Rosie Barton tried to grill Mark Carney. She failed. What would a competent journalist have asked?

Barton combined a curt attitude with soft questions, contributing nothing to the political discourse. So what should we be asking incoming PM Carney?

To anyone familiar with the recent work of CBC’s Rosie Barton, it came as no surprise that her marquee interview with odds on favourite next Prime Minister of Canada Mark Carney had the illusion of seriousness – vapid questions about non-issues were delivered with a curtness and furrowed brow – but lacked any substance. This cosplay journalism all landed like a transmission from an alt-reality Canada, where carbon pricing actually was effective climate action but had incidentally caused the affordability crisis. And so Mark Carney’s free ride to the PMO continues.

Let’s assess a few of Barton’s questions, and then propose a few that should have been asked instead.

Barton’s questions

RB:
You have proposed that big polluters pay consumers through a carbon credit market with the industrial pricing system. So you get rid of the carbon tax for consumers and you would put this in place instead. How would you ensure though that those costs aren't passed on to consumers?

[…]

RB:
It still sounds to me though that there's an opportunity for companies to pass that on to consumers.

Of course, Barton knows that carbon pricing included a consumer rebate – so the prices were not passed on to consumers. The entire premise and logic of this is ridiculous. If all corporate taxes are just innocently passed on to consumers, then their record profits must just be a myth! Why tax corporations at all? And all of this is very much yesterday’s news. Following Jagmeet Singh’s lead, every active politician in Canada recognises that carbon pricing is now a distraction to effective climate action.

Whether she knows it or not, Rosie Barton has allowed herself to be hardcoded with a key piece of big oil propaganda: Climate action is unaffordable. Canada can’t afford to take climate action. Canada owes the world no carbon debt. The unsustainable status quo is just fine and dandy, thank you very much.

Eventually, Barton just accepts Mark Carney’s response to her falsely premised line of inquisition at face value.

MC:
Well, just to be clear, them buying credits reduces their cost. It helps Canadians reduce their own emissions.

Does it? How does corporations buying carbon credits help Canadians reduce their own emissions? Does it help Canadians buy heat pumps, install solar panels, insulate their homes, safely use their bicycle to pick up groceries without the threat of being run over, or catch a high speed train to visit a neighbouring city instead of wastefully flying? Is nudging Canada’s private sector really how a just transition happens?

Questions journalists should be asking Carney

Food insecurity

Food banks across Canada are experiencing empty shelves and record queues – as grocery prices continue to skyrocket and grocery CEOs see record profits. In the last parliament, Lib-Cons united to vote against several NDP affordability bills. Do you support the NDP’s idea to implement a French-style price cap on essentials? If not, what’s your solution?

Foreign aid

The destruction of USAID is quickly resulting in tens or even hundreds of thousands of avoidable deaths. Pierre Poilievre has promised to “dramatically cut” Canada’s already meagre foreign aid. Do you support the NDP’s commitment to double Canada’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) to the 0.7% of GNI goal Canada promised decades ago at the United Nations?

The housing crisis

Do you agree that the current housing market has failed to meet the needs of Canadians and needs government intervention? If so, how would you ensure more social housing gets built? Do landlords add anything to productivity or the real economy, or actively harm it?

The driving crisis

Canada has some of the world’s worst rates of forced car dependency and some of the worst car traffic in North America. What would you do to improve Canada’s terrible transportation sector emissions? For example, would you match the Netherland’s per capita investments in electric passenger rail and safe cycling infrastructure?

Capital gains wealth tax cancellation

You’ve committed to cancelling the Liberal-NDP negotiated capital gains adjustment micro-targeted at the wealthiest 1% who use it to dodge income taxes, effectively paying a lower rate than the average Canadian, claiming this will spur innovation. Isn’t this just trickle-down economic nonsense? Did a wannabe broligarch pressure you into this irrational economic decision? How can we 'grow the economy' for everyone, instead of just the super wealthy? How would you prevent more greedflation and corporate price gouging?

Infrastructure

You’ve committed to investing more in infrastructure – what do you mean by that? Are we talking about another Liberal $30B oil pipeline gift for big oil? Or fast tracking the decades-overdue construction of high speed rail? Would this infrastructure be built by union workers or would you continue the Harper-Trudeau temporary foreign worker poverty-wage programme?

Military spending

You’ve promised a major bump in military spending to 2% of GDP, costing tens of billions annually. How are you planning to pay for it? Would you allow Canadian-made arms to be supplied to foreign militaries that intentionally target civilians and children, and ignore international law?

International humanitarian law

Do you recognise the authority of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court? As leader of the LPC, would you allow candidates who have voiced opposition to the ICC and ICJ and racist support for war crimes, infanticide and genocide to continue to represent the party and run in the 2025 election?

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It’s obvious that Rosie Barton wanted to be combative, and give Carney the ‘hostile witness’ treatment, but is just too unaware of partisan politics, systemic corruption and the hardships facing ordinary Canadians to pull it off.

Mark Carney has been pandering to "free" market broligarch “builders” by cancelling wealth taxes while making vague statements about building infrastructure. How is he going to tackle record inequality, low wages, food bank queues and ripoff rents? We have no idea. Leading up to this ‘hard-hitting’ marquee interview, Mark Carney had a lot to answer for. He still does.

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