Category: Provincial Politics

No Intervention for Doug Ford.

by Peter Lowry

Those people who are promoting an intervention for premier Doug Ford’s beer bonanza are missing a few clues. First of all, an intervention is normally conducted by people who give a damn about the person who has strayed. Secondly, we figure that an intervention over beer and wine is for someone who is addicted to beer and wine. Dougie does not drink!

But I do. And I am sick and tired of the stupid, greedy, corrupted politicians of all parties in Ontario who have been playing footsie with the beer barons for more than 90 years. The real addiction is with the unconscionably high alcohol taxes inflicted on beer drinkers that Ontario drinkers have been paying over the century.

And we know that these people proposing an intervention do not give a damn for Dougie. He is simply no kind of lovable bastard. Maybe his wife and kids tolerate him because of the family money but nobody loves a pompous ass. It is just in this case, he has done something right. He has freed the peasants. And that is from the way the prohibition politicians have been treating us.

And why the hell do we only have interventions for something that the blue-stocking crowd thinks is bad for us? Why do they think having a beer at 9 a.m. is a sign of alcoholism? And why does a gentleman never send his lady friend to that smelly, disreputable Beer Store to get him a two-four?

And why does Costco not sell two-fours? The questions roll on.

But one thing for sure is that Doug Ford is not pandering to the alcoholics among us. Hell, Dougie has never cared for anyone else in his life other than maybe his mother and his deceased brother.

His brother Rob taught him that as soon as you are elected, you start campaigning for the next election. It is party time in Ford Nation.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

It’s Bullshit over Beer in Ontario.

by Peter Lowry

The international owners of Labatt, Molson and Sleeman breweries have to be sleeping on the job. The Ontario government is seriously planning to expand their business for them and they are talking about suing the government. If I was the judge for that case, I would laugh the idiots out of my court.

What the government is proposing is that beer and wine sales in Ontario be expanded through convenience stores, grocery stores and big box stores. You can think of it as the peasants in Ontario being freed to buy their beer where it is convenient for them instead of where the Brewers’ Warehousing Beer Stores find it convenient to sell beer.

And besides, serving a market of 13 million people takes more that 450 beer stores, 660 liquor control board stores, 150 large grocery stores and some agencies in out of the way parts of the province. Even with another 300 grocery stores to be added, that is not enough distribution to meet the market need.

For comparison, Quebec has most of its 8000 convenience stores selling beer to a population of 8 million and Alberta has close to 2000 privately owned alcohol outlets and many hotels with off-premises sales, selling suds to 4.3 million. There is no question but there is a need in Ontario for a greatly expanded retailing of beer and wine.

Some skeptics of the government plan point to a specious agreement signed five years ago by a banker on behalf of the province. In the agreement the brewers promised to spend $100 million per year for four years to upgrade stores and build some new ones. What does not make sense of this is that it is a normal cost of doing business in a business worth many billions. New stores need to be built in growing communities and many of the ill-kept Beer Store properties in Ontario desperately need repair and improvements. Why would this be subject to litigation?

Frankly, Ontario has colluded with and coddled the foreign brewers for long enough. After 90 years of unconscionable profits for the breweries own delivery system, they can no longer expect a monopoly. They can make a lot more money with the expanded distribution of their products. If they do not like what the government is doing, they should remember that it is the government that calls the shots.

A rule of international trade is ‘Never piss off the local politicians.’

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Professionalism in Politics.

by Peter Lowry

Interesting argument the other day with a reader who likes keeping up with the political scene and who supports the liberals. He was stating his objection to professional politicians. Since his major experience with a professional politician was when Patrick Brown was the MP in Barrie and then the leader of the Ontario conservatives, I can understand his objection. Brown just might be one of the worst examples of a professional politician.

But that is why politicos refer to Brown as a retail politician. He knows how politics work and he works the system. Last year in the chaos created by the new Ford government in Queen’s Park, Brown was ricocheting around Peel Region trying to find a place on the dance card for the civic election. He knew he could run somewhere in Peel Region. Ford cut him off from the regional chair position—easy job, good pay. He landed in Brampton instead, where the incumbent mayor was vulnerable.

He had moved to Mississauga because he knew he could not defeat the incumbent mayor in Barrie. It was not his shallow personal connections in Peel but the ethnic mix that attracted him. Multi-culturalism minister for Stephen Harper, Jason Kenney, had set Brown up with free trips to India in those years when he was an MP in the Harper government. Brown had not only become buddies with Indian President Narendra Modi but had become a key contact with the many people in the very large sub-continent community in Canada.

Brown had already used these ethnic contacts in the Peel region to swamp the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party membership and delivered him the leadership of that party. (Brampton resident Jagmeet Singh noted that there were thousands of Sikh immigrants involved and obviously used many of the same group to swamp the NDP party membership in the same way as Brown swamped the Tories.)

In as much as the sub-continent community represents 30 per cent of the population of Brampton, Brown won the mayoralty by the simple promise to the Sikh and Hindu immigrant population in Brampton that there would be more cricket pitches in the city parks. The sub-continent people do love their cricket.

And that is what professional politicians do. They know how to win elections. They become expert. The professionals are the ones who stick around. The amateurs come and go.

But they can be good people who care about the voters. They can also be users. That is up to the voters to decide.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Kenney’s Conundrum, Capturing Carbon.

by Peter Lowry

It was in the business news recently. It was about the success of Shell Oil’s $1.3 billion carbon-capture plant, Quest, near Edmonton. The Quest plant is designed to capture and store carbon from the Scotford upgrader, a refinery that upgrades tar sands bitumen into synthetic crude oil. The Scotford upgrader plant output of about 200,000 barrels per day has provided the carbon-capture facility with 3.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide over the past three-and-a-half years.

It is particularly impressive that the Quest plant appears to bypass the bitumen slag by-product of bitumen processing by converting the excessive amounts of carbon in bitumen directly to CO². It also seems to make it obvious that the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) has been down-playing the amount of carbon in the tar sands bitumen from day one.

But what do you do with that much carbon dioxide? The Shell people refer to it as being sequestered, hence the name Quest for the plant.

Now if only there was a market for so much CO²? Eventually, we hear, scientists will figure out how to use CO² for fuel. As it is, this CO² is being pumped underground, where it is sequestered.

Canadian and Alberta taxpayers contributed more than $800 million to this project. While I do not know the cost of operating the $1.3 billion Quest plant, I will assume that Shell would save the federal carbon tax that will soon be levied on the ersatz crude oil produced at upgrading plants in Alberta. This will start at the current federal rate of $20 per tonne and raise to $50 per tonne by 2022.

Since the new premier, Jason Kenney of the United Conservative Party of Alberta, is committed to throwing out the provincial carbon tax, the province will be foregoing the money needed to help build more carbon-capture plants, such as Quest and other innovations for Albertans. Whatever premier Jason Kenney might be, he is obviously not much of a mathematician.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Fighting the facts of the future.

by Peter Lowry

In a discussion of what is currently happening in politics, the realization emerged that provincial politicians such as Alberta’s Kenney, Saskatchewan’s Moe and Ontario’s Ford are denying our progeny a future.  It was not a question of a planned or malevolent denial of a future but simple ignorance. These men are choosing the direction that conservatism dictates, as they as they slash and cut at anything that they do not understand.

At the four-day Collision Conference, with attendees from around the world, in Toronto last week, premier Doug Ford was booed when he came to promote Ontario as the place to do business. It was the same time as his government announced that it was cutting funds to assist in the development of artificial intelligence. The $24 million might not have produced any breakthroughs in AI but was critical to positioning Ontario as a place to create the future. That one foolish error probably cost Ontario billions in investment down the road.

And look at Alberta. Jason Kenney has already announced that he will end all of Alberta’s green energy programs—as well as ending the carbon tax. He might be too late to stop the opening of Alberta’s pioneering geothermal electricity generation plant. This is something the Italians have had for the past 100 years but the Alberta facility that takes the steam to power it from below the earth’s surface will be a first in Canada.

Why conservatives do not like anything they cannot touch, taste or smell is beyond this writer’s understanding. Does the world have to end with a bang one night to convince them that global warming is a threat to human life? The world is already into the throws of turmoil as the ice caps melt and the oceans rise. Drier weather in our west is feeding wild fires while the heavier snows of winter in the east are flooding the water systems in spring. The world is responding to the carelessness of mankind.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Fake news on the opioid front?

by Peter Lowry

We were reading a poster telling us about a community meeting to discuss a proposed safe injection site in the neighbourhood. It invited anyone who wanted more information or had concerns to come to the meeting. We had barely finished reading when a voice behind us said, “It’s all a lie you know.”

It is very strange to hear that. Sure, we have had people tell us that Donald Trump was really a very fine gentleman, just misunderstood. We have even taken time to hear out climate change deniers to try to understand their reasoning better. This was a new one.

But why would anybody want to suggest that the politicians are lying about the deaths of opioid users? This has been in the news for many months. They are panicking about it on the West Coast. The Medical Office of Health in Toronto is deeply concerned. Our emergency measures people in cities such as Barrie, are frustrated and alarmed. And those fools running the Ontario government are cutting back the funding for safe injection sites needed to help stem the tide.

Do those idiots think they are saving money by letting people die?

I was amazed earlier this year when our local conservative MP wrote an item for the local grocery flier wrap about this. He actually questioned the idea of providing clean needles and a place for addicts to take drugs. I figured it was just his way of demonstrating his general incompetence.

Someone whom he respected must have gotten to him and convinced him that he should support safe injection sites. The really good news came later when he announced he would not run again for MP.

I have always been horrified over the years when seeing people heading down the slippery slide into the world of illicit drugs. It is a terrible waste of human life. I see the safe injection sites as an opportunity for knowledgeable workers to connect and maybe save the lives of some of these people. It is certainly worth the small cost.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

A crying towel for the Beer Store.

by Peter Lowry

The Ontario government must be serious about Doug Ford’s promise to open up beer and wine sales in Ontario. We have both the Beer Store management (at Brewers Warehousing) and the Beer Store union paying for TV spots complaining about possible lost jobs. I wonder why? This is an opportunity for more jobs with the company, not less. To suggest that as many as 7000 unionized jobs at the Beer Store are at risk is a flat-out lie.

To begin with, there is the need for practically doubling the current distribution capability of the Beer Store. That means building new distribution nodes and hiring staff and more drivers. Why would any other company be given the right to distribute to as many as another 10,000 convenience stores, large box stores and grocery stores. It would likely make the Beer Store the largest distribution company in Ontario, if not Canada.

Secondly, the Beer Store organization could also become the largest recycling operation in Canada. Sales at all those LCBO, grocery, big box and convenience stores would stream back to the Beer Store for recycling. Some of the stores could keep their two-four business as a side line but could do far more recycling. They might even learn to do a better job of it.

Ontario citizens know that the current government at Queen’s Park would have little understanding of what is required to back up the needs of expanded retail systems. After the thrill of watching the government look stupid trying to get marijuana retailing off the ground in Ontario, we know this will not be the problem with beer and wine. We have a reasonably good distribution system in place and all we have to do is look at doubling it.

Just why the province would be paying some guy from Alberta $1000 per day to tell them how to do this, is a tough question. Maybe he could go back to Alberta and teach that province to do a better job in booze distribution with what he learns in Ontario.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

The Ford folk play high-speed games.

by Peter Lowry

What is a safe speed on a highway? That is a question that the Ontario government is trying to figure out. And they are wasting their time trying to answer it and they are wasting the public’s time.

Most drivers have an inflated idea of their driving skills and tend to push their limits. What drivers really need to consider are the driving conditions, visibility and condition of the vehicle they are using. The condition of the driver and others on the road are also a factor.

As Highway 400 passes through the city of Barrie, I am very used to turning on to the highway and setting my cruise control for the average speed on the left of the southbound lanes. That setting for many years, under good driving conditions, has been 120 kilometres per hour (74.5 mph). In an average of about 30 trips per year over the past 10 years, I have never been stopped by the provincial police who regularly patrol that highway.

The truth is that the de facto speed limit on all 400 series in Ontario has been 120 kilometres per hour for many years. These are restricted-access, multilane highways with centre dividers between the lanes in each direction. Sure, you will get a ticket for careless or abrupt lane changes and other motoring infractions but someone driving carefully and considerately at 20 clicks over the speed limit does not seem to be committing an offense.

So, what are those geniuses at Queen’s Park doing? They are creating some sections of 400 series highways where the drivers can feel free to drive at 110 kilometres per hour. They tell us that it is a test to see if people really want to drive so fast. I would be more worried if the de facto speed limit went up to 130 kilometres. We have to remember that not all of us have the reaction times of a race car driver.

And remember why many people go to auto races. They are watching for the more spectacular crashes.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Mayor Tory asks the rhetorical.

by Peter Lowry

Asking a question rather than making an accusation is another piece of equipment in the politician’s toolbox. Mayor John Tory of Toronto should be an expert at this form of bafflegab. He would have learned it in his years as a disciple of Ontario premier Bill Davis. Bill never publicly confronted his opponents. They were all friends.

This came home to me the other day reading about the letter Toronto’s mayor sent to the sitting conservative MPPs (other than the premier) from Toronto at Queen’s Park. What he was asking the MPPs to do was to speak up on behalf of their constituents. It seems that the provincial government had unilaterally and retroactively cut child care benefits of more than $80 million that subsidized day care spaces for more than 6000 Toronto families.

Tory had a perfect right to be disgusted with these MPPs but he knew their response before he asked. Backbenchers who rock the boat are sent to Purgatory. They become non-entities who do not get any good committee assignments or plum trips or chance of promotion. And if they ask too many questions or otherwise raise Doug Ford’s ire, they get sent to the far corner of the legislature to commiserate with former conservatives, MPPs, Amanda Simard, Jim Wilson and Randy Hillier.

Sure, John Tory would be well aware that conservative MPPs have a right to ask questions in the confines of caucus. The problem is that Doug Ford is not all that knowledgeable about the rights of the MPPs. Nobody wants to take the chance of angering him.

And while it is a long time since I took civics in school, there is little likelihood that any Canadian politician would be running for election solely for the purpose of representing his or her constituents. The road to power today is that you are elected in the sweep of your party, you answer only to your political party and your constituents be damned.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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

Bankrupt Ontario.

by Peter Lowry

You had no idea that Ontario was bankrupt, did you? We find that conservatives seem to have a very different definition of bankrupt than most bankers and economists. The other day Ontario’s deputy premier and health minister, Christine Elliott was on Global TV’s Focus Ontario, being interviewed by news anchor, Alan Carter. She told him that they have to cut spending on the sick and poor because Ontario was left bankrupt by the last regime.

One of Alan Carter’s weaknesses as an interviewer is that he has his own opinions and is not reluctant to express them. In this case, he was incredulous. He questioned the minister on her statement. He wanted to know on what basis could the province be considered bankrupt. He even asked the widow of a former federal finance minister how bad she considered the debt to provincial gross domestic product (GDP) to be that caused the supposed bankruptcy.

The interview did not end well.

Saying that the former government mishandled the public funds, has become a political mantra in Canada and the provinces for conservatives. The conservatives blanche at any and all deficits and always promise to balance the budget sooner than those other guys.

But what they are reluctant to do is to raise taxes for the wealthy. They are much happier making things more expensive for the middle class. And they consider poor people as something of a bother.

What the conservatives are best at is nickel-diming the public. They download welfare costs to the municipalities. They cut funding to our libraries. They tighten the rules for provincial welfare programs. They will increase fares for GO trains and buses. They are cutting down on the funding for school teachers and eliminating the jobs of teaching assistants. They are increasing the costs for the insufficient number of child care spaces for working parents. And the public suffers from the pains of a thousand cuts.

Christine Elliott is a very capable woman but she will let us down on behalf of this careless, uncaring conservative government.

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Copyright 2019 © Peter Lowry

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