By Doug Draper
Thing must be getting awfully desperate in Ontario when the provincial government has to consider selling off some of its richest public assets to grab some quick cash.
This Liquor Control Board outlet in Niagara may soon be on the chopping block. Photo by Doug Draper
Yes, we know the province’s Liberal government is facing a record $24.7-billion deficit thanks to a combination of the Great Recession, a massive exodus of industry and its own fiscal mismanagement. But does that mean the government should hold a fire sale that could lead to assets like Ontario One, power generating facilities like Sir Adam Beck in Niagara Falls, the LCBO and others that rake in billions of dollars in revenue annually for the province, falling into private hands?
We’ve seen this movie in Ontario before with the Conservative government of Mike Harris pushing to privatize a number of public-owned assets, including a number of the province’s conservation parks. Fortunately, the Harris government’s plans to sell our parks and our power utilities were scuttled in a tidal wave of protest from Ontario citizens and others, including the now-governing Liberals. But it did manage to get away with selling Hwy. 407 in the greater Toronto area to a private consortium and motorists have been paying for it ever since with ridiculously high toll rates for this 67-mile-road that make the tolls for driving the entire 300-mile plus stretch of New York State Thruway between Buffalo and Albany seem like a Christmas gift.
As a representative for some of the employees working for the public corporations the McGuinty government is considering selling off now said to reporters in a recent interview – this is akin to someone throwing their furniture in their fireplace to keep their house warm.
It is a desperate, shortsighted way of dealing with a serious deficit problem in the province – one that Ontarians may regret for generations to come – and it has got to be stopped. (more…)
