The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Good Talk -- Made in China.

Episode Date: January 16, 2026

Mark Carney was in China for the past few days and leaves with a pocketful of deals. Sounds good but how good is it? It's a busy Good Talk with more on the agenda, from the resignation of Quebec's premier to what exactly is Canada's position on Greenland? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Are you ready for good talk? And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here, along with Chantelle-A-Barre and Bruce Anderson. It's your Friday Good Talk. And as always, there's lots to talk about today. As we sit here, they're just wrapping up a Friday night dinner and glad-handed in Beijing between the Canadian delegation and the reporters who are covering it and the Chinese delegation who has been meeting with them. After what appears to have been, and we'll talk about that, a successful trip as far as

Mark Carney is concerned, because deals were made. There have been a variety of different opinions expressed about all these. I want to start before we get into particulars on the general assessment of Canada and China. Given the fact that it was as little as 10 years ago, we basically, came as close to breaking off relations as one can get, saying they didn't fit our values and, et cetera, those kind of terms used by the Prime Minister of the day, Justin Trudeau.

At this day of meetings that has been in Beijing today, the Prime Minister told reporters, among other things, when asked about that, that relationship, he said, we take the world as it is, not as we wish it to be. that being the new sense of the relationship between Canada and China. I want to talk for a moment about what that means to us before we get into the particulars of the trip.

Chantelle, why don't you start us? Well, it's certainly closer to the truth than the old mentor, which was in the Christen era. We are engaging with China benefiting from it and in the process doing good work for democracy because the more we engage economically, the more China will become democratic, which didn't happen. Also, didn't happen that lecturing the Chinese, everyone knows, does bring results. I do think that many Canadians are already watching Mark Carney's government

to see where the red lines are on a number of issues. For instance, it's not a fiction, it's a fact that a number of Chinese products available for export are manufactured and are cheap because the equivalent of slave labor is involved in their production. There are other issues of that nature. That being said, it's impossible to ignore China entirely. and in an era when you have to choose whether you're going to be subservient to a major trading partner of the U.S. that basically has a president that goes around saying he doesn't really care about anything that you manufacture and he wants to do without you, if you're Canada, a medium-sized power, not a major power,

you need to be looking out for how you are going to find a place in an environment that bears zero resemblance to the environment that we were in five, seven, nine years ago. Where are you on this, Bruce, on this issue of the potential gains, benefits versus potential risk? I definitely think that we're in a world where Canadians are trying to figure out what their red lines should be in a world where realism is, has a premium attached to it. People see the world as it is. They're anxious about the world as it is. The starting point for that was the change in the U.S. government,

in particular the very aggressive foreign policy and trade policy of the Trump administration. The meetings that are being held in China right now are a direct consequence of U.S. aggression towards Canada and other allies, and we're not the only country that is approaching the relationship with China in a different way. I think it's understandable that China sees itself in a situation where it has more leverage because of the way that the United States is approaching the rest of the world.

And it seems to be sending a message that if you want to do business with us, that's fine, but you can't endlessly moralize about how things operate in our country. Now, I think that's going to make some people uncomfortable in Canada, and I understand why, and I agree with Chantelle about the risks that we've seen in terms of does doing more business with China subtly or otherwise endorse some of the practices that we know happen in China? I think those are all questions that are part of the new normal, which is that there are no perfect choices. There are no choices that are easy to make. And I think this setting up the dynamic in terms of Canadian politics where the conservative position on these, maybe we'll spend a little bit more time on it, on these choices, is going to be different from the Carney government's position on these choices. and Canadians, I think, ultimately, will have a choice to make about which version of engagement with the rest of the world makes the most sense to them feels like it's most likely to serve their interests and support their values. You know, some of the principles have described this in, you know, different ways.

We heard what the prime minister said, but his phrase was earlier in the introduction. The Chinese President Xi talked about a turnaround of ties. Some conservatives, but especially some Republicans in the United States, have gone real aggressive on this. Trump hasn't really said anything yet. He may well do at some point today. But one Republican, leading republic called what the witnessing, what Carney was doing in Beijing as as anisine.

another described it as a grovel session. Is this kind of like expected, given our current state of relationships, and should anybody care one way or the other about what Americans are saying about what appears to be part of the New World Order? Well, you can't have everything. If you're the U.S., you can't send your ambassador to speak to a Canadian crowd to say we don't need Canada. Okay, fine.

I mean, you don't need me. I'm going to go and live differently, right? Have your president go around saying he doesn't care one way or the other about the major trade deal that he himself renegotiated with Canada and Mexico. And then if you don't want anything that Canada does, and if you don't need Canada, then you should not care. But you can't have one and the other. and basically the signals from the U.S. administration and from those that you quote, since the beginning of the visit, have all been, we don't need you. Well, you know, to Mark Carney's point, at least Mark Carney did not try to say

the Chinese government is in the process of transitioning to a more open society. He didn't try to pretend that he was doing this with his. different China. One of his ministers, Melanie Jolie, said, we're walking into this with our eyes wide open. I do believe that many Canadians

and the Canadian government have their eyes wider open than when Justin Trudeau set out to try to restart a more constructive relationship with China. But, you know, to give you a sense of

you talk about risks, Yes, the Canadian delegation and the journalist to cover this, when they, prior to landing in China, shut down their phones and got burner phones for the duration of the visit. Why? Because notoriously, the Chinese government uses its powers to look into cell phones to invade them and, you know, to find out whatever is in it. The fact that this was done is one caution, but it's also a sign that our eyes are wider open than they were because I don't remember a trade mission to China where people on the prime minister's plane traded their phone for burner phones. And I'm not too sure there are many countries that the prime minister visits

where that is the practice. Except in the United States. More and more Canadians are using burn their phones. But exactly. That is basically reality. As we know it today, you, I, Bruce, could not have imagined that maybe burner phones aren't a bad idea to go to the U.S. either two years ago. It would have been an Lplandish notion.

But increasingly, people are thinking long and hard about what's on their cell phone before they crossed the border to the U.S. Let me just say the whole idea of the Chinese listening in on what you're doing is historic, right, over the last 50, 80 years, basically since 1949. I mean, I can remember going to China in 76 and getting in there and filing right away because at that point, Deng Xiaoping was in re-education somewhere and nobody really knew where he was. And so I did a report on the little briefing I'd had. from the Canadian embassy officials that night about where Dengh was,

and I'd called him Deng Xiaoping. And at breakfast the next morning, my listener, interpreter person looked at me and said, it's Deng Xiaoping, not Deng Shelfing. There was only one way he could have known that. It's actually built into walls. You know, he built an embassy, know that there will be mics built into walls.

Peter, can I just pick up on that on Chantel's reference to eyes wide open? And I think that's such an important way of understanding how the world is going right now. I completely agree that one of the things that the Carney government has been careful to do is not to pretend that this is something other than realignment of our economic priority setting and the pursuit of economic opportunities because our traditional economic opportunities with the United States. aren't what they used to be. And to maintain that focus, to maintain a kind of a positive dialogue, but without a lot of flowery kind of aspirations that have a lot to do with shared values. That eyes wide open approach, I think, is similar to what we see other countries taking and how they're approaching a lot of the choices that they have to make going forward.

It's almost as though the only country that doesn't seem to have its eyes wide open is the United States. And it was interesting to me that I wasn't at this, but some people I know were at it and took notes. The U.S. Ambassador Pete Huxter, who we've talked about on this program before, was in Montreal, and he attended the meeting of the Chamber of Commerce. And in that session, he talked about, he was different from what he had previously been doing. And he spoke about the relationship as a relationship that works, which, you know, is sort of a rapprochement signal of some sort. But he also said that the U.S. is following the polls in Canada and are concerned to see that Canadians are more open to China right now than they are with the United States. I don't know exactly how he put it.

But our interest in doing more business with China was preoccupying for the United States. Now, it's surprising to me that they're surprised to see that because Canadians are very pragmatic about this. They're looking at it and saying, well, to Chantelle's point, if you don't want to do business with us, you know, that's disappointing. Maybe you'll change your mind about that, but we have to do business as we are a trading nation. And for me, the larger point is that across many different sectors, whether it's automotives, maybe in the financial sector, maybe in the defense sector, maybe in the technology sector, a lot of the policies of the Trump administration are going to create bigger and bigger headwinds for those global enterprises, those American-based global enterprises going forward.

And I can't help but wonder if they're not like, they're not putting their economy in a situation of that frog in the pan of water where the temperature just goes up and up and up and they don't notice it. And at some point, the thing that they may have been trying to accomplish, which is to contain the power of China and expand the power of the United States actually works out in exactly the opposite direction, that more countries are doing more business with China, that China is expanding its influence

and its economic relationships with the world. And America is putting a cap on its growth because of this isolationist tendency and because of all of these measures that just keep popping up out of nowhere, which are quite damaging, I think, to the interests of American companies. You know, you learn something every day on this show.

And I didn't know about frogs in boiling water and that it takes them a while to realize what's happening. But I know that. If you don't live in Quebec, it's a familiar figure used by sovereignthus to explain how the decline of the French language. You hear it regularly. How is it said in French?

What's the expression in French? That's the same thing in Grenoille in L'Buyant, which is slowly, you know, being cooked. And I'm not sure that people are used to have, are totally aware of the reference to the word frog as it used to be used. When I was growing up in Toronto to talk about those of us who had an accent that sounded French. Okay. Let's move on to some of the cooking details on this trade deal.

Because there are things that clearly are going to be asked when the delegation gets back to Canada. And it was a big delegation. It wasn't just the prime minister in the traveling. Press, there were four or five cabinet ministers, there were all kinds of discussions and potential deals being made. But let's kind of circle the major two, which seems to be the often whispered over these past couple of months. In fact, I remember mentioning this couple months ago, and Bruce kind of downplayed it said,

no, no, there are too many risks in this. But there's a whole idea of canola for autos. For EVs, especially. And canola is a huge deal for Canadian farmers, not just in the West, especially though in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, but also in central Canada, in Ontario, the Chinese tariffs on canola and getting them reduced considerably. While at the same time, Canada is reducing the tariffs for electric vehicles coming into Canada.

Tell me about the... this, is this about this deal and the potential once again risks in it? Doug Ford has already spoken about the auto issue. It's a careful step on EVs. We're not lifting tariffs on EVs from China. We are allowing 49,000 vehicles to come in with much lower tariffs than a 100% tariff that is currently applied. and there is language there and who knows if it's just language about the possibility of the Chinese operating opening auto plants in Ontario,

which the Premier said would be what he would want in exchange for the dropping of tariffs. So will it lead to this or will it just be a one-off? I can't answer that. I don't know how Premier Ford is going to react to that, but it certainly is not the all were lifting tariffs that he really feared. I'm also curious to see because it's a baby step, I think. I think the press release from the PMO says it's about 3% of cars sold in Canada, which is a very minute amount. I'm curious about the reactions south of the border, obviously. but at the same time, Premier Moe from Saskatchewan was part of the delegation.

My understanding was that he was in the general area of Asia and he was invited to join. And from where he says, canola is a big deal. So is, I think, the lifting of tariffs on seafood for other regions of the country, which kind of makes life a bit more complicated for the conservatives in the sense that two of their arguments over the past few months have been, the prime minister keeps traveling and comes back empty-handed. Well, that is not quite the case. But what he is bringing home, if you want to take shots at him for selling out on EVs, you are pitting yourself against prairie premiers who have tended to be the staunchest allies of the current federal conservative

party. So the politics of this will be interesting. Me, I suspect that Premier Ford will probably keep pushing to have more investment in the auto industry and this province from China rather than go to war over those 49,000 vehicles. But I could be wrong. I'm glad you did the 3% figure because 49,000 vehicles sounds like a lot of vehicles. And it is a lot of vehicles, let's face it. but it represents, according to the government's figures, 3% of the autos coming into the country. So that's...

We're not studying the market here. Well, it's a good thing, Peter, that there's transcripts of these because I need to go back to find out the thing that you said that I said when I said you were wrong. But I don't... You didn't say I was wrong. You said more along the lines of it,

it's a lot more complicated that or it's a, you know, it's a risky venture going into this. Yes, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so, okay. So we agree then. And we did then probably. But look, I think Chantelle's point about there are three dimensions to the, to the auto move. One is, you know, I think people like the idea of auto production in Canada. and the U.S. under Trump is making it really clear that they do not want us to be in the auto manufacturing business.

They're also making it clear that as an administration, they do not believe in electric vehicles. I saw in the New York Times the other day a reference to the U.S. policy on automotives. It was referred to as industrial suicide, that they were so putting their car companies in reverse. in terms of the forward-looking strategies, the kind of success that they could have in the future if they continue to pursue their investment in e-vehicles. It's part of the Frog in the Water story for me for sure. But if they're going to do that, we can't do that with them and succeed. And I think Premier Ford knows that.

And I think that the Canadians who work in the automotive sector also know that. The second thing is, would we ever be able to imagine seeing automotive production from China and Canada? I don't know, but I do know that BYD, I think, doubled a number of vehicles that it sold outside of China in one year alone from 2024 to 2025. It's a million vehicles that they sold outside of China. I gather in the last year alone. I don't think they're looking for very, very slow gains around the world. I think they're looking to expand their penetration into the auto market around the world. And then there's the technology question, which the conservatives have focused on a lot. Why would we allow these cars to be in our market,

collecting data, and allowing China to have a lot of information about us? I think this is an extraordinarily tricky question. But these cars are in a lot of countries around the world. There are a lot of Chinese products, not just cars, in our countries. I think one of the questions that people have to decide how comfortable they are with is, do we want affordable, high-quality vehicles? And if so, are we going to keep these out of the market because of apprehensions about a technology issue? And it's above my pay grade to know how serious this threat is. But it is certainly the case that if we want to be in the automotive business, If we want affordable electric vehicles, there aren't that many choices that involve America right now.

And so this is maybe a small step, but it's a step that hopefully helps solve some of the challenges that we see in this sector today. And maybe it's a bit of a wake-up call for North American auto manufacturers that if they want to defend their businesses, if they want to succeed in the long term, they need to recognize that if you shut off relationships with the rest of the world, including your biggest value chain partners, they're going to make other choices. Well, how could they not? Okay. I think that's enough on this subject. We may come back to it threaded through the remaining conversations,

but I do want to talk about things that are happening inside the Conservative Party, things that are happening inside the NDP. but I also want to talk and what's next up after the break the change that's happening in Quebec and what it means, not only for Quebecers, but what it could potentially mean for the rest of the country.

So we'll talk about that. Well, we'll talk about that right after this. And welcome back. You're listening to the Friday Good Talk right here on Sirius XM, Channel 167, Canada Talks, or on your favorite podcast platform. Or you're watching us on our YouTube channel. channel. Chantelle Ibert, Bruce Anderson here, along with Peter Mansbridge, and glad to have you with us.

Okay, not surprisingly, because we've been kind of hinting at it for the last month, six months at least, because of these problems in the polls. Quebec's Premier Legault has decided he's going to step down. He's going to resign and has called for a leadership convention and a new leader for his party. this all on the eve of an election. When is it due until this fall of 26? Early October. Okay. So what is LaGault's departure? As much as it was kind of expected in many circles,

what does it mean for the province? What does it mean for the country? It means that if someone tells you that he or she knows the outcome of the next Quebec election, you should take a pass on the prediction. Because this and everything that's happened over the past month in Quebec amounts to a major game change, but a very unpredictable one. It's not just that the leading party in the National Assembly,

the governing party is now looking for a leader for the first time in its history, because remember, Francois Legoe is the party founder of the Coalition of Avenir Quebec, and he is the man who put together. a party were savantist and federalists laid down their weapons on that front to work together inside the party. So will this leadership campaign, first question, is the unity of the CAQ possible under a different leader, or will we see a fight to the finish between two factions on the unity issue that sees the faction that loses walk away to one or the other parties, that are the usual, the Patskyvik and the liberals, the usual warriors when there's a referendum.

But the liberals are also looking for a leader because Pablo Rodriguez quit over the Christmas break. So the official opposition and the government for the time being and less than a year to the election are leaderless and are shopping for a leader. People said that it was, and I did, reshuffling the cars, I think Andrew Coyne on that issue at the better figure. Someone lego to all the cards are up in the air this week,

and nobody knows how they will fall. But first question, there is not a Mark Carney waiting behind a curtain to take over the CAQ. That's not been happening. There have been comparison this week. Someone from the business community. That's not how it works. Mark Carney was maybe not in politics until he appeared on the scene last year. but his name was around for more than a year.

There are serious people in the liberal movement in Canada that had been working towards its entry in politics. Nothing like that has been happening, and there has not been a high-profile outsider name that's been named. But there are similarities. The Patskiewiko has been ahead in the polls for months and months and months. The last poll, the one that was the killer poll, just before the Premier resigned,

basically the next morning, have the Coalition Avenir Quebec at 11%. That means 89% of Quebecers were set to not vote for the CAQ, which basically translated in zero seats if an election had been held with those numbers. It's hard to imagine you can't do better going from there, and it should be noted that the most unpopular signature policy that will be part and parcel of this campaign is the Patskevique request promise to hold a referendum on sovereignty.

66% of voters from poll to poll to poll say they're not interested, they don't want a referendum. Those voters will be looking for an option to stop that from happening. And they now have more options, a different liberal leader and a different CAQ leader,

and that could well turn policy St. Pierre Plamando, the PQ leader, into the Quebec version of Pierre Paulyev, someone who was premier for as long as the election was called and then saw a significantly disappear. Or not, Quebecers traditionally use campaigns to make up their minds. Everyone who has become a change premier in Quebec has come from behind so far. That was the case with Francois Legoe the first time. It was Jean Chariès's case. Philip Cuyard, Pauline, I go down the list.

So whoever leads in July may not be the premier in October. That's why I'm telling you, if someone wants to tell you, here's a safe bet, put money on this, don't. Bruce, you got any thoughts on this? I think this is a good development for federalism, for people who don't want a referendum, who don't want Quebec to separate. I think the Shantel put her finger exactly on the point that is the most interesting one to me, which is that these cards being thrown up in the year has left one party settled with a premium promise

that the market doesn't want. And it was, you know, maybe it wasn't going to harm them too much if nothing else changed. but now they've got a really difficult choice to make, which is on the basis of just looking at the numbers, you'd find some way to unwind that promise because I don't know that there's been a worse time imaginable to put to Quebecers the idea of what if we broke away from Canada and just found ourselves bobbing in a North American hemisphere,

the political circumstances of which are more uncertain than they've ever been in our lifetime. be that as it may, if the party wants to pursue that, I think the field is open for competitors to say, well, that's not on our to-do list. And so if you want to know what's on our to-do list, I'm sure it's going to be, you know, social progress and economic planning and economic management. And I think based on everything I've seen in the polls, and unless that's done in a ham-fisted way, it's going to be naturally more interesting to more Quebec. voters to hear what ideas people have for that.

The last point for me is that I know that the federal government in the context of having to think through what if there was going to be a Quebec referendum was going to have to figure out, well, what is the right role for the federal government in a Quebec referendum at this particular point in time when we're not talking about a referendum in reaction to a federal constitutional change or a federal intervention into Quebec affairs. But just a question that one party in Quebec wants to put to Quebecers about whether you want to stay in Canada or you don't, that question was perplexing, but might be less relevant now. It might be easier to just say, well, let's watch how Quebec politics develops and there'll be

a good debate about whether or not people want a referendum, let alone whether or not they'd stay in the country or choose otherwise. The history of provincial politicians in Quebec interfering in federal election, think Francois de Gauss telling Quebecers don't vote liberal or the reverse is not a good history. It will, it's never, it never results in positive outcomes. For Mark Carney or some of his Quebec ministers to be going around saying, don't vote for the PQ is probably something that PQ strategists would really appreciate. And they would have, within minutes,

they would have the block Quebec leader, EFrançé saying, look at them. They're so spooked that they think they want to tell Quebecers out to vote. So, no, no, the idea to tell voters what to do. What do you think the implications of that change in the dynamic in Quebec are for E. Francois Blanchet in Ottawa? Well, it's not a secret that Mr. Blanchet has been, wanting an early federal election. And by early, I mean one that takes place before next July 1st.

Why? Because he would like to shelter the bloc from any fallout from a possible Patskybecoe victory. Because the history has been that Quebec voters are more reluctant to support the bloc when they think that the bloc is part of a strategy to have a winning referendum. And that may change. But at the moment, but at the bloc, this point, anecdotally, you do not feel this impetus, let's have a referendum, let's leave Canada. And I think he, Francois, is very well aware of that. But the leading car in the parade on sovereignty is not the Bloch-Chebecois. It's kind of stuck in that parade. It can't just veer off in some other direction. So I expect that the first consequence will probably be that it's going to be harder, not easier, to get support from Bluqueville.

the Blackhevik-Wen, the House of Commons, on votes that involved the survival of the government. Correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm sure you will, but my understanding of the PQ promise is that it would be in a first term. Yes, yes, totally. Is there any way of not abandoning the promise to have a referendum, but to back off from the timing of it? I don't think so. This has been cemented over the past two years. And it would be very hard to have it look like anything other than trying to back off from the promise. It's going to be interesting to see because Bruce is right.

Economics will play a big part in the Canada-U.S. situation and what's happening with Donald Trump in the next Quebec campaign. and it's going to be interesting in that context to see who the parties recruit to defend their economic proposals. And especially if you're the Parts Quebecois in the context of wanting to do this referendum and opening the door to a more adversarial relationship with the rest of Canada between now and them, just take the agreement, which I believe is a major agreement for Canada, between Newfoundland and Labrador and Hydro-Cabec and Quebec on Churchill Falls and further developments. At this point, everyone who attended the birth of that agreement has walked away or has been chased off.

The premier who negotiated it, retired. The successor was defeated in Newfoundland. The Hydro-Cabect chair went and became the clerk of the Privy Council in Ottawa, and now Francois LeGoise resigned. But the current government of Newfoundland and Lebrador is promised to if it does come to a deal that is satisfactory from its perspective to put the deal to Newfoundlanders. Do you not think that people in Newfoundland would have second thoughts about that deal if it were to operate under a Patskiwegoi government devoted to another referendum on sovereignty? I'm not saying it wouldn't be a viable deal. I'm saying if you're a newfoundlander,

probably your first instinct will be to say, I don't really want this, because what if they leave the country tomorrow and we're left with this kind of agreement? So all these things will be part and parcel of the conversation. I have to say that I don't know what Bruce is finding when he does polling, but over the past two weeks,

the level of anxiety over the U.S. issue, goes way beyond trade in Quebec. It's very focused on green. And it is back to the level where it was last January. I find that the level of anxiety is actually overall higher and more layered than it was last January. Last January, there was a shock value to the tariff threat. And there was a kind of a feeling of, well, maybe he's exaggerating. maybe this is a negotiating strategy, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera,

which turned out to be kind of hopeful, but not realistic. And where people are at now is that they're looking at the amount of disruption in the world. And so the anxiety is more perpetual, more deeply woven into the fabric. And so that, you know, for me, when I'm saying, I can't imagine a worse time to try to pitch independence to Quebec. not saying this from a federalist standpoint, just from even if I was an independentist in Quebec, I would say,

how am I going to sell the idea of economic isolation? Who is going to hear me describe how Quebec's economy is going to thrive in isolation from the economy of the rest of Canada or with some more distance, let me put it that way, with the rest of Canada. Well, at the same time, all those companies in Quebec,

which do a lot of business in the, United States, and there are a lot of companies that do a lot of business in the United States are feeling that anxiety. How am I going to describe what's going to happen to infrastructure projects that have been announced as part of how the federal government wants to build up a stronger Canadian economy, including things like high-speed rail and port development? What's the best way, if I'm an independentist in Quebec, to argue the point that this won't be disruptive to their well-being. And there's defense as well. You don't need to be a, you don't need to catastrophize things to wonder, well, what are the defense arrangements going for? What will

they be 20 years from now? What will they be for Quebecers in an independent scenario? Those are all questions that tend to get overly hardened sometimes in these debates. And I'm not putting them on the table in order to kind of encourage people to do that because I don't think it's really constructive. But really just to say, I could imagine at different times in the past how you could capture that feeling of nationalism and national identity against unpopular federal policies and turn it into something that looked close to 50%. I just don't see how that works now. And I think that's a positive thing, to be honest. All right, I've got to take our final break.

I've got a couple of things I want to get in. We're rapidly running at a time. So we'll do that right after this. And welcome back. Final segment of Good Talk for this week. Chantelle, Bruce, Peter, all here. I don't, you know, I want to bring up Greenland for a second. Can somebody explain why Canada is not a part of the boots on the ground in Greenland,

given everything else that's happened lately? Can we first settle the issue of the boots on the ground? It's a lot more modest than what it sounds like. We're talking about a handful of French soldiers. Canada is in the area for operations, but it is stressed that it is not involved in new operations in and around Greenland. But I figure that Canada decided.

that it was a better idea to take a pass for now. I'm not sure that there was a lot of pressure on Canada to join. That's the other issue. That doesn't preclude something else happening later and further down the road. But at first it sounded like a very serious military operation. Then when you look at the numbers, you think, okay, and it is meant to, to ensure a better security in the area. No, listen, it's optics and it's no more than that.

Yes. But sometimes we like to be involved in the optics as well. But Bruce, a quick thought on this. Yeah, I think that Canada has been very clear along with the other NATO allies that this is a really important line that America should not cross. I think we have issued statements and also our own opening up a consular office. I guess they're probably two weeks from now, maybe next week, and the governor general will go and open that office with Minister Anand. I think that's an important gesture. I think that says something fundamental about the nature of the relationship as we see it.

So however different countries choose to express their – their interests and their priorities in that area, I think can be different from one country to the other, but I think Canada's been pretty clear about it. Will you still be able to do good talk as Consul General in Greenland? I'm sure it's a wonderful job, but I don't love the weather here in Ottawa today, and not trying to slight the weather in Greenland. I'm sure it's lovely there many days, but no, that's not good. Oh, too bad. We thought we could go do good talk.

over at your residence. That's right. Okay. I think Chattels Taylor made for this. She does like that. I do like Greenland, but I'm not diplomat as many people have noticed. Okay.

Two other quick topics. The conservatives and the NDP, the conservatives are only now a couple of weeks away from their leadership review on Pierre Palliev. The current guessing game is sounded like somewhere between the mid-70s and the mid-80s.

If that is the number he falls in, he's got no problems, one assumes. But you never, you know, as Chantel warned us earlier, you've got to be careful with any assumptions. However, also what's going on, there's a piece in the papers today. I can't remember who, whether it was a Globe or the Star, but somebody was reporting that there have been moves made by leading conservative figures on the federal side to try and smooth over the relationship between the

Premier's office in Ontario and the Premier's office in Nova Scotia and Polyev's office, which have been bad, bad, bad for a number of years. Thoughts on that? What does that tell us? I guess it doesn't tell us very much when it's at the Stafford's level, as high as the senior as the Staffors maybe. We are still waiting to see Mr. Puelev on the same stage as Premier Ford. And I don't think that either of the premiers you mentioned have much cause, given the shape of public opinion, their own relationship with the current federal government

and going out of their way for Pia Puelev. That being said, once that leadership vote, and certainly in the lead-up to the leadership vote, you haven't seen very many of those expressions. of support for Pierre Pueleev to continue as leader of the party. Afterwards, once Mr. Pueleev's position is secure, if it is secure, I'm guessing that he will have to put more of himself into these exercises because they're meaningless unless the principles actually show up.

I remember, and Bruce will remember, and that's a different context, but it does matter. I remember Bill Davis and Pierre Trudeau had a very productive working relationship around energy and the Constitution in the last years of Bill Davis's tenure and Trudeau's tenure. But when Brian Mulroney came on the scene, one of the more important things that happened to Brian Malerone going into that 84 campaign was, one, the big blue machine, the Ontario election machine rallied to him. but two, he showed up at an event with Bill Davis, the two of them side by side, something you didn't see much of with Joe Clark. So if and when that happens, which will not be before the leadership vote,

it will be interesting to see how Premier Ford balances his fairly healthy relationship with Mark Carney with Pierre Puelev's relationship, which has been non-existent. with him. Bruce. I'm intrigued by a few of the things that Mr. Poliyev is doing these days. They're a little bit playing against type, perhaps. I'm not sure how they're all going to work out.

I remain generally thinking he's going to get a nice level of support from his party. But who knows for sure. The first thing is that the attempt, even with his campaign manager, to do a reproschement with Premier Ford, I think, is notable because what they were doing, Pahliav and Jenny Byrne, his former campaign manager was a form of political malpractice. It just didn't make sense to be having so many crappy relationships with conservative thought leaders and conservative activists around the country by kind of inflicting your rhetoric into the mix in a way that was being done. So whether it will materially affect a relationship between,

you know, Ford and Polyev remains to be seen, but at least to be seen by conservative activists trying to do something to create some rapproch. One is probably good thing. Second thing is that Polyev has talked about how he did a good job of describing in the past what was wrong with Canada, but he didn't leave Canadians much room for hope. He wasn't very good at expressing hope. I see him doing a lot more of that now in his communication. I don't know how well it works. I don't know how well he comes across as a purveyor of hope, but I do notice a difference there.

I also notice that he's regularly said he stands ready to help the federal government figure out how to manage trade relationships. Again, it's not quite mice type, but it's there in his communication. and it was there, I think, in the communication the last couple days. So those little things are important signals that are embedded in their communication now that weren't there before and are probably pointed in the right direction in terms of creating more electoral prospects for the conservatives. What doesn't, I think, work is that there's a kind of an inconsistency on the policy level. So with China, for example, the conservative position is we want to sell them more oil.

We want to sell them more canola, but we want to reject their cars because we don't trust them. I think China has made it pretty clear that that isn't the basis for the economic relationship that they're willing to have with Canada. They just don't like the last part of it in the sense of telling them that you don't trust them. So I think the conservative position is kind of we want the cake and we want to eat it too. and I don't think it looks very pragmatic or realistic or living in the real world. I think on the U.S., Polyev is handicapped by the fact that too many members of his party like Donald Trump, that's the only party where you find that. And so his ability to be persuasive that he could have a better relationship with America

is not that credible because he doesn't really describe what that relationship would be like. just says, I'll work out a deal. And it leaves people to wonder, is he saying that because he thinks he thinks like Donald Trump or that he has some sort of special relationship that he could develop with Donald Trump? Or does it just sound like political rhetoric?

And so I think they're weak on the policy, but he's trying obviously a few things to try to strengthen his connection with mainstream Canadian voters. I've only a one minute left. So I'm going to save the NDP for a future show because we've still got time, lots of time to do that. But let me ask one question, Chantel, on Paulyev.

Are the changes in Bruce's described some of them that were witnessing with Pollyev in the last month or so? Are those real changes? Or do you think those are just for the purposes of getting past this vote at the end of January and then a retreat to the old Pollyev? Yeah. Chase away the natural. and it comes back in a hurry is basically where people are. I don't know that people, maybe some conservatives are paying a lot of attention to the nuances of Pierre Puehliev's position. If it is a serious switch, he's going to have to double down on that switch after the leadership vote, because it's not registering.

And it goes back to that other cliche. It's really hard to get a second chance to make a good first impression. In this province, Mr. Poitiev is basically outside the conversation at this point. And his MPs have gone silent. A fraction, a minute fraction of the Quebec delegates that could have attended that vote will be showing up in Calgary, which kind of tells you a lot about what you need to know about how people one way or the other at this point have come to a judgment on Pierre Poitleev. and that's basically where his party sits in Quebec. Elsewhere we'll see after that vote.

Okay. Thank you for this. Good conversation, as always. Bundle up for the weekend and central candidates can be a cold one. It is winter after all. It is the middle of January. So I guess we'll just live with it. Thanks for Bruce.

Thanks to Shantel. Thanks to all of you for listening. The buzz out tomorrow morning, 7 a.m. Eastern time. Subscribe at national newswatch.com slash newsletter, no charge. Enjoy it. Thank you, guys. Have a good weekend.

Yeah. Bye-bye.