Podcasts about Canada

In Brad West wants Chemtrade in Port Coquitlam, an April episode of The Jas Johal Show, the host lays out a 4-3 council vote in the District of North Vancouver against letting Chemtrade keep producing liquid chlorine at its North Shore plant past 2030. Johal says the plant makes 70% of the chlorine used to purify drinking water in Western Canada. Within the episode the dispute passes through a neighbouring mayor's offer to take the plant and a port lease policy that pushed manufacturing off port land. A day earlier, The Jill Bennett Show had given the legal frame in an episode that also took up the chlorine decision: a guest noted that municipalities "have been described as the creatures of the provinces."

That exchange is a useful key to Canadian podcasts right now. Large pressures arrive as small votes, and the most useful hosts keep asking which level of government actually holds the lever. You hear talk radio reissued as podcasts, from CKNW, Alberta's 880 CHED and QR Calgary. CBC's narrative series sit beside it, along with a near-daily churn of hockey.

The calendar is crowded. In October 2026, AP reported that the Parti Québécois had returned to power. In September 2026, British Columbia announced an election for 24 October. Ontario's municipal and school-board elections were scheduled for 26 October 2026. The feeds include Front Burner's Quebec separatism in the 'elbows up' era, The Jas Johal Show's Provincial leaders debate preview, and ward titles on Guelph Politicast. Most of these shows are about one province or city. The British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, Vancouver, Edmonton, Ottawa and Montreal pages go deeper into those places.

What Canada is

Canada is a North American country covering nearly 10 million square kilometres. That makes it the world's second-largest country, and it has the world's longest coastline. Its estimated population was 41,798,407 on 1 July 2026. Services employ about three-quarters of its workforce, and natural resources play an unusually large economic role compared with other OECD countries.

Talk radio and the question of who decides

The Jas Johal Show, on 730 CKNW, gives guests room to explain the machinery behind a story. Floor crossing hurts Conservatives; Poilievre's leadership in doubt moves from Ottawa's floor-crossings to a First Nations chief alarmed at a possible suspension of parts of DRIPA. The chief notes that the law passed in November 2019 with no MLA voting against it. Johal then presses a guest defending access to medically assisted dying on whether its availability is widening too fast. The Jill Bennett Show, which airs noon to 3 on the same station, is the more practical neighbour. Is a $40 weekly grocery bill in Canada? introduces a local woman whose household now spends $160 a month on variable groceries, including food and household goods, down from $800 to $1,000.

In Alberta, Shaye Ganam is heard on 880 CHED in Edmonton and QR Calgary. In ERs, Gerrymandering, Self Driving Cars, an emergency-department guest says someone pulling a weapon has become an almost weekly occurrence. In the same episode the studio drifts into finding north by Southgate and Northgate malls. On a separate political panel, one guest cites polling that shows the NDP leading in Edmonton and the UCP in rural Alberta. For the national angle, Front Burner's The other nine referendum questions in Alberta leads naturally to the Alberta page.

In Ontario, The Bill Kelly Podcast brings political commentary to the microphone. In Hiding SECRETS? Doug Ford's Alarming Attack on Political Transparency with FOI Law Changes, Kelly argues that proposed changes would make records about the Premier, his ministers and their staff nearly impossible to obtain. He sets this against Minister Stephen Crawford's claim that the government remains one of Ontario's most transparent. Treat it as commentary, not reporting. EH Radio Canadian Politics with a twist is angrier still. In EHR 1364 morning moment 'Brian Peckford on Polivere' Mar 27 2026, the host warns of a constitutional crisis created by what he calls the "Federal Liberal Communist Party of Canada." The show's guest interviews with Jerome Corsi turn to US election claims, which the guest presents as fact.

Housing and the cost of staying

Guelph Politicast shows how a national crisis looks from inside one building. Early in GUELPH POLITICAST #515 – To Form a More Perfect Tenant Union (feat. Janice Folk-Dawson), the host cites a local legal clinic's figure of a 245% rise in N-13 eviction notices since 2020 among cases known to the clinic. The guest then describes the 88-unit building where 35 tenants came to a meeting about an above-guideline rent increase. Her account of what they discovered: "none of us understood our rights as tenants." The group went to the tribunal together and won a decrease. That episode leads to the Ontario page.

The Missing Middle Podcast takes the policy view. In Second-Time Buyers Are Screwed (And Ignored), Mike Moffitt and Sabrina Maddow look at couples who have outgrown starter condos. They cite an Abacus poll of Ontarians in which 55% supported homebuyer rebates but only 8% thought the rebates were enough. The Ottawa Real Estate Podcast reads the market week by week. In The Six Week Window You Can't Miss, mortgage agents Paul Stevenson and David Warren cite national prices down 3% year over year, with Hamilton down 8%. The Ottawa page has more.

Hockey as civic weather

In Locked On Canucks - Daily Podcast On The Vancouver Canucks, the hosts sometimes become part of the story. Early in Never a dull moment for the Vancouver Canucks, Trevor Beggs reflects that a reporter does not expect to become the news. Later, his co-host tells him flatly that Adam Foote "is not a good coach." Locked On Canadiens - Daily Podcast on the Montreal Canadiens covers its team just as closely. SOFT?: Habs Captain Calls Out CASUAL Effort in COMEBACK Win vs. Panthers builds on Nick Suzuki's admission that "we were soft as a group." Be warned that sponsor reads appear in that episode.

Struddy's World - Got Yer Back is where the hockey talk gets technical. In STRUDDY's WORLD - Which Comes First: Defence of Goaltending?, he calls good goaltending "a byproduct of solid defensive play." His co-host then explains why goalies read plays rather than react to them. TSN 1200 Mornings is lighter. In TSN Mornings April 17, 2026 Hour 4: Sens vs. Canes won't be a comfortable series for fans, the hosts report that a Habs flag on a construction trailer in Ottawa would be swapped for a Senators flag.

The long view, and the harm in it

These next shows deal with residential-school abuse, sexual violence and suicide.

Kuper Island is Duncan McCue's series about four students at a residential school, three who survived and one who did not. In E2: Nights on the Boys' Side, a survivor recalls twice being unable to open the gym door. The next day he learned a boy had hanged himself there, "at least that's what they were told." The episode acknowledges that uncertainty, and near the end of the episode it gives a crisis-line number. Missing & Murdered follows Connie Walker's search for Cleo, a Cree girl whose family believes she was killed hitchhiking home to Saskatchewan. The feed now also carries other CBC series. One example is The kid who confronted his abuser at residential school (via See You in Court), about Willie Blackwater, who at 13 held a kitchen knife to his abuser. The Saskatchewan page is the natural next step.

The Nations of Canada works more slowly. Episode 296: What Am I To Do With My Name follows Berlin, Ontario, through the 1916 referendum that renamed it Kitchener after the British war secretary was lost at sea when HMS Hampshire sank. The episode treats the fight as a rehearsal for the national divisions of 1917. Episode 285: Komagata Maru covers the 1914 standoff in Vancouver's harbour. The Six Billion Dollar Gold Scam, made with the BBC World Service, reopens the Bre-X fraud. In 8. The fall guy, the host visits the de Guzman family mausoleum and sets the suicide account against the doubts of people who knew the geologist.

Out past the cities

The Backroads Bill Podcast covers Northern Ontario. In A Lifetime of Weather: David Phillips Reflects on Over 50 Years of Predicting Canadian Climate, Phillips remembers raking leaves in Windsor on the day after Hurricane Hazel hit Toronto, October 15, 1954. YQG In Bloom stays in Windsor-Essex. Windsor-Essex Jane's Walk 2026! describes a migrant workers' walk in Leamington, led together with a support group for those workers. Further afield, try the Saskatchewan, Manitoba and New Brunswick pages.

Where to start

• For the civic argument: The Jas Johal Show, Brad West wants Chemtrade in Port Coquitlam. Listen for who claims the final say.
• If history pulls you: The Nations of Canada, Episode 296: What Am I To Do With My Name.
• For housing from the ground floor: Guelph Politicast, GUELPH POLITICAST #515 – To Form a More Perfect Tenant Union (feat. Janice Folk-Dawson).
• Ready for harder listening: Kuper Island, E2: Nights on the Boys' Side.
• On a game night: Struddy's World - Got Yer Back, STRUDDY's WORLD - Which Comes First: Defence of Goaltending?

The Canada feed on this page plays clips from these shows.