we need to reset and refocus on what our union's job is to do. Jamie, we should say that Fred Hahn remains the QP Ontario president until the May 2026 election. So in about, I guess, about six months from now, there's going to be another election. Is there a campaign afoot to really make sure that he is out of a leadership position? I'm not aware of one at this point, but, you know, it's still early, and I don't know at this point. Yeah, well, he's, listen, I think his time in the sun should be coming to an end, far as I'm concerned, because like I said, I'm, you know, everyone knows my, my political leanings, but I feel that your union serves a very important role in society and for your
Starting point is 00:20:59 members and for workers writ large. And I just don't believe that that job can be accomplished when someone like that is sucking up all the oxygen in the room and talking about things that are not necessarily germane to the lives of workers across this country. I want to thank you so much for joining us, Jamie Clareau. Really appreciate it, and I hope you come back soon. Okay, thank you. You take care. Yeah, it's a little sanity has been restored to what I thought was an insane situation.
Starting point is 00:21:33 All right, up next, Doug Ford gave me some career advice. You're going to want to hear this. Welcome back to the Ben Muleruny show. Yesterday was an interesting day for me. First of all, I started the day by going to the gym and doing something at the gym. I haven't done a very long time, and I am feeling it today. A sit-up? No, I do sit-ups.
Starting point is 00:22:07 No, I did weighted lunges, right? So I had like two 20-pound weights, and I did lunges. and I am feeling it from the glute all the way through the back of the leg don't do that if you're going back to the gym don't do something you've never done before because I'm going to feel this for three days
Starting point is 00:22:28 you look ripped though oh man that's the t-shirt I love that quote I don't know who said it hey bro do you even lift do you even lift bro yeah it's a thing anyway so that's how my day started
Starting point is 00:22:40 and then we came did the show and as soon as the show was done I rushed to a big gathering of, I guess, you know, significant people within Toronto and Ontario and all sorts of sectors, 1,300 people for a luncheon at the Metro Toronto Convention Center to hear a speech by Premier Doug Ford. It was done by the Empire Club, where he was laying out the priorities of his government for the fall sitting at Queens Park. And after the speech, which was about 20, 25 minutes, I was brought in to conduct what's called a fireside chat where we sit down and I ask him questions to sort of in a more informal setting get him to talk more about some of the points in his speech.
Starting point is 00:23:29 It is not a journalistic endeavor in any way. It's a data dump for the people there and then by extension, everybody who watches on the news. news and reads the newspapers. My goal and my role was to pull information out of him in a controlled setting. So he knew what questions I was going to ask. And that was a way for us to have a really solid conversation. I had my eight questions. I got to seven of them. And look, it's supposed to follow a script, right? But he told me, right before he started his speech, She's like, looking forward to talking to Ben Mulrini. And I have a question for you before we start our Q&A. So I sat down and I asked him, what's your question?
Starting point is 00:24:18 You had a question for me, sir. Well, I might as all, just between us, 1,300 people and your sister. When or why? Are you going to be running for mayor of Toronto? Because we need something going down there. Just curious. Well. I'm sure a lot of people in this room would vote for you, raise money,
Starting point is 00:24:39 support. Well, thank you. I've always said that municipal politics is the closest level of politics to my heart. But I'm very busy these days, sir. I don't know if you saw the piece of paper in front of me. I'm a celebrated television and radio host. But I recently, sir, I took, I listened to my greatest fans online and I decided I'm now the founder of a new organization called the Canadian Nepo Baby Success Network because sometimes being born on third base isn't enough. And so, no, I would like to very much one day, but I'm a little busy doing the things I love doing,
Starting point is 00:25:20 and thank you very much for having it. A real politician speaking. Dodging around, you come from great stock. Yeah. I loved your dad. I absolutely loved him. He's a great man. He'd call me up and pump me up all the time,
Starting point is 00:25:32 And boy, do I miss them. And I used to go to Caroline. Your dad just got me going again. I felt like door knocking every time we hung up from each other. And, boy, we miss them. I miss them every day. But if I can say, as much and as hard as my sister works on behalf of her constituents and the people of Ontario, she is the glue that keeps our family together.
Starting point is 00:25:53 Without her, we are just, we are far less than what we could be. It was a, it was a, so that's how it started, right? That's how it started. It was fine. Just for the record, I'm having too much fun doing the Ben Mulroney show. I ain't running for anything anytime soon. But from there, we attacked a number of issues that are important to his government. And like I said, by extension, the people of Ontario.
Starting point is 00:26:17 We talked tariffs. We talked trade war. We talked energy independence. We talked to all sorts of stuff. How do we trump-proof the Ontario economy? All of those things would be headlines across the province. and yet the one thing that really everyone's talking about today was at the end of our conversation, he decided to share a story about the time he ditched his security detail and went to Home Depot.
Starting point is 00:26:48 A couple months ago, I pull in, I escaped from my detail at 8 o'clock in the morning before they come, and it ticks them off. So I hop in my pickup and I want to go to Home Depot. It was on a Saturday. and I pull up and I wanted to get some plants. Actually, it was the weekend before the Prime Minister came. I wanted to get plants for the cottage, so I loaded up. And I pulled up right by the nursery.
Starting point is 00:27:12 I think the majority have been to home depot. So I pull right up. I load up all the plants, and I'm ready to pull out. And here's this guy with a backpack and, you know, a bag. And he's walking out, the store manager is yelling at him. You know, come back, come back. security guards there and I said well go get them we aren't allowed to go get him and so he went around the side of where all the plants and outside the
Starting point is 00:27:38 parking lot so I was in my car I said screw this I'm I'm going after this guy so by this time my heart's beaten I'm ticked off so I go racing behind no one can see and I pull up behind him and jump it on the car I said buddy what's in your bag nothing's in my bag I said buddy I'm gonna kick your ass all over the parking lot, show me what's in your bag. I did. I couldn't help myself. And so I said, buddy, come over here. Nothing's in my bag. And so he's starting now by this time the store manager comes and he's on fire. You know, he's cursing and swearing. I guess I threw in a couple, colorful language too. And so he's emptying out his bag. And all of a sudden, so he's saying,
Starting point is 00:28:23 nothing's here. I said, how about your other bag? It's because he dropped and heard a cling. And so he went in there and he pulled out one of those saw blades that you open up and you use it as a saw blade. And the store manager said, that's what he stole. So yeah, depending on your perspective in life,
Starting point is 00:28:42 that's either a great story of just an everyday Premier who's just like you and me who's fed up with the crime that he sees or you're somebody who thinks a shame on you, Mr. Premier, for taking the law into your own hands. And so I want to hear from you, 416, 8,
Starting point is 00:28:58 6,400 or 1-3-8-2-25 talk. Let's take a couple of quick calls. How do you see the Premier's position, his street justice position where he decided to confront somebody that he believed was shoplifting from Home Depot? I like the store. I mean, look, I don't want to live in a world where we've normalized shoplifting. But we have normalized shoplifting. It's something you see all the time. At the LCBO, people are, you're the store. story after story, image after image from social media, people just walking in, taking what they want, leaving. And he spoke about that yesterday. Yeah. Another question that we didn't include there, he spoke about that.
Starting point is 00:29:39 He's tired of seeing these people walking in with shopping carts. Yeah. It's absolutely ridiculous. And people, they stand back, just let them do it. Yeah. And then, of course, there's also the, if I'm not, it's either Eritzia or Lulu Lemon.
Starting point is 00:29:49 One of those two stores has a policy that they will take action against employees who try. to stop shoplifters. That's how normalized we've made it. And I got to say, I kind of like that everyday citizens, including our premier, pushing back against that, saying, no, you don't get to do that. You don't get to break the rules and feel good about it.
Starting point is 00:30:17 Hey, Rick, welcome to the show. Hey, Ben, how are you? I'm well, thank you. Now, why do the stores have security? They can't do a thing. Yeah, no, I know. in a lot of cases, they're told to just watch. Other times they're told to detain.
Starting point is 00:30:33 It doesn't happen all the time. But I agree with you. Especially like when you see the LCBO. Those guys are, they don't do anything. But that is a directive that they're given. It's not that I don't know if they want to stop criminals or not, but they just, they can't or they don't. Well, they get fired if they do.
Starting point is 00:30:54 If they try to. It's just such a weird world we're living in. Rick, thank you so much for the call. Yeah, it's, you know what, I wish we had time for more calls. You know, we don't have, to Jamie and to everybody else who's calling in, don't worry. We'll take some more calls a little bit later in the show. Up next, another deep cut to our auto sector. This one is going to hurt.
Starting point is 00:31:16 We're going to dig into what's happening in Brampton next on the Ben Mulroney show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. All right, we're going to stay on the topic of the conversation that I had yesterday with Premier Doug Ford at the Empire Club before a crowd of 1,300 people when he laid out his vision for the fall session at Queens Park. He gave a speech. I conducted a fireside chat. We talked about a number of issues important to his government and by extension this province. and the people who make this province home. And obviously, tariffs omnipresent as a threat.
Starting point is 00:32:04 And before he even spoke, we all watched a commercial that is going to be carpet bombing the American airwaves from the province of Ontario, narrated by one of the great presidents of all time, Ronald Reagan. This is from a speech he gave in 1987. And this is what the Premier of Ontario wants our American friends to know about tariffs. Let's take Ronald Reagan's words and let's blast it to the American people. And our first launch is going to be on every major network. Maybe one may not get it. And we'll talk about that at a later day. No, it's actually CNN, to be honest with it.
Starting point is 00:32:51 They're a little nervous, but Fox and other people. but we're going to launch a $75 million ad, and we're going to repeat that message to every Republican district there is right across the entire country. Yeah, and it was in the voice of Ronald Reagan explaining why tariffs don't work. They might work in the short term,
Starting point is 00:33:14 but they don't work in the long term, and they are not equitable, they're not fair, and they're not respectful of the partnerships that countries have built with other countries throughout time and hearing it in the voice of Ronald Reagan
Starting point is 00:33:29 may sway people I suspect they won't I don't think that this Republican Party is the party of Reagan necessarily anymore but you know
Starting point is 00:33:39 I think I think Doug Ford feels that these are the types of things that a government does this is the type of thing that a premier does and this is how
Starting point is 00:33:51 he feels he can stand up for our province against, you know, the trade aggression displayed and demonstrated by Donald Trump and his administration. Part of my conversation with Doug Ford focused on the auto sector, and you'll remember, I believe, early last week, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnik was in Toronto, where he gave a speech and he essentially said, we're coming for your auto sector. Don't care if you don't like it, but we're taking it all. And it's going to be America first, second, and third.
Starting point is 00:34:26 And whatever's left that we don't want, you can figure out for yourselves. That was essentially the gist of what he said. And I broach that subject with the Premier. It's become very personal, not just myself, but every single Canadian. Every Canadian knows a friend, a neighbor, a relative that lives in the U.S. or a business partner. And Howard Lutnik, you know, smart business. person. He has to learn politics
Starting point is 00:34:55 as well. But he has to get on the page with the president. The president is saying one thing that he wants both auto sectors to thrive. And Howard Lutnik's saying, we're going to build autos. Well, I'll tell you, it's going to kill the auto manufacturers down there. All of them have come out
Starting point is 00:35:11 and said they've already lost a billion dollars because of free trade. It's so intertwined. The auto pack's been around since the 1960s. And as you've heard many times, auto parts will go back and four, six, seven, eight times. And I always say you can't unscramble an egg
Starting point is 00:35:28 that's been around since 1960. You have to make the omelette larger. And I've also said to inform our American friends that we buy 400% more vehicles than anyone in the entire world. And the vehicles that we buy off them, we produce roughly, and it varies but 1.7 million autos a year.
Starting point is 00:35:50 And 50% of them have American parts. So it's going to devastate the auto sector in the U.S. But we're going to survive. We're going to become more creative and come up with new ideas. And that's what we're going to do. But the auto sector has been here for 100 years and it will always be here for the next 100 years. So those were great words to hear as somebody who reports on the tenuous situation for our auto sector, worried about, you know, jobs and worried about factories closing and worried about Donald Trump coming for these jobs, as Howard Lutnik said last week.
Starting point is 00:36:32 It was nice to hear bullish language from our premier yesterday. Well, the news overnight was that Stalantis is moving a Jeep production from Brampton to Illinois. Brampton's future uncertain, 3,000 jobs in the car manufacturing sector alone, plus 1,000 supply jobs. This is going to hit like a ton of bricks, a ton of bricks. This is, to me, disappointing news. I also don't like it when Howard Lutnik is right. But this is – I didn't see this coming.
Starting point is 00:37:18 I certainly didn't see it coming. on the heels of, as I said, really bullish language from the Premier. But also the workers out there in Brampton, they had been living off the promise that that plant was being retooled for some e-vehicles. And with the electric market taking a hit, they had to think of something else. But once the tariff situation came into effect with Trump, they just stopped retooling. Yeah. And now they've been sitting, waiting in a holding pattern.
Starting point is 00:37:51 waiting to go back to work. They didn't know what they were going to be working on. And they all got the same voicemail from the plant manager, which really did sound like a voicemail that you would get at the end of the world. Hi, this is a voicemail to let you know that, well, the missiles are in the air. And they're going to land and none of us are going to survive. So kiss your loved ones. Make peace with your maker. And we'll see you on the other side. That's what it sounded like. It was, yeah, it really had that tone. Yeah. And it must have been terrifying for people who actually work at the plant to get that.
Starting point is 00:38:26 Well, so you hear that from your plant manager. And the next people you want to hear from is from your union. And let's listen to the head of a uniform, a lot of pain on how she sees this. And what we're seeing now are companies making decisions to appease the president of the United States. And that means for Stalantis, what they announced yesterday, shifting product that had been slated for Brampton, that, you know, they had promised three shifts of production there, 3,000 direct jobs, it's thousands more in the supply chain. This is devastating, but it also means and sends a message, I believe, to both levels of government that we have to step up our fight back against the United States right now. or we will see more decisions like this being made by corporations,
Starting point is 00:39:25 and that's my fear. Yeah, and that was on Greg Brady show earlier today. That was Lana Payne was speaking with Greg Brady. I don't know what we do. Like, I really don't know how this goes. I mean, are we, these are skilled workers. There's a tradition and a legacy of car manufacturing in that city in that area.
Starting point is 00:39:50 This is a, these are, these are skills that are, I mean, the father retires and the son or the daughter gets hired. I mean, this is, this is like, as Doug Ford said, this is a tradition of car manufacturing that goes back 100 years in Ontario. What do we do? If Stalantus is taking this away, is there another car that is going to come and replace it? It's not necessarily the case that because they are taking this a vehicle and they are going to move production down and manufacturing down to Illinois, that that's the end of the road
Starting point is 00:40:22 for car manufacturing at this Brampton plant. It's just, it's, it's, it's, if there were three little, uh, question marks before, now there's a 10 very big question marks. And I, I, my heart goes out to every employee who is sitting there wondering what the future holds for them. This is a dark and a sad day, and there's nothing worse than not knowing what tomorrow will bring. But we will keep you posted as the news comes to us. We will pass it on to you. Canada's oil sands produce the energy the world. needs. But it's the benefits that flow to all parts of our country, like hundreds of thousands of
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