Category: Provincial Politics

Ontario’s Premier Wynne should not be so reluctant to have an election. All she is doing is delaying the departure of Conservative Leader Timmy Hudak. It hardly seems fair. Ontario never deserved Mike Harris as Premier and there is no reason they should have to tolerate a Mike Harris Lite.

Mind you, Timmy told the Toronto Star last week that he is a changed man, a fighter for what he believes. It is what he believes in that has put him so out of touch with the people of Ontario. Hudak seems to consider former American President Ronald Regan and the recently deceased Brit Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher as deities. He must think of Mike Harris as their high priest.

What Timmy does not see is that Stephen Harper and crew in Ottawa are on the job and too many people screwing our economy could do lasting damage. The Ontario Liberals are about as far right as the people of Ontario can handle while the Tories are running down the economy in Ottawa.

Premier Wynne should realize that while voter dissatisfaction with her party is high, most of it is based on the foolishness of former Premier Dalton McGuinty. Give Timmy Hudak a month out on the polls, pressing the flesh and saying what he thinks and the Wynne Liberals are going to look pretty damn good to the voters.

The only thing that saved Hudak’s bacon when he was releasing all those ridiculous policy papers recently was that nobody read them. The few people who were paid to read them are convinced that they are a joke and refuse to grade them.

Timmy will promise anything to get elected. That must have been where he was coming from when he proposed that the province use magic money to pay for Toronto’s highway infrastructure and subways. These are things that he will never support as Premier but Timmy is not one to quibble over details.

For Kathleen Wynne, the real concern should be New Democrat Leader Andrea Horwath. If Andrea ever got a good speaking coach, speech writer, personal trainer, hairdresser and decent clothes, she would pose something of a challenge.

But the good news is that Tiny Tim Hudak will be toast after this coming election. The Conservatives will not allow him to completely destroy their party.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Ontario’s Premier Wynne might be desperate. Like most politicians fighting off an election—that they might lose—she is telling voters that an election in this province will cost over $90 million. Strangely enough, that is close to what the Auditor General said shutting down the Mississauga gas-fired power plant cost—over and above the government estimate. Does this mean that it is alright to waste a few hundred million saving some seats in a general election but it is not alright to spend about 100 million letting the voters comment on it?

Sooner or later, Kathleen Wynne has to call an election. This triumvirate at Queen’s Park of Horwath, Hudak and Wynne is not only unappealing, it is appalling. Mind you, with that selection of leaders, is it any wonder that fewer and fewer people in Ontario are bothering to vote?

And the question of an election should not be left to New Democrat Leader Andrea Horwath. If she can be bought off by a supposed reduction in auto insurance rates, home care for the elderly and closing some corporate tax concessions, you have to suspect that her vote comes very cheap.

With all the leaks and statements that have been made, poor Charles Souza is not going to have anything new to say when he announces his budget later this week. The announcement of $100 million for northern roads simply does not parse. Does this mean Ontario was not spending more than that on Northern infrastructure? And if the province is not spending more, why is it not?

And speaking of stupid, did you know that the Premier made the announcement of the $100 million for northern infrastructure support at the site where the province is rebuilding a highway rest stop—in the middle of Barrie! There is something like 20 gas stations and at least 50 restaurants grouped within a few kilometres of the five Barrie Highway 400 interchanges. Around Toronto, you can drive over 100 kilometres on 400-series highways without seeing a highway rest stop. Figure that one?

What Horwath, Hudak and Wynne need to realize is that minority governments are becoming a more frequent situation. Politicians need to learn to live with them. Tory Leader Timmy Hudak has to bring his marbles and play nice. Going away and pouting no longer works. Ms. Horwath has to show us what she can do. If she ever wants to be premier, she is going to have to demonstrate some leadership. Ms. Wynne needs to retake her grade-four geography. That used to be when our children first learned about Ontario.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

There needs to be a better solution to this power plant problem in Mississauga and Oakville. These were natural gas powered plants that some people said should not be built where they were planned. It boils down to an argument about location.

And the Not-In-My-Back-Yard people won. These NIMBYs were vociferous and backed by the Conservative Party of Ontario. The NIMBY organization in Mississauga is called the Coalition of Homeowners for Intelligent Power (CHIP) and claims some 10,000 homeowners in Mississauga and Etobicoke as members.

Obviously, there should have been some political oversight of this argument when the Ontario Power Authority had to go to the Ontario Municipal Board to force Mississauga and then Oakville to stop objecting to the plants. It involved a 280 megawatt generating capability, located on Loreland Avenue in Mississauga and a 900 megawatt plant on former Ford property on Royal Windsor Drive in Oakville. These clean-burning gas plants were replacing the old Lakeview coal-fired plant. They were needed to meet the rapidly growing demand for power in the two municipalities.

For some reason, the government dropped the ball but this was hardly the first mistake made by the McGuinty government. The actual decision to cancel the plants was in the heat of the 2011 election campaign. It was a purely political action under the direction of Liberal Campaign Chair Greg Sorbara. As Sorbara acted under the authority of Premier McGuinty, the chickens have to roost on him.

But, to be fair, why should Sorbara, McGuinty or even over-paid Ontario Power Authority executives have to open their piggy banks and cough up whatever all this costs. This CHIP organization should also be willing to pay for the cancellation. They were the people who kept demanding the end of the Mississauga plant. And the Auditor General tells us that the Mississauga plant only cost Ontario $275 million. When you spread it across 10,000 people, it is only $27,500 per homeowner. They said cancel the plant. They got what they wanted. It is now time to pay.

We hope that people in Oakville are richer than people in Mississauga. We hear that the auditor’s report on the Oakville plant costs might be four times as much as Mississauga. They are going to need deep pockets!

What we do not want is for the people throughout the rest of Ontario to pay for this damn foolishness. We need a rule that says if you do not like something such as a wind turbine, you should have the right to buy the property it is on and chop it down. Or how about if you do not like casinos: all you have to do is offer to pay the city the extra taxes the casino would generate and live in a casino-free community. Think about it!

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

How smart do you think you have to be to forecast an Ontario provincial election in the next two months? The reason is that opposition leaders Horwath and Hudak smell blood. They have Wynne’s Liberals on the run with the cancelled gas generating plants. It is not so much the couple hundred million involved as it is the bad accounting. Losing another $85 million is not just a mission to the moon for Ontario voters.

But the key will be Ontario Treasurer Charles Sousa’s budget. Charles is a nice guy who has never done anything like this before in his life. It is the creative political stuff that the Minister directs. And this is where he needs help.

But turning to former Prime Minister Paul Martin is no answer. If Charles has ever wondered why Paul is a former Prime Minister, it is because he was the Finance Minister in the Chrétien Cabinet of the 90s that balanced Canada’s budget. He took money from the unemployed. He impoverished Medicare. You might recall what the voters thought of dear old Paul as Prime Minister.

It would be like seeking advice from Dwight Duncan, Charles’ predecessor as Treasurer. Dwight even brought in a banker named Don Drummond to help him cut the deficit. Drummond was a big help. He wrote a budget plan for old Dwight that even made Timmy Hudak smile. What is frightening about it is that Charles is also a former banker. We have to hope he never liked Don Drummond over in that other bank.

Mind you, this is the time to say ‘to hell with the banks,’ we’ve got a political party to save. Charles needs a budget theme that Timmy Hudak cannot rail against and has enough good news for Andrea Horwath to have to support. It requires a new era of privatization and entrepreneurship for the province.

We will start by selling off the Liquor Control Board of Ontario. You can sell off the old headquarters as a wholesale operation and make a pot of money on that. Then you start auctioning off the stores. And do not forget, you can get as much revenue from liquor taxes as you ever earned from staid and stuffy LCBO.

Then you kiss off that foreign-owned Brewers Retail operation. Let it bid on doing the recycling operation if they like but sell annual licenses to convenience and grocery stores to sell beer. They will do a much better merchandising job and produce far more tax revenue from smaller lighter packaging.

Now think of the opportunities you can add to this. How about bidding to operate provincial camp sites? And if the NDP get antsy about all this privatization, just point out how many unionized inspectors the province is going to need to police all this action?

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

If Premier Kathleen Wynne thinks she can ignore Ontario’s chief electoral officer, it could be her last act as premier. Greg Essensa, has asked for an end to third-party advertising in provincial elections and Wynne would be smart to make sure it happens this year. Without controls, Ontario Liberals could find themselves on the receiving end of some particularly savage third-party advertising.

It was something of a surprise two years ago that the ultra-right wing Ontario Landowners did not launch their own campaign to counter the so-called “Working Families” advertising that was savaging Conservative leader Timmy Hudak. The Landowners’ error at that time was believing polls showing Hudak with a comfortable lead going into the election. He proceeded to lose the election from there.

Whether the Working Families advertising had a major impact on the Hudak Conservative campaign is a theoretical discussion. It certainly gave aid and comfort to the McGuinty Liberals. And even if the Working Families material was or was not approved by the Liberals, there was no question in anyone’s mind that it was attempting to help them to defeat Hudak. You would have to be kidding yourself to suggest that this was not deliberate interference in the election process.

And it is this interference that the chief electoral officer is trying to stop. For teachers’ unions to put out $6 million to interfere in the last Ontario election was morally and ethically wrong. And Ontario is one of the few jurisdictions where it is not illegal.

What was actually of more value to the Ontario Liberals in the last election were the teachers whom the union reps pulled together to help canvas for their Liberal candidates. If a major portion of that $6 million had been put towards this activity, it would have been far more productive than the Working Families advertising.

What the Working Families lack in the coming election is a family patriarch (or Premier) to get behind and promote. The unions will still want to savage Tiny Tim Hudak but they might be very reluctant to put their faith in Liberals again. That means the only candidate who might earn their generous support is Andrea Horwath and her New Democrats.

Mind you, Horwath and the other party leaders are all paying lip service to the electoral officer’s report. It is action that is needed.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Would the last sucker to get out of the condominium business in the Greater Toronto Area, please remember to turn out the lights. You should have seen the writing on the wall four years ago and realized the growing problems in the market. What you probably did not realize was that the biggest problems were created by the Ontario Government’s Condominium Act. Like most provincial legislation, it was written by lawyers to keep lawyers working. The act shows little concern or interest in the needs of condominium owners or residents.

The largest single headache in the condominium market has always been the speculative buyer. These are people who put a down-payment on low-end condominium properties before a shovel goes into the ground. The plan is to resell or rent when the building is completed. You really wonder where these people get their dreams of resale values or rental rates but you can be sure they are in for disillusionment when reality sets in. The really unlucky among them are the ones who move in to try to ameliorate their losses.

Owning a condominium is not like private home ownership nor is it like a rental environment. Owning a condominium is keeping up with the Jones’ in spades. You never know when you will be hit with unexpected assessments and increased condominium fees. This is your property buster and if we do not all look after it, what do you think will happen to property values? And if you are too busy to be on the condominium board, just wait until you learn what those people you did elect are doing.

And to say that the board you helped elect is just incompetent is probably an understatement. Not that you can sue them for incompetence. The Condominium Act gets them off the hook…if they take the advice of someone like an accountant, lawyer, engineer, etc. who might know something about the subject. This has created an entire industry in Ontario of people who are living off the avails of condominiums. Having once watched, in horror, as an engineer parlayed a $20,000 to $40,000 refurbishing job into a $750,000 bonanza for his friends, we can assure you that these people are certifiable experts at screwing the owners.

And the most serious problems are among those companies that are there to provide professional management. These companies will tell you all about the high standards, training and assistance available to their managers but where these people come from for all the new condominiums popping up, we are not sure. What is really chilling is the knowledge that no matter how little they know, they probably know more than your condo’s board of directors.

You might ask at this stage how the Ontario Government protects condominium owners. Pardon us, we cannot stop laughing.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

When the McGuinty Liberals decided to do something about trades training and standards in Ontario, we wished them ‘Good luck.’ There are some 190 skilled trades that initially need support on behalf of Ontario trades people, employers and consumers. To do the job properly will take time, good will and input from all levels of the trades. What it does not need as it travels down the road is to be run over by other levels of government and to be waylaid by mean-spirited political parties spreading dissention.

The first question asked last week when the federal Conservatives announced their budget was how the proposed federal trades plan would work with the Ontario program. You would assume in a normal country that the federal government would discuss such a plan with the provinces. It was when Quebec angrily told Finance Minister Jim Flaherty to blow his new program in his ear that you got a hint that preplanning is not part of the Conservative strategy. And it is obvious that Ontario has absolutely no idea how to fit the federal plan in with its approach. (Nor do the feds appear to want them to!)

And to make matters worse, the provincial Conservatives in Ontario have their own strategy. Here in Babel, we see the MPP from Orillia and the junior MPP from Barrie signing petitions to stop the purported trades tax. They seem to be opposed to the Ontario Trades College. Since the college has yet to do anything, the Ontario Conservatives are busy saying that anything they do will be bad for Ontario. They are building a bogeyman.

The Conservatives insist, up front, that the majority of Ontario trades people do not want to be members of the Ontario Trades College. The only questions that come to mind are whether the trades people have evaluated the benefits of membership and do they know anything about it? Mind you, if the College proponents have announced a fee structure before deciding what they will do for it, they will deserve all the slander they get.

The most interesting aspect of the Conservative vilification campaign is the threat that the College is going to bar your favourite handyman from building your backyard deck while putting new tile in your bathroom. They are shedding crocodile tears for the famous jack of all trades. Frankly that guy used to be called a ‘homeowner’ and it is about time someone saved him from himself.

What it boils down to is the cost of home renovations. Nobody is going to stop you from hiring the kid from down the street to paint your house. You will get what you pay for. And if you want something that says the tradesperson is qualified for the job, you are going to pay more. And it is most often worth it.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

It is a lonely road. Ontario Treasurer Charles Sousa is busy working on his budget and he is hardly going to listen to some bloody blogger from Babel. His Premier has told him to fix the deficit and that is what he is going to do. It hardly matters that squeezing the economy at this time is stupid. Charles has his marching orders.

Only a few of us said that Don Drummond’s report to Premier McGuinty and his Treasurer Duncan last year was crap. It was a banker’s report that said the province had to stop running deficits. Every banker in Canada is potty trained on that idea. It is like they know that they only lend money to people who do not need it. They are not exactly Keynesian economists. Banking has nothing to do with economics. Some of Canada’s banks issue economic forecasts as the closest they can get to any form of humour. They are usually wrong but it is a tradition, like giving out calendars.

But help is at hand. It is not exactly neutral help but we will take what we can get. The help is from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. Sure, the centre is a bit to the political left but it is a hell of a lot more responsible than the right-wing yahoos at the Fraser Institute. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has always done responsible and well-reasoned work.

And the name of the study says it all. More Harm Than Good is the very appropriate title.

And that is what faces us. With Finance Minister Jim Flaherty bringing down his austerity budget this week, with Ontario’s budget to follow, we are faced with the combination destroying our fragile recovery. We are told that Flaherty’s budget will take us back at least a half century to times of high apprenticeship. This seems like a band-aid solution to a haemorrhage but it is a typically Conservative Party answer. The only problem is that if Ontario follows up that conservative budget with another conservative budget, we will end up screwing the economy.

The authors of the report make it very clear that Liberal Party austerity efforts over the past year have done more for Ontario Conservative Leader Tim Hudak than the voters. They point out that Ontario’s misguided and ineffective efforts at austerity could be creating a self-defeating vicious circle.

The one thing that seems to puzzle the authors is how the Ontario government can keep changing the deficit figures. They are probably like the cost of not building gas fired generating plants. The figures just keep changing.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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