The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - The Long, Hot, Ontario Political Summer

Episode Date: September 4, 2024

What changed at Queen's Park this summer? A new – and the biggest – provincial cabinet of all time. A new education minister, but only for a few months because he liked the job so much, he quit politics altogether. A new policy on safe injection sites. But what stayed the same? Doug Ford's Conservatives are still the overwhelming first choice among voters. To discuss what's percolating at the Pink Palace, we welcome: Toronto Sun political columnist Brian Lilley; Globe and Mail Queen's Park reporter Laura Stone; The Trillium editor-in-chief Jessica Smith Cross; and Greg Brady, "Toronto Today radio host at 640 Toronto.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The more things change at Queens Park, the more they stay the same. What changed this summer? A new, biggest provincial cabinet of all time. A new education minister. But only for a few months because he liked the job so much he quit politics altogether. A new policy on safe injection sites. But what stays the same? Doug Ford's Conservatives are still the overwhelming first choice among voters. Let's maul over all of what's percolating at the Pink Palace with

Brian Lilly, political columnist, Toronto Sun. Laura Stone, Globe and Mail reporter based at Queen's Park. Jessica Smith-Cross, editor-in-chief at The Trillium. And Greg Brady, the morning radio host of Toronto Today on 640 Toronto. And we are delighted to welcome all four of you here around this table for this our first program of our 19th season here on TVO. What do you say we put the new guy to work right away? Happy to. Here we go. This is I want to read you this quote here of David Coletto the pollster as quoted by Robert Benzie our pal in the Toronto Star and it

goes like this. Sheldon bring the graphic up if you would. It's an enigma. He, the premier, is withstanding the same pressures that a lot of other political leaders haven't been able to and so the question is why? He's polarizing in the sense that if you don't like him, you don't like him and there's a lot of Ontarians who don't like Doug Ford, says Coletto, but he has enough who do and they think he's just a friendly, nice guy who isn't perfect, but admits mistakes when he makes them and tries to fix them, the pollster said. He's forgiven because he asks for forgiveness. Let's go around the table and get some theories

on why the Tories are still number one in this province. Fire away. Well, I think the opposition, specifically the Ontario opposition, and I think the Liberal Party, as they're kind of rebuilding from the ashes, and I think they're headed in the right direction. They're focused on the person

and not the party and the policies. So I think they need to kind of gear away from, Doug Ford, you won't even hear Marge Stiles use his first name, it's just Ford does this. Ford does that, I think it's the wrong strategy. Call them the conservatives. Talk about what the conservatives are doing to health care, what the conservatives are doing to education. I think you've got a winner. Steve, they've been trying this for the

better part of five and a half years now and it's not working. He's enigmatic, he's got a personality. I can't tell you how many times my phone rings or text and it's him telling a story about getting a haircut, almost as short as mine right now, down in Florida for 20 bucks or he swallows a bee and he makes it work and either it's a rival MPP or at times it's been an opposition leader or a leadership candidate and they're like how does he do it I can't do it quite like that and that's working for him right now so they should talk about the party and not the person. Jesse what do you think?

Yeah I agree. My personal theory on this is it's how Doug Ford talks. He talks like a real human being, not a politician. He stumbles over his words. He gets things wrong. He doesn't always make complete sense. But you get what he's getting at, and you feel like you understand him. And it's so rare, and it's so powerful in politics.

It really makes an impression on voters that this is a guy I like. Laura. I think, to the point about Doug Ford admitting his mistakes and admitting when he's wrong, I think that's rare in politics. You don't hear that a lot. Or when you hear it from other politicians, perhaps they try to put too much of a positive

spin on it and still try to make themselves look good. I think we've seen Doug Ford out there, and it's a bit of a joke now at Queen's Park, reversing his reversals and how many times has he changed course on this and that on major policies like the green belt belt which we saw last summer. But he kind of comes clean, he looks into the camera and he says he's sorry, and I think that is a rare quality in politics. He's also a populist. He came out this summer talking about liberalizing booze. We're gonna have alcohol in corner stores this week. That's a popular policy and there may be people who disagree with that,

and people in the health care sector who are concerned about the ramifications of that. But I do think all in all, most Ontarians agree with that as a common sense thing to do. Brian. On the forgiveness part, I was watching Justin Trudeau last week admit that he made a mistake, and he handled it very differently.

So the whole immigration file with the temporary foreign workers, even he admits he got it you know it's out of control. But instead of saying I made a mistake or my government made a mistake and we're going to fix it more sorry, he blamed the business community and said well we just did what they asked for and they demanded this at the time and and he's trying to explain away and I thought if he had I thought at the time if he just do what Ford does he would get a lot more sympathy from an electorate that's not giving him a lot of sympathy right now so I think that that forgiveness thing you know it can

be tough to to know what his policy is because if you don't like it might change in five minutes but you know I think that does sit well with voters. On the other hand, yes, the conservatives are in first place provincially as a party. If, and if you go do the deep dive on the Colleto numbers, you will discover that Doug Ford is the least popular of all the provincial party leaders. In fact, if you take the sort of, this percentage of the public approves him, this percentage of the public disapproves him, he's at minus 65, which is three times worse than anybody else.

Laura, explain how his party can be number one and he can be so personally unpopular. How does that compute? I think it's possible that people don't like Ford himself, but they might kind of reluctantly agree or maybe not completely disagree with things that he's doing they're not completely offended by the policies themselves I think it also points back to a point that Greg was making about the opposition we haven't seen the opposition able to kind of garner a stronghold with the electorate Bonnie Cromby is still trying to find the

Liberal Party we haven't heard too much from her over the summer Mauret Stiles seems to kind of focus on issues that are only appealing to her base as the NDP. She hasn't been able to kind of broaden that to a certain extent. So I think it speaks to where the opposition leaders are as much as it speaks to Doug Ford himself. And again, if you do the deep dive of the numbers, David Coletto goes on to say, quote,

ethics and being careful with taxpayers' money and honesty remain areas of vulnerability. How come? I've heard that from conservatives and so if you have people who support the party have those concerns they're going to be telling the pollsters that and also you know the people who support the liberals or the NDP are going to have the same concerns but it's leading into peer poly of conservatives more conservative conservatives who don't really love Doug Ford. When we talk on your radio station, we often talk about how the premier, there's a new verb to describe what the premier does. It's called Douglasing.

What does that mean? It's tough to tell if it's just physical or mental or it's just an emotion you feel. But yeah, I look and I go, I think polarizing also, when we talk about a populist, populists kind of polarize, you're either with or you don't. It's important to be interesting. He is an interesting person. We can watch a news conference

and kind of hang on his every word and wait for that moment where he might lose it. That said, I think all five of us would agree, we see a different Doug Ford post-pandemic. We see a more measured Ford. He felt like a loose cannon at city council. He was over-defensive of his brother personally and professionally at any time.

Loved his, obviously, his younger brother. But I think we've seen somebody that's more measured that picks his spots and tries to hit that. He did that news conference with a shooting at a Jewish school, shooting out the windows, with Olivia Chow and Justin Trudeau. And it resonated with people. Now, I thought he said a little bit too much taking a guess at where the would-be shooters were from and whether they were Canadian or not. People didn't like that.

But outside of that comment, the other nine comments, they hit the base and they go, there's a leader that's willing to step out there and at least as we said be human and have human emotions about things. You talked about press conferences and the Premier does one I don't know once or twice a week and Brian he did one this morning and he said something kind of interesting when he was asked a couple of times maybe three or four times about whether there would be an election next year because there's not supposed to be until 2026 in the month of June and you know he danced around played around a little bit with all that.

As we sit here trying to understand what the justification would be for having an election a year early and incurring $150 million of costs in order to hold that election a year early, what justification do you think the province will have? That, I think, will be his difficulty in coming up with an answer. Why go? I know the reasons that some of the people around him. And he's got advisors on one side saying, oh, we should go early.

And he's got other advisors saying, oh, no, this is a bad idea. What's the reason to go early? It has nothing to do with anything the electorate would care about. And that is, they're worried that if Pierre Poliev wins in October 2025, his first budget is going to cut spending. And that that will cause all kinds of problems for them. That'll come out in April 2025, just as the campaign is launching for Ontario. What happens then?

Liberals and NDP provincially say, aha, you can't trust a conservative. They're just going to cut, look at what Poliev's doing in Ottawa. That's behind the scenes. That's what they're talking about. But how do you justify that? What's the issue that you're going to run on?

I don't think they have one yet. And that's why I know some people want it, but I don't think it's set in stone that they're going to have one. He's certainly keeping the option open. Yeah, he's keeping the options open, I know some people want it, but I don't think it's set in stone that they're going to have one. He's certainly keeping the option open. Yeah, he's keeping the options open and he wouldn't say absolutely no. He did say no election this fall, but he won't say no to next spring.

I totally get why from the Progressive Conservative Party's point of view, you'd want to have an early election given the way Brian just announced the scenario. What is the public interest in going a year early? Well I mean that's the question for Doug Ford and the conservative, progressive conservatives, if that's what they choose to do. I think they could potentially benefit from a confused electorate who might not know that it's early or who might get mixed up between the federal and provincial level and they might try to kind of take advantage of that if they were to go early. But we saw what happened in the last federal election.

Justin Trudeau kind of, for the first half of the campaign, all of the questions were focused on why are we having this? And that could be the downfall of Doug Ford's decision to go early. Facing media and facing the public, having to justify why he's doing this could overtake the issues of a campaign. But I do think, I disagree with Brian in that, I think the electorate does care about this particular election and the Liberal Party for sure.

I think they, look, they've been in electoral purgatory for two elections and that's often what it is. When there's a bit of a swat to the backside to a party, it usually lasts two elections. It doesn't, if it lasts three, they're in big, big trouble. So I think they think they found their leader. I think they found their middle ground. I think they've, they clearly, I think, are delineating from NDP policy.

I can tell now what a liberal policy is and what an NDP policy is. And they're going to have to make the tough decision. I think they're headed in this direction, Steve, to kind of separate from the federal government. They've got an AGM in a couple of weeks. They're inviting Dr. Jane Philpott there, who fell out with Justin Trudeau. You hear rumors about candidates maybe who were fell out with Justin Trudeau. You hear rumors about candidates maybe from, who were exiled from Justin Trudeau,

running with Bonnie Cromby. I think she's gonna put a good team together, but I also think to Brian's point, they're gonna hear at the door, Trudeau, Trudeau, Trudeau. Doug Ford wants that. It's up to the Ontario Liberals to figure out how to separate, and just to go back to the NDP really quick, I think post October 7thOctober 7th, I'll say,

I think Marit Stiles wanted to make a concerted effort to move that party more towards the middle. For so many reasons and so many awful, horrific, tragic reasons, post-October 7th, I don't think she's been able to do that with her party. And I think they're in big trouble with the common person at the doorstep next election. Let me just go back to the election call

as we finish this off. And Brian, you probably know this question's coming, but here we go anyway. in big trouble with the common person at the doorstep next election. Let me just go back to the election call as we finish this off. And Brian, you probably know this question's coming, but here we go anyway. Your significant other works in the Premier's office. Are you likely to get a tip about this ahead of time? I get no info. I get no info at all. You know why people want to ask you that question now.

Yeah. Okay. There we go. Let's move on. This is as Jane Philpott potentially comes back into politics, Todd Smith just left politics altogether. He was education minister for how long? A couple of months. Zero school days. Why does a guy who gets shuffled to education, which is a big job, 35 billion dollar budget, why does he quit so quickly after getting the job?

I think he liked his last minister. He was the energy minister and his new jobs in that sector now. He was passionate about it when he was in the opposition benches. He was the critic that railed against it. So it might just be he wants to do what he's interested in. But I haven't had the chance to talk to him about it.

Brian, this cabinet now, as a result of Todd Smith's leaving and other people coming, has 37 members. There has never been a bigger cabinet in the history of the province. What do we think about that? I think it's revolting. I think it's horrible. Everybody in the PC caucus has an extra job, except I believe, unless it's changed, Lisa McLeod. Everybody has an extra job for extra money.

They're either in cabinet, they're on a committee, they're a parliamentary assistant. And look, you know, it's standard that you get extra money for chairing a committee or things like that. And I'm not saying that should change. What should change that maybe would solve this problem? Let's give MPPs a raise, something they haven't had in, what, 15 years? I think it was 2009. And so give them a raise. This is why the Premier's doing it, because MPPs are, yes, they're paid well compared

to the average person. They're putting in the hours that they should. It's getting close to minimum wage. But they should get that raise and stop this charade going on. Would the Toronto Sun editorially support that? Well, I have. You have, OK. I have in print.

I don't know what our position is, but I mean, it's a bit of a charade now. And also, bring back the pensions for them so that some of these people who are just hanging on because they have nothing else to do might go away. Mike Harris got rid of the pensions for them so that some of these people who are just hanging on because they have nothing else to do might go away. Mike Harris got rid of the pensions 30 years ago. Let's, I want to go to you on this, Greg. Usually when a minister of Todd Smith's ability quits, it's a blow to the government.

You don't like to see good, talented people leave your cabinet. Has that been the case this time? I think they're in some trouble here with Jill Dunlap from a communications perspective. I also think that... The new education minister. Yeah, I also think there hasn't been enough scrutiny. I think you could balance the scrutiny

for the international student issues between the federal government, immigration, housing, it all factors in. But I think she took her eye off the ball. It's her job not to issue the visas. That's a federal responsibility. But it's a provincial responsibility to watch the ball. It's her job not to issue the visas, that's a federal responsibility, but it's a provincial responsibility to watch the numbers.

And she wasn't watching the numbers at these polytechnics, and she wasn't watching the numbers at these community colleges, and she sure wasn't watching with what we'd call diploma mills, these things. They're almost in every E-strip mall next to a giant tiger or a daycare center, there's a college.

But I would look and I think you really need, and it's the one thing I think opposition members, as much as they would criticize Stephen Lecce, they admire his ability to get information across. They admired his ability to keep labor peace. I think they're gonna struggle with this one. And there are so many more issues post-pandemic than there was pre-pandemic.

Remember, Lecce had a couple years as a pre-pandemic education minister to get his feet under his ground. I don't think she presents well. I think that's going to be a problem. And I'm, I don't have no hesitation saying this. There was almost celebration from some of the opposition. They like that they think they can pull calls

in this minister. They do. How much confidence, Laura, do you think the education world has in Jill Dunlop as the new minister? I don't think the education world has a lot of confidence in any progressive conservative education minister to be quite honest. I think when I was I was very surprised when I learned that Todd Smith was leaving politics I always saw him as sort of a lifer to be honest and that's no insult to him. He just seems like a very political character and someone who really enjoyed it.

So whether it was the timing of getting a new job, as Jessica mentioned, and maybe being a little tired of the political world and kind of looking into his future and seeing what the next couple years look like in the education portfolio, it's not a lot of fun, I don't think, for any of them in that file. But he also seems like he would take one for the team on that front. So I was surprised that he left. And looking at who was going to replace him, It's slim pickings right now in the government to be quite honest. We've seen a lot of high profile ministers leave such as Monty McNaughton from

the Labour file, Todd Smith and as Ford mentioned today in his press comments sort of confirming one of the questions, they're asking PC members to confirm whether they're running in the next election. So they may even lose some other people who have been around for eight, nine, ten years and are looking to do something different. So I think it's going to be a tough slog for Jill Dunlop. And so much of the education file is done behind the scenes. As Greg mentioned, labor negotiations with the different unions and kind of all the behind the scenes discussion, that's a lot of work to get the trust on side with a lot of these

these unions that are not fans to put it lightly of the Ford government so I think she's got her work cut out for her both on the communication side but I think mostly in how she undergoes these negotiations with the unions. Jesse let me move you to perhaps one of the biggest subjects that came up over the summer which was a change in policy from previous governments, and that is this notion of so-called safe injection sites and where they are allowed to be, and I guess more importantly, where they are now no longer allowed to be, as in within 200 metres of a school or childcare centre.

From what you have picked up in your reporting, is this, in terms of policy, is this the right move? You know, I don't weigh of policy, is this the right move? You know, I don't weigh in on whether things are the right move or the bad move. I can say that when the government looked into the shooting that happened outside the supervised consumption site in Leslieville, they commissioned some expert reports. They had a supervisor go in to manage the place. They had Unity Health come in and do a report.

Neither of those reports suggested closing sites. One of them suggested expanding them and doing more. They all talked about the good these things do, and that does seem to be the expert consensus that you get from places like CAMH that, you know, God, I don't know what this is about. The premier's been pretty clear that when he's making this decision, it's about his own personal feelings. So that's there. I know that, you know, a woman from Leslieville who had two kids was shot outside of one. I don't know whether that's a reason to close them down. I know it's a tragedy.

I know that I've also spoken with mothers who've lost kids to toxic drugs who are passionate about keeping them open because they think maybe if I'd had one in my town, maybe my son or daughter would still be alive. So I know it's a really tough one. I know where the sort of expert medical community stands, but it's not the whole story. Brian, as I mean one of the things we try to figure out on this program is how governments make the decisions they make. So in this case,

would you say the balance was the preponderance of evidence that the policy should be changed or as Jesse says is the preponderance of evidence that the policy should be changed? Or as Jesse says, is it the premier's sort of gut feeling about how this plays politically? I think a bit of both. And you've heard the premier talk a lot about treatment. And both in the pages of The Sun and on the Full Comment podcast, I've interviewed a ton of people,

and including in the medical community, who think, or who agreed with harm reduction but said we've gone too far, that we're putting all our eggs in the harm reduction basket. The center in Leslieville, where Carolina was shot, they actually had on their website, until the supervisor went in and cleaned things up, that they had no expectations, no desire for anyone

to stop using drugs. And that had become a prevailing philosophy. And so we were sold accepting consumption sites or safe supply as it's a way to get people to treatment. But then the people actually running them went in the opposite direction and said, we don't believe in treatment. Using fentanyl is a lifestyle choice.

I mean, these were things that were actually said, published, printed. That's taken it away from what even previous liberal governments had agreed to. And so there has to be a rebalance. We can't have consumption sites where it's just about allowing you to use and never saying, hey, look, there's a better option than how you're living right now. How are you seeing it in your reporting? Look, I think that a lot of people

logically understand the benefits. And you speak with experts, you speak with people in the field, you speak with people who have experience with this, and as Jessica said, they speak very passionately about it, they've seen the benefits, they've saved people's lives, and they believe passionately that this will hurt people. I do think on the flip side, while you may logically understand it, your kind of emotional reaction to such sites is you don't like them,

you don't like what you're seeing, there's something about it that bothers you, you don't like kind of... You don't want it near your home or your school. You don't want it near your home or you believe. Or you believe it's enabling in some way. Exactly, you might rationally understand it, but you don't like it. I think that's kind of the gut reaction that the Premier's going for. I don't think there's any kind of straight answer

on this one, to be honest. I think those in the advocacy world are never going to stop fighting for it. I think maybe more so the public and certainly Premier Ford and his cabinet, he said today he's never even been to one of the sites. He just, you know, through his emotional feeling, objects to them. So there's kind of no right answer on which way to go.

But there's also the fact that between 2017 when we licensed our first one in Ontario and last year, deaths from opioids more than doubled. I know there was the pandemic in there, but another reason for opening these was reduced deaths. Hasn't worked in Ontario, definitely hasn't worked in British Columbia. So if they supposedly work, maybe we're operating them wrong.

And we don't have treatment success stories either. I saw an ITV documentary on YouTube where they did this right before the 92 Olympics in Barcelona. They knew they had too many people in the streets using drugs. And so they opened a safe consumption site there in 1990. They had the Olympics in 92.

But it was called Four Pillars for a reason. Some of it was also preventing crime. One of the Four Pillars is enforce the laws around these sites, and that isn't happening. I also thought it was really significant that not one, Olivia Chow I think she was on vacation but she put a statement out saying I disagree with this process, but not one other Ontario mayor stood up and many of them would probably lean more left than right and said this is wrong I want the safe consumption sites. That's

significant when Andrea Horvath ran in four elections as an NDP leader, a year and a half later was thanking the Premier for the announcement and documenting that we, every mayor will agree they need treatment. They need more treatment centers and more places for open drug users to go. But if Andrea Horvath's not in, she wants to get reelected again.

She's passionate about Hamilton. So are you, you love Hamilton. It's in big trouble right now if they don't turn things around from a downtown urban perspective. As powerful as those comments were, they were not the most powerful comments that the Premier made this past summer about something. Those were reserved for a particular labor

leader in this province. I don't want to turn to that next. A couple of weeks ago, at the Association of Municipalities of Ontario conference in Ottawa, 3,000 local officials from across the province arrive. And the Minister of Labour, Dave Piccini, saw Fred Hahn from CUPI, CUPI Ontario there. He approached him, and he really gave him a piece of his mind.

You've got to stop being such an anti-Semite, and you need to stop tweeting these things, two of which, incidentally, Fred Hahn has apologized for, he says says that even he acknowledges were over the line. QP National urged Hahn to resign. He has not. Premier Ford then at one of his press conferences said this. Sheldon, if you please. I just want to give my minister, David Pagini, a big shout out for his comments about Fred

Hahn yesterday. I'm proud of you, David. This guy has been a bully for 20 years. Do you know what's funny? I'm getting messages on my phone from QP members saying his comments have

been disgusting. In my opinion, he's a disgusting human being anyways, but that's here and there. He says he's bigoted comments. It's unacceptable. He's In my opinion, he's a disgusting human being anyway, but that's here and there. He says he's bigoted

comments. It's unacceptable here in Ontario. We have 110 nationalities speaking 200 languages and we all need to get together.

And I encourage QP Canada, someone has to discipline this guy, and I encourage the workers, next time a vote comes, vote this character out because in my opinion, he's just a terrible, terrible human being.

Premier Ford from a couple of weeks ago. Brian, CUPI claims that Ford and Pacini are abusing their positions by saying what they've said about Fred Hahn. What do you think? Fred Hahn is abusing his position as an officer of QP by being an outright anti-Semi. If you're cheering on the resistance and posting about how great the resistance rising up after October 7th, you are effectively backing Hamas, which the organization's name translated means the Islamic Resistance Movement. They're called the resistance. He's cheering on Hamas. And that's unacceptable. Premier's comments? You got a problem with him? Look, I think what the premier said

is very popular among his supporters. I think kind of this battle with Fred Hawn is the perfect foil for Doug Ford. I think what's been interesting to see is sort of the infighting within the union movement between the national arm of QP and QP Ontario which recently came out and backed Fred Hahn so that's going to be a storyline to watch right this isn't over QP had QP the national arm had asked him to resign he did not and then he was backed

by the regional union so you know I think there's there's no risk for Premier Ford to come out and say that. I actually think his comments in a way were kind of unhelpful to what he was trying to achieve and I'm not saying he should be I don't think he cares like I think I think he he said what he wanted to say and there are a lot of people I'm sure cheering on the Premier and Mr. Piccini for that but I think in kind of voicing those comments, it forced QP to criticize Premier Ford because they're now under pressure from their own union members not to align themselves with

the progressive conservatives who are not traditionally their party of choice. How do you see it? I think it's going to be really interesting for the Ontario NDP. That's how I see these things mostly because they've had, as Greg referred to earlier, a really tough time since October 7th. Different positions within their, with Sarah Jam is leaving, and it's made all of their other goals hard to achieve just to keep the party together on that one issue has taken a lot of wind out of their sails.

How do I say this? A lot of people approach me and say things like, Fred Han who's an openly gay man say that Fred Han wouldn't last five minutes if he were living in Gaza because it's not exactly a safe space for people who are gay and therefore they don't understand why Fred Han is championing Hamas the way he is. I mean this is a subject for your radio program numerous times. What are you hearing about this? Yeah a lot. I think, this is a subject for your radio program numerous times. What are you hearing about this? Yeah, a lot.

I think, listen, I think he's got his perspective. I think we'd have all day if the criticism was simply about Benjamin Netanyahu or political strategy or military strategy or his history as prime minister. But I hear from so many QP members. It's so interesting because we have a text line on the show, it's so different than Twitter. I think we've all given up trying to guess

what an election result's gonna be based on Twitter. We gave up on that with Trump and Brexit in 2016. But the text lines seem to document that QP members will tell me, I don't want any geopolitics. Israel could bag Sinwar tomorrow and kill him. And they don't want a union leader talking about it and sort of pitting them. This is like the least binary conflict in the world ever.

It's been 70 years. It's not black or white. There's 98% shades of gray. But the point is with Han, I think, I think Jessica's point's right on. The NDP are seen as being really, really tight with QP. And I'll tell you, there are a lot of QP members who are kind of looking for a new home right now.

And the Liberal Party in Ontario, bring them up again, would love an endorsement from some of those QP unions that are like, we don't want the geopolitics, just negotiate us a great contract, look after our families, give us benefits, give us great working conditions. And I'm not sure that's Fred's MO right now. This Brian, I'm going to put this to you because these two are more reporters as opposed to columnists. You are Mr. Opinion here. So if, should the liberals or new Democrats in the next election try to seek the endorsement

of QP Ontario? I mean, I wouldn't with Fred Hahn still as president. That would be incredibly difficult. But because under normal circumstances, they would, of course. Absolutely, they would. But I think Fred Hahn will still be in there. He was just recently re-elected. Although, like Greg, I hear from QP members, and they will say, well, it was a very small fraction.

It was a rigged process. If you put it to the full membership he wouldn't be in there. Perhaps but yeah, I can't see Bonnie Cromby doing that. I'm not even sure I could see Merritt Stiles doing that. Although the discussion I'm hearing is will Sarah Jama be welcomed back into caucus and she was just endorsing Fred Hahn. I think the New Democrats might like to have Sarah

Jemma back in caucus. But they kicked her out for a very good reason. I think, by the way, I thought Laura made a great point in that when I saw the Pacini moment at the AMO, I thought there's more likelihood of Hahn being booted out. And then when Ford did what he did, I think that actually hurt that momentum.

Because to your point, Laura, they had to circle the wagons almost. They almost felt like it's a concerted. It's like when somebody tells a great joke, and then someone says, yeah, I have a joke of my own here. Like, no, no, no. We just had a good joke, and we're all laughing. We don't need your joke.

You almost didn't need that the next morning of that endorsement from Doug Ford. My favorite part of the clip was the 30 workers all clapping. I don't know how they heard what he said. They're 30 feet behind. Yeah, whatever he said was great. But there was a lot of pressure from other unions, not just CUPI, on CUPI to do something about Hahn,

even if it's just to make him go quiet. Because they feel like it's damaging the entire union movement. I think it's hard to gauge, though. It does seem like Fred Hahn has a lot of support, both within the union. And we saw this petition to support him, whether those people are union members or not.

There are certainly those in the kind of the progressive leaning side of things who like what Fred Hahn talks about in terms of being pro-Palestinian, that's certainly how he likes to frame it, even though he apologizes for these things. And so I think he does have a lot of support. And we've seen Maaretz- Stiles appear with him at events not since the most recent apology but after he apologized for the resistance comments I think she has appeared with him so I'm not sure that they would disregard the endorsement of KB Ontario I think it's still very powerful for them. Wasn't that significant really

quick that that no Ontario NDP member said he should stay in that sort of window where it looked like he that they might turf him out after the national announcement not one has said he should go so which way do they land I'm trying to get them on our show they they're not talking about Fred Hahn right now they know they come on live I'm gonna ask them about Fred Hahn you probably would also they're not talking which is really interesting right that last video was really powerful and really controversial right the data if viewers didn't see it though the video that Fred Hahn cheered on had a Israeli diver that turned into

like a bomb halfway down and blew up over Gaza. And when he apologized for it he said you know it should have been it should have been about the people right? It's about Israel, it's not about Israelis, it's not about Jewish people. But the video didn't say that, right? The video said this is a human being turning into a bomb, and that's what crossed the line. A Jewish person. Yeah. All right. With a little over five minutes to go, let us come full circle here and talk about, because obviously we are already into silly season. This is going to be all election all the time for the next year as we approach what everybody assumes now is going to be a spring election. What could, because he's in first place as we've established, what could disrupt Doug

Ford's path to winning a third consecutive majority government, which no one in this province has done since the 1950s? It's hard to do. Jesse. I can think of two things. One, the RCMP investigation that's going on into the affairs around the Green Belt, if that goes really badly for him, that could obviously have an impact. The second is the reason for calling the election in the first place.

I think the smart money is on him doing it after the next budget. And if they try to construct a reason for the next election, and that goes poorly, if it blows up, whatever it is that they decide to tell people why they're doing the election, if it's bad, that could probably do it. Laura. The G word, that's what Jessica was talking about.

We haven't talked about the green belt much over the past summer. And the summer of 2023 was the summer of discontent for the Ford government when they were facing constant barrage of questions over their decision to open up the green belt and their changing reasoning for that. And of course, we had the major backtrack from Premier Ford

around this time last year. And that has been quietly bubbling beneath the surface. We've heard of witnesses being interviewed by the RCMP. We don't know who those people are or where they're focusing their investigation. But if that spotlight turns on to the Premier's office potentially or Mr. Ford or those around him, that could have devastating consequences for him. Whether that will happen between now and the next election, I don't know. I don't have any insights into where their investigation is.

But we know that that is ongoing. And that has the potential to really turn things for the Ford government. Brian. That, yeah, the police investigation, which perhaps is another reason to go early. I mean, what will be on their side, whether they go in spring 2025 or in 2026,

is the RCMP takes a long time to investigate anything. And so Doug Ford may be retired before we find out. And that's not an exaggeration if you follow our Mountie investigations. But if something did come out, that could potentially hurt him. The idea that he would necessarily face the same fate as David Peterson, though,

I think you've got to remember John Horgan in BC went early. It worked for him. Justin Trudeau in 2021, he faced a lot of criticism, lost some ground, but squeaked out a win. Jean Chrétien. Jean Chrétien more than once. So I mean, that's why we ended up having fixed election date laws, because Chrétien took advantage of them

every chance he could. So there's probably more pros than cons to going. I don't think he should. But you're right, it's going to be nothing but speculation until we get past either an election or the time for him to call one. Great. Khritjan would have gone every six months if he could have.

How do I win 13 elections? Well, I had them every six months. I think the Ontario Liberals are something to watch here. Brian might disagree. I still think they're a brand. I think they're Liberals are something to watch here. Brian might disagree, I still think they're a brand. I think they're a brand and not necessarily a party in decline. I don't think it's comparable to look at other provinces and go, well, they don't exist here, they're a non-entity here. And Steve, you've come on on Toronto today and you've talked about this.

We don't like in Ontario to have too much red or too much blue or brown and red at the same time. We don't like in Ontario to have too much red or too much blue or brown and red at the same time. The federal result looks inevitable. It looks like a walloping majority for Pierre Pauliev and the Conservatives. So is there advanced planning for Ontario voters, even next spring, saying how much on the right side as opposed to being more in the middle do I want? And if Bonnie Cromby can separate her policies from that of the Fed, this is a very unpopular federal government right now,

if she can say, this is what I'm going to do. And also, as we said at the beginning, call them out as they're the conservatives. If you run against Doug Ford, the person, as we said a while ago, I don't think you're going to like your result. It hasn't worked so far in two straight elections. It's interesting. I did not hear three words that I expected to hear from one of you here.

Anybody want to guess what those three words are? Ontario Science Centre. Does anybody think that's a percolating issue that could cost the government seats in the City of Toronto? Jessica. I think some people care a lot, but it's not most people. Really? Yeah.

Okay. I think the Liberals already hold the seat there, don't they? That one seat? Yeah, so they hold that. That's the area that's going to be most upset. The polling I've seen shows that, you know, especially when you get outside of the urban core of Toronto, people are like, oh we're getting a new science centre? Oh it's Ontario place? Yeah, I'll go. So I don't think it'll cost them seats elsewhere. And you're not even seeing the mayor of Toronto fight

about it anymore. Like she campaigned to protect the- Well, you know why? Yes, I do. Go ahead. Well, she made a great deal offloading the DBP and the Gardner costs, and you gotta give to get sometimes.

So if it's not a big deal with the mayor of the city, a left-leaning mayor of the city, where the Science Centre and Ontario Place are, it's not gonna be for mayors of Guelph or MPs in Sarnia. It's not gonna matter. I think it's very important to, very, very important to fewer people than maybe one would think.

But that is something to watch too, kind of how the Ontario Place redevelopment unfolds. If that happens on time, what the cost overruns might be. That is a major project for the Ford government. Doug Ford cares very deeply about this, so that's something to watch too, to see how smoothly that goes over over the next few months. I have time enough left to do a couple of things. Number one, we want to let everybody know that we are actually going to follow up on

this conversation on tomorrow night's program. We've got a discussion with four mayors from large municipalities in the province of Ontario who are gonna join us and talk about how they are employing new ideas to tackle homelessness and mental health issues and addiction better. So it's not, how should I put this? There are some success stories out there

and we're gonna hear from some of them tomorrow night. And with that, let me thank Brian Lilley from the Toronto Sun, Jessica Smith Cross from the Trillium, which you can get at trillium.ca. That's right. Laura Stone from the Globe and Mail, and Greg Brady, you can hear him in the mornings

on 640 Toronto. I wanna thank all four of you for coming into TVO tonight and helping us out with show number one of season number 19 here on TVO. Great to see you all. Congratulations on season 19. Thank you. Thank you.