Province Should Supersede Toronto's Management And Declare An Emergency

By Joe Fantauzzi

ninetytwopointeight@gmail.com

Days after the first bit of freezing rain began falling, there are still hundreds of thousands of Torontonians without power.

Toronto is also without political leadership. Rob Ford, the city's figurehead mayor, who apparently still has too much power, is rejecting help from Queen's Park and is refusing to declare an emergency.

It's time for the province to step in and do what the city's management will not. As soon as the final requirements fall into place for a declaration of emergency, if they have not already, the province must do so ─ issues around precedent and politicking be damned.

If nothing else, it would send a strong message to residents, such as those freezing in the dark, that this situation is being taken seriously. That impression is lacking at present.

The Constitution gives the province the ability to dissolve municipalities at its will; it should also enable the province to help a city paralyzed by a partisan fool who thinks he will come out of this storm a hero.

Tory Non-Confidence Stunt Fails Torontonians

By Joe Fantauzzi
ninetytwopointeight@gmail.com

The announcement today by the Progressive Conservative Party that a non-confidence motion will be  attempted with the aim of punishing the Liberal government for ineptitude on the gas plant cancellation portfolio is a stunt ─ and bad for Toronto.

The collapse of the provincial Liberals would not get Torontonians any closer to the things for which we need provincial involvement. Those important items include, but are not limited to, improved public transit, Queen's Park's eye on the ongoing Toronto casino debate and a reduction of sky-high auto insurance premiums, being pushed for by the New Democratic Party.

When the Liberal government prorogued the Legislature last October, the Tories, along with the NDP, condemned the government and accurately accused it of suspending democracy for partisan purposes. The Liberals said an over-heated environment was gridlocking progress at Queen's Park.

The Opposition noted prorogation, which came at the same time as the resignation of then-Premier Dalton McGuinty, gave the government an opportunity to avoid hearings into the gas plant scandal.
It also allowed the party to refresh itself with a new leader in a highly questionable way.

But since the legislative session has begun anew, the Tories have done little to nothing to reform the abuse of prorogation they stamped their feet so loudly about, even though it is wholly possible.

Photo/Saharalipour, Wikimedia Commons

By contrast, the NDP introduced legislation to fix the broken prorogation framework in Ontario.

Meanwhile, by pushing for a confidence motion on the very issue that arguably already contributed to the suspension of the Legislature for four months, the Tories are playing exactly the same cynical political games they accused the Liberals of in October.

Coupled together, the optics of this lack of interest in the reform of prorogation and the attempt to use a confidence motion to fall the government while gas plant committee hearings continue, is worrying.

And all of this before the Liberals unveil a budget May 2, which will provide a conventional opportunity for the government to test whether it has the confidence of the entire legislature.

With this gas plant-related non-confidence attempt, the Tim Hudak-led Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario is ignoring the needs of Torontonians.

Torontonians should ignore the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario during the next election ─ whenever that may be.