Will Dove  00:00 Our government is moving to restrict your access to natural health products. Some believe that the new regulations will ban nhps. But that's not exactly correct, although the ultimate effect will be much the same. Sean Buckley is a constitutional lawyer with almost 30 years of experience in defending our rights as Canadians for access to natural health products. You have a right to make decisions for yourself, that will protect your health. But our government will succeed in taking that right away. If you did not stand up for your rights. In this interview, Shaun explains just exactly how the federal government is moving to make your access to natural health products near impossible, but much more importantly, what you can do about it. Shawn, thank you very much for taking your time for this interview.   Shawn Buckley  01:00 Very glad to be here.   Will Dove  01:01 Well, now, I wanted to start with this question, because I sought you out for this interview, because I was hearing from people that the government is working to ban natural health products, but that's not exactly true.   Shawn Buckley  01:13 Certainly, they're working to make that much harder for people to get. Could you please explain exactly what is being done? Yeah, no, absolutely. And I think what happens is, is that, you know, if the effect is the same, you know, so when people say in the Health Canada, or the Government of Canada is banning products, it's no, they're not asking the law saying these products are legal, although, to back up and explain later, we'll, they actually did do that. So but that's, that's old news, that's 2004. But some, what they're doing is, is they're bringing in what's called the self care framework, and there's a whole bunch of little tentacles to this framework. And collectively, they're gonna put us in a situation where they might as well be banding our products, where, you know, I sincerely believe we're going to end up in a situation where we lose most of our products, especially the effective multi ingredient ones, and the ones that our healthcare practitioners rely on to treat us. So by way, of example, so they're gonna move us into the self care framework, where they're harmonizing how we regulate natural health products, with chemical over the counter drugs. And what they've made clear to us is, well, once, once we bought this new set of regulations, once were fully harmonized, you cannot, under this self care framework, get a license for something that truly is an over the counter. So like, we'll let's say you, you want a pain reliever, and you go to the drugstore, and you see aspirin sitting on the shelf. And next to it, you see white willow bark. Now, for your viewers that don't know is aspirin. As you can see, it comes from white willow bark. So while bear did was way willow bark has been used for centuries as a pain reliever, and it works really effective without the gastrointestinal bleeding of aspirin. And they isolated, you know, the molecule that is most responsible. There are other things in white willow bark that helped with pain relief, but most responsible, and then they tweaked that molecule slightly. So now it's a synthetic chemical, it's not a naturally occurring one, it still works for pain relief. But being that it's not all, you know, tied up with other ingredients as white willow bark is it has the side effect of gastrointestinal bleeding that actually causes deaths every year in Canada. So it's kind of interesting is you, we could use white willow bark for the same purposes, including, you know, the baby aspirin purpose of, of slate blood thinning that it's widely used for. And with white willow bark, without the problem. In fact, the British government did a big study on that and and reached that conclusion and the rest of the world, including Britain made no changes. So when, but, you know, I'm just back to this over the counter. So those two products would Citi be sitting there over the counter? Well, right now they're regulated quite differently. And in very clever marketing Health Canada said, Well, that's not fair to the consumer. Because here ESA has very strict chemical Drug Regulations. And white willow bark has much less stringent regulations. And the consumer can't know that they're both on the shelf beside each other. They're both for pain relief. We should subject white willow bark to the same strict regulations as aspirin in an effort to protect the consumer and give the consumer confidence. That's the marketing I can explain later why that's just nonsense. But it's for over the counter drugs, not anything you would seek the advice of a health care practitioner so Health Canada is telling us once we're are fully implemented in the self care framework, we are not going to be licensing products under this framework that, you know, you would seek the advice of a health care practitioner for? Well, the only other drug prep pathway that you can get a license either is what's called the new drug approval process and know how no natural products ever gotten through that process and not ever will. So in effect, we're going to lose any product. That is, or any condition that you would not just over the counter use, you know, so you'll still be able to get things like, Oh, I have a rash on my wrist, I want a skin cream for that. But things for serious conditions or eat away any modern condition, it's going to disappear. So even that alone is going to be a huge product problem. But there's a whole bunch of other things. But I think before I get into that, I think I should make clear, this is kind of part of it to face, you know, process of Health Canada. I started in this industry in 1994. I'm a lawyer when so when I say started in the industry, my law practice became involved in the regulation of natural products in 1994, I was actually actually hired by to be helped Canada's Council, a herbalist was suing Health Canada for stealing his herbs at the border. And I was hired by to defend Health Canada in that. And then after that, I started my own firm. And actually that herbalist was charged with practicing medicine without a license and another effort to get him to stop and hired me. And then ever since then, roughly half of my practice for 30 years has been invoked in the regulation of natural products. So what happened was we were unregulated before, just like the United States is unregulated. So you didn't have to apply to Health Canada, or permission, you were really treated like a chemical drug. And then in the, you know, late 80s, early 90s, both in Canada and the US the regulatory bodies, started attacking natural health products, and saying you had to comply with these chemical Drug Regulations, which were never intended to apply to things in our food supply. And there were citizen rebellions in both countries. But what's really shocking is both countries took the opposite approach. So in the United States, the citizen rebellion was so large that Congress actually held hearings and looked into how should we regulate natural health products. And at the end of that, they said that these products are so safe, that we should actually deem them by law to be safe. So they passed in 1994, the dietary Health and Education Act of 1994, were what we call natural out products are classed as foods, which makes perfect sense because most of the ingredients are in our food supply. I mean, just because you dry parsley and put it in a capsule, the same parsley you would buy for your salad. It's doesn't become dangerous, just because you put it in a capsule, it's the same product. So they deem them to be foods by law. By law, there's actually a legal presumption they're deemed to be safe. So there are federal or Food and Drug Administration can't pretend they're dangerous, like Health Canada does here. They're deemed by law to be safe. And their regulatory body can't take a natural product, app them off the market by law, unless they have significant evidence that there's actually a risk. I mean, the odd product out there can present a risk, and we're not worried about adulteration, anything like that, like everyone's legislation protects against that. And we're not worried about clean premises. And that's it. That's a separate issue that everyone agrees on in this effort. And separately, will Canada we have our citizen rebellion. And it was so large, that actually Parliament looked into it. So the Minister of Health at the time, Alan rock, this is in 2008, there's some there's a big citizen rebellion going on, and the government was going to bring in cost recovery. And what cost recovery is, is that the chemical drug companies pay fees to get a license to sell. They pay fees to be able to manufacture and in a building, even to label or package in a building that pay fees. This is what pays Health Canada salaries there's a bit of a conflict of interest because three quarters of Health Canada salaries from the chemical drug companies and and we shouldn't be structured that way because it does create a conflict of interest but health care Canada was going to post these species back in 1998 on the natural product industry, and so we actually started lawsuit. I mean, I didn't personally but the, you know, natural community did. And the day before the lawsuit was set to be heard, the government backed out so of health minister Alan Roxas, okay. We've heard Canadians are unhappy about this. And he asked the standard committee of health will you look into and not just, you know, a cursory look, take a deep dive and look into how should we regulate these products. And so the standard committee of health at that time, and this is, you know, 9899 had the broadest consultations of any standing committee in parliament in our history. It was wide and far. And they came to, they came up with a a bunch of recommendations, but the two themes that no one could deny, where you can't regulate these, like chemical drugs, like it's apples and oranges, it's so completely inappropriate. And don't pretend they're unsafe, because they're not. And also Canadians want increased access. So we wanted increased access now will help Canada in trying to regulate these like chemical drugs have always for all of my 30 years of practice, there's danger, there's danger, there's danger. And right now they're saying, well, they're dangerous. We need to do this to protect you. The Canadian citizen, rom the harm of these products, in fact, it's, it's almost funny, and I'll share with you why it's so was funny. But Sam, it's always funny that the got the Auditor General involved to do a report. I mean, what is the Auditor General know about natural product safety, but they did a report, basically outlining how dangerous these products are. And recommending new a couple of the things that Health Canada is now getting, like stricter penalties and, and cost recovery. Will in I mean, it's about 12 years ago now. I did an access to information request of Health Canada, asking them, can you show me all of the deaths caused by natural health products in Canadian history? And Health Canada said, well, we can't go back in all of our history. But we can go back to 1995. Because in 1995, we implemented a robust adverse reaction reporting system in response to the thalidomide crisis. And so we can we can go back to 19 or 1965. And tell you how, you know, report to every death caused by natural product that's been reported to this rather robust database. Well, they weren't able to point to a single death caused in Canada since 1965, to about 12 years go by us by natural product. Know that doesn't mean that there aren't debts. But it means that there are so few that they haven't come to our attention. Back in 2004, when we were completely unregulated, because bibra said, we were unregulated in July of 2004, regulations came into force regulating us for the first time and bringing us AP way into this chemical drug model. And a client of mine had a risk analysis expert, Professor Ron law, do a risk analysis at that time. Now, so if you bear in mind at that time, if we need to regulations to protect us, and we hadn't had any, we were purely unregulated. That's what it should have been the most dangerous, that's when you should have had to been stepping over bodies to get into the health food store, or indeed in your naturopathic doctor's office. So we were like the United States are today we were fully unregulated. And, you know, the, the, the comparison is apt because I don't feel dangerous when I walk into a health food store in the United States. And if I was to go to a naturopathic doctor, for example, in the United States, I wouldn't feel like I was in any danger. And that's where we were in 1994. And now Professor Ron law for his risk analysis use primarily Canadian government statistics, but he also looked at the statistics of other Western democracies to come up with a more robust probe. So back in 1994, when we had no regulations to protect us, do you know that you were 14 times more likely to be struck by lightning than to be killed by natural now, if I was to ask your viewers, sir to sit down with a pen and a pad of paper, and you seriously write out AR ri freedom you are willing to surrender to be protected by lightning, you'd go, that's just too stupid. Like I'm not, I'm not willing to give up any freedom to be protected by lightning, I recognize lightning as it is a risk. Because some of us actually get struck by lightning every year. I know, when I was in elementary school, a friend of mine got struck and killed by lightning, it happens. But it's so rare that we don't really feel threatened by so the point here is, is it's 14 or 14 times more likely, it's not even fair for me to compare the risk of natural products to lightning because Lightning poses so much more risk to you. Then there are health products now. I hope I'm making the point like so when you tell us it's risky. This is silliness. But there is a risk to taking these products away if you let me share a story with you of how I got kind of got both. Remember I told you in 1994 I acted for Health Canada because they were being sued by a herbalist. That herbalist was Jim Strauss and Health Canada when I was acting for them referred to him, to me as a rogue herbalist. And he was claiming to treat heart disease with his heart drops. And Health Canada said isn't this Rex, we have a row curbless treating a serious health condition with an unapproved treat a treatment that has not been approved by the government. And this This is just unacceptable. Now will that Kool Aid tasted pretty good. I drank the Kool Aid, I slowly bought it. And I thought no this, this really is crazy and out of hand, that we're letting this rogue herbalist sell an unapproved product to treat a serious health condition. Now, I was not taking into consideration that all that consenting Canadian adults should be able to choose take an unapproved product or an approved product or whatever. Like it's not up to Health Canada to take away our options. Maybe it's up to Health Canada to say there has to be full disclosure of what research does or doesn't exist. And you know, that and again, we're not talking about adulteration or prod or anything like that. So I have Jim's case dismissed. He was suing this federal government in the wrong court. But he and I got along really well. He actually took me for lunch after I had his case dismissed. And I start my own law firm. And in another attempt to get him, you know, to stop selling his heart drops. He gets charged by the BC College of Physicians and Surgeons with practicing medicine without a license because the act that gave the doctors the medical monopoly said only doctors can practice medicine. And the practice of medicine includes making treatment claims, and here he is claiming to treat heart disease. So he hires me why we're dead on the facts. I mean, he he was claiming to cure heart disease like full he was really he couldn't shut up about it. He was so passionate. And why he was so passionate about it was a he was an older gentleman. In fact, just so you understand the seats, he flew for the German air force in the Second World War. He was from Austria, and his family in Austria had been traditional healers for four centuries. And he was trained by his grandparents to be a traditional healer. Though he had no interest in that he got a PhD in electrical engineering. He's working for BC Hydro as an electrical engineer. high stress job is architect. He's rushed by ambulance to the hospital. They do an angiogram. He's got one artery completely plugged 100% Another 80% bug, and he is told by truthfully by the medical establishment, Jim, you need a double bypass to survive. He didn't like that idea, as probably none of us would. So he checks himself out of the hospital. He makes his heart drops based on the training his grandparents gave him. He cures himself with heart disease. He never did ever bypass surgery. He died 30 years later and an old book sold. And he started selling art drops. He quit his job at BC Hydro opened, started little herb shop. So that's why he's passionate about it. It's saved his life. Now, I was you know, I can't wait on the facts. So I was going to attack the law. I'm constitutional lawyer. I let the crown know that I was going to ask the court to strike down that part of the legislation is violating or Freedom of Expression is guaranteed in section two B of our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I did my legal research, the law was on my side. But I was worried about factual situation. Now, the judge should be with me regardless of the impression the judge can. But psychologically, I had a problem. Let's say the judge accepted Health Canada's narrative, that this is just snake oil, and oh my gosh, it's isn't this dangerous. He is telling people he can treat heart disease, it won't work. It's snake oil, their Delaine proper treatment, some of them likely have die. Like this is life and death, like an hour. So if the judge accepts that narrative, the judge is not going to want to strike down the legislation, this violating freedom of expression, because the judge will think he or she is killing people. So I had a narrative problem. So I go to Jim's herb shop, and I say, Jim, is there any way we can show you tell the truth? Like clearly, this can be clinical evidence or anything like that. And he thought for a moment, and then he goes in the back and he brings the box. And then he goes and brings me another box, and it brings me another box. And I forget if it was three or five, remember, it was an odd number. And these boxes are filled with letters. And they're all the same. It's like I had heart disease, I was sick, I was dying. They took your heart drops, like oh, well, God bless you know, those letters are not admissible in court, they're hearsay. But I can call the authors of those letters, to swear to tell the truth, and then tell the truth. And that's actually the highest form of evidence. And so I started folding these people. And on the day of trial, I had five middle class professional witnesses, which I just picked for credit ability purposes, the judges, middle class professional, they'd all had heart disease, they'd all had at least one open heart bypass surgery one at that, too. They all continued at heart disease, because the reason their arteries were plugging was not being addressed. They all needed another bypass surgery. Now two of them were too weak to survive the surgery. So they were just set by their doctors home to die. You can't give somebody a surgery, that's going to kill it, that and the other three weren't willing to go through it again. Because it's a really invasive and difficult surgery, it's hard to recover from. And they were willing to go through that experience again, just to buy another year or two. So for these witnesses, the medical system was a dead end, it was a desiccant. So they're all looking for alternatives outside. They're looking for the unapproved treatments now, because the approved treatments aren't going to work for the Oh, come across the heart drops, they all get well, they're all working full time at trial. Well, some of them had not been working well all of them hadn't been working for years they had been disabled one I think of as a full decade, had been disabled, is you can't work when you've got serious heart disease. They're all working full time at Trump. Now, that kind of converted me remember when I was working for Health Canada, against this herbalist, it's like, Is this ever dangerous to let people choose to use an unapproved treatment? We've got to stop this. Well, the truth was, I was I was completely wrong, I could have given you the names, addresses and phone numbers of 1000s of Canadians who were only alive who are only alive because of that one natural product. So this is life and death when we're talking about restricting access, and I could give you story after story after story. And you know dollars to doughnuts every time I lecture like I got person after person coming up to me sharing that the their luck, they literally and on. And I'm not even talking about those people that manage successfully manage chronic illness with natural products, because the chemical drugs are just awful at managing chronic illness and side of SPECT after side effect. So we're really talking this is important. And so when I'm telling you that, okay, we've got the self care framework that's going to be taking these products away. This is this is a serious issue.   Will Dove  24:29 Yes. Now, Shawn, before I get into my next question in regards to the natural health products, regulations, I know for a certainty there's going to be people watching this interview who are going to want to know what those drops are. Are they still available?   Shawn Buckley  24:40 Oh yeah, yeah, no, they are. So they're just stress heart drops. It's actually funny I take the missive preventative quite regularly putting my money where my mouth is here.   Will Dove  24:54 If you'll send me the link to where people can buy them.   Shawn Buckley  24:56 Well, I mean, I just Google strokes heart drops, so I know that I'm You could order them online from Strauss her company or whatever they're   Will Dove  25:03 called now. So it strokes s t r a U S, yeah,   Shawn Buckley  25:06 S T R A U S, it might be two S's, they might be two   Will Dove  25:10 s's. Okay, so I just, I just wanted to give that piece of information to the new people gonna be wondering. Now I want to get on with my next question, though, about the national health regulations, because you've walked us through this whole story about this self care framework, another buzzword is supposed to sound nation harmonizing natural healthcare products with chemical regulations, which is another buzzword that they used to sound nice. But you've already revealed the logic of this, that these are apples and oranges, that chemical drugs and natural healthcare products are no way the same thing. You've already pointed out that most of these national health care products come from foods ready consuming. Whereas of course, chemical drugs are a whole long laundry list of things that are foreign to the body. Another thing that I would point out, is that if you're talking about a natural healthcare product, the worst thing that's likely to happen is it won't work. Whereas with a chemical drug, the worst thing that's likely to happen is it'll kill you. So it's very clear that this isn't about protecting the public. And as you and I were discussing, prior to the interview, you said, what is really about this internet is intellectual property, property rights. Yeah. protection for the pharmaceutical companies to ensure and increase their profits.   Shawn Buckley  26:24 Yeah, so yeah. How the how the game works is that in our Drug Regulations, to treat any condition in Canada, you have to go through what's called the new drug approval process. And I guess I should first back up, I mean, I've shared with you how Canada and the US took different approaches. So basically, the starting point in Canada, is that everything is deemed to be a leap. And, you know, which is, you know, that's defensible for chemical pharmaceutical drugs, which as a class are credibly dangerous. I mean, I think three of our five leading causes of death are linked to chemical, pharmaceutical drugs, it's a little, it's a little objectionable, when you're, we're talking about things like parsley and garlic, and, you know, combination of herbs and stuff that we eat anyway. So but that's the starting point is, is we've chosen to make everything therapeutic, illegal, like, literally, if I told you, you know, you look dehydrated, I got some water to give you, and you drink it to, you know, solve your day, I've just broken the law unless I have a product license. So it proved that that water is safe and effective, I will have to have a site license, where my manufacturing might, you know, tap probably the city water would not be adequate would certainly wouldn't get through the approval process for my site. And like it would, and it would be very expensive water because I want to make a therapeutic claim, everything that's deemed to be illegal now, or a serious event, you know, anything but a minor health condition if you want to make a claim. So if you want to get approval, you have to go through what's called the new drug approval process. Now, that process is so costly, and so onerous that it literally costs a billion dollars to get through. I'm in my late 50s. In my lifetime, there has been one product that did not have a patent, go through that process. And that application was funded by government. So only products with patents get through the process. And this is for economic reasons. Well, if it costs a billion dollars, to get through that process, will you have to recover that billion dollars before you even start making a profit. And we're talking in the Canadian marketplace, there's only 40 million of us. So you've got to have a patent where you can charge high fees. I like to use Viagra as an example. Because for those of us that remember when Viagra was approved, just the advertising and I was so good even though you can't advertise in Canada, it was all in the United States, but we get their TV that and I remember it was news, you'd read about it in the newspaper how much the single pill cost like oh, it might be like $15 a pill, which back then was a lot of money. But that's because Pfizer had a pet. So they could no one else could make it because they would have to license and intellectual property rights. They had a patent so they they could recover their billion dollars or more me cost more to get through that process. They could recover that and more and make a big fat profit, because no one else could make it. Now as soon as the Pat Randolph anyone can make by Adria, the generic Name is Sudan FL. So you know, this, probably five or six manufacturers now have Sudan FL, and they can't charge that much, because there's competition. And that's how it works. But for natural products there, you don't have that. So you'd never be able to raise the money to go through that process. And if you had $2 billion, should never spend it. Now, what's happening with the new drug or with this self care framework is they're kind of moving us into a place where we have to go through that clinical evidence, or any health condition now. So in fact, I mean, under this self care framework, as I said, you're not going to be able to get a license, or anything for which you would seek the advice of a health care practitioner licensed by province. And, you know, they're not talking medical doctors. Now, some medical doctors use natural products. But it's really your naturopathic doctors, your homeopathic doctors, your traditional Chinese practitioners, you nutritionists, we go to these people to treat serious health conditions to treat chronic health conditions with natural products, but if you can't get a license now, for conditions for which we would seek these health care practitioners, then those products that are now licensed under the natural product regulations are going to have to go through this new drug approval process, and they can't. So we're going to lose that remember, I told you, we kind of went halfway to chemical drug model in 2004, when we started regulations for the first time s chemical drugs. But I see we only went half way. And that is, you know, already indicated we didn't have cost recovery. But we were also able to use traditional use evidence to show a product worked. And, you know, I'll use we had discussed earlier about scurvy. So let's say you know, there was a currency crisis. And, you know, international trade collapse for six, eight months, and Canadians are eating, you know, beef and potatoes, there's no citrus fruits. And scurvy becomes a problem again, because we don't have vitamin C. And you and I wanted to start a company to solve this, you know, super concentrated rose, hip tea i and vitamin C. Well, right now we could use traditional use app, and it's in the herbal tradition, there's lots of evidence of using vitamin C to treat scurvy, we literally could use the British naval records. You know, back in the sailing ship days when they started are first starting these long, you know, trans ocean journeys, their sailors were getting at literally disable because they didn't have vitamin C in their diet, because they didn't know they needed that. Right to where warships couldn't fight. This was a national emergency, and then they figure out, oh, we need vitamin C, let's, let's have them travel with limes. And the sailors would eat alignment day. And then while on no scurvy, and it's why we call British sailors limeys. Well, under our natural product regulations, we could use the British naval records and other traditional evidence to get a license, you know, so we could prove that vitamin C treats scurvy. But under these new regulations, we won't be able to use traditional use evidence anymore. So you and I would have to run a double blind to sizeable double blind clinical trials, we'd never do it because we'd never be able to recover our costs. And so that will be lost to us. So really, what's happening will is we're moving into a brave new world, where the only options for us to treat you know anything moderate to serious will be a chemical drug, because we've structured our drug law, to privilege and to let intellectual property rights. So we're only going to have one model, and that's chemical pharmaceuticals that were patented. Now, if you were to ask the question, Is that the best way to get good health outcomes? I mean, obviously not. You want to have a whole bunch of different models competing, and people will find out what works and doesn't work for them. You would never, you would never just say we would have a natural model, just like you'd never say we would just restrict ourselves to chemical drugs. But that is what we're doing. We're moving into a model where we're going to only have chemical drugs.   Will Dove  34:30 So let's talk about the timeline on this shot, because I what I from what I'm reading these regulations are not due to fully come into effect until 2025. I certainly haven't had trouble finding the supplements I usually use but I'm hearing from other people that certain things are becoming hard to find. So what is our timeline? Yes.   Shawn Buckley  34:48 So remember, because the date you gave up 2025 You were actually referring to cost recovery. So that was gazetted in the Canada cassette when you got to bring in new regulations you have to give notice. And so they've given the notice and their date for those to come into effect as April Fool's 2025. But that's just one part of the self care framework. The panel de sees $5 million day fine, stable already come into force, and legacy, they settle this open 2017, you can go to the nhpa.org site and look at a 2017 discussion paper, where we set out for you, this is the self care framework, there's this and this and this, and this is what they're doing. So all we're now doing, everyone's getting excited now, just because what we said was going to happen because Health Canada said it was going to happen is happening now. So we've got the cost recovery that comes in on April 1 2025, we've already got the increased fees. Another part of the self care framework is is that they're reducing the regulatory burden, or they chemical over the counter drugs. And that's happening now the pharmacists are very concerned because they're saying they actually should be stricter. This isn't in Canadian centrists. To   Will Dove  36:04 me, it's worldly, and he's talking about the very obvious case of the COVID vaccines that were never properly tested. And that might know are very, very dangerous.   Shawn Buckley  36:13 Now that's that's a separate topic and actually on the so I I work with a nonprofit called the natural product Protection Association, and its website is www dot and hppa.org. You can find on there a discussion paper I wrote on the drug approval process for the COVID-19 vaccines. And your viewers will be shocked, like in our regular drug approval process, this new drug approval process, you have to show safety, and then you have to show efficacy. And once you understand the safety profile and the efficacy profile, then and only then can you do a cost benefit analysis is this good idea? Do the benefits outweigh the risks? You can't do that if you don't know if it's safe. And you don't know if it's effective? Well, I think the COVID-19 vaccines never went through that process. A separate test was made for and will the word safety doesn't even appear in that test. The word efficacy doesn't even appear in that task. And so your your viewers will be shocked they can go and read that that discussion paper when Health Canada tells us they've been proven be safe and effective. That's a political statement. It's not it's not an accurate health statement. But the irony is, wow, if if we could just apply that test that they applied to COVID-19 vaccines to natural products. We're not going to lose them. Like you know full steam ahead. I mean, another irony in this one is a fun one is you know here they've you know already brought into law these new $5 million date fines for natural products. Well they deregulated hard drugs in in British Columbia. So they're it's not illegal anymore. To sell cocaine. It's not illegal anymore to sell Arrowood it's not illegal anymore to sell crystal meth. I mean, we want to do a poster, you know, help Canada's new war on drugs where they have you know, cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin. You know, perfectly legal and British Columbia no fine for trafficking. And you know, below that tap, you know, a chlobo, garlic and baby so bottle of oregano oil and say, you know, illegal $5 million fines. You know, Health Canada protecting you like it isn't this and say that we're, we're legalizing hard drugs. But we're imposing $5 million day fines on, you know, the natural health community. First names in our food supply, it's just It boggles the mind.   Will Dove  38:52 As as we've already pointed out, this has nothing to do with protecting public health. So now I'd like to talk about what you and potentially other lawyers are doing to push back against this and what the people can do.   Shawn Buckley  39:05 Well, I think the better question is what the people can do. I'm not confident that this is a matter that can be solved in court. I am mindful that earlier I said, you know, they were bringing in cost recovery and there was a lawsuit 98 and the back in 99. Back in 1998. The law was you couldn't impose cost recovery by regulation and they've since changed that law. So I don't see a clean lawsuit except you know, unchartered grounds have a right to you know, things like life, liberty and security that person which would include our right to choose how we're going to treat ourselves. But will you know, we just went through COVID and we both witness the most significant government intrusion on our rights and freedoms ever experienced in Canada even in wartime. So Me, and there have been charter case after charter case after charter case across Canada. And as a constitutional lawyer, I can't point you to a single case. In Canada, a single court case, that, you know, if governments tried to do this, again, we know with the next pandemic, that the, you know, plan to come our way, I can't think of a single court case that would act as a brake on any level of government to stop them, or even slow them down from doing what they've already done. And so I am I, I'm not hopeful at all, that, you know, we can solve this by way of the courts. So I'm actually though very excited about this as an opportunity. And some people might go, Well, why are you excited about Health Canada, bringing in all these measures that are going to restrict our access to natural products? I think this is the best thing that's ever happened to us. And the reason is, is that the two largest citizen rebellions in my lifetime have been over access to natural products. So the 9798, one, and 2008. Because over 70% of Canadians rely on use these products and a large number of those rely on them, to manage, you know, pretty serious things and or to stay alive. And so, we get mad, we get active when these are being threatened. And I mean, they, they really, they're being threatened like I've never seen before. So, so they're being threat? Well, a lot of the people in the natural immunity, really know nothing about this wider freedom narrative that you're involved in, in your podcasts, like, they know nothing about this a lot, you know, a significant portion of the natural community, watch the six o'clock news to be told what, how the what how the world works, and what you know, their worldview should be. Now they'll get they'll get mad about this. And they'll be asking, you know, just like some parents are asking about the, you know, trans storytime and its inner gardens. What's going on here? Like, why is the government doing this? And the reality is, is this is part of international harmonization with other Western nations to box us into a full on chemical drug model, right, when Canada has actually given away at sovereignty to how we're going to manage academics word for word. I mean, if we're gonna have the World Health Organization, and basically having sovereignty over Canada, dictating how we're going to manage pandemic, that's going to be a vaccine, it's going to be a chemical drug model imposed on us. And that's not going to work if we have, you know, natural health products to boost our immune system, where that's illegitimate viable choice. And so they have to get rid of that. That's all that's happening. But we could introduce the natural health community, which wouldn't have any idea, but that to that reality. So so we want to, this is the test case to get Arlette back will, like the freedom groups don't really have a target right now to see, can we actually get our limit to start bending to the will of the people, again, enacting for us? Because what party is standing up? Greta? What party, you know, objected to vaccine mandates? what party you know, objected to maski. It mean, it's a rhetorical question, because none did. Everyone went along with this. We didn't. We didn't have lively debate at all, if you were an opposition MP or government MP that questioned you are kicked out of the party. So parliament, I mean, the opposition failed in its role. And I think a lot of us think, you know, we can't get Parliament back. And now this comes along. And I think we can I think good, just listen, I mean, I think we're gonna have enough support. I, I work for the nhpa.org. And I invite every one of your listeners to go there and subscribe to our newsletter, because we're gonna have campaign after campaign after campaign. Right now we have a campaign there. And this is how we alert you and also, you know, plug into our social media follow us. But so right now we have a pressure your MP campaign where we equip you to go and meet with your MP and phone, your MP and write letters to your MP, like we equipped you to do that those tools are there, but we're going to campaign after campaign. But we're going to organize in all of the 338 Federal ridings and create local organizations where people go and join the party for nominations. Because that's their soft spot and get people on their policy committees we actually have to take in the people of Canada have to get control of the political parties again to get Parliament back. And I think we can do it. All right, this is the issue where we can get control of Parliament back. And now if we can't get parliament to deregulate, let's go back, let's harmonize with the United States and deregulate natural health products. Let's get back to where we recently were before this madness started. Let's get parliament to to pass the charter of health freedom, which does deregulate and moves the regulation to a different minister, where you don't have this conflict of interest with the pharmaceutical companies. And let's stop this international treaty that we don't follow the treaty where Canada looses its sovereignty to decide. And you know, the public, the public talking point on that will is really simple. It's like, do you mean to tell me that Canada doesn't have the expertise to manage a pandemic, like really, like, we don't have to give up our sovereignty, we have the expertise, we don't have to give that up to the World Health Organization. The World Health Organization just recently declared monkeypox, a pandemic, but the expertise in Canada that experts here has said, No, we don't really need to worry about monkey pox in Canada, we don't have to shut down. We don't have to mass or monkey box. And they proved correct. monkeypox wasn't a problem. So we didn't need the World Health Organization taking our sovereignty way over that. Now, if we retain our sovereignty, to manage how you handle any pandemic, that comes our way, it doesn't mean that we couldn't choose to do what the World Health Organization is suggesting. It's just we don't have to make it so that that's mandatory. That's the talking point. How does the government object to that we're a first world nation we have the expertise to manage how a pandemic should be run. So those will be the three asks right now we'll and if we can't get our limit back on that, if we can't get Canadians involved to get Parliament back. So you know, first of all, we maintain our access to natural health products. And secondly, we don't give away our sovereignty, the World Health Organization, if we can't do that, then we can't get Parliament back for anything. Because the natural product one, that's the one that's going to motivate citizens. So it's a tough case. And I mean, we can or we can't, but we need to know whether we can or can't. But you know, I actually think the cat.   Will Dove  47:18 Okay. So before I move on to my final question, Shawn, just in summary, what people can do, they can go and join nh ppa.org. Yep, all the recommendations there, which will, of course, include writing letters to MPs. But the other thing you suggested that people shouldn't be doing is reaching out to other people who are accessing the natural health products, that community of people who probably aren't aware of the current threat to our rights and freedoms, it's a much broader spectrum than just this issue, we'll get it and get them involved as well in something they care about. They may not care about the other things, but they will certainly care about this. And so this is a way to activate far more people to push back on this.   Shawn Buckley  47:56 Well, no, it's exactly like that will. But what I'm, what we're at the end hppa trying to do is is the reality with, you know, campaigns is is you can't take ownership. So what you want to do is is basically put out truthful information like say, No, you asked at the beginning, you know, are they being bad? Well, no, they're not being banned. This is what's happening. I mean, what we're going to end there where we might as well be banned, but could Oh, truthful information, that's, you know, non emotional, and the tools for people to whip, but you want the freedom groups to pick this up and run it under their opinion, and, and come up with their own campaigns. But you know, that's all ornate on what the end goals are. So it's actually a movement with specified angles. Like that's the only type of guidance you want, right? Because if everyone's asking for different things, then we never get to the table. So you know, we have to organize. So we get to the table and are asking for the same things. But you know, it's a, it's an ask that is in alignment with what freedom groups want, like, Yeah, we actually do want to see if we can get our element back. And most freedom groups are very concerned about, you know, the treaty, we can't call a treaty. So yeah, so I'm actually really excited. And you know, our first campaign is really just to shut down your MPs office. So you know, we watch you busy, we watch you call and we watch you writing letters, and not just once we found in 2008. And we had MP after MP, after MP telling us like, they couldn't function like their offices were just shut down. And I'd had a meeting at Prime Minister's Office in Ottawa, him was being escorted out of the building by then number two of the Ministry of Health political number two Laurie thrown us and, and, and he was saying to us that there was so much mail coming into the ministers of Health's Office that it was coming in and wheelbarrows like what people were doing is we had written a discussion paper was probably bandeau 2530 pages long and people would print that off, write a letter and staple the two together. So the mail was just incredibly bulky. But, but that got their attention. Mail coming in, and multiple wheelbarrows every day tells them, his letters were so much alike. You might need 10,000 emails they do once they start getting emails, they don't even count any, let alone read them, let alone response. But it takes effort to write a letter. So we actually whip you on how to write a letter, we clip you on how to visit your MP. So right now the only campaign we've got running is, let's pressure the MPs let's let's have all parties know. And we're in the process of trying to put together other campaigns.   Will Dove  50:47 For my final question, Sean, and you made allusion to this earlier, you're a constitutional lawyer, and you made reference to the clause in the Constitution that gives us the right to security of the person. Now, I've asked Brian Pickford about this. And I'm sure you know, Brian, he's the sole surviving author of that charter. And I asked him, does that clause security the person extend to what is put into our bodies? And he said, Absolutely, yes. Among other things, they did. So unfortunately, in the last three years, we've been living in a country that has refused to respect that constitutional right in terms of the COVID vaccines. But it seems to me that we could use this as a cautionary story challenge, because there's the flip side. Well, okay, now, we're not talking about you forcing people to take certain things, or very least highly pressurized and pressurizing them into it. Now, we're talking about taking away a person's right to put a certain thing in their body. Do we not have a constitutional right to that?   Shawn Buckley  51:47 Well, the problem will and I'm pretty sure that that's right. Pickford would agree with me is section one of our charter, which has been used against us in all this COVID litigation. So section seven of our charter reads, everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived there of accepting accordance with principles of fundamental Justice says, and the courts have interpreted that as a really strong law. And, you know, some of the strongest law is the, you know, medical marijuana cases, where people legitimately relied on cannabis to manage serious health conditions. And the courts had been banned on that. But what we've learned with COVID is, is that the charter really has become worthless, because of section one. And section one reads the charter, Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it. Now, we stopped there. Great. Okay, so the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it, if it's up there, great. But the mischief follows, subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. And courts have interpreted that as basically. So court will say, yeah, you violated this section of the charter and that section of the charter, but the god, it's demonstrably justified in the circumstances, and say, so there's no remedy. In the mean, that section here has slowly and now completely made our charter for all intents and purposes useless. So as you know, as a constitutional document guaranteeing rights, it has the shortest lifespan of anyone in history. I am constitutional lawyer, I think we'll all 100% agree in Canada that the charter is just useless, that those rights are meaningless. Yes, I know when Yeah. So I mean, I'm not hopeful in that a court cases take years and years and years, and the government makes them expensive as possible and, and basically tries to exhaust you financially, spiritually and emotionally, before you can even get there. And they'll just throw expert after expert or expert and if you lose, you're actually liable for the experts costs. i As you know, one case on this type of issue access to where we were seeking a declaration like Health Canada killed a number of people by restricting access to one natural product for a short period of time. In fact, that company was charged criminally and the court said, Yeah, you were selling with the license, but it was legally necessary. So we were seeking a declaration, just to get the court to agree that as a bare constitutional minimum, when the state takes away vital medication, like we're talking Life and Death medication, so it's a constitutional minimum, we were saying when the state takes away vital medication and here they were seizing shipments coming across the bourse at customs, that as a bare minimum, you'll have to tell people you stole their product. And there has to be some reasonable man Knesset for them to argue with you wait a second, my life is more important than this, you know, minor violation of a regulation like some bail that scene of rights because where people can't go to court. And even rich people wouldn't in this case be able to court go to court quickly enough to save their lives. They'd be dead before before he got there.   Will Dove  55:21 So you gave me the answer I was expecting. And I asked that question very intentionally, because I was expecting you to say that, that if we're going to win this in the courts, it's not going to happen. And I did that in order to add weight to what we talked about before that people want to fight this, they have to get involved with the NHPA, they have to write letters to their MLAs, they have to get other people involved. Because only when, as you said, we can shut down the MPs offices. That's what this is,   Shawn Buckley  55:48 we'll we're at this point where people can't sit still any longer. Like, you know, a lot of people, they're awake, they know there's a problem, but they're not doing things. And this has to be your full time job or you're going to be in a cage, you're going to be living in a 15 minute city, you're not going to be able to drive your we're going to be eating bugs, I mean, their Parliament's passing the law right now that basically is obligating them to find alternative protein sources. You know, do you know, we might be you know, in the next six months have a fake postman hook disease crisis, which then the government will force all the cattle in Canada, all the livestock to be injected with mn or a vaccine for Foot and Mouth Disease. And I don't know if the goal there is to basically kill off the calendar like, you know, sterilize them or kill them slowly. But they want to get rid of bull out there and Abba seating crickets. Now, if you don't start standing up to this stuff, if you don't start demanding that your access to natural products are in place, you know, if you don't go ballistic, when they barricade you into a 15 minute city, like, Okay, you can't be scared anymore. And the cool part is, and we learned this on the national citizens inquiry, I think we're the majority. Like we're you know, we've been all terrify, we're so caught off guard, we're all terrified. And I mean, really, you're going to be scared the next time they lock us in our homes. And if all of us just don't comply like business owners really again, are you going to require passports again, you won't have a business if you keep complying, like, this is the end, this is the end of our civilization, we were either going to be in a full blown police state with a much fewer of us, or are we start acting like human beings again? Can I share with you, you know, one of the witnesses at the National citizens inquiry she testified at in Red Deer. Her name was Regina. And she was from Poland. And she was involved in solidarity, the movement from the beginning. And, you know, so after they started to gain traction, and the leadership was arrested, you know, the, the remnant was, you know, trying to take care of the families and the leadership that had been arrested, and also keep, you know, the movement going and that she gets arrested for handing out pamphlets that go gets the government narrative. And she sentenced to three and a half years in jail by military tribunal. And she ends up coming to Canada's as a political refugee. So but she said, We had no support we had no one would support us, like, you know, a few but like the masses would not come out on the street until the economy collapse. And the bread ran out and people are hungry. Like people didn't come out until they were hungry. And then they come out and they take control over their country. Now will they were a police state for decades and decades and decades. At any time, they could have gone out on the streets at any time. They could have gone out on the streets and ended it and taken their country back as they did. But they were fooled into believing they couldn't and they only did when they were desperate. Well I don't I'm now pay the cost because I'm starving. If we wait till we're starving, I think they're gonna have us in the cage by the with the door law. There's so you know, there's gonna be a price. There's been we're past we're past the stage where we can get our institutions work. enforce again without a heavy OS. But it's it's such a minor cost compared to the cost of not doing something that I'm hoping, but you got to wake up. We're not wake up we have to be act, we're already and part of being active is finally waking people up like we have to stop now being afraid of, of talking to people that had, you know, shut us out and ridiculed us like we gotta get over all of that, you know being browbeaten and scared and that for their sake   Will Dove  1:00:35 I completely agree with Shawn, if we do not act now, if we wait until people are desperate, it's going to be too late. I'd love to you very much for your time for explaining all of this clearly, and for giving people a clear plan of action.   Shawn Buckley  1:00:49 Well, it's just been a pleasure to be on your show. And I don't think people appreciate how much work it is for you to do this type of show and do what you're doing. So I want to thank you for what you're doing because you're actually an example to the rest of us on taking action like every what you do can be different. Just figure out what your role is. And so thank you will for setting an example course.   Will Dove  1:01:16 retrograde motion