The Paikin Podcast - Everything Political: Trump’s Wildfire Tariffs, Finding Decency, and the Gordie Howe Bridge

Episode Date: July 24, 2026

Christine Elliott joins the Everything Political panel with former MPs Martha Hall Findlay and Tony Clement to discuss Trump's wildfire tariffs, the Gordie Howe bridge opening, and Elliott's organization Decency Matters. They also get into past incivility in politics, including an assault in Parliament with a hickory stick, whether politics is more civil behind the scenes than in front of the cameras, and what can be done to make politics more decent. They also take audience questions, including one on growing Canadian government debt and another on Conservative Party candidates being barred from participating in debates during elections.   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]  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Okay, Martha and Tony, shout it out. What were we doing exactly one year and three days ago? I'm pretty sure we were doing this. That is exactly right. Ding, ding, ding. You win. Yeah, that was our first episode ever of everything political one year and three days ago as we sit here taping this today. So we've managed to get through an entire year of doing this and we're all still speaking to each other. I think that's a success. That's a big success. Congratulations, everybody. Congratulations, everybody. And I have to say whenever, and more and more people are listening to it, the one thing that people I hear from people a lot is,

and it sure sounds like you are all having a lot of fun, which is true. I agree. I'm glad you think so, too. Now, Mr. Clement, because you troll me so much during hockey season with your Montreal Canadians, I'm going to get a modicum of revenge today because I don't know if you can see this, but I am sporting a little shirt of a baseball team that I have followed for longer than the Blue Jays have been alive. If everybody wants to know why I'm a Red Sox fan instead of a Blue Jays fan, it is because I became a Sox fan before the Jays were born.

Like the Jays, love the socks. As we sit here today, 14 straight victories. They haven't had that many wins in a row since 1948 or something like that. So I'm just going to enjoy the ride while I'm on it. No, absolutely. very impressive and they're the jays are in the basement now and um but the socks are steaming forward so good for them isn't that crazy how do you go from from game seven world series 11th inning the year before to last place the following year now admittedly long way to go still but the poor blue jays are

just having a rough go of it and i know martha keeps you up at night oh it's it's just killing me i didn't even know that the red socks existed before the blue jays so definitely Not a baseball person. Oh my gosh. I suspect in order to keep Martha engaged and interested in this conversation, we should stop talking baseball and start talking everything political. Delighted to welcome back to our airwaves, our two former parliamentarians. Tony Clement, the former Ontario and federal conservative cabinet minister,

Martha Hall Finley, the former Liberal member of parliament, now head of the University of Calgary School of Public Policy. And we've got a special guest this week. Christine Elliott, former deputy premier of the province of Ontario. She was at MPP at Queens Park for 16 years. And Christine, it's great to see you again. I think you know these other two characters on screen. Do you not?

Absolutely. It's a pleasure to join you all. That's great to have you join us. Although I don't think you and Tony were at Queens Park at the same time, right? No, no. We were separated by a few years, I think. But we both have the scars of being former health ministers. That's right.

Yes. Yes, especially during the pandemic. That was really interesting. Well, you have, yeah, that's right. Yeah, Christine, you were, you were health minister during COVID. Tony, you were health minister during SARS, but you both also share, gosh, do I bring this up? Or am I going to bring the conversation to a crashing halt by doing this? You also share one other significant thing in common besides being health ministers and conservative MPPs.

Do you know what it is? Ran for leader? Yeah. You've both run for leader multiple times unsuccessfully. There you go. Sorry to remind you go. Thanks for bringing that up. Hey, that makes all three of us.

Oh, that's right. We've all run for leader. We're all losers. There you go. Now, hang on, let's add it up here. Tony, you were 0 for 2? Right. Martha, you were 0 for 2?

O for 2. Christine, you were 0.4 3? Over 3. I'm the winner of the losers. Oh, man. It's always an honor to run for leader, though. Yes. You know what?

I'm glad you feel that way because you do contribute something to the choice, to the party. You get your ideas out there and, you know, the chips fall where they fall, right? That's the way it works. That's the way it works. Okay. Christine, we wanted you on this week. By the way, can I just say one thing? Because I get asked a lot, you know, hey, you were in politics.

I'd love to run for politics. Do you have any advice? And I, my first question to them is, are you okay with losing? because there's a lot more losing in politics than there is winning. So unless you can take being in a losing situation, don't, don't do it. If your if your mentality is such that it will crush you forever, don't do it because there's more apt to be a losing proposition than a winning proposition. That's great advice. Yeah, that's really great. You know, I'm sure there are others, but I can only think of one politician off the top of my head who never lost anything.

He won personal election in 59, 63, 67, 71, 75, 75, 77, and 81, and he won the leadership of his party. That's the only guy I can think of who never, ever lost. Very unusual. You're talking about Mr. Davis, so obviously. I am talking about Bill Davis for sure. Yeah, yeah, but that's very unusual. Yeah, I'll say. Okay, back on topic here, and I want to talk about two recent developments between our country and the United States, which seem to have people scratching their heads again. The first is the new tariffs that Donald Trump has decided to put on Canada as a result of, if you can imagine, fires, which apparently we're not doing a good enough job of preventing the wind from taking the pollution down south. So he's tariffed us 50% on a bunch of stuff. And the second is the Gordi Howe Bridge, which, uh, I guess in here, okay, I'll do something unusual here, Tony.

In fairness to Donald Trump, the prime minister of our country has had maybe three or four different things to say about what the deal contains, whether we're getting a piece of the action today or whether we have to wait. Anyway, there's all sorts of confusion about all of that. Add it all up and things between our two countries still look pretty miserable. Tony, what do you make of it all? I'm not sure what you meant about connecting me with Donald Trump that way. But anyway, I'll move ahead. I have no control. I didn't read it that way, Tony. Don't worry. Thank you, Martha. Okay. Fair enough. So just on the bridge for a second, we do need some clarity. And the leader of the opposition, Pierre Pollyeff, has asked in a public letter to the prime minister that the terms of the deal be the subject of debate at a parliamentary committee. be also open to the public to see because we've heard several different things from the prime

minister and they cannot all exist at the same time right so do we is is this is the american portion of this deal based on net profits after we get paid back or is it at the front end before we get paid back is the basic question i'm putting it very very simply but that's the basic question so we've heard different things from the prime minister i'm being charitable here uh and uh and we really do need some clarity on this so that we can judge the prime minister and is negotiation uh as to whether it is a good deal i obviously i want the bridge to to to open on july 27th i my personal opinion is if we if it isn't a good deal we could wait a year or two before we open the bridge it's not the end of the world to get a better deal um i i i do agree that we're at peak trump

right now or we've passed peak Trump that as time goes on his ability to to to influence and direct world affairs I think diminishes by the day and week so there there is a case to be made for putting some extra time in on the Gordiala Hill Bridge on the big issue which is our trade relationship with the United States I think it's long past due that we actually start negotiating seriously. I'm not sure we have done so over the past 15 months. Well, we're ranging the puck because we're waiting to see what happens in the midterms. Well, I think that we're, I think the prime minister has finally acknowledged just in the last 48 hours since we've, since we're, we're recording this that perhaps it's time to accelerate

the discussions. And I think I would have accelerated the discussions 15 months ago. But, you know, I can see that there, there are different points of view as to whether that would have been a good idea. Now it's a good idea. It really is starting to affect us, whether you're in the dairy or autos or cement or all these other areas that are impacted by these new tariffs based on some obscure law that the president Trump is using, which will have to be tested in court, and that will take months and months and months. So yeah, we're in a pickle now and let's get serious. And I would like to know as a Canadian voter what our strategy is. I've given the prime minister on this program now a year to be more specific as to what our goals are, what our intentions are, how it connects to national security, how it connects to continental defense, how it connects to all of these other issues so that we can put our best foot forward in these negotiations.

None of it has been forthcoming. and I understand the need for having discussions that are not public, but at some point you have to be open to the Canadian public as to what our goals are. I'd like to know what our goals are as a country in dealing with the American. Well, tell me this. Martha, do you think there's any value? And, well, I was going to say, let's operate on the assumption that Mark Carney is being purposefully vague about the Gordy Howe Bridge details, for an example,

because he doesn't want to inflame Trump by being specific about what's in the deal. So I guess the question is, do you see any value in being sort of strategically ambiguous about being clear on what the deal is on the bridge? Look, all of this conversation still presumes or still assumes that we're dealing with somebody rational, right?

You can't negotiate. even the concept of negotiating requires somebody to be rational on the other side of the negotiating table that's clearly not happening. We had a deal with the Gordy Howe Bridge years ago when the whole thing was proposed. I mean, the lawyer, Christine, the lawyers in us, right?

Like, of course there was a deal. Of course there were arrangements made. And of course, Donald Trump has thrown all of it up in the air, right? So that we're even having to quote, for, you know, people not watching and listening. I'm using air quotes, negotiate, makes no sense. So right now I'm looking at a prime minister who absolutely,

and I don't, you know, I don't, I'm not part of the discussions, but from where I'm looking, I see somebody who absolutely is trying to manage a situation for the benefit of the Canadian economy in a way that clearly is having to work. around Donald Trump. On the trade discussions, there have been discussions and negotiations ongoing all the way along. And I don't believe that the details of that should necessarily be public because then you're throwing your negotiating position away, even if you have like a decent negotiation on the other side. But where, and I felt this all the way along, our best allies

in Canada with respect to trade and all of these ups and downs is not Trump. We're not going to negotiate with the White House. He clearly don't keep a damn about anything that's written or signed. Whether it's a bridge, whether it's a US MCA, Kuzma, clearly no

concern for any deal from one day to the next. Our biggest allies in the trade discussions are in fact the American people and American businesses. And you can bet there are lots and lots of discussions going on at that level that is understanding we're not going to make any progress

with the White House. How can we count on anything with the White House? So there's much, much, much more discussion being had between businesses, between different industrial sectors on the Canadian side and the American side. So I just think the idea, even the idea of having negotiations with Donald Trump is nonsensical because he clearly doesn't actually care. error. Christine, how do you see it? Well, I would agree with Martha that you're not dealing with someone who's rational in this situation, as is clearly very mercurial, if we can say that. He changes his mind frequently, so I do think it is going to be the American people. They're going to at some point say enough is enough, and we've got to do something about this. But, and these tariffs

are really hurting the American people as much as the Canadian people. And the American people are taking notice of that. So I think that there is, with respect to the Gordiawe bridge, there may be a reason why the Prime Minister is being relatively opaque about the deal that has been negotiated. With respect to the tariffs, I know the tariff issue has been coming for a long time. and I think you're right, Tony, that we need to start negotiating on this. He made it sound as if it was because we were not managing our wild forests properly, and it was because of the smoke and so on,

but that doesn't really have anything to do with that. But now it was a whole range of tariffs on a whole range of different issues. I think that our minister and his team have worked to do and should get in there and start the negotiation. And we'll be back right after the next. this. Okay, friends, let's go on to Block 2 here. Christine, you have launched something or helped launch something here in Canada, which has existed in the United Kingdom for a little while, and it has to do with something that I think everybody on this call agrees is desperately needed, not just

in politics, but in life in general these days, and it's a movement called Decency Matters. Why to tell us a bit about it? Well, Decency Matters is a new Canadian organization that is aiming to bring a group of individuals together to advocate for the importance of decency and respect. And that's decency and respect in all aspects of life, in public and political life, in education, in the media, in nonprofits and corporations, because we believe that decency is sort of the minimum that we need in our society to keep our society together. And it leads to better leadership, better community involvement, and better life overall,

better work environment. And it's, I would say that it's not a partisan organization, notwithstanding my political background. It's really a values organization. And we had a group of people come together in May. sort of a thought leadership group. And it was politicians from all political stripes. It was people from the media education, other backgrounds.

And we came up with surprisingly similar ideas about what we should be doing and what this really means and why it's really important. And really we have a situation right now, I think, where we are rewarding non-decency. When you see social media outrage is the new normal, we want to return decency to being the new normal. You've been in and around politics for a long time, and I wonder whether you can recall a time other than now where decency was more desperately needed and in such short supply. I think it's really, really needed here now. I think that we have enough bandwidth here in Ontario and Canada to deal with it. There are some other jurisdictions, which I won't name, that I think are really struggling with this concept.

But I think this is something that's really important to all people, but they don't feel that they can speak out against it, that we really need to create that coalition so that we can celebrate decency and respect. I know that there are situations in healthcare, for example, where nurses are being treated with disrespect. I've seen situations at Queens Park where some of the goings on have really, I felt embarrassed about what's been going on when I see the children up in the stands watching what was going on. And I think that we really need to go back to being decent to create that kind of. democracy that we want to have because I think what we're seeing right now is a lot of people don't want to get involved in politics, for example, because they feel it's too mean, it's too rude. I spoke with one politician who recently elected, who came from healthcare and she said that what she's witnessed at Queens Park would never be allowed in health care organizations. So we really need to think about what we're doing and create that. situation where people can come and be together and talk about what we can do to change the situation. Because this just isn't a think tank where we're going to sit there and say, well, this is terrible. We've got to do something about it. We have to figure out what we're

going to do. So we enjoy. We certainly welcome like-minded individuals to come and join us. I must say I do hear all the time from people outside of politics that if they behaved in their line of work the way that many politicians they see behaving, you know, HR would be overrun with complaints and something would be done about it. Martha, I want to get you in here at this point because there is, I think there's a temptation to say that we are the way we are right now in large measure because the most powerful man in the world is, you know, kind of a deplorable human being who doesn't show any civility to anybody else. And his opponents certainly, feel the same way about him. Can we blame all this on being in an era of Trump?

No, I don't think we can. I think he's more a symptom than a cause. Certainly, when I was at the end of my time in politics, social media was really becoming a thing. And you remember how so many of us were so excited about the possibilities of social media and, you know, the Arab Spring. And we were all so positive about how this could really help, you know, it would democratize communication. It would, you know, open so much to broader communication. And it's gone a different way. It's become, I think, extremely polarizing. Well, it's not just me thinking. It's so clearly problematic now. And, I mean, when I was in, when I left politics, the last bit of my time in politics, I found, for example, I would put on my Twitter account and Facebook account, I don't actually do

that much in the way of social media now and haven't for years, partly because it's become so horrible, so vile often. But I would say, for example, if you're going to communicate with me anonymously, don't bother, right? You know who I am. If I don't know who you are, I'm not going to get going to engage. I think a lot of that is, we're seeing whether it's anonymous or not. we're seeing people say things on social media protected by the lack of physical connection. And they say things. They would never say to somebody if they were standing right in front of them. And I think that has just been snowballing.

And as such, I think Donald Trump is more a symptom than a cause. I think what's appalling is that people let them get away with it. Tony, what's your view on all that? Yeah, a couple things. you know, and first of all, I'm glad this initiative is taking place. There is a historical context. There's been incivility in the past and many nations, including Canada and the U.S. I think of the, I can't remember the name of the senator who attacked another senator with a hickory stick on the floor of the Senate chamber back in 1863 or something.

And of course, we've had our political assesses. nations like Darcy McGee here in Canada. And, you know, the great William Wilberforce in the UK, whose campaigned to abolish the slave trade and the British Empire was one of his initiatives. But the other initiative he had was to impose or to allow for greater civility in public discourse. That was another thing that William Wilberforce wanted to see. And this is back in 1812, 06, somewhere in the...

there. So yeah, t'was ever thus. And the only other thing I would add, not by way of criticism, but just analysis, I think we've got to be, you know, when we all say we want civility, when I don't want a situation where you feel as a politician unable to raise an issue, because then you'll be attacked for uncivil behavior, just by, virtue of raising an issue. I don't think that's what anybody's referring to here. No, we're referring to toxic behavior. Okay. That's good because what I've found is, you know, if you are attacking a government policy, sometimes you are accused of being uncivil and, you know, we don't, you know, you're, you're being negative. They don't say maybe uncivil. They'll say you're being

negative. So there's a difference, maybe this is what I'm saying. There's a difference between being negative, which is part of the role of an official opposition in a democratic country, and being uncivil about it. And I think that's, I think that's important to draw that distinction. Yeah. Christine, we do hear, though, and maybe you could tell me if this was your experience in politics, we do hear that there is a lot of incivility put on for the cameras during question period in order to get clickbait for social media clips. But that behind the scenes, there's actually a lot more civility in public life than we think. Is that true? Well, I would say that's what I experienced, yes, but that's not what the public sees. And the public sees a lot of really bad

behavior and the legislature during question period. And that turns off a lot of people from ever wanting to become involved in politics. And that's not good because we want to have people from with all different thoughts from all different cultures. We want to make sure that everybody feels represented, but a lot of people feel intimidated by that, particularly women. And that's not good in that, I think, stifles democracy. That's why I think this is really important. The other thing that I would just mention is that when we had our thought leaders to be, and we broke off into different groups to speak, when we came back, a couple of themes came back,

one was courage, to have the courage to speak up, to deal with some of these things. The other was to what do we look at for inspiration? And the seven grandfather teachings of indigenous people came forward as something that we should strive towards. Truth, humility, justice, wisdom, all of those issues. And I think that's a good starting point for us as we try to figure out what we need to do in order to counter the non-deasancy and instability that we see in all aspects. of our system. Well, let's follow up on this then. I mean, and I'd appreciate getting ideas from the three of you on how you think we can make. I mean, this segment's called everything political. So let's talk about politics and we'll leave the other sectors aside for now. What's an idea that anybody

can advance to try to make public life in Canada? Let's leave the United States alone for a second, but making public life in Canada a more civil place to do business and therefore a more appealing thing for those not in politics to want to give it a try. Christine, start us off. Sure, I think one thing that we can do is develop a set of standards for what we see as decent behavior and gives us people generally voting public generally the option to choose who they think is going to be a decent candidate going forward if that's important to them. And I believe it is important to most people. So I think they need to have something to judge it against. And I think that will help to create a situation where people are proud of the people.

people that they elect and are happy that they're representing them. A set of standards sounds like a really good idea. Martha, what would you add to that? I would love to see more people. And by the way, Christine, I think this is a great initiative. So well, well done and good luck with it. I would love to see people applaud decent behavior more often. I think we do it to ourselves.

We tend to respond to outrage. We tend to, you know, and whether it's the media, whether it's people watching politics, I would love to see more embracing and more positive response to when people are actually decent. And this is going to sound incredibly self-serving. But Steve, one of the things that you do and you have asked us to do on every one of these podcasts is at the very end, the good on you, which is a good on you where each of us says, something positive about somebody who isn't normally a part of our, you know, political background or party or past party, that in and of itself. I hear people really go, oh, I love that

part of the podcast because it's so rare that we actually have a time to say something nice about somebody else and that we, in fact, applaud doing it. So the more of that, I think, the better. We just, and maybe it is courage, Christine. Maybe it is we need to have. have more courage to just say, hey, that was a really nice way to behave or that was a really nice thing to say. And we don't do that enough. You know, I'll give some credit where it's due here. And I think you guys can correct me if I've got the title of this thing wrong. But I think at Queens Park, one day a year, they do something like be nice to somebody in opposition day.

Be nice to somebody who's not on your party day. And I do recall, Franz Helena, who is a new Democrat member of the, Ontario legislature from the Sudbury area, Nickel Belt, I think, who one day brought a cake to Queens Park and she was the health critic and she gave it to, I think, Deb Matthews, who was the liberal health minister of the time and it was a, okay, this is the one day a year where be nice to somebody who's not on your party day and she gave her a cake as if to say, okay, we're friends today and then tomorrow we go back to battle. Does anybody, am I making this up here or does anybody remember this kind of experience?

Not in my time, that's for sure. I don't call that specifically, but it's a great idea. Well, it might be before both of your time at Queens Park, but I'm quite convinced. I remember that happening. But anyway, Tony, what would you add to the list of things we can do to make politics more decent? That's a great question. I'm going to focus in on one particular subset of politician and political actors.

And those are the ones who have a faith. That's not everybody, but there's a good chunk who have a particular faith and also the humanists. So if you're a nihilist in politics, this is not for you. But for everybody else, I'd like people just to, before they act or react, consider their faith. You know, and consider that we are supposed to love our neighbor. consider that we are supposed to turn the other cheek sometimes, consider that we should look at our fellow human beings and try to have some empathy because they may be going through things that you're not completely aware of.

And, you know, look, we're human beings, I get it, we're judgy. But I think in politics, if you have one eye on your faith experience, it may in fact lead to more civility. And I'm not saying all of the political battles will go away because that isn't a democracy anymore. But I think we lose something when we don't consider some of those teachings from the sacred texts of your choice or from a humanist point of view. You know, as you were saying that, I'm reminded of an example of a guy I think we all know named Michael Corrin. Michael used to be a broadcast journalist, a writer, an author, and then he decided, late in life, I think in his 50s, that he was hearing the call of the priesthood. And he became an Anglican priest, and he has a parish in Burlington, Ontario.

And he's still a fairly frequent visitor to social media and gets excoriated quite frequently on social media and always responds with kindness. He does not lash out and get defensive. he, if you like, tries to kill him with kindness. And it's a, I think it works for him. And it's something we should all probably take some lessons from. Now, Christine, I do have, yeah, go ahead, Martha. I was just to say, and it's particularly interesting for Michael Corrin because remember, he used to host a show where different people from different political parties would,

would do a panel or be guests on a show. And that show was often pretty, there was some pretty nasty stuff that happened. happened on that show. He fesses up that he was a bad guy back in the past, that he was, you know, too nasty, too brutish. He fesses up to that. And he encouraged that, right? He encouraged that kind of thing on his show. And so I've watched the evolution of Michael Corrin with great interest as well. So it's a nice, a nice point to make. The difficulty, Tony, it seems to me, is that nowadays, well, let's put it this way. Maybe when you folks were in public life, there was a sense that if you don't agree with me, you're my opponent. But today, and I think particularly in the United States,

if you don't agree with me, you're an enemy. And you need to be vanquished. It's not just that we disagree and we'll meet somewhere in the middle. I need to win, you need to lose, and I need to destroy you in the process. What do we do about that? I think it can only really be turned around when the public looks at that and says this is not acceptable. you know, I, politicians left to their own devices. Sorry? The public's part of it. I mean, so many people.

No, I know. That's what's got to change. I agree. Yeah. I agree. And, you know, and they, this situation where, you know, I used to joke. And it was always a joke that I wanted to see the wailings and lamentations of their women and children, you know, the other side. But it was a joke, right?

But now I think it's reality. You know, so, no, I think that. And I don't think that's changing the United States. In fact, it's getting far worse. And it'll be interesting to see what the Democratic Socialists of America wants their takeover of the Democratic Party is full and complete. I don't anticipate return to civility with them in charge. So, yeah, it's not good. But I think ultimately, when people decide that this is not working for them, that's when things start to.

change. And there'll be somebody who'll come along who'll be ahead of the curve, who will say, I'm not going to be part of this, join my movement. You know, I want real solutions that will help you. And I'm not interested in these bickering fights. And that person will get a lot of votes at some point in the future. That's what I hope. Gotcha. Christina, I want to ask you one thing about this. And I don't mean this to sound like a cynical question, but here we go anyway. I know a lot of people who once they get out of politics say, boy, we really need to renew our commitment to making politics more decent.

But when they were in politics, they weren't all that decent or all that civil themselves. She was, though. I agree. I agree, which is, I completely agree, which is why Christine talked about a process. that took place not too long ago where a bunch of people got together on a Zoom and then broke out into groups and workshops. And I participated in it because she asked and I thought she walked the walk and talk to talk.

But there's a lot of folks who don't. What do we do about them? Well, I think that just like Michael Corrin, everybody has that epiphany and makes a decision. So I think that if people want to become involved, then they should. but they have to contribute to the solutions and finding a way for people to recognize how important this is in our public life and every other aspect of our lives.

And we want children and grandchildren to be able to grow up in the same way. So this isn't a process that's going to happen immediately. It's going to take some time and there's a lot of work to do. But I really believe that people are looking for this as an answer. And they should go to the website.

What is it again? Decency Matters.cate. Decancy matters. C.A. And please join it. Gotcha. Okay, we're going to move to Block 3 right now, which is viewer feedback. We do get a lot of emails mostly that come into our email address.

And people want, I think they want to hear you weigh in on this stuff. So here's the first one. This is from a guy named Conan Hoy who says, and this is, this can be about everybody's favorite topic. Debt. Canada household debt is 100% of GDP. Canadian non-financial corporate debt is 120% of GDP. Canadian gross government debt is 111% of GDP. Is this healthy?

How do we get out of this position? Both the conservatives and liberals, he says, seem to be encouraging spending, personal public and corporate. The plan seems to be invest more, spend more, grow faster, which often comes with more debt. Is growth a good answer? or just the answer that people want to hear, and is it politically expedient?

Okay, lots to chew on there. Tony, what do you say? It's a big problem for our country, and we have gotten away with it through a little bit of jiggery-pokery. We've gotten away with it with massive higher immigration, which increases our GDP,

but decreases our GDP per capita, and certainly those chickens have roosted in terms of health care access and housing access and all these other issues. So, yes, it is an issue. It's been for a period of time since the extension of Justin Trudeau to the prime ministership, you know, not an issue that was popular to talk about, overspending and debt, and even consumer debt.

But, you know, it's Newtonian physics, folks. eventually gravity does take hold and we will be paying the price for that in terms of lower productivity. Look at it. The Canadian dollar is at a 20 or 30 year low right now and people don't talk about it much, much as they don't talk about our negative GDP growth in the last two quarters. But those are the realities of the situation. And so I do think it is incumbent upon.

political leaders to give a truthful picture of where we're at as a country and at least have a plan that can be debated as to what to do about it. And the sooner we get to this, the better. Christine. Well, growth is good, but debt is not. And there's so many situations with respect to consumer debt where people are living almost hand to mouth right now because of the high cost of living, high cost of housing, high cost of food. And they're living rate on the the edge. So if something could happen, they can lose their house. All kinds of bad things can happen. So I think we really need to slow down on some of the consumer debt and some of the people that feel that it's okay. I've got a visa card. I'll just run it up to the maximum. It can't be doing that.

And in terms of government debt, that's a significant issue. I don't think what happened under Justin Trudeau was healthy because you will recall we did go into debt after the 2008, 2009. a situation, but that was to do things like build infrastructure and create that kind of growth, which was great, rather than just paying people money for doing, I'm not even sure what. So there is a lot of work that we need to do on government debt as well. Martha, that's certainly Mark Carney's explanation, which is we're prepared to run big deficits right now in order to get big infrastructure built and ultimately make the country more productive and efficient. Is that a good argument?

It is a very good argument, but it has to also be taken in context because we have run up significant debt for, as Christine says, not really quite sure what, really. We do know we have a massively bloated civil service in Ottawa, right? So an awful lot of money has been spent and continues to be spent on the non-productive things. So we have to cut that back significantly. We do need more infrastructure in this country. we do need to build more so that we can, in fact, enhance our economic prosperity. The pipeline discussions, the port discussions, to me those are way long in coming. And so, yes, I think that aspect of what Mark Carney and his government are doing is absolutely the right thing to do.

But we can't do all of it. And so there are going to have to be places where we cut back. Tony, I would be a little careful about blaming too much of this on high immigration numbers, because up until, and even it was only partway through the Trudeau, the more recent Trudeau government, our immigration was actually pretty, was being handled fairly well, right? It's been relatively recently, and this I do point at the Trudeau government, that we lost all control, right? People were coming in like crazy. But the challenge that we've had in the Canadian economy, our productivity numbers have been going down for decades.

decades. We, so I, I just would be a little cautious about laying blame on immigration and immigrants. I think we have a whole lot of, sorry. Yeah, no, no. I just, we have a whole lot of problems, economic problems, and frankly, not a whole lot of personal consumer discipline. I know lots of people who bought houses when the interest rates were really low, right? And cut, you know, you'd say, well, what happens if the interest rates go up a couple of points? Oh, that's never going to happen. We don't have a very good culture of fiscal discipline even at the consumer family level. And a lot of people have overstretched themselves. So we have, there's a government problem. It's a country problem. It's also, I think, a cultural, attitudinal problem.

Sorry, Tony, but if I misread that. Let me just make my point again, just to for clarity. The Trudeau government's point of view when people would point to economic decline, including productivity, as Martha has mentioned, would be say, well, our GDP is growing. Well, the reason the GDP was growing was because we had more people in the country consuming and spending. But at the same time, our GDP per capita per person was in decline and is now at the lower end of the OECD average of. of industrialized nations. That was my point. Right. But that's been a problem this country has been dealing with, not dealing with, actually is more correct. But that's, that kind of challenge has been going on for a long time. And we really need to get our act together in this country. Hopefully, you know, what's been happening south of the border has given us enough of a wake-up call

to say we can't continue with this complacency. Good question, Conan. Yeah, Conan asked a good question. provoked a good discussion there. Here's one from Chris Hayward from St. Catharines, who writes, oh, Tony, you may not love this one, but here we go. Here we go. While discussing if Pierre Poliev could win as leader of the conservatives, Martha touched on a point that I feel Tony moved on from too easily. That was the focus on team conservative, not just Pierre. I think, says Chris, I think the focus on Pierre being the only voice in the last election was devastating and will continue. When candidates did not show up for local debates, the message that this candidate represents Pierre and not my writing endures. It will endure. It undermined the idea of

representational democracy. Until a leader that allows our potential future MPs to speak and debate publicly in their own writings, to me, the conservative party is not an option. Okay, Tony, take Chris on. What do you want to say? I will repeat, mistakes were made. And Chris has raised a very good point. and I'm hoping in the next election that our candidates will be given the freedom to participate in local debates. There is obviously a risk whenever a candidate is exposed that way to local media and so on. I might say something a little bit off the main message of the party, but that's the, I think, when I was an MP and a candidate for election and re-election in Perry Somoskoka, I would attend nine debates, local debates in my writing.

Nine, possibly more. So you disobeyed the request of head office who said, we don't want you out there debating? Well, at first we didn't have that. We didn't have that stricter against us. We were allowed to do what we thought was best. And we were actually given binders full of our policy to prepare us for local debates, right? So I think probably in the last go-round, there was more of a more of a direction not to do too many debates, which I ignored. And, you know, there was no sanction against me for ignoring that.

But, of course, we lost the government. So there was nobody to sanction me in the end anyway. But no, I think it is important for local candidates to be accessible. You can do too many debates. It does take you off the door knocking. So that's part of the counter of it is every minute you're in a debate in some community hall talking to people who've already decided how they're voting. You are not knocking on doors and identifying voters who could support you. So I get that.

So there has to be a happy medium. I appreciate that observation. But it has come to a point, Martha, maybe you can weigh in on this. It's come to a point where, and I think the first time I heard about this was under the Harper Conservatives, and then I think the Ford conservatives in Ontario picked up on it, where there was essentially a blanket prohibition, maybe exceptions for senior cabinet ministers like Mr. Clement here, but essentially a blanket prohibition on local conservative candidates participating in any of these things at all. They were just told not to show up. And I don't know, I'll go on the record as saying, Martha, that I think one time in a writ period, every legitimate candidates got to have a shot to show up at a debate. and defend their side once, at least once. I mean, that's kind of part of the deal, isn't it? It is called representative democracy, right?

Like, and Tony, this is not, like, this could easily be a partisan discussion, and I don't think it should be. I think this is true for all parties. I think it's true in our country, absolutely. candidates should not only be free to be out there engaging, but it should be mandated that they be out there and engaging because that's how we vote for our representatives. I was very concerned about that,

and so I do think part of the problem in the last election was it was more the Conservative Party. I think one of my comments was, as an example of how I think this backfired, I really do think it did, Tony, was the campaign plane. It didn't say conservative on it. It said Polyev. I just found that to be indicative of a significant amount of hubris, and this is the Pierre Poitiav party, not the conservative party.

And at the time, I was actually, we've had this discussion, but I was a member of the party, which I had joined for voting in different leaderships. I was offended by the fact that the party, that I had, you know, been engaged with either on the opposite side or inside was describing itself as one person. That's not how we do things. So regardless of party, I got to say, Martha, there were lots of liberal candidates during the Trudeau years who put Team Trudeau on their longs. I don't, I don't, I don't forget, I ran against that guy, Tony. Yeah. Right. I'm just saying

there's a there are reasons. I'm not, and that's why I'm trying to say this really isn't supposed to be partisan comment. We saw it most obviously last, in the last campaign with one party in particular, but I would say this is for all parties. There should absolutely be much more engagement rather than less. Let's also put on the record here that this whole issue of it's all about the leader versus it's more about the team. If you go back to 2018, and Christine, you can correct me on this, but I think I'm right on it. Doug Ford was going nowhere fast as leader of the president. Progressive Conservatives in Ontario, because the campaign was completely focused on him.

It wasn't until he started doing campaign events surrounded by Christine Elliott and Caroline Mulroney and Vic Fidelity. Steve, he had a cabinet meeting. There you go. He had team. When he was surrounded by the team and people could see that it was more than just Ford, it actually was the team. That's when he started to go up in the polls.

Anyway, Christine, were you ever told when you were running, um, For public life, were you ever told don't show up for all candidates' debates? No, we're never told. I mean, they were encouraged not to attend too many, but I've always felt that it's really, really important for candidates to go to local debates. Yes, a lot of times they were sort of stacked with people that already made up their mind. But other people came to, and it's really important for them to be able to listen to what you have to say to ask you questions. That's democracy.

and especially in some parts of the province, which is perhaps more rural, where you don't get to do as much door-to-door knocking. And you need to go to public events and you need to be at events where people are going to fairs and other things as well to show up in person, perhaps not even in debates, but be accessible to people so they can size you up and figure out whether they want to vote for you or not. You know, Steve, there's another example.

And Tony, hopefully you'll appreciate this. Another example of where that approach, I think, backfired somewhat. And it was the 2004 federal election. And having been a candidate in that election, I remember that all of our campaign signs, they might have had my name on the signs, but it was Paul Martin's photo. So everybody across the country, it was Paul Mart.

Right? And I don't think that helped at all, frankly. So they're just trying to even it out, Tony. I'm trying to even it out. No, no, it's a double-edged sword. That's another example of where it didn't work. Yeah, yeah, I hear you. And as I say, I'll go back to my mantra.

Mistakes were made. Yes, indeed. Okay, we'll have one more question for our guests, but for some housekeeping here, and particularly since this is the first anniversary of everything political here on the Paken podcast, I want to spend just a little extra time here thanking some of the people who have really got us to this moment. We do consider it a point of principle, Martha, Tony and me, to have this be a free show for as long as we're doing this.

We don't want people to ever have to pay for it. But some people in their generosity have decided to throw a few shekels our way because they like what we're doing. And as a result, want to support our efforts. And you can do that by going to patreon.com forward slash the pay. and podcast. And I want to thank four people in particular, to start with here, who have given at the highest levels, and you will see their names after we're done talking in the credits at the end, because they have really given above and beyond the call, as it were. Shelly Lewis, Ralph Lean, Mari Isigai, and Charles Dallenbach, the four of you have really been,

what would Doug Ford say? You guys have been champions. You guys are really great in the way that you have helped us keep this thing going. So, what? as we celebrate our first anniversary, we want to thank Shelley, Ralph, Mari, and Chuck for all of their great generosity. Now, we have a few new names we want to throw into the mix here as well. Douglas R. Scott from Toronto says, Steve, your initiative deserves support. You have mine. It's on my list of required listening. Thank you, Douglas. Mark Tobin in Osceola, Ontario. Anybody know where that is, Osceola, Ontario? It's in the lovely Ottawa Valley, says Mark Tobin.

I'd never heard of it. But anyway, I am so glad to have found your podcast on Spotify, your balanced perspectives, and the respectful debate between dissenting guests is such a treat in this world of shock and clickbait. Good. We like that, Mark. We'd like to hear that. Mary Lennox in the town of the Blue Mountains in Gray County. I, as you can tell from the background, I'm not home right now.

I'm on Manitoulin Island at my camp. And Mary says that my father spent his teenage years, 1912 to 1916, on Manitoulan Island. Wow. And had to go to the mainland, namely Sudbury, to finish high school. And then he went on to Queens. His father was the Presbyterian minister in Gore Bay. So Mary always likes it when I mentioned Manitoulin Island. And I just did it again. Yeah. Thank you, Mary. And just Mary, I live many, many years in Gray County in Thornbury, went to high school in Meford. So hearing somebody who's listening from that part of the world, that's great. Thank you. Does your heart well. That's good.

And let's do one more here. David J. Smelsky, who's from Rockwood, Ontario. We were talking a couple of weeks ago about John Manley, the former deputy prime minister of the country who had some complicated feelings about America on the occasion of the 250th birthday of the United States because obviously Canada is going through an historically bad moment with the United States. But on the other hand, Mr. Manley mentioned that he has a daughter who lives in the states and American-born grandchildren. And David here says, I have a son, a daughter of law who's an American citizen and two grandchildren living near Atlanta, Georgia, that personal connection makes the topic feel especially close to home. And David decided to shell out a bit for us as well. So, David, thank you for your support on that. Reminder, everybody, patreon.com forward slash the Paken podcast. All of our shows are archived at the website, stevepaken.com. Let's get to our last block here, which is to say, as we tease earlier, we always have a part of this show where we ask our guest to say something nice about something somebody has done in a party that is not their own. And we say, good on you for doing that.

So, okay, Christine Elliott, you're our guest. Do you want to start off by giving a good on you to somebody who's not a conservative and who you think did something nice the past couple of weeks? Well, I would say that I approve of what Prime Minister Carney is doing vis-a-vis his relationship with Donald Trump. I think he's Pong Gulen collected I think he's got a strategy

and I support the way he's doing it. There's still a lot of work yet to be done but I support the way that he's doing it and I think he's approaching it correctly. There's a good on you from Christine Elliott to Mark Carney. Okay. Martha Hall-Finley, you're next. Well, I had

my initial thought was a good on you to Premier David E. because after working so hard for so many months to kind of stress the constitutional aspects of how we get along or don't get along in this country, he finally came out and said, British Columbia does not have the constitutional right to say no to a pipeline.

It's taken years of trying to get a premier of the British Columbia to actually acknowledge that. The lawyer nerd in me is it's Section 9210A. which makes clear that jurisdiction. But I really want to do this now that Christine is on because Christine, you weren't able to join the last time. And I wanted to say that my good on you was actually to both you and your late husband, Jim Flaherty, because the two of you actually exhibited the decency and respect that is so important and so often. lacking. And so especially given this new initiative of yours, that's my real good on you.

Excellent. That's very kind. Thanks, Martha. Tony, you get the last word. Yeah. So for my good on you, let's acknowledge that Warren Kinsella is a liberal. So I find him exasperating at times. But he's written a very important book called The Hidden Hand, the information war and the rise of anti-Semitic propaganda, which I think is an important addition to this discussion and debate that is going on, should be going on in our own country about hate against Jews and about where this comes from and what we can do about it. And so I want to commend Warren for that. And I know he's

taken a lot of flack from certain circles for that. But he is a strong individual who has historically been a voice against anti-Semitic behavior in our country, and he's continuing that work today. He sure has been. And Tony, warns we're on a number of war rooms for both federal and provincial liberal politicians. Has he ever had you in the crosshairs? No, I don't, I think, I think we've had a good respectful relationship. I don't feel there's, there's nothing coming up on, from my liver right now, full of bile. That's personal. No. Lucky you, because he's a tough

ombra during election campaigns. Yeah, I don't necessarily try to get into his crosshairs. Let's put it that way. A wise idea. All right. Great show, everybody. Thanks so much for joining us.

Christine Elliott, we remind everybody, decency matters.ca is the website which will be filled with information about the mission that she is on right now. Martha and Tony, great to see you again. Peace and love, everybody. See you next time.