53: Canada's Troubled Relations with China and the US. Charles Burton (author of The Beaver and the Dragon) analyzes Canadian Prime Minister Carney's meeting with China's Xi Jinping following the APEC conference. Burton described Carney as a "supplicant" who

The John Batchelor Show

John Batchelor

Society & Culture, Arts, News, Books

4.5 • 2.8K Ratings

🗓️ 6 November 2025

⏱️ 6 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Canada's Troubled Relations with China and the US. Charles Burton (author of The Beaver and the Dragon) analyzes Canadian Prime Minister Carney's meeting with China's Xi Jinping following the APEC conference. Burton described Carney as a "supplicant" who echoed Chinese rhetoric of "constructive and pragmatic interactions," which means focusing on trade while avoiding criticism. Issues discussed included Chinese tariffs on Canadian canola and Canada's tariffs on subsidized Chinese EVs. Burton addresses the severely strained Ottawa-Washington relationship due to US tariffs and President Trump's stated unwillingness to talk, feeding "anti-American sentiment" in Canada. This trade uncertainty is a factor in Canada's massive budget deficit, which aims to fund government infrastructure to compensate for lacking investor interest. Furthermore, concerns persist in Canada regarding Chinese EVs potentially functioning as "listening posts" for state security.
1907

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I'm John Batchel with Charles Burton, my good colleague, the author of The Beaver and the Dragon, about the relationship between Ottawa and Beijing.
0:13.7	The relationship between Ottawa and Washington at this point, I don't have a second sentence, Charles, because Mr. Trump has made absolute statements
0:23.3	more than once and that the Canadians are left waiting for a conversation to continue.
0:30.8	The driver of this was said to be an advertisement that was created at the behest of Doug Ford,
0:37.4	the premier of Ontario, the most populist of the
0:40.5	state, a man who was known as a Trump fan, as a MAGA fan, and he was using a clip from Ronald
0:47.2	Reagan once upon a time saying tariffs were not desirable, let's put it that way. That was the
0:53.8	original incident. Mr. Carney has said that he
0:57.1	has apologized to Mr. Trump, and I do not understand why this continues, except that it does.
1:04.3	What is the expectation in Canada that this will lift soon enough when Mr. Trump goes in another
1:09.9	direction, or that it is seen as a profound break?
1:14.9	Well, it's certainly an enormous concern within Canada. Canada had quite a high-powered delegation
1:21.6	in Washington negotiating about trade relations with the US.
1:28.3	And the scuttlebutt, or sort of the nudge, nudge, wink, wink from people,
1:35.3	was that these negotiations were proceeding well with regard to US tariffs on Canadian metals and wood.
1:43.3	Most of the products flowing between Canada and United States
1:48.9	are still subject to the USMCA, the free trade agreement that Mr. Trump renegotiated in his
1:55.7	first term. But these other aspects are very significant and also grave concerns over Mr. Trump's desire to reshore automobile manufacture away from the integrated North American automobile manufacturer today, which would be devastating to Mr. Ford's province, Ontario, because the auto industry is a major driver of the economy of
2:21.9	Southern Ontario. So I think that when that ad went out, Mr. Trump immediately said that he would
2:29.3	add 10% tariffs to Canada and that negotiations would not continue. And he's reiterated this on several
2:36.7	occasions that he has no interest in talking any further with any Canadians about anything,
2:41.8	and then he's satisfied with the current tariff arrangements. So I think Canada's hard-pressed
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from John Batchelor, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of John Batchelor and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.