Don Mills - How Atlantic Canada Can Pay It’s Own Way

We sit down once again with Don Mills for a frank, energized conversation about a new private-sector panel tasked with one job: raise productivity and close the prosperity gap with the rest of Canada. No spin. No bureaucratic maze. Just a focused plan to turn our energy potential, resource base, and export channels into real incomes and real jobs.

We dig into the big levers. Energy sits at the core: offshore wind, onshore wind, tidal, hydro from Labrador, nuclear in New Brunswick, and proven natural gas reserves. Don argues we need a modern transmission grid, predictable approvals, and clear timelines to unlock billions in capital. He challenges myths vs facts around fracking and mining by pointing to decades of safe practice elsewhere, remediation bonds that return mine sites back to nature, and the productivity gains that large capital projects can deliver. The goal isn’t to bulldoze environmental standards—it’s to replace uncertainty with clarity so investors build here instead of passing us by.

We also talk about the economic engine already working in our favour: Halifax Stanfield. With direct international routes, belly freight for seafood exports, and a billion dollars in upgrades, the airport shows how strategic assets compound over time and shift us from “nice to visit” to “smart to invest.” From there, we zoom out to the fundamentals: right-sizing a decade of public headcount growth, aligning regional efforts instead of fighting in provincial silos, and pacing population growth to match services. The labour challenge is real, which is why Don makes a strong case for the trades—electricians, pipefitters, and technologists will be the scarce skills that make big projects possible.

Underneath it all is a cultural reset: move from saying no by default to asking how we can do it responsibly. Startups and newcomer founders are already there—thinking global, shipping products abroad, and raising the bar on ambition. If we build the grid, streamline approvals, and keep the conversation rooted in facts, Atlantic Canada can pay its own way, lower tax pressure, and fund more doctors and teachers without leaning on transfers.

If this vision resonates, share the episode, leave a review, and hit follow so more Atlantic Canadians can find it—and join the chorus calling for smart growth.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome, Don Mills Returns
• 0:48 Book Success And Cross-Party Support
• 3:33 Why Atlantic Canada Must Produce More
• 5:34 New Panel: Mandate, Independence, Goals
• 8:44 Productivity Gap And Public vs Private Jobs
• 12:21 Power Of Persuasion And Public Report
• 14:23 Attitudes Toward Resource Development
• 18:23 Natural Gas, Fracking Myths, Alternatives
• 22:13 Mining, Uranium, And Regulatory Bottlenecks
• 26:23 Investment Certainty And Faster Approvals
• 29:13 Energy Vision And Regional Grid
• 33:03 Airport As Economic Engine And Trade
• 37:53 Collaborating Across Atlantic Provinces
• 41:13 Government Performance And Right-Sizing
• 46:13 Focused Consultations And Execution
• 50:23 Growth, Labour Needs, And Services
• 54:13 Skills Over Degrees: Trades Demand
• 57:53 Media Weakness And Communication Strategy
• 1:01:43 Making The Case: Benefits To Individuals
• 1:05:33 Optimism: Startups, Newcomers, And 2026 Outlook

Transcript

SPEAKER_03: 0:29

Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Welcome to the afternoon pint. I'm Mike. I'm Matt Conrad. Who do we have here? Don Mills. Don Mills. Our only our second person ever to have made an appearance on the Afternoon Pint for a third time. That's pretty cool. And technically, if you want to count the live podcast, you're the only one who's done it four times.

SPEAKER_00: 0:52

Oh, right. So there you are.

SPEAKER_02: 0:53

Yeah, there you go. Yeah, the live podcast. That was a cool. I mean, I'm sorry I wasn't there, Diane. I mean, uh I had I had a last minute thing. I had to be in another part of the province. But uh but yeah, gee, that was it sounds like it was a great success. I saw a lot of people quite happy about that.

SPEAKER_00: 1:08

Yeah, lots of good responses.

SPEAKER_02: 1:09

And uh congratulations to you on the reprint of your book.

SPEAKER_00: 1:12

Oh, yeah, I know. That's pretty exciting for us, actually. The the book has done um I'm not gonna say better than we expected, but uh certainly it's done uh done well and it still continues to sell.

SPEAKER_02: 1:24

Towards prosperity. Um so you guys have really worked that book. I mean, I've noticed I've seen just a lot of activity, uh and a lot of support has come behind that book. Um one cool thing I thought about that book, and it's just a quick notice, is that there was no there was no political divide. Um people were supporting that book on every side of the aisle, and I'm still seeing that support on almost a weekly basis, which is such a great thing, right? When you can un unilaterally just kind of all agree that we can do better things in our economy.

SPEAKER_00: 1:54

Yeah. I I think it helps that you know we uh we use a fair amount of data to support our uh points of view and uh and recommendations. And I've always found throughout my career that when you have uh data on your side, it you don't get as many arguments or or people coming uh at you uh because they don't have the same data.

SPEAKER_03: 2:15

Very cool. Yeah. The other thing though I do find, and I don't know if you experience this or not, but as someone who I uh you know, I look at you and I don't know how you consider yourself, but I consider yourself a pretty centered person, fairly neutral person. Um I find that when you are in the center, that you sometimes maybe get attacked a little bit more for your thoughts and opinions, because both sides don't maybe not like what you're saying sometimes.

SPEAKER_00: 2:39

Well, I've never held back my opinions, Matt. Yeah. And uh, you know, it's gotten me in uh some trouble occasionally, but uh uh I always felt that it's uh important to be yourself and to speak the truth as much as you can. And uh and just to that point, uh, you know, I think that uh our region needs a little bit more truth telling um about kind of what we have to do to be more successful, and um uh I'm gonna continue to do that for as long as I can, actually.

SPEAKER_02: 3:10

Yeah, no, we touched on that a little bit in our last our last show together, and I think I when you kind of really I mean there was something I uh I had a really great comment from that episode and you changed their perspective on something. And it was actually when you talked a little bit about Alberta and uh you know how how they feel and how how we are is how much how much we produce versus how much they produce, right? You know, we need to produce more to sustain ourselves.

SPEAKER_00: 3:33

Well, we need to we we need to kind of pay more of our own way, I think is the better way of uh of phrasing that, Mike. Um, you know, we've depended on the generosity of other Canadians for, you know, decades now, and we've gotten a bit too comfortable uh thinking that we don't have to produce anything here or mine anything here or develop anything here because, you know, somebody else is gonna take care of us and keep us in the lifestyle to which we become accustomed. And I can tell you that the Western provinces aren't uh aren't quite as uh, you know, on side about uh continuing to send money our way if we're not gonna be prepared to develop our resources in the same way that they're developing their resources to send us uh support.

SPEAKER_02: 4:16

Well we've been hearing that message loud and clear for a while now, really.

SPEAKER_03: 4:19

I heard something just yesterday or something like that. But um uh and correct me if I'm wrong, but did they just get approval for a new pipeline?

SPEAKER_00: 4:26

Uh what's the uh they've they signed a memorandum of agreement, uh um and you know, which is a good I think a good start. Um Frank. They seem happy. Yeah, but there's still lots of bumps on the road ahead, and one of them being BC, who are not on site. So, you know, we can talk about uh um energy for sure. Um it's a it's a big opportunity for our region, um, and we have to think about it in a different way than we have been currently thinking about it, and we can talk about that as well.

SPEAKER_03: 4:59

Yeah, so I mean uh this uh kind of to lead into it, we get lots of things we want to ask you. Um but uh the purpose of having you on here is uh because you had a special announcement yesterday. You kind of gave us a heads up at the live podcast that something was coming.

SPEAKER_04: 5:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 5:12

And uh we wanted to invite you on here to uh to talk about it because we want to get it like fresh while it was freshly new.

SPEAKER_00: 5:19

Yeah, it is fresh.

SPEAKER_03: 5:20

Yeah. So uh tell us about this panel that is that was announced yesterday with uh you know with uh Sean Frazier.

SPEAKER_00: 5:27

Yeah, so I uh Sean um um contacted me uh towards the end of September and uh caught me out of the blue, basically, and he asked me if I would be willing to um chair a panel to take a look at the um economic uh prosperity for Atlantic Canada. And uh I I thought about it a little bit before I said yes, uh, because I I wanted to be sure of a couple things. I you know, one of the things that I he he wanted to do is to have a private sector-led uh strategy uh developed, and I wanted to make sure that it would be completely independent of government before I said yes, and he assured me that uh we would have full um independence of what we did, and and you know, he would not uh not kind of uh get in our way. So on the basis of that, I decided um it's kind of where I've been pointed all my life, guys. Like, you know, I spent uh 40 years uh studying the um Atlantic Canada from a social, economic, political point of view, had a pretty good idea about what Atlantic Canada's about. It actually made me uh a pretty strong Atlantic Canadian, frankly, that that uh that career. And then I started writing about it and doing podcasts, and you know, you know, with David wrote wrote a book. And like, you know, my whole life has been on, you know, why is it that we're not more economically successful uh as the rest of the country? And you know, came to some conclusions and some answers about that. And now I get to put my money where my mouth is to some extent and and uh try to figure out uh what are our best opportunities to narrow the gap in GDP and productivity in particular uh with the rest of the country. And if we do that, uh you know, our standard of living here will get better.

SPEAKER_02: 7:13

It's a promising premise.

SPEAKER_03: 7:15

And that's so to anyone listening, kind of saying, like, okay, this is just like, you know, someone might look at this is another study or another panel or whatever, like what do you feel is the big difference between this and anything that's been done in the past?

SPEAKER_00: 7:28

Well, uh to my knowledge, uh, in this region, it's the first time it's uh purely uh private sector-led initiative. It's not a government uh initiative. Like if you think about the Ivony report, it was it was a quasi-public uh, you know, um uh sort of endeavor. Uh we have a we have a fully uh we have seven members, including myself, on the panel. All of them have, you know, strong business backgrounds um and a variety of backgrounds, which is really useful to the work that we're gonna do. And uh, you know, we're gonna be fairly practical, you know, and and but we're also gonna be, I think, demanding as well. So we're not gonna pull any punches about uh what uh we think should be done uh or what needs to change in order to be successful. Um let me give you an example, because I think this might put it in perspective. Last night we were uh the minister and I were having a conversation. It's available uh on l uh on stream, by the way, through the ECOA um website if anybody's interested. It was only a sh half-hour conversation, but it kind of outlined what we were trying to do and uh the mandate. Uh and part way through, we were kind of on a little script go through some questions. I said, listen, I have to go off script here, uh Minister, because you know, you're asking us to do a really important thing here, which is to uh improve uh productivity in our region. And I said, we have a we have a structural issue that we we need to uh uh talk about out loud. Uh and one and and it has to do with the fact that we have a higher than normal uh portion of the workforce who work for the public sector. And we have a smaller private sector. Now, if you want to talk about productivity improvement, the problem is that the public sector has not had any productivity growth for the last 10 years. And the private sector, from everything I can gather, has actually done reasonably well on the productivity side. So how can we narrow the gap unless we rebalance the workforce in this region to favor more private sector over public sector jobs? We can't have the public sector, which they've done for the last 10 years, add more jobs than the private sector. That is the recipe for disaster. And in the last 10 years, you just have to look at the data, that's what's happened. And so I kind of wanted to set the tone right away that we're just not gonna talk about where the big projects are that can make a difference, but what answer has to change from a policy point of view and and from a fiscal point of view uh to be able to realize our goals.

SPEAKER_03: 10:46

So you have this panel that is gonna be so what exactly are you gonna be like looking at? Because I mean we'll get into like the experience of the panel, but yeah, um what what type of like authority are you gonna have? Like is there anything that you can like what's really gonna make a difference? Are you gonna be able to walk in and say like, hey, do this, and they're gonna like yes, we're gonna do that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_00: 11:08

We don't have any power except the power of persuasion, uh and uh maybe moral authority, I'm not sure. But um you know, our job is to is to um make a uh put together a strategy, uh not just uh the ideas, but kind of the executional side. What ha how can it how can it happen, what needs to be done, like you know, so that as much as possible would be prescriptive in terms of the steps that need to happen. And then and then obviously uh it's gonna be we're gonna present to the public. We're not presenting to the government. We're presenting um, you know, our report to the public. And they can decide if it makes sense or not. And then it's up to the government and the private sector to figure out does this make sense and should we go for it? But one thing that's been very clear from the minister is that uh, at least from a coast point of view, they want to narrow the focus of where they spend their effort. They don't want to try to do everything for everybody. They have to pick some things that will make a big uh what I would call transformational difference to our the prosperity in our region.

SPEAKER_03: 12:17

Makes sense.

SPEAKER_00: 12:18

So I'm taking the minister at his word that uh, you know, he's gonna give uh give us uh give us full consideration and and hopefully take actions where he needs to take actions. But it's not just the it's not it's not just the government that needs to uh you know realize that there are things that have to change. It's the private sector as well. And uh and and it's the public as well. And and and why do I say that? Uh uh I would say based on my four decades of doing research in this region, we have attitudinal issues, serious attitudinal issues when it comes to developing natural resources.

SPEAKER_04: 12:55

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 12:55

You know, we're really quick to say no uh for sometimes no good reason uh when other jurisdictions are are are you know mining their their their materials and cutting their forests and and and putting up windmills.

SPEAKER_02: 13:09

Just to pause for a second, let's just talk about that. Like why do we think it is that here on the East Coast we we we we don't want to invest in in our natural resources? You know, what are some of the logic behind it?

SPEAKER_00: 13:22

I'll tell you, Mike, the real reason is this. Like we spent decades depending on government to solve our problems and and to finance our lifestyle. And so that dependency has really corrupted our our thinking about be being you know self-sufficient. You know, that dependency uh has led us to be able to easily say no because there's no consequences of saying no to developing our natural resources, because somebody else is gonna send us money to keep us in the lifestyle to which we've become accustomed, right? And so um that's the problem. Uh and it's and and it's been developing over decades. It's gonna take a long time to change that attitude. But you know, we need to find a way, uh let's talk about productivity for a second. When you look at the most successful of our provinces, which are, you know, Saskatchewan, BC, Saskatchewan, you know, a lot of it's driven because they're using their natural resources, which are really capital intensive. And you when you when you have to spend a lot of capital, you get productivity through that large capital expenditures, right? We haven't hardly had any of those heavy industry capital expenditures, especially in Nova Scotia for a long time. And so you want to increase productivity, you have to get some of those heavier industries uh going and and to make sure that those and investment in equipment and and and whatever uh are made in this province. So, you know, we've been we haven't had our our share of uh new capital in this region for a long time. Part of it's because we can't develop our resources. Simple as that.

SPEAKER_03: 15:02

Should uh non-Atlantic Canadians be excited about this?

SPEAKER_00: 15:07

I I think having a new attitude about trying to be you know more of a contributor to the Federation uh will be well received. Yeah. Honestly. I think that, you know, uh people uh you know already think we're pr pr pretty nice people, nice place to visit. But you know, I would like them to think it's not just a nice place to live, nice place to visit, but it's a nice place to invest. Yeah. And it's a nice place to, you know, do business. And I think that that's the that's the change that that that we need to see, um, Matt, if we want to get uh more investment coming into our region. And you know, we have like uh we did a podcast recently with uh a guy who is uh an oil and gas expert, his name is Jim Livingston, invite everybody to go and listen to that podcast. And one of the things that he was talking about was um the exploration of onshore natural gas. Well, you know, that's a no-go here, right? Nobody wants to do that because you can't do fracking in Canada. Can do it every ounce in the world, but you can't do it here for some reason. But what if there is another methodology that didn't use fracking to get the uh natural gas out of the ground? Would that make a difference? And he he has another methodology that does not use fracking, which takes away most of the arguments that people have about contaminant contamination of water, which doesn't happen, and and you know, earthquakes, you know, all that is taken away. Now, would that make a difference in in developing the natural gas reserves that we have here, which are significant, by the way, and proven. You know, um I forget what the the the the measurement is, but you know the in Canada uh today uh uh they need one million kilobytes of natural gas, whatever the determination to heat all the homes using natural gas today. In the maritime provinces alone, we have over a hundred million of reserves. Okay, which means, you know, um you know we have fifty years of reserves to heat all the homes of natural gas in the country.

SPEAKER_02: 17:20

So so fracking, so I mean You just said something there that I don't know if I agree with because I really don't know, and I don't like saying I don't know, I don't agree with you because I don't know the answer. So that's you know yet you commented there just like you know the fracking would be relatively harmless, is what you said. Uh uh I didn't say I didn't say I didn't say harmless.

SPEAKER_00: 17:39

So I was trying to understand that to make sure that's the same. So what I'm saying is that in other parts of Canada and across the United States, they've used fracking for decades, decades, uh uh with very little recorded issues with it. Now there is some potential of uh you know slight earthquakes uh happened on occasion.

SPEAKER_02: 18:02

And and well water effects.

SPEAKER_00: 18:06

Is that not true? No, that's not true. That's actually not true because uh you know it's well below the the water table. Okay. Well below the water tables. It doesn't affect wells. That that is from my understanding.

SPEAKER_02: 18:18

Because I mean that's something I just believe.

SPEAKER_00: 18:19

I know, of course you do. Why do you do believe that though?

SPEAKER_02: 18:22

Well, because I seem I I live in a rural community and I see no fracking signs. Oh, right. So I assume that's because of the water I drink is going to get messed up and start fracking.

SPEAKER_00: 18:30

That's a great argument to scare people, but what if it wasn't true? Well it's great.

SPEAKER_02: 18:38

I'm glad I brought it up because you know what? I'm sure a lot of people feel like me right now. Yeah, no, but I see these in our communities. When you go to a small community, that's one of the first signs you see is a no fracking and no robots. That's a new one, too. I like that one.

SPEAKER_00: 18:50

Good. Yeah. Uh but how about doing your research? How about how about looking at the literature? Right. You know, before you make that assumption. This is one of the problems we have in our society. You know, we have special interest groups that are very well organized to stop stuff. But who who are the counterpoints of of of promoting things in our society? It's usually the proponents of the of whatever the development is. It's not the average group of citizens say, oh yeah, we need to f we need to frack, we need to do natural gas. It doesn't mean that they're against it, but they're just not going to speak up for it. So it sounds like everybody's against it. I this is what I did in my life. I looked at, you know, public opinion on issues, and what I found is this is that quite often it was the the vocal minority that that you know kind of got the got the attention. And the silent majority it is an actual fact, are silent and and did not express their opinion. And and by the way, it's uh let me give you another example. But influences passed.

SPEAKER_03: 19:49

I actually probably fall into like in the the silent majority. I probably fall into that because I don't have a hard really stance either way, because again, I don't know. I'm not a geologist, I don't know. Right. So my thing is is like I think we should be exploring our natural resources because I think that is something that we can do to bring prosperity here, and we want people to buy that stuff. Sure. New money coming from around the world, coming here makes us richer and better, right?

SPEAKER_04: 20:13

100%.

SPEAKER_03: 20:13

So I love that side of it. The other side of it is like I'm I don't know enough about like what could happen if it causes earthquakes or sinkholes or I don't know, right?

SPEAKER_04: 20:22

Right.

SPEAKER_03: 20:22

I don't know. So for me, that's my thing is I'm the kind of the silent majority of like I don't have a hard stance.

SPEAKER_00: 20:29

Let me give you a couple of other examples. Yeah. Okay, if you don't mind. So uranium. Uranium, okay? Yeah. Uh we have uranium in this province. There was been a ban on uranium mining for since the 90s, 1990s, somehow I forget the exact date. And of course, we couldn't have nuclear power.

SPEAKER_03: 20:46

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 20:47

Well, really? I mean, Saskatchewan, uh one of the major um miners of uranium, has been doing it for like 60 years without any any harmful consequence. We have a Canadian province who has figured out that they can mine uranium and it's perfectly acceptable in in the population of Saskatchewan. That's the difference. Here we we we ban it. We could we we can't even look for it, we can't can't do anything about it.

SPEAKER_03: 21:15

That's unlifted now, though, hasn't it?

SPEAKER_00: 21:16

It's been lifted. But you know what? Uh someone No one's coming here yet. No. But why would that be the thing, Matt?

SPEAKER_03: 21:22

Because they're afraid.

SPEAKER_00: 21:23

Right. Yeah. Why would they come here just because it's now available? Because they know this is the Nova Scotia is rated among the 60 sort of jurisdictions uh uh that are tracked annually as number 60 as the last one. Wasn't it 59?

SPEAKER_02: 21:41

We just go back to New Brunswick this year, man. Because New Brunswick was. Okay. Okay, sorry. You got to tell your co-host uh David David about that one. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 21:50

So New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, last and second last in terms of preferred jurisdictions. Crazy though, eh? Now think about this. Newfoundland is rated uh number 13.

SPEAKER_02: 22:01

Wow.

SPEAKER_00: 22:02

Now why would that be, do you think?

SPEAKER_02: 22:04

I come from a very good one of intelligent folk.

SPEAKER_00: 22:07

No, they're practical and they have good regul they have a good regulatory environment relative to Nova Scotia and and New Brunswick.

SPEAKER_03: 22:14

I thought it was that half an hour head start, that's why head start. It might be there too. But no, no, I listen. So I I'm I'm I'm with you. I think, and I mean I also think the offshore wind stuff that we talked about in the last episode, I think that is something we need to explore. Um uranium, I'm I'm I'm with it. Uh because that is the other side of it where I know other places do it. So it it to me it almost seems so easy, so black and white, for to be able to just come and say and like to prove, like, hey, we've been doing it for 60 years here, there's no issues that we've had. Right. Group that hates it, you're wrong. Here's the proof.

SPEAKER_00: 22:55

Well, that's what I'm saying. Nobody's made that argument. You know, it it like it might be that you know, if you have somebody who's trying to open a mine, uh look at the the new gold mine was just approved in Guysboro. Like, you know, they took them a long time to get that approval, right? Well, they have to go so those so many hoops, so many years before they get to the it it takes real, you know, sort of uh strength of of of character to keep working on it. Like the average mine from from the time it's discovered to the time it gets into production in Nova Scotia is 17 years. Wow.

SPEAKER_02: 23:30

Now what if you were just a l what if there were no rules? Would that be a good thing?

SPEAKER_00: 23:33

No, no, there should there should always be rules.

SPEAKER_02: 23:35

No, no. But is there would there be how how could they expedite that process, I guess?

SPEAKER_00: 23:39

Well, they could expedite it uh uh like like in Nova Scotia, as I understand it, uh you know, this is what Sean Kirby, the executive director of the mining association in Nova Scotia, uh said to me, is that in Nova Scotia, there's not one department, but two departments that you have to get approvals for to open a mine. Okay. We're the only province in the country that needs two departmental approvals.

SPEAKER_02: 24:01

What does the first group do differently from the second group? I have no idea.

SPEAKER_00: 24:04

Okay. I have no idea.

SPEAKER_03: 24:06

Do you feel that the fear of investment, especially in the energy sector or even the mining sector, is the fear comes from that they feel like they're one election away from losing everything that they've invested in?

SPEAKER_00: 24:16

Well, you know, you need to have certainty when you invest.

SPEAKER_03: 24:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 24:19

And and especially when you have long lead times like uh development of a mine. You know, I just talked to a guy before I uh um uh came here today who uh has a an idea to open a a copper mine in in Cape Breton. And you know, because of where it's located, you know, one of the challenges with mining usually is uh you know, getting energy and water and a road into the mine. Well, he has a a uh a site that has all those three close by. He said he could actually be up and running in four or five years, which is really fast. And you know, but he still needs to get uh environmental approvals, both from the feds and and and from the province. That's a really tough process. So why couldn't we, uh while still protecting the environment, have certainty of timing? Say once you get your application and it's gonna be processed within this time frame and and you know uh it's clear and it's transparent and and there's no delays. Yeah. You know, that would help a great deal. So certainty of uh of the process would make it easier to invest here. We don't have that right now.

SPEAKER_03: 25:24

Do you feel that and like and maybe this is too long ago, but like do you feel that like the mining disasters that we've had that were such a big deal in like you know, 80s, 90s, whatever that we've had, do you think that factors into anything that people an older population might still remember?

SPEAKER_02: 25:38

That's a good uh question. Because it probably would sink into the psyche area, the cult fabric of the few.

SPEAKER_00: 25:43

Well, certainly the Westway disaster was you know an undermined mining. You have to recognize we don't do a lot of under underground mining. It's not the old. It's all surface uh mining and uh and it's very different uh than uh in the past. Uh you know, one of the things Do you think people know that though? No, they don't. This is my this is my point.

SPEAKER_02: 26:02

When you say mine, I think of Minecraft, like the guy down in the cave with the picture of the phone. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 26:06

No, no, but it's mainly surface mining, uh quarry mining kind of thing.

SPEAKER_04: 26:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_00: 26:11

And uh and here's the thing that uh I want your audience to understand. When you get a permit to uh do a mine, you have to put a bond down to remediate the site afterwards.

SPEAKER_03: 26:21

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 26:21

That's new. Uh not new, but it's it's it's what's one of the things that's changed. Right. Which means you have to return the site to its natural um, you know, environment the way it was before. And it's been done in already in Nova Scotia uh on several sites.

SPEAKER_03: 26:36

Well there was that one that it's a really popular tourist spot up in Cape Breton, that lake that used to be a mine.

SPEAKER_00: 26:40

Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 26:41

Yeah, yeah. It's a beautiful spot now.

SPEAKER_00: 26:43

So if people understood that it you know it's gonna be pack put back in to nature in an appropriate way and there's money for the cool element. Don't you think wouldn't that make a difference? They say, well, yeah, it's gonna be in maybe, you know, disrupted for a while, but it's gonna go back to its natural format.

SPEAKER_02: 26:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 26:59

You know, that's that's something a lot of people don't know. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02: 27:01

Cool. I I want to ask, like, so so yourself is on the panel. Like, who else is on this panel, right? I was I was curious to kind of know like what other kind of I mean, so obviously we're talking about mining and energy, what other things are we kind of pulling from that we think we could really invest in here?

SPEAKER_00: 27:15

Uh well uh so uh you know we have uh uh uh a cross-regional uh representation on on the panel. Uh we have Scott McCain, the chair of McCain Foods. So he brings the global perspective, scaling perspective, which we think is uh important to uh panel uh discussion. Um we have uh Kathy Bennett, uh who was uh uh Minister of Finance at one time in Newfoundland, uh before that an entrepreneur, and now a venture capitalist. So bringing capital to the region is gonna be kind of a big deal. Uh we've got Joyce Carter, the CEO of the um, yeah, fantastic, yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 27:54

That makes sense.

SPEAKER_00: 27:55

HIA for transportation, which is uh you know so we've tried to put people together that uh that bring some expertise and business.

SPEAKER_02: 28:04

And some diverse backgrounds there, too.

SPEAKER_00: 28:06

Yeah, we're trying to try to make sure we do that. And by the way, one other thing that we're gonna do uh that I think is important because I insisted on a small panel. I didn't want to have 14 people. No. It's just too unwieldy. Yeah. Uh even seven with seven strong personalities, you know, it it's uh interesting uh you know conversations already.

SPEAKER_03: 28:28

I no I noticed the afternoon Pink got left off that though. Oh I know.

SPEAKER_00: 28:32

A pub consultant. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 28:34

One guy don't understand that, experts.

SPEAKER_00: 28:39

So one other thing that we're gonna do, guys, is uh which I think it's really important, is we uh we're gonna uh uh uh develop an advisory council uh for people who can add specialized expertise. So, you know, we've already kind of identified some starting uh sectors that we want to pay a lot of attention to. Energy, big time, you know, we've got a lot of uh energy opportunity. Um we want to take a look at defense uh with what the uh government's committed to in terms of uh government uh spending on defense, it's gonna be pretty important. We're gonna look at ocean uh or blue economy uh issues, which you know we we have a special sort of relationship to the ocean here that you know we want to uh take a look at that and and critical minerals. So you know that there there may be other things, but those are the big what we call big bucket uh opportunities.

SPEAKER_02: 29:34

Okay, okay, you know, I mean one of the things that I I'm thinking just just from the little bit we've discussed today is education, right? How do we get this so everybody it does not become political politicized? Yeah. We're getting accurate information, right? You know, I'm still gonna go home research and fracking tonight, right? I'm gonna send you some weird emails at three o'clock if you're wrong.

SPEAKER_00: 29:54

I want you to do that, but only after you listen to that podcast with Jim and Livingston. Promise me to do that. Okay, I'll do that first. Okay, cool.

SPEAKER_02: 30:02

But but like uh, I mean, education. So how can we do it so that people learn more about this and they understand that I think what we need is a real public buy-in to to invest in our own economy. 100%. And everyone needs to kind of get on the same page. Yeah, we need to do stuff here, we need to get things moving, uh, and we need to uh somehow uh uh collectively agree on something.

SPEAKER_00: 30:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 30:25

Right? How can we get that? I mean, you're here today, that's a great start. I think a lot of our audience wouldn't know.

SPEAKER_00: 30:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 30:31

But like, could we get to the workplace in the same way that uh diversity training would? Like, I know that seems crazy, but like just to think that like we we do educate staff now on many levels.

SPEAKER_00: 30:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 30:42

Right? So how can we get there so we're in every office?

SPEAKER_00: 30:45

We we've uh we've been thinking about the sort of what I would call a communication strategy to run in parallel to the work that we do. You know, we we're we've asked uh a co to uh find a public relations company to help us with messaging throughout the whole process. And I'm hoping as a result of that, some of that will be putting out information that people don't know and try to uh, you know, uh educate them to your point uh about kind of what the opportunity means. You we want to quantify things. You know, we want to we want to be able to say that this opportunity is going to create this many jobs, that that that that that the jobs will be kind of in this range of uh pay and um and you know to me we have to create interest in what the opportunities will produce. And and and and hopefully you know it it means how does that you know the question that we're gonna have to answer is this how's it going to benefit me as an individual? Right? That that ultimately that's the the question that has to be answered. Sure.

SPEAKER_04: 31:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 31:46

And and and the best way to answer that is that if we become more productive, if our economy uh you know is growing at a at a even a national rate on on you know on a year in year basis, we're gonna have more resources to spend on services.

SPEAKER_03: 32:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 32:03

We're gonna have lower taxes. Yeah. So those two impacts are going to happen to every individual in the region. Those two things alone.

SPEAKER_02: 32:13

Right. And then the other thing is the waiting element how long we're gonna have to wait for this once we decide to Yeah you know it's not it's not gonna be overnight guys.

SPEAKER_00: 32:21

But you know somebody said well you know some of the things you can look at it's gonna take a long time. Well you've got to start somewhere.

SPEAKER_03: 32:27

Yeah if you don't start you've got to start you never get there.

SPEAKER_00: 32:30

And and look and and and seriously if you look at uh what Tim Houston's trying to do with Wind West, you know the first power coming off that it's gonna be in the 30s.

SPEAKER_02: 32:39

Two thousand thirties is it?

SPEAKER_00: 32:40

Yeah yeah okay that's soon enough that's pretty good no but it could be you know it's maybe if it's in the next 10 years it'll be great. Yeah you know but but you know it's not just getting the wind uh uh uh sort of captured you have to be able to deliver it somewhere right we do not have the infrastructure today right to deliver that power anywhere. Outside of yeah yeah so you know one of the things that we're gonna be looking at is the transmission grid for Atlantic Canada. So we're talking about you know new hydropower from uh Gull Island in in Newfoundland we're talking about wind power in Nova Scotia you know we're talking about uh maybe new nuclear power in in uh New Brunswick right talking about tidal power which is starting to come back finally talking about you know wind power on land we're talking about um you know natural gas offshore onshore we've got it all we've got we we've got every element of uh including hydro high hydropower with Mac dequac right uh which by the way it's gonna need like a nine billion dollar investment to bring it back to you know standard right so we got all this energy we we literally are sitting on the opportunity to become an energy superpower and exporter but we have to get an infrastructure in place to capture all these opportunities and bring them to market.

SPEAKER_03: 34:00

So we're talking lots about energy and those obviously take long-term investments lots that's the that's the long game but Joyce is on your board yeah and we're so you know she's obviously her she's the entryway and the exit of uh you know of Nova Scotia being you know this Joyce we'd love to get you on the show next year. Yes that's true we'd love to have her on yeah so she anyone who doesn't know Joyce is the one who is uh she's the is the chair of the CEO CEO okay of of uh the Halifax International uh airport yeah I I see her as maybe an opportunity where we can maybe bring tourism to increase tourism and get people here.

SPEAKER_02: 34:38

Well like the flights going to direct we were all just talking about tr uh trips to Ireland just before we started here really quick I'm going to Portugal because of WestJet foot of direct flight. I'm literally booked the flights this week I mean what's cooler than leaving Halifax and and and taking a four hour flight and landing in in in Gatwick right like or or or or some cool European country that you've never seen before. So can I tell you a quick story?

SPEAKER_00: 35:01

Yeah so I was on the founding board of the airport authority and uh we negotiated hard with the government to get a good deal that was not easy at the time but the whole purpose of the original board was to see the airport as an economic engine you know especially around bringing people in and and and and and being able to ship goods by air and and uh you know it's been twenty five years since the uh it became run the airport was run by uh a community board and it's accomplished what it's set out to do. It is an economic engine. There's almost 5,000 people working out at the airport today I think the last time I looked and it generates uh a couple billion dollars of uh economic activity because it's you know we're shipping stuff in the bellies of the plane right and and and now we're we've we've we're we've got a really pretty good airport. You've looked at they've they've invested a billion dollars in that airport since it was taken over that would have never happened under the federal government ever. So now we have a true international airport uh Joyce and her team are doing a great job expanding the routes and and and building the traffic because it's not easy. It's not easy to build traffic and some of it's still going to be seasonal obviously but nonetheless we're now more directly connected than we've ever been to the world.

SPEAKER_02: 36:26

Yeah with with some of the cheapest flights in the world to Europe.

SPEAKER_00: 36:29

Right you know and like if we need to send sea if we want to send seafood to Europe, it's gonna go you know some of it's gonna go in the belly of the plane that's what is the lobster beneath me that's better than there's tourism and so that's why I was saying the entryway and the exit because there's tourism obviously people who want to come here they have to come through our airport and then explore our region.

SPEAKER_03: 36:50

But then there's also the amount of like we have the best way we could help local entrepreneurs is get their goods to not just Nova Scotians but to you know Europeans and whatever, right?

SPEAKER_00: 37:01

So I'm working with the uh um Bermuda Air. Okay. Just uh not for pay just because I have a business interest in Bermuda and I want to make sure that direct flight that they've established stays there. If if you need me to like you know inspect those flights anytime Don you need me to go down there and help you out Don't you know how cheap it is to go to Bermuda? Oh it's crazy. Two two hours away? I think it's like three hundred bucks. Yeah it's a few yeah it's like they have great packages by the way if anybody's in interested in going this beautiful place to go. Yeah. But you know I've already been talking to them about uh they have restaurants that are looking for seafood for the restaurants. The grocery stores are looking for fresh seafood and they're looking to get away from the U.S. Well if we got a two hour flight coming from Halifax and we've got planes now flying there three times a week.

SPEAKER_02: 37:55

Right, yeah what can you see what the opportunity is totally put the airport down to Sanbro and we'll just fly the Oxford right from the dock.

SPEAKER_00: 38:03

You could do that good luck.

SPEAKER_03: 38:07

Yeah so with kind of with some of those things the uh like uh is there anything since you've built this panel yeah you obviously have an idea of where you want to go but do you think there'll be any surprises of like what could come from here?

SPEAKER_00: 38:20

Uh there's always going to be a surprise. Uh you know um you know one of the things that uh one of the challenges uh guys that I really want to uh mention is that uh you know we're looking at this as a a pan Atlantic um sort of uh exercise we think there needs to be a lot more collaboration cooperation in the region so let's get back to energy for just for a second. No everybody's got a big idea in terms of energy basically and um you know but you know we can't fund everything at the same level. The federal government can't do that but one of the things they might be able to do is help us with infrastructure to put the transmission facilities in to get whatever energy is is being developed to market.

SPEAKER_03: 39:05

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 39:06

That that would be a big contribution. But only if we collaborate you know if everybody's fighting for their own little peace in this region we only have two point six million you know people we've got to we've got to figure out how to work together better. And I that's gonna be one of the challenges of the panel to see if there's a way of of getting that to happen.

SPEAKER_03: 39:27

Okay. Yeah the uh I you mentioned the federal government so this is kind of a good segue actually for this is um I'm curious to to know what Don's overall opinion of how uh you know the feds have done this year. I mean obviously we had a leadership change and I I feel I know not everyone does but I feel that that leadership change actually has been made drastic changes in in our government this year. How do you feel they've been doing so far this year?

SPEAKER_00: 40:00

Well personally I like uh I like uh what Carney's done uh I think he's uh he's viewed internationally as being uh much stronger than Trudeau uh you know more more substantive uh he knows what he's talking about yeah and uh you can see that at the G20 meetings where you know with the absence of the US Canada played a very prominent leading role in that and it shows uh that people respect our our prime minister and you know uh he seems to be signing these trade deals with with people every other day he's just in Dubai and like you know now whether or not it's real it remains to be seen but the fact of the matter is he's sending a very strong message to the U.S. You know that it that's what he's doing. He's saying you know what guys we have we have options and they're not as maybe as good as the option that we have with you but we we need to diversify our our trade. And if the US comes back and we've got all these other trade deals in place, what does that mean for Canada? It means we're going to be booming you know so he's putting in place the building blocks either to you know to get through the Trump administration or you know and by the way the economy if you think about it in Canada is not tanky. It's it's not it's it's it's it's not as good as it was but it's not terrible. You know so I I I look at those two factors and say you know he's given confidence to the business community for sure. Uh his major projects approach I think is long term uh going in the right direction and uh you know obviously he's being attacked by uh the other side of course that's natural yeah but I think if you look at the polling numbers his personal popularity is pretty good in in Canada and uh it's because he's just he's calm competent and and and and sort of very steady what he's doing. You know and I I love what he's doing with Trudeau with uh Trump. Yeah he's not he's not begging them he he's you know Trump is coming to slowly the realization that things like lumber are really costing the U.S. economy a lot of money starting to back a little bit away from the tariffs you know I I think the longer we wait the better it is for us. You know we should not rush into any agreement with them and and especially with the midterms coming up. It's unraveling down there it feels I I I kind of I kind of agree with that. I just think that you know the longer we wait the better deal we're gonna get yeah so that's his strategy I think I actually really agree.

SPEAKER_03: 42:47

I actually really like what he's doing. I think what I also like about it is he doesn't come across as like the typical politician that um just makes a big deal about a bunch of things.

SPEAKER_00: 42:57

Well the thing that he's doing really well do you see him attacking the opposition doesn't know and that's something I really respect. And and I'm I'm I really like that I really like that part. He's very respectful to everybody and um like people need to take notice.

SPEAKER_03: 43:13

I agree I I think I I what I've been calling him I mean people ask about it he's just very quiet. And I mean he's competent but he's he's quiet and when I when I say quiet I don't I mean it as a compliment because it's like he's not loud barking like like you said not insulting anybody not making a bunch of noise yeah he's quietly flying around the world and making you know potentially making these deals or whatever yeah and I think when it all kind of comes together I a lot of the negativity that people still have because of whatever reason people have their issues with the liberals and the last partisanship is always going to be there. There's partisanship it just you know there's some people are obviously holding on to it a little bit much and all that stuff right he's a good call to center though I think for a lot of people he's a great call to center and I think the long game people are going to be like oh wow yeah I'm hoping I I I I'm hoping so I like I I I like a lot of the stuff that he's done.

SPEAKER_00: 44:06

One of the things that I'm not as happy about is you know he he he said that he was going to you know reduce uh the size of government I think he's been too gentle on that. Okay. And we need to be more aggressive on that. And you know the it gets back to the issue of productivity. Uh you might want to read a book by Donald Savoy uh that he put out recently on on government size and one of the things he he describes is he he says there are poets and plumbers it working for the government. And when I we did a podcast with him said what do you mean by that? He said well the plumbers are the people who take care of serving Canadians. Right. The poets are the ones who make up the policies uh to make life you know what it is in Canada he said right now in this in the federal government there are 70 percent who are poets and only 30 percent who are plumbers and to me that means that we have too many poets too many policymakers not enough people serving Canadians I like that analogy I like I like that I got that too I got nothing against poets either I think they're great.

SPEAKER_02: 45:14

No we need poets we just maybe we don't need 70% of the too many too much poetry.

SPEAKER_03: 45:18

Yeah no he has he has the data to back that up by the way he does have a plan to reduce like government and public sector but it's mostly through attrition I know but so you're saying it's not quite aggressive enough kind of thing here's the thing I would say bring me in like what's his plan? Like uh I don't really fully understand like through attrition what's he trying to get accomplished my understanding and you could correct me if I'm wrong but my understanding is he's gonna early retire some people and or package some people out that are almost ready or whatever and some about it through attrition. Through attrition okay that's it.

SPEAKER_00: 45:50

And to put it in perspective I think the last time I looked there were 360,000 employees of the federal government. Now I'm I'm gonna make this general comment about every level of governance a lot you know if you don't do sort of a review of your a serious review of your operations on a regular basis every number of years you get a lot of fat. A lot of fat and I can guarantee you that and I'm gonna pick a s a low number 15% you could lose 15% and it would make no difference to what Canadians receive.

SPEAKER_02: 46:26

Isn't the CRA like the most bloated it's ever been that's what I thought I heard we're not going to talk about CRA right now we're getting close to you guys are great we love you leave us alone next year.

SPEAKER_00: 46:36

Yeah but go on but but just to get back to uh that for a second so you know Andy Fillmore who you're hoping to have on your program you know uh he he ran on the idea of of uh fiscal responsibility right and and what he wanted to do was to do an audit of the operations to find out where the savings and efficiencies could be and believe me they're there yeah 100 percent but they you won't find them unless you look and council apparently do not want to do that. Now why would they not want to do that?

SPEAKER_03: 47:07

It's a great question because it sounds like they need to cut about 10 point five percent well like that is the amount they are proposing for a tax increase.

SPEAKER_00: 47:16

Well you know do you know how many employees uh work for the municipality? It's like 5,000. Very close to 5,000 now London Ontario city of almost exactly the same size they have 3,000. Oh wow you want to ask why why do we need so many more here? What what do we have more hills?

SPEAKER_02: 47:37

What what is it? I don't know I mean is that is that because like bus bus system like we might do different things than what they do there right?

SPEAKER_00: 47:45

Our bus system doesn't even compare to their bus system in terms of efficiencies. Yeah. Their bus system costs the municipality way less it because it's properly run.

SPEAKER_03: 47:57

That's a whole other rant I would go on too because when I ran for council in 2020, I wanted to pick apart the uh Metro Transit Oh that's a whole other thing that's that's another thing. Another topic for another push that's a taxi later exactly um so what do you what do you think the so obviously federal government like you're gonna have to have all levels of government involved in this in I mean I know it's I know it's a federal kind of working panel.

SPEAKER_00: 48:23

I'm not really interested in talking to governments.

SPEAKER_03: 48:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_00: 48:26

Honestly and I think how are you going to get your message up to you no no no but I I said this to Sean like this is not a uh we're gonna consult with everybody who has an opinion. Yeah you know we're gonna consult with people who can make a difference economically you know and that's uh you know that's the difference it's not a niving approach which I have nothing to nothing bad to say about that. It was meant to be a broad consultation of everybody, make sure everybody had a voice in this this is economic development you know and we want to talk to people who who actually can make a difference on economic development. You know so um you know we'll be talking to everybody like you know the economic development agencies and we got a lot of them we got we got more than you can shake a stick at in in this region. We want to talk to the business community uh through the chambers and trades of uh boards of trade of course uh and we'll you know we'll be seeking from them really something different than what it what's the big opportunity. We'll be seeking from them what policies need to be changed, what regulations need to be streamlined to make it easier to do business here. So that's gonna be another sort of initiative. We're gonna be speaking to all the um various sectors directly about what they see as their big you know economic opportunity and what needs to be done to realize the that opportunity. So we're not gonna be in every church hall listening to the you know the you know the various groups who have an opinion. Yeah they can write me they can write me and and you know uh I'll I'll look at it but we're we have a limited we we we we only have basically 10 months.

SPEAKER_03: 50:06

Yeah like uh we've given a very short period of time we have to be selective on what how how we do the consults of the information and you're are you just gonna like are you gonna hand it off to government or are you gonna publish it public publicly so we can go through it?

SPEAKER_00: 50:20

It's gonna be publicly released. We're not we're we're we're not we're not gonna the government i will see it at the same time as we release it as far as as far as I'm concerned. That's the best way to do it. That that's that's the transparent way to do it. And you know we'll live or die based on you know what we come up with.

SPEAKER_03: 50:37

Right. Yeah great do you think the panel will have anything to say about like affordability and things like that? Or is it just focused on economic development?

SPEAKER_00: 50:48

Well you know there's obviously other impacts of uh you know one of the things that David and I have talked about both in the book and in our in our podcast is you know uh we need to grow under control you know especially from a population point of view we need to be able to services to keep up with the with the growth and you know David and I argue about this all the time I think it's maybe you know one and one and a half percent population growth we can manage because we've done that in Canada for 60 years. Three percent is probably too much. You know so you know that's a that's a policy decision uh and but one of the problems one of the challenges that we're gonna have is that if some of these big opportunities economic opportunities are to realize we're gonna need thousands of jobs.

SPEAKER_03: 51:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 51:33

Like I w somebody told me uh Kathy Bennett was saying that the Gull Island um proposal they're gonna need 10,000 people to develop that that next hydro project. And uh so where are those 1000 people? They're not they're not in Newfoundland today. Right. They're not there today today and so that's just one major project you know so uh the whole issue about uh there's gonna be a challenge be between our labor requirements to get these big ideas uh you know operational and then managing you know the the housing issue the medical health issue the school issue you know the we have to plan for this now some of these things are going to take a while to develop so we have time to get to sort of ramp up but you know the problems of growth are a lot better than the problems of decline like I've always had to have growth versus decline.

SPEAKER_03: 52:30

If uh if you were talking to someone like young today they're in high school and they say they're feeling really optimistic about these projects that are coming up yeah what would you tell them hey this is what you should focus on this is what you should go to school for because you're gonna be able to get a job boom like in right now it's a dangerous thing to say these days because things are changing so quickly but what's popular today could change.

SPEAKER_00: 52:51

But I would say this and and I think that this is you know this is this is something a lot of people have talked about I like I really encourage people who have uh at you know sort of um uh an inclination to skills skills training to do skills training we're gonna need so many electricians and so many plumbers and so many you know pipe fitters and like that though those are good professions and I would encourage young people who who are not really interested in going to university but are looking for a good job. We're gonna have so many opportunities uh in those areas that I and we have a really pretty good uh community college system to train people in the skills thankfully so we have the you know the institution in place uh and I would uh encourage parents by the way in particular don't force your kids to go to post secondary if they're if that's not their interest or their you know what they're interested in doing like allow them to find uh you know another another um kind of employment uh uh and and I think skills skill trades are really you know underrated we don't need them yeah yeah um the uh I guess for like there's a lot of I I'm I guess like the the buy-in for this is that um because government's the you guys are gonna the panel's gonna be released and everything but you gotta make sure people are listening to it.

SPEAKER_03: 54:17

There's a lot of government mistrust. Yeah how do you think that the what do you think that the government can do like top priority to change to get that trust from people.

SPEAKER_00: 54:32

Well I think you know uh the major project uh approach that the government has taken uh I think provides credibility that they're willing to do big things. That's a start. And um you know they've got the they've identified the system uh mine in New Brunswick as a major project issue. You know that sends a message to the province that mining is good. Right. You know that that that's you know there's still going to be lots of opp bulimia I can promise you the opposition is forming already against that mine for sure. But you know I I think that that's what the government is doing to identify the major project is a step in the in the right direction.

SPEAKER_02: 55:12

So politics really need to get out of the way on this one. Well is that what you think?

SPEAKER_00: 55:16

I think that they they they need to facilitate some things. In in Atlanta Canada we need an energy major project. Is it Wind West alone or is it some combination of you know uh hydro from um uh Newfoundland and um maybe nuclear like you know Nuclear Brunswick sounds awesome by the way I was thinking about that earlier Nuclear Brunswick cool name I I uh I I actually I I'm a I'm a fan of nuclear I have been for a long time I think it's uh you know it's uh it's reliable obviously and it's uh uh you know pretty cle pretty uh clean and uh you know we've been sort of for years and years kind of brainwashed into thinking nuclear is bad but you know the the nuclear um sort of equipment that Canada built is been has a has an an amazing safety record we're not Chernobyl and like like a like our nuclear reactors are the best in the world like you know so we've got a record that goes back how many years right we've never had a problem never and and and ask the people who are living around Point Lepro if they're afraid of nuclear they're not afraid of nuclear at all doesn't they've lived with it for 40 years.

SPEAKER_02: 56:39

There's been no issue you know anyway so I think I think something something uh a cool project to get uh you know hire a couple people to kind of go and talk about these myths and facts and explore these places a little deeper and and and talk uh well yeah you guys you guys can do some of this yeah you guys could like in a TikTok format we'll get some dancing involved and some songs and everybody will like it then right dancing nuclear is not that bad nuclear we've I've had I've had dozens of people reach out to me already and say you know uh how can I help? How can I help you how how how can people help?

SPEAKER_00: 57:12

Yeah that's a good how how can people help by speaking up in support of the things that need to be done. Be part of the you know majority who are no longer silent.

SPEAKER_02: 57:23

I think one of AP afternoon points themes this year have been you know let's push let's let's believe in our economy let's believe we can do it as a as a maritime province and and we can succeed and we are just as good or better than anybody else.

SPEAKER_00: 57:38

Yeah we need the positive talk and we need the uh you know we need the ambition. Like you know like the our region has not been as and as ambitious as it should be I think I mentioned this on the last podcast.

SPEAKER_02: 57:49

You did yeah and I mean there's two two ways there's a facade like a vision's a good good thing and then other people just might have a a different thought on life, right? Maybe they just don't think about this stuff and maybe they need to just kind of open open their minds up to some some new new ideas and new possibilities. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 58:07

Mike here's one of the challenges demographics are playing against us right now.

SPEAKER_02: 58:11

We have uh the oldest population in Canada and you know I'm in the I'm in the uh I'm in the category of of being in the older c uh group yeah and you're in also in the agree the fact that you're still working this hard right a lot of folks I mean you know will get into their uh later years they start to relax a little bit yeah I know and but but what does that do to your attitude about development?

SPEAKER_00: 58:32

You know if you're not if it doesn't affect you you don't need a job any longer and and and you don't need to worry about things anymore you're gonna you're not gonna be supporting you know the development of a a mine two two kilometers down from your heart.

SPEAKER_03: 58:45

You know what Don Don I totally agree with that. That's the same thing that when we rolled out the the daycare like program yeah I saw so many people saying like I didn't have that when I was so who cares? Right. And it's like you know what if we cured cancer tomorrow so we should just not cure cancer because you didn't have the cancer cure back like five years ago. Right. But that's a really stupid mentality.

SPEAKER_00: 59:04

It's selfish it is that but you know we have a a higher percentage of of that older demographic who really are out of it in terms of being in the job market. Right. They don't have the same concerns about that about the future of the you know the the province or the region. So that plays into it.

SPEAKER_02: 59:22

Like you know I was at a house party the other week and and people I don't you wouldn't believe how many people tell me they don't read the news anymore. Mike I mean you know it's it's like it they're like and and they'll tell you they'll say Don they find it too stressful. And I don't find it stressful.

SPEAKER_00: 59:35

Well I'm glad you raised that uh issue Mike because we have never had such a weak media as we do today. It's completely absent. It it doesn't do any critical thinking it doesn't you know like no wonder people aren't aren't listening or watching anymore.

SPEAKER_03: 59:54

Podcasts are the strongest I've formed they're growing and you're able to talk about stuff like this.

SPEAKER_02: 59:59

Podcasts arguably aren't research journalism and sometimes they're not and and and I mean I I I could talk about that for a long time so I don't want to talk about it because I'll probably say something wrong. But uh but uh about I mean I am disappointed uh uh state of where journalism is and where we are and seeking information and seeking truth yeah um you know and uh and and working working together I said so the other theme of the show this year was kind of bringing people in together and and uh so can can I give you an example of how weak our our media is sure the announcement last night was important I think maybe in the realm of things not that significant I haven't had one journalist talk to me about it.

SPEAKER_00: 1:00:44

Wow except for us swoop in afternoon point the bozo gang here guys journalists I didn't know no we're not journalists we're far from it far from it we like to drink beer and ask questions I would have said different things so that you know what so that actually be that's a good point that one of the questions I want to ask is like how are you guys going to get your message out and how do you help Atlantic Canadian like how do you interpret those things that you guys are

SPEAKER_03: 1:01:11

to talk about so that the typical average Atlanta Canadian can understand.

SPEAKER_00: 1:01:16

Well I actually hope to do some public opinion research um uh early in the new year to kind of gauge where people are on some of the things that we're looking at and then and maybe use that as a metric going forward to see if things change over time. As I said, there are attitudinal issues that we have to overcome in this region. So we have to set the benchmark to where those attitudes are on some of these key you know issues related to development, you know. And and and and clearly there's a big educational component. We've talked about this people don't have the facts they're making their minds up on on wrong information from his comments. Mike uses signs to determine how things are I just read road signs and obey. But but but in terms of you know one of the things that we hope our communication uh consultant will help us with is a a strong social media. Yes you gotta get people where they're at you know and that's what I watch your announcement on YouTube. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 1:02:18

Yeah and I I saw you on LinkedIn. But like you know I don't I mean how many people would have seen that announcement and not even registered? Oh and I mean you know and and no offense to you I think it's a great thing. I think it's the fact that people don't see how much it closely resonates with them.

SPEAKER_00: 1:02:35

Well that's what I was saying before. You know if you can't connect well why is this important to me who cares? Yeah I I and I 100% get that and and until we can you know uh kind of get the functional education of Atlantic Canadians up in terms of how an economy works and how a good economy is good for them, you know, they're not gonna make that connection. You know but but if you say you know we're gonna be able to hire more doctors we're gonna be able to hire more teachers um and and it's not gonna cost you any more in your taxes to do that, then people might say that's probably a good thing. You know? And why is that going to happen? Because we're gonna have more revenue coming in to be able to do those things without relying on taxpayers to pay the bill.

SPEAKER_02: 1:03:20

I think you need some really good poets to get this message out.

SPEAKER_03: 1:03:23

Do you know any last question that I had um is uh how what does how does Dawn foresee 2026 for for Atlantic Canada? That's a great question.

SPEAKER_00: 1:03:39

Well if you read my book Matt I'm very optimistic. I'm very optimistic I'm particularly optimistic and I think I mentioned this to you before the last time is that you know we've done a lot of work with uh the startup communities and the incubators and accelerators across Atlanta Canada and one thing has come through uh really clear is that the ambition of the today's young startups are different from my generation. Oh yes they are they are thinking only about you know national international markets and that's all good because if they can build stuff here and sell it somewhere else that's going to be really good for us. Great. So their ambition is really good and the other thing is that uh you know and and this is a you know something that I really I'm excited about is that the percentage of the startup that are coming from newcomers to our country is really important because those people have high risk tolerance and they have high work ethic. That combination is really something that we've kind of been missing in this region for a while. So we now have an ambitious outward looking group of younger generations in business creating businesses.

SPEAKER_02: 1:04:51

I've seen this first hand by the way like I can I can see it and you I know you can see it in the in the in the environments we work in that we can see a no a more ambitious generation all of a sudden that's just kind of with with a attitude they're happy to be there right now that's what's made me very optimistic and it's one of the reasons that we wrote the book because we were seeing these changes that we didn't notice before.

SPEAKER_00: 1:05:15

You don't you don't see it until you get into it obviously a little bit. Because the all these young people are working you know behind the scenes. You know I I I I joined the creative destruction lab uh recently and uh I had had my first experience uh a couple months ago and I was just really blown away by the ideas of these young people and the the ambition that they show and how well organized and how smart they are it just made me think wow and they're and they're they're staying here to do it here. Right. That's the big thing. They're not going somewhere else. Now they might go somewhere else when somebody says oh that's a good idea I want to buy them. But up until that point it it all stays here. Right? And so that gives me great encouragement about what's going on. I really hope that our government levels get their fiscal house in order. I think it's disgraceful what's being done both at the municipal level and the provincial level um you know uh you know we're we're burdening the future with the debt and the debt is costing us a lot of cash that could be used for other things.

SPEAKER_03: 1:06:13

So do you think the recent budget federally is a good investment though? Good do you think that's good deficit?

SPEAKER_00: 1:06:20

I think there was a need for uh spending beyond you know a balanced budget. I would like to have seen it offset a little bit more aggressively. There are programs being done by the federal government right now that are not doing anything for anybody. Right. They could be completely eliminated and nobody would know that it made any difference. And like you know trading how some some of the current budget is being used to some new spending rather than finding new money to spend on new things is what I would like to see a better balance of and I just don't think there was enough aggression on that side.

SPEAKER_03: 1:06:56

That's fair.

SPEAKER_00: 1:06:57

That's very fair.

SPEAKER_02: 1:06:58

So that's that honestly that's everything I had we uh I'd like to cheers to you we'll do one thing because it's going to be 2026 is over in um and uh we'll be do we roughly have two episodes left for you here so so what's your new year's resolution we'll completely change it up well I hadn't even thought about that Mike it's a little too early I usually think about that at midnight on the uh last day of the year okay um you know what I'm gonna do more of the same more of the same all right so another episode of the afternoon pint hey cheers we hope to see you again next year and we'll we'll check in thank you very much this was great thank you thanks guys enjoyed it