Tamara Ugolini argues Canada’s 2023 wildfires—displacing hundreds of thousands and costing billions—were exploited by Trudeau’s carbon tax and Bill C-18, which she claims silenced news during crises while burdening Canadians with rising costs. Lawyer Hatim Kier reveals the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear Ontario churches’ appeal against COVID lockdowns, despite expert testimony on outdoor safety and inconsistent enforcement favoring secular gatherings over religious ones. With constitutional protections weakened and polarization deepening post-pandemic, Ugolini warns Trudeau’s policies risk eroding democracy under the guise of climate urgency and public health. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, Canada is on fire, both literally and figuratively, and our dictator-adjacent prime minister is becoming more and more of a political liability.
It's Tuesday, August the 22nd, and I'm Tamara Ugolini, guest hosting for you for the Ezra Levant Show.
Shame on you, you censorious bug.
Wildfires ravage the west coast of Canada as hundreds of thousands of Canadians are displaced from their homes and told to evacuate.
A similar tragedy happened in Kelowna, British Columbia in 2003, where roughly 25,000 hectares of land was ravaged.
In May of 2016, fire engulfed Fort McMurray in northern Alberta, with nearly 600,000 hectares of land burned over the course of almost a month.
It was the most expensive natural disaster in Canadian history.
And that's not to downplay the tragedy that wildfires cause hundreds of thousands of displaced Canadians.
But if we fast track to today in 2023, the Liberal government, coupled with far-left eco-radicals, would have you believe that this is the result of the climate crisis, the latest emergency that we should all be afraid, very afraid of, and prepared to acquiesce to.
Behold, the climate emergency.
It's a mode of wording that's used intentionally to ensure that you take the issue seriously.
And that seriousness means that the government must force you to act quickly.
In demanding this action, which thanks to the Justin Trudeau liberals, it means that we must all pay excessive taxes to ensure that the once hidden social costs of carbon emissions become front and center through the carbon tax, creating a ripple effect that acts as a deterrent and a barrier to doing, well, just about anything, including eating and heating your home.
See, the luxury of simply being able to afford to put gas in your car to get to and from work or heat your home with reliable fossil fuels, or of course, afford the very groceries that are needed to,
or of course, afford groceries that need to be transported across our vast country for stocking is becoming out of reach for Canadians who emphasize how unbearable the cost of living and the crisis has become in recent years with viral TikToks and other short clips posted on various social media platforms.
They depict the breadth of disparity felt by those just starting out to those who need to feed and clothe their children.
And of course, seniors are not exempt from this tax either.
The accounts are heartbreaking.
So I live in Ontario and I need someone to tell me the pros and cons of living in America because at this point, Canada just ain't it.
It's just like not it anymore.
Like the cost of living, it's just, it's too much.
The wages are staying the same.
I can't afford to move out.
I'm 24 and I'm embarrassed that I can't move out.
I can't.
So what am I supposed to do?
Where am I supposed to go?
What are the pros and cons of living in America?
And everyone's like, oh, Canada's so great, this and that.
It's not anymore.
Free health care?
You know how long it takes to see a mental health professional in Canada?
A year.
Dermatologists?
A year.
I might as well pay for private health care.
The wait list is so long.
Like, you don't even get the adequate help that you need.
So, where do we go at this point?
Where are we supposed to live?
Where can I live in a place where I'm able to enjoy my life as well?
Because I'm not enjoying it here.
I feel so utterly stuck.
I don't know what to do anymore.
You go to school, you get a degree, and you're still not guaranteed a job.
$60K a year?
That used to be like a decent amount of money, not anymore.
So, where do we go?
What are the pros and cons of living in America?
Because I need to get out of here.
As Trudeau's policies metaphorically burn Canadians, causing grotesque fallout and devastation in their midst, the one that becomes a clear example of catastrophe is none other than Bill C-18, otherwise known as the Online News Act, which is legislation that has caused social media giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, to block a wide range of news links on their platforms.
It effectively ceases Canadians' ability to access any and all news on their platforms.
The Liberals chose to ignore the key concerns around this piece of heavy-handed legislation, like that raised by Google, which includes an extremely broad definition of eligible news businesses, an unprecedented influence of the news by the regulators responsible for enforcing this act, which is the Canadian Radio, Television, and Telecommunications Corporation, i.e., the CRTC.
And Google even went so far as to say that this act would break Google search for everyone, not just Canadians.
They say that the link tax would fundamentally break the way search and the internet as a whole have always worked.
Internet oligarch Google was keen on working with the government to get this legislation right, but instead, the Liberals repeatedly cut off debate in order to ram through Bill C-18 before the summer break.
And while it hasn't been officially enacted yet, it will be any day.
Instead of repealing this piece of legislation that was condemned as arbitrary and ambiguously worded, Trudeau shifted blame when he was questioned recently about the inability of Canadians in fire-engulfed regions to access timely and accurate news about the rapidly evolving situation.
Local news is so important, and the work that people are doing to share messages and keep people informed with safe, up-to-date information is unbelievably essential to keeping Canadians safe.
That's why I'm going to make a comment on this.
It is so inconceivable that a company like Facebook is choosing to put corporate profits ahead of ensuring that local news organizations can get up-to-date information to Canadians and reach them, where Canadians spend a lot of their time online, on social media, on Facebook.
Facebook made billions of dollars in profits over the past years, including off of Canadians.
And we recently passed legislation that says, Facebook, if you're going to be sharing news or work done by Canadian journalists or local news, you have to make sure they're compensated for it fairly.
Well, instead of making sure that local journalists are fairly paid for keeping Canadians informed on things like wildfires, Facebook is blocking news from its sites.
In a larger picture, that's bad for democracy because democracy depends on people being able to trust high-quality journalism of all sorts of different perspectives and points of view.
But right now, in an emergency situation where up-to-date local information is more important than ever, Facebook's putting corporate profits ahead of people's safety, ahead of supporting quality local journalism.
This is not the time for that.
This is the time for Canadians to continue to pull together and be there for each other.
It's time for us to expect more from corporations like Facebook that are making billions of dollars off of Canadians.
The ability of Trudeau to remain out of touch to his own failures is pretty amazing, isn't it?
Canadians and the public both deserve and need access to credible news.
The government's attempt to mandate payment from social media platforms that enable this access actually contradicts basic freedoms and hinders freedom of the press by way of media communications.
As it becomes increasingly apparent that the head of the Liberal Party of Canada displays repeated leadership and aptitude, Canadians watch painstakingly in embarrassment at Trudeau's two-faced responses, which came to light most recently when he was questioned about becoming more of a political liability than a capable leader.
And just, this is unrelated, but this past weekend, I was camping with my family, and there was a vehicle that was a part of our, it was our neighbours, basically, and it had a bumper sticker on it with your name and an expletive, which I had to explain to my children.
Given that you're trying to do something that has rarely been achieved in Canada, in history, a fourth mandate, have you considered the possibility that you have become a liability?
Ever since the pandemic, in particular, we've seen an increase in polarization and frustration and anxiety and mental health pressures on a whole lot of people right across the country.
Nobody has been unaffected by that.
And part of the challenge we have politically is that we are seeing deeper polarizations.
But don't write off Canadians just because they choose to wave a nasty flag.
Don't write off a neighbor who chooses to put a bumper sticker that unfortunately you then have to explain to your kids.
People are hurting out there.
And what we've seen every single time there's been an emergency or a challenge this summer is neighbours stepping up to help each other.
This is who Canadians are.
We are a big, optimistic, diverse country with a diverse range of political views.
And it's one of our strengths.
Another one of our strengths is how we pull together when times are tough.
That's what we did during the pandemic.
That's what we do when we work together to invest in early childhood education.
That's what we do when we work with municipalities and provinces to build more housing.
That's what we do when we invest in our future all together.
Politics is never going to be a game of unanimous support.
It's about a whole bunch of thoughtful, good people coming together to try and figure out the best way forward.
And yes, there are people who are hurting, there are people who are lashing out, and we need to be there to reassure them that they're going to be able to succeed, that their kids and their communities are going to be able to succeed, even though the world is changing in very scary ways.
So I'm not giving up on anyone.
I'm going to continue working hard every day to build that future that we all know Canada can have.
We are the best country in the world.
Let's keep making it better.
A mere two years ago, Trudeau was the king of segregation and discrimination, campaigning in the 2021 snap election on the wedge issue of COVID vaccination status, attempting to normalize medical apartheid for a two-tiered society based on one's personal medical choices.
Remember this.
If you don't want to get vaccinated, that's your choice.
But don't think you can get on a plane or a train beside vaccinated people.
And now is the time for people who are still resistant to getting vaccinated to realize that that choice, which has consequences on putting our kids at risk,
which has consequences at having us risk more lockdowns because they haven't chosen to get vaccinated yet, that there will be consequences for those people in not being able to go to a gym or a restaurant, not being able to go to a movie theater, not being able to get on a train or a plane.
I want to stand up for the choice of those who are there for their neighbors, not those who are risking us all going into further lockdowns of slowing our economic recovery.
Trying to bring people together is not always compatible with science, with respect for human rights, with the best way to move things forward.
I mean, when Aaron O'Toole talks about, oh, yes, we need to unite people, we need to bring people together, he's talking about defending the rights of people who are anti-vax.
That's why we've been unequivocal.
If you want to get on a plane or a train in the coming months, you're going to have to be fully vaccinated so families with their kids don't have to worry that someone is going to put them in danger in the seat next to them or across the aisle.
Now, as Canadians grapple with the destruction of the country that they once knew and loved, chief segregationist thinks it's all sunny ways.
Budgets will balance themselves, don't you know?
But Canadians are feeling and reeling from the effects of a blissfully unaware prime minister.
They're becoming increasingly aware of the socioeconomic and political landscape within the country, and it's hitting them where it hurts, their pocketbooks, in a way that no longer can be evaded or brushed off.
As Canada burns, we need cooler heads to prevail.
Don't go away.
We have a special guest up next.
Supreme Court Denial00:12:41
Now, the guest for today's show is lawyer Hatim Kier from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms to discuss a recent Supreme Court of Canada decision to not hear an appeal on behalf of Ontario churches, pastors.
and elders that tried to challenge charter-infringing lockdown measures, namely indoor and outdoor gathering restrictions in places of worship.
You see, freedom of religion was a once constitutionally protected ground, but not for the Church of God in Aylmer or the Trinity Bible Chapel in Waterloo, who both faced hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of fines for simply upholding their right to worship during a devastatingly challenging time in 2020 and 2021, where people needed their community more than ever before.
While Canada's highest court did not hear this particular appeal, there are similar challenges coming out of Manitoba and Saskatchewan, where it is hoped that national importance can be established so that the appeals can be heard on their constitutionally overstepping merits.
Mr. Keir, thank you so much for joining me to discuss this case.
Now, if we could just quickly sort of flash back to the hysteria that engulfed society in 2020 with pandemic lockdown measures and of course mandates and the gathering restrictions, can you walk us through exactly what these churches, pastors, and elders were accused of being in violation of?
Well, if people remember, there were the waves of COVID and the lockdowns followed that.
And so when this all initially happened back in March of 2020, both of our clients' churches complied.
But then when winter came around and another round of lockdowns began, which were particularly strict and the province went into a shutdown phase, both churches decided that they couldn't in good conscience close their doors to their parishioners.
And so they continued to hold services.
The Aylmer Church of God started holding outdoor services eventually.
And the Trinity Bible Chapel was holding indoor services, but notably they had under normal circumstances, a capacity of 900 people in their hall.
And at times, they were limited to having 10 people indoors.
So they went ahead with holding services.
They received police attention as a result of that.
Charges were laid.
Fines were made against them.
At one point, Trinity Bible Chapel's locks were changed on them.
So they were locked out of their own church.
And then as a result, both churches brought a challenge to the lockdown provisions and their matters were joined and heard together.
And now here in the Ontario court, so kind of that middle ground of courts, Justice Pomerance denied the church's challenge and upheld what is being called violations of freedom of conscience and freedom of religion.
What merits was this being appealed on to Canada's highest court?
I'm reading that there was improper assessment, misapplication of the legal test.
I think that's in regards to the demonstrable justification of these measures, et cetera, et cetera.
Can you elaborate a little bit there on where justice may have gone wrong?
Well, your viewers may or may not know, but when someone challenges the government for infringing their rights, first you have to show that the right was infringed, and then the government has to justify the infringement.
And so we had arguments at both steps.
So in terms of the rights being infringed, something that Justice Pomerance did is she looked at the infringement to the freedom of religion and she found that there was one.
But then she decided that the other infringements to freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly, freedom of association, all of those could be quote, subsumed under the heading of freedom of religion.
And so our argument was that doing that failed to properly capture the infringement that happened to our clients' rights, especially peaceful assembly.
These were gathering restrictions.
And to assemble, it's a synonym, basically.
It means to gather together, to assemble together, and this is what their religious beliefs ask of them.
And so, when we get to that next stage and looking at whether or not the government has justified what they've done, the court doesn't get a full picture, we argued, if they're essentially just sweeping those other rights under the heading of religion alone.
And then, with respect to the justification that the government provided, what was interesting in this case is it wasn't just our experts disagreeing with the government's experts.
One of the government's own experts, an expert in infectious disease, actually agreed with us that outdoor gatherings are basically safe and they're not justified from a public health perspective because it would be better to give people opportunities to gather outside so that they don't gather inside.
So, despite that, the court found that the government had experts that were able to speak to reasons for why they did what they did.
And in the word of Justice Pomerance, she was not going to be an armchair epidemiologist.
And so, she decided that because the government was able to show the advice that they were leaning on, she had to defer to that.
And so she found that the infringements were justified.
We appealed that up to the Court of Appeal.
Ultimately, they agreed with the lower court.
And so we took these two issues or tried to take them up to the Supreme Court.
And they have since refused to hear the arguments of these merits.
At the end of the day, what kind of implication does that have on constitutional freedoms like freedom of religion, freedom to assemble, to gather moving forward in Canada?
Well, because the Supreme Court, as you can imagine, receives many thousands of requests to hear appeals, there's a first stage where you have to seek leave to appeal.
And so the court refused that.
They don't give reasons for that.
And so it just sort of puts an end to this matter.
Essentially, what the Court of Appeal said is the final word here in Ontario.
The same day, the Court of Appeal denied leave to appeal coming out of BC from a very similar challenge, churches facing lockdowns.
And so in both cases, the Court of Appeals decisions become the last word.
So in terms of our constitutional rights, we're left with the findings of the Court of Appeal affirming Justice Pomerance's decision, which worrisomely may have the effect of eroding some of these strong protections that we're supposed to have in our constitutional analysis.
So for example, the charter says that infringements have to be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.
And early on, you know, if we're going back to the very first court cases looking at this in the 80s and 90s, the court took a very strong stance and emphasized that word demonstrable, that the government has to lead evidence to show why what they did was necessary and why it infringed rights as little as possible.
But what we have coming out of this is that the government's own evidence seemed to undermine their reasons for doing this.
And really the only standard that they were held to is that they had to show some experts that were able to provide an opinion supporting what the government did.
Is there a concern here that the lines and the separation between state and government and the legislative assembly, the legal realm are being blurred and that there needs to be more concrete separation between these levels of governance?
I don't think from this case, I wouldn't go so far as to say that there was a blurring between these institutions.
From our perspective, there was a failure of the one to hold the other accountable.
What we were obviously hoping for is that the courts, as guardians of the Constitution, which even their own decisions have described themselves as, that they would put some scrutiny to the way that the government acted and really interrogate the measures that the government took.
So, for example, going back to the example of Trinity Bible Chapel, it has a 900-person capacity in their hall.
They were limited to 10 people at times.
And there were points in the lockdowns where they were limited to 10, but things like retail stores were able to have, for example, a 15% capacity.
Well, 15% of 900 is 135.
And so there was a real absence of any sort of scrutiny as to why the government took such a strict approach to a constitutionally protected activity, gathering at a church, versus something that isn't constitutionally protected, like going to the gym or going to the store, as important as those may be.
It really highlights a lack of cohesivity of the rules and regulations and how arbitrarily they were enforced or how arbitrarily the regulations came into effect, because as you know, that just doesn't make sense from a logical perspective on how you could come up with one number for religious worship gathering and one number for people heading into Costco.
How can Canadians, how does this change?
How can this be counteracted to prevent it in the future if the highest, most Supreme Court of Canada won't even hear it?
Just to go to the first part of your point there, one of the most shocking examples for me, looking through the regulations in detail, was that, as your viewers may remember, there was a point where someone horrifically attacked a family with a van in London, Ontario, and the regulation specifically created an exemption for a vigil to be held for that event.
And I'm not criticizing holding the vigil, but there's a real absurdity in the fact that they could create a singled out exception for this one event when much smaller groups wanted to just gather in churches.
In terms of what's next, there is perhaps some solace in the fact that the Supreme Court didn't hear this and strike it down.
They just haven't heard it.
So we're left with the Court of Appeals decisions.
And so, you know, hopefully we don't have to deal with this again.
But if similar things do happen in the future, there is an opportunity to still take it to Canada's highest court and try to obtain a ruling that defends our constitutional rights and really puts the government to task in terms of justifying measures that they take that infringe those rights.
And just on that note, because, you know, for lack of a better word, conspiracies abound that this will happen again.
Does something like this allow for a fast tracking into the Supreme Court?
I know you have to go through all these lower courts.
Traditionally, you have to go through all these lower courts first before you can get there.
Would something, would another infringement similar to this allow for an expediency of a case like this if it were to be brought forward again?
No, unfortunately not.
It still would have to take that slow climb up the ladder of courts to get to the Supreme Court.
There are provisions that allow for a direct appeal to the Supreme Court, but they're really limited to a sort of extreme example that someone is going to face some sort of an extreme consequence and has to get to the Supreme Court very quickly.
So, yeah, you know, You hear it in the news, you hear stirrings that similar lockdowns might happen in the future.
Hopefully, they don't, but if we do get to that point, then challenges will just have to be brought and work their way up through the system as well.
Well, thank you so much for joining me, and I look forward to hearing more work out of the JCCF that will come down the pipe in the future.
Lockdowns and Legal Challenges00:04:11
Thank you for having me.
Letters to Ezra are next.
And all of these are in relation to the rebel team's recent investigation on the ground reporting in Lahaina.
the small Hawaiian is the small Hawaiian island of Maui, where we sent a team of three rebels, including rebel commander Ezra Levant, and of course, video journalist Lincoln Jay and our Quebec correspondent, Alexa Lavoie, to determine and decipher what was fact and what was fiction.
So, if you want to find out more, you can go to thetruthaboutmaui.com.
And here we have some comments from some of our rebel viewers.
And Bizet, I hope I pronounced that correctly, says, never donate to big institutions.
They eat over 90% of whatever you donate.
Try to give it as directly as possible to who needs it.
Now, of course, this is, I believe, a direct comment to our original fundraising efforts for the Red Cross to deliver relief efforts to the people affected by these wildfires, devastating wildfires.
However, once we heard the concerns of our viewers, once we landed on the ground and discovered the localized community-based efforts being exercised by the people on the ground there, we switched gears and opted to instead throw to donation efforts of the people of Lahaina directly, their community-based relief funds.
We also started a GoFundMe campaign specifically for community members who needed some targeted outreach support.
And so I'm happy to report that we did reach that goal.
And I think even went above and beyond the final crowdfunding efforts to help assist people in those relief efforts and to rebuild the community that has been absolutely ravished by devastating wildfires.
Nidas Maximus says they used the excuse that people would run to the fire.
Sirens could have had an intermittent platter to identify threat very similar to fire, ambulance, and police.
That's a BS excuse.
The water guy should be dragged into a cell and locked up.
He was responsible for a percentage of death.
They need to be accountable.
Absolutely.
Accountability is paramount here.
It's number one.
And I too believe that it is a bit of a wishy-washy excuse.
And one of the interviewees that we have featured in the Maui reports actually stated herself that it was very clear if the siren started to go off and you went to seek refuge of the mountains because the alerts were specific to tsunamis.
So that would have traditionally been what would have happened if the sirens started going off and the alerts were issued.
People would go uphill into the mountains, but you would clearly see that the hills are being ravaged by wildfires.
And so why would you run up into the hills to be engulfed by flames?
It just doesn't make any sense.
People aren't that ignorant to continue to run into a wildfire while the sirens are blaring.
I think it would have become pretty evident very early on in the, if the sirens were released and they were sounded, that another opting for another direction would be key to survival.
Don't think that would have been difficult to decipher and understand.
The next comment comes from Nick Kata.
The really good thing was President Biden visited Hawaii.
God bless him.
To that, I say, I suppose better late than never.
That's been a wrap here on the Ezra Levant show.
And another Rebel will see you same time and place tomorrow night.