The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - The Bridge: Encore Presentation - Energy Part 1: Oil

Episode Date: December 21, 2021

We're looking back at The Bridge in 2021.  Today an encore presentation of an episode that originally aired on February 24.  It is part one of a two part series on energy.  Is the end of oil on the horizon?

You're tuned in to a special encore presentation of The Bridge. This episode is part one of a two-part series on energy. Enjoy. Hi, I'm Peter Mansbridge, and you're listening to The Bridge. Ah, yes, the Wednesday music, Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth. Bruce is with us from Ottawa. Good morning. Peter, I love that music every Wednesday. That just gets me jumping right out of bed.

I can't wait to talk to you. Well, let me ask you first of all, because this was the classic choice that had to be made yesterday. You know, four o'clock Eastern time rolls around and there's two things happening right in that moment. You've got Joe Biden meeting Justin Trudeau for the first, I guess, summit meeting of world leaders, including Joe Biden. And at the same time, you've got extensive coverage, wall-to-wall coverage of Tiger Woods running his car off the road. Serious accident. I thought you were going to say you've got your dog Theo looking at you like it's time to go for a walk, boss, and that's actually what happened. So you didn't pick either one of them.

I wanted to know which one you picked. What did you go for? Because the Canadian channels, you know, they tried to have it both ways, and, of course, you know, there was the CBC covering this virtual meeting, which was very virtual, at least for the first few minutes, and then they kind of went behind closed doors. But you could tell they were desperate to get back to Tiger. Yeah, I didn't follow the Tiger story very closely,

in part because I think that the history of events like that is that you just get very, very little hard information for the first who knows how many hours. I think Tiger's management also really shuts these things down. So two or three days from now, I kind of figure I'll be able to read a story that has some actual information in it that that's sort of reliable. But in the meantime, I was very interested in the Biden-Trudeau meeting. And I love the fact that it was virtual in a number of ways. One is I was thinking, if these two were meeting in person, all of the logistics, all of the effort, the travel, and everything else that goes into those meetings didn't have to happen. And as a result, I was reading this five-page roadmap that they issued this morning about the detail of what they talked about and had agreed to do together,

and I found it really quite interesting. So I don't know if most of the media coverage included much of that, but there's a lot of substance there. Okay. So what's the headlines on the substance? Don't give me the five pages. Give me the headline. Well, you know, this is the great advantage of the podcast,

of course, Peter, as you know, is that we don't have to just touch the surface of this, but I hear you. I hear you just want the highlights. Because we have a great program coming up, a really important one, one that you've lobbied for for some time. I've been very keen to have this program, and our guest coming up is a really great guest.

So I'm really looking forward to that. I do think that for everybody who is wondering, are pipelines going to be a point of friction in that conversation? There's no evidence that that was the case. There was a lot of content about mutual cooperation and fighting climate change, building clean technologies together, working on the critical minerals needed to support the development of batteries and doing that together. A lot about fighting climate change and building an energy transition in common, which I think is a really important

thing because it's important for people who work in the oil and gas industry and for those who don't to see that the relationship is strong enough that they can have the conversation about mutual cooperation. So I thought that was really very positive. And I was also looking for evidence that the leaders had talked about in one way or another, China, and also the question of bi-American, which is always a pressure point within the Democratic coalition when they get a president elected, let's concentrate on American jobs. And on China, I thought the language between the two leaders was very constructive. It was clear to me that there had been a fair bit of discussion between the two leaders was very constructive. It was clear to me

that there had been a fair bit of discussion about the two Michaels, the Canadians who are being held by China. And that, you know, I would surmise from what we saw that there was a strategy in mind between the two leaders to try to end that impasse. And I do think on Buy American, all of the language pointed to the idea that these two countries recognize their integrated nature and are going to try to work through any problems of that sort in a cooperative way. My take on these things is, you know, I guess a little more cynical. I've seen so many of these over the years. You tend to get the sense it's all been worked out beforehand, and a lot of it is kind of for show. And the only way to really judge it is not on what we saw in the moment,

not on what we read the morning after in the details of what they claim to have talked about, but really in the days, months, and even years ahead to see what actually happened on these things that they seem to be so in line on. Now, there's every reason to believe that these two guys should be online on some of the major issues because they know each other, they've worked together before, and they have common interests, especially on, you know, on climate change.

I mean, you know, oil, energy, not so much because of some of the differences. But on a lot of the other issues, including obviously the pandemic, they are kind of in sync. And there should be some reason to believe that something is going to happen. The China story, as you say, is an important one for both countries, and especially so for Trudeau, who would love to have the two Michaels out of China before there's an election, whenever that may be. But seeming to have Joe Biden sign on to help on that front could mean something

because there are ways the two countries together may be able to sort something out on that front given the wild card of the woman who's being held in Vancouver, at least partly because the Americans had asked for her to be held. Right. Well, look, I agree with you, Peter, that the actual, the idea that the two leaders sat down and said, what should we talk about? Maybe we should talk about batteries. And then they came up with a plan on that. I don't think that's how that works. I think the work was done in advance. And so when I look at it, look at what they committed to and decided to issue together on paper, I, first of all, compare it to what would the alternative agenda look like and what

did the last agenda of conversations with Donald Trump look like? And Donald Trump, the conversation was about, we've got to tear up NAFTA, Canada's being mean to us on dairy. It was mostly about Donald Trump's ego and his need to have that stroked. And there was no evidence of mutual cooperation on Donald Trump's part when it came to military. And yesterday, according to the statement, there was a discussion about rebuilding NORAD together, $11 billion item,

40% of the cost would be Canada. So I think that's a real tangible commitment. And you're right. I mean, maybe they won't carry through with it, but I don't know why they would have put it out if they weren't intending to. But the other thing, though, is that this critical minerals action plan was, from my understanding, one of the singular areas where the Trump administration and Canada actually put a plan in place because these minerals are really needed for these clean technologies, whether it's solar panels or electric vehicles. And the major source in the world right now of these minerals is China. But Canada has a lot of these minerals. So there was a self-interest on the part of America to build this action plan together.

And I think Biden came out loud and clear and said, we're going to continue with that. And the last thing I will say is that on automotives, it wasn't very many months ago when the mood around the Canadian automotive sector was we'll never survive the shift towards e-vehicles. The major manufacturers are going to unwind their manufacturing capacity here. And what are we going to do about that? Is there anything we can do? And lo and behold, we have a commitment by global manufacturers to do some of that work here in Canada now, and I thought the statement on that was quite encouraging as well yesterday.

Well, you've led us right to our major topic, not just for this week, but for next week as well. Next week, we'll talk about EV, electronic vehicles, and what it could mean for Canada, and how prepared Canadians are to move significantly in that direction. And also oil and the future of oil. And that's where we're going to start because still to come, as they say in the business, is the end of oil on the horizon. This is The Bridge with peter mansbridge

okay that's the big question is the end of oil on the horizon it's a provocative question and you may think we're going too far without even asking it but there is a sense of this issue out there in different parts of the world and you'd be surprised where some of it's coming from. So joining our conversation to talk about this is a friend of the podcast, a friend of the program, Markham Hislop, who is, you know, one of the best energy writers, most connected energy writers in Canada. He knows the Western Canadian story really well, but he knows the world energy story really well. He's based these days on Vancouver Island in Parkland, which is a great area of Vancouver Island.

Not that there's a bad area of Vancouver Island. It's one of the most beautiful spots in the country. Anyway, let's get going by talking to Markham because we were spurred on by this by a column that appeared in the New York Times about a week ago. And that's how we're going to start this conversation. The headline in the New York Times, Shell on a turning point says its oil production has peaked,

really leaves one with the impression that, okay, we're now into the downslope on the future of oil. You know the story well. You've been covering the oil patch for more than a little while. Is this the real thinking that's going on in the oil patch about the future of oil? Well, it depends on which oil patch you're talking about. The Canadian oil patch, perhaps not, at least is not as much as it should be. And this is one of the arguments I get into with folks in Alberta all the time. But I can tell you, I interview energy experts from around the world. And I remember in particular interviewing economist Ed Rawlings, who is the chief economist for Wood McKenzie, the big international consulting firm. And they had written a study in 2017 about the peak oil demand.

And I interviewed him in 2018. And so we were talking about peak oil demand maybe showing up in 2036. And this was one of the more aggressive peak oil demand forecasts at the time. And now we have a number of agencies, including McKinsey and other reputable consultancies, saying that we may be at peak oil demand now. And if not now, within a few years. That's how rapidly the energy system is changing. And I think that is not appreciated in the Canadian oil patch. It tends to be a little insular. It tends to be a little bit provincial, inward looking. And when you get outside of Canada, you talk to experts in the US or in Europe, you get a very different view of how the energy system is evolving and the role that oil is going to play in that system going forward. What's holding Canadians back or the Canadian oil industry back it was very interesting and i did this i broke a story in 2018 about a

series of meetings that started in the fall of 2014 and it was convened by five oil sand ceos people like murray edwards of cnrl i mean the ceo of shell and and synovus these are big canadian companies and they were really tired of being beaten up all the time in the media by the environmental groups. And so they had this secret meetings in Calgary with five oil sands CEOs and five environmental groups executive directors. And Zipporah Berman, who's regularly demonized in Alberta, was the co-chair on the environmental group side.

And Dave Collier, who was a longtime Shell executive and head of the Association of Pet a year, they hashed out a deal that was almost word for word, Rachel Notley's climate leadership plan in 2015. And that's why the famous four oil sands CEOs stood on the platform with Notley, the NDP premier, in 2015 to announce the climate leadership plan. That set off almost like a civil war within the corporate boardrooms of Calgary. And over the course of two-ish years, the opponents of the climate policy and climate science essentially did a very quiet war behind the scenes with these advocates of you know making accommodating climate policy and in the end the opponents won and they allied themselves with alberta premier jason kenney and so when the uh the election came around in 2019, that was the coalition that defeated Rachel Notley. And essentially, that narrative has more or less been dominant in Alberta politics ever since.

And what it does is it makes it difficult to have the kind of conversation that Alberta needs to have. It sucks all the oxygen out of the public conversation. So talking about the energy transition in Alberta is very difficult. And it's only lately because of the pandemic and other big structural changes that are just accelerating to the point where you can't deny it. Now it's finally, you know, there's some grudging acceptance in this narrative that maybe the world is going to change. But, you know, we should have been having this conversation five or six years ago. Yeah, yeah.

Mark, it's good to hear your voice again. And you and I know a lot of the same people. And I was around consulting in the sector and talking with some of the groups who were involved in those meetings that you just referred to. And I think your analysis is bang on in terms of what's holding this conversation back or what has been. I would probably be even a little bit more precise and say politics has been domestic Alberta politics and to some degree domestic Canadian politics. I think there was a point early on when a lot of federal conservatives,

disproportionately those from Saskatchewan and Alberta, decided that they wanted to be on the other side of the climate change argument from the Liberals and the NDP. And I think in one form or another, that early position has kind of rattled around and kind of wrapped its arms around the oil patch and led to a situation where sometimes even if the industry members wanted to go further faster in support of a transition

and in the pursuit of emissions reduction, that the politicians were telling them, we don't like the sound of that. It kind of undermines our political position. So I was actually going to ask you whether or not you sense that there's the potential for a shift right now, because I'd love to get your thoughts on this. It feels to me that Kenny arrives in office. He declares he's going to have this inquisition of where is the money coming from that's animating a message in Alberta or about Alberta, which frankly is a message that everybody's using everywhere in the world.

And he's going to have this energy war room, which, you know, from my vantage point, I'd love to know what you think. It looks like the kind of the weakest, most poorly organized army ever to fight any war anywhere. And so you've got this kind of, it felt like a political argument being forced on some industry members. And is that going to hold or is that going to break? What do you think about any and all of that and where is it going? I think it's fair to say that there is, for lack of a better way to describe them, a progressive camp in the Alberta oil patch. And I'll illustrate it by pointing to an op-ed that was published in the June issue of

Corporate Nights magazine last year. And the authors were Mark Little, the CEO of Suncor, and Laura Kiltrees, who is the head of Alberta Innovates, the provincial agency that does a lot of technology research. And they specifically acknowledged the energy transition and argued that the oil sands company, because it has so much free cash and already has a history of innovation, is ideally positioned to lead the energy transition. So people like Little are certainly out there advocating for this position. The problem is that they don't want to lead the parade. They want somebody else to lead the parade, and they want to be acting players. Because these are CEOs.

These are people who run oil companies. They don't want to be in the limelight fighting political battles like this. That's not what they're intent. And so they avoid them like the plague. But if there was a political leadership around an energy transition narrative, there are enough executives and managers and people in the oil patch like Little to support that narrative. The problem is, who's the spear now is that it's not really just a conversation among political progressives and people who don't feel the same way about the climate issue or see the economics of change in energy differently, but it's in the investor

community. And I remember just being kind of gobsmacked when Jason Kenney sat with the Globe and Mail editorial board only a year and a half ago I think it was and he told them that he thought that this investor interest in climate change was a flavor of the month and it was going to pass and I work with a lot of companies as you know and they don't think that at all. They think that these ESG environmental, social and governance expectations on companies are really important and growing fact of life. And if you're a CEO and you want to attract investment, and if you're a premier and you want CEOs to be able to attract investment, you've got to change your game. Is that a thing that you see in the ascendancy as it relates to the discussion in Alberta now? It's not as ascendant as it should be. I mean, I interviewed Eric Denhoff, who was the minister, deputy minister, sorry, of environment and climate change under Notley. And he told me about trade missions to New York

and sitting down with Wall Street, the big investment houses back in 2017, 2018. And the investors at that time, the Wall Street firms were telling them very clearly that climate risk was a huge issue and they needed climate policy so that they had a narrative to tell their investors. They had to say, look, Alberta has, they're doing something about climate and that's why it's still okay to invest in the oil sands. Now, fast forward

a couple of years and what happened last year when the Norwegian Wealth Fund blacklisted three or four of the big oil sands companies, CEOs like Alex Porbe of Synovus, who is the chair of the Board of Governors of CAP. So very, very influential. When his firm got blacklisted, it came out and talked about how it was, you know, it was unfair and it was green tokenism. And rather than acknowledging it as a wake-up call, hey, we have to do something, it was very petulant, I think is what I called it in a column. So again, Wall Street is moving faster than the corporate boardrooms of Calgary, and that's a bad thing. You know, I don't know the players like you two guys know the players.

But when I look at this situation from sort of the global perspective and you see what's happening in Europe and you see the move that Shell has made and the kind of things that Shell is saying, I mean all these companies are connected in some form or another. And you have to wonder whether the Alberta companies, and I guess it's not just Alberta, but some of the North American companies are resisting the moves that the European companies are making.

Somebody must be saying, hey, you know, at some point, we got to get in the game here. Are we really going to be left holding nothing at the end of it? Is there, are you seeing any sense beyond the things you told us at the beginning of this conversation that they are, that the Alberta companies at least, the Canadian companies, are ready to make a significant move. No. And I have an article in this month's Alberta Views magazine

in which I kind of address this very issue. And the European oil majors are becoming, they're evolving from big oil to big energy. They're investing in wind farms and solar farms and you know electrical utilities and and ev charging infrastructure and so on they don't have that opportunity in canada you can't go and you know compete with a quebec hydro or bc hydro the way you can in in europe and so they have a different set of opportunities. And I've interviewed a number of executives.

And in fact, I interviewed Janet Annesley, who was the vice president for Husky Energy for this story. And she said, and I think this is the approach that all the other companies are taking, we have modeled out to 2050. And our best business case is to lower our operating costs and lower the carbon intensity of our heavy crude oil. We will look at investments in clean tech and clean energy if there's a good business case for them, but that isn't going to be our primary focus. And I think you're seeing very clearly that that's Suncor is doing it.

CNRL is taking that approach. Imperial Oil is taking that approach. Those are the kind of the big four or five now. And I don't expect that that's going to change much going forward. Okay. Mark, I think your take on the kind of the cultural barriers that you're describing is absolutely right. It's really important for people to kind of think about it and how we overcome it. And I think it is compounded by the fact that the information flow about opportunity that Alberta could have if it embraced this kind of changing investment climate and changing energy demand, I think is a really important one. the largest companies in the world, the Microsofts, the Facebooks, the Amazons, and so on,

and what kinds of choices they were making in terms of where to locate and what sort of sustainability credentials they were looking to bolster and what kind of public policies they were looking to be surrounded by. And if you just looked at that and you were a young, aspiring Albertan, you couldn't help but come to the conclusion that, you know, the province needs to take a different approach to attracting investment. It can't be sending out these signals that say we're the one place you can reliably find in Canada anyway, that that really has a problem with carbon pricing, that really doesn't know that it cares that much about climate change. And so I don't know how that gets solved. But I wanted to maybe for my last question for you ask you, you know, social media, you use social media, I sometimes think of it as anti social media, because if you utter something that is controversial, in the community in which you live, you get it hard and fast coming at you. And now I'm sitting here in Ottawa and I can say the things I say and I don't. And sometimes

I'll say things like what the CEO worldwide of BP said, which is the world needs a rapid transition to net zero and carbon pricing is a great way to do it. But if you say that in Alberta, I get the sense that you take quite a amount of fury upon yourself. How does that make you feel? How do you approach that just from the standpoint of your own kind of ability to kind of walk through the community and keep pushing the reporting that you do and the thoughts that you have. I'd be very curious about that. Well, Bruce, I can tell you my hide's a lot thicker today than it was four or five years

ago. And this is very interesting because I am not Ansight Oil Sands. In fact, I wrote a 2019 book, The New Alberta Advantage Technology Policy and the Future of the Oil Sands, in which i argued that the oil sands companies by acknowledging climate policy climate change and and climate carbon pricing and all of that we're actually innovators and we're kind of leading the way in the in the canadian oil patch and what i've argued consistently for the last five or six years is that the energy transition is here the energy transition is accelerating it The energy transition is accelerating. It's an

existential threat to Alberta. Alberta needs to start talking about it now so that it can begin adaptation so that it is prosperous 10, 20, 30 years down the road. But the window of opportunity is closing. Now, the interesting thing is that is a pro-hydrocarbon narrative that does not line up with the dominant political narrative in Alberta. And for that sin, I am regularly roasted by not just the average oil rig worker on Twitter, But people like Brett Wilson, I mean, leaders in the oil community will take me on publicly and say all sorts of horrible things about me because I don't toe the line. Even though I'm pro-oil, even though I argue for strategies that would lead to their long-term sustainability and profitability and job creation and all of those things, I don't toe the line. And that is in today's political culture, in the populist political culture of Alberta, that's unacceptable. It's a bit Trumpy, isn't it?

I mean, the idea that if you say, well, we could use hydrogen or a small modular nuclear as a way of extracting our energy with zero emissions, that should be something that logical people would say, well, let's have a conversation about that. But I sense that that's, as you say, that's kind of verboten in the Alberta that you live in right now. Let me just, let me close it out with one last one for you, Markham, because this has really been enlightening and hearing, especially where you're coming from on your own beliefs and yet the wall you're up against in terms of trying to get, I guess, in some fashion

some people realistic. I mean, the fact is we call this little segment of our Wednesday podcast Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth. And it just seems to me that on, well, to some degree on both sides of this issue, there's been a lot of smoke and mirrors in the way it's portrayed and not enough of the truth. Am I being too conspiratorial here

or would that be a fair assessment? Peter, I remember writing a piece for the alberto oil magazine in like 2016 and i talked about the vancouver school of media the taichi the observer and and other kinds of independent media like that and the misinformation that they were spreading about the oil and gas industry and pipelines, because they were publishing pieces that literally were not factual. They were agitprop as opposed to real journalism. So on the other side of this, there are narratives, and there's a lot of reporting and writing that's wildly inaccurate. And then on the other side, the pro-oil, the oil boosters side, there's quite a lot of the same,

where they're essentially trying to justify the status quo. And this is where the energy war room comes in, because it was nothing more than a $30 million a year excuse to white, sorry, to greenwash the status quo. That's really what it's all about. And in the middle is where the truth lies. And that's where I've tried to live for the last six, seven, eight years on energy reporting, is to go to the experts. What do the experts say? What does an economist say?

What do, you know, these are the people that are independent and impartial and not involved in the political debate. And that gives one a very, very different perspective on the oil and gas industry and Alberta's future. Mark, it's been a treat listening to you. We really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us. Well, thanks for having me on.

I look forward to further conversations. And I'm sure we'll have them. Markham Hislop talking to us from Vancouver Island. He's an energy writer and author. And I guess Bruce is safe to say, it's certainly safe for him to say, that he's controversial. He tells it like it is in terms of the way he believes it. And as a result, he's been under the gun more than a few times by various players in the energy industry.

And it seems more the political players than necessarily the industry players. You have to unmute there, Bruce. Tricky technology. Here we go. No, I'm not getting you. Whatever you've done, it's great to watch him do that. He's tapping on his mic. I can see him, but nothing's working. No, whatever you did, you unplugged it somehow. So I'll let you keep working on trying to figure that out while I give a promotion to next week's program,

which is the logical addition to this. Because I think, you know, the tease provocative question that we asked was, is the end of oil on the horizon? Well, you know, it's not on the horizon unless you're looking way, way into the future. Okay, I think you're back now, Bruce. Whatever you did there. Yep, there you go.

Unless you look way, way into the future, it's not like going to be tomorrow. And it may never happen. As Markham says, if they adjust and adapt, oil can still play a role in our future, but it's going to have to be a lot different than the present. But anyway, next week we're going to talk about electronic vehicles. We kind of tipped our hand a little bit during that discussion,

but it's a fascinating discussion to have. And we're going to look at that in terms of what part of our future that is. Okay, sorry, or at least the kind of the big picture analysis that Albert part of and been trying to contribute to, that Alberta politicians, some of them anyway, are trying to pretend that the rest of the world isn't changing, trying to pretend that the only problems faced by the Alberta oil patch are problems that have to do with liberals in Ottawa, when that just doesn't stand up to any kind of scrutiny. So I think the truth is that that conversation is changing in Alberta somewhat. I think Jason Kinney's plunging polling support is an indication of the fact that Albertans are becoming more skeptical of that we stand against any conversation that might involve some change in the future value of

oil. And he's absolutely right that also that there will be oil used for quite some period of time and that the way for Alberta to participate in that market is to do things to reduce emissions, which some of the companies are very anxious to do and are already implementing, even though it's politically hard to have that conversation in Alberta, which it shouldn't be. You know, it's amazing what plunging popularity will do for you in terms of changing some of your thinking. I mean, just look at what he did on coal, right?

Kind of backtrack on the coal issue in the last month or so for many similar reasons, right? So we'll see what happens here. Uh, it, you know, it is such a key part of Alberta, who it is, what it stands for, what its past is, uh, linked to what it's, it feels that its future continues to be linked to. Um, so we'll see what happens and how that plays out. Meanwhile, next week, I know you're as excited as I am to talk about this whole issue of electronic vehicles and where we are.

You know, I go back and forth on this. Am I going to end up buying one? The answer is yes. What are the drawbacks? You know, is there enough, you know, how far can I get in my car? Things are changing rapidly on that front. And we're going to try and answer some of these questions. But I know you're pretty excited.

This is reminding me of the time on national TV, and this video is still out there on YouTube if anybody wants to find it, where you announced the internet. Is that how you put it? It was not quite that clear. There's something called the internet is the way it sounds. It's pretty funny. Amber Mack was talking to me about it the other day

and saying that she used to use that clip as part of her lectures when she started off. I'm just going to give you one little bit of advice before we wrap up today. I said, every time you say electronic vehicles, it has a little bit of the same sound, Peter. So let's tidy that up for next week. I look forward to that conversation. And we will have it. So listen, thanks so much. We've got to give the big plug for tomorrow and not just for the bridge,

which will be on its normal time and normal way to get it. But at five o'clock tomorrow afternoon on Sirius XM, Channel 167 Canada Talks, we'll have the debut

of our new program, Bruce and I and Chantal Hébert. It's called Good Talk. The three of us will always be on it. Occasionally we'll have a fourth guest. Tomorrow as the debut program will just be the three of us.

And obviously if you get SiriusXM you will be able to hear that program but I think there's going to be a way that you'll also be able to hear that program, but I think there's going to be a way that you'll also be able to hear it other than just that. And so at least initially, so you can get a listen to the kind of program we're going to be putting on.

You'll need to go to SiriusXM.ca to look for that, either later today or tomorrow morning. But the idea is SiriusXM.ca at 5 p.m. Eastern on Thursdays. We'll have good talk. And, you know, the idea is to sort of kind of gauge the national landscape on politics and, you know, major issues. So we'll see how that goes. Tomorrow we'll very much start with kind of laying the landscape down,

putting down the way we see things and everything from when there may be an election to the state of the political parties. That'll be show number one. And then obviously we'll get into various issues as it goes. I'm excited about it. And I know Chantal is. I think she's probably going to go for an extra long bike ride today in the snowy streets of Montreal. And I can't wait for us to have that conversation. And me too. So that's tomorrow.

That's Thursday. Friday, of course, the weekend special. I got a ton of emails last night from those of you who were putting forward your idea for a signature Canadian speech that you remember either from your childhood, from the last few years, something that you think will last the test of time. We were talking about this as a result of speeches that were made by Churchill and FDR and JFK and various others

and trying to and various others, and trying to remember, okay, what's the Canadian speech that sort of rings a bell for you? A lot of people have entered this idea. It's not a contest, but they've sent in their things. So if you have some ideas, themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com, themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com. Please send in your entries. Look forward to reading them all and running them out on Friday

during the weekend special. Okay, that's it for this day. Thanks, Bruce. Good to talk to you, as always. Great to talk to you, Peter. Okay, and we'll be back. You know, we'll be back in 24 hours. Coming up next on Canada Talks, Andrew Crystal and Crystal Nation.