Mapping out the year we are now into. What can the citizens of the City expect during 2025?
Chaos? Prosperity?
2025 is the year before the current Council has to seek re-election. The 2026 budget will be a lot different than what we saw in 2025. Both staff and Council are fully aware of BRAG and the impact they had on the 2025.
Eric Stern, spokes person for BRAG with a copy of the Proposed 2025 budget.
What were those impacts? There will be a budget book much earlier in the year and the words “budget impact” may be forgotten.
The Bateman Community Centre is expected to open in 2025 – nothing is ever certain with this site – when it does open expect a significant change in how the City and Brock University make use of the site.
“In 2022, Indigenous individuals made up 17% of firearm-related homicide victims in Canada, with higher rates for rifles and shotguns (40%) compared to handguns (7.6%). This percentage is over three times their representation in the general population (5%).
Additionally, women represent close to 9 in 10 victims of firearm-related violent crimes committed by an intimate partner. At the same time, men aged 18 to 24 are most likely to be victims of firearm-related violent crimes.
Measures to reduce access to firearms are expected to have a higher impact in rural areas, and western provinces, which experience firearm-related crimes at a higher rate compared to the rest of Canada.” (The Canada Gazette)
The federal government has finally introduced regulations prohibiting assault weapons – essentially automatic and semi-automatic firearms. These weapons are designed for war – only for killing people en mass. They have no other purpose. And no respectable hunter would lower themselves to using an automatic weapon to bring down their prey. Among other things these weapons were not designed for accuracy, but rather to kill the enemy with a barrage of bullet projectiles.
In 2020 the manufacture and importation of over 1500 assault rifles was banned but that didn’t apply to those weapons already in circulation in Canada. So that is now the subject of the new regulations prohibiting the use or transport of over 2000 models and variants.
Guns that have been deactivated.
Current owners have been given an amnesty period, until October 2025, to come into compliance. Owners, including gun shop operators may send these weapons back or export them out of the country. They could surrender them to the government for fair compensation, or have them deactivated at a government-approved gun shop at government expense.
During the amnesty these weapons are not to be fired, the lone exception being indigenous and others who can demonstrate that they hunt for sustenance. They may still continue to use the weapons for that purpose until October 2025. The federal government has been in consultation with Ukrainian officials about forwarding surrendered weapons, to assist them in the defence of their country against the Russian invasion.
The government is treading very carefully in this initiative after a false start on gun control last year and, of course, the long gun registry which became a politicized hot potato for the Chretien Liberals. Although police forces everywhere applauded that registry, it’s tough minded implementation, including a hefty registration fee and potential prison sentences for those out of compliance, turned the registry into just another east-west political football.
Typical rife found in thousands of barns across the country.
Police noted that the registry was extremely helpful when approaching a domestic dispute since long guns were a primary vehicle for domestic homicide. The Quebec government tried to retain the data collected in that province, even after Mr. Harper had shut down the registry. But Harper won the right in court to destroy all the information that had been collected.
We can expect the western red-necks to once again yell and scream that this is just another ideological move by a ‘woke’ government. They will complain that such a regulation violates their freedom and human rights. Indigenous hunters will complain that they will need to trade up/down for single shot magazine rifles. And gun shop owners will once again bellyache that they’ve been caught off guard by another draconian action of an anti-hunting government.
Mr. Poilievre has unsurprisingly jumped into the fray promising to reverse this as well as everything else the Liberals have done. The NDP, with much of their support in the western provinces, are between a rock and hard place. They know this is the right step for public safety in a civilized modern nation, but their western base is dead opposed to any more gun control.
Mikhail Kalashnikov and the gun he invented.
Perhaps it all comes down to what kind of society we want and what we expect of government. Should we allow military grade weapons in the public domain? Are we prepared to tolerate the kinds of consequences we see in the US where assault firearms are everywhere and mass shootings the order of the day? Or is public safety more important than someone’s trophy M16 or AK47. Also known as the Kalashnikov, the 47 today ranks as the deadliest, most prevalent and most game-changing individually wielded weapon in the history of military armament.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
The annual Climate Change Congress of the Parties (COP 29) held this year in Azerbaijan has concluded in uncertainty, discontent and pessimism. Pessimism is what every single one of those delegates should be feeling about the future of the planet we are leaving for our offspring. The global community has completely failed to halt the advance of global climate warming and with it the ravages of climate change.
Climate Change Congress of the Parties (COP 29)
It’s the fossil fuels and, like an addict on heroin, we are unable to put down the syringe. And the rush from this drug, fossil fuels, will continue for almost a millennium. The worlds largest producer of oil, the USA, emits just over 10% of global annual GHG emissions but accounts historically for the majority of all that stuff still up there. That unfortunate record is due to be broken one day soon by the world’s second largest economy and its most significant polluter.
China is still using coal
China, currently at 30% of global GHG annual emissions, is still building coal burning plants. In fact it had initiated 95% of all global coal plant construction in 2023. Ironically, it is also the leader in renewable technologies and electric vehicles. The country is claiming it’ll be carbon neutral by 2060. But only a blind optimist would buy that given its GHG emissions increased almost 5% last year, 15% faster than the rest of the world.
There is discontent among the smaller nations, including those island states which will eventually disappear into the ever rising oceans. Many of these less developed countries (LDC) are relatively small contributors to global emissions, certainly compared to China the US and Europe. But they are at the table, though it seems more like a trough. If money is for the taking, they want in – the only reason they used all those carbon credits getting there.
The COP process used to be about reducing emission reductions with a little cash on the side to help those LDCs in need. But it has morphed into an income redistribution exercise and a money grab. $100 billion was promised in 2009 and this year the ante was upped to $300 billion. Still the ask was for two or three trillion big ones. Delegates from less developed nations are calling it a paltry sum, but nobody is leaving money on the table. And how does India, with the fifth largest global economy and fourth largest military have the nerve to claim access to that COP money?
COP has lost its way. The 1990’s Kyoto protocol was the best chance to get global cooperation and action on reductions.
COP has lost its way. The 1990’s Kyoto protocol was the best chance to get global cooperation and action on reductions. But then GW Bush, the oil president, pulled the rug out and it was drill baby drill. Obama helped create the voluntary Paris Agreement in a faint hope to limit the earth’s temperature increase to below 1.5 degrees. But then the 2016 Donald took his baseball and went home. Though he is coming back and now threatening to take the ball diamond as well.
In any case it is probably too late for incremental emissions reductions, emission targets and all that bureaucratic stuff. Many have already decided we’re at the 10th stage of grief – acceptance. The oil companies may have lost the battle to discredit climate scientists since their predictions are ringing in close to home. But big oil appears to have won the war anyway. That 1.5 degree tipping point is now within sight – possibly as early as next year. And so the Paris Agreement will also have failed.
The demographic that is going to have to live with the results of COP29
So the discussion at these annual mega-groupies has turned to something else – welfare for those less developed nations in their struggle to adapt. COP is not really about emissions reductions for LDCs since if they can afford fossil energy they can easily afford the less costly renewable energy option. And these less developed nations typically are not the heavy polluters anyway. Even Canada, which has the tenth largest global economy and is the fourth largest oil producer, still only contributes less than 2% to the problem.
Russia has decided to ignore the world and fall back to it’s nasty environmentally dirty old imperial ways. The holy land has become one big carbon emitting battlefield. And China, already the world’s dirtiest polluter will continue to pollute, as we in North America continue to buy their manufactured goods, thus making ourselves complicit. The USA will once again face a neoconservative ideological agenda promising “drill baby drill” and an end to new renewables. Canada is almost certainly to follow if the opinion polls are right – Ontario already has.
Humble beggar
40% of India’s installed electrical power capacity came from non-fossil fuel sources in 2021. It already has among the lowest emissions per capita in the world. And perhaps that alone, reducing its carbon footprint when wealthier nations are floundering, is a good enough reason to reward India by letting it dine at the beggar’s banquet. And, no humble beggar, the Indian delegation was one of the loudest voices demanding more money at this COP.
It was symbolic that the last two annual COP meetings were hosted by nations heavily dependant on oil revenues for their GDP. This year the host was the autocratic and highly repressive former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan which obtains 90% of its foreign income from the black gold. That country’s president kicked off the COP by setting the tone. He lectured that oil was a gift from God.
The head of France’s delegation went home after the Azerbaijani president insulted France and Holland over their colonial policies. The Argentine president brought his entire delegation home after only three days, probably as a symbol to please his new pal the American president-elect. It was chaos and there were also reports of others leaving in droves like rats abandoning a sinking ship. And no one should wonder why.
Ray Rivers has worked on the climate change challenge since 1992. In addition to private consulting and heading the international emissions trading company Clean Air Canada, Rivers also assisted the federal and provincial governments in developing emissions trading and reduction programs. He attended COP 4 in Buenos Aires and COP 9 in Milan.
Lynn Crosby delegated at City Council yesterday. What she said is at the bottom of this article.
Lynn Crosby
How Council responded is set out below. Rarely does Council engage with a citizen. Crosby is more than a butterfly that flits about. She was heavily involved in the Meed Ward 2018 election campaign and at one point was being considered as part of the Mayor’s staff.
The discussion after the delegation went as follows:
Councillor Nisan:
With respect, this is all about engagement. You mentioned that that there wasn’t enough time for council members or the public to review. The strong mayor power says we only have 30 days between presentation of the budget and passing a resolution to amend that budget. It was the budget report put up October 25 and we have special council meeting to provide any Council amendments on November 25. Do you have any recommendations for how we would work within the strictures of the strong mayor legislation that only gives us 30 days?
Crosby: I think that you should release a draft budget that is very similar to the proposed one far sooner, because as far as I know, the legislation doesn’t say anything about draft budgets. The information we received prior was way too limited. There was as missing data and numbers. It was just very vague. We don’t even have till the 25th of November, because nobody thinks it’s going to change drastically the last week of November or the day of that meeting; more has to be released that’s very similar to the proposed budget much earlier.
Nisan: My second question it, does the strong mayor powers do mention that if the head of council does not propose the budget by February 1, Council must prepare and adopt the budget. Do you have a position about that?
We’re not allowed to do Q and A,
Crosby: I might be wrong the way I’m interpreting that. But does that not mean that, if a mayor does not, if February 1 comes and goes, and the mayor has not presented a budget, a proposed budget, then Council does that. Is that what that says? And they also have to do it on February 1.
We’re not allowed to do Q and A, but functionally, that appears to be the case. Some, mayors have taken that route. I thought it was sort of if the mayor doesn’t do it, then Council has to do it.
Chair Sharman cuts in – “ This is not a debate, please.
Councilor Stolte: My question is a little bit more generalized. I hugely appreciate that you’ve come to talk about engagement, because you are 100% right. There are a lot of ways that we could continue to improve. Do you have some good suggestions about perhaps we should be making sure we have all the information that is common sense. Good, solid, common sense. My question to you, as I said, is kind of generalized, and that’s when it comes to public engagement.
Would you agree that there needs to be a balance in our public engagement, especially when it comes to something like the budget? The budget is detailed. The budget is specific. The budget is very hardcore numbers, literally, and you, particularly yourself as Lynn Crosby represent.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say one of maybe 200 people in the city of Burlington that dives into it to the detail of what you do, and therefore your comments are valid and respected because you take the time to educate yourself, but 200 people in the city of Burlington, of almost 200,000 that represents 0.001% of the population who takes the time and effort to educate themselves to then be able to engage effectively. Would you agree that there’s a responsibility on both sides of the ledger, as far as the city providing opportunities for engagement, but the public also taking the time and energy to educate themselves. So the engagement they’re giving is really effective,
Crosby: Sure, but the problem is – how are they supposed to do that with a 615, page document, you hardly have any time. This is the problem. And so the people that are looking at this, they have all kinds of questions clarifications they’d like to make. It’s unreasonable to think that a massive amount of people in Burlington could do that. I think you need to give them what they need. And I think people have different ways of engaging. Nobody has to come here and stand here. People who are working can’t be here. And no people should not have to take a day off work to come here. People have other ways of engaging, and one of those valid ways is sending emails to council members. You heard Jim’s experience on how that went. You know, we often send, send in emails and you don’t get anything back, or you get a response back, which you don’t really believe quite answered you, and then it says the file is now closed. Well, it’s not closed for me.
I feel like you need to come to where people can engage and even if that’s if they’re replying on City’s Facebook page or this, councilors ones, look at that like that’s still engagement too.
Councillor Kearns: I want to understand a little bit more around what your group or yourself took back from what were considered sort of the height of the engagement opportunities, which would have been the mayor’s individual Ward presentations.
How the information that you saw there and the feedback received be reflected, in your opinion, in the budget that we have before us today?
As far as I could see, none of them chimed in and said that they knew the answer.
Crosby: I attended several of the meetings in person and almost all the rest virtually. I did not see any sort of agreement with people who were asking for reductions. I felt like it was too soon – having the meeting before the budget was released. The mayor can’t help it if she doesn’t have the information. Then, why are we doing this right now?
There, were a number of staff in the room – none of them ever spoke. As far as I could see, none of them chimed in and said that they knew the answer. I felt like a lot of the theme of the meeting was people politely giving suggestions on how the you know, cuts could happen, and how they wanted things to be reduced. Even small things – this idea that if it’s not a giant thing like transit it won’t make a significant enough dent in the tax rate. So we won’t go there.
The whole theme was, that you need to spend responsibly, and in times of difficulty like now and when the rate is over 8%
Do a whole bunch of little things – they add up. That’s what we did not see.
On the 25th no one really got the point, which was cut all the things that aren’t absolutely necessary – rein in your spending. We did not get that. Those of us who were at the meetings felt was that it was rather a waste of time.
Kearns: My second question is on the release of a draft budget. I had nothing to present at my own September 18 Ward two community update.
We then had two days of committee. Around the end of October, we did have the the line by line 615 page proposed budget. I was able to pull together a community meeting for the Wednesday, well attended, very rich dialog. I like sort of the theme being brought forward around releasing a proper draft budget with all the lines. I felt like community members wanted to be involved, but the timeline put pressure on sort of disengagement case. Might that be the case?
Crosby: Yes, absolutely. I think that’s important, and I think it’s rather unfortunate that you didn’t get the information you needed when you needed it.
Councillor Sharman: I have a couple of questions. Lynn, the first thing about the 600 page document, there was a summary that was, I believe, quite thorough and full of a lot of information for most people who don’t understand the accounting logic. Do you feel that that was inadequate the first 30 page the summary document in the binder?
Crosby: I think in general, it’s best to look at the actual meat and not just the summary. So, and I think oftentimes the summaries just are too vague.
Sharman: My second question is about the when you refer to as the tax increase of the city at 8.5 and I have to use an analogy to clarify my question. If you go into a grocery store and you buy a piece of steak and vegetables and butter and salt and sugar, each item has a lit has its own price, and at the bottom, there is a price for the total bill, which is what you’re paying, not necessarily an individual item by itself.
Isn’t it true that the tax increase is actually the sum of the bill of all the items, not each individual one, where the blend of the price is actually the bottom one, not the individual one, and therefore, clarity purposes, the tax increase is actually the bottom line, not the top line. Could you comment on that?
Crosby: You’ve completely lost me there.
Crosby: You’ve completely lost me there. I’m not a numbers person, though, so But to me, that’s complicated, and my point stands. I think that Burlington Council is responsible for the Burlington costs. You’re spending our money as you see fit. At the end of the day, you are spending 8.3% more. You’re asking people to give feedback on the budget by telling them that it’s going to go up 4.9 it is certainly reasonable to think that people’s answers on what they should how what you should be doing or not doing, would be different if they thought it was 4% something or eight.
Sharman: Did you not see in the summary document that we declared the 8.5
Crosby: Yes and No – it wasn’t clear, because at the at the meetings before that, the mayor did, I saw different slides at each meeting, sometimes the 8.3 was there. It was not there very prominently. Yes, it is in the summary, and it is in the other budget document to if you find it. But that does not change the fact that the media releases, the social media, posts, the interviews, – everything – we’re hearing, 4.97 4.97 and that is wrong, in my opinion.
The Crosby delegation:
November 18, 2024 – Budget Committee Meeting
During the budget process
Councillor Nisan:
With respect, this is all about engagement. You mentioned that that there wasn’t enough time for council members or the public to review. The strong mayor power says we only have 30 days between presentation of the budget and passing a resolution to amend that budget. It was the budget report put up October 25 and we have special council meeting to provide any Council amendments on November 25. Do you have any recommendations for how we would work within the strictures of the strong mayor legislation that only gives us 30 days?
Crosby: I think that you should release a draft budget that is very similar to the proposed one far sooner, because as far as I know, the legislation doesn’t say anything about draft budgets. The information we received prior was way too limited. There was as missing data and numbers. It was just very vague. We don’t even have till the 25th of November, because nobody thinks it’s going to change drastically the last week of November or the day of that meeting; more has to be released that’s very similar to the proposed budget much earlier.
Nisan: My second question it, does the strong mayor powers do mention that if the head of council does not propose the budget by February 1, Council must prepare and adopt the budget. Do you have a position about that?
Crosby: I might be wrong the way I’m interpreting that. But does that not mean that, if a mayor does not, if February 1 comes and goes, and the mayor has not presented a budget, a proposed budget, then Council does that. Is that what that says? And they also have to do it on February 1.
We’re not allowed to do Q and A, but functionally, that appears to be the case. Some, mayors have taken that route. I thought it was sort of if the mayor doesn’t do it, then Council has to do it.
Chair Sharman cuts in – “ This is not a debate, please.
Councilor Stolte: My question is a little bit more generalized. I hugely appreciate that you’ve come to talk about engagement, because you are 100% right. There are a lot of ways that we could continue to improve. Do you have some good suggestions about perhaps we should be making sure we have all the information that is common sense. Good, solid, common sense. My question to you, as I said, is kind of generalized, and that’s when it comes to public engagement.
Would you agree that there needs to be a balance in our public engagement, especially when it comes to something like the budget? The budget is detailed. The budget is specific. The budget is very hardcore numbers, literally, and you, particularly yourself as Lynn Crosby represent.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say one of maybe 200 people in the city of Burlington that dives into it to the detail of what you do, and therefore your comments are valid and respected because you take the time to educate yourself, but 200 people in the city of Burlington, of almost 200,000 that represents 0.001% of the population who takes the time and effort to educate themselves to then be able to engage effectively. Would you agree that there’s a responsibility on both sides of the ledger, as far as the city providing opportunities for engagement, but the public also taking the time and energy to educate themselves. So the engagement they’re giving is really effective,
Crosby: Sure, but the problem is – how are they supposed to do that with a 615, page document, you hardly have any time. This is the problem.
And so the people that are looking at this, they have all kinds of questions clarifications they’d like to make. It’s unreasonable to think that a massive amount of people in Burlington could do that. I think you need to give them what they need. And I think people have different ways of engaging. Nobody has to come here and stand here. People who are working can’t be here. And no people should not have to take a day off work to come here. People have other ways of engaging, and one of those valid ways is sending emails to council members. You heard Jim’s experience on how that went. You know, we often send, send in emails and you don’t get anything back, or you get a response back, which you don’t really believe quite answered you, and then it says the file is now closed. Well, it’s not closed for me. I feel like you need to come to where people can engage and even if that’s if they’re replying on City’s Facebook page or this, councilors ones, look at that like that’s still engagement too. It is absolutely thank you.
Councillor Kearns: I want to understand a little bit more around what your group or yourself took back from what were considered sort of the height of the engagement opportunities, which would have been the mayor’s individual Ward presentations.
How the information that you saw there and the feedback received be reflected, in your opinion, in the budget that we have before us today?
Crosby: I attended several of the meetings in person and almost all the rest virtually. I did not see any sort of agreement with people who were asking for reductions. I felt like it was too soon – having the meeting before the budget was released. The mayor can’t help it if she doesn’t have the information. Then, why are we doing this right now?
There, were a number of staff in the room – none of them ever spoke. As far as I could see, none of them chimed in and said that they knew the answer. I felt like a lot of the theme of the meeting was people politely giving suggestions on how the you know, cuts could happen, and how they wanted things to be reduced. Even small things – this idea that if it’s not a giant thing like transit it won’t make a significant enough dent in the tax rate. So we won’t go there.
The whole theme was, you need to spend responsibly, and in times of difficulty like now and when the rate is over 8%
Do a whole bunch of little things – they add up. That’s what we did not see.
On the 25th no one really got the point, which was cut all the things that aren’t absolutely necessary – rein in your spending. We did not get that. Those of us who were at the meetings felt was that it was rather a waste of time.
Kearns: My second question is on the release of a draft budget. I had nothing to present at my own September 18 Ward two community update.
We then had two days of committee. Around the end of October, we did have the the line by line 615 page proposed budget. I was able to pull together a community meeting for the Wednesday, well attended, very rich dialog. I like sort of the theme being brought forward around releasing a proper draft budget with all the lines. I felt like community members wanted to be involved, but the timeline put pressure on sort of disengagement case. Might that be the case?
Crosby: Yes, absolutely. I think that’s important, and I think it’s rather unfortunate that you didn’t get the information you needed when you needed it.
Councillor Sharman: I have a couple of questions. Lynn, the first thing about the 600 page document, there was a summary that was, I believe, quite thorough and full of a lot of information for most people who don’t understand the accounting logic. Do you feel that that was inadequate the first 30 page the summary document in the binder?
Crosby: I think in general, it’s best to look at the actual meat and not just the summary. So, and I think oftentimes the summaries just are too vague.
Sharman: My second question is about the when you refer to as the tax increase of the city at 8.5 and I have to use an analogy to clarify my question. If you go into a grocery store and you buy a piece of steak and vegetables and butter and salt and sugar, each item has a lit has its own price, and at the bottom, there is a price for the total bill, which is what you’re paying, not necessarily an individual item by itself.
Isn’t it true that the tax increase is actually the sum of the bill of all the items, not each individual one, where the blend of the price is actually the bottom one, not the individual one, and therefore, clarity purposes, the tax increase is actually the bottom line, not the top line. Could you comment on that?
Crosby: You’ve completely lost me there. I’m not a numbers person, though, so But to me, that’s complicated, and my point stands. I think that Burlington Council is responsible for the Burlington costs. You’re spending our money as you see fit. At the end of the day, you are spending 8.3% more. You’re asking people to give feedback on the budget by telling them that it’s going to go up 4.9 it is certainly reasonable to think that people’s answers on what they should how what you should be doing or not doing, would be different if they thought it was 4% something or eight.
Sharman: Did you not see in the summary document that we declared the 8.5
Crosby: Yes and No – it wasn’t clear, because at the at the meetings before that, the mayor did, I saw different slides at each meeting, sometimes the 8.3 was there. It was not there very prominently. Yes, it is in the summary, and it is in the other budget document to if you find it. But that does not change the fact that the media releases, the social media, posts, the interviews, – everything – we’re hearing, 4.97 4.97 and that wrong, in my opinion.
and elsewhere, we keep hearing the word “engagement” from staff, the mayor and city councillors. They say they want to engage with residents and seem to believe that their engagement is real and effective. In the opinion of many of those residents, however, it is not.
What exactly IS engagement? Looking at definitions and the purpose of engagement put forth by numerous experts, one finds common criteria. This from Citizen Lab puts it well: “The idea behind community engagement is that community members should have some power over the decisions that affect their lives. Community engagement requires an active, intentional dialogue between residents and public decision-makers. Its nature is formal: cities provide citizens with the necessary tools to get involved in decision-making. Its main challenges are identifying what is important for citizens, convincing them to engage, and offering them all the necessary information to make well-founded decisions.”
Today’s meeting focuses on the budget, so I will speak to the engagement surrounding that. It is indicative of the problems which I believe continue to repeat themselves in Burlington with respect to all engagement with citizens.
The City released their proposed 2025 budget on Friday, October 25. Residents pay the property taxes and have a right to clear explanations of where that money goes. Getting a 615-page document a few short weeks before the budget is voted on does not allow for true engagement. This is an issue both for residents and council members. The councillors got the budget when we did, how can they effectively represent us with such a short time to review it and get our feedback? This does not “provide us with the necessary tools to get involved in decision-making” when it is almost impossible to do so in such a short time-frame.
Speaking of not having the necessary tools: how can any reliable feedback be given in any manner including the much-touted (and, in the opinion of many, deeply skewed) city surveys, when we are not given the accurate numbers of what the proposed spending increase and tax increases even are? We also are missing the Flood Report and the post-2024 Transit Master Plan, which won’t be issued until after the budget is passed.
Fact: City spending will increase by 8.3%; Burlington property taxes will increase by 7.5%. And yet, the number we hear over and over again from the city and the mayor is 4.97%. The city has calculated this number by blending in the education and regional taxes. I suspect that if blending in other entities’ tax rates caused the Burlington rate to be higher, no such blending would occur. Asking residents if they agree with a 4.97% increase and to base their comments on that when the true increase is 8.3% completely skews any feedback.
If I went to the grocery store and filled my cart, adding up the costs of my purchases as I went, and then discovered at check-out that in fact the total is much higher because the price tags were labelled too low, I would realize that I would have made different choices along the way had I known. I would then be removing several things from my cart.
Additionally, since the Halton Region Police Service is looking for a 13.8% budget increase, which will “impact” the Halton Region increase by about 2%, this makes the continued presentation of the 4.97% number to council and the public, including at the November 4 Committee of the Whole meeting, even more misrepresentative. Your blended number, which you repeatedly reference as the “impact,” will be inaccurate and too low if this is approved at Halton Region.
It would be more prudent and transparent to time the Burlington budget process to occur after the Halton Region tax rate has been set and after all reports and data necessary for budget planning have been released. Under the Strong Mayor Powers legislation, the proposed budget doesn’t have to be released until February 1.
What else skews the feedback? Being asked to provide most of it before we even had access to the proposed budget, and therefore, zero idea how much any of our responses would actually cost in real terms, both in dollars and in changes to other services or items.
To ask citizens to give feedback at the Food for Feedback Event without us having any context of what the implications would be if we “voted” with stickers for increases or decreases on various broadly-worded items is quite simply a flawed and cynical approach. To do so with no numbers attached is pointless. I’m shocked that anyone thinks putting stickers on a poster in this manner counts as anything. You have no idea who even attended: surely not everyone who dropped by for “free” food even lives in Burlington. Some sticker-happy souls were children. You have no idea how many people stuck all their stickers on one box. And regardless, they certainly didn’t have “all the necessary information to make well-founded decisions.” And yet we are to believe that the mayor and staff used this at least partly as a basis for preparing the proposed budget.
Lastly, we had the mayor’s budget meetings held in each ward, again, before the proposed budget was released. Therefore, the necessary tools — the needed data and the context — were missing. And time and again when residents did try to engage – to give suggestions and opinions on asking for cuts and reductions, this feedback was met with excuses about why these would not be heeded. Stephen White and Jim Barnett spoke at the November 4 Committee of the Whole meeting about the lack of true engagement at those sessions.
I urge council and staff to look at Sherry Arnstein’s “Ladder of Citizen Participation”. Arnstein wrote in 1969 in the U.S. about citizen involvement and described this ladder. It has been described since as: “a guide to seeing who has power when important decisions are being made. It has survived for so long because people continue to confront processes that refuse to consider anything beyond the bottom rungs.”
The bottom two rungs of the ladder are labeled as examples of “Non-Participation;” the middle three as “Tokenism” and the top two as “Citizen Control.” I would like to quote from descriptions made by David Wilcox in describing the rungs for a UK publication (www.partnerships.org.uk/part/arn.htm:). These are the rungs of the ladder that I believe we are stuck on in Burlington:
Bottom two rungs:
1 Manipulation and 2 Therapy. The aim is to cure or educate the participants. The proposed plan is best and the job of participation is to achieve public support through public relations.
The middle three “Tokenism” rungs:
3Informing. Too frequently the emphasis is on a one way flow of information.
4 Consultation. A legitimate step … but Arnstein still feels this is just a window dressing ritual.
5Placation. For example, co-option of hand-picked ‘worthies’ onto committees. It allows citizens to advise or plan ad infinitum but retains for powerholders the right to judge the legitimacy or feasibility of the advice.
I’d like to end by repeating the idea of engagement which I cited at the beginning: “that community members should have some power over the decisions that affect their lives.”
I speak for friends and neighbours, for members of the Burlington Residents’ Action Group as well as numerous other residents who have delegated or commented on various forums when I say that we do not feel that we have any power over the decisions being made with respect to the budget on how OUR money is being spent. This is NOT a community budget. True engagement must go beyond the sheer number of events termed to be “engagement”; the type and worthiness of the engagement is what matters. Let’s try to get to the top of the ladder on engagement, not stay on the Manipulation and Tokenism rungs.
So many Ontario economic indicators are pointing down, and the failure to build housing could be the key to understanding why
Month after month the Ontario PC ‘s approach has absolutely failed to spur housing construction, and October was no different, according to data released by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation this morning.
There were under 5,500 Ontario housing starts last month.
There were under 5,500 Ontario housing starts last month. That’s only 44 per cent of the 12,500 per month pace needed to meet to hit the target of 1.5 million units by 2031 set by the Housing Affordability Task Force and accepted by the Ford PC government.
Housing data can bounce around month to month. But this isn’t statistical noise. Mark up a big F for fail because in four of the last five months Ontario housing starts have been less than 50 per cent of target. This government hasn’t hit a single target since they adopted them in June, 2022.
Twenty-nine months later, 211,980 new units have been started, 150,520 homes less than needed. The shortage that has been added by this government is enough to housing perhaps 300,000 to 500,000 people — a significant-sized city.
Broader economic impacts going unexamined
Housing scarcity increases renting and buying prices. It costs jobs in the residential construction industry. In May, Data Shows research showed BC’s big housing push was paying off with jobs and paycheques while Ontario slumped.
But there seems to be almost zero media attention on how this self-inflicted housing crisis hurts Ontario’s broader economy.
There is occasional acknowledgement that while Ford’s policies aren’t building much housing, they are spurring the growth of tent cities. Workers who can’t pay for a home become homeless. And for those unable to work because of disability, living on under $16,500 a year on Ontario Disability Support Program, the housing crisis is a complete catastrophe.
But with the asking price of a Toronto one bedroom apartment now at almost $2,400 a month or nearly $30,000 a year, it’s not just those relying on social assistance who can’t make ends meet. A worker earning $25 an hour and working 40 hours a week takes home just over $40,000 a year after source deductions.
Rising costs means an increasing number of people have nothing left after paying for food and rent. The rising housing crisis has combined with food inflation to become a general affordability crisis for many. And when fewer people have money to spend, it’s a problem for everyone, not just a few.
Consumer spending drives the economy, particularly the services sector. In most developed economies, consumer spending generates about two-thirds of GDP.
Ontario’s affordability crisis goes a long way to explaining why August retail sales in Ontario were lower than May 2022 though, outside Ontario, they are at a new peak.
Low consumer spending drags down everything else. Ontario’s unemployment rate is worse than the national rate. Ontario’s average wage is falling while rising elsewhere. Unionization is in decline.
There’s only so much housing failure an economy can survive. There’s only so much economic failure a good society can survive.
Fixing Ontario’s economic challenges not the priority
Added to the retail sales problem, the province’s manufacturing is declining, affecting jobs and reducing income from export sales (Data Shows will take a closer look at sales data tomorrow).
But despite these overlapping challenges, the top priority of a premier elected to “get it done” on housing and jobs is ripping up bicycle lanes in downtown Toronto.
Tom Parkin is a social democratic commentator and the publisher of the Data Shows newsletter.
A once great newspaper gets sold to a wealthy businessman who keeps the presses running.
That is until his financial interests are threatened.
Jeff Bezos bought the Post for $250 million in 2013.
To Jeff Bezos, the Post was a toy, it gave him some entrance, not that he needed it.
For the most part, he kept his hands off the day-to-day operations, and kept an eye on how much he had to inject into the newspaper to keep it alive.
To Jeff Bezos, the Post was a toy, it gave him some entrance, not that he needed it.
Besides owning Amazon he had a number of high-tech interests, the biggest being Blue Origin, a private aerospace company that provides sub-orbital spaceflight services.
This is where the big, really big dollars were.
There is hardly a household on the continent that isn’t impacted by his financial interests.
It is reported that sometime this year, when Bezos was discussing Blue Origin contracts with federal-level bureaucrats, mention was made of a problem. ‘You have a Washington Post problem’ was the way it is reported to have been put to Bezos.
Traditionally American newspapers have endorsed candidates. The Post had an endorsement they intended to publish last week.
Bezos instructed senior editorial management not to publish an endorsement.
Executives from his aerospace company met with Donald Trump on the same day the newspaper prevented its editorial team from publishing an endorsement of his opponent in the US presidential election.
More than 250,000 readers cancelled their subscriptions; reported to be 20% of their circulation.
Peanuts to Bezos; another death knell to the newspaper publishing industry and another hammering of newspaper credibility.
Democracy dies in Darkness
The reports, editors and columnists all huffed and puffed but most were at their desks the next day.
What if the people who write the news and those who operate the presses banded together and published the newspaper? Make it a 16-page edition with nothing but the masthead on the front page. The rest would be blank – except for the advertising. Circulation for that day would have soared.
What a statement.
Jeff Bezos
Would Bezos have shut the paper down – would it have mattered if he did?
The Washington Post is dead – the credibility it had is gone – and in the process, they took another chunk out of the industry’s hide.
What will Jeff Bezos do should Kamala Harris become the next President of the United States?
The Post has a motto: Democracy dies in Darkness; indeed it does.
Salt with Pepper is an opinion column reflecting the observations and musings of the publisher of the Gazette, an on-line newspaper that is in its 12th year as a news source in Burlington and is a member of the National Newsmedia Council.
Yesterday I cancelled my subscription to the Washington Post. In this, I’m joining many other journalists upset at the decision of the Post’s owner Amazon’s Jeff Bezos to ignore the advice of his editorial staff and make a political statement by pulling the plug on the decade’s long established practice of endorsing a candidate for presidency of the United States of America.
There is an argument, with which I agree in principle, that the news media should remain neutral and not be picking horses. But that stable burned down decades ago when former president Ronald Reagan scrapped the ‘fairness doctrine’ requiring broadcasters to be somewhat balanced in their reporting.
That opened the door and unleashed talk-radio for hate mongering rants, and Fox and MSNBC to promote their respective partisan sides; and eventually paved the way for the various social media to broadcast ‘alternate facts’ and repeat them as if they were true. And all this has made partisan politics in America as nasty and solidified as it is today.
Bezos claiming he is reverting to neutrality is a thin excuse. And the timing of the 11th hour decision to override and shut down the editorial folks at the Post, who had already sculpted their endorsement, stinks to high heaven. The Post’s announcement comes on the heel of a similar policy change at the Los Angeles Times prompting their editorial chief to resign in protest.
Were these decisions, at this late date, made because the race has become a coin toss with Trump now gaining the momentum? Was fear of recrimination should he win the real reason why these American publishing giants chickened out? Both of these papers have been very critical of the Trump candidacy in their coverage – primarily because of his incessant lies, the nasty, crude personal attacks and because he was outed as a fascist.
After all, Trump had ranted about revoking the broadcasting license of CBS just because he didn’t like the 60 minutes episode featuring VP Harris. So what would he do to the Post and its owner if he wins? Recall that Trump has been given carte blanch immunity by his Supreme Court for whatever he chooses to do once elected president. And journalists feature high on his enemies list.
Trump is the candidate of the rich and famous, promising further tax cuts as he clings to the false promises of Ronald Reagan’s trickle down economic theory. Isn’t that why Elon Musk has come to his side, bringing his wealth and the weight of his X social media platform with him? Trump demands and rewards personal loyalty.
Harris is a law and order, rules based, candidate who has talked about breaking up the large corporations and conglomerates and further taxing the wealthy. She argues that good fences make better neighbours and good regulations are good for the economy and us all. In essence, she has promised to steal from the rich and give to the (working) poor, the middle class, a modern day Robin Hood. That is a noble mission but it is easy to understand why Bezos’s, like Musk could be having second thoughts.
History informs us of what happened to the free press when Hitler took power in Germany. Would an American fascist with unlimited power want to do the same thing? I guess American voters will have to make that call. And this time without the endorsement of a candidate by the Washington Post. As is the Post’s motto, Democracy dies in darkness.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
“It is A time of massive anxiety.” Justin Trudeau was talking about Canadians’ economic outlook, pitching the durability of his liberal project to a gathering of global progressives in Montreal last month. “People notice the hike in their mortgages much more than they notice the savings in their child care,” he offered, perhaps implying that in doing so people failed to appreciate all he did for them.
A diagnosis of anxiety fits his own government, too. Mr Trudeau and his party have traversed an arc from heroic to hapless during nine years in office, and today are despised by many in Canada. Less than a quarter of the electorate plans to vote for him. With less than a year to go until a general election, Liberal-party members fear no plan exists to increase that share. They have lost two by-electionsin quick succession, as well as the support of their governing partner, the New Democratic Party. As this story was published, a letter was circulating among Liberal MPs calling on Mr Trudeau to stand down. Massive anxiety indeed.
Mr Trudeau became a beacon of morality after he swept to power in 2015, welcoming refugees from war-torn Syria that Christmas. He legalised marijuana, rewarding the record number of young people who had voted for him. He faced down a truculent President Donald Trump to salvage the North American trade pact that is foundational to Canadian prosperity. His government’s annual payment to families of up to C$7,787 ($5,660) per child under six is hailed for lifting 435,000 children out of poverty. After promising child-care subsidies to help more women into work, working-class and younger voters gave him renewed minority mandates in 2019 and 2021.
Three years later those groups have turned on Mr Trudeau. Today both tend to support the opposition, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives. What went wrong?
Chart: The Economist
The high cost of housing is central. The cost of owning a home in Canada has increased by 66% since he took office in 2015, with prices rising faster in this century than in any other sizeable OECD country bar Australia. Lack of supply is a problem in many, but is especially acute in Canada. In 2022 the average OECD country had 468 dwellings per 1,000 inhabitants. Canada had 426, a number that has hardly moved in a decade (see chart 1). Mike Moffatt, a housing economist, says a “wartime effort” is needed to triple the current building rate and throw up 5.8m houses in the next ten years. No such luck. In August, Canadian housing starts dropped to an annualised rate of 217,000.
Demand for housing from the large number of immigrants during Mr Trudeau’s decade in power has worsened the crunch. The number of temporary foreign workers jumped from 109,000 in 2018 to just under 240,000 in 2023. The number of non-permanent residents—including temporary foreign workers, students and asylum-seekers—has more than doubled from 1.3m in 2021 to over 3m on July 1st, according to Statistics Canada, representing 7.3% of Canada’s total population of 41m.
The education and health-care systems have also felt the pinch. Universities are bursting with foreign students, often lured by unscrupulous overseas middlemen offering “sham” degrees, according to Mr Trudeau’s immigration minister, Marc Miller. There were 560,000 student visas handed out in Canada last year. Mr Miller is cutting that number to 364,000. “It’s a bit of a mess, and it’s time to rein it in,” he said earlier this year. Some elementary-school teachers flounder, as they grapple with the children of recent arrivals who often speak neither of Canada’s official languages, English and French.
The pain of high housing costs has been compounded by a mediocre economy. Canada suffers from laggardly productivity growth, which has weighed on wages. Investment has been strong in oil- and gas-fields, and in extractive industries more generally, but has been overshadowed by other parts of the economy. Investment in tech, R&D and education taken together as a share of investment is lower in Canada than anywhere else in the G7 club of rich countries.
Canada’s economic ties with the United States have created problems since the end of the pandemic. American spending switched disproportionately to domestic services after lockdowns ended. This left Canadian manufacturers, whose goods had been flying off the shelves, in the lurch. More of the job of powering Canada’s economy, therefore, fell to its services sector, which relies on demand from Canadian households and the government.
Chart: The Economist
But demand has been throttled by higher interest rates. Monetary policy has had more “traction” in Canada than in the United States, according to Tiff Macklem, the central-bank governor. In the United States, most mortgages are fixed for 30 years, compared with, typically, five in Canada. A greater share of Canadians than of Americans have already seen their mortgage payments rise, although Canadian households bear more debt, relative to income, than anywhere in the G7. They now fork out an average 15% of their disposable income to service debt, up by 1.5 percentage points since 2021, compared with 11% for Americans. And unlike Uncle Sam, Canada’s government has not tried to soften the blow by loosening the purse strings. It ran a budget deficit of just 1.1% of GDP in 2023, compared with 6.3% in the United States (see chart 2).
Climate change offered Mr Trudeau perhaps his clearest opportunity to blend moral leadership with pragmatism. But he ignored polling showing that while Canadians were concerned about the climate crisis, they were also loth to pay taxes equivalent to a Netflix subscription to fight it. His carbon tax, introduced in 2019, imposed a levy on greenhouse-gas emissions, currently running at C$50 per tonne, scheduled to rise by C$15 annually to reach C$170 per tonne in 2030. Canada’s parliamentary budget watchdog said last week that most households were worse off when indirect costs of the tax were factored in. Mr Trudeau’s failure to find a way to compensate groups who lost out as a result of the tax left it and him vulnerable to attacks from Mr Poilievre; he says the tax will lead to “nuclear winter”, trigger “mass hunger and malnutrition” and compel poor, older people to freeze. Support for the carbon levy has crumbled.
Chart: The Economist
Mr Trudeau’s standing is not helped by the waning under his Liberal government of Canada’s influence in global affairs. When it last tried to win a seat on the United Nations Security Council in 2020, it finished behind Norway and Ireland. It spends just 1.3% of its GDP on defence, far below the 2% required of NATO members, and the pace set by rearming European members facing an expansionist Russia (see chart 3). Mr Trudeau has promised Canada will hit the 2% level in 2032. Meanwhile, its relations with Asia’s two most populous countries, China and India, remain ice-bound. On October 14th India withdrew six diplomats from Canada, the latest move in an ongoing spat between the countries over the murder of a Sikh separatist in British Columbia last year. In the Middle East, Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, does not return Mr Trudeau’s calls.
Instead of adapting to or confronting challenges thrown up by his policies, Mr Trudeau has preferred to attack his critics. He seemed inert as the erosion of his party’s support has accelerated. Some Liberals privately suggest the breakdown of his marriage last year distracted him. In a shuffle aimed at energising his front bench last year more than half his cabinet changed portfolios, but the economic message remained the same: we will continue to deliver “good things” to Canadians. Only recently has Mr Trudeau begun to acknowledge that this fell short. “Doing good things isn’t enough to deal with the kind of anxiety that is out there,” he told the Montreal conference. He still describes his voters’ problems in psychological rather than practical terms.
Boxed out
Mr Poilievre identified that economic anxiety early. This lent him credibility with the sectors of the Canadian electorate who felt abandoned. He has boiled his platform down to a series of simple three-word slogans. He says his first piece of legislation will be to “axe the tax”, ditching the carbon levy. He has yet to outline what his government would do to fight climate change, but polls make it clear that Canadians care far less than they used to. All too many have forsaken Mr Trudeau, and the causes he stood for. ■
Editor’s note (October 15th 2024): This story has been updated to include India’s withdrawal of diplomats.
Correction(October 16th 2024):An earlier version of this article cited a figure of C$50 per tonne as the current level of Canada’s carbon levy. In fact, it is currently C$80 per tonne. Sorry.
“…..Pierre Poilievre’s recent remarks that the tax, when fully implemented, would lead to a “nuclear winter” of “mass hunger and malnutrition,” a dystopian nightmare in which seniors are forced to turn their thermostats down to 13 C and people are left unable “to leave their homes or drive anywhere,” could have been reported straight-up, and not as lunatic hyperbole, wholly unworthy of a supposed prime-minister-in-waiting.” (Andrew Coyne, Globe and Mail – Sept 20,2024)
By Ray Rivers
September 29th, 2024
BURLINGTON, ON
For over a year now Mr. Poilievre has been ranting on and outright lying about carbon pricing. Ignoring the economic benefit of the climate rebate is not an accidental omission; dare I say, it’s a Trump-like strategy. Poilievre, like the US former president, clearly believes that if your repeat a lie often enough and loud enough people will believe it. And looking at the polls it seems to be doing just that.
I had a phone call earlier in the week from a Tory campaigner whose first utterance was that I should support Mr. Poilievre because as prime minister he will axe the tax. I politely pointed out that I drive an electric car and that carbon credit deposit the government sends to my bank account each quarter helps to pay it off. That is why we have carbon pricing right?
Mr. Coyne states it clearly. ”….not only is the carbon tax more efficient than alternatives, but it is also more fair. Indeed, if we are so foolish as to scrap it, having already gone to the trouble and expense of implementing it, most households will be made worse off, since they lose more by eliminating the rebate than they gain from eliminating the tax”.
Pierre Poilievre Graphic taken from the Walrus magazine
This is not the first time Mr. Poilievre (PP) has got simple economics wrong. He swore up and down that the real reason for the spike in prices immediately following the pandemic had to do with the size of the federal deficit and debt, rather than supply issues, price gouging or pent-up demand. In fact both the deficit and the debt have continued their path since then, but inflation has dramatically dropped from a high of 8% to a near normal 2% today. Had PP been PM and cut program spending as he demanded Trudeau to do, that would have just led to higher unemployment and lower growth.
Carbon pricing is one of the tools which Canada is hoping will help us meet our legally binding emissions reduction targets that we agreed to in the Paris Climate Agreement. And, yes Mr. Poilievre, there are opportunities to cut federal spending which would also help us meet those Paris carbon targets. Ottawa could once and for all stop subsidizing the oil and gas companies responsible for global warming.
Renewable energy –
Of course that would not please the significant base of anti-Liberal voters in petroleum rich Alberta and Saskatchewan. But it would be the right move, even for them, from a longer term perspective. And on the provincial front, one has to wonder why Ontario’s Mr. Ford is pushing pricey natural gas powered electricity production when the lowest cost sources of electricity anywhere today, according to a recent UN report, is renewable energy.
Speaking of Mr. Ford, it’s worth noting that not all Tories have the same passion we hear from PP when it comes to controlling the budget. The normally Tory friendly Fraser Institute has continued it’s ongoing criticism of Mr. Ford’s government, calling out Mr. Ford’s as one of the highest spending governments in the province’s history. “At every turn the Ford government has demonstrated that it’s an irresponsible steward of Ontario’s finances. The official 2023/24 spending numbers are simply the latest example.”
There is good reason why Ford has ticked off the Fraser stalwarts. Mr Ford is consumed by costly, almost psychedelic, pipe dreams. Needlessly tearing down and then rebuilding the Science Centre is an example. Another is the construction of his 413 superhighway, which is not yet even costed and promises to benefit only a handful of commuters and some friendly land developers. The latest brain burp takes the icing on the cake, however – a 50 km tunnel under the busiest highway in Canada – the 401.
Premier Doug Ford and his Minister of Finance strutting into the Legislature with the budget document in hand
Oh, then there is the economically reckless and self-serving corner store beer-gate. The opposition parties estimate it might end up costing a billion dollars to break the contract with the Beer Store just so Ford can say he’s put booze in corner stores before an expected provincial election this coming spring.
That contract would have expired next year anyway – and without penalty. Besides, it is difficult to understand why Ford, a non-drinker, would be so anxious to expand alcohol consumption given what we know about alcohol use and cancer.
I briefly made an appearance at the Ontario Liberal annual meeting in London last weekend where over a thousand people came together to discuss policy.
Former federal health minster Jane Philpott who presented her vision of primary health reform for Ontario was a keynote speaker. I also attended the session on economics and was impressed with Liberal finance critic Stephanie Bowman, a former accountant and banker, who chaired a session with some very talented panelists.
Ontario Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie
It’s clear that the provincial Liberals will be focusing their next campaign on economic growth and tax policy, with the middle class most clearly in their sights. But let’s not fool ourselves. That is no guarantee that the provincial Liberals won’t also be called out by the Fraser folks should they form the next government and run deficits.
Still, should they win, we can hope that Premier Crombie would be less consumed by the kind of pie-in-the-sky fantasies that has Mr. Ford frothing at the mouth.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
For the political junkies out there – the times could not be better.
The American presidential race, along with the races in each state for Electoral College Votes, is equal to top of the line LSD.
The federal election that could put the leadership of the country in the hands of the Conservative Party that I believe would do close to irreparable harm to the country and to the environment could take place very soon – well ahead of the expected date of 2025.
The race at the provincial level has actually started – no one has told the public yet.
Internationally there has to be an election in Israel at some point – and then the continuation of the trial that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces can take place. The impact in the United States of that trial will depend on who becomes the President of the United States.
In Ontario the most recent polling results from Abacus Research and commentary from Tom Parkin on those numbers will keep the political chattering class going for at least a week.
Study the numbers and let us know what you think.
NDP has access to largest anti-Poilievre swing vote, poll shows
Number of voters who would swing behind NDP to stop Poilievre is 50% larger than the group willing to vote Liberal to stop him
When the public gets to hear what Poilievre will do to environmental issues and the number of programs in place now: dental, pharmacare, child care – time of course will tell.
To stop Pierre Poilievre, 55 per cent of current Liberal, Green or Bloc supporters would “definitely” or “probably” swing their support to Jagmeet Singh’s NDP if they were best positioned, according to the most recent poll from Abacus Research.
The NDP’s potential swing group, which represents 17 per cent of the Canadian electorate, would boost the NDP within close range of the poll-leading Conservatives.
The NDP’s potential anti-Poilievre momentum is more than 50 per cent larger than the group open to following the Liberals to stop Poilievre. Only 11 per cent of Canadians drawn from current NDP, Green or Bloc supporters would definitely or probably vote Liberal to stop Poilievre.
Majority of Greens, Liberals would switch to NDP
My personal view is the Justin Trudeau can beat Pierre Poilievre if only because he is the lesser of two evils. But let us be clear Trudeau has made a lot of mistakes and people are angry.
Among Green supporters, 57 per cent would definitively or probably switch to the NDP to stop Poilievre, but only 36 per cent would switch to the Liberals.
For Bloc supporters, 36 per cent could swing to the NDP to stop Poilievre while 42 per cent could move to the Liberals.
And while 59 per cent of Liberals could swing to the NDP to stop Poilievre, only 50 per cent of NDP supporters are willing to make the same move for the Liberals.
Ending deal helps NDP access pool of voters “negatively affiliated” with Conservatives
The same poll found 40 per cent of current Conservative voters, representing 17 per cent of the electorate, are “negatively affiliated” to the Conservatives. For this group, their primary vote motivation is a dislike for the Trudeau Liberals rather than liking the Poilievre Conservatives.
In contrast, 79 per cent of NDP supporters are motivated by liking Singh’s NDP, rather than disliking another party or leader.
Will Jagmeet Singh make the same mistakes Thomas Mulcair made?
Jagmeet Singh, in breaking his association with the Trudeau Liberals, may now be better able to access this 17 per cent of voters with the Conservatives for anti-Liberal reasons.
Switching three of those 17 points to the NDP and adding its swing vote would pull the NDP into a tie with the Conservatives, with both just below likely majority territory.
Simultaneously coalescing an anti-Poilivre vote and peeling away some negatively affiliated Conservatives presents a tangible if narrow pathway for the NDP to stop the Poilievre Conservatives, a pathway blocked for the Liberals, antipathy for whom is a major component of Poilievre’s success.
Tom Parkin is a principal with Impact Strategies.
Salt with Pepper is the musings, reflections and opinions of the publisher of the Burlington Gazette, an online newspaper that was formed in 2010 and is a member of the National Newsmedia Council.
The national polls show that, were the election held today, a majority Conservative government with Pierre Poilievre as PM would be the result. Mr, Poilievre really only had one job for virtually all his working life, working for the Conservatives, regardless what they called themselves. That distinguishes him from the previous Tory leader, Erin O’Toole, who came to the job with a bag full of real-life experience as a former military officer and successful lawyer.
Pierre Poilievre
Poilievre’s misunderstanding of the causes of Canada’s inflation, his attack on the Bank of Canada and its governor and his promotion of crypto currencies as an alternative/complement to Canada’s official currency is concerning for anyone who has studied even basic economics. Mr. Poilievre voted against, what is becoming, a very successful national dental care program and will not commit to maintain either that program, the still embryonic pharmacare program, or the established national child care program.
Perhaps most concerning is his mis-characterization of carbon pricing. For a party leader to ignore the integral carbon credit which makes the program a net benefit to most Canadians is more than an error of omission – it’s a big fat lie. And though feigning concern for climate change, Poilievre is an advocate and champion of the oil industry which is major contributor to climate warming, after all.
Still, come the next election, according to today’s polls he is the only realistic alternative to Justin Trudeau. And most Canadians clearly are ready to change the channel as those polls would have you believe. Trudeau has fallen out of favour for a number of reasons. Some have called him an elite, the son of former PM who at times was a divisive leader. Social media abounds with posts about Trudeau and almost none of them are kind to the man. The so-called freedom truck convoy that shut down Ottawa in February made it clear how they felt – F*** Trudeau.
Jagmeet Singh
His minority governing NDP partner Jagmeet Singh recently held a press conference to announce that he had ripped up their 2022 cooperative governing agreement. Singh was uncharitable about the man with whom he had shared government for the previous two years. He didn’t use expletives to damn him, but what he said was worse. Justin Trudeau was weak. Some call it compassionate, understanding, compromising or tolerant – but Mr. Singh saw it as weak. And perhaps that is why so many Canadians also are casting doubt on this PM they re-elected to office twice.
For example, when Scott Moe, the premier of Saskatchewan, openly refused to turn over the federal carbon taxes it had collected, Trudeau left it to someone else to confront the premier. When Alberta’s premier Smith passed a sovereignty act – disturbingly similar to what Quebec separatists would like – Trudeau avoided facing her down. Pierre would never have put up with this kind of rebellion. He would have imposed a new national energy program for Alberta and sent in the mounties to place Scott Moe behind bars.
That may be part of the reason why people dislike him. As Donald Trump would say – sometimes we need strong leaders. But sometimes it’s damned if you do and damned if you don’t. Imposing the Emergency Measures Act as a last ditch effort to break the 2022 Ottawa occupation of Ottawa’s streets was a bold move. And yet many people seem to hate him even more after that. Pierre Poilievre championed the insurrectionists, disturbingly much as Mr. Trump had done with that mob that stormed the US Capitol building only a year earlier..
Justin Trudeau
Much like the Greens and other third parties, the NDP keeps it loyal membership turning out on election day if only for the promise of influencing national policy their way. And since Mr. Singh found the courage to partner with Mr. Trudeau back in 2022, he can take credit for a national $10 a day child care program; a school meals program; the creation of national dental care and pharmacare programs; and a number of other progressive initiatives.
At his press conference PM Singh was unequivocal in his belief that once Mr. Poilievre is crowned as PM he will end all those programs. So the question is why he has jumped ship at this time – a year before his agreement was to end? Does he really think he can become the next PM? Or has he just shot himself in the foot with his own membership?
This is not the first time the NDP would have helped end the very programs which they keep telling their loyal supporters they are fighting for. Jack Layton, in 2006, pulled the plug on the Martin minority government, thus leaving a universal national child care program to die under a Stephen Harper government.
It was simply politics over policy. Pure and simple opportunism. And as a result, Mr. Trudeau may not be the only Canadian party leader headed for a lonely walk in the snow if an early election is forced and the polls are right.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
“You deserve a government that tells the truth. That cares about regular people and does right by them. A government that isn’t under criminal investigation,” (Opposition Leader Marit Stiles)
At the entrance to the Milton Heritage Park, which hosted the annual Ford Fest on a recent Friday, there were a handful of protesters holding placards opposing Mr. Ford’s attempted Green Belt land grab and his highway #413 project. The provincial and local police at the site outnumbered the well-behaved protesters.
Premier Doug Ford with the largest Cabinet in the history of the province – 38 members – at a Ford Fest event in Milton.
There were no red-coats around, though we know they are coming – the mounties always get their man. They have begun questioning witnesses about Ford’s Greenbelt giveaway to his developer friends and who actually was pulling the strings in that drama. Ford has apologized and promised once again to keep his hands off the Greenbelt.
But it was a stupid move. Putting utility services into Greenbelt lands would have been limited by the capacity downstream to accept more waste and provide more water. And while always possible, it would have been prohibitively expensive, such that only the well heeled would have been able to afford those homes. So much for affordable housing. So much for meeting the province’s housing targets.
And then there is Ford’s other gift to the developers – his planned highway #413. The reasons previous governments had rejected building that road are just as valid today as they were a decade ago. An internal study by Ford’s own people has confirmed that this road would have an almost negligible effect on current traffic gridlock in the GTA, and most likely just add to the problem.
Ford’s big argument that the #413 would save GTA commuters a half hour commuting time is rubbish. His own people have shown that that would only be true for as few as 1200 commuters. But to make matters worse, the #403 will add additional car-dependent development and cars – and that would only add even further to the gridlock.
In fact Ford’s own people note that GTA gridlock is here to stay. The best shorter term solution would be to allow people to use the relatively empty #407. And that would mean subsidizing the #407 for drivers or buying it back. After all, we taxpayers have already built and paid for the road to reduce our traffic congestion.
Traffic on the 407 toll highway
It may be history, but it’s instructive to recall that Mr. Ford’s Tory predecessor gave the #407 away to a foreign consortium in a 99 year lease for a measly $3 billion, just so he could say he’d balanced an election-year budget. The lease he signed is apparently unbreakable and entitles the owners to engage in highway robbery – literally. As a result that highway is now worth over ten times what Harris got for it – more than $30 billion today. That is one heck-of-a-return-on-investment for the buyers but was a really idiotic move for taxpayers by Mr. Harris, as it turns out.
As if Mr. Ford had not learned anything, the proposed #413 will still carve out sections of Ontario’s Greenbelt. The #413 will cross three parcels of conservation land north of Toronto, and also take up prime farmland. As of 2022, the Ontario government found 11 species at risk along its proposed path.
Proposed route of Hwy 414
The #413 project is reportedly moving rapidly from planning to shovels in the ground, yet we, the taxpayers, have no idea how much this road will end up costing us. Some say $4 billion, some say $10 billion – but most say more. Ford needs to come clean. Previous governments have ruled against building this project and the next government is just as likely to make it an election issue – and if elected, kill it.
Other premiers have also made poor decisions without adequately consulting the public – McGuinty’s expensive election promise to move the gas plants; Wynne’s sell-off of Hydro One, Harris breaking up Ontario Hydro. But Bill Davis showed courage and foresight when he responded to the public by killing the community-destroying Spadina Expressway, now Allen Road.
Harris cheated us of our birthright when he gave away lease rights to the #407 for 99 years in a backroom deal. It’s a good thing Mr. Ford’s spa deal at Ontario Place is only for 95 years.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
Zee Hamid, Progressive Conservative candidate on the election campaign trial. He won.
Conservative Zee Hamid handily beat out his Liberal opponent to win the right to represent the people of Milton at Queen’s Park in the May 2nd by-election. Little more that a quarter of the eligible voters bothered to come out for the vote, despite it being a lovely sunny and warm day. That is a sad testimony on the state of our democracy, no matter how you spin it.
Milton has grown by leaps and bounds over the decades since its mayor pushed regional council to introduce the ‘big pipe’. Pipes actually, one to bring fresh water from Lake Ontario and the other to return that water as sewage back to a lake where safe fish consumption is already severely limited.
Premier Ford, Milton Mayor Gord Krantz and candidate Zee Hamid
Mayor Krantz, much like Ontario’s premier, is apparently in love with a 1960’s urban sprawl model of development. As its ‘eternal’ mayor, he has stacked the once charming farm community of Milton to overflowing with wall-to-wall housing and warehousing, destroying countless acres of quality farm and natural habitat, and saddling its rural residents with the high costs of maintaining sprawl development. One has to wonder why Milton was overlooked for inclusion as part of the provincial green belt in the first place.
Zee Hamid wasn’t always a Tory, having switched his colours for this election. He tried, unsuccessfully, for the federal Liberal nomination back in 2015 and had been a Liberal party donor up until fairly recently. Still, his record as a town councillor should help prepare him for his new role as MPP. And a good part of that record had been to promote exactly the kind of sprawl development over which his new party leader salivates. In which case Mr. Hamid is finally home.
Bonnie Crombie: Leader Ontario Liberal Party: She decided Milton was not winnable – and a win was vital.
This was the first provincial by-election since Bonnie Crombie won leadership of the provincial Liberals last December. There was an expectation that the new leader, who resides a stone’s throw away in Mississauga, would take advantage of the opportunity to win a seat and present herself where it matters most – at Queen’s Park. That she walked away, some would say chickened out, has to be a huge blow to the people who trusted her with their vote for leadership.
I had been a strong critic of Mr. Ford even before he stole the Tory nomination in what can only be described as a smelly right-wing coup on the eve of the 2018 election. At the time I wrote that Ford was ill equipped to lead a modern progressive province which Ontario had become since the turbulent days of Mike Harris. And he has done little to make me want to alter that sentiment.
But clearly there are a lot of people who feel differently about Ford and what the Progressive Conservative tribe he leads stands for. Somehow the entire Greenbelt fiasco, which was a disgraceful episode regardless whether the RCMP presses criminal charges, has been forgotten. The voting public showed up – or failed to show up – and rewarded the premier with another feather in his hat. There was also another by-election win in the Tory safe seat of Lambton-Kent-Middlesex to help boost the premier’s confidence and convince him that he is on the right track.
The Greenbelt fiasco and an ongoing RCMP investigation didn’t appear to matter to the voters that did show up for the btelection.
There was a time when even a hint of wrong doing spelled the end to a politician’s career. But today one can look south of the border to where a former president has been indicted on numerous criminal charges. And yet, incredibly, that has only enhanced the public’s affection for him. Perhaps Mr. Ford’s apparent fondness for breaking the rules helps explain this phenomenon which seems to result in his own popularity.
Particularly interesting is how the younger voters in the US have shifted their support from the person who claims to have done so much for them. Biden paid off a huge amount of university student debt and his policies have expanded the US labour force and reduced unemployment. Strangely the preference among the beneficiaries has been to throw their support to someone who opposed all of that and who is threatening to erode their democratic rights.
Social media is not capable of providing the depth needed to fully understand the changes taking place. For some reason society is limiting its sources of information at a time when credible sources are what is needed most.
Of course this younger generation generally shun TV news and won’t read newspapers to get their information. They prefer to tune in daily to unedited, virtually uncontrolled social media platforms – a grown up version of “kids say the funniest things” to get their daily dose of what is going on. At least the US has promised to ban Chinese controlled Tik Tok. The current large scale protests over Gaza have been traced directly to the vast amount of misinformation appearing daily on Tik Tok and other social media.
The Trudeau government also has been trying to do something to improve the quality of the content on online platforms and social media generally. It has introduced a number of laws, C-10/11 amending the Broadcast Act; C-18 The Online News Act; and C-63 The Online Harms Act. Governing media is a delicate rope walk and, of course the official opposition has generally opposed all of these new rules – at least until, and if, they form government.
There will be more opportunity to air those concerns as the clock ticks down to the next provincial election in 2026 and an even earlier federal election slated for October 2025. But the right thing to do after a by-election is congratulate the winner and hope that the trust of those who voted for Mr. Hamid will be truly earned.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
When Premier Doug Ford was handing out “strong mayor” powers in 2023, there were no protests and little criticism over an apparently anodyne amendment to the Municipal Act.
Those powers made clear the premier’s intuition on local government: mayors should run the show and a concentration of power is a good thing.
The power to approve budgets and bylaws without majority support on council is an abrogation of the core democratic principle of majority rule. Frustratingly, those powers cannot be delegated, according to the legislation.
What can be delegated to all of council is the power to hire and fire senior staff, including the city manager.
Do not sleep on this one, especially when combined with the budget and bylaw power.
Whether used or sheathed, the mere presence of this weapon can wreak havoc on a municipal administration like Burlington’s. It not only undermines local democratic institutions, but potentially also creates a municipal administration rife with the opportunity for dysfunction as staff may be in constant fear of the strong mayor and being “next.” They risk being defunded or defenestrated if they don’t say yes to the strong mayor’s every whim.
And once this path is beaten, it is much harder to regrow the grass. Staff may look to other municipalities for work to get out from under a strong mayor, or not bother submitting their resumes to a strong mayor’s city hall when there is an opening.If I cannot have an equal say on the budget nor on the hiring of the city manager, if the mayor alone is able to change the entire organization to suit them, why have city councillors at all, Coun. Rory Nisan asks.
Numerous mayors, including Guelph, Halton Hills, Kingston, Kitchener and Milton, identified the risks to local democracy as well as their own reputations and delegated powers.
Others found the siren song to be too much to resist, and either laid down the law unilaterally or, like in Burlington, kept the powers for a rainy day.
That’s why I drafted the motion that has now been unanimously supported by Burlington city council to request Mayor Marianne Meed Ward delegate those strong-mayor powers. The mayor has thus far declined to take a position on delegation of powers and so council has given her the deadline of our April 16 council meeting to respond.
Thousands voted in my election, and I am accountable to all my residents. If I cannot have an equal say on the budget nor on the hiring of the city manager, if the mayor alone is able to change the entire organization to suit them, why have city councillors at all? Who would want that job?
Burlington council is also officially requesting the premier rescind these undemocratic privileges.
Some, including the premier, will say that we need strong mayors to get housing built. However, there is no actual connection to “getting it done.” A NIMBY mayor can leverage strong-mayor powers to do less for housing if they apply the powers shrewdly, and allowing mayors to hire and fire senior staff gets us no closer to shovels in the ground.
Others may point to Mayor Andrea Horwath employing strong-mayor powers in Hamilton to approve an affordable housing project. Even if the intended outcome is commendable, the door is now opened wider for future deployment of strong-mayor powers to overrule duly elected councils, a dangerous precedent for the entire province.
Finally, claims that the mayor is accountable at the ballot box every four years and so they should have strong-mayor powers is a superficial take on local government. Representative democracy relies on strong institutions such as city councils, where distributed power balances competing interests, leading to better outcomes.
The premier is also accountable and oversees municipalities, but we don’t want him governing municipalities directly — the same goes for mayors. We have city councillors for a reason: they are the closest to the ground, providing the most representation. They are the local voice.
The history of the premier at Toronto city council, where his brother’s powers were stripped in 2013 in what the now-premier declared at the time to be a “coup d’état,” is hard to ignore.
Premier Ford has been known to back down from bad ideas when exposed. Mayors across Ontario can correct the premier’s judgment, delegate powers back and build trust with the community. This starts in Burlington with Mayor Meed Ward, who as chair of Ontario Big City Mayors can show leadership and do the right thing.
Local democracy is the best kind of democracy. Let’s keep it that way.
Gazette publisher’s note: Interesting that Councillor would choose a newspaper from a different city to get his message out when there are three online newspapers that have significant readership. Councillors are the closest to the ground, providing the most representation. They are the local voice. Right on Rory. How many people in Burlington subscribe to the Hamilton Spectator?
Rory Nisan is a deputy mayor in the City of Burlington. Prior to being elected to city council, he was a foreign service officer, during which he represented Canada at the UN, NATO and the Community of Democracies.
Some movement on that Special Council Meeting that the public was not able to see on the webcast.
There was no information on the city website about a Special meeting of Council – even though the Mayor had advised her colleagues not to leave after the adjournment of a meeting of Council.
We waited to watch the webcast once the room has been “reset”.
When we saw nothing we reached out to Councillor Paul Sharman who assured us there was nothing much of interest.
We then reached out to the City Clerk. The answer to the questions we asked is as follows:
The meeting after Council was a continuation of the closed session meeting that was entered into on January 12, 2024, with respect to the City Manager interviews and deliberations.
As per the motion, the notice provisions are waived for this meeting. A report out in open session is forthcoming.
First question is: How long did the meeting last?
Second question is: Why do they need two days to report out on a meeting ? That level of information is usually given when the come out of the CLOSED session.
City Manager Tim Commisso working his cell phone – Mayor Med Ward looking on – wondering perhaps?
We have suspected that the meeting was related to the position of city manager. Tim Commisso is scheduled to leave at the end of June. The interviewing process is currently taking place.
The City did send us the Minutes for the February 12th meeting. How you date the minutes February 12 for a meeting that took place on the 14th is beyond us.
Those minutes are set out in their entirety:
Special Meeting of Council Minutes
Members Present:
Mayor Marianne Meed Ward, Kelvin Galbraith, Lisa Kearns, Rory Nisan, Paul Sharman, Angelo Bentivegna
Member Regrets: Shawna Stolte
Staff Present:Tim Commisso, Samantha Yew (Deputy Clerk), Sue Evfremidis, Richard Bellemare (Audio/Video Specialist), Debbie Hordyk
Note: This City Council meeting was conducted using a hybrid model, allowing members of Council, city staff and delegations the option of participating remotely or in- person.
Call to Order:
Regrets:
Land Acknowledgement:
The Chair read the land acknowledgement.
Approval of the Agenda:
Moved by: Councillor Sharman Seconded by: Councillor Nisan
Approve the agenda as presented.
CARRIED
Declarations of Interest:
None.
Delegations:
Jim Thompson spoke regarding City Manager Recruitment (HR-02-24)
Items to be considered at the Special Meeting of Council:
City Manager Recruitment (HR-02-24)
Set out in blue below is the information we had to chase the Communication
Moved by: Councillor Bentivegna Seconded by: Councillor Kearns
That Council proceed into Special Council Closed Session meetings in January and February 2024, to conduct confidential interviews and deliberations related to the recruitment of the City Manager position pursuant to Municipal Act, 2001 sections:
239(2)(b) personal matters about an identifiable individual, including municipal or local board employees, and
239(2)(k), a position, plan, procedure, criteria or instruction to be applied to any negotiations carried on or to be carried on by or on behalf of the municipality or local board; and
Direct the City Clerk to schedule Special Council Closed Session meetings as required to conduct confidential interviews and deliberations for City Manager position in the months of January and February pursuant to Municipal Act, 2001 sections:
239(2)(b) personal matters about an identifiable individual, including municipal or local board employees, and
239(2)(k), a position, plan, procedure, criteria or instruction to be applied to any negotiations carried on or to be carried on by or on behalf of the municipality or local board, and;
That this resolution satisfies the Closed Session meeting requirements set out in section 239(4)(a) of the Municipal Act, 2001 and Section 27.2 of the City’s Procedure By-law for any meetings scheduled for the purpose of City Manager interviews and deliberations; and
Waive the notice and agenda provisions of the Procedure By-law including sections 22.1, 24.5, 24.6 for all meetings called for the purpose of City Manager interviews and deliberations; and
Waive the Closed Session provisions of section 27.6 of the Procedure By- law to allow the result of these meetings be reported collectively out at future meeting of Council, where Chair will accept a motion regarding the matters discussed in the closed sessions, or alternatively advise that direction had been given to staff during the closed sessions in accordance with the Municipal Act.
IN FAVOUR: (6): Mayor Meed Ward, Councillor Galbraith, Councillor Kearns, Councillor Nisan, Councillor Sharman, and Councillor Bentivegna
CARRIED (6 to 0)
Motion to Receive and File Information Items:
Moved by: Councillor Nisan Seconded by: Councillor Galbraith
Receive and file information items, having been considered by Council:
CARRIED
Delegation notes from Jim Thomson regarding City Manager Recruitment (HR-02-24)
Motion to Confirm Proceedings of the Council Meeting:
Moved by: Councillor Sharman Seconded by: Councillor Galbraith
Enact and pass By-law Number 01-2024 being a by-law to confirm the proceedings of Special Council at its meeting held January 12, 2024 being read a first, second and third time.
IN FAVOUR: (6): Mayor Meed Ward, Councillor Galbraith, Councillor Kearns, Councillor Nisan, Councillor Sharman, and Councillor Bentivegna
CARRIED (6 to 0)
Motion to Adjourn:
Moved by: Councillor Nisan Seconded by: Councillor Kearns
Adjourn this Council now to meet again at the call of the Mayor. 9:15 a.m. (recess), 9:17 a.m. (reconvene), 9:18 a.m. (adjourned)
Salt with Pepper is the musings, reflections and opinions of the publisher of the Burlington Gazette, an online newspaper that was formed in 2010 and is a member of the National Newsmedia Council.
“Spending under the Ford government has consistently been higher than it was under Wynne—whom Ford criticized frequently as a big spender during the election in 2018. Between 2017 and 2022, per-person spending (inflation-adjusted) has grown from $12,151 to $12,969.” (The Fraser Institute)
Ontario was already one of the most indebted jurisdictions in Canada. According to the the conservative think thank, The Fraser Institute, last year we paid out over $12 billion in interest payments alone. Even worse, that is projected to climb to over $15 billion annually by the time we head to the polling stations again. That is close to a 25 per cent increase over that three year period.
Ontario’s debt is approaching $400 billion, more than double that of the US state of California which has a population about equal to that of all of Canada. There was a modest surplus during the first year of the pandemic, when Mr. Trudeau’s feds were paying for just about everything. But Mr. Ford is planning to run deficits of almost $6 billion over the next two years, rivalling or exceeding those of the previous Liberal government.
According to the Fraser folks….”The irony for Ford, the deficit fighter, is that had he only maintained the inflation-adjusted per-person spending at the same level he inherited from the Wynne government, he would be closer to running a surplus today.” Our growing economy has seen revenues increasing, but they have failed to keep pace with government spending. Over $10 billion of new net debt was created last year alone and another $24 billion is expected to be created over the three year period.
So Mr. Ford has decided on a new gimmick. He’s creating an infrastructure bank, along the lines of the federal infrastructure bank. The province will ante up a few billion into the kitty and then the bank will rely on deposits from private investors. The money will be spent on provincial priorities like more long term care spaces, public transportation, etc. But, it will be arms length so the decisions about those investments will be made by a board of governors rather than our elected officials.
The federal bank, established in 2017, has been anything but a success. Then again, it was created to enable the federal government to participate in economic development for activities which might be argued are exclusively provincial or municipal. That is not a constraint for Ontario. Even so, Mr. Poilievre has called for the elimination of the Canada Infrastructure Bank. So why does Mr. Ford think his provincial bank is such a good idea?
It’s really just sleight of hand, a shell game – a simple application of smoke and mirrors. By pushing provincial spending into this new bank, he can take it off the provincial books, And the new bank will pick up all that liability instead and shrink the province’s deficits on paper, but not in reality. It’s kind of now you see it, now you don’t.
This scheme will not be cost free. Private investors, who will provide the bulk of the funds being dispersed by the bank, will demand to be paid market interest, which will be higher than what the government is currently paying on its debt. After all, this will not be provincial borrowing per se backed by the provincial government. Thus, the risk to investors will be higher. And to compensate for that risk, investors will want higher interest premiums than the government would normally have to pay.
Since more of the banks funds will thus be going into servicing the bank’s borrowing, less will be available for the various purposes for which it was created, such as funding long term care construction. Additionally, there are the not insignificant costs of establishing and operating the new bureaucracy, as well as rewarding its highly salaried staff to run the bank. Bottom line – this fancy financial dancing is the least efficient and most costly way to deliver provincial programs.
It would be less expensive for taxpayers if Mr. Ford just used the existing resources of the provincial government to pay its bills, rather than hiving those bills off onto an another costly bureaucratic agency. And of course, it certainly would be better if Mr. Ford simply reduced deficits and debt as he had promised to do back in 2018.
But that would involve revisiting taxation rates for some of the wealthiest Ontario residents. And most importantly, it would involve cutting out costly ‘pet projects’ such as the proposed Highway 413 and relocation of the Science Centre.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
If you are a taxpayer in Ontario and have checked your bank account recently you should see a deposit. That is your quarterly carbon tax rebate. It may or not be shown as CAIP (climate action incentive payment) depending on the banking institution. But it is tax-free money from your federal government and intended to offset the so called federal carbon tax.
The federal government argues that it’s not properly a tax since, as a kind of revolving fund, the carbon levy is revenue neutral. Everything collected is returned to tax filers less some small amount for administration. The point of the tax is to make the costs of fossil fuels increasingly more costly so Canadians will switch to non-carbon alternative energy sources.
Though the carbon levy was originally introduced as a climate change policy, it has in fact also turned out to be a good income equity measure. The carbon tax rebate, which, in Ontario is now approaching one thousand dollars a family annually, makes Mr. Trudeau look like Robin Hood.
According to a 2023 Statistics Canada report, 94 per cent of households with incomes below $50,000 received carbon tax rebates that exceeded their carbon-tax costs in 2023. About half of these households netted out between $20 and $40 per month.
Increasing the cost of fossil fuels is a step in the right direction towards rectifying the historical distortion in resource pricing. The federal and provincial governments have been subsidizing the petroleum sector with the handouts of tax payers’ money for at least half a century, and that hides the true cost of your gasoline and heating fuel.
Ontario, for example, is now spending millions of our tax payer dollars to cap its legacy oil wells which continue to leak methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. The landscape of Alberta and Saskatchewan is dotted with old unused orphan wells. Some 170,000 or almost 40% of all the wells are in Alberta need to be capped. And it has been left up to governments to clean up this mess.
Alberta was the first jurisdiction in the country to impose a carbon tax of sorts on its industries, back in March 2007. Quebec followed with a broader consumer tax and B.C. brought in an even broader one, covering roughly 70% of provincial greenhouse gas emissions. Quebec and Ontario then had implemented a cap-and-trade emissions program which exempted them from the federal carbon tax, but Doug Ford axed Ontario’s along with all new renewable energy projects as one of his government’s first acts.
The Canadian federal carbon tax was implemented in 2019. It is a progressive tax, similar to the programs in Quebec and B.C.,and increases each year in hopes that the consumers get the message. This year it’ll be 17 cents per litre of gasoline and 15 cents per cubic metre of natural gas. That works out to roughly $80 per tonne of CO2. But, the tax will more than double by 2030.
Mr. Trudeau dealt the credibility of carbon pricing a blow when his government decided to help homeowners by removing the carbon tax from heating oil. This lapse in policy stinks of partisan politics. Moreover, that has given Mr. Poilievre ammunition in his quest to completely axe the carbon tax should he win the next election. And given the polls that is exactly what will happen in 2025 if not sooner.
Pierre Poilievre hammering the Trudeau government in the House of Commons.
Most folks I’ve asked recently have not noticed receiving their clean air incentive (CAIP) in their bank accounts, even though they likely have. And that ignorance, may be why Mr. Poilievre is gaining so much traction with his misinformation campaign about the carbon tax.
Perhaps the federal government needs to reconsider using less expensive direct deposit for the CAIP. After all, nothing communicates the truth to taxpayers better than a government cheque in their hands.
Ray Rivers, a Gazette Contributing Editor, writes regularly applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Ray has a post graduate degree in economics that he earned at the University of Ottawa. Tweet @rayzrivers
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives started the new year with a bang: On January 2nd they launched their annual CEO pay report, Canada’s New Gilded Age, which reveals that Canada’s highest-paid 100 CEOs make 246 times more than the average worker.
Those 100 CEOs were paid an average of $14.9 million—setting a new all-time high. Top CEOs are making $7,162 per hour, meaning it only takes eight hours to make what the average worker earns after an entire year’s worth of work.
Certainly outrageous but also very dangerous. The number of people earning those exceptionally high salaries while thousands are not certain they are going to be able to keep the homes they have been making mortgage payments on for a decade. A society can’t function with this kind of imbalance.
The tax system gives the federal government the power to create a more level distribution of money.
But the government hasn’t been doing that.
Nor has the federal government been keeping the promises it made.
When Rogers took over Shaw the public was told that internet access and cell phone costs would not increase.
Remember when the federal government summoned all the heads of the supermarkets to Ottawa to demand that changes be made to the way food was being priced?
Have you seen anything positive done on either of those issues?
There comes a point when the public doesn’t want to put up with the failed promise delivery. Trust in government is diminishing.
If you want to understand what can happen when that trust disappears – just look south.
The CCPA report dominated the media market, garnering 2,195 media mentions in the first two weeks of January alone. That’s 48 per cent higher than last year.
Among those thousands of media hits, CCPA Senior Economist David Macdonald spoke with the CBC’s As It Happens and continues responding to interview requests even today.
The CCPA maintain they are not just making an impact in the media, they argue that their research feeds movements: both the Council of Canadians and Lead Now have launched campaigns mobilizing Canadians to pressure the government for measures that would disincentivize extreme CEO compensation.
Salt with Pepper is the musings, reflections and opinions of the publisher of the Burlington Gazette, an online newspaper that was formed in 2010 and is a member of the National Newsmedia Council.
Daintry Klein was delegating on the Drainage By-law Amendment; one of those dry as toast subjects – until she revealed that the large stormwater storage tanks that are proposed to be privately owned by the new condo corporation. At that point the delegation became more about what could happen to the current Millbrook residents and not so much about the bylaw amendment,
Mayor, Council, Staff and Fellow Burlingtonians,
“We would like to thank the Engineering Department for its work in updating this drainage by-law. It acknowledges climate change and provides important updates to recognize the impacts of rainfall and groundwater in the potential for flooding. The report also refers to best practices. It seems that further work needs to be done and we look forward to the City, the Region, Conservation Halton and the Province to continue to address the rapidly evolving risks of Climate Change consistent with the work being done by the Federal Government and the insurance companies. Through their extensive work, they have recommended their own set of best practices.
Yellow location are where developer Millcroft Greens want to build 98 homes.
“As homeowners, we rely on our governments to keep us safe. To protect us from what many of us are unaware of in our daily lives as we go about our careers where our expertise is in other disciplines. As part of the planning and building process, grading and drainage is considered and clearance certificates are issued upon completion to ensure that properties are safe.
Alliance is one of two community groups opposed to the development of additional homes on golf course property.
“It has come to the attention of Millcroft Greenspace Alliance that other standards used by the City and Conservation Halton to evaluate the causes and risks of flooding also need updating. We were initially encouraged to know that Conservation Halton, an organization that “Protects the Natural Environment from the Escarpment to Lake Ontario” is engaged in the East Burlington Creeks Flood mapping study. As we read the most recent report, we learned that the analysis is not relied upon by insurance companies. This raised questions for us. Further investigation led us to learn that Public Safety Canada and the insurance companies rely on the same flood modelling as FEMA in the United States which is a newer, more complex computer program that includes the impacts of rainfall.
“A National flood insurance plan would be based on this type of modelling. Conservation Halton and the City use HEC-RAS, a 1D model that considers surface water with adjustments but doesn’t include rainfall. When we have made inquiries to Conservation Halton, they advise us that they only consider riverine flooding. So, as we understand it, after the creeks and natural drainage are altered and channelized and the new regulation limits are established, Conservation Halton no longer considers the impacts of the broader watershed in its development decisions.
Klein: “The proposed update of this drainage by-law could be of particular interest to the homeowners in Millcroft.
“The proposed update of this drainage by-law could be of particular interest to the homeowners in Millcroft. We are aware of the experience of infill development particularly in south Burlington.
“Argo Development Corp and Millcroft Greens have to-date refused to withdraw their proposed development application. The City and the Region have unanimously opposed and subsequently requested, that the Province step in and issue an MZO.”
It was at this point that Committee Chair Rory Nisan cut in and asked Ms Klein to stick to the subject which was the Drainage By-law Amendment. Klein explained that she was trying to put her delegation into context and what it would mean in practical terms to Millbrook residents; Klein continued. This wasn’t the last time Chair Nisan cut in.
“The City on September 26 and the Region of Halton on October 18 of this year for reference of the passage of time. We are still waiting for the Province to act. Although the Premier is on record saying that he will not allow building on floodplains, he still has not stopped this development application. Hundreds of emails have been sent.
“At issue, is the fact that the Millcroft Golf Course greenspace was designed to drain the adjacent properties and slow the flow of drainage from the Escarpment to Lake Ontario, protecting properties to the south. As of December 1st, the witness statements for their OLT appeal are in. Glen Wellings, the planner on the Millcroft Greens file, diligently details the process and dates of the application but forgets to mention the stormwater peer review or the Conservation Halton flood mapping. He refers to the 6th and 7th holes as gently rolling with some flat areas.
The mill pond is a critical part of the infrastructure that has managed stormwater.
“As Millcroft homeowners, we understand from the initial engineering reports that the topography is actually contoured berms and swales that direct water through the fairway open channels toward the stormwater catch basins that take the water through the stormwater easements to the Millpond. And the fact that our properties were designed to have the functional drains 2.5 meters above the bottom of the fairways is also very relevant. This is all documented in the original documents when the Millcroft subdivision was created.
“The developer is proposing to fill the fairways up with topsoil and reduce the grade to the 2% guidelines. This could disperse the water across the neighbourhood into the existing homeowner properties causing the type of flooding that this drainage by-law seeks to address.
“The large stormwater storage tanks that are proposed to be privately owned by the new condo corporation are designed to manage the ongoing stormwater flows for our neighbourhood. These will be maintained by our neighbours and we must look to them financially for failure? They are also detailing that the new homes will be equipped with sump pumps – something the existing homes were not designed for due to the existence of the grading to the bottom of the fairways from our rear lot lines. Not to mention the fact that the proposed new rear yards will have catch basins in their back yards that manage the stormwater for the neighbours – potentially the site of a pool or patio in the future or garden refuse. Topics this by-law seeks to address. And we note that the engineers of this proposed application accept no liability for their work? Relying on legal recourse against neighbours to protect our properties is contrary to the goal of community building.
Klein: “We are not clear on the process to recover potential losses from the after effects of the proposed construction if it isn’t stopped by the Province.
“We are not clear on the process to recover potential losses from the after effects of the proposed construction if it isn’t stopped by the Province. The by-law suggests that ultimately, the Property Owners will be liable. However, if allowed, Argo and Millcroft Greens will change the existing Millpond, watercourses, ditches and swales and other existing green infrastructure per their development plans. The unsuspecting new homeowners of the proposed condominium corporations could be left with the liability long after Argo has withdrawn all funds from the development corporation. Would it be reasonable for builders to share in the financial responsibility for potential impacts of their actions? Should they be required to own and fund the proposed infrastructure?
“Recognizing that the Millcroft golf course greenspace is actually a natural form of the City’s stormwater management system, we urge the City to take all necessary steps to ensure that Millcroft Greens is prevented from building homes on this land. Public Safety Canada in its report of August 2022 prescribes best practices to include natural infrastructure as method of mitigating flood risks. As taxpayers, we ask the City to mitigate our collective risk and protect this greenspace.”
Klein is of the view that she was interrupted by the chair because some of what we had to say may be uncomfortable.
“This City endured the 2014 flood with many residents incurring out of pocket expenses to repair damages. We believe many residents are unaware of the potential flooding impacts of proposed infill development. The Province does set guidelines on stormwater however they seem to be outdated relative to Public Safety Canada and the insurance companies. There may be options for the City to implement its own guidelines.
Klein: Should the unsuspecting homeowners take on the liability?
“Our comments highlight information from the East Burlington Creeks study and notes from the City which we believe could result in unintended consequences for homeowners in the future after homes are built and the developer is gone. Should the unsuspecting homeowners take on the liability?
“The City has the opportunity to solve the issue of the proposed development on the Golf Course greenspace. It is part of the stormwater infrastructure for the City and we are unaware of any other infrastructure of the City that is privately owned and controlled. After three years of study, we look forward to this coming to a positive ending for the community as a whole before the OLT.”
What Klein chose to be polite about and not mention the grandstanding the Mayor did at a community meeting a number of months ago saying she was working with the then Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing about the issuing of a Ministerial Zoning Order (MZO) that would end the matter before it got to the Ontario Land Tribunal.
By Pepper Parr
According to the Fraser folks….”The irony for Ford, the deficit fighter, is that had he only maintained the inflation-adjusted per-person spending at the same level he inherited from the Wynne government, he would be closer to running a surplus today.” Our growing economy has seen revenues increasing, but they have failed to keep pace with government spending. Over $10 billion of new net debt was created last year alone and another $24 billion is expected to be created over the three year period.
Since more of the banks funds will thus be going into servicing the bank’s borrowing, less will be available for the various purposes for which it was created, such as funding long term care construction. Additionally, there are the not insignificant costs of establishing and operating the new bureaucracy, as well as rewarding its highly salaried staff to run the bank. Bottom line – this fancy financial dancing is the least efficient and most costly way to deliver provincial programs.
The federal government argues that it’s not properly a tax since, as a kind of revolving fund, the carbon levy is revenue neutral. Everything collected is returned to tax filers less some small amount for administration. The point of the tax is to make the costs of fossil fuels increasingly more costly so Canadians will switch to non-carbon alternative energy sources.
Mr. Trudeau dealt the credibility of carbon pricing a blow when his government decided to help homeowners by removing the carbon tax from heating oil. This lapse in policy stinks of partisan politics. Moreover, that has given Mr. Poilievre ammunition in his quest to completely axe the carbon tax should he win the next election. And given the polls that is exactly what will happen in 2025 if not sooner.
By Staff
