Ontario election a chance to put people and planet before profit

PV Ontario Bureau  

“Working people in Ontario cannot afford any more pro-corporate policies at Queen’s Park.” That’s the blunt assessment from Drew Garvie, leader of the Communist Party of Canada (Ontario) as he leads his party into an early provincial election called by Conservative premier Doug Ford.

The Communist Party is running seven candidates in the February 27 vote, with a view to building a stronger movement that can defeat pro-corporate policies and push for and win progressive reforms that put people and the planet before profit.

Since coming to power in 2018, Ford’s government has enriched corporate developers, landlords and retail and grocery monopolies while dismantling the protections and supports that working Ontarians rely on. Corporations are currently raking in record profits – in 2023, they hit $644 billion and were 54 percent higher than in 2019. At the same time, workers are left struggling with skyrocketing rents, suppressed wages and gutted public healthcare, education and social services.

Seven years of Conservative funding cuts to hospitals healthcare has degraded care, raised costs and worsened the staffing crisis, exacerbating an ongoing crisis. The Ontario Health Coalition warns that the government’s pursuit of healthcare privatization includes using public funds to throw open the doors to the for-profit corporate takeover of primary care. The coalition states that since Ford became premier, the number of Ontarians who do not have a family doctor has nearly doubled from 1.3 million people in 2016 to 2.5 million in July 2024.

With the housing crisis deepening, affordability is at an all-time low and homelessness is on the rise. “The Ford government’s removal of rent controls on new units and his refusal to build public housing have fuelled a housing crisis that affects millions,” says Garvie. “His attempt to use the notwithstanding clause to undermine the charter rights of people living in encampments shows once again that this government is a threat to democratic rights.”

Ford’s environmental policies are a catastrophic failure. With unmet emissions targets and attempts to hand over Greenbelt lands to developers, this government has proven it will always sacrifice the planet’s future for corporate gain. As the environmental organization Seniors for Climate Action Now (SCAN) states, “we can’t afford Ford – later is too late for the climate.”

To distract people and deflect blame for worsening inequality and economic hardship, Ford has repeatedly resorted to scapegoating and dog whistles. The Ontario Federation of Labour has called Ford’s behaviour a disgrace: “In 2023, he suggested that immigrants were to blame for Ontario’s housing crisis, as he attempted to garner support for his Greenbelt land grab. In 2021, he suggested would-be immigrants were coming to Ontario ‘to collect the dole’ – an outdated racist stereotype – and refused to apologize.” The OFL also noted that in the wake of worldwide protests in 2020 against George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, the premier claimed that systemic anti-Black racism doesn’t exist in Canada.

“The very real problems we face are not caused by racialized communities, immigrants and trans people,” says Garvie. “These are the direct outcome of a social and economic system that puts corporate profits ahead of people’s needs.”

Clearly, Ford’s Conservatives must be defeated. But, replacing them with the Liberals, New Democrats or Greens will not defeat the corporate agenda at Queen’s Park. The Liberals continue to prioritize corporate interests, promising only a gentler version of austerity – this is the same line working people heard from the McGuinty-Wynne Liberals, who simply continued the neoliberal policies of the previous Harris Conservative government. The Greens talk about “putting people over profits,” but their emphasis on “green capitalism” offers market-driven solutions, ignoring the fact that the climate crisis can’t be solved within the same system causing it. While many working people support the NDP, it is increasingly focused more on becoming a “responsible” alternative to the Liberals than on confronting corporate power.

A platform to vote for. A platform to mobilize a movement.

“We need to move beyond choosing between managers of capitalism every few years,” says Garvie. “This means that before, during and after the election, we have to build a united mass struggle around a comprehensive set of radical reforms that really puts people’s needs first – this is what we’re pushing in our ‘People’s Alternative’ platform.”

For the Communist Party, putting people first starts with raising wages and living standards. This includes raising the minimum wage to a livable level of $25 per hour, introducing a guaranteed income and raising disability and social assistance to livable levels so that no one is forced to live in poverty, enacting price controls on basic necessities including food and fuel, ending wage suppression in the public sector, and ensuring the right to organize for all workers regardless of industry or immigration status.

These measures are part of a full employment strategy that puts workers first. This strategy also includes a shorter work week with no loss in take-home pay, expanded manufacturing industries, investment in social housing and public infrastructure, and public ownership of key industries. Especially in light of the trade war launched by Donald Trump, Ontario needs plant closure legislation to prevent relocation due to US tariffs or corporations moving to lower-wage jurisdictions.

The People’s Alternative proposes to confront the housing crisis through a provincial housing program that would build 200,000 publicly owned and delivered units. The platform also calls for strict rent control legislation to roll back and control rents so that nobody is compelled to spend more than 20 percent of household income on housing, for vacancy controls which tie rent to the unit, and for an end to “sweeps” against unhoused people forced to live in tents.

To protect and expand public healthcare, the Communist Party calls for action to reverse privatization and provide full public funding to end wait times, as well as to extend universal public coverage to include long-term care, mental health, pharmacare, dental and vision care. The platform also calls for funding to be restored to safe consumption sites and for Queen’s Park to fund free and accessible addiction rehab programs.

In response to the urgent climate crisis, the platform proposes comprehensive government intervention to transition Ontario to publicly owned green energy while guaranteeing jobs for workers who are dependent on fossil fuel industries. Alongside this, the Party also calls for massive public investment in free municipal and inter-city public transit, and legislation to enforce strict legal limits for pollution and emissions, especially from industrial sources.

Garvie notes that any and all development in Ontario must begin with respect for Indigenous sovereignty. “In the first place, this means recognizing and implementing the UNDRIP principle of requiring free, prior and informed consent from Indigenous peoples and communities for development affecting their land and water,” he said. “It also means recognizing Indigenous self-government and self-determination, and ensuring the immediate cleanup of poisoned Indigenous land and water.”

Public education needs a new, needs-based funding formula to guarantee adequate resources for students, educators and schools. The recent decision of the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, under intense church pressure, to ban Pride flags from schools highlights the importance of incorporating the separate school system into a single, secular, public school system, something the Communist Party has campaigned on for decades.

On the post-secondary side, the government needs to restore and increase public funding, eliminate tuition fees and cancel student debt.

Garvie notes the importance of restoring and extending equality and democratic rights, which the Ford government has systemically undermined. “We need to enforce pay equity laws to eliminate the gender wage gap, introduce employment equity programs, and strengthen civilian control of police and prosecute police misconduct. We also need real, determined action to strengthen and enforce anti-hate legislation, including putting a stop to the deliberate equation of Palestine solidarity with antisemitism.”

He also says that the language rights of Franco-Ontarians need to be fully supported, and that Ontario should enact Mixed Member Proportional Representation (MMP) for elections to ensure every vote counts.

When asked how to pay for the expansion of programs included in the People’s Alternative, Garvie says that the money for that exists in Ontario, but the political will to get it is what is lacking. “We can tax the super-rich and make corporations pay their share by doubling the corporate income tax rate to 23 percent. We can reduce police funding and demilitarize police units. We can fight for the federal government to reduce military spending rather than double it over the next seven years, and dedicate that money to funding people’s needs.”

Build the movement for socialism

Elections matter, but winning far-reaching reforms like the People’s Alternative needs a mass movement that unites Indigenous nations, youth and students, immigrant and 2S/LGBTIQ+ communities and all those harmed by the Ford government’s corporate agenda into a coalition with the labour movement at its core.

“Voting Communist sends a clear message that Ontarians demand transformative change,” says Garvie. “But the fight doesn’t end at the ballot box. To overcome the crises we face, we must challenge capitalism itself. Only socialism can create a society where people and the planet are prioritized over profit – a world without poverty and war, where working people democratically own and control the economy. Socialism is urgently necessary and voting Communist helps build the movement for socialism.”


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