Would you like to see the political landscape change in 2018? By Tom Black

Tom Black

Happy New Year everyone and best wishes in 2018. Let us all hope and pray that this year brings some change in politics that reflect what the common people in rural and small town Ontario need to prosper and build this province back to its full potential.

The OLA has been part of a push for political change since its inception and has supported many politicians who have promised to work for change in the way that politicians and parties represent their constituents. We believed that we could work with individual politicians and have them voice our concerns in the halls of government and thus have some sway on policies and government process. After 14 years and many failures to that end, we now believe that none of the old parties can be changed because of the ‘back-room’ money connections to lobby forces, who really control all policy and all votes. These back room controllers seem to force whipped votes on all members to follow the party line.

MPP Jack MacLaren stayed very true to the cause of the people he represented and tried his best to have some input into Toronto PC politics but for that he paid a heavy price at the hands of the members of the PC party. They took every opportunity they could find to shame him in caucus and beat him down into submission when he tried to speak up for his supporters. If this had happened on the street, he could easily have charged them with bullying and verbal assault.

Not all members of the PC party took part in these rituals but the ones who refrained did not come to his defense and are therefore complicate. That is the real story of why Jack joined the Trillium Party and I, who has been privy to this abuse from the start, was in full support of the move to support a party that would represent the people who vote for them and not whip the votes to please the back room money lobby.

So folks, if you are not afraid to stand up for what is right and recognize that this political landscape in Toronto needs to change if the regular people are to be represented by our politicians, then please join us. There is no separation in the 3 main parties. The PC’s “Peoples Guarantee” has made 147 promises to people in an attempt to gain their vote. The reference to “Peoples” is very disturbing and has hints of the “Leap Manifesto” that the NDP came out with two years ago. It has a strange ring to it that we’ve heard from socialist countries referring often to the “People’s Party”.

Mr. Brown once made many promises to the OLA and me, when he needed our support to win the nomination of the PC party. Maybe we were all too hungry for change and thus were easily convinced that he would clean up the backroom, have free and open nominations in all ridings, get rid of the Green Energy Act, and re-address the sex-ed program. Once elected leader, Mr. Brown forgot those promises and rejoined the backroom so how much value should we put in the 147 promises that he presented in the “Peoples Guarantee”. We are not alone in our scepticism. After doing an assessment of Mr. Browns Hydro Policy, Mr. Tom Adams, a financial analyst wrote in the Financial Post, Nov. 30/17 “the PC’s decided the only problem with Wynne’s program is that it does not go far enough”.

Mr. Brown said that he would cancel the Green Energy Act and get out of as many contracts as possible, yet the biggest of these contracts with Samsung was up for renewal in Dec. 31, 2017 yet the PC party never brought it up in the house or in the media, so how badly did they really want to cancel it?

Take a look at the Trillium Party website, www.trilliumontario.ca and see who is running in your area, and if you would like to see a real option to vote for with a mind to making Ontario a more democratic province, please join us and help us get it done.

Thank you and Happy New Year.