The Ben Mulroney Show - Mayor Olivia Chow makes another announcement but gives a world salad answer when asked about the cost

Episode Date: March 18, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Mayor Olivia Chow makes another announcement but gives a world salad answer when asked about the cost Guest: Brad Bradford, Toronto city councillor for Beaches-East York 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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stock insights, and proper guidance, so you can become a better investor. It's time to get the financial future you deserve. Get yours, Questrade. Welcome to the Tuesday edition of the Ben Mulroney Show. Thank you so much for listening in from all points. You may be in London on CFPL, you may be here in Toronto on 640 Toronto, you may have found us on the iHeartRadio app or as a podcast on your favourite podcasting platform, but we appreciate you joining us, we appreciate you listening, we appreciate your enthusiasm. Hey, sometimes you listen in anger and that's okay too. Some big news for my family yesterday. it was announced that Canada Post is releasing a commemorative Brian Mulroney stamp in honor of my

father. And so on Thursday after the show, I will be hopping a plane to go be with them in Montreal as the stamp is unveiled. And like I said with Greg a little bit earlier, you know, grief is universal. We all experience it. And those of us who are lucky enough to love, feel that grief more deeply. And so there's nothing unique about my experience of losing my dad. But what I'm so fortunate about is that he keeps popping into my life at unexpected times and in really unique ways. is that he keeps popping into my life at unexpected times

and in really unique ways. I may be scrolling on Twitter and also the video will pop up or a stranger will stop me on the street to say something kind about what my dad did for him or them or what he meant to them, the impact that a policy of his may have had on their life. Maybe they immigrated to Canada while my dad was in power.

And those are moments where it really does feel like my dad is sort of walking back into my life as if he never left. And so to be able to go to Montreal and commemorate my father in such a wonderful way is really, really special. So on Friday, I will give you the whole download as to what that was about and how it felt. And just I want to thank Canada Post for putting this together. Last night, I went to Mamakas Taverna on Ossington to celebrate the 50th birthday of my friend John Onnie.

And the reason I want to bring him up to you right now is because he is an example of how it is never too late to reinvent yourself. He was, when he was living in Toronto, he would be the first to tell you that he wasn't the best version of himself. Hell, there have been times in my life that I haven't been the best version of myself. And then he moved and he met the love of his life and he found his passion and he worked so very hard to become the best at it. And today he is the fullest and best expression of who he could possibly be. And the one thing that never changed about him, however,

was how good he was to his friends. He has been a ride or die, steadfast, shoulder to shoulder. I'm the guy who's gonna go to jail with you kind of friend. And I just wanted to take a moment to thank him for inviting me last night and to share in sort of the love that all of us have for him. And also nobody loves Star Trek as much as he does. I may be a close second.

And so he was just, anyway, happy birthday, John. I think the napkins at the dinner said, only a legend has their birthday on St. Patrick's Day. And that is absolutely true. Happy birthday, JPA. All right, let's get into the business of Toronto, shall we? Because there's big news out of the city. The city's gonna get in on this war with Trump

by changing the rules of who the city does business with. It's got a plan to help Toronto handle those US tariffs by making sure that on certain types of business with the city, goods and services that the city buys, only Canadian companies will be able to bid. And Olivia Chow was asked by a reporter, our mayor was asked by a reporter, what this might cost the city in terms of financials. This morning on CNN, the American journalists asked me, how much pain can Canadian take? My answer was, and is, our ancestors chose this beautiful land we call Canada.

Gord, pause. I'm sorry. What? Can you replay that last part? But before you do, remember, the question was about what might this cost the city? Give me that last part again. Our ancestors chose this beautiful land we call Canada. We believe in public health care, we believe in supporting each other. Myself, I came from a place where my mother had to fight in order to survive. And we believe in our right. Okay.

And we are very united. Oh, God, super. How much is it gonna cost the city, Mayor Chao? Okay, so, okay, that's a non-answer. We see that from politicians all the time. But you'd think that we'd get the answer next. And hardy. Because we're a bit colder. What was it? With the temperature?

Than the US. And we have to depend on each other to survive, especially in the North, cold weather. That's why we are very united. Sorry, pause it a second. I think I need to be clear for the audience. This isn't two separate answers. This is the same answer that for the sake of sanity and some sort of logical train of thought we broke into two parts so that the inanity would be more manageable. Continue Gordretti. We're ready and we can tackle whatever comes our way. And everywhere I travel,

I'm hearing when I ask the question, will we ever be 51st state? That answer is so loud, so strong. It's just incredibly inspirational and uplifting. Okay, so again, the question was how much is this going to cost the city? And after, well that looks like over a minute and a half, but it felt like longer than that to me, the reporter had to interrupt to say that that was not what she asked. And then she finally gets the answer.

Sort of. I didn't ask about resiliency. I asked if we knew how the dollar figure was, how much it would hurt the city. That's a bit early days. Okay, so ah, okay. So let's be clear. The first part was filibustering. The first part was word salad for the sake of just eating into the clock. The actual answer was what we just heard.

It's a little too early. So the mayor is saying that she's gonna take these steps, these extraordinary steps, but doesn't know how much it is going to cost the city. That's the takeaway. She had the answer, she knew the answer, but want to run out the clock in the hopes of not having

to answer it. Oh my goodness. That answer is so loud. Long, long. Okay, coming up, I'm going to ask City Councilor Brad Bradford if he can make heads or tails of Olivia Chow's word salad of a non-answer yesterday. That's next on the Ben Mulroney Show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. Before the break, we tried to break down Olivia Chow's explanation of the City of Toronto's new policy of forbidding

American companies on bidding on certain types of city contracts. I could not make heads or tails of the answer. And so let's invite someone on who, in my opinion, has presented himself as a very strong critic of the mayor, but has always done so exclusively on policy and principle. And so I think he's a good faith actor who can tell us and look, I don't even know if this is a good policy or not. It may very well be. So let's ask him him let's welcome to the show Toronto City Councilor for Beaches East York Brad Bradford, Councilor welcome. Good to be here with you Ben. Okay so explain this new city policy to me is it a good idea is it a good idea that might not be properly executed? Yeah I think like

the spirit of the idea here has some rights obviously as Canadians whether that's the feds the and we want to look inward right now. We want to buy local. We want to support Canadian businesses. I think the challenge with the mayor's response on the tariffs has been, first of all, it's been very slow. Donald Trump was telegraphing this for months and actually in many respects, all the way back to his first term. We have dithered on this for the past five weeks.

Well, hold on. So, Brad, let me jump in right there. I'm glad you said that because it opens the door to a possibility that I think needs to be explored. I do not think what has happened in the past few weeks. We have seen the liberal party of Canada's electoral possibilities open up because Canadians have been, um, convinced that, that the liberals may be the right people to, on the federal level, to be his counterpoint. And I'm wondering whether Olivia Chow is saying, well, if it worked for them, it can work for me. If I talk tough on Trump now, maybe that'll help me when it comes time to go back to the ballot

box. And given the fact that she is so light on specifics and numbers, to me, it speaks to more of a performance than a policy. Well, absolutely. This is entirely performative. And you might be correct. That could be the read and the calculus from her. But I think the problem is when she went out on CNN yesterday, nobody got the impression

that this was tough talk. It was quite a bit different than Premier Ford, who's been excellent on this, doing the media circuit in the US and taking the message out there on behalf of Canadians. You know, Mayor Chao's interview yesterday, I think was, you know, she may have had the right intent, but it came out as awkward, disjointed and an award salad. And so I don't think anyone that saw that down in the US was thinking, well, there's strong leadership and Canada is really putting the boots to us. It was, it was difficult to understand.

And so, you know, from a, from a response of local government, I have been saying this, you know, since the beginning, there's really three things that municipal governments can do. And we have to have the mentality that Toronto needs to be the most competitive, most attractive place in the world to build a business. We're pretty far off from that right now. But you do it by cutting taxes, cutting red tape and reducing the regulation. But Brad, in the interim, in the interim, we find ourselves as a city with a budget shortfall year after year after year. We can't pay for the things we already have. From what I understand about bidding on municipal contracts, the

bid typically is won by the the lowest bid that's offering to check all the boxes. So if American companies in the past have won these contracts, to me it's because they were the lowest bidder. So if we take them out, aren't we telegraphing that we're willing to pay more for the exact same services and services and goods? Well that's exactly right and I think the mayor eventually sort of got there in her statement yesterday. The truth is she doesn't know how much more this is going to cost us. The truth is when you reduce competition, you know, and taking people out of the marketplace and the competitive bidding process, of course, you're going to have less competitive bids

for taxpayers. That means more money. And I think we also have to be cognizant that there might be specific services that the city renders or procures where we don't have a local alternative. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot of stuff here. The devil is in the details, but fundamentally, you know, the mayor has never seen a tax dollar that she didn't want to spend. And I think if you read the fine print on the plan that put out yesterday, this isn't even a ban. Staff are still going to have the discretion to include American companies if they think

that's in the city's best interest. So this plan is it's in the city's best interest. So this plan is all bark, no bite. It is another performative gesture. And at the same time, the days and weeks slip away as we have Canadian companies, the 127,000 manufacturing jobs here in the city of Toronto. And those companies are looking abroad to try and protect themselves against the tariffs and the uncertainty that we're facing with the US. Brad, last question on this topic, and then I want to move to one last topic before we got to let you go, because I know you got a busy day. But it seems to me that in a lot of ways, the bidding process, the American companies that could be bidding,

process, like the American companies that could be bidding, that could be filled rather by domestic companies. As you said, we may not have the companies to do it, or the companies that we end up hiring and using might have inferior products. Like this is, this is, we could be setting ourselves up for a disaster. Yeah, it's, look, it's a great opportunity in a sense for Canadian companies to get in there and and really push innovation and compete. And this might be an opportunity to have things that we are creating here in Canada. One of the frustrations I can tell you is whether we're talking about scooter technology or traffic, AI or modular housing. We have all of these

fantastic companies here in Toronto, here in the GTA, that can't even bid on work here in the City of Toronto because our procurement is so cumbersome. They're exporting our technology all around the world. California, Middle East, and we're not using it here. So that's absurd. But at the same time, there might be some gaps. I know the entrepreneur sector here, the tech sector in Toronto, they're incredibly resilient. And you know, I'm hoping that they can meet the moment, step up and deliver the services that we need. But you're right.

Like, again, you step to the podium, and you sort of spew these words salads, it's not actually very concrete. I don't think the consequences have been thought through fully. And at the same time, we're missing the point on the things that the city could do, reducing the taxes, reducing the red tape and regulation to make ourselves a more attractive destination for business dollars. Oh, sorry. One last thing is the ability of the city on the table to cancel already existing contracts. And are we prepared to eat the cost because there will be penalties if we have to do that? I think it would be on a case by case basis, but I have to tell you, I would be extremely

reticent of ripping up contracts that are underway and paying, you know, tens of millions of dollars in cancellation fees, especially with all of our. It would look good. Listen, again, if we're sticking with the performance, Brad, that would look good if they just tore up the contracts that look strong. Never mind again, if we're sticking with the performance, Brad, that would look good if they just tore up the contracts, that looks strong. Nevermind the cost, it looks great. I got one last question for you, sir. Olivia Chow, our mayor, said weeks ago

that she was frustrated at the snow removal that was a disaster, and that she was gonna look into the contracts, there was going to be an investigation. Now, since then, all the snow melted, but I have heard not one word about this investigation you're closer to the action than we are are you hearing anything has any has that has that needle moved no I don't think it's moved the mayor's strategy on snow removal here in the city turned out to be just wait for spring and that's totally unacceptable

look the contracts that she keeps trying to pass the buck on and and shred the blame, those were done as a result of an Auditor General report. The Auditor General did a report on this, found all the deficiencies, the shortcomings in the contract, and then we wrote a new contract to reflect that. The mayor signed off and voted on snow removal principles this past July. She was here, she was in the building. She theoretically needed to be aware of that as the CEO of this city. The irony in all of this, Ben,

is when she went out and tried to blame the contracts in your press conference, she was literally standing on a sidewalk that wasn't cleared by city staff. The most problematic sidewalks, of course, were in the downtown, and those are comprised of the 1,500 kilometers that city staff are responsible for cleaning. So there was a lot of misinformation obviously we haven't seen this move forward. I suspect

that we'll have something on the table at council but again it's another report another report request I don't think you're gonna see a lot of action on this and it's a shame because this city needs to focus on the basics yeah and certainly snow clearing in a Canadian city is a basic city service that most people expect us to get the job done on and the mayor's fallen short. Well, I'll tell you what a basic, it doesn't include creating a new city councilor specific for the indigenous community and from the indigenous community. I have to, I think I can guess what your opinion is on that but I'd love to get you on the record Well, it's insulting the idea that a position needs to be carved out for one particular community

For an unelected representative. I mean you look at one of the most effective and Beloved premieres in the country right now, and that's Wabkanoo in Manitoba. Yeah, so there's a lot of fantastic premieres in the country right now and that's Wab Kanu in Manitoba. So there's a lot of fantastic Indigenous people who are building businesses, who are creating community, who are raising money and creating jobs. If the focus is to elect Indigenous people, they need to be running for council. You should support great candidates across the board, but an unelected, undemocratic appointment for any particular community is not right. It's not something that I support. All right. Brad Brad for Toronto City Council for Beaches East York, as well as my friend and the man I walked alongside with in the St. Patrick's Day Parade.

I say thank you to you. I hope you have a great day. As they as people say way too much these days as you go into city council elbows up my friend. Let's go buddy. At Desjardins, we speak business, we speak equipment modernization. We're fluent in data digitization and expansion into foreign markets. And we can talk all day about streamlining manufacturing processes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do. Business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us and contact Desjardins today.

We'd love to talk. Business. Hi, I'm Donna Friesen from Global National. Life moves fast these days and we want to make it even easier for you to get the news you need. That's why you can now get Global National every day as a podcast. The biggest stories of the day with analysis from award-winning global news journalists. 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 Mulroney Show. So you'll remember Mark Carney, our new prime minister, said that he entered the fray of the political arena, because we as a nation were facing an existential threat and he was the man to deal with it. But he didn't go down to the United States to deal with it. He didn't get a phone call with the president. No, no. Instead, he had to go to Europe and he had to go there. And according to all the people defending him on my social media feed, he had to go there to bolster Canadian business and show the Americans that we are not beholden to them. Now, my two cents is he came home with

absolutely nothing except photo ops and footage for campaign commercials to show that he's prime ministerial. Let's also remember that this is a government that is held alive on life support by way of prorogation. It is a caretaker government, which means it should, by convention, be very limited in what it does. Instead, our prime minister is canceling, but not canceling, taxes. He is going around the world making decisions. These are not, by convention, he shouldn't be doing any of this stuff. Okay, but he's doing it.

And on top of that, he was elected leader of his party by about 150,000 people, and he's never been elected to any sort of office, not even dogcatcher. So there's a whole lot of unaccountability here, all of which I am fine with. It is our system and I am fine with it. However, given the fact that there is so little accountability on that side of the equation. There should be a commensurate increase in the accountability by the Prime Minister regarding his access, the access he gives of himself to the press so that we can know him better. There should be increased accountability as it relates to his disclosure of his financial holdings and

knowing what is in his blind trust. So and let's also not forget he has still not sat down for a long form interview so that Canadians can actually know who's leading them. That being said, he stood at a podium yesterday in Central London for a little bit of a presser and Mark Carney was asked a question from the Globe and Mail's Stephanie Levitz about his transparency and his blind trust. Let's listen to the question and the answer. Mr. Carney, Stephanie Levitz, Globe and Mail. We understand that you have now placed your

assets in a blind trust, so you don't know what's happening to them going forward, but you knew what they were going into that blind trust. So what are they? Look, Stephanie, I follow the rules of the Ethics Commissioner. I am following them well in advance of any of the requirements. As you know, because I know you know this, you know that these requirements come into effect in months. We're talking days after I became prime minister. So I'm complying with the rules of the ethics commissioner going through the processes and all the things that are necessary. Okay, so already you can tell he was testy.

He didn't like the question. Now you don't take any questions. So if already you are testy, good luck on the campaign trail. Good luck, Mr. Prime Minister. I say that with all sincerity. But from what I understand about these disclosure rules, if an election is called in short order, we will run the campaign and have to vote up or down on a liberal government led by Mark Carney without actually knowing anything about his financial holdings, because those don't become public until long after a campaign would be drawn to its conclusion.

So when I hear the Prime Minister say, I'm complying with the ethics counselor. What I'm actually hearing is, well, Stephanie Levitz, I am doing the bare minimum. And I go back to my original point, given the fact that there is so little connection between this, the government does have a mandate. It is a caretaker government with an appointed prime minister. I'm fine with all of it.

But doing the bare minimum on the other side of the equation is an affront to the citizens of this country. So that was question number one. He got follow up questions from Rosemary Barton of the CBC. Here's let's let's listen to that exchange. There's no possible conflict of interest in your assets. It's very difficult to believe. Look inside yourself, Rosemary. I mean, you start from a prior of conflict and ill will. I have served in the private sector. I have stood up for Canada. I have left my roles in the private sector at a time of crisis for our country. I'm complying with all the rules. Your line of questioning is trying to invent new rules. I'm complying with the

rules that Parliament has laid out and the responsibilities of the Ethics Commissioner. And I will continue to comply with those rules. Look inside yourself. The condescension dripping from his voice. How dare you question me or my motivations. I left my successful life to come to the rescue of this country. There are hints of messianic complex there. I may be, I'm a little glib, but come on, come on. That's how you see yourself rescuing the country? Look inside yourself. You start from a position of, I mean, I'm sorry, sir, couple of things here. Get used to questions like that if you're not gonna answer them.

They're gonna get worse. Bob Fife, Stephanie Levitt's colleague from the Globe and Mail said just a couple of days ago on Center Block with Mercedes Stevenson that Mark Carney is used to a compliant and deferential financial press. This is not that. These are the questions that you should get. These are good faith questions. Dark Carney is used to a compliant and deferential financial press. This is not that.

These are the questions that you should get. These are good faith questions. And now that you haven't answered them, it is incumbent on the press to become increasingly cynical and ask the question, why aren't you answering the question? Why won't you disclose? It is fair game. It is fair game, it is fair ball, and for those who want to pursue the what-aboutism of Pierre Poliev is aggressive with the press. Two things. One, he is not the Prime Minister of

Canada. He does not have the power or the authority or the ability to do anything that would affect markets or your lives or your investments. But Mark Carney does. His responsibilities are higher, which means the scrutiny that he should be under automatically must be higher. And two, actually there's three things. Two, Pierre Poliev has faced aggressive questions and positions from the press for a very long time. And I don't think there's anything wrong with him going into an interview prepared for a fight. And thirdly, Pierre Poliev answers questions every GD day. Every day. I don't think a day goes by that there isn't a microphone shoved in his face that he doesn't voluntarily stand there and and and allow his feet to be held to the fire. There's also the the angle that I'm

reticent to play but again this would be done to Pierre Poliev. If Pierre Poliev talked that condescendingly back to back to female reporters, he would be tarred and feathered as a misogynist in the public square. Tard and feathered. And what I think is going to happen, because I know some of these reporters personally, they are good people who are proud of the work they do and they know the work they do is essential, this obfuscation, this opacity that is coming from the PMO and Mark Carney is going to, this is gonna piss these people off.

It's gonna piss them off. And these people who some of them may have had an inkling of wanting to go light on the guy because he's new, will do no such thing. No more kid gloves. No more kid gloves for this gentleman. He is going to... I kept talking about the buzzsaw of Pierre Poliev that Mark Carney is going to have to deal with in the political arena. There's going to be a second buzzsaw coming for him and it will be in the form of the press corps, following him everywhere, hounding him until they get the answers

that they feel they deserve, not the answers that he feels are okay for him to give. This is not going to end well for him. This is pretty much day one for him. And already I'm seeing concerning, concerning things coming from Mark Carney and his camp. All right, coming up, your calls on everything I just talked about next on the Ben Mulroney

Show. Welcome back. We are talking about the press conference that our prime minister gave at the end of what some have referred to as a nothing burger trip to Europe where he came home with nothing but photos that he could use during his campaign and his condescending, in my opinion, a reaction to some good faith and essential questions asked by two female journalists. I want to put the question to our listeners at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. What do you think of our prime minister out in the wild?

I was a, I was a critic saying they didn't battle test him. They didn't get him ready for the job. They bubble wrapped him and wanted him to have smooth sailing all the way to the leadership of the country. And this is what you get. This is what you get when you don't prepare and you don't plan and you don't battle test your candidate for the tough questions and the high expectations of being the Prime Minister of Canada. Let's start with Sonja.

Sonja, thank you for waiting and welcome to the show. Thank you, Ben. This guy was a DEI hire. He didn't earn it. He met with the global elitists in Europe and he was a crown liberal leader. This guy is not to be trusted at all. There's nothing democratic about this. They put him in and he's pushing another agenda and we're all going to be very much in trouble

and very sorry if this guy gets elected because he you know I mean pulling the Trump thing like you know he putting the carbon tax down like what is he doing yeah I mean that was that was that was surprising to me but as they said on their Twitter Mark Carney got it done got what done it was your policy don't I mean the gas lighting is abhorrent thank Thank you, Sonja, for your call. I appreciate it. Hey, Brian, you're glad he acted this way. Why? Hey, Van.

How are you doing, man? I love your enthusiasm this morning. You seem a little bit pumped up again. Thank you so much. Well, for a couple of points. First off, I agree with you. He should have went down to see Trump, but I don't think he was prepared to get humiliated in the Oval Office and get a nickname I didn't like.

But poor him. But I do like the fact that he did act like this because now the mainstream media who's typically been compliant with the liberal agenda and not pressing them as they do poly-evity dimension are now maybe going to start doing that. Yeah I think I think they were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. I think they were and and let's be honest, ratings are better for news in general when you have a competitive election. And if the, so a lot of them were probably hoping that the race would tighten, and I'm not saying they did this on purpose,

but hey, you know, if we give the guy the benefit of the doubt for the first little while, maybe that'll help with the liberal party being more competitive, and then more people tune into the news. Well, my second point is I think that's going to backfarm them as well. If you just look south, what happened in November when Harris got anointed, got a little bit of a bump or a little bit of a bump in the polls, and then started opening her mouth and it became word salad. And that's why I think it's happening with this guy.

So I think when Pierre gets out of him, he's gonna really annihilate him. So thanks for taking my call. Brian, thank you so much. Let's welcome Nick into the conversation. Nick, I always love it when I read the notes that says Nick agrees with Ben. Ben, I love your show and thank you very much. Thank you. I'm hoping you are right.

The press corps has to hold Mr. Carney's feet to the fire. They gave Trudeau a pass for nine years. They always ask questions, he never answered them. Oh, he never answered them. It was so frustrating. He'd pivot right to a talking point that he'd memorized right before the event. It was so frustrating. This is the same press corps that chased Doug Ford down to the annals of the earth over license plates. And the only reason why they left them alone is because COVID happened. And why don't they apply the same threshold to the liberal government?

We'll never know, but I hope they hold its feet to the fire. Yeah, Nick, I think, cause at this point, their reputation is on the line. He has been, what happened yesterday could be a flashpoint in terms of Mark Carney's relationship with the National Press Corps. I think that he thought that they were just going to be there as his cheerleaders. When somebody pushed back with an honest question that people have, he pushed back hard and

condescendingly and they said, ah, not on my watch. If I got to pick between supporting my guy and showing Canadians that they can trust me as an honest journalist and an honest broker, I'm picking me 10 times out of 10. Thank you so much for your call. And Sam, what do you think of Mark Carney and his performance in Europe? Hi there, Ben. Well, you know what, I fear him a lot more than Trudeau because Trudeau wasn't all that smart, but Carney is sly like a fox and that's really dangerous for our country. I have a bit of a saying that I say. I don't worry too much about Trump or Trudeau. What I worry about is the woman in the grocery line in front

of me, the man at the gas pump beside me, the couple in the restaurant, because they are capable of voting liberal and that would be disastrous. That's all I got to say, Ben. I'll let you talk. Hey, thank you so much, Sam. Yeah, well, this country, I think, defaults to that position more often than they don't. I mean, the Liberal Party has been empowering Canada longer than any other party has been in charge of their own country. And it's a successful brand for a number of reasons. One, I think we tilt more to the center left as a nation than other countries. And two, this party demonstrates that the only thing that matters to it is holding on to power.

As somebody in the National Post said this morning, this party believes that its interest is the national interest. And therefore, they don't believe they're putting party over country because the party in the country are the same thing. Let's welcome Ian to the conversation. Ian, do you think that Mark Carney's worldview, his CV as a world banker is a plus or a negative? It's a plus, but it's a plus because the election kind of as you just alluded to is won by the middle So it's swaying that boat and polio is a guy that you know Got in got voted in at the age of 25

He has no world world experience to speak to and so the people in the middle are going to vote experience to speak to it so the people in the middle are going to vote unfortunately for for Mark Ernie and vote for the left that's that's what we're up against as conservative voters is that Paul Yev is continuing to just appease the people on the far on the far right instead of getting that middle vote he needs to stop being a child in a playground. I don't know if that's the case. I mean, let's be honest. And then our prime minister is about to go to Canada's north to make an announcement on Arctic sovereignty,

which might as well have been lifted from the speech given by Pierre Poliev in the exact same place just a few weeks ago. The carbon tax that he has been, that the conservative party has been, that the Conservative Party has been railing against for years as a job killer, as a wallet killer that will do nothing to stop climate change that they were demonized for has now been adopted whole cloth by the Liberal Party.

So I don't see how he can be a child when his policies, the very defining policies that the were anathema to the Liberal Party are now being adopted by them. I think there's a communications gap between what Pierre Poliev wants the country to know about him and his policies and his party that needs to be overcome. And there is still this, I think we're looking

at Mark Carney through rose-colored glasses, but I think those rose-colored glasses come off in an election campaign. What do you think of that? Yes, yes, I know. But the problem is, is that all we have people's opinion has been based a lot of it since COVID and is messaging, it's just not appealing to those in in the middle. It's definitely appealing to those in the far far right. And I would love, you know, I comment nonstop on his post. I'm like, please, make your message to the middle, get that middle vote. We need that middle vote in order to win the election.

So real quick, real quick, give me a real quick answer here. So you're not saying it's a policy issue. You're saying it's a messaging issue. it's communication. It's a messaging. Okay, all right. It's a messaging, he needs to get a message to the middle. All right, Ian, I wanna thank you so much for sticking around and joining me in conversation

and thanks to everybody who called in. Survivor has been calling me for a long time. These 18 strangers have answered the call for the adventure of a lifetime. My parents would always say, you're going to be the first one sent home. I can do this. I'm physically fit. I'm mentally fit. They must learn to adapt or they'll be voted out.

Being a physicist, playing men's hockey, this does not scare me at all. When my kids watch this, I want them to look at me and say, I'm proud of him. Survivor, new season Wednesdays on Global. Stream on StackTV.