The Current - Canadian politics heats up for the summer!

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

It’s the first day of summer and Canadian politics is already heating up. Prime Minister Mark Carney is hoping to pass Bill C-5 before the House breaks, but the legislation is drawing serious pushback from Indigenous leaders and others. Meanwhile, the G7 has wrapped — was there any progress on tariffs? Plus, a Conservative Party leadership review and by-elections in Alberta. It all makes for a busy summer in Canadian politics. Our national affairs panel — Rosemary Barton, Stephanie Levitz and Kathleen Petty — join us to break it all down.

Ten years ago, I asked my partner Kelsey if she would marry me. I did that, despite the fact that every living member of my family who had ever been married had also gotten divorced. Forever is a Long Time is a five-part series in which I talk to those relatives about why they got divorced and why they got married. You can listen to it now on CBC's Personally. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway and this is the current podcast. Yes indeed, it is the first day of summer and things are heating up, not just weather wise, but also in Canadian politics. The Prime Minister, Mark Carney, is hoping to pass new legislation before the House breaks after today's session. Top of the agenda is Bill C-5, which pledges to help speed up big nation building projects.

Meanwhile, the dust is still settling on the G7 summit. Plus there's a conservative leadership review coming. Keeping cool in all this heat is our national affairs panel, Stephanie Levitt, senior reporter with the Globe and Mail's Ottawa Bureau, Rosemary Barton, the CBC's chief political correspondent and host of Rosemary Barton Live. And Kathleen Petty is the host of CBC Radio's Alberta at Noon and the West of Centre podcast. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Good morning, Matt.

Morning. Rosie, bring us up to date on the status of Bill C-5. This is the Building Canada Act. It is at the heart in many ways of the Prime Minister's agenda. If the House is set to rise later today, how hard do the Liberals have to push to get this thing passed? Not very hard, to be honest. It will pass by the end of the day. I mean, that's where they're tracking, and it's gone.

It's been gone through in sort of record speed. It is the building projects of national interest. It's getting rid of the internal trade barriers. But it's those national projects of interest that have caused sort of the most problems or controversy or criticism for the government. And it's because it does concentrate the power of a minister or cabinet in a way that we haven't really seen before to green light some of these projects of national

interest and to potentially allow the minister as well to bypass provisions that already exist in law, whether it be the Environmental Protection Act or the Impact Assessment Act. And it also has raised concerns from Indigenous groups, First Nations groups, about whether it adequately will consult their communities about what's happening. This in spite of the fact that it makes very clear in the legislation that it will respect Section 35, rights of Indigenous peoples in the Constitution. it will respect Section 35 rights of indigenous peoples in the Constitution. So there's a lot of things going on in there and the government wants it passed by the

end of today because it is really what the Prime Minister said yesterday, the core of his government's response to Donald Trump to try and get some big things done in this country in a way that haven't been done before very very quickly. Let's talk about some of that pushback the Grand Chief Alvin Fiddler of the Nishnaabe-Aske First Nation. This is an organization that represents 49 First Nations in Northern Ontario was on Parliament Hill at a protest earlier this week and had this message for the Prime Minister. If you pass this bill, it will be a long hot summer. Because we will not sit idly by and watch any government

to come into our territory and take whatever or whenever they want it because it is ours. Steve, the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, Cindy Woodhouse-Nepenac, has said that she would not rule out legal action against the government, even with amendments that have been made in the last couple of days. How big of a problem do you think this is going to be for the government? It's a problem. It could be a down theroad problem, Matt. And what I mean by that is that the government has said pretty clearly that, you know, throughout the testimony, abridged as it was on this bill, that this bill doesn't address dream projects, which

is to say that someone's sitting around and saying, you know what I think we should really do? We should do this. What they're looking for are projects that are already, to borrow a phrase, in the pipeline, things that have gone through already measures of approval, things that already have indigenous consent and consultation at the nascent stages but are trapped in sort of a cascading number of assessments under the current legislative regime, which is to say, if that's true, if they are going to greenlight projects that already exist, already have the money, already have the support, that's fine. I think what a lot of, and I don't think they'll face a tight degree of pushback.

The issue becomes, as so many critics of this bill have raised, what happens next? These are powers that don't go away. What will happen? What if they run through all of these projects? There is a clock on this bill. It has a sunset clause. But will they seek to add dream projects, new projects, things that do have significant opposition to them into this project of Mr. Carney's? If they do that, that definitely opens up doors for court challenges. So the question then I suppose for First Nations

leadership in this country is will they seek to challenge the legislation prior to its active implementation, right? To say that no, this just abridges charter rights or it abridges our constitutional rights off the top or is Mr. Carney going to move fast enough that those legal challenges won't be able to catch up to the things he wants to do. Kathleen, you're sitting in Alberta. What is the expectation in that province about what this act and what the power that the government is looking for will achieve?

I mean, Steph mentioned, you know, in the pipeline, this is in some ways about pipelines, is it not? Well, it's a big part of a pipeline, at least in the view of Daniel Smith and Scott Moe, and they are his unlikely allies because they are definitely allied with this. As they say out in these parts, Matt, you make hay while the sun shines, and they think the sun is shining right now. They are encouraging Mark Carney, and I would add to that the conservative opposition is also assisting Mark Carney so he's got some cover there as well because as much as the liberals will own this bill and whatever the

consequences might be along the lines of what Steph was suggesting it's going to be owned in large part by the conservatives also and it will be interesting to see whether you know it's specific projects and obviously a pipeline to Prince Rupert is sort of priority one for someone like Daniel Smith. But then you have to look at things like the tanker ban, C-48, a bill that she wants gone. Although, you know, to listen to Daniel Smith, she's even sort of recalibrating there and saying, well, you know, perhaps we can just sort of carve out Prince Rupert. In other words, if the tanker ban stays, we carve that out. And C5 appears to have the

legislative power once passed to be able to do exactly that, to essentially circumvent existing legislation. Rosie, is the prime minister likely to run into the same obstacles that have prevented big things from being built in past? I mean, he's come in with this agenda and saying we want things done now, but is that possible in the system that we live in? I mean, it's a good question. I think he has a couple of things going for him.

First of all, his approval ratings are through the roof in this honeymoon period, anywhere between 50 to 60 percent of Canadians like what he's doing. He has a window of opportunity created by the U.S. president and a desire by Canadians to see this country do some big things. And he's got some buy-in, as Kathleen said, from the Conservatives. So he's got a lot of things going for him. The important thing about C-5-2, Matt, is there is no project attached to this, right? This is a bill that's seeking to find a framework to give projects provisional yeses. And it is, as Steph said, very much about tapping the easy

projects, the big projects that are already there. The problem for Daniel Smith is there's no proponent behind a new pipeline, and the government has made it very clear that this bill is about more than just pipelines. So yeah, it's very possible that we will see some big things done in a way in this country that we haven't seen before. But I think the prime minister is also going to come up against the political realities of being prime minister and that's maybe something that he doesn't quite get

yet. Steve, just last point on this briefly. The political realities are one thing. There's been this line floating around that he sees himself the prime minister as the CEO of Canada. How do you square the two? I think that's one of the most interesting things to watch with Prime Minister Kearney and I think that's why some folks have their backs up about this legislation, the idea

of the centralization of power, right? The CEO here, in this case the Prime Minister or obviously the designated minister for the act right now is Minister LeBlanc. What do they seek to do with that power? What's the check on it? Where's the accountability for it? And key for this bill, and I think much of what Mr. Carney hopes to achieve likely will be maximum transparency,

will be showing their work every step of the way. Is drinking raw milk safe like RFK Jr. suggests? Can you reduce a glucose spike if you eat your food in quote unquote the right order? I'm registered dietitian, Abby Sharp. I host a nutrition myth busting podcast called Bite Back with Abby Sharp. And those are just some of the questions I tackle with qualified experts on my show. On Bite Back, my goal is to help listeners create a pleasurable relationship with food, their body and themselves, which in my opinion is the fundamental secret to good health. Listen to Bite Back wherever you get your podcasts.

As with many things, Donald Trump is the elephant in this room, Kathleen. He was in the room for a little while and then he got in his helicopter and flew out of Cananascus early at the G7 meeting, extensively because of what's happening in the Middle East, but he'd also been sniping back and forth with Emmanuel Macron on social media. What stood out to you about Mark Carney's time in Cananascis and how he handled everything at the G7? Well, one thing that struck me was how at ease he looks. I mean, he looks pretty relaxed, at least in public.

I don't know what it was like behind the scenes, but he seemed pretty confident and quite pleased with himself and how things were going and why not. I mean, really the bar was don't kick him off, him being Donald Trump, and he appears to have accomplished that. I think what was most interesting for me, but we don't really know that much about what happened, were all the bilaterals. The G7 for me seemed, I mean, the G7 slash G6 and G many more on the second day, sort of as an entity seemed somehow less consequential in terms of no joint communique, but this

message from the chair, the chair being Mark Carney. I was more curious about all the bilaterals and the one-on-one conversations and whatever transpired there, and so much of that, frankly, remains a mystery. I know in his closing news conference when he was asked about his meeting with the Prime Minister of India, Modi, you know, the reporter asked for sort of more details of what they spoke about and, you know, he's fond of doing this. You'll notice this at news conferences. I'm sure Rosie Steph have noticed this. If he said all he wants to say, he just says, yeah, I referred to my last answer or my first answer.

And then that's the end of the follow-up. So, you know, he has this capacity to sound like he's sharing a lot of sort of precise detail, but then you realize, I'm not really sure he answered that question. And then you do a follow-up and that's his response when you're asking for more detail or clarity. So that can be kind of frustrating

sometimes. To that point, Rosie, what do we know about what came out of the meeting with the US president and particularly around the issue of tariffs? Well, we know that they've apparently agreed to now a 30-day window to make progress or get a deal. So the next deadline is July 21st. We know that Dominic LeBlanc is having some conversations today based on conversations he had earlier in the week and that there is now this agreed upon framework. The problem of course is that it's Donald Trump. So is this really something that Trump is aggressively moving towards in the same way that Canada is? Trump did say, he did say that Mark, quote, has a more complex idea than I do about trade, but it still looks good. You know, the prime minister has been asked

what that means. He won't say. This is a prime minister who is not going to get into a lot of details publicly about what happens in those bilaterals, about what negotiations are happening, about the details of anything. You know, that's frustrating for journalists who like transparency, but it is the way he operates. So he has a window here with Donald Trump that he himself has now set with expectations. It'll be interesting to see whether he can get something done because he's also, let's not forget,

doing a whole bunch of other things with a whole bunch of other partners to try and offer opportunity if this doesn't work with Donald Trump. And as also Steph said that if this doesn't work, there will be further tariffs on steel and aluminum, right? So how, from your perspective, how big is the window that has been created? Can they climb through this window? As always, you know, so much of it comes down to a question of political will.

And, you know and is there the political will on our side? I would argue absolutely, but what are we going to give up in exchange would be a question, right? This isn't – Donald Trump is a dealmaker. Everybody says that. Everybody knows it. What is Canada prepared to give him in exchange for lifting these tariffs?

If the answer is, well, we won't increase the existing tariff existing tariff you know war on steel and aluminum is that enough for the president you know he the president likes to talk about things in units of time and that New York Times had a hilarious piece where they talked about how many times he says in two weeks when he's asked for an answer to something when are you gonna make a decision in two weeks in two weeks and so you know this is where we're at you know we've moved maybe from a day to day let's wait and see mr. Carney is under pressure to get a deal from Donald Trump I mean he won government for goodness sakes on this right on this premise that I'm the guy I'm the one who can do this so he's

gonna have to figure out what victory looks like in 30 days time and in the meanwhile I guess you know no one's really getting a summer off Rosie and we'll come back to that in a moment maybe Rosie looking Rosie, looking through that window, or one window, is Pierre Poliev, who's the leader of the Conservative Party, man outside these conversations. He's going to face a leadership review, what, in January? What is the sense from your perspective as to how people in that party and then the caucus are feeling

about their leader? Um, that's a complicated question. Um, I think they are still giving him some time to sort of process what happens and figure things out. I'll be interested to hear Steph answer this question too. Listen, the first thing he has to do is get elected in this by-election. It can be called as early as June 29th, so it would be sometime in August. That's the first thing he has to do.

He's going to spend a lot of our time in Alberta to try and get elected. There are people, though, a little frustrated with where things are at. There are people asking why there's no post-mortem being done on the election. There are people asking why Pierre Poilier seems to be doing it himself. Listen, I know lots of people that still believe in him and I know a growing number of people that aren't sure if he's going to make it to January. Steph?

I'll echo everything Rosie said. He's got to get into a by-election. There's people willing to give him some time to get back into the House of Commons and see if he can get any shine off Mr. Carney. But is there the possibility he may not make it until January? I don't know that that's realistic. I mean, at this, again, at this moment in time,

unlike previous leaders, I would say that there's no organized camp. There's no Brutus hiding behind the Caesar waiting to wield the knife, right? Will it get to that? I think that would require major mistakes. I also think the grassroots of the party is very frustrated about a number of things about how the party is run and they're looking for a great deal of accountability on that

and changes on that. And so one of the things to watch for, I would say, in the months ahead is the extent to which is Pierpolli of trying to sign up new members to the party because that's how leadership reviews work, right? You have to be a member in order to vote. That the convention is in Calgary in January is interesting because, you know, if you're a rank and file conservative, you've been going to conventions your whole life, you're going to show up at this convention. Will new members show up at this convention?

I don't really know. And so how is he going to build the support? Right now, he's making call after call after call to all manner of people who were publicly supportive of him during the election, obviously trying to build a degree of support there. All this to say, will he last? Right now, it doesn't, there's no reason why he wouldn't, but it's also sometimes hard to make hard to see a world in which Mr. Poliev is the guy that ultimately can take down Mr. Kearney. The hound has almost called time

on our discussion here, Barkie. What's the name of the dog, by the way? That's Lexi. Lexi's a good dog. Kathleen, what are people going to be watching and what are you going to be watching for in this by-election? The by-election?

The by-election could be called at any time. The MP currently in the seat, Damien Couric, has officially resigned. So what are you going to be watching for? Well, first of all, how he navigates the whole issue of an independence referendum. Not that he isn't going to argue on behalf of Canada, of course he is, but he's been, you know, pretty careful and circumspect when talking about the idea of a referendum at all, as has Andrew Shear. But the other part I think that's going to be really interesting is, given the phone calls that he's been making, including to defeat the candidates, and I can't imagine they're going to be terribly honest with them, and given that

he's like the boss boss or the potential boss, if they ever decide to run again. I'm not sure what kind of feedback, honest feedback he's going to get. But anyway, with whatever feedback he's getting, I'll be interested to see how he runs the campaign. I mean, it's really a unique situation. Think about it. We just had a federal election. There was a lot of criticism about how he was the only sort of person out front. He was the party and he was running behind his party in that election. And a lot of the criticism has been around his style of leadership. So given this feedback he's been getting now, here he is running in another election,

this time to get a seat in it. You know, obviously a safe riding uh correct one by 82 percent but let's see how he campaigns and watch to see if his strategy if his approach if his tone is different than it was during the general i think that could be very revealing. Steph last word to you you said something earlier which is that it doesn't look like people are going to get a summer off. Are you expecting a busy, does the Prime Minister, given his agenda, does he need to keep hammering away during the summer? Is that what's going to be likely unfolding over the next couple of months?

I would argue he has no choice. He was elected as a man of action. Action does not take a summer off. When and if this bill passes, C5, you know, clears the Senate next week, it's implemented by Canada Day, well, then let's get a list together and let's get going, I would presume is the thing that Mr. Kearney is going to say. I hope you all get a chance to catch your breath over, it's been a lot over the last little while, it's good to get the band back together but I hope we don't have to do that again until the fall. Thank you for joining us and enjoy the first day of summer. Take care. Thanks Matt. Thanks guys. Rosemary Barton is the CBC Chief Political Correspondent host of Rosemary Barton Live.

Stephanie Levitt, senior reporter with the Global Mail's Ottawa Bureau. And Kathleen Petty is the host of CBC Radio's Alberta at Noon and the West of Center podcast. You've been listening to The Current Podcast. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you soon.