The following is a transcript of the Hon. Pierre Poilievre's remarks from March 3, 2026. These remarks have been edited for clarity. Check against delivery.

London, UK - You'll forgive me if I'm a little bit wired and tired, but we have this thing called jetlag, which I solve with caffeine. And the strangest phenomenon came to my attention when I visited one of your fine coffee shops here in London. I went to pay, I took my beverage, and after I said "Thank you," the woman said something very bizarre. She didn't say "you're welcome," she said "thank you."

It occurred to me that this is not the sequence our mothers taught us, which is supposed to be "thank you - you're welcome." But instead, it was "thank you - thank you." Now, reflect on all the transactions you do in an open market. Almost all of them have that same strange sequence: "thank you - thank you."

Why? Because the money that I gave her is worth more than the coffee she parted with to get it, and the coffee I took from her was worth more than the money, I can assure you, with the jetlag. That is the nature of the free market: both parties have to be better off or they wouldn't choose to participate in it

If I have an apple and want an orange, and you have an orange and want an apple, and we exchange, we're both richer even though we still just have an apple and an orange between us. Because now we have something more valuable to us than we had before. If there's any doubt, I prefer apples to oranges, but that's just me; each of us has different preferences.

Voluntary exchange of work for wages, product for payment and investment for interest benefits all participants in a free market or else they wouldn't choose to participate. By contrast, everything government does, it does by force of mandatory taxation.

Even the things we agree it must do, like fund a military, it has to be done through the coercion of the state. That's why no one writes "thank you" on their tax forms. Even though theoretically, it's supposed to be a transaction, you don't get the same mutual gratitude that you do in a free exchange.

Even though we are in England, I hope I don't create a diplomatic incident by quoting a great Scot to kick off my remarks. But this Monday will be the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. As he wrote, "What is prudence in the conduct of every private family can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom."

Put simply: when people can decide what to do for themselves, they make themselves and all of us better off. What is good for the parts is even better for the sum. Free exchange is the key to the well-being of commoner and country.

As he said: "Commerce… ought naturally to be, among nations, as among individuals, a bond of union and friendship." His books were long, but his principle simple: Free trade, free markets, free nations, and that is the theme of this speech.

Canada must become stronger at home so that we have unbreakable leverage abroad. Opening trade with like-minded free nations will do that, by diversifying markets, lowering costs for consumers and boosting wages for workers.

Smith is probably the best-known and least-read economist. For that reason, he is often misunderstood. If you Google "Father of Capitalism," his name and face will pop up. Yet the word "capitalism" or "capitalist" does not appear in either The Wealth of Nations or The Theory of Moral Sentiments. He never used the term.

He did not preach the supremacy of capital over labour, but the free and voluntary exchange of the two. Indeed, he believed that labour was the core of all value; to quote, "the annual labour of every nation" is the true source of wealth, and he warned against profits earned through state protection rather than open competition.

Nor did he glorify greed. When he wrote that we expect our dinner not from the benevolence of the butcher, brewer or baker, but from their own self-interest, he was not glorifying greed but rather describing obvious incentives. In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, he reminds us that human beings are bound together by something he called "sympathy" - by placing ourselves in the other person's situation and seeing through their eyes, thus our interest becomes their interest.

Indeed, if sympathy means caring truly and actively about the other fellow's wants and needs, then no one is more sympathetic than the entrepreneurial businessman who gets ahead by supplying the needs and wants of others. Others who must choose voluntarily to transact with him because what they get from him is worth more than what it costs.

That is the nature of free enterprise business. If you want to sell what the customer buys, you have to see through the customer's eyes. Smith did not invent the free market economy; he discovered it, just at the moment in history when these economies were embracing it over serfdom.

So we can compare the before and after to see which approach worked. Before 1776, there was literally no economic growth. Estimates by Angus Maddison show that between the year 1 and the year 1700, per capita GDP measured in 1990 dollars grew from about $444 to $615, in seventeen hundred years, meaning barely any growth in living standards in those seventeen centuries.

From 1820 to 2000, per capita GDP went from $667 to $5,700. Now, let me put this into context: on average, in the free market period, the economy would grow as much in one year as it would have grown in the average 200 years in the pre-free market period. Life expectancy literally doubled from the year 1800 to 75 from 35.

Then there is transportation. Winston Churchill famously noted that Sir Robert Peel in 1841 took just as long to go from London to Rome as a Roman emperor would have taken to go from Rome to London two thousand years earlier. In other words, there was literally no improvement in transportation technology in two millennia.

Then, in little more than a century, we went from horses and sailboats to jet engines and men on the moon. More advancement in a century and a half of free enterprise than in the prior two thousand years combined. For generations, free markets lowered costs, raised wages and lifted billions out of poverty.

Yet they are facing major pushback today from the twin threats of socialism and protectionism. That risks turning the Wealth of Nations into the poverty of the people. How did this happen?

The answer, if we're being honest, is that there is a backlash because working people across the Western world have been thoroughly betrayed. Wages lag. Housing is out of reach. Energy costs soar. Opportunities blocked. And the silent thief of inflation has robbed buying power.

The state took from the hardworking many to enrich the privileged few. It is not that the government left working people behind; rather, it priced them out and shut them out altogether. Net-zero policies drove energy and food costs up and paycheques down, all to fill the pockets of green grifters. Protected monopolies shielded from competition keep prices high. Corporate welfare enriched insiders at taxpayers' expense.

Gatekeepers blocked homebuilding, resource development and infrastructure - shutting workers from jobs and youth from homes. Licensing bureaucracies stopped immigrants from working in their professions, including in our hospitals, while mass migration drove wages down, rental costs up, and social services into the ground.

And worst of all, inflationary money printing robbed savings and paycheques from working people while ballooning the assets of connected insiders. That is the inflation tax - the most unjust and immoral tax of all. It takes from those with the least without even a vote in Parliament. The inflation tax is when governments spend what it does not have on what people do not want and then prints money to pay for it, inflating prices.

One of the worst, though not the first, was your very own Henry VIII. He used to have his minters melt down British coins and refill the inside with copper while extracting the silver and using it to make yet more coins. He put his face on the front of these very same coins, and when they would rub around inside people's pant pockets, the silver would rub off, and his red nose would be exposed.

Thus came the nickname "Old Coppernose," and Englishmen would know that their king had robbed them of the purchasing power of their money and of their silver every time they would look at his face with that red nose. If anyone wonders whether or not this caused inflation, here's a very simple mathematical reality: silver content dropped by 75 per cent and prices rose by 77 per cent during the Great Debasement of Henry and Edward.

Today's debasement has the same effect. An enormous gap between rich and poor has coincided with radical money-printing in the Western world. Homeownership: You wonder why young people can't afford homes? It's because the cost has been inflated. The number of dollars in circulation has been growing at six times the rate of the number of homes in the market in the United States, Canada and the UK over the last decade.

To be clear, housing costs less today than it did 55 years ago - if your money is gold. In fact, it has gone down by about half if your money is gold. But if your money is dollars or pounds, it has more than quadrupled in that same time period. So it is not that housing costs are rising; it is that the purchasing power of money is falling.

Meanwhile, billionaires leverage the newly printed money, which, just like the aristocrats of Henry VIII's time, they touch before it loses its value, to balloon their assets. To be clear, fortunes earned through industry and entrepreneurship should be rewarded and celebrated. But having wealth inflated by government is not the same thing at all. We want people to get rich by making, not taking.

Smith warned that when corporate and political power merge, the public loses. When corporations get ahead by having the best lobbyist, not the best product; when those with money turn it into governmental power and turn that power back into more of other people's money, then the people pay the price.

This form of trickle-down economics takes from entrepreneurs, workers and savers to give to the government, which then funnels it through bureaucracy, interest groups, and lobbyists, with only drops trickling down to the people at the bottom of the pyramid who paid for it in the first place.

Ironically, those who seek to aggrandize the state tell us it is all to redistribute wealth like Robin Hood. The theory was that if government decided who got what, it would make sure everyone got their fair share; that altruistic authorities would abolish greed altogether. Because while humans operating in the marketplace apparently are greedy, but in positions of government power, they are transformed into new and perfected creatures caring only about the well-being of others.

But if greed can exist in the market, surely it can thrive in the halls of government power. As Macaulay reminded us, human nature travels everywhere man goes:

Where'er ye shed the honey, the buzzing flies will crowd;

Where'er ye fling the carrion, the raven's croak is loud;

Where'er down Tiber garbage floats, the greedy pike ye see;

And wheresoe'er such lord is found, such client still will be.

If man is greedy, he will find a way to get rich by taking what government forces others to pay, just as flies take honey without making any. Whereas in the free market, the greedy man must sell things people choose to buy, much like the bee thrives by exchanging pollen for nectar to make honey and multiply flowers.

We Conservatives must be the champions of the honey bees, or the "strivers" as the great Lady Thatcher described them. The strivers whom she knew so well because her father was one of them. The daughter of a grocer, always carrying with her his memory in her heart, no matter where she went.

From Stephen Harper and John A Macdonald in Canada, from Thatcher and Churchill here: Conservatives have always known that the greatness of a nation lies in its working people. We will champion them by again restoring a meritocratic, bottom-up, competitive economy.

An economy where businesses compete through paying more wages to attract workers and lowering prices to attract customers. Where business is disciplined by competition, not propped up by handouts, carve-outs and bailouts. Economies that are stronger at home so that they can have unbreakable leverage abroad.

Some of that leverage will be for Canada to have deeper trade with many of our allies, especially the mother country. Otherwise put: we need free trade with other free nations. In 1994, Margaret Thatcher, the great Iron Lady, said:

"Trade is the oldest form of exchange known to man. From ancient times, it was the most natural form of daily co-operation between peoples, whether it be in the smallest village or the bustling marketplaces of Athens, Babylon or Rome. The marketplace is not the invention of some academic economist; it is the daily habit of the people."

What is true in Babylon was true in 1994 when she said it and remains true today. Now more than ever, Canada must begin to deepen ties with places like the United Kingdom. One way is through free trade with old friends, strengthening the bonds that we have between us.

For generations, Canadians and Brits traded, invested and fought on the same side of wars. The United Kingdom has long been one of Canada's leading investment partners. And much is happening in the world today that needs to bind us together. With the authoritarian theocracy in Iran crippled and the Ayatollah dead, we need to join with other free nations.

We also need to hope that Iranians will join the council of free nations. We support the Iranian people's ambition to have a free and democratic country, and we must secure our borders and our homelands to keep ourselves safe in this dangerous world.

We also must draw from the inspiration of the great Iron Lady, who, as part of the Western alliance of free nations, helped topple the Soviet Union and win the Cold War. We must strengthen that Transatlantic alliance and learn from her conviction and courage.

The same determination that reinforced us then must do so now. Today, I'm here to share an idea on how we can do that: it's to build on the guarantee of security and freedom by bringing together the longstanding ties that united us in the past.

Supply chains that we took for granted are being interrupted, and when democratic alliances fragment, others fill the vacuum. If trusted allies do not tighten their economic and security ties, less trusted powers will shape the world, control the supply chains and set terms. That is not a future that serves our people.

In such a world, warm words about old alliances are not enough. When the treaties and agreements that allow us to trade freely face upheaval, we need to double down and deepen our ties with our oldest and most trusted friends. Instead of shrinking markets behind tariffs, we should expand opportunities among friends.

That is why I believe the time has come for a new partnership between Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand - a modern CANZUK. A pact that opens our economies, removes barriers, recognizes credentials, expands skilled labour mobility, and deepens capital markets. Cooperation that helps us build stronger militaries and keep our countries safe from shared threats like China, Russia, and others.

Our four countries already have a free trade agreement that is already in place through the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But we must go further, because tariffs are not the only or even the biggest barrier to our trade. More often, trade is slowed by regulations, standards, product approvals, licensing rules of procurement, et cetera.

For example, Canadian beef is not able to make it into as many marketplaces of this country as it should because of regulatory obstacles. We must remove these types of obstacles so all of you can enjoy the heavenly splendour of beef from rural Alberta, if I do say so myself.

We will work to remove such barriers to bring you these joys and ensure that entrepreneurs on your side of the pond have access to our markets as well. We will remove needless complexity because trust is already strong.

So what would it mean in practice?

1. We would have automatic professional recognition so that a doctor here could be a doctor there. If you are capable of doing a heart surgery in London, England, surely you can do one in London, Ontario. We would ensure it strengthens our healthcare systems on both sides of this great ocean and that we share the knowledge between our two countries.
2. Product alignment - If something is legal in Sydney, Australia, surely it should be legal in Sydney, Nova Scotia, whether it's a car part or a medicine. That's why we need regulatory presumption of equivalence so product approval done in one country is recognized in all other countries.
3. We must allow mobility of skilled workers so that our youth can travel and work between these different countries, filling shortages and boosting economic growth at home and abroad.
4. Defence procurement - We need to team up to ensure maximum collaboration to deliver military equipment and weaponry at the lowest cost for taxpayers.
5. A critical minerals and energy compact. Canada has among the greatest supply of these incredible resources that we could put to use for freedom. We want to fuel the freedom of our allies by building up a strategic energy and minerals reserve that could be available in the event of war to those countries that have agreed to provide tariff-free access to Canadians.

Under my leadership, Canada will create this wonderful reserve, this guarantor of our freedom. We have ten of the twelve NATO defence-critical minerals, and we want them to be available on the side of freedom in the event they are needed.

There is also an opportunity for nuclear cooperation. We are the largest supplier of uranium anywhere on earth, we invented the CANDU reactor, and we have much to learn from you on nuclear fusion.

We should also strike an LNG supply deal so all of your natural gas comes from Canada. Not from Qatar, not from Russia and not from any other unstable or hostile supplier. You need to have Canadian energy fueling your freedom here in this country.

Le libre-échange est important parmi les alliés. C'est le meilleur moyen pour rendre la vie abordable et pour nous rendre « maître chez nous ». De travailler ensemble pour partager ce que nous avons ensemble, ce que nous voulons ensemble. C'est pour ça que je propose un nouveau partenariat entre le Canada, le Royaume-Uni, l'Australie et la Nouvelle-Zélande, qui va reconnaître nos qualifications, mettre en place une équivalence réglementaire, faciliter la mobilité des travailleurs, renforcer notre collaboration en matière de défense, créer un partenariat stratégique sur les minéraux critiques, comme j'ai proposé, pour rendre nos pays plus sécuritaires. Et comme ça, nous allons pouvoir partager nos efforts pour protéger la liberté et avoir plus de force dans nos négociations.

At the same time, we must broaden our efforts to ensure that our people have freedom here and abroad. We need to protect our borders and ensure we have solid immigration, which I do not believe should be part of the first steps of CANZUK. We need to ensure that we build upon the strengths of our countries, including, in Canada, bilingualism by protecting the French language in the context of this wonderful agreement.

We are countries that share legal roots, parliamentary government and a sovereign who stands above politics - a living symbol of our constitutional continuity. CANZUK will be stronger than the sum of its parts. Together, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom will each be stronger at home with unbreakable leverage abroad.

Conservatives around the world must not only unite in this way, but also to ensure that we open up opportunities for working-class people in all of our countries. In the last election, Conservatives were able to do that, adding 2.5 million additional votes, many of them in working-class communities. 46 per cent of self-described blue-collar workers chose the Conservative Party of Canada, by far a record. We won in unionized logging, manufacturing and mining towns that had never voted for us before.

We won the youth vote. In fact, even in the high school mock vote, we came far ahead of any of the competitors - if only they could have counted in the main ballot boxes. We need to build on that by offering a message of homes, jobs and hope to our youth.

We must be the party of balanced budgets and sound money to preserve and even strengthen the buying power of our people. We must lower taxes on work, investment, homebuilding and energy. We must unblock the production of all forms of energy, including oil and gas.

We must remove all governmental barriers to homebuilding so every youngster can own a home and pay off a mortgage. We must ensure jobs go to our people, not to low-wage temporary foreign workers.

Canada and the United Kingdom share language, culture, parliamentary government, and most important of all, folklore, including the possibly fictional legend of Robin Hood. I don't mean the medieval Marxist of 20th-century retellings. Robin fought, as do we, for ancient liberties of the common people: to hunt, harvest and keep what was theirs.

His legend actually emerged in the time of the Peasant Revolts, seeking economic freedom by fighting against laws that banned workers from travelling for work or accepting higher wages. A legendary taxfighter, his nemesis, the Sheriff of Nottingham, was a tax collector.

As Winston Churchill wrote: "Robin Hood is the spirit of the greenwood, the protest of the common man against the forest laws, the dream of the dispossessed. He is the hero of the yeomanry, as King Arthur is the hero of the knighthood. Whether he lived or not, he represents a reality in the hearts of the people, and his fame has outlived that of many a king and statesman. He personifies the English love of freedom and the popular instinct for justice, especially when it is denied by those in power."

Though born an aristocrat, the great Winston Churchill knew the value of hard work and the great men and women who did it. He proudly joined the bricklayer's union. He did this because, while he had written 58 volumes of Nobel Prize-winning literature, he still respected the genius and greatness of those who worked with their hands.

One of my favourite Churchill stories is from the Blitz. After the worst bombing raids, he would go out and chat and hear the stories of people in the rubble of their former homes. He would listen and comfort them. His bodyguard, Inspector Thompson, recorded in his diary that one day, after a raid, Churchill was helping the rescue workers near a bombed-out house.

He went down on his knees to clutch an elderly woman, who, while still conscious, was being dug out. For a moment, they looked each other in the eyes. Winston's coat was spattered with mud, the woman covered from head to toe in dust. Then, with a tremor in her voice, she said "thank you" and was taken away. Tears streamed down Churchill's face as he watched her.

He stood in stone silence before finally saying, "There goes greatness".

Churchill knew the war would not be won by the political classes who fretted and prevaricated, by the bureaucracy, the kings, the queens or even by Prime Ministers. It was common people.

Tram-drivers and steelworkers and tea-ladies. Barbers who dropped their scissors to pick up a rifle. Mill girls who volunteered to serve as air raid wardens. Men who rushed to the front, faced gunfire and never spoke a word of their bravery when they came home. Women who tilled fields, made munitions and fought fires in the Blitz. They didn't grumble. They didn't ask for recognition. They did their bit.

Conservatives have always known that the greatness of a nation lies in its working people. That there is nobility in work and resilience of those who fight their own battles, get knocked down by life, pick themselves up and quietly get on with their jobs. And there is wisdom in the common men and women who build things, fix things, move things and make things.

So often we call them the "ordinary people," but there is nothing ordinary about them - they are extraordinary. They are not famous. They do not make the evening news. When they die, there are no headlines, and no words spoken of them in Parliament.

But when they walk through heaven's gate, the trumpets sound for them. And the angels murmur, in the words of Churchill: "There goes greatness."