Merging public and separate school boards would save money Taxpayers Federation, health care and bull

Re: Ford seeks cuts despite Ontario spending least per person — Feb. 15

The Ontario government continues to look for ways to reduce government spending but, rather than look at “nickel and dime” solutions, they should concentrate on larger issues such as merging the separate and public school boards into a single public school system.

Those in favour of such merging claim this would result in annual savings of taxpayer money in the neighbourhood of $2 billion. This is a huge amount resulting from fewer buildings, less maintenance, reduced transportation, fewer employees, reduced bureaucracy and fewer school boards with fewer trustees, to name just some of the savings.

Newfoundland and Quebec, some 20 years ago, merged their government supported systems with little difficulty. I’m sure that Catholic children will suffer no harm from attending schools with children of other faiths or no religious affiliation at all.

High-ranking employees in the separate school system might claim that merging the two systems will not result in any financial savings but I wonder if they are actually concerned about saving taxpayer money or maintaining their own positions.

George Jones

Baden Re: Horwath invokes sacred cow in health care but delivers a lot of bull — Feb. 15

I, for one, applaud the efforts of the Andrea Horwath of the Ontario NDP and condemn the efforts of Christine Van Geyn and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

As a previous candidate for municipal office, I met with the representatives of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the organization that Van Geyn is the director of. This organization required me, a candidate for Kitchener city council, to commit to not increasing taxes while in office. Also, to publicly object to such tax changes regardless of the need for the dollars.

The ‘plan’ uncovered and displayed by Ms. Horwath, in any disguise, is a plan to be used to privatize and, at the least, reduce Ontario’s health care.

The ‘sacred cow’ of tax elimination is as the headline read: ‘bull.’

Len Carter

Cambridge