The Ben Mulroney Show - What's the Penalty for shooting a woman? Turns out it's just House Arrest

Episode Date: January 29, 2025

Guests and Topics: -What's the Penalty for shooting a woman? Turns out it's just House Arrest with Guest: Joseph Neuberger, Neuberger And Partners Criminal Lawyers, host of the podcast “Not On Record” -Doug Ford says it's time to say goodbye to Bike Lanes 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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Must be 19 years of age or older, Ontario only. Please gamble responsibly. Gambling problem? For free assistance, call the Connex Ontario Helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Happy Hump Day everybody. Thank you so much for joining us on the Ben Mulroney show on this Wednesday I want to say hello to everybody listening on CFPL in London and hello to everybody bracing for the snow here in Toronto on 640 Toronto. All right, it's a finally official. It was the worst kept secret

in politics we are officially in election season in Ontario and Doug Ford was asked point blank, I believe by Colin DeMello, why his government is seeking reelection. Right now, President Trump has put uncertainty, has put uncertainty to every single Canadian, a lot of other countries around the world. And this isn't going to happen overnight.

It may not happen February 1st. I'm sure something's coming. But this is going to be a battle for the next four years. And I want to make sure that I have a strong mandate to outlast President Trump. So it took him a while to get to that point. We've heard him say, I need a strong mandate to push back against these tariffs. I need a strong mandate to stand

up for my vision of Ontario within a strong Canada fortress am can. Now, it seems to have evolved into I need a mandate to outlive Donald Trump's administration. And I heard it, I let it sit with me, I thought about it, and I understand the logic behind that. That makes sense to me. I don't know that that is a reason enough to go to the polls, but I think it's a pretty decent argument. Yes, who knows what Donald Trump is gonna do today

or tomorrow or hour by hour. He is unpredictable. And I can get behind that. I can get behind that argument. I think he's gotta put far more meat on the bone for people to feel like they wanna get off the couch I think he's got to put far more meat on the bone for. For people to feel like they want to get off the couch and brave the cold and go vote. In the next election.

On February 29th, 7th, what's the 7th? Can't keep these dates straight, but. That to me is a step in the right direction in terms of the messaging of why we're in this election. Now he's got to show us what the next four years are going to mean in a renewed mandate of a progressive conservative government. And we've seen a few things. We've seen some of the things that have been put

in the window. We heard about the one and a half billion dollar re-imagining of healthcare. I was speaking with someone in the government yesterday about what that money actually means. And I believe Jane Philpott is gonna be speaking with Alex Pearson, who I believe will explain, get into the details of that cash injection

into the healthcare system. There are a lot of people who are very excited about this, they think that this could be revolutionary. And I'm very much looking forward to hearing Jane Philpott explain it. Because as I said yesterday, the devil is in the details. And we didn't have any details. It just looked like money being thrown down a rat hole. So give us more of that. And yeah, people might say to themselves,

I don't I don't want to switch horses in the middle of a Trump administration. Let's get it. Let's get ahead of that. Now we know what Doug Ford is promising as it relates to how he's going to talk to the Americans, how he's going to talk to Trump and how he's going to talk and he's going to defend Ontario within the confederation. And let's give him the mandate that we believe is the best of the three major options, so that we know that the sun will set on Donald Trump's time,

and we will have one consistent voice at Queens Park. That to me would be the argument that Doug Ford should put forth alongside some very meaningful policy initiatives. One of the policy initiatives that I thought was going to get off the ground, be off the ground by now, is the removal of the bike lanes. very excited when Doug Ford, as Josh Matlow said, meddled in this municipal jurisdiction. I thought he has 100% the right and the responsibility to do it. We'll talk about that a little bit later. But word is they're moving ahead with plans to remove the bike lanes. Part of me wonders, the cynic in me wonders, if they waited until

an election campaign was called so that people in Toronto would see that the bane of so many people's existence was starting to get removed. I mean, I want them gone by summer. That's what I want. I mean, did anyone see anyone in the bike lanes yesterday during the snow?

When we were all trying to get home at a snail's pace and there was one less lane on major arterial roads in this city, I didn't see a single bicycle yesterday. Not one. And of course you wouldn't see one. And you certainly won't see a hundred or a thousand. On days where we really needed that extra lane,

it was not available. You know, everybody gets mad when they see a when they see a double parked van that causes a choke point. What do you think a bike lane is? It's a permanent choke point. Like this spatial reason in 101, we have the same number of cars on using fewer lanes. You're going to have congestion. Anyway, I don't want to. Oh, actually, let's talk about right now. Let's hear what Josh Matlow said. The Toronto Council and other councils often find out about things that impact them by reading about them in the newspaper, rather than having a

provincial government that wants to work as a partner. That's not good government. Like, I'll give you an example. Bike lanes, whether you love them or hate them, most of us expect that the city government that we elect should have responsibility over how we design roads. And if you like the bike lanes, you can support them. And if you don't, you don't need to support them. But at least there's accountability at the level of government that we expect should have responsibility. Yeah, we stop it right there. I wanted to run in. I want to run in. I was on the other side of the street when I heard that listening on my phone. And I wanted to run in and I missed the opportunity

to have a conversation with Josh Matlow. Now, to be fair, he and I disagree on politics, but we've always had, always had respectful conversations. So that's how it would have gone. But what I would have said to Josh Matlow is, it's a little rich, it's a little disingenuous because the Yonge Street bike lane was touted as a pilot project.

And I know for a fact that the moment that they started making way for the bike lane, they started putting down permanent structures. So it was disingenuous to suggest that it was a pilot project. It was always meant to be permanent. And Brad Bradford sat opposite me on this very show where he said that when they were debating

the Yonge Street bike lane, the conversation was, do we put a bike lane on Avenue or do we put a bike lane on Yonge Street? And they decided that it was an either or proposition. It was binary, one or the other. They chose Yonge Street. So why are there all of a sudden bike lanes on an avenue? And so there is no accountability.

There's a bait and switch, it is agenda driven, it is about making experiencing cars worse, and it has choked productivity out of this city to the tune of $44 billion in lost revenue for the greater Toronto and Hamilton area. So it is absolutely not only in the purview, but it is the responsibility of the provincial government to say, you are depriving us of revenue.

And if you're gonna continue doing it with impunity, without consultation, without accountability, we are gonna deprive you of that ability to put these bike lanes wherever you want. And we are gonna get people to and from work faster so they can make money and they can spend money and we can get the revenue from it so we can give them the services that they depend on.

If you're not gonna act like the adult in the room, we are gonna act like the adult in the room. So that's what I would have said to Josh Matlow. And but again, I would have said it very politely. T.D. Direct Investing offers live support. That's what I would have said to Josh Matlow. But again, I would have said it very politely. Breaking news happens anywhere, anytime. Police have warned the protesters repeatedly, get back. CBC News brings the story to you, live. Hundreds of wildfires are burning.

Be the first to know what's going on and what that means for you and for Canada. This situation has changed very quickly. Helping make sense of the world when it matters most. Stay in the know. Download the free CBC News app or visit cbcnews.ca. Welcome back to the show and we are living in un-serious times, my friends. A young man who fired a handgun on a busy downtown Windsor

Street, wounding a woman, has been handed a conditional sentence to be served from home. Yes, this is our Canadian justice system in the works. And joining us to talk about, hopefully, to make sense of what I think is nonsense, is Joseph Neuberger of Neuberger and Partners Criminal Lawyers. He's also the podcast of Not On Record.

Joseph, can you explain this one to me? I thought we were living in a world where in Canada, handguns were supposed to be a thing of the past and somebody has one and wounds somebody and they are, the example we're setting of them is saying, you can't leave your house. Yeah, I hear you. Well, handguns are not gonna be a thing of the past.

I mean, they're quite prevalent. We have a lot of trafficking of firearms from the United States. So we're here to grapple with this for a long time. I think we need to look at this in a different perspective. So what it looks like is this individual spent 139 days in jail prior to getting a release. And so they get some credit for that. So you're looking

around six months, seven months jail credit. And then also the case took 781 days to get to trial or get to this place where he resolved. And he was on very strict bail conditions, which he has no breaches. So he would have abided by all his conditions for well over a two-year period. And as you know, the Supreme Court decision in Jordan says you've got timelines of about 30 months once you go to Superior Court. So this was one of those cases that was getting very close to what the timeline could be. So there could be alternative pressures on both the prosecution and sort of the court to try and bring this to a resolution without something else happening.

So I think we need that context as well. And all of it makes sense. That all makes sense. The context makes sense. But I go back, I go back to two things that one, the victim, I mean, by the grace of God was more injured. And two, the judge speaks of, you know, the deterrence being paramount in coming up with this sentence. But if I'm somebody who's got an illegal firearm and I'm in a heated moment and

I'm thinking to myself, I might want to pop one off, I might think to myself, well, look, you know, it's, I'm not going to face hard time no matter what I do it's uh, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna face hard time no matter what I do here. Like, I don't see where the deterrence was even considered. Yeah, no, I understand that because the conditional sense, you know, serving at home under house arrest does not strike really a balance between denunciation and really incapacitation where you take out an individual from society for a period of time because they're a risk and gun crimes are an offense this young lady could have easily been killed so this this should have resulted in in a jail sentence an actual jail sentence and I completely agree with you overall however I've always said that deterrence is a is a

fallacy people who commit these crimes don't stop and do the rational analysis that you just did unfortunately they just react on impulse or some don't care at all. And so you're going to have crimes that will be committed without that type of calculus to determine what my sentence will be. Crimes involving firearms have to result in sentences that are more meaningful. And there are more meaningful sentences out there which are not reported on people are getting Multi-year if not double-digit sentences for crimes. They're involving robbery with loaded firearms of invasions Etc and shooting, you know where you have these attempt murders in a public area Again, they're looking at sentences in excess of 10 15 20 years. So they're out there They're just not reported on much. But there are these aberrations that is a problem. And a conditional sentence, I will agree with you 100%, does

not speak to deterrence, and more importantly, to denunciation. In other words, this type of conduct, regardless of what circumstances you were in, cannot be condoned in Canada. Well Joseph Neuberger, thank you very much. You brought some much needed context to this story and I thank you and I hope you have a great day. You too, thank you very much. You brought some much needed context to this story, and I thank you and I hope you have a great day. You too, Ben, be well. All right, so now I put it to our listeners at 416-870-6400, one, triple eight, two, two, five, talk.

Let's use Joseph Neuberger's words as backdrop for this conversation. That what he just said, I think, made complete sense to me. You know, there's a lot of nuance there. The fact that there are, in fact, very harsh sentences handed out to people who use guns to perpetrate crimes. But the stories that are reported on are these types of stories, the leniency,

the people who get off easy. I may push back a little bit on the idea that criminals, if they have a gun, they're gonna use it and they're not gonna do that calculus that I just did about, oh, well, I don't wanna end up in jail, so I won't do the crime. I believe that there is a feeling out there that you will do the crime

if you know you won't do any time. And that's almost pervasive everywhere. It's ubiquitous. It just feels like we don't care about the victims and instead we worry about the criminals themselves and how can we best get them back on the streets as quickly as possible. Now that might not be a complete and accurate depiction of the reality on the ground, but it's what people feel.

And I think we've done a disservice. Maybe it's how these things are being reported. But I do think there's an element of the criminal justice system that is far too lenient in places where there should be no lenience, none, especially because we're living in the Trudeau in Trudeau's Canada, where every gun they want to take every gun off the streets. So if there's a crime involving a gun, every single crime should be a crime on which we make an example of the criminal to deter anybody from using a gun. You've made them illegal. Yes, they're still coming across the border, but you have made your position clear. Gun violence will not stand. Back it

up with action. Jonathan, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Yeah, hi, I just, you know, as a legal gun owner, um, and somebody that, you know, I just had a whole bunch of, you know, guns banned that I use illegally and properly and stored them safe and everything I'm supposed to do. The punishments are actually harsher for us. Yeah. And we don't do any of the crime.

Whereas this guy that has an illegal gun, he's on house arrest, which is ridiculous. Like if that was, if I was to point a fake gun at somebody, I would be thrown in jail for years. Yeah. Oh, remember the story over the summer of the person with the squirt gun? This person with the squirt gun.

Exactly. Yeah, this kid with the squirt gun was arrested because of assault with a firearm. The system is backwards. Now that might be an outlier case, but it's still something we talk about. And Jonathan, it must infuriate you as a legal gun owner to read stories about this like this.

Yeah, especially when you know, guns that were purchased after the last gun ban, when Trudeau says, well, there's a whole bunch of guns that are that are still you can go buy. So go buy those. A lot of people went and bought those and spent thousands of dollars on those. And then, he told us to, and then they became banned. And now we, you know what I mean? Like it's unbelievable. And what is that solving?

Like absolutely nothing. Whereas they position themselves as, you know, trying to make everybody safe by giving, you know, the analogy is like, it's like somebody that drives illegally, you know, it's like punishing people that have a license, you know, or making it harder for people to have a license to punish people that drive without a license. It's insane. Absolutely. Well, thank you for your call, Jonathan. I appreciate it. And that, that to me is, is one of the most frustrating things is every year on the anniversary of the massacre

at the École Polytechnique in Montreal, because the guy, what, 30 years ago used a rifle, that is now the lightning rod and the excuse and the cover that the Trudeau liberals use to go after lawful gun owners. Every year they trot it out, they go and they say, oh, look, we're tough on crime. And then they tighten laws that do nothing to solve gun violence. And then when we have a story of actual gun violence

with somebody using an actual illegal firearm, they could have killed somebody. I don't care if they're sorry. I do not care if you're sorry. I don't care that you are empathetic for the person that you injured. I don't care if they're sorry. I do not care if you're sorry. I don't care that you are empathetic for the person that you injured. I don't care anymore. I care about the victim.

I care about society. I care about people feeling safe walking down their streets. And the only way to do that is to throw the book at anybody who uses a gun. I don't care. And I know that we're stuck in this world where the rule is that if it takes a certain amount of time to get to trial, then that has to be factored in.

Okay, fine. But within the confines of that, throw the goddamn book at anybody who uses a firearm every single time. I guarantee you people will think twice. People will think twice after that. Instead, you've got people who are reading the same news I'm reading, hearing the same stories I'm hearing. On the same social media platforms that I am, they see the same images over and over and over again of repeat criminals doing violent crimes with illegal guns. And they do them over and over.

Why? Because they get out on bail or they get a slap on the wrist or they say they are sorry and so they get a conditional release. They're seeing the same things we are and that is creating an atmosphere of a sense of entitlement to do crime. If you threw the book at every one of these guys, I guarantee you some of them would think twice. This is the Ben Mulroney show and earlier today on the Greg Brady show, City Councilor Josh Matlow joined Greg because he's got to be in his bonnet. He has an issue with, I guess you could call it governmental overreach. He believes that the province is overstepping the bounds and meddling in places where the city

should have exclusive agency. Let's listen. Toronto Council and other councils often find out about things that impact them by reading about them in the newspaper rather than having a provincial government that wants to work as a partner. That's not good government. Like I'll give you an example, bike lanes, whether you love them or hate them. Most of us expect that the city government that we elect should have responsibility over how we design roads. And if you like the bike lanes, you can support them. And if you don't, you don't need to support them. But at least there's accountability at the level of government that we expect should

have responsibility over that. We do expect our city government to be responsible. But in my humble opinion, as somebody who has been affected negatively, adversely, in so many ways, on so many roads, by so many bike lanes, I take issue. I believe the government of this city has been acting irresponsibly. So I wanna hear from you at 416-870-6400.

Give us a call at 1-888-225-TALK. The reason the provincial government needs to step in is because left to their own devices City Hall would have never taken away the bike lanes. In fact, they would have added more. So I want to hear stories from you. Rob, welcome to the show. How you doing? Well, I'm in London. And it's the same thing here. They go willy-nilly throwing all these bike

lanes up, congesting traffic, and then on top of that there's construction, and then the city starts complaining that their CO2 emissions have risen because now there's all these vehicles sitting in lines and congested traffic idling. then they they spent extra money to put traffic lights in the bike lanes that are in sync with the traffic light for the cars so if you're so stupid that you cannot look up and see a green or a red light on the traffic light yeah without having your own personal bike lane traffic light you probably shouldn't be riding that light. Thank you. Rob, thank you very much. And the issues that you have in London are mirrored perfectly here in Toronto. And here's where I'm gleeful about the Ontario government coming in,

because I don't like being talked to like I'm an idiot. I don't like being told, no, no, what you're seeing with your eyes is not real. The congestion that you see on Yonge Street in Toronto, that's not due to the bike lane. That's not due to the fact that we've literally reduced the number of lanes by 50%. It's not because of that same number of cars, half as many lanes. That's not causing congestion. What's causing congestion is anything else that we're not in control of. That's BS. That's BS. And when you talk to me like I'm an idiot, I go find somebody I can talk to

who's going to treat me with respect. Nathan, welcome to the show. No, I said Jason, not Nathan. Oh, Jason, welcome. Yeah, hi. So the problem is that those decisions have been made as political decisions. They are not evidence-based decision making. And I think that has been part of the issues with not only about bike lanes,

but other decisions at City Hall. It's driven by ideology instead of relying on evidence to make a decision. Yeah, Jason, you're absolutely right. And thank you. And I completely agree. There is an ideology that is not based in the evidence that we can have bike lanes like they have in, like the Dutch.

Well, the weather there is a little different. The cities are built differently. And let's be honest, the only people that I see on a regular basis using the bike lanes are e-bikes for Uber Eats and food delivery apps. So it's like an HOV lane for food delivery apps. Never mind the fact that if you have an e-bike, you're not supposed to be in the bike lane. Never mind that. And then did anyone see any bicycles yesterday during a terrible snowstorm? Of course not. I don't

see anybody. That's not true. There's certain bike lanes that do in fact work. I hear Richmond and Adelaide are very popular. Keep them. Keep them. No problem there. If those are bike highways that get people out of their cars and they're worth the cost, keep them! I have seen no evidence to suggest that the bike lanes up and down the city, going north-south, do anything but hinder our ability to go north-south in our cars. And what you're doing is you're turning us into a sort of our version of Los Angeles, a city of neighborhoods where you don't leave your hood. You if you live in midtown, you're gonna stay in

midtown. If you live in downtown, you're gonna stay downtown. But under no circumstances, are you going to go to a restaurant south of where you live, because you don't want the hassle. And so yes, the city is saying, you are deliberately through ideological reasons, choking the life out of this city, choking the productivity out of its citizens, reducing their quality of life. You're also hindering the environment because the TTC still sucks.

So you're not driving them to the TTC. So they're still in their cars. They would rather be miserable alone in their cars than be miserable in a tin can with a bunch of strangers. So they're stuck in their cars idling, causing environmental damage, not getting to work on time, not having the extra free time to spend their disposable income, which means they're not spending money at restaurants, which means they're not paying taxes. spending money at restaurants, which means they're not paying taxes. And so there's less economic activity to the tune

in the GTHA of 44 billion dollars a year. That some of that money belongs to the province. So in a lot of ways, this is government overreach by the municipality messing with the coffers of Queen's Park. And they're coming in saying not on our anymore, because left to your own devices, you're gonna put even more bike lanes in. So we're not gonna let you do that. Focus on what you need to do.

Get the city moving. The people of Toronto deserve to get from point A to point B safely and effectively and as quickly as possible. Steve, welcome to the show. Ben, how are you? I'm well. Where do you find yourself this morning? Oh, I'm on Bloor Street right now and it is an absolute disaster. You're stuck in it's gridlock. Yeah. And I don't and you know what's funny? I just saw two skip the dishes e-bikes in the bike lanes and nothing else. Well, exactly. And they're not supposed to be. They're supposed to share the road with you.

But hey, you were just, it's very interesting what you're saying because call me a conspiracy theorist when you're describing a 15 minute city. Yeah, exactly. That's what they want. Are you not? Yeah, that's what they want.

They want everybody to be within 15 minutes of whatever they need. And if that means keeping them in their neighborhood and not allowing them the liberty and the freedom to travel anywhere in the city,'s just fine by them yeah yeah if i'm at avenue canning is that Danforth and pharmacy and it takes me an hour and 15 minutes to get there there is a problem oh yeah well there's a lot of problem yeah we're at Danforth yeah certain street you just got to get rid of them yeah i, I 100% agree on on the roads where they work, keep them. But they don't show us the data, by the way, they don't show us the data. And the numbers that they quote, I don't believe I do not believe because I've seen with my own eyes, I've literally sat there on Yonge Street at a cafe in the summertime, the numbers don't bear it out. People aren't using them. And then someone will

call in and say, Well, I use it. Okay, so you're the one that you don't just have an anecdotal one doesn't work for me. George, welcome to the show. Oh, hey, Ben, lovely show. Thank you. You know, you're perfect when you're talking about government overreach from the municipal side. And, you know, I don't know if you've mentioned Vision Zero at all, but Vision Zero is basically what's giving the bike lanes, brought the bike lanes to the entire city. With one decision, the city has given themselves extraordinary powers to change the roads everywhere without public consultation. And it's one of the things I've been battling to I'm actually near Hyde Park and they've used that as a excuse to stop people from

going into the park and based on their principles and it's just ridiculous. Yeah, and then yeah, and let me add to that George, I listen vision zero on its face makes sense. Nobody wants anybody anybody to die on our streets and And one death is too many deaths. However, does anybody think with the number going up, does anybody think that drivers just woke up one day and became blood thirsty? Or that we all of a sudden woke up one day

and we were worse drivers? Absolutely not. The makeshift hodgepodge, slapdash manner in which these bike lanes have been put down confuses the heck out of everyone to the point that I say, essentially what you're asking drivers to do is they learned how to juggle with three balls. And then the city comes with mission vision zero and says, turns off the lights, turns on a strobe light, throws them three more balls and says, keep them all in the air. And then they wonder when a ball drops and they're shocked at it. And that justifies doubling down on bike lanes. When I contend the bike lanes are one of the reasons the streets are less safe. We're joined now by Joe.

Joe, you're in the suburbs. What do you think of all this? Good morning. I like your show. Thank you. I'll say where the city's priorities are. I work early shift. So I live off Victoria Park and Huntingwood,

North York, Canada. Guess what was out there early in the morning? The city was on it. The plows. Guess what? They plowed the bike lanes and the main artery was not plowed. Yeah, that's that's that feels right, Joe. That feels that feels on, on brand for this city. I'm sorry that happened. I do hope that you're safe on the roads. Thank you so much for calling. Hey, let's welcome from the Ontario Safety League, Brian Patterson.

Brian, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Hi, Ben. Yeah, no, I think as I was saying, the lack of courtesy that's developed over the last eight or nine years is just unworkable. And I see it every day. I watched somebody today in a dump truck, fully loaded dump truck on the 400,

where there's every now and then there's these areas that get wind swept with snow. And he just barreled through an inch behind the car that was in front of him. Well, you know, I think, and Brian, listen, there's a lot of blame to go around. And I think a lot of it should be shouldered by drivers who are discourteous.

But I think the city has done everyone a disservice by changing the rules of the road, but not following up with educational programs to inform the other people on the road what their responsibilities are. And I'll give you a very specific example. Do you remember when the city put in the countdown clocks at crosswalks with the 10, nine, eight, seven, six pedestrians were not informed that once that hand starts

flashing, they no longer have the right of way at that point. If they are not in the intersection and a driver is trying to take a right, the driver has priority. Nobody in this city knows that that is the rule of the road. And so drivers are sitting there waiting to get through, but pedestrians think that that light, that countdown is telling them, you still have 10 seconds to get across.

That creates frustration and anxiety and anger in drivers. And the city did a disservice to everyone. Absolutely. And they have four or five different models of how the timing works. So people aren't sure when it goes to zero, is it going to turn red or is it going to turn yellow? Or do you have 15 more seconds?

The decision I think that's placed a lot of people at risk was that they open up the sidewalk before you can make the right hand turn or your left hand turn to clear. Oh, I agree. I remember when John Tory did that. I thought that was nonsensical because you've got you've got cars that are blocking the box and if you just gave them that right of way to say, okay, pedestrians, you have to wait 15 seconds, but then it's all yours.

You could clear two or three cars instead. He did the exact opposite. Oh, and I, I used to go. Instead, he did the exact opposite. Oh, and I used to go to Queen's Park on a regular basis. And like Wellesley went from two lanes in both directions to the bike lane. And then the bike lane meant that if the person in five cars ahead of you wants to make a left,

it may take two light cycles for you to get through. I think when I say the frustration, not that it's, much of it is created and that people are just frustrated, but the, you know, your sister wanted to bring back Elmer the safety elephant. I couldn't have had a better time than working with her as the Minister of Transport.

And she brought in more good news for everybody else. But boy, I tell you, the city and they take it as a, you know, Josh Matlow, the king of I'm right and you're wrong. Oh, well, just every four years you can vote me out. Really, Josh? Yeah, it's, incumbency is a hell of a superpower. Once you're in, it's hard to dislodge you. And not to say it's impossible, but once you're a city councillor, of a superpower. Once you're in, it's hard to dislodge you. And not to say it's impossible, but once you're a city councilor, the next time around you're more likely to remain a city councilor.

So it's not as, it's I think very reductive to say this is a city responsibility and they should make the decisions and then they're accountable to the voters. It's not that simple. No, no, but they have picked within their planning department, some of the dumbest ideas that issue at Dundas Square, where they went, okay, we'll let everybody go in whatever direction they want for a minute and a half. Yeah, it's our traffic back to university. People couldn't

get through. Then they pick other routes. And what what I see in other in a lot of areas people take the Route through the community. Yeah. Oh, well, I can't turn there. So I'll jog here and I'll speed down a 40-kilometer roadway. Yeah, I have no concern. I always laugh with these These people want to say oh they got I always laugh with these people who want to say, oh, they got 10,000 tickets were issued in my neighborhood. That's a tax grab. Yeah.

No, 10,000 people were speeding through your neighborhood and they've now got an opportunity to correct their driving. Yeah, I just think that things would go a lot better on our roads, even in their current state, if there was a feeling that everybody knew what their roles, rights and responsibilities were. And I think one of the reasons drivers are aggressive, and it's not just because they're

they'll speed through a yellow when they normally would be more patient, they speed through the yellow because they don't know if they're ever going to hit another green, is because they drivers feel like they haven't been listened to to and drivers feel like everything is on them. I had a conversation with a cyclist on this show who said, in a fight between you and me, you can kill me. And I said, well, I know that and I behave accordingly. Why don't you behave like you know that I can kill you? Why don't you see that I'm pulling, taking a right hand turn and rather than use the brake that comes standard on every bicycle? Why don't you slow down so I can make my right hand turn? Oh

No, I I the door The the you know the door prize the story. It's the same thing. I'm a motorcycle rider. I can tell you I'm very cautious when I realize somebody just pulled into a parking space. They're going to open the door at some point. So, no, the cycling community, I hope, has had their day and a more collaborative education-based process is going to come out of it. But it seems, I remember, can you imagine somebody's been

killed and they weren't wearing a helmet. Here's an excellent opportunity to remind people, everybody should wear a helmet. No, but instead it's the driver, the driver causes and the driver did cause it, but that doesn't mean there's not enough blame to go around. Brian, we're going to leave it there, but I hope I hope we can have you as a guest on the show sometime. Anytime, my friend. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, we got Jeff on the on the phone. Jeff, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Hey, Ben. You know, we seem to think I have the discussion that cyclists are just cyclists. A lot of these cyclists, or most of them, I would I would contend are drivers themselves. They just choose to ride their bicycles.

So what they're doing on the bicycles is what they do when they're driving because these cyclists are also drivers. So it's not like we have a set of drivers and a set of cyclists and neither of them overlap. That's entirely possible, Jeff. But I would also say like, I know that when I'm a pedestrian, I hate drivers and when I'm a driver, I hate pedestrians.

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