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The Current Transcript for September 3, 2021

Host: Anthony Germain

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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SOUNDCLIP

We need to protect our hospitals. We need to avoid lockdowns at all costs. Vaccinations will be mandatory for certain indoor settings, including restaurants, bars and casinos, amongst others.

ANTHONY GERMAIN: Fall is in the air and so is the fourth wave of the pandemic vaccine. Passports are being rolled out across many parts of the country. Kids are heading back to class. André Picard is here in half an hour to explain what rising case counts mean as the weather starts to turn. Also this morning,

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It's actually in the greenhouse because it stinks like mussels clinging on to it and oh, yeah, it doesn't smell very sweet. So we did have it in the kitchen and we were like, well, for smell. And then we realised it's the bottle.

AG: It's covered in molluscs and smells like a bin of rotting fish guts. And yet it is one Welsh woman's prised new possession. It's skim the waves of the Atlantic Ocean with a note nestled inside, kept safe and dry from the Canadian waters all the way to Wales. A classic message in a bottle story is coming your way in just over 30 minutes. We'll also have the final instalment of Recall How to Start a Revolution. The CBC podcast has told you the story of the rise of the failed coup. And now we'll hear about its fall. But we begin in the United States this morning with sky high case counts in the Sunshine State. I'm Anthony Germain, sitting in one last time for Matt Galloway. And this is The Current.

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Turbulent return to school in Florida as COVID cases rise and children fall ill

Guests: Chrissy Krampert, Vickie Cartwright, Dr. Mobeen Rathore

AG: Here in Canada, the fourth wave looks like over a thousand new cases of covid a day in Alberta. More than 700 a day in British Columbia. You head south of the border, though, and the words fourth wave have an entirely different meaning. And it's serious. The state of Florida now averaging close to 20,000 cases a day right now. That means back to school season. Is that much more nerve wracking for Florida parents, especially considering the state government has withheld funding for two of the 13 school districts that have chosen to require masking in class. Chrissy Krampert is the mother of three daughters who are under the age of 12, and she joins me now from Dunedin in west central Florida. Good morning.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: Good morning. Thanks for having me.

AG: I appreciate you taking the time your daughters are back in class. How do you feel as you send them to school every day?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: A great many emotions, worried, fearful, concerned for their health and their teachers health and sort of annoyed at the futility of all of this.

AG: What you talk about, the futility before we get to your sense of that, are your daughter's wearing masks? All of them?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: They are. They are great mask where they have done this from the very beginning of the pandemic. We sort of train them that if they wanted screen time, they had to wear a mask. And it became very simple to get them used to it. But many of their classmates aren't. Some of their teachers aren't. And that presents so much concern because it's happening across school districts, every, every classroom right now.

AG: You have no mask mandate in your district. Do your children understand why some kids are wearing masks and others aren't?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: They do. We've talked about it and because I've sort of become part of the activism group that is is trying to push the mask mandate, we checked with that. Sure, it was OK. Some of their friends don't like masks. Some of their friends don't realise they should still be wearing them. And, you know, my daughters don't understand why, especially the grown ups aren't protecting them.

AG: Now, you mentioned some teachers aren't. Can you explain that to me? Because I got to say, I don't get that.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: I don't either. I think there's, every teacher gets into the profession, every staff member who wants to work at a school to take care of propel kids forward. And I think that's true universally. But this has become such a political issue, such an issue of individual rights. You know, America's rugged individualism is somehow choking us instead of focussing on what is the greater good, how can we protect our schools to keep them open? And how can we lower the impact of this virus in a way that makes it easier for us to get back to our day to day lives?

AG: Have you spoken with some teachers privately about the situation? And if so, what are they telling you?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: I have we have one of our teachers who refuses to wear a mask and refuses reasonable accommodations when she's doing one on one intensives with our daughter. And her answer was it was her right, which according to the state of Florida, it is. And that it just baffles you because there's nothing these teachers wouldn't do for these kids. We have the very the very best teachers and we have them across the district, across the state. But because it's become political instead of science based, we have all of these differing opinions. The majority of Florida parents want masks in schools.

AG: But when these instructors look at the covid infection numbers in Florida, I think there's more than more than 200 kids who are hospitalised now in your state. I mean, doesn't that have an impact or sway people?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: I wish it did. I feel like empathy is one of those things, you know, empathy and compassion, that because of the trauma of the pandemic, because of the weariness of where we are for not having done this for now, this is the third school year that's been impacted by the pandemic. Everyone's tired and everyone has dealt with that trauma and fear and anxiety in different ways. And I think some people, instead of becoming immune to the virus, have become numb to the virus. And that's playing out in hundreds of scenarios across classrooms.

AG: Now, your governor certainly represents that rugged individualism that you mentioned in his interview. And he said that parents can bring up the kids the way they see fit and if they want their kids to opt out of wearing masks, that's their right. What do you make of his argument?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: I think it's flying in the face of science and our medical community that has told us the way to keep kids in schools, keep classrooms open, keep our workforce protected, because what happens in our hallways happens in businesses across the state. It just doesn't make sense. I completely understand that parents should be able to raise families the way they see fit. But this is a group project. This is public health. And the decisions that people are making are impacting others in my county. We have and four thousand students with 7000 of them right now out on quarantine. We've more than 20,000 that are are sick from the first day of school or only in our third week, which is a 3000 percent increase from the same time last year. It's a 300 percent increase from the entire semester compared to these three weeks. So we know that masks work, especially for the age groups that can't get vaccinated yet.

AG: Mm hmm. Well, listen, I hope that things improve, although you certainly paint a dire picture. Good luck to you and your daughters this semester. And thanks for your time.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: Thank you. I appreciate it.

AG: That's Chrissy Krampert. She's the mother of three daughters, all of them under the age of 12 who are attending school in west central Florida. Well, Vickie Cartwright has been listening in. She is the interim superintendent of Broward County Public Schools. Now, her district decided to require masking in class and the state government is now withholding funding. Vickie Carter. Good morning.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: Good morning. How are you? Very well. This opportunity to talk with you.

AG: I appreciate you being on the programme. Why did your board choose to go against your governor and his ban on mask mandates?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: So we have a slightly different interpretation of the order that our governor did earlier this summer. In addition to that, we also are looking at the data that is local for here within Broward County. And originally the recommendation going to the board was to make masks optional. But to be frank with you, our data just no longer supported that recommendation. And our school board was able to review that information and made the very difficult decision to go ahead and put in place a Amar's policy or a face covering policy, with some exceptions. But those were very specific for medical reasons or due to a child's disability.

AG: OK, now, when you when you mentioned your data, that actually led you this way, what's pertinent in that data?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: Our positivity rate was was going very high for our county, much higher than it had been pretty much throughout last school year. We also took a look at our hospitalisation rates. And so for our hospitalisation rate, we were well over for bed capacity, over 90 percent for our paediatric ICU beds. And that's that's critically important because you are absolutely right in your conversation. The Delta variant is acting much different than the two, you know, the original covid. And then, of course, the variant that came shortly after that. Right.

AG: What about mortality?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: Mortality is in your head. Yeah, that's we don't ever want to experience loss prior to school starting, so it wasn't related to inside of our schools, but prior to it starting in August, we lost two actually three staff members, two teachers and one of our era professionals inside the classroom. And that's real. You can't deny it.

AG: It's so sad to hear that, as you heard from from that, her kids are in a district where masks are optional. How have parents and students in your district been reacting to the mask mandate? Because I think, you know, if you have staff members who passed away, I can't think of a larger incentive than that.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: You know, overwhelmingly, our community has been very supportive when I'm out in schools, when I'm out in the community and public, when I see our parents. All I hear from them are the words, thank you for taking care of our children. When I interact with my staff, I thank you so much for taking care of us. We are so grateful. Mm hmm. So if we were required by the state right now to report on a daily basis the number of students and include very specific information, who they were, who their parents are, how to get ahold of the parents, and we have to do that across the entire district. The most I've reported in one day is seven seven students. Now, mind you, seven students out of over two hundred and fifty thousand students in this district.

AG: Well, it certainly sounds as though you've got some compliance. Let's let's give a listen to what your governor, Governor de Santos, has said about districts imposing mask mandates.

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At the end of the day, what the parents bill of Rights requires in our judgement is that parents be given the right to opt out if they think that's in the best interest of their kids so that districts can actually have policies. But you got out for parent the right. They've basically taken away the right of parent and say you don't have any say in it.

AG: How do you respond to that?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: We agree with Judge Cooper's interpretation of the parents, right, Bill, or the parents bill of Rights, I should say this.

AG: This is the judge who threw out the governor's executive order, right?

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: That's correct. And then shortly afterwards, the state, of course, has filed an appeal to that to go back to it. But in the parents bill of Rights, it doesn't prohibit school districts from adopting policies related to education, health and welfare of students. If it if that policy affects the parents right to control the student's education or health. And it is adopted by the district and challenged by a parent or a group of parents, we have to prove that the policy is reasonably necessary to achieve a compelling state interest. Right. And that the policy is narrowly tailored and not otherwise served by a less restrictive means. That language is in the parents bill of rights. And so what they said is that a statewide order or action interfering with the constitutionally provided authority of our local school districts to provide for the safety and health of the children based on the unique facts on the ground in a particular county. It's an overreach now just. And so that's what they're saying.

AG: But on that level of overreach. I've only got about 20 seconds on this. So the governor's withholding funding now almost to punish you.

CHRISSY KRAMPERT: And they're withholding my board members salary of thirty five thousand dollars each month, thereabouts. However, our federal government has also stepped in and has basically yesterday they gave us advisement the American Rescue Plan Act funds, even though our governor hasn't released it to us, they are saying you can go ahead and encumber those funds and if you'd like it needed, because the state is withhold or withheld funds from your school board members, you can use it to go ahead and get your school board members.

AG: All right, Miss Cartwright, appreciate your time. Thank you very much. Thank you. That's Vickie Cartwright, the interim superintendent of Broward County Public Schools, and we reached her in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Well, adding to the stress of all this in the back to school season down south is a worrying rise in covid cases amongst children, 214 kids currently hospitalised with the virus in Florida. And that's the second highest number in the U.S. only behind Texas. Dr. Mobeen Rathore is an epidemiologist and chief of the Paediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunology Unit at Wolfson Children's Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida. Hello. Good morning. Now you've heard from the parent and the superintendent. What's your reaction to the two interviews you've just heard?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Well, I think both of them spoke very eloquently and very effectively on the importance of mosques and schools, we are seeing an incredible surge which impacted the whole population. And even though in Jacksonville at least, and I think that's to Florida, it appears that the surge has plateaued for a dance. That is certainly not the case for children both in the community and in the hospitals.

AG: So why is the Delta variant causing so many more children to get sick with covid-19?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Well, as you know, that Delta variant compared to the original alpha variant is much more contagious. So whereas the alphabet, you know, one person gets infected, it spreads it to two people for Delta variant, it could be anywhere from six to eight people. So I think when children are getting infected now, they are in this school system and they're in the schools and they are not masked. They're going to spread it to a lot more children than adults. And so I think the Delta variant, by its nature, will be more contagious, is having more individuals infected, more children infected. And if you have more children infected, then you will have more children get sick or not. It's true that children in general, compared to adults, don't often get that ill, but they do get ill. And if more are infected, more will get more would get hospitalised. If more will get hospitalised, more will get into the intensive care units, get intubated and even get on a breathing machine respirator. We even had kids who are on [unintelligible], which is basically a heart lung support machine, sort of a last ditch effort on our part to support these children. So I think this is something we need to be very cognisant of, that kids do get infected. This is an equal opportunity factor. This virus does not discriminate. If you are susceptible, it will cause infection.

AG: Before you see children on life support, which is just such a ghastly image. What do you commonly see amongst your patients as far as symptoms go in the children versus the adults?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Well, the symptoms are quite similar to what you see in adults. Most children, fortunately, do not have underlying health conditions and their symptoms, maybe just respiratory symptoms of some heart defect. They also tend to have more abdominal symptoms, more diarrhoea. But once they get sick, it primarily affects their hearts and lungs. And that's why we have to provide them support. So I think the important thing here is that early on, this infection may look like any other viral infection. And so a parent may not think anything. In Florida, for example, right now, we are also having an outbreak of RSV. A lot of kids in the hospital, RSV, an unseasonal outbreak, which is pretty syncytial virus, another virus that causes infection in children. And I can tell you in this week, we are starting to see influenza. So we are very concerned.

AG: So how serious is this, MIS-C?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Oh, yeah, so we haven't seen MIS-C as much yet, but we are starting to starting to creep up. We usually see MIS-C four to six weeks after the surge and we are now in the ninth week of the surge in Jacksonville. So we are now seeing cases of masc and, you know, growing a lot of surge, influenza surge, RSV surge and then MIS-C. That's a disaster waiting to happen. No, we have that in our hospital. Yesterday, we had 21 kids in our hospital. And you said, you know, that's 10 percent of all the kids admitted to the hospital in central Florida. Yeah, that's seven deaths since the start of the pandemic. Four of those deaths occurred in the last two months. So we had one death every six months previously. And now we have two deaths per month in the last two months of this surge. So this is this is a serious virus. It's causing serious misery and death and morbidity in children. And we need to be prepared to protect our children.

AG: I can hear the seriousness in your voice. Just to be clear for your listeners, what is MIS-C? In a nutshell?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Yes, MIS is multi Aughrim Inflammatories Syndrome or which is basically a reaction of the body to the coronavirus infection, which occurs four to six weeks later. And important point to be made here is that the child may be asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic or may not even know that that coronavirus and they can still develop them as in fact, number of children we have seen over the last many months with MIS-c. He didn't even know that they had coronavirus infection. So I think this is a this that and that can be a very serious disease, sometimes much more serious than even the acute coronavirus infection.

AG: Well, let's let's hope we don't see any of it, which might be wishful thinking. I can tell by the urgency in your voice that this is serious. And I wonder, you know, with children being back in school just for a few weeks and listening to the interviews this morning, it sounds as though, you know, the trend. There's a spike happening. How worried are you that Florida could see more cases and perhaps get into that horrible, awful situation that we've seen throughout this pandemic of a hospital being overwhelmed?

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Yeah, I think we are at 90 percent ICU capacity, hospital capacity. And I think we are, even though the overall trend, overall surge in adults has plateaued, we have not plateaued. At our peak, we had 22 kids in the hospital. That may not seem like a large number, but if they're doing 214 kids and all of the state, that's a large number. And as I said, the number is Jagmeet Singh around 18 to 19 to 21. And so I think that that can cause a pressure on the health care system. So we are prepared as best as we can for any surge and all eventualities. And we are constantly reshaping our plan and updating our plan to meet. You're especially concerned if you start getting a lot of influenza animacy cases that could really hurt. All right,

AG: Dr. Rorthore, appreciate this. Thank you very much.

DR. MOBEEN RATHORE: Thank you.

AG: Dr. Mobeen Rathore is an epidemiologist and chief of the Paediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunology Unit at Wolfson Children's Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida. The CBC News is next. And then.

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We can't wait any longer. We must take immediate action and we will because we need to protect our hospitals. We need to avoid lockdowns at all costs. We want our kids in school and our businesses to stay open.

AG: We'll shift from Florida to Ontario and Canada. Summer is on its way out. So is the breathing room we've had when it comes to covid-19 in Canada, vaccine passports back to school and mask mandates here. André Picard will be here in six minutes to talk through the fourth wave. I'm Anthony Germein. You're listening to The Current.

André Picard on on vaccine passports; message in a bottle puts Welsh woman on the hunt for a Canadian fisherman

Guests: Andre Picard, Amanda Tidmarsh

AG: Hello, I'm Anthony Germain, and you're listening to The Current.

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AG: Still to come, a message in a bottle is always exciting, whether you're four or 40, maybe even a bit older, whether you're in Wales or on Canada's Atlantic coast, a fabulous story of a long lost note. Washing up on a fantastical foreign shore is coming your way in just a few minutes. But first, let's examine the autumn fourth wave.

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It's no secret this is something that I do not want to do. And let me be clear, this is a temporary tool that we won't use for a day longer than we have to.

AG: Ontario Premier Doug Ford on Wednesday reluctantly announcing his promise, his plan for a vaccine passport after months of insisting Ontarians wouldn't need one. The new rules will come into effect on September the 22nd. And it comes just as new modelling shows that the fourth wave of this pandemic could be worse than the third. Andre Picard has been helping The Current make sense of all things covid during the pandemic. He's the Globe and Mail health columnist and Andre is back this morning. Hello.

ANDRE PICARD: Good morning.

AG: So did Doug Ford have any choice but to implement this passport plan?

ANDRE PICARD: I think the vaccine passports or certificates were inevitable. We've known this for months. We've seen this trend go around the world and we need a way of separating the vaccinated from the unvaccinated because really now it's become a pandemic of the unvaccinated. So to answer your question, no, he didn't have any choice and he should have done it much sooner. I think we know that now.

Speaker 1: And Andre, what do you think of how it's being rolled out starting in a few weeks with a paper version and then going digital?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, it's very, very slow. It's you know, we live in this health system that operates on fax machines and it's operating at that 1950s pace. And unfortunately, the the pandemic virus is not going away. So it's things are going to get much worse before people actually start using these, especially the electronic version, which is still almost eight weeks away, which is kind of mind boggling.

AG: And as you predict, there's science backing you up. Ontario's modelling showing the potential for a serious increase in the number of covid cases this fall. What impact do you think that modelling had on this decision about the vaccine, passports?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think I think the numbers frighten people and I think they frightened the Premier. You heard him say, you know, he really didn't want to do this. He was dragged kicking and screaming to this. But to his credit, he did change his mind. But I think the numbers have a big role to play. We've kind of become inured to the modelling, you know, because we in the media, we tend to focus on the worst case scenarios, which don't play out. But even the moderate scenario is pretty disturbing. We're going to see very full use again. We're going to see services rolled back in hospitals and it's going to get ugly, unfortunately.

AG: You mentioned Ford's reluctance. He did say that he was forced into this passport decision because the federal government didn't implement its own national version. What do you make of that?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think there's a lot of petty partisan politics going on there. I actually don't think there's any evidence that Ottawa didn't want to do this. They've given the provinces actually a billion dollars to do a vaccine passport. So it's a bit of a splitting up hairs. You need one federal app or do you have a bunch of provincial apps that speak to each other? And I think it became clear early on that a single federal app wasn't going to happen because of provinces like Alberta said quite clearly, they're not sharing their data. So I don't think that's a fair criticism. And you can criticise Ottawa for a lot on this issue. But I don't think not wanting to do it is a fair criticism

AG: in terms of what's happening in the rest of the world. Lots of other countries using these so-called vaccine passports. How much easier is life without the app form of these passports?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, you know, electronic version is obviously much easier. You just have a little app on your phone, your flash, your a QR code, it shows your status and then you go to the restaurant or concert, et cetera. So imagine going to a hockey game or a football game where everyone has to show a piece of paper and a piece of ID as compared to clicking your phone. So it's a big it's a world of difference. So we have to have the electronic version, but we also have to have the alternative. Not everyone has a phone or a desire to have codes on their phones, and we need that alternative. But it has to be a small minority.

AG: Are there any other jurisdictions, perhaps in Europe that are kind of setting, you know, setting the bar for these kinds of passports?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, you know, Israel has been doing this since February, which I think it can call time is forever. That's again, what it's hard to understand why we waited so long. We saw this coming for many, many months. And, you know, the green pass in Israel, I think, is a really good example of one that works well. In France, the app is working well and what they've done, most importantly, is enticed people to get vaccinated. And we saw that even in Ontario, we saw a doubling of appointments. We saw that in B.C. So this is working for a couple of good rates already working before the implementation is there.

AG: Right. You mentioned Israel, as you know, cases spiking there after that country had been really seen as a leader in vaccinations and covered control. Is what's happening in Israel a sign of things to come for us?

ANDRE PICARD: I think it's a bit of a sign of things to come. But it's also a cautionary tale. What Israel has taught us is that, yes, vaccination is important, but we can't stop doing the other things so that Israel has brought in the vaccine mask mandate is back. So they're asking they stop that altogether. They're limiting crowds again. So you can't just magically see them vaccinated. We can do everything as we used to. And I think that was a message in the interior modelling as well, is we see a lot of people are vaccinated, but we have to still limit our contacts. We have to stop those huge gatherings that allow the virus to spread, especially amongst the unvaccinated. So I guess that that message is one we've been repeating for 18 months, is no single thing works. We have to have a suite of responses to this virus.

AG: And if I get you to shift your gaze to the western provinces, we're seeing these spikes in covid cases in Alberta and Saskatchewan. What are you hearing from the doctors, other residents in those provinces? What's driving this?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, you know, the western provinces are by far much, much worse the worst places in the country right now as it is at quite an alarming number of cases going on. And it's not a coincidence that they have the least restrictions or virtually no restrictions in Alberta, Saskatchewan anymore. And it's really demoralising for health care workers to just see the excuse filling up the beds in Alberta. There are very few beds already. The modelling out of that province is far, far more alarming that Ontario, you know, the message was the worst is yet to come. Fasten your seatbelts. And Alberto, I think we we really have to worry about they have no vaccine passport. They seem to have no desire to have any restrictions other than mandatory vaccination for health workers. But it's weighing on people very, very heavily.

AG: I'd like to shift to something else you've been writing about, Andre, and that's this Ivermectin. We're seeing a shortage of this drug. What is this used for?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, this is a drug that's used for veterinary purposes, largely for deworming horses and cows. And people are going to feed stores to buy this because there's this belief, mostly driven on the Internet, driven by far right radio hosts, that this is a magical prevention and a magical cure for covid. We even saw that the talk show host Joe Rogan, took Ivermectin after being infected. And sadly, there's no evidence that it works to prevent covid. And, you know, that just speaks to this desire. People want a miracle cure. There's a this is all wrapped up in anti vaccination. People don't want vaccination, want something else. And they've latched onto this. And they're really what gets people confused is this is a very good drug. It treats parasitic diseases. It was a miracle drug when it was developed in the 1970s. But that doesn't mean it works for viruses. It's a very different problem, the covid and than a parasitic disease. So there's that confusion there that people think it will work, but unfortunately, it doesn't.

AG: Any people getting hurt.

ANDRE PICARD: Well, you essentially poison yourself, you don't imagine taking a drug that is designed for horses, it's about 10 or 15 times the standard dose for a human that humans take Ivermectin in pill form if they have a parasite and they shouldn't be taking it in these liquid forms or in these cases that are available in feed stores. And you have to feel for the people who sell products for poor livestock because they don't know what to do. When humans get in and want this, they know that's going to harm them.

AG: As we witness down under, you know, fall is upon us. The temperature is going to change. We've seen what happens during different seasons with the pandemic. Where do you think Canada is heading now this autumn?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think we're looking at a return to restrictions, increasing number of restrictions even as people get vaccinated. But vaccination is the one we have to push. That's our hope. But not not to the exception of everything else. I think we're going to get back to looking like the a little bit like the first wave, but much more hopeful because we know there is a way out of this. So we have to, I think, not be too alarmed, but we have to be cautious going into the fall.

AG: And one quick last question for you. I know that you've written from the very beginning a lot and a great deal about long term care homes. What worries the most in the fourth wave with respect to those those homes?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think what's really alarming, if we look at the deaths, there aren't a lot of deaths these days, thankfully, from covid, but they're beginning to be all people in long term care. So people people revaccinated are dying, but it's because they're much older and they are at high risk. So I think we're seeing, again, this spike in long term care deaths. And that's been the tragedy since day one of this in Canada. And unfortunately, we're returning to the source and I don't look forward to writing these stories in the weeks to come because they're going to be many of them.

AG: All right, Andre, I hope I hope you're wrong, but your insight has often proven correct throughout the pandemic. Thank you so much. Appreciate that.

ANDRE PICARD: Thank you.

AG: Andre Picard is The Globe and Mail's health columnist. I'm Anthony Germain, not making the musical selections, even though I'm in St. John's and you're listening to The Current. Now, when you think about a message in a bottle, you might imagine a marooned castaway tossing out a lifeline for a rescue. But sometimes it's just a small treasure from Canada that washes up on a beach in Wales. Amanda Tidmarsh discovered something while walking with her two dogs. And Amanda joins me now. Hello.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Hi.

AG: Yeah, I want to get right to the start of this story. So walk us through the moment you found this bottle on the beach.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: I was out walking my two dogs. We went down onto the sand. The sea was just going out and it was quite rough and there was a lot of seaweed and whatnot on the beach. And I just saw something like Sparkle on the floor. And I thought, oh, it's a bottle. And I looked close to that. And I thought, oh, my God, there's something in there. And you could see that there was because it was like a clear bottle, clear wine bottle. There was something in there and the top was sealed and it was full of all barnacles or mussels. Yeah. So I picked it up. I put it in my pocket and took it home.

AG: So are you in the habit of are you in the habit of going to this beach in Wales looking for treasures?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Not really, no. I joked to my mum she often phoned me and I'm out and about with the dogs. And she would say, What are you? And I say, I'm down on the beach looking for treasure, just joking. And I couldn't believe I was really excited. I just put it in my pocket, drove home then and waited then for my son to come home from work. And I told him, we were really like two school kids. We were really excited. We had to break it open. It was really well sealed. And yeah, that was a letter for me. It's amazing from Canada.

AG: And that was wonderful that you managed to wait to share that surprise. And, you know, it came all the way from Canada. It was 5000 kilometres. What do you make of the journey that ]] this little bottle took all the way to where you are in Wales?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Unbelievable. Isn't that how how it reached without getting smashed or or lodged in rocks? You know, you think of the journey and it's just unbelievable. It's amazing.

AG: So when you popped it open, it must have been kind of exciting. What did you what did you see when you unfurled whatever was in there?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: When we opened it, it was really tightly sealed. And it was in like a Ziploc bag, a clear bag. So we had to unfold that and it actually put two little bits of sellotape on each end of the rolls, really tightly rolled up. So my son actually struggled to get the tape off. And then we opened that. We thought, whoa, oh my goodness, from Canada. I couldn't believe it.

AG: So this this guy was not messing around as far as sealing this thing. So it would float for a while.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: I know it was like, wow.

AG: And so what did the note say?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: I said that this bottle has been tossed over the side. It named the shipping vessel and he put the coordinates of actually way too often in the sea. And they were fishing for snow crabs. Yeah. And that was it. And he put an email and an actual address. So my daughter emailed him, but we haven't had any reply. And I've actually sent a photo of the bottle on the beach and a letter and posted that to the address and just wait and see.

AG: All right. Now we know that his identity is John Graham and that, as you just mentioned, he left his email address. But I gather you haven't been able to get a hold of him yet. I wonder why.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: I don't know. Perhaps perhaps he thought he'd never be found. It;s a bit of a shock.

AG: Yeah, he might he might be back out there on the water fishing and doesn't have access to the Internet. But here in Newfoundland's a small place, somebody listening is going to know who this John Graham is. I can almost guarantee it. But until so until someone tells us where we can track them down, what would you like to say to them?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: I don't know what to say really is just like a [unintelligible] bottle.

AG: Oh, dear. So where's the bottle now?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: It's actually in the greenhouse because it stinks.

AG: Like a kind of a seafood rot smell?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Yeah, like must it's like mussels clinging on to it and. Oh yeah, it doesn't smell very sweet. So I have to keep it in the greenhouse because we did have it in the kitchen and we were like well for smell and then we realised with a bottle.

AG: Mm hmm. All right. So if John gets a hold of you, I'm assuming you intend on keeping this bottle.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Well, yeah, I don't kmow what to do with the treasure.

AG: It was a wonderful treasure. Well, listen, it's a wonderful story, and I'm really glad that you're able to to share it with us and that you had your, you know, to be able to share this with the kid is a fantastic story. And listen, the next time you go out there, if you find any other bottles, would you let us know?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: No problem at all.

AG: Were you tempted at all to write your own note and put the bottle back in the ocean.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Oh, yes, I thought that was really is the old fashioned way.

AG: Kind of reply all with a bottle.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: Yeah, I know. Probably get stuff stuck out just across the way in post cold.

AG: Well, listen, that's a great story. It's a great story. And I hope we get to follow this up and perhaps The Current will be able to unite you with the sender of the bottle. So, you know, stay tuned. Who knows?

AMANDA TIDMARSH: All right. That's wonderful. Thank you. Lovely to speak to you.

AG: Great speaking with you. Thanks, Amanda.

AMANDA TIDMARSH: No worries. Bye.

AG: Amanda Tidmarsh is in Ronda Können, Taffe Wale's now, as Amanda says, she hasn't heard back from John Graham, the crab fisherman who threw the bottle into the sea. So, John, if you're out there, we'd love to hear from you and to our listeners. Have you ever sent a message in a bottle or maybe found one? Tell us about it. Tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or email us thecurrent@cbc.ca. I'm Anthony Germain and this is The Current. And as you've listened to this programme over the past year and a half, you know that I'm not usually the voice that you hear. You're accustomed to the dulcet tones and sophistication of Matt Galloway. And while he's been out of the hosting chair for the summer, he hasn't been taking it easy. I'll let him tell you more about what he's been up to. Good morning, Matt.

MATT GALLOWAY: Anthony, good morning.

AG: So I know you haven't been sitting on a beach with refreshments all summer. What have you been working on?

ANDRE PICARD: Might have been a day or two on the beach and maybe a refreshment as well. But no, the last little bit I have been in British Columbia in the interior of B.C., speaking with people who have been impacted by this year's wildfire season. Near the headlines is like 50 degree temperatures. Even when we were flying in, you could see the smoke from the wildfires in some of the areas. We spoke with somebody on the programme at the end of June who talked about how he believes that these fires were sort of a sharp edge of climate change in this country, given the fact that there's the election underway and this is a defining issue for many Canadians. We thought we would go and see it firsthand. So we went to a town called Lytton, British Columbia, at the edge of the Fraser Valley. It's beautiful. What an amazing place. And it has been almost completely destroyed and the folks who live there will be displaced for years. So we met with a lot of people, including a couple called Trish and Don. They have this ranch that kind of overlooks and there's nothing left there, but they're burnt vehicles and the foundation of their house. They're trying to rebuild. We met with members of the Lytton First Nation who have been on that land for generations. They're trying to figure out what they do in the weeks and months and years ahead. And then we kind of went around the region and talked to people about what fires have meant. We went up to an area near Kamloops and spent a day on the sketches and first nation. There have been massive fires through their territory as well. We were standing in a valley and it's just reduced to ash. All the trees are now just blackened kind of sticks. Got their community, though, was saved. And they say that the credit for that goes to the community's fire keeper because of what he knows about fire, what he knows about the winds that he has learnt from being out hunting on the land, how to fight the fire. And he feels that the fire crews should learn from the Indigenous knowledge. That person we spoke with him and talked with a lot of people just about what's been lost and what we all need to be thinking in the wake of those fires.

AG: Well, it certainly sounds like you gathered some fantastic stories. Now you're back in the chair on Monday. And I understand there's a theme that you'll be working on during this upcoming season of The Current.

ANDRE PICARD: And it picks up directly on what we heard from those folks and speeches. And it's all about the idea of resilience or what resilience means to them. In the last 18 months in this country, we've all been talking about how we get through these tough times. And we are going to hear stories this year of people who figured out ways to get through those tough times and figured out what actually resilience means. And it'll be interesting to hear it's a range of stories, but it'll be interesting to hear how people have turned, you know, what's become a bit of a cliche into a mantra for how they year.

AG: Now, final question for you, Matt. You've been stuck inside that stuffy Toronto studio throughout most of the pandemic.

ANDRE PICARD: The place to be.

AG: Yeah, I've been there. I think it's, you know, the interior because not so bad either. I'm glad you got there. But you've been getting out of the office now that restrictions have eased. What are you planning?

ANDRE PICARD: I mean, this is a big country. And the conversations, as you know, are where the people are. They're not in the Toronto studio. And so we're going to be heading out as much as possible to speak with people face to face. We're heading to Halifax because we know that health care is a real defining issue for many Canadians in this election, especially coming out of the pandemic came up last night in the French language debate. So we're going to Halifax in a couple of weeks to talk to people about how difficult it is to find a family doctor in Atlantic Canada. It's a familiar story for people across the country. Absolutely. I have this dream of driving kind of like The Current motor home across the country with my fingers crossed. This is the kind of thing that's going to happen. Stay tuned. Hopefully coming to your community sooner rather than later.

AG: All right. Well, if you need a Valot, you got my number. Listen, Matt, have a great season.

ANDRE PICARD: I'll be knocking on your door.

AG: Anthony Matt Galloway, host of The Current, and he'll be back in the chair on Monday, Labour Day. Now, a few minutes ago, I was speaking with Amanda Tidmarsh in Wales who found a message in a bottle from Canada. Now, do you think we have a whole story about a message in a bottle without a truly subtle music selection from 1979? No way. Here. The police hit song from 1979.

Unidentified: [sc]

[Song]

[ /sc]

AG: The Police. Coming up after your regional update, the final episode of the CBC podcast Recall How to Start a Revolution brings the story of the October crisis to a conclusion with a close up look at how the fall queue fell apart. I'm Anthony Germain and you're listening to The Current.

Final episode of Recall: How to Start a Revolution

AG: I'm Anthony Germain and this is The Current. Over the past two weeks we've brought you the original CBC podcast Recall: How to start a revolution. We've heard about the rise of Quebec's radical separatist movement. Its terror campaign of bombings in the 1960s. And the FLQ's kidnapping of British diplomat James Cross, who survived and of Quebec politician Pierre Laporte, who was killed. Here's host Geoff Turner with the conclusion to the series.

SOUNDCLIP

Geoff Turner: Shortly after the discovery of Pierre Laporte's body, provincial negotiator Robert Demers made a public offer to whomever was holding James Cross. The plane to Cuba was still on offer, if they wanted to turn themselves in.

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] After a few weeks one morning ‑ I had a bodyguard at the time. And he arrived at my home, as usual, but he said, “We think we know where a Cross is.”

Geoff Turner: The bodyguard's order was to bring Demers to an officer with the Surete du Quebec, the provincial police. Authorities were pretty sure they knew where Cross was being held. By now he'd been missing almost two months. Police had identified a house on Rue des Recollets in north Montreal, but they needed proof that Cross was there. So the RCMP planted a pair of officers posing as a couple in the apartment upstairs for surveillance. Then on December 2nd, out walks Jacques Cossette‑Trudel with his wife Louise. They're on their way to drop a communique.

Sound Clip: [Jacques Cossette‑Trudel] [speaks French]

Geoff Turner: Cossette‑Trudel says Algeria had agreed to defend the cause of Quebec separation before the United Nations. So they were carrying a communique for the UN. They also had a recording of an interview to be sent to the French philosopher Jean‑Paul Sartre, who at some point had also agreed to help them. They were arrested as they stepped off a bus at the Henri Bourassa subway station. Back at Rue des Recollets police were setting up for an operation. And that's when former Montreal bomb squad captain Bob Cote comes back into the story.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] We can temporarily park in front of this guy here.

Geoff Turner: Bob's been taking us on a little tour of north Montreal. It's December 3rd, 2019, 49 years to the day that Bob was tasked with a sensitive assignment.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] So this is where I was parked with my unmarked car, car 60...

Geoff Turner: Police had been hunting for the car that disappeared with James Cross back in October. They think they found the house. Now they want to know if the car parked in the garage was the same car that was used to take Cross away. It was Bob's task to find out.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] Now, all the streets were blocked here. Must have been 1:00 in the morning, December the 3rd. Very, very, very cold.

Geoff Turner: Bob and a colleague pulled over about a block away from the house. Five minutes later he made a call over the radio. The license plate was registered to a known member of the FLQ.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] OK. We can move on. We'll go to the house.

Geoff Turner: We drive the block to the house on Rue des Recollets.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] So, that's the building.

Geoff Turner: Bob pulls at a picture of the house from 1970. It looks pretty much exactly the same.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] So, Mr. Cross was held on the ground floor.

Geoff Turner: Two storeys, grey brick, nothing to really set it apart in this working‑class neighbourhood. So with Bob's discovery of the car, everyone's pretty sure they found James Cross. Now they just need to confirm it's actually him, that he's still alive, and then get him out without getting him killed.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] The Montreal police had a phony taxi fleet at the time. We had taxis with dome lights. And it looked like an ordinary taxi, but they were used for undercover jobs.

Geoff Turner: First, they evacuate the neighbourhood in this fleet of fake taxis. Then Hydro Quebec crews cut the power to the street. And then they wait. At 2am, a call comes over the radio.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] So we say, hey, Bob, there's a metal object that's been thrown from the window. At a distance it looks a piece of pipe and there's something white in there, something white is visible. OK. So, I go there.

Geoff Turner: It turns out the kidnappers had noticed all the activity in the night and spotted a sharpshooter on a nearby rooftop. They'd spray‑painted FLQ on a piece of plywood they'd stuck up in a window. In the event that it turned into a shootout, they wanted the world to know who was inside. Now they'd tossed something into the street, a short piece of pipe. So, Bob puts on his spooner vest, that's the oversized, bulletproof vest, meant to protect him from a bomb blast. And he directs his partner to drive him over to the piece of pipe.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] I opened the door to pick up the piece with my gloves, of course.

Geoff Turner: Bob directs his partner to speed away from the residential neighborhood on the chance there's a bomb in the pipe.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] So this is where ‑ yeah, this is ‑ I'm sure of this is here.

Geoff Turner: They pull up here, behind this St. Hubert barbecue chicken joint, of course. And then Bob turns his attention to the pipe he's holding. It's not a bomb, it's a message.

Sound Clip: [Robert Cote] It was only when I pulled the communique that we had the confirmation that Mr. Cross was there. That was the beginning of the operation.

Geoff Turner: Bob still has a copy of the communique. We got him to read it a bit for us. The kidnappers were not only confirming that they had Cross. They were asking for a lawyer to negotiate on their behalf. And they had someone in mind, a guy called Bernard Mergler. Bob makes a call on the radio and then points the car back to Rue des Recollets. It's noon by the time government negotiator Robert Demers arrives at Rue des Recollets. It had taken him a while to convince Bernard Mergler to come with him. When Mergler learned that the Lanctôt group wanted him to negotiate on their behalf, he wasn't having any of it. Thanks to his earlier dealings with the FLQ, he developed a real distaste for the group.

Geoff Turner: But Demers persuaded him to take on the unpleasant job. Demers had already opened up communication with the Cuban consulate. Mergler spent two hours at the consulate sorting out details. And then he and Demers made their way to Rue des Recollets.

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] When I arrived there, the whole sector had been surrounded by soldiers, a few hundred soldiers, one standing beside the other one. There were also sharpshooters on the roof of the surrounding houses. And we stepped out of the car in front of the house where Cross was detained.

Geoff Turner: On the street, Demers hands Murgler the government offer to the kidnappers. They'd arrange safe passage to Cuba in exchange for Cross's freedom. The time to negotiate has passed, he says. They either take it or they leave it. Then he tells Mergler to go knock on the door, give them the offer, and confirm it's really Cross in there. Everyone watches as Mergler walks up to the front door and is finally let in. Five minutes pass before Mergler emerges. It's definitely Cross in there, he tells Demers. But there's more...

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] Now, they may accept your offer, but they have a few conditions. They would like two of their group who were arrested the night before to be part of the group. They would also want ‑ the leader of the gang was married. He had the wife and a kid. He says, that he wanted his wife and kid to come with him to Cuba.

Geoff Turner: Demers agrees. The kidnappers also wanted journalists from 'Le Devoir' to be part of the group sent to Cuba, someone to document their time there. Demers gets the reporter on the phone, but perhaps, unsurprisingly, despite the offer of a scoop, his answer is no. With that out of the way, Demers lays out the plan for Mergler.

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] We will have a police car in front of them to indicate the streets which you will have take to go to the place where the exchange is to be done, which was an island in the middle of the St. Lawrence that you could go to by taking the Jacques Cartier Bridge, Île Ste Hélène. And you will also have half a dozen motor...?

Sound Clip: [Geoff Turner] Motorcycles?

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] Motorcycles in front of the police car. And there will be another police car behind them in case their car goes down during the trip so that they can exchange car.

Geoff Turner: Mergler then walks to the garage, opens the door, and steps aside as a car pulls out.

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] Mergler, I must say, courageously, entered into the car, sat in front with them ‑ in the back with Cross. And before leaving he looked at me, I knew what he ‑ how he felt and what he thought.

Geoff Turner: Some of the windows of the car are covered with newspapers. Cross is in the back seat between two of the kidnappers, both of whom are holding sticks of dynamite wired with a dead man's switch. The idea is, if anything goes wrong, the kidnapper lets go of the button and boom, or at least that's what police all thought at the time. Turns out they were actually dummy bombs. But Demers knew that Mergler was trusting him in that moment to make good on his deal.

Sound Clip: [Robert Demers] By that time, as you can imagine, there were thousands of people around the place. And so but ‑ a parade like that, you know, they went through the crowd and right down 15 minutes later they were at St. Helen Island and Cross was released and they were given to the Cubans.

Geoff Turner: Once they got to St. Helen Island, the Cubans took custody of the kidnappers. They were promptly bundled into a helicopter that whisked them away to Dorval Airport. That's where a Canadian Forces plane was waiting. James Cross was met by public officials and his daughter. He asked for a meal, barbecued chicken and a nice bottle of French wine. Cross would later complain he never actually got the wine. Then he was taken to Jewish General Hospital for some tests. He'd lost a lot of weight, but he was in remarkably good shape. The next day he met with police before heading to the office to see his staff. Then he boarded a flight to London, where he was finally reunited with his wife. At the airport, he faced the microphones. Surrounded by reporters, he sat and held his wife's hand, and for the first time since his abduction, he spoke freely.

Sound Clip: [James Cross speaking at a press conference] I hope you'll all understand that I'm very tired. And it's been a terrible strain, not only over the last eight weeks, but particularly over the last few days, since Wednesday evening when the denouement of this crisis started. And I just want to say two things. And firstly, how marvelous it is to be back in the world as it were, after having been shut up in close confinement for eight weeks. And the thing that strikes me most is how important the sort of simple things of life are, which one takes for granted when we're living our everyday life and suddenly when you're deprived of things like life with your family, talking to your friends or just breathing fresh air and seeing the sun, you suddenly realize how important all these things are.

Sound Clip: [James Cross speaking at a press conference] And the second thing I want to say is how wonderful it is to be back in England. Lots of times the last eight weeks I never thought I was going to be able to drink a pint of bitter again. I'm so happy to be back again with my family. My wife, who's, I think, gone through a terrible time in this past eight weeks because at least I knew what was happening to me. She didn't. And they refused to allow me to communicate with her except on very few occasions. This is really the happiest day of my life.

Geoff Turner: With the Lanctôt group hustled off to Cuba, police were left to track down the killers of Pierre Laporte. For two months, despite the presence of soldiers in the street, despite the sweeping powers afforded police by the War Measures Act, Paul Rose and his group had evaded capture. They'd been helped on their way by a network of supporters. One of those supporters was an accountant named Michel Viger, who was sèympathetic to the FLQ. He eventually got them set up in his old farmhouse in Saint‑Luc. It's about a half an hour from the house where Pierre Laporte was killed.

Geoff Turner: They dug a shaft and a tunnel under the basement floor for a hiding place. By late November police already had the farmhouse under surveillance. Twice they'd actually searched the house to no avail. But on the third visit in late December, police noticed strange sounds in the basement. When they confronted Viger, he caved and he revealed the bunker under the floor. And that, for all intents and purposes, was the end of the FLQ. The soldiers left the streets of Montreal on January 4th, though the War Measures Act wouldn't officially expire until April. All told, 497 people would be arrested under the act. In the first three days alone more than 1600 raids were carried out in Montreal. Only 62 of those arrested would even be charged with anything, let alone terrorism. Only two would ever face the courts.

Geoff Turner: Among the police and officials I spoke to, I got the sense that the WMA did little or nothing to speed the investigations of the kidnappings of Cross and Laporte. At best, they say, it helped keep a lid on things to quiet the revolutionary noise. Marc Lalonde was Pierre Trudeau's Chief of Staff when the War Measures Act came into effect. And through all these years, he hasn't wobbled a bit in his defense of Trudeau's decision to employ it.

Sound Clip: [Marc Lalonde] I think he was damn right about it all. Once you have people who think they are going to change our democratic system through violence, this is completely unacceptable, and measures should be taken to prevent this. And if you see that this kind of movement gathers momentum, you have to take measures to stop that momentum. And this is what I think led to the adoption of the War Measures Act. All along, Trudeau was doing it, if you wish, à contre coeur, against his own internal approach, but when you compare to the threat and what happened to Pierre Laporte, in particular, and the threat of assassination of James Cross, this was a much more damaging and dramatic phenomenon than the erroneous arrests of a number of people who may still be grieving about it. These people can blame Mr. Trudeau or the federal government, if they wish, but I think they are wrong. I think they are completely wrong.

Geoff Turner: I'm pretty sure Denise Boucher sees it differently. Paul Rose would stand trial for the murder of Pierre Laporte. He defended himself and used the courtroom as a grandstand for his ideology. He hurled insults at the judge and the prosecution lawyers. On March 12th, 1971, Paul Rose was convicted of murder. He received two life sentences with no chance of parole for 10 years. In one of the most famous photographs of this period, the shaggy, scruffy Rose is led from the courtroom. He has his fist raised in the air. His last words to the court were, "Long live a free Quebec, power to the people. We will triumph." Ten years later a new picture of Pierre Laporte's last moments would emerge.

Sound Clip: [news reporter] Just this week the Quebec Justice minister released a long‑awaited Duchaine report, which revealed that Pierre Laporte was probably strangled by accident. In an attempt to restrain him from yelling out, someone grabbed and held the neck of his sweater from behind, apparently tightening a gold neck chain inadvertently. The kidnappers and the police say it was still murder, but the report states that the man convicted of that murder was not present when Mr. Laporte died.

Geoff Turner: To Paul Rose it didn't matter which among them had choked the life out of Pierre Laporte. It was a collective action and the responsibility was shared. He just happened to be the one to do the hard time. In other interviews, Rose was intentionally evasive about whether it was deliberate or accidental, but Robert Demers was careful to remind me that in the instance of a death in kidnapping, that death is always considered a murder. After his release from prison in 1982, Paul Rose gained a Master's degree in sociology. He disavowed violence and became involved in the labour movement and fringe‑left politics. He died in 2013 following a stroke.

Geoff Turner: As for the Lanctôt cell, their exile away from Quebec society would last almost a decade. Jacques Cossette‑Trudel's fate had been sealed in the negotiations on Rue des Recollets. Police delivered him and Louise Lanctôt to Dorval airport. And at 7:45 that evening, a Canadian Armed Forces Yukon took off with them on board. It was a surreal moment, he says. After all, Cuba was the revolutionary model for these guys. But the shine wore off pretty quickly. Meeting other revolutionaries and reading about Marx, Che Guevara, Lenin - Cossette‑Trudel realized that Quebec, for all its problems, well, it wasn't exactly Latin America. Canada was not, after all, a dictatorship. In retrospect, while the cause was just, Cossette‑Trudel came to see the methods they used as excessive. In the end, Cross' kidnappers would spend eight years abroad in Cuba and in France. And in the meantime, Quebec was changing, and changing quickly.

Sound Clip: [Jacques Cossette‑Trudel] [speaks French]

Geoff Turner: Premier Robert Bourassa opened a number of ministries, developed social services. And the student protesters Cossette‑Trudel had been hanging out with in '68 and '69, well, they were climbing the ladders of the public service. They'd change Quebec from the inside, not from the margins. In retrospect, Cossette‑Trudel likened the events leading up to October 1970 to a period of teenage rebellion. And when he and Louise finally came home in 1978, the province was just a really different place. The Parti Québécois was in power. Laws to establish French as the official language had been put in place. And the provincial government was preparing to hold its first referendum on whether to separate from Canada.

Geoff Turner: The public sympathy for the FLQ that was evident in 1970, well, it was gone now. And when they faced the judge on the return from exile, nobody showed up to support them. Cross' kidnappers were accused of having abandoned the province by fleeing to Cuba. They were no longer seen as true revolutionaries. Cossette‑Trudel did do some time. He was sentenced to five years probation and two years in provincial jail, but he was released on bail after only eight months. And then he kept a low profile. He's spoken very little about his time in the FLQ, but he told us he felt a sense of duty to share his perspective on this chapter of Quebec's history. Cossette‑Trudel never considered that by what he called, "borrowing an Englishman for two months," he would live with the consequences the rest of his life. We ask Cossette‑Trudel if he has any regrets.

Friday September 3, 2021 Full Transcript

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