“
Building the future of a prosperous Ontario…”
An
exclusive conversation with the Hon.
Dalton McGuinty, MPP. Premier
of Ontario.
By Thomas S. Saras
Editor-In-Chief
Q:
I would like to thank you for the opportunity to interview with you today. This is your third year in power Mr. McGinty as Premier. Can you give our readers a synopsis of what you accomplished during this period of time?
A:
We have made some real progress but there is still much work to be done. We have made real progress and much of that credit belongs to the people of Ontario who have worked so hard to help us establish that progress. In our schools, we have smaller classes, more teachers, higher test scores and lower dropout rates. In healthcare we have more doctors, more nurses and shorter wait times. When it comes to the environment we are investing 2 cents of the gas tax toward public transit in our communities. We just shutdown, in fact we blew-up, the coal fire station this morning here in Toronto. We’ve got 288,000 new jobs over 90% of them are full-time positions. So those are good new jobs that Ontario is receiving. And that speaks the sign of confidence Ontarians have in their own province and of course the international investment community as well. You are not going to get investment unless you inspire confidence for the province. But we still have quite a lot of work to do.
Q:
Your government currently has complaints against the federal government about the amount of transfer of payments the province receives. Apparently Ontario will not be receiving as much funding as some of the other provinces because the federal government deems it as one of the richest provinces. As for immigration funding, Quebec receives more funds than Ontario because, according to Prime Minister, of its long-based history and as such the Prime Minister cannot reduce this amount to Quebec but at the same time cannot give anymore to Ontario. What are your comments?
A:
You know Tom, that I believe in traveling around the country to help my colleagues, fellow premiers better understand Ontario’s perspective and our circumstances. I think we are making some real progress helping them better understand where we are coming from. First of all we are proud to invest 4.9 billion dollars through Ontario taxes into the equalization program to help provinces receiving equalization. But what we are saying right now Tom is that given that every body agrees that there is a fiscal imbalance, which means we all agree that the federal government has far too much money and the provinces and territories don’t have enough. Given Prime Minister Harper’s reality, the question is, what is the best way to divide the money that comes down to the provinces and territories? Some of my colleagues in the equalization receiving provinces are saying well we should take some of that money and put it into the equalization, which does benefit Ontarians. What I’m saying is no. What we should do is take the money and divide it among all Canadians equally, which means you wouldn’t put anymore into equalization you transfer to all Canadians through the government on a per capita basis. So I will tell you why we do not want to put any more money into equalization because right now equalization in Toronto means 30% over the last four years has a built in annual escalator of 3.5%, and today Tom in Canada we have the lowest levels of funding to our colleges and universities in the country right here in Ontario. We have the second lowest levels for our education in the province. We are raising tuition fees; we have raised taxes in Ontario. We have the lowest per capita programs in the country. So we run a very tight ship. A very efficient operation but at the same time equalization is supporting funding to colleges and universities in equalization receiving provinces, for our higher levels hospitals, lower levels of tuition and lower taxes. We are putting in 4.9 billion dollars that is pretty fair and we are proud to do that but right now in order to straighten this engine we should transfer money through the federal government to all Canadians equally.
Q:
Last week we had a report by the office of the Ombudsman of the province, very critical of the civil servants working with people with disabilities. I want to hear your comments about this?
A:
Fist of all let me tell you that I am very proud of the thousands and thousands of Ontarians who devote themselves to public service through the Ontario public service sector. What is more of a pleasant surprise when you form the government you see that there are so many people who dedicate their lives to improve the quality of life for Ontarians. Politicians come and go but the public services is always there. I welcome the Ombudsman’s report. We are reviewing these recommendations and looking forward to our drawing of a bill to make sure how we can deliver best possible quality services deserved by the Ontarians.
Q:
To some extend I want to remind you the plea of the people with disabilities and your past promises to help them.
A:
When it comes to helping Ontario’s most vulnerable, this year we have invested another $218 million meaning we are up to $10.3 billion every year. That means 13cents of every dollar that the government spends is now going to help the most vulnerable compared to 15cents to our schools. So it matures on a level going up and up and up. It is almost to the point where we are spending as much on our schools as we are to our most vulnerable. In our first budget we increased support by 3% and in our 2nd budget we increased support by 2%. We have done a lot of work but there is always more work to be done, we have more budgets to come and every budget to come we will make it clear once again to help our most vulnerable. This is an important priority for us.
Q:
There was an announcement by your government that there were approximately 65 civil servants to be hired by the department of correctional services and police services. But these are only temporary positions and not full-time.
A:
I am not familiar with that announcement, but we could find out more information for you if you want it.
Q:
Yes, thank you. It is very important to know whether these new positions are temporary or full-time as your government announced. It was announced that they have created new full time positions, when we investigated we have been told that they were temporary positions, just for this reason we need to know whether these are included in the number of new jobs and also if every Ontarian has the right to apply.
A:
One thing you do need to know, that earlier this month we announced and we will be the first government in Canada to do this, we will be hiring 70 individuals with the Ontario Public Service for six-month assignments. I think this is something different from what you asked, but this is an internship program for the new Canadians to work in the government and enrich their knowledge of the system for periods of six months.
Q:
Yes, this is different from what I was asking. The announcement that I am talking about is specific about hiring 75 probation and correctional officers.
A:
We will look into that release.
Q:
Mr. Premier we have many programs for new Canadians but the civil servants seem not to be aware of these programs. When asked about these new programs their answers are we have no idea. This leads to a call to the Premier’s office to inquire about these new programs. This gives me the impression of a disorganized business. When are civil servants informed about these programs?
A:
Tom, I have never heard that consensus ever. You know we have a new web site, which is suppose to make it easy for everyone to access information even those who are thinking of coming to Canada from a foreign country to get a better understanding of what the opportunities are here. First of all I must say the purpose of a web site is so everyone can have access to that information. I have just mentioned about our new program to establish internships and mentorship for 70 people for 6 months then another 70 people for another 6 months and then another 70 people for another 6 months. I think you are aware of the announcement Mr. Mike Cole made. He introduced our new fair access to professionals and trades Act. This is the first of its kind in Canada and we established a full Registration Practices Commissioner. Its all about requiring Ontario’s 34 regulated professionals to ensure that the licensing process is fair, clear and open. This is in keeping with the recommendations of Judge Thompson.
Q:
Yes, Judge Thompson was present at the announcement when was made by the Minister. My question is how fair are going to be the civil servants implementing these programs? By offering a six-month internship to new Canadians you create hopes and at the end of this internship the disappointment could be even worse.
A:
Well the whole outlook is not to hire people but rather as new Canadians often tell us, they cannot get a job without Canadian experience. But they can’t get experience in a job setting. So what we will do is lead by example and do that ourselves and then march an appeal to the private sector, and say to them are you aware of all this talent? And we would like for you to take advantage of it, even if it is only for a six-month residency program or an internship of some kind. I think you might have seen the ads on T.V. No government has ever done this before. We’ve established a loan program as well. People tell us they have no money to take the test. Through this program we will lend you up to $5000.00 and you pay us back when you get a job. The fact that you do not have the money to prove that you are up to a certain standard to pass the test is not a good enough reason, so we will make the money available too.
Q:
Well, yes this will help but will not solve the real problems. Mr. Premier lately we have seen and heard about a lot of violence and crime here in Toronto, now more than ever before. The police and the city re-assuring us but there is no any action in order to solve the problem. What has your government done or will do to help solve this wave of crime and violence in Toronto?
A:
Let me just put something in perspective. Three years ago the province with the lowest crime rate in Canada was Ontario. Two years ago the lowest crime rate in Canada was in Ontario. Crime overall in Ontario continues to go down with a couple of exceptions. One is crime-involving guns and that has been a real issue for many young people. So we have done a couple of things. One, we said to the police we would help you hire 1000 more police officers, you got more crown attorney’s working, more judges working and we have created special courts that are better able to deal with gangs and major organized crime. That is one aspect of it. You have to be tough on the offenders. But then the other thing we need to do, and I know this is the guy who practiced criminal law, you need to wait for the guy to get into trouble, then you end up spending a lot of money on the police, on the crowns and on the judges and more money on the jails. You end up turning to the people and take their tax money to look after these people. The thing you need to do of course is prevent these young people from getting into trouble in the first place. We have made some real progress with this. We are changing a lot in Ontario and no one has ever done that before. We have for example said to Mike “Pinball” Clements, coach for the Toronto Argonauts, we will put $15,000.000 down you raise another $15,000.000 and then we will give you another $15,000.000 on top of that for a total of $45,000.000 to develop programs to appeal to young people. The other one Tom and we have many examples of what we have done, but I will tell you just this last one. We said you couldn’t drop out of school at the age of 16. It doesn’t make any sense in a knowledge-based economy for a kid to say, I am out of school, and I am 16. We are saying that the law now is going to require you stay in school until the age of 18. Now that’s a lot of work for us to do. We are going to create new apprenticeship programs. You don’t have to stay in a school inside a traditional classroom setting. You can look in an auto-body shop. So we want to set up new apprenticeship, new work-place opportunities and new co-op programs. We have also taken 800 teachers put them into a high school and said to them: “you are not getting a classroom, your only job is to track-down young people who are in danger of dropping out”. Furthermore we want them to track down young people who have already dropped out and bring them back. We are doing more than ever before to deal with crime when it happens. To hire police and more crowns, judges and more courts and at the same time working hard to prevent crime by creating more opportunities including schools that are now available in the evenings and on weekends. Remember the Tories shut them down because they could not provide funding to keep them open. So we have created this where young people can go to let off some steam without getting into trouble.
Q:
What are your plans for the future?
A:
Of course we want to stay focused on our major priorities, education, healthcare, the economy and an important dimension of the economy will be meeting our energy needs. Education – we will continue to get our classroom sizes down, get test scores up and the drop out rate down. Healthcare – again its about getting those wait times down, getting more doctors graduating. We had a ceremony earlier today over 300 international medical graduates. We have the most aggressive program in Canada now with 200 residency spaces, which for the first time ever this year is actually occupied by international graduates. The last thing we are going to do of course is to keep this economy going. It is doing very well. We have the lowest unemployment rate in I forget in how many years now. Last month alone I think we created 34,000 brand new jobs. We will also be making a very important announcement tomorrow that will meet our energy needs to the year 2025. No government has ever done that before. Mainly what they do is say what are the energy needs until the election. We are saying we want to do more than that.
Q:
Thank you Mr. Premier for your time today to inform our community and our readers.
