Sparing public service jobs would shrink Ford’s dollar to 66 cents

Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford says he wouldn’t cut government jobs in trying to find “four cents on the dollar” in savings if he’s elected Ontario premier this spring.

That leaves a huge amount of money off the table if a PC government wins power, inevitably leaving Ford scouring operating expenses to find — not cuts, he says — “efficiencies,” without a carbon-tax backstop on the revenue side.

In an interview Tuesday on CBC Ottawa Morning, host Robyn Bresnahan asked Ford if he would cut public service jobs.

“No, not at all,” Ford replied. “It’s funny, Robyn, I’ve got to ask you this question. Do you think there’s not four cents on the dollar of savings in the bloated government of Ontario?”

Ford then suggested that people at his events “broke out laughing” at the prospect of finding “only” four cents.

“There’s not a person on this planet that can tell me there isn’t four cents savings of inefficiencies of bloated bureaucracy that we can’t find in the government of Ontario, and just watch me do it,” he said in the radio interview.

It wasn’t the only interview in which Ford talked up his fourcents-on-the-dollar approach, should the PCs form government after the vote on June 7.

Ford’s hunt for efficiencies would turn a blind eye to onethird of provincial spending, if he keeps his word to not trim the public service.

The Ontario government’s 2016-2017 annual report on public accounts says 34.2 per cent of the $141.7 billion in government spending was tied up in salaries and benefits in that fiscal year.

With 8.3 per cent of expenses going to debt charges, a Ford-led government would need to pore over invoices tied up in transfers (accounting for 39.4 per cent of expenses) and operating costs (17 per cent) to find any meaty savings.

The transfers include money for doctors, universities, long-term care homes, childcare services and city governments.

Toying with the transfer money could affect jobs in publicly funded institutions. Chipping away at operations expenses could affect front line public services. Both could be messy.

Ford might be trying to find four cents in savings, but not on a dollar — more like on 66 cents.