There is a saying that, in many cases is a mere platitude: "Time heals all wounds." Often said to the bereaved, it is meant to impart that there are better days ahead; things will get better. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.
Take, for example the destruction wrought by a former premier of Ontario, Mike Harris. Lionized by some as a politician "who kept his promises," those without cognitive impairment will recall the reign of ugliness he unleashed in Ontario, the effects of which are still felt today. More about that momentarily.
The Star's Robert Benzie recently reported on a new book about the loathsome Harris, a collection of essays by the likes of David Frum, Terrance Corcoran and Jack Minz. When I read the article, I expressed to my wife the ardent hope that the tome finds its home in the remaindered bin very quickly.
Harris seems to have lived a charmed life, presently the chair of Chartwell's, the retirement and long-term care home chain that, amongst others, Premier Doug Ford indemnified against lawsuits related to Covid-19 deaths cause by negligence. Pays to have friends in high places, doesn't it?
In any event, as is frequently the case, Toronto Star readers have long memories and are happy to set the Harris record straight.
In Robert Benzie’s interesting account of a new book of writing about the Mike Harris regime by Mike Harris’s friends, there is no mention of what many feel to be his largest legacy. By persuading Ontarians that cutting taxes, firing nurses and teachers, and downloading provincial responsibilities onto municipalities would make life better for us, he created most of the problems that we face today — including the feeling by many that governments have let them down.
It is tragic that so many lives have been made worse by these policies. It is also tragic that progressive forces have still to find a way to respond to their aftermath.
Julie Beddoes, Toronto
Harris policies still plague Ontario
A long list of policies implemented by the Mike Harris Government are still adversely affecting the people of Ontario.
Let’s start with the more than 4,000 people who died during the pandemic mostly in Harris privatized long-term-care homes. Harris has also profited handsomely on the board of Chartwell, one of these private homes.
Next is the privatization of hwy. 407 now the world’s most expensive toll way. That same year he privatized the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station in a long-term lease. In a deal far worse than the 407 where the profit was privatized but the debt, risks and pollution remained public.
After going fishing with Kenneth Lay of Enron, Harris had Enron and a who’s who of private investors design Ontario’s electricity market. It is this electricity market that is still to this day causing rate spikes subsidized to the tune of $7 billion a year.
Hardly a success story as claimed by editor Alister Campbell.
Much of the health-care crisis we have today came from Harris slashing of funding, which caused the loss of more than 10,000 nurses.
The Harris education funding formula is still causing underfunding and a crisis in our public education system.
The Harris legacy is nothing to celebrate and most of his policies and legislation need reversing or the people of Ontario will continue to pay the cost of his many failures.
Paul Kahnert, Markham
Like the above citizens and many others, I shall never forgive nor forget what Harris did to Ontario, I wish him nothing but ill in his remaining years.
