Musings by Rod McQueen

The following guest essay was written by my partner, Susan M. Papp, Ph.D Most people in the western world were shocked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, yet, if you examine his mindset and historical perspective, Vladimir Putin’s behaviour is in accordance with the Soviet playbook of expanding and expropriating lands for the empire. It is well known that Putin was a KGB-trained operative. What he has done in Ukraine is similar to the manner in which Joseph Stalin ordered that Transcarpathia, the easternmost region of Czechoslovakia, be expropriated by the Soviet Union in November 1944. This action was taken when...

Canada has become a place I no longer like nor admire. It’s gotten to the point I don’t even want to know the news anymore and that’s an unlikely outcome for a former journalist like me. I made a personal pledge not to watch any Olympic coverage because I don’t think China should have even been awarded these games. They gave the world Covid, treat minorities such as the Uyghurs as slave labour, and took away freedoms from the residents of Hong Kong, all without a fare-thee-well from the world.  In fact, It turns out to be easy to avoid watching the...

At 62 percent of the total, the seventy-three Conservative MPs who today voted against Erin O’Toole was well over the 50 percent minimum required. But the ouster of another Conservative leader brings as much disgrace on the party as it does the leader who was just seventeen months into the job and in the most recent election beat Justin Trudeau’s Liberals in the popular vote. Among O’Toole’s problems with his MPs was the fact that he wooed social conservatives during the campaign for leader only to move later to the more electable centre by changing his position on some issues....

The market misses Frank Hasenfratz, founder of Linamar Corp., since his demise on Saturday, January 8. Linamar share price at the close of day Friday, January 7, was $78.45. Share price at the close yesterday, January 24, was $67.67, down 14 percent in two weeks. The broader market, the S&P/TSX composite index, was down about 2 percent during the same period. There are many causes for ups and downs in share prices, but I think it’s safe to say that Frank’s death is a major reason for the current drop. This too shall pass. Frank, who founded Linamar in 1966,...

The first thing you should understand about the late Frank Hasenfratz was his sense of humour. When you called him, he would say, “Hello,” and then immediately add, “I’m just sitting here counting my money.” The second thing was his no-nonsense approach to life. His second daughter Linda graduated from the University of Western Ontario then worked briefly as a pharmaceutical rep before deciding in 1990 to join the family business, Linamar Corp. Her father welcomed her but then said, “There’s only one job you start at the top and that’s when you’re digging a hole. And guess where you...

A lot of attention and praise has recently been heaped upon hospital workers, and deservedly so. But there’s another group that has also been on the front lines: bank branch employees. While approximately two-thirds of all bank employees have been able to work safely from home during the pandemic, the other one-third have been going into work as always, serving personal and business customers mask-to-mask. That means thousands of workers in approximately 6,000 bank branches across Canada.  The branch used to be the source of bank leaders. In the modern era, CEOs such as Matt Barrett of Bank of Montreal,...

Since the April death of Galen Weston, his son, Galen G. Weston, has been busy selling off what were once among the crown jewels in the family empire. It’s almost as if he didn’t want to make any of these moves as long as his father was still alive. Unlike many family businesses, this one has prospered since founder George Weston went into the bread business in Toronto in 1882. But what to make of all this recent activity? Among the many aspects of the business sold in recent months was the very core of the company — the bakery....

To all my loyal readers: May your Christmas be merry and bright. And may the year ahead bring good health and much happiness amid the turmoil that surrounds us.  Rod McQueen

Family businesses provide millions of jobs in Canada. Anyone can start a family business on a shoestring, in a basement, or a garage. Growing them beyond a hobby with a few hundred dollars in annual sales is difficult. Keeping them alive for the next generation is even tougher. Less than half of family businesses make it to the second generation. Only about 10 percent get to the third. “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations,” said Seagram founder Sam Bronfman. His grandson, Edgar Jr., fulfilled that prophecy through a foolish merger with Vivendi that slashed the family fortune from $8 billion...

A recent report by the Auditor-General of Ontario underscored an issue that has received too little attention. Among all the provinces, Ontario gives its twenty-four publicly funded colleges $1.6 billion annually, the lowest level of support on a per capita basis in Canada. Meanwhile, enrolment by domestic students has fallen 15 percent over the last eight years. Money to run these institutions has to come from somewhere so they have turned to foreign students whose numbers have increased 342 percent during the same eight-year period. Foreign students now account for 30 percent of enrolment and because they pay three or...

Dear Prime Minister: You and your staff may have seen the story in the Globe and Mail Wednesday morning about a number of Liberal MPs and others who have their eye on your job. Now you know how Erin O’Toole feels. The list of your hopeful successors is lengthy and is said to include Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly, Innovation Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne, man-of-the-world and my personal favourite Mark Carney, former Quebec MP Frank Bayliss and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland. The piece, written by Robert Fife, who usually gets things right, is careful to keep most of his sources...

Don’t you just love Quebecers and their views on language? Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau gave a speech recently that was almost entirely in English. He admitted that he couldn’t speak French and allowed as how he’d got along just fine in Montreal for more than a decade without speaking French. He even congratulated Montrealers, saying, “I think that’s a testament to the city.”  Rousseau might as well have admitted to committing sexual harassment so noisy were the complaints that ensued. “Anglophone privilege,” said one, “with a touch of contempt on the side.” Rousseau has since undertaken to learn French....

Last summer when the federal election was called, I assumed that Mark Carney would run for office. Everything looked to be in place for the former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England who had previously declared that he was a Liberal. He had just published a book, Value(s), that The Guardian called “magnificent” and a “landmark achievement,” high praise not usually given by the British newspaper. He was living in Ottawa and the safe Liberal seat of Ottawa Centre beckoned. But the man with a doctorate from Oxford did not run. At the time, I thought he’d...

Back in the day, the 1960s to be exact, when I showed up for first year at the University of Western Ontario, there was an organized frosh week. Purple Spur, a group of senior students, kept us busy all day, doing their bidding. I don’t remember all the indignities we were put through but picking up trash, barking like a dog, and generally feeling degraded were among them. The purpose, of course, was to create a community among the new arrivals. Western had only 5,000 students in those days, compared to 28,000 today, so it seemed easy to make friends....