The other day, in my post on political leadership, I chose Toronto Mayor Rob Ford as the figure to contrast what I consider to be the much more mature and thoughtful approach of Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne. My exclusion of the more obvious figure of comparison, Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak, was intentional, given that I have written so much about him in the past, each post essentially observing the same thing: his addiction to ideological bromides as substitutes for real policy.
That dearth of vision was much in evidence in Hudak's fundraising dinner in Toronto the other day. Saying all the 'right' things to those for whom real thought on policy issues is not an option, young Tim trotted out the usual 'solutions' to all of Ontario's woes, including:
...bringing unions to heel, getting rid of “expensive gold-standard” public pensions, new subways, introducing performance levels for bureaucrats, freezing public-sector wages for two years, and giving tax breaks for employers.
“We will modernize our labour laws so that no worker will be forced to join a union as a condition for taking a job. And no business will be forced to hire a company solely because it has a unionized workforce,” he said.
To regard Hudak as anything more than a tool of the business agenda is difficult, and I am only taking a bit of time to even refer to him here because of a column in today's Star by Judith Timson on how we crave what she calls authenticity in our leaders, which she describes in the following way:
Authenticity does not seem to be about being someone voters want to have a beer with, or even one with whom people always agree. It is about being a leader who comes across as authentically in his or her own skin, not spouting platitudes or panaceas, but one whose words and actions, in a very cynical age, people can believe.
While I don't agree with all of the candidates she cites for their authenticity (Rob Ford, Margaret Thatcher, Justin Trudeau), her other choice, Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, resonates with me, for the reasons I gave the other day.
Here is what Timson has to say about her:
Ontario’s new premier, Kathleen Wynne, has brought a different kind of authenticity to her office. For one thing, she has an extraordinary voice — one that is intimate and knowledgeable. Asked about public transit during a CBC radio call-in show not long ago, Wynne first launched into an affecting anecdote about riding Toronto’s brand new subway system back in the 1950s with her grandmother, wearing her “little white gloves.”
It was not only touching but brave, because Wynne dared to come across first as an ordinary person with memories others might share and not as a politician with a spiel about transit. Mind you, she’s also not afraid to deliver the bad news — if citizens want better transit, they will have to pony up in taxes.
So while others are content to talk about gravy trains, union bosses and the need for the euphemistic workplace democracy in their appeals to the passions and prejudices of the masses, Wynne is trying to set a higher standard for political discourse based on reason, fact and guilelessness.
Let's hope she succeeds.
I have a bit of a busy morning ahead, so just a brief post for now. I have written many times about young Tim Hudak, the lad who aspires to become Premier of Ontario through rhetoric that demonizes the public sector, public sector pensions, and unions. Apparently, constructive policy and breadth of vision are beyond his ken.
Here are two letters from today's Star that nicely capture the severe moral and intellectual limitations the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party labours under:
Re: Hudak takes aim at public sector pensions, March 18
I assume Hudak’s ambition is to ensure that no one has any money when they retire, except the rich, and of course the political whores who do their bidding. Hudak is on the same race to the bottom that the Republican Tea-Baggers advocate in the States.
Gerry Brown, Toronto
Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak shows so little interest in facts that I doubt he can be swayed by rational argument when it comes to public sector pensions. But the truth does matter, so here it is.
The pensions my members collect after a lifetime of work are far from lavish. In health care, the average retiree receives less than $19,100 a year. In the public service, it’s less than $21,800. In the colleges, it’s under $22,800. All three of these plans are in surplus. They have no unfunded liability.
Despite what Mr. Hudak says, talks between the government and pension plans cannot “fail” in our case, for the simple reason that they have already succeeded. The government asked us to keep premiums where they are over the medium term, and we were able to do that.
Public sector pension plans are a good deal for the citizens of Ontario. Through prudent investment, our plans provide more retirement security at less cost than private plans ever could.
Tim Hudak’s mistake is that he sees decent pensions as a problem when in fact they are a solution to the very real problem of seniors’ poverty. His attack on public plans masks the fact that he has no plan at all for retirement security for Ontarians — not even the private sector workers he claims to care about. Any fool can destroy a pension plan; it takes grown-up, long-term commitment to build one. Hudak should drop the right-wing blather and voice his support for expanding the best defined-benefit pension plan in the world, the Canada Pension Plan.
Warren (Smokey) Thomas, President, Ontario Public Service Employees Union
It occurs to me that perhaps the limited appeal of young Tim Hudak, the increasingly out-of-touch leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives, might be related to the retro mentality that periodically pops up in North America. You know, that nostalgic pining for a non-existent past where everyone lived harmoniously in a semi-suburban environment, when men would daily don their work attire (usually a suit and tie), go forth bravely to earn the family's bread, and then return home to be greeted by the loving, doting wife, clad, in the mode of June Cleaver, in apron and pearls. And, of course, there was the malt shop, were teens had good clean fun.
Perhaps that era's main appeal lies in its alleged lack of ambiguity. The answers were there for all who cared to look: good-paying jobs, the car as king, and clearly-defined roles for all. Environment and ecology were words used only by specialists who had little to do with their time.
That is the kind of fictitious past that young Tim seems to be drawing upon for policy formulation, and it is that kind of simplistic thinking that fewer and fewer people, I believe, are willing to uncritically accept, at least if this letter from The Hamilton Spectator is any indication:
Build new Fort Erie-to-Hamilton highway: Hudak (thespec.com, March 7)
I have just read the article wherein Tim Hudak is again quoted as saying he will go ahead with a new highway between Fort Erie and Hamilton.
I am a retired Ontario ministry of transportation employee who was involved in the mid-peninsula highway project and the later Niagara-GTA corridor study project. I am also a resident of Flamborough.
Tim Hudak scares the bejabers out of me.
All the studies have shown that the type of highway he wants is not needed in the foreseeable future. Why can’t he accept this fact?
I don’t think he is an uneducated man, but he seems to be unable to read or to comprehend. He is willing … no … he is anxious, to bulldoze through sensitive wetlands and prime farmland because he thinks it might get him more votes in the Niagara area.
Hudak appears to be a small-thinking man who cannot accept that his ideas just don’t work in today’s society. Most of his comments about jobs are red herrings when it comes to a new highway. While he talks about well-paying skilled trades jobs, he is also talking about getting rid of the unions that helped ensure those types of jobs are well-paid. Again, he doesn’t see the disconnect in his statements.
Although I lean to the right politically, I could never vote for the Ontario Conservative Party with Hudak as its leader. It is incredibly sad that those of us who do lean slightly to the right have no one to vote for.
Will MacKenzie, Flamborough
UPDATE: Perhaps young Tim would be wise to heed this advice from the father of the new conservatism, Preston Manning.
I wish I could take credit for the title sobriquet describing Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak, but that distinction lies with Val Patrick of Hamilton whose letter, along with several others that appear in today's Star, I am taking the liberty of reproducing below. Enjoy!
Tea Party Tim Hudak has launched into another round of union-bashing. This time he is focused on the thousands who have no right to strike and are required by law to have wage and benefit disputes settled by arbitration. His target this day was the firefighters of Stratford.
Attacking the decision in their case, he asserts a need for new legislation requiring arbitrators to “factor in the ability to pay.” Either Mr. Hudak is actively misleading the people of Ontario, or is too lazy to read the current legislation.
The Fire Protection and Prevention Act already requires arbitrators to consider: 1. The employer’s ability to pay in light of its fiscal situation; 2. The extent to which services may have to be reduced, in light of the decision, if current funding and taxation levels are not increased; 3. The economic situation in Ontario and in the municipality; 4. A comparison, as between the firefighters and other comparable employees in the public and private sectors, of the terms and conditions of employment and the nature of the work performed; and 5. The employer’s ability to attract and retain qualified firefighters. Similar requirements exist in the legislation covering others who are denied the right to strike.
Mr. Hudak is simply on a Republican-style campaign seeking to mislead and divide enough people to let him squeak to power. The only pay that needs legislating is that of the corporate CEOs who bankroll Mr. Hudak’s attack on workers and their unions.
Val Patrick, Hamilton
Tim Hudak has become a crashing bore. It’s always the same tired old right-wing bromides from this guy: unions bad, business good, cut, slash, burn.
We’ve been there, done that in the 1990s and what did we get? Longer wait times at hospitals, an education system more focused on test scores than critical thinking, a shredded social safety net that tosses the poor and disabled on the scrap heap of society and imprisoned them there financially.
Blind faith in business landed us in the worst recession since the Great Depression. The only good thing about an election now would be the end of Hudak’s tenure as party leader. So he should be careful what he wishes for, he just might get it.
John Bruce, Niagara Falls
Tim Hudak’s claim that unions are stalling Ontario’s economic recovery is factually incorrect. Corporations and their CEOs are making historical profits and salaries on the backs of Ontario’s workers.
Making such inflammatory statements only fosters resentment and anger; clearly, a more substantive and logically articulated policy is warranted. Inflating unemployment ranks, selling off profitable crown corporations and killing unions is mediocre thinking. Ontarians experienced that same kind of neocon economic policy during the Mike Harris era, we don’t need another dose of revisionist history.
As a retired pensioner, please don’t give me any guff about corporations being abused by union bosses, I pay a higher rate of tax than your corporate friends and I don’t have the luxury of tax loopholes.
RBC chief Gordon Nixon took a million dollar salary cut in 2011, but he rebounded to make $12.6 million the following year. Somehow I don’t feel sorry for him. What could he possibly have in his head that’s worth more than $12 million a year?
Hudak’s former boss, Mr. Harris, attended 18 corporate meetings last year and earned $780,000; that’s obscene. With that as a backdrop, Hudak wants to deny Ontarians a decent standard of living?
Nicholas Kostiak, Tottenham
So Mr. Hudak is once again attacking members of unions and environmentalists, blaming them for Ontario’s economic woes. If he is truly concerned about controlling spending and reducing debt he should look at himself, his party and the very wealthy, many of whom suppot his party.
Instead of attacking unions, that made many workers middle class, and those who believe that companies need to be part of the solution to our environmental problems, Hudak should do the following: cut his own salary, benefits and perks; increase his short working year; make the wealthiest pay their fair share of taxes; and close loopholes that allow the wealthy to financially benefit in ways that the average Ontarian cannot.
These suggestions, though supported by many, would never be supported by Hudak and the Conservatives because they would adversely affect many of those who support his party. Mr. Hudak should stop putting profit ahead of people and recognize the real pro-family beliefs of earning a livable wage and saving our planet.
Ken Walters, Toronto
I suspect young Tim Hudak would like to provide it for them.
The only trouble is, everytime he does, he affirms his incompetence. Yes, young Tim Hudak, the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, has weighed in on yet another 'obstruction' that he believes can be remediated through his simplistic prism. This time it is that pesky perennial problem of those darned endangered species, or more specifically, [g]overnment regulations protecting endangered species [which] are throttling business:
In a speech Tuesday to the Rural Ontario Municipalities’ Association (ROMA) conference at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel, ... Hudak told 700 rural municipal politicians he would slash “the more than 300,000 regulations, outdated rules, and runaround that you have to cope with just to get something done.”
To drive home his point for those listeners whose thoughts might have wandered away from the prattling stripling in their midst, the lad who would be Ontario premier pronounced:
“The problem is that these rules are ... not allowing our agriculture and business sectors to grow.”
As an illustration of the evil obstructionism of government, Hudak tartly observed: In 2003, there were exactly 19 species listed — today, well over 121” - clearly a sign of government regulation run amok, and surely not an indication of a deteriorating ecosystem, a concept I doubt that young Tim subscribes to.
Unaware of his irony, he vowed to use “verifiable science not political science” to determine what animals to protect. This, despite the fact that, as pointed out by Natural Resources Minister David Orazietti, the assessment and classification of endangered species is conducted by experts on the arms-length Committee on the Status of Species at Risk in Ontario.
But then again, I doubt that the hapless Hudak ever lets facts get in the way of a good ideological rant, and would seem to prefer this as the only sign of real progress:
I readily admit that I find it difficult, if not impossible, to fathom the extreme right-wing mind. To me, it is a mind mired in a world of fantasy, willful ignorance, and intractable denial. Magical thinking seems to be a substitute for cogitation. Name-calling in lieu of discussion. Denunciation instead of deliberation. And I would be quite content to leave such minds alone, content as they are in delusions of grandeur and superiority, except for the fact that they bother and disrupt the business of the adults in society.
The above, I'm afraid, is an all too apt description of the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, young Tim Hudak.
Yesterday, Kathleen Wynne brought down her throne speech in the Ontario legislature. As reported in the Globe, with nods to both the NDP and the Conservatives, the speech trod a fine line between fiscal responsibility and social spending in its effort to garner support from both parties.
Despite the reasonable and conciliatory tone of the speech, young Hudak, as is his wont, immediately rejected any possibility of support. The Star's Martin Regg Cohn notes the following:
Tory Leader Tim Hudak followed Wynne at the microphone to say his party would vote against the speech, instantly marginalizing himself just as he did last year for the Liberal budget (allowing the New Democrats to dictate the agenda).
He went on to reject any possibility of countenancing road tolls or congestion fees to address the problem of gridlock in the GTA until government waste [is] first eliminated. As Cohn tartly observes: Hmmm. Now there’s a Tory inaction plan: foster more political gridlock so that traffic gridlock festers for another generation.
I have no idea whether Kathleen Wynne has either the capacity or the political capital to reverse the significant damage done by her predecessor. I do know, however, that for Hudak to reject out of hand even the possibility of working collaboratively for a time, insisting instead on an imminent election, is the mark of an untutored and immature mind, wholly consistent with the extreme right-wing mentality described at the start of this post.
As noted here the other day, young Tim Hudak, in another move that shows the caliber of his leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, announced that student loans should be tied to student marks. This morning's Star describes his proposal as silly and his most preposterous policy statement yet (although I do suspect there will be some more headshakers coming from his office down the road.)
You can read the full editorial below, although I suspect its position will fork little lightning with Hudak, who tends to think only in very broad strokes:
American president Harry S. Truman once observed that “the C students run the world.” If Ontario Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak gets his way, they won’t even obtain a post-secondary education — at least one funded by government loans.
In his most preposterous policy position yet, Hudak says university and college students should receive loans only if they reach a certain — undefined — level of academic success.
It’s an absurd idea, tucked into an otherwise innocuous 27-page plan detailing Hudak’s vision for higher learning. As Truman (a Democrat) noted, it’s not just academic marks that propel people to success: character, drive and ingenuity are even better predictors of future triumph. But Hudak wants bureaucrats to create an academic cut-off point, blocking students with middling grades from getting student loans. “We feel it prudent to inject the student financial aide system with more market discipline,” his report says.
It’s worth noting that a political leader who preaches the merits of smaller government now wants bureaucrats to decide the academic future of our youth. Did he give any thought to this?
Many middle- or lower middle-class students rely on loans — which they pay back, with interest — to get an education. Curiously, wealthy students who don’t need to borrow will be free to explore academic mediocrity with no government slap-down.
It is true that many graduates struggle to find jobs in these challenging economic times. But the new reality is that most need more than one degree to find a viable career. Blocking education will not create economic growth.
While it’s not a new idea, Hudak’s plan rightly focuses attention on Ontario’s desperate need to train youth in the skilled trades. But not all young people should, or even could, become electricians or plumbers.
It’s already hard enough for young people to get ahead, and the government should not add more restrictions. Before an Ontario election is called, Hudak should drop this silly plan.
Perhaps Hudak needs inspiration from the words of Republican President George W. Bush in a speech to the 2001 graduating class at his alma mater, Yale: “To those of you who received honors, awards and distinctions, I say, well done. And to the C students, I say, you, too, can be President of the United States.” In other words — with a little financial help — you never know what a student might become.
Young Tim Hudak, the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, probably commands much more press coverage than he deserves. He certainly has been the object of more than one of my own blog posts, in part because of the fascinating window he opens into the mind of that segment of the electorate which believes his retrograde polices have merit. Indeed, it is never wise to underestimate people's capacity to buy into disproven bromides as they indulge in that peculiar form of magical thinking that suggests taxes can be cut, jobs created, and society advanced through no personal pain or sacrifice.
Recently, The Star's Bob Hepburn wrote a piece entitled Is Tim Hudak on the far-right road to victory? In it, he made the following observation about the far-right agenda Hudak is embracing:
His simple message: slash taxes, cut public service jobs, crack down on welfare recipients, beat up on labour unions, privatize government agencies, get tough on crime and create thousands of new jobs.
Hudak calls his proposals “bold, transformative ideas to fire up job creation and balance the books.”
Sound familiar? Indeed, Hudak is now fully embracing the controversial 1994 policies of Mike Harris, his old boss.
By doing so, though, he is gambling his entire political future on his belief that the Harris era is now just a faded memory for many Ontario voters and that the time is once again perfect to champion far-right policies.
The lead letter in today's Star suggests that Hudak's hopes for collective amnesia about the Harris era's depradations may be misplaced, as Steve McCahon of Toronto writes:
Bob Hepburn’s column was both well-reasoned, and insightful. However, several other points should be considered when analyzing the Progressive Conservative Party’s far-right shift in Ontario and the next provincial election.
The success of Ford Nation in Toronto, and the “breakthrough” of the federal Conservative party in the Greater Toronto Area, which gave Stephen Harper a majority government, should serve to concern political parties with more moderate, middle to left-leaning perspectives.
The “Red” Tory party led by Premier William Davis no longer exists. Michael Harris helped to redefine the party in the 1990s. The Common Sense Revolution was neither common sensie, nor revolutionary. It featured slash and burn politics. It took a funding of school boards out of the hands of local municipalities through the property tax-mill rate system.
The government saddled municipalities with funding of general welfare, ambulance services and subsidized housing. It introduced education policy that gutted arts funding, library and guidance functions in the local schools, and a system that has led to the closure of hundreds of local schools over the past 15 years.
I mention these specific changes brought about by Harris with regard to the effect upon the poor and middle class as a cautionary note. The Great Blue Wave that swept over Ontario in the 1990s threatens to re-emerge.
Mr. Hepburn’s comparison to the recent American election is appropriate; however, it fails to take into consideration how Ontarians have tended to vote in response to more recent provincial electoral campaigns.
Premier David Peterson’s snap election resulted in “political suicide.” The electorate punished the perceived arrogance of the Liberal party. During Premier Dalton McGuinty’s second election campaign, which led to a majority government, it was the issue of extending public funding to faith-based schools that destroyed John Tory’s campaign.
The next provincial election is likely to be fought on the basis of a single lightning-rod issue rather than on a broad policy platform. Ontarians are not likely to forget the vilification of “beer drinking single moms on welfare,” and huge slashes to the public service: primarily in the areas of the amalgamation of Toronto and health care leading to the reduction of 6,000 nurses and 11,000 hospital beds.
Premier Mike Harris came to power with the promise of fiscal responsibility and left as an ideologue who was out of touch with Ontarians. Similarly, is Tim Hudak the leader of the Tea Party of Ontario, the promoter of the Common Sense Revolution Part Deux, or Stephen Harper’s lapdog?
One can only speculate as to the “issue” that will dominate the next provincial election. Mr. Hudak has been touting his law and order agenda, while, he is promoting liberalization of the distribution of alcohol in Ontario. Teen smoking, drinking and driving, and gas station attendant violence are all serious criminal and societal matters.
Privatizing the LCBO and introducing the distribution of wine, beer, and/or alcohol at local convenience stores with the potential of “liquor store” holdups and further under-age drinking may very well be one issue that is worthy of focus.
Ontario does not require a hard-right political shift to create jobs, manage its fiscal house, reduce crime, and create better government. Ontarians should reject Tea Party politics, and its inherent divisiveness, despite the pretty packaging and bow in which Tim Hudak wraps it.
One can only hope that Steve McCahon's timely reminder finds purchase amongst the Ontario electorate.
That, of course, has about as much likelihood of achievement as the other three mentioned above. Too many examples abound of the arrogant assumptions politicians make about people as they abandon the interests of the collective to pursue policies that cater to only a certain segment of society. And what especially rankles me is the fact that they so shamelessly tell the most outrageous lies that betray their contempt for the majority of us.
Take, for example, Pierre Poilievre, that earnest old young man of 33 who is now in his fourth term as an MP and has found much favour with the Harper regime. As reported by the Star's Tim Harper, Poilievre, a staunch believer in the kind of 'right-to-work' legislation recently passed in Michigan, loudly, proudly, hypocritically and disingenuously proclaims it as
...“workers freedom,’’ legislation that would give federal workers the option of paying union dues and joining their colleagues in a work stoppage.
“I am the first federal politician to make a dedicated push toward this goal,’’ he says. “I believe in free choice for workers and I am going to do my part to see that happens at the federal level and I would encourage provincial governments to do likewise.
Ah yes, the famous Harper regime concern for workers' rights.
But perhaps the Christmas season will bring an unexpected gift. Despite the fact that the same prevarications are proclaimed regularly by that Ontario emblem of ineptitude, the Progressive Conservative Party's Tim Hudak, there is some evidence of nascent critical thinking on the part of the electorate. An article in today's Star by Robert Benzie and Richard Brennan suggest that young Tim's embrace of all things right-wing is beginning to hurt him in the polls. Now only two percentage points ahead of the NDP, his party, which seems perilously similar to tea-party ideology, is finding some resistance amongst voters, according to a recent Forum poll:
Forum president Lorne Bozinoff said the most recent survey suggests that some of Hudak’s right-wing proposals are not resonating beyond his diehard supporters.
For example, only about a third — 34 per cent — of respondents believe compulsory union dues should be outlawed while 45 per cent disagreed with that plan and 21 per cent were unsure.
Only 8 per cent of respondents agreed that Community Care Access Centres should be shut down with 61 per cent opposed and 31 per cent uncertain.
Bozinoff said a lot of the Tory planks are “just not authentic enough for people in urban areas,” which is bad news for a party with a caucus made up of mostly rural MPPs.
So, we can only hope that as 2013 arrives, more and more people will don their critical-thinking caps and subject all political rhetoric to the kind of thoughtful analysis that a healthy democracy both demands and deserves.
Such is my feeling about the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party's exultancy over so-called right-to-work legislation now in effect in 24 U.S states, Michigan being the most recent jurisdiction to join the fold.
As reported in today's Star,
Tories are eager to follow in the footsteps of Michigan’s anti-union legislation ... and turn Ontario into a right-to-work jurisdiction where workers can opt out of joining unions and paying dues.
The move is near the top of the agenda for the Progressive Conservatives led by Tim Hudak should they be elected come the next general election.
Liberally quoting Christine Elliott, a Tory MPP and the wife of Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, Richard Brennan tells us that Ms Elliott is confident that such legislation will be the answer to our economic woes since new businesses [will] pick Ontario because they will have the “flexibility” they need to get the job done without tangling with a unionized workforce.
'Flexiility' is always one of those words that sets my spider-sense atingle, since it is usually a euphemism for lower wages and working conditions. She then goes on to talk about the need for a 'nimble' workforce (spider-sense now on full alert!) so that businesses when they need to adapt to changing conditions in the workplace they have the flexibility to be able to do that.
With an apparently straight face, Ms Elliott avers that taking away the power of unions will result in higher wages “because we will have more businesses locating here. They will do well, they will be able to hire more people and pay higher wages.”
Only those who drink a certain brand of Kool Aid would accept such fatuous assertions without some research. Happily, the American site Media Matters has done the heavy-lifting on the subject, the full report of which I hope you will take some time to read. Its two most salient conclusions, supported by data, not empty rhetoric, are that right-to-work laws lead to lower wages and benefits for workers and that right-to-work" laws have little impact on employment.
As well, for those interested in the quite sordid provenance of the right-to-work movement, The Galloping Beaver has a post and a link that is most enlightening.
But I suppose Ms Elliott and her party of benighted souls are anticipating that people will simply react with Pavlovian salivation rather than reasoned discourse over her twisted version of a worker's 'paradise.'
I guess the short answer is to ignore the prating lad. Failing such a massive challenge to self-discipline and restraint, I suppose the other best answer is to hold his pronouncements up to public scrutiny, a goal I have modestly tried to achieve in this blog.
Such scrutiny invariably gives rise to ridicule; the risible nature of most of Tim's recycled pronouncements, many of which are mere carry-overs from the inaptly named Common Sense Revolution of his failed mentor, Mike Harris, invite such a response.
As usual, Toronto Star readers are happy to share their own observations, their letters-to-the-editor mirroring, I suspect, widely-held assessments of the young leader of Ontario's Progressive Conservative Party. To whet your appetite to read the full array of their reflections, here are a few of them:
There are no demonstrations at Queen’s Park demanding that the LCBO be privatized. The demands are coming from businesses that want to make profits.
Hudak says that “competition” is needed and it’s time to end the monopoly. Why would we take a monopoly that serves the public interest and change it to one that serves the private few?
Remember when the Tories introduced “competition” into the electricity sector? Rates have now tripled. Has “competition” lowered gasoline rates, car insurance rates or credit card interest rates?
To use Tory terms, the LCBO benefits from “economies of scale” that have resulted in “increased efficiencies.” The LCBO is extremely well run and well organized. Its profits serve all the people in Ontario.
Hudak is just a schill who wants to transfer that public wealth to the private few.
Paul Kahnert, Markham
There is an error in the following letter, which infers that The Beer Store is a government operation. It is, in fact, a private consortium:
So it’s official. Politicians are out of ideas. Is the tired (and tried) chestnut of privatizing the LCBO and Beer Store really the best Tim Hudak has to offer us? I guess “a chicken in every pot” didn’t test well.
Never mind the LCBO and Beer Store provide quality employment for 10,000 Ontarians and are reliable cash cows for the government, helping fund education, healthcare and social programs. Got to keep the stumping simple and treat the electorate as simple-minded.
David Kinahan, Toronto
With the government looking for ways to decrease its (our) huge debt, only a fool would suggest privatizing the LCBO cash-cow that brings in a billion a year.
The beer stores are in a different category, as they are owned by foreign breweries. They should be privatized as soon as possible and corner stores should be allowed to sell beer.
As for Tim Hudak, first he says: “let’s let the private sector into the alcohol business, let’s have some more competition.” Then he says there would be no reduction in the price of alcoholic beverages.
No wonder Hudak lost the election. He’s a dumkopf.
William Bedford, Toronto
Let me transpose what Mr. Hudak is really saying here. He can’t create any meaningful jobs so what he’s proposing is a liquor store on every corner — in the U.S. there’d also be a gun store.
So he wants you to know that when you really need to lash out at your family, because you just can’t find work, there will be a source of mind-numbing alcohol close by for your comfort. Because we all know alcohol is just like comfort food in a crisis.
Bon appetite.
Richard Kadziewicz, Scarborough
Tim Hudak, the boy who would be premier, has issued a policy clarification:
Hudak said the thrust of his proposal to put alcoholic beverages in corner stores, supermarkets or private specialty stores is to make it easier for Ontario consumers to buy a six-pack of beer or a bottle of wine.
Should the master recycler of tired ideas ever attain his ambition of leading the province, I suspect that the ready availability of alcohol, and the temporary solace it provides, will be much appreciated by Ontarians.
I have a busy morning ahead, so just a brief post for now. That serial recycler of tired policy, young Tim Hudak, continues to maintain his naive faith in the virtues of the private sector as a panacea for all that ails us, yesterday calling for the end of the LCBO's monopoly on alcohol sales.
Trumpeting the virtues of privatization, along with the possible sale in whole or in part of the monopoly that injects about $1.6 billion per annum into provincial coffers, the never-ready-for-prime-time-politics leader of the Progressive Conservatives might be advised to supplement his populist rhetoric with a little research. As published in today's Star, Canadian jurisdictions that have privatized sales have seen an increase in prices and a reduction in selection.
Perhaps none of that, however, will matter to those who support the errant but evangelical vision of young Tim.
What does it say about young Tim Hudak that this constitutes a major policy announcement?
Just wondering
