Doug Ford keeps repeating that phrase "for the people." But this week he again made the phrase a laughing stock. He quickly cancelled Kathleen Wynne's labour legislation which was "updated last year after a two year review with extensive consultations." Linda McQuaig writes:
Gone is the minimum wage hike to $15 an hour. So, just like that, faster than you can say "for the people," Ford has cancelled what amounted to a $2,000 annual pay increase that was headed for the pockets of the lowest-paid people.
He's also cancelling the two paid sick days a year, even though 145 countries (most of the world's nations) already offer some form of paid sick leave. Think how competitive we'll be without it! That should give us a leg-up on Guatemala and Botswana!
Ford believes in a tired old theory -- neoliberalism -- the economic equivalent of the flat earth theory:
Despite the persistence of this theory, there's little evidence to support it: most low-wage countries remain that way, while the high-wage nations of Europe and Scandinavia continue to excel in global competitiveness.
Business commentators argued that the higher minimum wage would drive businesses elsewhere, presumably leaving Canadian customers happily ordering their coffee-to-go from far-away places. Commentators made the same argument last year, when the minimum wage was raised to $14 an hour. However, Ontario's unemployment rate fell to 5.4 per cent, its lowest level in 18 years.
Ford isn't a tribune of the people. He's there to serve the interest of business -- pure and simple. It's the big lie in the quiver full of lies he peddles.
Image: rabble.ca
8 comments:
"For the people" isn't exactly a lie, Owen. Ford never defines which people he's talking about, leaving voters free to fill his empty slogan with their own meaning. But like all conservatives, Ford serves the interests of the privileged people, who want to maintain their status and roll back any minor gains others may have made.
Cap
True, Cap -- which underscores how the word "populism" has been corrupted. The people who the wword used to refer to were not the wealthy.
"Ford giving employers the power to demand evidence that workers aren’t faking an illness to get unpaid leave." Without getting into the other cuts non-union employees may see in their ability to take an UNPAID day or two off when ill, I wonder how anyone is supposed to get a note from their doctor when in most cases it would take 24 to 40 hours to even get to see him or her. Go the the hospital and sit for hours spreading the flu to other folks awaiting treatment for more serious issues perhaps?
I would hope that most employers have more common sense than to enforce this requirement Owen!
Oh, ya, "for the people", with an advisor like Gordon Campbell, el gordo, the former premier of B.C., for the people aren't the voters in the province, unless of course they're very wealthy and connected to corporations. With guys like el gordo "advising" Ford, Ontario can look forward to having the highest rate of child poverty in Canada, B.C. had the title the whole time el gordo and Christy Clark were in office.
Lowering salaries doesn't create jobs because, people with no money to spend, won't be spending it. People with no money wind up living on the streets and drug use increase.
We have seen in European countries, which pay high salaries, and have high taxes, society does quite well. People don't leave. they have something to stay for. countries which have high poverty rates, have the best and brightest leave. there is nothing to stay for. So as things become progressively worse in Ontario, and it will, and housing becomes more and more expensive, people who can, will leave. for some it maybe as easy as stepping across the border into Quebec. Some who can no longer afford housing in Ontario will move to the Maritimes so they can put a roof over their heads.
In B.C. while el gordo and Christy helped the developers and encouraged foreign buyers, young people started leaving B.C. They couldn't afford to purchase a home and couldn't start families if they had a home. Both needed to work.
Ontario has all sorts of "wonderful" surprise in store for them, Just check some of the B.C. blogs going back to 2001 to see how bad it got here, highest debt load, a Dam costing $10B., mining company didn't have to pay its electrical bill but gave $250K to the party of el gordo and Christy.
dougie isnt' smart enough to run things. The power brokers weren't going to turn over the province to something like him, and hence Gordon Campbell and I'm sure there are a couple of other boys just like him.
Common sense, Rural? According to Mike Harris, that's what the Conservatives stood for. Harris was a fraud and so is Ford.
Dougie isn't smart, e.a.f. But he knows how to take direction. And the former Harperites who surround him are telling him what to do.
"At the urging of medical and public health professionals, Bill 148 prohibited employers from requiring employees from obtaining medical notes to prove that they were sick. This rule is abolished by the new leave provisions introduced by Bill 47."
There are many minor ailments that may render a person unfit to perform his normal work, but that don’t require the attention of medical services. If in such cases those services are billed to the Ministry, it's an abuse of public funds. In any case, it amounts to a disregard for the efficient use of scarce resources. Market Law would dictate that an employer making such a demand should bear the costs, including a surcharge that could be used to open more spaces for Ontario applicants in medical schools.
When I ran into an instance of this demand for one day of absenteeism back in the late ‘60s, I asked for a written request so that I could communicate its substance to my provincial rep. The employer refused, so I provided it with a free sample of my phlegm. The sample might not have proved anything and I don’t think they did anything with it, but the absentee report was altered to indicate “justified”. (At the time I was working under a collective agreement that included a seniority clause. I realize that wage and salary earners are becoming increasingly unprotected from repercussions for backtalk. Oh, if the kids only knew what we’re continuing to lose. The house the libertarians are building for us is no fun at all.)
I agree wholeheartedly, John. The paradise liberterians peddle is no paradise at all.
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