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The AIH Transcript for November 30, 2016

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

CO: Hello, I'm Carol Off.

JD: Good evening, I'm Jeff Douglas. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

JD: Tonight:

CO: Judge not, not after what he said from the bench. A judicial committee recommends that Justice Robin Camp be removed from the bench after a sexual assault trial where he asked a witness why she didn't just keep her knees together.

JD: Keeping his cool. An employee at an Indiana air conditioner factory says he can hardly believe the news after Donald Trump claims credit for keeping some of the plant's jobs from moving to Mexico.

CO: Their pound of flesh. A British vegan tells us that her country's new bills are made with tiny bits of beef tallow. And the Bank of Canada says the pound sterling may not be the only cash with cow.

JD: Profile in fear. An Ohio State journalism student describes the moment he realized that an attacker who left eleven people injured on campus was the man he'd interviewed just weeks before.

CO: Hold the phone! Canadian journalist Ed Ou has covered conflict areas and repressive regimes but it's what happened to him on his way into the United States that has the American Civil Liberties Union calling Washington.

JD: And...just put your lips together and Go Away! An Oregon woman calls the cops after a passerby puts her through a never-ending rendition of the '90's nugget, 'Closing Time.'
As It Happens, the Wednesday edition. Radio that's gonna blow this story wide open.

[Music]

Part 1: Robin Camp report, Carrier plant update, Meat money

Robin Camp report

Guest: Raji Manjat

JD: Remove him from the bench. That's the recommendation from an inquiry by the Canadian Judicial Council into Justice Robin Camp.
While overseeing a sexual assault trial, Justice Camp asked a 19-year-old woman why she didn't just keep her knees together. That was in 2014. Justice Camp has since been promoted to the federal court. But now, he may lose his title all together.
Raji Mangat is the director of litigation for the West Coast Women's Legal Education and Action Fund. The group was an intervener at the inquiry. We reached Ms. Mangat in Vancouver.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Mangat, what did you think when you heard the news that the Canadian Judicial Council had recommended that Justice Robin Camp be removed from the bench?

RAJI MANGAT: We were very pleased to see that the inquiry committee had taken seriously the concerns that West Coast Leaf and other women's organizations that we were intervening in a coalition with, had put before that committee so we were very delighted to see that our concerns about the public interest, the treatment of marginalized vulnerable complainants the sexual assault trial, were taken very seriously by that body when they made their decision to remove Justice Camp from the office of judge.

CAROL OFF: How often do you see this happen, that the council makes this kind of recommendation?

RM: Since the council was formed in the early 1970s, I think there's only been 11 cases that have gotten to the point of an inquiry committee, and of those 11, this would now be the third where that recommendation to remove a judge had been made. So this is a very rare situation. But we were very happy to see that the egregious nature of justice can't conduct, the very serious real harm that that conduct has on sexual assault complainants. This is a crime that already vastly under reported in our criminal justice system.
So the fact that the responsibility of a judge to the public interest to being impartial and independent… that was all taken very seriously by this inquiry committee, and we were pleased to see that it was a unanimous decision of all five members.

CO: This comes out of a trial of a man named Alexander Wagar who was being prosecuted for sexual assault of a woman. But this review wasn't about how that that trial went, or whether Alexander Wagar is innocent or guilty, it was about the judge himself. Can you tell us why the judge's judgment was called into question?

RM: Absolutely. There were a number of comments made during the trial that really called into question the judge's views about you know how sexual assault complainants ought to behave, and these views are views that have been entirely discredited, and are very much viewed as rape myths and stereotypes about survivors of sexual assault that are no longer in our law. Sexual assault law has been reformed to address with this very form of bias. This very type of stereotyping. And as the inquiry committee found in its report today, Justice Camp sort of demonstrated antipathy. It sort of wasn't just a misunderstanding of those protections in the criminal code, but also sort of a questioning of their utility or sort of a lack of understanding about why those protections were in fact put into the law.

CO: Some of the things that were so egregious, as was pointed out by you and others and also that the committee looked at, that he the judge, Judge Camp, said she could have screamed, she could called out, she could have kept her knees together, she could have slipped her buttocks down into the sink – the alleged sexual assault took place in a bathroom – and that she was… he said that young women want to have sex especially when they're drinking. All of these remarks –it was just all through the three days of the trial. What effect did this have on the victim, do you know?

RM: Oh yeah. She actually testified at this hearing, and she reported that you know she had considered suicide. It made her feel terrible about herself, made her sort of call into question what her value is, the way that the judge approached her evidence, the way that the judge approached her coming before him with this terrible thing that she was reporting had happened, you know, understanding that he has a role there as the sort of arbiter of the case. But hearing these statements from the person who's in charge of hearing her trial, she had said that this had had a devastating devastating impact on her. And we're not surprised. We heard that from numerous other women who have either gone through the criminal justice system process or have not, simply because this is what they fear. And so to have this strong decision from this inquiry committee really I think goes some distance in bringing confidence back into the public's conception of the criminal justice system and whether it really can treat women as it should give them a fair and equal opportunity to be heard.

CO: The judge himself was apologetic when it was all brought to his attention and it's noted in this inquiry that Justice Camp made efforts to reform himself. He got guidance and counseling. His daughter came forward to say that he might be old fashioned but he's not a sexist and that he felt remorse for it. The inquiry said they noted all this. Did it affect their decision at all?

RM: No I think they rightly demonstrate in their decision, that yes, judicial education and sort of challenging beliefs is an important tool. It's important for judges to constantly be doing this. But after the fact education can't make up for what was such a profound disrespect for equality, you know as was demonstrated by his conduct. And so what the inquiry committee had to look at was it while you know they acknowledge that there's some benefit in the process of education and counseling that he went through what they have to look at is, what was the impact on public confidence? Was the impact so harsh that really this affects his ability to execute the office of judge? And they felt that it very much was so.

CO: Just briefly, does this mean that Justice Camp is going to be fired? So this is just one part of the process that has several other steps. So this recommendation will go to the Canadian Judicial Council itself, which has to then make its own decision about whether to recommend to the Federal Minister of Justice whether or not Justice Camp should be removed from office of judge, and of course he could always seek a judicial review of that decision. I should note in those two cases that I mentioned earlier, where the Canadian Judicial Council had recommended removal, both of those judges just step down before the process went any further because once the Minister of Justice makes her decision then that would actually have to go to Parliament. It would have to be a vote in Parliament about that and that's never to my understanding I don't think has ever happened in the history of our constitutional democracy.

CO: Ms. Mangat, thank you.

RM: Thank you for having me on the program.

JD: Raji Mangat is the director of litigation for the West Coast Women's Legal Education and Action Fund. We reached her in Vancouver. She was responding to a recommendation from the Canadian Judicial Council that Justice Robin Camp be removed from the bench. In response to the recommendation, Justice Camp said in a statement that he will provide no further comment at this time.

[Music]

Carrier plant update

Guest: Paul Roell

JD: Donald Trump is not president yet. But there are some factory workers in Indiana who are already happy with the work he's doing.
Carrier is an air conditioner manufacturer that had planned to move 2000 Indiana jobs to Mexico. But during his campaign, Donald Trump promised that he would convince the company to keep those jobs in the States. Trump says he did that, and if he did, it sort of worked.
Carrier says that about 1000 of those jobs will stay put. Mr. Trump and Vice-President-elect Mike Pence plan to announce the move at the Indianapolis plant tomorrow.
A couple weeks ago, one Carrier employee told us he was preparing for a layoff. So we called him back. We reached Paul Roell in Indianapolis.

CO: Paul does this mean that you'll be keeping your job at Carrier.

PAUL ROELL: Yes it does.

CO: How are you feeling about that?

PR: Really excited. Still kind of in shock and disbelief from the announcement last night when I’d seen it. But just a great feeling of relief.

CO: What does it mean for your family?

PR: I mean we have financial stability in our future. We don't have to worry about selling our current home to get one that we can afford with a lower income. So it's just really great for my family.

CO: The last time we spoke you didn't know what you're going to do if Carrier went through with closing the plant and you were thinking well you could look for other jobs but you said that you would never get something at the wage you were earning at Carrier. Was that confirmed? Did you find there was nothing… that you were going to be stuck with service working in jobs that were minimum wage?

PR: Yes I still went around town and looked at all the other places that were hiring and it was mostly fast food department stores and warehouses. And the most any of them paid was $16.75 an hour. And so it's not even close to what I make at Carrier.

CO: What do you make at Carrier?

PR: I make $23.83 an hour.

CO: It's a good wage.

PR: Yes.

CO: And now what do you see… so what do you think led to Carrier changing its mind?

PR: I believe it was because of Donald Trump and he negotiated with them and him I believe it was because of the contracts the United Technologies has with the government. They make five to six billion dollars a year off of those contracts. And I think Donald Trump just said if you move to Mexico to save $65 million and take these jobs, then we're going to take maybe a billion dollars worth of contracts away from you.

CO: Donald Trump had a lot at stake here, didn't he? Because he promised you people at Carrier that this was going to happen, that he was going to prevent Carrier from moving those jobs to Mexico. And it didn't seem likely because Carrier was saying it wasn't going to do that. it was going to go through with its plans to move the operation. So what do you think was at stake for Donald Trump?

PR: I believe it could have been his whole first term at stake, because this is something that he'd been talking about since… I want to say February 13^th… 3 days after the announcement was made. And he said 100 percent he could get Carrier to stay. And I mean, that was probably his biggest campaign promise. And so he's going in on a really high note and I'm hoping he can just keep that momentum going and follow through with his other promises.

CO: When we spoke with you, you said that a lot of people had voted in your plant, had voted for Mr. Trump because of that promise, and that if he didn't follow through with that commitment, that it was unlikely that would vote for him again. What are they saying today, your fellow co-workers?

PR: They're really excited and glad that he was able to come through. And now they're just kind of anxious to see if we're going to be making any concessions in the future to keep our jobs because we still don’t have any of the details about the deal that was made to keep our jobs. And we're hoping to find out more tomorrow when Donald Trump and the Vice-President-Elect, Mike Pence, come to Carrier.

CO: And the jobs at the plant, the two plants I guess, these two operations that were vulnerable to this. There were 2000 jobs there. Only 1000 jobs seemed to be those that will stay in the United States. Who is likely to lose their positions in the factories?

PR: It’s going to be the people that have the lowest seniority because we do everything based off of seniority. So most likely it's going to be people that have five, maybe six years at the most, and on down to new hires.

CO: And what concessions do you think there might be for this decision?

PR: I mean right now we're just speculating that once our current contract with Carrier is up in 2018, that they may try to get a lower pay scale for some of the more senior people like myself. And we are hoping they don't try to do anything with our pensions.

CO: You received a letter in the mail after you spoke in the news about your losing your job. What was that letter about?

PR: The letter was about how myself and other Carrier employees are in the position we are now because we're either lazy or unaccomplished and have never done anything with our lives, and just basically said we're going to end up working as greeters at Home Depot or other department stores.

CO: What do you say to the writer of that letter now?

PR: Say she should have given Donald Trump a chance instead of just right from the beginning being hateful and saying he’s not going to accomplish what he did, and he was just trying to con us into voting for him. And I hope maybe she could, she would write another letter just to apologize.

CO: You think it's going to happen?

PR: No, because I there was just too much negativity in the whole election. Because there’s a lot of division between the two parties, Republican and Democrat. I think it’s going to take some time to kind of heal those wounds that came out in this election cycle.

CO: Paul thanks for speaking with us.

PR: Oh you're welcome.

CO: Bye bye.

PR: Bye.

JD: Paul Roell works at the Carrier plant in Indianapolis, Indiana. That’s where we reached him.

[Music]

Meat money

Guest: Steffi Rox

JD: Here in Canada, we've been carrying around that plasticky new money for a while. But what few realized, until now, is that those polymer bills are made with trace amounts of animal fat. It started yesterday, when the Bank of England admitted that its new five-pound notes contain tallow - which is of course derived from beef. And yesterday, we got word from the Bank of Canada that tallow is used in the production process, so our bills may contain the animal product as well. That has some vegans upset.
Steffi Rox is a British vegan who first Tweeted about the issue. We reached her in Torquay, England.

CO: Steffi, what did you think when you heard that Canada's money is also made with some animal fat?

STEFFI ROX: I can't believe that you've got the same issue. It sounds like it might be a world-wide thing. I know there are some other countries that have polymer notes. I don’t know if they have the same issue too.

CO: And tell us why you object to the polymer bills that you have in the UK being made with tallow?

SR: Well as a vegan, you know, we go against anything that contains unnecessary animal products. So certainly that tallow is in our new bank notes. We’ve only had them here for about two months so they’re a brand new thing. Finding out that it’s in them is really upsetting for us, and that we weren’t told about it as well. You know, we see most products around us we can avoid quite easily. Bank notes are slightly hard to avoid. They’re an everyday thing that we need in our lives.

CO: Just briefly, what is tallow? What part of an animal is that made from?

SR: It usually comes from cows. It’s animal fat. It can come from pigs, but more often it’s from cows.

CO: We spoke with the bank of Canada yesterday and they said that it’s only 1 percent of the additives added to the bills, or the substance of the bills, only 1 percent is tallow. A very small amount. Is that really a problem?

SR: It is, yeah. I think, for me it's not the amount, it’s just the fact that it’s there. And in some ways also, the fact it's such a minuscule amount, in a way it can make it a little bit worse, because you think well, it's not an essential ingredient. If it’s so small, why did you have to use that ingredient, whereas I’ve since found out there are other ingredients that could do the same thing but they’re slightly more expensive, from what I've read.

CO: And do you know what purpose the tallow plays in the mix of the bills?

SR: I believe from what I've read it's anti-static for the notes. So, something that I think is not that essential.

CO: Well I guess, if you're like me and you've accidentally turned over a couple of these stuck together, these polymer bills, I guess, maybe there’s reasons to try and find ways of keeping them sort of from sticking together.

SR: Yeah I suppose so. I mean you are obviously a lot more used to them than we are. I’ve never had more than one at a time because they are just so new. And only our five pound notes have been changed so far. So we’re still just getting used to them.

CO: Now give us a sense of the reaction there has been since you revealed this quality of the polymer bills since you put it out on Twitter in the U.K.

SR: It's been absolutely crazy. I'd no idea that people are going to pay attention to my tweet. I simply tweeted to the bank asking if it was true and they responded. I've been getting so many people contact me. Some people think it's silly, and you know, why do vegans care, why would anybody care what vegans think? But a petition has been started and in two days it's been over a hundred thousand signatures against this ingredient in the notes. So there are a lot of people that really don’t want it in there, not just vegans, vegetarians. I mean, we’re a nation of animal lovers supposedly. So there’s going to be other people who are unhappy. Just think, why is there dead animal in our money. We just don’t want it if it can be avoided. It’s big news here, it’s in every national newspaper at the moment. The story of our corpse cash as we call it.

CO: We tweeted yesterday when we learned from our own bank of Canada of Canada that it's also made with tallow and immediately a huge response here. So obviously it matters to a lot of people.

SR: Definitely. Definitely. I mean there’s religious groups that aren’t happy about it as well. Over here, some of the Hindu groups are speaking out against it now they’ve found out about it. I think part of it is the fact that nobody was told about it in advance. So people felt like they were a little bit deceived as well.

CO: Now you have had, as you point out, there are people who say, get over it, why are you so sensitive. Many products have traces, everything from marshmallows to cell phones has maybe a bit of animal product in it. So does it matter? I mean is this so hard to avoid? And now of course, nothing more ubiquitous than your currency. How do you how do you avoid that?

SR: Well I mean in day to day life, it's relatively easy to avoid most things with animal products. You either choose not to use them or there’s usually an alternative. Like with candles for example, I know fancy shops where I can get vegan candles. I’ll just go to those. There are things which are much harder to avoid like mobile phones, cars, I mean I need a car to get to work. I try and use the most vegan car I can. I mean I don’t have leather interiors, I use vegan tires. But there are still components in the car that aren’t vegan and then there's nothing I can do about that. So there's all sorts of hidden animal products in things. But as vegans, we’re pretty good at researching things and avoiding them wherever possible. There's always something which comes out and surprises you.

CO: But how will you avoid your currency?

SR: Well that's the problem. At the moment, it's not too hard. Only our five pound note is the polymer note, so we can either use our coins or our cards to pay. But next year they're going to be bringing ten and 20 pound notes that's the same material. So that's when it becomes really hard. We are hoping that the bank will take a step back and potentially look at changing this ingredient in them. Whether they will, whether it's too late, whether they care enough about what we say is yet to be seen. They’ve not made any statements regarding it since responding to my tweet.

CO: Well I’ll be anxious to see how people here respond to the news. And Steffi, I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

SR: No problem at all. So thank you very much.

CO: Bye bye.

SR: Bye.

JD: Steffi Rox is a vegan. We reached her in Torquay, England. The Bank of Canada declined our request for an interview. A statement from the Bank said it followed up with the company that produces its notes, and they are investigating further. You can read more on this story on our website: cbc.ca/AIH.

[Music]

Dateline: Closing Time

JD: Dateline, Forest Grove, Oregon.

[Music]

JD: The call came to police on a Saturday night. A homeowner was in the midst of an altercation with a perpetrator we'll call 'The Whistler.'
We're calling him 'The Whistler' because he was whistling. And we're calling him a perpetrator because of what he was whistling: 'Closing Time' – that Semisonic earworm with lyrics about closing time at a bar, and who will go home with whom.
When the Music Crimes Unit, a.k.a. the police, arrived on the scene, the homeowner described an audio-attack that had taken place: the man, who may or may not have been intoxicated, walked past her house, forcing his music on everyone in earshot.
And it didn't take long for the keen-eared cops to make their collar. The Whistler was just a little further on, still blowing out 'Closing Time,' and complaining about being told to "shut up."
In the end, no charges were laid and the man simply whistled on home.
Asked for comment Captain Mike Harb would only say, "It's not clear if the caller would have been more or less upset if it was a different genre, or whether it was just the talent lacking in the whistling."

Part 2: Ohio State student, border journalist

Ohio State student

Guest: Kevin Stankiewicz

JEFF DOUGLAS: Since Monday, students and faculty at Ohio State University has been in shock. Monday morning, a grey Honda sedan hopped a curb on campus, drove straight into a group of people. The driver got out, attacked people in the crowd with a butcher knife. Before he was shot dead by campus police, the assailant injured eleven people.
The attacker was later identified as an 18-year-old Ohio State student, Abdul Razak Ali Artan. It turns out that Mr. Artan had been interviewed by the campus newspaper, The Lantern, just three months earlier.
Kevin Stankiewicz wrote that story. He's a journalism student and we reached him in Columbus.

CO: Kevin how did you learn that Abdul Artan, the student you had interviewed in the summer, was the attacker on your campus on Monday?

KEVIN STANKIEWICZ: I was on the scene reporting for the newspaper. Just as soon as we heard the sirens, I was there. So it had been about two or three hours of me reporting, and then I got a phone call from one of my journalism professors, and she had mentioned that there were media reports that Abdul was the attacker. And some outlets were citing sources and she gave me a call because she didn't want me to find out in any other way. She just wanted to let me know that this person who you spoke to was you know reportedly this attacker that has shaken the entire campus. So she wanted me to hear it directly from her.

CO: And you did learn that he was. How did you react when you figured out it was truly this man with whom you had had this interview?

KS: It was just a very overwhelming thing to hear that I had talked to, you know, not only did this attack that we not expect happen on my campus, the fact that I knew the attacker and had reported on him, the… sort of just the swirl of emotions only intensified a little bit. It had been a really hard day as a reporter and as a student, and then have you know, another layer of connection to the incident was certainly overwhelming.

CO: And what you learned is that, well, what you were covering, was that this this man this driver who had hopped the curb with his car, driven into a crowd of students, injuring a number of them, got out of his car with a butcher knife, began to slash at them, and he himself was shot dead by campus police. And then you learn that this is the man with whom you'd had a very thoughtful interview just months earlier.

KS: Yeah exactly. The interview was engaging and thoughtful, and at that time I thought it was a really important conversation that we shared. And I hadn't given too much thought again [unintelligible] except the initial days as it was published. And then to have to recall the conversation and think about all the things that he said in this context of Monday's event, it was an overwhelming experience and kind of just a swirl of emotion.

CO: The assignment you had in September was to speak with students who are just arriving on campus and you chose Mr. Artan. How did you come to interview him?

KS: It was the beginning of a weekly installment in the paper, so we were going to do it once every week, where I went out and spoke with a student who was on campus and just tried to share their story. So this was the first week, it was the first in class, and kind of the way I crossed on that campus I was leaving my off campus house where Abdul was sitting, ways was pretty much right after I got onto campus. And I was looking for someone who was alone and didn’t look like they were too busy or you know doing homework or talking with a friend. You know, I didn't want to interrupt anybody. So I just saw him sitting at the table alone. And I kind of explained to him what I was doing and he you know he was really welcoming. And at first he was a little bit surprised because I mean, who wouldn't be, when someone with a camera comes up to you and you know, asked to take their picture and talk, but he obliged and we spoke for 20 minutes.

CO: And what did he tell you about himself, about his life? Because he’d only recently come to the United States as a refugee. What did he tell you about his life in his United States and being a student?

KS: He spoke to me in great detail about his life, and he mentioned his time in Pakistan. And him leaving his native Somalia. He spoke to me at great length and in great detail, and he mentioned coming to the United States. I mean they first arrived in Dallas, and then came to Columbus which has a very vibrant Somali population. And his time at the community college for two years it then you know at this point, we came to him coming to Ohio State, and he'd mentioned that he did not know if there was a prayer room on campus. So he just expressed to me fear for praying on campus. You know, it being his first day, he just didn't know what the climate was like. He was able to tick off examples of Islamophobia to me. And he spoke about the way that he thought Islam was misrepresented in the media and that led to his fear of praying openly.

CO: Did he seem angry at all? Did he seem that he might have a violent disposition?

KS: No not at all. Really really not at all. He was super soft spoken and his tone and his tenor throughout the entire conversation. It didn't change. There was nothing sort of… anger... you know, the deep frustration that he expressed to me. It was really just a thoughtful kind of dialogue throughout.

CO: And yet, here he is just three months later. Allegedly, he's written a Facebook posting before he goes out in the car. He said that he has reached a boiling point over the U.S. treatment of Muslims. How do you square those two people? Can they be the same person in your mind?

KS: You know, when I spoke with him on August 23^rd, he shared a part of his story at that moment with me. The person who I talked to on August 23^rd was not the same person on Monday. On Monday, he wrote a new chapter in his story. Something happened between then and now that led to that terror and just really tragic events that happened at my campus on Monday.

CO: Do you have any regrets that you that you had this feature interview with him?

KS: No there's absolutely no regret at all. I think if anything, I hope what he said helps people understand a little bit more. But I definitely don't have any regrets. There's no way to foretell that anything could happen. And at the time I was just doing, you know, what I thought was, you know, the right thing to do. And tell the story of students on campus. I have no regrets over it. But I do, of course, I'm sad that what happened on Monday. Just you never imagine that. You get up and I started walking in class and I was the last thing I thought would happen. But I definitely don't have any regrets over what was published in August. I hope it added something to the conversation.

CO: Well Kevin I appreciate your insights. Thank you.

KS: Thank you very much, Carol.

CO: Bye bye.

KS: Bye bye.

JD: Kevin Stankiewicz is an Ohio State University journalism student. We reached him in Columbus.

[Music]

Question Period: pipelines

JD: As you heard on our program yesterday, the decisions are in. Yes, Yes, No.
The federal government gave the go ahead to two of three pipeline projects. Yes to Line 3. Yes also to the controversial Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. The government rejected the Northern Gateway pipeline proposal.
The Conservative Party has been pushing for the approvals. So, today, in Question Period, instead of claiming a win or celebrating the two Yeses, opposition leader Rona Ambrose asked why the government rejected Northern Gateway. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stood to defend his government's decisions. Here's what it sounded like:

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Applause]

SPEAKER: Right Honourable Prime Minister.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: Mr. Speaker. Yesterday's announcement demonstrated that in one year we were able to do what ten years of the previous government was unable to do. We were left on the sole commitment to both grow the economy and protect the environment at the same time, and that's exactly what we've done. By doing this, by demonstrating that we've listened to Canadians, we understand their concerns, both about jobs and about the future, but also about protecting the environment for generations to come. We acted in a way that was consistent with what Canadians have been asking for.

SPEAKER: The Honourable Leader of the Opposition.

RONA AMBROSE: Mr. Speaker, what the prime minister did yesterday was deny hope and opportunity to thousands of young aboriginal Canadians. [Sound: Applause, groans] He had a choice but he made a political decision at their expense. To take Gateway off the table even as an option to move our resources when we need as many options as we can get. The 31 First Nations and Metis Equity Partners in Gateway have said that they are shocked and disappointed at his decision. They wanted to see consultations continue. So how can the Prime Minister justify killing good jobs for young Aboriginal Canadians.

[Sound: Applause]

VOICES: Here, here.

SPEAKER: Right Honourable Prime Minister.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: The fact of the matter is, that the party opposite has never understood that the way to build a strong future is by both protecting the environment and creating good jobs. The fact that they have never understood that those two things go together is why they are flailing about for things to say today when we got done what they were unable to do for 10 years.

JD: That was Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responding to a question from interim Conservative Interim Leader, Rona Ambrose during Question Period earlier today.

[Music]

Border journalist

Guest: Ed Ou

JD: Ed Ou has travelled the world for his work. And the award-winning Canadian photojournalist knows what it's like to be detained on the job. He's been detained by authorities in Somalia, Bahrain and Egypt. But Mr. Ou wasn't expecting problems when travelling to the United States.
The CBC had assigned him to cover the protests in Standing Rock over the Dakota Access Pipeline on October 1st. He didn't make it past the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol at the Vancouver Airport. We reached Ed Ou in Arviat, Nunavut earlier today.

CO: Ed, what was your assignment when you headed across the U.S. border?

ED OU: I was on the way to cover Standing Rock for the CBC.

CO: And Standing Rock, this is of course in North Dakota. This is a Native American community that has been protesting against a pipeline. So that's was your assignment. And what happened when you tried to go through customs?

EO: I flew from Vancouver, Canada, or was trying to fly from Vancouver, Canada. And immediately when I put my passport, my Nexus cards through the booth, I got directed to secondary. For me, I’ve been working in the Middle East for the last 10 years. So this is quite normal.

CO: So people understand, you have… you’re extensively travelled. We're talking about the Middle East you've been, and you've been to Turkey, through Egypt, Somalia, Djibouti, Yemen, Bahrain. You've been covering stories all over the world. You have been back and forth across the border with the United States. And you have this Nexus card, and this Nexus card is something usually, it's a prior security clearance, isn't it? So you had that as well.

EO: Yeah. And so I was taken to secondary and one of the first questions they asked me is, you know, when was the last time you were in Iraq? What were you where are you planning on doing in Standing Rock? And so I was very forthcoming because as a journalist especially, working in the Middle East, a lot of the time we have to be careful what we say, because journalism is mostly not allowed in a lot of places in the Middle East. But being in the U.S., I figured, you know, this is a democratic country, this is somewhere about respects privacy and journalists and respect for freedom of the press. And so I was very straight forward. I told them I'm going to Standing Rock to cover these protests. You know I told them basically everything, like what I've done as a journalist, and they gave me a list of every country I’d traveled to the last five years. And they told me to fill in everywhere I'd been and why I had been to all these places. But I was very straight forward, because everything that I've done as a journalist, every trip I've made, every place I've been to, can be corroborated by a Google search of a story. So really I have nothing to hide.

CO: And had you had you ever had this experience before? Where you've been asked to detail every place you'd been and to start saying what you had done there?

EO: This does happen quite a bit when I travel, because my passport is usually full of a lot of stamps from places in the Middle East or East Africa etc. Now most of the time I’m very straight forward about what I've been doing because I really have nothing to hide.

CO: But now, this was different. Tell us in what way things were different in this trip.

EO: After going through my history, they asked me to open up my cell phones to them. They said, you know, like we just want to make sure that you're not posing next to any dead body.

CO: They asked you, you wanted to see if there's photos of you posing with dead bodies? What is that a reference to?

EO: I don't know, and they asked me that, and the first thing I thought of was one of my colleagues James Foley, who was very brutally executed by ISIS. At first I thought that's like, the reference. They wanted to make sure that I wasn't, you know, going to the Middle East to participate in extremist activities. But I told them that you know, respectfully, as a journalist I have a duty to my sources to protect them, just as a lawyer would have the responsibility to protect their client’s information, or a doctor would have a responsibility to protect their patient’s information. So I told them, you know, I understand that this is for security, but at the same time, I cannot do that.

CO: And what did you have on the phone as it might be sensitive?

EO: I had contacts of translators that I would use in places like Ukraine or Turkey or Yemen, correspondences with subjects who are activists in the Middle East. If any government has access to them, that information could be shared with other intelligence agencies. These agencies could be in authoritarian countries that would target people who they considered to be dissidents, or you know the U.S. could use a lot of information about the subject I have for any number of purposes.

CO: So you shut down your phones and you locked them?

EO: Before I cross any border, I turn off all my cell phones anyway. So the act of turning off your phone makes it so that they cannot access the data inside. So then the only thing that the border security people can do is to compel you to open them up and that's when I refused. They did take out my SIM cards and it`s unknown what they could have gotten with that. But even with your SIM card, they can find out quite a bit about you.

CO: And also, not just your phones, they took your notebooks away. What did they do with them?

EO: Yes. So they went through everything that I had on me. You know they told me that at the border they have the access to search, retain copy, and go through everything that you bring on you. And so they went through my reporter's notebook. They went through my clipboards with different things I had on me, they went through my expenses, and most of all they went through my journal. They read personal notes I’d written. That's something that is… that they can do.

CO: And then after all this, were you allowed across the border?

EO: No I wasn't. So I was there for quite some time and they… eventually, after lots of interrogation, they said that I might be on a person of interest list and I was being denied entry. And when I pressed them further and asked why, they said we don't have to tell you why. This is our choice. So I’ve told them like, look this is a clear violation of press freedom. You know, I'm a journalist going to cover a story.

CO: Your case has captured the attention of groups in the United States like the American Civil Liberties Union, the Columbia Journalism Review. What makes your experience so alarming to them?

EO: Well I think what worries a lot of these organizations for journalists, and journalists like myself, and you, is that if the U.S. can take the information from your cell phones and all your belongings, that's a very dangerous precedent for the rest of the world, for authoritarian countries to be able to have licence to do the same thing.

CO: And do they think this is something that we're going to see more of? Is this something that they believe is a new trend?

EO: I think it's very troubling. In the last few years, government agencies have been given very sweeping powers to spy on its own citizens, to spy on foreign countries including Canada. What's even more troubling is that the new administration has already demonstrated quite a distain for the press. But I think this has been a systematic effort to collect journalists’ and private citizens’ data for quite some time. This trend has started and I don't think it'll get any better?

CO: All right and we will try and get some answers or see if we can find out more about this. I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

EO: Thank you so much.

JD: Ed Ou is a Canadian photojournalist. He was detained and then denied entry to the U.S. by U.S. Customs and Border Protection while on assignment for the CBC. Today we reached him in Arviat, Nunavut.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection sent us a statement. While they do not comment on individual cases, the CBP does confirm that all international travelers are subject to inspection. The agency says it conducted more than 4-thousand cell phone inspections in the fiscal year of 2015, which represents a tiny fraction of all travellers.

[Music]

Red Cross

JD: Little sis to the rescue. Ten-year-old Gabrielle MacDonald was swimming with her 13-year-old brother, Nick, last summer at a popular swimming hole near Grand Falls-Windsor, Newfoundland. She saved his life. And last night, she was honoured for that act.
The City of St. John's and the provincial branch of the Red Cross presented her with an award. CBC reporter Jeremy Eaton was there, and he spoke with Gabrielle.

SOUNDCLIP

GABRIELLE MACDONALD: So we decided to go swimming and there was a waterfall there and we made a slide out of it. And when Nick… Nick slid down and he couldn’t touch the bottom. And then the undercurrent took him out. So it created a whirlpool and was sucking him down and he screamed for help. So I looked at my brother, I looked at my mom and I just swam towards him, and the way they taught us, we put our foot out and then we go like that. And that brings us to him. But I didn't really know what to do. Plus I was only 10 and my brother could die. So I didn't care I just went head first. So once I got to Nick, he pushed me under, and he pulled me back up and went under again. So I threw his arms on my shoulders and I swam him to shore.

JEREMY EATON: When you saw your brother panicking, I guess is what they call it, in the water, were you scared at all? How did you feel when you saw your brother like that?

GM: I didn't feel anything. It happened so quickly. I didn’t really have time to have a feeling or anything. It just happened. What happened.

JE: What happened after that? Do you remember?

GM: Well about 45 minutes later, actually, I was still in shock. I was just thinking in my head like, did that actually happen? And I looked at my mom and I started to bawl and I was like did that really just happen? Did I save Nick?

JE: And what did your mom say to you? Do you remember?

GM: She was like, yes you did it. It’s all OK.

JE: You were just given a pretty big award here today by the city of St. Johns and the Canadian Red Cross here in Newfoundland and Labrador. How did you feel to get that lifesaving award here tonight?

GM: I was really nervous. But besides that, happy.

JE: So will you continue to keep swimming? And you know do you want to become a lifeguard someday?

GM: Definitely. It's a really easy and fun job, especially teaching little kids, ‘cause I could end up helping someone save a life. And we live on an island, so we ever sink, it’s going to be kind of hard to get off if you don't know how to swim. What if there's not enough boats? They should know how to swim, not even just kids, all parents too.

JD: Yes indeed. Ten year-old Gabrielle MacDonald speaking with CBC reporter Jeremy Eaton in St. John's last night. Gabrielle was presented with an award from the City and the Red Cross for saving the life of her 13-year-old brother, Nick.

Part 3: Halifax gun violence, Missing sheep court, Ugly Christmas tree

Question Period: CBC funding

JEFF DOUGLAS: Hubert Lacroix has got them talking in Ottawa. The CBC President and CEO was on the program last night answering questions about his plan to take the public broadcaster out of the ad business. Mr. Lacroix says that without selling ads, the CBC would be more free to take risks and truly serve Canadians. But those ads bring in a lot of money, and Mr. Lacroix wants Ottawa to make up for the shortfall.
And that had Rona Ambrose on her feet in Question Period today. Here's what the Conservative's Interim Leader had to say.

SOUNDCLIP

RONA AMBROSE: Mr. Speaker, the CBC receives more than a billion dollars a year from taxpayers. And now they're looking for an extra four hundred million a year. That would need another forty-six dollars for every man, woman, and child in this country. Money that Canadians cannot afford. We're already 30 billion dollars in deficit and we cannot afford to keep spending. So will the Prime Minister assure Canadian families that they won't be on the hook for this. Do the right thing and just say no.

[Sound: applause]

SPEAKER: Right Honourable Prime Minister.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: Once again, Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives are demonstrating that they don't understand the importance of cultural industries, of artists, of creators, not just to Canadian identity, but to growing the economy. The fact is, investing in the stories that bind us together as a nation in both official languages, ensuring that Canadians understand each other's lives and experiences is at the heart of the mandate of the CBC. And listening to Canadians is exactly why we are on this side of the house and they are stuck in opposition.

[Sound: Applause]

JD: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Interim Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose in the House this afternoon.

[Music]

Halifax gun violence

Guest: Lana MacLean

JD: Members of the Black community in Halifax say they are living through a "public health emergency." There have been 12 homicides in the city so far this year. Seven victims were young Black men, including three who were shot to death this month alone. On Monday, the African United Baptist Association held a community meeting about the violence.
Lana MacLean is a social worker and sits on the Social Action Committee of the African United Baptist Association of Nova Scotia. We reached Ms. MacLean in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Maclean, what are you asking for from the city of Halifax and the government of Nova Scotia?

LANA MACLEAN: We are asking for the province of Nova Scotia and for the city of Halifax to consider it and respond to the recent gun violence as a public health matter.

CO: And why do you think it's is a public health issue?

LM: Because the impact that the recent gun violence has had not just on the lives and the loss of seven young African Nova Scotian me, but the impact that it’s had from a trickle down approach, in terms of the children, the community, the parents. And if we look at gun violence from an American lens, for example the American Pediatric Association, the public health administration, all consider gun violence a public health matter which requires a response from government at all levels to be more collaborative and much more broad lensed in its response instead of just looking at it as an issue of justice or criminality.

CO: You had 150 people from 19 churches who gathered at your meeting to discuss this, and you had people affected by the gun violence who were at this gathering. What were they telling you?

LM: So we had people who are churched there, and people who are non-churched, but all people from the African Nova Scotian community in the metro area, and some from outside. And the sense in the room was that we needed to have a candid conversation about what is happening in the community, and we needed to have an opportunity to talk about that in a real place in time, that we could express our sympathies, our hurts, our harms, and more importantly to look at how much trauma the community is under over the last you know least 20 years, where there's been a prevalence and a significant impact on the lives of African Nova Scotians.

CO: Did they tell stories about how this is affecting them, these shootings?

LM: Absolutely. We've heard people are afraid to go out of their homes. Folks are really concerned about the mental health and the mental wellness of the children, and the amount of anxiety children are experiencing. You have seniors talking about feeling overwhelmed and helpless. Not knowing how to support their loved ones, you know, not feeling safe in their communities. And more importantly, the lack of response by the province and municipality to meeting the needs in a strategic and culturally informed way, instead of the deafening silence of their voices on the health and wellness of our black community.

CO: In a community the size of Halifax, to have so many homicides in a year, 12 homicides is a large number. To have one particular community, the black community, have seven of those gun deaths in their case, is extraordinary. So what do you know more about? Who is doing this? What are the causes of this? What are we learning about who the perpetrators are and what the causes are?

LM: Well therein lies the issue, Carol. We're not finding very much. We know that the police don't even have some information that they can share, whether or not there are linkages or threads. The only common thread that the community can actually identify is that these are young black men who are victims of gun violence, and that gun violence has had a significant impact on the community. So we're in a process of still investigation, I think, from the lens of the justice or policing. And from the community's lens, the only thing we can see that is common is that there are young black men under the age of 30 and when we look from a public health lens, when people are prematurely dying, that is a major significant concern.

CO: I mean, are they targeted these men?

LM: You know the stories in the community are different. Some folks would say yes, some folks would say this, you know one of the gentlemen who died was an accidental death. It was not meant for him to be hurt or harmed he just happened to be the wrong place wrong time wrong door. So there seems to be some kind of connection. Demographically we can only suggest that, you know, in a city the size of Halifax, in a community where people are intimately connected, these young men may know of each other. But I can only hypothesize about the relationship. And are police solving these crimes? Are they arresting people? To my knowledge, for the last seven gun violence incidents, there has been one potential arrest I believe, and that was in the Jeffries case, the young gentleman who died. The other ones, they remain unsolved. There are several, not just the seven recent shootings, but there's a litany of young black men over the past number of years in this province, who have died due to gun violence, that those murders remain unsolved. All one needs to do is go to the Halifax Regional Police website and see the list of unsolved murders, and you'll see a numerous number of black male faces.

CO: Your call for a public health response to this. How would that make things different?

LM: You know, we're suggesting that it would make things different because it would take a global perspective that is larger to look at the implications and the root causes from the systemic issues that impact on the lives of people of African descent. The impacts around early adverse childhood events, or on early childhood development, and we can look at where some of the contagions that allow for the violence to happen, from a systemic lens. And look at ways that we can treat, not just from a mental health perspective, because the impact on radicalized communities also connects to the systemic issue of racism and systemic issues globally.

CO: And what response have you had from the city of Halifax or the government of Nova Scotia?

LM: At the present time, the response has been mute. I do understand Mayor Savage has publicly stated that he is waiting for the community to give some response and direction. But why are you looking at us? We're in the middle of this traumatic event to solve the problem and give you, you know, a course of redress. We have asked for things, you know, looking at a crisis team or mental health practitioners to come in to support the families and the children. These are symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. So people are in the middle of emotional crises. They don't always have the answers to vet to government to solve the problem.

CO: We will be following this story. Ms. Maclean, I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

LM: Thank you.

JD: Lana MacLean is a social worker and is also on the Social Action Committee of the African United Baptist Association. We reached her in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

[Music]

CIA chief

JD: "Disastrous." That, in a word, is how the head of the CIA describes any decision to abandon the nuclear pact reached last year between Iran and six world powers… including the U.S.
US President-elect Donald Trump campaigned on a promise to tear up the deal… referring to it repeatedly as one of the "worst deals ever made." But in an interview with the BBC that aired today, outgoing CIA director John Brennan warned the incoming administration not to tear up the agreement. Here's more of what he had to say about it.

SOUNDCLIP

JOHN BRENNAN: First of all, for one administration to tear up an agreement their previous administration made would be almost unprecedented. And then it could lead to a weapons program inside of Iran that could lead other states in the region to embark on their own programs. So I think it would be the height of folly if the next administration were to tear up that agreement.
If they're not disciplined and the language that they use, the messages that they send, their language will be exploited by the terrorist extremist organizations, as a way to portray the United States and the government as being anti-Islamic, and we’re not.

JD: Outgoing director of the CIA, John Brennan, in an interview that aired on BBC Radio 4's Today program.

[Music]

From Our Archives: All Families Equal legislation

JD: Family Day came and went months ago, but for a number of Ontario families who have been waiting for years, Family Day has only just arrived.
The All Families Are Equal Act passed unanimously yesterday in the Ontario legislature. And it marks a major milestone for same-sex couples and other parents who have to rely on donors, or surrogates, to have children.
It means they will no longer have to adopt their own children to be recognized as parents in the eyes of the law.
Back in May, we spoke with Raquel Grand, the mother of two daughters. She told Carol what the absence of such a law meant for her when her wife Deanna became pregnant… and when she herself later become pregnant with their second child.

SOUNDCLIP

RAQUEL GRAND: Well it was actually pretty psychologically stressful. I mean, when my partner first gave birth to our eldest daughter four years ago, it was the same as it is today. No recognition for me as a parent legally. When she gave birth, she ended up having a very difficult birth and she was hemorrhaging for quite a few hours afterward, and I ended up standing on the side of the hospital room watching her bleeding, passing in and out of consciousness holding this little girl, and realizing I might have to raise her on my own. And then the thought occurred to me that I wasn't even legally her parent. Do they even let you walk into the hospital with a child that's not legally yours? You know my wife recovered and everything is great. But at that moment in time we were in a legal limbo.

CO: And what did you do about that legal limbo?

RG: Well afterwards, even though my wife was, you know, recommended bed rest for weeks, she bled a lot, her iron levels were low and she was very anemic, we ended up basically pulling her out of bed anyways, to go across town to talk to lawyers and get the legal adoption of my daughter under way.

CO: That's what you had to do to adopt your daughter.

RG: Yeah I adopted her at the cost of thousands of dollars that I would have rather started an RESP for her. But instead I had to spend thousands of dollars to make my daughter legally my daughter. To this day she has the word “adopted” written on her birth certificate. And, you know, I went through this a second time when I gave birth to my second daughter, and we ended up in the EU for a few days because she was born with breathing problems at first. You know, it was a very stressful time, and while I should have been concentrating on her health and nothing else, I once again had to think of the fact that one of us was not the legal parent of our child.

JD: That was Raquel Grand speaking with Carol back in May. Yesterday, the All Families Are Equal Act passed in the Ontario legislature, meaning parents like Ms. Grand no longer have to adopt their own children.

[Music]

Missing sheep court

Guest: Montana Jones

JD: When Montana Jones left a courthouse in Newmarket yesterday, a woolly Shropshire sheep was outside the building to greet her. The Ontario shepherd just won a six-year legal fight. But the win is bittersweet.
It all began with Ms. Jones’ flock of Shropshire sheep. They were slated for government slaughter, because they were suspected of carrying a deadly brain disease called scrapie.
But when the Canadian Food Inspection Agency came to round up the sheep, the flock had vanished from Ms. Jones' farm.
Carol spoke to Montana Jones at the time. Here's a clip from our interview, in April 2012.

SOUNDCLIP

CO: Ms. Jones, where are your sheep?

MONTANA JONES: I don't know. I do know that they're not on route to the abattoir. I guess by now they would have been killed by now. Obviously, I'm glad they're still alive, but I have no idea. They did leave a note…

CO: The sheep didn't… but who left the note?

MJ: I went down this morning to do the chores. We were ready to have the rally today to see if I was due here at 8:30. As soon as the sun was up, went down. They're not there.

JD: The sheep were eventually located, and slaughtered. And Ms. Jones was later charged with conspiracy over the sheep-napping case. Yesterday, those charges were thrown out. We reached Montana Jones in Hastings, Ontario.

CO: Ms. Jones do you feel like this legal saga over your flock of sheep is finally behind you?

MJ: I would like to think so, but I also have a sense of feeling that there is another shoe that might drop. So I don't know… I am, you know, a huge sense of relief I have. But at the same time, you know, we may, Michael Schmidt, myself, and my lawyer Sean Buckley, we were very much geared up to go to court.

CO: Michael Schmidt was your co-accused, and so do you feel… so over the seven years, do you feel that that you wanted your day in court? Even though you were the one who was going to be facing the charges?

MJ: Oh absolutely. Because of all of the… you know, I suggested from the beginning that they had misidentified my sheep, and then it wasn't until years and years later when we learned that CFIA also, from the very beginning, was not certain that it was my sheep.

CO: You're referring to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, which was the agency that was pressing these charges against you, and this was an internal e-mail that suggested that maybe your sheep didn't have this disease called scrapie. Is that right?

MJ: That's correct. And the judge, even she seemed to be chastising or questioning the crown fairly heavily about why it took so long to get the specific e-mails that were requested.

CO: And this one in particular was in that group, and it changed the game, really, of the whole of the whole defence, and it confirmed what I had thought all along. This is the judge, ultimately, throughout the case, because it took so long coming to trial, and that was… getting this evidence was difficult to get, wasn't it?

MJ: Well she had several reasons and I mean she has actually a 13-page decision that she's printed, and not just the delay, but it was also, she was not convinced that it was my sheep originally in the first place. The crown was trying to say it didn't make a difference whether it was my sheep or not. The charges that were before the court were conspiracy, and obstructing a CFIA officer, and the judge kept coming back to repeat back to the crown that Ms. Jones’ sheep was not the infected scrapie sheep. And I think her exact words were, “then everything that flows from there is bad.”

CO: Now, when we last spoke with you on the issue, I mean, your sheep were nowhere to be found. That sheep had been ordered slaughtered, and they were gone. What happened to the sheep?

MJ: They turned up several months later. I think it was mid-June, on a farm about five hours from here, in Grey County. They did end up killing all of them. They also killed the newborns, and the remaining pregnant ones. When they did do post-mortem testing, every one tested negative for scrapie.

CO: I just want to get to some of the other things that were involved in this case against you. The animals when we spoke with you, the animals had disappeared, you said you'd had no idea where they were. There was a handwritten letter left at your farm saying “we have taken the animals into protective custody until an alternative to killing has been found or a clear evidence that the disease has been proven.” But you were charged with being part of that part of that, charged with conspiracy. So you still maintain that you had no idea what had happened to the sheep until you got this… until you learned that it was on the farm.

MJ: I had no idea who took them. I had no idea where they were. I was glad, very glad that they at least weren't being killed that day. I did know at the eleventh hour before it happened, that a group of farmers who were very concerned about you know the overreach with the government, and the fact that these were rare genetics that that were about to be destroyed without any proof of disease. So I did know at the eleventh hour that they were going to liberate them. But I didn't know where they were, I didn't know who they were. I didn't know where they took them. And you know what? And I still don't know.

CO: And I know, you've been through a great deal, and this has been quite a legal battle for you with the food inspection agency. But the agency is there to protect the public. Do you dispute that? Do you dispute that they have a role agriculture?

MJ: Absolutely they have a role. And I don't even, you know, I don't dispute that you know the scrapie eradication program is an important program. I casually estimate that they've spent over a million on this in the last seven years. We had over forty thousand pages of disclosure. When you factor in all of the government agencies that were involved, as the judge pointed out, you know, there was something like 14 homicides she was ready to reschedule. And she didn't think it served the public's interest to be having like tying up the courts with a six week trial for four sheep.

CO: What effect is this had on you? This legal battle and the whole losing your sheep? What is the toll it's taken on you and your business.

MJ: It has absolutely taken… I mean, I've had zero farm income since January of 2010 and I've just been kind of limping through this you know trying to make it to the next month. Certainly the worst toll has been with health, with mental health issues arising from dealing with all of it. You know just trying to make sense of it all. Because you think… well you know, when I think of what it is… it is an irony. The whole symbolism of sheep you know being good and wholesome and pure, and then the number of people’s lives that have been affected by this in a negative way. It is not just me, you know, it's everybody that's been involved in this. It's been a very long, arduous, emotional, and frustrating seven years.

CO: We will leave it there. Ms. Jones, I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

MJ: Thank you very much.

CO: Bye bye.

MJ: Bye bye.

JD: Montana Jones is a shepherd in Hastings, Ontario.

[Music]

Ugly Christmas tree

Guest: Sigbard Lundberg

JD: It's a Tannen-bombshell. A little while ago – too early perhaps, but let's not get started on that – the town of Lövånger, Sweden put up its Christmas tree. A tree with some genuine character. A tree with a little personality. A tree that our guest described as, "the ugliest tree that has ever been set up since the introduction of the Christmas tree in 1522."
Sigbard Lundberg made that complaint on Facebook. And he seems to be channeling the disgust of his community. We reached Mr. Lundberg in Lövånger, Sweden.

CO: Can you describe this Christmas tree that's been unveiled in your town?

SIGBARD LUNDBERG: Well the best description I think, this is from a nuclear explosion somewhere.

CO: Oh dear.

SL: So it’s very very awful. The people shaking their heads.

CO: It's very big.

SL: It's very big. Yes. I think it's about eight meters.

CO: And it hasn't got some branches on it, it's missing branches.

SL: Yes. And this seems very sad and lonely as it is. I think this is very sick. I think there must be some illness with the tree. I can't understand. We have millions of trees. It's hard to find a tree that more ugly than this.

CO: You've actually called this the ugliest tree ever been set up since the introduction of the Christmas tree in your town.

SL: Yes, from the year of 1522. That’s our history for four hundred years, at least.

CO: But apparently it had a bit of an accident. It fell badly, lost some branches; it was dragged by a tractor. It's had a rough time arriving at the center of town. Is that what happened?

SL: I'm not sure what has happened. This tree was not OK from the start and then maybe they have… if something has happened on their way to this place. But anyway when they saw how the tree was, when they chop it into a fire wood. I don’t think it’s burned.

CO: But some of the people in your town, there are saying that the tree looks very nice at night when the lights are turned on, when it's dark and you can't see the tree the lights. It holds the lights really well. Can you agree with that?

SL: Yes I do. But I also say, I also look very well when it's dark.

[Sound: Laughter]

SL: It's wrong place to keep that tree. It should be… it’s better if they had no tree there at all.

CO: But don't the children like it?

SL: Oh the Christmas lost meaning. I have… my house is across the road where this tree is. Maybe 60 yards from the tree is my house. I had to close the window, to draw the curtains.

CO: Oh dear. Maybe it's just like Charlie Brown's Christmas tree. Maybe it just needs some love.

SL: Yes, but it needs a lot of love then. It's not possible to restore it.

CO: Not even with love? Not even with some TLC? Some tender loving care? Nothing can restore this tree?

SL: No, it's a dead tree. We have millions of trees here. It’s only to chop down but and put another, I don't understand what the problem is. And the citizens that living here, they don't understand why this tree is chopped down and replace it.

CO: You know there's still a month to go before Christmas. How are you going to cope? How do you put up with that tree for another month if you're so angry about it now?

SL: I'm moving to Norwegian. I have my girlfriend there. So I only have to be here one week and then I more. And after that I’m going to sell my house here, and I'm going to do it straight away.

CO: And I understand you might actually get a chainsaw.

SL: Yes I have a chainsaw. And I called the government and told them I can do it for free and chop it down. Yes.

CO: All right, Sigbard. We'll leave it there. And I hope… I hope you come to find something some place in your heart for that poor old tree.

SL: Thank you.

CO: Bye bye.

JD: Sigvund Lundberg complained that his town's Christmas tree was "the ugliest tree that has ever been set up since the introduction of the Christmas tree." We reached him in Lövånger, Sweden.

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Nov 30, 2016 episode transcript

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