Front Burner

CBC•www.cbc.ca

Front Burner is a daily news podcast that takes you deep into the stories shaping Canada and the world. Each morning, from Monday to Friday, host Jayme Poisson talks with the smartest people covering the biggest stories to help you understand what’s going on. We’re Canada’s number one news podcast and a trusted source of Canadian news.

We cover Canadian news and Canadian politics, Pierre Poilievre, Mark Carney, the Donald Trump administration, the upcoming 2025 Canadian election, provincial politics from Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario, and politicians Danielle Smith, David Eby and Doug Ford. We cover Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary as well as other municipalities across Canada.

In this Canadian election year, Front Burner will be focusing more on Canadian politics. We will take a close look at Mark Carney’s first few weeks as Prime Minister-Designate, the Conservatives and Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre as well as other leaders like Jagmeet Singh from the NDP and Quebec’s Yves-François Blanchet from the Bloc Québécois during the 2025 Canadian federal election. The podcast goes beyond Ottawa and digs deeper into major election issues like U.S.-Canada relations, jobs, the economy, immigration, cost of living, housing and rental costs, taxes and tariffs, democracy and technology.

The Front Burner daily podcast covers Canadian news from every province and territory: Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Nunavut, Northwest Territories and Yukon. We cover news from major cities like Ottawa, Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton.

When U.S. President Donald Trump declares he wants to make Canada the 51st state, and decides to implement tariffs, Front Burner has an analysis into what is happening. We cover Elon Musk’s DOGE. We cover the latest in technology from the rise of bitcoin and crypto, the future of TikTok, Meta, artificial intelligence, influencers, and more.

Look to our archives to see fact-checked stories about infrastructure, fascism, border security, immigration, Pierre Poilievre, Justin Trudeau, the Republican Party, American politics, Canadian politics, India, China, Trump’s tariffs, Mark Carney, Elon Musk, Toronto, technology, artificial intelligence, international students, healthcare, and inflation. We cover global news like the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, the ceasefire, the Ukraine-Russia war, and the U.S. economy and U.S. politics.

Front Burner is a part of your morning news routine. Whether you’re in Toronto or Vancouver or Washington, this is the news that matters to Canadians. We take a look at the economy and break it down from the budget to interest rate hikes to inflation to recessions to jobs to the cost of living. We look at the policy around housing, Canadian housing supply, and what this means for first-time home buyers, renters, and those with a mortgage. We look at technology, from AI to the manosphere to social media like Meta, Twitter, Facebook, and more. We look at influential newsmakers like Elon Musk and influential technology industries like crypto and AI.

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Episodes

Understanding Pierre Poilievre: Part 1

On Saturday, Pierre Poilievre was named the new leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. Jayme Poisson was on the floor at the event, and heard from those overjoyed at the result. Today, we bring you those voices, and take a closer look at Poilievre’s life and career, to help you understand who he is. Tomorrow, we’ll examine his leadership campaign and how he might lead.

Sep 12, 2022•35 min

Queen Elizabeth at the end of an empire

Queen Elizabeth took the throne at the age 25, and stayed there through seven decades, 15 British prime ministers and the longest reign in U.K. history. From the earliest days as Queen, Elizabeth grappled with the British Empire transforming into a Commonwealth with more self-determined nations. But in more recent years, the Queen also ruled through the death of Princess Diana, numerous royal family scandals, and political upheaval like Brexit. Today, royal historian Carolyn Harris gives us a lo...

Sep 09, 2022•25 min

Inside Ukraine — a country living with war

The view of the war from inside Ukraine varies depending on where you are. For two weeks, CBC News senior correspondent Susan Ormiston has been crossing the country where the war has become a normal part of life for some. In the capital of Kyiv, businesses are re-opening, communities are rebuilding, and some who fled at the start of the war have returned. Meanwhile, in Kherson and Kharkiv, fierce fighting continues as Ukraine’s counteroffensive reportedly ramps up. The Ukrainians say they’re mak...

Sep 08, 2022•25 min

U.K. teens joined ISIS, Canada accused of coverup

It's been seven years since British teen Shamima Begum, then 15 years old, entered Syria with two school friends to join ISIS. One of Begum's friends has since gone missing, and the other was reportedly killed in an airstrike on Raqqa. Begum herself disappeared for years before encountering a journalist in al-Hawl prison camp in 2019, begging to return to the U.K. for the safety of her child, who subsequently died. Now, the BBC says the man who smuggled the girls into Syria was actually a double...

Sep 07, 2022•25 min

A mass killing in Saskatchewan

Eleven people have died, including a suspect, and at least 18 injured after a brutal attack that started in James Smith Cree Nation, Saskatchewan on Sunday. Two brothers, Damien and Myles Sanderson, were charged with first-degree murder and were being sought for the attack. On Monday, the RCMP confirmed Damien, 31, has been found dead, while Myles, 30, is still at large. The RCMP have asked residents across the province to remain vigilant. At this stage of the investigation, they believe some vi...

Sep 06, 2022•20 min

Front Burner Introduces: Pressure Cooker

John and Amanda have lived on the fringes their whole lives. They’re on welfare, living with John’s grandma, and struggling with addiction to opioids and Dungeons and Dragons. They’ve followed crooked paths to this point. John played in heavy metal bands and dabbled with Satanism. Amanda left home and discovered heroin before her 18th birthday. The couple converts to Islam in an attempt to turn their lives around. But things take a wild turn when a mysterious figure enters their lives and draws ...

Sep 05, 2022•36 min

Death threats, aliens, Boney M: inside a tour with Canada's 'QAnon Queen'

Death threats, hotel rooms left empty for supposed visits by Russian President Vladimir Putin, and hours upon hours of the song Rasputin by Boney M. These are the conditions former followers say they endured on a cross-country RV tour with Romana Didulo, the self-proclaimed “Queen of Canada." Didulo became a well-known QAnon conspiracy figure, with claims she was the rightful ruler of Canada, but she originally didn’t appear in public. Now, she’s touring the country with supporters in RVs, inclu...

Sep 02, 2022•27 min

How Serena Williams changed the game

On Wednesday night, Serena Williams won her second round match against no. 2 ranked Anett Kontaveit, to advance in what could be the last pro tournament of her career. Earlier this month, Williams hinted that it might be time to say farewell to her illustrious tennis career. For two decades, the star has dominated the sport, winning 23 grand slam singles titles, 14 women's doubles and two mixed doubles slams. Cecil Harris, sports journalist and the author of 2020's Different Strokes: Serena, Ven...

Sep 01, 2022•25 min

The verbal ambush of Chrystia Freeland and political anger in Canada

On Friday, a man in Grande Prairie, Alta., accosted Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland and swore at her repeatedly as she entered the city hall building. A video of the incident, posted online, shows the man yelling at Freeland, calling her a "f--king bitch" and a traitor, and following her in close proximity as she boards an elevator. RCMP say they are investigating the altercation, which has provoked widespread condemnation from across the political spectrum. And it’s also sparked broader...

Aug 31, 2022•25 min

More than 1,000 dead in calamitous Pakistan floods

Devastating flash floods in Pakistan have submerged one-third of the country, according to its climate minister. Officials say more than 1,100 people have died since monsoon season began in June and an estimated 33 million people have been affected. BBC correspondent Farhat Javed recently visited Manoor Valley in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where locals tossed her a handwritten note asking for help: "We need supplies, we need medicine and please rebuild the bridge, we are left with no...

Aug 30, 2022•21 min

Two Afghans on their frustrated efforts to come to Canada

It’s been just over a year since the last Canadian plane airlifting people out of Afghanistan left Kabul in the wake of the Taliban takeover. According to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, this country has successfully resettled more than 17,600 Afghans since August 2021 – and the government has committed to resettle 40,000. But many who helped Canadians during the war are still stuck there. Today, two Afghans explain the dangers they now find themselves in because of their previous ...

Aug 29, 2022•28 min

A car bomb’s impact on a Russia at war

On Saturday, a car bomb killed pro-war Russian commentator Darya Dugina on the outskirts of Moscow. Dugina was the daughter of ultranationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin, whose influence on Russian President Vladimir Putin is widely debated — leading to speculation the bomb was meant for Dugin himself. Today on Front Burner, The Guardian's Moscow correspondent Andrew Roth explains who Dugin is, the competing theories for who was responsible for the car bombing, and what impact the attack could...

Aug 26, 2022•22 min

Germany needs energy. What can Canada offer?

This week, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visited Canada as part of his mission to shore up alternative sources of energy to reduce Germany's dependence on Russian natural gas. Scholz finished the trip in Newfoundland, where he and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau agreed to form what Trudeau called the “Canada-Germany hydrogen alliance.” Meanwhile, Scholz also said he wanted more liquified natural gas from Canada. Today, CBC’s Peter Cowan and J.P. Tasker explain what happened during this trip and wh...

Aug 25, 2022•21 min

The myth behind 'nobody wants to work anymore'

Many employers continue to struggle to fill vacant positions, despite the end of most pandemic restrictions — and the underlying explanations for this vary depending on who you ask. A common notion is that people just don’t want to work anymore. But when Canada’s unemployment rate is at its lowest level in decades, does the data really bear that out? Today on Front Burner, economist and Atkinson Fellow Armine Yalnizyan debunks common myths and explains how the current labour crunch has roots str...

Aug 24, 2022•22 min

Ontario mulls private solutions for public health-care crises

It's a perennial debate: what role should the private sector have in Canada's public health-care system? The fact is, it's already part of the ecosystem. Now, Doug Ford's government in Ontario is mulling the use of more private surgery clinics to alleviate pressures facing the public system. The move is receiving praise by some, while others raise concerns over how an expanded role of for-profit health care could have negative effects downstream. Today, Dr. Danyaal Raza explains those concerns. ...

Aug 23, 2022•22 min

Can work-from-home go on forever?

The pandemic-era work-from-home experiment has gone on for over two years now and for some, it’s proven to be effective. For others, the isolation that comes with remote work hasn’t been easy. As some employers ask their workers to finally return, we dive into the debate around working from home — and what a successful hybrid model could look like. We’re talking to writer Anne Helen Petersen, co-author of Out of Office: The Big Problem and Bigger Promise of Working from Home.

Aug 22, 2022•28 min

Electric vehicles and an Ontario mining conundrum

The United States’ new and historic climate law is being hailed by some Canadian politicians and environmental advocates as a chance to turn Canada into a global hub for electric cars and their components. That’s thanks in part to money and incentives which could potentially give a boost to companies mining in Canada for the minerals used to make electric vehicle batteries. If that sounds like a big green win for Canada — it is. But it’s also more complicated than that. Today, we’re taking a loo...

Aug 19, 2022•25 min

The fatwa on Salman Rushdie, 3 decades later

The writer Salman Rushdie is still recovering in hospital from a brutal attack at a literary event last Friday. A young man rushed onstage and stabbed Rushdie nearly a dozen times, leaving him with injuries so severe he may lose an eye. While Rushdie himself has never been attacked like this before, this isn't the first attempt on his life. He has been targeted by death threats ever since the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran issued a fatwa calling for Rushdie's death in 1989. The fatwa was over Rushdi...

Aug 18, 2022•29 min

What we’ve learned since the FBI raided Trump’s Florida home

In the wake of the FBI raid on former U.S. president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida earlier this month, more details have emerged about what federal agents are investigating, including potential violations of three different federal laws, one of which is the Espionage Act. One unsealed document shows that the FBI seized 11 sets of classified documents, including some with the special designation of “sensitive compartmented information,” a category meant to protect the country’s most...

Aug 17, 2022•23 min

Everything is expensive Part III: Rents

Rents are on the rise in Canada, making it harder for tenants to find a place that fits their budget. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s definition of "affordable" housing is a place that costs you less than 30 per cent of your household's income. But in Vancouver, where the average monthly rent for a two-bedroom is now $3,597 — you'd have to earn more than $150,000 for that rent to be affordable. In Toronto, your household would have to make more than $135,000. On today's episode of ...

Aug 16, 2022•20 min

Afghanistan, one year after the Taliban takeover

One year ago, the Taliban effectively re-took control of Afghanistan. Chaos followed in the capital, as thousands of people desperate to get out of the country converged on the Kabul airport. As this was taking place, U.S. forces continued their withdrawal, which marked the end of a 20-year war. Today on Front Burner, we’re talking to Kabul-based journalist Ali M. Latifi about this iteration of the Taliban’s rule one year on, the ongoing impact of economic sanctions and what daily life is like f...

Aug 15, 2022•28 min

TikTok is changing the music industry — and music

With its immense catalog of sounds — from old tracks to new and every remix in between — TikTok has evolved beyond its early days as a space for lip-syncing videos and dance trends into a cultural "tastemaker," and a driving force for the music industry. The app is now partnering with Ticketmaster to help users find and buy concert tickets right on the app. With its recent filing to trademark "TikTok Music" in countries including the U.S., New Zealand, and the U.K., there's evidence that TikTok'...

Aug 12, 2022•26 min

Could the new U.S. climate bill hold lessons for Canada?

Despite its name, the Inflation Reduction Act is in large part a climate bill, with $369 billion US earmarked primarily for investments in green innovation in the U.S. and cutting greenhouse gas emissions. The U.S. Senate narrowly granted its approval last weekend, paving the way to a House of Representatives vote where political observers anticipate it will pass and be signed into law by President Joe Biden. Today on Front Burner, guest host Jason D'Souza speaks with Time magazine senior climat...

Aug 11, 2022•26 min

The latest on Canada's monkeypox outbreak

Monkeypox cases in North America continue to climb. Last week, the U.S. declared monkeypox a public health emergency. Here in Canada, the number of cases is approaching 1,000. The disease can be painful and the self-isolation period can be lengthy. Right now, men who have sex with men remain the most at risk of infection. Today on Front Burner, Dr. Darrell Tan, a clinician scientist in the division of infectious diseases at Saint Michael's Hospital and associate professor in the Department of Me...

Aug 10, 2022•26 min

The ‘sextortion’ of Amanda Todd

After her death by suicide in 2012, Amanda Todd’s name became closely linked with cyberbullying in Canada. From the ages of 12 to 15, the teen was relentlessly harassed and exploited online by more than 20 social media accounts that extorted her for sexual images. On Saturday, nearly 10 years after her death, a 44-year-old Dutch national, Aydin Coban, was convicted of extortion, possession of child pornography, child luring and criminal harassment against Todd. Today, Eva Uguen-Csenge — who help...

Aug 09, 2022•21 min

The unexpected rise of Quebec’s Conservative party

Quebec's Conservative party — unaffiliated with the federal Conservatives — had long been essentially a fringe party in the province, with no seats in the legislature, no invitations to major debates and little funding. But since former talk radio host Éric Duhaime took over last year, the party has become a contender in Quebec politics, at some points polling as high as nearly 20 per cent. A recent CBC News investigation found that of the first 54 candidates the party has announced, nearly 30 p...

Aug 08, 2022•22 min

The chaotic trial of InfoWars’ Alex Jones

For many years, far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones has touted that the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was a fake. The parents of its victims have been targeted because of Jones's claims that they were "crisis actors" in a plot to force gun control. Now, two of those parents are suing the InfoWars host for compensation and punitive damages. Today Dan Solomon, senior editor at Texas Daily, tells us more about the surprising turns that went down in the trial and what's at stake fo...

Aug 05, 2022•31 min

Tension in Taiwan as China reacts to U.S. visit

U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan may have been brief, but it wasn’t short on controversy. She's the most senior U.S. official to visit Taiwan in decades — but many worry her visit will fan the flames of an already tense relationship between the self-governed island and China, which claims Taiwan as its territory and opposes any engagement by Taiwanese officials with foreign governments. Ahead of Pelosi's visit, China ramped up military drills near Taiwan, and Beijing has vowed to...

Aug 04, 2022•22 min

As Meta struggles, Zuckerberg puts employees under the gun

As the global economy slows down, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is pushing employees to speed up. The Facebook and Instagram parent company set a record in February, losing the most stock value in a single day in U.S. history. But Zuckerberg has continued sinking billions of dollars into his vision of a “metaverse,” pressed for faster updates to compete with TikTok, and is upping the pressure on employees. According to reports of an internal Q&A in June, Zuckerberg told employees: “Realistically, the...

Aug 03, 2022•24 min

Inuit ask Pope for justice over accused priest

Last week, Canada asked France to extradite a Catholic priest accused of crimes against Inuit children in Nunavut decades ago. RCMP have said Rev. Johannes Rivoire is wanted on a Canada-wide warrant related to a sexual assault charge laid in February. Rivoire had previously been charged with sexually abusing children in Nunavut, but those charges were stayed in 2017. In Iqaluit on Friday, as part of the Pope's final stop in his "penitential pilgrimage" in Canada, a delegation once again called o...

Aug 02, 2022•25 min

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