Nuanced.
Where real conversations happen — with host Aaron Pete.
Nuanced.
252. Robert Fife: Why Great Journalists Must Cause Trouble
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Globe and Mail journalist Robert Fife joins to discuss media bias, Pierre Poilievre, Mark Carney, political journalism, CBC anonymity, foreign interference, media subsidies, residential-school reporting, and nearly 50 years of holding Canada’s most powerful people accountable with host Aaron Pete.
You've spent nearly 50 years, as you just described, telling Canadians things that powerful people often did not want them to know. Where did that instinct come from, from you?
SPEAKER_01The people who are in power, whether they were corporations or uh politicians, need to be held accountable um to the public. No democracy can survive without a free press. And some and a free press is is going to cause trouble. That's what we do.
SPEAKER_00You may have seen that story about the CBC where they had reported uh some of the liberal caucus members being frustrated with the direction Mark Carney and his cabinet were moving in regards to fossil fuels and looking at a new pipeline. The CBC allowed them to stay anonymous. What was your reaction to that?
SPEAKER_01If they don't have the balls to put their uh to put their names out publicly, then I wouldn't have written the story. Or I would have, what I would have written it, I would have written it already. I would have gotten a hold of the story of the letter somehow, and I would have said who the MPs were.
SPEAKER_00I mean, what cowards they are. I've looked at the coverage of Pierre Polyev, and I find that he gets a lot more scrutiny than I feel like I see on the Prime Minister currently.
SPEAKER_01You may be right in the sense that there's an unfair bias towards against the Conservatives in Ottawa. I think that's probably true, and it's always been the case, um, uh generally speaking.
SPEAKER_00How would you like Canadians to remember the work that you've done? Robert Fife, thank you so much for joining us. I am so honored to be able to speak with you today. Would you mind first briefly introducing yourself for people who might not be acquainted with your long, impactful career?
SPEAKER_01Okay, my name is uh my byline is Robert Fife, but everybody calls me Bob. Uh I'm um I've been uh covering national politics for 48 years. I started uh news radio, which is now defunct. I went on to United Press, which is now defunct, then Canadian Press, and I was the Bureau Chief at the uh Sun Media, and the Bureau then went on to be the Bureau Chief of National Post and its uh affiliate newspapers, and then spent uh a decade as Bureau Chief at CTV News, and uh the last 10 years at as a bureau chief of global mail, and I've just stepped down as a bureau chief, although I'm on a retainer in September, where I hope to spend time mentoring young, younger globe and mail journalists and writing hopefully the odd scoop.
SPEAKER_00Fantastic. You've spent nearly 50 years, as you just described, telling Canadians things that powerful people often did not want them to know. Where did that instinct come from, from you?
SPEAKER_01Well, I come, I was raised in a small northern Ontario town called Shaploe. Uh it's between um it's near Timmins, uh, but it's on the main line of the CPR between Sudbury and Thunder Bay. It's a small town. Uh, when I was growing up, it's a it was about 3,000. It's now uh less than that. Uh all these communities are are uh shrinking in size. Um and uh I just my view has always been that um the people in these small communities, like most Canadians, work very hard, they pay their taxes, and they're very honest people. And um uh I find it uh it's in my sense my journalism is all about um speaking for people who have no power um but who are honest and hardworking. And so I've always tried to um focus my uh journalism on accountability journalism. Uh the people who are in power, whether they were corporations or uh politicians, uh, need to be held accountable um to the public. And so that's the way I've always operated. Uh, I think that that is an important role in journalism. Powerful people have lots of lots of voices to support them. It's the ordinary people who don't. And so uh that's been uh uh really fundamental to my journalism. And um I I I I won't share I I I I believe and I've tried to um instill that into uh generations of younger journalists who I've mentored.
SPEAKER_00You've said that growing up in that small town helped develop your moral compass. What experiences there shaped that for you? What what gave you that kind of mindset?
SPEAKER_01Well, I'll give you two two good examples. Um uh there were three reservations in Chapel. Um, and uh two of the reservations um the people were um um doing not too badly, but the major uh reservation um uh there was a lot of racism and in that town. Uh and I went to school with uh kids um from the main reserve um uh who never ended up finishing um public school. Uh and their communities were devastated by alcoholism, uh unemployment. Um, and this uh I'll give you an example of of how the Indian Affairs Department and Canadian government um wrecked these people's lives. They lived uh for the longest period of time, probably forever, uh on Big Missanabe Lake. It was a big, big lake uh north of our uh Shaplo. And this is where they were able to hunt and fish and sustain themselves because there was a lot of uh wildlife and lots of beaver and otter and mink and all the sort of things that they could sustain their livelihoods. And the Indian Affairs, I think back in 1948, moved that community about 40 miles from Shaploe um into uh uh on a reservation with a very small lake. So they couldn't they couldn't sustain themselves and they didn't offer them any employment. And the kids had to take a bus ride on a dirt road 40 miles there and back every day. Well, that community, which was thriving at one time, um was just devastated by uh over the years by the by the uh by the fact that they had no livelihood, their way of life had been ruined, and the kids, um their parents ended up um you know becoming alcoholics, uh, and uh the whole community was ruined. And many of these uh young kids that I went to school with, and I knew fairly well, also had their lives destroyed. And uh on top of that, um, the community itself, there was a lot of racism, particularly among the police, uh towards um uh that particular community. I think they're a lot better now. They moved them, they moved, they moved closer into town, about seven miles from the town. And over the last uh decade or so, they they now own their own lumber trucks and they're they I mean the community is is um I think thri thriving now, although I think the opioid crisis is hitting a lot of uh communities, uh indigenous uh communities, but also everywhere, as you as you know. So that was something that always struck me as something that was completely unfair. And um uh and uh uh the other factor is that there was a large also French-Canadian population who um who were worked in the work in the lumber mills. And uh the people who owned the lumber mills lived above less like a mark, Karl Marx, uh uh of a Karl Marx uh or uh Frederick Engel's uh book. They lived above on a hill above the the the basically the shacks that the the people worked in in the lumber mills. They weren't really paid that very very much, but they the rich people who owned the lumber mills lived way above them in these big man, big and beautiful homes. I wouldn't say they're mansions, but for Shaplo, they were mansions. You know, they owned airplanes, they had the best trucks, the best cars, and all that sort of stuff. So um uh that to me, uh the injustice of uh of there was a Shapelow was a microcosm of the larger society. And those two uh those two um the the the treatment of indigenous people, the treatment of of uh the French-Canadian uh workers, or something that really bothered me a lot as a kid. I was like uh watching that. Uh um and I think uh I think that's had an impact in um in in my journalism. Um I can't, I can't, I can't, it's I guess it's hard to describe, but it's something that's embedded in your soul, if you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. No, thank you for sharing that. You didn't attend journalism school and have described journalism as a trade learned through experience. What did working reporters teach you that you don't think could have been learned in a school?
SPEAKER_01Well, first of all, I I don't have any um I don't have any animosity towards schools. In fact, the um the the younger journalists that are are coming out of schools, I'm pretty impressed with. So that's not the issue. Uh uh But um I also don't think you need to be go to uh journalism school to be a good reporter. Uh you know, you can you you can um have a you can be in economics or arts or engineering or or be a plumber, frankly. Um you just have to uh uh you you learn the writing on the job as you would as a as a skill trade. And it's just your ability to be able to listen and to see um um stories that need to be told. And you don't have to be trained to do that. Um you're probably everybody's doing that every day of their lives, looking around and saying, well, you know, that's a story that needs to be told. So um I'm not against journalism schools, but I'm also uh I'm also a strong believer in um people can anybody can be a really good journalist if they're curious, they listen, and they ask questions.
SPEAKER_00Gerald McNeil taught you not to become a steronographer for government, and he also encouraged you to study gossip columns to understand the personal relationships behind political power. How much of covering Ottawa is understanding policy, and how much of it from your perspective is understanding the people and the relationships behind it?
SPEAKER_01Well, um just give you a little example, but Jerry McNeil is long gone. Um, he uh was a really great mentor to me because he, you know, he said, don't pay attention to the lies and bullshit. You got to cut through that. And um, and he was absolutely right. Uh Jerry uh took um uh the government to court over Last Tango and Paris and censorship, and he changed the censorship laws in this country. He wrote a book about the prison system called Cruel and Unusual Punishment, the way our prison system had treated uh prisoners. And um, so he had a huge influence on me in in be uh in looking at um uh uh looking at uh uh how you can help um people who have no voice and and not to be um uh not to think you're important because you're invited to a uh a cocktail party uh with the Athens on the Rito crowd. Um, you know, uh I'll give you an ex good example. I've never had a journalist in my house, or sorry, I of course have lots of journalists, I never had a politician in my house and never will, because I don't want them to think I'm gonna be their friends. I'm friendly with a lot of them, but I don't want them to come to my house and then I find out they've done something wrong and I and I write about it, and they say, Oh, please don't write about it because we're friends. You've invited me your house, don't do this. So you you really have to draw the line. And in Ottawa, you have to understand that uh these people are not your friends. You may like each other and get along very well, but they're using you too. And so you you just have to understand that's the world you're you're you're living in. Um so uh and Jerry, what Jerry did would say is read gossip columns um because they tell you who the powerful people are. Like I'm talking about like the social, like who's hanging out at which cocktail party or going to which event, because it shows you the intermingling of the powerful and the connections that are going on. So then you realize, oh, well, they just got a contract. They got a contract, and they I see they're they're they're buddies, they're going to uh games and they're and and you know they've been invited to this social or that social. And you start to see that when you start to see the connections, you can start to be a better reporter because if you know that people are getting contracts or getting favors because of that of their connections, uh, whereas you know somebody may somebody else may be bidding on a contract, but they don't have that relationship, but their bid might actually be better, but they're losing it because they're not friends with the cabinet minister, you know, that's not right. And that's the kind of stuff you you have to look for if you're a reporter to say, okay, um, why is this happening? Well, this is happening because they're friends. Uh a number of years ago, I did a story on during the Cretchen period. Uh the Irving family, as you know, are billionaires. Uh and they basically own uh New Brunswick along with the McCain family. They have a fishing camp uh in on the Mara Machine, which is um like it's like a resort. And federal cabinet ministers, including the industry minister, which was dealing with the Irvings all the time, and the defense minister, of course, they they build ships. All of these people were going to the Irving fish camp free. Like this is probably this would be a fortune to go there. Um, and they were going there and they were all keeping this secret. And I found out about it, I reported it. The Irvings went crazy. Uh the the government uh embarrassed all the senior ministers who were going, but they stopped it. Uh but you know, look at what the Irvings were getting out of that. They were had they were they were having contact with with uh powerful ministers who were gonna who had the po potential to direct hundreds of millions of dollars or perhaps billions of dollars to the Irving family. That is the kind of the story you need you know that connection, that's the kind of connection you you have to look at uh if you're going to do really good accountability journalism.
SPEAKER_00On that note, you may have seen that story about the CBC where they had reported uh some of the liberal caucus members being frustrated with the direction Mark Carney and his cabinet were moving in regards to uh fossil fuels and looking at a new pipeline and they wanted to come out, but the CBC allowed them to stay anonymous and not put their names forward. What was your reaction to that?
SPEAKER_01I I I I just shook my head. I mean, I just that's not right. Why would you allow them, if they've signed a letter, why would you allow them the anonymity? They don't if they don't have the balls to put their uh to put their names out publicly, then I wouldn't have written the story. Or I would have what I would have written it, I would have written it already. I would have gotten a hold of the story of the letter somehow, and I would have said who the MPs were. I mean, what cowards they are. Total cowards. You know, they don't like what uh Kearney's doing, and they write a letter, and then they they get the CBC to play along with it, but they don't they don't have uh the the courage um to put their names to it. I just think that's wrong. Uh I I would not have agreed to do that. And I I know for sure David Wamsey, who's the editor-in-chief of the Global Mail, would not have published that article without us naming who these people were. I mean, they are elected officials, for heaven's sakes.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And it speaks to that relationship of like they like those politicians are absolutely using you and going to keep that in mind in the future.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, look, I mean Ottawa is a place where you're gonna be used. Um and you have to that's why you have to be you have to you have to have a moral compass. You have to be able to look at yourself in the mirror every day and say, Am I okay with myself? Because if you if you if you're not happy with yourself, you gotta ask why. And if you're allowing yourself to be used by politicians for their benefit and not the benefit of the Canadians who you're really there to serve, um, then you have to maybe you're in the wrong business. But you know, there are a lot of journalists in Ottawa, unfortunately, who um think it's important to be um for their own self-esteem or whatever, their ego to be able to go uh to have um you know a cabinester call them or to be invited to uh um you know a dinner at uh somebody's home, uh, and then you get co-opted. And getting co-opted is not journalism.
SPEAKER_00No chance we could get a list of those individuals by chance.
SPEAKER_01Well, I don't I don't I don't want to get into uh well personality. Of course. They know who they are.
SPEAKER_00Michael Morris, who you knew in Shaplow, uh wrote that you were constantly peppering him with questions as a student. He also recalled that years later you used your UPI connections to get him assigned to cover a 1985 field burn near Shapeau connected to nuclear winter research. What did it mean to you to connect your hometown to an international Cold War story?
SPEAKER_01Well, my uh uh Michael Morris was my high school teacher, and he he um he was a journalist actually. Um he worked he uh worked in Saskatchewan uh for a long time and then came uh back to Shaplo and taught school. So I I re- uh he was a good writer and uh he uh you know told me all he was actually also the co coach of our hockey team um and ended up being the mayor of Shaplow. But he um he was very he told me all kinds of great journalism stories. So and and and he was uh also uh um a journalist who you know believed that you know we had to hold people to account. That's the important role of journalism. So yeah, I mean I think it felt great that I was able to do that for him. Um he uh he had big influence on on me um in terms of talking about politics and talking about history. And uh, you know, when you're in a small small town, I don't know whether what town you came from, but if you're in a small town, um, especially that's very isolated, you don't know what the world is like. And the only way you're gonna be able to learn what the world is like is talking to other people or reading uh books and histories and novels and whatnot so that you can get a sense of what the world is like outside uh your own hometown.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. Yes, I I come from Chilliwack. My First Nation community is open hope, British Columbia. So I I and I love corner gas and and how you kind of connect those small communities to the bigger world, and it is a microcosm that almost works a little bit better so you can kind of see the challenges that urban uh cities can face. You have said that the job of a journalist is to cause trouble while also warning that reporters shouldn't make things personal. I'm wondering from your perspective, what is the line between adversarial accountability journalism and performative, antagonistic kind of gotcha type journalism?
SPEAKER_01Well, I'll give you a couple of examples. Um, some of the stories that I'm particularly uh I look, I've had some major stories on SNC Lavlin, for example, and the Chinese foreign interference and cash for access for the for um um uh under the liberals. But some of the stories that uh that uh are are examples of accountability journalism. Uh when Afghanistan fell and the Taliban swept into Kabul, um, there were a lot of um we had an obligation to um uh Afghan translators and and fixtures who helped the Canadian military. Um and we we we were there was a lot of the immigration department was really screwing up and trying to help help these people. There was also another group, the guards at the Canadian Embassy um were not the Canadian government wasn't gonna help them. No, they they they risked their lives outside that embassy guarding it. I mean, the Taliban come, you know, there were a number of instances where they they were threatened, uh, and their lives were threatened. And so um my my I and my uh colleague Steve Chase did uh did a lot of work on um bringing these people's uh troubles to life so that we could get them out. And it and uh the government finally did. But it was a it was a tough slog of really constantly writing about it and having uh fortunately the gold also put those stories on the front. So it shamed the immigration department into helping to get these people out of Afghanistan. And and some of them it was too late for them to get out, but they were able to get um uh bribe people to get into Pakistan. And then the Canadian government did bring them back. But it was only because of that kind of journalism. Another example was the um there was a a number of years ago that there was what we were called the no-flying list kids. These were Muslim uh uh Canadian kids who had the similar name as somebody on on a or the same name as somebody on a no-fly list. So the families were showing up at airports with their two-year-old kid or eight-year-old kids, and they made had the same Muhammad, whatever name, and they weren't uh they wouldn't let them on the planes. And they're saying, look, that this kid's not a terrorist, he's two years old. What's going on here? And the government wouldn't change the the all it really needed was changes to the computer system so that these kids could get on these flights. And the government wouldn't do it because it was gonna cost too much money, and we kept writing about it, and the families then began a lobbying effort with MPs, and the MPs put pressure on the government. And I'm just gonna uh shut this off. Um sorry about that, that's one of my calls. Um anyway, um so uh it it ended up the government did uh spend seven, eight million dollars to fix that. But if we didn't do that, these kids would still not be able to get on on planes. That's the kind of power of of accountability journalism. Now I can roll and write a nice story about how some you know cabinet minister did something good for somebody. Well, that's wonderful. But there's a lot more harm being done if we to people and we can fix that. And that's what I want uh uh my journalism and other people's journalism to to do is to is to shine the light in dark corners and hopefully get change as a result of that.
SPEAKER_00I'd like to ask more of a personal question from my own experience. I recently interviewed Pierre Polyev, and as I was preparing for the interview, I was trying to figure out what was missing and what hadn't been done before, or how to bring uh a new take to it. And I had looked at and watched for a while a lot of journalists trying to gotcha Pierre Polyev. Um, and we can debate rightfully so. Rosemary Barton uh pushed him pretty hard and interrupted fairly regularly to try and disprove a point or challenge him. And then I juxtaposed Donna Friesen from Global News, her interview with Mark Carney and her interview with Pierre Polyev. And recognizing I have my own biases and flaws, I had ChatGPT run through both transcripts and it found that Donna Friesen treated Mark Carney like a statesman who was dealing with really tough files and that there were nuances to all the issues. And with Pierre Polyev, it was much more ChatGPT shared the feedback that it was much more about how he was a failure, how he fell short, what his shortcomings were, whether he was a good leader, whether he uh misunderstood his role. All of these like really harsh questions. And the overwhelming feedback I see from people is that there seems to be a lot of animosity from journalists to Pierre Paul Dev. And again, we can debate whether or not that's true, but I tried to just give him the space to lay out his vision. I haven't, I didn't hear a lot of questions about what he would do in his first 90 days as prime minister, how he would approach um the reconciliation file, like actually just trying to engage the issues. I didn't interrupt him a lot. I just gave him the space to speak. And a lot of people shared positive feedback. A lot of people said that uh I'm a shill for the conservatives by not challenging him more. And I'm just trying to think through how do you approach interviews like that, where there's a lot on the line. It's important to get things um on the record. But at the same time, personally, I've looked at the coverage of Pierre Polyev and I find that he gets a lot more scrutiny than I feel like I see on the prime minister currently. And that just surprises me. Do you see that? Or am I just living in an echo chamber filled with nonsense?
SPEAKER_01Uh no, I I think there's two, a couple of points to be made. First of all, um, Kearney's done uh uh a remarkable turnaround from the liberal government of uh Justin Trudeau. Uh if you look at what he's accomplished in uh uh over a year, it's pretty remarkable. Um he's uh you know got a deal with the pipeline uh for uh Alberta. We'll see whether that gets built. Uh he's we've got LNG um uh uh pipelines approved. Um we're we've got a $10 billion uh that's being put out so that First Nations can invest in um and benefit from resource development, not only in uh LNG and oil and gas, but also um in critical minerals. Um he's uh he's he's cut taxes. He's done, he's done a lot. He's he's traveled a lot. He's we spent uh he's put our our uh defense uh spending at 2% now, and is just we're in the process of buying uh actually really new and important uh submarines. So if you look at all the accomplishments that he's done over a short period of time, um it is pretty remarkable. Now the jury is still out, and we are going to, you know, the rubber hasn't hit the road with him yet, and I uh and I think when the money starts going out the door, uh and we'll see if uh if you know liberals start benefiting from this uh and whether there's any kind of corruption that comes from this. I don't think he personally is corrupt, but you know, people are human, it's human nature, right? Uh, if there's a lot of money going out the door and it's not watched carefully, uh there could be um boondoggles for sure, and and there may be um you know illegal activities on behalf of somebody. So we all have to pay attention to that. But you have to be objective, he's had a remarkable year, uh, for sure. And and when you you have to contrast that with with Pierre Pollier, this was a guy who uh was going to uh win in massive majority government until Trudeau left. And he blew it. He blew it. He got into he didn't reach out to uh Doug Ford, the anterior premier, which he should have done, uh, because he didn't think that Ford was right wing enough. He didn't reach out to Tim Houston, who was a very popular uh conservative, progressive conservative premier in Nova Scotia, again, because he didn't think he was right wing enough. Um he alienated and went after Jean Charret, who could have been a remarkably uh important uh um uh election person for him in the province of Quebec. Um so he cut that off. Um you know he he's he's done he so he lost the election campaign, he lost his own seat. And uh, you know, we thought maybe he was going to there were times where where it looks like he was going to um uh uh um show a different side of his person uh of his person but uh personality, uh a nicer side uh to build bridges with with uh um uh uh more center-right conservatives. And he hasn't done that. And he's um he's he's continued to show a very partisan, nasty side to him. And right now, what we're seeing being played out on social media is this what is now erupting into a war in the Conservative Party between those who are against him and to those who are for him. Just you know, two a week ago, he got up and uh in British Columbia uh and uh talking about the new uh BC conservative leader and said, I'm glad that you won because when you beat these um uh eastern Canada uh liberal lobbyists. Well, he was talking about the supporters of Carolyn Elliott, who is a really very strong conservative, who won who lost only by 60 votes. And but she was a BC liberal previously. She was a yeah, she was, but in the butt so was anybody in that party was a BC. The BC Liberal Party was was conservative and liberals, right?
SPEAKER_00I mean that's a mix of a mix of the two, but obviously people kind of like within within BC were aware of who leaned liberal and who leaned conservative.
SPEAKER_01Right. But miss nobody, there's no dispute that Miss Elliot is is a conservative. I mean, all of her all of her uh, if you listen to what she said in the campaign was pretty conserved pretty conservative views. Um and she was supported by people like Ben Woodenthan and other people, um, and Andy uh Anthony Koch, who work for uh Pure Polyev, and they're very strong conservatives. Anyway, all I'm just saying is that um when you lose an election campaign and your and your party begins to split, you're going to get a lot of attention on you. And uh and and he's not he hasn't shown he's not showing the ability to uh mend fences with uh Doug Ford and with other uh premiers, which he actually needs to do if he's going to uh win the country. And so um you may be right in the sense that there is an unfair bias towards against the conservatives in Ottawa. I think that's probably true, and it's always been the case, um uh generally speaking. But you cannot deny that what is going on right now is an internal war in the in the conservative party and that and Pure Poly is hanging by his fingernails, in my view. Um and Mark Carney's time is he will he will get much more critical coverage uh for sure. Um, but he's just been moving so fast on a whole range of areas that um uh you know he's he's getting he's getting the benefit of the doubt. Uh but I I think that will change over time.
SPEAKER_00I guess my perception, because I'm not anywhere near the Ottawa bubble, I'm way out in British Columbia, is that I can't tell very clearly if, and we'll move on from this after, but whether or not it's journalists trying to write his political obituary or whether or not he does actually have these problems. Because anyone in British Columbia watching David from Moose on the Loose or others know what the the difference between Caroline uh Elliott and Carolyn Findla was. One was a true blue conservative, and Caroline Elliott had said things in the past that were much more middle, uh left of center uh in certain quotes, and she was that was posted all on social media about her journey. And so that's more what he was speaking to. Corey Tanike and Doug Ford are broadly seen by, I think, everyday people to be either like Corey Tanike is a lobbyist who people have concerns about whether or not he is driven by his principles and values, or whether or not he's a lobbyist trying to accomplish things for clients and other things. And so there's this mistrust. And when I interviewed Pierre, he said there are these group of lobbyists who have always had a foothold in political parties. And I don't want it. I'm gonna say what I think is true, and I'm gonna fight those people. So to me, I view it much more as like a lobbyist versus politics being grounded in principles potentially, versus um like whether or not Pierre Polyev is hated by the base. I think the base likes him because a lot of people on social media like him.
SPEAKER_01I don't think he's hated by the base, but uh but he's he is uh first of all, you're you're right about lobbyists. I mean, uh all the parties have them, and you know, I try not to deal with lobbyists because they have their they're they've got their own uh um self-interest at at play here for sure. Um but uh the the fact of the matter is that Pierre is in trouble. Uh I mean I talk to conservative MPs, um, and you can see it being played out on social media where they're all fighting with with one another. And uh I don't know whether he's gonna make it till Christmas. Well I'm not some breaking news. Not that the party is going to, but uh, you know, the caucus because of the reform act, which they've signed on to, the party can can um can vote him out. And they don't I don't I don't see a uh um a success right now, but I I I could see that happening, and I could see them saying, okay, we're gonna have an interim leader and then we're gonna have a uh leadership race uh you know uh a couple of years from now and uh see if we can find somebody uh who can take on Mark Kearney, and maybe by that point uh the gold dust on his shoulders will have been blown off.
SPEAKER_00Wow. You built relationships not only with ministers and political staff, but with cleaners, guards, cafeteria workers on Parliament Hill. I'm I'm wondering uh how did those relationships develop and how did that inform your reporting?
SPEAKER_01Well, look, I'm from a small town, uh, and you know, everybody knows what you're doing. Um and so I have always operated in that I, you know, I talk to everybody. And as a journalist, that's the best way. I mean, I I'm no BS here. I mean, I, you know, I talk to the cleaning staff, I talk to the security guards, um, I I used to talk to the messengers and the uh even the one time there used to be an elevator operator in the House of Commons. They don't have that anymore. Um, but these people all have eyes and ears and they listen, and uh they will tell you. I mean, I during the Senate spending scandal, I can't tell you how many times guards would say, walk by me and whisper, um, the senator so-and-so is around the corner, he's trying to avoid you. He's down this hallway, you know. Um and or people would give me uh um, you know, documents or say, I've overheard this. Um, but that's the job of a journalist. You know, you gotta listen. That's the key thing. I've had I have some journalists uh who worked with me. One guy, um, I'm no no names mentioned, but he he always went out to to lunches with uh deputy ministers and assistant deputy ministers, um, you know, and I'd come back and I'd say, Well, would you would you learn? Well, he never learned anything because he never shut up uh because he was talking all the time. And, you know, you don't have to prove to somebody how smart you are, you just have to go and listen to them and ask them questions and get them to trust you. And it doesn't have to be, and and I, you know, um, like a lot of I'm at a different stage in my life, so uh, you know, cabinet ministers would would more or less talk, uh, call me back. But that's that's because I'm an been around a long time. But for young, for when I starting out in for the longest period of time, I didn't even bother with cabinet ministers. First of all, they're not gonna tell you anything. And if they do tell you anything, they're probably just gonna try to suck you into writing what they want. But if you talk to uh some members of their staff, they all want to feel they're important. They want to pass on information, and you learn stuff by talking to like legislative assistants who actually see all the documents that go to the minister. So those are the kind of ways you have to figure out how you can get information from people. Uh, who you can talk to and who might know this. You know, also you know, somebody just left as a chief of staff or just left as a legislative aid or communications director. Well, follow up with them, keep talking because they know they just they may not know six months from now what's going on, but they certainly know if they've stepped out the door a month a month ago, what the hell's been going on in that shop. So that's the way you have to figure out how can I get a story? Who's gonna give me the information? What do I want to learn? And then just work the phones, go and have lunch with people, try to get try to get the story. And that's the fun part.
SPEAKER_00The Globe's editorial board recently acknowledged that the media, including the Globe, failed journalistically in 2021 by initially reporting that the remains of 215 children had been found at Kamloops when ground penetrating radar had identified anomalies rather than human remains. Do you agree with that assessment?
SPEAKER_01Uh well, look, I don't know about that particular instance, but I I come with the community I came from, there was a little uh there uh I I should look out my window when I was a young boy, and there were then it was torn down. But there was a there was a residential school there. There had been two residential schools in Chapel. One had uh uh was burnt down and ended up, believe it or not, uh ended up being as the town dump. Uh and the second uh uh uh the second the the after they burned down, they built it near our house. So I could look out the window, I could see the residential school, but it it had gone by the time um I have I was growing up, but it was still the shell of the building was still there. And there used to be a um a little uh uh graveyard not far from that quite not that far, but a far enough away from um that school. And there were uh metal um uh graves markings with but with with paper and plastic over it, but all the names had sort of been gone. And I know it was an we knew it was we would call it an Indian graveyard uh when we were growing up. And I had no idea anything about that. I just thought, oh, well, I don't know what this Indian graveyard was about. And when the Truth and Reconciliation Commission um came down with this report, um, I was at CDV then covering it, and they uh there were these um um healing sessions that I went, we were able to go and cover. And um many of the people were speaking for the first time of what it was like about how the Indian agents and RCMP would come in, pick them right off the street, they never even say goodbye to their parents, sexual and uh abuse, uh violent abuse um uh in the hands of some it's in some of the schools. And it and then it it dawned on me that that graveyard was kids. These were kids who probably died of tuberculosis. They buried them, they never brought them the bodies back home, they just buried them near the school. So uh I think I don't know in this particular instance, but surely to goodness, some of these braves are there with kids because if there was an in my little community where there were uh these were kids, I think, from Mousini, um, who had been taken in into the Anglican uh residential schools. And so they're buried there. Um so there's no doubt in my mind that this is that that is that actually happened, and there were probably graves, for sure there has to be graves of of indigenous children um at that at that site. There I I I I So leaving all I don't know what the I'm not quiving with whatever the Gold editor is is saying, but for sure I believe that there are graves there.
SPEAKER_00As an indigenous person, I think there's a difference between respectfully listening to indigenous communities and it's suspending normal standards of verification. How do you think journalists should honor survivor testimony and indigenous knowledge while still independently testing the empirical claims being made?
SPEAKER_01Well, just do your job as a journalist, right? Um try to get the facts and stick with the facts and um you know but anybody who who's listened to uh these healing sessions, these are not people making they're not making up stories. This is some of these people uh there was a woman who was very, very shy, I could see a very, very shy person, and for the first time she spoke at that. And I'm telling you, I had tears in my eyes. Um, so um that that these people are not making this up uh at all. I mean, they these are lived experiences, and as journalists, you have to, you know when it's true and not true. Uh, but in terms of you know uh the rest of the stuff, you have to, you know, fact-check everything, uh, for sure. Um, you know, um but you you should you have to do that in any case. You can't sus suspend your belief, right?
SPEAKER_00How important from your perspective is it to speak to people you might really disagree with or not be aligned with? I've spoken with Francis Widowson about her perspective on the 215 and Cam loops, Tim Thielman, uh, who's argued that we shouldn't be doing any reconciliation at all, Nigel Bagar, who argues that there were benefits to colonization. And having these conversations has just helped me understand their perspective. How important is that from your perspective?
SPEAKER_01Well, first of all, bravo to you, because that's exactly what you're supposed to do as a journalist. You listen to all sides. Um, and I'm I'm the same as you, even though I may disagree with somebody, I I I listen to their viewpoints respectfully and I try to uh incorporate unless it's unless it's bigotry or racism and uh uh otherwise I I try to include their voices in uh my stories because that's our obligation to present all sides and let people make their own minds up. Um I can I can disagree with somebody um and still uh be quite friendly with them. I mean. People have different perspectives on a whole range of issues. And um I I just don't think you have to be a journalist to do it. I just think that as a human being, you should be respectful of everybody's opinions unless it unless it borders on bigotry or racism and uh or misogyny. And you know, I think you have to you have to draw the line and say, look, I don't agree with you on that because that's that's crossing the line.
SPEAKER_00Agreed. Couldn't agree more. Tara Henley argues in her upcoming book, The Trust Spiral, that media helped create its own credibility crisis by abandoning objectivity, becoming politically uh homogenous, and growing disconnected from working class audiences. Do you think her central critique is fair?
SPEAKER_01Well, I think it's much more complicated than that. Um, I think the problem in it has been that um uh print media has uh been in decline because uh the advertising dollars have gone to Facebook or other social media, and so you're we're losing our um local media, we're losing our national media. Um that's and and that's a big factor. There are there are fewer reporters. When I grew when I first came to Ottawa, uh there were uh 22 reporters at Canadian press. I think there's now six. And and everybody had a a beat, indigenous affairs, it's gonna be called Indian and Indian and Northern Affairs then. Um it uh you had consumer affairs, you had health reporters, you had uh beat reporters on defense and uh economic reporters and a whole everything was covered. Uh and the beat reporters are are very highly knowledgeable because they really cover their departments, like fisheries, for example, they actually knew everything. And now uh, I would say probably 80% of government is probably not even covered anymore because we don't we have so few bead reporters to be able to do that. So that's one factor that uh comes comes to play. The rise of social media where everybody um feels they're a reporter and and uh comments and everybody's um and that's a that's another big factor. And unfortunately, a lot of journalists feel that they can um they can use social, they can go out in social media and give their own opinions on issues, uh, which may be different from what they're trying to write. And I think news reporters should should not be doing that, uh, should not be allowed to do that. But that's that's going that's going on. And and you've also seen um, which is probably goes actually way back to the early times, but you're starting to, you know, you have Fox News, which only gives uh people a point of view from that particular point of view. You've got um, you know, MS, MBC, but now MS, which gives a left-wing uh type of view. Uh CNN is probably a little center left. Uh so you have these spheres where everybody can just comfortably go and get everything in, they can go to an echo chamber and hair everything back and forth. And um it's very there are very few um serious uh news organizations where you can go to and get um which with more or less balanced coverage. Uh I think the globe is pretty good at is pretty uh provides very balanced coverage on on balance, so does the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, more conservative in terms of its editorials, but really good, really good solid journalism. Um, you know, The Guardian will give you a left-wing perspective, but the the actual reporting is is quite good. So there are few, there, but there are fewer um uh news outlets that can provide really good balanced coverage. And I'm I'm hoping that over time, when uh because communities are going to want to be serviced by want to know what's going on in their community, uh, that young people, perhaps somebody like you, uh, will say, you know, I I can serve my community by doing an online version of what would be in a newspaper. Tell people what's going on in the locally, what's the cultural things going on, what's sports going on, what's happening at City Hall. Um, because we do need to be informed. And you're not going to get it from Reddit, and you're not going to get it from X, uh, and you're not going to get it from Instagram. Um, so uh all I challenge you is you're you're doing this right now, for example. You are in your own podcast, you're providing um news to your uh to people in that in your area. Uh I don't know how wide your your podcast is, but I'm sure I know I'm sure you're servicing uh a particular area of your of your uh uh British Columbia. Um so uh she's right in some senses, but I think she's she's oversimplifying it.
SPEAKER_00Okay. I'm wondering you you just commented on the globe being pretty middle-grounded. What do you think of the criticism that the globe and mail is more left-leaning and the national post is more right-leaning?
SPEAKER_01Well, the national post is more uh um right-leaning for sure. Um, I mean, it's it's a conservative newspaper and it supports the conservatives, and some of it, some of its um selections are uh for the front page are pretty clearly conservative. Uh the Globe is not a left-wing paper by any stretch of the imagination. It I mean, it's a business paper. Uh, you know, it's it's sent it's center right. Uh um you may have some colonists who are uh are on the left for sure, but the and the editorial page editor uh Pat uh Brathour is is is not a left winger, I can assure you that. But it's it's it's a it's basically a center center newspaper. Sometimes it leans a little to the right, sometimes a a little to the left.
SPEAKER_00You reportedly avoided voting federally for decades because you believed it helped preserve political objectivity. I'm doing the same thing. I haven't voted provincially or federally in quite a few years now, since I started interviewing politicians like the Premier of BC and Pierre Polyev. Do you think that that is the right direction for people who are reporting or trying to cover these types of issues?
SPEAKER_01Well, personally for me it is, and obviously for you feel the same way. Um, you know, look, a lot of people uh feel that it's their obligation as a citizen to vote, and I certainly don't begrudge that, but this is just a very personal thing for me that I don't want to feel like um um I'm biased in any way, even though of course I have my biases, uh everybody does. But it's just something that I feel is the right thing for me to do is not to vote um federally. I voted provincially, uh I voted municipal elections, but um I didn't I I've never voted federally, and I probably won't vote uh well on the next election campaign is if it's three or four years from now, I'll probably won't vote for the first time in 50 some years.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Critics argue that news organizations receiving federal journalism tax credits or payments created through the online news act may be perceived as financially dependent on the same government they are supposed to scrutinize. What safeguards do you think are necessary to support uh editorial independence or public confidence in that independence?
SPEAKER_01Well, I don't I don't think that uh any news organization should be accepting these kinds of um arrangements. Um I know the gold does on the lake on the labor stuff, but for my personal opinion is I don't think we should do that. But here's what I do think we should do. Um I think that um there should be uh tax incentives um that uh to people who subscribe to a Canadian publication or Canadian podcast. If it's Canadian and I subscribe to it, I should be able to get a tax break. And it doesn't matter what it is, as long as it's a Canadian um uh uh news uh source of some kind um and you subscribe to it, you should be able to get a tax break. Um and this this this doesn't uh this is gives you the freedom of choice. You can freely subscribe to whatever if you want to subscribe to rebel news, subscribe to rebel news or the Western Standard, that's fine, or the Toronto Star. There shouldn't be a litmus test of what is a news organization. If it's uh first of all, so I think that would be uh uh the best way of doing that. And secondly, I think there should also be uh tax incentives for advertisers. If they advertise in the Global Mail, if they advertise on your podcast, they should be able to get a tax break. They can't get a tax break for uh the New York Times or uh any or US um media at all or any kind of media, but if it's Canadian media, then they should be able to get a tax break. That to me would be a way to encourage uh um uh homegrown journalism. And it would also um give people the freedom of of choice. And by these by tax incentives like this, um the government can't go after you. They can't threaten to pull money or because they don't like what you're writing about. So to me, that's a simpler, cleaner system. I think we do need help. The news media in this country needs help, but um I think that's that's a bet better solution than you know government giving them money or depending on government grants or or whatever.
SPEAKER_00Agreed. Young journalists, as I'm sure you're aware, are entering the industry with fewer jobs, less mentorship, intense pressure to publish quickly, and constant demands to build a personal brand. What are the what are we at risk of losing uh from the journalism you were taught?
SPEAKER_01Well, uh look, um when Black Lives Matter um happened, um everybody realized that our newsrooms were not reflective of Canadian society. And I went to Philip Crawley, who was our publisher at the time. I said, Philip, I'd like to mentor two indigenous or sorry, two um racialized students every year. Uh and we'll so they can get jobs. Like there's no point going on out and hiring somebody and having them fail. They've got to learn. So he uh he agreed, and we've we're now the program has been in its fifth year and it's been renewed for another five years. The 10 students that um we've mentored, and and by by mentor it, I mean you have to write. You have to write so that we can get you, you get bylines so you can get jobs. And all these kids have gotten jobs. I've been pretty impressed with them. They they could, you know, there's no there's not the future is pretty grim, uh, you know, in in this business of ours right now. But and these are smart kids who could go and become lawyers or scientists or computer specialists or whatnot, but they want to be journalists. And my view of them is they they're they're not what the way you're describing it. They actually care and they want to learn and they want to do good journalism that's gonna make a difference in people's lives. So I'm not uh I'm not pessimistic about that. There are some people who are in for the ego and want to be uh uh social influencers, but I will tell you that the the people, at least I've mentored, are not like that. And I'm much more optimistic about the future of journalism than a lot of people because I think that eventually um you're going to see communities in communities that have no um uh local media that there will be people who young entrepreneurs who will come in and will uh create uh online versions of newspapers and people will subscribe to it because they want to know what's going on in their community, and you know they'll I think they'll be successful. So I'm I I choose to be an optimist and not a pessimist.
SPEAKER_00Well, I'm glad to hear that. May I ask, which journalists working right now in Canada do you believe are cut from the same cloth as you, willing to develop sources, challenge power, and pursue difficult stories. For me, uh, it's Holly Doan from BlackLock's Reporter. But who stands out to you?
SPEAKER_01Well, she's Steve Chase, who is my writing colleague on a lot of the big stories. Um, I think that um Marika Walsh, um, who I hired is a real go-getter. She's a I always try to put some of the young reporters near her because she looks the phone like you can't imagine, and she has no political bias. She's just let's go. And no matter who you are, I'm I I'm gonna hold uh you uh to a higher standard. I'm gonna shine the light. Um, so I I'm I'm I think she's uh just uh an excellent reporter. Holly Doane is uh has do has done some good stuff too. Uh Holly is is by the way, around my I'm she'll be a little younger than me, but she's been at it for a long time. She used to be at CTB, uh, had been a China reporter. Um, and they're doing some good stuff because uh they they remind me of I.F. Stone's journalism. If Stone was a famous American journalist who did journalism only through documentation, and what she's doing is the same thing. She's they're only using access to information to get stories. And she just did a really good uh piece on the Farm Credit Corporation CEO spending ridiculous amounts of money uh on uh international travel and fancy dinners and whatnot. And frankly, I'm disappointed that nobody else has picked up that story because that should that woman uh should be fired. Um, she's clearly abusing taxpayers' money.
SPEAKER_00You have broken stories that have triggered resignations, investigations, and sparked national debates. When you look back, which stories are you the most proud of?
SPEAKER_01Well, I think that uh I think obviously the SNC Lavlin um story is really an important one. Um, and I'll tell you why. If they had gotten allowed been allowed to get away with that, uh powerful corporations would have simply said, you know what, we don't have we're being charred, we're we're facing charges of bribery or corruption. You know, we're just going to hire a couple of lobbyists and they're going to go to the prime minister's office, and the prime minister's office is going to tell the justice minister to drop the charges. I think about that. That's a that's a very dangerous precedent of what happened in a democracy. So um, to me, that that is a to me was one of my most important stories. I think our chin our coverage of the Chinese foreign interference in our democratic life is really important. It led to the establishment of a foreign agent registry, changes to the criminal code to outlaw foreign interference, changes to the CES Act to allow CES to be much more forthcoming in alerting municipalities and premiers and corporations of the extent of uh, say, Chinese or Indian foreign interference or whatever foreign interference that may be going on. Um my coverage when I was at CTB of the Senate uh spending scandal led to um significant changes in terms of transparency and uh financial controls over how senators spend our money. Those are um, you know, I think uh important stories. I already mentioned the uh I think the no-fly list kids, uh, which I think has been uh important change. Um, you know, we we were able through our coverage to stop Huaway from uh forcing the telecoms to pull out Huawei gear because it could use the to spy on on Canadians. We did we we found out that you know Canadian universities were sharing their uh RD with Chinese military institutions, which is mind-boggling, but they were. And um that led the government to ban uh universities from getting financial support if they were cooperating with Chinese military institutions, and it also led to uh uh banning Chinese and uh takeovers uh in uh certain sectors of economy, like AI or quantum, uh and and certain types of uh other high-tech uh stuff. So those are the kind of stories that I think uh uh have made a real difference in in have proved uh have made improvements for the good of our Canadian democracy.
SPEAKER_00Two more very quick questions for you. Thank you for being willing to share your time. Do you have any regrets, things you would have done differently looking back on them now?
SPEAKER_01Um well, yeah, yeah. I mean, there's uh there's if you have regrets about, you know, maybe I could have been more careful in stories that I've done. Um you know you know, daily journalism uh is fraught with um with uh it's easy to make mistakes. And um and those are the ones where you just wake up sometime in the middle of the night and say, Oh, damn, I should have written it this way. Um you know, um you can't you could you try to be as careful as you possibly can, but you do make mistakes. The key thing is to correct them. Um what I like about the globe is that yeah, if we make a mistake, you have to correct it. And you know, I don't like it when it happens, but it's it's it it yeah, you have to do it. You just have to make those because we're all human, right? We make burn infallible, we make mistakes.
SPEAKER_00As you retire, and I know you mentioned you're still gonna continue doing scoops and you're gonna be mentoring the next generation and still be involved, but as you retire, how would you like Canadians to remember the work that you've done?
SPEAKER_01Well, I just I want people to um and I want younger journalists to um to do accountability journalism, to hold the powerful corporations and politicians to and institutions to account. Um you know uh our democracies can't survive without a free press. No democracy can survive without a free press. And some and a free press is is going to cause trouble. That's what we do. Um, because the powerful don't don't like it when we expose the stupid mistakes that they make or misspending or uh or uh in some cases uh outright corruption. Um but it um it's absolutely necessary, and uh that's the only way that's the thing I I um I'm very proud of. I mean, I've never sold my soul to anybody. And I that's what I want journalists to be like. Don't sell your soul, look yourself in the mirror, make sure you have a moral compass, and try to do the best you can uh of speaking up for people who um have no voice.
SPEAKER_00Well, thank you for joining us today, and thank you for all the work that you've done. I think it gives Canadians a lot of hope. I think this conversation has provided a lot of hope because uh, as you know, there are a lot of fears about the powerful and the influence that they have and how they can um impact policies, impact communities, and with people like yourself willing to hold them accountable, question them, uh, at times at risk to yourself is an incredibly important role you play in our democracy and helping make sure that there's another another generation coming up. I am very grateful for. So thank you so much, Robert, for being willing to join us today.
SPEAKER_01Well, thank you very much, Aaron. Have a good day.
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