Ontario government’s blatant scheme to buy votes

It’s no secret that governments, especially those of the liberal persuasion, love to confiscate money from the taxpayers and use it to bribe them into supporting their caring and compassionate government. The recent ice storm in Ontario gave Premier Kathleen Wynne a great opportunity to put the dictum of former Obama Chief of Staff and current mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel, into practice—never let a good crisis go to waste.

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The ice storm hit the weekend before Christmas depriving 300,000 homes and businesses of power. Many people did not get their power back until New Year’s Day. Loblaws supermarket chain decided to donate $25,000 in gift cards to give to people to replace freezer food they lost during the blackout and might not be able to afford to replace. Having an excellent supply of other peoples’ money and not to be outdone by a group of grocery stores, Wynne announced the government would match Loblaws generous gesture. Lest anyone think Loblaws was acting out of the goodness of their heart that is not the case. Loblaws acted in what was in the best interests of Loblaws. The grocery chain benefited greatly from their donation in the following ways:

• The chain will receive a tax deduction for the value of the gift cards they provided;
• Loblaws received a great deal of free publicity for their donation. It cost a fraction of what expensive television commercials they make showing Executive Chairman Galen G. Weston travelling throughout Canada giving ice cream to children costs;
• Many people who received the cards do not shop at Loblaws. By requiring them to go to a Loblaws store to use the cards, the potential is there to gain new customers;
• People spending more in the grocery store than the limit of their gift cards would result in Loblaws increasing their sales revenue.

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The boon to business was noticed right away by other supermarket chains. Sobeys and Metro soon had their own gift cards to give away and the matching funds by the caring Liberals jumped from $25,000 to $100,000. No big deal; it’s just the taxpayers’ money. Other businesses soon jumped on the bandwagon and the actual amount the government will spend is increasing. There might be some merit to society generally if the gift cards actually went to people who lost hundreds of dollars in food and are not in a financial position to refill their refrigerators. But alas, in order to get maximum attention for their efforts, the premier decided the provincial government would be in charge of handing out the gift cards. After that decision was made, it is easy to guess how it all turned out. For three days last week, the cards were available at some government offices of Ontario Works. Lineups for the freebees began early and each day, the offices quickly ran out of the cards. The cards came in two amounts, $50 for an individual and $100 for a family. In order to qualify to receive one of the cards people had to show ID with their address on it to “prove’ they lost power. Whether these addresses were actually checked to see if they indeed lost power is not known. In order to get the $100 card, all a recipient had to do was to say “family,” whether the card was for more than one person or not. Why have to tell the truth in order to get a freebie from the government? The lineups were so long that some people who went to offices ended up with parking tickets on their luxurious cars. There was no proper inquiry into whether or not the people who were receiving the cards were really in need. If this was truly a program to help low income people who were seriously disadvantaged when their food spoiled, there was a much better way to help them. But getting the government out of the way would not have allowed the premier to get credit for the program which was the whole purpose of Ontario getting into the act with Loblaws and other businesses. The gift cards could have been given to food banks. Those who work in food banks could have provided cards to their regulars who truly are low income people. And since there is a stigma in going to a food bank, people would be less likely to park their Mercedes in front of a food bank to snag $100 in free food. The people who would go to a food bank would more likely be those who truly did need food. And it’s not over yet. Kathleen Wynne’s “look how great and caring I am” program was limited to Toronto. While Toronto was hardest hit simply because of its population, people in other parts of the province also lost power for days. Now they are complaining, quite rightly, we suffered too so where are our gift cards? Like the energizer bunny, the program will keep going and going and going. And more people who can afford to replace any spoiled food will be lining up all over the province. But Kathleen showed she cares—and that’s all that really matters.

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