Exchange with Neil McKenty

Are you satisfied with Canada’s policy of official bilingualism? Here Neil and callers discuss this with Max Yalden, the official Languages Commissioner. Minority language issues were particularly pertinent in time this show was recorded, back in the mid-eighties, with bill 101 in Quebec restricting the use of English, and opposition to french language rights in Manitoba.

Here we have a discussion with Charles Lynch, the Canadian journalist who worked all over the world and ended up as Ottawa correspondent for the Southam chain of newspapers.

Among those issues mentioned are the rights of french-speaking Manitobans which Trudeau and Mulroney spoke in support of in parliament, British politician Cecil Parkinson, Diefenbaker’s legacy, and the story of how Montgomery tried to hide booze from Churchill when he visited the Canadian army on the Rhine – ‘Canadian ingenuity’ ensured he got his whisky – listen to find out how!

Neil discusses how he got into a presidential press conference and managed to ask the President of the United States, Ronald Reagan some pertinent questions. Also we hear how the future Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney deals with Exchange. Finally, Neil’s old friend and broadcaster Helene Gougeon from Toronto’s CFRB.

Quebec premier René Lévesque on Neil McKenty’s radio show, Exchange April 18th, 1983.

Listen to the whole episode by clicking below.

Click below to hear Catharine McKenty talking about reconciliation on BBC Northern Ireland

Click below to hear John Diefenbaker discussed on Exchange. In this episode, Neil talks with several significant Canadians: such as Colonel Pierre Sévigny, a war hero who became Associate Defence Minister and who was involved in the Cold War scandal ‘The Munsinger Affair’; Rich Little, the Ottawa-born impressionist who. after success in Canada imitating Diefenbaker and others, went on to fame and citizenship in the USA; Montreal area MPs Egan Chambers and Bryce MacKasey (also the president of Air Canada, and famously was appointed as the ambassador to Portugal by John Turner, which led to Brian Mulroney’s comment about patronage ‘There’s no whore like an old whore’) ; and finally Neil talks to Montreal Gazette associate editor and CJAD sports supremo Ted Blackman.

Click below to hear the episode of Exchange where callers discuss the PLO

Click below to hear a whole episode of Exchange devoted to Joe Clark and his leadership problems.

Discussions are had with the public, Mr. Gamble, a Toronto-area conservative, Dalton Camp, the conservative commentator, and with Joe Clark, the leader of the opposition and of the federal conservative party.