Posts with the Prime Minister tag

Barris Beat

Rights tested half a century ago

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
PM Pierre Trudeau answers questions from reporter Tim Ralphe on Parliament Hill during the October Crisis, 1970.

It was a moment on live television – something considered rare then. The Prime Minister, Justin’s father, moved up the steps to his office on Parliament Hill. Reporters converged and questioned, one of them, Tim Ralphe, more aggressively than the rest. He poked his microphone at Pierre Trudeau and pressed the concern of many in Canada at that moment.

“Sir, what is it with all these men with guns around?” he asked.

The day before, Oct. 12, Trudeau had called for the Canadian Armed Forces to deploy armed troops to protect high-profile locations and individuals in Ottawa and Quebec City.

“Well, there are a lot of bleeding hearts around who just don’t like to see people in helmets and guns,” Trudeau said. “But it is more important to keep law and order in society than to be worried about weak-kneed people.” (more…)

Barris Beat

Tell me, Prime Minister…

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
RCMP Const. Heidi Stevenson at a public- service event in 2020. Cdn Press photo.

On Sunday, April 19, after as excruciating a night of pursuit as any known to her force, I’m sure, RCMP Const. Heidi Stevenson made the toughest decision of her life. She’d heard radio calls from a fellow constable nearby that he’d been shot by a murder suspect looking like an RCMP officer, driving what looked like an RCMP cruiser in Nova Scotia. She must have recognized the object of the all-night manhunt was taking deadly advantage of RCMP insignia to approach innocents and shoot them. She must have decided to at least try to take away that advantage. She spotted the impersonator and took drastic action.

“She rammed him,” Brian Sauvé of the National Police Federation told the Toronto Star, “and probably saved countless lives.”

Not, however, her own.

(more…)

Barris Beat

Keeping our wits about us

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Lucille Ball in her famous “I Love Lucy” chocolate factory episode (1952).

I’d waited patiently – keeping my two metres of distance. Then, I was next in line to cash out at Zehrs. I started placing groceries on the conveyor, and the young cashier began processing my purchases. Problem was, the sensor that stopped the conveyer automatically at the cash register, suddenly failed. My bananas, sour cream, chips and meats all tumbled together onto her code-reader. She couldn’t scan the barcodes fast enough. We both shrugged and took advantage of the moment to smile at the jumble of food. And I couldn’t resist.

“Have you ever heard of Lucille Ball?” I asked, thinking she was far too young to know.

She looked skyward for a second, “Oh, yeah. Sure,” she said. (more…)

Barris Beat

Leadership in our darkest hour

Written by Ted Barris on . 1 Comment
Winston Churchill greets public with signature V-for-Victory signduring Second World War.

It’s come back to me often the past few weeks. It’s the last scene from the movie Darkest Hour. Winston Churchill, just a few weeks into his wartime administration in May 1940, watches across the English Channel as Belgium falls to the Nazis. Then, France falls. Desperately, he entreats thousands of private boat owners in England to retrieve retreating British Army troops – 300,000 of them – from the beaches of Dunkirk. And he contemplates Hitler’s invasion of Britain, delivering in the House of Commons one of many momentous wartime speeches:

“We shall fight on the beaches…” he proclaims. “We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be.” (more…)

Barris Beat

Bridging social distance

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Warning sign posted at Uxbridge Arena, March 16, 2020.

We hadn’t seen each other or talked for a while. I had gone outside Sunday afternoon, partly to get some air, but also to escape the assault of bad news about the coronavirus pandemic. But suddenly this friend dropped by for a visit in my backyard. The conversation was really welcome, but of course it was mostly about things closing, Canadians trying to get home or when this all might end. Eventually I asked how he and his family were doing.

“OK, mostly,” he said, and he then gingerly explained a member of his family had been diagnosed with cancer and was undergoing treatment.

“I’m sorry,” I said. But what I meant was, “Sorry that I let all this global chaos get in the way of caring about you and your family first.” (more…)

Barris Beat

Make it awkward

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Mother Canada sculpture at Vimy Memorial.
Mother Canada sculpture at Vimy Memorial.

The man sat at the back of the audience area through most of my presentation. I spoke, as I usually do in those situations, walking among those in the audience, in this case 30 people seated at about eight tables. My topic was the Battle at Vimy Ridge coming up to the 100th anniversary next year. And I was speaking at a small Ontario fair last weekend. I could see the man was reacting to what I had to say. He frowned a lot and when I’d finished he put up his hand.

“Is it true that all the French-Canadian troops threw their rifles overboard on the way over to France?” he asked.

I paused a second, wondering where he was going with the question. I didn’t want to think there was prejudice involved. “No. I don’t think that’s true, since one of the key regiments at Vimy was the Royal 22nd from Quebec.” (more…)

Barris Beat

The politics where you live

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
When most of this clump of black walnut trees came down, we faced a massive clean-up.
When most of this clump of black walnut trees came down, we faced a massive clean-up.

When it happened, I figured maybe the solution was close by. I wasn’t entirely certain they could or would pitch in, but I thought I’d try to find out. I’d never really gone to them for help before, but I thought this time I would. So, I sat down and wrote a letter to township council.

“The recent rain and wind storm,” I wrote, “battered the township. And among the victims were some of our old-growth trees.”

I went on to request some assistance. (more…)

Barris Beat

Handling the handlers

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment
Toronto mayoral candidates (l-r) Doug Ford, Olivia Chow and John Tory.
Toronto mayoral candidates (l-r) Doug Ford, Olivia Chow and John Tory.

She started looking and listening from the moment she entered the room. Almost as if she were a bomb-sniffing canine, she was casing the space in which Olivia Chow was about to participate in a mayoral debate, Monday evening. I was the moderator and introduced myself. She had a raft of questions about where Ms. Chow would be sitting during the debate, and what the order of speaking would be. Then, just before her candidate entered the room, the handler approached me with one final question.

“How will Olivia know when her speaking time is up?” the woman asked me. “Have you got signs to count her down to the end of her time?”

“No.” I said. “I’ll just tell her she’s got 30 seconds left.”

“I really think you ought to have visual signs for her,” she insisted.

“Don’t worry. I’ve moderated a lot of debates. I don’t think we need visual signals. I’ll just find an appropriate moment, a breath pause in Olivia’s comments, and I’ll gently say, ‘Thirty seconds.’ It should work just fine.” (more…)

Barris Beat

Paving over peach paradise

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment

We met her along a suburban crescent of retirement-like houses in Vineland, Ontario. The homes were built in 1990 on local farmland, but looked brand new. Anyway, for semi-retired Patricia Pierce, the setting was perfect – almost opposite her old elementary school and close to the farm where her parents had raised her and thousands of Niagara Peninsula fruit trees.

“I would never have thought in a million years I’d be here in this retirement village,” she said. “But somehow it seems very appropriate.”

(more…)

Barris Beat

A claim of security

Written by Ted Barris on . Leave a comment

CHAIN_FENCE2aIt was about 6:15 the other morning. Nothing was stirring outside. I happened to be out giving the dog one last run past the fire hydrant before leaving for the city. My wife had pulled the car into the street. I noticed her staring straight ahead with a look of total surprise on her face. I looked in the same direction.

There, about 20 metres away, a deer (I think it was a doe) dashed across the road, paused on a neighbour’s lawn, then just as quickly bounded several times into a backyard and disappeared over a fence.

“She looked petrified,” my wife commented.

(more…)