Mark Carney Shows Us His True Colours

Is Canadian Liberal Party Prime Minister Mark Carney more conservative than former Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper?That is a question that I've been mulling over over the past week since the release of Carney's economic spring update which tells us a lot about the man and what this governing party is actually about.So in this video I'm going to go over some of the criticisms of this a different perspective that I believe one of the other major party leaders are offering, as well as discussions around the Sovereign Wealth Fund, what that actually is, and the idea that the Liberals have to privatize airports.Because we all know privatizing public assets has worked out every time.I'm being sarcastic.We are going to get to some examples.

In fact, before I even get there, think.Can you think of one example where privatizing a public asset has worked out for the vast majority of Canadians?and not just, you know, the wealthy few that own that asset.But we'll get there.Let me first start with this is the reaction that NDP leader Avi Lewis had to the release of Mark Carney's economic update.And honestly, as I discussed in a video last week, this should be the opposition leader, because he's the only person that has a coherent argument against what Mark Carney is doing.

Pierre Paulyev is still trying to pretend that Mark Carney is Justin Trudeau, that he's somehow to the left of Trudeau.That's not how he's spending so much money.Meanwhile, pouring all of this money into defense, cutting 40 ,000 public sector jobs, cutting public services.This is what a conservative prime minister would do.If Pierre Polya was prime minister, these are things that he would be doing.Not to mention privatizing airport, privatization of any kind is not a left -wing idea.

That is a conservative idea.That is neoliberalism.So we'll get to that.that in a second, but just that I'm not even going to bother with Pierre Polyaev.You can go and watch his videos and his garbage, whatever he's saying, but it's such a waste of time because it is not even an opposition.There's nothing of substance to work with when it comes to his criticisms.

Whereas you have an actual opposition and what Avi Lewis is arguing.Mark Carney and Pierre Polyaev ideologically, very similar, unless you're stuck in the culture war garbage, then yeah, I guess Pierre Polyaev is your guy.But in terms of the economics, not that far off.Let me first get to this clip from Avi Lewis.

Where are the measures to actually support pharmacare for Canadians, which this government promised?Instead, we've seen Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland say that the feds are not going to extend the national pharmacare plan that we fought for and won in the supply and confidence agreement.So they're walking back things that would benefit Canadians and help them with the cost of medicine, which is not exactly an optional expenditure in a family budget.

So this gets me to the first real question.solid criticism of this economic update and that is the lack of support for health care.There is a great piece here that I will link to below the video under sources from the Toronto Star from Althea Raj.Opinion Mark Carney has forgotten who helped him get elected.Now the only thing I would argue with about this piece, as we'll get into the details here, is how it's framed.Because to me this is not about Mark Carney, you know, turning his back on the government.

on progressive voters.It's about him turning his back on Canadians, because health care is something that all of us need.So this is not to me, this is not about progress.I don't care who you voted for, how you think you are ideologically, politically.I care about if you're Canadian, if you live in this country, how you're impacted by this.So as she writes, dig into the details and you learn national farm care is ending.

There is no new money to create more child care spaces.Federal health care spending is drastically being cut.Oh, and the government is looking to privatizing airports and ports.Moves Prime Minister Harper didn't even publicly contemplate.And we'll get to the airport stuff later.But she goes on to write, the federal government is also slashing billions from health care at a time when hospital emergency rooms are swamped.

The population is aging and mental health needs are often left unmet.The federal government won't be renewing the 1 .2 billion in annual transfers to the provinces that support mental health and addiction services, as well as home and community care, nor the 600 million in annual transfers for long term care.It also looks like the 500 million annually set aside to increase Canadians access to expensive drugs for rare diseases won't extend beyond next March.And there are many more details in this piece, but I want to focus on, as I highlighted here, the mental health care aspect of this.So the NDP, late last week put out this, underinvestment in mental health is costing Canada, NDP's Gore John.So he is proposing or introducing a motion urging the federal government to adopt a national target for mental health services of 12 % of total health care spending and to work with provinces and territories to achieve that goal.

Quote, mental illness is a leading cause of disability in Canada and it's now estimated to cost our economy 200 billion every year.First, I want to point out, I don't normally directly quote party websites because I want to be clear, I don't work for the NDP.I'm not associated with the NDP in any way.but this wasn't even really covered in the media.If you look, try to look this up.This, this did not.

make news this is part of the issue with having the NDP be so small right now they have what like five members and having the concerns be the opposition is that these sorts of motions don't make news the way that if it was a conservative or the opposition party does then they'll make news with their motions but because the NDP is so small despite this issue being incredibly important it doesn't get the headlines that it deserves now I This gets to, you know, I'm going to get to a clip from Avi Lewis discussing this, but this idea that, oh, we don't have the money.But let's just put, putting aside, say you don't care about the mental health of people.Let's say all you care about is saving money.That's your main concern.The government needs to save more money, needs to stop spending money.We save more money by investing into something like health care, into, in this case, mental health care.

That benefits us in the long run.We are losing money by not taking care of this major issue.So here is Avi Lou speaking on this.

I think the question of maid in Canada has been, the subject has been refashioned recently as we see people choosing maid out of desperation.And I think that for people with disabilities, I know the disability community is deeply disturbed.a community that lives in legislated poverty with an insulting $200 a month disability benefit, and despite the much vaunted changes to the application process for the disability tax credit this week in Ottawa, it's still way too hard.The disability tax credit is still connected to the disability benefit, and people are living in legislated poverty.People in mental health crisis should be getting the supports that they needMental health is part of your health.

It has to be part of our universal, publicly funded health system.If people are choosing, made, choosing to die because they can't get supports that they need in life, something is broken in our system.

So this speaks to both the lack of assistance when it comes to disability support, as well as the medical assistance in dying or made, where some people who feel like their lives are incredibly tough, for a variety of medical reasons, choose assisted dying instead of living their lives because of the system, at least partially because of a system that does not support them.It's hard to be, and when it gets to mental health, this speaks to a wide variety of issues that people deal with.It's hard to be a productive and contributing member of society if your mental health isn't taken care of.These are investments that improve our social fabric and our economy.Going back into the point where if all you care about is wasted money or the economy or whatever, if that's your only concern, investments into healthcare, including mental health, benefits us all.Now let me get to the sovereign wealth fund, because there has been a lot written about this, a lot of comparisons, like the one to Norway.

We'll get to Mark Carney's clip in a second here.But it's missing what this actually is.So CBC writing here with their headline, Canada's getting a sovereign wealth fund.What are they and how might this one work?Sovereign wealth funds are state -owned investment accounts, usually started with the country's extra money.Now, on its face, if you don't know what this actually is, it sounds like a great idea.

These are this is a way to invest into public infrastructure in a way to help build our country up, maybe build more public housing, more investments into rapid transit, high speed rail.Great idea, right?Not exactly what's going on here.So first, I want to play Mark Carney's clip, him announcing this and the comparison he makes and what the reality actually is.

So here's how it works.A sovereign wealth fund is essentially a national savings and investment account.It's designed to grow wealth for future generations of Canadians.Many countries, many countries that are blessed with natural resources, like Norway, have sovereign wealth funds.Canada hasn't had one until now.The new Canada Strong Fund will give all Canadians a direct stake in building Canada strong.

Now, to be clear, just like with the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway 150 years ago, Canada's major projects will mostly be built by private companies.And just as in the 1870s, the federal government will support these projects through loans, grants and other incentives.And we do this because these projects have wider benefits to our economies, benefits that exceed the private returns.

The comparison to Norway is incredible because it Mark Carney's Sovereign Wealth Fund is actually the opposite of what the Norway model is.So there's a great piece here from Luke Savage in the Toronto Star.Mark Carney compares the Sovereign Wealth Fund to Norway's.Canadians are smart enough to see it's not the same.And I want to be clear, this isn't the only piece that points this out.You could look this up yourself, look into this.

What Mark Carney's, what his sovereign wealth fund is, how it's set up, is not at all what the Norway model is.So as he writes, Norway, just like Canada, boasts vast oil reserves.And in the early 1990s, its government decided to start putting a share of the revenues into a fund that would be publicly owned and controlled.Today, the fund is worth roughly $3 trillion.In stark contrast, Carney says the government's Canada Strong Fund will use public money to invest alongside the private sector in nation -building projects on a fully commercial basis, which is just another way of saying that the state is going to subsidize private projects rather than tax the profits of the oil industry, which could well reach a record $90 billion this year thanks to the U .S.

-Israeli war with Iran.and reinvest them in public goods.It wants to use our collective wealth to underwrite them.This, as scholar Seth Klein recently observed, is in fact the exact opposite of the Norwegian model.So where the Norwegian model is, in this case, taxing oil and putting that into the sovereign wealth fund to help build up this publicly controlled amount of money to be able to reinvest back into society, what we're instead doing is taking money that could be going to public services already and putting that into this fund to help fund private projects that are at least going to be partly, if not wholly, owned by those private entities.This is just public -private partnership by another name.

As he goes on to write, there are real problems inherent in funding projects this way.For one thing, when projects are backstopped by public funds, they can often balloon in cost as profit -motivated companies feed at the trough of government subsidies.Many of the projects liable to be greenlit, moreover, will likely be the ones for which theAnd on the idea of how these public -private partnerships normally work out, We have data on this.So CUPE shared this, a bad track record.Speaking of, in this case, Carillion was the lead company in the consortium that built the P3 public -private partnership, Brampton Civic Hospital, a project the Ontario Auditor General found to have cost $200 million more than if the province had borrowed to build it publicly.

A more recent auditor's report found that 74 P3 projects cost the province $8 billion more than if they had been produced or procured publicly.So instead of simply building these projects ourselves with public money and having them publicly owned, we are handing money off to private corporations that have a profit motive and wasting more money and oftentimes taking more time to build and complete them.This is the insane politics that we have had for at least the last 40 years that have just continued under both liberal and conservative governments.Similar approach in the US as well, regardless of if it's Democrats or Republicans.This is the approach that has been taken, handing money off, handing public money off to private interests.And we wonder why things are so screwed up.

You can't simply trust that these companies, which have their own motives at play to make themselves a lot of money, that they're going to be able to execute these in a way that makes sense for the public.Whereas if you actually have public projects where the sole interest is in the public, that completely changes.the motive of how these projects are produced and how they're executed and run once they're built.I just, again, this is a continuation of Stephen Harper politics that conservative voters, if you're a conservative voter and this is what you love, and maybe you're an executive, this all sounds great to you, you should love Mark Carney.This is your guy.Pierre Polyev is a joke.

Like, it's no wonder why Mark Carney continues to enjoy success in polling.Because on one hand, he has fooled people to think that he's for them.And on the other, he is serving the interests of traditional conservative voters that have moved over from Pierre Polyev, who just continues to drop in support, and gone over to Mark Carney.Because this is exactly what they want.This is what they would have wanted out of a Pierre Polyev government.Now let's get to the airports.

because this is part of this as well.Liberals plan to grow sovereign wealth fund by recycling money from airports, other federal assets.So essentially privatizing airports.In case you don't know, airlines pay fees to airports so that they could land, use the terminals, use the airport.And that is revenue that is generated for the government.If you get rid of that revenue source, you are once again, we're talking about short term gain because in the short term, you're going to make money from selling off the airport.

But long term pain, because you no longer have that revenue source feeding in to government, whether it's talking about the need for public services, the need for infrastructure investment, whatever it is, you no longer have that revenue source.So before I get to other examples of the failed public services,efforts of the past, let me get to this clip from the Liberal government attempting to defend this on CTV News.

What evidence do you have to suggest that privatizing those assets would do what you just laid out?So for example, keep costs contained for Canadians.Evidence in other countries like Spain and the UK actually would show us that the opposite ended up being the case.

Yeah, look, there have been various exercises in privatizing.In fact, Canada is quite far behind most other countries in this regard, and mistakes have been made in other places, but not in all places.So we'll want to learn from those experiences and make sure that we apply the good lessons here in Canada and that when a decision is made, that it is one that will be reassuring to Canadians that is in their interest as travelers, but also in their interest as owners of these facilities.

Absolute bullshit.This is a great question from Vashti Kapelos, pointing out the reality of other places that have privatized airports and how it did not work out.The cost of airline tickets didn't go down because they privatized an airport.No, they'd stay the same or went up, and on top of that you removed a revenue source.There is no benefit to this.Show me one example of privatizing a public asset and it working out for the vast majority of people.

One example.There aren't any.Because it never does.Because the very reality that you now introduce a profit motive where there wasn't one before.So it's not going to work out for the most amount of people.It's going to work out for the executives who now own that asset.

It's not going to work out for everybody else.So just a couple reactions here.Thatcher privatized water agencies in the UK.Somebody should check across the pond how their privatization of rail, water, airports went.Did not go well.As I pointed out, is there one example where privatizing a public asset has turned out to be beneficial for Canadians as a whole?

Petro Canada, Air Canada, Highway 47, Hydro One, all I see are regrets.You can look into each of these.All mistakes.This is from Yahoo Finance here from April 2019.Worst deal ever.The 407 is worth $30 billion today.

I'm not sure where it's at now, but it's definitely more.Ontario sold it for $3 .1 billion in 1999.Not to mention, in case you don't know, this is a toll highway.Removing that revenue source as well.CBC here from a piece in 2017.How privatized power haunts Ontario politics.

Many voters blame high electricity bills on privatizing Hydro One, which could spell disaster for liberals.And they did end up losing that.provincial election to Doug Ford, which is so insane because Doug Ford's for even more privatization.But people just have this binary thinking when it comes to politics.Well, this didn't work out, so let's go with this.Even though liberals and conservatives are the exact same on this issue of privatization, they went with the guy who's even more pro -privatization.

But again, the failure of selling off Hydro One didn't work out for people.And go down the list.Again, please in the comments, find me an example.Please share.Go read the comments.Anyone that doubts me, go check the comments and see if anyone brought up an example where privatizing a public asset worked out for the most amount of people.

You will not find one because it does not exist.Here's Avi Lewis speaking to the perspective that Mark Carney brings and why it is so out of touch.

Why not?Labor economists are really important for understanding things that bank economists don't see.

But they shifted it out to the private sector forecast because people would accuse governments of fudging the numbers and playing funny, so they are relying on a neutral party as a base.

If you want to get a neutral society, a neutral party that represents the scope of society, then you should see workers, movements, trade unions, and other organizations represented there, and not just banks, who have an interest in the way that these budgets get written, in the forecast that That is the heart of the issue with Mark Carney.

It's not that he is uneducated or stupid or whatever Pierre Paglia was trying to claim now.It's his perspective.It's Mark Carney's perspective, which is that of bankers and private interest.This is who he is, who he's always been as the former governor of the Bank of Canada, former Bank of England governor.This is a certain perspective that he has.And maybe you believe that private interests have the interests of the vast majority of people in mind.

I don't believe that.I think we have seen that is not the case.So I have very little faith that Mark Carney's version of neoliberalism is going to work out when the past four decades of it haven't.Maybe I'm wrong.Let me know your thoughts below.If you enjoyed this video please hit like and subscribe and check out some of the other videos I have on this channel.