Doug Ford Archives - Page 9 of 10

Cabinet ministers in Ontario’s Progressive Conservative government have insisted throughout the pandemic that when they close schools or businesses they are guided by science and following the evidence.

But they have ignored the evidence when it comes to regulating political advertising.

The government recalled the legislature in June to tighten restraints on pre-election ad spending by so-called “third parties” (advocacy groups other than political parties).

The old law let groups spend up to $600,000 in the six months before the official starting date of the election campaigns. The new law extends the time to spend $600,000 to 12 months prior to an election kickoff.

The government lost a court decision when a judge decided the $600,000 cap over 12 months was an unconstitutional curb on the “freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression” in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Days later the Conservatives deployed the Charter’s rarely used Section 33 — the “notwithstanding clause” — in a bill to overrule the court.

The opposition parties voted against the bill, probably figuring they benefit from more ads that attack Conservatives. But essentially the opposition and the government agree. They all agree the new law will reduce the influence of election ads, and they all think voters are naïve and gullible.

The government house leader in the Legislature, Paul Calandria, compared spending by the PCs’ opponents with American super PACs, the corporate and union political action committees that spend limitless funds supporting or attacking election candidates.

Without tighter limits on third-party spending, Calandria asserted, “a few wealthy elites, corporations and special interest groups… would be allowed to interfere in and control our elections with unlimited money….”

By reversing his government’s court defeat, premier Doug Ford said he’s “protecting democracy.” But from what?

There is no evidence the public needs protection from political ads because the ads don’t work.

The New York Times columnist David Brooks cites U.S. research showing “in state and national elections” there is “barely any relationship between more spending and a bigger victory.” The evidence Brooks cites found that if one candidate ran 1,000 more commercials than an opponent it translated into “a paltry 0.19 per cent” advantage in the results.

The authors of the book “Negative Campaigning,” political scientists Richard R. Lau of Rutgers University and Gerald M. Pomper of Princeton University, reviewed more than 100 studies and experiments conducted during U.S. elections, concluding that “advertising, negative or positive, appears ineffective at increasing turnout or persuading voters.”

After carrying out experiments during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, University of Rhode Island political scientists Liam C. Malloy and Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz concluded, “…Negative advertising appears to never be effective in either increasing a candidate’s margin of victory or driving up turnout for the candidate or driving down turnout for the competition.”

Like other paid advertising, people bypass political ads. Commercials, radio spots and print ads for all kinds of products are failing to deliver. A University of Southern California professor, Gerard J. Tellis, analyzed 750 studies on advertising effectiveness published between 1960 and 2008 and found a 10% increase in ad spending led to only a 1% increase in sales.

Updated research shows ad effectiveness continues to descend.

Sales would rise by only 1% if a firm doubled its TV advertising, according to a study published this year by University of Chicago researchers. They focused on 288 popular consumer goods such as Diet Coke and Bounty paper towels, concluding that the return on investment was negative for many products. Companies spent more on commercials than they earned back in additional sales.

Voters don’t need government protection from election advertising. They are protecting themselves. Around the globe, hundreds of millions have downloaded ad blockers. Voters also have natural defence systems against incoming political missiles. In a national poll in 2011 for the Advertising Standards Council of Canada, 57 per cent said most advertising is truthful, but just 30 per cent said the same about political advertising.

When they make policies about Covid-19 — or about political advertising — politicians should follow the evidence.

—–

Marc Zwelling is the founder of the Vector Poll™ (www.vectorresearch.com) and author of Public Opinion and Polling For Dummies, published by Wiley (2012) and Ideas and Innovation for Dummies (Wiley, 2021).

The views, opinions and positions expressed by columnists and contributors are the author’s alone. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of our publication.

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I have three unrelated observations to start this campaign.

Here’s the first:

We’ve all heard how politics makes strange bedfellows – but in the 2021 federal election, so far what’s strangest is how the current bedfellows are an exact inverting of the 2019 script.

Whereas in 2019, Justin Trudeau ran – hard – against Ontario Premier Doug Ford, in 2021 we read The Star’s Rob Benzie reporting that there is a “nonaggression pact” between the federal Grits and the provincial Tories.

But it’s more than a ceasefire; is there an actual alliance at play here?

The first sign was when federal Conservative leader Erin O’Toole was in a bind to start the campaign, walking into the trap set by the Liberals over mandatory vaccines. As O’Toole sputtered to clarify his position – ahem, not unlike Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath, who wanted to try out all the positions before settling on the right one – Ford put out hints that he would unveil mandatory vaccines in Ontario’s health-care settings and in schools.

He then did so, more or less.

As O’Toole launched his platform, a central component of which is to end the Liberals’ agreements with various provinces to deliver childcare, Ford’s education minister was hinting Ontario could reach a deal with the feds to deliver the Liberals’ signature social program.

Here’s the second:

Having canvassed for four Liberal candidates in the Greater Toronto Area – North York, Newmarket and Etobicoke – I have a pretty direct observation.

The gender gap right now is wild. Even doors that our canvassing data management app, Liberalist, says should be historically Liberal come with a wrinkle: the “man of the house” is very grumpy about Trudeau. The rest of the family is still Liberal, but the male of the species is going to shut the door or not-so-politely shoo you off his lawn.

There’s always been a gender gap, but this time it seems pronounced beyond anything I’ve previously experienced.

How will the Liberals look to correct their standing amongst men? Is it about fiscal probity? Is it about something that helps pocketbooks? I’m stereotyping here, because the policy solution seems less effective than just the fact that there is something about this PM and his government that men of a certain age… resent.

As a senior Tory friend said, the one thing the Liberals have going for them is that it’s not clear that these men are inclined to vote for O’Toole just yet. Moreover, O’Toole – notwithstanding his strange Mr Clean slash Men’s Health slash Bouncer at a Gay Bar (to quote Jenni Bryne) platform cover photo – is not working to shore up his support with women. Again, a stereotype, but he is deliberately poking many women in the eye with his vow to “pull a Harper” and cancel childcare.

The final observation:

The Conservative ad is an image of a boxer punching Canadians with red gloves, hitting us with debt and high house prices. But then the solution this image demands is B-roll of some guy who I know to be O’Toole but not everyone does, and then “vote Conservative”. It’s an interesting opening, then followed by not a lot of anything.

The Liberal ad, on the contrary, is all about how Canadians worked together with the Liberals in their corner to get through the pandemic, narrated by a smiling, familiar Trudeau.

Obviously, both messages can’t be true. But at least the Liberal one features the leader.

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Ontario’s political parties have a bad spending habit, but they don’t have to pay for it because taxpayers get stuck with their political welfare scheme.

In Ontario, political parties are given millions from the pockets of hardworking taxpayers through a system referred to as the per-vote subsidy.

This money does not go toward funding their official government office expenses at the provincial legislature. Taxpayers are already on the hook for those expenses.

The political welfare money goes to partisan political parties so they can spend it on anything they want. This includes attack ads, lawn signs, and partisan offices for party bigwigs.

When he was running for office in 2018, Premier Doug Ford promised to scrap Ontario’s political welfare system. Instead, he’s only made it stronger. Ford has also teamed up with other party leaders to have taxpayers give politicians a $10 million payday loan by taking future subsidies before the next election.

Disclosures from 2020 reveal that Ontario’s four major political parties spent a combined $15 million on partisan expenses to help run their political arms.

While Ontario’s political parties might try to claim that they’re the ones footing the bill, the truth is that political welfare payments means that these expenses are being paid in large part by taxpayers.

That’s because the province funnels over $12 million of our hard-earned money to Ontario’s political parties every year. And it’s not as though political operatives are toiling in austere sweatshops. Even a quick glance at their spending shows they don’t need taxpayer charity.

Last year, Ontario’s governing Progressive Conservative Party spent $191,145 on “meetings hosted.” Perhaps the PCs could find a way to spend less than $500 per day hosting meetings.

Ontario’s NDP managed to spend $84,175 on postage in 2020. That’s more than three times as much as the PCs and Liberals spent on stamps combined. Hasn’t the NDP heard of email?

As for the Ontario Liberals, the party with eight MPPs somehow managed to spend $134,790 on office furniture and equipment expenses. Just how many people does a party that no longer has official party status need working at party headquarters?

While some may argue that Ontario’s politicians need to have some of their office expenses covered, taxpayers already spend millions covering the cost of official government offices. Every MPP at Queen’s Park already gets $299,000 to pay for their official offices each year, courtesy of Ontario taxpayers.

With all this wasteful spending, political parties, not Ontario taxpayers, should pick up the tab in funding any non-official expenses. That means ending political welfare.

All four of Ontario’s major political parties have come out in support of party subsidies. They rely on taxpayer dollars to pay their bills. Taxpayer subsidies account for more than half of total income for the PCs, NDP, Liberals, and Greens.

But whenever one calls into question the political welfare system in Ontario, the parties get apoplectic.

“There has to be a way of funding democracy,” said NDP leader Andrea Horwath.

Horwath and other party leaders continuously claim that their parties would be unable to survive and operate at full capacity if the province’s political welfare regime would go the way of the dodo bird.

Nonetheless, these reckless expenses indicate that all four parties have plenty of room for savings. And, 10 years after the federal government repealed political welfare at the federal level, national political fundraising continues to hit new records.

Parties can survive and thrive without handouts.

It’s time to take the cake away from Ontario’s politicians. It’s time to end political welfare.

Jay Goldberg is the Interim Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

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While Ontario’s college and university employees have been busy cashing in on massive pay hikes during the pandemic, taxpayers and tuition-paying students have been barely getting by.

The newly minted minister responsible for universities and colleges, Jill Dunlop, now has a full knapsack of homework to do on this expensive file.

With a $33-billion deficit, the number one job of all of Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s newly shuffled cabinet ministers should be to find savings within their departments.

In Dunlop’s case, there are plenty of savings to be found.

Consider the numbers from Ontario’s three largest universities: the University of Toronto, York University, and the University of Waterloo.

At the University of Toronto, the number of employees making more than $100,000 ballooned by 8.9 per cent in 2020.

York University and the University of Waterloo also saw significant increases of 7.8 per cent and 5 per cent, respectively.

But as university employees were enjoying raises, everyday taxpayers were losing their jobs. The province lost 355,300 net jobs in 2020. At the end of last year, Ontario’s unemployment rate stood at 9.6 per cent.

The numbers go from bad to worse for students.

Young workers, aged 15 to 24, saw the most significant job losses of any demographic group in the province last year, according to Ontario’s Financial Accountability Office.

For every worker over the age of 25 who lost their job last year, five workers under the age of 25 lost theirs.

Despite these massive job losses, Ontario’s students can expect higher costs when they return to school in the fall, while Ontario taxpayers will be forced to pay for the province’s bloated post-secondary salary tab.

Ontario’s universities spend well over half of their budgets paying their employees.

Compensation accounted for 61 per cent of the University of Toronto’s 2020 budget, 68 per cent of York University’s, and 62 per cent of the University of Waterloo’s.

How does that affect government spending?

The province of Ontario currently spends more than $10 billion annually on post-secondary education.

Based on our province’s three biggest universities, Ontario will spend anywhere from $6.2 billion to $7.0 billion on university employee pay this year.

In addition, the Ontario government’s post-secondary budget has increased by $2.4 billion over the past five years, suggesting that employee wages and benefits were responsible for growing the budget by about $1.5 billion.

With a $33-billion deficit, Ontario cannot afford billions of dollars in pay hikes.

As a new minister bringing a fresh perspective to the colleges and universities ministry, now is the time for Dunlop to show leadership.

That leadership should begin by tackling these outrageous wage hikes.

The Ford government has introduced legislation that, on its face, attempts to rein in extravagant salaries and benefits by capping government employee wage increases at one per cent per year.

However, the legislation has far too many loopholes. It allows raises greater than one per cent for length of employment, performance assessments, and the completion of further education.

In addition, as far as the colleges and universities ministry is concerned, limiting pay increases to one per cent simply doesn’t go far enough.

It’s time for pay cuts.

Dunlop can work with Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy to reduce the deficit by cutting wages in the colleges and universities ministry and closing the loopholes that are facilitating these extravagant annual raises.

It’s simply unfair to keep asking students and taxpayers to pay higher costs to allow those who work for the government to avoid sharing in the burden of tackling the disaster that is Ontario’s finances.

For too long, Ontario governments have allowed the province’s deficit to get out of control by refusing to make tough decisions.

It’s time for Dunlop and the Ford government to act.

Jay Goldberg is the Interim Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

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Ontario Premier Doug Ford blamed the pandemic when he broke his election promise and increased per-vote subsidies for political parties. It was wrong then. Now that Ford has presented a path to reopen the economy, it’s definitely time for him to shut the door on political welfare.

When he was running for office during the 2018 provincial election, Ford rightly promised to scrap per-vote party subsidies.

“I do not believe the government should be taking money from hard working taxpayers and giving it to political parties,” said Ford.

Ford was voicing his objections to the political welfare regime the Wynne Liberals introduced in 2014.

Under the Liberal plan, political parties received an annual 55-cent payment for every vote they received in the most recent provincial election. Wynne’s Liberals cashed in on over $4 million from taxpayers between 2014 and 2018.

Ford promised things would be different.

“Everyone in the province is frustrated,” said Ford. “The party is over with taxpayers’ money.”

Yet in Ford’s first two years in office, his Progressive Conservative government failed to scrap the political welfare scheme.

Then, in February, after Ontarians had endured nearly a year of the pandemic and the economic hardship that accompanied it, Attorney General Doug Downey announced that, rather than keeping Ford’s promise by eliminating political welfare, the government would break the promise and expand the political subsidy.

Downey’s legislation increased the per-vote subsidy by another eight cents.

With Ford’s PCs having garnered over 2.3 million votes in the 2018 election, the enhanced subsidy means that the governing party is entitled to over $1.46 million between now and the next election.

Downey attempted to justify the Ford government’s about face by claiming that political parties needed help amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

“COVID came along, and we want to make sure that we have good, vigorous debate here in Ontario,” said Downey.

There’s 800,000 unemployed Ontarians laying awake worrying about their finances. How many taxpayers do you think are currently worried about politicians not having enough money to fund their political attack ads and lawn signs?

Downey also insinuated that “vigorous” debate could only occur in the province if taxpayers are forced to hand over millions of dollars to political parties.

But party fundraising data shows that Ontario’s political parties are doing just fine.

The PCs raised over $4.5 million in 2020. That’s just 10 per cent less than pre-pandemic levels. Meanwhile, the provincial Liberals tripled their fundraising last year. How many businesses wish their revenues only declined by 10 per cent? How many have achieved a 300 per cent increase?

If Ford’s PCs want to make sure Ontario has a “vigorous” pre-election political debate, $4.5 million will pay for more than enough campaign ads.

Further, political parties also benefit from extremely generous donor tax credits, even before they rake in their per-vote subsidies.

For instance, a voter who donates $1,000 to an Ontario political party receives a $607 tax credit. If that voter donates $1,000 to the Red Cross, the provincial tax credit is $99.

Does Ford truly believe political attacks ads are six times more valuable than the Red Cross?

On top of all of that, politicians get 20 per cent of their campaign expenses refunded by the government, meaning they’re paid for by you, the taxpayer.

Given the government used the pandemic to justify breaking its promise to scrap per-vote subsidies, it’s time for the province to unveil a new plank of Ontario’s reopening plan: scrapping political welfare.

With the election less than a year away, it’s time for Ford to take his first baby step towards getting off the gravy train and scrap the political welfare.

Jay Goldberg is the Interim Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

Photo Credit: The Canadian Press

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Ontario Premier Doug Ford has less than a year to make good on the affordability agenda he promised voters while on the campaign trail.

“We have a very simple theory,” said Ford. “Put money back into the taxpayers’ pocket instead of the government’s pocket, because we believe that the taxpayers are a lot smarter at spending their money than the government.”

Ford’s message hit home with hardworking taxpayers after fifteen years of tax hikes.

The Progressive Conservatives’ platform laid out several promises on tax relief, but three were emphasized throughout the campaign: refundable tax credits for child care, lower gas prices and a middle-class income tax cut.

Three years in, Ford’s record of keeping promises is mixed at best.

On the positive side, Ford kept his commitment to make child care more affordable.

Rather than pursuing top-down, government-run child-care program, Ford introduced a flexible refundable tax credit to let parents recoup more of their tax dollars. This program covers many different kinds of child-care costs so that parents, not bureaucrats, can decide what is best for their children.

Ford also kept part of his promise to reduce gas taxes by 4.4 cents per litre through scrapping cap-and-trade carbon tax and 5.6 cents per litre through lowering the gas excise tax.

Ford immediately repealed the provincial carbon tax. Ottawa offset that tax cut by imposing the federal carbon tax, but Ford deserves credit for fighting the feds tooth and nail.

But Ontarians are still waiting for part two of the plan to reduce gas prices, the 5.6 cents per litre excise tax cut.

Ontario drivers are paying 48 cents per litre in taxes when they fill up their gas tanks, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation’s 2021 Gas Tax Honest Day report.

Had Ford fully implemented his gas tax promise on day one, a typical family filling up their minivan once a week would have already saved about $655 at the pumps.

While Ford has helped reduce child-care costs and done some good work on gas prices, taxpayers are still waiting for the promised middle-class tax cut.

Had the Ford government fulfilled its income tax cut promise on day one, taxpayers could have saved up to $2,300 over the past three years.

There are those that will argue that Ontario’s budget deficit should stop Ford from implementing his affordability agenda.

After years of overspending, the Ford government can easily find the necessary savings to return more money to taxpayers without inflating the deficit.

Ford’s promised gas and income tax relief would return a little more than $3 billion into taxpayers’ pockets every year.

To find savings, the best place to start would be to ask government bureaucrats to live in the real world like the rest of us.

Government employees in Ontario are paid roughly 10 per cent more than their counterparts outside of government. And while many outside of government have taken pay cuts or lost their jobs, the list of provincial bureaucrats that make more than $100,000 has increased by 23 per cent.

Reducing bureaucrat salaries by five per cent would save $3.6 billion every year, more than enough to offset the impact of Ford’s promised tax cuts.

Ford should also save money by ending corporate welfare, which was another campaign promise that the government has yet to live up to.

“Corporate welfare is wrong,” said Ford in 2018.

Yet, in the first three years in office, this government has handed over tens of millions of dollars to wealthy corporations like the Ford Motor Company and Maple Leaf Foods.

That money should stay in taxpayers’ wallets, instead of being siphoned off into the bank accounts of corporations.

The bottom line is that Ford has plenty of options to allow him to implement his affordability agenda without growing the deficit.

With less than a year until the next election, taxpayers expect Ford to live up to the promises that got him elected in the first place and provide much needed relief.

The clock is ticking.

Photo Credit: The Canadian Press

Jay Goldberg is a syndicated columnist and the Interim Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

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