Here’s To Doug Ford For Cheaper, Easier-To-Get Beer, And For More Roads and Highways For Ever Cars And Trucks, Driving At Higher Rates Of Speed On Them
A Commentary by Niagara At Large reporter/publisher Doug Draper
Posted November 5th, 2025 on Niagara At Larger
One of many speed cameras and elsewhere in Ontario broken down by vandals.
Unless I’ve missed something, I have never heard one word from Ontario Premier Doug Ford about the vandalism of speed cameras in Niagara and other regions of the province in all of the many months these cameras have been in use.
That’s rather interesting for a Premier who makes a habit of portraying himself as a law and order, get-tough-on-crime guy.
I’m sure that if I or anyone else tried to block machinery about to saw down trees or pave over wetlands to make way for more urban sprawl, or physically stand in the pathway of way of another pipeline being built to transport gas or oil, Ford would have the police out faster than you could say; “Where are the cops when vandals are taking a hack saw or can of spray paint to speed camera near an elementary school?”Instead, the Ford government has just passed legislation ordering Niagara and every other municipality across the province to completely stop using speed cameras as a safett tool as early as next week.
This in spite of the fact that many municipal mayors across the province, along with police departments and school boards, have presented evidence to Ford that speed cameras are effective in slowing traffic down on roads where it needs to be slowed down for the safety of other drivers and pedestrians, including children walking back and forth to school.
Ford’s first argument against speed cameras is that they are “a cash grab, which may appeal to his hardest core base of supporters, but which holds little credibility when you thing that there are many other examples of “cash grabs” out there that he has refused to do anything about.
On the “cash grab” front. how about charging people to park at hospitals to visit their sick loved ones, which Niagara Falls MPP Wayne Gates, among others, have been urging Ford, over and over again, to do something about.
And what about charging younger men $40 a pop to get a test for prostate cancer which could mean the difference between life and death? What about high fees financially challenged students are forced to pay for parking at our colleges and universities?
I could go onand on but what really bothers me is how weak a fight our Niagara regional government and other municipal governments across the province are putting up to save speed cameras.
On this one, given the proven benefits speed cameras add to community safety, Niagara and other municipalities should declare their willingness now to take a case for keeping them all the way to Canada’s highest courts.
Meanwhile, I for one, don’t care to hear any more crap from Ford and his minions about how much they care about our safety.
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Doug Draper, Niagara At Large
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