# Ontario Premier begs for money



## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

This is rich. Deputy Premier Deb Matthews, who rides to work in a chauffeured limousine, thinks the most heavily taxed people in North America should volunteer to pay more taxes to make up for the extravagance and bad management of her government.

Makes as much sense as sending a jumbo jet full of bureaucrats to Paris to fight carbon emissions.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2015/12/20/ontarians-urged-to-help-province-pay-off-its-debt.html

Do these people even listen to themselves? Do they not know anybody with common sense they can try these ideas out on before they embarrass themselves?


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

To be fair to the current regime, it was Mike Harris who started this program.


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## Rusty O'Toole (Feb 1, 2012)

Found the Liberal.

The Liberals have been in power since 2003. How long can they keep blaming everything on him?


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

They are not blaming it on him. They just lack the common sense to scrap the idiotic program that he started.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

It's hardly begging. And isn't this what Conservatives are usually asking for... Voluntary taxation?


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## Daniel A. (Mar 20, 2011)

Maybe they should start a gofundme account.


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## Just a Guy (Mar 27, 2012)

Or, they could be like Alberto's "new way" and just take it from you as fast as they can while racking up deficits at the same time.

I like the Saskatchewan adds for the election "remember when the former government was in power..."

Satelite tv gives you so much local coverage from across the country...its just plain depressing everywhere.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

Now that he is no longer Minister of Finance, Joe Oliver tells what he _really_ thinks about Ontario finances. 

*Ontario is a fiscal train wreck*


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

actually Joe Oliver *never* said that ontario's debt is a fiscal train wreck. It was the Financial Post editors who said that.

journalists & contributors don't write their own headlines. These are solely the duty, the responsibility & the product of a newspaper's editors.

did Oliver ever say ontario's debt is a fiscal train wreck? all i see is that he called the debt "an overarching problem for the province."

the former minister of finance called it a "cautionary tale for the federal government." He called it a "challenge for the country as a whole" plus a "path of fiscal imprudence."

Ontario is "the largest sub-national debtor in the entire world," Oliver said. He ended up with a couple of cliches, saying the debt is a "vicious cycle" & a painful "wake-up call."

but train wreck? Never. Jamais.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

My post #8 refers to the entire article, not just to the headline. Oliver said a lot more than he could say as a federal minister.

But your point is well taken. He didn't say "train wreck". That was the headline writer.


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## sags (May 15, 2010)

Whatever the Fraser Institute and other right wing lobby groups are paying their "economists" and "pension experts" is way too much,...... considering what a lousy success rate they have.

Big business should reassess their support and put their money into getting more bang for their bucks.

Labour unions spent a whole lot less than big business, and had a whole lot more success to show for it.

Maybe the conservatives want to stop unions from spending on politics, because the unions play the game better.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

GoldStone said:


> Now that he is no longer Minister of Finance, Joe Oliver tells what he _really_ thinks about Ontario finances.
> 
> *Ontario is a fiscal train wreck*


I do agree with him that Ontario needs to get back on track fiscally. The feed in tariff was an economic disaster, one that I have been criticizing since the start. At this point, we have to hope that the government holds to their stated plan of growing spending at less than the rate of GDP. I think we may also need to consider raising the HST to 15%. But we need a focused commitment to reduce debt to GDP substantially over there next ten years. That can largely be accomplished by keeping deficits small or just balancing the budget. The government had the rest of this mandate to persuade me that they can deliver on this or I will be forced to hold my nose and vote for the conservatives. Patrick Brown has been very vague so far, but my impression of him was that he was the more radical of the leadership contenders. Ontario doesn't need radical changes in policy. I would be satisfied with ending the feed in tariff and holding the line on spending growth while implementing needed reforms in how programs are delivered. Education seems like it is ripe for change in terms of value for money.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

andrewf said:


> Patrick Brown has been very vague so far, but my impression of him was that he was the more radical of the leadership contenders. Ontario doesn't need radical changes in policy.


Well, he did say in a recent interview that his goal in politics is "just be reasonable". That doesn't sound like a radical agenda. 

http://www.torontosun.com/2015/12/13/reaction-split-to-pc-leaders-reasonable-approach


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## fraser (May 15, 2010)

This is not new.

Ontario has been in trouble for a number years. Successive Gov'ts have added to the problems-both Liberal and Conservative.

I do not live in Ontario but it is worrisome for me. What happens in Ontario and Alberta has an impact on the entire country. Just look at our sinking dollar. I watched my former employer move good jobs, facilities, and manufacturing out of Ontario (and Canada) over the five years to my retirement in 2009.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

GoldStone said:


> My post #8 refers to the entire article, not just to the headline. Oliver said a lot more than he could say as a federal minister.
> 
> But your point is well taken. He didn't say "train wreck". That was the headline writer.



yes, it was a digression into the sins & vicissitudes of headline exaggeration - the bane of all journos, who never know what kind of conflicting or clashing headline the editors are going to paste onto their stories. In some cases (not this one, though) headlines will even contradict what the story itself proves.

back to Ontario, hasn't haroldCrump been posting similar criticisms for many years now? except haroldC writes so much more eloquently & vividly than than joe oliver's dry & bland commentary.

i agree with fraser when he says that the situation is worrisome for all canadians. As citizens we unfortunately tend not to think about what our provincial governments are doing. It's much easier to focus on ottawa. This will likely become even easier, with all the new celebrity goings-on in the nation's capital.

by keeping the focus on provinces such as ontario, perhaps also alberta, that are facing debt upheaval, critics such as HC & goldstone are showing other provinces a mirror of their own backyards.


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