Ford pledges inquiry into Ontario’s books
PC leader calls finding in watchdog’s report a betrayal of public trust
Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford says he will launch an “independent commission of inquiry” into Ontario’s books in the wake of a damning auditor general’s report into the Liberal government.
Ford said Thursday that budget watchdog Bonnie Lysyk’s finding that the deficit is at $11.7 billion, not $6.7 billion, has exposed “a betrayal of the public trust.” Premier Kathleen Wynne, however, countered that the larger shortfall calculated by Lysyk stems from “a dispute that’s been going on between professional accountants for a couple of years now.
“We appreciate her perspective and I think that that disagreement, that dispute, between the accountants will go on for some time,” Wynne said.
There are two key points of contention between the government and Lysyk.
The auditor is concerned about the way the Liberals have structured the Fair Hydro Plan that borrows money to reduce electricity rates by 25 per cent, but is kept off the books because it is bankrolled through government-owned OPG Trust. She also disputes whether $11 billion in government cosponsored Ontario Public Service Employees’ Union Pension Plan and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan holdings should be counted as assets.
While Ford promised his own hydro scheme to replace the Liberals’ rate cut, he pointedly would not rule out a future PC government booking the pension billions against the bottom line. “The auditor general performed a valuable public service and uncovered one of the largest financial scandals in Canadian history,” he told reporters at the Hilton Hotel on Richmond St. W. “We now know that, in their desperation, Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals cooked the books,”
“The consequence of Kath- leen Wynne’s desperation is now clear: we cannot trust anything about Liberal estimates or projections, and their budget is no longer worth the paper it was printed on,” the PC leader said. “I know that people are angry and want answers. We’re going to get those answers,” he said, adding outside auditors would be hired to complement Lysyk’s work on a publicly funded commission of inquiry.
That commission would be expected to report back quickly and could lead to accounting changes at the province.
In her pre-election report to the Legislature, the auditor general estimated the deficit for next year at $12.2 billion.
Ford said the Tories would soon release a “costed plan” for the June 7 election.
While he vowed to find 4 per cent in “efficiencies,” which would necessitate slashing spending by at least $6 billion a year, he admitted he would be unable to balance the budget right away. “It won’t be in the first year. We’re going to do this in a modest and responsible fashion,” he said.