The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Raj and Russo on Budget Day - What Happens Now?

Episode Date: November 4, 2025

After a year of waiting, the Liberals produce a budget, one with much anticipation at a critical moment. As always, with a minority government, if the opposition votes against it, it almost certainly means an election.  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. It's Budget Day. So what happens now? Raj and Rousseau, Reporters Notebook, coming right up. And hello there. Welcome to Tuesday. Peter Mansbridge here.

And it's a big Tuesday, especially in the nation's capital. But really across the country, because what happens in the nation's, capital today will affect everyone in some fashion. And that's the big question. How is it going to affect us all? It's budget day. Carney government tables its first budget with much expectation assigned to this moment.

We're going to try and get at that with our reporter's notebook every second Tuesday. As you know, Rob Russo from The Economist and Althea Raj from the Toronto Star. join us, give us a sense of what they're hearing as the various things that happen on Parliament Hill happen. And this is a big day. It's often said this is the biggest day for any government aside from the speech from the throne. When they're first assembled, it's budget day. What they plan to do with the country's economy, really, and how they're going to do it. So we'll get the latest from Althea and Rob. The budget's still to be announced later today.

Early evening, Atlantic Canada time, early afternoon, BC time. So we get to that in a moment. But as always, we want to remind you of the question of the week for Thursday's your turn. And the random ranter, of course. The question is all about Remembrance Day, which comes up next Tuesday. So it's the last your turn before Remembrance Day. And there's been a bit of a tradition on this program in the last few years to get your own personal memories, thoughts about Remembrance Day.

It could be just general thought, or it could be related in some fashion to relatives, parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, uncles. You know, we always tend to think of just the First World War and the Second World War, but there have been other conflicts where Canadians have fought and died. Korea, you know, the Balkans, excuse me, the, you know, Bosnia, you know, Bosnia, Kosovo, and, of course, Afghanistan. And so any memories you have, thinking back in terms of your own situation,

your memories about Remembrance Day. Love to hear them, and we've already received a lot of letters, and we'd like a lot more, so keep them coming. Here's how you do that. You send your entry to The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. Keep your entry to 75 words or fewer. Remember to include your name and the location you're writing from.

So we get a sense of country. And you have to have your entry in by 6 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow. Those are the simple rules. That's how we make this happen. So that will be Thursday's your turn, along with the random ranter, of course. Okay, let's get to today's reporter's notebook. Once again, Raj and Rousseau are the guests.

Let's hear what they have to say. so when this program first airs will still be hours away from the budget being tabled so technically we don't know anything that's really in the budget all kinds of rumors but let me start this way and rob economist man um why don't you handle this because you know the government has been saying different times over the last few weeks this is going to be a big budget it's going to be a bold budget It's going to be a generational budget and a variety of other names that they've tried to associate with what this is going to be. By the end of today, what do you think we'll be calling it? Well, I asked the question similar to that to one of the people who are involved with putting it together and then trying to get it across the line, the legislative line.

I said, tell me what it is in a headline, because I'm a headline kind of guy. And he said, I just identified gender, which I shouldn't do. But pulling the woke weeds is what they're calling this budget. We will be pulling the woke weeds. I thought they already did that. Haven't they been doing that for months? Yeah, but I think they're going to do it in a more dramatic way. and that's that is that is you're right mark carney's entire campaign since he became leader

and ditched the carbon tax but i i my follow-up question was then how is that going to make certain people in cabinet feel and apparently they're they're okay with it specifically i asked about Stephen Gilbo. I asked about, you know, two or three others who are apparently a little bit more comfortable with the direction that this is going in, even though they are going to be even more violently turning their backs on the legacy of the last decade. It's a, you know, for those of us who've been around a long time, this is a really difficult one. Mark Carney was here in 2000. 2009 when there was a great recession. And the government was faced with a serious global economic disruption.

It wasn't a sort of transnational or binational one, but it was a global. And he helped then the government turn the taps on. So there is some experience he has with that. But this is also going to be like 94-95. And that was another question I asked this person. Is it 94, 95, or 95, 96? And there's an important distinction that the Paul Martin Kretchen government, their first attempt at reducing spending was a failure.

People forget about that. They were heavily criticized. And it was the second one that really dramatically cut back, in particular in terms of transfers to the provinces. And this person said that this will be a two-step effort, that there will be probably even more dramatic cuts in the next one. But that doesn't mean that they haven't learned from the stumble of 94-95. There will be significant cuts in this budget as well. So it's one of those ones that's kind of like a Paul Martin budget.

At the same time, it's got to be a Jim. Flaherty budget, I guess, is what I'm saying. Okay. Let me hear what else of you thinks. I'm not sure that I followed all of that. That was a history lesson of the last 30 years, which Rob is very good at doing. I think we've been told that the cuts will be a deeper next year because they have a three-year plan on reducing operational deficits.

One of the other words that have been used by the government to describe the budget is sacrifice. Prime Minister Carney used that word in his speech. He had used the word austerity months ago to describe the budget to lots of controversy, especially in Quebec. I think what's going to be really interesting is what's the central theme of the budget, because I don't think it's going to be about reducing wokeness. is it going to be seen as a big spending budget

because we know there's a lot of spending in this budget probably more than we expected more than the liberal platform in the spring indicated to us the revenues that we're supposed to be responsible for the spending in the liberal platform $20 billion in tariffs have vanished

so how are they going to make the money? math work. And then the cuts are, I'm told, deeper than expected. So who's going to latch on to what to say, aha, there's enough here for us to support this budget, assuming they don't have three floor crossers? You know, is Elizabeth May looking at this budget and saying, okay, well, there's no direct fossil fuel subsidies, but there's still, you know, pathway to get more oil and gas development. So do I really want to support this budget? Or do I want to work? I need to remain prime minister because I'm afraid Pierre Pogne will remain prime minister because that's the other big story in the background.

I think there is enough in this budget to justify the NDP or the Black Quebecois supporting it. But there's also enough in the budget for them to say, no, we don't want to support you. And it's going to be interesting to see, obviously I haven't seen it, what the central theme of the budget is that allows people to say, aha, this is our narrative and that's what we're jumping on to. If it's going to be a campaign document, I don't think it is. I think that there's been some backpedaling away from bringing down the government in the last few days. But if it is going to be a campaign document, it can't be about cuts,

even though there are some who are taking delight in pulling the woke weeds, as I've said. It has to be about hope. And that might help some of these parties. for this or consider voting for it. Because right now, right now, there are a lot of people who have no hope in Canada. If you're an auto worker, you don't have hope. If you're a steel worker, if you're in the forestry sector, you don't have hope. If you're a young person trying to buy a house or trying to find a job, you don't have a lot of hope right now. If you're a renter, you don't have a lot of hope. So it has to provide hope for those people. It has to be a hopeful document.

And it has to answer the question, I think, in order to achieve hope, can Canada do big things that it hasn't been able to do for a long, long time again? Can the state, I mean, we've got an economist, a kind of free market economist, although he has a lot of skepticism about the market, can the state actually engender this hope? Can it do things that private industry is clearly not willing in the current environment? to step up and do? Can the state do it? Again, something that hasn't happened in Canada in a long, long time. Okay. You know, there's so many questions involved in some of the things you've both said that we can't answer for another four or five hours because we don't know what's in the budget. And so I'm going to leave that aside. But, I mean, that whole last sequence about hope it depends a lot on money.

And as Althea said, where's the money? Like, where's the beef on the money side? Because the money that was supposedly coming in isn't coming in. What if there's a $100 billion deficit? Oh, yeah. I think it's a big spending budget. What's interesting to me is I agree with Rob on the, like, I don't think this budget was crafted for election purposes.

It will be interesting to see, you know, if we're going to compare old budgets, like the Harper era budgets that were very much focused on like what is the soccer mom at home thinking about like what's in it for her. Oh, there are these little niche tax credits that my kids can use for art classes and sports teams. And it was very focused on pocketbook issue. And this budget seems to be more about pro-growth. And like, to Rob's point, like the technocrat is now in charge. Forget these expensive little boutique things that didn't actually do anything for the economy. We're going to focus big numbers to get big returns and it's not really an election friendly budget because

you have to imagine something that's far greater than yourself and I'm not sure that that's where people are at. People are worried about the day to day and so thinking like okay maybe I can trust this guy to do this but there's what's in it for me I don't know if that's going to be answered in this budget. Yeah I think they're worried a lot of people are worried about tomorrow, and I mean literally tomorrow, as it relates to all the various things that are going on in the international situation. Let me focus on what we can deal with, and that is what happens to this thing after it's tabled. Because I find it interesting that you both seem to be suggesting there may be a wiggle room in the tough talk that we've heard from some of the parties,

even the block. That kind of shocked me, Althea, when you said that the block could end up supporting this. I thought it was like cut and dry. They're not dealing on this at all. Well, I mean, I don't see them voting for it, to be fair, but I can see some of their members abstaining or not showing up to vote to allow the liberals to pass it if it came to that. But I think a lot has happened in the last week.

In the last two weeks, really, the background channels have, like, picked up. And they have made no big compromises on the key issues that the block laid out. But I think there's going to be enough for them to say, okay, well, we don't actually want, it's not responsible to have an election. Yv Francois Bancet, the leader of the block, has said that a few times. But also, we've heard language shift completely from the conservatives. Pierre Puellev, the conservative leader, has refused to say whether all of his MPs will show up, whether abstaining is an option.

He, on Sunday, had a press conference, and these words made me laugh because he made me think about, well, they could have been levying against him last year. He said that Mark Kearney should stop playing games and trying to force an election. So there's, you could see a scenario where actually, you know, nobody wants an election, but nobody wants to be seen to be the person responsible for the election, except for the conservatives. but nobody wants let me rephrase that nobody wants an election but they all want a posture

that they don't want an election so politics one one yeah like you can see a scenario where maybe there's a block friendly amendment as it maybe the liberals

support the sub amendment and because the gays vote first the opposite Like, the opposition will know, the opposition that wants to be deemed to vote against it, like the conservators will know whether or not all of their members need to show up. But, I mean, that's pretty risky. The liberals have tried to get their three votes, and I don't know that they're there.

Rob, yeah, nobody wants to wear the scarlet letter of having triggered an election six months after the last one. Okay, that's what they're trying to avoid. Nobody wants to be seen like the NDP had been seen in the last parliament is propping up a government. But I think everybody is pretty much has accepted the fact that in Canada, everybody gets a chance. Unless the budget is a disaster, there's nobody who really wants to defeat the government. And there's some talk of the conservatives, in effect, pleading with the NDP to do the deed for them since they're not really an official party and make sure that the numbers aren't.

there to defeat the government. We don't know. What we do know is that Carney had meetings with each of the party leaders, the opposition party leaders over the last few weeks. His antennae was bristling. That means I'm sure that he picked up one or two things from each of those guys that might induce them to support the budget. So we're going to find out on Thursday because that first sub-eventment, I think by the block, moves on Thursday. A lot of people don't think that sub-abendments can actually defeat governments, but Bob Ray moved to sub-abendment in 1979 as an MP for the New Democratic Party

that brought down Joe Clark's government. So they can bring down governments, and everybody has their hurry-up offense electoral plan ready to go, but there are fewer now expect that it'll be put into action. Is there any one thing that could force? the opposition to vote against it? Like, you know, I mean, you floated the $100 billion deficit. You floated the $100 billion deficit, which is like a huge number, right,

that unheard of in Canadian budgets passed. That wouldn't do it? Well, they all have to do. Go ahead. No, no, it's okay. Go ahead. I was just going to say that that's the national banks figure. It could be, and it could be as high as.

a hundred billion. But if it's spending in areas new Democrats like or the block is like, they'll vote for it. I mean, the thing about this parliament is, to paraphrase Stephen Harper, it's a strong, stable minority government. No one party holds the balance of power. And the party in power is short just three seats. So it should be hard to work something out to keep the government in power. Alcia. They all have different incentives. So, you know, if there's a huge corporate tax cut, you know, you could see a scenario where a lot of conservative MPs actually are comfortable with this budget and like the direction of it, but actually vote against it because everybody, almost everybody will be whipped. It'll be interesting to see whether the NDP caucus is actually, um, solidly has one position because everything that we've,

heard basically suggest that they're the ones to watch that you could easily have four caucus members, maybe five vote against it to others either abstain or vote in favor of it. They are a mixed bag and a much larger tent than we used to think, I would say. On the conversations that Mark Carney had with the opposition leaders, one of the things that I find really interesting is the way some of the words have been used, like, if you're discussing and you're talking about actual spending and trying to get somebody to support you, is that a negotiation or is that a discussion? If you're misleading the public about what's happening behind the scenes, and I would say the block probably was doing in the question period

on Monday by suggesting that there were no talks. Is that posturing, or are you basically lying to the electorate? So there have been more nuanced conversations, if you wish, between the opposition parties and the prime minister and his emissaries, Steve McKin and Francofilippe Champagne, Stephen Gibaud with the Black Quebecois. And so there are more talks. happening than we were led to believe, I would say, especially in the last two weeks.

Just a couple of quick points on this before we move on. And that is, you know, one of the reasons Joe Clark fell in 79 on the budget vote was he didn't have the numbers. And not having the numbers included the fact that he didn't have his own numbers. You know, there were MPs out of the country, Flora McDonald, I think was one of them. but is there any indication here that all the Liberals are in their seats for these budget votes? They've been told to be. They've been told to be.

They've been told to be. They can't use their app. They have to be there in person Thursday Friday. And opposition MPs? Not the same. I know opposition members who basically have been told they can vote on their app, but they should have a backup plan. Yeah, that's the other difference though, Peter, is that you don't have to be there to vote. You can show up virtually now.

as long as you're in the country, right? You've got to be in the country for that. That's right. You know, but so you can do that. There will be no hiding. There will be no excuses. There can be other things that that can be done. I mean, they can, they can just say,

the Canadian people don't want an election. We don't want to vote for this. So we're just going to walk out. There might be a party that says that. We're not going to give them our approbation or our negation because they don't deserve that, but Canadians don't deserve an election. So we're just going to walk out. That could happen to.

Those were big words, Rob. Did you learn those of the economists? You get to use those? When I put on my monocle and my top hat, it's amazing what comes out of my mouth. Okay. Who are you going to be watching for in these next couple of days? If there's one person or one segment of a party that you're watching,

who would that be? I'll be watching, Steve. McKinnon who has to count noses who has become very close to the he's the house leader who's become very close to to Mark Carney and who up until let's say 10 days ago even more recent than that I've said right up until the end of last week it changed a bit over the weekend I think was saying he didn't have the votes and and he had no indication beyond the fact that none of them really wanted to bring down the government but none of them wanted to vote for the government. He had no indication. So he's got to, he's got to round

the numbers. And the more fretful he looks, I think will be an indication of what's going on. The other thing that we should watch for is this doesn't end, even with the first vote on Thursday. Because the NDP is not a party, it means that when this thing goes to committee, the opposition has a majority on those committees. The block and the conservatives can make. make changes there or try to force changes there. And maybe some of those changes might be palatable to the liberals if it means survival. But it's going to go through a tough test for the next several weeks ahead at committee stage. And the opposition parties, because they are majority, have been flexing their muscles in other areas of legislation. So we should expect them

to do it there as well. And they'll also have the opportunity to get a sense of what the public's reaction is to all this stretched out over the next couple of weeks. You know, as Althea mentioned earlier, the NDP are not only not a party. They're not united in what they do have. So it's hard to follow them as a group. But who are you going to watch, Althea? I don't know if I'd say it's a who because I think so much, like so much depends on so many different people.

What I want to know is can whatever happens on Thursday and Friday? be replicated in the spring. Because right now, everybody doesn't want an election. Pierre Paulyev wants to go through his leadership review first. The NDP's in the middle of a leadership race. Yvrenfant-D doesn't really want a campaign. Does that scenario exist in the spring when Pierre Paulyev has had his leadership review,

when the NDP has a new leader? Like, can the stability of the government last beyond just this vote. And if the block is the one that's willing to dance, I mean, the block is the one that didn't want the NDP to have official party status because they want to have all the negotiating power in committees. So do they flex their muscles

to try to get as much as they can? Or, you know, the other part of the block story is like what's happening in Quebec politically, which is the PQ looks like it's going to win the provincial election. next fall. Does the block actually want the federal government to work or do they want to make it difficult for the federal government to work so they can tell Quebec is here? See, federalism doesn't work. You'd be better up having your own country. So I think the block is going to be, I know English

Canada doesn't really pay that much attention to the Black Quebec law, but I think the block is going to be a huge source of power, conflict. potentially to this government. And what has been interesting to me is seeing Steve McKinnon, Ra mentioned he's the government house leader, change his tone with regards to the bloc. So he's been really antagonistic with regards to the block Quebecois, criticizing them, like daring them, insulting them,

like to the point where Yv Francois Abnerchev doesn't always have like the best bedside manner, but came out and said like, what do they think we are? like we're not just, we're not liberals, they're not going to vote for you because you don't, you're not even talking to us. And this week, he was really nice to the ones.

So, maybe he realizes that there's stability for this government could be found through the block, but then how long does that last? Okay. Don't go anywhere. I've got to take a break. We'll be right back after this.

And welcome back. You're listening to The Bridge, the Tuesday episode. This Tuesday, it's Raj and Rousseau on the reporter's notebook. And they're both getting ready, as the rest of us are, to find out what exactly is in the budget. That'll be coming up later this afternoon, early evening on the East Coast. Okay. Here's my topic number two. You know, I thought we'd come to sort of the... the end of the story on the, the Ontario ad, the Ford ad, but it seems that that's still going on in terms of what was actually going on in the background of the good cop, bad cop,

Doug Ford, Mark Carney, positioning on this. There seemed to be two kind of different versions as the Carney version of what happened between the two of them over this ad. And there's the Doug Ford version of events does this thing

does this thing keep on going is there is there a problem in this alliance between Kearney and Ford or is this much ado about nothing who wants to take a crack at that

well that's good to hear go ahead is there a problem in the alliance no I think everybody's putting their own spin on it. I don't know. I wasn't in the room. I don't know what Mark Carney saw and what he said to Ford and what Ford took away

and how that can be different from what Mark Carney took away. I thought it was interesting that David E.B., the Premier of BC yesterday, said, okay, well, we're not going to move forward with our planned ad. And initially, the Premier seemed to all want to have this elbows-up approach. you know, Wob Canoe in Manitoba was flexing in saying, yeah, this was a great idea, he supported Ford. And I think the prime minister has convinced everybody, maybe the commentaries have convinced the premiers that they're better off speaking with one voice than this good cop, bad cop

routine or 13 different voices negotiating with the Americans because Donald Trump seems to be very fickle and we don't know where he's going. the plan 10% tariffs that he announced said he was going to impose haven't actually yet been imposed it's hard to know what the president is thinking and why he's thinking it I think the bigger issue is how long the setback with I guess formal negotiations because we're told that negotiations are still happening behind the scenes when does that start kicking in and how much leeway, frankly, Mexico is making with the Americans because the Americans have decided to negotiate bilaterally with Mexico.

And that's probably the biggest threat to us at the moment. Forget a Ford ad about Ronald Reagan. What do you think, Ron? Well, I think it's clear that now the premier has said that Mark Carney called him several times from Asia to try to get them to back off the ad. to take them off the air immediately. And we can see that David Eby thought that was a sensible thing to do. So in essence, we're being told that Ford defied the prime minister.

So there is some sort of a breach in their relationship. I don't know that it's permanent. The question is why. Why did Ford decide to do that? Well, one reason is obvious. He's got a half a million auto jobs that are on the line in his province. Is the other reason political? Is Mr. Ford interested in a federal role at some point?

He sees a conservative leader who is enfeebled. And is he just laying the groundwork in case there is a leadership and he might want to run in it, despite his challenges with Canada's other official language. The problem, though, is Mark Cummings. A little slip there. Tiny little pickle. Okay. The problem, though, is Mark Carney's.

It raises the question, then, if he tried to convince the Premier not to run the ads, why is he apologizing for Doug Ford? Why is he apologizing for Premier Ford? You know, I've been an advocate of advocating Canada's national interest. I think it makes sense that Premier's state. in the provinces and the federal government negotiates bilaterally with other countries. But it is raising the question,

I think, in the liberal's own caucus, why is he doing this? And what is he getting for it? Okay. Because it started with a campaign that was very difficult, very tough, elbows up. And then it started with a deadline of July 21st. And then it started, and then it continued,

that deadline went, and then it continued with the abandonment the digital sales tax and on and on and on and now it's it's an apology and what what is Canada getting for it and right now it's not getting anything so those questions are beginning to fester and therein lies I think the political danger for for the prime minister has elbows up become elbows down oh there's no doubt about it but I think that that was an active strategy from even that first phone call during the election campaign. I think the team around Mark Carney and the prime minister

have decided that that is the best way to approach Donald Trump. And I don't think it's a bad thing for the premieres to be flexing their muscles because there needs to be an outlet for all this frustration that we all have vis-a-vis the Americans. And they're accountable to their voters as well, right? So they have a job to be doing, and the prime minister has a job to be doing. And initially, a lot of what Mark Carney was doing, his first meeting at the White House, a lot of conservatives were praising him. This is exactly what the business community wanted to hear that he was striking the right approach. I think where the questions have emerged,

and Rob mentioned this, I said this on at issue last week, but we seem to be, like, their negotiation strategy seems to be getting us to concede and then moving the yardstick constantly. And we're like, we're not learning the lesson. So it was military spending. Then it was the digital service tax in June. Then it was we're dropping our reciprocity tariffs. Then it was who knows what because we heard dairy. They were discussing dairy.

They were discussing culture. And now they're only discussing side deals. We're not talking about a new economic security partnership like he had mentioned. the prime minister had mentioned earlier in May and in June. Well, what happens when you're sitting down and negotiating, renegotiating Kuzma and all the stuff that you were willing to negotiate away? You've already dealt on temporary side deals. It don't matter.

What do you have left to give away when the big prize is the thing that you're sitting down to negotiate with? I think a lot of people have questions about that. I you know the way I look at it is if the prime minister has gone into an elbows down position which you make a good argument I'll see that that's what he's done and so did Rob the Canadian people don't seem to have gone into an elbows down position they're still very much elbows up um they seem to embrace the Doug Ford ad yes you know you said wab canoe did the prime minister seemed to indicate that there were premiers who shared his opinion that they shouldn't be going that route but when you've got

you know this government needs to support of Canadians right now they'll need it on the budget they'll need it on their negotiation position are they at risk of losing that by this kind of stance they seem to be taking right now unless they're something, unless there's something going on in these negotiations or non-negotiations, depending on who you want to believe about what's still going on, unless there's something going on that we don't recognize, it would appear that they seem to have the upper hand. Well, they're Americans, but they always would. But they do have the upper hand. They're 10 times bigger than we are. And 77 or 78% of our

exports go to them. And I think it's 17 or 18% of their exports come to us. Yeah, I get all that. But, you know, we're talking about a process that's been going on all year. And we, I'm not sure where our victories are. Little victories. Yeah. No. And, and that's made this entire budget exercise even more difficult for Carney, because there's so much that he doesn't know about the Canadian economy. But if you're trying to advance the interests of the Canadian people, you're trying to advance the interests of those people who have no hope, well, there's going to be a lot of cold turkey or no turkey in Jean-Cierre, in Windsor, in Brampton, in Sioux-St. Marie, in the interior of British Columbia, unless we get some sort of a deal on tariffs. And it's going to be

even I think more shuddering for a lot of Canadians unless there is some certainty about what kind of arrangement we have with the United States because there's hundreds of billions of dollars that are on the sideline completely frozen and if you listen to Carney he he says that's even worse than the tariffs like he wants to attract capital for a lot of these big projects but why would an international corporation do that if they don't know what the field looks like. Is it a muddy field? Is it a pristine field? Is there no field at all? Is there no arrangement? Is it a trade war? Is it an economic war with the United States? A broader war. And all of that makes it impossible for business to do that. And yes, you could just tell, look at the expression on Carney's face on Friday. He was shoving crow

down his throat when he said, yes, I apologize to the president because, you know, for whatever reason, it was a made-up reason. We all know that if anybody has anything to apologize about, Donald Trump should be apologizing the Canadians for, in essence saying we're not a country, that we're not a people, that we'd be better off. He can't do that right now. He can't do that because he has to secure the future of an economy that is already, already. suffering. It wasn't in essence. He actually said it. Canada's not a real country. Yeah. Among all his other things. You get the last word, Althea. You can take it in any direction you want. I think Mark Carney told the truth because during the election campaign, he was kind of

trying to be cute and dancing around whether or not Donald Trump had raised the 51st state. And he suggested that he had been respected, i.e. that had not been raised. And then it emerged that actually the president had said that and that caused a few days worth of news stories. So I think Mark Coney learned a valuable lesson early on that you're better spill the beans because somebody will do it for you

eventually. I think the lack of a strong position vis-à-vis Donald Trump is one of the reasons why the liberals have been worried about having an election and frankly why they have tried not to have this budget cause

an election. That and the fact that people are starting to lose their jobs and it's going to look pretty ugly out there and you don't want it to be ugly in the middle of a Christmas time election, basically. So I do think there will be measures in the budget to attract capital investment to Robb's point,

but it's probably going to be trying to make Canada attractive for infrastructure projects, natural resource projects, a more business-friendly tax incentive climate. So all of Mark Carney's aura has been that he's the best economic manager. And I think that that is what they're going to lean into. Maybe he's not the guy that you thought he was going to be vis-a-vis Donald Trump,

but he can't be. But he's still delivering on the thing that we said he had, which is he's the guy who has a plan. this is the plan. Well, we're about to find out what, at least what the plan is later on this afternoon. And so we'll look forward to hearing that. Thank you to both of you. I know Althea, you're probably heading into the, into the lock up, as they call it. They don't actually lock you up. But you can't take away your room where you can't get out of the room. I mean, they escort you to the bathroom. So I guess if you really wanted to make a run for it,

But there are security guards. Yeah. The whole idea of the lockup is to give reporters a chance, not only to read the document, but also to get briefings from various finance department officials and some political officials as to their take on things before the real zoo begins in Parliament when the reading of the budget takes place

and the opposition parties get their first crack at saying what they think about it all. Thanks to you, Althea. Thanks to Rob. We'll talk to you all again in two weeks' time. Take care. Thanks, Peter. Rob Russo, Altheiraj, reporter's notebook for this week.

Big day on Parliament Hill. Okay, just before we leave, I want to give you a sense of tomorrow because tomorrow's a special day for us. Wednesdays, as you know, are usually on core editions, although this year I've kind of sprinkled in a few a new things every once in a while and tomorrow's is a new

program. It's not an encore. Special guest. If you are someone who occasionally listens to the BBC or watches the BBC, the World Service,

because you can get it in Canada, obviously, both radio and television, then the name Lees Doucette is one that you have heard many times reporting for some of the biggest stories in the world Elise is the chief international correspondent for the BBC and she's worked hard to get to that position she started in the 80s worked her way up

and one of the ways she worked her way up was being a frequent visitor to a country that we've talked about so many times on this program and other programs over the last 40 years and that's Afghanistan Lees has written

just written her first book it's called The Finest Hotel in Kabul it's been out here in the UK where I am for another week well not even a week

another few days and it's about to be released in Canada and Lees was good enough to drop by the Bridge for a little interview, talk about her book and talk about her career. Because not only is she a great journalist, a great reporter and now a great author.

She's a Canadian. And that story of growing up in Atlanta, Canada, I'm making it to the big time in one of the finest journalistic organizations in the world, the BBC, is one of the things we talk about tomorrow. but we talk about her book, The Finest Hotel in Kabul. That's the capital of Afghanistan, of course. That's right here, tomorrow, on the bridge.

Hope you'll join us. That's going to do it for today. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. I'm Peter Mansbridge. Talk to you again in less than 24 hours. Thank you.