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The AIH Transcript for May 31th, 2022

TOM HARRINGTON: Hi there, I'm Tom Harrington.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening, I'm Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

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Prologue

CH: Tonight

TH: Left wanting more. The federal government has granted B.C.'s request to decriminalize some illicit drugs. But our guest says the new policy doesn't quite measure up.

CH: No surrender. Russian advances bring Vladimir Putin closer to claiming victory in eastern Ukraine. But the former deputy minister of Ukraine's defence department says her country's forces won't give up the fight.

TH: Anti hatchet job. In 1936, a Black gold medallist planted an oak sapling he brought home from the Berlin Olympics. Now, Cornelius Johnson's tree is under threat -- and our guest is doing what she can to save it.

CH: Thank you, nest. The man behind some of your favourite film soundtracks looks to birds for inspiration. And he tells us his approach has artists from Beck to Elvis Costello flocking to join him.

TH: An embarrassment of riches. For years, the magazine How to Spend It has catered to the ludicrously wealthy. But now, its editors have decided its title is no longer on the money.

CH: And… gory details. Paleontologists have long wrestled with the question of whether dinosaurs had warm blood, like birds, or cold blood, like reptiles. And now it turns out they may somehow have been both.

CH: As It Happens, the Tuesday edition. Radio that loves a good dinosaur story and, you know, anything in the same vein.

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Part 1: B.C. Drug Exemption, Ukraine: Donetsk Battleground, Bird Song Album

B.C. Drug Exemption

Guest: Leslie McBain

CH: British Columbia is set to decriminalize possession of small amounts of some illegal drugs. Today, in Vancouver, federal Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, Carolyn Bennett, granted the province an exemption to the law. Starting early next year, adults will no longer be charged for having up to 2.5 grams of opioids, cocaine, meth and other substances for personal use -- and their drugs will no longer be confiscated. Since the Covid pandemic began, drug deaths from toxic supply have soared. And British Columbia has been particularly hard-hit. Carolyn Bennett made the announcement alongside her provincial counterpart, Sheila Malcolmson, in Vancouver. Here is part of what Minister Bennett had to say.

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CAROLYN BENNETT: Minister Malcolmson and I want to be very clear. This is not legalization. We have not taken this decision lightly. We have been working with the province over the past months to ensure that their final application was able to meet the criteria necessary for Canada to be able to grant a province-wide Section 56 exemption to the Canadian Drug and Substances Act. This time-limited exemption is the first of its kind in Canada. And with it comes great responsibility for the health, safety and wellbeing of the people in British Columbia and a template for other jurisdictions across Canada.

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CH: The Federal Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, Carolyn Bennett. Leslie McBain co-founded the advocacy group Moms Stop the Harm after her son, Jordan, died of a drug overdose in 2014. We reached her in Pender Island, B.C.

TH: Ms. McBain, at today's announcement, Vancouver's mayor, Kennedy Stewart, called this change historic and groundbreaking, and he said he felt like crying. What was your response?

LESLIE MCBAIN: Well, I feel the same. It's historic, and it is groundbreaking. It doesn't go far enough. But, you know, it is a huge step in the right direction. I mean, we've been trying to get the criminalization exemption for years. The downside to me, the more sad part, is that the threshold of 2.5 grams… [clears throat] excuse me, that is offered in this exemption is not enough, and it may have unintended consequences. So we were hoping for a bigger threshold. But, you know, all in all, it is a step in the right direction.

TH: You wanted 4.5. The government is offering 2.5. What difference does that make, really?

LM: Well, 2.5 is very small for people who are dependent on drugs. If people who are dependent have… have a higher tolerance, they need more drugs. And so, a 2.5 threshold, if people are going to obey the law, will make it so that those folks have to go out more often to access a legal amount, not a legal drug, but a legal amount of drug. They may have to go out four times a day or five times a day. This increases their vulnerability to… to a very bad batch, to something that could possibly kill them. And it happens, as you know, five to seven times every day somebody dies in this province. So, that's one of the downsides of having this very low threshold. Yeah, so I wonder, you know, we actually know who… who actually wanted the 2.5, and that is the criminal justice system. They are the ones who pushed for the lower threshold.

TH: Why do you think Minister Bennett is being so cautious on this? What's the problem with going to 4.5? What… what message were you being told?

LM: Mm-hmm. There's really no message around why. I think, you know, the… the party line is that it's a matter of public safety, which I actually don't understand what that means in terms of people who use drugs. They're going to… they're using the drugs anyway. So they are in an unsafe situation, just having to access a toxic, poisonous supply of drugs. If she wants to talk about… and you know, I have great respect for Minister Bennett, but if she wants to talk about public safety, then we need a safe, regulated supply of drugs for people who… who are dependent, who need it.

TH: Last year, more than 2,200 people died from drug use in B.C. That's, as you said, like five to seven people a day. How many lives will this move save?

LM: None, actually. It won't… I mean, it goes a great deal to reduce the stigma, to have the public understand a little bit more about drug use. People should not be criminalized for their use of drugs. And so… so, this is helpful in informing the public. But the only thing that is going to save lives, as I say, is the safe, regulated supply. Decriminalization does… does one thing, and it keeps people with this very small amount of substance from being involved in the criminal justice system. This is a good thing. It's definitely a good thing, but it hasn't gone far enough. So decriminalization is a huge step in the right direction, and I think we can only go forward from this point. They say it's a temporary measure for three years. I think a lot of research will be done in three years, and people will… the people who are making the decisions will see that you know, nothing bad happens when you decriminalize people who carry drugs. And so, hopefully, they would then, over time, be able to increase the threshold.

TH: Critics will say, though, and often do in these particular situations, that decriminalization will encourage drug use. What do you make of that argument?

LM: And I think that's a false assumption. What the research shows is that when different, more progressive laws… and this is not here, but in different countries, laws are passed, and people are able to access a safe supply, people are decriminalized, the drug use actually goes down. And this is true in Portugal, and it's true in Switzerland, for instance. So, I don't know why it would increase drug use? If people want to access drugs for whatever reason, whether it's to relax on the weekend or experiment or because they're dependent, they're going to access the drugs no matter what.

TH: The provincial minister, Sheila Malcolmson, said today. She talked about how shame and fear plays a part in these drug deaths and the many people who use alone, and they die alone. And you've had the pain of loss yourself. What do you want people to understand about the stigma around drug use?

LM: Mm-hmm. People who use drugs are no different than people who use alcohol. Addiction is addiction. So, we need to move away from thinking of drugs as this, you know, evil, devil's substance and just say, okay, this is another substance. And the stigma around it has been for a century. And if we can't see our way to drop that stigma, then we're not doing our job as a society. But I think the decriminalization part of it is a step in the right direction to reduce that stigma.

TH: So that change is set to begin at the end of January of next year, and it's going to run for three years. Ottawa says it's going to monitor how it goes, do some more research, adjust depending on what happens. Minister Bennett says it's only the beginning. But how difficult is it for you to wait to see these changes, to see what will actually happen?

LM: It's hard. There's no question about it. It's very hard, but it's been very hard for six years for us. You know, since the declaration of a public health emergency in 2016, we've been fighting hard for policy changes. I would say it's like turning the Titanic. You know, it's just slow, slow. It's so slow. And… and because of this, the hesitancy and the… the slow way it progresses, people die. You know, people die. And so it doesn't matter to dead people what the thresholds are or what decriminalization is. The only thing that is going to help. And this is, you know, our next… our continuing battle is to get safe supply for people who are dependent. This won't stop all the deaths, but it will reduce the market of organized crime.

TH: Ms. McBain, thanks for talking to us about this today.

LM: You're very welcome. Thanks for asking me.

CH: Leslie McBain is the co-founder of Moms Stop The Harm. She was in Pender Island, B.C. And you can find more on that story on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

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Ukraine: Donetsk Battleground

Guest: Alina Frolova

CH: EU leaders feel they reached their agreement to ban 90 per cent of Russian oil imports with surprising speed. But to President CH: EU leaders feel they reached their agreement to ban 90 per cent of Russian oil imports with surprising speed. But to President Volodymyr Zelensky -- and presumably the people of Ukraine -- it's taking place in agonizingly slow motion. President Zelensky welcomed the EU's announcement of the ban. But it's not going to take effect by the end of the year -- which, in the midst of an ongoing invasion, is a frustrating delay. Especially when Russian forces aren't wasting any time, they've forced the Ukrainians to give up ground in the strategic eastern city of Severodonetsk. That brings Vladimir Putin one step closer to claiming some sort of victory, after the repeated failures of Russia's invasion so far. Alina Frolova is the former deputy minister of Ukraine's defence department. We reached her in Kyiv.

TH: Ms. Frolova, how would you describe the situation in Severodonetsk? The Russians appear to be having considerable success there. The governor says Russia controls 70 per cent of the city. How would you describe it?

ALINA FROLOVA: Well, depending on what you consider a lack of success, I mean that they try to occupy the Severodonetsk, which is actually a city, but not the… some kind of like a biggest one. Already for a few weeks, and they still didn't get a control over it. And so, we perfectly understand that they try to occupy, to report that the whole Lugansk region is like delivered through 100 days of this war already, which escalated, but that's not completely truthful. So, that's still part of the Lugansk region is staying under the Ukrainian control. And I won't be so much concentrated just on one city. I would like to, like, have a helicopter view on the frontline. And if in these positions, Ukrainian army just like partially lost some positions. So in other directions, they have a counter-offensive. So we cannot exactly evaluate this like a great success or such substantial success.

TH: Russia had suffered many losses early in the war after the invasion in February, but even President Zelensky has suggested that they are having more success, particularly in the East. How do you explain the Russian successes in the last few weeks?

AF: Again, this is not the success from the point of view of the movement, but this is more about the holding the line. They start to learn some lessons from the… actually, the…. the battles which they had here around Kyiv. So, first of all, the Donbas region was more, let's say, preparative. We can say so because the occupation of eight years, they made some kind of frontlines there. They made some developments there. They organized logistics. So for them, it's much easier to have a logistics connected to Crimea and Donbass region, which was part of Donbas region, which was occupied, and that gives them more floor for having more forces, more equipment. However, if we again have a look at the… their attempts to make an offensive, they still cannot do it. And that's, I think, the floor and gives a lot of political consideration and for understanding the overall situation on the frontline.

TH: What will happen to the Donbass region if Ukrainian forces can't hold back this Russian assault, which, as you say, is much greater than in past efforts, the number of troops and equipment?

AF: This is war. Not all the battles can be won. So for us, the principal position is to win the war. And we understand that in some moments, we can, like, step back. But the… we didn't reject our goals. And the main goal in this war is complete, like the release of all the Ukrainian territories, including Crimea and the whole territory of Donbas.

TH: The U.S. said today that it's not going to send long-range rockets to help Ukraine, ones that could potentially use… be used against Russia. What's the impact of that?

AF: Well, still, we will have had these long-range, but of limited, let's say, range. So, it’s up to 70 kilometres as soon as we have from the latest reports. Unfortunately, this decision is made step-by-step. So, they… we hear each week that we didn't send some weapons. Then one week passed, and due to all the developments, and due to all the pressure, still, the government of the United States and all the other countries continues to increase, let's say, this list of the equipment they can provide.

TH: In Brussels today, the European Union announced a ban on most Russian oil by the end of the year. And the European Council chief, Charles Michel, described that, saying, in his words, maximum pressure on Russia to end the war. But President Zelensky has said the Europeans are moving, and have moved, too slow on this issue. What does this ban mean for Ukraine in the short term and the long term?

AF: For us, the term till the end of the year. Unfortunately, this is too long. I mean that we are losing people each day. And we have, like, missiles… massive missiles attacks each day. And till the end of the year, this is like an incredible number of days and an incredible number of losses. Plus, not the whole oil will be under sanctions, oil supply. Not the whole gas supply will be under sanctions. And just so you understand that in the last month, Russia supplied to European countries and sell, like, more than ten billion, if I remember right, tons of oil and it means that they obtained the money for… to produce more than 1000 missiles. So, if we will just like a short step-by-step decrease the… this, like, number of tons which they supply, it will not substantially influence their capability to proceed with this war and with this operations. Only crucial and only a very drastic decrease in the supplies can influence. But we don't see the appetite for this. And really, the decisions are made really slow. Yes, And for us, it's painful because this is loss of our kids, of our people, of our soldiers. And this is huge losses which our economy is suffering from.

TH: Ms. Frolova, thanks for talking to us about this.

AF: Thank you.

CH: Alina Frolova is the former deputy minister of Ukraine's defence department. We reached her in Kyiv.

-- and presumably the people of Ukraine -- it's taking place in agonizingly slow motion. President Zelensky welcomed the EU's announcement of the ban. But it's not going to take effect by the end of the year -- which, in the midst of an ongoing invasion, is a frustrating delay. Especially when Russian forces aren't wasting any time, they've forced the Ukrainians to give up ground in the strategic eastern city of Severodonetsk. That brings Vladimir Putin one step closer to claiming some sort of victory, after the repeated failures of Russia's invasion so far. Alina Frolova is the former deputy minister of Ukraine's defence department. We reached her in Kyiv.