Ontario Conservative leader Tim Hudak’s’s New Deal for Ontario’s Public Sector is a very bad deal for everyday Ontarians. The Hudak slash and burn plan will decimate essential public services, throw thousands of people out of work, remove workers’ rights, tear up existing contracts, privatize public services, and make life less affordable in Ontario. Tim Hudak’s desire for a “flexible workforce” means a low wage and part-time workforce.
The Ontario Liberal Government’s austerity 2012 budget with its cuts to social services, public healthcare, education, public housing and infrastructure has already created hardship for many Ontarians and has increased the growing income inequality and poverty in our community and across the province.
This fall the Ontario Liberals with the support of the Hudak Conservatives passed Bill 115 removing the democratic collective bargaining rights of Ontario’s teachers and education workers. The Ontario Liberal Government has also prepared legislation that gives the Ontario cabinet sweeping powers to impose compensation contracts on all provincial public sector workers until 2017-18. It will allow the provincial cabinet to not only freeze wages but to roll them back, to change salary grids and non-wage benefits, and to bar unions from going on strike. And now Tim Hudak wants to tear up the existing contracts of Ontario public sector workers. This unconstitutional wage freeze scheme which has been championed by SDSG MPP Jim McDonell will be challenged in the courts as it denies the collective bargaining rights of Ontario public servants and will cost provincial taxpayers more in the long run when it is struck down by the courts.
As for Tim Hudak’s comments about privatizing the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) and the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) , the Ontario Government would be giving up billions of dollars each year in revenue to fund essential public services such as hospitals and schools. Last year the OLG gave $1.7 billion to the Ontario treasury and the LCBO contributed $1.6 billion to the province. Where is Tim Hudak going to find the money to make up this shortfall in revenue to pay for essential public services?
Ontario needs a progressive, prosperity, people’s budget in 2013 that creates good jobs, improves public healthcare, home care, long-term care and education, reduces poverty, makes life more affordable for everyday people, and provides a fairer tax system. We need a fairer tax system in Ontario to help pay for our vital public services and to reduce the growing income inequality in Ontario which is at a thirty year high.
The richest one per cent are taking home a bigger share of income growth than since the late 1920’s. Most middle income and low income families and seniors have not seen an increase in their real income in many years. Fifteen per cent of Ontario’s children still live in poverty. The Ontario Government should stop the corporate tax giveaways that don’t create jobs and ensure that the large, profitable corporations and the wealthiest one per cent pay their fair share of taxes. If the corporate tax cuts were restored to the 2009 level, if the wealthiest individuals earning more than $250,000 a year paid a two per cent surtax, and if tax loopholes were closed, billions of dollars would be raised by the provincial government each year.
By working together and putting our families and seniors first, we can stop the reckless public service cuts, defend our democratic and economic rights, create a people’s budget, and build a better, fairer, healthier Ontario where no one is left behind.
Brian Lynch,
President, SDSG Provincial NDP riding association.
