The Ben Mulroney Show - The BC land ruling case creates uncertainty, could take 5 years to work out

Episode Date: October 31, 2025

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Now streaming on Paramount Plus. It's the epic return of Mayor of Kingstown. Warden? You know who I am. Starring Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner. I have sway in these walls. Emmy Award winner Edie Falco. You're an ex-con who ran this place first.

years. And now, now you can't do that. And BAFTA award winner Lenny James. You're about to have a plague of outsiders descend on your town. Let me tell you this. It's got to be consequences. Mayor of Kingstown, new season now streaming on Paramount Plus. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Welcome to the Halloween edition of the Ben Mulroney show. It's Friday, October 31st. Thank you so much for joining us. And we're going to start the Halloween edition. What do kids ask?

Trick or treat? Well, here's the trick. A post by Justin Trudeau on X. It was an honor to be recognized by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs as the 2025 global leader. Let me read that again. It was an honor to be recognized by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs

as the 2025 global leader. Sharing this moment with so many inspiring leaders from Chicago and around the world was truly special. The council's work to bring people together across borders, ideas, and experiences matters more than ever. Thank you to the Chicago Council for this recognition and for your commitment

to building a better, more united world. that's that's the trick it's the trick and the treat we it's the trick and he gets the treat uh listen i think he could have been honored in any number of years but 2025 misses the mark he wasn't doing anything in 2025 that's about his halloween a tweet as i've ever seen look i listen i i part of me feels like i'm taking the cheap shot here this is what you do when you leave politics. You do your victory lap and people fete you all over the world and try to set yourself up for the next chapter in your career.

But honestly, I think that he should have gotten in, I don't know, 2015, right? When we were all brimming with optimism because it was 2025 and sunny ways and gender parity and all that stuff. 2025 was the year he was actually absent from the arena. Yeah. Yeah. It's exactly it. I mean, could you have given it to him at the beginning of his term of his run as prime minister? I mean, for what reason? I don't know. But if there was any ever a time that you could, it would be, I guess, then. Yeah. To be as charitable as somebody could ever be charitable.

I'm just, listen, to be, I'm just being a little cheeky right now, to be honest. And frankly, why not? But anyway, eh, eh. Yeah, how about it? I'd expect him if he was down in Los Angeles watching the game with Katie Perry to be wearing a Dodgers hat. Oh. That's, I just would. I would. No, he would.

Honestly, No, he wouldn't. No, he wouldn't. He would not. Hey, put it this way. Whenever he went to other countries, didn't he put on there? Yes. Yes.

Whatever outfit or. Fair enough. Fair enough. He does like, he likes his costumes. Okay. So speaking of costumes, speaking of Halloween, here's the scariest part of Halloween 2025. Shrinkflation.

All right. You're handing out candy. We're all handing out candy. I bought my candy and I bought it and I thought it to myself. And then I found out about the story that we're doing. The boxes that I've been buying for years are smaller because the candy inside is smaller. Oh, we got the audio. Let's listen.

This Halloween, beware of shrinkflation. I said this in our previous hour. I'm going to say it again. my intrepid producer Mike Droulet gets such a kick out of these AI little zingers that he builds. He's so proud of himself. Look at the look on his face.

He's so proud of it. Look on his face. He's so proud that he's able to add this color and depth and tone to the show. Well done, sir. Thank you. Thank you. Mars and Hershey

quietly shrank the weight of their variety packs by up to 17%. And that's the one. That's the box. I remember every year. I know why I remember because every year one of those boxes

ends up in my bedroom and it hangs out by my side of the bed and now the boxes are smaller. The number of bars in each pack hasn't changed so shoppers

may not notice the lighter boxes. The shrinkflation tactic lets companies keep profits up without raising prices outright, especially and this is the key,

cocoa prices have more than doubled due to bad harvest in West Africa. Certain countries are doing this right though, right? France and Brazil,

they have to alert the public when the size drops. And I don't know if you... That makes sense. I'll tell you, one of my favorite candy bars is the Wonder Bar. I love the Wonder Bar. And I think the actual one that you buy at the store, like the regular size one, smaller. Without a doubt, it's smaller.

Oh, yeah. Mars Bar's got smaller, for sure. Everything's getting smaller. And there's part of me that doesn't mind, because I don't think, if I want, if I want that, that sweet hit, I don't mind that it's a little smaller, like for my waistline, but I'm paying the same amount for it. And that's a problem. Right?

It is. It is. You know, if you're going to be called Mr. Big, better be Mr. Big. All right. Here's a scary story that's actually a real story. And we've been talking about this non-stop since the ruling drop. We're talking about the Cowichin Land Ruling, the BC Supreme Court granted Aboriginal title over 5.7 kilometers of land in Richmond to the Cowichin Nation, sparking confusion among property owners and concerns about investment security. And you'll remember a few days ago there was a Richmond Town Hall landowners expressing anger and frustration at the city for not informing them that this lawsuit started in 2014?

Say that again. 2014, before Justin Trudeau became prime minister. That's when the lawsuit started or when the court case started. And I kind of think all stakeholders, anyone who would have been affected by it? I'm pretty, it feels to me like the governments, either the city or the province, had an obligation to let everybody who could be affected by it know. And they didn't. And so a lot of people are panicking and we've heard.

already anecdotally some terrible stories, which we'll get to. But of course, someone tried to take advantage of this moment of panic to really so even more panic. We don't know if it was a prank and we don't know if it was something else, social commentary, who knows. But the city of North Vancouver is warning residents about a fake letter that's circulating online that falsely claims that indigenous land title cases could threaten private property ownership in Vancouver. Yeah, North Vancouver.

North Vancouver. So we've been talking Richmond and now this is North Vancouver. Officials say the letter printed on a bogus city letterhead is completely fraudulent, not connected to any real legal action or local first nations. You can make anything look legitimate. Anything. You can get letterhead. I mean, it's not hard.

I mean, yeah. We're living in a world where twice a. day, twice a day, I will see a video that I do not know if it's real or not. My kids, though, they gave me a tip. So I think for videos made with SORA, I believe, there's always, in the video, there's always going to be like a little patch

of digital fuzziness. Yeah. It's a little pop up every now and then. And if you see that, that's an indication that what you're seeing is AI. I mean, there's a lot of different. There's the hands, like multiple fingers. Yeah, but that's less and less now.

Less and less now. I find that it's just, it's almost, because there's a lot of ridiculous things that happen. Yeah. Well, I mean, I saw an interview. There was an interview with Blake Snell, who was the pitcher the other night for the Dodgers. And I thought it was AI, but then I looked it up. It was actually real because he was saying that the Jays were lucky. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he said that, oh, it was lucky. Well, maybe you say that after. He gave up two home runs on three pitches and he said, oh, yeah, it was.

No, go with that. Because that means you won't be prepared. if that's the frame of mind you had when you gave up two home runs in three in three pitches, good luck in game six. Yeah. But back to the here and now and back to the couch and legal challenge. There's some very real implications from this decision by the BC Supreme Court. One of them, it's so sad, a Richmond manufacturing company's $100 million project was denied bank financing because of the uncertainty that followed the land title ruling.

So think about it. This was going to be an investment of $100 million into the community. by a company, a private investment, and they couldn't get the funding because the bank said it's too big of a risk to throw that sort of money at you when we don't know how this is going to shake out. That's, this is real. And for those who say there's nothing to panic over, tell that to the rich manufacturing company.

Tell it to the people who either were banking on new jobs or we're expecting a new facility think about the, again, the investment, the knock-on effect in that community, that's gone. And that's one story. This is going to go on time and time again. Up next, we speak with someone who has been following every part of this story. I kind of quoted him yesterday, made me sound far smarter than I am. So we're going to dig into his perspective on this when we get back. Don't go anywhere.

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On all of those platforms, we say welcome, and we say thank you so much for health. helping us build the Ben Mulroney show into something that will last the past the test of time we'll have to see. Every now and then you hear somebody say something that sticks in your head and you say to yourself, this is going to be information that I absorb and through this lens I will be seeing a lot of things from now on. And yesterday on social media, I saw David Brett, the editor and publisher of the new Westminster Times talking about what's going on in British Columbia as it relates to the Cowich. land claim issue and he pointed out on social media besides giving a very fulsome analysis of what was going on he pointed out we are not in an age of reconciliation we are an age

of decolonization decolonization is the opposite of reconciliation and if you sit with that for a moment it makes a lot of sense and so to join us to talk about the entire drama that's unfolding in British Columbia as well as this this intellectual battle between decolonization and reconciliation. We're joined by David Brett. David, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for joining us. Thanks for having me.

I love the show. Well, thank you very much. Yeah, you said something that really resonated with me yesterday. But before we get into that, let's talk about the nuts and bolts. Let's talk about what is really affecting so many people. Give me your sense of how things are playing out right now. Because we know that the conservatives in British Columbia tried to nip this whole thing in the bud with a motion that would recognize the property rights of the property holders and the NDP government voted it down. So where are we now in terms of fighting this, this, this, this, B.C. Supreme Court ruling.

Well, I would say to some extent, it's in a huge mind. battle because for one thing, the parties to the case are all appealing, you know, the government of Canada, BC, the city of Richmond, the Port Authority, and the even the Tuosan First Nation and the Muscoon First Nation, who feel aggrieved by this ruling. The political climate is kind of a mess. That's the 410 in the collectors. Sorry about that. Continue. Yeah, it is what was brought up at this meeting in Richmond a couple of days ago for the residents to learn about this is that both BC and the government of Canada are laboring under these litigation directives from on high that some people feel is handicapping the government in its ability to defend landowners. and homeowners. And it's this posture of reconciliation that they're supposed to stand down from adversarial positions in court and seek reconciliation. So this has created a kind of a cloud

over all of the legal proceedings. And the public is just confused as to what we're supposed to be arguing about. Now, I've had people on this show, and I've read some various articles and opinion pieces from some very smart people who are saying the only reason people are panicking is because people like me are telling them to panic and I challenge that you are on the ground you I'm sure you've spoken to some of the people directly affected by this is there a reason for BC landowners to panic well I think the city of Richmond had made a very strong case that the ruling has to be overturned because it speaks to the Land Title Act, certain sections of that act, and that Aboriginal title

can sit alongside or underneath fee symbol ownership of property. And their argument, I think, is sound that this could undermine the Land Title Act for everyone. So not everyone agrees with that, But I think the fact that they're making that argument, you know, there is credence to it. So, you know, perception is often reality. So if people perceive that there's a potential threat to their title across the province, then banks, investors, the entire underpinning of the economy becomes so much shaky. And Dave, we were just reporting on it that there's a manufacturing. facility in Richmond that was going to build a $100 million new facility and they can't get the bank has denied their funding. So we're seeing it. We're seeing real negative knock-on

effects of this uncertainty. How long, David, could this take to make its way through the courts? In an ideal situation where the Supreme Court of Canada says, yeah, the BC Supreme Court got this wrong. How long is that going to take? well this was discussed and some of the homeowners came forward to ask that very question and the answer was likely in the neighborhood of five years five years the bc supreme court uh appeal that could be heard within a year so you're talking a year and a half uh there and then it could is going to end up being appealed to the supreme

court of canada and there's a question of whether the spring court will even hear it you have to be given permission to bring a case before the Supreme Court. And if they do grant that permission, well, then you're into multiple years beyond that. So people are going to lose their homes. I mean, we're already hearing stories of people who cannot renew their mortgages right now. And that's an untenable situation for even a few months, let alone five years. Yes. So the Attorney General of B.C. Nicky Sharma was there and said that they're going to apply for a stay of proceedings.

I don't know if that is going to satisfy banks who are obviously extremely risk-averse. So it's true. The homeowners in this particular area, you know, you drive down number six road in Richmond, it's There's some palatial mansions there. There's a golf course. There's then federal land, the YVR fuel depot. You know, there's huge infrastructure in this area. And what everyone's going to do in the interim is simply unknown at this time and it's looking pretty grim.

Well, David, you know, I think in an effort to be as progressive and inclusive and a forward thing with an towards reconciliation as possible with this ruling, the British Columbia Supreme Court in my humble estimation, did more damage to reconciliation than anyone else in recent memory for me because they've created an oppositional relationship here. Like this is not two people coming together. This is two groups that are forced to fight with each other because of course the governments representing the taxpayers

and the voters have to come to the defense of those people, which is now putting them in an oppositional, confrontational position with the very people they should be seeking reconciliation with. It's dumbfoundingly dumb. Yeah, and this was my point about decolonization. You know, it's the opposite of reconciliation, because to reconcile, you have to have a posture of submission and to stand down from an adversarial relationship.

Well, the decolonial narrative puts everyone on a war footing. And that war footing has been being played out for years and years and years. And it starts with removing monuments, changing names of schools, changing names, sort of demonizing the narrative of Canada. as a genocidal racist establishment that should be, quote, unquote, dismantled. So this narrative of dismantling systems of oppression is what the decolonial narrative is all about. Yeah, David, we're going to have to leave it there. Yes, I really appreciate you coming on, really thank, and thank you. I think you've added really some depth to the conversation in a way that I think very few have,

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