The Speech from the Throne
Ontario

On Tuesday afternoon, Lt. Governor David Onley delivered the Liberal party’s first legislative plan since Premier Kathleen Wynne was selected several weeks ago.  Voted on Wednesday morning, the throne speech passed with the support of the NDP; delaying an election for the time being, at least.  Not surprisingly, given that the Liberals needed the support of at least one of the opposition parties to avoid a motion of non-confidence, the overall theme of the speech was one of co-operation between all three parties.  For the most part, the speech took a conciliatory tone, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach, and included ideas that the Liberals felt should appeal to both opposition parties. 

Moving forward into this legislative session, the central objectives of the government will be fiscal responsibility, job creation, and economic growth; with the caveat that none of these objectives should come at the expense of building a ‘fair society’ that leaves no one behind.  This again demonstrates the government’s attempt to play to the desires of both opposition parties, a fact emphasized in these lines from the speech: “there are so many opportunities for progress, for all parties to join together.  There is common ground that transcends partisan politics”. 

Speech from the Throne Highlights

• Renewal of commitment to balance budget by 2017-18
• Restrain program spending to 1% below GDP after 2017-18 balanced budget
• Build sustainable model for public sector wage negotiations that will respect collective bargaining
• Re-examine corporate tax compliance issues, as per Drummond Report recommendations
• Explore elimination of health tax exemption for larger companies
• Tackle youth and aboriginal unemployment, get more people with disabilities into the workforce
• Move Accessibility Directorate to Ministry of Economic Development
• Contribute $50 million to a new venture capital fund to give small/medium businesses a leg up
• Increase spending to both home care and mental health treatment programs
• Stay the course on ending coal-fired electricity plants, continue upgrading electricity grid
• Continue roll out of day-long kindergarten
• Work with non-profit and private sectors to help get young graduates the skills and experience they need to enter the workforce
• Create a comprehensive transit plan to ease traffic gridlock which may include new levies
• Give local residents and municipalities more say on things like: wind farms, gas plants, casinos
• Address special transit needs of Northern Ontario
• Let people on social assistance keep more when they work
• Pledged to create permanent youth advisory council
• Work with all parties to get to bottom of gas plant fiasco
• Reduce car-insurance premiums
• Allow social assistance recipients to keep more of what they earn when they work

 PC Reaction

Not surprisingly, the PC party voted unanimously against the speech; arguing that despite the Premier’s attempt at conciliation, the speech only serves to further entrench what they believe was a fiscally unsustainable McGuinty agenda.  To this affect PC Leader Tim Hudak was quoted as saying: “I was hoping for better, I was hoping for a different course”.   The PC party will again hope to force an election when the time comes to vote on a budget.

NDP Reaction

The NDP, for their part, voted unanimously to approve the throne speech.  However, while they noted that in their opinion the speech showed some promise, they were also cautious in their optimism, arguing that it was still very vague in terms of details.   NDP Leader Andrea Horwath was poignant in her remarks, stating that: “people need a little less conversation, and a little more action”.  Horwath has already delivered a list of demands to the Premier, which she insists must be included in the budget in order for it to secure NDP support, these include:  a job subsidy program for youth; closing corporate tax loopholes; better home care for seniors; allowing welfare recipients to keep more of their pay; and a 15% reduction in auto insurance premiums.  Horwath appears to have finally drawn a line in the sand, and it will be interesting to see whether or not that remains true come time for the budget confidence motion – should the Liberals fail to deliver on all of her demands.
 
Media Reaction

By and large, most pundits agreed that the conciliatory tone of this throne speech had a singular purpose: keeping the Liberals in power beyond the upcoming budget.  The Liberals are cognizant of the fact that they will need the support of at least one of the opposition parties if they hope to avoid a spring election, and so much of the speech was devoted to outlining policy options that might offer a broader appeal.  While the speech did clearly offer policy points that might be workable from an NDP or PC perspective, many pundits also agreed that on the whole the speech was quite vague and offered little in the way of details.  This is important to note, as it will be the finer details of these policies which ultimately determine whether or not enough opposition support can ultimately be gained in order to avert an election.

Grassroots will continue to monitor the events and news coming from Queens Park for all our clients in the weeks and months ahead.