Inquiry

Thursday July 19, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday July 19, 2018

Doug Ford’s PCs launching inquiry into previous Liberal government’s spending

Ontario Premier Doug Ford is vowing to “clean up” the government’s finances, in part by launching an inquiry into the previous Liberal regime’s spending.

April 27, 2018

The PCs have created an Independent Financial Commission of Inquiry to probe Ontario’s past spending and accounting practices. The commission will be led by former B.C. Liberal premier Gordon Campbell, as well as Al Rosen, a forensic accountant, and Michael Horgan, a consultant with decades of public service experience.

“The commission will give you the answers about what went wrong,” Ford told reporters, from behind a podium bearing the slogan “Restoring trust.”

The commission’s findings will be made public, and Ford said the results should provide some advice about how to fix the situation.

December 11, 2014

“We go in there, we’re going to find additional waste, we’re going to find areas that we can drive efficiencies,” he said.

The premier is pledging that the inquiry would build on the work of the province’s auditor general, Bonnie Lysyk, who has been critical of government accounting standards that she said understate its deficits by billions.

“The office of the auditor general appreciates the government’s intent as part of the financial commission of inquiry to address the accounting practices we have previously expressed concerns about,”  Lysyk said in a statement. (Source: CBC News) 

 

Thursday July 14, 2005

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday July 14, 2005

‘Redneck’ Harris irked OPP inspector

Former Ontario premier Mike Harris was a “redneck” who wanted speedy action to remove native protesters from Ipperwash Provincial Park, but was resigned to proceeding through the courts, a judicial inquiry was told yesterday. 

OPP Insp. Ron Fox testified yesterday he was paged to a noon-hour meeting at Queen’s Park on Sept. 6, 1995, the same day Dudley George was killed during a skirmish between police and protesters who’d moved into the park two days earlier. 

At the meeting was the-then Conservative premier, his attorney general, solicitor general, natural resources minister and their deputy ministers. 

In a subsequent call to the police commander at the Ipperwash standoff, John Carson, Fox warned police were dealing “with a real redneck government.” 

“They are f . . . barrel suckers. They just are in love with guns. There’s no question they don’t give a sh . . less about Indians,” he said in the recorded call played yesterday at the Ipperwash inquiry. 

During the meeting, Harris criticized police for not taking immediate action when the natives moved into the park and suggested it would be raised at a later inquiry, Fox said. (Hamilton Spectator)