Provincial Politics – Page 101

The winning ways of Wynne’s Whigs?

February 4, 2015 by Peter Lowry

This should warm you up on a cold February day. There is a provincial by-election tomorrow in Sudbury, Ontario. There is a lot of money on the table over that vote that says Wynne’s Whigs get their asses kicked. And they deserve it. They have resisted reform. They arrogantly co-opted a sitting federal member of another party to be their candidate. They ignored all the pleas in the electoral district for democratic choice. And along the way, they tried to mistreat a quadriplegic.

Consider all the anger directed at Justin Trudeau and his federal team when they break their word and interfere in local nominations. At least Wynne’s Whigs have never promised not to interfere. That does not mean that real Liberals are not fed up with their arrogance. When you deny local party organizations any purpose to exist at other than election time, they become shallow little fiefdoms of sycophants.

And just what incentives did they have for the sitting federal New Democrat Member of Parliament for the area to get him to resign his seat and run in the provincial by-election for the Liberals? To suggest that this entire exercise is just cheap and shoddy is to give it too much respectability.

And to kick a quadriplegic to the curb to make room for your star candidate is an entirely new low in politics.

Wynne’s Whigs refused the electoral district a nomination meeting. They, in effect, said “This is your candidate, like it or lump it.”

And for every Sudbury Liberal who walked away in disgust, Wynne’s Whigs brought in sycophants from other Ontario ridings to fill the gap. The only problem was that they are not voters.

And there was no concern about money for the campaign. Wynne’s Whigs had the entire Ontario database of Liberals to beg for funding.

There is one small cloud in that the Ontario Provincial Police are listening to the offers made to the previous Liberal candidate. Because he is a quadriplegic and unable to take notes, he records important meetings. While this type of thing is normally done through deniable underlings, Wynne’s Whigs might have gone a little too far up the food chain this time.

So get your bets down before Thursday’s results come in. Maybe someone will have to hand Wynne her head.

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A cheap shot from the cheap seats.

January 30, 2015 by Peter Lowry

Remember recently when we reported on the Conservative “snore-fest” leadership race in Ontario. Can you guess who might have read our report and decided to liven things up? It’s that kid in short pants who has nothing better to do as a federal Member of Parliament than to waste time in the provincial leadership contest. Did we tell you he also takes cheap shots at opponents when he hopes they cannot answer?

It would be worth reporting if we thought for one minute that he was contributing anything to the contest. Even Prime Minister Harper said he did not care what that MP did as long as he shows up to vote for Conservative bills in the House of Commons. That is his total contribution in Ottawa. What makes him think he can do anything better for voters at Queen’s Park?

It is unlikely he would know about an old trick from American politics called the “Roorback.” It has fallen into disrepute in recent years because of the speed of news media dissemination today and the effectiveness of social media. A good Roorback used to be a particularly scurrilous attack on an opponent when it is too late for the opponent to answer the charges. It has the subtlety of loudly passing gas in a crowded room.

But amateurs still try it. Brown pulled it at the end of a leadership debate the other evening. He targeted Oshawa MPP Christine Elliott who was Deputy Leader of the provincial Tories under former Leader Timmy Hudak. He accused Elliott of standing shoulder to shoulder with Hudak in regards to the plan to axe the jobs of 100,000 Ontario civil servants last year. Coincidently Brown was at the announcement of the plan as the Barrie Country Club is in his federal riding. (He never likes to miss a chance to get his picture in the local papers.)

In fine political style, Ms. Elliott shared the blame with her caucus colleagues for the plan that probably cost the Conservatives the election, and Hudak his job, She said she was disappointed that Brown felt the need to go after all of them in this way.

While many in the Progressive Conservative provincial caucus claim they were blind-sided by Hudak’s announcement, it has been proved that copies of planning documents had been given to caucus members. The policy documents that mentioned the 100,000 job cuts were collected again after the meeting for security purposes.

The Barrie MP might be a little more credible in his complaint if he had not been seen congratulating the Ontario Conservative leader for his brilliant leadership after the speech that day at the Barrie Country Club.

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Ontario’s booze battle becomes a bar brawl.

January 27, 2015 by Peter Lowry

Remember in the old western movies when the bad guy would punch the hero and everyone in the bar got into the fight. That is how it feels now that people are getting involved in the argument about beer, wine and liquor sales in Ontario.

It started as a dignified discussion of the disgusting inadequacies of Ontario’s Beer Stores and the foolishness of the politicians who continued to use the situation for their own interests. What it has evolved into is a revolt among beer drinkers and Liquor Control Board customers and trouble for Premier Wynne’s Whigs. They are now attempting to assess how little they need to do to quiet the riot.

One of their problems is that Finance Minister Charles Sousa has been emboldened by his banker–led council on government assets. They are telling him he can get more money from beer. His party also gets lots of political donations from the beer barons if they will just maintain the status quo. Meanwhile consumers are looking for real change. These are the consumers who voted for Wynne last year because they thought she was progressive. If is this demand is not met, the anger will grow louder.

It is certainly not this blog that is turning the tide. This blog is read mainly by politicos and media people. (And more than 200 of you are not even in Canada.) Babel-on-the-Bay has stood alone among Liberal and progressive bloggers in Ontario demanding change. We have to give the credit for the current weakening of the political stand in the booze battle to the Toronto Star. This blog might have been the gnat that annoyed the politicians but it is the Toronto Star with more than a half million Saturday readers that scares them into action. Wynne’s Whigs can ill-afford to give the finger to the Toronto Star.

Fighting valiantly for consumer support, the Beer Store and the Liquor Control Board (LCBO) have launched an advertising war in a last ditch attempt to stem the tide. It might cause a delaying action for the LCBO but the Beer Store will be changing. No matter what changes Ontario Finance Minister Sousa makes, it is likely to be an inadequate half-measure. We expect that anything less than allowing convenience stores to sell beer and Ontario wines will bring little succour to his government.

But when beer is resolved, it will become a battle over the LCBO. The facts are clear that the provincial government can raise more in taxes from freeing the liquor stores than continuing to force an uncomfortable, poorly merchandised and weak monopoly on the voters. And the one-time revenues from the sale of LCBO assets would go a long way to paying for electrifying GO trains or running a railway north to the Circle of Fire.

It might take the next three years to make the changes that are necessary in liquor sales but that is all the time the Wynne government will have. The government has to prove it is progressive and it will be popular moves such as opening beer and wine sales to convenience stores and privatizing the LCBO stores that give it the opportunity.

Ontario voters have made it very clear that they are no longer satisfied with paternalistic government. They were set to toss Premier McGuinty but he read the tea leaves and left. Wynne has a rare opportunity during this majority mandate to be progressive and daring. She made ground with her solution for pensions but she has a long way to go to bring Ontario into the 21^st Century. To do that, she has to get out front and lead.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

It is recess time in the Ontario PC leadership.

January 25, 2015 by Peter Lowry

It is like a middle school recess time. You should not need playground monitors but it is still a good idea to periodically look outside and make sure there are no brawls. We are pleased to report that nothing very much is happening that was not expected to happen.

What we can tell you is that everyone is in place and playing nice. The cut-off for nominations is the end of January and there does not appear to be anyone else rushing to get more signatures in ten electoral districts. The next important date is February 28 when the membership cut-off is supposed to take place.

The months of March and April are set aside for candidates to challenge each others’ memberships. This would be a minor tempest at best and will not be of much public interest. While this is an every member vote, the maximum votes from each electoral district is fixed at 100. They are going to be adding percentages in this exercise.

What is most interesting about the rules is that it will still be the losers who pick the winners—even if they are not there to do it. Counting the vote will be an exercise in taking off the losers and adding their second, third and possibly even fourth choice to the remaining candidates until somebody is at 50.1 per cent or better. With voting completed by May 7, the results should be known in a few days.

While it is a bit early for morning line handicapping, Oshawa’s Christine Elliott MPP is still the party favourite. The older Progressive Conservatives are solidly behind her and while she is unlikely to walk away with the first ballot, she should have a good lead.

The pit bull of the race is the much more aggressive Lisa MacLeod MPP from Nepean. With most Ontario Conservatives thinking of her as a more strident Christine Elliott, she is in a clear second place.

Of the three men in the race, Vic Fedeli MPP from Nipissing best fits the image of the successful businessman.

Monte McNaughton MPP from Lambton-Kent-Middlesex is now the darling of the Campaign Life and the religious right.

The one we think of as the guy in short pants is Barrie MP Patrick Brown. People have a lot of fun trying to figure out what the heck Brown thinks he is doing in this race. He is out classed, out gunned and out of his mind if he thinks he is going to achieve anything other than the most derision. He is likely to be the first one dropped from the race but God only knows what name his foolish supporters will put number two beside.

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Is Canada racist? No. Is there racism in Canada? Yes.

January 24, 2015 by Peter Lowry

The announcements of the concern about racism the other day in Winnipeg came as no surprise. That part of this country has been trying to stuff the racism genie back in the bottle since the confluence of the Assiniboine and Red Rivers was the site of an early trading post. Give the city the credit it deserves though, the racism is now exposed and the city has a chance to work on the problems. It is just too bad that Montreal does not do the same. It continues as the most racist city in Canada.

And we are not talking of mistreatment of Canada’s aboriginal and Métis people in Montreal. We are talking the insidious distrust of anyone who is not racially or tribally pure laine. While there is sometimes a misunderstanding of cultural sensitivities between the anglo and francophone populations in Quebec, there is no excuse for the continued demand for an intolerant ‘Charter of Values’ as promoted by the Parti Québécois during the last provincial election.

But when the ruling Liberals under Philippe Couilliard also promise a version of the values charter, you are right to question the motives. Is this pandering to that insipient intolerance? Quebec politicians of all stripes seem to feed off a culture of intolerance. It goes back to the battle on the Plains of Abraham. It was supported by the clerics of the Catholic Church in Lower Canada. And then, as the church lost its influence, politicians found it useful. It took the Supreme Court of Canada two decades to finally squash Premier Maurice Duplessis’s infamous Padlock Law but even then the jurists failed to address anything more than the fact the province did not have jurisdiction to pass the law.

Both Thomas Mulcair of the New Democrats and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau are sensitive to the issue. Scratch hard enough with either and you see the defensiveness they hold for Quebec. They are Quebeckers first and federal politicians second. Mulcair stabilizes his Quebec sensitivity with his French passport. The younger Trudeau balances with his maternal ties in British Columbia.

There are obviously few Quebecers who want to link the pure laine or de souche (hard liner) attitudes in Quebec to an inferiority complex. That would be like a feather pillow with little resistance and less impression. The problems are the politicians who will skate with it because of its potential for them to gain ground for their own ambitions. Everyone saw in the introduction of Pierre-Karl Péladeau to separatist politics last year that it was a horse he wanted to ride. While Péladeau won his rural seat in the National Assembly last year, his naϊveté helped pull down his separatist party.

Any Canadian from other parts of Canada who has travelled in Quebec and knows its people will tell you that Quebecers can play in the first line of any team they choose. There is no rational for any values charter that does not recognize that diversity of Quebec is its strength. The diversity of Canada is something in which we all take pride.

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What a difference a day makes in a Tory budget.

January 19, 2015 by Peter Lowry

Did you see Finance Minister Joe Oliver’s dance of the seven veils last week? This guy is right in his element playing Peek-a-Boo. At least it makes more sense than his budgets—if we even get one this year?

When last heard from the other day, he said he might have a budget for us in April—or maybe May. Or did we just come up with a reason for the Prime Minister to call the federal election this year in April?

While nobody gives the federal Finance Minister much credit for intelligence or wit or anything else for that matter, Mr. Harper just expects him to do as he is told. Mr. Harper has already announced goodies for the voters for this year based on there being a budget surplus. And he expects Oliver to deliver it. Since the budget surplus was forecast at $1.9 billion just last November, declining revenues from the oil and gas sector have obviously wiped out the surplus.

And Mr. Harper does not like to look foolish.

Even though the former Conservative Finance Minister, the late Jim Flaherty, had made it clear that income splitting for rich families was a really bad idea, Mr. Harper went ahead and announced its implementation for this year.

Most experts cannot see how Oliver could possibly announce an honest surplus this year even by wiping out the $3 billion surplus built into the figures. It shows how much this government relies on oil and gas revenues and how heavily Canadians have been taxed on their gasoline consumption.

Industry users and consumers are currently basking in gasoline costs at about two-thirds of previous rates. By gradually decreasing prices as crude oil prices fall, refiners and gasoline retailers have been maintaining their profit margins while provincial shares of the crude oil price have been falling rapidly. That is why Alberta, and to a lesser extent Newfoundland, have been feeling the fuller impact at a faster rate. With no sales tax, the Alberta government is finally paying the piper.

In his speech late last week, Joe Oliver admitted that “The impact of lower oil prices on the Canadian economy is complex and creates both benefits and harm.” We will hope that most of the harm befalls the Conservatives for their failure to take into account the volatility of commodity prices.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

It is time for Ontario to grow up.

January 17, 2015 by Peter Lowry

Visualize this: Ed Clark of TD Bank and former banker Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa are in Sousa’s Queen’s Park office. They have their $600 brogues up on Charles’ desk and each a substantial glass of single malt scotch in hand. You can smell the scent of the peat bogs in that scotch as it is savoured. And Charles says: “What do you think we should do with the damn beer stores Ed?

It is a classic case of the ignorant leading the culpable.

Ontario citizens have had to tolerate the ignominy and insult of bad beer retailing for more than 100 years. It is pathetic marketing, promoting pitiful merchandising, perpetrated by long-dead blue stockings and perpetuated by poor-excuses for politicians. The Beer Store is a disgrace and a disservice to the people of Ontario.

Letting two semi-retired bankers address the issue is damn silly. And they think they are just going to demand more money from the foreign owners of the Beer Stores?

But the problem encompasses both the Beer Stores and the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO). These two operations represent close to 40 per cent of the Canadian beverage alcohol market. They are out-of-control monsters that our politicians have been afraid to touch or trouble. They offer patronage, political payoffs and prestige. They are cash cows that provide the province with billions. They also represent an antiquated and out-dated and an outrageous demonstration of the contempt with which Ontario politicians hold the voters.

The combined LCBO and Beer Stores return a dividend annually of about $3 billion to provincial revenues. No provincial treasurer has so much as questioned this largess despite the questionable ethics involved and the conflicts created.

But truly independent studies have been finding that Ontario has been forgoing potentially higher revenue. The problem is that the province acts as importer and wholesaler, distributor, retailer, regulator and collector of taxes for the LCBO while giving free rein to the foreign brewers who own Brewers Retail operations which are known as The Beer Store. In a free market world, neither system works for the consumer.

The best protection for this stupidity is the lazy unthinking voter who is satisfied with the status quo. “It works,” the voter sagely says, “Why rock the boat?”

The simple answer is: We can do better. We can create more jobs. We can get better tax revenues. We can have more choice. We can have greater convenience. We can have warehouse stores and fancy stores, convenient stores and neighbourhood stores. We can do more for domestic products. We can sell beer and wine in convenience stores and improve our convenience stores in the process. We can have liquor stores that have Air Miles promotions and stores that just offer better prices. And in the process, the government will find that total alcoholic beverage revenues exceed what the Beer Stores and LCBO produce for the government today. Entrepreneurship will guarantee that.

And then government can go back to being the licensing body, the regulator, the tax collector, that it is supposed to be on our behalf of us voters. It has certainly been doing a lousy job of being a booze merchant.

And do you know what the easiest part of this is? It is telling politicians that we want this to happen. Every Queen’s Park habitué with whom you come in contact can be told: “We want Ontario to come of age.” “We want privatized alcohol sales in Ontario.” “It is time for Ontario to grow up.”

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Wynne’s Whigs not warming to Sudbury weather.

January 16, 2015 by Peter Lowry

The cold seems to bite through the thickest thermal clothing at this time of year in Sudbury. Yet the Super Stack in Copper Cliff still dominates, layering the city in its customary grey after each snowfall. The February 5 by-election just adds to the greyness of the scene. Mind you the temperature and desperation seem to be rising in Queen’s Park as the foolishness of the Liberal position in the by-election becomes clear.

Wynne was whistling past the graveyard when she opted to ignore the wishes of the local Liberals and appointed the former Sudbury New Democrat MP to represent her party. While the only published public opinion poll is likely inaccurate, the possibility of the real provincial New Democrat candidate winning is a warming thought.

It could be of benefit to all of Ontario if Premier Wynne was delivered a lesson in democracy. It might even surprise her to learn that Glenn Thibeault, who had represented the riding in Ottawa for the past six years as a New Democrat, might have won in an open nomination contest. Nobody said he was not welcome if he came openly and wanted to contest for the party nomination.

But kicking a quadriplegic to the curb was not Kathleen Wynne’s finest moment. Andrew Olivier might not be running to win this time but he is running to teach Ms. Wynne a lesson. And he is draining off some of the Liberal support from Ms. Wynne’s candidate.

It is unlikely that anyone this far south of Sudbury can tell you who will win. Polls are a waste of time in the circumstances. You need a good weather forecaster and a sunny day on February 5 and hopefully the temperature will not be much less than -15 degrees. The contest is between the Liberal and the New Democrat and frankly the New Democrats are better at turning out their vote in that town. And the Liberal cause is hardly helped by pissing off the former candidate and local Liberals who believe in democracy.

It is not as though the by-election is going to mean more than bragging rights for either Premier Wynne or New Democrat Leader Andrea Horwath. Ms. Wynne’s majority will probably be good for a full term.

But it sure would be nice if Wynne and her Whigs moved into the 21^st Century. We have democracy now and they need to learn about it.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

It’s small beer from Ontario’s beer cartel.

January 10, 2015 by Peter Lowry

It’s too little, too late and frankly insulting. The foreign-owned brewers who own Ontario Beer Stores have seen the writing on the wall and think they can negotiate out of the mess of their own making.

The beer giants have offered to sell a position in a few beer stores to local craft brewers. They think this can get them out of the barrage of criticism that has been directed at their antiquated, inadequate and deplorable beer monopoly. Too bad, so sad, it’s not going to do them any good.

The Beer Store barons need better public relations. And they should have started it years ago. This writer came to Barrie ten years ago and started complaining then about the beer stores in this town. They are disgusting. The complaints were brushed off. They ignored our very reasonable and rational concerns about their stores. They just never realized how many people at Queen’s Park might read this blog.

Sure the Toronto Star has greater circulation, higher priced writers and concentrated on the filthy foreign ownership instead of the filthy floors in the stores. It is the people who have to use the stores that the politicians need to heed. This monopoly is abusive and stupid. They should have gone to the Ontario government years ago and offered to distribute beer to approved, qualified convenience stores. That would have been smart, progressive and good public relations. Even Big Brother in Orwell’s 1984 loved you.

Convenience stores hardly have the room for kegs and two-fours. The current beer stores could adequately handle recycling, and the bigger boxes. And with adequate walls between recycling and beer, the stores would have a chance to do proper merchandising.

But as it stands now, Ontario’s superbly stupid politicians have sicced a banker by the name of Ed Clark on them to stick them up for some form of franchise fee. Clark is no threat to the foreign-owned brewers but whatever Clark thinks he is going to pull off is just going to be paid by the voters who are not going to like it.

What Ontario desperately needs is some common sense management of this beer market mess along with privatizing the Liquor Control Board of Ontario. (No, they are not separate problems.) One of these days, they will smarten up, we hope.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

Wynne is destroying democracy in Ontario.

January 9, 2015 by Peter Lowry

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne does not seem to know much about democracy. She got her present job because of a corrupted controlled convention. She thinks she can just appoint whichever candidate she wants in by-elections. She really does not understand that her attitude is what is helping destroy democracy in Ontario and in Canada.

Wynne does not seem to understand that the Liberal Party needs internal democracy to survive. To stifle democracy is to encourage corruption. The current corruption leads to encouraging people who want to manipulate the party to their advantage. It establishes the party as uninterested in attracting new people. It fails to develop active youth participation in policy and other party activities. It is not a party capable of reaching out to local voters for their support.

And yet Kathleen Wynne goes to Sudbury this week and announces that disgruntled former New Democrat Member of Parliament Glenn Thibeault is running as a Liberal in the February 5 provincial by-election. It does not seem to matter to her what local Liberals think of Mr. Thibeault’s candidacy: they can like it or lump it!

It seems that Mr. Thibeault was having problems getting along with federal New Democrat Leader Thomas Mulcair. Mr. Mulcair used to be a Quebec Liberal before he became a New Democrat. Maybe that was what encouraged Mr. Thibeault to switch.

While Mr. Thibeault has a right to switch parties as he wishes, imposing him on Sudbury Liberals without a vote or discussion, smacks of autocracy. Did he even bother to buy an Ontario Liberal Party membership?

And federal Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is just as wrong. He and his sycophants talk about his open nominations pledge. He did not even keep his word on that. He has forced his own candidates on ridings. The party has mysteriously failed to greenlight people who apply to be a candidate in their electoral districts. And where the leader is not making the decisions, he allows local manipulators to make the decisions for him.

Democracy is a fragile jewel. It shatters so easily. We need more people to fight for our democracy. Please help.

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