Provincial Politics – Page 128

No, education in Ontario is not big enough.

March 6, 2012 by Peter Lowry

It sometimes seems that the Toronto Star editors enjoy setting pontificating eggheads up for a fall. Professor George Fallis of York University appears to be their latest victim. Professor Fallis writes in today’s Star that Ontario does not need three new university campuses. He makes the argument, in an opinion page piece, that Ontario has enough campus capacity now. He believes that future growth in capacity will only force existing facilities to compete for enrolment. An attitude such as that can only draw derision from across the province.

The professor’s mindset seems to be off. First of all, we need more competition in Ontario. We hardly need to encourage any academics who believe that they do not have to work hard for the attention and attendance of their students. Professors also have a responsibility to keep fees and costs of higher education affordable for students. Academic tenure is not designed to encourage the lazy but to allow challenge and freedom of thinking. Learning must challenge minds not wallets.

The purpose behind the three new campuses is to bring university training and learning to more students across Ontario. We have to bring education to the students and that means going where the growth in population is happening. The day our universities have to compete for enrolment is when we can truly say we are doing the job of educating. Until then, we are denying higher education to those who want it. Education is not just for the professor’s elite.

Babel is one of those three academic centres that will benefit from the province’s promise of growth. Georgian College, based here, has successfully partnered with various universities across the province to bring expanded learning capabilities to central Ontario. Babel (or Barrie, if you insist) is not demanding another university of its own. The city believes that it is the breadth of learning that must be encouraged to help build a strong and varied economy.

Babel’s current mayor, started five years ago to build higher education possibilities. He worked on it before he was even in city politics. He created what is known as the Growing by Degrees task force to expand post-secondary opportunities in the city. The task force has been very successful in bringing more universities to partner in higher education in the city.

Babel respects learning. The city has recently joined with Sudbury-based Laurentian University to develop multi-million plans for a downtown campus that will not only help revitalize Babel’s downtown but build a new style of learning environment. Plans will hopefully include education facilities from kindergarten to PhD. Nor is the planning just for the young. Babel knows that learning is no longer a pastime but a lifetime.

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Does the Rotman School have a degree for prigs?

March 3, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Who would have thought of the Rotman School of Management promoting a prurient position? The director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School writes in the Toronto Star the other day that a casino in Toronto would be a “costly, socially destructive boondoggle.” Instead of offering serious economic studies to make his case, the author tells us of the supposed glitz, tackiness, misery and crime that goes with casinos. This is hardly a very scholarly approach to the question.

We can assure the writer that to not build a casino in Toronto is more socially destructive than he seems to understand. Maybe if he knew of the scope and conditions of the illegal casinos that are operating in the Toronto area and the criminality that these operations generate, he would have a far greater appreciation of the need for legal outlets. And to suggest that a casino is a boondoggle—a waste of time and money—could only be made by someone with no idea of what is involved.

The writer needs to understand that Toronto is a major tourist destination. The city attracts visitors from around the world. The city is a year-round convention location. That is why Toronto is also a very successful North American entertainment centre. It is a major league sports town and a world class business and financial centre. To not have a casino is to degrade us in the eyes of sophisticated tourists and business visitors.

To be fair to the writer, he did make one statement with which many experts agree. He said that building casinos “in an already thriving downtown, is a truly terrible idea.” The best example of this is the bad planning that put a young adult ‘entertainment district’ in the John and Richmond Street area in Toronto. It attracts the wrong crowd, at the wrong times in an area that did not need that much more traffic.

What the writer does not seem to understand is that casinos are an entertainment venue. You go there to be entertained. Most of us, who go to casinos, go to have fun. That money you lay on a craps table or stuff in a slot is part of your cost. The few people who win get some added fun. Humans have been gambling since the dawn of time and only the foolish and prurient think they can stop it.

The Rotman School writer also seems concerned that some people want to turn Ontario Place into a casino. That is a very bad idea for the wrong location. Ontario Place works as a family entertainment area. A casino might be a viable tenant at the west end of the Exhibition grounds if other year-round entertainment besides Medieval Times can also be located there. It is not ideal but, at least, there is good access.

The best location in all of Metropolitan Toronto for a casino is probably Woodbine Racetrack. The track is already in the entertainment business. The operators clearly understand that good food, services, excitement and entertainment are part of the glamour and attraction of a full-scale casino.

But Woodbine is not the only location. The Greater Toronto area can probably sustain as many as four casinos if the proper mix of entertainment and tourist attractions are included. And as managers for these casinos, there might even be some spots for Rotman School of Management graduates.

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McGuinty’s wily Whigs can work wonders.

March 1, 2012 by Peter Lowry

It was a revelation this morning to be reading a columnist in the Toronto Star who thinks like a real liberal. This is not only a rare and wondrous thing but the writer actually proposed not cutting but even increasing provincial taxes for business and the rich. If we all write in the same vein do you think we could embarrass McGuinty’s Whigs into acting as liberals for a change? Or do you think this was Premier Dalton’s scheme all along for him to bow to the pressure of liberals in Ontario’s populace?

We have never suggested that he might really be a liberal before. While his Whigs use the name “Liberal” as though they might be a legitimate political party, he seems to scoff at any suggestion that he might be anything other than an out-of-date, right-wing Whig. McGuinty is certainly far to the right politically of the early reformers of York and Clear Grits of Western Ontario that came together under George Brown to create the venerable Liberal Party of Canada.

In a recent CBC television special, actors showed how George Brown set aside partisan positions to work along side Sir John A. Macdonald to bring together Canada as a nation. Now would you not have laughed to see Premier McGuinty in the role of Brown?

But you never know. Some people have more depth than we give them credit for. His doughty Treasurer Dwight Duncan has yet to be heard from. It will be March 29 before we get the Treasurer’s word on how much, if any, of the bunk from Don Drummond will be heeded. While Mr. Duncan is well known for his hesitations and half measures, it will be his chance to recant his Whigishness and emerge as a true reformer.

Duncan could, for example, doublecross Drummond and take a giant step into political stardom, by selling off the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) operations. He is hardly going to lose any tax revenue—in fact, it would increase tax revenue substantially—when privately-owned stores are free to do proper merchandising for their customers. Think how wonderful it would be to have a privately-owned central warehousing operation vying with independents to supply privately-owned liquor stores across the province. Wow!

Mind you, we could hardly have the privatized liquor stores competing with that decrepit old Brewers’ Warehousing operation. There would have to be a companion act by the legislature to end that foolish beer monopoly. Just think of how many Liberal votes that would garner from convenience store operators across the province. The government could then use all the Beer Store ‘In and Outs’ as recycling depots. They already smell like it.

We do so wish that this is the delightful surprise that Mr. McGuinty has in store for us. If he did, all would be forgiven. Well, almost all.

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McGuinty fuelling more unrest than just labour.

February 21, 2012 by Peter Lowry

If Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty thinks he is going to just stir up labour unrest by savaging civil servant wages, he does not know the half of it. To even send the message to the people employed by the government that he is going to take money from them is a declaration of war. And he can expect no quarter. He will be savaged by the union members who supported the New Democrats and he will be equally savaged by the many union people who supported him in the last election.

McGuinty recently told an Ottawa audience that his “government will negotiate firmly to a result that keeps us on a sure and steady path to eliminate the deficit.” And, with that attitude, it will also be a sure and steady path to eliminate the Liberal Party of Ontario.

Yes, we joke about McGuinty and his pack as being Whigs—Liberals from 200 years ago. At the same time, we have to agree with many liberals who want to rebuild the provincial party. The difference is that we desperately need a liberal government in Ontario. We need a liberal party that will work for the rights of the individual in our society. That seems to be something that Whigs do not do.

We have no party working for us. This is serious. Hudak’s hooligans are not even conservatives. Their backbone is made up of mainly extremist Libertarians. Former Premier Bill Davis must wonder what happened to that civilized party he once represented. The New Democrats have some decent people involved but nobody wants a party that is under the thumb of the toughest of the labour unions.

There is wide-open space for a left-of-centre party in Ontario that could be liberal and here is McGuinty over in right-of-centre. His Whigs hardly fit the bill. Real liberals care about individual rights. Real liberals would do something about a Medicare that denies people the services of a family doctor.

Real liberals are not in Premier McGuinty’s wheelhouse. He thinks he has some God ordained role in paying off Ontario’s debt. Why is not clear. The people who voted for him last year had no such intention. They just wanted some decent, caring government instead of the Harris/Hudak rape and pillage style of government or a repeat of the fiasco of the Bob Rae NDP government of the 1990s.

It was not as though Ontario voters showed all that much confidence in Mr. McGuinty. Despite the loss of his majority, he is not in a bad situation. No party wants to rush back to the polls. Everyone would understand it if he just settled back and governed well for a few years. He could concentrate on fighting with Ottawa, not organized labour. He does not really have to impress us too much. If he could just stay out of trouble, keep his cabinet out of trouble and restore some confidence in his party, all could be forgiven. He could do it if he burns the Drummond Report and gets Treasurer Dwight Duncan a kindly, cherubic personality transplant.

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Have you had your Drummond today?

February 18, 2012 by Peter Lowry

It has been calculated. If you take all of the copies of economist Don Drummond’s report, piled them in front of the Ontario Legislature and lit them with a match, the resulting bonfire would not keep us very warm.

But it is a warming thought. It would be the best use for the drivel that Drummond tried to foist on us. If Premier Dalton McGuinty was trying to set up a bogeyman to take the blame for some austerity measures, he found the perfect scapegoat. All we need now is to hear from opposition leader ‘Tiny Tim’ Hudak that he agrees wholeheartedly with everything Drummond says. That would put the cap on a totally ridiculous exercise. You keep expecting the Premier to announce this report is to show people what Ontario would be like if the Conservatives win the next provincial election.

The worst part of the entire fiasco was when Drummond brought up the tragedy of the Greek financial crisis. To mention Greece in the same breath as Ontario is a travesty.Ontario does not have a financial problem. Ontario has a total debt of about $240 billion and a gross domestic product of more than $500 billion. That is not much for 12 million people to handle. It is the equivalent of a family earning $50,000 per year and owing $24,000 for house, car, cottage and other long-term debt. Drummond’s TD Bank will let you borrow a lot more than that.

But suppose you want to pay down some of that debt? Would you fire the gardener and the garbage man and cancel the Globe and Mail so that you could reduce the debt? Or would you forego the family visit to Disney World this year?

And that is what Don Drummond and his friend Dalton McGuinty do not seem to understand. If you want to save money, if you want to pay down debt, you cancel the foolish and frivolous—you do not throw people on the streets and pay increased welfare.

And while we hesitate to suggest this, the province has an ace-in-the-hole that a family does not always have. A government can raise its own pay. It can go to its taxpayers and say: sorry folks but we need a bit more money. And very few would be mad about it if the government just put a surtax on the rich. It would be great if they paid their fair share for a change.

And while the government is at it, it could reverse the trend in corporate taxes. Over the years, Ontario governments have reduced corporate income tax by more than 80 per cent. It makes you wonder why they even bother collecting it. If a business needs its profits to expand its business or to do research or hire more people, that is okay. The company that wants to send its profits off-shore or to buy its competition should be taxed to the hilt.

As you can see, there are options.

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Ontario’s treasurer tries to fly alone.

February 17, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Ontario Treasurer Dwight Duncan nearly crashed the other day. He tried to steal economist Don Drummond’s thunder by announcing some of his own initiatives to save money. The three areas he talked about were the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) head office and main store in Toronto, Service Ontario and support for Ontario racing. After digesting what he had to say, you have to admit, he is no Don Drummond. Duncan seems happy with half measures and faint stabs at the problems. The poor man does not seem ready to fly alone.

In fact, at the end of his presentation, you were not sure if he was trying to discuss things sensibly or simply dissing Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition in Ontario.

Start at the beginning with the LCBO proposal. He told his audience he wants to sell that prime piece of real estate down by the Toronto Harbour that holds a wonderful liquor store where you can buy products from all over the world. And incidentally, the head office of LCBO is there. We always thought that store seemed to be a perk of working down there on Toronto’s waterfront.

But why just sell the land? Why not sell the LCBO?

Drummond has no concept of this aspect of government. He should stick to banking. The facts are that sooner or later, the Ontario government has to get out of the liquor business. The government is in it for the wrong reasons. It milks the LCBO as a cash cow. The government restricts the business opportunity to appease long-dead temperance fanatics. It is not getting the money out of the business that it can and it is interfering with good marketing practices. How stupid can the government be? The truth is that private sector bidding for the store franchises would produce huge one-time amounts to pay down the deficit. And the ongoing tax revenue from those stores would easily replace current revenues. Dwight Duncan thinks he might get a couple hundred million for the headquarters. He has no idea what the entire lash-up is worth. What a piker!

And while he is at it, Duncan can get rid of Brewers Warehousing. In any other jurisdiction a monopoly like that would be illegal.

And yet he wants to privatize Service Ontario! Maybe, he says. He does not seem too sure. By the wayDuncan, the operative word is “Service.” Sure, privatize it. Just make sure private operators also provide service to Ontario before you save too much.

Dwight’s third idea is the most hair-brained of all! He wants to cut off the subsidies for horse racing in Ontario? That might be alright but does that mean he is giving up the provincial share of the racing handle at the tracks? Is he giving the tracks more of the money they are making on slots? Is he going to let all those slot joints play with the big kids and become full-blown casinos?

Wow,Duncan forgot to mention privatizing them. We want to buy one!

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A note of thanks to Don Drummond.

February 16, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Dear Mr. Drummond:

The Premier has asked me to thank you for your services to the Province of Ontario. He thought you might have some creative ideas to help him balance the provincial budget. Obviously you do not.

Your suggestions will be filed in the same place as Mike Harris’ schemes from the 1990s. They did not work then. They will not work now.

But that is not your fault.

Please submit your bill. We are currently figuring out how to tax all the money back from you.

But again, thanks. Try not to let the doorknob hit you in the ass on the way out.

A Secretary to Mr. Mcguinty.

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It’s time to ban third-party campaign ads.

February 15, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Enough is enough. It was revealed last week that an Ontario election attack ad took a blue ribbon in the United States. In a country that invented campaign sleaze, an Ontario campaign ad for a group of unions calling themselves ‘Working Families’ won an Award of Excellence. It is probably just one more good reason that this type of advertising must be stopped.

Unlike that really strange television campaign about kids that had Ontario voters very confused last year, the ‘Working Families’ ads were smart and mean and clearly aimed at defaming the leader of the Ontario Conservatives. The only thing that was wrong with the ads was that they failed to say ‘Vote Liberal’ at the conclusion. They also needed to say, ‘sponsored by the Ontario Liberal Party.’

And if those ads were not for any political party, they should be banned. If the ads are not by a party or candidate, they are then an attempt to interfere with the fairness of the election process.

The television broadcasters should also take some responsibility in this. By no measure does this type of advertising meet any standards of fairness, honesty or truth in advertising. Labor unions cannot hide behind a false name such as ‘Working Families.’ Using a false name is deception. It seeks to deceive the viewer. It is the same as the thief who wears a mask. They are hiding from you. They are hiding from the truth.

The guy who runs the advertising agency that wrote and produced those attack ads was very proud of his work and that award. He should not be. The truth is that attack ads are the easiest to write. That is why politicians like to use them. All you do is take a seed of what people think about someone and plant it in enough muck to grow something bigger. These ads are for the lazy.

The tough ads are the honest ones. They are where you, metaphorically, look the viewer in the eye and tell the truth. It is the type of advertising that has to reach out to the viewer and share a depth of understanding and empathy. The good ads have to be credible, believable, endearing, honest and open. And they do all that in 20, 30 or 60 seconds.

Americans like to use attack ads because they have a two party system. The times when they have a credible third party running, they do not know what to do. If you try to paint a negative image of an opponent in a multi-party campaign, you might have no idea which of the remaining parties will benefit.

If people think the ‘Working Families’ campaign won for Premier McGuinty, they need to give that campaign some further analysis. Tiny Tim went into the October election the easy winner. The polls gave him the election. If he had never opened his mouth during the campaign, he might have won easily.

But he did open his mouth. He was erratic, unreliable, confused and left an inconsistent message. He alienated urban voters and turned new Canadians against him and his party. The only part of the province he won easily was the WASP band across the province that runs from Ottawa to Sarnia. It was the Ontario version of the American Tea Party, the Ontario Landowners’ Association, who won that for him.

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A letter to Premier Dalton McGuinty.

February 13, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Dear Dalton: No doubt you have spoonfuls of sugar ready to go with the medicine you hope Ontario residents will swallow. The first dose comes with the Drummond Report and then the second with the provincial budget. Meanwhile, the media will continue to frighten citizens with speculation and rumours. What puzzles us though are why, in front of the news media, you said last week: “There are legitimate public expectations that we’ll do everything we can to eliminate the deficit as quickly as we can.”

You have got it wrong again Dalton. Take your time. Sure, former civil servant and bank economist Don Drummond might have some interesting ideas. They certainly should be considered. Our barber also has some interesting ideas. You should talk to him too.

Just who is telling you that you have a problem? Is it that young Mr. Hudak? We sometimes tend to forget that he took courses in economics. He is also a protégé of Mike Harris, one of the worst premiers in Ontario history. The two H’s, Harris and Hudak, are ideologues. That means that they put their theories ahead of people. It means they put business wants ahead of what people might want. Hell, they might even put their right-wing creed ahead of people’s lives. These are not nice people. Why should you worry about what they want?

It seems you told that audience in Ottawa the other day that you are going to cut the wages of civil servants in Ontario. That does not sound very smart. If you are paying them too much, who is at fault? What has changed? Has the cost of living in Ontario gone down and we failed to notice? Is it their fault that Ontario has a deficit?

You really need to rethink this Dalton. That is kind of Harris-Hudak thinking to blame the civil servants for something they did not do. Ask interim federal Liberal Leader Bob Rae what happened to him as Premier when he blamed the civil servants in the 1990s.

You should really think about what caused the recent economic problems for Ontario. Obviously there is not much you can do about the American banks who screwed up the mortgage business in the U.S. You have to deal with things you can correct.

For example, we have lost a lot of jobs in Ontario to low-wage areas in the United States. Have you thought of ways we could penalize those companies who send jobs out of the country? Should you ever buy anything from such companies? Sure, we have to respect trading agreements but American states seem to have no problem finding ways to protect their jobs. What are you, a boy scout?

Dalton, you really need to rethink your basic strategy. Liberals are supposed to respect the rights of the individual in our society. If we have hurt your feelings calling you and your caucus Whigs, we apologize. After all, Whigs are just Liberals who are two hundred years behind the times.

If you want to move into the 21^st Century, we will be happy to analyze this Drummond report for you and show you how a modern Liberal would make sure that the proposals helped the people of Ontario—not penalized them for your government’s mistakes. And we will only charge a fraction of Don’s bill. Your new pal, Peter.

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Ontario’s ‘Tiny Tim’ will soldier on.

February 11, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Ontario’s Provincial Conservatives have a chance to dump their leader Tim Hudak at their meeting today in Niagara Falls. As there is no immediate replacement available, they probably will not bother. It would be a foolish move anyway. Despite his lack of political smarts that led to his loss to the McGuinty Whigs, there is a tradition among Tories that if you win some more seats you get a second chance to win it all.

Tiny Tim’s role model and mentor is former Premier Mike Harris. Unlike Hudak, Harris never tried to tell us he was smart. He posed as ‘The Tax Fighter’ in the 1990 provincial election and watched Bob Rae’s New Democrats win the election. Harris made a comeback with his ‘Common Sense Revolution’ after Rae had lost the bulk of his union support, five years later. Rae practically handed Ontario to Harris on a platter.

Despite all the gaffs Dalton McGuinty and his Liberals made in the 2011 provincial general election, Hudak could not capitalize on the lead he had in the polls. Voters started paying attention to him during the campaign and he came across to them as callow and stilted with his parroted right-wing pitch. If Andrea Horwath and her handlers had been able to better understand the dynamics of that election,Ontario would now have its second ever NDP government.

But for both Tiny Tim and Andrea, the next provincial election will be do or die. Their main problem is to not force the election too soon. All the political parties have to pay their election debts and build some reserves before anyone wants an election. Since neither of the opposition parties want to give the other too much leverage, the forcing of an election is an intricate dance. In 2015, the Liberals will be committed to an October election and their best bet will be to have a new leader in place well before then.

A new Liberal leader is not the only change that voters need. Much depends on whether the party can come up with a jobs-oriented economic plan that makes sense to the voters. Ontario has lost too many of its manufacturing jobs for a full recovery and the federal Conservative’s emphasis on supporting our western resource base is not going to help.

If the Ontario Liberals were really smart—which might be wishful thinking—they would be doing the critical planning now. If the party had a new leader in place by the spring of 2014 and an action plan ready for the fall of that year, they would have an opportunity to win a snap election.

They would need a good rationale for the action but they could, in effect, run against Prime Minister Harper and his Conservatives. The best thing to do with Tiny Tim at this juncture would be to ignore him. And a strong job-creation action plan would look after Mrs. Horwath.

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