The Paikin Podcast - Minister François-Philippe Champagne: Will His Budget “Transform” Canada?

Episode Date: November 17, 2025

Canada’s Minister of Finance François-Philippe Champagne joins Steve to discuss the budget, if it was truly “transformational,” if it was an “elbows up” budget, how to deal with Donald Trump, why they didn’t cut taxes on all new home purchases, if this budget favors older people at the expense of younger folks, why they didn’t scale back the old age supplement, and how to keep auto plants in Canada. They also look at the curious case of a budget speech mentioning immigration numerous times, how Champagne wants to “take back control” of immigration, and how to build big things again.And, finally, they discuss Champagne’s mentor and friend, Jean Chrétien, why Champagne entered politics, and what makes a good politician. Follow The Paikin Podcast: YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/@ThePaikinPodcastX: x.com/ThePaikinPodINSTAGRAM: instagram.com/thepaikinpodcastBLUESKY: bsky.app/profile/thepaikinpodcast.bsky.socialEmail us at: [e-mail]

Hi, everybody, Steve Paken here, and we have kind of a special guest this week. The Minister of Finance for Canada, Francois Philippe Champagne. Now, of course, we're going to talk about the budget, which was just released. It was his first ever budget, the first ever budget for the Mark Carney government. Francois Filippe-Champin represents a riding called Saint-Morice Champlain. That's very close to the same writing that Jean-Cretchen represented. Monsieur Champagne was raised in Chewinigan, and Jean-Cretchen, as you know, was born and raised in Chewinnigan. And one more thing they have in common, of course.

Jean-Cretchen was the first ever Francophone finance minister in Canadian history. Mr. Champagne is the fifth. So, yes, we will talk budget. Yes, we will talk his background. We'll talk about why he got into public life in the first place, having run for office for the first time 10 years ago. Francois-Philippe Champagne,

Canada's Minister of Finance, on the Paken podcast, coming right up. The Pagan podcast one-on-ones, presented by Beer Canada. Minister, again, thanks for spending some time with us tonight. We really appreciate this very much. It's great to be with you, by the way. Of course we're going to talk about the budget, but I think this offers us a bit of an opportunity

to find out a little bit more about you because this is, in some respects, your big coming-out party, right? Your first budget as Minister of Finance. And so I want to know why 10 years ago, you decided to put your name on a ballot anyway. Oh, I always wanted to serve. You know, if you asked my friends, they would say,

I wanted to be in politics since I was five, I think, and I'm 55, so that's kind of a few decades ago. And I, you know, all my life, I wanted to serve. I went to the United States to study. Then I spent 20 years in Europe. And about that time when life was too comfortable in a way, I say it's time for change. and I decided to come back to show it again.

Imagine from London, England to show it again. Quebec is quite a transition. Bit of a culture shock. It's a transition. And I started to run two years before an election. I'll give you something which will make you smile. My writing is bigger than Belgium. So just to give a sense of perspective to our viewers.

You're about two hours west of Quebec City and it is huge. Yes. I mean, it's eight hours north-south driving. So just to give a sense of perspective. and I remember going in small community there's about 34 in my writing and they brought me to this pizza place I still remember

we got there they said let's ask the manager if you can start shaking ends imagine in a pizza place for lunch and no one knows who I am and so they put me in front and they say you go shake hands and I remember going around the table and say hi my name is Francois Filippe Champagne

and I'm going to run to be your member of parliament and people looking at me and say but there's no election but I said there'll be won one day And this was two years before the formal elections. I did campaign. 2013. 2013 and anticipation of 2015.

2015 for about two years. So, and you know what it showed me and what it taught me is that in politics, there's tweeting humility, authenticity, and empathy. And I would say the humility part, when you put your name on a ballot and you try to gain the trust of people, there's something very. humbling in that and authenticity. You have to be who you are. You know, I come from Show It Again, so we have our own style.

You may know the other guy. I was just about to ask you about the other guy. I mean, in spite of, in spite of, you know, what's going on in your public life right now, you might not be the most famous person ever from Showingan again. Well, I don't think I will ever reach that at 92. You know, if you bring him to a room, he's going to, I have another story for you once. He's probably 89 and we're walking together in Showing again. and he goes by and everyone that he sees,

hi, my name is Jean-Cretien. So I said, sir, you know, in showing again. I mean, it's a safe bet to say 99% of people recognize you. Maybe in Canada would be 80%. He said, never take a chance. And since then, it's funny because I do events now and people say, why would you say your name? First of all, it's a sense of humility.

You know, you introduce who you are. And it's a good icebreaker. And then I would say empathy. because when I ran, I remember I always left an empty chair around the table. And it was a reminder to everyone. You know, there'd be always an empty chair. Someone could sit. People had to stand.

And I said, just remember that we are here to bring the voice of that person who doesn't have a seat at the table. So I don't know if it's my upbringing. I don't know if it's something about rural Canada. But I always thought the cardinal points for me have always been humility. authenticity be who you are and an empathy because you serve for the people

and so the empty chair if you ask my campaign team they would recognize because sometimes people wanted to take that chair and I insisted that would be the empty chair because it's a good reminder why we're here for I want to find out more about your relationship

with Mr. Kretien because of course you have Schoenigan in common you're both members of parliament for the Semarice region you, he was the first Francophone finance minister, you're a Francophone finance minister. How instrumental was he in your decision to run or how much of an influence is he right now in your life?

Well, it's an interesting story. You know, he started as a somewhat of a mentor, then certainly kind of a reference in what I was doing. And now he's become a friend. You would be surprised because there's a few generations, between us, but maybe it's because he knows public service, he knows what it takes. And actually, I invited him for the 2025 budget. I texted him, believe it or not, that 92 he texts.

And I said, sir, it'd be great if you could come. And because I was able to find a quote when he was finance minister. And it inspired me when I did budget 2025. At that time, he said, I accept this responsibility with humility, but also with confidence. And I felt exactly the same on budget day. Humility, because, you know, you're trying to present a pathway, a roadmap for Canada. But at the same time, with a sense of confidence. You know, I'd been member of parliament for 10 years,

I've had the privilege to serve as minister of five departments. So I felt this kind of confidence in terms of being able with the prime minister to present something that Canadians would see themselves in. Can I follow up on that? Is it how different or difficult is it to serve the prime minister who put you in, Justin Trudeau, and the prime minister who's kept you there, Mark Carney, given that they are very different people, they are very different ideologically, they lead in a very different style. How difficult is that for a minister? But it's very different. You know, Prime Minister Carney, in many ways, we come from the same place. In the sense, we both serve internationally. I've known him when he was in London, England. We have evolved in similar circles.

We are very keen on looking at what others have been doing around the world. I got to know Prime Minister Trudeau when I ran, actually. A lot of people asked me, did someone call you? And I said, no. And I just decided one day in London, believe it or not. I don't know if I would do the same again today, knowing everything it takes to win. But I had this dream. I left London not knowing.

And at the time, people said, oh, you're going in the writing of a prime minister. You know, it's almost red carpet. But the reality was very different to win and to make, well, first of all, to win the nomination. There was a liberal member of parliament. then to win an election in 2015, and you would probably say there was no certainty there either, you know, and then to win four times, three times since then, my fourth election. So it's been an interesting journey, but like I said, Prime Minister Trudeau, believe it or not, for your viewers, they probably, it's going to be some kind of news.

I've never spoken to Prime Minister Trudeau before I became a member of parliament or maybe during the campaign. You never spoke to him during the campaign? During the campaign, he came, I think. You know, since it's fourth election, I can't remember exactly the first time we met, but we didn't know each other, really.

You know, I've knew some people in his staff because I ran the Banff Forum and some of them came to these events. But Prime Minister Cardin is very different because we had seen each other in different circles and I think we're very complimentary in many ways and that led us to craft this roadmap, the budget, the investment budget we have for Canada in 2025.

Are you still in touch with Mr. Trudeau at all? I saw him on the campaign trail in the last campaign by, in the sense, it was an opportunity. I don't think he knew I was coming, no, I knew it was, it would be there. So, but it was, it was nice to say at that time, obviously it was no longer, you know, leader of the party,

yeah, exactly. So it was a different. But, yeah, I mean, there's something when, I guess when you leave active politics, that it's a different perspective. I have that a lot, I have the privilege of talking to Prime Minister Crittian on a very regular basis. So I have the insight a bit of what it is for those who have served the nation

and now are more in looking at it from a private capacity, but obviously with an interest for public service. I do want to talk about the specifics of the budget, but before we do that, I think this is kind of a neat opportunity to give people a sense of how budgets are made, how they come together. Because I suspect they have a sense that you meet with the prime minister. he says to you, here's what I want to see in the budget

and then you and your team go and basically write it and make it happen. Is that what happens? The budget process is very different. By the way, I'll give you another insight. So that may become news again. The budget decisions binder are taller than me. And you may say, well, you're not the tallest person in parliament. That's a fair statement. But a budget is hundreds of decisions that you have to craft. And then

obviously present to the prime minister. There's a lot of iteration and interaction because obviously it's hundreds of decisions that come down at the end to the minister of finance and the prime minister. But that suggests it starts with you, not with him. Is that right? Well, I mean, we had a roadmap already

because when you're out of an election, you already have crafted a sense of where you want to go, where you want a country to go. when we said we need to build a country, empower people, protect our sovereignty, those were things that we ran on and set people. We ran also on affordability. So the tax got helping first time homebuyers.

But at the same time, we were of the same view that we needed to put Canada on a path to prosperity and really do a change. You know, for example, when we decided to present our capital budgeting, framework. We were on the same page in the sense I've been saying for a number of years, we need to present a different way to Canadian in the sense that people see what's an expense and what's an investment. Canadians would understand that when you go to the grocery store,

you spend, when you buy a house, you invest. And I always thought it's a better way to present that to Canadians, more transparent. And actually, Kevin Page, the former parliamentary budget officer came out yesterday to say, in fact, this is more transparent. The International Monetary Fund, imagined, said that they wished the other G7 country would do the same. The UK does that as well. And also the budget season. That's something, you know, when I was infrastructure minister, I always said we should

not look at the calendar here. We should look at the construction season because that's really what matters in our country. If you're an Arctic country, you know that the construction season is shorter than, for example, if you're in Europe. And I remember when you have budget in April or May, you basically lose a construction season. If people need to plan, by then it's over. So those were bold moves to say,

this has always been done in Canada the same way. You say, you know what? I think there's a better way. Whose idea was that to move to the fall instead of the spring for a budget? Well, listen, I'll keep that between the prime minister and I, but let's say we were on the same page in terms of looking at that because it made sense. And that's why I say when we're complimentary.

I've been 10 years in government. So I have a sense of the machinery of government. We have both seen things from, I live 20 years in Europe. He was in Europe for a number of years as well. So we could compare the United Kingdom did that. We did something somewhat similar, but obviously we're a federal state,

they're a unitary system. So we need to adapt that. But the construction season, I think, speaks to people. because if you're an entrepreneur or a builder that speaks to you but also speaks to provinces because Steve you've covered provincial politics for a number of years

and it was a bit odd to me before being finance minister that you would add a federal budget after provincial budgets in many ways so we're a bit of an outlier in the G7 because now you provide more predictability to provinces because you come in in the fall, in our case in November,

then they present their budget closer to, you know, spring. They come with their budget. And then you have municipalities, you have, you know, the benefit of the construction season. So I just think it was a better way to do. But, you know, when you change things that have been done the same way in Canada for a long time, you need to explain.

But we had a great validator when the international monetary fund came out and say, actually, the way Canada does it should be how other G7 countries should do. That's a pretty powerful endorsement in addition to the benefit that we saw for Canada. There's always a lot of speculation about how hands-on a minister of finance can be compared to the prime minister. You know, is this really the finance minister's budget or is it more the prime minister's budget? And I presume it's a challenging thing to be the minister of finance when you've got a former governor of the bank of Canada and the Bank of England as the prime minister that you report to because he knows

numbers pretty well. How tricky is that? It's great. Actually, it's great. You want someone who understand numbers when you're the finance minister. But you can't get too much past him, I'm guessing. No, but the point is that we, in that way you can work with someone who will really understand the impact of the decisions from a financial market perspective, from a bond, from a rating agency's perspective. And, you know, I was lucky maybe in life, there's a bit of luck. I read a book called Extreme Ownership, which my team would smile because it's almost mandatory reading.

And it comes from the Navy Seals and how they take their lessons to management. And it's all about focus, prioritize, and execute. And I love that because obviously there's a lot to learn into focusing prior to everything. in executing. And I would say it served me well when we're preparing that because, like I said, when you do a budget, it's hundreds, hundreds of decisions. But this time, Steve, it was even more so that not only we did a budget, but we also did an expenditure review.

And if you look at previous government, these exercises were done in parallel. They were not concurrently done. In our case, not only we did a budget, but we did an expenditure review where we found 60 billion dollars of savings, which by itself is something that the other government took years to do. Well, we'll see, right? We'll see if those 60 billion materialize. Well, at least I can tell you because I've reviewed each and every one of them. And I can tell you, you can quiz me on all of them because not only I identified them, I had to present them to a cabinet committee and sign off on them with the prime minister. So I know pretty much every line that it would come

to the $60 billion to get to that number. When you know about the thousand, you know about the $100,000, you know about the $1,000,000, you know about the tens of million, the hundreds of millions, and then the billion. But it was quite an exercise. So that's why I'm saying this was not like any other budget process, because on one end, you're asking me behind the curtain,

we had to do the budget. But at the same time, we needed to do the expenditure review, which by itself, as you would know from previous government, is an exercise in itself. It is indeed. So to bring that to fruition needed a lot of discipline, hard work, and focus. And that's why if you ask any one of my team, they can repeat to you focus, prioritize, and execute. Your press secretary, John, standing right there, is that legit what he's saying there?

Have you read the book? Oh, John, I'm calling you out here in front of the minister. You haven't read the book yet, have you? Oh, but we get the rundown. Oh, I mean, they don't need to read it. Because they hear it from you all the time. Because they heard from me. They know exactly what's in it.

But, I mean, it's the teaching of, you know, I read another book in my life called Talent is Overrated. So I believe in discipline and focus because, you know, when you put something of that magnitude together, you need a lot of discipline and focus because you might, like I said, for the people, we imagine some people may think. you kind of go in a room and like writing a book and you start what people need to understand is that for about every line you see in the budget or every paragraph there is a fiscal decision behind so there's a process it's not like someone goes in there in his office and

start writing a chapter because every every chapter is backed by a fiscal decision that needs them to reflect it in the numbers so that's my point is that people sometime behind the curtain you start with the fiscal decision and then obviously that is being translated in text in a budget but you start with the fiscal decision as to what do you want to do how you want to do it this is the point in the interview where I remind the people watching or listening to this that my job is actually not to beat him up over what he's done in the budget my job is to ask him questions about why he made the decisions that he made so with that on the record I want to start with something very neutral and then

we'll dive deeper. Sure. Every budget, I think, at least in my experience, every budget attempts to tell a story. What is the story that this budget attempts to tell? Well, four things. The first thing is that we're facing Edwin. But Canada's no different.

And I think people have, if you ask Canadians in the street, I think the speed, scope, and scale of change that we're living is quite unprecedented. Sometime I said, referred to 1945, others would go back to the fall of the Berlin Wall. But there's no doubt that if you look at the geopolitics of the world, the world economy, the supply chain, if you look at the technology with AI and quantum coming,

we are in an era of great change, you know, quite unprecedented. So you start with that and you say, this is affecting families, this is affecting people on the shop floor, this is affecting farmers in the field, It has an impact on all of us in so many ways. So you start with that and you say, with this headwind, Canada is no different. We're all facing it. You know, every country in the world has to pay a fee to access the largest consumer markets out of our border.

That's the new reality. And nostalgia is not really a good strategy. You can hunker down and hope for the best or you say, well, you know, we're going to invest in ourselves. So the first thing is that there's Edwin. The second thing you say, well, we have fiscal capacity. And in that sense, what is very telling, you may have seen that the International Monetary Fund came out and said there's really two countries in the world who can't afford to do that. It's quite striking for the International Monetary Fund to single out two countries in the world. We were one of them.

Kristallina, which is the managing director said, Canada and Germany, those are really the two countries who have the fiscal capacity to adapt to this new world. Then you say, okay, if I have the fiscal capacity, what are the pillars of growth? So you need to invest in housing. That's a main affordability issue. Then you look at infrastructure. Then you look at productivity and competitiveness. And then you look obviously at defense because those are kind of the pillar for growth. Whilst at the same time addressing the issue of people, which is affordability.

And I'll come to that after because people, I would say, are keen for us to prepare the country for prosperity for the future. But they're concerned about the end of the week and the end of the month and say, you need to help me now and also plan for the future. And lastly, I would say, Canadians have been tightening their belt for quite some time. And so they expected their government in Ottawa to do the same. So hence the $60 billion of savings, I think, is giving us credibility. People say, yes, okay, I understand, you need to invest. I get that.

I invest myself. But at the same time, you need to reduce your expenses. and by the fact that we said we would balance our operating budgets with budget with revenues within three years is giving that confidence to people that things are in order. And my message to Canadian is that

we're going to be okay. There's Edwin, but when I look at Canada and we have the privilege of sharing the G7, so it's always when you compare yourself that you can benchmark. But you look at Canada today, we're a huge magnet for talent. I mean, people want to come here.

It's a place people like Canadian values. They want to come here. We put $1.7 billion to attract the best and brightest mind to our country in our labs, in our shop, in our industry to build the innovation of tomorrow. Then we're one of the very few countries in the world, which knows how to build planes, to build cars, to build ships, to be a leader in AI and quantum. We have critical minerals that many would say are akin to oil in the 20th century. You know, critical minerals are going to be essential for the economy of the 21st century. We have an abundance of energy, and energy is key in order to generate growth.

And we're the only country of the G7, which has a free trade agreement with all the other G7 countries. So when you look at all that, you sit there and I can tell us, a lot of my colleagues would like to be in my shoes. Because they said, yes, there is headwind, but you're one of the few as the fiscal capacity. you have very strong foundational pillars in your economy. You know, everything that I just mentioned. You're investing in the things that will produce growth,

infrastructure, housing, productivity. And at the same time, you've been able to show fiscal discipline. So that's why you've seen in the BBC and others. When they look at Canada, people seem to indicate that we have the right recipe. And yesterday, Kevin Page, which is a former parliamentary budget officer look at the strategy we adopted. He looked at the fiscal sustainability and the transparency and he gave us a pretty good review. You know, in the world of uncertainty, I think he rated overall the budget as B plus. In the world of uncertainty that we live in, that people

understand at home, I would say you can always do more, but it's a fairly good start. You're okay with a B plus? Well, listen, you always aim for an A and A plus, but considering the state of the world, we have a chart in the budget that shows it comes from the International Monetary Fund just to give you a sense of perspective that what they call the uncertainty index is higher now than during the financial crisis but not by a small margin, by a huge margin.

So you say you present a budget at the time that they recorded which is almost the highest uncertainty that we have recorded and you come out with a budget that people find themselves in and you invest in the right thing and the IMF praise you, I would say under the circumstances, Steve, as Canadians, we should feel confident that we have a good roadmap. You use the word unprecedented twice in that last answer.

And I have heard you also say that what is required in unprecedented times is a transformational budget. Can you tell us something in your budget that you believe is truly transformational? Oh, please, sure. the benchmark is again Germany the largest investment that you see in the G7 today is what the German have been doing in terms of infrastructure housing and investment it's 500 billion euro over 12 years we're doing 450 billion dollars in five years and I'm not even adjusting for the size of the economy which is the German economy is twice the size of the Canadian economy so when you compare again you can look in absolute terms and have your own opinion but

when you sit at the G7 table, people compare you to others and they say, oh, God, the Canadians. Our plan is at par or bigger than what Germany did, which is ale in Europe as the biggest plan to build the infrastructure that is needed and to put Germany on a path to prosperity. So when I say generational, well, you have to compare and you say in the G7, this is probably the biggest investment plan that you see in the G7 countries now. So it's a pretty good place to be. You won't be surprised to hear. I've talked to some people who don't think this budget is as transformational as you think it is.

And for example, a business person I was speaking to the other day said, if you really wanted to be transformational, take all the taxes and fees off housing. That'll start housing going. Not just take the HST off first-time home purchasers, but all the taxes off everyone. That'll get you going. Yes, it'll raise the deficit, but nobody's going to be mad at you if the deficit goes from $75 billion to $90, billion or a hundred billion. Well, I may disagree with you on that. Okay. Because I would say to that person, go, go back and look at what people, you know, want. On one end, they want fiscal

discipline. And at the same time, they want you to invest. You need to find the right balance because we're not in the world where you can have unlimited deficit either. No, but did you consider taking more taxes off housing to encourage more construction? Well, we took measures to deal with the development charges, which is really an issue in our country. in some cities like here and other places. That's for municipalities to decide, though, not you. Well, yeah, but we have a bit of levers to entice people to go in the right direction. So listen, you can always do more, but for everything you do more, there's a cost.

And I would say, again, something, but you need to compare what other countries are doing as well. And that's why I say when you do that, that's where you come out on the equation and you say, well, Canada is, you know, on infrastructure, 51 billion in infrastructure. again, I would encourage you to compare with other countries. You would say, that's a pretty hefty sum of money. I get you, but I'm trying to find out you were no doubt presented with a whole bunch of different options on housing, for example. You know, you could take all the taxes and fees off everything.

You could do nothing. You could do something in between. You opted for something in between. Something ambitious, like Bill Canada homes with $13 billion. Yes, housing is an important issue in our country. country but there's a lot of there's a lot of things we need to do at the same time yes you want to do that but at the same time i would say canadian expect us to to play our part within nato which is also requiring us i mean you know this is on the federal budget basically to to meet up our

commitment so you know the job of finance minister as we appreciate is one of always tough decisions you don't sit in your office and everything that comes to is easy usually everything is a matter of choice and deciding, but you have to, you know, you have to balance these things. We need to protect our sovereignty. I mean, if you look at the deficit this year, 75% of it is to defend our sovereignty

and to do affordability measures. Let me ask you about the sovereignty, that. Because that's an interesting point. Canada Strong shows up in this budget a lot. You use that expression a lot in the budget. And yet, I suspect most Canadians have probably never felt more vulnerable in their lifetimes than their lives.

they feel right now because of you know who who's in the white house and he's doing a pretty successful job of making us feel vulnerable and weak does this budget adequately make us stronger adequately well it's it's the largest investment in defense and generations i mean i think you probably have to go back to 1945 again where you put that as a as a pillar of what we need to do in very uncertain times. And you need to build a capacity for the armed forces. But at the same time, you need to do that in a smart way. Because the amount of money that we're going to have to invest to protect our sovereignty, you need to learn also what's been happening south of the border. You know, there they've been using the defense budget to support industry,

to do research and development, to invest in innovation for us. It's quantum. It's AI. It's cyber. I mean, you just need to do that in a smart way, that this is a catalyst for investment in the country. But I think, you know, going back to your question, yeah, you could do more on one end, but you have to balance all that. At the same time, I need to do that to meet our commitment at NATO. I need to build the infrastructure that you want in cities because people said, well, municipalities would tell me we need infrastructure, we need sewer, we need water infrastructure, we need parks. on the other end provinces were asking me we need you to help on health infrastructure

I know it's an endless to do list I get it you know what you're asking me before I in the way I hear that and I again empathy certainly but I think everyone in my shoes would say yes a very tough balancing act because you know

you have to balance that with other things you need to do on infrastructure housing which is a really an affordability measure and at the same time, if I may Steve, remaining true to who we are as Canadians. You know, Canadians are very attached to our social program, whether it's farmer care, dental care, child care. And I think we were able to protect what's dear to Canadians. At the same time that we have an ambitious plan for the future. So that's what you need to compose with when you're the

finance minister. And there's a lot of good ideas that people have come with. But that's where you, you know, you have to look at all that and then you have to make decision. But if I look, you know, Canadians in the street, I've been traveling pretty much all week. You know, if you were with me in the street, you'd see that I think we, you become pretty good at feeling the mood of the nation. And when I'm at Pearson and walk and people stop me and say, yes, we're with you. And, you know, it speaks to them. I can say when it speaks to people in the street from the worker at the restaurant to

the factory worker to people I've met from Calgary to Vancouver to in Toronto at home. I said, you know, if people see themselves in that budget, mission accomplished. Do people ever stop you and say, you know, you really blew it with that budget? Does that happen? Listen, you have to be careful because the syndrome of politicians, my wife always bringing me back to reality, she would say, you think you know everyone and everyone loves you. That's the syndrome. So there might be people thinking that, but it's not that I have people.

stopping me to say that. That doesn't mean that they don't, there may not be people, you know, having criticism by all means. But I feel that the mood and, you know, when you've been doing that for 10 years and you come from a world Canada where you're like a mayor, everyone knows who you are, wherever you go. Whether I go grocery, I go fill my car, I go to the farm, everyone, you know, either stop me or know who I am. The mood of, I don't need a lot of pollster to tell me where people feel because I have a lot of interaction. If I walk at Pearson with you, you'd see, but you're pretty famous. People would look at you and stop you.

I'm not Champagne famous, though. No, no, but I don't know. You're out there. But you see, the point is that people recognize you, you because you've been doing a lot of TV for decades. For me, is that they've seen me maybe on TV or something, but they feel the connection. It's like my shoes.

This morning, finance minister Francois-Philippe Champagne took part in a long-standing budget tradition. Champagne selected new shoes on this budget eve. The minister was at Boulet Boots in St.Che's Quebec, where he chose a pair of black dress shoes. Believe it or not, I'm at Pearson. I'm going to the bathroom. The gentleman who cleans the bathroom,

he said, oh, you're the finance minister with the shoes. When the person who cleans the bathroom at Pearson recognized you because of the shoes, I think, you know, in a sense, the fact that I went to make part of the shoes was also a big message, because for me was made in Canada by Canadians for Canadians

and those are the same shoes that are that the RCMP officers are wearing. So for me, there was something truly Canadian about that doing a different way. When I say being authentic, you know, I say that to everyone who wanted to do public service. Not trying to be who you're not.

Just be who you are. For me, it was not like, my team was surprised because they came and they said, you just thought about that. I said, I would not have done it any other way because I knew from campaigning that this is a, the factory was being doing boots since 1933.

So I'd been there a couple of times. They do cowboy boots. But in one of the visit I paid many years ago, I noticed they were doing military shoes. They do like the Army cadets, boots and others. And I found out through my interaction that they were doing shoes. And, you know, it speaks to many things like how Canadian SMEs can support the defense industry. Because they do...

Small medium enterprises. Yeah, exactly. Small medium enterprise. how they can. And it, for me, it embodied a lot of things, you know, talk about Bill Canada, Canada Strong, you know, the humility that I said, you know, let's show the people that you go there with the workers and showcase what they do best in Canadian manufacturing. So it was a powerful, I thought, powerful message.

And it seems to have resonated because, to be honest, I got people talking about my shoes more than you would believe. And since I've been around the country pretty much all week, it's from COVID. I mean, say, at least from Montreal to Vancouver and Calgary and pretty much in between because you meet a lot of people at the airport. I'm going to ask you about, oh, that's perfect timing, actually, that they let you finish the answer before they knocked on the door. I was doing a Zoom once with other leaders.

Some FedEx thing came and I had to stop and say, I don't know, maybe one of my daughter ordered something, but if I don't pick up the luggage, not the luggage, but a package, You know, that meeting might be important, but I'll be in trouble for a long time if I let that package go, so it's all fine. There's a guy I read in the Globe and Mail every week named Paul Kershaw, who represents a group called Generation Squeeze. He's out in British Columbia. And he points out that budgets consistently favor older people at the expense of younger people who for the first time, as you know, feel they're not going to do as well as their parents or grandparents did. And so I want to ask you a series of questions about the decisions you. made as it relates to being perhaps a little less generous with older people so you could

have been more generous with younger people. For example, the old age supplement. You could have cut it. You could have taken that money and given it to younger people for their purposes. You did not. How come? Well, I would say to Paul, which is his first name, right? what we've done in this budget is really meant for you because we're course correcting. I mean, Paul should be happy that in three years we're going to be balancing the operating budget with the revenues we generate and that what we're going to borrow from there is going to be to build a country. I mean, you and I, if you look at these investments in infrastructure, who are going to benefit

most is not necessarily people like you and I, but it's the next generation. And I'll give you an example, people were saying if you were to rebuild the St. Lawrence Seaway, which cost about $4 billion, but as generated a trillion dollar of trade since it was created since it was done, you have to look at when we do these trade corridors, when we're going to build the infrastructure, that's really for future generations, because the lifespan of these assets are 100 years plus. Also, you're building the country when you say we're going to modernize our infrastructure or we're going to build more home so it's more affordable. I would say the biggest affordability issue in my own view, well, first of all, you leave more money in the pocket of everyone. So if you were young, you got also the tax deduction, 22 million people got it. But also if you invest in affordable home for most families, the vast majority of families,

their biggest expenses is their home. And by making sure that you would have a stock of affordable home so that you have a home you can afford so that you don't spend too much of your income on housing yourself, I think is an affordability measure for future generation as well. So that's what I'm saying. No, I take your point on that. There's a number of things where you could say, on one end, you need to maintain what is needed. It's not about taking away from one to give to the other, but there's a way to, to do things, I would say, in a smart way, well, you're protecting the income of those

who've worked all their life. But at the same time, for Paul, when you say, but in three years from now, when I'm borrowing, it's to build your country and my country, for which if you're younger, you're going to benefit for much longer time from these assets that we're going to build in the country. So there's intergenerational fairness in that.

I take your point. But Paul would also say, you're sending $18,000 checks to people who make $100,000 a year. And they may not need that as much as the young people, youth unemployment's at 14% in the country right now. Maybe you could have taken some of those billions from six-figure earners and created better employment programs for younger people. Was that an option?

Well, we created more opportunities for young people. Think about the summer job program. Think about what we came, this program, which helped you to get into the workforce. It's 45,000 out of memory of additional space that we've created for young people because to your point, and I go back to my empathy,

you know, youth unemployment is something that I think about very often because it's the next generation. I have two daughters, you know, like you and many people watching. You want to make sure that they would inherit a country which they can prosper and thrive, you know. But I think we...

again, it's always a matter of balance. I think that by investing in our young people, investing, you may remember, we protected research and science. You know, a lot of people would be... It's your former portfolio. Yes, exactly. Well, I thought it was important because if you think about research and science, this is about the future of our country.

It's always about balance, but I hope Paul would find himself when he looks at housing, when it looks at, you know, infrastructure. sure what we've done for youth employment, to make sure these programs, the Youth Climate Corp, for example, which is something that a number of youth organization wanted. You know, that's why I say in the budget, which is meant to charter a roadmap for the country,

you try to have measures that everyone would recognize themselves in. And I hope Paul will recognize himself, but otherwise I'm happy to meet him and engage in a discussion, you know. I will send this to him to make sure he knows you'd be happy to meet him. I'm sure he'd be happy to hear that. You know, it's a little unusual, I'm guessing, for a Minister of Finance to talk about immigration in a budget speech

because budgets are about numbers, but you did speak about immigration in the budget speech, and you did say we are taking back control over the immigration system, which of course suggests that it was out of control before you got here. How badly was it out of control and how confident are you that we're going to get it back? under control? Well, we needed to go back to more sustainable levels. I mean, people, Canadians have felt it, you know, in the sense that I always feel that when you accept

someone in your country, you also have the duty to make sure that they can find a home, that they can send their children to school. If they have to go to a hospital, that there would be a space for them. You know, there's kind of this quipro quo, you know, you let people in. It's like, you let me in your house. But at the same time, you know, you know, there are some things that people would expect if you allow people to come in your country. And I think it was a bit out of balance, you know. We've seen the capacity to Canada has always been a very welcoming nation. Our country have been blessed with a number of people who have made Canada their home.

But we have found in many places that our capacity to welcome people or the number of people coming was exceeding our capacity. our capacity to welcome them. So when you see that, you say, well, we need to take control of that, you know, take back control to make sure that the levels match our capacity to welcome these people. Are you confident that's happening now? Well, if I look at the levels that we've put in the budget with the prime minister, there's a, there's, you know, a course correction that will bring us to more sustainable level that give me confidence that we're getting,

you know, we're still welcoming because you want to be a welcoming nation. We have been very judicious in how we do. There's different temporary workers, permanent residents. I mean, there's a number of consideration in that. But I think there again, we, I believe we struck the right balance. We'll get back to our interview with Finance Minister of Francois, Philippe Champagne in just a moment.

But first, we've got this ad read from B. Canada. Canada, as we all know, is in an ongoing affordability crisis that no doubt affects many of the people watching or listening to this, and Canadians have the right to know whether their governments are making their life more or less affordable. The organization representing Canada's brewers wonders if you knew that in Canada, 46% of the price of beer is government taxation. Yes, Canada imposes higher taxes on beer than any of the other great beer nations, higher than Germany, Belgium, Mexico, the U.S., the U.K., Brazil, Denmark, and Ireland. At 46%, it's higher than any other country in the G7.

And Canada's already high beer taxes go up annually and automatically. Beer Canada says the powers that be hope you won't notice. They call it sneaky. They also think that automatic is not democratic. And now that you know you can do something about it, Beer Canada would like you to help stop this practice of automatic beer tax hikes. So they go to this website. Hereforbeer.ca.

That's hereforbeer.ca. A special website on this issue and ask yourself, why does the best beer nation have the worst beer taxation? That's a message in the interest of fairness and transparency from our friends of Beer Canada. And who knows? It might even prompt a question of the finance minister. And let's get back to that conversation right now. Minister, full disclosure on this next question.

This show is sponsored by a group called Beer Canada. They represent the brewers of the country. And I'm not going to pussyfoot around with you here. I'm just going to say they sponsor this podcast, and they haven't asked me to ask you this question. But having done an ad read about beer prices for the last many weeks, I'm curious myself. Half the price of a cost of beer is taxes.

And the taxes go up automatically. And I wonder whether in any of your budget deliberations or meetings, you considered giving people a break on the price of beer. Well, we gave a break to 22 million Canadians on their tax, so they have more money in their pocket to do whatever they want with it. If they want to buy beer, they have more money in their pocket to do so. I think this was a measure that, you know, leaving money in the pocket of people is the best way to empower Canadians.

Because the first thing, they can do whatever they want then with the money. I don't want to pick and choose for Canadians to say whether they would want this or that. I think a better way is to leave more money in the pocket. You know, if you want to buy a book for your children or if you want to, you know, go buy beer or you want to do savings, it's up to you. But I think rather than me picking what you may want, it's probably better for me to say, I'll leave more money in your pocket. And therefore you choose however you want to spend it. And the automatic increases that go in every year, did you ever think about stopping that? Well, you always want to look at fairness.

You know, when you talk about tax and it's always about fairness. So I've always said, let's look at, you know, different measures. You've seen that there's taxes that we remove because they were inefficient in some ways. I'm not, you know, as Minister of Finance, you would not expect me to talk about tax policy in advance of any new. budget or updates but um i hear you on that but i still believe that one of the best way to uh to provide choices for people and empower them is to leave them more money in their pockets so they can decide whatever they want fair enough but but you did take the tax off yachts and private jets why did you do that that's very simple you know the answer i think i do but go ahead yeah no

why don't you guess well i'm guessing that when the tax was on those items. We lost a lot of capacity in this country, and people bought their private jets and their yachts from other countries and other companies, and therefore our domestic industry got in trouble, so you took the tax off in hopes of being more competitive. It's even more simple than that. I thought that was pretty simple the way I described it. Okay, go ahead. Tell me. Go ahead. It costed me more to collect the tax than the tax I was collecting. Seriously? I'm a very simple man. It's when something cussed me more than what I collect, I said that doesn't make sense. No, but it's that simple.

Really? It costs more to collect it. It costs more to administer the tax than the tax I got. So it was a very pragmatic decision. I'm a very pragmatic. If you tell me it's going to cost me more to administer the tax than what I get, well, the answer is fairly clear. Okay. I want to ask you about the auto industry.

Your government, government of Ontario, have put a lot of money, billions of dollars into maintaining and hopefully growing a domestic auto industry. And it looks like Donald Trump has got his sights set on that business in a very, very desperate way for our domestic manufacturers. I want to ask you whether you think, and you know, of course, that there have been announcements by the auto manufacturers that they may be moving production, well, they are moving production to the United States.

Are they breaking faith with the agreements they made with the governments of Canada and Ontario by doing that? we're going to fight for each and every one of those plans. I was there at the time when we negotiated various agreements, you know, to secure production in Canada. And that's why we said we would enforce the contractual provisions we have there because at the time, you have to say when you have Canadians who support industry, there's like a social contract, obviously, you know,

these workers and us and Canadians would expect that people would respect not only the spirit but the letter of the contract and I just want to remind when we invested with the government of Ontario to build the auto industry also of the future when it was about electric vehicle for example I still believe this is the North Star

you know it's going to take more time but you know what when you've been doing the same thing for 100 years it's quite natural that you know when you change technology. It takes a bit more time for adoption, consumer preference, the sales, you know, you look at these things. I look at what happened to Henry Ford with Model T was not an immediate success. TestD took 17 years to be profitable. So, you know, there's a lot of adjustments in terms of market technology. You think it's still a good bet? Because the way we structured it, because the way we structured it in most cases, in most cases was what we call a

credit. So they took the technology risk and the construction risk. We were only coming in in many respects when the plant was an operation that they were selling. Remember, this was at the time of the Inflation Reduction Act. In the States. Previous administration in the United States, which we mirrored, but in a way that says, if you're going to produce, there'll be a credit. But obviously, you leave the risk with the manufacturers as to, you know, the constructions, whatever delay or technology because you come in when they are in production in most cases. But what we need to do now is to make sure we support the industry and help them pivot. That's why we have this strategic response fund of $5 billion to say, because I believe in a strong

auto sector, to be honest. I think there's very few countries in the world, as I mentioned to you before, that as a narrow space industry, an auto sector, shipyard. you know, manufacturing capabilities and refining capabilities as well when it comes to mining and a very large natural resources industry. I mean, we're blessed in many ways, if you compare Canada to many other countries, which, you know, they don't have natural resources. They don't have necessarily these large industry that employ a lot of people.

so we're going to be we're going to be fighting for each and everyone of those plans here's a bit of an offbeat question I'd like to know one thing that you really wanted to get into this budget but couldn't oh I thought you would ask me one thing I wanted in this budget that I succeeded in pudding

can I turn that around no I assume everything in the budget is there because you're content with it but no no but one thing that is transformational I think and well I mean that I really cared about and I'll come to your question because it's only fair because I'm not going to let you forget it I know it's an interview and now you're supposed to ask the question I'd like to turn that around sometime because it's easy for you but not today yeah no no but I know but one thing is that looking at how we can provide better health services in the north that is

something I'm pretty particularly proud you know I've been talking to in with first nation leadership and say there's a way for us to look at how we can better provide services in in the health sector in the north, you know. Because that's your responsibility, not provinces. That's yours. Well, I would say providing health care is provincial, but in certain areas, it's the federal government. As indigenous, yes.

But more generally, it's like, you know, this whole thing of flying in and fly out and bring people, I think there's a better way for us to do that. And I've asked the prime minister and I ask, the minister responsible, to really look at that also with the, with the Department of Defense, because, you know, we're going to build the North in many ways. Is there a way that there could be clinics that could serve people as well? So I am, if you ask me about something, I'm particularly pleased

because that is a, it's about helping families, children, and people who live in perhaps remote communities or the North to see how together we can provide better health services to them. You said one thing that I wanted that did not get into the budget. For whatever reason. you can't do everything what's one thing you want it in there you cannot do everything well there there's an embryo of that in the budget which is i have been looking at forest fire very much and how we can better equip the nation to fight well it's part of the fight against climate change

but seeing how much forest fire have been devastating communities in the country we started with something in the budget to say we need to look with the responsible ministers as having more of a, I would say, updated management structure, emergency management structure, water bombers and all that, just to make sure. But you got something in the budget on that. I'm looking for something you didn't get it. No, but it's not a full nine yard. So that's what I'm saying.

It's not a full nine yard. It's like, you know, I did perhaps a few yards, but it's not a full. nine yards that I want to go through with that because I think this is one which is going going back to Paul fighting climate change and you know for example making sure we have the equipment and the structure to fight for example forest fire and do our part on climate change is something that would appeal to Paul okay um if you knew a man who had 25 letters in his name with a hyphen as well which camera should I favor here. This one here. And he had a signature that looked like this. What would you conclude

about that person? That's your signature. I recognize it. It's not easy to imitate. It's not easy to imitate and it's not easy to read. What does that say? Listen, everyone has in authenticity. Go back to that. You want to be authentic. I'm not trying to be anyone else that I'm not. This has been my signature since I was fairly young and it's never changed since then. I'm looking for an F. I'm looking for a P. I'm looking for... Oh, I'll ask you. Hold on. Well, yeah, I don't see a thing here. No, no, all done. Yeah. You see the F, hold on. We'll do that for the viewers. So you see clearly the F. I don't see it clearly. It looks like... Well, I mean, listen, this looks like F. Okay, maybe. Well, I mean, let's settle for

maybe. Where's the P? The P is there. Where? There. My name... And then the C, champagne. Hang on, hang on. And you know, when you write the check, you don't want your signature to be easy to copy. My last name starts with P. So I know what a P is supposed to look. look like. That's not a P. It doesn't look like that. It doesn't look like a P. But when you write the check, you don't want your signature to be easily... I don't write as many checks as you, so there we go. Yeah, but...

Should we finish this interview with a regular handshake or a Schoenigand handshake? Which one you prefer? Maybe just the regular one. Okay. Minister, it's awfully good of you to spend so much time with me today. It was great. You're very good and, you know, I'm sure the people will really enjoy that. You've done a great job and Canadians are proud of you. Merci. At the procha. Steve, I know you're all about fairness.

Always. Yeah. So you asked me about what? 20 questions in the last 45 minutes? Probably 30. 30, imagine. So let me ask you three at least. Let's start to have fun of it.

Who did you interview in your life? And not just like in the recent past, but in your life, that that's been the most memorable interview you did? That's an easy question to answer because the very last interview I ever did on the show that I used to host for 19 years, the agenda on TVO was with my father. 92 years old. And that will always be not only my last interview

as a full-time employee of TVO, but my favorite. Tell us a bit more about him so that the viewers who did not watch that show can be, if we were back in that interview, what you would say was the takeaway for people to watch that evening. I'm sure there was a lot of chemistry. That must have been great to interview your father in many ways.

It was brilliant. Share with us one or two moments that are memorable for the viewers. Well, we spent probably three quarters of the interview talking about his life because he's 92 and he's seen a lot of stuff. And he's born and raised in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, lived his whole life there. And the big takeaway, I think for most people, will be how much I love him and how much I admire and respect and I would even say worship him. He's the greatest man I've ever met in my life. So there. Well, it says a lot about you.

When I think about, you know, you've been great. People have known you for a number of years. But the fact that your best interview is with your father and the way you describe it and I can see the emotion, it's just, it's big validation that you're a man of principle. I'm just lucky. I'm lucky to have been born to him and my mom. That's it. Listen, what better way to end this show?

today. Steve, thank you very much for having me. Enchante. Merci. He's not bad.