The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Pierre Poilievre: A Political Life -- The Book

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

An interview with Andrew Lawton the author of the new book on Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre. Who is the man who wants to be Canada's 24th prime minister and what does he actually stand for? The answers to those questions and more are the focus to today's program.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You are just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge. Pierre Poliev, who is he? The new book, Poliev, A Political Life. We'll talk to the author, welcome to Tuesday. Special program today. You may recall a couple of weeks ago, in fact I think it was just two weeks ago, that we talked to the author, Paul Wells, about his new book on Justin Trudeau, Justin Trudeau on the Ropes. Well, today we have the author of the new book, Pierre Poliev, A Political Life. His name is Andrew Lawton.

He's a writer and a journalist, and this is his crack at trying to tell us about who this guy is, who is leading the polls, not by a little bit, but by a lot, could well be the 24th Prime Minister of Canada. So we'll get to that in just a moment, but first a reminder of this week's question of the week. The question is pretty simple. What's on your mind? And it could be anything. It could be, as we're going to discuss today, domestic politics,

or it could be international affairs. There's certainly a lot going on, as you can tell from what we discussed yesterday with Janice Stein. There are lots of different issues at play, or it might be something about climate change, or it might be something about the carbon tax. It could be any number of different issues at play. Or it might be something about climate change. Or it might be something about the carbon tax. It could be any number of different things. And it's wide open. It's up to you.

What's on your mind? The secret is, put what's on your mind into a paragraph. Okay? Or so. Don't go long. Not looking for essays. Looking for a thought here of what's on your mind. And we'll put all these together,

and that creates our Thursday program of Your Turn, Your Opportunity. The heck with Mansbridge. We've had enough of him telling us what the issues are. Here are the issues according to, well, according to you. It's your turn. Sound along to the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com, the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. You've got until 6 p.m. tomorrow night, 6 p.m. Wednesday, Eastern Time,

to get your thoughts in on what's on your mind. Okay, enough with that. Let's get to the topic at hand. The topic at hand is the new book, Pierre Polyev, A Political Life, by journalist and writer Andrew Lawton. So here we go. Here's my conversation with Andrew Lawton. So, Andrew, how hard is it to do a book on a guy who doesn't want to be interviewed? It adds a challenge to it.

But in the end, it actually wasn't as difficult as I feared it would be at the beginning when I was getting the sense that he wouldn't want to be interviewed because ultimately the interview with Pierre Polyev, if it had happened, probably would have been the last interview I had done anyway, because you really want to give someone the opportunity to respond to everything else that everyone else has told you about. So in that sense, it wasn't all that difficult. It just meant that his side of a lot of this was missing. But one of the useful things is that Jenny Byrne, who's Pierre Polyev's longtime advisor, former romantic partner, campaign manager, most likely she did speak. And in a lot of ways, there were things where she was really able to speak to Pierre Polyev's mindset about certain things.

So I was able to cheat in a little way by speaking with Jenny, but it would have been nice. But really, as I looked at the final product, it wasn't necessary, I think, to capture the essence of who this guy is. And quite frankly, you knew him anyway. I mean, you had talked to him before, not for the purposes of this book, but for other stories. You interviewed him in the past. Why do you think he decided against it was it you know the the fear that some politicians at this stage especially when you've got this kind

of a lead they don't want to say something that's going to you know knock things out um or he didn't trust you know his wariness about the media is kind of well-known. What do you think it was? Why would at this point he say, I mean, I don't want to say you're a friendly writer, but you, you know, as you concede, I mean, you ran for the provincial conservatives at one point, and you were kind of a right-of-center guy in terms of your thinking. So he couldn't have feared you. What do you think it was? I think there's a general risk aversion in conservative politics in Canada that even

with Pierre Polyev being a bit bolder on a lot of things, or a lot bolder on many things than his predecessors, I think that is still the default position on something like this. I mean, Stephen Harper was notoriously closed off to the media. There were very few pieces that came from that government detailing the inner workings of his office and his team. And certainly, he would never invite someone into his home for some magazine profile in the way that we've seen from Justin Trudeau and whatnot. So I think that's the default position. I do think that they, my sense is that there was some internal consideration given that probably wouldn't have been afforded to other people for the reasons you've mentioned. I think I might have had a better shot at the request than others did.

And certainly people around him were given permission to speak. And there were some that I reached out to that, you know, told me quite explicitly, yeah, I'd love to, but let me run it up the flagpole. And I don't know if they're calling Pierre personally, if they're calling Jenny Byrne, if they're going through the Conservative Party media relations, but they were getting a green light to speak. So in that sense, there was a level of access afforded that was official in nature. So that general risk aversion, I think, is part of it. I also think that in general, it's very difficult for someone like Pierre Polyev the conversation to himself and to speak about the things that you need to get a picture of someone, the vulnerabilities, their childhood, all of these things. So when you do get glimpses in public speeches from Pierre Palliev, it's often a personal anecdote that is conveying a political point. He talks about the housing

market and he weaves in his family's experiences of having to downsize when he was growing up. He talks about these things and there's always a point to it. Do you think that when you see him do that, and the examples like you just gave on housing, when you see him weave a personal story into the story he's trying to relay to the uh to the public to voters is that him speaking or is that the inner circle saying you know you should tell that story what do you think so one of the the really fascinating things that i learned about pierre polliev in the course of writing this book was how he is his chief advisor, which is rare for a lot of people. I think Andrew Scheer is a very good contrast, because here's a guy where, and I've

actually had the opportunity to speak about this to Andrew Scheer after the fact on record, he really let the advisor set the tone and set the narrative. And in the end, he's really going against what he not necessarily against what he believes, but against what his instincts would be. And in Pierre Polyev's case, I've had a number of occasions, not even for this book, but where I've been at a Pierre Polyev rally. And I say to one of his, you know, communications people, hey, can I get a copy of the speech? And they said, well, there isn't one, because he's just up there and doing his own thing. And I think that's why there has been an authenticity about him, even though he calculates things. And even though he is obviously very aware of, if I say this, then this happens, and he's running those scenarios in his head, he is still deciding what he says himself. And he is still in the driver's seat of his message. And I think that's a very unique thing for certainly conservative leaders, but I would say for political leaders in general in this country. Yeah, I've been to a few of his speeches watching how he sort of performs that element of his leadership. And there's no doubt that,

at least in the ones I saw, he wasn't reading from a speech. But it was almost like it was a speech. It wasn't full of ums and ahs. He knew exactly what he was going to say and how he was going to say it, and he just, boom, delivered it. So I hear you on that point. What I'm wondering about is, you know, I get it that he's his own best advisor and he is the main advisor, but you also talked about Jenny Byr burns role and you know i understand his wife has a pretty good role too in terms of advising him

and and suggesting things for him is that the limit of the inner circle such as there is one are those the power voices around pierre poliev i think they're certainly the most influential, but one of the things that became apparent to me was how wide a net he passed when it comes to consultations. So during his leadership campaign, I heard a number of stories of him calling out people at all hours of the day and night, weekday, weekend, doesn't matter, and saying, hey, what do you think about this? What do you think about this? And again, it's not being deferential to these people, but it was really wanting to bring in a wider array of voices. And there's one story in the

book that was shared by Hamish Marshall, who a longtime conservative campaign operative, and he worked on Pierre Polyev's leadership campaign. And he said they were at this meeting. And a number of people were there. And they were talking about something and that something doesn't matter. But not everyone at the table was a subject matter expert in the thing. And Pierre still wanted every single person at the table to have their say on what they thought the campaign should do. And how Hamish Marshall relayed that to me was that he sort of viewed it as their expertise didn't matter. The fact that they had a seat at the table meant that they had a value to offer. And therefore, what they had to say

was something that he wanted to hear. And it wasn't that, as was relayed to me, that Pierre wanted consensus. He wasn't just waffling and trying to get everyone on board, but he wanted to canvas from a lot of different people. And I think in that sense, he does seem to be uncomfortable with the idea of just keeping a very, very tight grip on communication so much so that you don't know if the people around you are really representing the broader country you're trying to serve. I'm wondering what you think most Canadians think of this guy, because we're at that point once again where, you know,

Canadians could very well have a new prime minister within the next year. 24th prime minister of Canada is way ahead in the polls. It seems almost impossible that anything could happen to change that. Of course, things can happen, but let's assume nothing does. And you go for this moment where you pretty well know that most Canadians really don't know him. So you spent some time, obviously, trying to understand him, where he's coming from, who he is. Who is this guy?

How would you describe him based on what you've managed to learn about him that you didn't know? Because you obviously knew some things. So one of the things that is quite interesting is how ordinary he is in so many ways. I mean, this is a guy who was born in Calgary, had quite a tumultuous childhood in terms of parents being divorced at a young age, father coming out as gay at a time when that wasn't nearly as accepted as it is today. And then, you know, having a very ordinary life. You know, he did the same things as a child that other people do. He had the same interests, albeit a bit nerdier in high school. And then he

went into politics and university. And I mean, I was involved in politics and university, I know exactly the type. And then in that sense, he was normal, but always had that ambition, and has always driven to do something more. And one of the things that was interesting is that there was a quite a large body of public documentation about Pierre Polyev through his adolescence, even and his university years, because he was always the squeaky wheel at party conventions, and he was always speaking to media. So you can get these quotes in the Calgary Herald or the Ottawa Citizen. And that says a fair bit about him that he was always wanting to be on the radar in some way. And in that sense, it's not surprising

that he's the kind of guy that's ended up taking the path he is. So I think there's also the contradiction that I was interested in exploring a little bit on how this average middle class guy is also undeniably a career politician. He went into politics at 25. It's the only job he's ever really had in any significant length of time. And he, despite at one point saying he believes MP should be capped at two terms, is now in the middle of his seventh. So how does he square that? And that was, to go back to your first question, Peter, that was the one thing that I really missed out on by not being able to interview him. As I was curious, not even as a criticism, but how do you rationalize that shift from, you know, opposing and having quite a forceful opposition to career politicians to being one yourself? And again, not a criticism, but at what point in your mind did that flip? That would have been the one thing that no one else was able to offer that I would have been

interested in getting from him. It reminds me, you know, I was reporting in Saskatchewan in the mid-70s when Toronto called me up and said, we're moving you to Ottawa to cover Parliament Hill. And I said, oh, God, no. It's the last place I want to go. Don't send me there. But they did. I didn't have a choice. I went to Ottawa, and within two weeks I was hooked.

I thought, I never want to leave this. This is great. I love doing this story. And so I guess it can work both ways too. It's not just obviously on some reporters, but on some politicians, they get there and they don't want to leave. They want to keep climbing the ladder.

The two-term thing, I kind of get it to some degree, and I think you point this out in the book, that two-term is kind of an American thing in the sense that you're thinking two four four year terms, and that can be it. Well, in Canada, especially with our, our tendency to have majority or minority governments, you're going to have two terms in three or four years. You know, it's, it can take a lot, you know,

a lot longer before you feel that maybe you uh you shouldn't be moving on but clearly something's changed in his mind about that that idea um what surprised you about what you learned for for somebody who knew a good deal already starting this process what surprised you about what you learned about him on on on the amusing side of it, to give a lighter example, was the sense of humor. It was just through talking to people that you get a sense of all these practical jokes he's played, you know, impersonations of political leaders, you know, prank calls on his staff, on John Baird when John Baird was the foreign minister. So that was just

on a lighter note, one of the things that stood out. I think on a more substantive note, it was how consistent he's been on politics going back to the time that he was 20. I mean, one of the, and I opened the book by talking about this, one of the interesting things is that when he was, I think it was 20 or 21, he wrote an essay called Us Prime Minister, I Would. And it was part of Frank's tronics and Magna's essay contest, which was a student scholarship contest. And he wrote a 25 word essentially roadmap for what he would do as prime minister. And you read that today, 25 words or 2,500 words, 2,500 words.

It would be a very short mandate on the, on 25 words, but 2,500 words, 2,500 words. Uh, it would be a very short mandate on the, on 25 words, but, uh, 2,500 words. And you read that. And with the exception of a little bit about term limits and, and being two terms, you, I could pass that off as a speech that he gave right now. And, and it would be unsurprising to a lot of people when he talks about the importance of free market capitalism, the importance of individual responsibility, the importance of freedom as the building block of society, and even some of the language, some of the turns of phrases he used in that essay, I could find mirrored in speeches that he's given recently, and the announcement of his leadership campaign. And, you know, for politics, which very

cynically can oftentimes, you know, fly in the wind, it was remarkable to me how much what he has been talking about has remained virtually unchanged over the years. Do you like him? I do. I do. And I think there's always a skepticism I have of any political leader. In my personal interactions with him, which have just been limited to, you know, the time before or after an interview, he's always been quite friendly. And I think in general, I've found his approach to politics quite refreshing. And look, I don't hide my right of center position in my coverage. And while I think the book is rooted in facts, I think that's an important context for readers to understand for where I'm coming from. But he has also exhibited in his campaign a lot more. I don't want to use the word purity, because I think that has implications I'm not trying to convey, but a lot more authenticity that has been lacking in the conservative movement in Canada. And one of the crucial examples of that is the pivot you always see

from a figure's leadership campaign to when they're running in the general election. And that pivot hasn't really taken place with Polyev. So the things he's campaigning on now are the same, generally speaking, as what he was campaigning on when he was seeking only conservative votes. Well, a certain consistency in that that some would appreciate. You know, he's had a line that he wants to deal with, and he's still pushing that line. Where are the faults in this person?

Do you find faults? I think there are faults in everyone. I think one of the challenges of being a calculator, which is, I use the word calculation a few times in the book, is that you can be, not necessarily indecisive, but you can delay decision. And that was a fault that was identified even by some people that have worked with Pierre Pelletier, where he the simple decisions, simple questions, take very long periods of time, because he's in his mind running through, okay, if I do this, then this, there was one example I provide where they were deciding whether when he wins the leadership, which his team knew was going to happen, whether Anna, his wife, should be the one to take the stage before him and

introduce it. And this is just a simple question. Do you want your wife out on stage to say thank you and give a warm up for you and bring you on? And that, as I understand, it took weeks to decide. And it wasn't like running it against poles. It wasn't like, ooh, would this help us in Quebec? Would this help us here? It was just Pierre overcomplicating this thing. To what end? I mean, would it matter in the grand scheme of things?

Probably not. That's interesting. You know, I'm trying to think that one through. Was it like being, you know, protective of his wife? He didn't want to put her in a situation that could backfire? Because I'm sure he certainly had confidence in her in the sense that she could deal with the issues. She could deal with the issue of introducing him. But to be hesitant around that fact

and i i don't even know if it was out of concern to be honest i don't think it was out of concern for her i think it was for the image of the campaign you know normally for starters the leadership announcement was very challenging because the queen had just died so what would normally be this unbridled celebratory event now has this pall cast over it where people are in black, we're in a period of mourning. And so that was part of the complicating factor as well. When a winner is announced, there's this tremendous energy.

You know, ladies and gentlemen, the next Prime Minister of Canada is what Ian Brody would have said. And then Pierre Polyev would come out. Whereas to have someone else come out, even if it is his wife, who is somewhat familiar with to voters at the time, it changed things a little bit. And I think in the end, it was and she did introduce him, by the way, that was what they decided on.

But the fact that I can't even think of what the downside is right now. But this was a decision that belabored and what was belabored, I think is very interesting. And that was one that was conveyed to me, there were other little things. But I think that's the challenge is that when you are so committed to finding the right path and reaching a decision through a logic and a reason, you can oftentimes just avoid that going with your gut that I think is important. I've heard you say in other interviews that there are some things that Pierre Polyev is going to like in the book, and there's some things he's not going to like. What's he not going to like? So I think that the book is honest in the sense that it looks at his political career. And through his political career, he's had to, I mean, in the sense that anyone who's aged has had to do this, go through a maturation process.

Now, the challenge of this is that when you are a member of parliament at 25, your maturation is happening in a more public way. And the book, I think, is pretty reasonable in terms of documenting the missteps along the way, whether it was the time that he just, you know, didn't want to wait for security to clear his car on Parliament Hill. So he just, you know, hits the button himself and drives through, you know, some of the times he's been unparliamentary, we might say, in the language he's used. And also, I had people that were speaking to me now, mostly on background and not for attribution, which I realize people will obviously approach with skepticism, as is their right, about working with him and working for him. And especially earlier on in his career, how difficult that was for a lot of people.

I mean, one longtime political staffer I spoke to said he was insufferable. That was the word when he was a cabinet minister for the first time, and very demanding on employees. And many of the people that worked for him when he was in cabinet, I could not get to speak, I would not be interviewed. And I can, you know, read between the lines on some of that. So I think showing that is probably one of the more, would be one of the more unfavorable or unpleasant things for people that are really loyal to Pierre Pallièvre, perhaps Pierre himself in the book. Is it that same kind of loyalty that we saw Harper have? I mean, the whole time Stephen Harper was leader and prime minister, his caucus and his party were extremely loyal, and he made sure they were,

you know, he told them what he didn't want to hear them talking about. Is that the same kind of loyalty we should assume that as long as things keep going right here for Polyev, that's the same kind of loyalty you're going to see here? I think so. And it was actually one of the challenging things earlier on in the process when I was sending out requests for interviews. And a lot of the people that were in his life 20 years ago are still in his life today. Some of them are in caucus. These people always want things. They want jobs. They want access. They want all of these things because this is the guy that is likely to be, as you mentioned, according to polling, the next prime minister.

And there is a loyalty there that was actually quite a challenge at first when I was writing the book. And one thing just for my own approach that changed is at the beginning, I really wanted on the record interviews, I wanted on the record interviews, people I could quote in the book. And I learned after, I don't know, maybe a dozen of these interviews that it was more important to prioritize information than quotes. And I really shifted my focus to saying, no, no, no, I'm happy to be on background. I'm happy to be not for attribution. And then obviously I have to verify things in other ways. But that was when I shifted my attitude there, I started to get a lot more of the useful information

that I was able to put in the book when people were not worried about their name necessarily appearing. And I think to go back to your question there, the loyalty factor was a big problem because this isn't a guy who has, again, he's had the same job for the last 20 years. A lot of the same people around him today are part of his story back then. So they're still very much in his life and not wanting to alienate. One thing I can vouch for is that's not just a conservative trait. You could find that same situation, trying to pry information out of liberals or New Democrats, you name it.

They're careful and they want to go on background. I guess for most Canadians at this point, if you said, what does Pierre Poliev stand for? What would he do if he was Prime Minister? They'd do the axe attack stuff. And they very well might do the defund the CBC promise. So you won't be surprised that, you know, given my background, that I want to see what, if anything, you were able to find out about that or even what you think he would really do. I mean, it's one thing to say something,

especially when you're trying for party support, as he did through the leadership and as he continues to do now. The CBC thing has been a promise of conservative leaders that goes back quite a way. Perhaps none as adamant as he seems to be. Do you think he would do it? So this is where I go back to that consistency we were talking about earlier, and I think he has to. I think he has left himself on that pledge, particularly no wiggle room, because he says defund the CDC. He says it. He says it clearly. He says it unequivocally. When he was the leader, became the leader, he continued to say that. And there was actually a little aside after I had covered one of his rallies during the leadership campaign in London, my city.

And I had run into him in the hallway after, because I think we were walking to an interview or from an interview, whichever it was. And, you know, I mentioned just how big the applause was on his defund the CBC line, and he had quipped, sometimes I think that's the only thing I need in my platform. And it was a joke that was actually, I think, fairly revealing, because he saw just how that issue, for whatever reason, just galvanized support so much.

And I think he'll do it. I don't think it's going to be a shuttering of the entirety of CBC. Now, the most clarity I've ever heard him give on this issue was in an interview I did on my show with him. And I really drilled down to try to get him to say exactly what do you mean? And he had given an answer, which has been quoted in like other articles by other outlets since then, where he talked about, you know, yes, we need to preserve, you know, French language coverage. And I think he said indigenous or northern. But that was basically it. Now, what was interesting is that if you listen to the exact wording he gave there, he doesn't say keeping Radio-Canada. He says keeping French language, like as though French

language coverage outside of Quebec is what it sounded like. But there's been a little bit of a discrepancy there. I would expect that Radio-Canada stays. I would expect that some of the northern and rural radio would likely stay. I would be very, very surprised if the TV division stays. And certainly like the online news division, I think would likely be gone. But again, he's left himself in a wiggle room. And if he has a majority government, as it's looking like he will, you can't have a mandate that looks like Stephen Harper's did, where the focus is on, well scratch below that, a lot of frustration that the conservative government did not really use its majority government the way it could have and the way a lot of people wanted to. And I think by the time 2011 came around, the conservatives under Harper were so baked into this incrementalist mindset that they weren't really primed for any

big substantive change. And again, I mean, Harper could have changed the CBC board if he wanted it and really dramatically shifted that organization. Organizations like the Canadian Human Rights Commission, which conservatives have had issues with, really maintained the attitudes that they had beforehand. And I think in that sense, I've been told by people around Pierre Polyev that his first term is going to be a very ambitious one. The comparison that was given by one friend of his was similar to Mike Harris in Ontario, his first term, where you come in, you do a lot, you do it quickly because you have to.

Yeah, you can't wait around. I mean, if you have rigid beliefs and you think it's the right thing to do and you know the pathway to doing it, then you've pretty well got to do it, especially if you've got a big majority government. You just create problems for yourself if you basically dawdle and do nothing out of the gate. But as we come to a close on this interview, which I found fascinating, Andrew, and what you've learned about him, I come to a point that you've raised here in the last couple of minutes, which I think would help listeners understand him even better than they already do, if they do at

all. And that is the difference between him and Harper. Because you seem to be suggesting a fairly significant difference on that last point. Yes, and I think that on core conviction, they're probably similar on a lot of issues. I mean, one interesting thing about Stephen Harper that you see in Pierre Palliev is really an unwillingness to engage significantly on social issues. And I know this is always the perennial discussion in conservative politics of how conservatives are going to deal with the abortion question. And in this case, we have a leader who has not really promised anything to social conservatives, which was very similar to Stephen Harper. And I did an interview with Paul Wells, who wrote a book in 2006, Right Side Up, in which he actually quoted Pierre Polyev about Stephen

Harper's really relationship with social conservatives. And it was a very revealing quote that talked about how, you know, Harper's success was really taming that faction of the party. And that puts Pierre Polyev in a very different category from Andrew Scheer, who was himself from the social conservative wing of the party and had been elected as leader thanks to that group. And Aaron O'Toole, who was not a social conservative, but had really catered to social conservatives to win the leadership, and of course, then was left with this group that felt betrayed. So Pierre Polyev doesn't know them any. And in that sense, he's created a very large coalition in the conservative movement in this country, without having to really make these boutique promises to different groups. So I think in that sense, he's similar to Stephen Harper. But where he's different is that Pierre Polyev is a lot more, my sense of him, and again, I could be wrong about this, is that he is a lot more willing to rock the boat of institutions in

Canada in a way that Stephen Harper was not. Now, while Stephen Harper's background was in the same Alberta reform politics of Pierre Polyev, he was a lot more conciliatory in his attitudes and approach, and again, a lot more incremental. And when push comes to shove, I don't think Pierre Polyev is looking at politics and looking at government through an incremental lens. And I actually think that he, again, and this is not coming from him directly, but it's coming from other people around him, that he also was one of those people who felt maybe not that the conservative government was ineffective. That's not his view. He was a part of that government. But that it didn't leverage its power as much as it could have.

And I really think that has weighed on him as he plans out what sort of prime minister he wants to be. And that's something that I really think sets him apart from Stephen Harper. Now, is it because they're fundamentally different people? Or is it because Pierre Polyev just has the benefit of looking back and seeing what happened to that government? That I don't know. Well, we very well may find out, depending on how things go over the next 12 to 18 months. Andrew Lawton, this has been a fascinating conversation. Wish you luck on the book, and we'll talk to you again at some point. Thanks for this.

Thank you, Peter. There you go, journalist, writer, Andrew Lawton. His new book is Pierre Poliev, A Political Life, published by Sutherland House Books, and you can find it now. It's on the stands now. Bookstores, online, you know where to go if you want to find out more about Pierre Polyev. Okay, a couple of other notes to make in our end bit section, one in particular, and we'll do that right after this And welcome back, you're listening to The Bridge for this Tuesday I'm Peter Mansbridge, you're listening on Sirius XM, channel 167, Canada Talks, or on your favorite podcast platform.

Well, those of you who have been listening to The Bridge over the last few years know that I have a couple of, I don't know, things that I always talk about. One of them's the Arctic. One of them's climate change at times one of them is the airlines flying, airplanes anything related in any way to a runway well that's what our

end bit is for today found this on CNN they have a travel section and they like to keep us up to date on various things. And one of them is, as it turns out, airline food. All right, have you flown lately? Have you flown in the last couple of years? Better still, did you fly 20 years ago, 30 years ago, longer than that?

Because the comparison is quite striking. I'm not going to read this whole article to you, but I'll read you a little bit of it. Nathaniel Mayerson of CNN wrote this. And this is how Nathaniel starts off. If you took an American Airlines flight in the 1960s, you'd be wined and dined from the coach class. That's like economy, right? With their Royal Coachman menu. Your meal began with the beef consommé and proceeded to a sliced breast of chicken dipped in wine.

Care for a fruit tartlet for dessert? Today, if you're flying in coach class, economy class, you'll need to book a long-distance international flight or maybe a long domestic flight, a coast-to-coast domestic flight, to receive a free meal of any kind. On shorter flights, you might get a choice of complimentary cookies, pretzels, maybe potato chips. Sometimes you'll be really lucky, one of those shrink-flationed

Kit Kat chocolate bars. Airplane food has fallen a long way from the glory days of in-flight dining where meals were served on white tablecloths and stewardesses scrambled eggs in the air. They literally scrambled the eggs for you. Disappearing meals have joined a long list of pain points, inconveniences, and cutbacks that flyers endure today. But industry cost-cutting isn't the only reason your tartlet is gone.

The end of in-flight dining for many passengers surprisingly rose out of a number of big changes in government regulation, airplane design, in-flight movies, industry tax breaks, plus heightened health and safety concerns. But you know what? It had a lot to do with price. You know, there was a fellow who was the head of, I think it was American Airlines. He had a Canadian connection too, I think, the same guy. I think he ended up at Canadian Airlines. But he was famous for doing, basically costing out what it cost his airline

to supply one olive in each salad. And he managed to crunch the numbers, have the accountants look at all this, and you know what it came to? $40,000 a year for that olive in a salad. So guess what? That was the end of olives and salads. That's just an example of the way they went about cost cutting. So it's been a long way. When I was in the airline business, so I've mentioned before, worked for a little airline in Western Canada called Transair. It was great fun. Loved the airline. We had an impeccable safety record.

We flew DC-3s, DC-4s, the big plane. My day was a DC-6. Eventually, they got to 737s around 1970, I think. But when I was there, it was all prop planes. But the menus were pretty good for a little airline operating mainly in Manitoba, Northwestern Ontario, and Saskatchewan. They weren't great meals, but they were certainly

better than what you're served up these days. Now, there's still fancy meals when you get up into the business class section or first class or you see some of these airlines, international airlines, Singapore Airlines who aren't talking about meals lately, but some of those fancy airlines and some of the meals are exorbitant. But for the most part, for the traveling passenger who's going from A to B, Toronto to Winnipeg or Halifax to Montreal,

don't expect a connoisseur's delight. You'll be lucky if you get by with, you know, peanuts. Remember, there used to be peanuts with the Joe? You don't see peanuts too often anymore. Now, there's health reasons around that. But it's basically, you know, potato chips and pretzels. Anyway, for some of us who remember the old days, they were pretty fancy. You know, the pictures to support this article in CNN

are kind of hilarious because everybody on the plane is dressed to the nines. All the men are in suits, ties, jackets, press shirts. All the women are dressed up. It's like everybody is going somewhere really important. And therefore, that huge long tray of food that's going up and down the aisles is clearly part of the picture. Okay, that's my memory bank for today.

Tomorrow is our encore edition, being Wednesday. Thursday, we're back with your turn and your answers to the question, what's on your mind? Get your answers in, themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com. Get them in by 6 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow. Don't forget your name and the location you're writing from and try to keep the answers relatively short. Looking forward to talking to you tomorrow. The ranter promises me he will be back this week as well. He had to take last week off. He was crushed with real work.

His rant, however, will be back this week. At least so we're told. Alright, I'm Peter Mansbridge. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you again in about 24 hours.