The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Moore-Butts #24 -- Making Tough Choices

Episode Date: October 1, 2025

For the last fifteen years different governments in Ottawa have known tough choices were going to have to be made about the Post Office. But those choices were delayed or postponed. Now it's tough-choice time again. Is there a better way to deal with situations like this? Just one of the angles faced in today's episode of Moore-Butts Conversation #24. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You're just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge. Tough choices like what to do with the post office. How do you make them? Moore Butts, their conversation number 24 is coming right up. And hello there. Welcome to Wednesday. A special day for the Moore Butts Conversations.

it's number 24 this day. Normally on Tuesdays, but this has been a week that's been, well, there's been a few changes in terms of the setup this week. So this is a one-off this Wednesday, a new conversation with Moore and Butts. And it's, the conversation is about tough choices.

Like, what are we going to do with the post office? Well, how do you make those kind of decisions at a time of heavy-duty partisan politics? Some interesting thoughts. from James Moore and Jerry Butts coming up in just a moment. But first of all, a reminder of what the question of the week is because you only have until 3 p.m. this afternoon, 3 p.m. Eastern Time to get your answers to this question.

What's your view on gun control in Canada? It's a controversial topic. It always has been. We've kind of ducked from doing this lately, but it's been in the news again. So your answers on that question. What's your view on gun control in Canada? Send it along to the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. Keep it to 75 words or fewer.

Include your name and the location you're writing from. All right. So there you go. Those are the rules, as we say. for your answer to the question, what's your view on gun control? All right. Let's get at it with Moore Butts Conversation Number 24.

It's all about tough choices and how you make them, how should you make him? And the classic example right now is what to do with the post office. So here we go. James Moore. and Jerry Butts. All right, James, we'll start with you because, well, you wrote a piece for CTV the other day that inspired us to have this discussion.

And it's basically about tough choices, and surprise, surprise, tough choices can be tough. Especially if that choice is going to reverse something that perhaps you did or your party did in the past. But give us your basic theory. don't want you to read the whole article, but give us your basic sense of what you were getting at there. George Will once said that leadership is about the ability to inflict pain and get away with it. And, you know, I don't need to lead my son to McDonald's. He wants to go.

You know, you have to lead him to greener pastures and more responsible choices. You know, specifically about the Canada Post-Track, I think we're kind of in that dynamic. For a long time, I think everybody's kind of been aware of the reality of things, right? the Canada Post is not sustainable, but the whole company has effectively collapsed. They were delivering to 14 million homes in 2006. Now it's 18 million homes at a time. And there's like a 70% drop in the number of letters that are being sent by Canadians. The whole model has failed.

And we've known this for a long time. As a matter of fact, back when we were in government under Prime Minister Harper, I looked at the numbers. And it was Canada Post actually had a surplus of about $65 million back in 2015. And then the whole business model has completely cratered for a whole bunch of money. of reasons. COVID didn't help. But, you know, just the fact that, and also labor, labor strife that they've had over the years has resulted in just companies shifting their communications with their customers over time. But, you know, back in 2015 and 14, we put in motion a bunch of necessary

reforms because it was kind of obvious where things were going. But the politics of it at the time was really challenging. And we dragged our feet, the truth is, in our government, in the last few years of our government, because the politics of it is hard, because people who rely most on Canada, post are who are people who are technologically resistant, people who live in rural and remote communities, people who are older. So, you know, those are kind of three cohorts that are kind of scream conservative traditionally. And so, you know, for us politically, there was a, there was a dynamic. But, you know, we sort of rogered up and said, look, we have a majority of government now. Obviously, we aspire to have a majority government in the future. I think if we don't sort of get

the ball rolling on this, then I think the country is going to be in a bad spot. Justin Trudeau and the liberals and the NDP, to be fair, at the time saw nothing but political opportunity of saying this is a bad thing, even though in the face of clear evidence that this is the responsible thing to do, they said, you know, we shouldn't do this. We're going to guarantee the status code. In fact, we're going to do better. And Justin Trudeau said, we're going to have home mail delivery for everybody and nobody will be left behind. So we basically lost a decade. And now we have a crown corporation that is billions of dollars, you know, habitually over time and it's only going to get worse. And now we're maybe in a near crisis situation. So the politics of it led us to

slowly recognized reality, but the political opportunity led the lip, frankly, the current government or the certainly government of, I think, Justin Trudeau, to put the politics ahead of the responsible approach to public policy. And I think that was a real mistake. And, you know, Jerry will tell me why I'm wrong. Yeah, okay. Well, why don't we, why don't we ask them that? Because the two, the thing that you two guys have successfully done on this, you've stayed away from kind of partisan shots at each other. Yeah, yeah. And that, and that's been much appreciate it. I don't know whether this is partisan or whether it just basically makes sense of what the situation was. Jerry? Yeah, I don't, I'm not going to have a political argument with James.

I think that this is, without speaking directly to that particular topic, I think that this is something that changes in government face all the time. That, you know, when I'll use an opposite that example, the conservatives campaigned that they would never reverse themselves on income trusts, right? And then after they got into power, they realized how much money that was not only going to cost it in the present, but it was going to create a giant tax loophole for people, you know, there was talk of bell turning itself into an income trust. It was kind of insane the way things were going. So the government did the responsible thing and reverse course on it. Otherwise, we'd have an even more difficult fiscal picture than we do. On the

Canada posting, I think that the reforms that the Harper government tried to put in place were all coming from the right place. They were all directed toward making the corporation more sustainable. But let's face it, the plan that was put in place in 2014 wouldn't have, it would have been a drop in the bucket compared to what's needed now in terms of reform. Because we all live this life. My wife and I were talking about this in the car the other day. When was the last time you sent a letter to somebody? And without sounding out of touch with what other Canadians are going through, I'm sure there are still people who use it, but we know from the aggregate data that traffic is down something like 75% in the government. I think I read somewhere that

the corporation is losing $10 million a day. I mean, this is kind of an insane situation. So And in, you know, the olden days that Peter, maybe you'll tell me never existed, what you would do is get a committee together of representatives from all parties, the conservatives at least presumably thinking that they'll form a government at some point in the future. And the, well, the smaller parties are in a difficult position in the BQs. And there's no political gain for them to take any water in their wine here, especially in rural Quebec. back. But I would love to see some form of cross-partisan cooperation on this because, man, it's a mess. And it actually reminds me of one of the first big issues I was involved in in politics when I was trying to build the platform for Dalton McGinty in opposition. And the Ontario government, because of cost overruns and the nuclear fleet, had just gone through

this excruciatingly painful reform of Ontario Hydro, where they broke Ontario Hydro up and they created the companies we have today. And that all came from a select committee of the legislature where the liberals who had been in power relatively recently put one of their most senior people on it, a great man by the name of Sean Conway, who I've been thinking a lot about this week because his seatmate James Bradley sadly passed away, maybe another show. But everybody took that deadly seriously because they knew that there were $21 billion that couldn't be accounted for by the current Ontario hydro that had to be defeased somehow by the taxpayer down the road. And they ended up with a relatively sensible policy that all parties agreed to. And it didn't really change when the government changed.

So to me, if I were, you know, someone, as my favorite junior high school teacher used to say, if someone screwed God's face on me today, I would say, guys and gals get together and try and figure out a bipartisan approach to this because it's first of all it's going to take a long time to fix and both parties are going to have to support it because you know chances are both parties will have to govern over it so I haven't I haven't think about that with my now former conservative colleagues and stuff as they think about this is that there's every temptation frankly to do what I just did right just a point about what happened over the last 10 years lost opportunity and that's true and it's fair to say that However, that gets you nowhere in terms of what your responsibility is going forward.

And as conservatives think about, you know, what's next and how to position themselves. And I think Pierre was, Pahliav, was, I think, acting in good faith, maybe tongue and cheek, but whatever, about talking about, you know, the build Canada proposal that he has or the Canada First Act. And I think he's sincere about trying to put it out in the window. It doesn't always come across as sincere, which is a communications problem, but whatever. But I think this is an example where I think it would make imminent sense because there are issues and it's always a question in a government that you always struggle with is should I be following public opinion now or leading public opinion? Is the public ahead of where we are as a government? Like are they way ahead and there are multiple examples in recent history where we can think where the public was a way ahead of the politicians who were too scared. De-criminalization of marijuana.

Equal rights for gays and lesbians and when it comes to marriage where everybody was cowed and scared. But there was a breaking point and people just kind of broke and fell away. When it comes to Canada Post, like everybody's just kind of frustrated and annoyed because they know they have a couple of items that are going to come. But with each, you know, labor dynamic that we've had in the past few years, people, they just shift and they say, screw it, I'm going to just do all my billing electronic and figure it all out. And that's led to the evaporation of the use of Canada Post. I think on this one, conservatives should see the dynamic that you aspire to govern maybe the next 18 months, maybe the next 36, 48 months, but you're going to inherit this nightmare. And so maybe you're in opposition, you don't have the burden of actually having to implement some things. Maybe you should clear some space here to be seen to be responsible because the public is ahead of whatever Prime Minister Carney is going to do.

The public is, I think, more aggressive in terms of, you know, ending the mandate for a monopoly delivery structure. The public is already there. So you can probably clear some space and actually look more thoughtful and reasonable relative to what Mark Carney has to deal with, which is a progressive left and Cup W and the unions and people who are going to be super antagonistic about this, seniors who in the last election for the first time majority voted liberal instead of conservative, who lent their votes to conservative,

who will be really annoyed this winter about having to go out in the snow and go to a community box. Those voters are kind of available. And if you look reasonable, you get some reasonable vote and the liberals might lose some turnout and margin on the senior vote, win win, win, grow up. Let's move forward and be thoughtful about this. And hopefully they find that space.

Yeah, sorry, Peter. Let me just, let me stop you for a second because, I mean, you two guys are not in the game anymore, at least not directly in the game. And there are hundreds who are. Does anybody talk like this from the two main parties? Does anybody say, you know what, we've really actually got to stop this fighting on this issue and have some kind of independent committee, or not independent, but a select committee that is going to sort this out?

Yeah, I think there are people, and in particular on an issue like this where I don't think there's a lot of political hay to be made here on either side, to be honest. I think that it's going to cause headaches. Any kind of reform here is going to cause headaches. Change is going to come. It's a question of whether or not

it's going to be slower fast, and both parties are going to have to manage it. So I just, I think this is one of those issues where in the public interest, if I were in my old job, I'd call whoever was in that job and whatever, whoever happened to be the leader of the opposition at the time and say,

look, we've got to sit down and talk about this because it's going to be, it's going to be a problem for you someday. Yeah, and that has happened on issue. But the debate that I think that you're asking about, Peter is like, you know,

people just bluntly saying, like this makes no sense. Like, when when people elect a cohort of Canadians to Parliament, for the governing parties anyway, I know this is to be true. I can't speak for New Democrats. Lord knows who can, but certainly for liberals and conservatives, the governing parties,

like there is a dynamic that exists there where, like, people need to understand how our system works. When you get into the closed door room of a caucus meeting or the closed door room of a cabin meaning, that's where you have the, you should have, the freedom to speak freely, be aggressive, be assertive for your region, speak about your values, talk about where we need to go, criticize the way in which we're going right now, chastise the communication, parliamentary plan, whatever, and then everybody put it on the table and then smoke it all out and then come to an opinion. And then once the opinion has come to, you have to surrender to the majority or the plurality of the vote in the room. That's our system. So I might come into a room

and there were two, you know, it's been over a decade or whatever, but we remember we had two like most impressive debates that we had in our cabinet in the past. One was we had one minister who was arguing in favor of not the northern gateway pipeline but the mackenzie valley pipeline to the north and another minister was was firmly against it and these two ministers who are very senior and very thoughtful and very aggressive about their positions in front of the fullness in the full of cabinet chaired by the prime minister they went at it and one had a profoundly impressive argument on one side and the other had a profoundly impressive argument on the other side for and against the mackenzie valley pipeline the whole conversation took well over an hour and they had slides

and decks. It was very, very good. We kicked it around the room and we made a decision. We are not going to do it. We are not going to have a government being in support of that project. And then when we left the room, both of those ministers shook hands, agreed that they had had their moment. They fought in the ring. They duked it out. Democracy went out. The majority has rules. This is now the government's position. I had my shot. This is now the government's position and away we go. And I had that with another minister over copyright reform and whether or not to be more libertarian or to protect IP rights relative to international standards and you know my side went out but it was a very intense debate so in our system about Canada post and other issues a healthy government

you have ministers and cabinet colleagues and caucus members have a very aggressive debate when when that breaks apart and people start leaking or they say well that may be their opinion but mine is that's when your government fails it's not when you make a wrong decision but it's when the system of governance of robust debate falls apart because the losing party in the debate doesn't surrender to the majority and allow the majority opinion to to move forward and doesn't communicate an opinion in which you disagree. Some people think that that's somebody buckling or not showing leadership or, you know, no, our system is such that you present your views in the room. You make the argument. And if you lose, that's the way it goes and you have to support the government because

you might agree with your government seven out of ten times. But that means that the three out of ten that you don't agree with, you soldier up, you put the water in your wine and you celebrate the seven out of ten that you agree with. And those are the compromises that pile up over time that maybe leads you to not run again or maybe have a change of heart about being in that caucus or whatever. But those are the compromises that over time governments have to make internally

in order to look and be seen to be by the public to be organized, responsible, judicious, and effective. I want to ask beyond what happens in one party, in one caucus, this idea of putting it, someone putting it forward, we should talk together on this thing because it's too important and we don't want to make it a, you know, a political fitball.

Everybody knows something has to happen here. So let's assume for a moment that either the liberals or the conservatives would initiate that discussion. It would seem to me it would have more success if the opposition party offered that up because it's least expected from the

opposition party, especially this one with this leader who can be very aggressive and has been successful at being aggressive to a degree. Am I crazy on that or does it matter? No, I don't think you're crazy about it at all, Peter. I think sometimes the most important opportunities are missed because they're not obvious for people in politics. And it's pretty clear to me, anyway, from my vantage point, that what Mr. Poliov needs to do to make himself a more viable candidate for prime minister is to appear more statesman-like

and open-minded views held by people who don't normally agree with them. And if he could choose a high-profile event to demonstrate that he's capable of that, he would coincidentally increase his electoral prospects materially, in my view. It's true. I think as well, though, that it's not the job of the opposition to prop up. I mean, this is the sort of the debate that happens internally, Peter. I'm not, you know, making argument for one of the but it's in our in our system of government you know there's the internal thing i just just went through but also it's not the job of the opposition to prop up the government to give them alternative ideas or to propose the more really unpopular stuff such that the government can

pivot off of them be seen to be more reasonable while the opposition just self immolates i mean it's a frustration that conservatives have had you know certainly over the since 2015 right where media say well what would you do what would you do and then some you know backbencher or somebody comes forward says, well, I think we should do this. Well, and that position has 20% public opinion that allows liberals to create some room to do something more modest and responsible, you know, at just slightly less margin of, you know, aggressiveness. And then the liberals get the victory and conservatives look like we were, didn't know what we were doing. So, so, you know, there's a risk in that. That doesn't serve you. And also, I think governments are,

governments are better when they're held accountable by a stern and effective opposition. The difference is, you know, in a minority parliament, you can come off as just not being reasonable and responsible in the face of extraordinary challenges, whether it's Donald Trump, whether it's COVID, whether it's the O8 economic crisis. If you're playing the usual game of politics of just being really stern, really aggressive, really robust in the face of extraordinary challenges of a pandemic or a Trump or what have you, then you're making a bad move. So I don't think there's an ethos that Pierre Paulyev and conservative should have for the entirety of the current parliament. I think you take it on a matter-by-matter basis, and you make it clear that on this issue, we are not going to buckle, but on this one, here's what we have to put in the window. And I think you have to be strategic. And it's up to the government. Like, Mark Carney went to the governor general and said, you know, he was invited to former government.

He said, I will form a government. It's up to him to find the parliamentary coalition that will constitute 50% plus one in order to keep his government in office. And that's not up to whoever, you know, Don Davies in the NDP or the bloc or Pierre Pauliev to sustain this parliament. That's the prime minister's job. I get all that. I understand all that. It's just that I thought the two of you were hinting at, you know, every once in a while, maybe only in the life of a 20 or 30-year span where something comes along where you kind of need.

You need people to get together and say, look, we've got to fix this, and we can fix it together. It's a one-off. It doesn't mean all the other stuff where we do fight on a daily basis. I get that. But I thought the two of you were indicating to me that maybe on the post office, especially seeing as you both have a checkered past on it, both parties, that maybe here's the time to do something together. I think this one, I think the post office is one where it could be

because, like, there are the two issues that have been kicked around and talked about more than anything else, but nothing has ever done on it or Canada Post and CBC. Everybody has an opinion and they're all over the road, but nobody, like, but to actually do something about it, CBC is a little, a little bit more aggressive because the voices in independent Senator Wright media are, you know, very absolute about it. And it touches on issues of language and culture that are,

more but the actual delivering of a piece of paper from one Canadian to another is a little bit more clear and hopefully less emotional i think you probably can um and there are all kinds of studies that have been done out there and i think it can be done i think reasonably i don't i haven't noticed anything over the over the weekend i you know that says the conservatives are going to be you know you know aggressive of this i mean it was um lisa wright came out in social media she was the minister responsible for the file and she came out on on twitter and said you know these are good reforms that we proposed and you know that's fine so i i think on this one i think there'd be some some room from margin and maybe that'll pave the way for uh knowing what that looks

like in terms of cooperative policy making on other issues going forward do you want to final word on this part of the conversation jerry no i i think that you know just that there are issues that can transcend the political climate of the day and sometimes those issues do so because they're so big and the public just says, look, guys, this is big and gals, this is way bigger than your political interest, 9-11, for instance, and the security arrangements the country had to come to afterward. And sometimes they're kind of really important, but they're not going to decide the next election. And there's a shared political interest in both parties coming together to solve them. So I think that Canada Post is definitely in the latter category.

Stephen Harper did that in our government, you know, when we were Barack Obama, cornered us, frankly, into taking out, taking a equity stake in GM and Christa at the time. And he informed the parties and let, you know, Premier McGinty know at the time and said that we're, this is something we're going to do. It's not in my nature, but you need to know and this is what it's going to look like. John Craig Chan did that after 9-11, to Jerry's point, you know, he needed to share. It was a really interesting moment, a learning moment for me in the opposition. I was brand new MP.

I was 24, 25 years old back in 01. And 9-11 happens. And we're the official opposition. And, you know, the NDP were there in full four. us as well. But the liberals knew at the time that there are certain questions that I know you want to ask about border, about air marshals, about Afghanistan, anti-terrorism stuff. And we're still learning this and we're understanding what President Bush's administration with their expectations are. And there's a lot of stuff that feeds into our decision-making that is really

sensitive. And I know you want to ask it and you're right to ask it. But you shouldn't ask it, but you need to ask it. But you can't ask it. And there's a dynamic here. But we need to tell you, we need to have a conversation that's not going to be on the floor of parliament in front of all the cameras and all that. So Jack Layton, I'm going to make you a privy counselor. Stockwell Day, you're the leader of the opposition. You're from provincial politics. Opposition leaders are not normally privy counselors, made him a privy counselor. And Jean-Cray-Champ brought them in and informed them and briefed them on intelligence matters such that they could do their job as in opposition parties. Ask the tough questions, ask the

reasonable questions, expose where you disagree with us. Fine. But there are certain unique things about this that if we don't answer it, we look like we're hiding security things that the public should know. But there might be reasons why we're doing that. And there's a gray area of nuance here. And we should talk about that before we just treat this as business as usual. It's not business as usual. Did they make the right choice by accepting those privy council positions and whatever security clearances went with them? Yeah, I think so. Because I don't, I mean, there's tons of scrutiny about that time in that window in Canadian history. And I don't think, and I think Stockwell, they acted like a responsible adult. Jack Clayton did as well. And by the

the way, if they didn't, that would have been smoked up pretty quillarily. And so there's a burden, there's a liability and an expectation shouldered on you. And if that happened, and if you mistreated that, that obligation, then, you know, you burn yourself. So, so I thought they treated that responsibly for sure. But you know why I'm asking that. Yes, Pierre, probably I didn't get the security clearance, but there you are. But, but on the other hand, different, I think it is a different dynamic. So I don't think it was quite as hot. A, and B, there were credible questions about about liability of incumbent liberal members of parliament and the and and i don't think it's quite as you know you know we're talking about the largest terrorist attack of

north america soil in history versus did a liberal member of parliament who nobody can name get elected because they rounded up a bunch of students and yeah i think there's a degree of a degree of uh liability there in terms of in public interest okay once a reporter always a reporter peter couldn't resist and i saw you coming three yeah no i i i've I know. That's why I was surprised you didn't knock it down before I had to ask you. Anyway, we're going to take our little break here. We're well past our break moment, so we'll take it now and come back a couple more questions right after this. And welcome back. You're listening to the Moore-Buts conversation number 24.

James Moore, former conservative cabinet minister, and Gerald Butz, former principal secretary to Justin Trudeau in the 2015 government. Okay. You're listening on Sirius XM Channel 167 Canada Talks or on your favorite podcast platform. Sometimes I wonder, and you two could definitely give me the answer to this question, whether we're in the media or in the general, public, don't understand how tough some choices are that are made by governments.

That, you know, sometimes we think it's all automatically, you go in a cabinet meeting and make decisions, boom, boom, boom. Without considering just how difficult, how tough some of these things are. Now, I know that's why you're elected, that's why you're in the positions. make choices. But do we do we sometimes not underappreciate just how difficult some of those choices are that are being made? Cherry, you start us here. Well, look, I mean, people go into these jobs with their eyes open and I think there's justifiably very little sympathy in the general public for politicians complaining about how difficult their jobs are. There are a lot of

offsetting benefits to the role they have. And most, the biggest one, of course, being the privilege how many people in the history of the country have had the chance to be federal ministers of the crown, let alone prime minister. It's an enormous privilege. But in my experience, when James was speaking earlier in the episode about the two examples where there were kind of real differences of opinion behind closed doors and cabinet. And I had a phrase for that that I picked up somewhere along the road that you disagree, disagree and then consent, right? You disagree. disagree and then we're all together, even though we still disagree, I take on this position, no matter what I'm minister of, because that's been the consensus view of the room and the consensus in our system is declared by the prime minister, right? And I can think of at least half a dozen examples where sitting quietly in the back of the cabinet room as staff, I observed real differences of opinion on big picture issues like the assisted dying legislation, marijuana a legalization, the structure of our climate plan, the structure of the Canada Child Benefit,

there were very thoughtful people who had very well-considered arguments that lost, and you never heard about them after you got out of that room. So I think that there's this view in the public, not so much, I think all these decisions are hard, Peter, almost by definition. You know, somewhat, Mr. Crutchin was apparently, had a apparently said to one of his ministers early in his government that, who came to him with a hard problem, he said, don't come to me with hard problems. You solve the hard problems. Come to me with the impossible problems. And I think that every, at the top of almost every cabinet agenda, I was part of both in Ontario and in Ottawa. Those impossible problems were at least items one through three on the cabinet agenda, because by nature, This is the highest body, either in the province or in the country, where we come to settle things, we can't settle anywhere else. And I'm never one to run down politicians or public servants.

I think that they do incredible work. Most of them are, and I mean, this is not a partisan point. I mean this from all parties, they take their work very seriously, and they try their best to solve problems in the interest of the country that can't be solved anywhere else. I have one about the difficulty debate, and this was one that was really personal, really, really difficult, not for me, but I observed it. And I think I'm okay to talk about this aloud. I think it's been talked about in the past. It's been, you know, over a decade, so I'm always sort of ginger about, you know, talking

about these things. But in the 08 to 11 Parliament, there was, I think it was a motioner of private members bill before Parliament to ban the use of asbestos in Canada. sensitive in the region of Quebec where obviously there's jobs, there's an asbestos mine, and it's really important. Christian Parody was the conservative member of parliament, one of a handful of conservatives elected in the province of Quebec. And this was really a massive issue. In other words, if the federal government took this position and banned asbestos, you're talking about the closure of a mine, hundreds, if not thousands of jobs, lost, communities in jeopardy,

you know, we know the whole narrative. And so there was an opposition motion to do this. Most objective analysis said that this is obviously a product that should be banned. It causes his cancer. But the political dynamic in Quebec in the riding with a member of parliament who was a minister, like it's a huge problem because he was elected promising to defend these jobs in this industry and do this, make it as safe as possible. So we had to debate in cabinet and around the cabinet table was the late Chuck Straal who had lung cancer. He thinks, I think at the time he thought in part because of his personal exposure to his best dose. So imagine the conversation that happened there and the debate that happened that had to be had to be

managed by the prime minister and the rest of the caucus as you have um chuck straw the late straw bravely serving in in politics in parliament and in cabinet in spite of having a cancer diagnosis where he could have been home his son has now since represented the writing since 2011 he could have been home could have been doing other things but he ran for office because he was convinced that he had good public health and he had a mission to to accomplish and he was appealed to i know by stephen harper to say, but I know Stephen Harper Peelden personally said, you need to run for public office because people who get a cancer diagnosis need to know that their life doesn't end with

diagnosis. And you serving in public life is a shining example of that. And we have other examples that Dominic Leblanc and others, but Chuck Straw was ours, that people who get a cancer diagnosis know that they can do really important, really meaningful things in their lives in spite of a cancer diagnosis. And lung cancer is a really tough one to get. And Chuck Strall agreed, well, then now here he is in that mandate from 08 to 11. And the issue of whether or not we should ban a cancer-causing substances before cabinet. You can imagine the debate that happened around that room. And we eventually got to the position that we would ban it, but it was going to be phased in,

and we sort of compromised. It was all this. But it was extraordinarily personal and uncomfortable and very difficult. And the things that Chuck Straw was called by other cancer survivors and the abuse that he took because our government didn't do an immediate ban was brutal and vicious for a guy who didn't need to be in public life and could have been at home triaging his cancer and being with his family in what might have been his last day as he didn't. know and on the other hand christian parody and the brutality that he got because we did get to a

position to ban so like it was a lose lose lose and it was a torturous debate i know certainly for those two individuals and you know i'm out here in british columbia i had no politics in it but the torture that those two men went through one on the professional side one on a personal side as they tried to manage an issue is about as hard as it gets and those kind of things do happen and nobody gets exposed to it but people know that they have to have those conversations and make those judgments and they'll be judged by those judgments in really personal and a vicious and sometimes abusive ways. Yeah, being in politics is not always fun. Last question. And hopefully you can get away answering this without revealing any

internal secrets. But does a moment arrive in these debates and discussions that go on in caucus and in cabinet? where that person at the head of the table, the prime minister, has to make a decision, has to call it one way or another. Have you ever been in that room where he is, the prime minister of the day, has clearly been on the side that is weakest in the debate,

or weak's not the right word, but there are fewer people on that side than there are against it. And how does that play out? Jerry, you're nodding your head like you. Well, yeah, I can remember several. I'm not sure I can reveal the subject matter, Peter, but I can remember several cases in Ottawa where the prime minister was predisposed to one, I may or may not have mentioned two of those cases already,

where he was predisposed to the point of view that ended up, losing the debate in cabinet. And that happens a lot, right? And the prime minister always has a decision to make at that moment, whether he or she changes their mind and whether they stick to their guns. And in most cases, certainly with Prime Minister Trudeau and Premier McGinty, they were more likely to alter their point of view in a cabinet discussion than they were. Now, especially with Premier McGinty and Prime Minister Trudeau learn this, I think, over time.

But Dalton was very careful not to show his cards too openly before a contentious cabinet meeting for precisely the reason you're describing. There may have been a sponsoring minister who knew how the Premier felt. but in big cases, and I'm thinking about like the coal retirement, the Green Belt, uh, um, healthcare reform, all of these things that Dalton did, especially in his first term, that were big changes to the way Ontario had been governed for a very long time. They were, they were knocking down, drag him out fights in cabinet. And I mentioned the late Jim Bradley again, because he's so on my mind. But he was the quintessential minister in that he,

could passionately argue one side of an issue within cabinet and then you would see him in the cabinet out scrums better argue the opposite point of view but the one that prevailed in the room than the sponsoring minister did and I know some people look at that as oh that's just proof that politicians don't really believe in anything I don't I think it's proof that serious politicians believe in the cabinet system of government. And once that cabinet decides something, you have the enormous privilege of being there for the debate. It is your red-letter responsibility to go out there and defend it.

You get the last word, James. Yes, all of that is true. The obligation and commit, like once you commit to the process by which you have your free speech, free vote, free input, But when the decision comes out at the end and it goes in a certain direction, then you have that obligation, I think, to demonstrate fidelity to the process. Because that's really what you're doing is you're saying, we had a debate, we had a process and all that. But also, like, as we think about baseball, as the Blue Jays have obviously a fantastic year,

you know, in baseball, if three out of ten times you step up to the plate with your bat and you make contact with the ball and you get on base, just three out of ten times, seven out of ten times you fail. Three out of ten times you get on base. you're a Hall of Fame player. So you get used to a lot of failure in baseball. There's a lot of failure. But the wins matter. And in politics, it's actually very similar.

You do put water in your wine. We're not quite as righteous as we thought we would be. We didn't quite have the margin that we thought. The Senate has disappointed us. The stakeholders didn't step up. This minister proved not to be what they were. Like, you get used to a lot of failure. And so your question, Peter, about are there times when a prime minister has to sort of cut bait

and walk away from an issue? Yeah, lots, very often. And you're fortunate if you get to your three out of ten. successes because you get avalanched by issues beyond your control, whether it's the economy, whether it's the economic climate, whether it's President Trump, whether it's circumstance or a province goes off the rails or Quebec decides to have a referendum or Alberta decides to have a referendum. Whatever happens, that's beyond your control. You're lucky if you get to drive the narrative. And if you're going to lose your caucus or lose your cabinet over being intransigent

on an issue, then you have to cut it loose and move on to the next one and hope you get a win there. And this is the delicate dance of governing amongst human beings who are, we are all flawed. We all have our weaknesses. We all have our egos. And politicians have them just animated and on public display. And you have to be able to understand how to work with people. Otherwise, you fail miserably. James Moore, Gerald Butts, another great conversation. Morebutts conversation number 24. Thank you both. We'll talk to you in two weeks. Great to be here. Thank you. James Moore.

More Butts, Conversation number 24. We've had a run of them, and there will be lots more coming, your way. The designated day for More Butts Conversations is Tuesdays. This was an odd week, because yesterday's National Holiday, Truth and Reconciliation Day. So we had to shuffle things around a little bit. But two weeks from now, More Butts will be back on that Tuesday. Tuesday. Next Tuesday, alternating Tuesdays. It's the reporter's notebook with Othia Raj and Rob Russo. All right, a quick reminder about tomorrow. Tomorrow is your turn. A question of the week,

what's your view on gun control in Canada? There have been stories in the news about gun control in Canada. Questions raised about things the minister has said, about the buy-back program and including other things. But what's your view? We want to hear from you in 75 words or fewer. But you don't have long to get it. If you haven't already sent in your answers, and I know many of you have, and that's great. But if you still have something you'd like to say on this, get it in before 3 o'clock Eastern time this afternoon. It doesn't leave you much time. Send it to the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com.

Include your name and the location you're writing from. And we look forward to hearing what you have to say. The random ranter will be here tomorrow as well. Friday. It's good talk. Sean Tilly Bear and Bruce Anderson. They'll both be along. I'm in Calgary today.

I flew out here yesterday, and I've had a few things to do, people to meet, and a couple of obligations that I have to meet, which I will do, starting tonight, then flying back tomorrow. We'll do code talk on Friday, and then it's back to Scotland. So it's been another fun week with a lot of good programming, I think, anyway. You, of course, will be the judge of that. All right, that's it for this day. I'm Peter Mansbridge.

Thanks so much for listening. We'll talk to you again in, well, less than 24 hours. Oh, actually, tomorrow, your turn. will be with Will. Well, Mansbridge, will be subbing because I'll be on a plane. So enjoy that. He loves doing it. And from what I've seen in your letters, you like hearing them.

So that's Willie tomorrow on the bridge. I'm Peter Mansbridge. Thanks so much for listening today. The program will be here in less than 24 hours. Thank you.