Carney, Smith and the people who hold them back

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:01][music] [music] [music] >> Good evening Western Standard viewers and welcome to Hannaford, a weekly politics show of the Western Standard.

[00:00:22]It's Thursday, May the 21st.

[00:00:24]If you're a James Bond fan, do you remember the iconic scene where Bond looks for Scaramanga Scaramanga in the hall of mirrors where there is one target but multiple false images.

[00:00:36]The man with the golden gun, wasn't it?

[00:00:39]That's my guess.

[00:00:41]Yaroslav Baran from Ottawa chipping in with the important information. Yes, it was the man with the golden gun.

[00:00:48]But we're looking today and we're trying to make sense of something that's worldly similar in Canadian politics today where wherever you look, whatever you look at, nothing seems to be simple, straightforward, or what it was announced as.

[00:01:02]For For example, what does Alberta independence mean for Prime Minister Carney? Is it a problem or an opportunity?

[00:01:10]Mr. Carney still wants us to drive electric cars, it seems. They'll be made in China by the look of things, not in Windsor. But is his promised grid expansion big enough to allow the switch anyway?

[00:01:20]He says he wants to build up the armed forces but recruits foreigners while sidelining the traditional talent pool in some box-ticking exercise to get more women and non-white men. And so it goes on.

[00:01:33]Government by press release and crossed fingers.

[00:01:36]One person we trust to guide us through this particular hall of mirrors is our old friend Yaroslav Baran. Welcome back, Yaroslav.

[00:01:46]Always good to be here, Nangle. Thanks.

[00:01:48]Uh Well, we appreciate you taking the time.

[00:01:50]Yaroslav, you just to remind people, you were once communications director to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. These days as co-founder of Pendulum Group, you're a political consultant in Ottawa.

[00:02:01]So, let me ask you this. In Western Canada, we've become reflexively suspicious of anything that the Prime Minister says.

[00:02:08]Uh maybe this isn't a healthy response.

[00:02:11]Do we just need to get a life? Give him a break?

[00:02:14]Well, first, Nigel, I note that Albertans have more than ample reason to be suspicious of of their relationship with Ottawa or with the federal government. Uh Alberta's got a long history of contributing well above its weight to effectively subsidize other regions of the country, and while enduring slurs and barbs from those same regions for being, quote and quote, regressive and for wanting to kill Mother Earth and uh and not getting with the program of any slew of of of liberal policy agendas.

[00:02:46]So, um Alberta has a premier that is clearly signaling that Alberta's not going to take that anymore. I mean, Alberta's a prosperous and successful province, and you know, you you know, you folks in Ottawa have a choice. Either work with us and address the the valid historical tensions, or the outcomes are not going to be pretty.

[00:03:09]Now, Nigel, I don't know if you remember this. Preston Manning wrote a widely circulated opinion piece during the federal election campaign uh a year ago, a warning that uh the national unity is going to be in jeopardy if the conservatives don't win. He was widely criticized at the time for being alarmist and for legitimizing separatist sentiment, but I think that naming something and endorsing it are two very different things, and the last year has shown amply that Albertans are indeed very, very fed up with giving the federal government um you know, or allowing the federal government to to bulldoze uh Alberta's uh prospects for greater prosperity. And and they're clearly signaling that that the federal government has one last chance.

[00:04:01]Well, you know, I think I think you accurately summed up what people feel.

[00:04:06]But I I do wonder whether this whole Alberta independence movement is actually from Mr. Kenney's point of view a great thing. It gives him something to to point to when he is addressing Eastern audiences and said, "You need me to protect you from the you know, the forces of separation.

[00:04:25]We've seen them in Quebec. Now we're seeing them in Alberta. A strong centralized federal government is what you need and I'm your man to give it to you. Uh so, maybe Western independence is not something that he wants to see go away.

[00:04:42]Um if if that's the game he's playing, it's a really really dangerous game to play because nobody wins ultimately when we gamble on on trying to ignite forces of of separatism. I I don't see his actions as um as trying to keep separatism alive. Uh if anything, it's really it's it's really putting wind in Danielle Smith's sails and she has emerged as arguably the strongest premier. She's certainly one of the most capable politicians in Canada right now and she is standing up to him and with with quite a bit of success recently if we look at some of the some of the leverage that she's been able to use in extracting concessions from the federal government. Like, is is this an opportunity as well as a challenge? Well, sure. Cha- The challenge is obvious. It not inflaming separatist sentiment and trying to keep it at bay and over time trying to diffuse it.

[00:05:41]There is something of an opportunity here for Mr. Kenney as well. Um and that is that if he genuinely uh, follows through on the things that he's signaling that are Alberta-friendly, he could have the prospects of in the medium to longer term redefining the relationship between his party, the Liberal Party, and the voters of Alberta. Because let's let's face it, the Liberals have been a pariah in Alberta basically since the National Energy Program.

[00:06:14]See, all it would take, in my view, is a simple statement that yes, we are going to back a pipeline.

[00:06:23]Now.

[00:06:24]You know, not in a month's time we're going to take it forward to see if it can meet meet certain standards, at which point we'll look for a sponsor, and maybe we'll get a decision in October, right around when Alberta is having referenda on the several issues.

[00:06:43]Uh, and with the idea that after that, it could still And it's still all in the realm of maybe. Be If you want a result, a certain result, make a decision and live with it. Now, why doesn't he do that?

[00:06:57]I mean, this is not just us. This is everything about that has gone through to the, what do they call it, the National Projects Office, where all the really good schemes are going to be fast-tracked.

[00:07:09]Well, very little has come out of it, and what has come out of it was already well advanced before the office was established. It seems like we always have this It's like holding the carrot in front of the donkey, you know? It's always just a little bit ahead, but never actually get it.

[00:07:25]Yeah. Well, I'm not surprised that most of the projects being transacted by the Major Projects Office are uh, projects that were in in the pipeline, so to speak. Um, It's terrible. because you're not going to you're not going to start from a you're from a standing start with uh bold new projects that are just ideas and and bring them to to fruition overnight. So, yeah, understandably they they started with well-advanced projects, but they're going to have to show some some some results. They're going to have to show results quickly.

[00:07:58]Um public opinion polling is already starting to show that getting results is potentially Mr. Carney's biggest liability as a brand issue. He seems to be doing the right things, saying the right things, and that's generating a fair bit of of uh of of tolerance and and patience with the public, but that patience is not going to last forever. Sooner or later, you're going to start to hear the tap tap tap, okay, let's you know, where's the beef? You're going to have to actually deliver, not just promise.

[00:08:32]So, uh there's two things that I'd love to get into with you. The first of them is the consensus on global warming.

[00:08:40]That seems to be changing.

[00:08:43]Al Gore recently said that rather than a warmer climate, we should expect an ice age instead.

[00:08:50]Uh Bill Gates famously said that they weren't talking about global warming anymore, they're talking about adapting to it. So, yeah, you know, these are two of the major prophets of the of doom for that we've had to listen to all these years changing their tune.

[00:09:08]Um I realize this is a more nuanced discussion that we have time for today, but nevertheless, it does seem that most of the important countries in the world have got rid of the idea of chasing a zero carbon emissions target, but Mr. Carney presses on.

[00:09:25]Is this because he's a true believer, or can you imagine some other motive for doing that?

[00:09:31]Honestly, I think he uh I I I think primarily he's he's a businessman, and when climate change and climate action were all the rage, he was the one coming forward with market solutions to try to address it and was championing them all all over the globe. Now, public sentiment, not just in Canada, but internationally has shifted. There are other priorities of of concern, things like cost of living and economic rejuvenation and export diversification and immigration and the list goes on and on and on and he has pivoted. But his challenge is going to be not so much himself, but it's going to be his caucus.

[00:10:16]Uh as you know, Nigel, he has a very razor-thin majority in the House of Commons.

[00:10:23]And even all else being equal, he's going to slip back into minority status this summer.

[00:10:30]There are two MPs that we know of already in his caucus who are going to be resigning their seats for different reasons.

[00:10:37]Uh one uh had to take a diplomatic appointment, for example, and one to run for a provincial uh leadership race. So, he is going to slip back down. He doesn't like that.

[00:10:47]That's not a comfortable place to be in.

[00:10:49]And the dissidents, the climate dissidents in his caucus, whose ringleader is Steven Guilbeault, the so-called Green Jesus, former Greenpeace leader, and so on, former environment minister under Trudeau, they realize that that gives them leverage.

[00:11:04]Uh that he they've already formed a climate caucus inside the Liberal caucus of some two dozen MPs or so, and they realize that they that they can flex.

[00:11:14]They can flex their muscles now, and they've given themselves, you know, a self-professed uh agenda of keeping the government in check. In check for them, of course, means from straying too far away from the Justin Trudeau climate agenda. So, that's going to be a difficult challenge for Mr. Carney to deal with and it's all in turn.

[00:11:39]So, would you draw the link between that like this green caucus within the liberals and his seeming inability to actually come down and decisively deliver uh approval for a pipeline of the kind that Premier Smith is looking for?

[00:11:57]But the pipeline is going to have to happen. Um you know, it seems that the Prime Minister is enough of a real of a realist that he's come to the conclusion that there will not be any tolerance for stringing Alberta along with some sort of a cute a pipeline if necessary but not necessarily a pipeline kind of position. Uh I think we'll see a serious push now led by the government of Alberta led by Premier Smith to get a credible partnership or coalition together and a business plan before the federal government by Canada Day and we've got a pretty public commitments already from the federal government uh that it will be handed over to the major projects office by October. Um there's enough momentum and expectation already that this is going to happen that if it doesn't uh it will further exacerbate not diffuse the uh the push for some kind of either sovereignty or outright separation in Alberta.

[00:12:59]Oh, I I think you're absolutely right about that. So, there's it's it's >> gets it. Yeah, he he sees this threat as real. I think that's really boxed him in. He needs to deliver on a pipeline.

[00:13:11]Well, there you go. There's my theory about that he finds Western alienation a helpful political lever in the East. So, maybe not. Uh okay.

[00:13:22]Now, of greater interest to Eastern Canada are the forthcoming negotiations over free trade between the United States and Canada.

[00:13:32]Um Do you think Mr. Carney actually wants the a deal out of this?

[00:13:41]I was tempted with a an intriguing argument this morning in the National Post.

[00:13:47]It made the point that maybe he doesn't particularly want to do a deal with the United States. He has other ideas about the direction he wants to take. So, he's looking to be flattened by Mr. Trump and then say, "Well, there you are. Now we Now we All that's left is that we go and open the orders with China or something like that." I mean Does he want to win? Yeah, failure isn't really an option in these negotiations.

[00:14:13]Like, yes, he's politically benefited from being Captain Canada and, you know, flexing his arm against against Donald Trump.

[00:14:21]Um the public was certainly hungry for for that kind of leader and they got it, fine. But, failure in these negotiations cannot be turned into an ultimate political positive because the economic costs will be far too great. The The European Union, Nigel, has been aggressively working on a trade diversification agenda vis-a-vis the United States as well.

[00:14:47]And the EU only sends 21% of its exports to America.

[00:14:53]For Canada, that figure is 76%.

[00:14:57]So, uh intentionally allowing this trade negotiation to fail or or even simply being okay with it failing would be economically devastating.

[00:15:09]And as we've seen, um the bulk of Canada's exports to the United States have been tariff exempt because they've been protected by the umbrella of the current North American Free trade agreement. Imagine for a second what the economic consequences would be like if that umbrella disappeared.

[00:15:31]Suddenly, every export sector would be hurting just as much as the steel and aluminum and and copper and softwood and auto industries are currently suffering. That would be the case economy-wide. That would be economic disaster which would instantly translate into political disaster for the person sitting in the chair. So, failure in these negotiations is not an option.

[00:15:58]Do you think he'd give give in on supply management to save the rest?

[00:16:05]There are some creative solutions with regard to supply management that don't necessarily require the whole structure to be torn up.

[00:16:17]A year ago, Canada signed an agreement with New Zealand. New Zealand has a massive dairy industry. They're massive dairy exporting country. They've wanted more market access in Canada and they've taken Canada to court over it through various tribunals and so on. And Canada and New Zealand came to a bilateral compromise that did not require dismantling the supply management architecture, but simply redefining who gets access to the tariff rate quotas.

[00:16:49]And and a little bit of adjustment within the current rules satisfied New Zealand. I suspect we may see something along those lines. Don't dismantle it, but find a way within the system to give Americans more access and give it to the right people.

[00:17:05]Mhm. Okay. Well, that that would certainly be welcome. So, with cheaper cheese. Um >> Yeah, but but we've got to remember how politically sensitive supply management is here in Canada. In Quebec, it is it is a sacred cow. Um >> [clears throat] >> your life, but I There you go again.

[00:17:22]It's a sacred cow. Yes.

[00:17:24]>> [laughter] >> Uh and yes, so touching really touching that in a meaningful architectural restructuring way would be uh politically very very precarious for the government.

[00:17:39]Do you think that Mr. Carney's goals are really what he says they are?

[00:17:44]And if so, are they realistic? Hm.

[00:17:48]What's he really trying to accomplish in his ministry? He is a business person who is leading a liberal party.

[00:18:00]And that creates certain inherent tensions.

[00:18:06]From what I see, he's genuinely trying to address many of the same issues that a conservative government would would be addressing. Trade diversification, rejuvenating our extractive sectors, getting things done more quickly than we have in the past in terms of permitting and reviews and so on.

[00:18:24]The real question is, will his party tolerate it?

[00:18:28]Um Steven Guilbeault and the Green Caucus or the Climate Caucus, they've already signaled that they're going to keep him in check and that they're going to try to slow down his agenda.

[00:18:40]If he had a majority of say 30, 40, 50 seats, that wouldn't be an issue. But if he has this the slimmest majority that he currently has, those voices could potentially be very powerful.

[00:18:56]The biggest slick maneuvering that's going to be required for Mr. Carney is not going to be necessarily with the United States or with dealing with different economic sectors here in our own country. It's going to be internally with his own caucus.

[00:19:11]Um managing that very broad coalition that he has actively put together and trying to keep everybody happy. It's not going to be easy.

[00:19:23]You wonder sometimes if the lesson of the whole thing isn't be careful what you wish for. Yeah. He wanted to be Prime Minister.

[00:19:32]He is really dealing with the legacy of Mr. Trudeau even to this day as you know.

[00:19:37]Yeah, absolutely. Like he is not he is certainly not a carbon copy of of Mr. Trudeau. I know that for political expediency some of his political opponents will try to present him as such. I frankly don't think that's going to work cuz that's not who he is.

[00:19:50]But he is to some degree a fish out of water in his own party, but yet he has to lead his party and the government branded in his party colors. That's going to be his biggest challenge.

[00:20:04]One of the criticisms leveled against him quite is that he advised Mr. Trudeau for some years before Mr. Trudeau finally resigned.

[00:20:14]Do you How could How could we be in this situation if his advice had been followed?

[00:20:21]Yeah, look, I I was surprised that he accepted that that a appointment. It was what about a year before the election to be the economic advisor at large to the Trudeau government. I was I was stunned that an obviously sinking ship would Well, I'm I'm I surprised that they tried to wrap themselves in the you know in the Carney Carney mystique? No, not at all. But the fact that he accepted while still having political aspirations of his own. But look, he's he's trying to chart his own course.

[00:20:49]Uh, there is tension within the Liberal Party over this. There Make no mistake, there is. I I hear it every day here in Ottawa. Uh, lots of Liberals are not happy. They they don't feel comfortable in this new Carney form or recreation of their of their party.

[00:21:05]And you know, Nigel and as you know, just as well as I do, in politics, the greatest um the greatest precursor of solidarity is strong polling.

[00:21:20]But, once you start to dip in the polls, all those people, all those factions that have been biting their tongue, suddenly feel, you know, I've got nothing to lose now. Um and we're not doing great under his leadership anymore, and then they will become vocal, they will become public, and they will become visible.

[00:21:39]Um it happens to many governments. It will happen to this one. It's really just a question of when.

[00:21:45]Well, the fascinating discussion, as always, with you, Yaroslav. Thank you for coming on the show.

[00:21:52]My quick assessment is that uh we're not going to we're not going to stop questioning Mr. Carney about what he's doing and why he's doing it, but maybe we should appreciate that it may be not as easy for him as we like to think.

[00:22:07]Well, it's going to come down to results. He's going to have to show results. Where's the beef, Nigel?

[00:22:13]Where's the beef?

[00:22:14]Well, wherever you find it is going to be you're going to be paying a lot more for it than you used to. 40 bucks a pound is nothing these days. Look, we won't take it in the grocery direction, but thank you for again for coming on the show. Always great to see you, and we'll have you back. My pleasure, as always. Bye-bye.

[00:22:32]For The Western Standard, I'm Nigel Hannaford. Goodnight.

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