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On January 24, 1985, AM980’s Sports Call program interviewed Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery to understand the case against the London bid committee’s bid to host the 1991 Pan Am Games. After explaining that we oppose the bid because it sticks the taxpayer with a hefty bill for the games, the show interviewed Darwin Semotiuk of the London Bid Committee.
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On January 23, 1985, CHRW 94.7 FM’s “Forum” program interviewed Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery about the London bid committee’s bid for London to host the 1991 Pan Am Games at taxpayer expense. Emery and Freedom Party’s No Tax for Pan Am Games Committee opposed the bid on the ground that it would leave taxpayers footing the bill to host the games, and to pay for the white elephants left behind.
Also interviewed was bid booster Gord Hume.
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This news report on 6X radio in London canvassed the positions of various stakeholders favouring or opposing London’s Pan Am Bid Committee’s bid for London to host the 1991 Pan Am Games at taxpayer expense. Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery was one of the four individuals interviewed and was, of course, opposed to taxpayer funding for the games.
NOTE: In the report, Emery makes several references to “our group”. The group to which he is referring is Freedom Party and its No Tax for Pan Am Games Committee, which had its own newsletter.
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On November 29, 1984, Sportscall’s host, Gary Alan Price, invited two of London’s 1991 Pan Am Games Bid Committee members – Dr. Bert Taylor and Jim Hardy – to be his guests. The show fielded calls from listeners, including Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery. Emery called in to ask why the bid committee couldn’t finance the games with privately-contributed money, instead of with taxes. He condemns the Bid Committee’s activities and philosophy as immoral.
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On October 19, 1984, in London, Ontario, revellers in the Gatewood Crescent area (most thought to be students of the University of Western Ontario) smashed beer bottles on the street and driveways, and urinated on lawns, gardens, and automobiles. Local residents found themselves virtually helpless against the collective onslaught of over 1000 party-goers. Despite police attempts to disburse the crowd by using tear-gas, verbal and physical onslaughts against residents continued into the hours of dawn. On a Wednesday (it’s not clear which Wednesday) in November of 1984, the radio station at the University of Western Ontario broadcasted a one-hour discussion about the Gatewood riot. Panelists included Freedom Party of Ontario’s Action Director, Marc Emery. Emery found himself having to pronounce explicit moral judgement against those who did not seem to have any regard for, or understanding of, the property rights of others.
NOTE: This recording was featured at pages 11 to 12 of Issue 4 of “Freedom Flyer”, the September to December 1984 issue of Freedom Party of Ontario’s official newsletter.
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In 1984, the leftist London Union of Unemployed Workers (LUUW), led by activist John Clarke, performed a sit-in at the office of London Mayor Al Gleeson, to bring attention to the financial situation of two London mothers. In this recording, radio host Wayne Maclean had Clarke and London alderman Joe Fontana on the show as guests to discuss the LUUWs activities. Marc Emery, then Freedom Party of Ontario’s Action Director, calls into the show in response to Maclean’s comment that the ease with which one can get welfare makes us an “enlightened society”. Emery asserts that most of ones problems are the result of the decisions one has made. He takes particular issue with Maclean’s comment that the threat of government enforcement of tax laws is “just a perception”.
You can listen to the entire 1 hour and 35 minute broadcast. Emery calls in at approximately the 1 hour, 26 seconds mark:
or listen just to an excerpt from it, being Emery’s call into the show:
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In July of 1984, then Freedom Party of Ontario Action Director Marc Emery, together with volunteers from the Freedom Party of Ontario, went door-to-door distributing a letter opposed to taxpayer funding for the Pan Am Games. A local contingent of businessmen and municipal politicians had tendered a bid for London, Ontario to host the 1991 games, and the bid included a budget in which taxpayers would be stuck with picking up the lions’ share of the tab. Emery had submitted his letter to the local London Free Press, which had declined to print it. After Emery’s letter was distributed door-to-door, a No Tax for Pan Am Games Committee was formed, which published a number of newsletters to keep opponents of taxpayer funding for the games aware of developments. Ultimately, in early 1985, Emery and Freedom Party were successful: thanks largely to their organized opposition to taxpayer funding for the games, public outcry against public funding for the games ultimately resulted in Canada’s then federal Minister of State for Fitness and Amateur Sport, Otto Jelinek, issuing the announcement of a 5 year freeze on taxpayer funding for sporting events. The London bid was dead. The 1991 Pan Am Games were held in Cuba, at the expense of Cuban taxpayers.
In this Radio 98 episode of Wayne McLean’s show “Hotline”, Marc Emery and then London alderman Joe Fontana debated taxpayer funding for the London Pan Am Games bid.
Note: This audio is captured from a cassette tape. The recording on side 2 of the tape suffers from speeding-up and slowing down of the tape that appears to have been caused by variable slowing of the tape reel during the recording of the broadcast (the tape, itself, is not stretched or creased or otherwise damaged and the cassette mechanism moves freely). This digital capture plays side 2 continuously after side 1, such that the audio irregularities are heard during the second half of the recording.
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On February 9, 1984, a federal commission on pornography and prostitution held hearings in London. Marc Emery and Robert Metz attended and each gave testimony. The following day, “The Wayne McLean Talk Show” host Wayne Mclean discussed the commission and pornography. Featured guests were John Bowles, Gail Hutchinson, and Marc Emery. Liberal MPP (later Ontario Premier) David Peterson is interviewed. Robert Metz called-in later in the broadcast to clear up some of the mistaken impressions that other callers had about his and Marc’s testimony at the commission.
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It’s early February of 1984, and everyone’s talking about pornography and censorship in Canada. Federally, the Fraser Committee on pornography is holding cross-Canada hearings. On this particular date – estimated to be February 6, 1984 – the Chair of the Ontario Board of Censors, Mary Brown, is the guest of Wayne McLean’s talk radio program on Radio 98, in London, Ontario. She fields calls from the show’s listeners, including Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery and Freedom Party president Robert Metz. Both take on Brown over censorship.
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Before Freedom Party of Ontario was founded in 1984, one of the founding members of the party – Marc Emery – was the publisher of the London Metrobulletin, the owner of the City Lights Book Store in London, Ontario, and a recent candidate for alderman in that city. By 1983, his activism and publishing had made him a well known proponent of individual freedom in the London area.
This is Bill Paul’s first interview of Marc Emery. Emery discusses his political orientation, feminism, libel laws, his 1980 founding of the London Tribune newspaper, his newer London Metrobulletin tabloid, Ayn Rand, and more. The exact date of the interview is not known, but Paul and Emery discussed the fourth issue of the London Metrobulletin, which issue included a reproduction of a passage from the December 2, 1983 Ontario Hansard, which indicates that this interview was recorded in December of 1983.