The Ben Mulroney Show - The NDP at a crossroads/How a pro-hamas hacker broke airport security

Episode Date: October 16, 2025

 GUEST:   Paul Wells/Canadian journalist and pundit GUEST:  Phil Gurski/CEO of Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting/former CSIS agent Guest: Dr. Eric Kam, Economics Professor at Toronto Metropolitan University 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 Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast is brought to you by the National Payroll Institute, the leader for the payroll profession in Canada, setting the standard of professional excellence, delivering critical expertise, and providing resources that over 45,000 payroll professionals rely on. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show on this Thursday. October 16. Thank you so much for spending a part of your day with us. The NDP are facing, they're at a crossroads. They're at a crossroads. And what to do after losing so much, so much in the last election. They lost seats. They lost. Moral authority. They lost the blue-collar vote in this country. And now they are faced with the opportunity to read. brand and refocus.

And from the looks of it, they didn't get the memo. This liberal, this NDP leadership race is shaping up as a battle over the party's identity. And I just, I don't think that the leading candidates are going after their traditional vote and their base. I've actually, I was very surprised to see the platforms from the candidates that have step forward, and how, and their vision of what the NDP should be. I mean, the NDP, it's an existential crisis for the party.

But they don't seem to see it that way. They really don't. I mean, look, the first scandal was before, it started before the race even started, when, and it was more of a PR battle than anything. Apparently, this has been the stock and trade of their party forever. But in the world we're living in, this, this controversy caught fire. It was identity politics. Yeah, where they limited the number of cis men, so people, I guess, like me, who could sign nomination papers.

Apparently, that's a thing they've done for a very long time. But in 2025, people were saying, really? Like, should we be a party limiting anything? We should be going after as many votes as possible. And when you tell people who look like me, probably don't share my vote, who think differently, but who look like me, that because they look like me, they are worth less. Okay, okay, shoot yourself in the foot right before the 100 meter dash.

That's a great idea. Literally take a gun and shoot yourself in the foot and then run the race and see how you fare against the other parties. They said it was about inclusivity and which is what they, that's the de facto line that they come up with. Yeah, it's, I mean, it's inclusion by way of exclusion. Okay, make that make sense. So here are the three main contenders.

You got Heather McPherson, who says she's a big tent candidate, wants to broaden the appeal of the party and win more votes. She says the NDP must stop with purity tests at divide members. I mean, that sounds good. That sounds good. But I've heard Heather McPherson on... She's from Edmonton, by the way.

Yes, I've heard Heather McPherson speak very passionately about her opinions on Gaza. If you're a Jew, if you're a left-leaning Jew in this country, is I okay you know like take that for what it is then you got Avi Lewis who I got a lot of time for Avi Lewis I've we've spoken with him in the past and his dad was a wonderful man as a matter of fact my dad um offered him the position of Canada's ambassador to the UN interesting and you know as a conservative reaching out to a left-leaning Canadian to do that that that spoke to a time

in politics, it doesn't really exist anymore. Yeah. And Avi Lewis, very passionate, very vocal, when he speaks, people listen. I mean, there are a lot of reasons for the NDP to like Avi Lewis as a candidate just because of who he is. No one calls him a NEPO baby, by the way. Oh, no, they do. Oh, they do? They do, yeah. I would not. Would you consider him the frontrunner? You know, he's the name recognition alone. I haven't seen polls. I haven't seen any polls on this, but anyway, Avi, he's an activist and a filmmaker of, obviously, because of his father's Roots in the party. He's got legacy. He wants the NDP to reclaim its left-wing identity and be

critical of capitalism. But he also had a kind of a, huh, he had an odd push. He wants that public grocery store. Yeah, he wants the public, he wants, he promises wealth taxes. Because we don't have those here. Yeah. We don't have them in Canada. Everybody's in with those. Caps on rent and a public option for grocery stores. Again, I saw a journalist. I can't remember who it was. It might have been Chris Selly, who referred to like the big bad grocery cartels. The margins of grocery stores. And yes, they've been, yeah, they've had some bad PR and they made some bad moves with the price fixing and stuff like that. But the margins on groceries are minuscule.

They are razor thin. You don't get into the grocery game to make a lot of money. You make it at scale. That's how you make money in the grocery. game. So then Charlebois, the food professor, he laughed at this idea. He said, oh, yeah. So really you think government's going to do a good job at this?

But that's, I mean, that's the thing. Have you ever seen a government program that comes in under budget and achieves its goals? Ever! Ever! Oh, wait, the gun buyback program. Oh, wait, no, it's right. Let me list off a few. Yeah, sorry. And he blamed Jugmeet Singh, deal with the Trudeau

for confusing voters. He's right. You know, when you throw in for that long, the NDP become the liberals and the liberals become the NDP. And when the liberals have a bigger brand and more money, they are going to take those votes and keep them. But let's also remember that Avi Lewis took a picture recently with Fred Hahn. Now, for our national listeners, Fred Hahn is the Ontario president of CUPY, the largest public sector union in the country representing 800,000 people. a rabid anti-Semite, and he has made it his entire mission in life to sow misinformation about the war in Gaza that has led to the dehumanization of Jews across this country, including in his own ranks, 25 Jewish members of QPi have lodged human rights complaints.

Actually, that number's grown. I got an email yesterday. It's up to 60 now. 60 members. Dues paying members of QPie. Good union folk who do nothing but pay their dues, go to work, and hope that their union represents their interest so they'll have a job tomorrow, have felt unsafe because of the decisions made by one of the leaders in their union.

And that union has been sponsoring and promoting anti-Israeli projects across the country. And especially on campuses where Jewish students are feeling extremely unsafe. Remember what he did it up at York University, pushing to say

trying to teach TAs how to promote So the money that these union members are forced, by the way, legally forced to is going to activities that make them feel unsafe. And Avi Lewis is posed with both of them smiling. And look, when a conservative is at a meet and greet and takes a picture with somebody

who might have posted something sort of over the line on the right wing side, that politician is required. to disavow that person and their politics. In other words, there's an implied ownership of that person's politics by a right-wing politician. Well, Pierre Paulyev was excoriated for taking pictures with some equally despicable people. Yeah, except those people's politics are not well known the way Fred Hans are because he makes national news when he gets in front of a microphone. So you can't plead ignorance about who Fred Hahn is and what he believes.

And yet he stood with this man. So what does that mean for Avi Lewis moving forward and the people he's going to surround himself by it? Then there's Rob Ashton. He is a union leader, a longshoreman. So he's got roots in the traditional base of the party. Blue collar candidate pledging to fight for working people. Yeah.

Oh, we've got a clip of him. Why don't we listen to him? And we look forward. Look forward to truth and reconciliation in our hearts. And the only way we can do that is every decision that's made in Canada, it's made with indigenous rights at the center of it. Any decision that we make should be government to government. And as we move forward, free prior consent is the truest form of reconciliation. Every single decision that is made in Canada needs to run by the, has to be run by the indigenous

voices in the country. Uh, how much time do we have here? How much? Yeah, we don't have any time. Like, you can talk about this with Paul Wells next. Yes, yeah. Oh, yes, that's exactly. We've got, we're joined by Paul Wells, Canadian journalist, pundit,

who knows far more about everything than me. But yeah, we're going to talk about that with him. Oh, it's the end of the, it's the end of the segment. Okay. Yeah, okay. Okay, does any of this make sense to the great Paul Wells? We'll ask him next. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show.

We want to thank you for joining us. We want to thank you for helping us build this show on all the platforms on which you find the show, on YouTube, on social media, on podcast platforms, on the radio, and on streaming apps, a lot of places, but you guys are in a lot of places and we want to find you where you are. Very pleased to have back on the show. Paul Wells, great journalist, great punit. You can find him on Substack. And whenever he writes something, I read it for sure. And we wanted to have Paul on the show. Welcome, welcome back, Paul. Thanks so much for being here. Hi, Ben. Thanks for having me. Yeah, we wanted to get your take on this burgeoning NDP, federal

NDP race and your thoughts on who's in the race, what they're pushing for, their vision for sort of in their minds, hopefully, an evolved NDP, one that appeals to more people than it did in the last election? I think it's turning out to be an interesting field of candidates. You've got a guy like Gavi Lewis, who has an awful lot of broadcast and writing experience and has a lot of people behind him who have history sort of making trouble in the NDP. They help to crystallize the opposition to Tom Mulcair at the 27 campaign and you know and then there's Heather McPherson who's got real experience in the in the caucus and comes from

Alberta and is trying to be a bridge builder and this guy Rob Ashton is a longshoreman everyone else claims to be for the working class he has been leading one of the country's most important unions for nearly a decade and and and this suggests the NDP understands and is testing a few possible answers to the fact that they lost their appeal

among working Canadians and have really had their clock peed by the conservatives over the last decade. They're trying to find some way to walk that back. And look, and you're right, look, every one of these people have a lot of things that you would want to put in the window. Every one of them has

an appeal. But when you dig down a little bit and listen to some of the things that they're pushing for, that's to me where the disconnect comes. You know, there's still an unhealthy fascination with what's going on half a world away when there's plenty of problems for the working class here in Canada. That's my perspective from where I sit. But, but, you know, there's the, there's the Eve Engler of it all.

We got to talk about this guy who is increasingly coming off. Look, in the beginning, I just thought that he was a really extreme left-wing, true believer. I'm now actually wondering whether there's something off with this guy. Well, he just, he's kind of a low-tech version of the extremely online. He asks provocative questions and records the answers and gets his jollies that way. I mean, there's people like that all over the spectrum. Yeah. Um, I, I believe I've never had a conversation with this guy, even though he's been around the hill forever.

And, you know, my understanding is not qualified to, uh, to be a candidate. Um, but it is true that in a leadership contest, like, so let's talk to, let's talk about the more legitimate, uh, competitors. They, uh, they need the support of the base that's there. They need the sort of support of people who thought the NDP was doing the right thing for the last decade. Yeah. And then they can. begin to talk to the rest of us. Yeah. So it's not that different from what's happening in the conservative party where, you know, whatever Pierapolia might actually think. He needs to, he needs to sound like the rock-ribbed party base that's going to be in Alberta voting on his future in January. Yeah.

And, you know. And that's where, you know, I'm hoping for your insights on this. Because, yeah, what we see is the public. facing NDP. We hear the speeches. We hear those rallying cries and they'll either resonate with somebody or they won't. But I have to assume, Paul, behind

closed doors, when the leadership of the party gets together and they look at the balance sheet of the party and they look at where they lost votes. A dose of realism has to come into the conversation pretty significantly.

And they, I mean, they must put out polls that are asking asking their base and asking their potential voters what they want from the NDP. There's pragmatism must come into the conversation at some point. Yeah, but I think there's going to be different definitions of what constitutes pragmatism. What do you mean? Well, I mean, so you said an unhealthy obsession about conversations or disputes that are happening halfway around the world. I think if you pulled NDP members, probably 99% of them are very upset about what's been happening in Gaza and would feel strange if they weren't hearing that from the candidates for the leadership of the party.

As for the finance of the party, that, I mean, that's a huge problem. Look, political parties die. This one might. Political parties also come back, but they don't usually bounce back. people still talk about the amazing breakthrough that Jack Layton won in 2011 you know a hundred a hundred-ish seats in the House of Commons that parties never seen anything like it before since what they don't talk about is that was his four is four six eight oh that was his fourth try and it took all eight years of

his leadership to get there and it took every day of those eight years like it wasn't he sat around twiddling his thumbs and then he got lucky um and uh And similarly, you know, if there's like, so I look at this field and I say none of them has a snowballs chance in the next election. Right. But if they're thinking, if they're only thinking in terms of the next election, then they deserve what's coming to them. But if they're thinking about listening more, talking more, getting into, you know, union halls and church basements, places that haven't seen a lot of NDP partisan activity in the last 15 years, and doing it until they're bone tired and then doing a lot more of it, then they might have a chance over

the medium term, you know? Yeah. Do you think that this peace process that has just begun to unfold is almost a, it's a, it could be of benefit to the NDP if they, if this sort of gets placed on the back burner, at least temporarily where we don't have to worry about death counts and calls of genocide and starvation and every day coming out of Israel and coming out of Gaza, then, as you said, 99% of that base won't be clamoring to hear what do these people think about this thing, which then in turn could allow them to speak more consistently on those issues that would appeal to people beyond

that base. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting. There was a party that tore itself to pieces over these issues long before the NDP and liberals and the conservatives wrapped their heads around it. That was the Green Party, which in 2019, 2021, under enemy fall, 2019, I don't even remember which of those two elections it was, but they were, they were deeply divided by infighting over Israel versus Palestine questions. And it essentially ended enemy. Paul's leadership of the Green Party. More peace and less death is a good thing, first of all, for the people concerned. Yes. And secondly, if it lowers tempers here in Canada, which after all is never going to be the place

where these issues are resolved, then that simply not simplifies life for everyone trying to do politics. You know, I had a Green Party canvasser come to my door. a few years ago, and I said, I'll tell you this. Nobody in Canada wants to hear the Green Party solution to peace in the Middle East. And then suddenly, suddenly every party was trying to find a solution to the

Middle East. So what do I know? You know? You know, you certainly know a lot, sir, and I really appreciate you sharing those thoughts with us here on the Ben Mulroney show, and I hope to talk to you again soon. Thanks so much, my friend. Thank you. Cheers. All right, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we've got how a pro-Hamas cyber attack crack the security system at a number of Canadian airports. If you're not frightened by this story, you should be.

This is one of those examples of Canada not being serious about issues we should take exceptionally seriously. Don't go anywhere. Ben Mulanichos back after this. Welcome back to the Ben Mulerinocho. Thank you so much for spending some of your day. with us. I want you to put yourselves in a position you've been in many, many times before where you are just, you're busy, you're late, you're on your way of the airport. In fact, you've made it to the airport. And you know that there are a bunch of steps that you have to take in order to get

to your plane and ultimately to your destination. And a lot of those steps involve going through security. And I've been in that position. I'll put myself in that position right now. I don't think there's a single time I have gone through security where I haven't thought about the security. I've commented in my own mind about, oh, they got a new machine or, oh, this line is moving quickly. They must really have their act together today. Or, oh, they have a new protocol in place that is allowing for people to get through more quickly and hopefully just as securely because security at airports matters. Since 9-11, I don't think anybody takes for granted that they are always safe. And it is up to that last line of defense at the airport to make

sure that we feel safe and secure when we board an airplane. So imagine for a moment you're about to go through security. And through the loudspeakers and on this, you hear a sound and you see an image on the screens. Let's play what some people at the Colonna airport, and I believe a few other airports across Canada, heard yesterday. Okay, so this was the Qasam anthem and the voice of Abu Ubaida. He was a Muslim commander and one of the companions of the prophet, mostly known for being one of the ten to whom Paradise was promised, and there were on the screens at Colonna, Windsor, and Victoria were very threatening pronouncements that Israel lost the war, Hamas won, you are pigs, pictures of Benjamin Netanyahu, it was a cyber attack that saw this means of communication at the airports taken over, co-opted, and promoting hate right before people go through the line we just talked about. So to discuss this, we're joined by Phil Gerski, the CEO of Borealis threat and risk consulting,

also a former CESIS agent. Phil, welcome to the show. Hey, Ben, how are you? Yeah, sorry, that was a big lead up to this conversation, but I thought it was important to get it out of the way before bringing you on. This must have been frightening to so many people as they were about to go through security, because they're thinking to themselves, what else have the, And these guys are terrorists.

I mean, they could call themselves hackers all they want. They are terrorists. Yeah. The terror that somebody could have felt, right as they're about to go through security in a place where you're supposed to feel secure must have been just awful. Absolutely. And I was kind of laughing at your introduction, Ben. My wife and I would just come back from Newfoundland.

We were in Newfoundland for a weekend. I was in St. John's Airport. And thank God I didn't see a Hamas video in the Departures Island, which is good. But no, I mean, first of all, this is an incredible cyber. attack. So the first, you know, you talk about the last line of defense, right? What kind of cyber defense do they have in places to stop this from happening? So that has to be looked at what wasn't done. And more importantly, you know, why would you target these small airports? Is it because the cyber defense is redeemed to be a little

less strenuous there? What is it that happened to Pearson or at Montreal or Vancouver? And what it shows is exactly what terrorist groups like Hamas and Hamas is a listed entity here in Canada are trying to do. They're trying to get their propaganda in our faces. in trying to spread fear and terror amongst Canadians. So it's an awful event. And if you've got to figure out why did this happen? So let's level set for a second. And my goal is not to spread fear on this.

In fact, to give information so that that fear can be dispelled. But typically at airports, those screens and those speakers, I have to believe. I want to believe, and you tell me if I'm wrong, that that is a, that's a, a separate system from the security that we go through to make sure that what gets on planes is safe. Am I right to assume that? I'm not a specialist in that, but I'm going to go with you and say, yes, it probably is a separate system. Nevertheless, they did target the, you know, the communication system of the airport. So yeah, it probably is not linked to security itself, but the mere fact that they found an in, they found a weakness in the system to do this,

and they said people are milling about trying to go get to their aircraft and they're seeing this propaganda spread is a really bad sign. So I think a lot of fingers are being pointed and rightfully so as to who dropped the ball in this one. Okay. So, you know, I'll leave it to others to do that investigation and we'll report on whatever those findings are when they come out. But in your estimation, what sorts of conversations are happening at Trudeau and Vancouver and Pearson today? What are they doing to shore up their cybersecurity today? Whenever something like this happens, Ben, of this scale, you're always going to have a what-is scenario, right?

Do we have the things in place to bring some happening? How did it happen? What backdoors were used? Are there weaknesses in this system? How is it hacked? So I'm going to go on a limb and say there's probably good cooperation amongst airport security officials across the country, across the network, and they're all going to learn from each other.

So hopefully, if there is a common backdoor that was exported, they can be patched sooner or rather than later because you don't want to repeat to this. But I'm with you. I don't want to spread fear either. This is a terrible event. it wasn't a threat per se no one was heard you know they weren't targeting anybody but it does it's something that shouldn't be allowed to happen because canadians don't want to be bombarded with this terrorist propaganda in their airports okay so um what is so that's those are the conversations happening at the airports what about on the security forces side what about on the police the policing side because not only did the terrorists and that's what i'm going to call them from now on get in to the a v but uh there were acolyte walking amongst the everyday citizens in the airport recording this stuff to upload it to social media.

I mean, they were there. They were on the ground. They were, yes, they weren't through security. They were on the other side of it. But they were there to witness it firsthand. So there are a number of people involved here. This is a conspiracy clearly. So what's happening at CIS?

What's happening with the police forces? How far, if you'd been at CIS when this happened, what would you be doing today? I try to figure out who was uploading the images to the internet because support for a listed terrorist entity is an offense under Canadian law. You know, Ben, the whole Gaza, Hamas, Israel thing has been a hugely contentious, as you're well aware, but we're talking about a listed terrorist entity and people who support that entity putting information online here in Canada. They have to be discovered, they have to be investigated, determine if, in fact, they've committed a defense on the criminal code, or worst-case scenario that these supporters may, in fact, envision something more terrible down the road, like an actual attack.

against an airport or against some kind of public venue. We know their support for Hamas, Ben. We've seen the flags flying at Palestinian protests in Canada. So there are supporters of Hamas in Canada. So CESIS, my former colleague, could have figured who's who in the zoo. Where are they? What are they up to? And again, hopefully to, you know, investigate them at the point where we prevent anything

bad from happening like an actual attack. Do we have the tools at CIS to be investigating this thoroughly? I mean, should these terrorists, I mean, I'm sure they were really. happy in the moment, but did they sleep with one eye open last night? Probably, because, you know, again, I'm not a cyber expert, but there's ways of determining who's who and where they are. So they will be found eventually, and hopefully they will be charged with certain versions of the criminal code. So yeah, maybe they feel like they're king of the hill right now because they've done this, but there'll be a price to pay. And yes, my

former colleagues do have the tools that make this determination to see exactly who they are, where they were and how they did this. So hopefully they'll pay the Piper sooner rather than later, and I hope they do see them when I open tonight, Ben. Last question for you, the fact that they targeted these smaller airports, the fear would be that they were road testing something, right? Like that they were setting up a trial balloon to see what they could get away with. And I guess the fear, if you've got to be realistic about this and you got to think worst-case scenario, that they were road testing it here at a smaller airport to see if they could

get away with something bigger at a bigger airport on a larger scale a little bit later. Let me give an analogy, Ben. go back to 9-11, where was the flight school training that was carried out by those people in place, Lake Minnesota, off the beaten path? I'm not saying that that Colonna and Windsor and Victoria precursors. There's something, you know, but I know you're not saying that, but we have to, we have to plan for it. You can't, you plan for the worst and hope for the best. 100%. And this is why they would have, like I said, initially, maybe these airports weren't quite as secure as the major ones in Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal. Maybe they were testing this as a possibility. So yeah, that has to be taken into consideration. why do they target these three specific airports? How do they determine the vulnerabilities and are they planning something better?

So, yeah, I'm confident of my colleagues in CESA and the RCP that they're on top of this. Obviously, it is a potential threat, and they'll do what they can to try to prevent anything more from happening. All right, Phil Gersky, we appreciate it. We thank you so much. The CEO of Borealis threat and risk consulting, former CIS agents so glad to have gotten you on the record with this one.

Really appreciate it. My pleasure, have a good day. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. Ben Mulroney here with our great friend who knows far more about economics than I, Dr. Eric Cam of Toronto Metropolitan University. Always great to talk to you, Eric, because, you know, the economy, front and center, very important for so many people, probably no more important than for the people of Brampton, Ontario right now. Stalantis is moving jobs out of Brampton in favor of a new car manufacturing plant in Illinois. This came as a giant blow just a few short days ago.

There are 3,000 workers that depend on these jobs directly in the factory, another thousand for knock-on jobs. And they've been on break for 18 months as they've been retooling this factory, only to be told, yeah, no, we're pulling a fast one. and we're moving down to Illinois. What advice would you give to the people of Brampton right now? Economic advice on how to weather this storm. You know, Ben, the first thing I would do, honestly, is psychologically take it very seriously because this problem is going to get worse before it gets better.

So if you're one of these people that are affected through no fault of their own, there are a few things you can do. And the first one, of course, is to apply for government support measures. I mean, we know that there's employment, insurance and social assistance. There's a thing called Better Jobs, Ontario. And there's even a Canada-Ontario job grant where employers or the government can offer a grant

to cover training costs. And that really leads me to number two, Ben. Sadly, the sector is diminishing. I don't see it coming back anytime soon. Ontarians and Canadians are realizing that what Donald Trump wants, Donald Trump tends to get and that that lets you know where that person should put his elbows. And a lot of these people, Ben, it's time if they haven't yet to invest in reskilling and what they call upskilling to identify local growth sectors and try to get some certification or training in roles for those

fields because the automotive sector is in decline. And as we move forward, Ben, there's only going to be less jobs than more jobs and people are just going to have to start to explore alternative options for employment and and look you're not here as an expert in the automotive field but do you have any sense of what those fields those upskill fields might be for somebody who has been trained to work the line and to build cars what what can you do with those as a base skill well you know luckily we call those skills general skills and in in a bad economy that that's not a bad thing. So you pretty much are sort of thrown open

for looking at industries in things like tech and manufacturing, grocery stores, things like that. Wherever general skills are valued, there is no, listen, having a job is a precious thing. And so in a time when you're in an industry that's collapsing and you're out there looking for work, there really is no bad job. So you cast your net wide and see who,

who wants your skill set. All right, let's move on to the housing market. You and I have talked about the doom and gloom of this housing market, and it doesn't look like it's getting any better. Royal La Pages, Roy La Pais, rather, is saying that the housing prices are going to continue to slide, which is making it less and less of value for people to put their houses on the market. And if you can't afford your mortgage, what are your options? You actually have some, although again, not as many as you would probably like.

It's time to do what I call financial triage, just like they used to on mash. It's time to talk to your lender and talk to your lender early because lenders prefer solutions over foreclosures, Ben. And you may be able to qualify for some temporary relief, just off the top of my head, deferred payments, interest-only periods. or even term extension so this does provide an opportunity to review your mortgage term and it also and we've said this on your show right wealth creation in canada is debt reduction and so in times of economic contraction it's time to cut other expenses which will really look like a boost in income and then there's the other sort of more out there options like you can rent out your property

or a lender approved short sale or even some co-ownership but right now now, I think people should worry about debt restructuring and as opposed to, say, voluntary surrender of their property, which is a really long-winded way of saying there are alternatives out there. Speak to your lender because the last thing they want you to do is default on your mortgage. Yeah. So it's not, it's not the end of the road. If you think it's the end of the road, talk to your lender because there might be another pathway to staying in your home. Well, absolutely. You know, you have more options than seller default, right? And the trick here, as, you know, an educated consumer is the best customer, Ben.

You act quickly and proactively with your lender, and that can really minimize a financial damage and maybe even give you some breathing room around your debt. All right, let's talk about some good news for Canada on the economics front. Peter Howitt, Canadian Peter Howitt, won the Nobel Prize for Economics. And I guess a lot of it revolves around his theory of creative destruction. Lay out what that theory is for us. Well, first of all, he's a very nice man.

He spent a lot of his career at Western, and he's a very nice fellow. This is a little bit interesting. Creative destruction, as a definition, it's just a very old economic concept. It was created by an economist named Joseph Schumpeter in the 1700s, and it describes how innovation disrupts and replaces old industries. So in a sense, it drives economic growth through constant transformation and innovation. So it sounds like a bad thing, Ben, but it's a good thing.

What it says is that innovation disrupts legacy sectors. So as new technologies and new business models arise, they replace outdated industry like, say, Canada Post. And so we even have some Canadian examples, things like Shopify and Amazon. So it's just a fancy term to say, in with the new and out with the old. Okay. And how does that play into what the work that he does. did that led to this Nobel Prize in Economics. So again, he was a growth still is. He's a growth theorist. So him and Philip Agion, and they shared the award, they tried to come up with a theory

furthering the work of Robert Lucas, and I don't want to geek out here, but it's called endogenous growth theory. So if you give me a second. Yes. Exogenous growth theory is when the parts of the economy that provide the growth are outside of the economy. And so if that's the case, then economic growth at some point has to cease. What Agion and Howitt did was they came up with theories that said the factors that drive the growth in the economy are within the economy. And if that's the case, like creative destruction, economic growth does not have to cease. And in fact, it can be infinite. And there's some real lessons there for our federal government right now that doesn't think that innovation and research and development are priorities. But if you look

at the work of Howitt, he's saying the exact opposite. And of course, he's right. Is there a place for someone like this new Nobel Prize winner, Peter Howard, on some sort of economic task force for this government? I mean, if he's saying things that you think are of value and this government should be paying attention, maybe we try to fold him into the decision-making process. You know, of course. And not to to toot my own horn, but this profession offers a few very, very brilliant minds, and his is one of them. And I think it's about time that we start taking lessons from neoclassical economic theory because there are the growth theories that work and the growth theories that don't.

And if I may be quick, and I know you know what I'm going to say, one growth theory that is a mass failure is immigration. And yet we keep coming back to it over and over. So maybe it's time to pick up a first-year economics textbook, Ben, read a couple chapters and get us back on the right track. We don't even need to go as far as getting a Nobel laureate to join the government. We just need them to read a first-year university economics handbook. Hey, always great to talk to you, Eric.

Really appreciate it. Stay healthy, Ben. I don't know. I think it would make people feel really good if on the heels of winning the Nobel Prize in economics, this government brought him into the fold in some capacity. You know, just to bring him in to, I don't know, pick his brain a little bit. Well, they always say they need smart people around. So, I would suggest, yeah.

Smart people attract other smart people. And Mark Carney's a smart guy. I think it would be a really good message to send that they were able to bring someone like that in. But what the heck do I know? Thank you.