Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2018

The Current Transcript for January 24, 2018

Host: Anna Maria Tremonti

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

WILLIAM DARITY: For those infants who are born into the very lowest quartile of the wealth distribution, we would give them a trust fund that would be in the amount of $50 to $60,000.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: It is a bold idea—give every child a lump sum on a sliding scale when they reach the age of majority. Make it clear the money has to be used for the growth of personal wealth. It can go toward an education, a business, a home. Two American economists argue it would address the wealth gap pointing out that right now university-educated African-Americans still have less wealth than white high school dropouts. They say it would cost the government less than it now gives the wealthiest five percent of Americans in tax breaks. Hear the argument in an hour. Also today, last month it seemed pretty clear that Russia was being punished.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: The ever formidable Russian Olympic team banned from the 2018 winter games in South Korea because of prior systemic doping.

AMT: Today, not so much! The number of Russian athletes who will compete in Pyeongchang equals the number who competed at Sochi and they may even get their flag back. So how much of that Olympic ban was adjusted to save the IOC brand? Hear the concerns in half an hour. But we're starting with another story where Russia is a player, this time perhaps deliberately passive. And the U.S. is perhaps deliberately ambiguous, as Turkey opens another front in a Syrian war we had hoped was ending.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Missiles launching]

AMT: I’m Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current.

Will Turkish airstrikes reignite the war in Syria?

Guests: Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, Patrick Cockburn

AMT: Just as many had hoped that the seven-year-old war in Syria was actually winding down, a new front has opened up—further complicating an already complex conflict. Turkey has started sending troops and launching airstrikes across its border into north-west Syria in recent days. They're targeting Kurdish YPG forces—as this Turkish military commander explains.

SOUNDCLIP

TURKISH COMMANDER: We are preventing the Islamic state group and YPG from expanding to our country as well as other countries to carry out actions against peace and tranquility. Our aim is to achieve stability and peace for our country and for the region.

AMT: But Turkey is a NATO member. And those Kurdish forces have been backed by the U.S. as they've battled ISIS inside Syria and the Assad regime. The U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was diplomatic when he addressed the situation on Monday.

SOUNDCLIP

REX TILLERSON: We are concerned about the Turkish incidents in northern Syria. In a statement I issued yesterday we recognize and fully appreciate Turkey's legitimate right to protect its own citizens from terrorists’ elements that maybe launching attacks against Turkish citizens and Turkish soil from Syria. We are engaged with Turkey and we are engaged also with the leadership of our coalition and are asking for both sides to show restraint.

AMT: But Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan reportedly brushed off the U.S. plea for restraint. Aslı Aydıntaşbaş has been watching this unfold from inside Turkey. She is a senior fellow at European Council on Foreign Relations and a columnist at Cumhuriyet—one of the biggest newspapers in Turkey. We have reached her in Istanbul. Hello.

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Hi Anna Marie.

AMT: What is the mood in Turkey since the Turkish military began shelling inside Syria?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Well I have to say there's a huge uptick in nationalist sentiments very much amplified. Media has been instructed by the government, actually, to not carry out a “No To War Campaign” and there have been several sort of rounds of arrests of people who have been active on Twitter opposing this. So I would say the mood is very much in support of the Turkish offensive.

AMT: And what triggered this military action now?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: This little enclave on Turkish border—on the Syrian side of the border —called Afrin is an isolated Kurdish enclave, that's been run by a group called People's Protection Units. Turkey considers them an offshoot of its own Kurdish militia group PKK, which has been waging a war against Turkey for almost four decades. And therefore it considers YPG terrorists. Now, it so happens that this group is the main U.S. ally in northern Syria. They've been working with Pentagon and fighting ISIS—the Islamic State on the ground—and pretty much swept through northern Syria: with U.S. aid, with air power, with planes taking off from U.S. bases in Turkey. So it's a complete mess. There's also Russians involved because this group has also connections to Moscow and the little enclave that we're talking about—Afrin—has been a Russian protectorate of a group that's backed by Americans on the Turkish border. So it's a real mess.

AMT: So there are a lot of players. And of course the People's Protection Unit is known as the YPG.

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: That's right. It's known as YPG and the political party is PYD.

AMT: Okay. Now we know Turkey is a NATO member and a long-time U.S. ally. The YPG—the Kurdish forces —have been backed by the U.S. in the Syrian conflict. The YPG, instrumental in the defeat ISIS in certain parts of Syria. So how is this affecting Turkey-U.S. relations?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Turkish-U.S. relations are basically going through an all-time low, I would say. Things got so bad, that for a while end of last year around December, there was a visa ban imposed on Turkey. Turkish citizens couldn't apply for visas to U.S. Embassies here. And there are many reasons, but much of it had to do with U.S. support for Syrian Kurds in Syria in their fight against ISIS. I think that Trump and Erdoğan tried to establish a special connection and both men seemed to want it. But the reality on the ground is that the U.S. considers Syrian Kurds the most effective fighting force against ISIS. And that calculus is important.

AMT: And in fact, they are seen as tougher than the Iraqi Kurds—the Peshmerga. They are seen as a very formidable fighting force. Are they not?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: They're very disciplined. And they do have experience. And what's important is that they are war determined than the other Syrian opposition groups. They're not fractured. It’s one movement. So in some sense it's easy for Pentagon to work with a force that's more disciplined than the others. The rest of Syrian opposition is all fractured.

AMT: And of course, I guess the fear for Turkey is that the push for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey—this group will help. This will spill over the border. This is why they see them as a threat?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Exactly. So the majority of Kurds actually live in Turkey, and it's a very difficult relationship right now. There's a major crackdown on the Kurdish party for example—the pro-Kurdish party in Turkey. And basically I think the Turkish fear is being surrounded by what they call here a Kurdish belt on its southern flank—both sort of in terms of what it means for autonomy in Syria down the road, and also for fear of the impact it would have on Turkey's own Kurds.

AMT: Now you have written that the Turkish government has made some mistakes in terms of their relationship with the U.S. in this attack. What do you mean by that?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: About a decade ago until 2015, in fact, we've had a peace process with Turkey's own Kurds. I think it's become indistinguishable. The Syrian aspect of this conflict and the Turkey aspect—yes there is a border in between but it's part of the same thing. I think that Turkey should have stayed in the peace process with its own Kurds and worked with U.S. and Kurds in the fight against ISIS. That way Turkey would have had more leverage in Syria and not feel like the U.S. has betrayed Turkey by working with Kurds. And there would have been coordination—a three way coordination. It also would have meant a lot for Turkish democracy if the peace process continued. So I think both sides walked out on it in 2015 and it was detrimental—both for Turkish democracy but also in terms of creating this major rift within the transatlantic alliance.

AMT: Now we know that area that Turkey has attacked is actually controlled by the Russians right now as well. So where does Russia fit into this?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: So that's an added layer of complication. The rest of the Kurdish zone is home to U.S. troops—about 2000 special forces. But this one area has long been a Russian protectorate—few hundred Russian troops. Basically it's an island separate from the rest of the Kurdish zone, and has been a pride for Russia. Erdoğan had to send his chief of staff and also his powerful intelligence chief to Moscow to convince Russian authorities to open up the air space so Turkish jets could fly. It was basically after a blessing from Moscow that Turkey could carry on this operation. Of course the Russians are happy in terms of sowing seeds of distrust between Turks and Americans. And they're also hoping that this would force Kurds—Syrian Kurds—into perhaps accepting a deal with Damascus.

AMT: On Sunday Turkish ground troops crossed the border into Syria to join free Syrian army soldiers in their fight against the YPG. Where do you see this going?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Well it's hard to say. This is a densely populated area and the operation is now only in the countryside. But the big question is, what happens if and when Turkish troops get to the city centre? We're talking about minimum half a million people. So I think that it will not be an easy operation for Turkish military. They're saying they're trying to avoid civilian casualties, but of course Kurds are saying that they are determined to resist and sort of protect the city. So I think that we will see a lot of diplomacy behind the scenes over the next few days from Moscow, from Russians, and also from Americans saying we don't really want civilian casualties; this is making it very difficult for us to work with Kurds in other parts of Syria.

AMT: So is it clear whether the Turkish population actually supports its president on this?

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Well it's not difficult to unleash nationalist sentiments in Turkey, especially given that the message is so controlled and the government has been telling the public that this is a terrorist enclave on our borders. But I have to say, it's difficult to answer you because I cannot measure. Media is very controlled at this point in Turkey and those that have been opposing the Turkish operation have lately—particularly on the social media—have been detained. So I cannot tell you in terms of percentages, what percent of the population supports this operation. I would say it's pretty high.

AMT: Okay, well thanks for your insights.

ASIL AYDINTASBAS: Thank you.

AMT: Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, is a senior fellow at European Council on Foreign Relations and a columnist at Cumhuriyet newspapers in Turkey. We reached her in Istanbul, Turkey. We heard a clip from the U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson—pleading for restraint, this week, as Turkey moves into Syria. Here he is again—from last week. And this may help explain Turkey's recent, military moves.

SOUNDCLIP

REX TILLERSON: United States will maintain a military presence in Syria focused on ensuring that ISIS cannot re-emerge. Our military mission in Syria will remain conditions based. We cannot make the same mistakes that were made in 2011 when our premature departure from Iraq allowed Al Qaeda in Iraq to survive and eventually morph into ISIS. It was that vacuum that allowed ISIS and other terrorist organizations to wreak havoc on the country.

AMT: Rex Tillerson announcing that the U.S. will maintain 2,000 military advisers and troops in Syria, despite having defeated ISIS for the most part – some of that fighting still goes on with ISIS. Joining us now from Canterbury, U.K. is Patrick Cockburn, the Middle East correspondent for The Independent. The author of The Age of Jihad. He has been following this latest escalation in Syria very closely. Hello Patrick.

PATRICK COCKBURN: Hello.

AMT: I have to tell you, just this morning; I am reading in the New York Times that the White House is now trying to distance itself from this plan. Its disavowed this plan for the American military and the Pentagon has come out and said, 'Oh no, no. We've got this plan that Tillerson just talked about.' What do you make of that?

PATRICK COCKBURN: Well, it shows [laughs] hesitation in the White House, and I think for good reason. You know this was really a very explosive new departure in U.S. policy that Tillerson announced last week. I don't think the media or anybody else picked up on it immediately, but it was. The U.S. had policy in the past was that they were only in Syria to pursue Islamic State—Daesh. And that when that was done, they would depart. But suddenly Tillerson says, that we're going to stay there; it's is an open ended U.S. commitment; and our objective is to ultimately get rid Assad, to reduce Iranian influence. And of course if U.S. troops stayed in the Kurdish controlled areas— people say 2,000 troops—but what really makes this important is that they can call in the massive firepower of the U.S. air force. So it's a much more significant military commitment than it looks. That this was effectively a guarantee to the Kurds holding quite a large chunk of Syria in opposition to what Turkey wants, what Damascus wants, what Russia wants. So this really stirred the pot last week. And a couple of days later, this provoked the Turkish invasion. So it really was a really radical new departure. And whatever the Pentagon thought it was doing—if it was their policy—I don't think they realized that it was going to have such explosive consequences.

AMT: And so what is Turkey's end game in this?

PATRICK COCKBURN: Well their end ambition is that there should not be a Kurdish sort of mini-state, which is what there is in northern Syria along their southern frontier because this destabilizes the relationship between Kurds and Turks in Turkey. That's been their aim really for the last three or four years. But it's become a more and more obsessive aim. And so that's their ambition. But it's a question of can they do that? And that of course affects whether the U.S. is affected by whether or not the U.S. stays in the Kurdish area and guarantees it. It affects what the Russians do because they feel that the Kurds have put all their eggs in the American basket. It affects what President Bashar al-Assad and Damascus does because he wants to reunite the whole of Syria under his rule and not have a big Kurdish enclave.

AMT: I have a clip I'd like you to hear of Kino Gabriel, a spokesperson for the Syrian Democratic Forces which includes the YPG—talking about Russia's role in what's gone on in the last several days.

SOUNDCLIP

KINO GABRIEL: Turkey would not have dared to shell our cities or our villages or commit crimes against our children without Russia violating their ethical obligation towards us and giving the green light to Turkey to fly their jet fighters over our skies. Therefore, Russia is required to provide an explanation of the circumstances around the Turkish aggression against our people.

AMT: So Russia is essentially looking the other way. Am I correct Patrick?

PATRICK COCKBURN: Yeah, I didn't. It could've. People are saying Russia had green-lighted this operation. Maybe one should say they didn't put up a large red light as they could. As I said, this is a consequence of the switch in American policy last week and after all Russia supports Assad in Damascus and has done so with military force. So if the U.S. says that its policy objective in Syria is no longer primarily to pursue Islamic State, but is to reduce the power, get rid of Assad, to reduce Iranian influence, you know that's an attack on a Russian ally. So that really changed the political environment within Syria. That's why the Russians did it, and really could perhaps it's fairly predictable that could happen. As was said earlier, that senior Turkish officials went to Moscow and said what they were going to do and the Russians clearly had some agreement and said we won't stop you. The Kurds went there as well and got nowhere with the Russians.

AMT: Now the YPG, correct me if I'm wrong, they kind of feel the U.S. owes them, don't they? For what they did against ISIS.

PATRICK COCKBURN: Yeah, and with good reason. They fought very hard. They were the ground troops for the successful U.S.-led campaign in Syria. Thousands of YPG fighters have been killed and wounded. They are the people on the ground that captured Raqqa and various other places. They were supported by U.S. firepower and special advisers and some weapons and logistic help, but they really did the fighting. So they're very nervous that the U.S. might say, 'yeah well thanks for that and goodbye because it's more important to us that we maintain good relations with our NATO partner Turkey.' But that hasn't happened so far. But clearly the Syrian Kurds are very nervous that's going to happen. And they're nervous that the U.S. response to the Turkish invasion of Afrin has been really pretty tame so far.

AMT: How do the Kurds in Syria relate to the Kurds in Iraq? We've got a number of Kurdish groups that want autonomy in these countries that have resisted. They seemed to have come to some kind of agreement in Iraq, but in all of these wars we've seen them step up for Western nations as well.

PATRICK COCKBURN: Yeah. You know they're looking for an ally. I mean the authorities in Syrian Kurdish areas have had bad relations with one of the parties in Northern Iraq. Sometimes it's difficult—it's difficult to get across the border between the two areas the Iraqi Kurds were led to. But at the same time there's a degree of Kurdish solidarity in all these places, whether it's in Iraq or Iran or Turkey or Syria.

AMT: Patrick Cockburn, always good to hear from you. Thank you.

PATRICK COCKBURN: Thank you so much.

AMT: That was Patrick Cockburn, the Middle East correspondent for The Independent. We reached him in Canterbury, UK. Stay with us. The CBC News is next. And then…

SOUNDCLIP

BECKIE SCOTT: This is one for the clean athletes.

AMT: That's Canadian Olympian Beckie Scott when she was awarded a Bronze medal at the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. It would be eventually upgraded to a gold medal after the two Russians cross country skiers ahead of her were stripped of their medals for doping back in 2002. Beckie Scott joins me in our next half hour as we ask whether the International Olympic Committee deserves a medal for its handling of Russian athletes competing at next month's Pyeongchang Games. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current.

[Music: Bridge]

Olympic committee risks trust of athletes and the public over Russian involvement in Winter Games

Guests: Beckie Scott, Paul Melia, Helen Lenskyj

AMT: Hello I'm Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

AMT: Still to come, growing inequality is one of the most pressing issues across the globe today— And it's only getting worse. In half an hour from now, we'll hear about an innovative proposal with the potential to go a long way to leveling the playing field – it’s called the baby bond. But first, judging the games.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Russian anthem]

AMT: The Russian National anthem—it's usually a fixture of the Olympic Winter Games, But you won't be hearing it at the Olympics in South Korea next month. Of course it was major news late last year when the IOC—International Olympic Committee— banned the Russian team from competing in the games. And then this week, a compromise was announced—some athletes from Russia will be allowed to compete after all. But they will wear neutral uniforms, identifying them simply as an "Olympic Athletes from Russia." And if they win a medal, it will be the Olympic anthem that's played—not that of Russia. It's just the latest chapter in the ongoing saga of Russia, doping, and the Olympics. The story that was dramatically told in the recent documentary Icarus, where filmmaker Bryan Fogel sat down with Grigory Rodchenkov—a Russian doping specialist.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Icarus clip]

VOICE 1: Does Russia have a systematic, state-wide doping system in place to cheat the Olympics?

VOICE 2: Yes.

VOICE 1: Were you the mastermind of a state-wide system that cheated the Olympics?

VOICE 2: Of course. Yes.

VOICE 1: Russia won a total of 73 medals in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. How many of those athletes were dirty?

VOICE 2: 30.

VOICE 1: Russia won 81 total medals in London. How many of those were dirty?

VOICE 2: 50 per cent that's for sure. They were using special program, state-sponsored of course.

VOICE 1: Was Putin aware of the existence of a Russian doping system?

VOICE 2: Yes.

AMT: Well that comes from the documentary Icarus, which was nominated for an Oscar yesterday. Revelations about Russia's doping program have been damning. Many are hoping to have their lifetime bans overturned, so they can compete in South Korea. But the possibility of seeing those Russian athletes compete again raises questions about fairness. Canadian Olympian Beckie Scott joins us now with her thoughts. She is a three-time Olympian, and the first North American woman to win an Olympic medal in cross-country skiing. She is also the chair of the Athletes' Committee for the World Anti-Doping Agency or WADA. Beckie Scott joins us from Canmore, Alberta. Hello.

BECKIE SCOTT: Good morning.

AMT: So what did you make of the IOC's initial ban last December on Russia participating in the Olympics?

BECKIE SCOTT: I actually was very encouraged. And felt it was a very positive step when they made their first announcement. The WADA Athlete Committee had actually supported WADA's executive committee when they suggested that the IOC ban Russia prior to the RIO Olympic Games when the first Richard McLaren's reports came out indicating that Russia had been using a state-sponsored system to dope athletes. So we were disappointed prior to RIO that the IOC did not take that step, but encouraged and supportive of the decision in December when they did decide to suspend the Russian NOC.

AMT: And so what do you think of the decision now to allow some athletes to compete under a neutral logo?

BECKIE SCOTT: In following that, I think that there was a number of concessions that were made, including this neutral logo, which isn't really that neutral when you consider that the word "Russia" is on the uniform. It's Olympic athlete from Russia—that's not entirely neutral. And then you understand that the Russian team will most likely be allowed to participate in the closing ceremonies under their flag. But as I understand it, the criteria that's being used to permit Russian athletes to compete in the Olympic Games has not been published yet, it remains a bit of a mystery as to what's been used to allow the Russian athletes to compete in the Olympic Games. And the process is still ongoing. So until then, I don't really know what to make of it.

AMT: Has WADA put out an official statement regarding the concessions at this point?

BECKIE SCOTT: No, not that I know of.

AMT: Okay. Beckie Scott, take us back to your Olympic Games in Salt Lake City in 2002. What happened?

BECKIE SCOTT: So I was competing in my second Olympic Games actually for the Canadian team. And won a bronze medal in women's pursuit—that's a race at the time. Took home a bronze medal. And then on that day of the closing ceremonies actually received the call , that the two women who had finished in front of me—the gold and silver medallist—had actually tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. And at that time I thought, 'Wow.' I mean to me doping in our sport was quite an open secret. It was certainly something that everyone or most athletes were aware of was going on. And I was sincerely surprised that they had been caught. But just assumed that the medals would be redistributed and these medals would be reallocated right away. In fact it took two years of appeals and the cases were heard before the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and they were upgraded subsequently one by one. So it went from a bronze to silver, then from a silver to a gold, in a series of smaller ceremonies held in Canada.

AMT: So they made that decision at the end of the games. But when you were on the podium you actually said, “this one is for clean athlete." So you kind of knew. Is that what you were saying?

BECKIE SCOTT: Yeah absolutely. You know it was an open secret. I think something as Canadians—as North Americans really—we were talking about with quite a bit of certainty. There were so many indicators and so many red flags and so many suggestions that the playing field was not level. And there was really no other way to explain it. So to me in my mind there was no other explanation. There was there was a lot of doping going on in our sport.

AMT: What was it like? What's it like as an athlete to know you are competing against people when it's an open secret that that kind of doping is going on?

BECKIE SCOTT: It's incredibly frustrating. When at that level as an athlete you're invested 100 percent. It's your livelihood. It's how you're earning your living. It's an emotional physical investment. The amount of time and energy that you're putting into your sport and into your career is 100 percent. And to know that no matter how hard you try or no matter what you do, you will come up short because you're not cheating because you're competing against athletes who are taking performance enhancing drugs and cheating the system. It's incredibly frustrating because there's actually nothing you can do about it.

AMT: And to get that gold two long years after, how did you react to that? What did you think? How did you feel?

BECKIE SCOTT: It was quite a process. Obviously it was a long time. And certainly there's no replacement for standing on the podium on the day of the race or the competition and experiencing that to its full. I very much enjoyed standing on the podium as a bronze medallist. It was the first medal for Canada and it was a dream to stand on the podium of course. But I will never know what it's like to have a gold medal placed around my neck at the Olympic Games. And that's a loss for sure. And I think any athlete who comes home from the Olympics with a bronze medal will tell that there is a loss of in terms of endorsements and opportunities as well. A bronze is not the same as gold. But to receive it two years later, you know, at that point it had become very much about justice and the fight for clean fair sport as well. I really internalized how important it was to continue to stand up for clean fair sport because it was certainly something that even at that time—so many years ago—appeared to really be under threat.

AMT: Beckie Scott, stay with us as I bring one more person into this discussion. Paul Melia is the President and CEO of the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport. He was part of a team that made recommendations to the IOC on how to deal with Russian athletes and doping. Paul Melia is in our Ottawa studio. Hello.

PAUL MELIA: Good morning.

AMT: What were your recommendations to the IOC when it came to doping and the Russian athletes?

PAUL MELIA: Well, when the so-called ban was announced and they indicated there would be this pathway for clean Russian athletes, we, the leaders of the National Anti-Doping organizations around the world—and just to point out that the work that we do in national anti-doping organizations in our countries is for and on behalf of clean athletes around the world. Clean athletes like Beckie. That's our job. That's our focus. That's where we put all of our energy. So we have a lot of technical expertise on how to administer the world anti-doping code, including how to go about the testing. So we reached out to WADA first of all, indicating that here are some criteria that we think would be important if you're going to assess whether any athletes from Russia are clean and we think they should be held to a higher standard because Russia has been running a doping program for many years now. So we'll remove the presumption of innocence for those Russian athletes and hold them to a higher standard. So this is the kind of testing. Here's the time frame—at least 12 months with some exceptions. Make sure that we have athletes on the biological passport. Make sure that there are a number of out of competition tests. Make sure there are urine and blood tests. Make sure that the right kinds of analysis are performed on those athletes who conducted the testing. What labs did the analysis. All of those were part of the criteria that we recommended. And we also offered our assistance to the panel because we knew there was a lot of work to be done.

AMT: So now the IOC is going to allow some Russian athletes to compete. Is that the right decision?

PAUL MELIA: Well, we don't know because again we offered our assistance—our technical expertise. And we offered the criteria. But we also encourage them to be transparent about the process. We think that it's important if they're going to allow certain athletes to participate from Russia that those athletes should be named. The criteria used to determine their eligibility should be published. And the test histories of those athletes should be published so clean athletes around the world can gain some confidence that they've been subject to the same robust anti-doping program that these athletes have been subject to.

AMT: So in other words you won't know until they show up?

PAUL MELIA: Well we won't know until they show up—unless they do publicize the names and the test histories in advance. Yeah, unfortunately.

AMT: Many of them have apparently been cleared. Have they not?

PAUL MELIA: Well they have been cleared by this panel. We understand upwards of 400 or something less than 400 have been cleared. We don't know the names of those athletes. You see things in the media now coming out about some athletes that the Russians are complaining haven't made that list for one reason or another. But you know this is the sort of mess that we're left with because of the way in which the IOC has responded to this doping crisis.

AMT: And it now appears that as many athletes who were at Sochi for Russia will be in South Korea?

PAUL MELIA: Yeah, so we have a ban on Russia, and yet we're going to have a Russian team—similar size to Sochi and Vancouver— with the Russian name on their uniform. So it's a very interesting ban.

AMT: I want you to hear a clip with a different view. Piotr Dutkiewicz defends the Russian athletes. He is a professor in the Political Science department at Carleton University. Listen to him.

SOUNDCLIP

PIOTR DUTKIEWICZ: There is no final proof that Russia was systematically involved in doping. Maybe there were some cases that made this whole picture very black. I think the International Olympic Committee made the right decision because this is not about state. It's about individual athletes who are competing. If Russians athletes are free from doping, if they would like to prove that they are worth to compete with others on the same footing, that's a good news definitely for the sport. This is about individual athletes not about state to state relations. If we talking politics that's one thing but if we talking sport then those athletes have full rights to participate.

AMT: Paul Melia, what you think of that?

PAUL MELIA: Well, I have to believe that the professor has not read the McLaren report or any of the other investigations that the IOC themselves have had conducted—two other separate investigations. And you know since the McLaren report was published with all of the evidence contained in it the Russians have been invited to refute that evidence—to demonstrate how that evidence is not correct—and they haven't brought forward any evidence to show that what McLaren has produced is not true. And McLaren's report and the subsequent IOC reports confirm that this is a system wide state- sponsored doping program that's been going on since 2011.

AMT: What impact could this whole experience have on the public perception of the Olympics, Paul Melia?

PAUL MELIA: Well, you know I really think what's at stake here is the very credibility of the IOC and the Olympic Games. I think that the IOC is really underestimating how the public is watching and going to react to how they've handled this situation. And I think they have to be careful. I think that they have been challenged to demonstrate some moral and ethical leadership here and to stand up for clean athletes around the world and they've failed to do so far. So I am I'm very concerned about the consequences going forward for the IOC and the Olympic Games.

AMT: Beckie Scott, you know what it's like in the weeks and the days leading up to the games. What effect does this ongoing "doping saga" have on athletes as they prepare for South Korea?

PAUL MELIA: I think it has very much the same effect that Paul described on the public. There's a continued lack of faith and credibility and confidence in the system that's set out in theory in place to protect clean athletes and their rights to compete at a level playing field. And as this story continues to unfold and the measures that should have been so strong, so strict, and so firm on learning that a member state has been engaged in this scale of corruption. I think it's really diminished athletes confidence in what they're going into.

AMT: I can hear the frustration in your voice, Becky.

BECKIE SCOTT: Yeah, for me it happened many years ago. It's not obviously a personal journey anymore. But as a representative of clean athletes that's on WADA's athlete committee and hearing from athletes nearly continuously, I share their frustration and I share their sentiments going into this. It seems to me that very few sports bodies or sport administrative bodies are invested in clean sport and the values they support that the athletes are. It is frustrating for athletes.

AMT: Okay, well thank you for your insights both of you. We'll leave it there. Thank you very much.

PAUL MELIA: Okay, you're welcome.

BECKIE SCOTT: Thank you.

AMT: I’ve been speaking with Beckie Scott, a three time Olympian in cross-country skiing. She is also the chair of Athletes' Committee for the World Anti-Doping Agency or WADA. She joined us from Canmore, Albert. Paul Melia is the President and CEO of the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport. He is in Ottawa. The Russian doping controversy may be the biggest scandal to hit the Olympics lately.But to help us put it in the larger Olympic context, I'm joined now by someone who's been watching the Olympic movement – and what she calls the "Olympic industry"—for more than three decades. Helen Lenskyj is Professor Emeritus of sociology and gender at the Univeristy of Toronto and has written six books on the Olympics including, Inside the Olympic Industry: Power, Politics and Activism. And she joins us from Toronto. Hello!

HELEN LENSKYJ: Good morning.

AMT: How do you react to the IOC's initial ban in December on Russia participating in the Olympics and then what we hear now?

HELEN LENSKYJ: Well I think the IOC has taken a route that lets them have their cake and eat it because they can still have excellent field of Russian athletes competing. You can imagine if the field was diminished by these 300 who allegedly are going to be admitted. So they've got their brand protection in place quite firmly and looking as if they're doing a few things towards the goal of keeping sport clean. And this anti-doping crusade really involving a lot of infighting between WADA and the IOC, Code of Arbitration for Sport and so on. It's a losing battle, and cynical critics like myself, would say that it's a miss of clean athletes and clean sport and a level playing field. There are so many other variables on top of doping that make it an unfair competition for so many people.

AMT: Such as what? Such as what?

HELEN LENSKYJ: The training conditions in countries. The amount of money put into high performance sport. The amount of government money—there have been some estimates of how much it costs, how much the government has to invest to get a gold medal and it's in the tens of thousands of dollars. Australia did some research along those lines. So you have a teenage athlete from a rural area of India like Dutee Chand for example, against the odds rising to get to the Olympics when probably 99 percent of similarly disadvantaged young women in this small village in India who might have the same talent, but nobody spotted them and nobody helped him along. They're not going to make it. So globally it's absolutely no such thing as a level playing field.

AMT: So do you think there's too much attention on doping? Do you think that the whole system needs to change?

HELEN LENSKYJ: Oh definitely, the whole system needs to change. And when I wrote my first Olympic book in 2000, it was in the wake of the bribery scandal. And I concluded the last chapter the last paragraph that my advice was people who love sport and value social justice would give up on the Olympics and put their time and energy and attention into other international competitions that don't have the baggage of the Olympics.

AMT: Do you see that happening?

HELEN LENSKYJ: No, it was an idealistic kind of statement that I make then. Actually I'm just writing the last chapter of my new book on the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and I quote myself that, that quote about people who love sport and value social justice, and really I don't see a whole lot of change happening at the highest level of Olympic sports. So it is a frustrating and depressing kind of situation.

AMT: Let's talk the politics around this as well. How concerned is the IOC with it alienating Vladimir Putin and Russia?

HELEN LENSKYJ: Yes. They have a strange relationship. Certainly around the Sochi games, it was so obvious that Russia had a concerted attack on LGBT people through their legislation, through criminalizing all sorts of innocent behaviours. And the IOC just did nothing about that. They said, 'oh it'll be right. They won't go after tourists. They won't go after our athletes. It's an internal domestic kind of thing.' And then you see Pussy Riot, the protest group, getting whipped by security that the Russians had provided.

AMT: And what would they stand to lose if Russia were to choose to opt out of the Olympics altogether?

HELEN LENSKYJ: Well certainly after their big successes in Sochi we know that they have a very strong team of athletes, and if the 300 plus the 39 who are having their cases held in the Court of Arbitration for Sport, if they were all eliminated you can imagine what the field might look like—in pretty much the same way as in the lead up to the London 2012 Olympics. There was a move to keep out a large number of male sprinters who had been found to have Clenbuterol in their samples and then the IOC and WADA and British Olympic Association and so on, all sport of put their heads together and said, 'we can't really eliminate all of these people because if they go to court they'll probably get allowed to compete. So let's just forget about these life bans, which are probably illegal anyway.' When I look at the numbers like 40 or 50, mostly black sprinters—male sprinters—if they hadn't been at the London Olympics, the 100 and 200 meter races would have been a [unintelligible], like they wouldn't have been worth watching in the eyes of the viewing public.

AMT: So as we are less than two weeks away how much I mean the fact that these scandals have on the Olympic brand?

HELEN LENSKYJ: I think the brand is getting very well protected and that really is the main goal of the IOC and WADA and even CAS. Paul was mentioning or stating that the IOC should be more transparent. In fact in cases that involve the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the parties can choose to have confidential proceedings. So we have no idea as the as outside critics of what goes on behind closed doors. If it suits one or other parties to keep the proceedings confidential.

AMT: So we're going to have to leave it there on that very depressing note. Helen Lenskyj, thank you.

HELEN LENSKYJ: Thank you.

AMT: Helen Lenskyj is Professor Emeritus of sociology and gender at the Univeristy of Toronto and has written six books on the Olympics including, Inside the Olympic Industry: Power, Politics and Activism. She is in Toronto. We did request an interview with the Russian Embassy in Ottawa and the IOC and we did not hear back from either.

Could the wealth gap be closed by giving babies $50,000? Some economists think so

Guests: Darrick Hamilton, Fred Lazar

AMT: I'm Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: We're living in a time that's—we have to make our position very, very clear where we're standing. Do we move with the darkness? Or do we stand and support the light.

VOICE 2: It's a very important time because I think the world feels creaky and unstable and a lot of people uncomfortable.

AMT: That’s a promotional video for the World Economic Forum, underway in Davos, Switzerland. It's the annual gathering of the global elite – politicians, plutocrats, and other among fabulously wealthy and potently powerful. And this year – perhaps weary of how outnumbered they are— their theme is "Creating a Shared Future in a Fractured World." The widening gap between the world’s rich and poor that's driving much of the discussion. We're focusing in today on a concrete idea that some believe could go a long way toward alleviating that inequality, and maybe even achieving that Davos goal of a 'shared future in a fractured world.' It's called the 'baby bond.' And it would mean giving every child born in America a lump sum payment—of as much as $50,000—in the U.S. because that’s where the people promoting this are. The money would be earmarked for specific, 'wealth-building' expenditures, such as buying a business or home, or a university education. Darrick Hamilton is one of the economists behind the 'baby bond' proposal. He is an associate professor at the New School in New York. And he is with me from New York. Hello.

DARRICK HAMILTON: Hi and thank you for having me on your show.

AMT: How would this baby bond program work?

DARRICK HAMILTON: Well, it is targeted specifically at the source of inequality. I see inequality beginning when people enter adulthood. Some people have access to some capital that allows them to purchase the economic security of an asset like a home, like some capital to start a new business, or graduating from college without debt so that they can pursue a career in a managerial or professional career. Where others are locked into a cycle of a downward mobility or lateral mobility. So what baby bonds are intended to do is literally provide everyone with a trust fund. And it's not a giveaway. It's simply some initial capital so they can again get into one of those vehicles that really provide people with economic security over the life course.

AMT: And so you say everyone. When would they get that money?

DARRICK HAMILTON: So they would get it when they become an adult. And you know there is some dispute over the timing of when they should get it. Should they get it at 18 or should we give it to them when you're 23 or a little bit older? And to be honest, I'd hate to get bogged down in that specific detail of the program because I'm open to various iterations.

AMT: And would everyone get the same amount? How would you decide?

DARRICK HAMILTON: It would be based on the wealth position in which are born. So everyone would get it. It would be universal. But the dollar amount would vary based on a family that you're born into. You know the program is really intended to adjust and protect people from the families in which they are born. If we want to have a society that rewards people based on the merit and the activities that they pursue, then they shouldn't be tied into the family that they're born into— good or bad. Your birth right should not determine your life course. So we're providing some initial capital for all Americans. Again if you're born into the most wealth-poor family or a family with the least amount of resources, then your account would be larger at birth.

AMT: Up to $50,000.

DARRICK HAMILTON: Up to $50,000.

AMT: And so what are the strings attached? What can they spend it on? What areas do they have to spend on?

DARRICK HAMILTON: The money would have to be used toward some asset enhancing endeavour. And the three major ones that me and my colleague William Darity have conceived of initially and that is down payment for a home, some capital to start a new business to encourage entrepreneur activity or allow people to pursue entrepreneur activity. And the third one is a debt free college education. One of the critiques that people often levy against the program is that, 'well what about this? What about that?' It doesn't solve early childhood problems. And to some extent it doesn't. And that's not the intent for the program.

AMT: Well let me ask you that. Why do it this way rather than give money to marginalized families, where the children are growing up and they can put it toward their education or helping them in different ways as children?

DARRICK HAMILTON: I think it comes down to the difference between income and assets. Income is vitally important. It is a flow. It allows you to make basic needs. It allows you to be above subsistence. But assets allow you to have choice. financial security, and allows you to have a longer horizon. What we often think about wealth is the outcome—how much wealth you have. But we really think about the fact that wealth is an input into your economic security as well. If you want to make any major decision in life, if you have wealth, that allows you a greater facility to make that decision and make it come to fruition.

AMT: So you make a distinction between the wealth gap the income gap. It's not what you're making per week, per hour, per year. It's what you what you can accumulate in wealth?

DARRICK HAMILTON: Really, that's it. Yeah, actually.

AMT: Think about all the endeavours that people might pursue in life. If you want to make a decision to start a new business, you're not going to finance that out of income. If you want to finance an expensive education, income can't finance that. If you want to have political influence, those with wealth have greater ability to have that influence. Wealth simply gives you agency. It gives you choice in a profound way that income does not.

AMT: Anecdotally, you've looked at this as well. Even through your own experience. Can you tell me how you grew up and how you went to school?

DARRICK HAMILTON: Sure. I had the great privilege of going to an elite private school in Brooklyn—Brooklyn [unintelligible]. But I also know that my family was not born into the highest economic position. You know no one wants to consider themselves poor, but it was clear to me that we were not a high asset family. Education is not a protective factor against racial inequality in health, but rather blacks as they acquire more education, the gap between whites and mortality statistics remains the same or actually increases. For example, black women who have a college degree are more likely to have an infant mortality than a white woman who dropped out of high school. So education is not this big protector. I guess the last thing I'd like to mention about my family position is that also one of the reasons why we restrict the baby bond to some asset promoting endeavour is that if I were to be given a resource from an account—a trust account set up at birth—when I was a young adult I consider myself someone who is responsible and makes good decisions, but I know from my altruistic motives I would have been restricted to help family members rather than self-invest so that I can have economic security over my life.

AMT: So what are you trying to tell me? Are you saying that even with education as a young person moves forward they don't have the wealth back up from parents or whoever to sort of get through the initial hurdles?

DARRICK HAMILTON: That's exactly what I'm trying to tell you. Education simply is not enough. Simply because you observe people with high levels of wealth having high education doesn't mean that education caused that high level of wealth.

AMT: Okay, so again you're looking at giving as much as $50,000 to individual Americans when they hit relatively the age of majority. How much would that cost?

DARRICK HAMILTON: In the United States context, if the average account is seeded at $20,000 at birth and there are about four million babies born per year, the cost would range anywhere from $80 to $90 billion. To put that number in context, that's about 2.2 percent of what the federal government currently, spends in their annual budget.

AMT: Okay. I am speaking with Darrick Hamilton, economist at the New School in New York. As you know, your baby bond idea does have its critics. Please stay with us. Listen in. I've got someone who is a bit weary of this idea. Fred Lazar is an economist; he's an associate professor at the Schulich School of Business at Toronto's York University. And he's on the line. Hello Fred Lazar.

FRED LAZAR: Oh, hi Anna Maria.

AMT: What do you think of the program Darrick Hamilton is suggesting?

FRED LAZAR: Look, I think it's all intentions about the number of issues. My difficulties with it is if you say no it can be used for education, well by the time people get to the age whether it's 18 or 19—pick whatever age you want—you've lost in a lot of low income environs. Especially sort of the inner cities. You've lost most of the talented people. They're just not going to get to the stage where university is an option. There not going to get there for many reasons—wealth income being among them. But also the life in the community. If you're saying well give them the money to start a business, whether it's 18 or 23. My experience with various start-ups is most people with start-ups simply are immature and really don't understand business. And if they're able to get funding which is quite difficult—unless you do have some sort of wealthy backers—but even in those cases if you do get funding most companies are going to fail.

AMT: Well what about the idea that if you wait till someone is 21 or 22, they could for example be educated in the trades. They might be able to get the things they need to start a business. We don't only have to talk about university education. He's talking about starting a business or getting the capital that would not be available to someone from a marginalized family to start something.

FRED LAZAR: Capital is a problem for most start-ups. I mean the odd exceptions are individuals that have sort of a wealthy network. Giving them money provides no assurance that a high percentage of these companies would succeed. My feeling is given track record's most of them would fail. Then overlay this with the inevitability of charlatans coming in. You have any type of government program—tax spending programs— there are people there that will figure out ways to exploit the programs.

AMT: But we already have people exploiting every tax program we have now. Don't we?

AMT: If you introduce these programs I can see whether it's academic institutions, private institutions, even individuals coming along and trying to sort of exploit the beneficiaries of these bonds. If the money is going into housing, the problem there is you don't have the income to support the mortgages. You know you're not going to find housing for $50,000 in U.S. cities, definitely not here in Canadian cities. So you're going to have to get a mortgage. To support the mortgage you're going to have to have an income.

AMT: Let me ask you, Darrick Hamilton has said that statistically a university educated African-American has less wealth than a white high school dropout. So this is their idea to kind of deal with that wealth gap. What would you suggest to deal with the wealth gap?

FRED LAZAR: The trick of the wealth gap is to improve the income opportunities for African-Americans. And over time they will build up the wealth, they will pass it on. But what's more critical—the sort of income opportunities and the income gaps. Eventually that will be reflected in wealth. If you look at the wealthiest families, what stands out is there is a turnover in a family. If you look at in the U.S., the 100 wealthiest families today, many of them were not there 20, 30, 40 years ago. Many of them it's because people created companies that were very successful and you have to look at how they created the companies. They probably did have difficulty funding them—only when they got some traction did investors jump in.

AMT: Well let me ask you, we know in Canada that there are billions in assets that will be transferred over the coming years. That doesn't really include a lot of racialized communities. So how do you pull them in? Again it's assets. It's not necessarily businesses. But it's homes. It's other things.

FRED LAZAR: Yeah. But assets again, their value is in generating income. That's the value of the assets. You don't just say, 'I've got a stock portfolio, isn't this wonderful?' Well you have it because it generates income for you for future generations. Does make life so easier, it opens up more opportunities. But it's the income that is critical.

AMT: Now, Canada has programs throughout the provinces to help families with money while their children are under 18 depending on the size of the family. Depending on a number of things—the Canada child benefit. Is that beneficial? Do you see that as helping children?

FRED LAZAR: It helps families. It helps them cover the cost of having children and raising children.

AMT: Do you think that translating into help when those kids are adults?

FRED LAZAR: If the children do progress through school and then move onto to some form of post-secondary education, yes it does. I can't speak for the U.S. I can speak for Canada. But every new immigrant group largely didn't have the wealth. Didn't have the income. Many of them were highly-educated, but given so the regulations of professions here, they were not able to practice in their professions. And what you tend to find is over two or three generations many of the—not all—but a significant number were able to pull themselves up the second, third generations were wealthier, had higher income levels. So then you go look in sort of the inner cities, sort of the black communities, and you haven't seen yet the same sort of track record. It's beginning to improve, but you haven't quite seen it. So then one has to ask is, 'okay, is there a systemic problem within these communities that needs to be addressed in order to give the people with the talent, with the skills, the opportunities to move ahead.'

AMT: Isn't what he's suggesting?

FRED LAZAR: No, this is just saying by the time they get 18 or 20—assuming some are able to sort of move on and start a business, and very few of them might be although there are a lot of entrepreneurs in sort of the inner cities or those that are now able to go to university, we're going to make life a little bit easier for them. We'll remove some financial constraints. But in the U.S. you do have programmed to provide financial assistance for low-income individuals to go to university. The U.S. government set asides for minority-owned businesses. They're also some programs to assist minority-owned businesses. They're working to some degree. But one has to look beyond that and say, 'okay why aren't they producing better results.

AMT: And why is that do you think?

FRED LAZAR: And other fundamental problems

FRED LAZAR: Such as?

AMT: So there is a lack of mentorship, support, leadership, role models for these children. If they're not going to school, if they don't see the importance of school, if none of them are starting a business, then you're not going to do these things either. You have to address the problem at a much earlier age, and you have to try to change the mindset—the role models that are available to young people.

AMT: Okay, Fred Lazar. Thank you for your thoughts on this.

FRED LAZAR: Okay, my pleasure.

AMT: Fred Lazar, associate professor of economics at the Schulich School of Business at Toronto's York University. Darrick Hamilton is listening in still. Darrick Hamilton, what's your response to those criticisms?

DARRICK HAMILTON: So he offered many and I'll be brief and try to go through and explain them and respond to them as best as possible. First, he started with the purpose of wealth is income generating. Well I think that's a myopic understanding of wealth. Sure wealth generates income, but it also provide you economic security, and frankly it provides you choice. So the purpose of wealth is much more expensive. He argued why not invest in early education. Well you can. The baby bonds doesn't preclude investments in education. In fact we should have government efforts to address the disparities that are structural with regards the education. That's not a critique of the program. It just argues that we should do that as well. We have enough resources to do it. He offered that companies fail. He says that if you give young adults this money at an early age then they invest it in a corporation and then the companies fail. The problem with that point is that it lacks the understanding empirically of what the main reasons why companies fail in the first place. And the number one reasons why businesses don't succeed is often because they are undercapitalized to begin with. Baby bond is intended to at least give people an opportunity. If you know you're going to receive this trust account at some point in life, well you are incentivized to develop the financial literacy skills or whatever skills you may need to be a recipient of that bond. It should encourage you to self-invest in education, so that they can be in better position to use that bond. But if they're not going to get the account to begin with, they're not incentivized to do so and they're locked into inequality.

AMT: What do you say to the belief that it's inner city culture, not lack of wealth that keeps some communities down?

DARRICK HAMILTON: Again, let me give some more statistics to shed light. He talked about the main way that people generate wealth is through their income. That is a grave misunderstanding of how wealth is generated. We noted if you are black and in the middle quintile of the income distribution in the United States, your wealth position is lower than that of whites in the lowest quintile. So income does not solve the racial wealth gap.

AMT: He also raises the idea that they would be vulnerable to people exploiting the fact that they knew they were getting as much as $50,000 at a certain age.

DARRICK HAMILTON: Well we always need to address financial reform to avoid predation. The Bernie Madoff scandal of the United States showed that even the most sophisticated amongst us are subject to financial predation. But it’s not an issue limited to people from low resourced areas. That's an issue across the board.

AMT: You know you are using a lot of statistics to make your point and we talked a little bit about your own personal experience. I want to ask you because of the argument about education. What you're saying is that even when marginalized young people end up in the same schools as those who are not as marginalized, there's a different kind of thing happening is there? Because of wealth versus income gaps of the family.

DARRICK HAMILTON: That's right. That's even cherry picking off those that are at the high end of the distribution from marginalized communities. But we know that even in these elite schools everything is not the same.

AMT: Spell it out for me. What do you mean?

DARRICK HAMILTON: Well the idea around trust accounts probably began in my head when I was in college and thinking about the access that some people had versus other people. I knew that I had peers that were likely going to receive resources from their relatives, where I understood that I had relatives in need. So that led to a different type of pressure. And I hate to individualize it because that becomes an anecdote. But I know that narrative is certainly not unique to me.

AMT: We've been watching the fights over money and tax schemes in the U.S. For the last couple of months. What appetite is there for spending on something for a wide swath of the population like this?

DARRICK HAMILTON: For these type of political programs I think you have to have a long run horizon. If this current administration is unwilling to address inequality in a profound way with the bold policy then we need to think about local demonstrations. Perhaps we can look at localities and put together experiments to see how well they do or keep pushing the ideas and keep with the social movement.

AMT: But you're arguing that in fact it won't cost Americans any more than it cost them right now to give tax breaks to others.

DARRICK HAMILTON: Sure. I mean the U.S. government already engages in asset enhancement with their tax code to the tune of well over $500 billion. So the problem isn't the dollar amount but to whom it is distributed. The top five percent of earners in the U.S. receive about 60 percent of that benefit while the bottom 60 percent receives about 12 percent of that entire budget.

AMT: And that's the real wealth gap you're talking about right there.

DARRICK HAMILTON: Exactly right. We structure inequality with our tax code. Not just thinking about how we refine taxes so that others pay more. We can think of ways to restructure our tax code so that everybody has opportunity.

AMT: Darrick Hamilton, thanks for your thoughts today.

DARRICK HAMILTON: I appreciate it so much. Thank you.

AMT: Darrick Hamilton is an economist at the New School in New York. He is in New York City. What do you think of the baby bond idea—would it work to close the gap between rich and poor? Find us on facebook, tweet us @TheCurrentCBC, or send us an email from our website. Go to cbc.ca/thecurrent, and click on the Contact link. That's our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for Q. Actor Peter Turner joins Tom Power to talk about his new movie, 'Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool' And tune in tomorrow for a special edition of The Current. We're devoting the entire program to the relationship between Indigenous communities and Canada's child welfare systems... and storiessuch as Tamara Malcolm's. Her son Lee and his two brothers were apprehended in 2007 by Child and Family Services in Winnipeg. At the time she was with an abusive partner, but after she left him she tried to regain custody of her kids—to no avail. Her case drew national attention after she took to social media, but she says child services still would not grant her custody of her children. Her son Lee also wanted to return back home. And he grew tired of waiting for permission. In 2015 he decided to try and find her himself. Here is Tamara Malcolm's story—and be sure to join us tomorrow for more. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti, thanks for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

TAMARA MALCOLM: Well I was in the room with him, and the police had come in and arrested me in front of him and took me to the police station and questioned me for about close to 11 hours. Released me, and I went back to go see him. But I was told by security that he was no longer there. I was distraught. I was really hurt. I couldn't understand what was going on. Nobody would explain to me what was happening to me and my children. I went to my Mom and there was a card left, and they had taken my kids from my Mom as well—my two younger children. I was really hurt. I tried calling to ask what's going on, and nobody could give me answers. They said it was under investigation. Lee was eight-years-old at the time. Now what I later found out was that he was abused by my ex-partner, but I never found that out till later. My ex-partner was charged and convicted of the offence, but my children were never returned to me. So every day I thought of my kids. There wasn't a day that went by where I never thought of my kids. I went into a lot of different ceremonies then I just did a lot of beading. I really love beading, and I find that it's very therapeutic, and that it really helped me cope with having my sons away from me for such a long time. I know that he had a very difficult time in a lot of the homes. He was put in more than five homes. He said numerous times he had tried to reach out to the children's advocacy office and the agencies to ask him to help come home and they always said, 'oh yeah, we're working on it. We're working on it. We're working on it.' It was repeatedly said to him. But nothing was ever done. Lee was 15-years-old when he came home. He phoned me from the bus stop and asked me to come and get him. So I went and picked him up at the bus station, and I was afraid but I picked him up anyways because he made it this far and there was no way I was going turn my kid away. So we were walking—after we got out of the vehicle—we were walking up to the house and he turned over and he hugged me and he said, 'Mom, I'm finally home.' I need for people to hear me out there because I feel like I'm not alone. I feel that there are families like mine that are in the same situation. And a lot of people are weak and they don't have a voice. So I want to be the voice for everyone who is afraid and can't speak.

[Music: Theme]

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

January 24, 2018 Episode Transcript

Social Sharing

More from this episode