The Ben Mulroney Show - Should the NDP leadership race be a reality show?

Episode Date: November 12, 2025

Guest: Andy Gibbons, Principal at Walgate advisory .  Former vp WestJet  Guest: Regan Watts, Founder Fratton Park Inc., former Senior aide to minister of finance Jim Flaherty - If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Executive Producer:  Mike Drolet Reach out to Mike with story ideas or tips at [e-mail] Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Get better answers to tough questions. BlueJ, AI for tax experts. the Ben Mulrini show. It's Wednesday. It's the top of the week. And so it's a high watermark for us when we have these next two guests with us. Please welcome for this week in politics, the Wednesday edition. Andy Gibbons, principal at Walgate Advisory

and Regan Watts, the founder of Fratton Park and former senior aide to Jim Flaherty. Both to the both of you, I say happy Wednesday. All right, so we're talking about the NDP leadership race. There may be one new person added to that list as he is 10,000,

$100,000 short of the $100,000 admission fee to join that race, but there are still some hurdles for him to clear. I'm talking about agitator extraordinaire, troublemaker, rabble-rouser, a generally unproductive member of society. Oh, and also anti-Semite of the highest order, Eve Engler, and it looks like he's trying to get in. He's trying to get in. Guys, what do you think it would be better for the NDP to welcome him in and fight him

out over his ideas or or keep him out because he really is, he's a toxic and terrible human being. So I'll start first then. I couldn't agree with you more about Mr. Engler in your description of him. Anti-Semite extraordinaire

is an understatement to put it mildly. I think his entry into the race would benefit the NDP if only because they need the money. You know, $100,000 bucks is something that would go a long way for a party that's essentially broke and heading towards. bankruptcy. And it is part of the legacy led, left behind by Jugmeet Singh, who is the most

useless federal politician in the history of Canada. And I put him even more useless than Justin Trudeau, because at least in the case of the long national nightmare, he did win an election four times. With respect to the federal political scene in his entry and what it means for the NDP race, I think it means something depending on where you sit. If you're a conservative, you don't actually like his entry, not because him getting into scuffles with other NDP candidates doesn't make for good politics and good television, but it further drives the NDP towards irrelevance. It is now a party of pink and purple-haired activists who love Hamas, the West Bank, and the state of Palestine, and not the working class party that you and I and

Andy grew up with with broadband and Dewar and, you know, Mr. Ray and people like that. So it's not good from a conservative perspective. From a liberal perspective, you almost want to donate to Mr. Engler's campaign because the more useless the NDPR, the better it is for the Liberal Party of Canada. So I think on a net positive for anybody, it's the liberals, but Mr. Engler, in my view, adds nothing to Canadian public life. Well, and

Andy, I want to read something from the Globe and Mail for you because, listen, we got to take the good and the bad. We've got to be honest about things he does have backing, right? He's not just shouting into a vacuum. He does represent a particular voice. He's backed by the socialist caucus of the NDP. That can't be

insignificant. And he expressed, concern on Monday with the vetting committee. This is, this is the issue. They think that they're going to ban him. And he went on to say that this, this vetting committee would have probably found reason to ban Zoran Mamdani. So I think, I think Eve Engler views himself as sort of the, an acolyte of momdani. And he says, party vetting is a threat to democracy. There's nothing Eve Engler can't turn up to 11, huh? It's a threat to democracy. He said in email, differences of political opinion should be determined by the membership, not a three-person back room committee.

What do you think of that? Well, look, we're talking about him, right? He needs media attention and headlines. It was funny, Ben, you mentioned the socialist group of the caucus endorses him. I didn't know there was another part of the caucus. I thought the whole thing was the socialist caucus. Yeah, yeah, all of them, I guess. So look, you look at this leadership race.

I was looking at this. organic farmer, a social worker, a union leader, a filmmaker. And now we have, at best, you could describe him as an agitator. Now, if you're too extreme for the NDP, that tells you where the NDP is and who their support, what support base they have left. Yeah, I agree. He's going to get coverage. He's going to get donations.

And whether or not he's allowed in or not, he's going to have it, he's going to have an impact on this race. Yeah. Now, you wanted it to be a reality show. You asked you to be a reality show. if no one's actually watching the NDP leadership race, who's going to watch a show the NBP leadership race. If it were executive produced by Kim Kardashian,

I think a lot of people are tune in, just saying. Let's move on to our next topic, guys, because Regan Watts is, I'm going to name check Regan Watts. He was referenced in this article by John Iveson about how the liberals are loving the bad blood that has infected the conservative party. And near the end of the article, There was a great attention was paid to caucus management, how important the caucus is to various conservative leaders.

My father, I don't think you'll get any pushback from a lot of people who know about caucus management that he could have written the book on how to treat your caucus, how to keep them on side, even when, even in tough times. Regan goes on to say, what do you say? He's a quote, he referencing Pierre Polyev, continues to be a fork in a world full of soup. That's an excellent line, my friend. he's got to figure out how to be a spoon for the liberals the event of the last week has been political bliss enough chaos to make the conservatives look as unelectable as the nDP but not so much that the leader is ousted regan maybe you can expand on your fork and spoon imagery well i'll take it one step further in talk agriculture you mentioned your your father ben and he is the gold standard with respect to caucus management prime minister harper when he was leader and then became prime Minister was not the type of man who filled his caucus with warm and fuzzies, but he did listen to them and he did respect them. I worked for Minister Flaherty. We spent, you know, countless nights with caucus consulting on the budget. And when Minister Flaherty tabled the disaster of a fall

economic statement in 2008, which nearly toppled the government of Stephen Harper, nobody in caucus called for his head. And that's in part because Jim had built up enough goodwill with his colleagues, and they were his colleagues, and he viewed them as such. And by the way, so did Prime Minister Harper, even though he was party leader, that you didn't see caucus calling for either the Prime Minister's head or Minister Flaherty's head at that difficult time. You know, contrast that with Mr. Polyev, you know, he treats his caucus like he's a mushroom farmer. And if anybody who knows anything about mushrooms is you grow them in the dark and you feed them

with nature's fertilizer. I can't use the word that I'm thinking because it's live radio, but you get my point. And if you treat caucus like a bunch of mushrooms and keep them in the dark and feed them a bunch a bull. Eventually they're going to get agitated and not be pleased with your leadership. It was only a matter of time. You can't rule with fear for as long as Mr. Polyeb has. And again, I go back to the state of play at the top of the ticket. To get elected in this country, you do not have to be better than the Almighty. You just have to be better than the alternative. And Mr. Polyev, to my quote, he is a fork in a world full of soup and has to become a spoon. He has to figure out a way

to adjust his tone, adjust his approach, and bring people along. And he's not done that. And he's not done that yet and he still has time and look it's entirely conceivable he remains leader and and even wins the next election but he's he's got to make some changes uh andy we don't have a lot of time left so if i if you don't get to complete your thought here we'll pick it up on the other side of the break but if you take uh everything regan said and i think he said it very very well if you take uh his um assessment as fact then we have to i guess you got to ask yourself is this lack of ability by by Pierre Poliath

to manage the expectations and the disparate voices inside his caucus is that a bug or a feature? In other words, is that who he is or is this something that can be fixed? I think it's something that can be fixed. And to be fair to him,

I think he's getting a bit of a raw deal. I mean, he did assemble the biggest coalition of voter since your father for the conservative party. That is a true statement. and but he also assembled the largest coalition of Canadians who don't want him to be prime minister of Canada and I think you know this is going to be this is going to be the telling winter for him now I don't have a chunky soup reference like Regan but I also but I also want to say you know liberal arrogance and glibness over this is reaching high levels even for them I think they're

a little too glib and sure of themselves here and I think they should be careful I think they think they think they have a mandate that they don't have and they should just be really careful and get down to business and be very workmanlike and not not glee in others difficulties well and i i i i listen i agree with a big chunks of what both of you said i think that they've um i think they dodged a bullet by having this distraction i keep people's eyes off of the budget but the conversation around the budget is far from over in fact it's going to accelerate as people dig into that more before it actually comes to the confidence vote of it becoming law.

And until then, if they don't have something else to distract us with, people are going to pay attention to this thing that increasingly I'm hearing from people, it's just not a great, it's just not a great budget. I think a lot of us expected more from the big brain of Mark Carney. But we will, of course, talk about that in the days and weeks ahead. All right, when we come back, we're going to talk about Mark Carney because in this weekend, he's set to release even more major projects out of the office. And we're going to see if this is like Santa coming early.

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is the midpoint of the midweek version of this week in politics with andy and regan which means it's time for a segment that we only start recently but we already love it's time for the political play of the week. Regan, you're up first, my friend. You have to tell you that intro will never, ever, ever get old, and I love it. So I actually have two. I have a good and a bad. My bad play of the week is for Major League Baseball in denying John Schneider,

the Toronto Blue Jays manager, AL manager of the year. He had an outstanding performance. The team was amazing. The guy who won it was a manager for the Cleveland Indians. The Cleveland Indians had players who bet against themselves. the Toronto Blue Jays had players who bet on themselves. And I think there's a clear difference there. And Schneid's got robbed, in my view, and hopefully the Jays bring it back.

I would point out, I would point out, first of all, it's the Guardians, a point of order. But secondly, I think you're right. But I think the way I look at it, and I don't have this information, but I would look at what the expectations were for both teams prior to the beginning of the season. I suspect that the expectations on the Jays were far lower than the Guardians. The chase finished last place and then ended up winning the American League East and were the top team in the AL. Anyway, Major League Baseball, I don't want to accuse it of an anti-Toronto or anti-Canada bias, but we should look into that. My good play of the week, though, is actually a member of parliament from Simcoe North, a gentleman by the name of Adam Chambers.

You know, Adam was interviewed on CBC this weekend, a bit of a gotcha interview or it could have been in the questions he was asked around Mr. Polyev. I thought he handled himself miraculously well. He's a very intelligent man. He's an outstanding parliamentarian. And for your listeners on the radio and your viewers on YouTube, spend some time paying attention to Adam. If the Conservative Party hopefully someday will ever form government, Adam will almost certainly go into cabinet.

He's a generational talent and a very, very intelligent man and a great politician. And I thought he had a very good week among very few in the Conservative Party who did. Yeah, I've gotten to know Adam a little bit over the years, spent some time with him in Ottawa. And I agree with you. I like the cut of his jib, as my dad used to say. All right, Andy, time for your play of the week. Yeah, mine is the resilience of Premier Doug Ford, Ben.

So this week, David Coletto put out an abacus poll that measured where Doug Ford is, three majorities later and eight years as premier. So just a reminder for your listeners, Bill Davis did not win three straight majorities. So after eight years in power, Doug Ford has 51% support compared to 29 and 19, 23 and 19. He leads in all major regions. He leads with men and women. He leads with young and old. And this popularity and this track record puts him next to the Ralph Klein's and Peter

Loheeds of this world. So the resilience of Doug Ford and his support cross-sectional after eight years and dispensing all kinds of leaders of the opposition is the political play of the week. And it's historically unbelievable where he is. Well, let's spend some time on that if we can because I think we all have some opinions on it. To what then, Regan, do you attribute the longevity and the popularity at this point in his government, which should be long in the tooth? What do you attribute it to? How much of it is him?

How much of it is opposition parties that either are still trying to cast off the bad feelings that voters have, like they do have the Ontario liberals and the NDP that just can't seem to coalesce around anything and drive the numbers up? I think part of it, Ben, is circumstance and the Premier is benefiting from, by the way, in the same way that Jean-Cretchen did, an ineffective, futile opposition. However, and I have to say, you know, the Premier for me is a story of resilience, as Andy says. I think his strength and why he continues to remain popular, though, is because he's not afraid to admit he's made mistakes or make changes. And I think in an era where people are looking at politicians dimly as they ever have, to have a Premier come out, even if he's made some boneheaded moves, he admits it, he acknowledges it, and he changes course and course corrects. You know, here's the guy, the Premier, goes to Home Depot on Saturday mornings.

Anybody in Etobico will know this. He'll go and do his own Doug Ford polls and talk to people in the aisles of Home Depot and ask how things are going. Yeah. You know, and how can you not have a pulse on the people if you, if you're, to do that kind of thing. So for me, it's his ability to apologize, recognize when he's made a mistake. It's his ability to listen to people. And he's governed relatively well. I mean, the Ontario government released their false statement. I think it was last week. Maybe it was this week. They're basically on track to do a balanced budget in the next couple of years, which is remarkable considering the economic turmoil that Ontario was in, thanks to President Trump and the tariffs and the pressure that those tariffs are putting on the Ontario economy. And one observation about the Home Depot polls. I mean, he told me a story when we were in conversation at the Empire. club that, you know, that he accosted a shoplifter and told that story. And that went wide,

but a lot of politicians on the opposite side of the house of Queens Park took issue and said, oh, he probably broke the law and he should be charged. I was like, you guys aren't getting it. Like, he knows how to talk to people. When he told that story, he connected with so many people who wished they could have been in that position with them. They would have helped the premier in that moment. And to turn it around and say, oh, he must have violated someone's charter rights. That's why you're going to keep losing to this guy because he gets it. He knows how to connect. All right, somebody who has connected, he's our prime minister, and it looks like he's set to deliver even more good news on the front of building the

projects that are hopefully going to make this country more successful, more prosperous, more fair. It's expected that Mark Carney is going to add at least four mining and energy developments to his government's major projects list. And that's happening tomorrow. So I think a lot of us are going to be paying attention to that. This is according to the Globe and Mail. And so what they're suggesting is a liquefied natural gas project in BC, Ontario's Crawford Nickel Project, New Brunswick's Sisson Mine, and a hydroelectric project in a Caloet. This is, see, these are the things I was hoping to see, Andy.

I was hoping these big projects that are finally going to unlock the bounty that God anointed this country with. Yeah, and he told you, I think, and he told Canadians, you know, just be a little bit patient. We're going to add to this list. So I think that's going to be a good day tomorrow. But the question still remains, Ben, how many of these projects, like, so what he's saying is these projects are going to be referred to the major projects office.

They're going to expedite review and cut through red tape and all these things. But Canadian business leaders are still saying, we need that for the entire business environment in this country. Yeah, yeah. And I'm kind of waiting for that part to be addressed. Like, yes, it's great. These projects are being referred. But again, the other thing I'm watching out for is if it took 10 years.

to get a permit to build a terminal at the port of Vancouver. How long will it take under this office? How long would this nickel mine have taken before the office? How long will it take with the office? We're missing some of that scrutiny by the media. I'm not saying it's bad or not worthy, but there's lots of legitimate questions about these projects and what is actually going to be achieved in the public interest

and what is going to be expedited. I think those are legitimate questions to ask. Regan, I'm going to let you take us to the break, but Sean Spear, the editor at large of the hub.ca, I think rightly and fairly criticized the fast-tracking of the major project's office because to recognize that a need to fast-track acknowledges that the underpinnings of the system are designed to work far slower for everybody else.

So a couple things, one, Ben, you led this segment in asking if Carney was Santa Claus and I'll just remind your listeners that while he has me purring, he is also, in fact, from the Northwest Territories, which is not too far from the North Pole. So he might be... He might be very well be Santa, yes. There might be some lineage between Santa Claus and the Prime Minister. Your question, though, with respect to major project management office

and Sean's comments, and Sean's an intelligent man, and I like a lot of what he has to say. The fact is, we live in a society where there is lots and lots and lots of government. And having a project office like this, I think is a signal that, because by the way, the conservative party had one when they were last in power as well, but the system is what it is, and we need to find ways to break through the system. I'm a little surprised that there's only four projects on this latest list.

I expected more, and I know that your listeners and viewers from Alberta are saying, where is the pipeline? I suspect that's being worked on, and that'll come and do course. The big question for me is, as Andy says, can they communicate how long things would have taken and how short they would be under this new approach. And I guess we'll wait to hear the announcement and wait to be seen. Indeed. Hey, guys, as always, love chatting with you. Thank you so much for another great panel.

Enjoy the rest of your week. And we will see you. We'll see you next time. Go Rough riders.