Re: OT: Canadian Politics
so, I'm curious.
why does everyone dislike Kathleen Wynne so much?
I mean she's certainly bungled some files pretty badly (i.e. hydro). And she carries with her the weight of 15 years of Liberal baggage.
But in terms of her policies, and how her government has run the province, why are people so vehemently opposed to her? The economy is doing very well, unemployment is quite low. She definitely fudged the numbers to make the deficit look more palatable which is pretty frustrating. And the debt is an issue. But why the vitriol?
I'm orginally from a rural county along lake erie, so I can speak to the thought process in that area a little bit. She and the liberals are absolutely despised, though the county had a long history of voting liberal both federally and provincially before around 10 years ago. Despite what Bolduke would have you believe, it's not because everyone there are a bunch of racist, misogynistic rednecks.
Our local economy was based on manufacturing and cash crops - mainly tobacco. We were one of the highest earning, richest counties in the province. People could make amazing livings on small 50 acre farms and that in turn drove the rest of the economy. The small town I went to elementary school in didn't have a stop light, but it had two good elementary schools, a high school, an arena, a community centre. The liberals put in new regulations that forced tobacco farmers to upgrade their equipment so that we were producing the highest quality, cleanest tobacco in the world. Many invested hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then Ottawa decided to turf the tobacco quota system just a few years later, but the province under McGuinty refused to put in their share to buy farmers out of their quota. It decimated our local economy.
Manufacturers have been closing up shop as well. When they leave, they almost always cite increasing hydro costs.
The liberals have been forcing wind turbines in these rural counties that people don't want. They're noisy, they're an eye sore, people who live near them report health problems, they produce power we don't need during hours we don't need it, and the contracts drove the price of electricity through the roof. No matter how hard the municipalities and the people fight we can't stop them.
They get screwed even more on hydro bills because of these "delivery charges" for having the gall to settle down outside the GTA.
The people also view Wynne and the liberals as fiscally irresponsible. A few billion dollars on cancelled gas plants to save a few seats in the GTA. Billions in interest and debt down the road so they can roll back our hydro bills in the short term, a problem they created, to save their election hopes. 4 billion in increase borrowing costs for an accounting scheme that allowed them to hide the borrowing and cling to their balanced budget promise, only to abandon a balanced budget and try to buy the election.
Then there's the minimum wage. Our small-town economy is dependent on small business. Most small businesses you speak with are completely fine with the minimum wage going up, but gradually. The need cost certainty. A 20% overnight increase followed by another $1 an hour one year later is seen as vote buying on the backs of small business, plain and simple.
In general there's the feeling, with good reason, that Wynne doesn't care about anything other than the GTA. It looks like the GTA has had enough now as well.
