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The Current Transcript for January 27, 2022

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

He believes that Ukraine would fare better when it is peaceful and the neutral state living in peace and cooperation, both with Russia and its European neighbours.

MATT GALLOWAY: Tensions remain high on the border between Ukraine and Russia. The United States says an invasion may be imminent. Russia says no such thing is planned, and countries like Canada are sending support to Ukraine. In an hour, the Russian ambassador to Canada in a conversation about what Canada can do and should do to help resolve the situation. Also this morning, at the beginning of the pandemic, essential workers were cheered as heroes as we head into year three. Is that still the case?

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I don't feel recognised for the rest of that. We take every day and I definitely don't feel like we're heroes. I feel like we're almost the heroes that got left behind.

MG: In 30 minutes. Our Work in Progress series continues with a look at essential work and whether this pandemic can truly improve wages and working conditions for those who can't work from home. We begin, though, with a dangerous passage in pursuit of a better life. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

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Migration policies under scrutiny after family found frozen to death near U.S. border

Guests: Vaibhav Jha, Craig Smith

MG: As you've been hearing, a family of four was found in Manitoba last week frozen to death while trying to walk across the border into the United States. A man from Florida has been arrested and charged with human smuggling in connexion with the incident. The family was believed to be from the state of Gujarat in India. RCMP have not yet confirmed their identities, but Indian media have been reporting that the description is similar to at least one family from the village of Dingucha in Gujarat. Vaibhaj Jha of Char is a reporter with the Indian Express and we've reached him in Gujarat. Vaibhav? Hello.

VAIBHAV JHA: Hello, hello. How are you doing?

MG: I'm well. Tell me what you've been able to find out about this family and who they may have been.

VAIBHAV JHA: After the news broke out of a four member family from Gujarat found that the other US-Canada Border Police officials in Gujarat told reporters that there is a certain village known as Dingucha in Gandhinagar, capital city of Gujarat. From there, a four member family is also missing and their description matches with that of the four people found dead in Canada. So when our team visited the particular village, we came to know that the family had left for Canada around 10 days ago on a visitor's visa. Yet they had informed their relatives over there that they they're going for a new life over there. And since about Wednesday, they had stopped all communications with their relatives back in Gujarat, and it was about the same time and their relatives approached the police, claiming that they have been missing in Canada for the past four days.

MG: Who have you been able to talk to to get this information?

VAIBHAV JHA: We have been able to talk to the direct family of this four full member family of the relatives, police and the village head of the Dingucha, who gave us the record of how the family had travelled to Canada, how this was the first time that the four of them actually went overseas looking for a new life of theirs. So we tried to connect with the father, also of the missing family. He is in a state of shock right now. Yet he spoke to us. He told us how he was waiting for a call from the four people saying that they have reached Canada safely, but the call never happened.

MG: Tell me about the village. Can you describe the village of Dingucha for me?

VAIBHAV JHA: Linklater is an urban village, which is very affluent here. People have two to three houses over here. Families have always migrated out of Dingucha in the past 30 years. They have migrated overseas to U.S., Canada, U.K. and search for a better livelihood. When we visited the village, we found out that almost 50 percent of the houses were locked and in Dingucha because the families had wolf to the US or Canada. Even this particular four member family that had gone missing, at least six of their relatives are currently in Canada and US, who had migrated around 10 to 20 years ago. So this is a trend that we had noticed in Dingucha. Where families who are in the business of farming all private jobs, they look for a better livelihood opportunities in the US and Canada. They come back to India during the Diwali festival to touch base with their roots and all but majorly they stay overseas itself in Dingucha.

MG: Tell me more about that. I mean, help me understand why a family coming from a middle class community would try to get to the United States illegally.

VAIBHAV JHA: When we spoke to the relatives of this four member family, we found out that at least six or seven of their members were already settled in the US. And for this family, the main person who was missing is a schoolteacher. But he or he had always aspired for the Great American dream. He wanted to settle in the US. He was well-to-do in India. He had a good job. He had a good house, a wife and two kids. Yet he wanted to move to the US to find for a better livelihood opportunity.

MG: You said the American dream. Why does the American Dream have that kind of appeal and that sort of poll, do you think?

VAIBHAV JHA: So in the past 30 years, we have all since 1990s, we have seen this kind of migration of business persons from Gujarat who dare to take a risk leaving behind whatever they have in India, and they travel with the U.S. to make a name for themselves. So this kind of initially, I mean, in the past 30 years, the charm of having a good life in the U.S. had always motivated them. We have seen mass migration of families in cities are nearer to the capital city of Gujarat's Gandhinagar. We have seen villages that have got 50 percent empty because the families have moved to other overseas. So this is the kind of trend that the entire state has witnessed in the past 30 years.

MG: 50 percent empty. So the village would just hollow itself out because people are leaving to find a better life.

VAIBHAV JHA: Yeah, exactly. And it's a very normal thing over there for the people who are still in that village because they themselves are now aspiring to move to [unintelliglbe] overseas.

MG: What have you learnt about the people who run the smuggling operations to bring people from India to the United States?

VAIBHAV JHA: So police have not disclosed much in this case, apart from some detentions that they have made today. But what they're claiming is that there is illegal human trafficking network, which exists from Gujarat to Canada, where people are charged somewhere between 18 to 30 lakhs, which is somewhere between two to three million Indian rupees. You know, to get a visa for Canada and then eventually from Canada to US. So this is what the police are investigating right now. The investigation itself is in a very preliminary stage, so the press has not been provided much information by the police. But hopefully in the coming days, we will be able to get more details on this record.

MG: And so when you talk about the cost of it, that's around 30,000 Canadian dollars that sort of works out to, that's per person in terms of how much they would pay to try to get to the United States?

VAIBHAV JHA: That is per person, yes.

MG: And is that affordable to- you mentioned, you know, the standard of living of people ending up? Would something like that be affordable? Or would that be an enormous expense that they would have to try to figure out how to pay?

VAIBHAV JHA: For those who aspire to move overseas, that's an enormous amount. Yet, some of them they sell off their properties, the sell off their land to arrange for the money, they give it the trafficking ring, and somehow they just want to reach over there, you know, to entice for better livelihood. But yes, the amount is not small for them.

MG: How widespread is the knowledge of those trafficking rings? Do people know that they exist to police know that they exist?

VAIBHAV JHA: The investigation is in the nascent stage, so it would not be right for us to say that everyone is aware of this racket because that is what the police is investigating. But yeah, there have been cases in the past as well that people have been arrested in fake passport cases in Gujarat, where have been running a racket of providing fake documents to avail [unintelliglbe] visa for Canada.

MG: Do people know, who are taking this trip, do they know how dangerous it is? This family, we believe, came to Canada and then tried to cross into the United States by walking across a frozen field? I mean, through deep snow in the dead of winter with incredibly cold temperatures. So do people who are embarking on that voyage. Do they know how dangerous it is?

VAIBHAV JHA: As far as our findings, this particular family that went missing from Gujarat, they're not aware of the hard condition as they are to face, especially when they had a toddler with them. And, you know, they had to survive a temperature of minus 35. We don't think that this particular family was aware of the conditions over there.

MG: If they do manage to cross the border into the United States, what happens then?

VAIBHAV JHA: What we have come to know so far is that they even, you know, after migrating to Europe, they have manual jobs ready to do. But all this is part of police investigation right now.

MG: But is there a sense that there is a community that's there, that there are people, perhaps from similar villages or the same village who are there to welcome those who are making the journey?

VAIBHAV JHA: Of course. Of course, yes. Yes, that is correct. There are people from their own community, their own village that have already settled in over there. And these people, they make their own community people to help them out when they when they reach US or Canada over there.

MG: This is a terrible tragedy. A family killed, including young children, and they died in this attempt to try to get into the United States. Is your sense. I mean, this is making news in India. Is your sense that that what happened will deter people from making that similar voyage?

VAIBHAV JHA: What we sense is that there will be a closer scrutiny by the police on this illegal traffickers, but it'll be difficult for us to comment about whether the trend of migration will be affected, especially after the pandemic conditions in India and the kind of job losses that we have seen in the past two years. I mean, it will be difficult for me to say that people will be better to undertake such journeys.

MG: That that draw of the American dream is perhaps even more powerful because of what people have been through during the pandemic.

VAIBHAV JHA: Exactly, exactly.

MG: Vaibhav, appreciate speaking with you. Thank you very much for what you've been able to tell us.

VAIBHAV JHA: Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity as well.

MG: Vaibhav Jha atia is a reporter with India Express. We reached him in Gujarat. Craig Smith is a senior research associate with the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Migration at Ryerson University. He's looked at what can lead to tragedies like this one. Craig, good morning to you.

CRAIG SMITH: Morning, Matt. Thanks for having me.

MG: Thank you for being here. What did you think when you heard of the death of these family members from India in the brutal cold of Manitoba?

CRAIG SMITH: It's obviously horrific and contemplating the last hour of their life is extremely chilling and sad, there's no other way to put that. But also, as somebody who studies this type of thing and governmental reaction to it, it was unsurprising but also troubling to see government, police and media are now focussing almost exclusively on a person who was driving a van on the U.S. side of the border at the absolute last leg of this journey and all of the headlines of being around this family being called the victim of human smuggling. I think that really misses the big picture.

MG: All right. So let's untangle that. First, why weren't you surprised?

CRAIG SMITH: I mean, this is a quite typical reaction. I'm not sure, you know, the degree to which your listeners follow these stories, but last week, 30 people earlier this week, 30 people died in a shipwreck off the coast of Florida. And the government then focussed on the human smugglers, the US government. We've seen record boat crossings across the English Channel in the past year and a half. A few months ago, another boat capsized there. Priti Patel, the interior minister of the United Kingdom, also blamed the entire thing on evil human smuggling rings. And we see the same discourse on boats crossing from Libya, people coming from Turkey to Europe, etc. This common discourse, and like other markets, when you have very high demand for international migration and very few legal avenues to access that, then you're going to generate illicit markets. Prohibition plus demand equals criminal markets. And so this is. An obvious thing for people who study this, but for governments not to look at the way that their own policies and their interactions with other states and visa policies affect these types of routes and choices that people make to fulfil mobility aspirations. I mean, again, it's missing the big picture. The analogy that I propose is that it would be like if we hear about an opioid overdose, that you blame the street level dealer for the opioid crisis or something along those lines.

MG: Take a listen to this. This is Scott good. He's with the Grand Forks sector of U.S. border control, talking about that issue to your point of human smuggling.

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Typically, it's health from a third party, and those are the, you know, the lowest of the low, the smugglers that just don't care about human life. And they're going to put your life in danger if you attempt to associate with one of those smugglers and come across. There's just so many bad things that can happen. The smuggler is going to leave that part out. As a matter of fact, in fiscal year 21, the Border Patrol rescued over 12000 people. Whether those were, you know, extreme cold and the frostbite and hypothermia or, you know, drowning victims and dehydration and things like that on the southwest border, I mean, these these things happen every day.

MG: I want to go back to the idea of the big picture in a moment, but how sophisticated. He's talking about a network. How sophisticated, from your perspective, would that so-called network be?

Speaker 5: It is not human smuggling networks, not as they are portrayed by law enforcement, and we should be seriously asking the question, and I hope we get a chance to talk about the U.S., Canada safe third country agreement there. If somebody like the police and law enforcement are claiming that something is a huge transnational network, it generally be because they want the resources to fight that network. And in the U.S. specifically, we just need to look at the U.S. southern border with Mexico and the way that the Customs and Border Patrol, where this person works, the way that they behave on the western border and the resources and billions of dollars that they have and question the motivations of this type of discourse.

MG: What do you understand about the draw here? I mean, this is a family living a middle class life in India, should we be surprised that that family would take the risk to two as as five, I was saying, you know, find the American dream.

Speaker 5: So I would imagine that these people probably try to apply for a U.S. visa beforehand. I mean, in most cases, that's what happens. Or so we did research on Roxham Road, where most people are coming across the border the other way and spoke with 300 people who claimed asylum coming over Roxham Road from 2017 to 2020. And 40 percent of those people had previously applied for visas reserved for European Union states or Canada, and were denied those visa before they made the choice to make an irregular journey to claim asylum instead of being able to claim asylum at an airport. Like most people do. So understanding that big picture. But the other thing is completely unsurprising that they're a middle class family because it costs a lot of money to do this type of thing. The people who are the most desperate, the people who have the least, are trapped where they are. That's why another big fact of refugee movements and asylum and irregular migration. You need financial and social capital. You need the networks to be able to make this kind of trip.

MG: You mentioned the Safe Third Country Agreement, and we heard a lot about that when through Roxham Road and other points, refugees were fleeing the United States and coming into Canada. How does that agreement impact those who are leaving this country?

Speaker 5: Yeah. So two things here. One is that the majority of people crossing the U.S. Canada border, maybe 30 percent were fleeing the United States, but the majority were flying into the U.S. or coming up through Central America on longer international intercontinental routes to get to Canada. So yeah, that really kicked off by the Trump administration policies, but now has become a point, an end point for international routes. The reason that people know that they can cross [unintelligible] is because of the Safe Third Country agreement has created a situation where people can't claim asylum at land borders, at an official border points and so that they have to cross between ports of entry to claim asylum. It's very interesting to know that that's what people know about this route in the first place. The second thing is that if you look back when Canada was debating internally in House of Commons committees in the 1990s, whether or not they wanted to institute an agreement like this, they looked at the European case and they looked at the U.S. And parliamentarians said, essentially, we shouldn't extend the safe third country agreement to the entire border because if we do that, we will incentivise more human smuggling. More criminality will essentially create this market and create profit. Canada will have a larger undocumented population as a result, and that's why one of the main reasons of the Safe Third Country Agreement looks the way that it does. It's very important for the listeners to understand that groups like Amnesty International and the Canadian Council for Refugees have been fighting to save their country agreement in courts over the last couple of years. The government, so the federal courts, ruled that the safe third country agreement should be struck down because it returns people to punitive and abusive detention in the United States. The federal government appealed and won that appeal, and now for the first time, and finally, it's going to be heard by the Supreme Court of Canada this year.

MG: And so what would you want to come out of that? I mean, we asked to speak with the Minister of Immigration, Shaun Fraser, and he directed us to an interview that he'd done in which he essentially said, you know, there's no place for dangerous and illegal smuggling in Canada. So I guess just finally, in the last minute or so that we have, what would you want to come out of of if the Supreme Court looks at the Safe Third Country agreement? What would come after that to better protect those who are trying to to move across borders?

Speaker 5: I mean, I'm not a lawyer. What we need for people to safely be able to cross borders is more legal mobility channels. I mean, everybody knows that this is the case, easier labour mobility, et cetera. But what we should not do is- Canada also is in the process of trying to renegotiate the safe third country agreement with the United States. Over the course of the pandemic, we've been turning people back at the border, telling them they can wait and then maybe come back later. It's exactly equivalent to the Remain in Mexico programme that the Trump administration put in place to tell people that they can wait in dangerous border cities in Mexico and now has been extended by the Biden administration. And it's what the European Union Turkey Agreement looks like. Canada is about to make this choice, whether it's going to join the club of states that militarise their borders and make dodgy deals with third countries. Or we can keep going down the path where we offer humanitarian assistance and have migration policy that's guided by a rights based approach rather than a policing approach.

MG: Craig, we'll have to leave it there. It's good to speak with you about this. Thank you very much.

CRAIG SMITH: Thank you for having me.

MG: Craig Smith, senior research associate with the Canada Excellence Chair in Migration at Ryerson University. You're CBC News is next. And then we will talk about essential workers. After a couple of years of this global pandemic, they're still showing off. They're still sacrificing are starting to contemplate what's next. We'll talk about the future of essential work coming up in six minutes. My name is Matt Galloway and this is The Current on CBC Radio One.

Essential workers on the pandemic and what they want to see happen next

Guests: Danielle Turpin, Dr. Stephanie Ross

MG: Good morning, I'm Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current.

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MG: Still to come, the threat of a Russian invasion of Ukraine has Naito nervous Europe on edge and Canada sending fresh military aid overseas in just under 30 minutes. My conversation with Russian Ambassador to Canada Oleg Stepanov. We'll talk about Russian military drills, sanctions and this country's role. But first essential work before, during and after the pandemic.

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MG: The last two years haven't been easy or safe for many people deemed essential workers, they've been asked again and again to keep going to work while millions of others stay home. But the pots and pans that Canadians banged every night as a gesture of thanks have gone quiet. The so-called hero pay for grocery store employees has long since expired, and so as part of our series work in progress today, we're looking at how the pandemic has changed essential work and we'll start with the people who sell you your groceries.

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VOICE 1: Hi, my name is [unintelligilbe], and I'm on my way to work right now at a grocery store in Toronto. I love working here for over 12 years. The hardest was working during the pandemic. For me has been the uncertainty. I was just a worker. It literally feels like every day is day one of Covid. For COVID prevention, from the time you leave your house, on the bus, on the subway, and then when you get to work the precautions because you never know until the very end when you need different PPE and all that. So it's really hard. It's really stressful. The first couple of months of the pandemic, you know, everybody was like, Oh, you guys are heroes on the radio, on the news, in the newspaper. I saw this really funny clip where they had like a cartoon drawing of the Justice League, and then they had two grocery workers that was drawn into the clip and they were like, You guys are part of the club now. We've always felt like we were a part of a club with all the recognition, but at the same time, it was good to get that. It's always good to be recognised, but that has come and went. What would make my job easier? Like, you know, reality is it's paid sick days. You're scared, you're scared to get scolded because you don't want to stay home for like five days, 10 days, 14 days because you're losing pay, especially right now. Food prices are skyrocketing, rents skyrocket and nobody wants that.

VOICE 2: My name is Carmen Louie and I work at Donalds Market in Vancouver. This is actually my 18th year. The hardest part working at the grocery store during the pandemic is, it starts from phase one for people who was not complying to our rules, that was then. Most customers that come in now, are very obedient, I guess, with the rules, if I may say that. Being a cashier at the front, the community have been very supportive to each other.

VOICE 3: My name is Felicia Hoys and I work at No-frills and I've worked here for 16 years. I would say the hardest thing working through the pandemic is just it's been extremely busy at the store compared to how it used to be. We're just having to work longer hours. Especially at first, the customers were very sympathetic and very appreciative. They're a little bit more irate these days and just not as understanding or patience. I don't feel recognised for the risks that we take every day, and I definitely don't feel like we're heroes. I feel like we're almost the heroes that got left behind because even just when they roll out things like the vaccine, like, it's just unfortunate that us having to have worked through the whole pandemic these long hours, we just were never put first like anything we could spread at the most if we were to get sick because we're putting and coming into contact with like hundreds of people per day. I find a lot of co-workers are coming into work with these mild symptoms, but just because they can't afford to take the day off. Hero pay, I think, is number one that we need.

MG: Grocery store employees aren't the only ones feeling forgotten. Danielle Turpin was working as a personal support worker at a long term care home in Peterborough when the pandemic started. Danielle, good morning.

DANIELLE TURPIN: I'm a thank you for having me.

MG: Tell us what some of the day to day things were that you experienced when you were working as a W in a long term care home.

DANIELLE TURPIN: A lot of these problems existed prior to the pandemic, and I think that's really important to note here. But the pandemic really heightens the seriousness of the issues. Staffing issues were compounded by hundreds and thousands like it was. It was pretty impossible to bear with at times. Because of this short staffing issues, KSWs were forced to make tough decisions regarding client care, sometimes had to make decisions regarding their safety and not following care plans properly just to get the job done.

MG: Can you tell me more about those tough decisions? What would one of them be like?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Sure. I think one thing that was happening fairly commonly during the pandemic was having to transfer patients and transfer residents without the assistance of another co-worker. So there are certain levels of care certain residents need, and some of them require two people to assist them to do the care properly and safely and because we had limited staff. That wasn't always possible. And that was a pretty serious fall risk and safety issue for the residents and for the staff, to be honest.

MG: He said it was a decision. I mean, if you weren't able to safely do that, transfer, what would happen to those residents?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Oh, well, I mean. Of them require, you know, a lift to help them do that, and it's required to have two people to be able to do that properly and safely, when to spot and support, the other one to push and ease the lift. So if we have just one person being able to do that, there's no support, you know, in case something falls or God forbid, the straps break or anything like that. So it's super important that that care plan is always implemented and it just was impossible to do that. The decision wasn't really a decision that we just made lightly. It was kind of forced upon us because we didn't have the staff.

MG: Do you mind telling me a story of a specific example of those tough decisions that you were forced to make when it came to the care of the residents that you were helping to look after?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Yeah, sure. I mean, this one in particular, I think, is probably one of the decisions and one of the situations that led me to have to make the decision to leave, and it was more about having to say no to the residents. And that's a really big issue. We do not have enough time. There was never enough time for residents to give them just the bare bones basic needs. So after meal times and everything, what happens is we would go and start getting them ready and do their personal care, such as getting them ready for bed. You know, they'll be ringing their bells and people have to use the washroom and everything. And one of the hardest things for a or anyone in health care, we think, is to tell a resident that they have to wait. And this one in particular, residents really had to use the washroom, and she had to wait because we didn't have the staff to be able to assist her. And even though she was capable of using the washroom on her own and never really was incontinent because of the staffing issues and because of the fact that we were forcing her to wait. She ended up having an accident and was incontinent, and it was probably one of the most degrading experiences she's ever had. And I was a part of that, and I felt like I contributed to that. So it was very shortly after that her and I both had to cry, and it was very shortly after that where I decided I can't be a part of this.

MG: That's awful to have to be through. And I mean, again, it's not something that you know is your fault. You're put in this position because you're short staffed because there aren't enough people to help those residents. So did you talk to to management and to your union about what you were going through?

DANIELLE TURPIN: I did. I spoke to supervisors and management, and it wasn't just me speaking to that. This was a fairly well-known issue, and I just kind of want to be clear also that I do not in any way think this is a worker issue. I don't think that this is even an independent facility issue. This is a systemic failure that needs to be addressed regarding policy change regarding better funding into the, you know, in resources into long term care homes, in particular home care. But I did speak to management and I think even though I was supported and I was told I was understood by some of the management, I think other people felt that their hands were tied. So nothing really got done about that. I think it's almost like we don't have the resources and they kind of turned a blind eye to that and to some of these problems.

MG: We know that a lot of PSWs are women, many are racialized women. How does that add to the burdens that they are experiencing more broadly during the pandemic?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Oh gosh. Well, I think the lack of empowerment and the lack of a voice, case studies in general don't have a collective voice. We don't have the ability to really seek the proper type of working environment that we deserve, especially in larger cities where the majority of our racialized women. That was all kind of part and parcel on why I decided to create home care workers cooperatives.

MG: Tell me about the cooperative. As you said, you got to the breaking point where you couldn't continue to do that, work safely in that long term care homes. So you created this cooperative. What is it?

DANIELLE TURPIN: It's a home care cooperative. We provide home care services to clients in our communities. I think the most important thing about worker cooperatives in particular areas is it gives power back to the workers by ways of worker ownership and democratic control in their work environment. Members are going to have an equal vote in policy changes and decision making, such as benefits and wage and profit sharing, work hours, et cetera. Another key point to be made about this, and one of the reasons why I created it, is because worker co-ops are grassroots social enterprises, so all the jobs, all the money that is created stays within the community of services. So nothing's going off to distant shareholders or for profit agencies,

MG: and you're caring for people in their own homes, which is where they want to be.

DANIELLE TURPIN: Exactly the majority of people, it's been set in in tons of data, especially recently. Majority of people want to age at home, they want to stay at home, and it's way more economical to do that and to provide funding for home care than it would be to actually find the the for profit long term care homes that are existing currently.

MG: When you talk. About empowerment and you talk about taking control of your situation. How many workers do you think are able to do that? Is it easy for them? Who would be in your situation to do something similar to seise control of their destiny as you have?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Yes, actually. I was really surprised at how easy this was for years actually, in this business, I knew something wasn't right. And when I finally left long term care, I started doing a little bit of research and I came across the Canadian Worker Cooperative Federation. And when you're talking about, is it easy to do that, they will guide you and workers all the way through. I was given a grant to help with a feasibility study in order to kind of really give me a good idea on whether this is a good business model and is going to work and succeed.

MG: You're an essential worker. And as I said at the beginning, way back when when this thing started, we were out at 7:00 or 7:30, depending on where you happen to be banging the pots and pans in celebration of an appreciation of those essential workers. Do you feel like society values the work that you do?

DANIELLE TURPIN: Oh, of course not. No, I think individually people value and I think our clients value the work that we do for the most part. But no, I don't think so, because if they did and if we did, however many pots and pans we decided to bang is irrelevant. We don't find the system we have. There has to be a fundamental shift in the way we think about caring for our seniors and our most vulnerable people. And for those who care for them. So until that happens, I have no faith that things are going to change.

MG: So I'm glad to speak with you about the work that you're doing. Danielle, thank you very much.

DANIELLE TURPIN: Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

MG: Danielle Turpin is a personal support worker and one of the founders of the Home Care Workers Co-operative in Peterborough, Ontario. The pandemic may have been a wake up call for some Canadians, exposing what working life is like for many essential employees. But whether that will lead to any fundamental changes in the labour force is an entirely different question. Stephanie Ross is the director of the School of Labour Studies at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. Stephanie, good morning to you.

STEPHANIE ROSS: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Do you hear a common thread in the experiences of the essential workers that we've been hearing from this morning?

STEPHANIE ROSS: Yes, actually, I think the common thread is a sense of disappointment and maybe even betrayal. I think, you know, we think back to the beginning of the pandemic, you know, especially in the first wave in April, May 2020. That's when this discourse about the heroism of essential workers was really intense, right? People were expressing kind of an outpouring of gratitude. All of these public displays, as one of your guests mentioned, you know, there were cartoons depicting grocery store workers as superheroes. And in an important sense, you know, not only health care workers, but also workers that hadn't normally been considered essential were now included in that definition, like grocery store workers, other workers in food production, agriculture, food delivery, all those people that were keeping society going at a basic level. But I think that what your guests have talked about is the fleeting nature of that valuation. And we can see some ways in which that appreciation was fleeting. What is in terms of pandemic pay premiums, right? These came and went very quickly. They were introduced in the spring, April, May 2020, but they were mostly gone by the middle of the summer of 2020. And even though we've had several waves of the pandemic since then, that in some ways we could argue is riskier. Those pandemic pay premiums haven't returned. And I'd add to that that, you know, the workers who tend to be in these essential occupations, which are also often caring occupations. And I think Danielle really put that very well. These are essential occupations, but because they have also traditionally been seen as, for instance, the work of women, in some ways, they haven't been valued in the way that we often value work. When you think of essential work like PSW work, long term care, health care, even teaching education as an expression of women's natural propensity to care, that kind of allows decision makers employers to take advantage of this idea that women are going to do this because it's natural. They're going to sacrifice themselves for others, it's a labour of love. And so you don't really have to pay people well for the things that they're going to do out of their nature or because they care. And I think that people are feeling the contradiction between that notion that they're essential, but that we don't actually have to recognise their essential role with either wages or with safe and dignified workplace.

MG: Well, this is something that you looked into. You surveyed workers during the pandemic about the relationship that they had with their bosses and one of the things that came out is that employers in some instances were using the moment that we're in the pandemic that we're still living through to push their workers.

STEPHANIE ROSS: Yes, absolutely. I mean, I should note this is a survey we did in the fall of 2020. And so, you know, keep in mind, we did this survey of Ontario workers about their experiences both at the workplace but also with government income support programmes during the first two waves of the pandemic. And so we identified a lot of the issues that your guests have spoken about above 50 percent in the study reported that they had more responsibilities at work. Sixty percent said that they were working hard, harder and that was especially true of the women in our survey. But they were also working harder in the context of work that was less safe, that was more anxiety producing. And that while their employers had made safety modifications at work, those seemed to be fleeting, also as fleeting as pandemic pay, if you will. Lots of people note did significant pressure to come in to work while sick, and about 25 percent of the study participants reported negative interactions with employers. Like being forced to take their vacation time during shutdowns, rather than being able to have access to that when they could use that to recharge. Bullying by supervisors. Problems with getting paid or at all, or on time being threatened with job loss. So I guess I would say the thread that really came through in that survey was the sense of anger and betrayal that many people had, that their sacrifices had were going on rewarded and that employers were taking advantage to get people to work harder and using ideas that workers should be grateful to have a job, to keep them working and certainly as a substitute for wage increases.

MG: Let me let me play an excerpt for one more worker. This is Freddy Vasquez, who works as a cleaner at the Cargill meat processing plant in High River, Alberta. This is a plant that's just been through another outbreak of COVID in early January. Here he is, describing the work on the meat processing line.

SOUNDCLIP

The line has gone up to its normal speed. So is just congestion and trying to cut a piece of meat that is coming your way, you probably have five seconds. You cut that piece to specification and send your other piece of meat is coming by. There's eight people that have to cut this type of meat. If people decide not to show up, we'll cut this specific type of meat. You can have six people that would have to cut it, and the meat is still coming out really, really fast. We have actually no sick days, so you have to realise people are coming to work sick because how are they going to make ends meet? There have been people who have told other people that they weren't feeling well and people have said, You know what, if you report this to the nurse, they're going to send you home and you're not going to be able to, you're not going to get paid. So but recently we got something from a union saying that they're trying to work things out so that people can somehow get sick pay. For the people that I've talked to, they said that they haven't received a penny yet.

MG: Stephanie Ross, how do we understand this, that this far into the pandemic in places like meatpacking plants, there are still workers without sick pay. They have to come to work sick because otherwise they're not going to get a penny, as Freddie said.

STEPHANIE ROSS: It's stunning, really. You know, we have had two years, but more of advocacy. For the most part, they've gone unheard. But I think that what this tells us is that it's the work that's seen as essential, not the workers. What's important is that for employers and governments, I would argue that as long as there are people to do the work, the impacts on the workers themselves, whether in terms of their physical or mental health or the financial burdens that they bear, aren't really important.

MG: Well, let me ask you about that, whether there's people to do the work because we're seeing labour shortages in a lot of those essential sectors now people are leaving and they're not coming back and they're going to work somewhere else. How much of that has to do with people being fed up with the working conditions in the pay and saying, You know what, I'm going somewhere else?

STEPHANIE ROSS: Yeah, I think it has everything to do with that. And I think it's a very unusual situation for a lot of employers because I think, you know, since the 1990s, really employers have have benefited from a labour market where, you know, there's a lot of structural unemployment. And so I think that they've felt quite empowered to set the terms of the labour market and to not worry that workers have a lot of options in terms of exiting and leaving to other jobs. But for sure, the pandemic has changed something about how workers see their relationship to the workplace. Look, if you think about the way in which the risk reward relationship has really changed about work.

MG: In terms of what we're willing to give up, what we're willing to sacrifice

STEPHANIE ROSS: is exactly a lot of frontline workers who were initially kind of made into heroes in the subsequent period and the pandemic have been subject to not just low wages, but, you know, abuse from the public. Can we imagine in April 2020 that we would have been seeing protests in front of hospitals and sort of abuse at health care workers. People have also been surrounded by death and disease like I think we can't underestimate the impact that the loss of family of loved ones has made people rethink, like what are their priorities? But I think the other thing to add is that not all workers had the power of exit. And so there's a couple of other options. I think one is I think we're going to see in lots of places, not a great resignation, but a great disengagement where people are going to withdraw their energy. And then the other possibility is collective action.

MG: We're out of time. But let me just ask you just finally very briefly, I mean, if you we've been thinking about what the new normal for work looks like and everybody's been musing about this since the pandemic started. Given everything that you've said and what we've heard from essential workers. In the best case scenario, what does that new normal look like from your perspective?

STEPHANIE ROSS: Well, if I could, if I could think utopically, I think that a renewed wave of unionisation would make things enormously better for people. I think a renewed set of demands to better regulate the labour market through improving employment standards. And I think that those were always things we really needed. And now I think more than ever, we we need that. But also, how much do we work? You know that Training Centre for Policy Alternatives has showed that the the biggest companies have done extremely well during the pandemic. CEOs are doing very well. But is that where we want our collective wealth to go? Why should we not be thinking about redistributing that wealth so that people can walk less? Those are experiments that are going on in Europe where, you know, Finland, Iceland and many individual workers are reducing the length of the workweek and without loss in pay. And that is actually having better results in terms of people's ability to balance their work with the rest of their lives. And frankly, I think those are questions we need to really be taking up as we emerge hopefully soon from this collective experience that we've been having because otherwise, you know, the sacrifices that we've made for the last, going on three years now, will be for nothing. And I fear what will happen if people don't see their sacrifices translated into improvements in the quality of work and quality of life.

MG: Stephanie, great to speak with you about this. Lots to think about. Thank you very much.

STEPHANIE ROSS: Oh, thank you so much, Matt.

MG: Stephanie Ross is director of the School of Labour Studies at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. This is part of our series work in progress. Looking at the future of work, we'd love to hear from essential workers in particular. How has your work changed over the course of this pandemic? Do you still feel like you're being treated like a hero? And what would make for an ideal work environment for you in future? Email us thecurrent@cbc.ca. Coming up after your regional update.

SOUNDCLIP

It is officially proclaimed by NATOs at brushes and nursery rhetoric has to be contained. So, you know, are just not feeling very much secure.

MG: 100,000 Russian troops at the Ukrainian border and a nervous natto alliance in 90 seconds. My conversation with the Russian Ambassador to Canada, Oleg Stepanov, about diplomacy, conflict and what role he thinks Canada should play in this situation. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

Russia's Ambassador to Canada Oleg Stepanov on rising Ukraine-Russia tensions

Guests: Oleg Stepanov, Roland Paris

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current

Speaker 2: [sc]

Today, I've authorised the extension of Operation Unifier for three more years. This is a 340 million dollar commitment as part of it. I've authorised the Canadian Armed Forces to deploy 60 personnel within days to join the approximately 200 women and men already on the ground. This also includes a provision of non-lethal equipment, intelligence sharing and support to combat cyber attacks.

MG: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaking yesterday in announcing Canada's increased support for Ukraine. Russia has stationed an estimated 100,000 troops along the Ukrainian border. Talks between Russia and NATO are ongoing, but Naito members have also begun preparing their own military responses. I spoke with Russia's Ambassador to Canada Oleg Stepanov, yesterday before the prime minister's announcement. Here's that conversation.

OLEG STEPANOV: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Is Russia planning to invade Ukraine?

OLEG STEPANOV: Absolutely not. No intent, no desire.

MG: You said there's zero chance that this will happen.

OLEG STEPANOV: Zero chance.

MG: And yet there are an estimated 100000 troops along the border with Ukraine. Russia has illegally seised the Crimean Peninsula in the past. Given that, why should Canada or any other country believe that your government won't invade Ukraine?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, a couple of points. First of all, our troops are in our national territory, is conducting regular drills. It's our sovereign right and we can conduct those drills everywhere on our national territory. Second, we know that Russia and the West agreed to disagree on the genesis of the Crimea return to Russia. You know, the history of Crimea. Nikita Khrushchev voluntarily joined Crimea to the Ukraine right during Soviet time and for previous level of candidatos 300 years it was practically Russia, the United Nations.

MG: The of course the United Nations has not recognised this, hasn't recognised the referendum, hasn't recognised the annexation and has said that that Crimea was taken by Russia. I guess the point of this is given what has happened there. Why should people believe that this wouldn't happen again when it comes to Ukraine?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, let me put it this way. I'm always asking myself, what be the rationale of Russia to invade Ukraine? What Russia gains by doing that? I mean, there is no practical political reason for that, and Russian Russian policy is very realistic and very pragmatic. So I don't. Well, you know, my my guess would be that the current spin in the in the Western governments and media regarding situation around the Ukraine is an attempt to distract public opinion from Russian proposal. Those United States and NATO to sit at the table and discuss broader as they discuss European security as a much broader and complex issue.

MG: Let me ask you, let me ask you about that. Russia has said that Ukraine should be forever denied membership in NATO. What right does Russia have to demand something like that of another sovereign state?

OLEG STEPANOV: It's not a demand, it's the logic. We believe that Ukraine would fare better when it is peaceful and the neutral state living in peace and cooperation, both with Russia and its European neighbours. Our concern is our concern regards the expansion of NATO. You know, while Russia never politically and publicly and officially stated that neither is a threat to Russian security. The expansion of NATO be perceived as a threat because NATO is the strongest military force in the world. Together with the United States and Europe and the US allies, the claim to be a nuclear alliance, it's one billion people. We as military expenses that many times as much as Russia. And when we see the approach of NATO's infrastructure to the Russian borders, we are getting very concerned.

MG: But you also say that you also said that NATO's or that Russia believes that Ukraine would be better as an independent voice in this as a neutral party. What right does Russia have to demand that of a sovereign state? Do you believe that Ukraine is a sovereign nation?

OLEG STEPANOV: We believe that Ukraine's sovereign nation, but the same logic can be applied to the persistent desire on behalf of the United States to get Ukraine involved in aid to Ukraine. Constitution Before the 2014, the overthrow of the democratically elected president, Yanukovich stated that Ukraine is not going to join any military alliances. So with Western help, a new government came to power or change the constitution and claim the official course to join NATO. I don't believe that there is a consensus in the Ukrainian society regarding joining neither.

MG: How do you know that?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, because we are neighbours with Ukraine and we know the wounds of the Ukrainian population. But once again, I would like to return to the practise of international relations. When you want to get into the meaningful conversation began regarding security, you have to, for example, remember the OSCE summit declaration, which directly says that no party, no state can build its own security at the expense of the security forces. And that's how we perceive the expansion of made up that neither is trying to build an offence, its security at the expense of security of Russia. I would suggest that neither politicians try to sit in our chair and try to have the Russian perspective perspective from Moscow.

MG: Ukraine has asked Canada to send defensive weaponry if Canada sends military aid. How will Russia respond to that?

OLEG STEPANOV: So once again, it's not conducive to the settlement of conflict in Ukraine. The more weapons in the country, which is in the process of civil conflict, a civil war just fuels that conflict. Our view is that every party has to show restraint.

MG: You invited the Foreign Affairs Minister, Melanie Joly, to Moscow. What could a beating like that achieve, do you think?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, as a diplomat, I believe that the diplomatic channels of communications have to be open should function in all weather mode. Canada is very vocal about Ukraine. Internationally, Canada says that it has special interests in Ukraine, taking into consideration the Ukrainian Canadian community here historically. So it would be only natural that if Canada has any type of concerns regarding Russia policy, or if Canada sees any constructive proposals to lay on the table in front of Russia, it would be very, very useful for our senior officials to meet and communicate.

MG: What about the prime minister? Should the prime minister reach out to Vladimir Putin?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, it's the decision of the Canadian government if they see it is useful. I would say that President Putin will be welcoming such a call.

MG: What about the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, Chrystia Freeland? There's a travel ban that prevents her from travelling to Russia. Would your government lift that for her as the deputy prime minister of this country to be involved in those diplomatic channels as you characterise them?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, I would say that in the current situation, when there is a widespread practise of blacklisting officials and, you know, it's a kind of tit for tat practise internationally, there is an exception when there is a need to get in touch with a certain politician who's blacklisted, that ban usually lifted for that purpose. We did that with the Americans. It can be done here, I believe.

MG: So Chrystia Freeland would be welcome in Russia?

OLEG STEPANOV: of course, if she comes with the initiatives to help to advance the dialogue on Euro-Atlantic security and around Ukraine.

MG: Obviously, there was a warning by Canada's cyber spy agency of potential cyber attacks by Moscow. And then this week there were reported network disruptions at Canada's Department of Global Affairs. You talked about means that could be taken. Should things escalate? Has your government carried out cyber attacks on Canada?

OLEG STEPANOV: No, absolutely not. I would like to underline and stress that Russia has never engaged in any malicious cyber activity against other states. I would also underline that my government position is that the cyber sphere has to be no free from any military or subversive activity.

MG: And so what do you make of the fact that the Canadian Centre for Cybersecurity says that critical infrastructure in this country has to be aware and already take steps to mitigate Russian state sponsored cyber threat activities?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, I would say that unfortunately, in the West, Russia is so demonised that anything that can't be explained immediately blamed on Russia, so it's a presumption of guilt. We got accustomed to that, but once again, I would say that those allegations are completely groundless.

MG: Naito members, as you know, have threatened economic sanctions against Russia if the aggression continues, including direct sanctions against President Vladimir Putin. You told CTV that sanctions never work. What did you mean by that?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, because if you look at the history of unilateral sanctions introduced by the West against any sovereign country, they never achieved the declared goal to make that country, to make that country to change its political course. And obviously against Russia, economic sanctions would never, never work. Sanctions, as the press secretary of President, Putin said, I believe yesterday. Sanctions are politically destructive. That's true. And sanctions create a certain mood in the business community, preventing the development of business contracts, ties and et cetera. But they are not able to achieve the declared goal.

MG: The Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, has used the word demands and says if we do not receive a constructive answer from the West on our security demands, Moscow will take appropriate measures. What are those appropriate measures?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, I believe my minister elaborated on that, that if the talks fail and our view on how we can alleviate the situation in the Euro Atlantic is not taken into account. We will be forced to seek political and military response to the current state of affairs.

MG: And what does that mean? A political and a military response?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, it means that, for example, if Russia is threatened militarily, we'll be able to find the deterrent to the threat.

MG: What is it that Russia could do, do you think, to help de-escalate the situation? This is a very tense situation right now and you've pointed it steps that you want other nations to take. What is Russia willing to do here?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, for example, today is the political advisers to the leaders of the Normandy format meeting in Paris. My belief is if you are talking about Ukraine, the best way is to persuade to the government in Kiev to get back to the table with the region of Donbass and get back to the fulfilment of the Minsk agreements. That would be the best way and in the interests of all the parties, Russia would support it in all its support, the peaceful solution of conflicts, especially conflict in eastern Ukraine, because it's a region that borders strictly Russia. And, you know, having conflict at our border is not in our interests.

MG: What about withdrawing some of those troops that people believe has led to the escalation of tensions?

OLEG STEPANOV: Well, when the drills are always the troops will be withdrawn.

MG: Ambassador, it's good to speak with you. I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you very much.

OLEG STEPANOV: Thank you very much for having me. Bye bye.

MG: Bye bye. Oleg Stepanov off as Russia's ambassador to Canada. We spoke yesterday.

SOUNDCLIP

Russia essentially has two options here. They can engage in meaningful dialogue or be subject to swift and severe consequences, such as financial sanctions. And you can trust that I will continue to actively engage with our partners, with our allies as part of the coordinated efforts to push for de-escalation in the furtherance of the international rules based order.

MG: That's Canada's Minister of Defence Anita Anand, speaking on CBC Radio's As It Happens last night. The federal government announced additional support for Ukraine yesterday, and Minister Anand will travel to Ukraine in coming days. For more, I'm joined by Roland Paris. He's director of the University of Ottawa's Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and an associate fellow of Chatham House. He's also a former foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Trudeau role in Paris. Good morning to you.

ROLAND PARIS: Good morning, Matt.

MG: What impact do you think Canada is sending an additional 60 military personnel and non-lethal weapons could have on the situation in Ukraine?

ROLAND PARIS: Well, I think it's important to put this in context of what many other countries Canada's partners are doing at the same time and continuing to support the Ukraine government as part of a larger effort to demonstrate unity on the part of Western countries to raise the costs for Vladimir Putin if he considers taking additional military action in Ukraine and also to demonstrate support for the Ukraine government. 60 additional trainers are not going to change the military situation on the ground, obviously. I think the elements that Canada mentioned yesterday that could potentially have some significant effect would be helping Ukraine to defend itself against cyber attacks. It's not clear exactly what capabilities Canada might be able to offer, but that's a point of particular vulnerability for Ukraine.

MG: Should Canada do more? The Conservative Party said that Canada should immediately provide lethal defensive defensive weapons to Ukraine.

ROLAND PARIS: You know, some Western countries are providing lethal weapons. Others are not. You know, even the lethal weapons that might be provided to the Ukraine government won't really change the battlefield balance. Russia has more than enough forces to sweep across Ukraine if it chooses to do so. One of the potential uses of these weapons is to be distributed frankly to to a resistance force of Ukrainians should should Russia invade. But I think that the bottom line here is that the Western countries, including Canada, have essentially said they are not going to fight the Russians face to face on the ground in Ukraine over Ukraine. And what that means is that the toolkit that's available to actually defend the Ukrainian government against a determined Russian force is quite limited. The toolkit there are many elements in the toolkit, but even some lethal weapons is not really going to change the battlefield situation.

MG: You just heard the ambassador say there's zero chance that Russia is going to invade Ukraine if that's true. What is Vladimir Putin looking to achieve here?

ROLAND PARIS: Well, the ambassador is has a job to do as a diplomat and by saying there's zero chance of an invasion. You know, that's what he's been instructed to say. We have to look at Russia is doing and to describe what it's doing as regular exercises as it's been characterised is it's just not plausible by all appearances. What Vladimir Putin is doing is cranking up the heat, not just on Ukraine, but on the native alliance and on the United States to apply extreme pressure in order to secure concessions from the West. And the specific list of demands that Putin has put forward effectively would rewrite the security map of Europe. Seeing NATO's withdraw troops and weapons from much of Eastern Europe, including many existing members of NATO's. It's important to underline that Ukraine is not a member of NATO's, but Putin's demands include withdrawing NATO's presence from countries like Poland and Lithuania, Latvia and Romania. And so I think that what he's doing is cranking up the pressure he's seeing where there might be opportunities for him to grab something to make gains. He's a very talented poker player. He's reading his adversaries right now. He's keeping his his strategy close to his chest. It's not clear exactly what he will do.

MG: And yet the Ukrainian president Zelensky says that, you know, the idea of the United States ordering diplomats families to leave is premature. He says he doesn't feel there's an imminent threat from Russia. What do you make of that?

ROLAND PARIS: Well, you know, I think that there are different views within Ukraine, including some who are trying to calm the domestic situation, but the Ukrainian government has been very clear in reaching out to its partners, seeking whatever support it can, and clearly views this Russian deployment as as an imminent threat, which it is. You know, if Russia wanted to make the case that it has no intention to invade Ukraine, well, then one thing that it could do would be to remove the massive invasion force that it has just put right beside Ukraine.

MG: Does Russia have a right to be concerned about the possible expansion of NATO's, particularly in Eastern Europe?

ROLAND PARIS: Russia, after the end of the Cold War, Russia accepted the the admission of a number of former Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe into NATO, and since then, Putin has become much stronger in saying that this is unacceptable to Russian interests, and there has been a debate about what kind of discussions might have taken place, and the U.S. has been very clear, and people who are involved were very clear in saying that there was never and there was never a promise not to expand NATO's. But Russia does have concerns about its the areas around its territories. Historically, as a country that isn't naturally defended by barriers, physical barriers like mountains, it has sought security by expanding its control over surrounding areas. That was the genesis of the Russian Empire, arguably also the Warsaw Pact organisation. So this is a longstanding concern within Russian strategic thought. But Ukraine is not about to and probably will never become a member of NATO, even in 2008, when NATO's said that Ukraine should become a member. It didn't offer membership. Many, many non-NATO members were against it. There has to be a consensus. And Ukraine doesn't meet their criteria for membership yet in NATO's anyway. I don't think that this is a serious thing.

MG: Let me ask you about consensus. Briefly, Naito doesn't seem to be totally in sync. Germany has prevented Estonia from sending German made weapons to Ukraine. Germany itself has been vague on what sort of sanctions it would support. What do you make of the reluctance on the part of Germany?

ROLAND PARIS: Germany has its own very specific historical reasons to be hesitant to be exporting offensive arms into potential conflict situations. This is the post-World War Two identity of Germany as a peaceful country, which we've all benefited from, frankly. But at the same time, you know, Germany is a core member of the native alliance. I think that Germany is kind of facing a test right now. It has a new government about how much it is willing to resist Russian pressure. The issue of lethal or non-lethal weapons to Ukraine, I think, actually is a fairly marginal question. The more important question for Germany is whether it will ultimately approve a massive new gas natural gas pipeline from Russia called Nord Stream two. And there's an enormous pressure on Germany and from some elements within Germany not to finalise that gas pipeline. If Russia continues to behave this way, it's unclear how Germany will come down on this.

MG: Just finally, what is at stake for Putin in terms of trying to get? One of the commentators we spoke with last week said that in some ways he's up a flagpole and it's hard to see how he gets down from this. What's at stake for him on the world stage, but also domestically if he does pull back his forces?

ROLAND PARIS: It's true that he's put a lot on the line now, even though they, you know, the Russian government, as you heard from the ambassador in your interview, insists that these are normal exercises. Everyone knows that he's invested a lot. His moves, all of these forces towards Ukraine, he's set these demands. He's cranked up the pressure. It would be hard for him to walk back. He is. There is a reckless side to him in a way that there's less for the Chinese, for example. I think the more confident in their growing power and willing to wait as they expand their their power. I think Russia and Putin in particular, seised their own vulnerability, and he wants to take advantage of whatever situations are available. The recklessness is in cranking up the pressure and escalating and then having the confidence that he's going to be able to navigate some outcome that's positive for him. Who knows how this is all going to end up? But you know, this is part of the new world that we're living in, and we have to recognise that NATO's needs to remain strong in the face of these kind of actions because Putin, if anything, understands the language of power.

MG: And sees vulnerabilities and cracks.

ROLAND PARIS: Oh my goodness, he recognises them. And when there's divisions, and he's hoping with this pressure to both create and expand divisions within NATO and between Europe and the United States, he's just applied this pressure. He's seeing what's happening. And and this is why NATO's should be reinforcing its presence in its member countries in Eastern Europe and the Baltics right now, saying to Putin, You might be trying holding a gun at our head and saying, back away from there, what we're going to do is reassert and reaffirm our commitment to defend all of our members.

MG: Roland Paris, great to speak with you about this. Thank you for your insight.

ROLAND PARIS: Thank you very much.

MG: Roland Paris As a former foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, he was in Toronto. We did request an interview with the Foreign Affairs Minister, Melanie Joly, but she was not available. That is The Current for this Thursday. Coming up next on CBC Radio One, it's Q the maestro, Yannick Nezet is again speaking with Tom Power. He is who is again the Canadian Connector music director at the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Montreal Orchestra Metropolitan musical director of the Met Opera in New York, one of the great conductors of our time. You will hear him in conversation coming up in just a few moments on CBC Radio One and heads up, tomorrow on the programme. We're speaking with British Columbia's provincial officer of health Dr. Bonnie Henry, about a shift that she announced recently when it comes to BC's pandemic strategy. We'll talk about how she sees the way forward in dealing with COVID 19. That conversation tomorrow on The Current. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you tomorrow.

Tuesday January 27, 2022 Transcript

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