00:00:00.000Hello, I'm Rachel Gilmore, your least favorite person's least favorite journalist. Welcome to
00:00:11.480Bubble Pop. Normally, this is the point when I tell you to subscribe to the show, but I am actually
00:00:18.060starting off today's show with an announcement. But for the record, you can still subscribe to
00:00:22.220support my journalism. Now, you might have already heard this announcement because I posted it in a
00:00:28.240video yesterday. But let me just quickly take you through this and then we'll get to today's show.
00:00:33.360See, when I went independent, I was really scared that it wasn't going to work. So I threw
00:00:37.800literally everything at the wall. I mean, I've been researching, scripting, filming and editing
00:00:44.020short form news videos five days per week. I also do a weekly Tuesday night stream and I've been
00:00:49.360scripting, booking and recording this live podcast. And in the background of all of that, I also travel
00:00:54.380across canada to talk to canadians for various kind of speaking gigs do freelance investigative
00:00:59.900work for the thai and the national observer and i run a media business with like it's just me um
00:01:06.700you know so that comes with a bunch of financial and logistical work that someone with a journalism
00:01:10.620background doesn't have a lot of training for i'm gonna be honest it's too much it's not sustainable
00:01:17.340and I am burning out which sucks but I really want to make sure that I can give you guys the
00:01:26.640quality of reporting that you've come to expect from me so in recent weeks I've been thinking
00:01:31.700about what I offer you guys that you seem to enjoy the most and what I get the most fulfillment from
00:01:38.200and I keep coming back to my investigative pieces you know the moments where I've broken news where
00:01:43.340i've unmasked neo-nazis in canada or laid out canadian companies profiting from ice and when
00:01:50.140i actually have the time to do that work i feel like it's some of the most impactful stuff that i
00:01:55.020do so um it's also when most of you upgrade to paid subscriptions which i do need to pay my rent
00:02:01.900so i really appreciate that so um yeah i have decided that the thing that makes the most sense
00:02:09.500is to retire this podcast. But that doesn't mean I'm going away. If anything, it means you're going
00:02:15.780to get more Rachel, higher quality, because I am going to be doing three videos per week instead
00:02:22.480of five. And that way I can keep this work going. I can work ahead on the kind of high quality
00:02:28.520journalism that you guys have come to expect from me and stay on top of all of the other stuff that
00:02:33.440allows me to actually pay my rent while doing this work, you know, so freelance stuff, speaking gigs
00:02:38.720and a book proposal that I am supposed to be working on.
00:02:42.780Eventually, my hope is that this means I can pump out more high-quality investigative work.
00:02:47.800I can work ahead on that kind of high-quality journalism that you guys expect from me
00:02:52.080and do some deep dives into stuff like continuing to unmask neo-Nazis
00:02:58.240and exposing other things hurting our democracy.
00:03:01.440I really want to dig into the encroachment of for-profit healthcare
00:03:04.600and the corruption from some provincial governments.
00:03:06.900And because I still stream every Tuesday, I have a space where I can do the occasional interview
00:03:11.880when a guest pops up. So thank you so much for being here. Thank you for listening. And thank
00:03:18.480you for believing in my journalism. While this might feel sad for some of you, I can promise you
00:03:23.540that it's going to help keep the quality of my work up and even make it better long term. So
00:03:29.120I really appreciate you understanding. And to go out with a bang, I have got a damn good last
00:03:35.840episode for you all. The NDP have a new leader, and he's already making waves in Canada and around
00:03:43.460the world. Abby Lewis isn't afraid to take some big, unabashedly leftist swings, and in a world
00:03:49.440where the rich keep getting richer and the rest of us keep getting screwed, that's pretty goddamn0.96
00:03:54.040refreshing. But it's not all smooth sailing. He's got some big challenges ahead of him, including0.75
00:03:59.600navigating some spats with the provincial arms of the NDP and bringing the federal party back from
00:04:04.880the brink. There's a lot to cover and I am so excited to welcome Abby Lewis on the show. Abby,
00:04:12.820welcome back to Bubble Club. Oh my God. I can't believe I'm the last guest on the podcast.
00:04:18.900I'm so honored and grateful, Rachel. And also, you know what? I just want to say,
00:04:23.400I'm so grateful to you for your taking charge of your own output in an economy,
00:04:31.000a digital economy where people who are bravely doing independent journalism like you are being
00:04:35.560asked to auto exploit and and just be you know endlessly feed the algorithm um and you're
00:04:43.080finally after an incredible like what has been a year or so or more yeah like a year and four
00:04:48.760months about yeah of just going all out and just doing everything to pull it back a little and
00:04:54.280focus on the depth of what you can do as a former journalist um i'm i'm thrilled i'm proud of you
00:04:59.880for the all for jack actually modeling what it looks like to say i'm gonna do a little bit less
00:05:05.560in terms of wall to wall i'm gonna go deeper because that's what we need and that's what you
00:05:10.440do at your best and i'm you know i've said before without sucking up to the host you do your
00:05:15.400journalism i respect that but i'm a huge fan of your work and i'm really looking forward to this
00:05:20.040new era for you it's such a smart decision thank you so much that's so kind of you i really
00:05:24.520appreciate it and thank you for making the time i'm sure you know you've become a pretty hot
00:05:28.440commodity since the last time you were on so i really appreciate you being my last guest facing
00:05:34.360the thicket of microphones and like a scrum my big problem with these scrums which i've done lots of
00:05:38.760interviews over the years but like yeah getting scrummed by a huge like a number of crews at the
00:05:42.440same time i talk with my hands and i'm constantly banging the microphone oh no you're gonna end up
00:05:48.520with a scandal because you accidentally punched some national post reporter without meaning to
00:05:53.080And you know how that's going to be free accidentally.
00:05:57.460Now, Abby, I did want to start off by giving you that huge congratulations for the victory because, oh, my God, that was what a night.
00:06:07.380And it really seemed to invigorate a lot of people.
00:06:11.020But I also I did want to start off with an acknowledgement of how this has probably also been one of the hardest times of your life.
00:06:19.520Most people, when they lose a parent, they get time to grieve.
00:06:24.640And, you know, you, I'm so sorry about the loss of your father.
00:06:30.320And I can't imagine the rollercoaster of emotions you must have felt losing him right after you won the leadership.
00:06:37.320So, as I said before, you really gave him such a beautiful gift of hope that the dreams that he fought for his whole life might be realized through his son.
00:18:02.000I am surrounded by by brilliant folks.
00:18:04.640And I just struggle every day to make them proud of that.
00:18:08.000If I can do that, that's that's funny.
00:18:09.920Well, one thing that must have been, the reaction to your victory must have given them some giggles and definitely some pride. I actually, you know, people were really crashing out, Abby.
00:18:26.320like people were crashing out especially on the sort of the the political right commentator
00:18:33.380class I yeah I wanted to ask you I mean like all these people were declaring the death of the party
00:18:41.420when you won a lot of people who I don't think I've ever voted NDP in their lives sorry my
00:18:45.880not a single one of them you made me blubber a little and now my makeup's running but
00:18:49.800Yeah, but the, you know, and obviously they've been wrong. I mean, we saw in the recent by-elections there, in two of the ridings, the vote share stayed roughly the same, but in University Rosedale, it pretty much doubled the NDP vote. So that's not exactly the sign of a dying party.
00:19:06.760But I'm wondering why you think your politics specifically, within the NDP even, inspired such a strong reaction from the political right.
00:19:18.020I mean, there was the week there after the convention, after my dad passed away, there was that sort of someone online commented on the whiplash, right? That there are people are venerating this great, you know, old socialist and demonizing his spawn for exactly the same politics.
00:19:36.340Like my dad's favorite. My dad loved to say that he was a socialist. He said it at every opportunity he had. He loved to talk about nothing more than the depredations of capitalism. You know, this was his frame. And he was to be lionized in that moment. And I was to be the source of terror.
00:19:58.540I think it's, I think that the, we have a new political reality in Canada. And we have the
00:20:06.640prime minister who is still very popular. It's still very trusted. And we have a new, and I think
00:20:12.000part of it is a hungering for a new, more respectful, less bombastic and theatrical,1.00
00:20:18.000God, enough of Doug Ford and Polyev and name calling and Trump and stupid nicknames for people1.00
00:20:23.320and just gross, gross behavior celebrated.1.00
00:20:26.280We have, I think, a kind of a groundswell of rejection of that
00:20:30.020and a desire for our politicians to maybe be a little more boring
00:20:33.080or maybe be a little more like grownups or whatever.
00:20:36.300And I think Carney benefits a lot from that.
00:20:38.500And yet, I think there are transformative changes
00:20:41.360taking place in the direction of our country.
00:20:49.360because I watched Prime Minister's sort of fireside chat
00:20:52.740the direct video that he did this past week to Canadians with Great Interest.
00:20:57.060And he immediately started talking about the economic responses that he,
00:21:01.940you know, is taking credit for in the financial crisis 2008-2009. And his frame is that we will
00:21:08.880reassure Canadians that we will act with overwhelming force against the threats
00:21:14.300arrayed against us. Now, he was talking as a banker about economics, but there's this subtle,
00:21:19.560maybe not so subtle, very clear shift to warlike military framing. And that's accompanied by his
00:21:27.640defense industrial strategy, which is a half of trillion dollars of new investment in weapons
00:21:32.980and war in the next decade. There are big changes afoot in this country. There are a number of bills
00:21:37.760that set aside consultation, indigenous rights, environmental assessment for these projects that
00:21:44.000are deemed in the national interest. These projects which are never about investing in
00:21:47.160childcare in the national interest. Projects that are never about investing in completing
00:21:51.320the dream of universal head-to-toe healthcare as a national interest. They're about extractive
00:21:57.220projects. They're about shipping raw resources. They're about investing in a big new defense
00:22:01.260export industry. They're about oil and gas and new pipelines. These are consensus projects
00:22:08.560that benefit elites massively and corporations that are already war profiteering, excess profits
00:22:16.600from the skyrocketing skyrocketing price of oil another inflation crisis which is going to drive
00:22:22.120food even further out of reach for for for canadians who actually work for a living
00:22:28.040there are dramatic things happening that are changing in the basis of our economy and our
00:22:32.760direction as a country and there are cons their consensus positions from the far right national
00:22:39.640Post editorial board and pretty, you know, out there columnists to the sober center-right,
00:22:46.900now what are we calling them, red Tory, carny liberals, like whatever that political identity
00:22:52.200is. And so, yes, these ideas that we take the wealth of this country and the role of government
00:22:59.540is to capture a fair portion of it and invest it in things that make life less cruel and unfair
00:23:06.900and extraordinarily difficult for the vast majority of us. That is a threat to the next
00:23:13.480big cash-in that is being lined up right now in an era of global instability, where corporations
00:23:19.780that are already making billions upon billions of dollars every single year, while people struggle
00:23:24.840to put food on the table for their kids and their families, those corporations are going to cash in
00:23:29.980at an exponentially higher level. And the political class and the elites in this country are lined up
00:23:36.200behind that. And when they get a sense that there's a kind of populism of the left, which is
00:23:41.480emerging, which is being granted the credibility of a national political party. Yes, we are still
00:23:47.040a caucus that can fit inside now, you know, like a minivan or a D&D table. We could have a
00:23:56.480reservation without even needing like to push the tables together at a restaurant. We are still
00:24:01.360small but these ideas are big they are catching fire and they pose a threat to the dominant
00:24:08.000powers in our in our society so i think that the role of the extreme right wing in the cultural
00:24:13.040space in the media space in canada is to demonize and caricature our version of left populism
00:24:21.920while the serious center-right can dismiss us or ignore us but we are going to build power
00:24:28.720at the base and our strategy is not to win the air war we will win the air war when we're winning
00:24:35.360the ground game we can pierce through with ideas and we can spread the message with big megaphones
00:24:41.040and it's incredibly important to do communications which is something that i spend a lot of my time
00:24:45.040doing but we have a focus on organizing organizing organizing which is also a threat to power
00:24:50.880because it actually means one-on-one conversations in the neighborhood in the grocery store on the
00:24:55.840corner and building power in neighborhoods, building bottom-up power, which is much more
00:25:01.220durable, which is much more less vulnerable to the vicissitudes of political swings, because we're
00:25:08.660talking about organizing, which is what the NDP was traditionally the best at, and bringing back
00:25:14.880that culture. It's a longer build, potentially, although things can happen fast in politics these
00:25:19.200days, but it is a very substantial power that we are trying to build, and I think it's a real threat.
00:25:25.840Yeah, definitely. But it's, it's, I think that part of why they're thrashing so much is because socialism really is having a moment, if you will, globally, like, you know, there's the Green Party in the UK, there's Zoran Mamdani, there's, I mean, Emily Lohan out in BC, like, there's, there's all of these voices coming up. And I think it's because they really speak to the realities that people are living that we've been gaslit about. I mean, when you have governments looking at macro economic indicators, like debt to GDP ratio, for example, and not actually
00:25:55.700looking at the wealth gap that is the highest it has been according to statistics canada and
00:26:00.100recorded history in canada you know you're not actually capturing the day-to-day issues of
00:26:04.160everyday people um but you know i think that one of the things that you're up against in that is
00:26:10.440the conservatives have been voicing those those issues with um you know arguably i would say in
00:26:17.680my you know i'm not not pretending to be fully uh you know neutral and not have opinions on these
00:26:23.280But, you know, I would argue that the solutions they present don't actually adequately address the problems that they are accurately identifying.
00:26:32.200But because they were actually accurately identifying the issues, they were able to really eat away at the NDP's working class flank.
00:26:39.680So how do you make your message resonate with voters again, particularly when the right is working so hard to make the NDP look silly in some ways?
00:26:48.540I mean, they had that like those they grabbed whatever clips they could from the convention to make you guys look like, you know, like unserious.
00:26:56.020But I mean, how do you tackle that online atmosphere and actually have a message that connects?
00:27:03.840I really agree with your analysis and I'm glad to hear you say it because I think it's really true.
00:27:09.600The conservative, not just Polyev, not just the Conservative Party in Canada, the conservative movement, the mega politics coming from the United States and our own convoy movement all the way through to the manosphere and the funnel that brings young men into online spaces of misogyny and the extreme right.
00:27:39.600that you've done such groundbreaking work documenting they are harvesting the legitimate
00:27:45.520rage of people who are being ground to dust by the unfairness of this economy people are right
00:27:54.160to be angry and i think that the democratic left in canada has been reluctant to speak to that rage
00:28:02.400um because we're so easily characterized by overwhelmingly you know unfair media environment
00:28:08.880etc you know that we're not serious and stuff like that so we maybe we've shied away from really
00:28:14.400speaking to the rage but the conservative movement has done it um and they have built a formidable
00:28:22.160extreme right and a coalition of people who are prepared to vote right-wing um and follow
00:28:27.680cultural uh the culture online culture of of of right-wing um views by speaking to the rage by
00:28:37.920saying you're angry, you're right to be angry, and you should be angry at these people, trans kids,
00:28:43.600immigrants, international students. That's an expert move of rising authoritarianism to redirect
00:28:49.440the rage at injustice and economic inequality towards the most vulnerable in society. And beyond
00:28:55.120that, they're a hammer looking for a nail. Everything is a tax gun. The only solution they
00:29:01.520have is cut taxes and you know acts attacks they'll find a new tax as long as there's one tax
00:29:08.400left in a country like canada they will be claiming that we could solve all of our problems
00:29:12.720by cutting that tax and for whatever reason i think you know would it be a whole other show
00:29:17.520just to explain why that works or to invent you to interrogate that together it does work enough
00:29:22.720of the time yeah but i think now um you know we have seen enough tax cutting the digital services
00:29:31.520tax the carbon tax is gone this whole thing about the carbon tax it was going to make everything it
00:29:36.000was the reason everything was so expensive we have one freaking moment of of memory in this country
00:29:44.560where it's like they cut the carbon tax everywhere and everything got more expensive after like three
00:29:50.880days it was it was it was an illusion it was never the thing that was making life so expensive
00:29:59.360even if it had been which it wasn't it was price gouging every excuse they get to gouge us more
00:30:08.160they just gouge us more because nobody stops them because the government does not actually consider
00:30:12.080it its responsibility to to protect us from being extracted from by big tech by big grocery by big
00:30:20.560telecoms by big everything right so the conservatives done a great job of that and i believe that we
00:30:28.240are offering solutions and this is why rachel when when i we launched the campaign in september
00:30:33.680uh of last year we came out with a public option for groceries and a wealth tax and a green new
00:30:39.280deal and an electric bus revolution and ideas to put people to work under public ownership to solve
00:31:10.100that are really appealing to Canadians
00:31:13.600because people see i think that the biggest barrier to change is that we've lost the belief
00:31:21.620that change can happen and so when we describe something clearly enough a lot of people are like
00:31:29.420public grocery stores okay i don't have an immediate allergic reaction to that because
00:31:35.040i'm not extremely conservative and like i don't mind the government runs health care we got public
00:31:39.920auto insurance in british columbia our rates are cheaper than uh alberta or ontario we still have
00:31:45.100a public phone company in saskatchewan yeah public things are they could be okay so tell me how this
00:31:49.520works okay it's 50 stores you've got regional distribution hubs 300 million dollars a year
00:31:53.960to subsidize okay that sounds like money but not a crazy amount of money in an economy our size
00:31:59.540you say 30 to 45 cheaper groceries i'd like to see someone try that you know so now toronto's
00:32:06.720doing a pilot. Ottawa's doing a pilot. And they're talking about it in Montreal. There's a, there's
00:32:10.180in Quebec, there's a, there's a province-wide, like a public procurement, food procurement
00:32:16.820network that's bringing together people in food justice and the food bank system, but also,
00:32:20.840you know, co-ops and, you know, this could be a revival of the co-ops. Suddenly people are
00:32:26.380picturing a life which is less cruel and impossible. And they're like, why couldn't we
00:32:33.180give that a try and so i think it's the solutions it's the actual proposals that will get back
00:32:39.940people and and simultaneously expand the political imagination so that not only do we think that
00:32:46.800this public grocery option is worth a try but we actually start believing again that things do not
00:32:53.460have to suck this hard that actually in a country as a wash in wealth as canada we could have a
00:32:59.220better life we deserve good things we can have good things and it's possible and once that spark0.97
00:33:05.680is unleashed look out because it can really catch fire and i think that's another part of the extreme
00:33:11.720reaction to us from the right wing um and the attempt to brand us as communist you know like
00:33:18.320soviet style empty store shelves bread lineups etc but avi what if toby luke can't have another
00:33:25.120billion dollars we need to consider that right yeah this guy is falling so i really do think
00:33:32.240that that left-wing populism um has unlimited potential i don't know whether we'll be smart
00:33:37.760enough and work hard enough and avoid enough mistakes and grow power fast enough to actually
00:33:44.640do it and and fulfill the promise of it but i know it has immense potential and i see people
00:33:51.280getting lit up by it and i see our ideas cutting through already um from a party which is being
00:33:57.120simultaneously dismissed and listened to on things like surveillance pricing which is what
00:34:02.000we came out with on our first day in ottawa um and and so we're going to see where this goes but
00:34:10.160i don't think we can be naive and think that these ideas which are not revolutionary which
00:34:16.160are actually kind of reasonable and maybe even somewhat moderate but these ideas are deeply
00:34:22.120threatening to a status quo which has not been challenged in quite a long time the mainstream
00:34:26.860narratives of this is how it has to be there's no way we can change this all of what the hell
00:34:31.760are you talking about an alternative to the way things go not possible we we represent a threat
00:34:37.580to that ironclad narrative and when that starts to crack apart change becomes right there we can
00:34:45.000reach out and grab it i think that's part of what was so smart with bringing uh the surveillance
00:34:49.960pricing uh as one of the first issues that you guys really like drove home in the house of
00:34:54.600commons because i've seen so many motions opposition motions die and it make no splash but
00:35:00.200it's just like it's it's a great issue for encapsulating corporate greed and everything
00:35:06.040that canadians are dealing with the way that big tech takes advantage of us the ways in which
00:35:10.760if a grocery store is allowed to get even a few extra cents from you if any capitalistic like
00:35:16.680company is able to get a few extra cents from you they will find a way to do it and it's just kind
00:35:21.160of the epitome of that so that was really clever but you know something that i keep coming up
00:35:26.040against i see it in my comment sections i see it in your comment sections is um a lot of the stuff
00:35:31.320that you have suggested does freak people out now we can have a conversation about why it freaks
00:35:35.960people out, the media ecosystem, the way that National Post seems to have like the strongest
00:35:41.200legion of columnists writing the most output relative to any other paper in this frigging
00:35:47.160country. But I do think that when people say they're scared, you have to listen, right? And
00:35:54.300you have to understand where that fear comes from. You know, there's the issue of moving off
00:36:00.100of oil and gas, for example. I know I've heard you say that you have a promise to transition in a way
00:36:05.880that people aren't going to be penalized workers like you want to transition so they have other
00:36:10.840job options because the transition is coming whether you want it or not it's just whether
00:36:14.200you're prepared for it but that still scares people because you're asking them to trust a
00:36:18.840politician's word that they're not going to lose their job when that's burned them so many times
00:36:22.680before right exactly when you tell people that you're taking these huge swings and presenting
00:36:28.600changes how do you get them to believe you that it's not going to be this scary thing and that
00:36:33.800it'll actually help them how do you make them less afraid well that's a really great example
00:36:38.280and i think that this is i mean right now we're not in government right we are we are proposing um
00:36:45.640and we just have to keep we have to keep being honest and remind people that we're not asking
00:36:51.880them to trust us i think like the the transition is the last word that workers hear before they0.82
00:36:58.840they get screwed. Here in British Columbia, forestry workers, you know, they were supposed
00:37:03.360to transition and then, you know, mills close and the industry has been just downsliding for
00:37:10.340decades. And now with the tariffs, it's another one of the top three industries, I think, that
00:37:14.880are affected by the tariff wars. And when workers in the forestry industry are told,
00:37:20.980don't worry, they're going to get retraining and stuff like that, it's just never happened.
00:37:24.760like literally after clackwood sound this the war in the woods in the in the early 90s here
00:37:29.880in british columbia this big the first big fight um over protecting old growth um part of the
00:37:36.520standoff was you know there was going to be alternatives developed you know um and it turned
00:37:42.880out that they were they were telling forestry workers like they should work in ecotourism
00:37:47.200and what serve cappuccinos to the environmental activists they've been facing off with in the
00:37:53.640woods the year before like it's it was insulting and and it never happened or or the or the fisheries
00:38:00.200workers when the cot collapsed um there's no transition for workers they're thrown on the
00:38:05.760trash heap and i think oil and gas workers have every reason to be afraid because these transitions
00:38:12.300have never been done with a focus on workers so since the beginning of the of the leadership
00:38:17.780campaign we've been really clear we're talking about public ownership because the government has
00:38:22.980an absolute moral responsibility to take care of workers first. Workers create the value in our
00:38:28.220economy. And in resource economies, that's especially true because we're not doing a lot
00:38:33.360of processing, whether it's logs or oil or whatever. We're mostly shipping relatively
00:38:37.900raw resources to other countries. And those workers must be protected. That means that we
00:38:43.900need new industries and a green industrial strategy to create the new jobs in a heat pump
00:38:49.900in every home, in an electric bus revolution, in the east-west power grid, in large industrial
00:38:55.520scale projects and development and manufacturing returning to our economy as an important element
00:39:01.700of making our economy more independent and building more unionized, good family-supporting
00:39:05.740jobs. Those jobs have to be in place in communities first. We have to get started, right? Because
00:39:12.160every time you start talking about we need to get off of oil and gas rollercoaster, the
00:39:16.220translation for people in resource economies is you're shutting down everything tomorrow.
00:39:19.660We never said we're shutting down anything tomorrow. We literally never said that. That is literally an industry talking point to shut down the conversation so the transition never starts. In a country like Canada, we have not even started.
00:39:32.640when the rest of the world, because of the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the gas price
00:39:38.580explosion in Europe, those countries in Europe double down on getting away from fossil fuels.
00:39:44.960And now they're doing another round of it because of the illegal war against Iran. And so Canada's
00:39:52.100being left behind. We're still arguing about pipelines, and we're not getting started on
00:39:57.620getting off this resource curse roller coaster because the industries are so powerful, because
00:40:03.100so much money is made, because governments are addicted to the revenue, and who's going to get
00:40:07.440sacrificed every time there's a market disruption? It's workers who pay the price. And yet the
00:40:13.680industry and the political class has convinced workers to resist change because they deny any
00:40:21.300start on any alternative. In Alberta, people have been talking about the need to diversify the
00:40:27.240economy, away from oil and gas exclusively as the major source of revenue for the government,
00:40:31.820the major funder of social care in Alberta for decades and decades and decades. And every time
00:40:39.380anyone's come up with the most modest proposal to diversify the economy, it's like the sky is
00:40:44.440falling. You hate workers. You're going to shut down our communities tomorrow. It's going to be
00:40:49.000a ghost town. And then we get another pipeline. So if we really want change, we have to be committed
00:40:54.800to telling the truth. We have to be committed to centering workers in the story that we tell
00:40:59.420and coming up with proposals and out of the box proposals where we say the private sector is not
00:41:05.740doing it. They make too much damn money from the status quo. They will keep pursuing the status0.79
00:41:10.620quo until we all burn. And this summer is going to be another summer where the planet is literally
00:41:17.380on fire underneath our feet and in our lungs. And we will keep doing this until somebody has
00:41:23.280the courage to say that government has to intervene and start this transition and guarantee
00:41:29.080employment for people so that we can just get started. We're already so far behind. So part of
00:41:35.040it is just consistency, you know, and part of it is like watching my dad for decades and decades
00:41:40.620maintain the same views, patiently re-explain to people who didn't want to listen that it's just
00:41:48.100wrong that pharmaceutical companies that make tens of billions of dollars a year should deny
00:41:53.580life-saving medicines to a significant portion of humanity. It is wrong. And the role of government
00:41:59.980to step up and force corporations to do enough of the right thing that people don't die unnecessarily.
00:42:06.180They can still make profits. We're just not talking about cartoon profits. We're talking
00:42:10.780about reasonable profits, right? And I've watched him do that for my whole life. And I feel like
00:42:15.900that is the work we have to patiently keep explaining it and not dilute the truth that
00:42:22.360we understand to be true to the things that we know even if they don't strike people as popular
00:42:29.660in a particular moment because we know we know who really suffers in in in these unfair arrangements
00:42:36.120in our society they're the most vulnerable people they're trans kids in in provinces that
00:42:41.980invoke the notwithstanding clause to deny them care, to take away their fundamental rights.
00:42:47.160They're resource workers who are being automated out of existence. Oil and gas industry has figured
00:42:53.320out how to make a barrel of oil with almost half as many employees as 10 years ago. The industry
00:42:58.980is throwing workers under the bus every single day. It's not people calling for a transition
00:43:03.260who are throwing workers under the bus. It's the greed of the industry itself. So we just have to
00:43:08.760keep we have to stay true to these to these principles and build a movement and a political
00:43:15.800momentum that is based on clarity and honesty and I believe it's the way to do it I can't think of
00:43:23.080any other yeah I uh I want to turn to audience questions for the last 10 minutes but I quickly
00:43:29.140had one last thing I wanted to ask you before we pivot to those I have like a million more things
00:43:33.700I could ask you, but I'm trying to. I take too long to answer. No, it's okay. No, that's the joy of the podcast kind of platform. That's the one thing I'm going to miss is you can actually have like real substantive conversations. But yeah, so you guys can go ahead and start putting some questions in the chat if you'd like. But I did specifically want to ask you, you know, obviously, what you just spoke to kind of speaks to the divide that we're seeing between the federal NDP and the Alberta NDP.
00:44:00.920But another provincial NDP that's been in some dicey, been getting some dicey headlines lately, is the BC NDP.
00:44:10.980David Eby was reportedly set to suspend key portions of the province's Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, or DRIPA,
00:44:18.460in the wake of a ruling that struck down free entry mineral staking, one that is being appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada.
00:44:24.020But then on Sunday night, BC Premier David Eby came out and said they wouldn't actually introduce legislation to suspend key portions of DRIFA, this legislative session.
00:44:33.160People in BC are really concerned about BC's, about Eby's handling of this.
00:44:38.680There are people, I just got a press release in my inbox calling on Eby to resign.
00:44:43.120As a federal NDP leader with ties to these provincial parties, do you have concerns about what the BC NDP Premier is doing here?
00:44:50.760And what do you have to say about that?
00:44:52.640Well, I think what we've seen in the past couple of weeks is a really intense democratic debate within a party and a government and within a province.
00:45:04.820And I think, see, to me, this is actually an example of how politics works.
00:45:10.420There are different interests in society. And when it comes to Indigenous rights, Indigenous rights have never had the power of extractive industries, for two randomly chosen examples, to influence government policy.
00:45:26.000But we build power from the ground up. And for me, political, like the political system is one venue for these kinds of struggles and social movements, civil society, trade union movements are really other important fields of battle, right, in terms of the ongoing struggle for justice.
00:45:47.620And I think you've seen the line shift on this issue over time as different constituencies have made very forceful cases within the BC NDP, within the BC NDP government, within the province of British Columbia.
00:46:02.180And I think that the shifting approaches by the premier have reflected where power is brought to bear on the decision making process.
00:46:10.000And I actually think that's healthy. And I think too much of our politics is focused on the personalities involved. As if, you know, if Dave Eby were just making all the decisions as one person, that's one kind of government. Dave Eby is responding to an array of pressures and powers in society and a contestation of powers in society.
00:46:31.060And right now, I think that the Indigenous leadership in British Columbia asserted its power. And the government is responding, I think, in a responsible way to that power that was brought to bear on a decision that has been, you know, that has shifted.
00:46:48.260it and i i think it's encouraging like i think it's good when governments listen i think it's
00:46:53.620good when governments you know when when ford was going to develop the green belt and like
00:46:58.220marit styles and and and the ndp led uh you know there's a whole coalition in society that really
00:47:03.520pushed back hard there was obvious corruption at stake there was like and the ford government
00:47:07.740backed off right that's there are examples where governments changed course and generally it's
00:47:15.100because of pushback. Too often it's because of pressure from corporations and banks and the
00:47:19.720wealthiest in society. So when we see pressure working in other ways, I think it's great.
00:47:24.540I don't think that's something, you know, to like pin on one person or their personal handling of
00:47:29.620something. I really see these things as the battle of forces in society. I'll be subject to it too
00:47:36.280as a leader of a national party. And this is democracy in action, folks. I think it's a good
00:47:42.020thing all right um we've got about eight minutes for audience questions i'm going to turn to those
00:48:04.180okay so i've got some uh audience questions here uh the first one i'll just grab a super chat one
00:48:10.100and then we'll turn to the the freebies because you know we uh we like to support everyone um
00:48:15.460yeah so uh zwarhol wants to know how can we stop mark carney's reckless attempt to integrate ontario
00:48:21.060teacher pension plan with the war banks potential host city in toronto um i i'm not overly familiar
00:48:28.180with that so and i i don't know if you've had a chance to look into it but uh what are your
00:48:32.580thoughts on that well i there there is this move for canada to host this this defense bank and you
00:48:38.500know i i see it as um as a negative development in general like we talked about right at the beginning
00:48:46.180um carney is increasingly using the vocabulary of war um intertwined with the with economics
00:48:54.980and and is proposing huge investments in in military expenditures in canada to create a
00:49:01.860defense export industry to you know increase our defense exports by 50 percent hosting a global
00:49:07.940uh financial mechanism for funding weapons and war like what do we think all these weapons are
00:49:14.660used for folks like i know everybody feels scared and like the world is full of war and and and
00:49:20.500authoritarianism but like do we really think that just having way more weapons is going to make
00:49:25.540things more peaceful like let's just get down to basics now the pension funds um are some of the
00:49:30.660biggest pools of capital in the global economy and canada has a bunch of really big ones and i
00:49:36.500think that their investments um should reflect the values of their members and i don't think that the
00:49:42.660ontario teachers retirees um and people who are contributing to that pension plan think that
00:49:49.380investing in in in war uh and weapons is what their pension plans should be doing but the pension
00:49:55.620plans have been constructed by banks and and by big finance uh to reflect the absolute you know
00:50:02.980imperative to get maximum profit and nothing else. And so, yeah, we have to challenge these things
00:50:07.860because pension funds are huge funders of private capital, sources of private capital in the global
00:50:15.700economy and in Canada's economy. And I've always believed that they should be in line with the
00:50:20.340values of the workers that they, whose futures they represent. And I believe it is possible to
00:50:25.560have values-based investing that is absolutely capable of securing a dignified future for