407

Thursday May 12, 2022

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday May 12, 2022

Use Highway 407 to ease GTA traffic woes

Premier Doug Ford raised some eyebrows last week when he talked about highways, and actually made a lot of sense.

December 11, 2018

That’s not what we’ve become accustomed to hearing from the premier in this area. He seems bound and determined to build new highways wherever he can, no matter the financial cost and environmental consequences.

But when it comes to Highway 407, the underused, mostly private toll route across the northern GTA, Ford hit the bullseye.

“I would never have sold it,” he said. “What did they sell it for, $3 billion? And it’s worth, what, $20 billion now? So I don’t believe in selling off toll roads.”

Two things on that. First, current estimates actually put the value of Highway 407 closer to $30 billion, making the sale back in 1999 look even more foolish. And second, it was a Progressive Conservative government, the one led by Mike Harris, that sold off the highway for what we can now see amounted to a handful of beans.

But never mind. Ford wasn’t part of that government and it’s a long time ago. The essential point is that even a PC premier can now see the folly of selling a valuable public asset for far below its long-term worth.

Wednesday May 23, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday May 23, 2018

York police probe Highway 407 data breach that led PC candidate to quit

York Regional Police’s fraud unit is investigating the “internal theft” of customer data from 407 ETR, the company that oversees Highway 407, CBC News has learned.

September 21, 2017

On Wednesday, the former Progressive Conservative candidate in Brampton East, Simmer Sandhu, resigned over allegations of his involvement in the data breach. Sandhu called the allegations “totally baseless” and said he would work to clear his name.

His resignation came hours after 407 ETR announced it was informing some 60,000 customers that their names, mailing addresses and in some cases their phone numbers were stolen from the company’s office in the past year.

Sandhu worked at the company for nine years, until he left about two months ago.

December 18, 2015

A spokesperson for York police said the investigation is in its earliest stages and few details were immediately available on Friday. The

spokesperson did not say whether or not the investigation will include allegations of links between the data breach and Sandhu.

Liberal Leader Kathleen Wynne and NDP Leader Andrea Horwath both called for police to probe the circumstances of the stolen data while campaigning this week.

On the campaign trail Friday, Ford told reporters that police had not contacted him nor his campaign team to discuss the stolen data.

He then reiterated the Tories parted ways with Sandu “as soon we found out about it.”

Ford added that, to his knowledge, no other candidates or ridings have been linked in any way to the data breach. (Source: CBC)