TORONTO, ON: The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) is today calling on Kathleen Wynne and the Ontario government to ensure that any sale of Hydro One ensures that investors will have the ability to fix the floundering company.
“Breaking up and privatizing a low-productivity government-owned company with overpaid staff makes a lot of sense,” said CTF Ontario Director Christine Van Geyn. “But a minority interest sale while the government retains operational discretion is not going to work. It will not save ratepayers a single cent. It is an attempt to add a billion dollars to government coffers for pet projects, without calling it debt.”
Hydro One has been plagued by decades of mismanagement and scandal. Hydro One was responsible for half the costs of Ontario’s ill-advised smart meter program but only a quarter of the installations, and the salaries paid to the Hydro One leadership were so outrageous the scandal is now a Harvard Business School case study.
Ontario pays the highest prices for electricity in North America. Prices have gone up 325 per cent since 2002.
“Ontarians are sick of paying the highest electricity rates in North America, and deserve better than a partial sell-off of bad assets to fund more spending. Ratepayers deserve real reform in the electricity sector,” concluded Van Geyn
Christine Van Geyn, CTF Ontario Director
