Canadian Red Cross

You have to figure out, you know, what you're doing in terms of going forward.

That path, again, somebody who's at the Canadian Red Cross, man, I've seen, you know, I've seen how important it is to make the first step the right step.

And sometimes it takes a couple of days to make the right step, right? But again, you know, there's, I mean, no, there's nothing holding back the BC Lions from cutting them.

I just, it's more of a league thing for me.

It's not about calling certain people out, right? Like that's not going to, all that is the initial argument when you start, you know, when you start pointing fingers and saying this guy needs to do this, that person needs to do that.

No, it just needs to be something that's talked about and taken seriously in the Canadian football league amongst all our stakeholders.

I'll tell you what, man, you know, like I've been in certain situations and staff situations at the Canadian Red Cross where I am, you know, and, and, and.

know if an hr issue has come up there's been times where i've i've i have admitted i've had to say like look you know what um there's the here's the policy in which we've got to follow right but it hasn't ended there with me but i'm going to follow this pot and i'm going to try to advocate for some change i empathize right like you have to have a conversation guys i mean there's a kid that's potentially i mean that the season's done and and you know potentially his career and we're just we're like oh yeah two games and haggerty can just i i think if that if it ends there i think that you know we've lost the plot

Joining us today is Ashkin Poorhedri, co-founder of Coast to Coast First Aid and Aquatics.

A University of Toronto neuroscience graduate, Ashkin has been a certified first aid and CPR instructor since 2011. and an instructor trainer since 2013, holding instructor trainer credentials with the Canadian Red Cross in different areas, such as professional responder program and first aid slash CPR.

Coast to Coast operates more than 37 locations across Ontario, Alberta, Nova Scotia, and has certified over 150,000 people and has been named a top three Canadian Red Cross training partner nationally for three consecutive years.

Its proprietary digital testing platform has now captured more than half a million individual exam responses.

So before further ado, let's welcome this very special guest.

And, uh, one of the things that, uh, certainly con- kept us going is the build- the building of the Peace on Earth Society.

Um, it's a, it's charitable foundation where, you know, we have built, uh, since we came to Canada, and we have fundraised over $750,000 through the sale of our product to so many causes across Canada, from the Canadian Red Cross to, uh, Indigenous communities across Canada to Refugee Hub, who's-- that are trying to make sure that refugees find a warm welcome for them across the country, um, to the Dallaire Institute for Children, Peace, and Security to make sure that children are not recruited in war zones.

So we try to dig into so many campaigns and so many communities and try to find other ways that we can also be there for people who have been there for us.

So the message that we have shared with the, with the country is that everyone wants peace, everyone loves chocolate, and this is the perfect marriage.

Oh

... that says, "Gift of the Canadian Red Cross Society," that they hung onto it for 80 years.

And it was passed down to somebody's great-niece, and she contacted me and said, "I cannot bear to throw this away." And I said, "Please don't throw it away.

Please send it to me."

I think everybody should have two in their yard.

Um, Hope for Humanity, which is, uh, a commemoration of the Canadian Red Cross.

Um, and, and yeah, so, so that grouping is, was, was really commercially the most successful of all the Canadian roses.

Mm-hmm.

I started my career in the research and planning unit of the Department of Justice and doing program evaluation by and large of the various justice programs.

From there, I moved on to the Canadian Red Cross and I was head of the home care division there in charge of a $25 million operating budget, 900 employees and 13 offices.

And at around that time, my father passed away.

My mother went into a depression and my little two-year-old, three-year-old, I guess at the time, Danielle, toddled out of her room and said, mommy, I never see you.

So I was heading for that.

And then he started driving for the Canadian Red Cross.

So he just couldn't stop working just constantly, just got to keep going.

And then COVID hit and he was working for Red Cross and it just, it took a turn where he was not making sense a lot of the time and doing stuff and being that person who had to, to bring him in and do those appointments and all that kind of stuff is, is very, very taxing.

Global Affairs is providing consular support to the families of the missing Canadians, as well as the Canadian who was located this week.

The federal government has pledged $5 million in humanitarian aid and will send more than 18,000 emergency items from the Canadian Red Cross.

Canada's prime minister said today he'll tell Vladimir Putin to get out of Ukraine and give back all of its captured territory if they speak at December's G20 summit.

There are indications Donald Trump might allow the Russian president to attend the conference in Miami.