Good Talk -- Was This The Week Canada Really Changed?
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What events made this week a turning point for Canada’s political landscape?
are you ready for good talk and hello there peter mansbridge here along with bruce anderson and chantilly bear you know i'm not quite sure where to start this week because it's been one of those weeks i mean a lot of stuff um Obviously stuff that affects the Prime Minister, but stuff that I think affects Canada, the way we look at ourselves and who we are. So let me talk about that just for a second and get your thoughts on it. You know, we had a week of wining and dining big money in Toronto. We were wined and dined by Europe. We put airports on the leasing block. All this while watching Stephen Harper standing... you know, verbally alongside Mark Carney on the U.S.-Canada story and more. And then you had this, like, remarkable scene last night of Pierre Polyev, the guy who had a 25-point lead in the polls just a year and a half ago, having to sneak out the back door of his own caucus, avoiding the cameras and comments.
So I don't know. There are a lot of lanes there we can go on. Pick a lane, Chantel, and give me a sense of what's going on. And in effect, has it changed the nature of our country of all these kind of things that have been going on lately?
No, I don't think it has changed the nature of our country. Will it change the nature of our country or will it reshape the way we see ourselves and our place in the world over time? Certainly, I believe that process was already ongoing over the past year since Donald Trump has done whatever he's done, but also how Mark Carney has responded. What we have seen, though, is... putting more flesh on the bone of looking elsewhere, recasting our relationships, given what has been happening in the United States. So instead of sitting back and complaining and saying all of the things that we may think about the Trump administration, this government has been trying to, one, put the words out, we are going to do things differently into action, but also using the opportunity of the crisis to do things that probably have been on the minds of many governments over the years.
So I'm just going to take airports as an example of that. The first government that started to think about leasing, we're not giving away our airports, by the way. We're not nationalizing airports.
We are
leasing their operation, or we would be, to investors who would want to make a profit out of it. Whether they do and whether that translates into better operations of airports is... something that has happened in some countries. Many countries have been doing that and not in others. So we'll see over time. But the first government that talked about that was Jean Chrétien's government and then backed off and went the route that we have now. Stephen Harper looked at it and thought, I'm going to have too many branding issues with acceptability. It's too easy to maneuver this until we're giving away our airports. Bill Morneau appointed a committee to look at the issue and it recommended going the route that we're going.
And what I thought was interesting was that among the people on the committee were Michael Sabia, who is now the clerk of the Privy Council, Mark Wiseman, who is now our ambassador to the U.S., appointed by Mark Carney, and Dominic Barton, who has just been appointed by Mark Carney as the head of his investment agency. So, Clearly, these people are close to the prime minister. One assumes that Mark Carney himself was already of a mind to do this airport move. I'm not saying it's good or bad, but I'm saying that it wouldn't be happening if there was not receptivity in public opinion to new ways of doing things. And at least to have a debate. I'm not going to go into the EU thing yet, but... That is also, it's changing the conversation.
We will be having a conversation about the EU. We are not becoming a member that is bound by Brussels rules. That is not the point. But it is an interesting conversation to be had. And this week, we really opened that conversation.
Okay, Bruce, your thoughts in general on this issue about... You know, the kind of things that happened this week, you know, Chantel's kind of like...
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What events made this week a turning point for Canada’s political landscape?
0:00–16:44
2
How is the government planning to lease airport operations and why is it controversial?
16:44–17:59
3
What does Canada’s emerging partnership with the EU mean for trade and security?
17:59–27:18
4
How is the Trump administration influencing Canadian policy and public opinion?
27:18–28:50
5
What are the key takeaways from the recent Quebec leaders’ debates?
28:50–29:10
6
How are the latest poll trends shaping the upcoming federal election?
29:10–31:19
7
What issues are driving the upcoming Alberta referendum and why should Canadians care?
31:19–38:24
8
What conclusions do the hosts draw about Canada’s future direction after this week’s events?
38:24–52:05
Speakers
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