A Fish Stinks At It's Head...

...and there would not be a "Caledonia Issue" if Grand Chief McGoonty had done his job.

Activist a nagging thorn in Fantino's side

CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD

Kelly McParland: The high cost of Dalton McGuinty native terror

Posted: January 07, 2010, 4:00 PM by NP Editor
Filed under: Full Comment,Kelly McParland

I was wrong.

In my unbiased and evenhanded assault on Dalton McGuinty, I suggested we'd never know how much the Ontario premier had wasted making life miserable for an innocent couple caught in the crossfire of a native land dispute in Caledonia, a town near Hamilton.

This assertion was based on no research whatsoever, and appears to be wrong. Right here in the Toronto Star, one of my all-time favourite publications, the ridiculous cost is spelled out in nauseating detail:

HAMILTON–The taxpayer bill for the simmering land dispute with Six Nations protesters in Caledonia is $64.3 million and counting.

The running tab, according to Ontario's Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs, does not include $15.8 million the province paid for the former Douglas Creek Estates, which was seized and occupied on Feb. 28, 2006 by protesters from the nearby Six Nations reserve.

Ottawa kicked in $26.4 million to reimburse Queen's Park for the cost of purchasing the residential subdivision that was then under construction. The money included $10.6 million to offset extraordinary policing costs.

The tab also does not include the recent out-of-court settlement between the Ontario government and a Caledonia couple, Dana Chatwell and Dave Brown, who were suing the province and OPP for $7 million for abandoning them to the lawlessness that surrounded the disputed 27-hectare site adjacent to their home.

$64 million? Not including the original payment to the developers, and whatever the government eventually paid to Chatwell and Brown.

Well done, Dalton McGuinty. A responsible use of taxpayers' money, no question at all.

National Post

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Kelly McParland: The high cost of Dalton McGuinty native terror
Posted: January 07, 2010, 4:00 PM by NP Editor

I was wrong.

In my unbiased and evenhanded assault on Dalton McGuinty, I suggested we'd never know how much the Ontario premier had wasted making life miserable for an innocent couple caught in the crossfire of a native land dispute in Caledonia, a town near Hamilton.

This assertion was based on no research whatsoever, and appears to be wrong. Right here in the Toronto Star, one of my all-time favourite publications, the ridiculous cost is spelled out in nauseating detail:

HAMILTON–The taxpayer bill for the simmering land dispute with Six Nations protesters in Caledonia is $64.3 million and counting.

The running tab, according to Ontario's Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs, does not include $15.8 million the province paid for the former Douglas Creek Estates, which was seized and occupied on Feb. 28, 2006 by protesters from the nearby Six Nations reserve.

Ottawa kicked in $26.4 million to reimburse Queen's Park for the cost of purchasing the residential subdivision that was then under construction. The money included $10.6 million to offset extraordinary policing costs.

The tab also does not include the recent out-of-court settlement between the Ontario government and a Caledonia couple, Dana Chatwell and Dave Brown, who were suing the province and OPP for $7 million for abandoning them to the lawlessness that surrounded the disputed 27-hectare site adjacent to their home.

$64 million? Not including the original payment to the developers, and whatever the government eventually paid to Chatwell and Brown.

Well done, Dalton McGuinty. A responsible use of taxpayers' money, no question at all.

National Post

Queens Park Babble

What you hear not always what you get

November 27, 2009

Jim Coyle

Friday, 200 or so high school students will visit Queen's Park as part of Local Democracy Week. If all goes well, this will be one of the most formative experiences of their young lives.

To make the most of the visit, we offer the following advice. In addition, of course, to suggesting they be very careful during that game of "political speed dating" that's on the agenda.

First, "parliament" is derived from the word "talk." Words are the currency here. They have enormous power. Pay them great heed.

So important is every word uttered on the precincts, so carefully are they chosen, that we always encourage novice reporters to get up to speed by reviewing Hansard transcripts starting from Confederation.

(The bright ones usually don't get much farther than World War I before the penny drops.)

Second, on no account be fooled during your visit by any snores emanating from press gallery offices.

Therein dwell hyper-alert specialists expert in the business of analyzing and interpreting the millions of words that pass yearly across their consciousness. To be sure, no Cold War Kremlinologist was more expert at piercing the facade of calculated misdirection and concealment.

Let's take a recent example – the proposed harmonization of Ontario's retail sales tax with the federal GST.

But for heaven's sakes, kids, don't try this at home. Not everyone is qualified to follow this debate. What seems clear to the untutored can turn out to be a cruel mirage.

For instance, here's Premier Dalton McGuinty in recent months and years on the matter of harmonizing the federal and provincial taxes:

"I'm not going to be harmonizing our taxes."

"My concern about harmonization is we would have to add PST to so many consumer items that are presently exempt."

"Harmonization of those two taxes would lead to a net increase in taxes for the province of Ontario and for Ontarians."

To ever get his support, harmonization would have to be revenue neutral not just from a government perspective but "from an Ontario consumer perspective."

Nothing could be clearer, you might say.

Now, let's consider PC Leader Tim Hudak's view on the same matter:

"There's little sense in allowing two separate governments to apply two separate taxes and policies and collect two separate groups of sales taxes."

"We understand how that (harmonization) can help the economy."

And, for the sake of further clarification, former interim PC leader Bob Runciman:

"Our party is supportive of harmonization."

"We think it's something that should occur."

At least as clear a stand as the premier's.

As to the value of holding public hearings on matters of public importance, McGuinty had chosen his words carefully there, too.

"Public hearings: those words go together nicely if you believe in true democracy."

So, as anyone can see, it's clear that Dalton McGuinty opposes the HST, Tim Hudak supports it, and the premier is insisting on public hearings into it.

And that's where you separate the amateurs from the trained professionals.

The learned know that, in fact, McGuinty is committed to the HST, Hudak's against it, and the premier is refusing public hearings.

Which brings us to the last thing the students should know.

No one is really equipped to cover politics without first having read Lewis Carroll's, Through the Looking Glass.

"When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean," said Humpty Dumpty. "Neither more, nor less."

And that, kids, is why most political journalists have IQs of genius level and make upwards of $2 million a year. Because, around this place, you just can't believe everything you hear.

Harder And Harder TO Find Those Who Voted For Change

HST could be a game changer

Goldstein: Premier Dalton McGuinty has certainly come up with a novel way of selling his 13% Harmonized Sales Tax to Ontarians, coming everywhere July 1. His messaging appears to be: "You're too stupid to know this tax is good for you.. MORE...

....not angry enough

Harmonized tax does it -- Ontarians are getting angry

Woodcock: There's a famous phrase attributed to Marie Antoinette which has popped into my head a lot lately. When told her people couldn't afford bread, she is supposed to have replied: "Let them eat cake." MORE...

Dulltoon/Duncan Seems To Have Taken The Advice

Should Have Gotten Rid Of Smitherman Sooner

McGuinty directly tied to hiring of ex-eHealth CEO: auditor

Lack of oversight and broken rules fed eHealth fiasco

Thu Oct 08 2009

The following is excerpted from the statement delivered at a news conference Wednesday by provincial Auditor General Jim McCarter on the subject of spending by eHealth Ontario and its predecessor agency:

In all Fairness Us Harrisites Have ToShare Some Of The Blame

$1B waste of money: McCarter

By ANTONELLA ARTUSO, JONATHAN JENKINS AND BRYN WEESE, QUEEN'S PARK BUREAU

eHealth Ontario is eXpensive, eMbarrassing, eNraging and, for Health Minister David Caplan, the eNd.

Full Story

Here Is Another One

Gambling on a power plant

By CHRISTINA BLIZZARD, SUN MEDIA

It's one thing to allow the scandal-plagued Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) to continue to sell lottery tickets.

Another Balloon From The PROMISING Premier

'Green' jobs and red ink

By SUN MEDIA

With news Ontario is negotiating with South Korea's Samsung Group for wind turbines and solar panels in a deal Energy Minister George Smitherman says could bring billions of dollars of investment and hundreds of green jobs to the province, we have some questions.

They also apply to the 50,000 "new" green jobs Smitherman and Premier Dalton McGuinty claim Ontario's Green Energy Act will create over the next three years.

First, does this mean 50,000 more jobs before or after jobs losses in the traditional energy sector are subtracted?

Second, how many of these jobs will be permanent?

Third, what will be the taxpayer subsidy per job created?

Fourth, how long will these subsidies last?

Fifth, what impact will this have on electricity rates?

These days, politicians routinely predict huge job gains by "going green" in a process that appears to consist of little more than pulling numbers out of a hat.

Of course, governments can create as many green jobs as they want by subsidizing renewable energy at rates high enough to attract private investors. Typically, this means subsidies at least twice as high as what they now pay for power.

But these "new" jobs won't contribute to economic prosperity if the result is skyrocketing electricity rates, massive, ongoing public subsidies and job losses in the traditional energy sector. All that, in fact, will hurt our economy.

Spain is a global leader in renewable energy, but a recent study by economics professor Gabriel Calzada Alvarez of Madrid's Juan Carlos University found it lost at least 2.2 jobs elsewhere in the economy for every green job created and only one in 10 green jobs was permanent.

The estimated cost to taxpayers for every green job created was 571,138 euros, over $900,000 Canadian. The estimated cost for every wind industry job created was over one million euros -- over $1.5 million Canadian.

The Spanish government, unsurprisingly, has called Alvarez's study "simplistic" and argued its own data suggests a rosier picture.

But it doesn't change the question -- what does McGuinty mean by claiming 50,000 new green jobs in three years?

Or is the claim, in fact, meaningless?

Definative Comment From No New Tac McGoonty

George 'not going anywhere'

By JONATHAN JENKINS, QUEEN'S PARK BUREAU

Furious George isn't going anywhere -- yet.

Those Who Voted For Change Will Say It Is Only $3500.....

....but it says volumes about the attitude of many politicians, bureaucrats and civil servants.

A $3,500 exercise in flawed symbolism TheStar.com - Canada - A $3,500 exercise in flawed symbolism

August 28, 2009

Jim Coyle

What we have here is a failure to learn The Lessons of the Choco-Bites.

This week, Premier Dalton McGuinty summoned his Liberal caucus in from their summer frolics to attend a daylong meeting on, among other things, how to market his proposed harmonized sales tax.

Oddly, though Queen's Park is a summertime ghost town, its corridors an echoing emptiness, McGuinty did not hold this meeting in the government caucus room so generously provided in the Legislature building by taxpayers.

Nor did he find adequate to his tastes any of the many other rooms vacant around government precincts, which if not quite up to the Palace of Versailles are at least the equal of most hotel conference centres on the airport strip.

Instead, the caucus meeting was convened at the Toronto Board of Trade down on Bay St.

In the real-estate biz, the holy trinity is said to be location, location, location. In the image-obsessed political racket, it's symbolism, symbolism, symbolism.

So just what did the premier's choice of setting say?

First, for an initiative frequently billed as "bold," this was hardly a courageous expedition. The harmonized tax has long been a fond cause of the business community. It's doubtful that Liberals arriving in the heartland of HST support had a single chance encounter with a mind that needed changing.

How much bolder would it have been, say, to have met in the conference room of a suburban hockey complex, or the party room of a seniors' residence – the better to show a willingness to make the case for the new tax to folks who seem to have the deepest misgivings about it.

But there was a higher imperative at play. The McGuinty brain trust wants to demonstrate its pro-business bona fides. It also appears to be a little twitchy at the skittishness over the tax among government MPPs.

It was probably to keep potential caucus grumblers a little farther from meddlesome reporters that the meeting was held off site, and that the diversionary tactic of a premier's event was scheduled uptown at about the same time MPPs were arriving downtown.

Whatever the goal, it was apparently worth paying for. As the Star's Robert Benzie learned yesterday, the Liberal caucus paid $3,500 for the privilege of using the Bay St. space.

Which brings us back to the Choco-Bites.

That dubious $3.99 confection that one eHealth Ontario consultant already billing the province for $2,700 a day saw fit to also expense to taxpayers. The junk food that became shorthand for the spending fiasco for which the premier came to take ultimate responsibility.

What McGuinty said when new rules were announced for contracting and expense procedures was that "common sense" was called for in these matters. In fact, he set a new gold standard for appraising expenditures.

"If you couldn't sit down in front of a family at the breakfast table and say, `I'm submitting the bill for this or for that,' and look them straight in the eye then maybe you shouldn't be submitting that bill."

As it happens, the $3,500 bill to rent the Board of Trade space while government meeting rooms were vacant could have covered a lot.

It would cover about 350 hours' pay at minimum wage. It would cover the proposed HST rebate to several Ontario families.

It could even have covered the daily fees of an eHealth Ontario consultant, or about 14 per cent of a speech by the agency's former CEO, or a Willy Wonka-worthy mountain of Choco Bites.

But one thing's clear. Odds are the premier didn't vet the room rental past any Ontario breakfast table.