The Paikin Podcast - AI Minister Evan Solomon: The AI Revolution, Economic Fallout, and Data Centre Backlash

Episode Date: July 22, 2026

Canada’s Minister of AI and Digital Innovation Evan Solomon joins Steve to discuss whether the AI revolution will make the Industrial Revolution more than a century ago look like a tea party, his role as Canada’s first-ever AI Minister, growing concerns about job loss, whether we are marching into a political revolution, the backlash against energy-consuming data centres, and whether we can trust big technology companies. They also discuss NDP leader Avi Lewis’s statement that “we are rushing into an unregulated experiment” run by some of “the plain weirdest people that have ever been masters of the universe on planet Earth,” Geoffrey Hinton’s concerns about the existential risk AI poses, and Solomon’s decision to get into politics and the transition from journalist to cabinet member. Support us: patreon.com/thepaikinpodcast Follow The Paikin Podcast: YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/@ThePaikinPodcastSPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/1OhwznCIUEA11lZGcNIM4h?si=b5d73bc7c3a041b7X: x.com/ThePaikinPodINSTAGRAM: instagram.com/thepaikinpodcastBLUESKY: bsky.app/profile/thepaikinpodcast.bsky.social Email us at: [e-mail] 

Experts say we are on the verge of an artificial intelligence revolution that will make the industrial revolution more than a century ago look like a tea party. AI is going to revolutionize our lives in ways we can't even imagine, and that is both thrilling and terrifying. So we thought we'd invite Canada's first ever minister responsible for AI to join us and tell us how this is all going to work. Evan Solomon, one-on-one, coming up next on the Paken podcast. It's my pleasure to welcome to the Paken podcast, Evan Solomon. Canada's first ever, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation. He's also the member of parliament for Toronto Center and Minister. I think this is the first time I've ever called you, Minister, because full disclosure,

we've known each other a long time since your days in journalism. Welcome. It's good to see you. Where are we finding you on this day? I am in Toronto. Great to see you, Steve. Mr. Paken, just a pleasure. And here we are. Middle of the summer, I'm sure, for knowing. you, there is some baseball paraphernalia close bot. Yes. Right. On cue. So I can take a cue. Well, let's start with a question sort of from 30,000 feet. I want to get the sort of overarching mission, since you are the first to have this portfolio, of what the prime minister has actually tasked you to accomplish in your job. What is it? So Steve, the prime minister's kind of

foundational insight when he became the prime minister was that we're going through these two really important dynamics right now one the geopolitical realignment that everyone's talked about they heard in his davos speech that we are moving as a world away from a kind of reliance model to a more resilient model and that's going to forge some new partnerships and that geopolitical realignment we're all aware of. At the same time, that's happening at the same time as a technological revolution. And you've talked a bit about that already. Everyone knows that AI's here and that chat GPT moment that happened was very much kind of like the birth of the internet that I first documented when my career started. And I started a magazine about technology

and I was covering technology on CBC and I was an entrepreneur. That was the internet revolution. Now we're into a next one, this AI revolution. And so you had these two, this geopolitical realignment happening at the same time as a technical technological revolution. And prime minister said, okay, we need a minister to focus on the technology. And there's kind of two ways to think about it. You might want to think about it on the horizontal, on the vertical and the horizontal. So the vertical way is the pure AI, companies that are just in the AI space,

That's the vertical. They're literally AI companies, building the technology, building the infrastructure and that whole, what the ecosystem, the stack, whatever your metaphor is. And there's about 150,000 Canadian, Steve, that are working already in that Pure Play AI. And so the first task was, let's support that. We need sovereign Canadian AI to make sure that we build it here and that the jobs stay here. and the innovation stays here and we have some kind of control. So the first question was, let's, you wanted to make sure that we build that vertical AI quantum stack, those things.

And then there's a horizontal way, um, line where AI intersects with healthcare and AI intersects with governance and with agriculture and with transportation. And that's that cross section where you see almost every day that's happening. and the ministry's job is to facilitate the use of that. And there's basically three questions that we've got to ask ourselves. And this is what I think about every night. I think the prime minister has asked. One, if we don't build the infrastructure here,

the infrastructure to build the economy of the future, the technological infrastructure, that includes everything from the electricity grid and to the data centers and all those things. If we don't build the infrastructure here, we're going to have to rent it from somewhere else. It's expensive. And if we don't invest in the innovation here and build it here, we're going to have to buy it from someone else. And that's expensive.

And if we don't make the rules here, we're going to have to follow someone else's. So what he wants me to do is build here and invest and innovate here and make the rules to benefit Canadians so the jobs and the IP stay with Canadians. How much did you know about all of this before you got the job? So my background originally was all essentially technology. As you know, in the early 90s, Steve, we can date ourselves here. In the 90s, I started a company with a friend of mine, Andrew Hinesman, still a dear friend, and we started a magazine called Shift Magazine to Chronicle the Birth of the Internet. We were the first, you know, on magazine to sell online ads.

And we were very innovative. And we actually had a TV show. And we built a company that we eventually sold after eight or nine years and did well. And it was great. And at that time, I was also, you know, back in the 90s, I hosted a national TV show on CBC television called Future World and for many years. So I was, you know, so technology was really something that I spent. the first part of my life totally focused on and the impact of technology on society.

And fast forward when I was, when I had left my job at CTV hosting power play and question period in the radio show, I went down to New York and I was working at Eurasia group and G0 Media running that, G0 Media. And we had done a lot of work in AI there. That was a huge part of our work was in AI on the regulatory side, on the politics of it, on the technical side of it. And so when I came back to Canada for the election, which was a critical moment in our country's history

where people were stepping up to build this country stronger, I was pretty well versed in AI. In the last 15, 16 months, Steve, it has been a deeper dive into the remarkable innovation ecosystem that we've got here in Edmonton, in Alberta, in Quebec, in British Columbia, in Nova Scotia. And, of course, here in Ontario, just booming. You're going to forget my curiosity on this.

But when you sit down with your iPhone or whatever and you use a, you know, a large language model system, which one do you use? So we use, I use a lot of different ones because my job is kind of experiment. So first I got to see what the frontier models are using. Clode and, you know, chat, GPT. I've used all of those, you know. and so I kind of experiment back and forth for different things. The one that I use and professionally what we insisted on using was a Canadian company called Cohere. So the one that I use every day at work, and this is a distinction.

If I'm personally using it, you know, I'll experiment around. But anytime I'm working and anytime I'm doing anything official, we have a model that is Canadian built called Cohere. and for those people that don't know, this is kind of a cool story. There are only four countries in the world that have functional large language models that can do what people do. There's the United States with, you know, chat, GPT and clode. There's China. France has one called Mistrel, and Canada's got Cohere.

And some folks are like, I've never heard of Cohere. It's really aimed at businesses and at government. So RBC uses it. and Bell Canada uses it, and many and many around the world they use it. We and the Canadian government use it as well. In my ministry, we use it. And we use it as a trusted model. And we, of course, in government, for anything classified,

we have a very protected version that we put protections around. But it's a great model. And it's the model that I use more than any other, which is the Canadian coherent. Have you ever delivered a speech that was written by AI? No, I have not. I have had many people ask me that. Yeah, you can't expect us not to ask that because that's a good question. It's a great question and people ask me how often you use AI or are you really AI and they poke me in the face and stuff. The truth is, I don't do that for a couple of reasons. It's super important for me. And as you know, Steve, I'm, you know, I've been a politician for 16 months here.

So, you know, it's not the, the paint is pretty fresh here. It's really important to, every time I engage with anybody, to have a sense of authenticity. And to, I think, I think my team would rather, I actually read a prepared speech one instead of just talk off the cuff so much. So, you know, they'd like it. If it was prepared by AI and I would actually read it, they would probably be. be happier. But, you know, I'm trying to have two things. One, to try to just be authentic and connect with folks. But the second thing is, and I think you've been at a couple of things that I've done, I kind of tend to speak without notes a lot. And I take a lot of questions. And in the same

tradition that, you know, when I worked as a journalist, I liked politicians that knew their file and we're confident enough to take any questions at any time. And you've covered politics, and you know both of us could probably sit around swapping stories about politicians who always were available. They didn't hide behind talking points. And they were ready to take the question. And I try to do that. Where AI is really helpful is in synthesizing material in helping to create some options that then we can kind of look at for strategic points. And so we use it as a tool in strategic thinking. We use it in strategic analysis of document analysis.

There's lots of ways that AI is useful. Connecting with people, not so much for me. In fact, I'm happy to put on the record here that I saw you as the headliner recently. I think it was just a few weeks ago at, or maybe it's a little more than that now, but anyway, and I talked to a lot of people afterwards, and they were very impressed at your ability to sort of command the room and speak without notes and do Q&A with the crowd. So, yeah, your broadcasting background is certainly an asset in that, and you certainly put on a good show that night. I want to get a better sense, though, given that we're all trying to figure out the ramifications. of AI and what they will be, and we have heard both positive and negative, but on balance,

what do you think it's going to be more of? There's a way to frame this, because as you say, there's folks that are really excited about it and folks that are really wary about it. And the position that I've tried to adopt the whole time is we have to be open to all the opportunities of AI. And it is very difficult to underestimate, to overestimate the benefits in life sciences and health. Go to any hospital. I mean, this is where you're going to see it, not hyping AI what it is to help you write a letter. Go to a hospital. Like we, like I've gone to many times, go to UHN and talk to doctors who say using AI, we can pinpoint a tumor so much better.

that we can cut down the amount of chemotherapy that someone needs from 40 visits to five, right, material. You can talk to emergency room doctors who are exhausted and say, we can see 30% more patients now because we have an AI scribe that's accurate to scribe the information of patients telling me, which at 2 in the morning, after a long shift, can be hard, and then they have to take notes, and they have to pass those notes to another doctor. and that takes a lot of time. And the AI.

So there are countless, incredible stories in health care. Or I literally just got back from Manitoba where I was on a farm where they were using AI, for example, there's a great AI that they're using to detect rot in potatoes and giant bins of potatoes. These are very valuable to farmers. And if there's a little rot, it can spoil a massive, massive, massive. a barrel. So there's AI for crop the mystic that is used, you know, on fertilizer. So to so a farmer can know exactly the amount of fertilizer to use here and not here. So you see AI being beneficial to save, you know, the margins on a farm can be 3, 5 percent. And they can get that yield up

like that. That can make or break their season. And you talk to farmers, by the way, farmers are heavy adopters of tech. And it's fantastic. In healthcare, it's fantastic. In transportation, Peterborough is using it on their lights to cut down on idling, so cars idle less and stop less, and cutting down traffic 30%. Excellent. But then there's real concerns about job loss, about privacy, about personal information. Let's pull those apart. right now as we go because you mentioned job loss. The conventional wisdom in the past has always been that when a new technology is introduced, of course there are going to be jobs lost, but so far, the new jobs created by the new technological revolution, whatever it was, created more jobs.

And on balance, it was a net positive for society. I'm not hearing that about this. Do you think AI, based on what you know so far, will create more jobs than it eliminates or vice versa? Kind of hard to say yet. So I could go find experts and say, Steve, here are these experts are saying, in Canada, we've created 150,000 new jobs already. And we've added $200 billion to the economy. So this is going to be the greatest thing ever. And then you're going to say, well, wait, I heard the godfather of AI say it's going to take away all these jobs and so-and-so laid off 10,000 workers and they were programmers. Like, let's just everyone take a breath.

we're at the beginning of something that is a really generally a dramatic revolution, okay? So the anxiety levels are super high and the hype levels are super high. So our job has been to be really pragmatic about this. And when I released the new national AI strategy called AI for All, it's important the principle here is that this, that AI should serve everybody. AI to serve Canadians, not the other way around, and it should serve everybody. It's not the digital divide. It's not for those people who just understand it now or the tech people. This is a technology, kind of like the internet, kind of like the pen and paper, that it's got

to be accessible to wherever you are in the economic ladder and whatever, rural, urban, east, west, north, north, south, we want to serve everyone. That's the first thing. And it's got to serve people. The second strategies are, so AI for All, then it's trust opportunity and sovereign control. And those are the basic strategic pillars. The first one is trust because we know that there's a lot of, and this goes to your issue, trust about jobs and trust about privacy. So we've got to first and foremost build trust because technology moves at the speed of innovation, but citizens move at the speed of trust.

And so we've got to build trust and that has, and so right after, we launch, we have our privacy legislation to protect our kids, protect our privacy, protect our personal information with new privacy laws. And then the second pillar is opportunity. And that's the jobs pillar. So under the jobs pillar, we know that AI has created a lot of jobs, but we just don't know what's going to happen. It's most likely there's going to be some job displacement.

We haven't seen a ton of it show up yet, according to the Bank of Canada, but we're not waiting. So under the opportunity pillar, a couple things. One, first thing you need to do is you need to have education as a hedge against job loss. That's why people get an education in the first place to get a better job. So we're, in the fall, we'll be launching a national AI literacy course for every single Canadian. There'll be another strand aimed at students. There'll be a strand, so that's important. We're also going to be providing an AI tool, like an AI agent, to all post secondary students, colleges, CJEPs, universities, that's going to be really important. So they have the ability to use something and that's subsidized.

And then we're investing in training and skills for workers and we're working on skills training courses. But young people, like I've got a 21-year-old and a 23-year-old, so I hear about this a lot. we are supporting 90,000 job placements for young people in small, medium-sized companies across the country. And those are subsidized positions that we will be paying for to get 90,000 young people job training, but also helping companies understand the technology. And we're working with different organizations to do that. So that's the opportunities.

and there's lots of more investment in workers. And then finally the opportunity or the sovereign control because Canadians are worried that we're going to have to follow someone else's rules. And we want to make sure that we're buying Canadian and we're building here in Canada and that the jobs and the innovation stays here in Canada. And that's what we're going to invest in as well. And we can get into the details of that.

Well, sure. Our job picture, the training and education piece is the central pillar of our strategy. Okay, a whole bunch to follow up on there. So let's start with that. How should we react in your view to this study from McKinsey that came out last year that says current technologies, including AI agents, could in theory automate activities accounting for 57% of U.S. work hours today? I mean, it does sort of beg a question about whether or not we're walking into a or maybe marching into a political revolution here. Well, I do think, you know, I don't know that particular study, but I've seen a ton of studies, Steve, that some have predicted job growth

and some of predicted job loss. My gut sense says when you talk to people even anecdotally, you know, they're saying, wow, you know, I'm using AI now more so I don't use my lawyer as much because it's drafting contracts, right? But are you going to draft a contract and never talk to a lawyer? I mean, are you going to, so, you know, I have, by the way, one of my kids is going into law school, so I get this question about lawyers a lot. But look, my sense here, Steve, is on the optimistic side, AI is augmenting work. And it's taking away a lot of, first of all, a lot of the very tricky work. Let me just give you an example. Again, I was introvers. Rivier last week in Quebec, and there's a company there called Waste Robotics, and they

deal with recycling, so they got these conveyor belts of garbage. That is usually humans that are picking through, for example, to sort out the steel from the copper at a crushed car. So they got a robot in Tron-Rivier. They invented the IP, a robot that has gripping technology, and they can see, oh, that's copper. They take the copper off. because that's, you know, 5x, 10x more valuable than the steel.

And they sort it really quickly. And they do that with plastics and other things. Really rugged job for people to be candid. People don't love that job. It's very physically demanding. They can't do it. This is 35% more effective, way more recycling. But this company has also gone from a small company to a big company because they're so competitive,

they're selling around the world. at higher paying jobs. So this is a company that is staying in Tuare Revere, right? Because they're innovating. They're hiring in Tuare Rivier. And it's Canadian tech, and they're selling it in Europe, and they're selling it in Australia. So, you know, there's lots of examples where it's making companies more creative

and allowing them to stay in local places and innovate in local places. And there's going to be some places where, as you say, there's going to be jobs that are going to be displaced, and we need to make sure that our workforce, the best hedge against that is a highly educated, highly trained workforce that's educated both on how to use this technology, but trained in skills. And one principle I say often is education is like a passport.

Everyone needs one. You absolutely have to have it. But skills are like a visa that you need to visit a country. You're probably in the rest in your life going to have to get new skills and hands up if you're still doing the skill that you went to school for. Most people change their skills throughout their career. And I think that's going to happen. And it's going to happen for sure at an accelerated rate. So that's why our first obligation is not to predict the future, but to prepare for it with an educated skilled workforce.

I take your point that you want to have the sovereignty associated with all of this. in Canada, as opposed to having to rent other people's sovereignty, American, for example. Having said that, there is, I was going to say the beginnings of, but it's probably more than that by now. There is a fairly strong anti-data center movement picking up in this country right now. We're seeing some jurisdictions that are already passing either resolutions or laws saying, we don't want your data centers here or a hold on any potential future building of data centers here. What do you make of all that? Well, again, and I'm smiling because, you know, you and I know each other well, these are really good questions about that.

There's lots of jurisdictions that are wanting them as well. I don't, you know, because they recognize that they need a future for it. So it's really, it's both things are happening at once. You've got a huge investment in this infrastructure and real concerns in communities that this infrastructure is not going to be built right. So, you know, my approach and our approach is this is like anything, first of all. If you want the infrastructure, a road, a bridge, a port, a data center, like these are things that are going to be part of the engines of the economy of the future and create jobs.

You've got to build them right. And that means you've got to do it transparently. and you've got to do it openly, and you've got to do it with stakeholders. And the truth is that with the data centers, these things are, there's so much hype around it. People have seen where data centers have been built that people suddenly think they're going to take my water and my power and spike my rates. Exactly. So those are real concerns.

But let's look at it. First of all, data centers have been around for decades and decades. Anytime you're on the internet, any company you have that stores, data are using data centers. Not on the scale, though. You'll acknowledge. Not on this scale. Well, so there's really big data centers, these giant data centers for training these models, and there are smaller ones and many in between.

So our approach has been very simple. The federal government, you know, we have a program that supports building data centers, some data centers in Canada. Normally it's the provinces who are the, who, their energy, regulators are the ones that allocate this. Just so folks appreciate. A data center is really, Tate needs a lot of energy, a lot of power. And so the regulator allocates usually in megawatts, how much power.

And then the biggest data center is the ones that haven't really been built yet in Canada, and very few of them around the world, are these what's called a gigawatt, a thousand megawatts, which essentially is like enough power for the city of Ottawa, like something like that. So that hasn't been built yet. but those are what people are talking about. So here's what we have said when the government is involved, and this is what we've told almost all the people building them, and they agree.

One, let's take the water case. These things use a lot of water. Reality. Most data centers that are being built now, I would say almost all of them that are being built today, use what's called closed-looped water. So they recirculate the water. They don't take,

new water all the time. Those were things that used to be done. This is like a gas guzzling car from the 50s is very different than a hybrid car today. We're building hybrid cars today in the same data center. So these are closed loop water. So you've

got big data centers that say we'll use less water than a golf course. The one that we're looking at, we're entering into a letter of agreement with a couple data center builds in British Columbia, one in Vancouver.

They're using closed-loop water, and they're collecting rainwater from BCE place. So the water is important. So they've got to limit water use, and they should be open about it. So we like closed-loop water, or even zero water. There's Canadian technology

where they actually immerse the stacks, the hot, they get very hot, these stacks of chips in immersion tanks. Is the $13 billion one north of Edmonton, is that going to be a closed-lobed? loop one? So, so, uh, Alberta just have a, uh, a metadata center. It's a very big one. That's the biggest ever in Canada. They've just made the deal. That haven't built it yet. That is closed loop water. Okay. Okay. So they're doing water use. Second, um, power reuse. So there's a lot of heat that's

generated. So heat reuse. There's a lot of heat. These things are, that's why they need to be cool. So, but they still produce heat. So what they want to do is capture the heat. And the reason, in the one that we're working out with, tell us they're using the heat to heat 150,000 homes in Vancouver. Okay. The one in Edmonton, they're also using heat recapture. Okay. So one, that's two. So these are the four, or maybe there's five questions.

Community should be asking, and we're asking, how much water is it closed loop? How much heat? Two, rate payers. Is this impacting me? Like in the summer, am I going to get my bill is going to go up? And every one of these companies, whether it's Microsoft or these big American companies, if they're building them, they make a pledge with communities and to not pass on the cost of any power that they actually end up using to the rate payers.

And that should be important. And provinces and communities will say the rate payer shouldn't be paying for that. So no hit on the rate payer. so I think that's really key. And finally, Steve, investment in the community. What are the benefits? Well, there's benefits in construction. And by the way, these are complex things to build.

They're not like warehouses. Two, there's a lot of ongoing jobs. So in Alberta, that will create 3,000 jobs to build. And an ongoing, you know, 400 jobs, I think, is the number. I don't quote me because that's the Alberta number. we weren't involved in this data center bill, the Alberta government, but hundreds of jobs on a regular basis. But usually there should be other investments in the local community.

And I think what you're going to do is there'll be, we have urged the industry to come forward with industry standards that are on water, heat, rate payers, and investment in community, and transparency. And communities are right to ask those. and I think once they recognize that, that's one element. And I know I'm going on, but can I just say one last thing? Sure.

Who benefits from this? Is a real question. And again, I'll give you an example. We as a government are building what's called an AI supercomputer for our researchers. So people that, oh gosh, a supercomputer. Every country, France is, Germany, the United States, they're building these computers that help research. solve big problems in the frontier.

Where is ours going to be? Well, we don't know yet. This is a great question. So we are investing. It's going to be about a billion dollar investment. And so this is a really important. So Canadian researchers have the capacity to research here. And why is that important?

So I don't have to go to other countries to rent space, which is very difficult to get, very expensive. And then we've got to stand in line for other researchers. So they innovate way faster than we do, unless we stay at the forefront. So this is a matter of sovereignty, national security, and it's really important.

So we're going to do this. So I put out a call for proposals and we'll make the choice this fall as to the location. But there's a bunch of places, including in Hamilton, where you're from, and there was a debate about that. And all across the country,

they've pitched us, we would like to do this. Now, this is essentially a data center that is going to provide what's called the compute. Compute's kind of like, think about it like the gasoline in your car, like it's the fuel of innovation. You need it. And the compute power for our researchers.

If we don't build it here, all our researchers, our tax dollars have to go pay and we'll go to another country, Europe, the United States, and we'll have to buy it. So we need this for our sovereignty. And so that is going to be an important data center. That will be closed loop water system. That'll be heat reuse. That won't affect rate payers.

But it also is going to benefit researchers across the country. But at the end of the day, I don't have to tell you, and I think you've actually spoken to this in the past, this is all about trust. And you want these large companies that intend to do this work to demonstrate to the public that they are trustworthy. And I wonder how that happens, given that these are some of the companies that we deal on a regular basis that have proven in the past to be anything but trustworthy. That doesn't necessarily sound encouraging, does it?

Yeah, my job is not to burnish the reputation of one company or not. Like, let's be clear. Those folks need to win trust on their own. I expect them to do that, okay? So I'm not here to wave a flag for any of them. And they got to do that, frankly. And if people don't trust them and there's been horrific incidents and there's been all, then, you know, they got to do a better job. My job, my first job, and foremost, is one to protect Canadians.

So, you know, my loyalty, my job, my commitment is not to AI companies, but is to citizens who want to use this stuff responsibly and safely. It's full stop. That's it. And so that means the trust part first comes with, we're going to be. make sure that there's regulation. So within days of launching the AI for all, trust opportunity, sovereignty, the trust pillars first, I tabled legislation to update our 26-year-old privacy legislation, protecting privacy and consumer data. So I'm going to protect kids, protect privacy, protect our personal information. So what are we protecting it from? So we're protecting

it from deepfakes. So if someone has a deep fake of Steve Paken or me or someone else, that's harmful, you should have the right to have that taken down and go to a platform and say, I want that off your platform. We think Canadians deserve that right. They shouldn't just be passive. Oh, geez, it's out there. I have nothing. So we'll give that right. If someone's collecting your personal data, and data is really valuable now, and everyone's collecting data, and they're using it to price gouge you, surveillance pricing, price gouging, whatever you want to call it, we think that if that's happening, those people who are doing it should be punished and have to stop. So we'll stop that.

We think when you're collecting kids information, you should have a higher responsibility not to trade on it. Right? We think privacy is a fundamental right. All those are in our privacy legislation. And to enforce that for the first time, we are setting up a regulator. We've never had a regulator that can not only enforce that, but have very serious, financial penalties, $25 million, $10 million for some penalties, $25 for another, and 3% of global revenues. This never happened before in Canada. We've never had the ability to enforce

penalties. So the first and foremost obligation here to build trust is to protect Canadians, protect our kids, protect our privacy, protect our information. That's really important. So, like, I just want to be clear, whatever company has got an AI chatbot, an AI, algorithm. They can abuse Canadians. I'll give you another example of what our privacy legislation. If, you know, people go online now, they apply to a mortgage and an institution may be using an algorithm to determine you get a mortgage, you don't, you get a job, you don't. But how do we know what's in the black box? How do we know what's not saying, well, we don't want to hire women, which would be illegal? How do we know what the criteria are? Our legislation would demand that

there's some transparency about what the criteria are. So someone could say, I want to know why I didn't get that bank loan. Is it because I'm a woman of color? So part of this is to empower citizens. And this isn't about protecting passive citizens. This is empowering citizens to have power so they can make sure that they're protecting their kids, their families themselves. And Canadians have the right.

The second obligation I've got is to build Canadian options. Sovereignty is not solitude, Steve. Sovereignty is not, it doesn't mean I'm trying to build a little moat and make us, you know, everything in Canada. We want access to the best tech. Nobody can be alone in this stuff. And sometimes it comes from the U.S. and sometimes Europe and sometimes Asia. We all know that. We're a trading nation. We want foreign investment to come and Canadians want to use the best technology. But sovereignty is safety and sovereignty is choice. So Canadians should have a choice. You know what? I want to use a Canadian option. And maybe they want to use a Canadian technology like Cohere or a Canadian application for their health care or Canadian. So we need to

invest in Canadian small and medium-sized businesses. Our strategy, top line, Steve, we're investing $2.3 billion in small and medium-sized enterprises. And when people say, oh, oh, what does that mean? Let me just quickly break it down. We have a $500 million technology growth fund to invest in technology because a lot of companies have said to us, gosh, we'd like to stay in Canada, but we can't get capital to invest here. So we're going to provide that to invest and believe in Canadian innovators. There's 3,000 plus companies in AI right now employing people. We want to invest in that innovation.

There's a $500 million business development bank program called Lyft that is low interest loans so companies can grow. And there's a $500 million through what's called the regional development agencies. These are, I'm actually the minister of federal economic development, southern Ontario as well. So we invest in small, medium-sized companies that are in tariff-afflicted industries and mold making and tool and dye makers and manufacturers, steel makers. in Hamilton, some fantastic, I'm wearing a hat tonight called, it's right over there called by Kit Steel, Great Steel Company that were, and these, by the way, are mostly zero interest loans that are repayable. I want folks to understand that. We're investing in these companies at zero interest, long-term payback, they pay back at 90%, Steve. So that's a billion and a half dollars.

And finally, I've got a $700 million fund for what's called the compute access fund. A lot of companies need to buy compute. They've got to go to big companies and buy that, you know, tokens. It's expensive to solve their problems. And we're saying, well, we'll subsidize you. That will help you innovate because that's a huge expense. But if you buy Canadian compute, we'll subsidize you 67 cents on the dollar. And that's to incentivize Canadians building here in Canada cloud structures that so you can buy Canadian here.

And so we have incentives to invest here, to build here, to keep the jobs here, to raise money here, to hire here. And my first and foremost responsibility is to support Canadian workers, Canadian jobs, and protect Canadian citizens. So when you talk about trust, that's the way we're doing it. And we'll be back right after this. Let me do a follow-up on this issue of trust, though, and this quote is too delicious not to put to you, because the new NDP leader Avi Lewis said the other day, we are rushing into an unregulated experiment that is being run for the benefit, profit, and power of some of the just plain weirdest people that have ever been masters of the universe on planet Earth.

Does he have a point? Yeah, he's got a point in the sense that there may be lots of, masters of the universe that he doesn't like and many people may not like, but he's also missing the point, which is you got to build right. And let's not castigate a whole, and let's not decide to dismiss and check out of an entire technological revolution, what's happening, because in the United States, there's some extremely powerful people that may not be aligned to your ideology, his ideology, my ideology, whoever's. Look, this technology, let's just be practical, you know, this technology is, this is a form

of innovation. It's a tool. Our hospitals are using it. And if we don't build it here, they got to, and I'll go back to this. They're going to have, they're going to use it. You don't think our researchers are going to use it. You don't think our surgeons are going to use AI. If we don't build it here and build it right, then we got to buy it from someone else who may not be doing it right.

So, you know, where I think, look, I agree with Ovi in the sense that we got to build this right. And we are totally in alignment on that. Our government, me personally, we got to build it right. And we've talked extensively about that. Building right, supporting communities, making sure it's sustainable environmentally. All those criteria. We've got to build this stuff right. But it's not, it shouldn't be a, we should either check it out or put our heads in the sand and stop and pretend it doesn't exist.

And let our businesses not compete, not have access to innovation and let their competitors go. Because, you know, our tool and dye makers who are using this, our manufacturers who are using this, our healthcare workers who are using this, our farm workers who are using this. are farmers who are using this, I would rather they buy Canadian solutions. I would rather the innovation stays here. And I would rather the jobs and the innovation economy stays here. And this is a profound point about the future of work. Okay.

And again, I'm not here to debate with Ovi who it's about stop and go. And I'm not about yes or no. Let's do this right. to be practical, let's be pragmatic. And we should ask these questions. So I think it's great that he's asking the questions. I just think there's really good answers that are not stop and never do anything and demonizing. So, so, and I do think, Steve, we've got to ask the questions and we've got to decide to build this right in our benefit. We're not rushing. This whole idea that this is a mad dash. But I will tell you, we are in a very

difficult economic trade war. And we have businesses in my job as the Minister of Federal Economic Development for Southern Ontario. I'm with businesses that need to innovate or they can't survive. They got to pivot from autos to supporting energy. And there are people doing that. They got to go from making parts for the auto to making parts for the aerospace industry. Right. They need to retrain to on die makers. They need to use the most advanced machinery. If they don't compete here, someone else is going to take that job and we will see companies die. And that hurts towns. So it is not a stop or go. It's let's give Canadian workers the best tools to compete, the best education to compete. In my view, when we have those, we will compete with the best,

we will build with the best and we will create the jobs of the future. So I really don't think we should be talking about we should do this or not this. We should be asking how do we build something right? Let me do one more question on AI before we move on to something else. And that is you probably saw these comments from Jeffrey Hinton, the University of Toronto so-called godfather of AI, who said that AI could pose an existential threat if it becomes vastly more intelligent than humans.

He's a pretty sharp guy, and that is a pretty provocative thing to say. How seriously do you think we should take those concerns? Well, I know Dr. Hinton, he won the Nobel Prize, and Canada's got three of the godfathers, right? Jeffrey Hinton, who works, by the way, folks, at Vector, which is one of our national AI institutes, which we support. And in our plan, we've invested in even more heavily. So, you know, I know him well, and I respect him. In Montreal, we've got another one, Mila, with another of the godfathers, Joshua Benjillo, who we're also working very closely with on AI safety.

He's building an AI safety model called Law Zero that we are big backers of, an AI to police AI. So he's the other godfather. Then we have a third godfather at our third institute in Edmonton, Rich Sutton, who's the master of machine learning. They've all won the touring prize. This is the highest prize in technology. And Rich Sutton has a very different view again.

He's much more optimistic. But let me just go back to Jeffrey Hinton. Jeff is and has spoken to me extensively about AI, especially in autonomous warfare and how dangerous that could be. And we've seen how the battlefield's shifting and drone warfare. And he's got some real profound questions about that. and Steve, we're going to date you and I here, okay, so just hang in there. Yeah, this will take you back to the early fears about a nuclear bomb.

Do you remember that first it was a book, and then it was a film called Failsafe. Do you remember that about? Fantastic, yeah. Larry Hagman is the interpreter. That's right. Oh, God, Henry Fonda is the president. And there was a bomber that was told you got a bomb rush, and the fail safe box was was locked so it couldn't be hacked and so but it had been hacked into and so and there were real

fears about how technology might inadvertently cause a nuclear war so look these are long time concerns with technology that you and i have have dealt with our whole lives and they're real so far be it for me to dismiss that stuff minister i want to take advantage of you being here by talking a little bit more about you because as you pointed out earlier in our conversation you are a first term member of parliament you haven't been a politician for very long and i want to just do a bunch of questions about how you're finding the whole experience starting with how well do you think your previous career in journalism prepared you for the job you have now so in two two things i prepared me one being a entrepreneur uh really help you know spending the first sort of decade on my life

running a business that was really helpful because so much of my job is about supporting entrepreneurs and figuring out what people do, especially in the technology space, that was super, super helpful. And then as a journalist, I think two things, Steve, listening to people, you know, governments are only as good as the information they get. And in a sense, you know, governments grow deaf over time. So you got to keep your ears open. And I remember as a journalist, I was.

told once when I was a young journalist by, you'll know this journalist, a guy named David Halberstam, who was a great journalist in the Vietnam War and then the Pentagon Papers and Watergate. And you know where I met him actually? I met him at Fenway Park once. He's a big Red Sox fan. That's right. I met him too. And he was a big tall guy, right?

Yeah. And this is the crazy thing. In between political books. So he was a writer and he'd write these big books about the civil rights movement, which he covered, right? The Vietnam War, Watergate. Best in the brightest. He would, best in the brightest.

He would write books about sports. And he wrote a book, for example, about Michael Jordan. And I said to him, Mr. Halberstown, why do you write books about sports? You're a Pulitzer Prize winning, iconic, serious, political. And he says, I'm going to tell you something, kid. As you get older, your peripheral vision narrows. and he said, my job, as I grow older, is to keep it wide. And the athletes have the widest peripheral reason because they're always on the playground.

And they are playful with their reality. And he said, just remember, as you grow up, don't narrow your focus. Make sure you're open to new ideas. That is such good advice. I never forgot it. And as a politician, I think about that. Don't let partisanship narrow. listen to people. Keep your peripheral vision open because new things are happening. And you got to

adjust the new circumstances. And that was a real advice from a journalist that has helped me as a politician. Yeah, great story. I wonder whether you talk to any former journalists who became politicians, because as I don't have to tell you, the record of journalists going into politics is very mixed. Some have been successful and some have had terrible scandals to have to deal with. Did you consult any before you got in? Look, there's a long history of people who have been journalists throughout history who have gone in and, you know, Reni LeVette, for example, was a journalist in Quebec. So, you know, not a career. I would be particularly supportive of in terms of his mandate. But, you know, there's lots of people. Look, yeah, I mean, Seamus O'Regan and I have known each other for a long time. So I

to Seamus because he was a minister and he was he and I both worked at CTV and he went in. The person who's riding was Toronto Center was Marcy Ian. And when she left, I ran in her riding. So I talked to Marcy a fair bit about the transition. What's the best advice either of them gave you? The best advice, listen to people and show up. listen to people and show up. Show up is so key.

Show up locally. Like in the end of the day, you're voted in by your community. So, you know, even if you're fortunate enough to become a minister, you know, you're elected by the people in your community.

So show up and listen. I think that's the first thing. I think Steve, you know, in the end of the day, you never, know, I've been in public life for a long time. You're never as good as they say you are, and you're never as bad as they say you are.

Like, in the end of the day, you've got to do some work. You're going to have some good days and bad days. You know, for me, the most important thing is, and I, you know, going back to your question about being a journalist, try to be available, try to be authentic. If you don't know, say it. If you have nothing to say shut up. try to be productive with your time keep your heart open and empathetic to people

don't be too sensitive to criticism because after all your job is to defend the right to criticize you you're actively representing people's right to dislike a politician in safety that's what democracy is it's not about defending the right to people that agree with you it's about to defend the right to say you stink and I was like okay you know I'm going to fight for you too because that's the job.

And I don't know what that. I was just in a meeting, so I'm going to quote this. And I don't know what that you can bleep it out. But, you know, I've raised kids and, you know, I've been married for 25 years. And I came to this job because Canada's in, you know, I believed in the fight. I believe in the leader, Mark Carney. And he was the right man and the right person at the right moment. And this is the right fight for Canada.

And I do believe we're in a mission moment. I'm not a particularly openly partisan guy. I didn't come up at the partisan route. I was a journalist. I was a business person. So I'm not really about dividing at all. But I believe we're in a mission moment for this country. We got to build and we got to get things done.

as I like to say to my team, get shit done. So that's what I want to do. I want to build some things. I want to build some in my community, social housing. We're building affordable housing. I deeply believe in that. We need it in our community. I want to build an innovation economy

because I think the best innovators, the best educated workforces here in Canada. And I want to make sure people have the right to, like I did, put their kids in hockey and ring it and buy an affordable home and raise their kids however they want to. Practice the religious. that they want to safely. Okay?

Like these are fights that we're in. And we're in a fight for our country right now. And I was very fortunate to have to be in a moment in my life where I could put my hat in the ring. And I could ask to serve the country. Tripoli fortunate to have the opportunity to do so and to be a part of this cabinet to do it. And so at this point of my life, I just feel that this service is, it is the most remarkable thing I've ever done by. a mile. The reality that people live in every day, you know, you ask people for their vote and in return,

you've got to do something for them. And that social contract is so deeply important. And we got to lead on that and we got to take some, we got to build and I think the country's ready to do that. So it is, you know, and as a, my old skills, the skills I had as a journalist, part of what we got to do is tell the story of who we are, how we're going to build and who's doing the building. We have not done a great story of telling, I think you have, not to blow smoke here, Steve, but you know how important it is to tell the story of the builders. We tell the story about our

athletes a lot, and we tell a story about some of our political leaders. But there are stories about entrepreneurs and risk takers who built this country and are building it today that I believe we have to tell to inspire us to have the confidence and the convinced. And the conviction, to build this country in a critical moment. Let me follow up on the comment you just made about your partisan affiliation. You are, of course, a liberal member of parliament. And I wonder when you make that decision to go from neutral journalist to a member of a political party, how concerned are you, as you are on that journey, that some people, maybe many people,

are going to be saying to themselves, ah, he worked for CBC once upon a time. Now he's come out of the closet and he's become a big L liberal. maybe he was a liberal all along. Maybe we can't trust the journalism he did in the past. How much did you worry about that? Not that much to be candid. Because the work stands for itself. I think I was, I sure got a lot of people said,

I thought you might be a conservative after I saw you, you were tough on people. Look, I stand by the work I did and I think people can see that I was, I approached it authentically and I did my job, any more than a judge may have a political view. And the truth is that, you know, deciding to serve and to throw my hat in the ring was a moment for,

I mean, there are real three factors. One, Mr. Carney, and I've known him for a long time. I deeply believe in him as the right person at this moment. I really do. I think his integrity is there. I know him personally as the most decent guy. And I also think he just matches the moment. Like we are in a mission critical moment and I think he was the best person.

And he wanted to serve. He's got the candle of service that burned super brightly in his heart. And he talked about that with me. And he asked me, you know, like to see if my candle of service burned. And it did. And so it was the first of all the man and then the moment. Like I was working in the United States. And it was just.

a moment to come back home and get in the fight straight up. And I left my job and I came home. And just for the record, we were 20 odd points behind, right? Like, it looks good in the retrospect, but, you know, it was a risky proposition for lots of people, not just me, but it was a time to fight. It was time that I had been so fortunate for this country. I've been so blessed. You know, my grandfather came over here as an immigrant. My grandparent mother here is. an immigrant. And I've told you this story. My grandfather worked where I am now. I'm on front street at a minister's office. Okay. My grandfather worked at Queen and John at stone clothing and died at 52 of a heart attack walking home from lamppost to lamp post when my dad was 13 years old, the youngest of

eight. And that was a sweatshop. And they came to this country. So here I am. Look at, you know, a remarkable immigrant family story. So many immigrant family stories. So, you know, serving this country is, was absolutely critical. So, no, I didn't worry about that. And finally, I'm going to say one last thing. Look, the world is polarizing. The far on the ends, the far left and the far right. And I get that.

And, you know, I'm not a hyperpartisan person, but what I believe the best place is the practical middle to build. And to me, under Mark Carney, the Liberal Party, is the best place to do that. And I get this is super polarizing. But, you know, I started my life in business. In the end of the day, you've got to put your hat in the ring and you've got to, you're not going to please everyone. That's not the job. You've got to do your best.

You've got to try to build. You've got to serve. I would just say this. I am close to the conservatives. I serve across the aisle with conservative members of parliament, and we speak every day. They are friends. They do their job.

They get up and they do their job, and I'll do my job. But we are citizens. We are friends. We respect each other. When they have an issue in their writing as the minister of FedDev, I will help an NDP or a conservative just as much as a liberal, because that's the job. And I think people should know that.

Like there is a civility and a commitment to the rules-based order and the general civility and pragmatic ability to come together as Canadians to build that, you know, I really believe is important. And we've got to preserve that center. And, you know, it's going to waver back a little one way or another. But it shouldn't go, those radical swings, and that's pulling each other apart, you know, I'm kind of here to fight against that

and to pull folks together and see if we can get some stuff done. That reminds me of the governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, who always said he runs a GSD campaign, right? A get shit done campaign. That's the way he put it. I want to ask you a fairly unhelpful question here, which is, and you've pointed it out a couple of times here, you've been great pals with Mark Carney for a long time,

and some of your colleagues in the Liberal Caucus have waited a very long time to get into cabinet, you know, when Justin Trudeau was prime minister, and some of them are still waiting. And I wonder how jealous or pissed off at you do you think some of them are, given that you went from rookie MP right into cabinet on day one?

You know, I would just say I haven't experienced any of that kind of thing. It's a pretty collegial and welcoming caucus. I will be candid. It has been remarkably welcoming to everybody. And I think everybody understands Mr. Carney. We all serve at the pleasure of the prime minister. And he's going to pick his folks in cabinet and for parliamentary secretaries. And everyone's playing a role. And you'll serve effectively or not. And then that could change. And then, you know, he may change it. And that's his responsibility. My responsibility is, again, I feel fortunate. I had no idea that was going to

happen. He doesn't, he didn't consult me on that. I got a call and that was, look, it's an honor. I think he's a new prime minister and he wanted to have a new team. And it's a new government, new prime minister. He's a rookie. He's new to politics too. We're both the class of 25, So that's kind of good. There's a lot of people in the class of 25, by the way, and a lot of people who came into Cabinet in the class of 25, Tim Hodgson and others. Our job is not, is to just serve and do well. We work really well.

I personally have found my colleagues the opposite of how you're describing it. People who have served in Cabinet have given me incredible advice. I can give you some of it, too. they gave me advice they said i'm here to help you what do you need and people have been absolutely supportive and and my job is to put my nose to the grinds around to do a good job but you know it like everyone's on a mission here like people are not it's not recess you know people aren't tugging at people's ponytails and gossiping like it is and i think mr carney's like this the prime minister he's the attitude is less than

Let's get stuff done. Let's bill. And it is super practical in there. Like it is not gossipy. It is everybody, there's a mission focus to build, to get results, to act decently for Canadians. Does he yell? There was that piece in the paper by Althea Raj that said he's a yeller. I can tell you I've never, never seen that.

And, you know, I get there's gossip. I've never seen that. I will say this about the prime minister. And I've said it to you. One, he, and I know this from the past, the president, and I know he's wired to serve. This guy has served as the governor. He left a job to come back and serve in finance

without any first guarantee that he would become the governor of the bank. People forget he served. This guy is a public servant. this guy is tireless. I mean, I have a lot of energy, Steve. Like, I don't sleep a lot. You know this. I'm a workaholic.

This guy texts you in the early morning and texts you at night with stuff, get this done. Where's this? We're totally focused on results, totally focused on Canadians. And, and yeah, I just, you know, look, it's interesting for me as a former journalist to see that. you know, let me just say that did not reflect anything that I've seen. The caucus has been super collegial when we've had disagreements and there are disagreements. The whole point of caucus is to have a safe space for disagreements, right?

This is not, oh, there was disagreement in caucus. Like, caucus is meant to represent your community, to represent your point of view and then to come to terms. That is a welcomed, safe place to do inside caucus. we do it and we come together and we get shit done. I'm going to have one last sort of wacky question for Minister Solomon in just a second, but let me first say this is a free show. We're going to keep it free forever. But if people want to help support the work we do,

patreon.com forward slash the Paken podcast. A lot of people have been kind enough to throw a few bucks our way. And in the next episode, we're going to do a long list of some of the thank yous that we're going to give. All of our previous shows are archived at Steve. paken.com. My last question for the minister is, I know when your birthday is. It's on 420. Anybody who's got a birthday on 420 has got to be a big dope smoker. Is that right? Well, there's two, well, okay, I got to tell you something. I can't even believe I'm going to say this.

It is true that when pot was legalized, a bunch of people started giving me pot on 420. As people will know, I'm a lightweight. I barely drink. Like I'll have a glass and booze. It's very very, very rarely, but I'm not a drinker because I'm a super lightweight. So I'm not a dope smoker. I don't smoke pot. I have great. But you didn't inhale. No, I inhaled. And it was lovely and it was great. And it's legal. That's fine. But I honestly, I can't, I can't do that stuff. You know, I can't smoke pot or drink and do this job. It's so, so hard. But have I, yes, was it fine? Absolutely. had do I occasionally have a drink absolutely but 420 I will also say when I grew up this is like I shouldn't say this so when I was a kid people were like 420 that is Hitler's birthday

yeah that's true too isn't it yeah I like you know Jewish kid who grew up and I was like how do you guys even know that and they're like so I was like and so I was quite relieved when it became 420 later in life, a much better version of the day than the first version. So when people started associating it with 420, I was super happy to have that over the first horrible one. Well, we have been super happy. And I want to thank you for spending so much time with us here on the Paken podcast. That's Evan Solomon, the Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation, and the

MP for Toronto Center. Minister, as always, thanks for your time. and peace and love to everybody. We'll see you next time.