Tony Clement, Unions and the National Citizens Coalition

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Tony Clement and the National Citizens Coaltion go back a long ways, to the days when their spin-off group, Ontarians for Responsible Government, helped to get Mike Harris elected, by running attack ads agaisnt Bob Rae.

But to show the clout he has with them, former NCC Vice-president (when Stephen Harper was president) Gerry Nicholls reports that:

Industry Minister Tony Clement was angry because the NCC has posted in its "Tales from the Tax Trough" booklet that he had spent $30,000 on a trip to Kenya. And it was true, he had. But Clement called up NCC president Peter Coleman to complain and amazingly Peter agreed to apologize and to delete
the Kenya reference from the booklet!!

And the NCC didn't do anything to warrant an apology. The NCC even posted a message from Clement on their site (Note they refer to him as "Peter" Clement). All I can say is that when I worked at the NCC we never would have let a politician bully us like this. (1)

Tony Clement Fights Against Unions for the NCC with Tax Dollars

Looking at one recent anti-union campaign, referred to as the 'Free the Lively Seven', launched by the National Citizens Coalition, you will be led directly to Tony Clement and Industry Canada.

1. The Background: The NCC

If we had to identify what the NCC is against, it would be difficult, because there are a great many things. However, Stephen Harper's VP, when he himself was President of the National Citizens Coalition, Gerry Nicholls, in his spin-off group ProudToBeCanada (PTBC), states pretty clearly what they are 'for'.

After saying "I am not a 'Tory'. I'm a Conservative".

We're: Pro-life. Pro-freedom. Pro-USA. Pro-Christian. Pro-Israel. Pro-family. Pro-traditional marriage. Pro-free market capitalism. Pro-war-on-terror and war on Islamofascism and terror in Iraq and everywhere else. Pro-military. We're for smaller governments. For less taxes. Against socialism. Against state-owned or state-run media. Against asinine state controls on our legal gun ownership. Against the so-called "progressive", left-wing church of liberalism.

Sounds like Stephen Harper to me.

2. The Victims: 'The Lively Seven'

One of the many tactics of the National Citizens Coalition, when they are attacking unions or Canadian Institutions on behalf of corporate interests, is to select a perceived victim or group of victims, then exploit them to elicit contributions; while putting a human face on the campaign.

In this case the poster children were seven women from Lively, Ontario (part of Sudbury). When the United Steelworkers won the right to represent the employees of all TD/Canada Trust branches in the area, seven women decided not to join, despite the fact that the majority did.

The National Citizens Coalition is "shamelessly" exploiting seven workers at a Lively bank who don't want to join a union, the Ontario/Atlantic director of the United Steelworkers of America says. Although he never mentioned the group by name, Wayne Fraser took dead aim at the NCC in a release issued from his Toronto office.

"Our union was recently certified at several bank branches in the Sudbury area and we are in the process of negotiating improvements to wages and working conditions," Fraser said in the release. "Suddenly full-page newspaper ads and opinion pieces have sprung up all over Ontario, declaring support for a small group of workers who did not sign union cards at one branch," he said. (2)

WHAT'S HAPPENED
- The Steelworkers organized eight branches of the TD Bank in Sudbury.
- In all, 114 people were certified as members of Local 2020 of the USWA six months ago.
- The local has since been trying to negotiate a first contract.
- The National Citizens Coalition has posted a website, called http://www.freethelivelyseven.ca/ containing what it says is "the true story of The Lively Seven

3. Enter Susan Martinuk

Susan Martinuk is a right-wing (Conservative?) journalist, who is not only a friend of the National Citizens Coalition, but is also a regular contributor to the spin-off group ProudToBeCanadian, or PTBC.

She runs a company called Journalists For Hire, so if you need a bit of PR for your next redneck adventure, just call Susan.

Well, she inked an op-ed piece in a Conservative magazine, throwing her support to the NCC:

The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) and the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) have decided that Canadian workers need to be empowered. This is supposed to happen via a campaign to restore workers' rights to Canada's labour laws. Under the shibboleth "labour rights are human rights," they are also promoting a document that they deem to be a "Workers' Bill of Rights." This bill was first circulated during the election, when every party leader but Mr. Harper signed it in exchange for union support. The unions are now making much of this refusal and calling for our new Prime Minister's endorsement. (3)

The union fought back and of course the NCC lost the case, not that they really expected to win. It gave them publicity and money, and that was the whole idea anyway. One more attack on unions in the name of corporate profit. They'd already moved on.

4. Enter Lise Poratto-Mason

The trial of the Lively seven was handled by a Sudbury lawyer, Lise Poratto-Mason, who was retained by the National Citizens Coalition. She is listed on their site under contacts and in a fundraising blitz by the NCC, it was reported that they still needed money to pay her bill.

THE BILLS FROM THEIR FINAL FALL COURT CASE ARE NOT YET FULLY PAID. DIG DEEP. TAKE A STAND FOR THE RIGHTS OF ALL CANADIAN EMPLOYEES BY ASSISTING THE LIVELY SEVEN WITH THEIR COURT COSTS.

5. Enter Tony Clement

As I've stated the National Citizens Coalition spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to get Mike Harris elected, so Clement is indebted, and obviously still an active member of the NCC.

Once the appeals of the Lively Seven were exhausted, he announced that he would be setting up an advisory board for an agency under his mandate as Industry Ministry: FedNor, which is supposed to represent the interests of Northern Ontario.

However, NDP MPs, who represent most of the area, claim that it does everything but, and want it put at arms length of the government. Aka: they want Tony Clement's hands off it. Wise move.
And on this advisory board we find the NCC's lawyer, Lise Poratto-Mason. Now it's an unpaid position, but Clement seems intent on raising her profile. Are they looking to this NCC lap dog as a possible Conservative candidate to run for one of the ridings in the area?

Not to worry though. He did give her a patronage appointment on the Canada Pensions Board, so it's all good.

Poratto-Mason, Lise Céleste Pauline, Sudbury, Ontario
During Pleasure (Interpretation Act)
2009-05-14 - 2012-05-13

Sources:

1. NCC Now a Pussycat, Making Sense With Nicholls, December 12, 2009

2. Steelworkers take aim at NCC: Union objects to how the National Citizens Coalition is portraying a group of Lively anti-union activists, The Sudbury Star, September 17, 2005

3. Workers' Bill of Rights: something we don't need, By Susan Martinuk Canadian Conservative Review, Spring, 2006

Tony Clement Gives Away Natural Resources to Bust Union in Sudbury

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In deciding what will be eventually be edited into my book, the chapter on Anthony Peter Panayi aka Tony Clement, would be incomplete if it did not include his selling off of Stelco to a Brazilian firm with no safeguards for the community or workers.

Companies with strong unions pose a threat to the neoconservative agenda, so Clement works on the side of the companies who will help to "knock them down a peg or two".

Steelworkers Local 6500 president John Fera is lashing out at Vale Inco, calling it a “third world employer,” as the midnight July 12 expiry date for the union's collective agreement draws closer. ... “We've seen nothing by pushback from this company, and quite frankly, we're fed up with it,” the release stated.

“Our federal Conservative government must have been sleeping when they sold us out to Vale instead of protecting our non-renewable natural resources that now belong to Brazil. (1)

Then when the sale went through -

Less than three years after winning a $19-billion “dream” acquisition of Inco, the head of Brazil's Vale SA has made a shocking assessment of its Sudbury operations: They're unsustainable at current cost levels. The comments from Vale chief executive officer Roger Agnelli come amid simmering tensions between the company and unionized workers in Sudbury.

The Brazilian mining giant is demanding major concessions from 3,300 workers there; contract talks have broken off and a potential strike looms as the Sudbury operations endure a two-month summer shutdown in response to dismal nickel prices.

...Federal Industry Minister Tony Clement initially demanded answers from Vale for violating its Investment Canada Act commitments but later said he was satisfied that Vale was not targeting Sudbury with its job cuts and mine shutdowns. (2)

And of course Clement did nothing on behalf of the workers, siding with the corporation:

Canada will not take any action against Brazilian miner Vale over cutbacks at its Sudbury mining operations, Tony Clement, the Industry Minister, said yesterday. Vale announced in March it would cut 423 jobs at its Canadian operations and shut its Sudbury, Ont., facilities for eight weeks, sparking questions from Mr. Clement over whether the company was violating agreements it signed when it bought Canadian nickel miner Inco in 2006. "At this point, we're not going to be proceeding with any action with respect to Vale Inco," Mr. Clement told reporters in Ottawa. He said the company did not seem to be targeting Canada in its cutbacks. (3)

And with friends in high places, Vale held out while workers suffered.

SUBURY, Ont. — Striking Vale Inco employee Rod Price says he's "lost everything," and so have many of his colleagues.

"The banks are taking our houses, our vehicles. A lot of us are using the food bank, and as time goes on it's getting worse," Price said, his words coming as puffs of steam through the holes in his balaclava on a frigid day on the picket line.

"Guys are upset, hurt, crying. They don't know what to do with themselves."

More than 3,000 employees of nickel miner Vale Inco have been on strike since mid-July, and after seven months living off of $800 a month in strike pay, the repo man has come knocking.

"We've got people losing homes. We've got families breaking apart. We can't make our payments," said worker Pat Digby, braving a wind chill of -25C to picket at the front gate of Vale Inco's smelter in the Sudbury neighbourhood of Copper Cliff. (4)

So it should come as no surprise that while the workers finally settled, many losing pensions after their homes, Vale is now recording a huge profit.

Net income at Brazilian mining company Vale probably soared nearly five-fold in the second quarter on higher iron prices, as a new quarterly pricing system allows it to vastly increase the sale price of its ore. The world's largest producer of iron ore is expected to post net income of $3.83 billion when it reports second-quarter earnings after markets close on Thursday, according to the average estimate of six analysts -- an increase of 384% over the previous year.

Vale this year moved to a quarterly pricing system after the aging annual benchmark mechanism unraveled amid quarrels with China -- the world's largest buyer of the metal. The year-on-year jump was helped by the global economic recovery that boosted commodities prices from mid-2009 levels, as well as by higher sales volumes of iron ore and pellets. Profits likely soared 139% from the previous quarter, driven by an increase of around 100% in iron sale prices as a result of moving to the quarterly system. (5)

So how are you liking neoconservatism so far? And yet the government is still going through with massive corporate tax cuts.

Sources:

1. Vale Inco a 'third world' employer: union, by Sudbury Northern Life Staff, June 27, 2009

2. Globe and Mail, June 2009

3. Ottawa will take no action over Vale's Sudbury cutbacks, Clement says, National Post, 2009

4. Vale is still holding out with no help from Clement for the workers, Canadian Press, 2010

5. Vale profit soars in Q2, By Brian Ellsworth, the Sudbury Star, July 23, 2010

Tony Clement, Jim Flaherty and the Adams Mine Scandal

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

If anything defines the Mike Harris years in Ontario, it is their love of corporate fat cats. The higher up the corporate ladder, the more clout you had with Harris and the boys.

And they would go to extraordinary lengths to accommodate them.

There are lots of examples of this, but one of the best is the Adams Mine scandal.

A Harris friendly company purchased the mine in the hopes of turning into a dump site, but there were grave concerns. The pit's rock walls were unstable, and there was a great potential for contaminants to leak into the groundwater.

Despite this, Harris used every trick in the book to try and make a ton of money for his buddies, even selling them 2000 acres of crown land at rock bottom prices. Land they had no authority to sell.

Public Concern Temiskaming is demanding to know how the Conservative government can allow the sale of 2000 acres of Crown Land near the Adams Mine to a company that may not hold title to the Adams Mine property. The Conservatives had justified the secret sale of Crown Land to the Cortellucci Group on the basis of the Cortellucci s claim of ownership over the adjacent Adams Mine property. But Cortellucci s claim to title is now subject of a major lawsuit. The Cortellucci Group have been named in a $10 million suit by waste giant CWS (Canada Waste Services) over control of the Adams Mine site. Charlie Angus of PCT says the lawsuit raises major questions about the government s attempt to sell the Crown Land at the surprisingly low price of $22 an acre.

You just can t sell buffer land to people who don t have clear title to the original property. I know the Cortellucci s are the biggest campaign donors to Ernie Eves, and I know the government has been trying to push this sweetheart deal through without any public input, but surely, the issue of who actually owns title to the land has to be addressed before any sale is allowed, stated Angus.

The CWS lawsuit alleges that dump promoter Notre Development engaged in the purported sale of the Adams Mine site to the Cortellucci Group even though CWS had a $4.6 million lien on the property, as well as a right of first refusal over any new Adams Mine dealings. Angus says the failure of the Conservatives to address the issue of title at the Adams Mine is just the latest in a series of politically-inspired gaffes over the Crown Land deal. There s been a smell about this secret land deal and it s not just garbage. This is a government that is hell bent on trashing public process and carrying out an unjustified fire sale of Crown Land just so that Tory developers can make hundreds of millions of dollars by bringing back the Adams Mine. (1)

And this was not the first time that the Cortellucci Group were given preferential treatment.

Mr Dwight Duncan (Windsor-St Clair): My question is to the Minister of the Environment and Municipal Affairs. Earlier this month, your colleague Mr Gilchrist resigned from cabinet as a result of a police investigation into allegations that government policy was for sale for the price of $25,000. You, sir, wrote a letter clearly attempting to influence a decision of the Ontario Municipal Board on behalf of developers with clear financial ties to your party. In fact, Jay-M Holdings contributed over $15,000 to your party.

Minister, you're aware that a number of other developers have a great interest in the Oak Ridges moraine and they too have a great potential to gain from your involvement. To what extent was your interference prompted by financial contributions to your party and to what extent are you prepared to stand up today and put a freeze on the Oak Ridges moraine to ensure that proper development takes place over time?

Hon Tony Clement (Minister of the Environment, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing): I thank the honourable member for the question and would say to him, as I said in this House last week as well, that the letter he makes reference to was not a letter to the OMB; it was not a letter to any member of the OMB. It was a letter to the regional chair. It did not take a position on the issue before the OMB. It took a position defending a piece of legislation over which I have carriage. It was advising him of the letter of the law and in no way was it an attempt to in any way influence a quasi-judicial tribunal. It was not even written about an issue that the tribunal had carriage of. So I disagree with his characterization.

In terms of who gave what to whom, I know that all political parties receive donations from individuals. I'm aware that our party has been the most successful at that because we have the best record for the people of Ontario, but it had no impact on my decision to write a letter or not to write a letter. Mr Duncan: According to a report prepared by noted York University professor Robert MacDermid, 28 companies with links to the Cortellucci and Montemarano Development Group made 209 contributions to your party, totalling $335,000,
between 1995 and 1997. That same group of companies made no contributions to this political party. One of those companies, is Fernbrook Homes Ltd. Let me read to you an ad about Fernbrook Homes, and I quote this from their ad which is readily available on the Internet: "Now previewing, a private, gated community overlooking ... the Oak Ridges moraine." Can you confirm that this is the same Fernbrook Homes Ltd which is tied to the Cortellucci and Montemarano group of companies who made 209 contributions to your party totalling $335,000? (2)

The Cortellucci Group would end up contributing almost a million dollars to the party, including $47,000 to Jim Flaherty's leadership run and $40,000 to Tony Clement's. (3)

There is no doubt Cortellucci's Tory connections run deep, as do his pockets. Since 1995, the Cortellucci group of firms have donated almost $1 million to the party and played host to one of the marquee fundraising events on the Tory calendar a dinner every fall that brings in more than $300,000 in one evening. The $900,000 in donations to the party made up until 2001 represent the largest amount of money to come from any one company or group of companies with common ownership, outpacing even the firms owned by Peter Munk and the Barrick Gold fortune. Donations made since midway through 2001 are not yet publicly available.

Major banks, by comparison, have donated roughly between $200,000 and $250,000 to the Tories in the past eight years. The fundraiser primarily draws developers and builders and was first championed by the late Tory cabinet minister and successful car salesman Al Palladini. Insiders say it was Palladini, who represented the riding of Vaughan-King-Aurora, who brought Cortellucci and his business partner, Saverio Montemarano, into the Tory fold and urged Cortellucci to make friends with former premier Mike Harris.

Harris and Cortellucci were especially close, Tories say, adding the developer has yet to form any sort of personal relationship with Premier Ernie Eves. (4)

And not just the provincial conservatives:

[Cortellucci] also hosts a string of annual fundraisers for cabinet ministers, federal Tory leaders and Canadian Alliance politicians. In 2000, Cortellucci donated $100,000 to the Canadian Alliance under then-leader Stockwell Day, according to York University professor Robert MacDermid. On the development side, Cortellucci, along with his brother Nick, owns a string of home building companies and firms that do the excavating and grading for new subdivisions. (4)

Harris tried everything from loosening environmental standards, to creating a crisis so that he could assume control of Toronto. But in the end, the dump site did not materialize, but Clement did learn how to play the game.

Tony Clement Goes on Safari to the U.S. to Bag Oil Sell Out

When fellow MP Gerry Ritz launched his one man comedy tour during the Listeriosis outbreak, our Minister of Health. Tony Clement, was nowhere to be found.

Turns out he was in the United States protecting the 'proportionality' clause in the NAFTA agreement. This clause is good for the U.S. but could be devastating to Canada.

According to the Parkland Institute:

This obscure-sounding clause essentially states that, when it comes to energy, no Canadian government can take any action which would reduce the proportion of our total energy supply which we make available to the United States from the average proportion over the last 36 months.

In other words, if over the last 36 months we have exported just under 50 per cent of our available oil (including domestic production and imports) to the United States—and we have—then no government in Canada can do anything which would result in us making less than two thirds of our total oil supply available to the US.

...this clause seriously jeopardizes our own energy security in this country, and severely hampers our government’s ability to set our own energy policies. ... For example, if a natural disaster were to hit eastern Canada tomorrow, our government could not say that we will cut oil or gas exports to the US by 10 per cent in order to increase the oil and gas available for disaster relief in Canada. (5)

And According to the Dominion:

As the US election campaign kicks into overdrive, Canadian politicians and oil executives are stepping up lobbying efforts to make sure whoever controls the White House keeps purchasing notoriously dirty oil from the Alberta tar sands.

Executives from energy company Nexen Inc., which has major investments in northern Alberta's heavy oil industry, and Tony Clement, chair of a Canadian cabinet committee on energy security, met with Democratic candidate Barack Obama's top energy advisor Jason Grumet in late August to cement the "energy partnership" during the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado.In addition to official political pressure from Canadian cabinet ministers attempting to force Obama's hand on the tar sands, the oil industry has hired high-powered lobbyists of its own. Gordon Giffin**, a former US ambassador to Canada, is now a registered lobbyist in Washington for the energy firm Nexen Inc.(6)

The Canadian people will always come last with this government.

Tony Clement Gives Away Natural Resources to Bust Union in Sudbury

Footnotes:

*Charlie Angus is now an NDP MP, and is doing an excellent job.

**Mike Harris and Gordon Giffen were both on the board of Ace Security Laminates

Sources:

1. Legal Battle Raises Questions About Cortellucci's Adams Mine Deal, ADAMS MINE COALITION, May 8, 2003

2. Legislative Assembly of Ontario, November 3, 1999

3. Government accused of secret land deal, By Richard Mackie, The Globe and Mail, May 8, 2003

4. Developer's Tory party ties run deep - Caught in controversy over land deal: Proposal involves Adams Mine, By Kate Harries and Caroline Mallan, The Toronto Star. May. 9, 2003

5. Over a Barrel: Exiting from NAFTA's proportionality clause, By Gordon Laxer, John Dillon, July 16, 2008

6. Canada's Tar Lobby: Tar Sands Lobbyists Focus on US Democrats, By Chris Arsenault, The Dominion, September 8, 2008

How Mike Harris Stole the 1999 Ontario Election

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In the video at the bottom of this page you'll hear Mike Harris insider, and long time Tony Clement colleague, Leslie Noble; suggest that Harris could not have been all bad, otherwise he would never have been re-elected in 1999.

But there were three contributing factors to his 1999 victory:

1. Money

2. Deceit

3. Theft

1. All Kinds of Money

One thing we keep hearing about the Harper Neoconservatives, is how much money they have and their ability to fund raise. And while they will try and lead you to believe that the majority of their donations come from ordinary Canadians, that is not true. Their largest backers are the corporations and wealthy Canadians who stand to gain the most from the Neoconservative agenda.

And like Mike Harris, Stephen Harper changed the rules for political contributions, to try and bankrupt the opposition, while they cleverly used non-profit and religious organization to rake in cash on their behalf.

One good example of this is Jim Flaherty's supporter and friend Charles McVety, head of Canadian Christian College. He has set up several religious front groups, many of which are political. He does separate the political ones by stating that no tax receipt is allowed:

We need your financial support to continue fighting for family, child protection, democracy, justice, religious freedoms, and political accountability. Please donate $100 to the Building the Future campaign. Help us help you influence policy and law. NOTE: Due to CFAC's political actions to support family, religious freedom and democracy, Revenue Canada will not allow us to issue charitable tax receipts. (1)

However, no matter what group you decide to donate to, they all go to the same place:

Press the button at McVety’s Word.ca TV show, shown on The Miracle Network and it leads to the donations page for the "Institute for Canadian Values" seeking new members (annual fee to join, $35.00) and 'will accept donations'.The Institute for Canadian Values is not a registered charity and is as political as The Canadian Family Coalition. Of course they are all housed in Christian College ... here is another interesting issue. If our donor gives through the the main ICV site hoping to support the work of that politically minded organization, how would McVety’s staff know NOT to send her a tax receipt that would go for a donation to the college? Would a receipt be sent anyway? (1)

So by having the funds all go to one place, whether earmarked for the political or the charitable, they are able to launder political money and issue receipts that would not be allowed otherwise.

That's just one example to show how easily it's done. And Mike Harris did adopt the "family values" crowd.

Advocacy group activity in 1999 also reached record levels. At least 29 groups took part in the campaign and together spent well over $6 million, more than both the Liberals and NDP. The TV advertising of the main advocacy groups was as heavy or heavier than what the NDP managed to buy on a sample of 15 TV stations. (1)

Besides religious groups, there was also enormous support from Stephen Harper's National Citizens Coalition and Jason Kenney's Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

But Harris's system to generate larger amounts of money was a bit more transparent.

Party contribution data demonstrate that the government's near doubling of the legal limit on contributions to political parties in an election year (from $14,000 to $25,000) was prompted by the Tories' dependency on contributions from wealthy individuals and large corporations who give the maximum donation possible. The higher limits on contributions brought the Tories an additional $2.2 million, while the Liberals took in $277,000 and the NDP $103,000 as a direct result of the changes.

To almost all Ontarians, the higher contribution limits are irrelevant because they cannot afford to donate such large sums ... [Robert] MacDermid concludes that both previous and existing contribution caps are not a restraint on, but rather a licence for, the very wealthy and corporate interests to try to influence government. (2)

Mike Harris himself bragged that he had the support of 100 corporations, many of whom gained enormously from the neoconservative agenda. And they certainly helped to influence the election results:

More than two-thirds of the money the Conservative central campaign raised came from corporations. MacDermid calculates that 16 per cent of all the money raised came from just 19 corporate conglomerates. For example, TrizecHahn and its subsidiary Barrick Gold made 17 contributions worth a total of $121,000, and the Latner conglomerate, which includes companies such as Dynacare, Greenwin Properties and Shiplake Investments, gave over $100,000. Over all of the contribution periods in 1999, TrizecHahn and related companies gave to the Tories $255,000, the Cortellucci and Montemarano companies $254,000 and Latner companies $220,000. (2)

2. When First We Practice to Deceive

York University political scientist Robert MacDermid says the Tories are operating on a permanent campaign footing, helped by changes to the Elections Act and the Election Finances Act last year that have given them an electoral edge unseen in the history of Ontario politics. In his recently released paper, Changing Electoral Politics in Ontario: The 1999 Provincial Election, MacDermid reveals how these election law changes gave the Tories an unfair advantage in the 1999 provincial election campaign. And he argues that the Harris government's extensive use of government advertising and Conservative Party pre-campaign* advertising has rendered controls on campaign spending meaningless. (2)

They also shortened the period of time for campaigning which benefited them immensely:

When the government shortened the campaign period from about 40 days to 28, it benefitted fund-raising that depends on large donations from relatively few individuals and corporations. The Tories raised $4.9 million dollars without spending a penny on fund-raising, while it cost the NDP $206,000 to raise just over $400,000. The shorter campaign also brought the unregulated pre-campaign period closer to election day and allowed the Tory campaign to advertise in the pre-campaign period as much as in the campaign period without any concern for
spending caps. (2)

And they reduced the number of seats, claiming that it was a cost cutting measure but instead just erased seats they knew they couldn't win:

The government's 21 per cent reduction in the number of MPPs, from 130 to 103, has resulted in few cost savings to the taxpayer because of increased members' spending and a projected salary increase. MacDermid argues that this measure has in fact cost Ontario citizens, reducing their chances of receiving timely services and assistance from their elected representative. (1)

In their book: The provincial state in Canada, Keith Brownsey and Michael Howlett, also wrote of the Harris government:

"As in 1995, the Tory campaign was a well-executed, generously funded and probably the most undemocratic Electoral campaign that post-war Ontario had witnessed." (3)

3. Run Thief, Run

But what probably factored the heaviest into the Mike Harris victory was the abuse of our tax dollars for self promotion.**

Question: What you are doing is unprecedented. Your current $4-million spending spree is just the latest. It comes on top of millions spent on education propaganda. It comes on top of millions spent on wasted welfare propaganda. It comes on top of millions wasted on business propaganda. In total so far, and it's early going yet, early days yet, you have wasted over $42 million worth of taxpayers' money in a desperate attempt to save your own skins. Minister, why should taxpayers be involved in this plot to fund your re-election campaign? Minister, you're wasting $42 million of taxpayer dollars on PC Party propaganda. It doesn't matter how you slice it and how you dice it, that's what it's all about. (4)

The self-promotion also included enormous expenditures for signs. I remember those. "Pay Homage to Mike Harris Here" ... "Last Chance to Pay Homage to Mike Harris for the Next 300 Feet" ... "Honk if You Like Mike Harris. Honk Even if You Don't Like Mike Harris. We have Riot Police and we Know How to Use Them" OK, maybe that's not exactly what they said, but we knew what they meant.

"... the log for three stations in the 12 months before the campaign, shows the Tories advertised in the months before the campaign at unprecedented levels, buying almost as many TV ad spots in the month before the campaign as they bought during the campaign and spending as much money on advertising before the campaign as they spent during it. The Tories used government advertising as part of their overall re-election campaign and the key ministries of Health and Education spent $20 million dollars on advertising in the run-up to the campaign. Government advertising ran at unprecedented levels during the campaign, bathing voters in feel-good spots and positive imagery. (1)

We need to watch for some of this stuff in both the next federal election and the next Ontario provincial one, now that Tim Hudak, Mike Harris's protege is heading up the party.

Tony Clement, Jim Flaherty and the Adams Mine Scandal

Footnotes:

*The Harper government was the first in Canadian history to run attack ads against their opponents outside of an election campaign.

**Harris's chief of staff, Guy Giorno was behind this advertising campaign at our expense. He is now Stephen Harper's chief of staff and apparently the "brains" behind the Canada Actions plan and the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars on self-promotion ads and signs

Sources:

1. How Charles McVety moves money, By Bene Diction Blogs On, April 24, 2008

2. York U. Political Scientist Reveals Secret to Conservatives' Electoral Success, York University Press, Septemebr 5, 2000

3. The Provincial State: Politics in Canada's Provinces and Territories, by Keith Brownsey and Michael Howlett, UTP Higher Education, 2001, ISBN-13: 978-155111368, Pg. 193

4. ORAL QUESTIONS: GOVERNMENT ADVERTISING, Ontario Hansard - October 28, 1998

Two-Tier Tony Clement and the Gutting of Healthcare

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

When Tony Clement was named the first health minister in Stephen Harper's cabinet, the Canadian Medical Association raised the alarm.

Former Ontario health minister Tony Clement, once dubbed ‘Two-Tier Tony’ for his oft-stated belief there must be more “choice in health care,” has been appointed federal Minister of Health for the newly-minted Conservative government. Critics immediately tabbed the 45-year-old lawyer’s appointment as an omen for further devolution of federal authority in health care and disinterest in enforcing the principles of the Canada Health Act.

“It’s quite shocking,” said Mike McBane, executive-director of the Canadian Health Coalition. “It sends a very clear signal that the Prime Minister would appoint someone who is ideologically committed to privatizing the delivery of the public health care system, someone who was aggressively involved in dismantling the Ontario health care system, in firing nurses and shutting down hospitals, and someone who’s an ideologue. He’s not someone who’s balanced and interested inevidence.” Ontario Health Coalition director Natalie Mehra said Canadians should be “deeply concerned,” given Clement’s support for the privatization and deregulation of long-term care facilities and for the creation of for-profit hospitals in Brantford and Ottawa, while serving as the province’s health minister from February/2001-October/2003. (1)

Credit Where None is Due

It's always interesting when I hear people say that Clement was praised for his handling of the SARS epidemic. That epidemic was a bit of a wake-up call for the arrogant Clement, because he looked around and asked "where are all the nurses?" Good question since he had fired them all.

And after candidly admitting that the public health system was “close to collapse.”

Critics duly noted the system’s deterioration was self-inflicted, as it had been gutted by Tory government measures that included laying off thousands of nurses, as well as turfing scientists in provincial health labs scant months after Clement assumed the portfolio. (1)

The front line workers during the SARS epidemic, knew exactly who was to blame:

As a union of front line providers, we can attest that the SARS outbreak was marked by chaos and confusion, inadequate resources and planning, and a determination to place economic interests above health and safety interests. Employers and government all too often excluded the input of workers. Such an outbreak was almost inevitable given the starvation of our health care system. Worse, we have seen little that gives us hope that the necessary changes are happening.

With the cutback of hospital beds and resources stretched to the limit, there has been a longstanding problem in Toronto hospitals with wait times in emergency rooms. So much so that the Toronto Emergency Medical Services has recently had to devise a new system for leaving patients in hospitals to ensure that ambulance paramedics can return to service in a reasonable amount of time.

As a result, during the outbreak it was not uncommon for paramedics to be required to wait for hours on end in their ambulance with a suspected SARS cases before being allowed to take the patient into emergency. Indeed, paramedics were often re-directed from a hospital unwilling to accept a suspected SARS patient. We are not convinced that the necessary improvements that are required in infection control have been made since the outbreak. Indeed, some negative practices are deepening. (2)

He scrambled to clean up his mess, throwing his weight around, but only history credits him with handling the crisis, instead of preventing it, or at least lessening it, when he had a chance.

Clement always put corporations above people and loved the power of sticking it to those who were less fortunate. Growing up Anthony Payani, raised by a single mom, I don't think he was terribly affluent. But then when his mother married former Ontario Attorney General John Clement, suddenly he was royalty who could snub his nose at everyone.

In 2002, he announced that MRI's would be available to those with money, so they wouldn't have to wait in line with the peasants.

The Ontario Health Coalition reacted with outrage over Health Minister Tony Clement’s announcement of the opening of for-profit bidding on 25 MRI and CT scan machines for Ontario. With this announcement, the provincial government has made clear its intention to take non-profit public hospital services and fund for profit corporations to provide them in private clinics.

“Stubbornly clinging to an ideological approach with no public mandate and no outcome-based evidence, the provincial government is risking the future of our public Medicare system and must be stopped,” said Irene Harris, coalition co chair. “We view this announcement as an extremely grave threat to the future of our Public Medicare system and will respond in kind.” - The Minister still has not justified creating for-profit cancer treatment at Sunnybrook Hospital in the face of a Provincial Auditor’s report that found that the for-profit treatment was more expensive and that waiting lists had not changed. (3)

Later that year he went to Banff where he plugged private health care. The only thing he left out were the facts:

Since it got into government the Ontario PC party [under Mike Harris] has radically altered the balance of public not for profit and private for-profit control of Ontario's health system: approx. 90% of Ontario's laboratory sector is now controlled by a private sector oligopoly of three companies: MDS, Gamma Dynacare (recently bought by Lab Corp), and Canadian Medical Laboratories.

The non profit Victorian Order of Nurses, VHA and Red Cross have closed programs and offices across the province as homecare has been handed over to for-profit corporations such as Bayshore Health Inc., Paramed, Bradson, ComCare, WeCare and others. The majority of Ontario's long term care beds are now controlled by for-profit companies as a result of the PC government's bed awards over the last several years. Several corporations are the big winners: the multinational giants Extendicare Inc. and Central Park Lodges, and domestics Leisureworld and Regency Care.

Cancer treatment is now offered for profit at Toronto's Sunnybrook Hospital, through Canadian Radiation Oncology Services Ltd. Health Minister Tony Clement announced two for-profit hospitals to be built in Ottawa and Brampton with awards to private consortia to be announced in the new year.

.... The government has faced ceaseless complaints as more and more evidence is unearthed that residents' care levels in Ontario's long term care facilities are the poorest in Canada. The Provincial Auditor has found that profitised cancer treatment costs more and hasn't dented waiting lists. Private labs have taken the most profitable section of the service and left the most expensive to the public. (4)

And he didn't do much better as federal minister of health. When it was discovered that several deaths were the result of the products Sleepees and Serenity Pills II, among the nearly 12,000 unapproved natural health products on the market, in Canada, W-Five ran the story.

W-FIVE requested several times to speak to Canadian Health Minister Tony Clement about the four cases of estazolam and Health Canada's enforcement measures, but our repeated requests were declined.

When they tracked him down, on the run, he blamed it on the Liberals. Typical. When they were first elected their answer to everything was "thirteen years" referring to the length of time the Liberals had been in power before them. However, they didn't realize that at some point you have to change the channel. It wasn't until NDP Pat Martin pointed out that they were now part of that thirteen years, that they shut up.

How Mike Harris Stole the 1999 Ontario Election

Sources:

1. Two-tier Tony Clement appointed new minister of health, Canadian Medical Association Journal, February 22, 2006

2. The Canadian Union of Public Employees Presentation to the Justice Archie Campbell Commission into the SARS Outbreak, September 30, 2003

3. For Profit MRIs and CT Scanners Extremely Grave Threat Ontario Health Coalition Warns of Public Response, Globe and Mail, July 8, 2002

4. Minister Clement's Semantics in Banff Will Disguise Fatal Poison Pill, Ontario Health Coalition, September 4, 2002

5. What's in the Pill, W-Five, CTV News, February 23, 2008

Tony Clement: You Want to Sell What?

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

From his days as a young radical at the University of Toronto, Tony Panayi (Clement) was on a mission to sell our sovereignty to the highest bidder. He was helped in his endeavours by other young neocons, like Tom Long and Leslie Noble.

They took over the campus PC's and later the provincial PCs with the help of Preston Manning and the Reform Party*, the American Republicans who created the concept of the Common Sense Revolution, the National Citizens Coalition and the Fraser Institute, to name just a few.

"Mike Harris's Common Sense Revolution was designed primarily to remake government in the image of big business ... Fortified by corporate "think tanks" like the C.D. Howe and Fraser Institutes, and citizen front groups like the National Citizens Coalition and the Canadian Taxpayers Association." (1)

And in fact, once elected, lobbyists like Guy Giorno and Leslie Noble, had far more power than elected officials.

One pipeline Noble has to influence government decision-makers is the unelected cadre of political aides in the offices of the Premier and his top ministers. These aides, many of whom report to Noble during the election campaign, wield tremendous power in government, a reality acknowledged by some Tory MPPs.

Tory backbencher Bill Murdoch says they openly flaunt their power. ``They say, `Hey Murdoch, we didn't even have to go through an election and we're running the place.' '' Queen's Park Speaker Chris Stockwell, a Tory MPP, calls them a ``cabal'' and says they make decisions without input from elected politicians.

Noble's own correspondence to clients demonstrates a familiar, routine relationship with this unelected cadre. To a client, Noble explains she is contacting Giorno (Harris' director of policy), Hutton (Harris' director of issues management), Lindsay (Harris' chief of staff until last year), Brian Patterson (former economic development minister Bill Saunderson's executive assistant, now assistant to Transportation Minister Tony Clement), Peter Clute (Finance Minister Eves' executive assistant), and John Guthrie (he was Consumer Minister David Tsubouchi's executive assistant). In her correspondence, Noble also describes how she contacts members of ``P and P'' - Priorities and Planning - the inner cabinet that makes most government decisions. (2)

And yet it's interesting to hear her defend Mike Harris as a man of the people in the video at the bottom of this page.

Tony Clement's Fire Sale

In 1997, after too many gaffes and a scandal, Al Palledini was demoted and Tony Clement moved from the backroom and the backbench to the transportation portfolio. At the time Harris was in a bit of trouble. He had carried through with Republican strategist Mike Murphy's 30% tax decrease, and with massive cuts and the implementation of user fees, he was still not able to balance the books. With an election looming, he needed to find some cash and find it fast.

And despite what was said in the video I mentioned, claiming that Harris did not have a privatization agenda, he actually had a privatization minister. And it was he and Tony Clement who decided that the best way to not only generate cash but ensure that no additional revenue could be obtained by the province, they sold a highway. Yep. Highway 407, that has become a veritable cash cow for SNC-Lavalin**, was sold for peanuts. (about 1% of it's value with a 99 year lease)

Rob Sampson, Minister without Portfolio with Responsibility for Privatization, today announced the sale of Highway 407 for dlrs 3.1 billion, making it the largest privatization in Canadian history. Highway 407 will be sold to a consortium of Grupo Ferrovial and its subsidiary Cintra Concesiones de Infraestructuras de Transporte, SNC-Lavalin, and Capital d'Amerique CDPQ, a subsidiary of the Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec. The consortium will purchase from the province the right to own and operate Highway 407, along with the obligation to finance, design and build west and east-partial extensions to the highway.

"Completion of the highway is important to Ontario's continued economic growth. It will stimulate new economic activity in communities across the Greater Toronto Area and throughout the province," said Tony Clement, Transportation Minister. "The extensions will also enhance our transportation infrastructure by reducing congestion on Highways 401, 403, and the QEW." ... The province's decision to pursue the sale of the highway was announced February 20, 1998. The transaction is expected to close on May 5, 1999. The terms of the sale will also include an innovative method of regulating tolls and linking toll revenue to congestion relief. "The travelling public will be happy to know that we have struck this deal with their time and pocketbooks in mind," added Sampson. (3)

Except that our pocketbooks were emptied with this deal. As James Bow suggests, it was:

"... the worst decision the Harris government made, which remains a large and lasting legacy: the sale of Highway 407. This flawed decision illustrates the mistaken belief that Harris seemed to have that government was easy, and cuts could be made without consequences ... . provincial taxpayers were short-changed on the deal.

... The big problem was what the Harris government did with the funds raised. As the sale took place, a few months before the 1999 provincial election, the money raised ($3.1 billion) was placed into general revenues. As a result, the Harris government was able to claim that they had balanced the budget after just four years in power, and after inheriting a “massive fiscal mess” from the previous Rae administration. Unfortunately it is a simple fact of accounting that you should not use the funds raised through the sale of capital investments as operating revenue. That’s a very bad credit move, as such revenues simply aren’t sustainable. Many politicians likened this to selling the refrigerator to pay for food. The reduction in the deficit was a phantom, and Ontario’s fiscal situation deteriorated as the economy slowed ... " (4)

Now with the federal government, Clement's selling off of our assets is still his top priority. An example of this was Stelco to Vale from Brazil. Negotiators with Vale now say that they were surprised how easy it was for them. Usually when they invest in foreign companies, governments want assurances that the workers and communities will be protected. But they state that the Harper government and Tony Clement wanted nothing, and as a result we got nothing.

Federal Industry Minister Tony Clement should resign in "disgrace" for refusing to intervene in mining job losses in Sudbury, says a senior official with the United Steelworkers union. "I think (Clement) should step down," said Wayne Fraser, director of Steelworkers District 6 which represents thousands of union members in Ontario and Atlantic Canada."I think he is a disgrace to the government and to the people of Canada," Fraser said. He was reacting to Clement's statement Tuesday that the Conservative government will not take any action against Vale Inco over cutbacks at its Sudbury mining operations. (5)

This is what happens when ideology trumps common decency. They completely ignore the human and humane elements.

Social Darwinism 101.

Two-Tier Tony Clement and the Gutting of Healthcare

Footnotes:

*On August 29, 1995, Mike Harris met again with Preston Manning to discuss the possibility of forming an alliance. It would not officially take place until 2000. (Open for Business, 1997, Pg. 21)

**SNC-Lavalin was also given a large contract by Stephen Harper to help with the rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan.

Sources:

1. Open for Business, Closed to People, The Transnational Corporate Agenda, By Tony Clarke, Fernwood, 1997, ISBN: 1895686733, Pg. 33

2. Queen of the Park: She's the Premier's adviser and Ontario's leading lobbyist. Should taxpayers be concerned? By Kevin Donovan and Moira Welsh, 1999

3. PROVINCE SELLS HIGHWAY 407 FOR 3.1 BILLION US DOLLARS, UK Guardian, April 13, 1999

4. Harris Flawed Legacy. By James Bow, July 13, 2007

5. Clement Should Step Down: Steelworkers, The Sault Star, June 2009

Tony Clement and 101 Things to do With Cat Food

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

A few years ago, I was having coffee with a friend and she was discussing how hard it was for her to manage as a single mom. This was during the Mike Harris era, and despite the fact that he boasted about cutting income tax by 30%, he offset it with user fees and reductions in services, so the net gain was minimal.

She lamented that she had been unable to save money and said that when she retired she would probably end up in a single room, reduced to eating cat food.

Not wanting her to stress, I patted her hand and said "Don't worry, Chris. You'll never be able to afford cat food."

In Mike Harris's Ontario, the very rich got richer, while everyone else was lucky to get by. And if you complained, he had very big riot police, ready to make you forget you were ever hungry.

And the cat food comment, was not unique as there were many reports that seniors had been reduced to eating it for nourishment. Whether true or not, it was certainly possible.

At the bottom of this page is an episode of a recent Steve Paikin show on TVOntario, where a panel is discussing whether or not the Common Sense Revolution had been a success. I can certainly see what many people have been suggesting lately, that our media is tipping to the right. Usually Paikin is a pretty enlightened guy, and yet to debate the issue, he has a former Harris cabinet minister, a former Harris "Whiz Kid" with close ties to Guy Giorno and Tony Clement, and a right-wing journalist.

The only offsetting voice is that of Marshall Jarvis from the Ontario English Catholic Teachers' Association. He does a very good job of reminding people that revisionist history is just revisionist history, but the facts are the facts. And the fact is that Mike Harris was a train wreck.

And if we needed a reminder of that, the choice to speak up for Mike, Dave Tsubouchi, will sure jolt our memory.

David "Tuna" Tsubouchi

Dave Tsubouchi was Mike Harris's first Minister of Community and Social Services, who came down with a bad case of political foot in mouth disease. The day he was sworn in, a reporter asked about welfare reform, to which Tsubouchi replied: "I haven't figured out how to be an MPP yet, let alone a cabinet minister."

Unfortunately, he never did figure out how to be either.

But that didn't stop him from adopting the same confrontational attitude as the rest of the caucus, making arbitrary decisions and then refusing to explain himself.

It is difficult at the best of times for marginalized and disadvantaged people to have any public voice. Political participation is traditionally low among people who are already excluded from the social and political mainstream (Jackman 1994). Since the election of the Harris government, Ontario has also seen a truncated democracy specifically around access of the most marginalized people to the political process. The government has closed down various mechanisms that had been established by previous governments to consult with groups particularly affected by changes to social programs. Thus, for example, after the 1995 election Minister of Community and Social Services David Tsubouchi simply refused to meet with the Social Assistance Advisory Council (made up of social assistance recipients and representatives from community agencies) that was supposed to serve as a consultation body to represent recipient perspectives. This left the council no option but to resign. Internal documents indicate that the same ministry has deliberately adopted a policy that it will not consult with advocates and recipients. (1)

Not that the decisions were ever really his to make. All that was handled in the backroom, by people like Guy Giorno Leslie Noble, Tom Long and Deb Hutton (Tim Hudak's wife)

Tsubouchi's job was just to try to justify the actions. Boy did he mess that up.

In the Tories' first year in power, the Social Services minister had caused the government more embarrassment than any other member of executive council. Tsubouchi was kept in cabinet, in part, because he was the only member of a visible minority in the Tory benches, and because Harris accepted that the rookie minister had faced an impossible task.

As minister supposedly responsible for delivering succour to the poorest in society, Tsubouchi's mandate had been, in fact, to increase their hardship. It was he who was charged with slicing the income of welfare recipients by 21.6 per cent; he who was charged with forcing them to work for the money that was left. The situation would have been difficult enough for the most adept and experienced of politicians. But even though Tsubouchi was, in fact, more experienced than most in his caucus, having served on Markham council for six years, he seemed to have learned nothing while there, at least in regard to debate. On the floor of the House, the performance of the bearded, mild-mannered amateur poet and actor was fumbling, repetitive. sometimes almost incoherent. "Well, Mr. Speaker . he would begin, like an actor who had forgotten his lines, desperately improvising while he waited for a prompt. None came.

The opposition would have targeted Social Services as a key area of attack regardless of who held the portfolio. But when it became apparent that Tsubouchi was the weakest actor in the Tory cast, they tore into him with the gusto of undergraduate film critics. (2)

The opposition would joke "That's one man we'll never ask to resign" (3). He was a gift.

But some of his best gaffes were when he was trying to convince those on welfare that they could eat on $ 3.00 a day. And he knew how, or at least he thought he did.

On October 3, 1995, [Bob] Rae rose in the legislature for his first question of the day. The Liberals had already been hammering away at a recent Tsubouchi gaffe; the minister had advised shoppers on welfare that they could absorb his government's cuts by buying dented tins of food or waiting for tuna to go on sale for sixty-nine cents. Now Rae rose, right hand in jacket pocket, as was his custom, and solicitously asked Tsubouchi if he knew just where one might find tuna at such a low, low price.

.... Tsubouchi assured the leader of the third party', that tuna was commonly available at that price. "In fact," he added helpfully, "even if it's not priced at sixty-nine cents, quite often you can make a deal to get it for sixty-nine cents." After a moment's stunned silence, the House erupted. The sounds might have resembled outrage to those listening in on television, but in fact most members were roaring with laughter, including government backbenchers, several of whom looked up at the incredulous reporters in the gallery and shook their heads in woe. The only people not laughing were Tsubouchi and Harris. The premier hunched forward in his chair, staring grimly at his desk. When Speaker Al McLean finally got the House to quiet down, Rae affected an air of bemusement. "I can honestly say I was not anticipating" the response, he told the House, "but I'd like to ask him, when was the last time he bartered for food?"

In the wake of such debacles, the Tories tried to improve the rookie minister's verbal fencing skills, bringing in a communications expert on a $25,000 contract. But her efforts produced little visible effect, and within a few weeks of the tuna incident. Tsubouchi was at it again, this time apologizing to the House after Toronto Star reporter Kelly Toughill pointed out to him that new regulations would cut welfare payments for 115,000 people with disabilities, something the Tories had promised not to do. In his apology Tsubouchi lamely claimed that the cuts were inadvertent. A patently angry Harris berated his own minister in front of reporters. "That's no way to run a government and it better not happen again," he warned. (4)

But the dented tins and tuna were just a warm up.

In response to a question, again by NDP leader Bob Rae, he indicated that he had a shopping list showing how to live within the limits imposed, that he would be happy to share with Mr. Rae. Having publicly announced its existence, Tsubouchi then stalled for weeks before finally giving it privately to Rae, apparently believing he could keep it from the public.

The list was published in most papers and became a topic of debate for several weeks.

Tories attending a fundraiser found their cars pelted with the menu staple [bologna] as they arrived. Diners in posh Toronto restaurants debated whether tuna could be found for less than 69 cents (one businessman claiming he had seen it advertised for a mere 63 cents in Leamington), and a Toronto Sun columnist actually followed the menu for a month and reported on it. Tsubouchi never recovered from this fiasco. He was demoted barely a year after his appointment, to the much less demanding Consumer and Commercial Relations portfolio, and has rarely been heard from since.

And yet here he is singing the praises of the Harris regime, as though he was a prominent participant, and not a laughing stock.

Between he and Al Palledini, we often thought the Ontario Legislature was a spin off of SCTV:

Correcting Some of the Revisionist History

Mr. Jarvis is absolutely correct when he states that the comments made by the other three on the panel were an attempt to rewrite history. Leslie Noble claims that they consulted ordinary Canadians but nothing could be further from the truth. The only consulting done was with Corporations and right-wing fringe groups like the PGIB, the National Citizens Coalition, the Fraser institute and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

She also defends Harris's cuts suggesting that they were due to the downloading of services by the federal government. That is true in part, but Brian Mulroney did the same when Bob Rae was premier.

And as for responding to concerns of the public, the agenda for the Common Sense Revolution was contrived at the University of Toronto by a group of young radicals, including Tony Clement (aka: Tony Panayi), Tom Long and Leslie Noble. It had absolutely nothing to do with meeting any one's needs but their own.

And the promotion of the so-called CSR was created by a Republican strategist, Mike Murphy, right down to the 30% tax cut. Bob Rae made mistakes and yes he was inexperienced, but much of his reputation was "created" by the Ontarians For Responsible Government, an offshoot of the National Citizens Coalition.

And yes Mike Harris did win in 1999, but it was through craftiness and deception. I'm doing a separate posting on that.

It's important to understand this for two reasons. The first is that Mike Harris's chief of staff, Guy Giorno is now Stephen Harper's chief of staff, and he is created the same kind of confrontational and secretive administration for Harper as he did for Harris.

The second is that Mike Harris's protege is Tim Hudak, the new leader of the Ontario Conservatives, and we have to make sure that he never gets elected.

Tony Clement: You Want to Sell What?

Sources:

1. Mike Harris's Ontario: Open for Business, Closed to People, Rights and the Right, By Ian Morrison, Fernwood, 1997, ISBN: 1895686733, Pg. 73

2. Promised Land: Inside the Mike Harris Revolution, By John Ibbitson, 1997, ISBN: 0136738648, Pg. 182

3. Hard Right Turn: The New Face of Neo-Conservatism in Canada, By Brooke Jeffrey, Harper-Collins, 1999, ISBN: 0-00 255762-2, Pg. 174

4. Ibbitson, 1997, Pg. 183-184

A Clever Distraction: "Any Palladini is a Pal of Mine"

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Before entering politics, Al Palledini was the owner of the Pine Tree Ford Lincoln dealership in Woodbridge, Ontario. He was best known for his slogan "Any Palladini is a pal of mine" and a series of television ads created by a young Rick Moranis.

But with the help of Reform Party members who taken over the riding association, he beat out his next opponent by more than 8000 votes.

Palledini* was likable enough and always smiling, but he also earned a reputation for "barely taking the time to open his mouth before changing feet". (1) He was also ill prepared to become a cabinet minister, having just a grade eleven education and never having been involved in politics before.

In fact, when Mike Harris called him to tell him he would be the new Minister of Transportation, he thought he had dialed the wrong number. "This is Al Palledini, Mr. Harris ... " (2)

What Palledini didn't realize was that neoconservatism demands that cabinet ministers are either ill qualified or won't blink. He fit the first description. Political science professor and author Brooke Jeffrey explains:

His [Mike Harris] theory was unique, but understandable if one considers his neoconservative perspective. Normally, ministers function as spokespersons for the "constituencies" they represent through their Departments. The minister's role, around the cabinet table, is to put forward legislation benefiting these client groups, or to express concerns about the proposals of other departments which might have adverse implications for their constituencies. .... But Mike Harris has a different view of government, and so naturally his view of the role of ministers is also at odds with tradition. ... If they were to have any hope of implementing their ambitious and radical agenda, no minister could be allowed to be captured by client groups ... (3)

In February of 1996, when the Harris government announced that they would be pulling the public transit funding (to help pay for the 30% cut to income tax), Palledini was rudderless trying to deflect criticism. (4) This was tough on municipalities, especially larger urban centres that required this service. Harris tried to offset it by suggesting that his cabinet ministers would forgo their chauffeur driven limos, causing Palledini to state "Fighting the traffic to come downtown, I'm not used to. I wouldn't want to do it everyday. It's rough." (5)

Palledini was not totally useless however. I have to say that I liked the late Al Palladini and that I admired his performance as Minister of Transportation. Unlike John Snobelen, he didn’t poison the waters talking about the need to create “a useful crisis” to instigate reforms, and Palladini went after drunk drivers and truck safety with a vigour that I’ve not seen in many a minister. (4)

He was just out of his league. In the end it was not his incompetence however, that caused his demotion but a public scandal, when it was learned that he had been paying $1500.00 a month in child support for a baby he had with a woman, not his wife. (5) On October 10, 1997, he was demoted to Economic Development, Trade and Tourism.

Palladini's move, which many saw as a demotion, also allowed former Harris adviser and neo-con stalwart Tony Clement to take over the reins at Transport as Palladini moved on to become Minister of Economic Trade, Tourism and Development. In announcing the shuffle the premier nevertheless chose to accentuate the positive, describing Mr. Palladini as "the best salesman in government" and declaring he had "the energy, enthusiasm and commitment to market Ontario around the world." (5)

And Palledini did not disappoint those who looked forward to his comic relief.

By 1998 Mr. Palladini was up to his old tricks again. Rather than selling Ontario to the world, he was busy lambasting the cab drivers of Ottawa for "shoddy" vehicles and incompetent service. Residents of the nation's capital, always attuned to slights from the provincial capital, responded with their own gibes at the hapless minister. Finally, the mayor of Ottawa, Jim Watson, managed to put the matter in perspective by pointing out that the issue of licensing was a municipal, not a provincial, responsibility in any event, and that he didn't "think we need a royal commission on the matter."

The uproar over his broadside had barely subsided when the minister was widely quoted for his enthusiastic reply to a reporter's tongue-in-cheek question about the state of the economy and recent buoyant liquor and condom sales. "I think they go hand in hand," the minister replied, apparently serious. "I think it's great ... I hope they give Mike Harris's government the credit for all the partying that's going on, and all the positive things that are happening in our economy. I think it's all tied in. It's all one and the other." There was no official word on the reaction of the Tories' "family values" caucus, but it seems unlikely they were amused. (5)

Al Palledini died on March 7, 2001 in Mexico. Support for Harris's reign of terror was plummeting. Two by-elections in particular "suggested that the bloom was off Mike Harris’ rose" Palledini's riding of Vaughan-King-Aurora, went to Liberal Greg Sorbara in a byelection on June 28, 2001, where he took 61% of the vote, and in another; Beaches-East York the Conservative candidate could only muster 10% of the vote. (4)

Tony Clement and 101 Things to do With Cat Food

Footnotes:

*Palledini's legislative assistant was Joan Tintor who would later become a "Blogging Tory". In 2007, the Harper government gave a contract for communications consulting worth up to $20,000, to Tintor, for "communications professional services not elsewhere specified." They claimed this was not for her blog, but she refused to be interviewed.

In his new book, Harper's Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power, party strategist Tom Flanagan notes the Tories' innovative use of blogs in the 2006 election campaign. He cites in particular two members of the Blogging Tories, Steve Jank and Stephen Taylor, who write highly partisan blogs on federal politics. Mr. Flanagan writes that campaign manager Doug Finley "appointed people to monitor the blogosphere and to get out stories that were not quite ready for the mainstream media." These bloggers "amplify and diversify our message," he wrote.

Sources:

1. Hard Right Turn: The New Face of Neo-Conservatism in Canada, By Brooke Jeffrey, Harper-Collins, 1999, ISBN: 0-00 255762-2, Pg. 177

2. Jeffrey, 1999, Pg. 176

3. Jeffrey, 1999, Pg. 175

4. Harris Flawed Legacy. By James Bow, July 13, 2007

5. Jeffrey, 1999, Pg. 179-180

Mike Harris and Ontario Under Corporate Rule

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Almost immediately after Mike Harris and his team, with the help of Preston Manning and the Reform Party; won the election in 1995, they put their agenda into high throttle.

Where Stephen Harper suggested that he must move incrementally to avoid scaring people off, Harris and his young radicals, had no such inclinations.

They made it clear that Ontario would be changing the way it did business and priorities were about to shift.

Though they claimed to have consulted ordinary Ontarians to draft their Common Sense Revolution, that was absolutely false. The Common Sense Revolution was created by a Republican strategist, Mike Murphy, and promoted by the National Citizens Coalition, and policy input came from right-wing organizations with ties to multi-national corporations. And Ontarians didn't know what hit them.

It was no longer the prime role of government to intervene in the marketplace on behalf of the public interest to stimulate job creation, redistribute wealth through social programs, or ensure that the industrial sector met environmental standards. Instead, the prime role of the Harris government was to serve the interests of big business by providing a favourable climate for investment through lower corporate taxes, lower wages, lower social spending, and lower environmental standards. The democratic rights of citizens—to adequate food, clothing, and shelter, or education, employment, and health care, or a safe environment, social equality, and decent public services—were hijacked by transnational corporations. (1)

And Harris and his team knew full well what they were doing:

Mike Harris is not only aware of this transnational corporate agenda but is anxious to ensure that Ontario accommodates to the new economic and political order. Indeed, this may have been what the architects of the Common Sense Revolution really had in mind when they drafted their platform for Ontario's future. After all, the main theme behind the Common Sense Revolution is the call to re-invent the role and responsibility of government in Ontario. While the idea of a "limited" and "downsized" government, along with a 30 percent slice in personal income tax, was sold to Ontario voters during the election, there was a lot more to the Harris agenda for "reinventing" government. Simply put, the government was getting out of the business of ensuring that the basic rights of Ontario citizens were met regarding employment, housing, education, health care, environmental safeguards, and social equality. Instead, the government's prime responsibility is to secure the kind of economic and social conditions required to make Ontario an attractive place for profitable transnational investment. Under the Common Sense Revolution, therefore, the role of government is being re-invented and re-engineered to serve the interests of transnational capital. (1)

But if this wasn't exactly what voters had in mind, Guy Giorno's Omnibus Bill * was a kick to the groin.

Yet, the cornerstone of the Common Sense Revolution, namely, the model of corporate government which Mike Harris has in store for Ontario, was largely unveiled through the infamous Omnibus Bill. Introduced as the Savings and Restructuring Bill, it called for amendments to some forty three separate pieces of legislation on the Ontario statute books. As Toronto Star columnist Thomas Walkom observed, the Harris government's Omnibus Bill served to centralize power in the hands of the cabinet to an unprecedented degree while, at the same time, transferring power into the hands of corporations through extensive forms of
deregulation and privatization.

In other words, the Harris agenda is not to eliminate government, as many of its critics initially charged, but to re-engineer government to serve the interests of transnational capital. As Walkom describes it:Harris is getting government out of the business of helping the poor. He is getting government out of the business of environmental and business regulation. But where Harris figures state action is needed to promote private enterprise, government power is being strengthened." (1)

This was of grave concern to the opposition, as MPP James Bradley pointed out at the time:

"I notice one provision of this bill; it's the only new provision, and this is dangerous. Some of you who have been around this House for a while will know this, and some in the cabinet must be concerned. The new provision eliminates the policy and priorities board of cabinet, effectively giving more control of government decision-making to the Premier's office. Well, we know who that means. That means Guy Giorno's got more power**..." (2)

And with the Harris government, lobbyists had more power than the elected MPPS. Though Leslie Noble moved back to the corporate sector after the election, she was in contact with the premier's office on a daily basis and was directly involved in much of the decision making.

When Mike Harris was elected Premier, Leslie Noble became the hottest power broker in Ontario. The 37-year-old is one of Harris' closest advisers and runs the leading lobbying firm dealing with the Ontario government. No other lobbyist has Noble's access to Harris. And no other top political adviser to Harris is a lobbyist. Noble helped write the Common Sense Revolution, ran Harris' successful 1995 election campaign and will run the Tories' next campaign, expected later this year. Noble has no official job with government but regularly briefs Harris, his cabinet ministers and Tory MPPs on what needs to be done politically to stay in power. In corporate circles, Noble is the lobbyist Ontario business executives hire when they want the Harris government's ear. (3)

These young radicals who met at the University of Toronto, including Tony Clement, Tom Long and Leslie Noble, did very well under a corporate run government. But they were only getting started.

A Clever Distraction: "Any Palladini is a Pal of Mine"

Notes:

*Much like the disastrous Omnibus Bill he wrote recently for Stephen Harper.

**Since becoming Stephen Harper's chief of staff, Guy Giorno has also centralized power to the PMO, where he has more say over what is going to happen than the prime minister.

Sources:

1. Mike Harris's Ontario: Open for Business, Closed to People, The Transnational Corporate Agenda Behind the Harris Regime, By Tony Clarke, Fernwood, 1997, ISBN: 1895686733, Pg. 28-36

2. Official Records for June 23, 1998, Legislative Assembly of Ontario, Discussion Bill 25

3. Queen of the Park: She's the Premier's adviser and Ontario's leading lobbyist. Should taxpayers be concerned? By Kevin Donovan and Moira Welsh, 1999

Tony Clement Takes on the Reform Party

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

After the 1990 election, the Ontario neoconservatives had five years to build up their party. They had hired Republican strategist, Mike Murphy, to create the "Common Sense" campaign, fashioned after one he ran for New Jersey Governor, Christine Todd Whitman, right down to the 30% reduction in income taxes.

Anthony Panayi, now Tony Clement, was president of the party and acting as secretary for Harris, as they travelled the province and networked with right-wing organizations, in preparation for the next election.

But they had one stumbling block that could lead to their downfall: The Reform Party. There were several members who wanted Reform to run in provincial elections, and began making preparations for an Ontario party. Kimble F. Ainslie, who had been PC leader in Southwestern Ontario, left to form the Reform Association of Ontario, which left Clement and others worried that they could split the vote.

In their research on the 1990 election, the Tories discovered that the presence of fourth parties meant a difference between a minority and a majority government for the NDP. If the Tories had picked up two-thirds of the fourth-party vote that went to groups such as the Family Coalition Party, they would have won 10 extra seats in the legislature. Instead of only 20 seats, they would have had a far more respectable 30, leaving the NDP to form a minority government.
　
It fell to former party president ... Tony Clement to staunch the flow of votes from the Conservatives to fourth parties. The biggest fourth-party headache for the Tories was the threat of Reform running in Ontario. The federal Tories obviously had failed to respect Reform. Ontario Tories didn't want to make the same colossal blunder. Clement, son of former Ontario attorney general John Clement, gave himself the task of learning everything about the western-based party that had wreaked such havoc with his federal counterparts.

"I wanted to learn not only about them, but to allow them to learn about us," Clement recalled. "We were absolutely convinced that if they were to look at us, and look at where we were coming from, we might not be able to satisfy them on 100 percent of the stuff, but we could satisfy them on 80 percent of it. And maybe that would be enough to reduce or eliminate the threat of splitting the vote and allowing 130 Liberals to get in, just as we'd seen 98 out of 99 Liberals federally in the province of Ontario." (1)

But Clement did not have to fight this himself. A group led by Craig Chandler, Focus Federally For Reform (FFFR) (2), came to the rescue, as he would many times for the neoconservative movement. Chandler had provided input for the Common Sense Revolution and wasn't about to throw it all away now.

The Tories took a two-pronged approach. They planned to make connections with the grass roots as well as the elite of the Reform Party. Concerning the grass roots, Clement hit pay dirt when he acquired a fairly comprehensive list of every Reform member in Ontario, some 25,000 names. The Tories sent out mailings incessantly to every Reform member on that list, with letters that went a little like this.

"Hi, my name's Mike Harris. You don't know a lot about me but here's some policy. Here's where we stand as a provincial party. You might be interested in it." The plan was always to lead with policy. Grass-roots people talk about policy. There was no point telling people to vote Conservative to avoid splitting the vote. Voters have no stake in strategic voting. They simply don't care. Main Street Ontarians care deeply about issues. Reformers hate the old top-down style of politics and like discussions on policy. The Tories caught the wave. In mailing after mailing, they asked the Reformers for their opinions — on education, crime, and the deficit. They sent out questionnaires and were amazed at the number that were returned.

Kindred souls with shared goals. Besides, the Reform Party was already in trouble when it was discovered that they had neo-Nazis operating within their ranks.

"We were very, very clear though, in our dealings with them that we weren't going to change who we were for them. Mike was very clear on this. We would share information with them. We should share who we were. If they felt comfortable with us, that was their choice, come on board. We're an open party. You can join up, you can get involved in the riding associations, etc."If you do not feel comfortable with us, this is who we are, we are not going to change who we are for you, but we understand," Clement said. He stressed that there was never any intention to "out reform Reform."

"We never said, 'How can we change ourselves to make our-selves more acceptable to you?"' Clement recalled. That would have been as much an affront to Reform followers as it would have been to mainstream Conservatives. The Tories kept it simple: they shared policy statements, introduced their leader Mike Harris, and told Reformers that they were welcome to climb aboard. A lot of Reform members took up the invitation and easily integrated themselves with the Tories at the riding level. In Cambridge, the federal Reform Party candidate headed up the candidate search committee for the Tories' provincial candidate. In Durham West and in Al Palladini's riding of York Centre, Reformers were members of the executive.

In addition to courting grass-roots Reformers, the Ontario Tories set out to create a working relationship with the movers and shakers within the federal Reform Party. Mike Harris met three times with Reform Party leader Preston Manning, the first meeting taking place in December 1993. They met again on 3 May 1994. At that time, Harris and Clement talked to Manning, his campaign manager Rick Anderson, and Ed Harper, the only Reformer from Ontario, prior to the release of the Common Sense Revolution. They shared with Manning and his people their ideas on welfare reform, tax cuts, and deficit reduction, and they asked the Reformers if they had any ideas which they wanted to share with them. The provincial Tories needed Manning and Reform on side. More specifically, they needed to spell out to Manning that there was no room on the right for a fourth party in the Ontario election. (Before the Tories left Ottawa, they discussed their radical plan with Tory leader Jean Charest, his policy gurus, and Conservative senators.)

The third phase of the campaign to deal with the Reform threat took place the day after the launch of the Common Sense Revolution in the spring of 1994. Harris met with Manning and his people and then the Tory caucus. They invited Jean Chretien and the Liberals, but they were too busy. Ah, well. Essentially, said Clement, they were treating the federal Reform Party with respect, while not trying to pretend to be something they were not. As a result, Manning decided not to branch into provincial politics. In October 1994, Tory efforts paid off. In an official vote at the Reform General Assembly, close to 70 percent of the members from Ontario and two-thirds of the Canada-wide membership voted against running candidates in
provincial elections.

Clement attributed the higher vote in Ontario to the massive effort which the Tories had made to get their message out to Reform members in that province. There were no deals struck, no high-powered strategic discussions. It was a matter of each leader setting out policy and forging informal links. Formal ties were far less important than getting to know each other. And it worked. Reform stayed home during the 1995 election. (1)

Ainslee was not happy, and accused the Harris team of sabotaging him. The results of the election were 82 seats for Tories, 30 for the Liberals, and the NDP were reduced to 17.

Mike Harris and Ontario Under Corporate Rule

Sources:

1. Right Turn: How the Tories Took Ontario, By Christina Blizzard, Dundern Press, 1995, ISBN 1550022547, Pg. 64-67

2. What are People Saying About PGIB, PGIB Website, Accessed July 23, 2010