01) ONTARIO ELECTION AVERTED AS NDP SLIPS

By Liz Rowley

     An Ontario election has been averted, with the NDP throwing its support behind Premier Wynne's budget, despite the Liberal government's plan to cut jobs and wages across the public sector, and slash spending on health, education, social programs, and public services.

     The Liberal minority will survive to fight another day because the NDP's conditions for support were so timid. While the NDP asked for 25,000 youth jobs, the Liberals gave them 30,000. The NDP asked for long term care beds, so the Liberals gave them beds. The NDP asked for a 15% cut in auto insurance rates, and the government promised to get it done.

     Perhaps feeling the heat of public criticism, the NDP came back just before budget day, asking the Liberals to create and staff a Parliamentary Budget Office. The only thing the government didn't give was authority for the Provincial Ombudsman to supervise the healthcare file.

     With pressure from labour to avoid an election and the possibility of a Tory win, the NDP backed the budget, no doubt with some sense of relief.

     But why did labour support this budget with its devastating attack on public services and public sector workers?

     There are two sharply different reasons. First, the right wing social democratic leadership is still predominant in many Ontario trade unions, which refuse to criticize the NDP and view the labour movement solely as an electoral machine for the party.

     Second, there is real fear and trepidation in the OFL and among progressives at the strength in the polls for the Tories, despite scandals in the Prime Minister's Office in Ottawa, and in the Mayor's office in Toronto. While a majority of voters and working people generally are appalled by massive Tory corruption, the Tories still have a sizable base which rejects all criticism as `lies' and `damned lies' by the `soft‑on‑Communism' press and media `maggots'.

     They take their lead from Rob and Doug Ford, John Baird, Jason Kenney, Tim Hudak, and an assortment of pit‑bulls. And their leaders are very well funded, as the little $90,000 solution to the Duffy problem shows. 

     Well, everything's relative. Perhaps the $90,000 is peanuts, compared to what it was designed to hide from public scrutiny. An independent public inquiry would help to find out.

     More important, the corporations behind them are huge funders ‑ never mind the Canada Elections Act, tax receipts, financial rules and laws, etc. Pierre Poutine was funded by people with deep pockets, who never asked for receipts. How many other extra-judicial operators are getting ready to steal the next election - maybe in Ontario, maybe in Toronto, or maybe Canada again?

     The federal Tories and the Ford Brothers' machine in Toronto broke election financing laws, and got away with a slap on the wrist. It helps to have friends in high places. New laws to sharply reduce election spending, and to police and enforce those spending limits, would also reduce the frenzy of US‑style attack ads that coincidentally helped the BC Liberals hang on to government.

     It would all be "ridiculous" (to quote the Mayor) if he and the Tory machine weren't such an immediate threat to democracy and to working people.

     In the context of deep austerity, the public is feeling the pain of the cuts and insecurity imposed by right‑wing "with us or with them" governments. Some, like those described as "Ford Nation," are looking to blame someone for their falling living standards. Their grievances are real. But the tea party populism whipping up their anger is manipulated by powerful corporate forces. Front men like Ford, Hudak and Harper are directing that anger at unions and unionized workers, at women, migrants, youth, Aboriginals, people of colour, and LGBTQ persons, all labelled the privileged "social elites". This is a dangerous and explosive cocktail.

     It may be that the Ford Brothers have gone too far. The Mayor could be forced out in advance of next year's election. No doubt that would be a victory for democracy in Toronto. But the Mayor and his Bro were elected as part of a right‑wing majority in City Hall that aimed to privatize city services, sell public assets, slash jobs and wages, and smash city unions, amongst other things. The Mayor may go, but his agenda remains, 18 months before they can be turfed out. Too long to wait on stand‑by.

     So, we have by‑passed an Ontario election this spring after all. Instead we can anticipate new opportunities for an election this fall, when the stakes are too high, and the political options too limited to stop the train wreck that's surely ahead. The 5-year austerity plan put in place by Premier Wynne, backed by the NDP, and imposed by PM Harper's majority federal government, is the guarantee that things are about to get much worse for the 99%.

     There's no solution in the current Legislature or Parliament, and with the undemocratic first-past-the-post system, little hope for any real progressive change in the near future. In fact, this electoral system gave Harper a majority with the support of only 20% of eligible voters ‑ a scenario that's quite possible in Ontario.

     The present minority situation gave the NDP a golden chance to fight for significant concessions like public auto insurance, rent controls and social housing construction, substantial increases in the minimum wage and social assistance, plant closures legislation, and infrastructure spending to create jobs and raise living standards. Instead, they supported an austerity budget that will do great harm to working people, the unemployed, women, youth, and many others in Ontario.

     Mass independent and escalating political action in the streets to resist austerity and demand new policies that meet people's needs: that is what the labour, democratic and people's movements must organize now. A Peoples' Coalition is the political vehicle to stop austerity and change direction.

     In Ontario, the OFL's Common Front is a good first step, but needs more action on the agenda, and more active participation by OFL affiliates. The Days of Action are a good model for sustained and escalating action. What's urgently needed is the political will and the money. We need to get on with it while there are still public services, jobs, pensions, and rights left to fight for.

     For more on this, check out the Communist Party's 10 Point  Prescription for a People's Recovery @ontariocpc.ca.

(The above article is from the June 1-15, 2013, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5L 3J1.)