Patrick Brown claimed: “But I remember listening to those small businesses and hearing how they just feel pummeled, beat by provincial policy about the cost of doing business here..”
Fact: Site Selection—a magazine of corporate expansion and economic development – found that Ontario is the most competitive province in Canada. They gave their Canadian Competitiveness Award to the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development and Growth for a second year in a row in 2017.
Fact: Ontario is the job creation engine of Canada, we’ve created more jobs in the past year than any other province.
Province Jobs Created – Last 12 Months Ontario +149,200 Quebec +66,500 British Columbia +64,200 PEI +1,200 Nova Scotia +2,200 New Brunswick +700 Saskatchewan -2,200 Alberta +16,500 Newfoundland and Labrador – 4,700 Manitoba +14,400 Canada +308,000
(Source: Statistics Canada)
Patrick Brown claimed: “…in federal politics where we… brought the GO train back…”
Fact: The Federal Government didn’t bring back the GO train. It was a joint effort between municipalities and the provincial government
(Source: The Canadian Press; December 17, 2007, https://news.ontario.ca/mto/en/2011/02/making-public-transit-better-for-barrie-go-commuters.html)
Patrick Brown claimed:“We’re going to cut middle-class income taxes by 22-and-a-half percent”
Fact: Not a single person in this province will see the amount of provincial income taxes they pay reduced by 22.5%. There are 5 income tax brackets in Ontario and while the marginal rate in the 2nd bracket will be reduced by 22.5%, the effective tax rate paid by Ontarian’s won’t go down by that amount. It is not accurate for Patrick Brown to say he’s reducing people’s taxes by 22.5%.
Every Time Patrick Brown appears on CFRA, he’s caught intentionally misleading listeners about some pretty important facts.
This needs to stop.
It’s time he understands that Facts Still Matter in Ontario.
Maybe ask Steve Paikin for Todd Smith’s recording
Patrick Brown claimed: “They proceeded with 1100 more contracts” and “keep signing new ones”
Fact: Wrong and wrong. First, Todd Smith, Patrick Brown’s very own PC energy critic, was on the Agenda with Steve Paikin on March 6th, 2017, admitting this was entirely inaccurate.
Here’s the exchange:
Steve Paikin: “But they’re not signing any new contracts. So the tweet says she signs the next round of bad energy contracts tomorrow is inaccurate, right?”
Todd Smith: “Yeah, Okay. I’ll say that’s inaccurate.”
Second, we suspended LRP 2 last fall.
(Source: http://tvo.org/video/programs/the-agenda-with-steve-paikin/wynnes-power-play, http://www.ieso.ca/sector-participants/feed-in-tariff-program/overview)
(Source: https://news.ontario.ca/mei/en/2016/09/ontario-suspends-large-renewable-energy-procurement.html)
Patrick Brown idea on Hydro Prices
And how do you plan to do that without a plan?
15.8.2017 Patrick Brown claimed: “I am going to make hydro prices go dramatically down”
Fact: He has absolutely no plan to do so.
(Source: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2017/08/15/patrick-browns-disastrous-tenure-as-pc-leader-opinion.html)
Source: Facts Still Matter in Ontario
Patrick Brown claimed: “The province isn’t funding mental health properly…”
Fact: Our government has been a champion for mental health supports for people across the province. As part of Budget 2017, we built on our previous investments by expanding access to psychotherapy, supporting access to mental health and addictions services for post-secondary students and providing free prescription medications for those 24 years of age and younger through OHIP+.
Source: Facts Still Matter in Ontario
Patrick Brown claimed: “It’s short term fixes and they’re not looking at the structural problems”
Fact: Our plan to reduce electricity bills by 25% for everyone is a significant structural change that represents a fair solution to an issue that’s been unfairly placed on one generation.
This is not a temporary solution, and it does not sacrifice investments in the energy system. We’re changing the way electricity costs are recovered, and moving funding for assistance programs off of hydro bills. This plan is the biggest rate reduction in Ontario’s history.
Source: Facts Still Matter in Ontario