By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Wednesday December 5, 2012
Dwight Duncan has warning for next Ontario Liberal leader
Tim Hudak asks Santa ‘Dwight Duncan’ to keep labor restrictions
A confidential report says Dwight Duncan has always been admirably frank as finance minister. His finger-wagging, however, is usually aimed at Tory and NDP rivals across the floor.
Now fellow Liberals are bearing the brunt of his bluntness.
In the race to replace Dalton McGuinty as premier, Duncan is watching warily from the sidelines, preparing his own exit strategy from provincial politics. And fussing over his fiscal legacy:
Après Dwight, le deluge?
“I don’t intend to go silently into the night,” he told the Toronto Board of Trade during a PowerPoint show outlining doomsday scenarios for Ontario’s fiscal future:
Tory tax cuts would add billions to the budget deficit and undermine government programs. NDP tax and wage hikes would imperil the economy.
But Duncan was also sending a clear message to the seven candidates vying for the Liberal leadership. The winner of the January convention will automatically inherit the premier’s office and dictate the terms of the next budget.
A few are straying from the party line by second-guessing the teachers’ dispute. Some candidates are hinting they would have handled the unions differently, deftly avoiding any imposed deals.
While they waver, Duncan disdains pussyfooting. He stressed Monday that the controversial Bill 115 must be deployed to ensure total payroll costs do not increase. (Source: Toronto Star)