Skip to main content

Hudak keeps open option of alliance with Liberals

Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak has kept his powder dry and has reframed from personally criticizing the Liberals' proposed public sector labour legislation. Or even commenting on it.  

Instead, he sent out Monte McNaughton, who faulted the proposed legislation with a variety of vague criticisms:  the legislation "is clearly lacking teeth" and exempts too many workers,  McGuinty "is taking a weak approach," and "doesn't have the courage to make tough decisions".

But McNaughton did not say the PCs would actually vote against the bill.  

Hudak's absence and McNaughton's refusal to say the PCs will oppose the legislation, make it look like the PCs are open to some sort of a deal with the Liberals.

They had better watch out -- the Liberal labour strategy has led the Liberals to a sudden, sharp drop in the election polls. So it may not be a winning strategy for the PCs to twin up with the Liberals on it. 

The Liberals will need at least some support from the PCs if their legislation is to pass, as they won't get support from the NDP. 

But the Liberals are not making it easy for the PCs to come over. Yasir Naqvi, Liberal MPP and parliamentary assistant to the minister of finance, baited Hudak for his refusal to comment on the Liberals proposed labour legislation. “Tim Hudak can’t duck his responsibility forever.”


Out of this exchange entirely was Randy Hillier, the PC's supposed labour critic.  On the far right of the party, it's not clear how open he would be to supporting the Liberal line.

There is no word on when the Liberals will actually introduce their proposed legislation to the legislature.  Likely, they will want to get this nasty business (which requires them to attack 500,000 public sector workers who have often supported them in the past) done as soon as they can.  That way they can move on  to something more positive before the Budget showdown this spring (and the possible election that may follow it).

The PCs might come around in the end on the Liberal public sector labour legislation, but they have an interest in making  the Liberals squirm for a while longer.

Notably, today, the PCs pushed their own interest arbitration legislation, which takes a completely different approach than the interest arbitration portions of the Liberal legislation (and which takes an even more employer-friendly approach).

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ford government fails to respond to 72% increase in COVID inpatient days, deepening the capacity crisis

COVID infections continue to drive up hospital costs and inpatient hospitalizations in Ontario. For the most recent fiscal year (April 1, 2022- March 31, 2023) hospital stays related to COVID cost $1.221 billion, according to new CIHI data.   This is about 4% of total hospital spending, creating a very significant new cost pressure beyond the usual pressures of population growth, aging, inflation, and rising utilization.   Costs for COVID related hospitalizations increased 22.2% in Ontario in 2022/23 from the previous fiscal year, rising from $999 million to $1.221 billion.  That rise is particularly notable as the OMICRON spike of late 2021 and early 2022 had passed by the the 2022/23 fiscal year.   The $222 million increase in COVID hospitalization costs came in the same year as the Ford government cut special COVID funding and, in fact, cut total hospital funding by $156 million.     In total, there were 60,653 COVID hospitalizations in Ontario in 2022/3, up from 47,543 in 2021/2. 

More spending on new hospitals and new beds? Nope

Hospital funding:  There is something off about the provincial government's Budget claims on hospital capital funding (funding to build and renovate hospital beds and facilities).    For what it is worth (which is not that much, given the long time frame the government cites), the province claims it will increase hospital capital spending over the next 10 years from $11 billion to $20 billion – or on average to about $2 billion per year.   But, this is just a notional increase from the previous announcement of future hospital capital spending.  Moreover, even if we did take this as a serious promise and not just a wisp of smoke, the government's own reports shows they have actually funded hospital infrastructure about $3 billion a year over the 2011/12-2015/16 period. So this “increase” is really a decrease from past actual spending. Even last year's (2016-17) hospital capital funding increase was reported in this Budget at $2.3 billion - i.e. about 15% more th

The hospital crisis: No capacity, no plan, no end

While Canada has achieved universal public healthcare coverage, that does not mean conservative forces have given up trying to erode that coverage and expand corporate care where it does not currently exist. The battle has become particularly intense in Ontario under the Ford Progressive Conservative government, which is implementing serious cuts to the level of care and moving to bring in for-profit mini-hospitals. Inadequate Staffing.   Less and less of hospital spending is on staff.   Employee compensation as a share of hospital expenditures has consistently shrunk in Ontario. This is not some immutable law of hospital development.  It is in stark contrast with the rest of Canada, where compensation has become a larger share and now accounts for 67.1%. Hospitals in provinces other than Ontario now have 18 percent more staff per capita than hospitals in Ontario. Overall, if Ontario had the same staffing capacity as the other provinces and territories, there would be another 33,778 full t