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The Current Transcript for September 15, 2016

Host: Anna-Maria Tremonti

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

It's ridiculous, you know, a jar of cheese is over 11 bucks. And then you look at the cost of a container of strawberries that are over $15.

ANNA-MARIA TREMONTI: So add that up and you would spend at least 26 dollars for a jar of Cheez Whiz and some berries at a grocery store in the North. This week's report on the cost of groceries in First Nations communities in Northern Ontario mirrors food bills across the North and Arctic. Successive governments offer food subsidies that never seem to reach far enough when food and other necessities must be flown in, shipped over, or carried in over thinning ice roads. Which is why a man in Winnipeg wants to see Canada disrupt its transportation system in the North — and make room for airships. The durable benefits of the dirigible, in just a moment. After that...

SOUNDCLIP

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: If you're trying to suggest that there are people in any part of the country that don't both want growth and jobs for the economy and a protected environment, well then I think you’re mistaken

AMT: In this week before Parliament resumes, as the first anniversary of the election that brought them to power looms. The Liberals need to be seen to be acting decisively on both the environment and the economy. From Paris to pipelines, we've got the update and the debate in half an hour. And the fate of HMS Terror just found in an Arctic Bay may have been different with a little respect.

SOUNDCLIP

If these explorers had asked for our Inuit traditional knowledge on surviving, they could have survived. I'm confident of that.

AMT: If traditional Inuit knowledge wasn't recognized back then, Cathy Towtongie wants it for her people now. She runs the organization that reinforces the land claims agreement put in place when Nunavut was created, and she wants Inuit input over the division of artifacts from the Franklin expedition. Hear her as we follow up on the stories we've been covering in an hour. I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti, this is The Current.

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'We need a solution to the North': How airships could make life more affordable in Northern Canada

Guests: Barry Prentice, Dan Grossman

[Music: The Disruptors Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

[TV commercial jingle]

Really high prices, for everyday items, mmm it's the WayNorth Way.

STORE MANAGER: Here at WayNorth foods, we're committed to bringing you the high prices you just won't find anywhere else. This week, take a huge bite out of your budget with two-pack steaks, now just $72.99. Spend a big bundle on your little bundle with baby formula, just $55.39. Our prices just keep rising. 10kg bag of all purpose flour, now just $54.99. You won't get ahead with these deals — red cabbage, just $28.54. So come on down to WayNorth Foods, where nobody offers you less for more!

ANNA-MARIA TREMONTI: Well, that's from a satirical television commercial about the cost of living in Northern Canada. And while the video was a joke, the prices are not. A new report this week confirmed what people in the North already know, it is that expensive to live in some isolated northern communities. According to the study by Food Secure Canada, an average family living in Attawapiskat in Northern Ontario would pay nearly 2,000 dollars a month on groceries to meet basic nutrition standards — compared to 847 dollars in Toronto. As part of our project The Disruptors, were looking at an innovative proposal to solve this longstanding problem. Some people are floating the idea that airships are a lower cost solution to transport cargo to remote areas including to Northern Canada. Barry Prentice has been saying this for years. Lately, he has found that people have begun to listen. He's a professor of supply chain management at the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba. He is also the President of Buoyant Aircraft Systems International, which he hopes will one day fly airships to the North. And we've reached Barry Prentice in Winnipeg. Hello.

BARRY PRENTICE: Hello.

AMT: When we say airship, what do you mean?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, there's various kinds of airships. The ones that are the inflatables, like the Goodyear blimp. And then there are the rigid style airships like the old Zeppelins. They're all called airships, but there are some very significant differences between them obviously.

AMT: Mmm. And why do you say Canada needs airships?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, we need a solution to the North. Simply put. And we know that the ice roads are melting more rapidly, they're becoming unreliable. They have little gravel runways, many of them are on islands and hard to expand, and of course very expensive. So that makes food costs high. And if you want to build roads in the North, in the Boreal of the Arctic, it's about six times more expensive than building a road here in the South. So what is the option? And this is one that has worked, we know it works. It's a technology that worked 80 years ago. It's a matter of putting it to modern technology today and doing it again.

AMT: And so how would using airships on a wide scale change things in in Northern and Arctic Canadian communities?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, I think it would be a very positive disruption because it would lower the costs for everything. People get focused on food costs and obviously they are very high, but it's not just food it's everything. And if you're running a store in the North, if you break a window that costs more because you have to fly something in. If a refrigerator unit breaks, you have to bring in a technician and hope he has the right parts. So, the airship would lower the costs. We believe that the cost could be maybe as low as a quarter of what is currently being cost for flying things in, and roughly the cost of the ice roads.

AMT: And why would it be lower, where's the savings, is it the size of the thing? Can you get more stuff out there?

BARRY PRENTICE: Oh yes. I mean, airships can get much better as they get bigger. And something over about 10 tons is the starting point in terms of the short haul moves, in say Ontario and Manitoba. Further to the North, bigger airships likely, because it's a longer distance, but the amount you can carry, 50 tons, the old Zeppelins would carry up to 70 tons. So, you really have a lot of opportunity to lower the costs of food. And also, it's a question of bulk. One of the expensive things in the North is corn flakes, because, you know, they're all basically air. The airplane gets filled and that's all you can take, so that's the cost you pay. Whereas an airship is so big you have no limit on volume.

AMT: And how does that compare to what you can bring in on a plane or a ship?

BARRY PRENTICE: Oh, it depends on the airplane. If you're looking at the communities in Northern Ontario for example, you're maybe bringing in 1,000 pounds at a time, so half a ton. And further to the North, it depends on the community but Iqaluit would bring in large airplanes, but then the smaller communities, no, they only have small runways. So, the costs are very high because of that.

AMT: And what about regulations? Can anyone just, can you go out and get a license to fly one?

BARRY PRENTICE: [laughs] Well, the regulations for aviation are pretty strict. And this is one of the areas where we drag and lag behind also. Canada has not updated its regulations, and particularly with pilot training. We still have a requirement, we were forced to get a hot air balloon license in order to fly an airship, which makes no sense at all.

AMT: They didn’t know the difference? [laughs]

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, you'd wonder, I mean, what the reason was. But the reality is that Canada has never really developed the policy. I mean, there is no policy on the books for airships as to whether the government is in favour or not in favour, or indifferent to the to the topic, and that that's a problem.

AMT: Mmm. You know, I have a clip I want to play for you. This is Joseph LeBlanc, he is a board member of Food Secure Canada. He studied the issue of food prices in the North, listen to him.

SOUNDCLIP

The cost of freight is high, but really, the root of the high cost is the sticker price system in which food is sold. So, when I hear these kind of technological solutions, really, it will only serve the shipper by reducing their costs. And so, you know, and when you have a single store in an isolated community, they have no incentive to compete, there's no reason to lower your price. If you lower your expenses — and they have done that — they've sent bigger ships, bigger planes, they've sent stuff on the ice road, they sent like, this does happen, they reduce their costs, and it doesn't translate to lower prices.

AMT: Barry Prentice, what do you think of that?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, I think that's a misrepresentation of the truth. I think that the system that we have, and if anybody believes that those companies are gouging, they should buy shares in those companies and enjoy the great returns. I don't think that is true at all. I think the problem is transportation and that person just is ill informed.

AMT: Well, what about those who would say the airship industry would cost too much and getting it all set up, it's not worth it?

BARRY PRENTICE: [chuckles] Well again, on what basis would they say that? You have to look at the alternatives. If the alternative is building roads, all-weather roads, then you’re looking at spending something around 3 million dollars per kilometre — and we have a lot of kilometres. The ice roads in Manitoba alone are 2,200 kilometres, that would be over 6 billion dollars just to convert those roads to gravel roads. And then you have to pay the trucking and maintenance and everything else. Airships don't need that infrastructure.

AMT: Now, you wrote a submission to Transport Canada about this. What have you heard from the government about the idea of using airships?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, you know, I get this confused response back from the people in the regulatory branch that everything is OK, that there's lots of opportunity for people to get pilot's licenses. We’ll bring in foreign trainers for that matter, and we’ll give exemptions. It's just sort of an ad hoc, you know, we'll muddle through, as opposed to a conscious policy to say why aren't we looking at this in a serious way? All we get is people who, you know, either chuckle at the idea or just simply ignore it or denigrate it without ever testing it.

AMT: And you take this very seriously. You've built your own airship and hangar.

BARRY PRENTICE: Yes we did. In fact, we did this because we wanted to first of all demonstrate what an airship could do, but also research what is the effect of cold weather. We found out a lot in our research. One of those was that it better be a rigid airship if you're going to operate in the North.

AMT: And all of this was destroyed in the weather, in a storm this summer?

BARRY PRENTICE: Yeah, there was a storm came through here with tornadoes that touched down nearby. The winds were something like 126k, and the hangar had withstood everything for five years but it didn't take that storm. So we lost the hangar and the inflated airship inside. And in that situation, we simply could not get insurance for that building or the contents, so we had to take the risk ourselves.

AMT: And what’d you lose then?

BARRY PRENTICE: [chuckles] Everything, pretty much. I mean, we salvaged a few bits and pieces, but we haven't got any ability to rebuild that.

AMT: You spent years on that.

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, five years.

AMT: And your own money.

BARRY PRENTICE: Yes, it has been all our own money.

AMT: Huh. Did you ever fly it?

BARRY PRENTICE: Well, we had it close to the case, it was obviously in the air, in the hangar floating. And our problem was our door needed to be expanded. And in fact that was what seemed to fail during the storm was the door. We were on the verge of getting that replaced, but a little too late.

AMT: So you've spent all this time looking at this and you want to see it happen. Where's this coming from for you?

BARRY PRENTICE: [chuckles] Well, partly I'm an academic, I'm a transportation economist and, you know, I started becoming interested in this about 15 years ago when we could see the ice roads starting to deteriorate and the season being cut. And we looked at, you know, what are the options? And the airships were starting to take on more interest at that time. Obviously technology has moved a long way since the 1930s. So there's an opportunity to apply new technology, and, you know, the more you look at it the more you realize that this is really an opportunity for the future and particularly for Canada. Some like 70 per cent of our entire land mass has no roads. And if we're going to have access to that area for both our communities there but also resource development or just security, we need means to get there and the airship offers that solution.

AMT: OK. Well, Barry Prentice, thank you for your time today.

BARRY PRENTICE: My pleasure.

AMT: Barry Prentice is a Professor at the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba. He's in Winnipeg. He sent some photos of his airship before and after it was destroyed. Check out our website cbc.ca/thecurrent. Now we spoke with Transport Canada about this. It said it was aware of the recent growth in the airship industry. It says it's exploring ways to help ease the cost of living in Northern Canada, and its goal is to encourage innovation in the transportation system without favoring any particular industry or technology. While there aren't many airships in the skies these days, but there once was a time when the airship was the way of the future.

SOUNDCLIP

[airship buzzing sound]

That famous old German dirigible, the Graf Zeppelin, comes rolling up from Rio. She stops in Miami on her way from the Argentine, a hop of over 4,000 miles. A brief rest, and then she's off again on her way to Chicago, where she circles over the World's Fair.

[airship buzzing sound]

AMT: Well, you can hear the propellers is on the dirigible there. It is the earlieth 20th century, in the earlieth 20th century, sleek silver zeppelins, the size of the Titanic would float through the air, and ferry passengers across the ocean in luxury and style. Today, many people don't even know what an airship is. To tell us more about the history of airships and where they may go in the future, I'm joined by Dan Grossman. He's an aviation historian. And we've reached him in Atlanta, Georgia. Hello.

DAN GROSSMAN: Hello.

AMT: What do you think of the idea of using cargo airships for access to remote communities like the Canadian North?

DAN GROSSMAN: I think it's an excellent idea. I think Dr. Prentice makes some really very good points, and that Canada may actually be even more appropriate a place for this technology than other areas in the globe. If you have a need to get to a remote place that has little or no infrastructure, and it's not really economically feasible to lay railway track or build roads or huge airports, airships offer a wonderful way to get large or bulky items to those remote areas, you know, relatively cost effective manner.

AMT: Well, we heard that clip from The Golden Age of Airships. To what extent are we seeing a revival then of the airship industry?

DAN GROSSMAN: Well, we're certainly seeing an interest in a revival of it. The Lockheed Martin has developed a hybrid airship very much to meet the types of needs Dr. Prentice was talking about. They've actually signed a contract to sell 12 of them.

AMT: To whom?

DAN GROSSMAN: They are certainly advancing. A company called Straightline Aviation in the United Kingdom. And interestingly from what I've heard, some of that company's plans are to deploy these airships in Canada. There's a company called Hybrid Air Vehicles in the United Kingdom, which currently has a flying hybrid airship called the Airlander 10, which was originally designed as a surveillance vehicle for the United States military. And they have had a few initial flights of that over in Cardington, England. So there is an interest in it and there is work being done. We should also mention the Aeroscraft out in California, which has some pioneering technology in terms of eliminating the need to valve, lift and gas and drop ballast, they compress and decompress lifting gas. And they've had some success making that work, so there's work being done in this area.

AMT: And talk to me a little bit more about the Airlander that you mentioned in the UK. First of all, surveillance, they start working on this before they were using drones? Would this be along with drones that they would use this?

DAN GROSSMAN: No, drones have been in existence for quite a while. This was intended as a vehicle that could stay aloft for extended periods of time, weeks really, and can also fly very very high. Now, when you're carrying electronic surveillance gear, that gear is not especially large and it's not especially heavy, as opposed to the cargo loads we're talking about. So the ship that is in existence the Airlander 10 is a lot too small to do the types of work Dr. Prentice was talking about. It has a payload of about 10,000 kilograms, really not big enough to be feasible, but they're hoping that it will serve as a prototype for what they call the Airlander 50, which they predict it may be able to lift 60,000 kilograms, which is a huge amount of cargo.

AMT: Now the airliner crashed, did it not?

DAN GROSSMAN: Crash may be too strong a word, it definitely [chuckles] had a ugly landing incident. And they have some issues that they need to work on, the people over there at Hybrid Air Vehicles are very passionate and dedicated and I know they're really determined to work out those kinks.

AMT: Now, when you talk about airships particularly in the early 20th century a lot of us go straight to the Hindenburg disaster. That crash happened almost 80 years ago but the newsreel footage remains well known today. Let's listen.

SOUNDCLIP

It's starting to rain again, the rain had cracked up a little bit. It's burst into flames! (unintelligible...) It's burning, bursting into flames and it's falling on the mooring mast, and...(unintelligible...) this is terrible, this is one of the worst catastrophes in the world. Oh it's four or five hundred feet into the sky, it's a terrific crash ladies and gentlemen. The smoke and flames and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast, oh the humanity. [unintelligible] I can't talk ladies and gentlemen. Honest it's just laying there a mass of smoking wreckage.

AMT: It's pretty spectacular that the fire consumes the structure in seconds does it not? Less than a minute.

DAN GROSSMAN: About less than a minute. It was about 245 metre structure and it was completely burned to ashes in less than a minute. So that's a pretty dramatic destruction.

AMT: Thirty five people were killed, but there were how many on board that day?

DAN GROSSMAN: I believe there were 97 onboard. About two thirds of the people did survive actually, it's hard to believe looking at the film but about two thirds survived.

AMT: How important was the fact that that was caught on film?

DAN GROSSMAN: Oh, it was very important. A lot of airships had crashed prior to Hindenburg. Many had a much greater loss of life but they were not caught on film. So, it didn't have quite the same public impact.

AMT: This was a German airship that was docking in New Jersey. Was it responsible for the decline of airships, that disaster?

DAN GROSSMAN: I don't think so. Hindenburg was really obsolete before she made her first flight. When Hindenburg flew in for the first time in March of 1936, there was already the Martin M-130 flying boat known as the China Clipper, which had already flown in November 35, between San Francisco and Honolulu. It flew farther, faster, it was just a much better vehicle. So, airships had been eclipsed by the technology of the fixed wing airliner, and airships for the purpose of Hindenburg, to carry passengers and mail across well-traveled routes, let's say Europe, North America, those would have been obsolete anyway. But no one really looked at the time, at airships performing the type of [unintelligible] that we're talking about today. And so, when airships were replaced by fixed wing airliners and remember nearly 20 years after Hindenburg, we had the 707 jet airliner. So, technology increased at an incredible pace and everyone was focused on moving passengers from let's say London to New York, et cetera. But now when we're talking about moving cargo items to remote areas, they definitely have a place that they didn't have before.

AMT: So where do you see this airship revival going at this point then?

DAN GROSSMAN: So we don't really quite have the airship built and ready to go yet. It's not quite ready for prime time. Although I do think that if an airship is created and ready to go and can do what it needs to do, that a lot of the regulatory problems Dr. Prentice talked about will settle with themselves. If Lockheed is able to build an airship that can efficiently and effectively deliver things to remote areas of Canada, I'm pretty confident the Canadian government will find a way to allow it to operate.

AMT: Well, Dan Grossman thanks for your time today.

DAN GROSSMAN: Thank you so much.

AMT: Dan Grossman is an aviation historian and we reached him in Atlanta, Georgia. And I already got a tweet out of Halifax, Christina Mack saying never thought twice about cargo airships until this morning. That makes two of us. But tell us what you think about the idea of using the airship. We’d especially like to hear from you as you live in a northern community. Tell us about your cost of living, whether you think airships would make things more affordable for you, whether you think the government should be looking into trying to kick start this industry. We are on Facebook. We are on Twitter @TheCurrentCBC. You can email us as well via the website cbc.ca/thecurrent, click on contact. And stay with us. The news is next. Then, what is your main priority as parliament reconvenes this fall? The economy, the environment? We will hear how the Liberals believe they can and must deliver on both. I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti This is The Current on CBC Radio 1, Sirius XM and online on cbc.ca/thecurrent.

[Music: Extro]

Back To Top »

Liberal agenda to reduce emissions while expanding pipelines contradictory, say critics

Guests: Rob Russo, Tzeporah Berman, Martha Hall Findlay

ANNA-MARIA TREMONTI: Hello, I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

AMT: Still to come, the HMS Terror, one of the ships from the doomed Franklin expedition was discovered this month. It is a British vessel discovered in Canadian waters. But Inuit residents of Nunavut want a seat at the table when it comes to discovering what to do and deciding what to do with the artifacts. That story in half an hour. But first, a sneak peek at what's on the agenda of a new season of parliament.

SOUNDCLIP

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: Together, we are creating a plan that will help us meet or exceed our emissions targets and encourage clean economic growth.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: We need to get our resources to market but we need to do that in responsible, sustainable, thoughtful ways. You cannot separate what is good for the environment and what is good for the economy

AMT: Well what is good for the environment, what is good for the economy that is the balance Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be aiming to strike this fall. One he's talked a lot about before you heard him there at the UN in April, then again in Alberta. Both climate and energy issues will be coming to a head soon with parliament resuming next week. A big decision on the Trudeau government's docket will be whether to approve Kinder Morgan's Trans-Mountain pipeline expansion. A decision on that is expected before the end of the year. On the other hand, there is an effort to put a price on carbon, to ratify the Paris climate agreement, something other nations are expected to do in the coming days as part of the UN's climate week. Rob Russo is the parliamentary bureau chief for CBC News. He joins us from Ottawa. Hello.

ROB RUSSO: Hello Anna-Maria, how are you?

AMT: Well, I'm well and I want to know what you can tell us. Parliament’s about to convene next week, right Rob?

ROB RUSSO: It is, yeah.

AMT: So what are you hearing about the big items on the agenda for the Liberals?

ROB RUSSO: Well, the clock's ticking towards deadlines on three areas. They’ve got promises with best before dates in three areas. And the first one is on democratic reform. That's the commitment to make the last election the final one in which we vote in the first-past-the-post system. And you don't have to listen too too carefully to hear the sound of some languid backpedaling that's going on there. They're realizing that this is going to be very difficult to do. Might not be possible without a referendum, unless they can get some opposition support. So they're prepared if necessary to step away from that, I think. The other time-dated promise is to do something with the new health funding agreement. Harper funded it to a certain extent and then sprinted away from it, because he knew that his government couldn't really win many votes on it. Some difficult discussions going on here at the federal and provincial level on a health accord. Elbows have been up all summer, that's going to be a thorny one. And then of course, the final one you referred to it in the intro, was a climate agreement and pipeline construction decision. And therein lies the first kind of casted glance on the political capital that the prime minister has amassed, and he has to decide where he's going to spend that capital on the climate agreement versus pipeline construction.

AMT: OK, so let's talk pipelines for a moment. Just how keen is he to get at least one pipeline approved this mandate?

ROB RUSSO: Well, he has said that he wants to get our resources to market. That is code for he wants a pipeline built. Now, how keen is he? Well, you know how when you scrape and you save and you've amassed a little bit of money and you're really proud of the fact that you've got some of that money in a bank account? Well, he knows now he's going to have to spend some of that money. He's going to have to, you know, years of toil to get the support of First Nations people, of environmental groups. Well, he's going to have to spend some of that support right now on this decision.

AMT: OK. And we've seen of course some demonstrations against Energy East. What's the safest, politically, pipeline for him to go toward?

ROB RUSSO: Well, it's probably the Kinder Morgan Trans-Mountain pipeline. The Liberals have about 17 seats in British Columbia. Up from two in the last parliament and almost all of those came from Conservative held ridings. So you know that they're not going to lose a lot of votes on a pipeline in those ridings to Conservatives, because Conservatives tend to favour a pipeline. They have about 40 seats in the province of Quebec. Most of those gains were possible because of softening NDP support. And he has the possibility of picking up even more of those seats, given the drift in the NDP vote right now. So if he was going to do the political calculus and you know that he's already done that, there is more for him to lose in the province of Quebec by forcing through a decision in favour of Energy East than there would be to lose in British Columbia.

AMT: And he's already spoken against the Northern Gateway right?

ROB RUSSO: Yes he has. He says he just never wants to see oil tankers in that pristine part of British Columbia. So that really does leave the Trans-Mountain pipeline as the one that's possible for him. And if you look closely Anna-Maria, there are the broad outlines of a deal there. We have an NDP premier who's in favour of it, and we have a kind of a Liberal Conservative premier in British Columbia, who says if certain conditions are met she will also be in favor of a pipeline. So that sounds to me like the beginnings of a negotiation. I think those negotiations have been going on. And if we look closely, there are the makings of a deal there by year's end.

AMT: And, you know, we know that there's some unpopularity in Vancouver among environmental groups obviously and Indigenous groups, but there are there are business groups or others who want to get oil to market.

ROB RUSSO: Yes. And I think to give the prime minister and some Liberals their due, they also if they want to get re-elected, they know that they need to do something about what's being called here in Ottawa slowth. And that's either no growth in economic terms, or very slow growth. If the economy is not going well, the Liberals don't stand a very good chance of hanging on to their majority. So they need to do something to get the economy going. And they see this, until they can restructure the economy, because they are in favour of doing that, to foster environmental clean up industries, to get into renewable energies. Until they can do that which is a 10 to 20 year project, they need to do something to get Canada's economy out of this slowth period, and a pipeline is a big part of that.

AMT: OK. And now the US and China have ratified the Paris agreement earlier this month. Where does that leave Canada, Rob?

ROB RUSSO: That leaves Canada scrambling. While we were spending the summer on the dock, they were on the road going to provincial capitals, again elbows up, very difficult discussions with a lot of provinces to try to get them to come to some sort of agreement that might look like a national strategy, if not a national plan, to put a higher price on carbon. They've made some very very important commitments in Paris last year on reducing greenhouse gases. They're not going to be able to use to announce an agreement when China and the US do so at the UN next week. But if they're going to do it by year's end, they they've got to sort of bend some provinces towards their point of view, their perspective on this. And discussions are very difficult in Eastern Canada, in the Atlantic provinces in particular, and in the province of Saskatchewan and other provinces as well. There are some tough discussions going on.

AMT: So what can we watch for, because we have heard the prime minister say you can balance these issues environment, economy?

ROB RUSSO: I think if they're going to get this done, and when you talk to Liberals here, what they think, is you can have credibility on a pipeline only if you have credibility on the environment. So they are probably looking at a two step process. In other words, if they can get a deal on reducing greenhouse gases, then they can turn to their friends in the environmental movement and say see I have bonafides here on the environment, now we need to do something to get the economy going. We're going to do it in a responsible way, we've shown you that by coming up with this climate deal with the provinces, and we're going to have to get a pipeline built. He's never going to get all of them onboard. He's never going to get all First Nations on board. But he has enough capital, political capital, they feel, to spend some of it and get some of them happy, enough of them happy to get a pipeline built. But only if there is a climate deal.

AMT: OK, Rob Russo thank you.

ROB RUSSO: My pleasure Anna-Maria.

AMT: Rob Russo, Parliamentary Bureau Chief for CBC News. He joined us from Ottawa. Now, of course the objectives of building pipelines and pricing carbon may seem at odds to some. But joining me are two guests to discuss how the Liberals may be able to balance those goals. Martha Hall Findlay is a former Liberal MP, she is also the President and CEO of the Canada West Foundation. She joins us from our Calgary studio. Tzeporah Berman is an Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies at York University. She's been appointed by the premier of Alberta to co-chair the oil sands advisory working group, which is studying how to implement the new climate plan and develop a pathway to 2050. She is speaking for herself here and not for that working group, Tzeporah Berman is in Vancouver. Hello to both of you. Good morning.

MANY VOICES: Good morning.

AMT: Tzeporah Berman, let me start with you. Can Prime Minister Trudeau reconcile building a pipeline or extending that pipeline, with meeting Canada's commitments under the Paris agreement on climate change?

TZEPORAH BERMAN : Well, you know, I think Anna-Maria that there are really three considerations here. One is, how much will a pipeline increase emissions? What kind of growth in the oil sands would it mean? Alberta has a new climate plan, which caps oil sands emissions. It's a very strong climate plan, it's the first time we've ever had a cap on emissions from the oil sands, and I think the real question that we're not looking at, we're not really having an honest conversation, is about whether or not you need a new pipeline under that cap. And the fact is oil is getting to market now and we could even increase production to the cap without more pipelines. We have capacity in the pipeline system and it's, you know, for a long time this has been a polarized conflict and there's become this political calculus as you were just talking about, that there needs to be a pipeline, that if we're going to have economic success we need a new pipeline. And that's just not true anymore. And I think that the second consideration is whether or not a new pipeline is consistent with our commitments in Paris. Can you build a new pipeline, a new infrastructure capacity in the country, and still meet our commitment to be well below two degrees. There's been a couple of studies on that, one in Nature journal and one by the International Energy Institute. And what they look at is global market economic scenarios. What does a two degree world look like? Because the NEB is looking at business as usual scenarios. That's a six degree world. And both of those studies have said that you need to cap emissions from the oil sands at a level that doesn't require a new pipeline.

AMT: Martha Hall Findlay, what do you think of what Tzeporah Berman is saying?

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: Well, if there was no economic benefit to building a pipeline I don't think the proponents would be willing to spend the extraordinary amounts of money to do that. So, I think it's pretty clear there is an economic argument for pipelines. Even the prime minister is acknowledging that the Canadian economy will benefit from getting our oil to tidewater. The challenge that we have and the frustrating part about the discussion about pipelines is that pipelines are one aspect of the entire energy system, and when we're looking at what we should be doing in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, we need to look at the entire energy system. We need to look at consumption, we need to look at demand. And then we need to look at, on the understanding that we're going to be producing, how do we best transport it? That's what pipelines are about. So when you look at the alternatives, when you look at rail and acknowledge we are getting some to market, but not nearly enough to the world markets. We're captive to the United States market. Rail is not a good option. Rail is not only worse in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, but it's also terrible in terms of safety. Trucks are even worse. So, you know, you have to look at how do we reduce, how does Canada reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in the totality. I mean, transportation makes up a full quarter of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions. How do we deal with reducing those? How do we deal with reducing the greenhouse gas emissions that are due to the production of electricity across the country? Which is also a huge portion--

AMT: [interposing] OK, so how do we? How do we?

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: Well, the idea of having a price on carbon, I mean, some of us have been promoting that for at least a decade. Saying that if you have something that you want less of, it makes sense to actually make it more expensive. So the idea that there is a growing enthusiasm for a price on carbon is terrific, because that means that you're actually focusing on demand, you're actually dealing with consumption, which is the true heart of the whole concept of greenhouse gas emissions.

AMT: Tzeporah Berman.

TZEPORAH BERMAN : So I don't disagree on the price on carbon, but the fact is a price on carbon is not enough. We know that. To actually constrain emissions enough to meet our targets, we would need a price on carbon that is far higher than politically anyone is willing to put in place. And, you know, of course industry is saying they need more pipelines. The fact is industry has always said that. CAPP has wrongly forecasted that production would exceed our current pipeline capacity in 2012 and 2013 and 2014, and again this year. And the reason they do that is because they want to keep their options open and they want to be able to dramatically increase production. They're saying they can do that while still reducing emissions, but that's a big bet for the nation to make. Especially considering how destabilizing a pipeline like Kinder Morgan would be.

AMT: OK, so just clarify CAPP is the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

TZEPORAH BERMAN : Yes.

AMT: OK, so let me just ask you this. So, the creation of a pipeline it would not solely bring oil at the rate of production that it is being made now, it would increase the production. Am I correct?

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: But it would also replace significant traffic that we already have, for instance by rail. So, when you look at, one, are we going to be producing this stuff? And I would just volunteer that, you know, as long as world demand is continuing to go up and it is and it will continue to increase for a significantly long time to come. Why Canada should actually be the one to point fingers at to say, you know, you can't supply that demand seems a little bit frustrating because at the same time we have a government that saying we want to improve our economy. The irony is that when you improve an economy, which we are all hoping ours does, then you are going to have more people driving cars, you're going to have more people building buildings and existing in buildings, and these are huge emitters of greenhouse gas emissions. So again, go back to the in the energy system as a whole, look at consumption look at demand. I totally agree, a carbon tax is not the only solution by any means, but it is one. But you know, why do we have buildings in cities lit up all night long when nobody is there? Why do we not focus more on the trucking industry for example? These are all areas that we should be looking at. And we shouldn't just focus on one particular part of Canada's economy, which is important, and do it harm.

AMT: Martha Hall Findlay, you know the statistics. Until there was a downturn in the price of oil, the statistics always showed that the production of oil and gas was still the biggest emitter over transportation. Canada's own statistics show that. So I know you're talking about transportation, but you're not negating the fact that those emissions are there.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: Transportation and oil and gas, depends on the year but they're pretty much equal. But then you throw in agriculture, agriculture is huge.

AMT: Well, no, but if you're looking at the different slices of industry, that industry still has a-- but Tzeporah Berman I want to ask you--

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: [interposing] No, no, that’s what I’m saying you--

AMT: But let me ask Tzeporah Berman, Kinder Morgan's goal with the Trans-Mountain pipeline is to open up Asian markets. Do you believe the demand is there for Canadian oil long term?

TZEPORAH BERMAN : Well, I don't think it is and neither does the International Energy Agency. The fact is, we should be able to produce oil. No one's saying we shouldn't produce. The question is how much? Should we be increasing it? And a pipeline isn't made for a year or two, five or ten years, they're not put out of commission in a decade. If we build new infrastructure now, it's there for the next 20 or 30 years and we need to plan for the future. And we have committed to decarbonize our economy by 2100. We've committed to an 80 per cent reduction in emissions by 2050. And so then, the question is how much oil are we going to be producing in the future? And that really depends on the emissions from that oil. The fact is, even under a very strong Alberta climate plan, by 2030 at 100 million tons, the oil sands would be about 50 per cent of the emissions that Canada is allowed under the Paris agreement. And so that means that if the federal government is going to say OK, that's an OK level of emissions from Alberta, we're going to have to have massive reductions in the rest of the economy, that are probably pretty expensive. And is that possible? And that's what they need to show. They need to show how we're going to meet our targets in the country as a whole, if we continue to allow production at a certain level from Alberta.

AMT: Martha Hall Findlay.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: I think the federal government fully recognizes that you have the need to improve our economy on the one hand, and the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The challenge that I have is that greenhouse gas emissions don't respect political borders and, you know, to the extent that for example, the folks working on carbon innovation, carbon technologies in Saskatchewan for example, are looking at ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions of coal fired plants, which could if in fact, can significantly reduce the emissions from the immense number of coal plants in China for example. Could do far far more in terms of helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a global problem than just saying we are going to meet our targets in Paris. I don't think anybody is saying that we will be able to necessarily meet as a world the targets that were made in Paris. Virtually every country is going to have a real challenge doing that. The International Energy Agency just to clarify something that Tzeporah said, they actually do forecast significant increases in global demand. They're saying that the rate at which that is increasing is slowing down, but demand for oil is continuing to go up and will continue to go up for a long time to come. The Canadian economy, we are in a position of having a tremendous opportunity to capitalize on our resources. That's great for our economy. We should be able to transport what we produce, the most environmentally sustainable way, which is in fact pipelines, far better than rail or truck. And let's do it the best way possible. And that's a challenge that the government is facing and I think. You know, at some point they the leadership that we will be able to see, and we hope to see at the federal level and provincial level is to say we need to understand that this is an entire system. We have greenhouse gas emissions from all sorts of places. This is an important part of our economy. We're going to be producing it, so let's transport it the most efficient and environmentally sustainable way possible.

AMT: Tzeporah Berman, go ahead.

TZEPORAH BERMAN : But I don't disagree with that. But if you look at the National Energy Board analysis of what kind of capacity is needed, their projections, even including, you know, a low amount of rail, so not increasing rail. Because there is a new pipeline capacity in the Enbridge line 3 connection, we have enough capacity. Kinder Morgan, the existing Kinder Morgan pipeline isn't even running full right now. And so, the real question is how are we planning for the future? And do we need more capacity and if we build more capacity is there going to be pressure to exceed Alberta's cap in the future? Because, you know, we hear all these, you know, the sky is falling there are empty pipelines. I think the fact is, is this government going to risk pretty massive social upheaval on the West Coast, where thousands have already said they would blockade this pipeline, constitutional lawsuits with First Nations for a better reason than industry wants--

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: Well, ok but I think--

AMT: But let me just ask a question, if we have enough capacity, if you have enough capacity why is this conversation happening?

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: Exactly. If we had enough capacity you wouldn't have people willing to spend billions of dollars building the ability to actually transport this product. It doesn't make sense and I mean, I'm not going to pretend to understand economic forecasts for a business better than the businesses involved. We don't have enough capacity. We don't have enough capacity to get our oil beyond the United States, the world markets where we can get world price. It's a false argument to say well, we already have enough capacity therefore we don't need pipelines. If that were true we wouldn't be having this discussion.

TZEPORAH BERMAN : No, we're having this discussion because industry wants to increase production. And if they can do that while decreasing emissions, well that's a great thing if they can decrease emissions per barrel.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: But if increasing--

TZEPORAH BERMAN : But the fact is over the last 10 years our improvements as an industry as a whole, emissions per barrel, haven't gone down. They did go down, you know, 15 years ago when there was a switch to cogeneration etc. but improvements have flat lined now.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: But if it increasing production is a problem, then improving our economy is a problem, as I said at the very beginning of this of this interview. We want to improve our economy. As soon as we improve our economy, we're going to have more people driving cars, we're going to have more people in buildings. We’re going to be increasing greenhouse gas emissions.

AMT: So then how do you reduce consumption? Where is that where is the government innovation to reduce consumption and offer an alternative?

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: But I think we're starting with the efforts toward a carbon price, which I totally applaud.

AMT: But that’s not reducing consumption, that's paying more for the same consumption.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: No, no, Anna-Maria, you and I are old enough to remember 1973. Price goes up on something, people start actually using a lot less of it. Is the carbon pricing being discussed enough?

AMT: But I'm asking where the alternatives are.

MARTHA HALL FINDLAY: But there are alternatives and there are all sorts of technologies being developed, there's no question. So those of us who are environmentalists, as well as proponents of actually taking economic advantage of the resources that we have and there are a lot of us who feel both ways, you have to look at how do we address the whole system. So how do we improve the technologies in producing oil and gas? How do we--

AMT: [interposing] OK, we are out of time, we have to leave it there. But all of this of course steps into parliament just next week. So thank you both for your perspectives. We'll see how it plays out on Parliament Hill. Thank you both.

MANY VOICES: Thanks very much.

AMT: That's Martha Hall Findlay, former Liberal MP, President and CEO of the Canada West Foundation. She joined us from Calgary. Tzeporah Berman is an Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies at York University. She joined us from Vancouver. Stay with us. Coming up in our next half hour, we're talking about the stories that we've been following this week. Piya Chattopadhyay will be here. We're looking at the proposal to screen immigrants for non-Canadian values. We're also talking about the controversy over Nate Parker's The Birth of a Nation. I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti, this is The Current.

[Music: Extro]

ANNA-MARIA TREMONTI: Hello, I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti, this is The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

[fast paced drum beat]

VOICE 1: The sentiment is out there. How do we keep it from exploding as we've seen into the intolerance, and I'll say the word, racism, that we've seen in Britain and the United States?

VOICE 2: When it's in regards to Nate Parker and The Birth of a Nation, it's almost as if we have to choose between our blackness or our womanhood.

VOICE 3: It is very frustrating. Expert panels of all sorts in many countries have reviewed this issue, and come to the conclusion that fluoride at the right level put in the water supply is a very effective measure in reducing dental decay.

[fast paced drum beat]

AMT: A little taste of the week that is on The Current. Now it's time to get to some of your feedback on what we've been following. So to go through your tweets, posts, emails, Piya Chattopadhyay. Hello, you're back.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Hi.

AMT: Piya Chattopadhyay is with me, she is the host of CBC Radio's Out in the Open, it airs when? Today?

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Today.

AMT: Today.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Today at 1:00 o'clock, Saturday at 3 o'clock, podcast is dropping this morning.

AMT: You are everywhere.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: I try to be.

AMT: OK, well--

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: [laughing]

AMT: Let's get to it, nice to have you here. [laughing]

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Thank you. [laughing]

AMT: Last Thursday, I was speaking to Conservative Party leadership candidate Kellie Leitch about her proposal to have would-be immigrants to Canada screened for so-called anti-Canadian values.

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KELLIE LEITCH: It's not intolerant to believe in a set of values we expect everyone to share. And in this country, it’s a Canadian value to respect religion other than those that you might follow yourself, to respect other cultures, to respect sexual orientation that’s different from your own. Violence and misogyny, those aren't Canadian values. Tolerance and generosity are. And I want our Canadian public, but our party our Conservative Party to have a robust discussion about these.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Hoo boy, we got some heated response to that interview and the discussion that followed. Monica Marias wrote on Facebook, there's no such thing as a model or ideal Canadian, a society that emphasizes uniformity is one that creates intolerance and hate. Claire Scullion wrote in from Ottawa, does Dr. Leitch propose to ban prospective immigrants to Canada if they don't share those values? If so, how do we reconcile that with the fact that many Canadians who were born here are homophobic, denigrate women and do not see women as equals. Will we deport them? Ludicrous.

AMT: Jane Goudri of White Rock, British Columbia agreed with the plan. I'm a feminist, I'm appalled by the massage any imbedded in many world cultures. I am not a racist. I think it's a very cheap shot to bring racism into this discussion. It is their value system that Kellie Leitch is talking about.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Fatima Baht from Toronto had a different view. Do Canadian values support neglect and abuse of Indigenous people? Old Stock Canadians have instituted the reserve system, the residential school systems, are these the Canadian values she wants to promote?

AMT: And Eberhardt Krouse of Campbellville, Ontario offered his immigration experience. My immigration interview took place at the Canadian Consulate in Germany in 1967. The questions attempted to determine whether I had the potential to become a valuable member of Canadian society. What's wrong with that approach? Has our social and political correctness taken us so far as to no longer be able to discuss reality.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: And finally on this one, Joe Wheeler of Chilliwack, BC had this view. It seems to me that Kellie Leitch is trying very hard not to bring up the fact that she is basically targeting Muslims.

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Inuit demand input over division of Franklin expedition artifacts

Guests: Cathy Towtongie

AMT: OK, moving on to a different story. Two years ago, the wreck of HMS Erebus was discovered in the Arctic when the government of Canada funded a research mission to find the remains of the Franklin expedition that was looking for the Northwest Passage. This week, news broke that the wreck of the second ship on that ill-fated mission had also been found.

SOUNDCLIP

Resting proud in 24 metres of water, we found HMS Terror. 203 years old, it is perfectly preserved in the frigid waters of the Northwest Passage.

AMT: That is Adrian Schimnowski, operations director at the Arctic Research Foundation describing the discovery. One that was made thanks to information the crew received from a local Inuit hunter. While many history buffs were excited by the news, it also raises questions of sovereignty for the Inuit people. Cathy Towtongie is the President of the Nunavut Tunngavik. She joins us now from Kugja. Hello.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Hi.

AMT: This was a very important discovery. Tell me about the people who deserve the credit for this discovery.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Louis Kamookak is from GJoa Haven. He's always documenting Inuit traditional knowledge and oral history that led to the discovery of both vessels. Sammy Kogvik also deserves recognition for the role he played in locating the HMS Terror. But six years ago, Sammy Kogvikwent out fishing and hunting and he saw a ship's mast. And so, he knew where the location was. But he kept it to himself because Inuit, those communities were warned by the elders if they search for artifacts that were ancient or kept on digging into the past, misfortune will fall upon them. So it was kept within the Inuit community.

AMT: So what changed, why did it come out now?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: I guess when Parks Canada was searching, Sammy Kogvik realized the mast that when he went fishing was part of the search. And if he did not provide them with his knowledge about the wreckage in Terror Bay, it would take a lot longer time.

AMT: Your own family has a connection to the Franklin mission doesn't it?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Yes. My grandfather was part of the previous expedition and it's written in a book by Ukkusiksalik, which is Wager Bay by David Pelly. And as a child, I used to play with a gold coin. And with that gold coin was a serpent-like animal with a man standing on top with a sword, and on the back was a lady, very serene type, with fat cheeks. And my grandfather told my mother if you ever needed white man's money, use this coin. So, at that time children were being shipped off to residential school. My brother was going to Churchill, Manitoba. My mother gave that coin, that gold coin, it used to be very heavy. It was fun to play with because it was heavy.

AMT: Mmm.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: And my mother gave it to my brother and at the residential school that coin was stolen.

AMT: Aww. So it was a coin that your grandfather got in payment for working with a previous expedition?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Yes. I'm not the only one. I'm not the only Inuk. Other Inuit had artifacts like silver spoons, forks, knives, and they use them for buttons or put them on their clothing as decoration. These things were an introduction into the Inuit culture and they were shiny and they were heavy, and so they went with the clothing that the Inuit wear. But this proves Inuit knowledge should be listened to.

AMT: Mmhmm. Well, what do you want to see happen to the artifacts recovered from the Franklin mission ships then?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Under our Nunavut agreement article 33. We the Inuit, when we were negotiating with the government of Canada, we knew there were ships in our ocean.

AMT: Mmhmm.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: We've seen ships on Marble Island. You can see the hawk of it. And in other parts of the Arctic. So, when Inuit were negotiating, we negotiated with Canada saying if anything is found on our lands and our resources and our water, 50 per cent of it belongs to the Inuit. And unfortunately, during this discussion between Britain and Canada. Canada has not included Nunavut Tunngavik on these discussions, because Canada has agreed with the Inuit including the first preamble, Inuit we were insistent that sovereignty was mentioned. It was a strange idea that the sovereignty of the Queen to the exclusion of all others was mentioned. So Inuit, within our first preamble of our agreement, we hold sovereignty for Canada.

AMT: So, in other words as Canada negotiates with Britain what to do with all of this, you should be at the table?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: We have to be at the table. It violates the Crown's fiduciary duty to Inuit and its consultation obligation. Our agreement is a constitutional agreement. And I have written to Minister McKenna twice asking about the status of the negotiations, and requesting to be included. These discussions are very important to Inuit. If these explorers had asked for our Inuit traditional knowledge on surviving, they could have survived. I'm confident of that. But they were a civilization that felt that their type of civilization was superior to our civilization, and that was their undoing.

AMT: So, in other words that oversight of not respecting the knowledge of the Inuit back then, you want to see some respect this time around, you want to be part of this?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: We do need respect. The type of knowledge that this civilization that Britain introduced to our society, we respected it. But at the same time, if they had respected our knowledge in surviving and eating our food, which Inuit brought to them, seals. They looked down on it and didn't eat it.

AMT: OK, so if you look at what's going on with the artifacts now, Parks Canada is negotiating with the UK over what happens. And they've sent us a statement and it includes the fact that they say they're committed to exploring options for joint ownership of the artifacts with, quote, our Inuit partners. What do you think of that?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: That has to be rightly done. I'm happy to hear about it, because we do have the Inuit Heritage Trust, and under the Nunavut agreement, we have joint ownership of any artifacts, from anything that's located in our lands and waters. And I'm happy to hear that, because our ancestors had a stake, and they felt responsible for these explorations that were coming into their region and ensuring their survival.

AMT: You know, they do make the point that some of the wrecks and the artifacts are property of the United Kingdom.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: We are on international waters. The Northwest Passage is on international waters and other countries are interested too. Not just Canada. So we, the Inuit, Canada has to include us.

AMT: So, in other words this this may be about ships from long ago, but there's a principle here that extends into what happens as people move forward.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Of course there is. We know as Inuit, how critical Inuit knowledge was, and how critical Inuit knowledge is at this time, and it should be considered paramount in any field of work in Nunavut.

AMT: And so what kind of involvement do you have now with the Canadian government on negotiations, specifically surrounding these wrecks, and more generally looking at the future of a much busier passageway?

CATHY TOWTONGIE: We did write to minister McKenna twice. We asked about the status of the discussion and we requested to be included. We have had no response. But with the legendary Inuit patience, I'm sure we'll keep prodding forward until we see a realistic settlement.

AMT: OK, well, thank you for speaking with me today.

CATHY TOWTONGIE: Thank you Anne-Marie.

AMT: That is Cathy Towtongie, she is the President of the Nunavut Tunnguvik. And she joined us from Kugja. Piya I just, what she said about the legendary Inuit patience.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Mmm.

AMT: But that idea that maybe if the explorers had been willing to eat the food as the locals and leaned on them a little more--

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Yeah, rely--

AMT: We’d have a totally different history lesson.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Exactly, rely on local knowledge and local people. They most often help you out.

AMT: There you go.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Alright, let us get to some more of your letters now on another story we brought you this week. The film The Birth of a Nation premiered with a lot of buzz at TIFF, the Toronto International Film Festival last weekend. But a lot of the conversation was about a 17-year-old rape charge and acquittal for its writer, director, and star Nate Parker. Writer Morgan Jerkins spoke about why as an African-American woman she's conflicted about seeing the film.

SOUNDCLIP

I thought OK, great, a film about black liberation that's perfect timing with the Oscars so white movement, as well as the Black Lives Matter movement that’s spanned across the world now. And when I found out that he was accused of rape and even though he was acquitted, I was like oh my gosh, I was so disappointed because I was like I know this is going to come up and it's going to bring up a lot of charged conversations, both in mainstream as well as in the black community.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Well, the controversy about the film provoked controversy amongst our listeners as well. Chris Van Es of Port Hope, Ontario writes, which part of not guilty does the media not understand? Nate Parker was acquitted. Dervish Girl tweeted I will definitely see this important film despite media hysterics about a non-issue.

AMT: Sarbjit Kaur tweeted a different answer to our question about going to see the movie. I may see the film at some point, but the initial excitement I had to run to the theater is gone. Brittany Becker wrote on Facebook that personally she cannot separate the art from the artist. Then the suffering of people becomes nothing more than the price we pay for art, she says.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: And finally on this one, Mike Archibald had a few thoughts he added on Facebook. He posted it's really sad that it takes something like this to have this conversation. Women of colour have been saying this exact same thing since the sixties. A director is no artist, a film is made by thousands of people in multiple corporations. This is basically saying that all of those people should suffer because of one man.

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Advocates call for public registry for sperm donors and offspring

Guests: Vanessa Gruben

VOICE: Tracking the story.

AMT: Tuesday we brought to you a documentary by CBC's Julie Ironton about three half siblings conceived with sperm from the same anonymous donor. They are teenagers now, they connected for the first time by using an American private donor sibling registry. Lexie, one of the teens said she hoped more offspring of sperm donors have access to the registry to help them find their relatives.

SOUNDCLIP

The donor sibling registry is like, so good. But the only problem with that is like we found it like now. And I think that like if they were to like advertise it more or like when you're going into the fertility clinics them being like, hey, there's other people like you, there's other people that are using the same donor as you, like make sure that families know about it.

AMT: OK, well, currently the privately run registry relies on donors and their offspring to voluntarily submit information. Advocates for a mandatory public registry say there are important legal and public health benefits to tracking sperm donation. That call has grown louder with multiple lawsuits brought against a sperm donor who admitted to lying on his application about his mental health and criminal record. Vanessa Gruben is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa. She's also a member of the Centre for Health, Law, Policy and Ethics. She is an advocate for a public donor registry. And she joins us now from Ottawa. Hi.

VANESSA GRUBEN: Hi, good morning.

AMT: Why should there be a public registry for donors and their offspring in Canada?

VANESSA GRUBEN: Well, I think there's a couple of different ways in which a register can operate. And we had planned for a register here in Canada, that registry would have provided very important health information to donor conceived people. It wouldn't have provided the identity of the donor or the identity of siblings, but that health information is quite important for donor conceived people. Otherwise, you know, they're really operating with half a medical record.

AMT: So what kinds of legal issues arise as a result of not being able to track information about sperm donors and their offspring?

VANESSA GRUBEN: Well, so you've touched on one of those legal issues in terms of the accuracy of the information. There is no legal requirement as it currently stands that a donor provide accurate information, that's certainly something that one would hope would be part in parcel of a register. And really, from a legal perspective it's a bit complicated because of a Supreme Court decision we had a few years ago. The Supreme Court concluded that the provisions in the Federal Act which would have provided for a national registry and that law making authority actually falls to the provinces. And so ,it's now up to the provinces to to come up with this these registries, which of course is a bit more complicated from a legal perspective, but as far as I'm concerned there's no reason we couldn't have some national coordination around that.

AMT: Mmm. So how does a public registry work?

VANESSA GRUBEN: So there are, as I said, there are different types of registries that exist. In the UK, donor anonymity is not allowed. And so that registry, in addition to ensuring that there's health information collected, that registry would provide at the donor conceived person with the identity of the donor at a certain stage. But not, as I've mentioned, not all registries work like that. The registry that we had planned for in Canada would have provided non-identifying information about the donor, but not identifying information. So you wouldn't know who the donor was necessarily. That registry also served another important function or would have served another important function, and that is it would have allowed for a mechanism for a donor conceived person to contact the agency responsible for the registry, to find out whether a prospective intimate partner was genetically related to them. And so that's of course quite important to avoid what we call in the in the legal world, inadvertent consanguinity, you know, you certainly wouldn't want a situation where two half siblings were in that situation. So, as I as I say, registries can serve different functions and there's different ways to do it. And we have some good models across the world.

AMT: In the absence of an national registry, people such as the ones featured in our documentary resort to private registries. What are the concerns about a private registry?

VANESSA GRUBEN: Well, yes, so as the story highlighted, the people in this story have used the donor sibling registry, which is privately run out of the United States. When we're talking about information, health information, these kinds of sensitive information about genetic relationships, I certainly feel that the preferable option is to have that information in the hands of either the provincial government, or some arm's length agency. Provides increased security for that information, it also just provides an extra rigour and it's also certainly stability in terms of the funding that it receives you're not relying on individual donors. And so, I think a public registry is certainly the preferred option over a privately run.

AMT: Mmm. You're making the point that there's just, what is there no will to have some kind of a public registry that is like provincially integrated now?

VANESSA GRUBEN: Well, you know, I'm not quite sure, I'm not sure what the what the reason is. I think certainly this was something that was felt to be important when the federal legislation was being crafted and now that it's up to the provinces, I think there's different appetites in different provinces to regulate reproductive technology. Here in Ontario, we've recently started to fund IVF. I think that one important component or a piece of that funding program would have been the creation of a registry. And I would hope that that's something that the provincial government is thinking about here in Ontario, because it is quite important for those who are donor conceived.

AMT: And there is another dimension, and that's the ability for half siblings to be able to find each other. How does that play into the argument?

VANESSA GRUBEN: So that that raises a very interesting legal question. And that is whether or not we should prohibit donor anonymity, or in effect have a system where donors are required to disclose their identity. And that would facilitate those connections between half siblings. There has been some litigation in British Columbia about this issue. The Pratent decision was issued by the British Columbia Court of Appeal a couple of years ago. And the court in that case ruled that there was no constitutional right to know one's sperm donor. However, there are many other mechanisms to move towards a system of openness. We have a short time today, so I don't want to get into all the various legal obstacles to overcoming donor anonymity, but there are some important things that need to happen before we can move to that kind of a system, not least of which is family law reform to ensure that donors who do not want to be considered legal parents are not, fall outside the legal definition of parent and that non-biological intended parents are recognized as parents. So there are a number of legal steps that need to happen before we could--

AMT: Before we can go there.

VANESSA GRUBEN: Yeah, exactly.

AMT: We have to leave it there. Vanessa Gruben, thank you.

VANESSA GRUBEN: Thank you very much.

AMT: Vanessa Gruben, Associate Professor in the faculty of law at Ottawa University.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Well, we have a bit of time to get to a few of your responses on one more story. Yesterday, The Current talked about a study that found tooth decay in Calgary had worsened since that city decided to stop adding fluoride to drinking water, that happened in 2011. It's an effect Denise Kokaram has seen firsthand. She's a dental hygienist who works at the Alex Dental Health Bus, which provides free dental care.

SOUNDCLIP

We've definitely been seeing children, some of them seven, eight years of age with full mouth, almost full mouth decay, rampant decay present. It's not unusual for us to see children who have abscesses, decay that's to the point where there's not much left of the tooth, and families where they're saying they're aware that their child has this type of disease, and there's nothing they can do about it. They don't feel they're in a position to afford to address the issue.

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PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Lots of responses on this one, Anna-Maria, might even say had some of our listeners gnashing their teeth.

AMT: Oh, you had to didn’t you?

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: I didn’t have to. Inna Platonova tweeted Calgary city council should be ashamed for refusing to hear evidence.

AMT: Joshua Eaton expressed a popular sentiment on Facebook, perhaps the problem is the amount of sugary food children are eating and their lack of overall general oral hygiene. You can't expect fluoride in the water to help with everything.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: The affordability of dental care was a hot issue too. Silvie M tweeted in the early 80s a hygienist would visit my school twice a year to give fluoride rinses to the whole class. An idea for Calgary?

AMT: Laurin Liu added 95 per cent of dental care in Canada is privately funded. It should be an integral part of public health care. And Paul Hughes tweeted a dentist in Nunavut is as rare as a unicorn.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Kristine Hamilton pointed out that in many parts of the country water issues go beyond the question of fluoride. What a luxurious debate. Let's consider communities in our own country that would love clean water, fluoride or not.

AMT: Very good point. Finally, today, time for something completely different and much appreciated. We received the following letter this week from Jessica Magpayo. It has to do with The Current’s toll-free listener line, which as you may recall we stopped using more than a year ago. The number’s no longer listed on our website but apparently it is still on the Facebook page. And Jessica wrote this, please be advised that the 1-877 phone number on your Facebook page is an adult hotline

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: [laughing]

AMT: in case you’re not aware.

AMT: OK, so we dialed it.

[phone ringing]

TELEPHONE VOICE: Welcome to America's hottest talk line. Ladies, to talk to interesting and exciting guys free, press one now. Guys, hot ladies are waiting to talk to you, press two to connect free, now. Ladies, press one now. Guys, press two now.

AMT: There you go.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: Oh, so many places to go with this.

AMT: Oh, well, you know, we’re more interesting than a radio line, come on.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: We got a new phone number, you can call Anna-Maria, no.

AMT: So, the old phone line has been reassigned. clearly. The Facebook site has been updated. Thank you Jessica.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: [laughing] Don't press two or one. Despite the fact that the car no longer has a call in line for your responses, we do want to hear from you in many other ways. Tweet us @TheCurrentCBC, we are on Facebook, or e-mail us from our website you can do all that and download the podcast, you can find out all the ways cbc.ca/thecurrent.

[Music]

AMT: And let's give credit where credit is due. The week on The Current is produced by to Idella Sturino, Howard Goldenthal, Ines Calabresi, Kristin Nelson, Lara O’brien, Julian Uzielli, Shannon Higgins, as well as Pacinte Mattar, Sujata Barry, Liz Hoth, John Chipman, Karin Marley, Willow Smith, and our intern Jacqueline McKay. The Current writers Peter Mitton, Web producer Lisa Ayuso, our technicians this week were Gary Francis and Jennifer Rowley, thanks also to our network producers Michael O’Holloran, Anne Penman and Susan McKenzie. And special thanks to q producer Lisa Randall.

AMT: Our documentary editor is Josh Bloch, senior producer is Richard Goddard in Toronto, Cathy Simon in Vancouver. The executive producer of The Current is Kathleen Goldhar. Piya Chattopadhyay, thank you for joining me today. We're out of time.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: We're out of time à demain.

AMT: I'm Anna-Maria Tremonti, Piya is here tomorrow. Thank you for listening to The Current. What about that phone line?

[Music: Extro]

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September 15, 2016 full episode transcript

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