During CBC Yukon’s all-candidates' federal election forum, the four rivals for Yukon MP took questions on their leaders taking on U.S. President Donald Trump, their party’s level of support for supervised consumption sites and more.
Alongside CBC reporter Virginie Ann, CBC’s Dave White moderated the livestreamed event at the Whitehorse studio on the evening of April 15. While there was no in-studio audience, some questions were posed live by White while other comments and queries were presented in the form of recordings from Yukoners from around the territory.
Gabrielle Dupont of the Green Party of Canada, Ryan Leef of the Conservative Party of Canada, Katherine McCallum of the federal NDP and incumbent Brendan Hanley of the Liberal Party of Canada were all smiles when the News popped into the studio for a quick photo ahead of the forum.
From puppy love and free eggs at the doors to close encounters with caribou and a muskrat camp with kids, the Yukon’s candidates for the lone seat in the House of Commons started out with a softball: describing their standout moments on the campaign trail so far.
When asked why Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is best fit to face down U.S. President Donald Trump on tariffs, Leef highlighted the importance of maintaining strong diplomatic ties with the U.S. as allies, friends and neighbours. He suggested it takes a “strong leader” to focus on items like interprovincial trade barriers. He called it a “wakeup call” to look at the single-market reliance Canada has on the states, which he said has driven jobs and business south of the shared border.
“We need to lower taxes and bring those jobs back to the country, and we need to find a market domestically that allows us to take advantage of the products that we have, and we need to start pushing those globally and look at external markets,” he said.
The Conservative plan is well-grounded to do just that, as well as look more domestically, according to Leef.
McCallum identified with the fear and insecurity that many Yukoners are feeling.
“I think the question is: who's going to fight for everyday working Canadians and not protect the powerful and the massive corporations, and what kind of Canada are we fighting for? We obviously need to stand strong and stand up to bullies and not allow any of Canada to be sold off,” she said.
While McCallum didn’t specifically mention NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, she said the NDP plans to meaningfully improve employment insurance, commonly known as EI, to make it more generous to workers who lose their jobs. McCallum also pointed to her party’s plan to “build Canadian, buy Canadian” when it comes to building infrastructure needed for homes, highways and health care. That means using Canadian-made resources to keep people working and stimulate the economy.
Hanley noted the question came from a member of the border community of Beaver Creek. He heard similar concerns around Trump’s tariffs threats and annexation talk.
“There's also the feeling of the economic threat, and certainly this is the most common issue I'm hearing at the doors is: what's going to happen to my savings?” Hanley said.
“What Prime Minister [and Liberal Leader Mark] Carney is leading, continuing to lead, is the ‘Team Canada’ approach. So, at a high level, that's continuing the relationships and the trust building with U.S. counterparts at all levels, including business leaders, to really ultimately convince the U.S. administration that tariffs are not in anyone's interest. But it's also decreasing the interprovincial barriers, increasing our economic sovereignty, making us less dependent on the U.S. and strategically placed countermeasures that are already in place.”
Hanley explained that revenue from countermeasures will go toward support for workers and businesses, such as in the form of EI.
Dupont, who didn’t mention Green Party co-leaders Elizabeth May and Jonathan Pedneault, said her party will also seek “peaceful resolution.”
“We need to keep in mind that what's happening at the administration level is quite different from what is happening at the state level,” she said. Dupont pointed to the recent Alaskan resolution affirming Canada's national sovereignty.
“This is very, very encouraging to hear and to see that even a Republican state like Alaska would still be interested in being our friends but also doing business with us,” she said.
She suggested this side of the border can build its own resiliency.
“It means working on our clean energy transition so we can be fully in charge of producing our own electricity and we can also definitely look at measures to increase our resiliency with growing more food locally and really look at what Yukoners already have, and how can we boost what we already have?” she said.
Leef and Dupont indicated they are open to crossing the border this summer.
“I don't see there's any need for us to punish our good friends immediately across the border for mistakes of an administration,” Leef said.
McCallum is closed to the idea given she said she’s a new Canadian with dual Australian citizenship and has spoken out about the Trump administration.
“I don't feel like I am safe to cross the border at any given moment while Trump is the president,” she said.
Hanley noted that, if re-elected, he may very well need to cross the border as part of Carney’s “Team Canada” effort.
“For leisure purposes, I would also feel quite comfortable travelling to say, Skagway or Haines, Alaska. I think it's just important to make sure that documentation is in hand and well established,” he said.
A question from Jill Aalhus, the executive director at Blood Ties Four Directions, expressed concern that the programs they run, including a supervised consumption site in Whitehorse, “could be at risk.”
“One thing that's at the front of mind for our organization and the folks we support is: what is the future of these essential services going to look like?” Aalhus asked.
Dupont sees substance use issues as a health-care issue. She indicated it’s important to keep other options open when it comes to dealing with the problem.
“We heard from the tape here that safe consumption sites are a tool in the toolbox to address this problem. And we do have other tools in the toolbox, and one important tool is treatment. And we do know that when people are ready to seek treatment, we also need to be ready to offer them a spot,” she said.
To that end, Dupont said the Green Party pledges to fund and resource treatment programs for everyone who needs them — including in the communities where they live and where their support networks exist.
Leef highlighted the important harm-reduction work being done to “keep citizens safe.”
“I think it’s a great observation by Blood Ties Four Directions around the sort of the confusion between harm reduction and safe supply questions that a lot of Canadians aren't fully familiar with,” he said.
At the same time, per Leef, compassion dictates a need to focus on treatment.
“Our government is looking at opening 50,000 spaces for treatment. What that will look like will no doubt be regionally driven” including by First Nation governments, he said.
“It's encouraging that our government is focused on changing the dialogue to the necessary treatment that will bring loved one's home instead of leaving them vulnerable.”
McCallum spoke about her personal experience dealing with family member’s addictions.
“In my experience, the addictions are often caused by the by trauma, and I think that we need to deal with people's mental health and support NGOs who are doing harm reduction, who are offering harm-reduction programs and post-harm-reduction programs,” she said.
“We need to make sure that there's enough money in mental health. Mental health should be part of the health-care system. People should be paying for mental health with their health-care cards and not their credit cards.”
Hanley, a doctor and Yukon’s former chief medical health officer, said he has been involved in helping counter the “crisis” since 2016, when fentanyl first arrived in the territory. He indicated he sees inconsistent government responses to this file. He reflected on his health committee work drawing attention to the “toxic drug crisis."
“I am very worried about some of what I’m hearing from Pierre Poilievre on calling supervised consumption sites ‘drug dens,’ for example,” he said.
“We need to stick hard. We need to increase the scale of our response. We need to focus on prevention, harm reduction, access to treatment and enforcement.”
The full recording of the CBC forum can be found on YouTube.
Contact Dana Hatherly at dana.hatherly@yukon-news.com
