Doug Ford gets failing grades on the energy file

“I’m going to be upfront and honest about what I’m going to do. I won’t make reckless promises. When I make a promise — I keep it. Period.”

The speaker, of course, is Premier Doug Ford, before he was elected, as quoted in his own election platform.

As we have seen in the year-and-a-half since he was elected, that pledge was a fraud.

Ford said he would not make cuts to front-line education. If cutting 10,000 teaching jobs isn’t cutting the front line, nothing is.

He promised to end hallway medicine. It’s getting demonstrably worse instead. He promised to lower gas prices. They’ve been up and down due to forces he has nothing to do with. He promised to improve mental health services and instead cut them.

And then there’s electricity rates. Ford made some very specific promises: He would cut hydro rates by 12 per cent, and save the average family more than $170 per year.

Instead, a 1.8 per cent rate increase was announced this month and instead of paying $170 a year less, the average family is paying $24 more.

During the election campaign, Ford and friends used the Liberals’ mishandling of the energy file as a key weapon. It worked. Granted, the Wynne government gave him all sorts of legitimate ammunition. But at this point, it’s safe to say the Conservatives have done an equally bad job, if not worse.

Consider that in addition to failing to offer any consumer relief, the government:

> Cancelled cap-and-trade, costing municipalities millions in revenue that would have gone into infrastructure, and giving the federal government no choice but to implement a carbon tax that we would not be paying if cap-and-trade was still in effect.

> Clumsily fired the head of Hydro One, costing the publicly owned corporation more than $130 million.

Cancelled green energy contracts, claiming breaking the contracts would save millions, but forgetting to mention the cost of doing so would be a minimum of $231 million, for which taxpayers are on the hook. Ford tried to hide that cost as “other transactions” within the Ministry of Energy’s budget, but the watchful Opposition New Democrats dug it out and made public the government’s dishonesty.

> Forced electricity providers across the province to change the layout of residential bills to make the province’s subsidy appear more prominent. The subsidy is no larger, but the government bets that by making it more prominent it will get credit for helping consumers. We’re betting most consumers are not that dumb.

> Stubbornly stuck with its plan to spend 30 million tax dollars fighting the federal carbon tax in court, although two court rulings have already confirmed what most people knew — climate change is a national issue and the federal government has the right to implement measures that are in the national interest. This in addition to the government’s disastrous attempt to force gas station owners to feature misleading gas pump stickers. The stickers didn’t stick, and neither did the attempt to portray the carbon tax as a cost without acknowledging it also comes with a rebate that is leaving most consumers better off in the end.

On managing the electricity file, the Ford government gets F across the board. Fail. Dismally.

Ford said he would not make cuts to front-line education. If cutting 10,000 teaching jobs isn’t cutting the front line, nothing is