The Ben Mulroney Show - How do we prevent tragedies like the one in Vancouver, from happening again?

Episode Date: April 28, 2025

Guests and Topics: -How do we prevent tragedies like the one in Vancouver, from happening again? 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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You may be listening in London on CFPL or here in Toronto on 640 Toronto. You may be listening to us on the iHeartRadio app or in podcast form, but regardless, we're doing this together starting on Monday, and we're gonna see you through till the end of the week. Now, up until yesterday, I was convinced that today, I would start the show by talking about the 35-day election campaign

that is finally coming to a close. And we would be looking back at it as well as looking forward to the election tonight, and we will have a new government by tomorrow morning. I thought that's what was going to happen until I woke up up to hear about the 11 dead in the tragedy in Vancouver at the Filipino block party where a man drove his car through a crowd mowing people down. As of right now, 11 have passed away, but there are many more, dozens more injured, some of them critically. The man has been charged with murder.

I believe it's eight counts of murder thus far. And look, I want to be very careful because we've been having a very high level, very important conversation about public safety and crime throughout this entire election campaign. And so it's natural to fold this terrible story into that narrative, into that conversation. But we don't know enough right now to be able to say this is one thing or this is another. So for example, I saw people rushing to judgment when they said, when the police chief said

that this man was known to police. But we don't know why he was known to police. He might have been known to them because of mental health issues. As a matter of fact, why don't we listen to interim Vancouver police chief Ray on who this suspect is. The driver of the vehicle was the lone occupant and he was arrested at the crime scene by members of the Vancouver Police Department after bystanders and witnesses intervened to detain him. He remains in custody. While I'm not prepared to speak about the potential motive, I can now say with confidence that the evidence in this case does not lead us to believe this was an act of terrorism.

I can also tell you that the person we have in custody does have a significant history of interactions with police and healthcare professionals related to mental health. So some people heard that and jumped on it and said, oh, like this guy, this guy should have been, should have been in jail. And I don't know that that's necessarily the case yet. Like, I don't know that yet.

I think it's fair to have this conversation, fair to ask ourselves, depending on whether the liberals win or the conservatives win, how would this case be treated? But until we have more information as to exactly who this man is, why he did what he did, we really do have to tread lightly. lightly. Now the mayor of Vancouver joined into the conversation as well talking about a need for review of the sort of the safety protocols around block parties like this. Like all of you I'm completely heartbroken. I'm shocked and I'm angry. And I'm devastated by the lives that have been lost and the pain that's been inflicted on our community. Families gathered to celebrate, to dance,

to share their culture and their pride. And in an instant, their world was shattered. And as a result, I've directed a full review of our event safety measures, including barriers, traffic control, and safety protocols. Our first priority is and will always be protecting the residents of Vancouver and see that's where I think we're gonna spend a little bit of the time in our Conversation later on on the Ben Mulroney show because apparently according to the cops the they their their assessment of the whatever threats were That could be presented did not warrant any additional security. But clearly, they should have, it should have warranted that. Clearly, there should have been some sort of barrier preventing somebody from doing exactly what happened.

And because, and I said this a little bit earlier this morning, we've seen this happen in Toronto. We saw this exact same thing happen in Germany at a Christmas fair where a guy just took a car and tore through that Christmas fair. We know these things can happen and if they can happen then shouldn't we always be protecting against that? So that's going to be a conversation that we have a little bit later but let's turn our attention for just a couple of minutes to the election. You've heard me on this show be exceptionally partisan over the course of the last month

or so. I have told everybody listening, I am not a member of a political party. And this year, Pierre Poliev and the conservatives have earned my vote. And with that as my operating system, I have done what I can to help them. I'm not a journalist. I'm biased. And just, you got to deal with it. But today is the end of the race. And I just want to take a moment to appreciate the fact that we could see 70, 75, maybe even a higher percentage of that of eligible voters turning out to vote in this election.

This is a thing of beauty. This is the thing that makes Western democracy magical. The rights and the responsibilities coming together over the course of an election campaign and expressing that public will through voting in a free and fair election. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. And you don't have to be a conservative or a liberal or NDP. We can all appreciate that what is going to happen today is a beautiful exercise of democratic

rights. going to happen today is a beautiful exercise of democratic rights and I'm very proud to be Canadian on a day like today. What matters most to you? Is it unforgettable adventures, connections with lifelong friends, peaceful moments of reflection, feelings of joy and freedom you can't wait to experience again and again? Or is it the vehicles that help you make all those special moments possible? Whatever your answer is, Toyota is here to bring you closer to the things that matter to you. Because they matter to us too. Toyota. For what matters most. Do you eat food? Do you go anywhere?

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Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show and it's news that we really don't like to share. We wish we didn't have to share it, but one of the largest mass murders in Canadian history unfolded over the weekend in Vancouver when a man turned his car into a weapon and mowed down. At this point, 11 people have died with many more in hospital with critical injuries. And look, like I said, we want to reserve judgment on a lot of things, but here's something that just doesn't make any sense to me, and hopefully we can make sense of it together.

The mayor said that he is going to review the security plan and to figure out how this happened. Vancouver Police Department interim chief Steve Ray said he knows a lot of people have questions, but nevertheless, he said he is confident that the safety plan that they had before this tragedy was, quote, sound. And the police use a formula to assess risk at large scale events.

And that includes whether protests are likely, whether threats have been made, whether anyone associated with the gathering and a history with the police, and so on, and so on. And based on that formula, they took a certain number of steps that did not include putting bollards up so that somebody couldn't drive through like that. I don't think you can say the plan was sound

if this is the end result. Let's take a call. Mark, welcome to the show. Hi, Ben. I'm a retired police officer. I used to make arrangements for events such as this. Thank you for your service. Yeah, no problem. First of all, you can't harden every target. There's too many varieties that can happen. The one obvious breakdown I can help him with is a sepsis of what went wrong. My question is why was he out? Whether it be from jail or a mental

institution which we no longer have, that would have prevented this tragedy. As for putting up bollards, it does work but in smaller towns or smaller locations, you know, you may have four or five events going on on any one day especially in a place like Vancouver. How do you harden all those targets at the same time? Oh, yeah. And I want to be very clear, Mark. I'm not blaming any of the police or anyone like that. I'm not suggesting that they drop the ball. I'm just wondering why, you know, because we've seen this before. we saw in Toronto in 2018, we saw what happened at that Christmas fair in Germany last year.

People are using their cars to do some damage. And so that's becoming more and more commonplace. Yeah, and that is certainly a weapon that can be used to kill multiple people, more dangerous than any firearm. And again, if we go right back and spring this into the election, it's not sovereignty on the ballot, it's the economy and public safety. And that's what we're dealing with. Mark, thank you very much.

And I'd love to hear from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225. Talk, how can we prevent this sort of thing from happening again? It does feel to me like we're always, we're quite reactive, right? We can defend, the new plan includes defending against the old threat. And I just wonder maybe there are smart people who can call in and let me know what we can do better

or maybe this is as good as it gets. Frank, welcome to the show. Good morning, Ben. Good morning. Morning. I think in this instance, because mental health or mental illness is an issue, given that there's been previous incidents involving

this person where the police have been involved, I think what we need to do and consider is changes to the Mental Health Act. For example, in cases where someone who's mentally ill or unstable and has had falling outs with the law, I think in those circumstances, if we get court orders that are issued in situations like this to ensure that treatment is followed, taking the proper medication is followed.

Because when you're dealing with someone with a mental illness that is triggered to do something like this, you can take all the safety precautionaries in the world. And eventually, if someone is going to get the opportunity to do something, they're going to do it. So, focus on the person that's mentally ill, and I think that will probably assist with maybe eliminating or reducing the possibility that someone like this can do it again. Well, thank you very much for your call. And look, like I said, we don't know what motivated this man yet. The story that I read in the newspaper was, you know, he had some mental health issues.

They were exacerbated by the murder of his brother and the suicide of his mother. Yeah, murder of the brother, suicide of the mother. And I can't imagine the anguish that one would experience after tragedies, successive tragedies like that. And if he was already suffering from mental health issues, those would have gotten far worse. Would anyone know that they could have led to this? Probably not. Probably not. But was there a way to perhaps keep an eye on this person? I don't know. I don't know. Ted, welcome to the show. Yeah, hello, Ben. I want to thank you with what you're doing,

with your service on the radio. I really appreciate that. Thank you very much. You're a great addition. I wanted to bring up one point you're missing is the New Orleans where the same thing happened. I can't remember how many people were killed. Very unfortunate.

Yeah, you're right. Yeah, I forgot about New Orleans. Yeah. That was the closest one. It's almost a copycat. This really hits home for me because I love going to all the street festivals in Toronto. This is what I think makes Toronto what Toronto is all about. Like makes the city for me. And I'm I'm thinking there should be some kind of spectrum that that is used for when there should be some kind of spectrum that is used for when someone is constantly committing events where their mental health is deemed to be very fragile. And if you're on a spectrum where you're at a point where you could be either injuring

yourself or injuring others, then you should have some rights taken away where you're given help. Yeah. You're given proper medication, not sent out into the public just to cause whatever havoc happens. Yeah, I mean, you make a good point. Like I said, I don't know the solution. I don't know whether involuntary confinement is the way to go.

But if this person had had as many interactions with mental health professionals and the police as we are led to believe then They should have eyes on this guy. Don't you think oh, yes, definitely? Yeah, and and all current street festivals. They should have like going forward They should meet possibly have you know police cars or something Barriers that you know where they were they will in the future. That's for sure. Hey, thank you so much for your call. Terry, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Welcome. Great show you have there,

Ben. Thank you. Yes, I what I would like to say is with the barriers they could put up like a cement truck or a city of Toronto truck or a City of Vancouver truck where you can move it as soon as the show's over and it's not too complicated. I think you make a really good point. Just back up a big truck and nobody can get in. And if people do need to get in and out, you just move the truck and it makes a good point. All right? A big cement truck with the word Vancouver on it or something like that.

And look, again, I want to be very clear. This is not me attacking the police or the organizers in Vancouver. I think like everyone, we have questions so that we can move forward with our eyes open and be more prepared in the future. But I go back to what I said before, this, this, this person who did this, we were told at the press conference that he was known to police and health, mental health professionals. I don't know what that means. I don't know how many interactions he had with the police and with mental health professionals. But I have to assume that if he was quote unquote known,

it's more than one. It's more than one. And so I don't know what levers you can pull when somebody comes up and interacts with the police and interacts with the mental health services a few times. I mean, can you force that person into treatment? Can you force them into a mental health facility? I don't know. I don't know what the law says these days. And at some point, even if they have mental health issues, do they have the requisite ability

to understand what they did? Does this man know what he did? Because if he did, then he's got to stay in trial and he's got to face the full force of the law for the lives that he took. But that's a big if. That's a very, very big if and I am not the person to determine whether or not he has that requisite wherewithal. Diane, thanks so much for calling in. Oh, hi there. I just wanted to weigh in on something that's under-reported.

Someone who works in the mental health field, I've done a lot of my own research on this phenomenon and too many times when suicides or homicides happen, they are blamed on the individuals underlying mental illness. However, there's not enough or any attention in the mainstream given to the fact that going on psychotropic drugs without proper supervision or coming off of them too abruptly can unfortunately lead to a host of symptoms like homicidal ideation and behavior, suicidal ideation. Yeah. And this is- Diane, I've got to leave it there, but thank you so much.

A very good point to end this conversation on. Hi, I'm Donna Friesen from Global National. a very good point to end this conversation on. New episodes drop every day, so take this as your personal invitation to join us on the Global National Podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts. Welcome back to the Ben Mulrooney Show. And listen, I'm I say this slightly tongue in cheek, but not completely tongue in tongue in cheek. slightly tongue-in-cheek, but not completely tongue-in-cheek, the CBC has been working its tail off

to ensure its survival. Journalistic ethics be damned. And look, I've got a lot of time for Rosemary Barton. I've met her many times. I find her to be a great journalist. I think she's one of the best, right? And if the CBC disappeared tomorrow, Rosemary Barton would find a home somewhere else.

However, in this election campaign, it has been pretty clear to me and a lot of people that the CBC has been working overtime to shield Mark Carney from the criticism and questions that a lot of people have. And last week, a reporter named Catherine Lavec laid out the fact that basically the platform that Mark Carney unveiled was Justin Trudeau's platform. Liberal platform, frankly, that's something I will say that has been ready for several

weeks now. Mona Forte was the one who was working on this and it was ready before Mark Honey even became liberal leaders. So that was Catherine Levesque speaking with Rosie Barton. Now with that as context, listen to this exchange between Rosemary Barton and Jason Kenny sparring about that very same platform just the other day. The rabbit that the little book of campaigns been trying to pull out of the hat is exactly that. To say to at least a portion of the pro-change voters,

this is change. I don't think that's very credible. Same team, the platform was a Trudeau platform. It's the same- That's not true. It was a Carney platform. It was not written for Justin Trudeau. That is simply not true.

Listen, this is a matter of... Is that an objective CBC fact check statement? I think subjectively what I will say is... You can say it subjectively, but objectively it is accurate to say that... It reads to me like a Trudeau platform. Well, that's fine. It can read that way. I don't know. I guess it reads to the CBC differently. But it reads to me like a Trudeau platform, which is interventionist, more spending, implicitly higher taxes, not addressing the

fundamental issues around productivity or competitiveness, the flight of capital, the flight of investment, the decline of per capita GDP. These are the underlying issues in affordability and I'm just saying I think there is a tension in what's left of a swing electorate around that. That's fine. What my point was, because there was a conservative in what's left of a swing electorate around that. That's fine. But what my point was, because there was a conservative talking point emerging that this platform had been written for Justin Trudeau. That is not true.

It reached me like it was. You can read it that way, but it was not written for Mr. Trudeau. I mean, that doesn't make any sense to me. Make that make sense, Rosie. You literally had Catherine Levesque on your show. Name the person who wrote it for Justin Trudeau. So I don't understand that. But this is to me one of the reasons that the CBC has lost credibility. I want to hear from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. Look, we could

wake up tomorrow to a Mark Carney majority, which means the CBC will be getting, not only will they get their $1.4 billion, they're gonna get 150 million more in funding from this liberal government. And I wanna know what you think about that. I can tell you, somebody who works in media, and I've worked now for two very large media companies that have to rely on,

you know, selling ad space and doing what they can to stay afloat. That's a lot of money. That's a lot of money that I can tell you we do not have. We do not have. So there's a part of me that's a little bit resentful, not going to lie, a little bit resentful. And I'd love to know what you think. I mean, when you hear that, when you hear a journalist say, this was written for Justin Trudeau, and then when a conservative comes on and repeats that, he is tarred as using a conservative talking point, that I don't know what to do with that. I mean, I do know what to do with it, but I want to hear from you. 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. Because don't forget, not only are they getting

150 million more dollars, but the liberal plan is to essentially entrench the funding in legislation. So the only way to get rid of it would be a repeal by government by the House of Commons, a vote in the House of Commons. Jim, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Good morning sir. Good morning. The biased and I don't know how to say like if it's propaganda or not, but the way they sway

on the reporting, the vocabulary that do you use, the verbologies that do you use just to describe one candidate from the other. Now if I'm not mistaken, didn't Rosemary turn around and try to sue the conservative government on an election there two ago or one ago? I don't know. That doesn't sound familiar to ago? I don't know. That doesn't sound familiar to me. I don't know. If somebody knows the answer,

they can feel free to give us a call, but go on, Jim. I believe that's true. Well, listen, like I said, Rosemary Barton, if the CBC disappeared tomorrow, Rosemary Barton would be snatched up right quick somewhere. Her voice would not disappear. And frankly, I think she's an outstanding journalist. I just think through the prism of the existential threat

posed by a conservative government, I think there's been some slanted reporting in favor of the guy who's going to give the CBC a lifeline. Joe, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Hey, Ben, how are you this morning? I'm very well, thank you. Excellent.

Thanks for having me on. I agree with you 100%. The reporting is completely skewed, completely slanted. When you watch it, it's almost as if we're on two different planets and it's a dystopian society. And the best part is the CBC spends millions and millions of dollars on television shows, and I use the term television loosely because the shows don't air on television.

They are only on the CBC Gem app and maybe watched by, I don't know, hundreds of people. It's absolutely ridiculous. And you've got to pay for that app. I've noticed that once. I was going to download the app so that I could watch some of the shows. Turns out, no, no, national broadcaster, I have to pay for those. And that made no sense to me.

I said, I thought I've already paid for them with my taxes. Yeah. Yeah. It goes back to what you said. that made no sense to me. I said, I thought I've already paid for them with my taxes. Yeah, yeah, it goes back to what you said. You work for a private broadcaster. I've been in the broadcasting business of my entire life as well, where you have to fend for yourself and sell ad space. And if you don't have ratings and you don't sell ads,

then you don't make money and you sometimes have to lay off people. Obviously your company's gone through that. CBC doesn't really have these problems. In fact, the executives get paid bonuses. It's pretty wild. Hey, Joe, thank you so much for your call. And let's welcome Olivia to the Ben Mulroney show. Thanks so much for calling, Olivia. Hi, Ben. Hi. Real quick, that fella who called just a while ago saying that Rosemary Barton, he thought it sued the Conservative Party.

That isn't that true. It was Rosemary Barton and the CBC, they sued the Conservative Party and Rosemary Barton has less sued them because they used her image in a commercial. They used everybody's image in a commercial. But she sued, they ended up losing Rosemary Barton and the CBC. So that's a done deal. But they have gone after the Conservative Party for using her image Interesting. I don't remember that story. I don't know why you would I'm pretty sure that falls under fair use Or was under Harper when it happened, but it was fairly recently relatively speaking

Well, I listen, I appreciate the context and thank you so much for your call. And look, again, I come from, I come at this story from a very particular perspective as somebody who has worked at in television and now radio for almost 25 years. And when I started in TV, times were good. Times were real good.

We were having our Christmas parties were legendary, legendary, huge massive Christmas parties. When we flew places, they took good care of us. We stayed in nice hotels. And then about five years into it, bit by bit, they started pairing things back and budgets started going to YouTube, the advent of YouTube, the advent of Netflix, all of those things came together to make it so it became harder and harder and harder to make ends meet in television.

And the mantra in private broadcasting is do more with less. I can't tell you how small our teams got and how much those small teams were expected to produce. Same in radio. I mean, if you, we do a great show. I think this is a great show. And you know how many people work on this show? Me, my producer, and Gord.

And the three of us together, and Dave comes on a little bit later but there's three of us doing this show and I'd like to have more people I would and if I were at the CBC George how many people would we have we were at the CBC seven people we'd have seven people working on this show we would have interns and we would have assistants and we would have people who do nothing but cut audio and we'd have people who, I don't know, dress the set and do social media. We don't have that. Nobody has that in private broadcasting because the numbers don't justify it and the numbers

don't justify it in TV or at the CBC either, but they live in a fantasy land where they've got all the money they need. There's no limit to how far criminals will go to cover their tracks, but investigators will go even further to uncover the truth. I'm Nancy Hicks, a senior crime reporter for Global News. This season on Crime Beat, I'll take you from the crime scene to the courtroom and inside some of Canada's most high-profile cases and some

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