The Ben Mulroney Show - Warning labels on junk food. Coming to Canada?

Episode Date: June 3, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Warning labels on junk food. Coming to Canada? with Guest: Sylvain Charlebois, Canadian Researcher and Professor specializing in the Food Industry 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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like a very un-Texas thing. Texas is where people move to be free of government intervention and taxes and regulation. It's at a home of the free and it's the embodiment of the American dream. And yet I read that there is a bipartisan bill aimed at strengthening nutrition requirements for school kids and mandating labels

of certain food additives to the point that foods like Skittles and Mountain Dew would warn that the ingredients are not recommended for human consumption. So here to talk about that and other food related stories, very pleased to be joined by the high watermark in these affairs is Sylvain Charleboix, the Canadian researcher and professor specializing in the food industry, food professor. Welcome to the show. Good morning, Ben. So what do you make

of this bill, which is making its way through the legislature in Texas, and it is getting bipartisan support. Yeah, it's an interesting move. So I should remind your listeners that the Secretary of Agriculture is from Texas. Actually, she's an alum of Texas A&M. And the field and I was actually in Texas just last week. And the field is a bit different. I do think that there is more importance given to public health. Yeah, even in Canada, you feel it as well. So when you look at some of the policies that are coming out of either Ottawa or different provinces, public health is an important issue. That's impacting policy

all over North America. So and Texas is not immune to that. And look, warnings help. I mean, we've seen in the precipitous drop of people smoking, there's no way the disgusting warnings on the packaging haven't helped get those numbers to drop. So warning labels do help. To me, had this happened five years, 10 years ago, there's no way Republicans would have supported it. It just so happens, in my opinion, that Robert Kennedy Jr., who has been entrusted with making America healthy again, has that portfolio and is under the Trump banner that it has now found purchase amongst Republicans. Exactly. I mean, the spirit behind this new policy is not about banning things, it's about encouraging behavior and incentivizing companies to reformulate and change how they commercialize different products.

We're actually seeing in Canada, as of January 1st, 2026, we will see more front of package labeling telling consumers if a product has too much fat, sodium, or sugar, you're basically giving more information to consumer and let them decide instead of just banning things. Well, you know, and that's a good point. I mean, essentially cutting through and it's almost like giving people a translation for the confusing list of ingredients that are on the back. We don't necessarily know what all those things are. And just because they have a complex name

doesn't necessarily mean that they're unhealthy. But for somebody to then translate that and say, here's actually what it means for your overall health and for your blood pressure and for the fat that you're consuming, that could be a good thing. Absolutely. So I actually really like the approach

if you actually give all the information possible to the consumer and let the consumer decide what is good and not so good for them and loved ones. Yeah. I think that's the way to go. And then the market basically will decide and will incentivize companies to provide different products of the marketplace.

All right, let's move on to another story because a few months ago it was all about buying Canadian in the face of American tariffs, Canadian flags everywhere, we were trying to appreciate what's the difference between a Canadian company and made in Canada, produced in Canada, and you saw Canadian flags everywhere and and the hope was we were going to pick the Canadian product over its American counterpart. And now we're, according to you, that, what has that movement lost steam? Well, it's not according to me. It's according to Nick, which is the firm which collects actual sales data from grocers directly. I mean, that's the source you want.

You can't, like surveys, we've actually surveyed Canadians and everyone wants to buy Canadians. But what is actually is going on? How are people spending money? So Nick would know, it would be the only firm which can tell us exactly how people are spending their money. And numbers are out for this winter from February to April. My guess is that your listeners will be a little surprised to learn that sales for Canadian food products are up 4.4%. American food products, they're down 4.1%. So we're looking at a shift

of 4% essentially. Now, it may not seem like a lot, but it is a lot. I mean, we're creatures of habits. We tend to buy the same things over and over again. So despite inflation and everything else, I think a jump of 4.4% is significant. Yeah. And you know, I'm glad that that's the number because, you know that when times are good and people have the money that will allow them to make any choice they want, you know, we will default to the thing that makes sense. And now we're living in a time of scarcity in terms of the amount of money we can put towards grocery shopping. And the fact that we've chosen, I mean, a little bit, but still a significant amount, we've chosen the Canadian product over the American product, even, even though it might be more expensive. And even

though we might have less money does speak to sort of a sort of that that that national imperative that we were all called to answer. No, exactly. And so, so I do think that that the Buy Canadian campaign is was successful and frankly important for all of us. It was kind of therapy. It felt like a Canada Day parade every day at the grocery store. The challenge right now is that, well, you know, there are artifacts and artifacts tend to disappear. Even though they're there, you don't see them as much as you used to Yeah, they blend in the background

Exactly. We need to give Canadians different reasons to buy cane other than well I don't like that new tenant at the White House Hatred will drive behavior, but only for some time All right lastly you know we talk a lot about Interprovincial trade barriers, and I'm so glad to talk to you because, you know,

you're reminding us that the patchwork of different drinking ages in Canada is, in effect, an inter-provincial trade barrier that maybe should come down. Do you know, Ben, why the legal age, legal drinking age in Ontario is 19 and not 18? No, no, I mean, I know the story in the United States as to why Louisiana had an 18 drinking age in Ontario is 19 and not 18. No, no. I mean, I know the story in the United States as to why Louisiana had an 18 drinking age and everyone else is 21, but don't know the Canadian story.

It's because of grade 13. And grade 13 doesn't exist anymore. Oh, interesting. And so you have three provinces where the legal drinking age is 18, so Quebec, Manitoba and Alberta. Everyone else is 19. And to be honest, I mean, most people listening to us right now say, well, who cares? I mean, it's not a priority. Actually, if you talk to companies, if you talk to investors looking at Canada, other

than India, we are the only country in the world where we have several different drinking legal age within the same country. Yeah. And when you look at provinces like Ontario that have so many municipalities that are butting up against Quebec, there's a microcosm of that friction happening in real time. Absolutely. So it's only a year difference. But at the same time, if you think nationally, it becomes a bit of a problem. And so since we're talking about inter-provincial trade barriers, if we're thinking about selling beer in convenience stores, and we're thinking of allowing alcohol

products to be sold everywhere across the country. Why not tackle the issue of, of the legal drinking age, which is a little ridiculous as far as I'm concerned. I've always wondered why we have different rules in different provinces. Well, I mean, listen, I, I think, I think highlighting it is the first step in having the conversation, but I've said many times on this show that Ontario has the most dysfunctional relationship with alcohol in the country. This crazy precious.

Because you grew up in Quebec, Ben. Yeah, but the fact that, I mean, between the LCBO and the beer store and treating people like they are children. And when I say something like that, I get pushed back from people saying, oh, you're just, you know, you want people drinking and driving, which is absolutely not the case. It's such a ludicrous statement on its face.

I think it's changing in Ontario. I think the mindset is slowly changing. Thanks to multiculturalism, people coming from all over the world with different mindsets, it's great. Well, thank you, Sylvain. I want to thank you for highlighting these three important stories.

I always love talking to you on the show and we'll talk again soon. Take care. Bye bye. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. And if you cast your memory back to the dying days of the Trudeau Liberal government, they pretty much admitted that they screwed the pooch on our entire immigration system, breaking the national consensus that had existed for decades and generations. And they were gonna reverse course and they were gonna right size the number of people coming into the country.

So yesterday on this show, we alerted you to the fact that in the first four months of this year, 817,000 people were brought into this country, most of whom came in under the temporary foreign worker program, which is just a bananas number. And we also had a separate conversation about the idea of, you know, if you're gonna hire,

if you're gonna buy Canadian, which is, you know, the elbows up crowd wants you to buy Canadian, then why not hire Canadian? Isn't that as meaningful, if not more meaningful than buying Canadian? And so the National Citizens Coalition has come out in favor of hiring Canadian, just exactly what we were talking about yesterday

with youth unemployment skyrocketing and students battling for fewer and fewer summer jobs, entry level jobs, service industry jobs. Perhaps it's time to say, look, enough is enough. We need to prioritize the people who are here, the people who have been here, the people who have a stake here at places like Tim Hortons, like Wendy's, like A&W. And so I wanna ask you, the listener of this show, give us a call at the Ben Mulroney Show.

Are you an employer? Do you hire Canadians first? Or do you hire the best person for the job regardless of their status? I would love to hear from you and have this conversation with you, because look, I feel terrible that the system has pushed us to having this conversation.

But because back in the day, of course, if we had temporary foreign workers, it's because there were needs that needed to be filled in this country. And of course, we wanted those people here to help drive the economy, help drive the engine of growth, to help pay taxes and pay into the system so that we could afford the social services that all of us need to avail ourselves of. And that is not the reality

anymore. It seems wherever you turn, there are not Canadians, but people who have been brought in here to do jobs that Canadians could do, that Canadians want to do, that Canadians need to do in order to get their foot in the door, start building their way up the economic ladder, and starting with an entry-level position somewhere to eventually do something else, something bigger, something more fulfilling. And yet that doesn't exist anymore, or to a large extent, it doesn't exist anymore. And so this idea of hiring

Canadian, I wish it wasn't the reality. I wish we were back in a time where we all agreed on the value of immigration and the different pathways to immigration, but that's not the reality anymore. There's a bunch of people that broke that. And now we're dealing with a broken system. Perhaps the way to fix it is to urge companies and pressure companies to hire Canadian. I'd love to hear what you have to say. And let's start with Ken. Ken, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show.

Hey Ben, how are you buddy? I'm well, thank you. All right, so I got a teenage son. Yeah. The last two, three years as he goes out before school ends to try for a part-time job, hard to find it. They don't hire him. They hire other people, foreigners and these foreign students.

I don't mind these foreign workers, these temporary workers that go out and work in fields and farms. Yeah. Yeah, because I don't think any Canadian is willing to do that. But at a Walmart, a Canadian tire, a home Depot, pizza pizza, Tim Horton, those part-time jobs are for Canadian people and Canadian teenagers. Why me as a parent gets to save three to 400 bucks, possibly 500 bucks a month in my pocket. If my son goes out and earns that money himself. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, those white finances, sir. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, it goes right by an answer, sir.

Yeah, of course. It affects an entire family. You're not you're not handing out an allowance anymore. You're your child is learning really the fundamentals of what it means to be part of a workforce. They're learning about having a boss, being accountable to that boss, being on time, learning tasks. Yeah. Learning the responsibility, being part of a team, all of that stuff. There are various ways to learn it, but the best way for them to learn is to get that job. And the fact that it is not available to vast swaths of

young people, what's going to happen to those people? What's the knock on effect for that kid who can't get that entry level job that so many generations prior to relied on to become the people they ultimately become Thank you so much for the call. Let's welcome Andrew into the conversation Andrew. Thanks so much for calling in How you doing? I'm great. Thanks Great to be here with you. I'm a restaurateur in Toronto You know, we we put our we put jobs out there. Yeah, and my inbox gets flooded I mean flooded like yeah, I could put a job out there for a minimum wage salary and I'm getting 300 to 400 resumes.

Wow. One thing I've found out over I would say the last five years at least is 99% of the people who apply are under qualified, have no qualifications, have no relevance to the job and these are all new Canadians coming through really in regards to Canadians coming through for the jobs you know I I want to support Canada I I'm an immigrant myself I have a small business I employ probably 60 people and I want to continue to to inputs into the economy but I can't because I'm getting floated to the point where I'm stopping looking at those resumes.

Now, really? So let me ask, compare this. How long have you been in the business? I've been in the business all my life. I've been a chef for 37 years. So compare this moment in time to say 10 years ago. It's completely different. Like when I first came over into Canada, 25 years ago ago, it was it was the Sri Lankans were

in the kitchen, but they were assimilated into our into into the Canadian culture. Yeah. And they were really hard workers. They came through. They had the skills or they develop those skills really quickly. Right now, I feel that there is such a massive influx of people who do not have the skills that I'm looking for right But it's just it's just whitewashing. So it's it's it's quite it's way too much quantity and not enough quality It's startling better. You should see my inbox you'd be startled. Yeah, I know what I just skim read

They're all right, not necessarily the names. Yeah Hey Chris, thank you so much for adding your details to this story. That's a really important part of the conversation. I appreciate it. You take care. Let's welcome Andrew. No, that was Andrew. Let's welcome Chris. Sorry, Chris to the show. Chris, welcome. Great show. Let me just say, and really fantastic topic because, you know, I, so I hire a lot of general labor positions, so this is a perfect topic for that. I have to be honest with you, I go with the other caller just before. The amount of immigrants that are coming in is fine, but the skill set that they have

is very, very low. Second thing I'll say quickly too, because I know you're in a rush, if there's 10 people that are applying for this job or 10 interviews I have. I got like nine immigrants and one Canadian. And the reason why the Canadian is there is because their mom and their dad told them, you need to go get that job. I have to be honest with you. We're all here saying, where are these jobs for our kids and all these, but they don't even want them. They don't even want to work. And with all due respect, when they do get the job, then they're late, they don't really work that hard.

Interesting. Interesting. So it's not as simple as I've made it out to be. I appreciate it. Thanks, Chris. Thank you so much. Hey, Jay, welcome to the show. How are you, sir?

I'm doing pretty well. Thank you. What do you think of all this? I run a construction company up in the Cortholates and a lot of my friends I grew up with kind of are in the same trade with me and construction. And we got ads out all over trying to find workers. And I don't know, no one's calling. So I don't know. This guy's got 400 people. I don't have anyone in and I'm doing construction. Really? You would think I mean, I have to assume your construction jobs pay

pretty well. It's I'm shocked that the, that the well has run dry. It's, uh, yeah, we pay for a top installer between 35 and $40 an hour on the book. And, uh, there's no one behind us with pouches on I'm 40 years old. Yeah. Well, Hey, thank you so much. I think I got time for one more call and let's welcome John into the conversation. Yes. So here, I think the problem is twofold. Number one, a lot of these people from overseas who are coming to work, a lot of these employers

are being subsidized. My wife used to work at Jim Orton. That's exactly what happened. Government covers half the price. Yeah. So why, why would you hire a local kid when you can pocket the difference? Well therein lies the rub my friend. Frankly, that should not be the case. Hey, I wish I could hear the rest of your points but I want to thank you very much. I want to thank everybody for participating in this. Clearly it is not as simple as hiring Canadian.

There's a lot more into it. Perhaps we'll drill down into that a little deeper the next time. But thank you all for calling. Let me out! Rick put you in there for a reason, sweetie. Mom just asked! Whoa! Get back here! This is for your own good! Rick and Morty. New season, Sundays on Adult Swim. Stream on Stack TV.

Get your mouth rounded.