The Bill Kelly Show Podcast:

The good news is Canadians have a lot of trust in their institutions.

The not-so-good news is that a strong minority of Canadians believe a small cabal of people “secretly manipulate” world events from the shadows.

New polling conducted for Elections Canada suggested that Canadians have strong confidence in institutions like the elections agency (78 per cent), the police (74 per cent), the mainstream media (54 per cent) and provincial and federal governments (56 per cent and 55 per cent, respectively).

But the poll – conducted by Leger, and based on a survey of 2,582 adults between April 1 and April 11 – also found that a surprising number of Canadians are willing to believe in conspiracy theories.

GUEST: Phil Gurski, President of Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting, Director of the University of Ottawa’s Security program, and former CSIS analyst

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Mélanie Joly received one of the biggest promotions in Tuesday's cabinet shuffle, vaulting into the foreign-affairs post as Ottawa grapples with increasing tensions in the Indo-Pacific region and tries to resolve challenges in its relationship with the United States.

The 42-year-old Quebec lawyer was most recently responsible for Canada’s economic development agencies, official languages and tourism.

In 2018, she suffered a major cabinet demotion after, as Canadian Heritage minister, she bore the brunt of criticism in her home province over the Trudeau government’s unwillingness to impose sales taxes on the Netflix video-streaming service.

What lessons did she learn from her 2018 demotion and will she succeed at her new role?

GUEST: Stephanie Carvin, Associate Professor at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University

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The Liberal government has just one day to decide whether it will once again appeal a court order — one that told the government to both compensate and provide services to Indigenous children.

While federal ministers responsible say they’re weighing the “complex” decision, Indigenous advocates continue to push the government to drop the litigation.

ALSO: Pope Francis is coming to Canada

GUEST: Dr. Dawn Lavell-Harvard, President of the Ontario Native Women’s Association

Lawson is being inducted as an athlete and builder due to his immense contributions to hockey, football and horse racing, alongside Sean Foley (builder, golf), Carol Angela Orchard (builder, gymnastics), Dr. John Kendall (athlete/ builder, running), and Don Lovegrove (builder, media).

In addition to his current role as Chief Executive Officer for Woodbine Entertainment, Lawson has been heavily involved in sports his entire life as both an athlete and executive.

ALSO: The future of the horse racing industry in Ontario

GUEST: Jim Lawson, CEO of Woodbine Entertainment Group

The Bill Kelly Show Podcast:

Roughly 29,000 more Hamiltonians need to get vaccinated to reach the minimum rate required to protect the community from COVID.

Ontario’s goal is for 90 per cent of eligible residents — those born in 2009 or earlier — to get fully immunized with two COVID shots.

Hamilton was at 80.6 per cent as of Monday, which is one of Ontario’s lowest rates.

Getting to 90 per cent requires about 29,000 more first doses — a daunting task considering the majority of shots now being administered in Hamilton are second doses.

GUEST: Dr. Elizabeth Richardson, Chief Medical Officer of Health for the City of Hamilton

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National Defence Minster Anita Anand says she is committed to ensuring “justice is served” in the fight against sexual misconduct in the Canadian Armed Forces.

Just hours into the job, Anand says she will be relentless in her pursuit to shift the culture within the military so those in uniform feel safe, while restoring Canadians’ trust in the institution

GUEST: Stephanie Chouinard, Associate Professor of Political Science at the Royal Military College

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Ontario plans to spend 20-million-dollars to double the number of long-term care home inspectors in the province. Long-Term Care Minister Rod Phillips says the government plans to hire 193 staff, creating a ratio of one inspector for every two long-term care homes.

ALSO: Ontario Expands Career Growth Opportunities for PSWs and Nurses in Long-term Care

Protecting our progress by supporting over 2,000 additional nursing graduates by 2024-25

GUEST: Dr. Vivian Stamatopoulos, Co-Founder of Canadians4LTC Standards and a Professor at Ontario Tech University

The Bill Kelly Show Podcast:

Ontario employers will soon be required to create right-to-disconnect policies for their workplaces, in an effort to address the ills of “hyper-connectivity.”

Legislation, if passed, would require workplaces with more than 25 employees to develop internal right-to-disconnect standards. The move would make Ontario the first province in Canada to implement such a measure.

It comes as the pandemic increasingly blurred lines between professional and personal lives for those able to work from home, accelerating long hours and what some call “availability creep.”

GUEST: Jerry Dias, Unifor National President

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The Canadian housing market’s secret sauce is parents helping first-time buyers with down payments.

According to a report by CIBC Economics, parents gave their kids just more than $10-billion in down-payment help over the past year, which was 10 per cent of total down payments over that period. Just less than 30 per cent of first-time buyers got this help, which averaged $82,000.

The CIBC report is one of the first attempts to dig into the impact that parental gifts are having on a housing market where prices have surged higher for more than a decade.

GUEST: Benjamin Tal, Deputy Chief Economist for CIBC

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has considerably shaken up his cabinet roster, naming new ministers to key portfolios including defence, health, foreign affairs, and environment, while adding in a handful of rookies.

In a swearing-in ceremony underway at Rideau Hall, the new minority Liberal cabinet is being unveiled, and it includes some new titles, including a new minister for mental health and addictions, and a minister for housing.

GUEST: Dr. Lori Turnbull, Director of the School of Public Administration with Dalhousie University

Retailers in Canada reported fewer sales in September amid supply chain bottlenecks and a reopening of the economy that allowed consumers to spend more on services.

GUEST: Bruce Winder, Retail analyst & author