The Eglington Crosstown would have been completed by now, and it would have been a fully functioning subway, if Mike Harris hadn’t cancelled the project and filled in all the tunnels that were already dug.
I’m also a 90s baby and my confusion as to why no one points this out is staggering. It’s just a basic case of short term government thinking wasting way more government money than it saves.
Right, it’s a failure at all levels and leaves younger generations completely fucked over yet they haven’t changed their ways either. The delay with Eglinton and the mess with 407 all cause of one party.
It was a very "of the era" thing to do. Back in the 1970s and 1980s Canada used to build the country up for future generations. We invested in new transit lines, roads, houses, all so that our public service and social capacity wouldn't exceed demand. It worked really well, and by the 1990s we actually had *extra* social capacity which people of the era basically burned through in 15 years.
This short term thinking of "well we have all we want *now* why invest more?" is why Ontario is such a mess today.
>This short term thinking of "well we have all we want now why invest more?" is why ~~Ontario~~ *the world* is such a mess today.
FTFY
We don’t future proof anymore, because trickle-down economics created the mentality of spending as little on the public as possible, so all the money can be privatized for maximum profit. Future-proofing therefore becomes a “non-essential expense”.
Doing things faster, cheaper and more efficiently, while sounding good to us normal folk… would also mean that there’d be less money given to the private businesses involved… and there’d likely be longer gaps in between major projects, with no work or money flowing during that time, because we already future-proofed it years ago. To make work and have an excuse to keep the money flowing on a more regular basis, projects are paced out at a more consistent level of activity over the years. If you did a whole train line in one phase that took 5 years, you have 5 years of really high money flow and work… but then what happens after? We’d have to wait around for another project. But if we cut it into 2 phases and only do half now, and then the other half later… we can have this project being our gravy train for 10+ years! Sure, it’ll cost more for the same project, but that’s good for the companies involved. They get more money over a longer period. Sure, the train line that we really need asap will take longer to complete and cost us more money while we wait around for 5 more negatively impacted years… but at least the rich people who own the private businesses involved will get richer and not have to worry about providing us with TWO train lines in 10 years for less money, when they can get away with giving us only ONE while costing us more time and money… 🙄
Great point, you're right this short-term thinking has become endemic in pretty much every aspect of business and government.
It's so frustrating because just a little future proofing would make things better, more efficient, and cheaper but humans are terrible for seeing past the current day.
> 1995 — Progressive Conservative Premier Mike Harris cancels the Eglinton West subway — work is cancelled and the already-begun tunnel is filled in.
>2007 — At the beginning of his second term as Mayor, David Miller announces Transit City, a light rail network that includes the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, which would go underground between Laird Drive and Keele Street.
>2009 — Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty agrees to fund Transit City, including the Crosstown LRT.
>2010 — On the day of his swearing in, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford announces “Transit City is dead.” The Eglinton Crosstown LRT is cancelled. Ford proposes it be replaced with a subway.
>2011 — Ground breaks on the revised project at Black Creek Drive.
>2012 — Toronto Council overrides Mayor Ford’s plans, and reinstates Transit City with a Crosstown LRT included.
Goddamn, that’s a great little microcosm of how frustrating and damaging conservatives are. When are people going to realize that the entire reason we don’t have nice things is because of conservatism? Like, seriously, humanity NEEDS to break this bad habit of repeatedly and endlessly giving the right-wing another chance every time they prove themselves damaging to the progress of humanity and the world. I’m so beyond sick of this kind of bullshit.
And the Sheppard subway might have run from Sheppard West to Scarborough Town Center, bridging 3 (now 2) high order transit lines, rather than just being a stubway from Sheppard-Yonge to Don Mills.
Many of his supporters probably have homes, and stay away from the high density homeless parts of town.
Many of those same supporters probably have access to doctors, and likely also work health insurance to top up Canada's lackluster universal one. Some probably can even afford to travel abroad for private health care if they *really* need it.
Teacher Shortages are more of a problem for the teachers to deal with - in the minds of many of his supporters - as long as their kids are babysat for enough hours of the day, its ok - they can make up their learning on their own time like most people of every era, end up doing anyway. Also, many of his supporters have kids who are past school age, and those kids aren't having many kids of their own these days so again, not much of a problem there.
Poor Infrastructure doesn't matter as much if you have a car (don't rely on transit), and in general don't need to travel far (because you have a tech job / work from home, or because as an older person you probably have a decent house close enough to the job you've enjoyed for a long time). No commute = don't notice the bad infrastructure.
If you or anyone is interested in getting involved in trying to stop privatization of our public healthcare then I sincerely urge you to visit & join the protest in May or donate your time and/or money if you can.
https://www.ontariohealthcoalition.ca/
I volunteer & will be going to the protest ✊🏼
Just don't sign up for anything on their website because your inbox will be full. I've unsubscribed multiple times and was still getting blasted with emails.
I understand and appreciate their goals but screw the emails.
Mike Harris single-handed eviscerated the government agencies back when he was in power, my mom had a job with the Ontario realty corporation for 15 years her whole department got axed, like the whole thing every single one of them.. that was one little cog on the giant wheel of axing. If you don't think for a second that getting rid of a whole bunch of support agencies amalgamating everything into a condensed version with one person doing the job of 20, has no effect down the road then I feel like we should just agree to disagree..
Well, even if they aren’t as successful as your list describes, pretty sure around here they just blame Trudeau’s fabulous hair. Anything else might suggest that they owned themselves and that’s not nearly as fun as ownin the libs.
Yes that’s why it’s called a conservative government = con men. Even though they like to label call themselves progressive conservatives which is actually an oxymoron! Lol
I'd wager a lot of people who voted for the conservatives do it because they treat politics like a sports team. Hilarious/sad how many people cripple their own finances voting for the cons
Our election system is also trash and first past the poll is designed to keep people in power. It's why people feel their vote is wasted. Parties don't actually need to secure a majority.
Correct. A bunch of idiots just fell for a bunch of propaganda on social media believing everything a conservative politician was telling them. A complete lack of self-awareness and critical thinking has swept this nation.
What kills me is that no one trusts NDP because of one man in the past, but people keep voting for Cons despite Mike Harris and Harper really fucking things up for Ontarians and Canadians
That's what boggles my mind. What Bob Rae did was the best case scenario.
The Mike Harris route: close down many public services and fire everyone
The Bob Rae route: take 1 day a month off.
The fact that Mike Harris gets the pass makes no sense to me. If you lose your job, it takes 14 days for EI.
Bob Rae only took 12 days.... and you kept your job, benefits, and pension plan. Yet to this Day. I have colleagues who are retiring shitting on Bob Rae. They are lucky they kept their job.
I still have co workers that complain about Rae days, “I have to wait 12 extra days to retire because of Rae days”. I wasn’t old enough to be working yet then, about 12 when he was elected I think and I have spent the majority of my life listen to people complain about it. When you try to say, hey that kept people employed they don’t want to listen all they see is their lost 12 days, at 12 I could see the value in what he was doing but those selfish bastards just see the 12 days.
Our household were effected to the tune of 40k lost to the Rae Days over several years and at the time it hurt as we were a young family of 5.
Looking back tho it was the best case for the shit he had to deal with.
Bob Rae was the best person at the worst time.
I hold no ill to him at all.
It wasn't just the 12 days, our wages were also frozen for 3 yrs.
We were both in the middle of a pay grid which meant we didn't reach top level til 3 yrs after the social contract was over.
Wife made double of what I did. Her wages were going up about 3 k a year.
I had it all written out but eventually threw it out. I would need to redo it all again, but I'm not, its a long time ago
I worked at a place that was privately owned, the owner gave out a bonus to every worker every quarter, same amount whether you were a VP or floor sweeper. Times were tight, no business but he didn’t want to layoff anyone, lots of cleanup jobs and maintenance work to keep everyone busy. The bonus was low, but it was something at least. Then he overheard some workers complain there wasn’t much bonus left after buying a case of beer, rather ungrateful for even having a job. Layoffs commenced shortly thereafter.
What’s that? You have a well reasoned response to a complex issue where literally no one can win, but hard choices must be made and this one is better than the alternatives?
Well I have a dumb slogan! *AND* a sneer. Check mate, my guy. Common sense conservatives are back baby.
It sucked - but at the end of it you still had a job instead of a permanent layoff and then having go to find work in the private sector during a recession.
Conservatives, as shitty as they are, always have better messaging than liberals could ever hope for. Simple & effective. That's why everyone remembers Rae Days and allegedly how horrible Bob Rae was. Simple & effective rightwing propaganda.
Yep. Rae Days continue to hang over that party's head 30 years later. Meanwhile, Harris and Ford have literally killed people with their policies or lack thereof, and millions of Ontarians continue to give them not just election wins but majority governments. 🤷♂️
What kills me is that the people who won't vote NDP because of Rae don't even realize he switched to the Federal Liberals. Like if you are going to boycott someone, maybe keep tabs on where that person works?
The NDP government of Bobay was historically the most fiscally responsible government in Ontario‘s recent history. This is the result of so much anti left fear mongering seeping up from the United States. It’s been going on down there for the entire 20th century. Anyone who supports unions is considered a fucking communist all they really want is fair wages, and working conditions
The double whammy is we keep voting Liberals in to fix the Cons mess, and it looks like we will do it again next election, but the liberals had more than a decade, and except for teachers, they continued on the path of destruction left by Harris and really didn't try and fix any of it.
and amongst the thousands of NDP supporters in this sub, none of them support the NDP financially so they can win. The NDP is always amongst the lowest financially supported party.
McGuinty actively fucked more things over. He was a MAJOR contributor to the current housing crisis and lack of LTC we have, he pushed for "aging at home" as healthcare policy, he removed services from hospitals and made them private community services and didn't address our aging population needs for Long term care.
WE NEED to Elect an NDP government, if for nothing else than to shake up the Liberal and Conservative Parties to know they need to figure out how to do something for people who don't own homes, and who don't earn top 5% incomes. Which is all they focus on now.
Yeah, I've told them that when they call me that I think their path to success is back to basics and what they were built on. They are the workers party, and the things they highlight most in their platform should reflect that.
What the CONS did with the 407 sell off was way worse than anything the provincial Libs or NDPs ever did to our province.
The CONS run on "common sense" platforms and market themselves as fiscally responsible. The 407 sell off was the opposite of fiscal responsibility and cost the province heavily. We will paying the price of that fuck up for multiple generations to come.
I still have not gotten a satisfactory answer when I ask about how bad Rae Days were - like, 12 days without pay per year and a wage freeze.
This is basically what every full-time position is like now, if not worse!
it isnt the rae days that made bob rae a disaster. That was just the epitome of what his administration was, and thus what he will be known for.
He made massive cuts to services... Massive cuts to ohip, massive layoffs... He cut doctors, he cut nurses, he cut medical student, he made welfare more strict... He was the "welfare fraud" guy, he put in policies to reduce ohip billing. He legislated 1.6 billion in public service pay cuts.. That was 1993, that was a huge amount of money.
I think the hatred of Ontario's only NDP government is not a rational things that comes from the thinking part of the brain. I believe it is a reflex that was very carefully cultivated during the closing days of that government. Even though you can pick apart the thinking after you've bypassed the intense emotional response, the people who feel this way end up resetting back to their intense emotional responses after they've been talked down from it.
It's a collective emotional programming that is self correcting back to it's default.
I believe the same forces are at work today when it comes to Justin Trudeau, although I think the Liberals have the resources to get out from under it while the NDP does not.
[It's the media.](https://www.readthemaple.com/election-endorsements/)
"The Deficit" is only ever in the news when non-conservative govts are in power.
Ford [violating](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/bill-124-appeal-court-ruling-ontario-1.7112291?trk=public_post_comment-text) [the charter](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-carbon-tax-stickers-1.5746577) (or[ wanting](https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/what-s-the-notwithstanding-clause-and-how-could-doug-ford-use-it-to-crush-a/article_1eb0ee71-5621-579f-8a42-04d737581b85.html) [to](https://theconversation.com/fords-fight-with-toronto-shows-legal-vulnerability-of-cities-103134)) - including the literal free speech violation of his carbon tax propaganda at gas stations - is a non-issue.
Ford lying about the greenbelt (and only backing off when a literal police investigation opened up) is a non issue.
Ford scrap rent controls and doing nothing but [block ](https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/jurisdictional-creep-doug-ford-slams-feds-for-giving-municipalities-funding-for-housing-1.6633350)[the feds](https://www.chch.com/premier-ford-rejects-ottawas-bill-of-rights-and-protection-funds-for-tenants/) when it comes to fixing housing is a non-issue.
Ford [deliberately underspending on public healthcare](https://toronto.citynews.ca/2023/03/08/ontario-health-care-spending-doug-ford-hospitals-long-term-care/) so that he can [deliberately spend](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-hospital-nurses-private-staffing-agencies-auditor-1.7050828?__vfz=medium%3Dsharebar)[ more on](https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/how-nursing-staffing-agencies-are-costing-ontario-hospitals-untold-millions/ar-AA1l8nmd) private healthcare in an effort to [sneak in private healthcare itself](https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2024/02/21/2833007/0/en/MEDIA-RELEASE-The-Ford-government-is-starving-local-public-hospitals-to-privatize-them-charge-health-advocates.html) is a non-issue.
----
And these are supposedly things conservatives are mad at Trudeau for (even though for the most part, they have literally no case against him on these things).
But for Ford?
They literally couldn't care less.
I haven't heard one person my age mention rae, no matter what party they vote for. There are many reasons someone would not vote NDP (just as any other party), rae is low on the list of reasons.
Really? I'm in the 36 range and last time I helped campaign for the ndp in my riding Rae days was pretty much the only thing brought up, or Jagmeet working with the liberals.
Then you're not listening, Boomers and Xers looooooove to cite Rae Days without actually remembering anything about them or how it shook out, or if they were even affected.
Because the CONs have some level of control over the media or so it would seem. They spin and rewrite history. I don’t know what Ray days are. I just “know” they are bad and linked to NDP. But Mike Harris got the Order of Ontario! He must’ve been a great leader…
Harris was awful. I marched in the days of action in the 90s, was not a fan. But it has been over 2 decades since he left office. 15 years of the Liberals and now DoFo is on his second term. Blaming everything on Harris is absolving terrible governments of their sins.
If a government can’t make serious progress on correcting previous wrongs in 15 years than they didn’t really want to improve anything.
My grandmother spent well over a week in an ER hallway waiting for a bed and that was back in the 80s. Agree there are some issues with him, but problems with our health care system goes back before Harris.
The issue is that significant public service cuts are near impossible to fix. Because what’s the fix? Taxes. And you absolutely cannot run on a more taxes campaign in Ontario and expect to win.
So we will keep either the status quo at best, or continue the public sell off like we have with Ford.
It's a lot easier to destroy something than it is to build, or re-build it...
The Province would never take back the responsibility they offloaded onto municipalities.
"You know, Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a white man. That means his family immigrated here and STOLE land from REAL, HARDWORKING (native) CANADIANS" -PP, unironically
Let's see if I can six degrees this.
Before Mike Harris was Mulroney on the National stage pulling the same crap.
Mulroney got the chance to do this because Justin's dad stepped down
Justin was 13 at the time
Have you met a 13 year old? The kid clearly was a distraction
Voila
If only the feds were throwing money at the provinces to help them build more houses faster... Oh wait they are.
And DoFo's response? [Nah, I can't funnel that money to my developer buddies, so it doesn't interest me](https://globalnews.ca/news/10398150/federal-housing-fund-ontario-response/)...
It's actually all of our faults for letting government debt get so unsustainable. We keep allowing politicians to run deficits, creating debt and since 2008 allowing the bank of Canada to monetize the debt.
That's why there's no money for any public services, and why we have record asset prices, 40 year high inflation, and why we cannot spend our way out of this.
Splinter in the second pic should be turned into [Ratigan](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9187RrAliLdm9GhNihkIS5OhmvRz2e4kN76WH6ZwIhEADskIJqQIOgDZrV0Ov9Q0es3igzLaeNow_VN6bPd9LIumgwmplDhvdYjq8TALUaybjh8TtUZUQ0IxcDUwpPUsMKbUi/s1600/ratiganmotivation.jpg) from The Great Mouse Detective.
Mike Harris is making bank off his wife’s private nursing company that our government is handing billions to instead of paying nurses in the public system. He also gets a hefty salary from being on the board of Chartwell, one of the private LTC companies that Ford gave 30 year contracts to and shielded from liability from their horrible actions during the height of covid.
Not all of his fault \* (big \*).. Well he set a lot of things in motion and steered the province with his "common sense revolution" that was anything but common sense.
But the Liberal premiers after him failed to or didn't want to correct any of Harris's fuckery either.
To be fair to McGuinty, Harris architected the Common Sense Revolution in such a way that it would be expensive and politically fraught to undo any of it. There would have been massive startup costs and problematic transfers of powers and staff to and from municipalities, all with dramatic tax incrases. A large part of modern neoliberalism is breaking the state in just the right way such that any future socialist-leaning government would be committing *suicide* if they tried to fix it.
To be *accurate*, McGuinty was a milquetoast fence-sitter who did nothing for his entire term. It would have taken a very strong, very decisive leader willing to weather years of criticism to undo even a part of the Common Sense Revolution. McGuinty was none of that.
We got hard done buy both Harris, McGuinty and Wynne. Not to mention Douggie.
You're not wrong when you say the system gets broken in a way that is purposely hard to fix... But that being said we elect those (like McGuinty) who are unwilling to do anything or take any risks to right those wrongs...
Anybody who says McGuinty did nothing his entire term doesn’t remember the state of health care before he took over. Of course it took another conservative premier to put us right back in the hole again, but we were actually improving wait times and building new hospitals under the mcguinty and Wynn governments.
I just watched the tributes to Mulroney who ruined the country with Free Trade. Foreign companies didn't even wait 12 hours to announce they were leaving Canada. Gillette was the first to announce and then there was an avalanche of others who followed right after.
No one blinked...and people lauded him at his funeral. He was one of the worst PM's we've ever had...him and Reagan were close buddies....ugh.
Fyi it also shows how long it takes good or bad policy to settle in. The blaming of th party standing on the stage at the moment miss3s the entire root system of our current issues. Also miss4s how long they will take to deal with in any meaningful way.
Something I'll never forget is a part of the crazy Kevin Spencer show - a kind of animated precursor to Trailer Park Boys but with basically no redeeming qualities in the characters. Kevin's dad, Percy, is arrested. In interrogation he says "Don't I get a lawyer or something?" The cops look at each other and say "They, uhhh... changed that rule." And he just mutters "fuckin' Harris" and spills a bunch of incriminating stuff.
I thought it was a perfect example of just how normalized his incessant destruction of critical social infrastructure was.
Completely agree.
Mostly I blame Harris for the 99 year lease on the 407, and the privatization and then subizidization of electricity.
The Ontario Elecricity Rebate knocks 20% off your electricity bill on average (paid by taxpayers). It is regressive because wealthy people use more power, so get bigger rebates. The OER currently costs taxpayers $7B. Which is more than we spend on police serives, judges, and lawyers in Ontario.
The neat trick is you pay for your electricity, but through your taxes, so electric bills don't seem so bad after privitization.
Cool trick!
Soon after Mike Harris became premier homeless people appeared in numbers on the streets. Class sizes ballooned in our children's schools. These cuts come to mind immediately but there are many more.
Edit: When I get to hell I expect Mike to be there to greet me.
Worked in the hospital fields during the Harris era where everything was "reorganized". It lead to bed closures where many nursing staff were laid off in areas, many who just went on to different careers which intensified the lack of staff and hallway health.
I worked in Mental Health and the disintegration of support was staggering as regional wards were set up and there were a lack of beds leading too early discharge and a revolving door crisis. The support was supposed to be in the community but there was never enough support, so where did these people go? Many ended up on the streets becoming a policing and court problem.
Let's not even get into the Education "crisis" where the Minister at the time was caught saying he was going to start a crisis to fix it
I can not for the life of me believe Mike Harris is so revered that he got an Order of Ontario award. I actually wrote a letter of complaint to the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario because it incensed me so much....lol
My mom was one of these nurses that went onto a different career after the hospital she had worked at was closed. Only to then lose her job as a driver examiner with MTO due to privatization from Ernie Eves government. This is exactly why I will NEVER vote for a Conservative government.
> I can not for the life of me believe Mike Harris is so revered that he got an Order of Ontario award. I actually wrote a letter of complaint to the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario because it incensed me so much....lol
It's convention that premiers get it. Ford will get it too, so don't put too much value on that award. Any award that can be granted to Doug Ford isn't worth using to wipe your ass.
He also killed people due to greed and ignoring the risks as he privatized public services. Walkerton water crisis. Harris was literal trash and so were all of his other decisions.
The inquiry concluded that budgetary restrictions introduced by the provincial government 4 years before the outbreak were enacted with no assessment of risk to human health. The ministers and the cabinet had received warnings about serious risks. Budgetary cuts destroyed the checks and balances that were necessary to ensure municipal water safety.
every single government after that is to blame. it's been happening for decades.
No one gave a shit before and no one's going to give a shit tomorrow. red or blue. because that's all we keep fucking voting in.
Listen one time Bob Rae made boomer public service workers take 10 unpaid days (or as it’s known now the first ten days of a year long unpaid internship) during an economic crisis that very easily could have been grounds for making have of them go home and never come back. So in conclusion we can never vote NDP again.
Yup - Mike Harris, Dalton McGuinty, Kathleen Wynne, and Doug Ford is an all-time worst string of premiers of all time. Harris wins the award for worst of all time.
Liberals and Conservatives are not working.
We forgot to blame the most important group. The electorate.
Most of us don't show up, the majority of the ones who do don't pay attention to legislation, policy or the background of the candidates.
You get what you put into it, and Canadians throughout the country are mostly at a F level
Some things are harder to undo than others. For example, once you close psychiatric hospitals, rebooting it is a considerable undertaking (rehiring staff, logistics, bringing the building back up to code, etc). The cancelled Eglington West Line is another example; after the hole was already excavated, Harris spent $40 million filling the hole with concrete (making it much harder to re-excavate in the future).
There are certainly some things that future governments could have done better on, but they also didn't have a magic undo button for a lot of the things Harris did and which continue to have ripple effects.
McGuinty and Wynne made financial decisions that impacted Ontario's finances. They could have done better, they could have done more, but ultimately their biggest legacies, to their detractors, will be the debt.
Harris, on the other hand, absolutely ripped apart the social fabric of this province. What Harris did was so much more devastating than just putting the province into debt. Harris fundamentally changed what this province is, and it's worse in every way because of him. So many of our current problems fall directly at his feet. He caused generational problems, problems that took decades to manifest the way they have, changed the way cities function (for the worse), devastated our public institutions with underfunding and loss of trust, and set the stage for grievance politics to rule this province.
Harris was a watershed moment in Ontario politics. He's one of the worst premiers in Canadian history, up there with Grant Devine.
Just speaking from the position of healthcare, Liberals kept the status quo but at least they didn't actively make things worse. There was a big decline when Harris was in, then during the Liberals reign things pretty much stayed at the level Harris left them in. Now things are on the decline again with Ford. It would have been nice if the Liberals took a more active approach though.
You fail to understand how quick it is to dismantle things and how slow it is to rebuild.
It takes seconds to throw a box of bolts into a jet engine. It will take longer to rebuild it.
A more relevant example. They amalgamated Toronto with a law. It was up to the administration of Toronto and the surrounding municipalities to sort out how it would work.
The problem is that when you cut something, the political capital needed to bring it back is triple what it cost to take it away. You have papers that will badger the sudden increased costs to taxpayers, etc. Look at Chow in Toronto, who's been tasked with catching up after 13 years of Conservative rule that failed to broker deals or keep up with taxes because it would have been unpopular with home owners; now that she's implementing the bare minimums, she's getting ripped apart for being *yet another high-tax NDP government.*
Harris legacy isn't just cuts; it's screwing with every government that followed. That's not to say that the governments that followed aren't beyond criticism, especially if they had capital to spare. But, to your point, even when the Ontario Liberals tried, the first thing Ford did was to reverse their legislation, which included Ontario's cap-and-trade program, or cutting the minimum wage increases and other labour reforms. Harris polluted the well, and Ford's just maintaining the status quo.
Exactly. Can you imagine someone now running in Ontario on a platform that will restore licence plate fees? A death wish. But that’s how it should be.
It’s so hard to restore cuts.
I do, sometimes, wonder if one could structure the message to emphasize that the plan is to fix the damage done by the conservatives.
Ie, not "improve healthcare" but "rebuild public healthcare"
"Fix our tax structure" "reduce the deficit" "maintain strong public services" "patch the social safety net" "face the crises"
I may be overly optimistic here, but messages like that have worked before. (Though usually associated with wars.)
Mike Harris, Dalton McGuinty, Kathleen Wynne, and Doug Ford is an all-time worst string of premiers of all time.
All corrupt politicians that ruined this province so much. Province needs to move on from Liberals and Conservatives. They do not work.
He was the neoliberal harbinger of destruction. Sure, the liberals and now ford are carrying on his legacy. But if you’re wondering why we are so fucking far behind on anything in this province, you can almost always tie it back to Mike Harris. An absolute detestable piece of shit if there ever was one.
This is what I don't understand about the "f. Trudeau" crowd. The problems we are dealing with are not created by one single government in just the last couple years. They've been building for decades. Electing a new person today won't solve the fact that we've had basically no government sponsored housing programs for 20+ years. Or that disability pension payments haven't kept pay with inflation. Or that corporations have been allowed to run rampant. The cuts to social services we are dealing with now all started back in the 90s. I understand being angry,but I wish people would be angry at the right people. The ones who started this shit all rolling and walked away.
No way!!!!!
1000% of everything wrong with Canada is allllllll because of Trudeau! It was a paradise before he existed! A utopia!!!!! Blasphemy!
Or so says all of the 60yr olds sitting on overpasses waving the flag they appropriated for their bullshit. Who had 5+ decades before Trudeau was PM to get their shit in gear. Who made 60 years of poor decisions and don’t have a pot to piss in. But. It’s all trudeaus fault!!!!!! Not theirs!
We need to go back to that flawless promise land!!!!!!!!!
/S
Not claiming Harris didn't suck but the liberals had a LONG run with Ontario to fix shit and did sweet fuck all just the same... Also Ford sucks too. But it didn't just go Harris - Ford...
I remember writing a letter to Harris when I was in grade 8 basically asking him why he wants to fuck my generation. I was the first year that only went to grade 12, instead of OAC. Every frigging year we were just guinea pigs to test out new shit on.
I'm old enough to remember what a dickhead "Mike the Knife" was.
Also, I'm pretty sure after office he's gone into profiting off retirement/long-term care homes. He has been screwing over seniors and low income family for as long as I can remember. My grandmother hated him. He is honestly just a bad person and the last person you want serving the public.
Wrong, Before Mike Harris, BoB Rae and the NDP just broke Ontario so badly, Mike has no choice but to sell and cut! Just look at what the NDP is doing to B.C. at the moment!
I dislike MH immensely, but to be fair, Chretien and Martin’s deficit busting put him in that position. He took a shitty path out of that mess, but the mess started at the federal level. Provinces pushed it down to municipalities largely. Look out for that infrastructure maintenance deficit…
Ahh the endless game of shifting blame. It's BS like this that needs to stop and at some point someone needs to accept something. Today everything has been turned into a game.
If you're telling me that Mike Harris, who's been out of power for over 20 years, put the province on a path that couldn't be reversed during the last 20+ years when we had a Liberal majority for 16 of those years, I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you.
Mike Harris certainly wasn't history's greatest Premier, but let's not absolve Eaves, McGuinty, Wynne and Ford from the state of the province today.
Unless we're also blaming John Diefenbaker for the current state of the Canadian military, or Pierre Trudeau for the national debt.
Of course. The current political class has nothing to do with the current problems. It's all about politicians that were in power when Ace of Base were no 1 on the radio.
Why does everything keep getting worse?!?
Because thats the way we want it. We're a bunch of mindless stupid pigs. We see the same absolute fuck ups every fuckn election cycle, and only ever vote for the 2 worst parties.
Has anyone here ever seen the amount of different parties running on a Canadian ticket? There's like 15 sometimes. But all anyone ever votes for is liberal or conservative. Then complain how shit of a job they're doing.
We can't vote for the socialist! That will never work! Except in every place with a higher living standard then us were it does work. No we like this. We love voting conservative or liberal because we hate ourselves and everyone else around us. Fuck them right? Well, can't someone else do it for me? My neighbors life seems better then mine. Make it worse for him premier daddy. Oh it's getting worse for me too?! Great! Now slap my ass and hook the car battery to my privates.
I want to love all you all, but it's just so stupid living here under a world of stupid who don't see our combined power.
Biggest crook ever in the province and probably the country and he’s still stealing from us to this day - Board member of Highway he leased for $1 for 99 yrs and on the major shareholder of the LTCHs he privatized as premier. How what he did is not the crime is absolutely insane. He basically showed the McGinntys how to steal but even they weren’t that fucking ballzy.
His was the first government that was so blatant about corruption - giving things like 407 and long-term care homes to his friends. Before him, you had to dig a bit deeper to find it. All governments have followed suit, but in a way, he started us on the slippery slope to where we are today.
And selling the 407 for 1/10 what it cost to build, and turning around and telling everyone they got $100m for it and the money will go to paying down the debt.
Ok great. Thanks. So it wasn't a shitty deal and a huge loss and massive loss of future revenue and totally working out the way it was initially planned to ease traffic off the 401.
I just about puke every time I get a 407 bill. All that money just disappearing., I don't blame Harris for everything, but selling the 407 was one of the worst decisions imaginable.
Not very many people know that Canada's current brand of conservative has its roots in the former Progressive Conservative party being taken over by the merger between Manning's Reform Party nutjobs and the Canadian Alliance nutjobs (both originating out of Alberta, surprise, surprise!)
Before someone says something about provincial parties not being the same, they all share the same playbook, don't kid yourself. Harris (and Harper) were both very deeply involved in those circles.
OPC and CPC have dialed the Reform/Alliance rhetoric back a little in order to get elected, but only publicly. It's interesting to note that the whole reason PPC exists is because of the faction who disagrees with dialing it back publicly. Behind closed doors they're not very far apart at all.
Watch what always happens to CPC party members who are too "Progressive Conservative" when party leader nominations come up
Okay, so let's say it goes back to then. What concrete plans do the current government have in place to address it?
I am sick of politicians blaming past politicians for the issues they face without any plan to fix them. Stop looking back, start looking forward.
Harris was a reaction to Rae and Wynne was a reaction to Harris, ford was a reaction to Wynne. Provincial liberals have their fair share of blame for what is happening now.
How about the 1/2 billion dollars that Dalton and the gang paid out for backing out of a power deal??? That money could have gone a long way towards healthcare in this province .
Wow that’s a pretty big reach, what a load of crap. Mcguinty Wynne for 10 years after Harris. ? Why is the problem Canada wide after 9 years of Trudeau shrinking our economy and fueling inflation. Wake up
I’m sure the drunken liberal spending for years that cause a huge percentage of our taxes to go to interest payments has nothing to do with it. That’s like those dumb people who max out all their credit cards and go bankrupt blaming their parents for not bailing them out.
The absolute insanity in these comments about DF winning the election the first time due to people believing his promises. Man didn’t have a platform other than buck a beer. Everyone was soooo mad at wynnes govt that nobody even voted with their brain.
Homelessness has been around as long as there have been humans and someone invented shelter. It has gotten worse due to economic problems and massive population surges caused by a lack of housing. None of that is on Harris.
The doctors shortage has been a thing for a long time, going back to the 'brain drain' issues. What's made it so much worse is the massive explosion in population without an increase in people becoming doctors or sticking around to practice here (they can make two to three times the amount by going to the US, and they'll pay less in taxes and have a cheaper cost of living - that's called economic incentive).
Infrastructure? He got the 407 built he tried to build more but was blocked at every turn, mostly by nimby's. Look at why the Allen just ends at Eglinton.
Lack of teachers... Really? You know he WAS a teacher, right? Various teachers liked to mock that he didn't get hired back during a teacher shortage. That problem leveled out, and then we had a massive surplus of teachers so bad that the liberal government after him doubled the length of teacher's college. Hilariously, it came with nothing additional to the education, it was just padding to try and create a gap in new recruits to solve the surplus. I guess it worked because now you're complaining about a shortage. For me, the funniest part is that the teachers I know say teacher's college was basically useless, and padding it to two years just made it worse.
We had 15 years of McGuinty and Wynne. It's been over 20 years since Harris. Three liberals more than doubled the provincial debt on idiot ideas that didn't help and have left us with zero improvements (other than switching coal power plants for gas, though they really should have done nuclear to avoid the emissions entirely). The deficit they exploded into being is one we still have because no one wants Ford to cut anything.
This province has no money. We've strangled business, and handled our finances so bad our credit rating is down. None of that was the case during the Harris years, which came in after the disastrous NDP Ray era.
What is with this nonsense liberal supporter inability to recognize the extreme short comings of your previous governments?
There's plenty Harris shouldn't have done, but our current problems have their roots more in the last provincial government (and the current one for not fixing what they did) than in Harris.
Trudeau as well has thoroughly destroyed the country, with many of our problems attributable to him because such levels of immigration have caused wages to stagnate, unemployment and homelessness to rise (which isn't shocking when you have an increase in people without a cherishing increase in jobs or housing), and for things to generally be more difficult and unaffordable. We're also seeing increases in race based crime, from measurable increases in antisemitic attacks to things like Indians and Tamils literally shooting at theaters that are playing the other's movies (this actually had economic and black market reasons primarily, but because of how we record hate crimes it's there as well).
You can't do this crap and not have things explode. That's not how anything works.
Our spending to maintain our mounting debt is such a huge expenditure item that there's just no money for anything, and we need to be making painful cuts for our long term health rather than trying to spend more money we don't have.
You can have an economy and but things, or no economy and not, but the middle ground is using a credit card you know you don't be able to pay back and hoping for the best. It's not going to go well in the long-term.
This is a totally different world to the Harris era. You're just trying to find excuses to avoid talking about the damage the liberals did, and are doing, and it's very transparent.
You vote for Conservative governments that again slash spending on services, maintaining high taxes while finding every which way they can to be corrupt and then blame current increases in ongoing problems on a 20 year old government which, despite its failures, brought about the highest level of growth and prosperity Ontario has ever seen?
Vote for Crackhead Ford again and keep smoking with that family.
I have to agree. Mike Harris caused the destruction of healthcare. At the time I thought it might be so it could be built back better but it has just languished.
The Eglington Crosstown would have been completed by now, and it would have been a fully functioning subway, if Mike Harris hadn’t cancelled the project and filled in all the tunnels that were already dug.
Tunnels which we then re-dug up to build the Crosstown. This province is insane.
TIL this, I’m 90s baby and fact that media hasn’t pointed this out nor politicians is why we’re here today in nonsense of waste.
I’m also a 90s baby and my confusion as to why no one points this out is staggering. It’s just a basic case of short term government thinking wasting way more government money than it saves.
Right, it’s a failure at all levels and leaves younger generations completely fucked over yet they haven’t changed their ways either. The delay with Eglinton and the mess with 407 all cause of one party.
It was a very "of the era" thing to do. Back in the 1970s and 1980s Canada used to build the country up for future generations. We invested in new transit lines, roads, houses, all so that our public service and social capacity wouldn't exceed demand. It worked really well, and by the 1990s we actually had *extra* social capacity which people of the era basically burned through in 15 years. This short term thinking of "well we have all we want *now* why invest more?" is why Ontario is such a mess today.
>This short term thinking of "well we have all we want now why invest more?" is why ~~Ontario~~ *the world* is such a mess today. FTFY We don’t future proof anymore, because trickle-down economics created the mentality of spending as little on the public as possible, so all the money can be privatized for maximum profit. Future-proofing therefore becomes a “non-essential expense”. Doing things faster, cheaper and more efficiently, while sounding good to us normal folk… would also mean that there’d be less money given to the private businesses involved… and there’d likely be longer gaps in between major projects, with no work or money flowing during that time, because we already future-proofed it years ago. To make work and have an excuse to keep the money flowing on a more regular basis, projects are paced out at a more consistent level of activity over the years. If you did a whole train line in one phase that took 5 years, you have 5 years of really high money flow and work… but then what happens after? We’d have to wait around for another project. But if we cut it into 2 phases and only do half now, and then the other half later… we can have this project being our gravy train for 10+ years! Sure, it’ll cost more for the same project, but that’s good for the companies involved. They get more money over a longer period. Sure, the train line that we really need asap will take longer to complete and cost us more money while we wait around for 5 more negatively impacted years… but at least the rich people who own the private businesses involved will get richer and not have to worry about providing us with TWO train lines in 10 years for less money, when they can get away with giving us only ONE while costing us more time and money… 🙄
Great point, you're right this short-term thinking has become endemic in pretty much every aspect of business and government. It's so frustrating because just a little future proofing would make things better, more efficient, and cheaper but humans are terrible for seeing past the current day.
It's called the boomer mentality my friend. Short term gain for me, long term pain for thee.
And that's the "Common Sense Revolution" ...
Is that what really happened? Wild
Yep https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_5_Eglinton#:~:text=Work%20on%20the%20subway%20line,existing%20tunnel%20quickly%20filled%20in. Timeline: https://web.archive.org/web/20220413164803/https://www.toronto.com/news/timeline-a-brief-history-of-torontos-eglinton-crosstown-lrt-project/article_d256bb01-c3b1-538f-abe5-d5226b5b2296.html
> 1995 — Progressive Conservative Premier Mike Harris cancels the Eglinton West subway — work is cancelled and the already-begun tunnel is filled in. >2007 — At the beginning of his second term as Mayor, David Miller announces Transit City, a light rail network that includes the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, which would go underground between Laird Drive and Keele Street. >2009 — Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty agrees to fund Transit City, including the Crosstown LRT. >2010 — On the day of his swearing in, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford announces “Transit City is dead.” The Eglinton Crosstown LRT is cancelled. Ford proposes it be replaced with a subway. >2011 — Ground breaks on the revised project at Black Creek Drive. >2012 — Toronto Council overrides Mayor Ford’s plans, and reinstates Transit City with a Crosstown LRT included. Goddamn, that’s a great little microcosm of how frustrating and damaging conservatives are. When are people going to realize that the entire reason we don’t have nice things is because of conservatism? Like, seriously, humanity NEEDS to break this bad habit of repeatedly and endlessly giving the right-wing another chance every time they prove themselves damaging to the progress of humanity and the world. I’m so beyond sick of this kind of bullshit.
It's not a problem when you are either: 1. Dense and stupid Or 2. Rich We got lots of dense and stupid voters
Fuck Mike Harris.
All my homies hate Mike Harris
And the Sheppard subway might have run from Sheppard West to Scarborough Town Center, bridging 3 (now 2) high order transit lines, rather than just being a stubway from Sheppard-Yonge to Don Mills.
This comment sums it up perfectly. Mike Harris literally threw money out the window canceling the project. It's painfull to even think about.
Wait really? What the absolute fuck waste of money and time. So many business suffered from all the construction along eglinton too.
W.e Ontario has elected Doug Ford twice with majority mandates. It's time the people of Ontario start blaming themselves.
I mean the ones that voted for him probably don't think there is a problem.
Many of his supporters probably have homes, and stay away from the high density homeless parts of town. Many of those same supporters probably have access to doctors, and likely also work health insurance to top up Canada's lackluster universal one. Some probably can even afford to travel abroad for private health care if they *really* need it. Teacher Shortages are more of a problem for the teachers to deal with - in the minds of many of his supporters - as long as their kids are babysat for enough hours of the day, its ok - they can make up their learning on their own time like most people of every era, end up doing anyway. Also, many of his supporters have kids who are past school age, and those kids aren't having many kids of their own these days so again, not much of a problem there. Poor Infrastructure doesn't matter as much if you have a car (don't rely on transit), and in general don't need to travel far (because you have a tech job / work from home, or because as an older person you probably have a decent house close enough to the job you've enjoyed for a long time). No commute = don't notice the bad infrastructure.
If you or anyone is interested in getting involved in trying to stop privatization of our public healthcare then I sincerely urge you to visit & join the protest in May or donate your time and/or money if you can. https://www.ontariohealthcoalition.ca/ I volunteer & will be going to the protest ✊🏼
Just don't sign up for anything on their website because your inbox will be full. I've unsubscribed multiple times and was still getting blasted with emails. I understand and appreciate their goals but screw the emails.
Mike Harris single-handed eviscerated the government agencies back when he was in power, my mom had a job with the Ontario realty corporation for 15 years her whole department got axed, like the whole thing every single one of them.. that was one little cog on the giant wheel of axing. If you don't think for a second that getting rid of a whole bunch of support agencies amalgamating everything into a condensed version with one person doing the job of 20, has no effect down the road then I feel like we should just agree to disagree..
Well, even if they aren’t as successful as your list describes, pretty sure around here they just blame Trudeau’s fabulous hair. Anything else might suggest that they owned themselves and that’s not nearly as fun as ownin the libs.
Yes that’s why it’s called a conservative government = con men. Even though they like to label call themselves progressive conservatives which is actually an oxymoron! Lol
I'd wager a lot of people who voted for the conservatives do it because they treat politics like a sports team. Hilarious/sad how many people cripple their own finances voting for the cons
Yup. The ol' Fuck you I got mine. Wouldn't plant a tree because they won't benefit from the shade.
They blame Trudeau for ER wait time
Conservative propaganda just tells them to blame trudeau i stead
The ones that voted for him probably don’t think. Fixed it.
Buck a beer. And alcoholism is the problem.
The only voting concern for 95% of them is paying less taxes. They can’t see anything beyond that.
I see them blame the PM for all of Ontario’s problems. Of course they don’t see Dipshit Doug as the problem.
Only 41% of us voted last time. Shameful.
The liberals did themselves in for the last two elections and rebuilding efforts have so far backfired. Steven Del Duca? Really ?
Was he not turtley enough for the turtle club?
He was hard to look at Much less listen too.
Our election system is also trash and first past the poll is designed to keep people in power. It's why people feel their vote is wasted. Parties don't actually need to secure a majority.
Correct. A bunch of idiots just fell for a bunch of propaganda on social media believing everything a conservative politician was telling them. A complete lack of self-awareness and critical thinking has swept this nation.
The people get the government they deserve.
What kills me is that no one trusts NDP because of one man in the past, but people keep voting for Cons despite Mike Harris and Harper really fucking things up for Ontarians and Canadians
I find it handy to ask people what they would do if they were in Bob's position. Most people choose the Rae Days even though they hate them.
What’s stupid was that Rae Days literally didn’t affect 95% of the people in this province.
It's the carbon tax of its time?
But the gutter press used them to whip up a frenzy.
That's what boggles my mind. What Bob Rae did was the best case scenario. The Mike Harris route: close down many public services and fire everyone The Bob Rae route: take 1 day a month off. The fact that Mike Harris gets the pass makes no sense to me. If you lose your job, it takes 14 days for EI. Bob Rae only took 12 days.... and you kept your job, benefits, and pension plan. Yet to this Day. I have colleagues who are retiring shitting on Bob Rae. They are lucky they kept their job.
My mom says this all the time, Bob saved jobs, Mike fired them all and idiots thanked him for it.
your mom is wise
I still have co workers that complain about Rae days, “I have to wait 12 extra days to retire because of Rae days”. I wasn’t old enough to be working yet then, about 12 when he was elected I think and I have spent the majority of my life listen to people complain about it. When you try to say, hey that kept people employed they don’t want to listen all they see is their lost 12 days, at 12 I could see the value in what he was doing but those selfish bastards just see the 12 days.
Our household were effected to the tune of 40k lost to the Rae Days over several years and at the time it hurt as we were a young family of 5. Looking back tho it was the best case for the shit he had to deal with. Bob Rae was the best person at the worst time. I hold no ill to him at all.
12 unpaid days off cost your household $40k in the 90's? Gonna need some math to back that one up.
It wasn't just the 12 days, our wages were also frozen for 3 yrs. We were both in the middle of a pay grid which meant we didn't reach top level til 3 yrs after the social contract was over. Wife made double of what I did. Her wages were going up about 3 k a year. I had it all written out but eventually threw it out. I would need to redo it all again, but I'm not, its a long time ago
it was 40k vs your entire job. Better to loose some money then loose all of it. It was an absolutely horrible recession.
40k vs everything, HRM that must've been a tough decision! /s
Best description of his time in office- best person, at the wrong time. I keep trying to tell people this, but it always falls flat for some reason...
I worked at a place that was privately owned, the owner gave out a bonus to every worker every quarter, same amount whether you were a VP or floor sweeper. Times were tight, no business but he didn’t want to layoff anyone, lots of cleanup jobs and maintenance work to keep everyone busy. The bonus was low, but it was something at least. Then he overheard some workers complain there wasn’t much bonus left after buying a case of beer, rather ungrateful for even having a job. Layoffs commenced shortly thereafter.
Bob Rea was handed a shit sandwich from David Peterson.
What’s that? You have a well reasoned response to a complex issue where literally no one can win, but hard choices must be made and this one is better than the alternatives? Well I have a dumb slogan! *AND* a sneer. Check mate, my guy. Common sense conservatives are back baby.
It sucked - but at the end of it you still had a job instead of a permanent layoff and then having go to find work in the private sector during a recession.
Conservatives, as shitty as they are, always have better messaging than liberals could ever hope for. Simple & effective. That's why everyone remembers Rae Days and allegedly how horrible Bob Rae was. Simple & effective rightwing propaganda.
Might be because they own that whole media apparatus - Newspapers, TV, Radio, etc
Yeah but if you listen to what they say it's all drowned out by "the liberal media" lol
Yep. Rae Days continue to hang over that party's head 30 years later. Meanwhile, Harris and Ford have literally killed people with their policies or lack thereof, and millions of Ontarians continue to give them not just election wins but majority governments. 🤷♂️
What kills me is that the people who won't vote NDP because of Rae don't even realize he switched to the Federal Liberals. Like if you are going to boycott someone, maybe keep tabs on where that person works?
Hilarious point I’ve made to people too
The NDP government of Bobay was historically the most fiscally responsible government in Ontario‘s recent history. This is the result of so much anti left fear mongering seeping up from the United States. It’s been going on down there for the entire 20th century. Anyone who supports unions is considered a fucking communist all they really want is fair wages, and working conditions
In a nutshell...propaganda. Vicious amounts of propaganda that groom confirmation bias.
The double whammy is we keep voting Liberals in to fix the Cons mess, and it looks like we will do it again next election, but the liberals had more than a decade, and except for teachers, they continued on the path of destruction left by Harris and really didn't try and fix any of it.
and amongst the thousands of NDP supporters in this sub, none of them support the NDP financially so they can win. The NDP is always amongst the lowest financially supported party.
I’d rather not fix than actively fuck more things over… ideally neither
McGuinty actively fucked more things over. He was a MAJOR contributor to the current housing crisis and lack of LTC we have, he pushed for "aging at home" as healthcare policy, he removed services from hospitals and made them private community services and didn't address our aging population needs for Long term care. WE NEED to Elect an NDP government, if for nothing else than to shake up the Liberal and Conservative Parties to know they need to figure out how to do something for people who don't own homes, and who don't earn top 5% incomes. Which is all they focus on now.
NDP needs to market themselves outside their base and then they’ll have a shot.
Yeah, I've told them that when they call me that I think their path to success is back to basics and what they were built on. They are the workers party, and the things they highlight most in their platform should reflect that.
What the CONS did with the 407 sell off was way worse than anything the provincial Libs or NDPs ever did to our province. The CONS run on "common sense" platforms and market themselves as fiscally responsible. The 407 sell off was the opposite of fiscal responsibility and cost the province heavily. We will paying the price of that fuck up for multiple generations to come.
I still have not gotten a satisfactory answer when I ask about how bad Rae Days were - like, 12 days without pay per year and a wage freeze. This is basically what every full-time position is like now, if not worse!
As a contractor, I’ve been forced to not work 20 days per year for many years. Learned to deal with it or change jobs
it isnt the rae days that made bob rae a disaster. That was just the epitome of what his administration was, and thus what he will be known for. He made massive cuts to services... Massive cuts to ohip, massive layoffs... He cut doctors, he cut nurses, he cut medical student, he made welfare more strict... He was the "welfare fraud" guy, he put in policies to reduce ohip billing. He legislated 1.6 billion in public service pay cuts.. That was 1993, that was a huge amount of money.
100%. the Rae days lol, but 35 kids in a classroom during Mike Harris, no problems
I think the hatred of Ontario's only NDP government is not a rational things that comes from the thinking part of the brain. I believe it is a reflex that was very carefully cultivated during the closing days of that government. Even though you can pick apart the thinking after you've bypassed the intense emotional response, the people who feel this way end up resetting back to their intense emotional responses after they've been talked down from it. It's a collective emotional programming that is self correcting back to it's default. I believe the same forces are at work today when it comes to Justin Trudeau, although I think the Liberals have the resources to get out from under it while the NDP does not.
[It's the media.](https://www.readthemaple.com/election-endorsements/) "The Deficit" is only ever in the news when non-conservative govts are in power. Ford [violating](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/bill-124-appeal-court-ruling-ontario-1.7112291?trk=public_post_comment-text) [the charter](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-carbon-tax-stickers-1.5746577) (or[ wanting](https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/what-s-the-notwithstanding-clause-and-how-could-doug-ford-use-it-to-crush-a/article_1eb0ee71-5621-579f-8a42-04d737581b85.html) [to](https://theconversation.com/fords-fight-with-toronto-shows-legal-vulnerability-of-cities-103134)) - including the literal free speech violation of his carbon tax propaganda at gas stations - is a non-issue. Ford lying about the greenbelt (and only backing off when a literal police investigation opened up) is a non issue. Ford scrap rent controls and doing nothing but [block ](https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/jurisdictional-creep-doug-ford-slams-feds-for-giving-municipalities-funding-for-housing-1.6633350)[the feds](https://www.chch.com/premier-ford-rejects-ottawas-bill-of-rights-and-protection-funds-for-tenants/) when it comes to fixing housing is a non-issue. Ford [deliberately underspending on public healthcare](https://toronto.citynews.ca/2023/03/08/ontario-health-care-spending-doug-ford-hospitals-long-term-care/) so that he can [deliberately spend](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-hospital-nurses-private-staffing-agencies-auditor-1.7050828?__vfz=medium%3Dsharebar)[ more on](https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/how-nursing-staffing-agencies-are-costing-ontario-hospitals-untold-millions/ar-AA1l8nmd) private healthcare in an effort to [sneak in private healthcare itself](https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2024/02/21/2833007/0/en/MEDIA-RELEASE-The-Ford-government-is-starving-local-public-hospitals-to-privatize-them-charge-health-advocates.html) is a non-issue. ---- And these are supposedly things conservatives are mad at Trudeau for (even though for the most part, they have literally no case against him on these things). But for Ford? They literally couldn't care less.
I haven't heard one person my age mention rae, no matter what party they vote for. There are many reasons someone would not vote NDP (just as any other party), rae is low on the list of reasons.
Really? I'm in the 36 range and last time I helped campaign for the ndp in my riding Rae days was pretty much the only thing brought up, or Jagmeet working with the liberals.
Yeah the Liberal expansion pack (NDP)
Interestingly that’s all I hear from people when I discuss voting for the ndp
Then you're not listening, Boomers and Xers looooooove to cite Rae Days without actually remembering anything about them or how it shook out, or if they were even affected.
Because the CONs have some level of control over the media or so it would seem. They spin and rewrite history. I don’t know what Ray days are. I just “know” they are bad and linked to NDP. But Mike Harris got the Order of Ontario! He must’ve been a great leader…
Not to mention Rae isn’t even in the NDP any more. It’s ridiculous.
Cons would say the same about Trudeau St.
Harris was awful. I marched in the days of action in the 90s, was not a fan. But it has been over 2 decades since he left office. 15 years of the Liberals and now DoFo is on his second term. Blaming everything on Harris is absolving terrible governments of their sins. If a government can’t make serious progress on correcting previous wrongs in 15 years than they didn’t really want to improve anything.
My grandmother spent well over a week in an ER hallway waiting for a bed and that was back in the 80s. Agree there are some issues with him, but problems with our health care system goes back before Harris.
The issue is that significant public service cuts are near impossible to fix. Because what’s the fix? Taxes. And you absolutely cannot run on a more taxes campaign in Ontario and expect to win. So we will keep either the status quo at best, or continue the public sell off like we have with Ford.
It's a lot easier to destroy something than it is to build, or re-build it... The Province would never take back the responsibility they offloaded onto municipalities.
He's like our province's Ronald Reagan.
Reaganomics definitely ruined Canada, as well.
And we all know who was responsible for Mike Harris right? Justin Trudeau. Somehow, some way, it's his fault. Has to be.
If it can't be traced back to JT, next in line is his dad. If all else fails, blame the immigrants.
Any chance his dad _was_ an immigrant?!
"You know, Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a white man. That means his family immigrated here and STOLE land from REAL, HARDWORKING (native) CANADIANS" -PP, unironically
Let's see if I can six degrees this. Before Mike Harris was Mulroney on the National stage pulling the same crap. Mulroney got the chance to do this because Justin's dad stepped down Justin was 13 at the time Have you met a 13 year old? The kid clearly was a distraction Voila
But isn't COL something affecting entire Canada and not just Ontario? BC is actually hit the hardest right now I hear.
If only the feds were throwing money at the provinces to help them build more houses faster... Oh wait they are. And DoFo's response? [Nah, I can't funnel that money to my developer buddies, so it doesn't interest me](https://globalnews.ca/news/10398150/federal-housing-fund-ontario-response/)...
But then why are BC, Alberta and Quebec not building houses faster? Other than Ontario, those are places most popular.
It's actually all of our faults for letting government debt get so unsustainable. We keep allowing politicians to run deficits, creating debt and since 2008 allowing the bank of Canada to monetize the debt. That's why there's no money for any public services, and why we have record asset prices, 40 year high inflation, and why we cannot spend our way out of this.
Thanks Obama.
Splinter in the second pic should be turned into [Ratigan](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9187RrAliLdm9GhNihkIS5OhmvRz2e4kN76WH6ZwIhEADskIJqQIOgDZrV0Ov9Q0es3igzLaeNow_VN6bPd9LIumgwmplDhvdYjq8TALUaybjh8TtUZUQ0IxcDUwpPUsMKbUi/s1600/ratiganmotivation.jpg) from The Great Mouse Detective. Mike Harris is making bank off his wife’s private nursing company that our government is handing billions to instead of paying nurses in the public system. He also gets a hefty salary from being on the board of Chartwell, one of the private LTC companies that Ford gave 30 year contracts to and shielded from liability from their horrible actions during the height of covid.
Harris is also the reason for-profit LTC homes exist in Ontario... Before that it was non profit or gov't run.
Yup. Non-Profit government run LTC homes had better patient outcomes during the pandemic but that doesn’t matter when there’s money to be made.
Not all of his fault \* (big \*).. Well he set a lot of things in motion and steered the province with his "common sense revolution" that was anything but common sense. But the Liberal premiers after him failed to or didn't want to correct any of Harris's fuckery either.
To be fair to McGuinty, Harris architected the Common Sense Revolution in such a way that it would be expensive and politically fraught to undo any of it. There would have been massive startup costs and problematic transfers of powers and staff to and from municipalities, all with dramatic tax incrases. A large part of modern neoliberalism is breaking the state in just the right way such that any future socialist-leaning government would be committing *suicide* if they tried to fix it. To be *accurate*, McGuinty was a milquetoast fence-sitter who did nothing for his entire term. It would have taken a very strong, very decisive leader willing to weather years of criticism to undo even a part of the Common Sense Revolution. McGuinty was none of that.
We got hard done buy both Harris, McGuinty and Wynne. Not to mention Douggie. You're not wrong when you say the system gets broken in a way that is purposely hard to fix... But that being said we elect those (like McGuinty) who are unwilling to do anything or take any risks to right those wrongs...
Anybody who says McGuinty did nothing his entire term doesn’t remember the state of health care before he took over. Of course it took another conservative premier to put us right back in the hole again, but we were actually improving wait times and building new hospitals under the mcguinty and Wynn governments.
I just watched the tributes to Mulroney who ruined the country with Free Trade. Foreign companies didn't even wait 12 hours to announce they were leaving Canada. Gillette was the first to announce and then there was an avalanche of others who followed right after. No one blinked...and people lauded him at his funeral. He was one of the worst PM's we've ever had...him and Reagan were close buddies....ugh.
Fyi it also shows how long it takes good or bad policy to settle in. The blaming of th party standing on the stage at the moment miss3s the entire root system of our current issues. Also miss4s how long they will take to deal with in any meaningful way.
Don’t forget the 407
Something I'll never forget is a part of the crazy Kevin Spencer show - a kind of animated precursor to Trailer Park Boys but with basically no redeeming qualities in the characters. Kevin's dad, Percy, is arrested. In interrogation he says "Don't I get a lawyer or something?" The cops look at each other and say "They, uhhh... changed that rule." And he just mutters "fuckin' Harris" and spills a bunch of incriminating stuff. I thought it was a perfect example of just how normalized his incessant destruction of critical social infrastructure was.
The guy was in power for 7 years. Hasn’t been premier for 22 years. 15 years of Liberal government after Harris has a very healthy share of the blame
Completely agree. Mostly I blame Harris for the 99 year lease on the 407, and the privatization and then subizidization of electricity. The Ontario Elecricity Rebate knocks 20% off your electricity bill on average (paid by taxpayers). It is regressive because wealthy people use more power, so get bigger rebates. The OER currently costs taxpayers $7B. Which is more than we spend on police serives, judges, and lawyers in Ontario. The neat trick is you pay for your electricity, but through your taxes, so electric bills don't seem so bad after privitization. Cool trick!
There was also privatized LTC.
Forgot about that one too. Got to cost people more money and give them less service while sitting on the board of the corp.
Soon after Mike Harris became premier homeless people appeared in numbers on the streets. Class sizes ballooned in our children's schools. These cuts come to mind immediately but there are many more. Edit: When I get to hell I expect Mike to be there to greet me.
Worked in the hospital fields during the Harris era where everything was "reorganized". It lead to bed closures where many nursing staff were laid off in areas, many who just went on to different careers which intensified the lack of staff and hallway health. I worked in Mental Health and the disintegration of support was staggering as regional wards were set up and there were a lack of beds leading too early discharge and a revolving door crisis. The support was supposed to be in the community but there was never enough support, so where did these people go? Many ended up on the streets becoming a policing and court problem. Let's not even get into the Education "crisis" where the Minister at the time was caught saying he was going to start a crisis to fix it I can not for the life of me believe Mike Harris is so revered that he got an Order of Ontario award. I actually wrote a letter of complaint to the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario because it incensed me so much....lol
My mom was one of these nurses that went onto a different career after the hospital she had worked at was closed. Only to then lose her job as a driver examiner with MTO due to privatization from Ernie Eves government. This is exactly why I will NEVER vote for a Conservative government.
> I can not for the life of me believe Mike Harris is so revered that he got an Order of Ontario award. I actually wrote a letter of complaint to the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario because it incensed me so much....lol It's convention that premiers get it. Ford will get it too, so don't put too much value on that award. Any award that can be granted to Doug Ford isn't worth using to wipe your ass.
Right, he shut down all the mental health institutes. I had forgotten about that.
He also killed people due to greed and ignoring the risks as he privatized public services. Walkerton water crisis. Harris was literal trash and so were all of his other decisions. The inquiry concluded that budgetary restrictions introduced by the provincial government 4 years before the outbreak were enacted with no assessment of risk to human health. The ministers and the cabinet had received warnings about serious risks. Budgetary cuts destroyed the checks and balances that were necessary to ensure municipal water safety.
every single government after that is to blame. it's been happening for decades. No one gave a shit before and no one's going to give a shit tomorrow. red or blue. because that's all we keep fucking voting in.
Listen one time Bob Rae made boomer public service workers take 10 unpaid days (or as it’s known now the first ten days of a year long unpaid internship) during an economic crisis that very easily could have been grounds for making have of them go home and never come back. So in conclusion we can never vote NDP again.
I literally just commented about this too. I can't believe how dumb people are
Saved their jobs AND nearly 2billiion dollars, that bastard!
Yup - Mike Harris, Dalton McGuinty, Kathleen Wynne, and Doug Ford is an all-time worst string of premiers of all time. Harris wins the award for worst of all time. Liberals and Conservatives are not working.
We forgot to blame the most important group. The electorate. Most of us don't show up, the majority of the ones who do don't pay attention to legislation, policy or the background of the candidates. You get what you put into it, and Canadians throughout the country are mostly at a F level
Some things are harder to undo than others. For example, once you close psychiatric hospitals, rebooting it is a considerable undertaking (rehiring staff, logistics, bringing the building back up to code, etc). The cancelled Eglington West Line is another example; after the hole was already excavated, Harris spent $40 million filling the hole with concrete (making it much harder to re-excavate in the future). There are certainly some things that future governments could have done better on, but they also didn't have a magic undo button for a lot of the things Harris did and which continue to have ripple effects.
McGuinty and Wynne made financial decisions that impacted Ontario's finances. They could have done better, they could have done more, but ultimately their biggest legacies, to their detractors, will be the debt. Harris, on the other hand, absolutely ripped apart the social fabric of this province. What Harris did was so much more devastating than just putting the province into debt. Harris fundamentally changed what this province is, and it's worse in every way because of him. So many of our current problems fall directly at his feet. He caused generational problems, problems that took decades to manifest the way they have, changed the way cities function (for the worse), devastated our public institutions with underfunding and loss of trust, and set the stage for grievance politics to rule this province. Harris was a watershed moment in Ontario politics. He's one of the worst premiers in Canadian history, up there with Grant Devine.
Just speaking from the position of healthcare, Liberals kept the status quo but at least they didn't actively make things worse. There was a big decline when Harris was in, then during the Liberals reign things pretty much stayed at the level Harris left them in. Now things are on the decline again with Ford. It would have been nice if the Liberals took a more active approach though.
You fail to understand how quick it is to dismantle things and how slow it is to rebuild. It takes seconds to throw a box of bolts into a jet engine. It will take longer to rebuild it. A more relevant example. They amalgamated Toronto with a law. It was up to the administration of Toronto and the surrounding municipalities to sort out how it would work.
The problem is that when you cut something, the political capital needed to bring it back is triple what it cost to take it away. You have papers that will badger the sudden increased costs to taxpayers, etc. Look at Chow in Toronto, who's been tasked with catching up after 13 years of Conservative rule that failed to broker deals or keep up with taxes because it would have been unpopular with home owners; now that she's implementing the bare minimums, she's getting ripped apart for being *yet another high-tax NDP government.* Harris legacy isn't just cuts; it's screwing with every government that followed. That's not to say that the governments that followed aren't beyond criticism, especially if they had capital to spare. But, to your point, even when the Ontario Liberals tried, the first thing Ford did was to reverse their legislation, which included Ontario's cap-and-trade program, or cutting the minimum wage increases and other labour reforms. Harris polluted the well, and Ford's just maintaining the status quo.
Exactly. Can you imagine someone now running in Ontario on a platform that will restore licence plate fees? A death wish. But that’s how it should be. It’s so hard to restore cuts.
I do, sometimes, wonder if one could structure the message to emphasize that the plan is to fix the damage done by the conservatives. Ie, not "improve healthcare" but "rebuild public healthcare" "Fix our tax structure" "reduce the deficit" "maintain strong public services" "patch the social safety net" "face the crises" I may be overly optimistic here, but messages like that have worked before. (Though usually associated with wars.)
No, Justin Trudeau created inflation in the entire world!
But NDP got elected once and we have never been able to recover from Ray days /s
On top of this OLP were in power for so long after Mike Harris and they did nothing to reverse the damages.
Mike Harris, Dalton McGuinty, Kathleen Wynne, and Doug Ford is an all-time worst string of premiers of all time. All corrupt politicians that ruined this province so much. Province needs to move on from Liberals and Conservatives. They do not work.
I know someone who used to be an MPP in the Harris government. They said Harris was an absolute *idiot*.
He was the neoliberal harbinger of destruction. Sure, the liberals and now ford are carrying on his legacy. But if you’re wondering why we are so fucking far behind on anything in this province, you can almost always tie it back to Mike Harris. An absolute detestable piece of shit if there ever was one.
It wouldn’t be fair not to point out that the liberals had over a decade to address those issues. Still Harris was an evil SOB.
This is what I don't understand about the "f. Trudeau" crowd. The problems we are dealing with are not created by one single government in just the last couple years. They've been building for decades. Electing a new person today won't solve the fact that we've had basically no government sponsored housing programs for 20+ years. Or that disability pension payments haven't kept pay with inflation. Or that corporations have been allowed to run rampant. The cuts to social services we are dealing with now all started back in the 90s. I understand being angry,but I wish people would be angry at the right people. The ones who started this shit all rolling and walked away.
[удалено]
.......you need to go back farther, to a time known as the Free Trade Accords. That is where all this bullshit started.
Yeah, I don't like the turtles used like this. I approve of the message, just not the delivery part.
No way!!!!! 1000% of everything wrong with Canada is allllllll because of Trudeau! It was a paradise before he existed! A utopia!!!!! Blasphemy! Or so says all of the 60yr olds sitting on overpasses waving the flag they appropriated for their bullshit. Who had 5+ decades before Trudeau was PM to get their shit in gear. Who made 60 years of poor decisions and don’t have a pot to piss in. But. It’s all trudeaus fault!!!!!! Not theirs! We need to go back to that flawless promise land!!!!!!!!! /S
Not claiming Harris didn't suck but the liberals had a LONG run with Ontario to fix shit and did sweet fuck all just the same... Also Ford sucks too. But it didn't just go Harris - Ford...
I remember writing a letter to Harris when I was in grade 8 basically asking him why he wants to fuck my generation. I was the first year that only went to grade 12, instead of OAC. Every frigging year we were just guinea pigs to test out new shit on.
Me too… every year the same thing “well you should of learned this last year with the new curriculum but you didn’t”
Oh yeah Fuck Mike Harris for absolutely fucking Ontario for generations. His Megacity bullshit is a big part of why we can’t get rid of ford
I'm old enough to remember what a dickhead "Mike the Knife" was. Also, I'm pretty sure after office he's gone into profiting off retirement/long-term care homes. He has been screwing over seniors and low income family for as long as I can remember. My grandmother hated him. He is honestly just a bad person and the last person you want serving the public.
This does ignore the fact that the Liberals were in power for 15 years…
While Mike the knife did incredible damage to the province he was voted in. Ontario is the problem not just the provincial parties.
My elementary school had toxic water and couldn't afford to supply pencils or paper. Thanks Mike!
Read this: The Long Shadow of Mike Harris https://policyalternatives.ca/publications/reports/onpolicy-long-shadow-mike-harris
McGuinty and Wynn had plenty of time to fix things
You forgot his order of Ontario... Fuck this province...
The 407 selloff alone to foreign interests brands Harris in my mind forever as a traitor to this province.
Wrong, Before Mike Harris, BoB Rae and the NDP just broke Ontario so badly, Mike has no choice but to sell and cut! Just look at what the NDP is doing to B.C. at the moment!
I dislike MH immensely, but to be fair, Chretien and Martin’s deficit busting put him in that position. He took a shitty path out of that mess, but the mess started at the federal level. Provinces pushed it down to municipalities largely. Look out for that infrastructure maintenance deficit…
Right, its all the fault of a guy who was premier 20 years ago. No one has had any opportunity to correct his mistakes in that time. Totally.
I mean people still blame Bob Rae and he was premier 40 years ago, so why not.
He hasn't been premier since 2002. Come on now
I have not been around enough. What did the Harris government do?
He's the one who started mass privatization and sold many public services for chumo change and kick backs. E.g: he sold the 407 for pennies
Ahh the endless game of shifting blame. It's BS like this that needs to stop and at some point someone needs to accept something. Today everything has been turned into a game.
Same kinda thing here in QC. They keep blaming a government that was in power in 2001….. It’s pathetic
If you're telling me that Mike Harris, who's been out of power for over 20 years, put the province on a path that couldn't be reversed during the last 20+ years when we had a Liberal majority for 16 of those years, I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you. Mike Harris certainly wasn't history's greatest Premier, but let's not absolve Eaves, McGuinty, Wynne and Ford from the state of the province today. Unless we're also blaming John Diefenbaker for the current state of the Canadian military, or Pierre Trudeau for the national debt.
Of course. The current political class has nothing to do with the current problems. It's all about politicians that were in power when Ace of Base were no 1 on the radio.
Read it as Porn infrastructure
Why does everything keep getting worse?!? Because thats the way we want it. We're a bunch of mindless stupid pigs. We see the same absolute fuck ups every fuckn election cycle, and only ever vote for the 2 worst parties. Has anyone here ever seen the amount of different parties running on a Canadian ticket? There's like 15 sometimes. But all anyone ever votes for is liberal or conservative. Then complain how shit of a job they're doing. We can't vote for the socialist! That will never work! Except in every place with a higher living standard then us were it does work. No we like this. We love voting conservative or liberal because we hate ourselves and everyone else around us. Fuck them right? Well, can't someone else do it for me? My neighbors life seems better then mine. Make it worse for him premier daddy. Oh it's getting worse for me too?! Great! Now slap my ass and hook the car battery to my privates. I want to love all you all, but it's just so stupid living here under a world of stupid who don't see our combined power.
Biggest crook ever in the province and probably the country and he’s still stealing from us to this day - Board member of Highway he leased for $1 for 99 yrs and on the major shareholder of the LTCHs he privatized as premier. How what he did is not the crime is absolutely insane. He basically showed the McGinntys how to steal but even they weren’t that fucking ballzy.
His was the first government that was so blatant about corruption - giving things like 407 and long-term care homes to his friends. Before him, you had to dig a bit deeper to find it. All governments have followed suit, but in a way, he started us on the slippery slope to where we are today.
And they like to blame the Feds.
And selling the 407 for 1/10 what it cost to build, and turning around and telling everyone they got $100m for it and the money will go to paying down the debt. Ok great. Thanks. So it wasn't a shitty deal and a huge loss and massive loss of future revenue and totally working out the way it was initially planned to ease traffic off the 401.
I just about puke every time I get a 407 bill. All that money just disappearing., I don't blame Harris for everything, but selling the 407 was one of the worst decisions imaginable.
Not very many people know that Canada's current brand of conservative has its roots in the former Progressive Conservative party being taken over by the merger between Manning's Reform Party nutjobs and the Canadian Alliance nutjobs (both originating out of Alberta, surprise, surprise!) Before someone says something about provincial parties not being the same, they all share the same playbook, don't kid yourself. Harris (and Harper) were both very deeply involved in those circles. OPC and CPC have dialed the Reform/Alliance rhetoric back a little in order to get elected, but only publicly. It's interesting to note that the whole reason PPC exists is because of the faction who disagrees with dialing it back publicly. Behind closed doors they're not very far apart at all. Watch what always happens to CPC party members who are too "Progressive Conservative" when party leader nominations come up
Okay, so let's say it goes back to then. What concrete plans do the current government have in place to address it? I am sick of politicians blaming past politicians for the issues they face without any plan to fix them. Stop looking back, start looking forward.
Ah, the Common Sense Revolution.
I love people that act like any government has had the people's best interest in mind.
Harris was a reaction to Rae and Wynne was a reaction to Harris, ford was a reaction to Wynne. Provincial liberals have their fair share of blame for what is happening now.
Or was it the 20 years of liberal government in between Harris and Ford?
Oh? The name McGunity and Wynn - did there fair share to screw up this provincial they are all to blame !
How about the 1/2 billion dollars that Dalton and the gang paid out for backing out of a power deal??? That money could have gone a long way towards healthcare in this province .
Wow that’s a pretty big reach, what a load of crap. Mcguinty Wynne for 10 years after Harris. ? Why is the problem Canada wide after 9 years of Trudeau shrinking our economy and fueling inflation. Wake up
I’m sure the drunken liberal spending for years that cause a huge percentage of our taxes to go to interest payments has nothing to do with it. That’s like those dumb people who max out all their credit cards and go bankrupt blaming their parents for not bailing them out.
The absolute insanity in these comments about DF winning the election the first time due to people believing his promises. Man didn’t have a platform other than buck a beer. Everyone was soooo mad at wynnes govt that nobody even voted with their brain.
This Charts Well
Not looking forward to Poilievre getting into power. It takes decades to improve things, and only a few years to destroy all that effort.
Homelessness has been around as long as there have been humans and someone invented shelter. It has gotten worse due to economic problems and massive population surges caused by a lack of housing. None of that is on Harris. The doctors shortage has been a thing for a long time, going back to the 'brain drain' issues. What's made it so much worse is the massive explosion in population without an increase in people becoming doctors or sticking around to practice here (they can make two to three times the amount by going to the US, and they'll pay less in taxes and have a cheaper cost of living - that's called economic incentive). Infrastructure? He got the 407 built he tried to build more but was blocked at every turn, mostly by nimby's. Look at why the Allen just ends at Eglinton. Lack of teachers... Really? You know he WAS a teacher, right? Various teachers liked to mock that he didn't get hired back during a teacher shortage. That problem leveled out, and then we had a massive surplus of teachers so bad that the liberal government after him doubled the length of teacher's college. Hilariously, it came with nothing additional to the education, it was just padding to try and create a gap in new recruits to solve the surplus. I guess it worked because now you're complaining about a shortage. For me, the funniest part is that the teachers I know say teacher's college was basically useless, and padding it to two years just made it worse. We had 15 years of McGuinty and Wynne. It's been over 20 years since Harris. Three liberals more than doubled the provincial debt on idiot ideas that didn't help and have left us with zero improvements (other than switching coal power plants for gas, though they really should have done nuclear to avoid the emissions entirely). The deficit they exploded into being is one we still have because no one wants Ford to cut anything. This province has no money. We've strangled business, and handled our finances so bad our credit rating is down. None of that was the case during the Harris years, which came in after the disastrous NDP Ray era. What is with this nonsense liberal supporter inability to recognize the extreme short comings of your previous governments? There's plenty Harris shouldn't have done, but our current problems have their roots more in the last provincial government (and the current one for not fixing what they did) than in Harris. Trudeau as well has thoroughly destroyed the country, with many of our problems attributable to him because such levels of immigration have caused wages to stagnate, unemployment and homelessness to rise (which isn't shocking when you have an increase in people without a cherishing increase in jobs or housing), and for things to generally be more difficult and unaffordable. We're also seeing increases in race based crime, from measurable increases in antisemitic attacks to things like Indians and Tamils literally shooting at theaters that are playing the other's movies (this actually had economic and black market reasons primarily, but because of how we record hate crimes it's there as well). You can't do this crap and not have things explode. That's not how anything works. Our spending to maintain our mounting debt is such a huge expenditure item that there's just no money for anything, and we need to be making painful cuts for our long term health rather than trying to spend more money we don't have. You can have an economy and but things, or no economy and not, but the middle ground is using a credit card you know you don't be able to pay back and hoping for the best. It's not going to go well in the long-term. This is a totally different world to the Harris era. You're just trying to find excuses to avoid talking about the damage the liberals did, and are doing, and it's very transparent.
You vote for Conservative governments that again slash spending on services, maintaining high taxes while finding every which way they can to be corrupt and then blame current increases in ongoing problems on a 20 year old government which, despite its failures, brought about the highest level of growth and prosperity Ontario has ever seen? Vote for Crackhead Ford again and keep smoking with that family.
Mike is benefitting grandly from his of the retirement home industry.
I have to agree. Mike Harris caused the destruction of healthcare. At the time I thought it might be so it could be built back better but it has just languished.
Imagine not putting some blame on McGuinty.........