Ontario Premier Doug Ford faced the opposition benches on Monday for the first time since June.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
Ontario Premier Doug Ford was hammered with questions on Monday from opposition parties who accused the Progressive Conservative government of rewarding its friends with a billion-dollar fund for training workers, as the legislature returned from its extended summer break.
Mr. Ford faced the opposition benches on Monday for the first time since June, when his government announced the legislature would be returning in late October instead of its scheduled start in September. The government said at the time it needed more time to implement its new policies, such as a bill to fast-track mining development, and to assess the economic impacts of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The multibillion-dollar skills development fund is intended to give money to unions and businesses to retrain workers. The fund was recently the subject of an Ontario Auditor-General’s report, which said the distribution of $1.3-billion in training grants was “not fair, transparent or accountable.”
Auditor-General Shelley Spence also said political staff doled out hundreds of millions of dollars to groups with lower scores on their grant applications for while higher-ranked applicants were passed over.
The report said many applicants retained professional lobbyists, some of whom were later revealed to have close ties with the government. Queen’s Park publication The Trillium also reported that Labour Minister David Piccini recently attended the Paris wedding of a lobbyist whose client received more than $7.5-million in government grants. (Mr. Piccini’s office said in a previous statement that the minister travelled to Europe for a long-planned family trip and attended the wedding. Speaking to reporters on Monday, Mr. Piccini said he paid his own way.)
Ontario A-G says grant selection process for skills training program ‘not fair, transparent’
Mr. Piccini has defended the way the money was allocated, saying the fund has helped tens of thousands of people land employment and denied any misuse of taxpayer money.
Mr. Ford largely sat silent on Monday as opposition leaders accused his government of using public funds to reward its friends and donors.
“Premier, explain to all of us exactly what a conflict of interest is,” said Liberal MPP John Fraser, as he demanded Mr. Piccini’s resignation.
“Does the Premier believe that the government is his own personal piggybank to reward insiders and well-connected lobbyists?”
Answering for the government side, House Leader Steve Clark said PC members are excited to be part of Mr. Ford’s team “that is going to stand up to Donald Trump.”
Mr. Piccini, who took most questions about the fund on Monday, repeatedly said the government stands with workers.
“I’m proud to stand up here and talk about the 100,000 people, thanks to the skills development fund, that have now entered the job market,” he said.
Ottawa pledges ‘full due diligence’ after audit of Ontario skills fund
NDP Leader Marit Stiles, who said the province is currently experiencing an unemployment crisis with hundreds of thousands of people out of work, asked when Mr. Ford would take action to help.
“Can the Premier tell us exactly how much public money went to friends of the government instead of supporting workers during this jobs disaster?” she asked.
Mr. Ford told the legislature that Ontario is “under attack” from Mr. Trump and is doing more to make its economy more resilient and self-sufficient. The government also unveiled new legislation Monday intended to cut red tape across various sectors, as well as its previous pledge to remove speed cameras from municipalities.
The government said its red tape bill is needed to address long wait times that some businesses face for government permits. In materials distributed Monday to reporters, before the bill was made public, the government said it would review 332 “business-facing” permits or approvals by 2028, with an aim to eliminate or streamline 35 per cent of them. Mining permits, already subject to recent changes meant to speed up the approval process, are to be targeted first.
Ontario said its bill would also change rules around water quality, making it easier to dig new or replacement wells where protections for the source water are already in place. Forestry companies would no longer have to apply for annual wood harvest permits. The bill includes changes that would make it easier for more medical professionals, licensed in other provinces, to work in Ontario.
The bill would also make good on Mr. Ford’s pledge to ban all municipal traffic speed cameras, which his own government had itself enabled with legislation in 2019 that built on changes developed by the previous government. Several cities, including Toronto and Brampton, had urged Mr. Ford to reconsider and allow them to keep cameras in school zones. But the Premier has insisted the cameras are a “cash grab” and said the province would be instituting other traffic-calming measures instead.
The Premier also repeated on Monday his call for retaliation against the Trump administration – a strategy Prime Minister Mark Carney has said his government will not be pursuing while talks with American officials are under way. Mr. Ford and Mr. Carney met privately on Thursday at the Premier’s home, with neither speaking to media after the meeting.
“We have to keep fighting against President Trump, and we need to hit back,” Mr. Ford said. “I said that to the Prime Minister.”