Premier Owes Answers to ONTC Workers, Families

QUEEN’S PARK – Premier Kathleen Wynne needs to tell Ontario Northland workers and their families when she will publicly declare an end to the Liberals’ ill-fated ONTC fire sale, Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli demanded today.

“The Premier and her party have left ONTC workers and families in limbo for nearly two years now, not knowing whether they should buy a car, buy a home or send their child to college or university,” said Fedeli. “The Auditor General revealed the folly of the Liberal fire sale and confirmed what I maintained all along – that this would not save money.  She needs to end the uncertainty now.” Fedeli also pointed to the fact businesses have put off hiring and investments in Northeastern Ontario while they wait to see what the Liberals did with the ONTC. “The Premier continues to keep her finger firmly pressed on the pause button of this region’s economy. It’s clear she has no plan for jobs in the North.” Wynne also needs to explain how she expects Northerners to either accept or afford a 10-cent-a-litre provincial gas tax hike to fund Toronto transit while at the same time abandoning Northern transportation needs, Fedeli continued. “Her transit panel report uses the phrase province-wide eight times, so to insist that this isn’t the Liberal plan is flat-out dishonest.  Much like the billion-dollar gas plant scandal, her words and her math don’t match up.” Fedeli also thinks Northerners are fed up with a government that expects them to pay for scandal-aided cost increases to sky-high hydro rates, which have tripled under the Liberals. “It doesn’t have to be this way. Tim Hudak has laid out the Ontario PC five-point Million Jobs Plan which will create jobs, make energy affordable, rein in wasteful spending, and cut job-killing red tape,” said Fedeli. “It’s time to change the team that leads this province.”