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The Current Transcript for September 11, 2019

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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Do we continue to choose to move forward confidently into the future or do we go back to the failed Harper approach? Do we go back in ways that will move us forward?

LAURA LYNCH: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attempting to frame the choices voters will have in an election that's being called today. His opponents of course see it much differently at least partly as a referendum on Trudeau. Today we set the stage for what's certain to be a fierce fight for power. After that the scale of Hurricane Dorian's devastation is growing every day.

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Everything that you know is like gone. You know. I don't really know how we're going to get back on this.

LL: We are just starting to find out about incredible tales of survival and you'll hear two of them in half an hour. All that and more coming up. I'm Laura Lynch and this is The Current.

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The election campaign begins

Guests: Marie Vastel. Katie Simpson, Campbell Clark

LL: Well the campaigning has actually been ramping up for weeks today though it is official. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is visiting the Governor General this morning asking her to dissolve parliament so Canadians can go to the polls on October the 21st. There is a lot to talk about with our weekly national affairs panel today Campbell Clark is the chief political writer for The Globe and Mail. Marie Vastel is the Parliamentary correspondent for Le Devoir and they're both in our Ottawa studio. And Katie Simpson is a senior reporter with CBC News covering Federal politics and we reached her in Ottawa, I think at the airport. Hello to all of you.

KATIE SIMPSON: Yes. Good morning. I am sitting in a private sort of area at the Ottawa airport overlooking Andrew Scheer's plane so that's where I'm going to be for the next 10 days or so.

LL: Okay. Well can you, Katie, start us off by walking us through how things are expected to unfold when Trudeau visits Rideau Hall?

KATIE SIMPSON: Well today's a big day that everyone's really been waiting for. You know we have a fixed election date in Canada so the big question was how long will this campaign be. And today Justin Trudeau is going to go to Rideau Hall do all of the formalities and officially kick off this election campaign. I'll be covering the conservative leader Andrew Scheer for the first 10 days or so. And the message he's really trying to break through here is, his theme is you know helping you get ahead and he's really trying going to try and deliver an economic message to voters hoping that that will motivate his base to vote but also motivate any of those centre right leaning voters that maybe voted for Justin Trudeau in the last election hoping to bring them into his fold.

LL: Okay Campbell Clark you are there in Ottawa staying put I imagine. And you heard how Katie says she is going to frame things you heard what Trudeau said off the top. What do you think his message is going to be today when he comes out of Rideau Hall?

CAMPBELL CLARK: I think it's going to be that. Well aside from that we have to keep working on Australia. It's good. You know the change that we started has to keep going. It is you know progressive politics it's that government can help you. We are the ones that are going to invest in you - invest is the word they use for that these days - to help you through insecure times, to you know deal with the troubles that you have economically. So it's a flip side of that. You know we'll put money in your pocket targeted it from Andrew Scheer its government will help you with make ends meet.

LL: Now we know in campaigns are often headlines that pop up every day that may or may not knock leaders off their message. Your newspaper today has a story about SNC Lavalin. And what does it say?

CAMPBELL CLARK: Well it says that the RCMP has been trying to look into whether there was obstruction of justice in this affair and that they've run into the same kind of wall that the Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion did which is that several of the people involved are asserting cabinet confidence and saying they can't talk about some of the matters here and you know that's a problem for getting to the bottom of things.

LL: Marie Vastel, do you think a story like that knocks Trudeau off?

MARIE VASTEL: I think he's lucky it's on day one and not on day 37 or 38. It's not great because instead of the message today being Trudeau launches the campaigns will be Trudeau launches the campaign but also has to answer about it since he left early again. They've tried really hard to get this file kind of behind them before going into the election. He prevented a Commons committee from inviting the ethics commissioner who handed in his report on the affair and blamed Mr. Trudeau this summer. And this is kind of you know forcing them to deal with it again at a time where obviously they wish didn't they didn't have to. And it gives Mr. Scheer - I'm sure he's very happy about that - more munitions to talk about it again.

LL: Marie I have to ask you though how does the SNC Lavalin issue play in Quebec?

MARIE VASTEL: Very differently. Mr. Trudeau's been you know hammering this whole time that he was defending jobs defending a lot of jobs in Quebec but also elsewhere in Canada and that he will not - in his words - apologize for that because he was doing his job. And I would say that argument does resonate more in Quebec. The columns have been different. The editorials have been different. The headlines have been different. It's almost as if you have two sort of interpretations of what happened whether you read English news or whether you read Quebec news. I don't think- I think this hurts Mr. Trudeau. I don't think it hurts him that much for it to come back to the forefront during the election. I don't think hurts him so much in Quebec right now.

LL: And Katie you've got you're heading to Quebec today with Andrew Scheer is that correct?

KATIE SIMPSON: Yes. So Andrew Scheer it'll be interesting to hear what Andrew Scheer has to say about this because he is going to go back in because of how different this story reads in both English Canada and French Canada. Andrew Scheer his main message today he's going to- he's actually playing offence today. He's going to two ridings held but one by the NDP in Quebec. And later today he's going to. The Greater Toronto Area and a writing held by the Liberals. He's trying to play little offence they've got some star candidates that they're looking to promote and they're hoping that by recruiting these star candidates in the riding of Trois Rivieres it's a former mayor he's running for the Conservatives well-known well-liked. They hope they can steal that writing from the NDP and then in Vaughan, Woodbridge it's Theresa Cruz. Anyone who watches sports in the 1980s will know that name. She was a female broadcaster at a time when there are not a lot of female broadcasters in sports. And so she is running for the conservatives in that riding that's held by the Liberals so Andrew here is going to try and start this campaign with a little bit of offence, trying to target some seats they think they can bring back into the fold and really using those star candidates to try and get those messages out.

LL: And Campbell Clark, Trudeau is heading west.

CAMPBELL CLARK: Yes I think we don't know that much about how Trudeau is going to spend the next few days. But you know if you're Justin Trudeau, they both try to do symbolic things here. You know Andrew Scheer is trying to say he's starting off from the front foot and that includes Quebec and I think Justin Trudeau be travelling a lot of the country pretty quickly.

LL: Okay. Yes. One of the first ridings he's going to hit is actually an NDP riding so let's talk about the NDP. Jagmeet Singh kicked off the party's campaign on Sunday at a rally in Jack Layton's old Toronto riding but New Democrats are in a pretty different position than they were under Layton.

MARIE VASTEL: Well that's an understatement. Yes he's definitely the one starting the campaign I think with the biggest challenge in terms of the party is having trouble with its finances. They don't have other candidates yet. They promised they would have 302 two candidates by today. I'll be interested to see if they actually do have them which would be 90 percent off of their slate. They also are doing really really badly in the polls I mean they've been kind of stalling or even going downwards a little bit losing points, it looks like to the Green Party. In Quebec for example people are thinking that Mr. Singh could keep potentially one, maybe two seats out of the 14 that they have right now. It's definitely the pressure is definitely on him as the campaign starts and I think you will see, as Katie mentioned, the other leaders go into ridings held right now by the NDP or like Mr. Trudeau today where they think they can gain from the NDP troubles, whether it be in Quebec, whether it be around Vancouver, whether it be in Ontario, in Windsor it definitely looks like the NDP seats are kind of up for grabs right now.

LL: Right. And Mr. Singh has said one of the challenges he faces in Quebec is some voters discomfort with the fact that he wears a turban. He addressed directly in a recent French language ad. Do you think that will be enough?

MARIE VASTEL: I'm not sure. I think it was wise I think the NDP had to address the elephant in the room Mr. Singh had talked about it before but this is definitely more you know putting it in your face. Yes here it is. It's part of my identity and I won't hide away from it but it also doesn't affect necessarily how I drive my policies. I don't know if the point was really brought in the ad, though. When you listen to the actual content of the ad it doesn't really address people's fears that how his religion would intertwine with his policies. I also heard people say because so for people who haven't seen it at the beginning of the ad he doesn't have his turban on and you can see his hair and then he puts it on and has it off for the rest of the ad. I've actually heard people say well if he can take it off for the ad why does he have to wear it. I wonder if it really addressed people's preoccupations and really answered their questions.

LL: Campbell Clark I want to come back to you. The Prime Minister has agreed to only participate in in one English language debate and two French language debates. Why that strategy?

CAMPBELL CLARK: Well I think it's the incumbent strategy and you know he has been taking a hammering over things like SNC Lavalin. His big challenge in this election is; are we promised all these things we looked like we were. We gave people the impression there would be this heady grand change in government and many people feel that he fell short of that. And if you're the incumbent prime minister facing off against a bunch of other leaders saying look how you've disappointed us and throwing up examples in your face and making you sort of tread water and deal with those things it's not a good look. And he has a much- He couldn't stay out of the debates after what happened last time. And if you recall but the official TV consortium debates sort of didn't fly because Stephen Harper didn't want to take part in that and there were a number of other debates and Justin Trudeau called for an electoral commission to debates commission and that's what we have so he has to do those two English and French and you pretty much can't stay out of the TV debates that are sort of one on one and those are probably a better forum for him. If he takes on each leader one on one that's great but being the hopeful funny ways Prime Minister that's now being attacked by four other leaders, that's not a good candidate.

LL: How does that for. For Andrew Scheer that he's not going to get as much of a crack at Trudeau in the debates as he probably wanted, Katie.

KATIE SIMPSON: Oh no. And of course not any opportunity that an opponent has to square off against your main challenger and you have an opportunity to look prime ministerial, all the opposition leaders want that chance to be able to have their moment where they're seen giving you know that metaphorical punch in the face to an opponent in a debate. And that is something that all of the challengers are trying to do and it's something that Justin Trudeau himself wanted to do going into the 2015 election campaign. 2015 Justin Trudeau is very different than 2019 Justin Trudeau and I think Campbell sort of made that point as well.

LL: All right let let's switch over and talk about the Green Party for a little bit because it's had a rather tumultuous few days. The Green Party Leader Elizabeth May said she won't prevent her MPs from bringing forward motions on abortion. And then yesterday a Green Party candidate Pierre Nantel called for Quebec to separate from Canada as soon as possible. Marie Vastel, what do you make of all that?

MARIE VASTEL: Well thought through for listeners who might not be super familiar with Pierre Nantel he was an MP with the NDP. He also flirted with the idea to join the Bloc Quebecois. He's a big defender of Quebec nationalism. So to us it's not that surprising but it's also not that smart to say that. Right as the campaign gets under way. You'll remember that in 2008 when there was a coalition to try and take over the power from Stephen Harper. One of the big things that was criticized about that coalition was that the Bloc Quebecois was part of it. The Bloc Quebecois who wants to separate Quebec from Canada. So I have a feeling that at a time when Elizabeth May is trying to make the argument that she could hold the balance of power that she could be responsible for holding a minority government into keeping them into power whether it be conservatives or liberals as long as they do more for climate it is her argument. I don't know if Elizabeth May can really sell that as well if she has to recognize that one of her star candidates in Quebec wants to separate from Canada. I think that's really really tricky. And then on the abortion issue I think it also gives her opponents a lot of ammunition. Elizabeth May saying you know that she wouldn't keep candidates from tabling private members bills to be fair she says that theoretically her candidates have to be pro-choice but it is a position that you will hear the NDP criticize over and over and over again because it feeds right into their narrative that Elizabeth may in the Green Party really aren't as progressive as the NDP and according to them. And it just kind of gives you an indication that Elizabeth May might get herself into trouble over the next 40 days if she keeps you know misspeaking or misrepresenting or maybe having to admit certain parts of her platform of her party's policy that people were less familiar with because people paid less attention.

KATIE SIMPSON: If I can, one more thing the more scrutiny that Elizabeth May is going to be under because Elizabeth May at times- you know people who might be uncomfortable with Justin Trudeau and they're like you know what? I'm disappointed I voted for him in 2015. I'm disappointed. I think I'm just going to give my vote to Elizabeth May because I really like that she's going to put a big focus on climate those progressive voters they're going to see the comments on abortion. They're going to see the comments on Quebec separation and that is going to play so well into Justin Trudeau's hand because what he wants to do right now is set up a situation where people will feel uncomfortable. There is a fear. He wants to instill feel fear in voters that if they don't vote for him, if there is a split of the progressive vote that Andrew Scheer is going to win. So all of these new things that are coming out are around Elizabeth Maine by the way even though it's party policy that they have to support a woman's right to choose. My colleague in Ottawa if out easily found at least one candidate who filled out a thing saying that we would be anti-abortion and how that it's something that he would fight for. So you know the vetting process might not have thought that. And so you know what Elizabeth May says no one here is going to try and start that discussion reopen that debate. Well guess what we found a candidate who did right away. So it plays right into Justin Trudeau's hands.

CAMPBELL CLARK: The big question about the Green Party is always can they keep that between elections bump going and now they've got a rise in the polls and it looks like they have some momentum and they might displace the NDP. And then suddenly you get those big party problems. You know what's your position on abortion? How do you vet your candidates? Do you have any sovereigntists in your [unintelligible]? You know most of the other parties have had at some point someone saying that you know, we used to support- I used to be a sovereigntist in Quebec or you know they haven't had a completely clear position on abortion but now they're having to deal with those things. It's more in my view not just a are they progressive issue but do they have their act together issue. If you look at their abortion policy it's pretty hard to figure out just how they expect that to work when you can't be pro-life to join the party but you can't be pro-life when you're voting in Parliament and what is Pierre Nantel saying about the future of Canada. He's left the NDP for the Green Party but he'd like to go back to the Bloc Quebequois while it's really somewhat confusing about beyond climate change. Who is the Green Party and I think that's going to be their issue.

LL: I just want to briefly touch on what role Indigenous issues could play in this election. The assembly First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde held a press conference on Monday. Just have a listen to this.

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CHIEF PERRY BELLEGARDE: Not endorsing any party. I'm asking First Nations people to get out to vote. Look what's happened in the last four years. Look at all the party platforms. Who is making strong statements when it comes to rights and title and jurisdiction. Who are making strong statements regarding the U.N. Declaration. Who are making strong statements it comes to restorative justice and make an informed decision. I want to see the sixty one point five percent number of first eligible First Nation voters go up. I think we can have an impact no question.

LL: Marie Vastel voter turnout among indigenous voters as well as young voters was higher than usual in 2015. How likely do you think we are to see a repeat of that?

MARIE VASTEL: While Perry Bellegarde surely would like to see that he says that they made a difference in 50 ridings four years ago that they tipped over 21 ridings and that they should you know embrace having that impact on the election rather than just staying home as he used to do until 2015 when he himself voted for the first time I found it interesting that Chief Bellegrade wouldn't endorse any particular party. But for one part his language was very reminiscent of the Justin Trudeau language and slogan. He kept talking about you know we need to keep going forward, we need to build on this momentum. And also in the clip that you just played we can hear that he kind of lists the priorities of the AFN and you can clearly decipher from the priorities he lists that one of the parties the Conservative Party is less in sync with those whether it be the U.N. Declaration on indigenous rights which a private member's bill implementing that was blocked by conservative senators whether it be you know making climate change the first and foremost priority, denouncing our dependence on fossil fuels which obviously the conservatives disagree with. I think clearly Chief Bellegrade has a preference even though he'll be very diplomatic and won't say it, but it'll be interesting to see if Indigenous voters do feel like they had an impact because one of their own, Judy Wilson-Raybould, was kicked out of one job in Cabinet and then left cabinet. The government bought a pipeline which some Indigenous communities agree with. But a lot of them also disagree with and so will they feel like they actually did have any impact or will they be disillusioned and just stay home? I think it's still unclear at this point.

LL: All right. We have just over a minute left and I want to go around the table here and go to each of you to tell me what you think is going to be the pre-eminent issue in the next several weeks.

KATIE SIMPSON: My guess is the economy because we're good. Everyone wants to talk about that. But whether that stays on agenda and everyone can stay on message and know the conservatives they're not talking about the economy something has gone terribly wrong.

LL: Marie.

MARIE VASTEL: Yes I would agree with the economy. I wouldn't underestimate the importance of the environment but also in a broader theme the importance of where you want the country to go. I think that would be Mr. Trudeau's argument in a broader way values direction of the country versus what they see as their as their only opponent. If you look at things under that sphere they're only opponent being the conservatives.

LL: All right. Campbell Clark, last word to you.

CAMPBELL CLARK: Well I just wrote a column saying there isn't a dominant issue, this is a culture war where people are going to be saying we're on your side. You think like us you know that's the chose forward versus we're in it for you. So I think we're in for a sort of amorphous visceral, less issue oriented campaign at least for the first couple of weeks.

LL: All right everybody here we go. I'm sure we'll be talking to you again. Thanks so much for today.

GUESTS: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

LL: Campbell Clark is the chief political writer for The Globe and Mail. Marie Vastel is the Parliamentary correspondent for Le Devoir and Katie Simpson is a senior reporter with CBC News covering Federal politics. And our election coverage doesn't just begin here starting at 11:00 a.m. Atlantic that's 10:00 Eastern 9:00 a.m. Central CBC Radio 1 we'll carry live coverage of the kick-off to the 2019 federal election campaign. The program will be hosted by Susan Bonner and Chris Hall and it will carry the speeches and media scrums held by the. Party leaders I'm going to be involved as well with a panel of former MPs for their take as the campaign gets underway. Well the CBC News is next. Then stories of survival in the Bahamas after Hurricane Dorian. We'll hear from a woman whose elderly mother had to be tied up with a makeshift harness to keep her from floating away. If you're listening in the Central Time Zone you'll be hearing an election special up next. But you can always catch up on The Current through the CBC Radio app or through our Web site cbc.ca/thecurrent. I'm Laura Lynch and you are listening to The Current. [Music: Theme]

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Hurricane Dorian survivors

Guests: Akiem Wiggings, Sissel-Mosvold Johnson

LL: Hello I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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LL: Still to come is it time to abandon changing the clock from daylight to standard time and back again. Some B.C. residents sure think so. We'll find out the implications of changing or not changing the clocks in half an hour. But first as Atlantic Canada cleans up after Dorian, we go to where the hurricane really hit the hardest.

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KEVIN COLLINS: I'll be honest there, the one thing that gives us hope and hope is gone right now, but it seems to be trickling back in, is seeing the people that care. That's come from outside the show. You know that they care and love and bringing supplies and you know making sure we're provisioned to be able to just live this out and start working and - I'm sorry for getting emotional which is the one thing that is seeing that people care that just touches your heart. You know and it gives you hope and fortitude to try to keep going.

LL: Kevin Collins stands in front of his badly damaged home on Abaco Island one of the areas devastated by the winds rain and flooding of hurricane Dorian last week. Help is starting to arrive in the Bahamas from international aid organizations and smaller grassroots groups as well. And one of the hardest hit communities a settlement called The Mud, a search and rescue team from Burnaby, BC has been out looking for survivors and recovering the dead. But the challenge is immense. It's estimated that 70,000 people are now homeless in many areas. There's no power no drinking water no way to leave. The communities that have been levelled. Sissel-Mosvold Johnson, her husband George Johnson and her mother Virginia Mosvold just barely escaped with their lives. Sissel used to live on Vancouver Island. 10 years ago she moved to the Bahamas. When the hurricane hit. She and her family had to get creative about how to stay alive. We've reached Sissel-Mosvold Johnson at a hospital in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Hello.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Hello.

LL: When did you start to realize that you were in trouble during Hurricane Dorian?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well to be honest I have no idea what time it was on Sunday. Sunday evening it was dark and we. My husband was worried because our door looking like it was going to be blown open. And he happened to shine a flashlight out to look to check on it and he saw this big wave coming and he just yelled to me in the bedroom 'Go to your mom's right now. The ocean is coming'. And so I gathered up my mom got her up into the kitchen.

LL: So the water started to rise. And why were you worried about your mother?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: My Mom is 85, using a walker she had a stroke three years ago. So she was you know in our care. So we were you know [unintelligible] and we saw the water rising. Thankfully our doors and windows were preventing the water from coming in right away. But then the back door rushed open and then the water just rose up like so quickly in the house. Before we knew it it was about four feet. My husband got us. We both we lifted my mom up on the kitchen counter.

LL: Did you think that would be enough?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well we did it but we weren't sure. But it just kept rising and rising and then we were like 'We're going to drown'. Until this point we're up on the kitchen counter and there's water up on the counter and getting up to our knees and George is, my husband, just said we've got to get in the attic. So he started jumping up and punching the drywall and ripping it down to make a hole. We through my two little dogs up there first and then he tried- He jumped up and he tried to pull me up but it just wasn't working. So he came back down. He pushed me up and then we were trying to pull my mom but we just couldn't. She was too heavy for us. So my husband got her up on the top part of the bar of our kitchen island. And then when he came out. And then he started- he found some cable wires some kind of wire in the attic that he could pull to make of some sort of a harness to wrap around her so she wouldn't drift out the front door in the current.

LL: Oh my goodness! How was she at that moment?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well she was you know when we were trying to put her in the attic, she was like 'Just leave me. Save yourselves'. Until of course we were all just having a meltdown because we couldn't get her in the attic. So my husband you know when he got the harness on her tied it to the rafters so she wouldn't drift off. And we were just so worried we didn't even know how high the water was going to come. The only thing that saved her from being swept off.

LL: This must have been so hard for you.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Oh it was- It was the worst. Just knowing we had to leave her down there was just know I can't even describe.

LL: How long were you in this situation with you in the attic and your mother sitting there partially underwater?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well my mom then by morning, by daylight, my husband was the only one who could get to where she was. So my husband was walking on the rafters down to check on her every as often as he could. And then by morning he looked down and there was a harness dangling and no mom. She had taken it off as you told him /I took it off I was going to my bedroom'. At this point she was floating in the kitchen holding on to the refrigerator.

LL: What did he do?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: He was trying to get the harness back over to her to pull her back. But she says 'No I'm going to my bedroom'. And thankfully the fridge had wedged. So it was floating but it couldn't float out the door, like everything else that's going out the door. So she was holding on to that.

LL: So this must have been going on for for quite a few hours at this point.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Oh yes. I would say she was floating in water basically for almost two days.

LL: How did you finally get out?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well once the water started to recede on Tuesday there was still about two feet of water in the House on Tuesday. My husband managed to get down and find a chair from my mom that was high enough. And he even managed to move her over into the chair. And then he found something to put her feet up on. So she wasn't sitting in the water anymore. And then he you know during all this time he had been punching holes in the ceiling to look for anything that we could use or what have you. So he did find a blanket that happened to be way up on the top of one of our closet shelves. So he wrapped her up in the blanket, because she was very hypothermic at that point.

LL: So the next the next thing to do was to get out of the house I guess. How did you manage to do that?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: I didn't come out of the attic until Wednesday morning when everything was dry. And that's when we could move around a little bit. There was still a lot of flooding around the property. But right around the immediate house area was basically dry. My husband was pulling off the siding off the house so that he could write the word Help on our deck outside so someone could see it if they flew over.

LL: Did you get help?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: We did. There were many helicopters flying and then a small plane flew past and then it turned around and came back and then it dipped down almost to say like we see you. And then later that afternoon we got rescued by someone called the Bahamas adventures. They have [unintelligible] Jeeps. They're like old army jeeps that were converted into tourist carriers. They used to come to our farm with tourists. And anyway they had sent one of them was a friend of ours and some other men to come and rescue us. They had tried the day before but there was still too much water on the roads. But once it receded to about three feet they were able to come out.

LL: So they got you out.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: They did.

LL: And I'm wondering what happened to the farm.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: We lost everything. We had a worker that was more than just a worker to us. He was like family. He'd been working with us for about nine years. He unfortunately drowned in his room.

LL: I'm so sorry.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: So he had a suite down by the barn and he must have been asleep, because the wave came in so quickly. He had no chance obviously to get out. So. We had 25 feet of water at our farm area because it would slightly lower elevation than that where our house was. We lost our animals and everything else, all our babies.

LL: I'm so sorry you lost so much Sissel. You are at the hospital with your mom now. What kind of condition is she in?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: She's still guarded but she's doing much better. Her kidneys were failing but as of yesterday they were slightly improved. She's got a really bad infection in her leg. They were doing tests on it yesterday to see what sort of bacteria they're dealing with. And then they've checked her heart. They're not sure if she had had a heart attack or a stroke during all of this but they're still doing tests. But she's doing amazingly well considering her ordeal.

LL: No kidding. Your friend's back on Vancouver Island, they've been trying to help you. Tell me what they've been doing?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well they have been trying to raise funds here. Go Fund Me. And you know the love and support that we've had from our friends, it's just been- you know there are no words to describe the gratitude we have for that.

LL: Now I'm wondering at this point are you ever able to even think about what's next, whether you go back-?

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: And say right now where it's just sort of hour by hour day by day. Everything is really hinging on how my mum recovers and what sort of care she's going to need at this point forward. But right now we're just you know we can't go back to our house because, we can't. You know our house has currently after all the water subsided has about four feet of bark mulch, pine trees and sewer all through it. So it's really not salvageable as far as- I mean it needs to be gutted out and completely redone. And you know we lost everything. We just aren't able to wait and have hurricane insurance. But even with hurricane insurance when you get flood like that it's not included in hurricane insurance.

LL: Sessil, I am so sorry for everything you've lost. I'm very glad though that your mother is OK and I hope she continues to improve. Thank you for talking to us.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Well you're welcome. Thank you so much for putting us in your thoughts and prayers.

LL: Okay Sissel goodbye.

SISSEL-MOSVOLD JOHNSON: Thank you.

LL: Sissel-Mosvold, Johnson her husband George Johnson and her mother Virginia Mosvold survived Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas. We reached Sissel Mosvold Johnson in Fort Lauderdale Florida. My next guest was rescued from the Bahamas along with his wife who is eight months pregnant. Akeim Wiggins left their home in Freeport when the waters started rising. He's now in High Springs Florida. Akeim. Hello.

AKEIM WIGGINS: Hello. How are you doing?

LL: Good. Tell me what happened when Dorian first hit.

AKEIM WIGGINS: When Dorian first hit the area that I live in, it usually never ever floods. It's on high ground but the first day everything was okay. Now the second day when I came to settle the surge started to come in. Now power's off and the phone signals were in and out. And I had no sort of you know warning that hey the water's going to come in and land or anything like that. It was just that I just looked outside and they saw water out by the road. So I was saying 'Hey', I told my wife I said 'Hey, I see water and wonder if we should leave now'. And then by the time she came in look the water was already by the doorstep. So I only had time - and she is pregnant - I only had time to grab my passport my documents and we had to jump right in our cars. And by the time we got in the cars the water was already three feet. So I have a Japanese car so that the engine already started you know water started getting in the engine. So at that point of time I was wondered are we going to make it out. The car is like choking trying to get over that water because a surge came in so fast. So we finally made it up out of our yard and we're driving away and then we saw all these cars and people evacuate their homes. While we're driving our cars a smaller wind is just pushing it. We almost got pushed over like six times like the car literally would get blown over.

LL: The car was tipping over?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Yes it was tipping over.

LL: Akiem, can you just tell me how long was it from that time when you looked out the door and you saw the water coming to the point where you jumped into your car and started driving away?

AKEIM WIGGINS: That was literally like just about four minutes.

LL: Wow.

AKEIM WIGGINS: Got so fast the water came in and that was unreal because we're inland. So picture 75 or 80 percent of the island underwater. It's like where to go. And while we're on the road you know we've seen trees fall on people's car as they try to get away. And we're thinking are we going to make it out alive. The whole experience was just like a total nightmare.

LL: I'm sure it was. When you when you were thinking to yourself 'Are we going to make it out alive?' what at that point was worrying you the most?

AKEIM WIGGINS: My unborn child because my wife is eight months pregnant. That's our first child. And I was thinking, God, I just really need you to protect us and save us right now so I can be able to meet my first child.

LL: How was she doing at that point when you were driving in the car and it was tipping over?

AKEIM WIGGINS: She was panicking. She was praying the whole situation was tough, unreal. People, cars stalled out in the middle of the road because they drove through so much water and then they come in out of the car. Then they started you know like- the water rolls so fast. But as we drive we are seeing the water come in sort of like we're driving for lives and things dropping so we [unintelligible] in and out. And then finally you make it by a friend.

LL: Yes. You went to a friend's house didn't you? You were looking for higher ground. What happened?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Looking for higher ground. And you go by a friend you make it there and you're thinking okay you're safe. And then you look out the window and you see the water coming by your friend's house. So now everyone in the house has now jumped in their cars and drive. So at that point of time we have no signal. We don't know what areas flooded so we don't know if we drive to this corner of the waters there. It was unreal. It's like honestly are we going to die or not.

LL: How did you end up making it out?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Well because our cars are small, our friend's car was a bit bigger. He had a truck as well. So we somewhat had to drive in the side of him to like block us from getting pushed over by the wind. And we end up going by another friend where we thought that was safe. And within about an hour or two everything was fine. And then we saw water coming in there and it was just like the phone signals were in and out. So we just happened at that time to hear- We heard the radio say make it to [unintelligible] Hotel or the Grand Lucayan Hotel which is the highest point on the island. So they were saying that eleven o'clock that night there is going to be a tsunami watch and possibly a high tide of more surge water. So we were like we got to make it to the Grand Lucayan because literally everything in the whole island is on the water at this point.

LL: So you do made it to the hotel.

AKEIM WIGGINS: We made it to the hotel.

LL: And now you're in Florida. How is your family doing and your wife's family?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Well we are currently staying by a family member and we're just happy that we can [unintelligible]. And you know just the everyday essentials and have water because right now in my city Freeport it's tough. You know the gas stations they're out of gas now and the water is contaminated. So I just had to get out of there for my unborn child because hospitals were out of water. The hospital was even flooded so even the banks were demolished. So I came over here with basically no cash. So it was like I love my country. I do intend to go back, but right now I have to think about my family my unborn child. That's why I came to the U.S.

LL: Did you lose people in the storm?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Yes my wife did lose a few cousins. One of her cousins live in this really nice area Lee Lakes east of the island and her whole house was flooded, and right after hurricane my wife and I and her brother were out looking for like two days. Then in the final the U.S. Coast Guard found her about 30 miles away from her house. Under the new bridge that was constructed. So she was floating all around in the search and they found her dead. And her husband, one of the guys on the jet skis went when they were doing the rescue mission [unintelligible] the storm had I had passed over they were trying to rescue him but by the time they pull him up so much water has gone into his lungs that he couldn't breathe any more. His body just gave out.

LL: I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that you've had so much loss. Your wife, how is she doing now?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Very now she is very emotional, beautiful thing even though it's been almost a week. She lost her family members. So I'm just trying to keep her calm and keep her happy because I don't want to stress the baby out of her you know. It may have caused any complications. I'm just trying my best to comfort her.

LL: Is the plan for her to give birth there?

AKEIM WIGGINS: Originally before this bomb. No. But right now she is eight months pregnant. She's due next month. And to go back home is like unreal to go right now. So I guess we will have to have her to have the child here.

LL: Do you have medical insurance to be able to pay for all of that?

AKEIM WIGGINS: We do not have medical insurance. We do not have access to funds. So right now it's kind of you know pray and hopefully we get help in any which way.

LL: I know this may be too early for you to think about it but what is next for you? How is your house back in the Bahamas?

AKEIM WIGGINS: My house is flooded. It would take a lot of money, you know we got to take out all that drywall. The roof caved in from inside. But however the roof on top is still all right. So it can't be restored but of course they still don't have the funds to do that yet. But I know mould will come so when they get back to the Bahamas I will have to take that out and hopefully mould doesn't spread that than the wood and within the drywall. But I do intend to go back home. At this point of time I can't say when, but you know I'm not going to- I don't plan to stay in a country not able to work or anything. But my main concern as a healthy child and after that I'll just take it step by step basically. But I do love my home. I do intend to go back.

LL: Will you rebuild on the same property though? Because you always thought that that could never flood and now you know differently.

AKEIM WIGGINS: Well of course I'll have to because I'll just have to hope another hurricane five comes that way because usually it never floods. But the way the hurricane came it was the whole island. It was like if my house flooded where else to go. You understand. I was so crazy about the whole thing. The hotel that was the shelter where we went to the hotel was the one that usually flood. But the way the hurricane, the way that it came it blew the wall of water the other way. So that that hotel was actually a safe haven.

LL: Does your wife is she also saying she wants to go back, or is she even thinking about that right now?

AKEIM WIGGINS: She is not thinking about anything. I just keep her calm. You know she has family still back home so she misses them. It was heartbreaking because she felt only. She's the only daughter to her mother. She always wants her mother be there in the delivery room and on Mother's still there in Freeport. So even before we left it was heartbreaking to know that she wasn't going to be dead by the baby is being delivered. So I think that's one of the hardest things that my life has to go through knowing that her mother's going to be their first child.

LL: Akeim, I again I I'm so sorry for all that you've lost. I wish a very healthy birth for you and your wife and you'll have some joy in your life when you see your new baby. Thank you.

AKEIM WIGGINS: Thank you for having me.

LL: Akeim Wiggins is a Bahamian whose home was flooded in Freeport during Hurricane Dorian. He and his pregnant wife are now in the United States. We reached him in High Springs Florida.

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LL: Coming up in our next half hour what the sex lives of three women can tell us about human desire. I'll talk to Lisa Taddeo about her new book Three Women. And is it time to end the ritual of changing up the clocks. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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Passion and pain: Why this writer studied women's most intimate desires

Guest: Michael Downing, Lisa Taddeo

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to the current. Spring forward. Fall back. That's how I remember which way to change the clocks twice a year. But many British Columbians want to just forget about the whole time change business altogether. More than 200,000 people in the province responded to a poll asking if it was time to stop changing the time. And 93 percent said yes. No word yet on what the government will actually do with that information. But B.C. isn't the first jurisdiction to question the wisdom of all that springing forward and falling back. So we asked an expert about its origins.

SOUNDCLIP

MICHAEL DOWNING: My name is Michael Downing and I wrote the book Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time. For about 100 years. Daylight Saving Time has caused confusion among the general populace around the world who have had to try to figure out what time it is. And it has also tied up the legislatures in almost every country who have practiced it, principally because the very idea of putting your finger into the face of your clock and altering the time of day is at best a philosophical proposition. We were told - I think most North Americans grew up with the myth that we did it for the farmers. And it's notable and typical of this controversy that the farmers were the group who hated daylight saving the most because of course farmers use morning sunlight. So for them daylight saving was a problem because it took away an hour that they had to get their crops ready for market. But there were people who loved it and particularly city people tended to love Daylight Saving Time because most people were employed in cities in factories and in other businesses which were at adopted the nine to five day. And so what daylight saving did is give them evening hours of sunlight. In other words pushing forward the clocks meant we had less available light in the morning but more in the evening for leisure activity. So among urban dwellers it tended to be popular right from the start. But the real popularity of daylight saving has long been among businesses because those same people who were given extra daylight at the end of the day tended to shop more on their way home if it was bright outside, and thus really the sustaining reason we have daylight saving to this day.

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MICHAEL DOWNING: There was a tremendous amount of opposition from the farmers in fact it was so unpopular in Canada and in the United States that before the peace treaty was signed to end World War One we had for a year and a half. The farmers insisted impressed with their incredibly strong lobby to have it rescinded.

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MICHAEL DOWNING: But it was individual cities in North America that immediately then develop their own what they called municipal Daylight Saving times so that what we had was individual cities running their clocks ahead of other places in the country. As this increased and it spread from city to city to city. Soon it was impossible to tell what time it was. Railroads couldn't tell what time they were going to pull into a station because nobody knew what anybody was doing with their clocks in the city next door. The absurdity goes like this: In the United States. There was a famous bus trip in nineteen the 1950s where you could take a 35 mile bus trip from Ohio down to Kentucky and you would cross through seven different time zones in those 35 miles. The very foundation of the project of time zones was invented by a Canadian, a great railroad engineer whose name was Sanford Fleming, and he's the person who first gave the railroads the idea of dividing the globe into 24 segments to coordinate their business around the world because the railroads were so popular and important economically at the end of the 19th century. And it was really that putting clock time into 24 segments that then 25 years later gave way to daylight saving time which almost destroyed Sanford Fleming's great idea of time zones.

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MICHAEL DOWNING: What is going to happen if British Columbia does what they intend to do is it they are not getting full year daylight saving. They're moving their time zone one zone to the east. They're moving from Pacific Time to Mountain time. If we start to let individual provinces cities and towns create their own time zone that is moving, we won't have any predictability and time is a very fragile reality, right. It only has two real virtues; predictability and synchronicity. And if we start to have individual provinces changing their times it then becomes impossible to predict what time it is in places around the world.

LL: Michael Downing is the author of Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time. You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One and Sirius XM. I'm Laura Lynch. Female desire. It's complex and mysterious. So Lisa Taddeo set out to find out more about it. For eight years the journalist and writer immersed herself in the lives of three American women. There's sophisticated Sloane, a restauranteur whose husband chooses men for her to have sex with. There is Lena a housewife from Indiana separated from her husband who refused to kiss her and she's sleeping with her high school ex. And there's Maggie, a young woman who says she had a relationship with a teacher at 17. She reports him years later after he was named teacher of the year. The teacher was charged but he was acquitted and got his job back. 'Three Women' is the book that tells their stories and its author Lisa Taddeo joins me from New York City. Hello.

LISA TADDEO: Hi. Thank you for having me.

LL: Now we'll get to the three women at the heart of this book in a moment but I want to start with the story that actually opens the book and it's a story about your mother. I wonder if you could tell it now.

LISA TADDEO: Sure. When I was younger when my mother was still alive she had mentioned a story about casually the way she mentioned a lot of things that were a little bit- that should not perhaps have been talked about casually. It was a story about a man who used to masturbate behind her as she walked to work every day. And when I got older and after she had passed away I asked my older brother about it. I asked my mother sister about it who still lives in Italy. And it was just- it became very- it just became a very shocking thing for me in part because my mother had not related this story with any sort of shock but with kind of just you know flip ins almost.

LL: So how did that thinking about your mother influence how you approached writing the book?

LISA TADDEO: So the part about my mom and thinking about mothers in general began to settle into the forefront of my brain as I was researching it, but it wasn't until after that I was putting all of the pieces together of these three women, and of all the women I had spoken to the book for us in the hundreds that the weight of the mother, the mother's desire and how either little we knew about her mother's desires or how much it factored still much in the present of each woman that I spoke to. And that's how I circled back to my own mother in that story.

LL: I found this quite interesting early on your editor gave you another book for inspiration and it was My Neighbour's Wife by the New York writer Gay Talese. How or even did his work shape what you eventually went on to do?

LISA TADDEO: Well it did. It did because I you know I was very impressed with the immersive nature of that book. He had spent a I believe a decade with people- with mainly swingers. He also operated a massage parlour which included happy endings for its clients. And he received many happy endings so that he could faithfully describe them. So while I was impressed by the immersive nature of his book I just felt it was a little, not a little, it was incredibly male. And I wondered how a book about desire told from a female perspective would look.

LL: He actually told you that the only way you would match his masterpiece is if you went out and slept with married men.

LISA TADDEO: Correct.

LL: And what did you say?

LISA TADDEO: In the moment. I just said I think that that's probably not something I'm going to do. And I said, because we started talking about just my having sex with people in general. And he said Yeah you should just do X Y and Z and record it. And I said well what if I get - I mean coming from having a father as a doctor who I was constantly hearing about diseases and stuff I was a very disease oriented younger person and especially now more than ever. But I said what if I get a disease, like a sexually transmitted disease, and he said very just dropping the mike kind of goes well then you should write about it. Like Oh.

LL: There you go. No limits.

LISA TADDEO: No limits. And I remember going home after that and calling one of my other editors from a man from Esquire and saying, you know, Gay Talese told me I should do this and I feel like I mean I'm not going to do any of it but does it make me less of a reporter like that was the feeling I came away with because I was you know I was a decade younger than I am now and it was it was you know it was this was a sort of idol, and I didn't really know what to do with that.

LL: Okay so you come away from that and you obviously became certain in your own mind but you didn't want to do and you settle on as you said wanting to tell only the stories of women. Why?

LISA TADDEO: Yes. Well because you know I started by talking to men and women. I was even talking to one man up until almost the end. But what began to happen is I was just naturally drawn to the women story because there with the complexity to them to the aftermath of a sexual interlude, the aftermath of what it felt like, the sort of the fact that with men there was a compartmentalization to desire that with women I didn't see as much certainly there are women who compartmentalize things. But it was just about a numbers' game. And as far as numbers were concerned the women I were speaking to were just so much more. Their stories were rendered with such complexity that their self-awareness about their feelings of desire and lust were so much more compelling to me anyway.

LL: All right then. So you eventually you you focus in on Maggie, Sloane and Lina. But where did you start in your search for them?

MICHAEL DOWNING: I drove across the country six times, all told. The very first thing that I did that sort of solidified the direction that the book was going to go in was to move from New York City to rural Indiana.

LL: But you wasn't just a matter of sticking a pin on a map. You chose Indiana for a reason.

LISA TADDEO: What one of the things that I drove through Kinsey to the Kinsey Institute on purpose because it was where they studied sex, and I was trying to sort of I'm like, okay, where is the cartel, where is the nucleus of sex in America. And that was what I came up with because it was both scientific but it was also about sex. So a scientific studying of sex was seemed to be like the perfect place to start. And while I was there I met this doctor who was performing these hormone treatments on a group of women who were losing weight and they were feeling really great in their bodies and feeling newly sexual. And he said you know let me ask some of them if they might be willing to talk to you. And many of them were. So I moved to Indiana yes and then I moved in to an apartment and I stayed there for about two years with Lina, the housewife.

LL: So you obviously Lina was one of the first on your radar. Why did you choose her, Sloane and Maggie?

LISA TADDEO: You know it was as much of my choosing them as they're choosing me. They were the ones who genuinely let me into their lives the most. And they allowed me to live basically with them. And to answer my questions about these you know really deep thoughts and the caverns of you know the things that make us tick and the things that make us fear.

LISA TADDEO: Let's talk a little more specifically about them, then. Maggie is perhaps the most compelling even tragic story in the book. She's the only one of the three whose real name is used and in a lot of ways it's a very difficult story. What did you struggle with when it came time to write about what Maggie had experienced?

LISA TADDEO: It was hard to go back into the parts of her life that she had already lived through in a courtroom. And it was hard to do that knowing that it was just difficult to relive it for her. At the same time I knew that to tell her story in a way that other people specifically the most the staunchest non-believers in a way for even them to just be able to wrap their heads around that I had to get specific. And so while I knew it was going to be hard, we talked about it every day and I would often say to her can I ask you a question now, or is this not a good time. Maggie wanted to tell her story and she had not had her story heard. She had tried to tell her story to the media. They had viciously misused her and the story of her family in a way that was absolutely despicable, I think. And on top of that she has said since the books come out that it's given her closure. One of her heroes has said that she was her hero, Abby Wambach.

LL: The soccer player.

LISA TADDEO: Yes. They posted the book on Instagram and I said you're Maggie's hero and she said Maggie is my hero. On top of that hundreds of women have been writing to her and to me saying how she's helped them, how she's saved them, how her story is- her bravery and telling it has made their lives feel like they could get through them.

LL: Maggie went to the police after the teacher was awarded Teacher of the year and she sought criminal charges against them. This is years after it actually happened and he is acquitted which is devastating to her. I'm wondering how her story might have been different if it had happened today in the era of Me Too?

LISA TADDEO: You know it's funny I've thought about that a lot and I asked a lot of people close to the case and off the record who said that they really weren't sure that it would have changed because of some of the things that the jurors said. So I wonder if it would have been different. I don't know. It could have been. Certainly the reaction to Maggie's story post Me Too out in the world since the book's spin out has been I think very different to what it would have been prior. But that said, in terms of you know in terms of Lina for example, people in Lina's town have still not heard of Me Too. And I think that's something that's very difficult for people on the coasts and in large cities to understand that it's not across the board something that people know about in a way they might have heard the hashtag, but it's not something they really- that's been inculcated into their community.

LL: Let's talk about Lena a little bit more. So she is in what is essentially a sexless, loveless marriage. Her husband doesn't even want to kiss her because he finds the sense of a kiss offensive to him. She tells members of her women's group about her affair with Eden who is her married high school ex. And you can see that women's is sort of eating it up a bit, but they're also at the same time they're judging her for it. How did the relationships between women complicate the way Lina expresses her desire?

LISA TADDEO: So you know that was part of what became almost as compelling as Lena's narrative itself which was unfolding in real time as I was talking to her, which was just kind of exactly what anybody would want when telling a story. And also what she wanted in terms of being able to talk about something that was happening in her life that made her excited again. The other thing that became compelling was the way that the judgment around her and the women, the way that they were privately telling me they thought she was a slut. All of a sudden after having just a week or two prior listened as she talked about her husband not touching her and held her and told her what you could do. They tried to help her through it. And I was so shocked by that. And in terms of those women and in terms of Lina what she already knew she didn't have to see that happen. What she knew from her mother and her sister it was that she wasn't allowed to go outside of what she had. She had a marriage. She had children. She had a house. That was what she had and that was all that she needed and whatever was happening behind closed doors, or in this case not happening, was not something that she should think about or talk about or think that she deserved better.

LL: Each of these women has trouble. They can't seem to tell their partners or their lovers what it is that they want. Am I thinking about Sloane particularly when I say this. Her husband is choosing lovers for her. What part does shame play in this?

LISA TADDEO: You know with Sloane I think that shame is more stuff from her past that bubbles up. With Sloan I would say that her marriage is one of the happiest that I've found when people have said why are there no happy marriages. I think that Sloane's is very happy. What I also think is obviously it has a lot of complications and questions and confusion as all relationships do. But, and because Sloane's relationship is a and from the norm it obviously makes people think that there's you know that it's more fraught than maybe it is. And some of her confusion comes from sex with other men and the way she feels about it. But she also you know if she said to her husband I don't want to do this anymore. He wouldn't say well I'm leaving you, as she related to me many times. She's like you know I'm confused about this. But he does X Y and Z for me. I love him. This is something he wants. Sometimes I like it and sometimes I don't. And questioning what that means about me and how I am and the world is what she was looking at. But in terms of shame, I don't think there was- the only shame that- she doesn't really have shame about what she does. What she does have is the notion of people looking at her and her community in a certain way. The notion of what they might say to her children as they grow up. That is where her fears stemmed from. But I wouldn't say that it's an actual shame that lives inside of her.

LL: All three of these women have difficult relationships within their families growing up and I'm wondering how you think those relationships shape the women they became and the relationships that they sought out with men.

LISA TADDEO: Well I think that they I think that any anything that happens to us in our formative years is obviously going to shape how we interact with men. With these three women they did. They've had a lot happen that that shaped that. But what I will also say is that. Almost everyone that I spoke to - after you talked to somebody for two weeks, three weeks, two months, three months, six months you're going to hear about all of those things. Eventually everyone has things. They're large things or they're an accumulation of little things that add up to being a big thing. They might not be terrible things. Some of them might be wonderful things. But when you put them all together they're what make us who we are.

LL: Was there any moment, one episode when you watch these stories unfold when you thought 'aha this is the perfect illustration of just how complicated desire is'?

LISA TADDEO: Yes. With Maggie. With all of them. With Maggie I think desire is so vastly complicated which is why I wanted to write about it. But with Maggie the notion that this teacher was taking advantage. But she also had her own desires in there and discounting those desires I think is the opposite of showing the honesty and the truth of desire in our lives. So I wanted to show hers too. I don't think that showing only what this teacher did that was obviously wrong and terrible. It was its own thing. And then Maggie's desire was its own thing. And when it comes to Lina, I felt like Lina was an almost perfect and raw, just the existential point of desire which is that she wanted this man blindly and she did these things that I think a lot of us want to do or think about doing. Some of us might do them and some of us might only play them out in our brains. But Lina was kind of the realization of all those wants that we have. So I thought Lina's was it was complicated but it was also pure in the sense that she was just- she had been raped as a young woman then she had been abandoned as an adult by her husband. And so she was going after the one thing that made her feel alive which I think is kind of not complicated but also the ways in which she was doing it looks complicated from the outside.

LL: I came away from reading this book frustrated. I felt the three women were all victims, low self-esteem who let men control their lives. Is that the way it should be read?

LISA TADDEO: I definitely don't think so. I what I think is that I think that you know I think to to think that someone else is a victim is not real. I mean these women are not victims they're either the heroes or the victims of their own narratives as we all are. I think depending on the day or the hour of the day. And what I found compelling about them was that they were honest about the way that their pain which has shaped who they were. They were also honest about their passion. But being honest about one's pain is really one of the reasons why they're there in the book. They were okay, we're talking about that. I spoke to hundreds of people who had pain, like most of us have pain that we are afraid to share because of what other people are going to say about it, pain or passion.

LL: You come back to your mother at the end of the book and the last bit of advice she gave you before she died. What was it?

LISA TADDEO: Don't let people see you happy.

LL: What does that mean to you now?

LISA TADDEO: For me that advice was not as shocking as I think it might be to other people who didn't grow up with that. But at the same time it was sad and it does stick with me. It was also something that had been embedded in me my whole life because I saw my mom kind of practice it.

LL: And not owning her own desire in the process of it.

LISA TADDEO: Yes.

LL: Are you following her advice?

LISA TADDEO: No. I mean I have a lot of I have a lot of anxiety and depression that definitely comes from my mother, both biologically and environmentally, so I think it's quite easy for me to follow her advice because I have a hard time being happy. So yes in a way I am following it because I can't not follow it.

LL: So I wonder if your mom was still alive, what do you think she'd make of the book?

LISA TADDEO: I don't know. I think she might have waited for it to come out in Italian. I don't know. You know it's funny because my editor said to me - my parents have both passed away by the time I started the book - and he said you know he wondered if I would be able to write this kind of a book if my parents were alive. I had a boyfriend who we lived in the same house after college and we got a two bedroom condo literally because I didn't want my parents to think that we were in the same room. So I don't know if I would have written this book if she were alive and I don't know if I would have wanted her to read it. And I also think that she would have not read it if I asked her not to.

LL: You think she might be aghast at some of the intimate details?

LISA TADDEO: I think that when Katie Couric said that she liked it my mom would have been okay with everything.

LL: Okay well we will leave it on that note Lisa Taddeo. Thank you very much for your time.

LISA TADDEO: Thank you for having me.

LL: Lisa Taddeo is the author of Three Women. She was in New York City. Well that's our program for today. The CBC Radio election kick-off special is up next in the Eastern time zone. That's in one hour from now for Atlantic listeners. And now that the campaign is officially getting underway the search for appropriate campaign songs must begin. Donald Trump was asked by a number of artists to stop using their songs during his campaign. Canada's Neil Young had asked twice. He admitted he had no legal recourse but he made it clear he didn't want his rockin in the free world being used by Trump. It turns out Neil Young was a Bernie supporter. I'm Laura Lynch. Thank you for listening to The Current.

[Music]

'Campaigns are all about leaders': Three former MPs on what to expect on the road to the federal election

Guest: Libby Davies, Allan Rock, Gerry Ritz

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and this is The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: We've done a lot together these past four years, but the truth is we're just getting started so Canadians have an important choice to make. Will we go back to the failed policies of the past or will we continue to move forward?

JAGMEET SINGH: We are going to bring a hopeful message to Canadians that we can build the country of our dreams, health care when they need it, good jobs, and a bright future.

ELIZABETH MAY: This is the most important election in Canadian history. It's time for every so-called leader of every party to accept the targets that are driven by science not by politics.

ANDREW SCHEER: We have been telling Canadians and showing Canadians how Justin Trudeau has consistently misled them. He has lied. He has let Canadians in the eye and said things that he knew was not true. And we made the case that he has lost the moral authority to govern.

LL: And of course you heard there Justin Trudeau the prime minister, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, Green the Green Party Leader Elizabeth May and conservative leader Andrew Scheer. This morning the Prime Minister visited Rideau Hall and got Canada's forty third election officially underway. There's lots to talk about. And today we want to introduce you to three former members of parliament who are going to be joining us throughout the election campaign. Gerry Ritz is the former Minister of Agriculture under Stephen Harper. He is in Saskatoon. Allan Rock is the former justice minister and health minister under John Chretien's Liberal government. He is in Ottawa. And Libby Davies is the former House and Deputy Leader of the NDP. She is in our Vancouver studio. Hello everyone.

GUESTS: Good morning to you all. Hello.

LL: All right. To all of you have been in this position before the elections been called. What is going through the minds of politicians and candidates? Let's start with you Libby.

LIBBY DAVIES: Well it's always a very exciting day when the richest dropped and the campaign is up and running and you know candidates have been preparing for this time some for months some even longer than that. So it's a very important time in Canada and I do feel that this election is a very critical election in terms of a climate emergency and the choices that are before Canadians and it's been very interesting to hear the leaders today. I was very pleased with the message that Jagmeet Singh put forward. I think he did two important things he introduced himself to Canadians because not enough people know him. And he also laid out the very clear choices and it's about the public interest versus the private interest in having someone who will fight with you on the issues that are important, whether it's health care or housing or people's rights and so on. So there's a lot of important issues out there. But clearly you know it's a good day for the candidates to get out there and do their thing. And what I hope most of all is that Canadians feel engaged. You know this is an opportunity to hold the parties to account to ask your questions to quiz your local candidates. This is what democracy is about. I think young people really count in this election. Indigenous communities really count in this election but we all count. So let's make it really a good campaign.

LL: Gerry Ritz over to you. We did play a clip of Andrew's share there speaking actually before the Prime Minister had officially called the election and clearly on the attack. What do you think is going through the candidate's mind in the conservative party?

GERRY RITZ: Well I think for any candidate regardless of what party first timers it's fear. For all others it's excitement. They've done this before they know what's involved. I know my former colleagues and the new contenders have knocked on some four million doors across Canada. And the message is strong. It's about affordability they might be making a little more than might be seeing a little more go through their hands. But at the end of the day it's getting tougher to pay the grocery and the power bill. So that's what this election comes down to. But the primary thing will be affordability and the economic viability of everyone. It's unfortunate that Andrew's plane was diverted due to fog. So we weren't able to get him in full campaign mode but I'm certain he'll have picked that up later.

LL: And that is something that all candidates just have to contend with. Allan Rock you have been in the position before being part of an incumbent government going back to the polls. What do you think is going through both Justin Trudeau's mind and the field of candidates in the Liberal Party?

ALLAN ROCK: Well the urgent need I think to define the issues and to make the case that this government deserves re-election. The Canadian tradition is to give what does a majority government to give it a second term. It's not invariable but it's it happens most of the time in history and I think the key thing for the Prime Minister and his team is to make the case that they deserve a second term that they haven't been perfect but that the country's going in the right direction. I must say I mean I as a liberal I was delighted at the start. This morning the PM looked calm and confident. He was getting his key messages out clearly. The economy which continues to grow notwithstanding an uncertain world unemployment at the lowest rate in 40 years and so on. The list of achievements of which he and his colleagues can be justly proud on the other hand. I thought Mr. Shear in the clip that was played sounded like he was auditioning for the role as leader of the opposition. It wasn't about what he could offer the country or what the Tory Party represented as change. It was rather him on the attack about the SNC Lavaling.

LL: That couldn't possibly have surprised you I mean all the reporters are asking Justin Trudeau about the same thing.

ALLAN ROCK: Still I would have thought that someone who is auditioning to be prime minister would have put the emphasis on what he has to offer as leader of the country. That's not what he did this morning is too bad he's lost in fog and we didn't get to hear him at the official start.

LL: Your choice of phrase, they're lost in the fog.

ALLAN ROCK: Yes but you know we'll hear him eventually. And I think Canadian clear Canadians will be asking him Well what do you have to offer affordability. But what does that mean and what would you do to grow the economy and he was critical of the government's achievement on negotiating a new NAFTA, which I think was a major accomplishment, dealing with the unpredictable American White House. But so I think the incumbent government has to set out what the issues are and what is there about their record that justifies a second term. The Prime Minister made a very good start in that this-

LL: We also heard from Elizabeth May the leader of the Green Party which is certainly hoping to pick up seats especially on Vancouver Island in this election and Libby Davies I have to ask you how worried are you about the Greens draining away NDP support especially on Vancouver Island and NBC?

LIBBY DAVIES: Well I think it's going to be very interesting to see what happens in B.C. and including Vancouver Island of course. And you know I think the Green Party is well known Elizabeth May as well known for her very strong stance on the environment and climate change. But I do feel that on other issues they're still finding their way and I think it's one of the earlier commentators said this morning, you know she kind of glossed over a lot of very major issues around health care and students and affordability. We've also seen some blips in terms of where the Greens at you know this question of not having whipped votes. So it raises the question that issues around same sex marriage or abortion rights. She tried to put it to bed but there but there's still there. We have one of her candidates in Quebec. It's very unclear what he's really saying and she acknowledged that today actually in her opening remarks and she's going to have to speak to the candidate about what he's really saying in terms of his sovereignties position. So I feel that for the Greens you know it's not very clear where they are on a number of issues. We've also had a candidate in B.C. who had this to say we have a lot in common with the Conservatives at their ideological core. So I think they're actually trying to look to NDP supporters to vote Green but they also are very clearly aligned with conservative values on a number of issues particularly economic issues. And I think people need to put that in perspective in terms of what is the Green Party really about.

LL: Gerry Ritz I think that that's something that happens in all campaigns is that the stories emerge on the front pages of newspapers or candidates may say something that doesn't actually dovetail, with what the message of the party is trying to put out. And it can tend to knock the leaders off their message for the day. I'm wondering in your experience as a candidate when that kind of thing happens how does it play out in your riding on the doorsteps as you're talking to people?

GERRY RITZ: Well it's amazing what is done on the news and what actually ends up on the doorsteps is usually quite different it's like that old kids game where you whisper in the year and 10 people down. It's a whole different message. It's all in the way it's spun. It's all in the sort predetermined conclusions by different areas. You know I saw the prime minister get knocked off of his message today with questions on SNC and well direct questions that need to be answered. But at the end of the day you know as Jamie watch said earlier you've got 40 days and every minute is precious. So anytime you're not making that connection it's a minute lost and they add up at the end of the campaign.

LL: Now we have heard a lot about how the leaders are going to focus on various regions of the country where they see the best opportunities to pick up seats. And Allan Rock, the prime minister is starting off in B.C. This afternoon he called it his second home this morning in his news conference. What do you make of the way he's targeting the first day of his campaign?

ALLAN ROCK: Well he began the campaign in 2015 in British Columbia as well. He did live and work there. I think it's smart. I mean there are really three key battlegrounds. There's lower mainland of British Columbia there's Ontario especially the GTA and there's Quebec and I think each one of them presents enormous opportunities for every party. I think the Prime Minister's going to focus today on the lower mainland of B.C. reminding people of his close connection to the province, stressing our environmental record. In Quebec, there are some NDP seats that I think are at risk at grave risk. If you go by the polls and the assessment the analysis of public opinion I think those are real opportunities for the Liberal Party. In Ontario and GTA in particular, I think the spectre of Doug Ford and what he represents is connection with the Conservative Party, it's connection with sheer hold promise for the Liberals campaigning there. And so I think going to the British Columbia to start off is is smart and I'm sure that's why Mr. Shears in Quebec today because he realizes there are opportunities for all parties. So those are the three key battlegrounds and of course every other province and region must also be campaigned in very fully.

LL: Libby Davies, you heard Allan Rock say the Prime Minister will talk about the environment when he's in the Lower Mainland today where you are. Tell me how you think that's going to go over in the Lower Mainland.

LIBBY DAVIES: Well just listening to Alan who I respect a lot I think he left out one major reason that he's in Metro, Vancouver and that's of course the question of the pipeline and he knows that for many many people in B.C. This is a huge issue the Trans Mountain pipeline and of course to his government who bought the pipeline it's been a very unpopular decision here. So I you know I'm not surprised at all that he would be here in Metro, Vancouver, although I have to say that the writing that he's in Vancouver Kings Way which is held by Don Davies I think if they think they're going to win that riding their mistake and it's a very strong riding for the NDP and and Don Davies no relation to me but a good friend has done a great job. So but I think it's very strategic that he's here in B.C. because it is about environment and he knows that he's got to keep his seats in B.C. maybe make gains. But I think that's going to be tough. And on the other side I mean I think it's interesting that Jack meets saying decided to be in London North Centre which actually the NDP- it's not a it's not an incumbent riding. It's a riding we hope to win. It was won by the NDP provincially. So that's sort of the narrative that's been written that you know we're only defending the places where we have incumbents is actually not true. Mr. Singh has been and I think it's nine ridings in the last week or so and they basically are new targets. They're target seats that we're hoping to win. So I think that shows strength and growth. So sometimes you know we can buy into a narrative that isn't actually really what's going on the ground and that will unfold of course during the campaign and we'll all be following along.

LL: Gerry Ritz, your leader Andrew share is starting off in Quebec today. What does that say about what the party's choices are in this election?

GERRY RITZ: Well any campaign is about managing your time and your resources both money and people at the end of the day you look where the seats are and you go after them. Certainly there are issues that need to be addressed in Quebec. There's issues in Ontario, Maritimes, The Prairies and B.C. and of course the North. So it's a matter of the proverbial dropping the rock in the pond and the ripples go out you build your campaign further and further. Everyone does an analysis of what they consider safe seats and they become part of the bee tour not that they're degraded by any stretch but just that you need to put your resources into where you have seats at risk or where you have the opportunity to pick up seats. So it's all about the strategy. This was planned actually a week or 10 days ago whether the prime minister called the election or not. Everybody kind of thought it would be next Monday not today. But having said that this Wednesday announcement that got fogged in certainly will go ahead anyway.

LL: Alan Rock another flurry of questions that Justin Trudeau had to face from reporters today were about was about the Bill C 21 and Quebec. It's a tough thing for all of the leaders I would say. It is the legislation in Quebec that bans religious symbols or clothing for people who work in public service, teachers, firefighters et cetera. I'm wondering what you thought of Trudeau's response which is essentially I'm not going to touch this one with a 10 foot pole while running for re-election.

LL: Well I think that's the right answer when you're kicking off an election campaign is a controversial bill. The newspapers tell us it's popular in Quebec I'm not sure that's right. But I think the PM does not want to get involved in a fight he doesn't have to. The bill is being challenged. The question will become before the court and its constitutionality will be determined. It may be that as it reaches the higher courts as it goes to the Supreme Court of Canada eventually the government of Canada may wish to intervene and have its say. But for the moment there's no practical legal purpose to be served by the government of Canada taking a position or in initiating a separate legal proceeding in relation to that legislation. I think it's good judgment to leave it alone. There are many other issues to talk about and. You know that it's counterproductive, as he said to get involved in this. Can I make a comment though about the leaders? I tend to think that these campaigns are all about leaders. People across the country come to a conclusion about the person that they want to have leading their country. And so what are the advantages I think that Justin Trudeau has going into this thing is that he's run a national campaign before. I remember travelling with John Chretien when he was an incumbent and going across the country with him during the national campaigns. I can't describe the amount of pressure that's on a party leader during that period. The expectations the demands the long days and of course the leaders debates on which so much rests. Having the having gone through that once before. Having lived the experience, knowing about the pressures, being able to pace yourself, being able to keep things in perspective. Justin Trudeau has that advantage. Andrew Scheer's a very capable politician and he'll pick it up quickly but I think I think for Justin Trudeau it's a real advantage to have lived at once before and it might just make a difference in the long run.

LL: Libby Davies I want you to pick up on that because for the NDP it is dark meat things first national election and of course the NDP is hurting for money at this point. How do you think his experience will affect the campaign?

LIBBY DAVIES: Well I think he did very well today in introducing himself and laying out the key issues and I do want to say that you know I've been involved in many NDP campaigns, nationally and locally, but I feel that we have the best platform that I've actually ever seen. It's very substantive our platform on the environment the climate crisis and relating it to the economy and the transition is really quite superb. So I feel that Mr. Singh is out there, he's engaging with people. I think he has a lot of residents resonance with younger people and people in racialized communities. So he's new you know it's very historic in Canada this is the first time that a racialized leader has led a federal campaign and run for prime minister. So I think the NDP is rather legendary really and in terms of being out there and taking on new roles and new stances. We've seen that in terms of Alexa McDonough A.G. McLachlan and people who've run for the NDP as leader.

LL: But what about the lack of money?

LIBBY DAVIES: We're always the underdog. You know I'll be the first to put that out there where we're a scrappy bunch and I've heard this narrative so much you know like well the in the NDP is written off you don't have enough money. We don't have the same amount of money as the as the two major parties but we have an incredible ground game we have an incredible team of candidates. I've seen some of these campaigns already across the country. There's a momentum. So when Allan says it's all about the leaders will obviously there's a lot of focus on the leaders. But I do think what happens locally and for each of us who have been MP is we know what we do locally really counts. Those local campaigns really count and I think that's very true for the NDP. The money is coming in now. It is picking up. So I actually feel very optimistic. There's a sense of momentum. I think the key thing is for Canadians to get to know Mr. Singh. I hope he does very well in the debates because they are important. You know unlike Mr. Trudeau he's not hiding from that Mr. Trudeau is saying he's not going to go to some of the debates which I think is very unfortunate. So people will have a chance to hear and get to know Mr. Singh.

LL: Allan Rock what about that? You're the Trudeau is not going to participate in quite a few of the English language debates. How does that reflect on him?

ALLAN ROCK: I think it's neutral. I don't think it makes any difference in the long term. He's going to be in the key major debates both in French and in English. And Canadians will have ample opportunity to hear from him during the campaign and during the debates you're speaking of he will in fact be at rallies and meetings across the country, seeing people in every region of Canada and talking about his policies. I don't think he'll have a lasting difference or be an issue with legs as they say.

LL: Gerry Ritz How do you respond to that? The Prime Minister is not going to be there front and centre against your candidate and [cross talking].

GERRY RITZ: Just before that Allen said how important the debates were and then he looked around and said they're not. So I'm kind of wondering leaders are important they're the face and the voice that people see on an hour by hour newscast by newscast basis. But Libby is absolutely right. You know the team around a leader make a big difference in the strength that they're going to have going forward. None of these parties can run just one person. It's all about the strength of the team that you had before behind you and having the resources and the money and so on. Like these things are expensive. They tend to take on a life of their own and you're constantly making changes on the fly and it's how those people adapt to them that actually scores the goal at the end of the day. There's no lack of issues in this particular campaign we could run a lot of the things that were talked about in 2015 because not much of it got addressed. We've legalized marijuana and that's sort of where it stalled. So other than that we've got some major problems with some of our trade partners. We've got big problems in British Columbia with the resource sector at loggerheads. But you know we're one of the largest coal shippers. That seems to be okay. And the cruise ship industry is a bigger footprint than the pipeline. So there's some real issues to to walk through a minefield here.

LL: Well Gerry Ritz, I mean you heard Justin Trudeau today talking in his opening remarks about what he says his government has achieved and warning people not to go back to the Harper years he never even mentioned Andrew shares name isn't going to be a problem for Andrew Shearer to be running against Doug Ford to the premier of Ontario, essentially is who they're putting up as a boogey man here and [unintelligible].

GERRY RITZ: Yeah. I mean you go with whatever you think is going to get you the most votes at the end of the day but you know Doug Ford is not going to be on the ballot Stephen Harper's not going to be on the ballot. So they're sort of living rent free in Trudeau's head. If that's what he's keeping looking over his shoulder at, he's going to miss the other guy coming at him.

LL: Allan Rock what do you think of it? Is it just that simple that you can just bat that away the visage of Doug Ford and Stephen Harper or is that part and parcel of what you're getting with the conservatives?

ALLAN ROCK: I think Doug Ford is going to be in a major factor in this campaign. He may not be on the ballot but I think the label of conservative in Ontario has taken on a particular hue for those who've lived under Doug Ford for the last year. And I think it's not going to do the [unintelligible] any good to be associated with him. It's early in the campaign that the platforms haven't yet been tabled I expect the liberals will have a Pharmacare plan. We'll have significant proposals on handgun issues. So we're going to have platforms from all the parties over the next two weeks which will help us define the issues in this campaign and also solidify the image of the parties and what they stand for in the public eye as the weeks go by. So it's early. Campaigns do matter enormously. I mean 2015 is a good example of that. The Trudeau Liberals came out of third place to win that largely because of his performance across the country and in the debates. And of course there are always unpredictable events that happen that can colour the campaign or leave a public impression that affects votes. So yeah I think that we have a long way to go and I think the opening day is just sort of a taste of what's to come. And I think for the Liberals it went very well.

LL: All right I want to ask you all, as you see everyone gearing up and getting going. I'm wondering do you miss it? Libby Davies.

LIBBY DAVIES: I've been thinking of that this morning as I got up so early to come to the studio. You do miss it in a way because a campaign is very intense. It's very exciting. You have this incredible opportunity to talk to thousands of people. Well I mean during the pre campaign as well. And you really get into this space where you have amazing conversations with people and people are very open you're at the doorstep. So I mean I do think that's wonderful. And I do wish every candidate no matter what party they're running for, all the best with that because it's so intense. It's trying you kind of put your regular life on hold. But I also feel like okay I was an MP for 18 years. I kind of did my thing. So I'm happy to also take on different kinds of roles. But it's a great thing to have a federal election campaign.

LL: Gerry let's just briefly.

GERRY RITZ: I agree with Libby it's an exciting time it's a very humbling time to go out and ask people for their support again. I was happy to do that and win consecutively. Yes I miss it. My wife doesn't.

[Laughter]

LL: All right Allan Rock the last word to you. You've been out of the active game in politics for a while now. Are there any bones in your body that are twitching and wanting to get out there?

ALLAN ROCK: Yes it's a thrilling really experience that adrenaline surges and the excitement is hard to articulate. But like Libby I think there are different stages of life and I'm happy to be doing what I'm doing now. I'm glad I did it and I look back on it with fondness and a day like this can certainly make the juices flowing and you want to get on the plane and speak to the crowd. But I'll leave that to others today.

GERRY RITZ: I think we're about we'd be remiss if we didn't send out a great big thank you to everybody that is taking part. It's a huge life changing experience whether you win or lose.

LL: All right. All right. Thanks to all three of you I know we'll be talking again during the campaign so I'll speak to you soon.

ALLAN ROCK: Thanks Laura.

LIBBY DAVIES: Thank you.

LL: Gerry Ritz is the former Minister of Agriculture under Stephen Harper he is in Saskatoon. Allan rock is the former Justice Minister and Health Minister under John Chretien's Liberal governments. He's in Ottawa and Libby Davies is the former House and Deputy Leader of the NDP. She's in our Vancouver studio. That is our program for today. Now that the federal election campaign is officially underway, well the search for appropriate campaign songs is on but finding that catchy number with the perfect energy and the uplifting lyrics can have pitfalls if you don't commission one on your own. Donald Trump for example was asked by a number of artists to stop using their songs. Canada's Neil Young had to ask twice. He admitted he had no legal recourse but he made it clear he didn't want his rocking in the free world being used by Trump. It turns out Neil Young was a Bernier supporter. I'm Laura Lynch. Thanks for listening to The Current.

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Wednesday September 11, 2019 Full Episode Transcript

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