My Vision for Ontario

Head Table Guests

John Koopman, Vice-President, Spencer Stuart and President, The Empire Club of Canada; Delores Lawrence, President and CEO, NHI Nursing and Homemakers Inc.; Monica Hinds, Recipient, Minds in Motion Bursary, Justin Eves Foundation for the Learning Disabled and Student, University of Toronto; Robert J. Dechert, Partner, Gowling LaFleur Henderson LLP and Past President, The Empire Club of Canada; Dr. Kevin Smith, President and CEO, St. Joseph's Health Care; Isabel Bassett, Chair, TVOntario and Past President, The Canadian Club of Toronto; Nan Grant, Special Education Teacher, Parkdale Collegiate Liaison, Justin Eves Foundation for the Learning Disabled; Blair McReadie, President, Ontario PC Party; Noella Milne, Partner, Borden Ladner Gervais LLP and Director, The Canadian Club of Toronto; and Rabbi Yisroel Janowski, Founding President, Ontario Association of Jewish Day Schools.

Introduction by Ravi Seethapathy

Elections are extraordinary things. They are, on the surface, the purest manifestation of democracy wherein issues and solutions are laid out before voters like a buffet spread. But there is a major difference, and that is one can only select a particular combo and not cherry pick individual items.

Our speaker today stands for a "combo package" he truly believes is relevant and important for the people of Ontario.

What is also sometimes less obvious about elections is the terrible pressure they place on party leaders. Campaigning tirelessly in the face of withering attacks from their opponents and questioning by the media, they take their message to schools, homes, the marketplace and factories.

Our speaker today is no stranger to meeting such challenges. By tackling fiscal deficits and improving economic competitiveness he has made Ontario the largest economic engine of Canada, despite 9/11, despite SARS, and despite the recent black-out.

All these achievements (and hardships) speak volumes about his character, vision, leadership and experience.

In the words of Robert Frost:

The woods are lovely dark and deep But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep And miles to go before I sleep.

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to our podium today the Premier of Ontario, the Honourable Ernie Eves.

Ernie Eves

Well thank you. Good afternoon.

These two organizations have a long tradition of pro viding premiers and other leaders with a forum to discuss the day's most important issues and I appreciate this opportunity very much.

Before I begin, Td like to extend our best wishes to the Jewish community on the eve of Roshashana and a healthy and happy new year.

Well we're getting down to the wire. Things have really started to heat up in the last three weeks. Everyone is working hard. I'm excited about our team. There have been some bumps in the road, but the early days have been great and I'm very pleased with what I've seen so far. There's still one looming question though. Will this be the year the Leafs win the Stanley Cup?

Many people ask me why I returned to public life and the reasons have never been clearer than the events of the last few weeks. I returned to public life because I believe this election is crucial to the future of the Province of Ontario. We have a million more people work ing today than were working in this province eight years ago. Our students are competing with the best and bright est around the world and they're winning. Six hundred and twenty thousand people have the dignity of a pay cheque every week instead of a welfare cheque. Ontario is truly a success story.

But as successful as we've been, we are at a crossroads in our province's history.

Both of my opponents in this election would like you to believe that you have to make a choice between tax cuts and services that we all need. I believe that is a false choice. Lower taxes are the key to providing the eco nomic growth that is so essential to this province. It is this growth that creates jobs and keeps people working. It is this growth that gives government the financial ability to invest in state-of-the-art health care and world-class education.

Our strong economy has enabled us to invest almost $11 billion more a year in health care--an Ontario record of more than $28.3 billion this year alone. That means we have 21 new hospitals in the province. We're building the first new medical schools in the province in over 30 years with two campuses in Sudbury and Thunder Bay. We've hired almost 13,000 nurses and have promised to hire an additional 8,000 nurses. We've increased spaces in med ical schools by 30 per cent and we're providing free tuition to physicians and nurses, who agree to locate in under-serviced areas of the province.

A strong economy also means that we can invest more money in education than ever before and we have built 383 new schools. We have increased our commitment to public education, and will continue that commitment by

in excess of $2 billion over three years, which is more money than recommended by the Rozanski Report.

But let me make no mistake. High taxes would threaten all of this. Without a strong economy the services that you and I as Ontarians value most are at risk. We have come too far to turn back now and there is so much more yet to do.

A lot has been made lately in the media about which party can best manage the province's finances. Well I'm happy to be judged both on my record and our plan. We have balanced the books of the province four times in a row and we will meet the extraordinary challenges of this fiscal year. SARS, mad cow, West Nile virus, a North American blackout, and we will balance the books of this province for a fifth year in a row, the first time since 1908 that that has been done. We have cut taxes 225 times and we will continue to reduce the tax burden on people and on jobs. We have provided taxpayers with $16-billion worth of tax relief, which has stimulated our economy and has grown government revenue by almost $17 billion a year. Our economy has flourished. We have led the G-8 nations of the world every year for the last eight years. We have done well. But the job of keeping our economy strong and competitive will never be done. We will never see a day when we don't have to keep on working to keep Ontario strong. Frankly, the thought of deficits, tax hikes, and under-funded health care and education makes my hair curl.

I understand that Mr. McGuinty was here last week. Dalton has become a lot better when it comes to deliver-ing a line. But what about when it comes to delivering a bottom line? Dalton has promised every single Ontarian (he's looked into the camera and into your living rooms every single night since this campaign started) that he will not raise your taxes. Make no mistake about it. Taxes will be higher under a Liberal-Dalton McGuinty government. But you don't have to take my word for it. Walter Robinson of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said: "It is very clear as defined under the law. What they are proposing on the personal income tax side is a tax increase. He says he is not going to raise personal income tax on working families when in fact he is." The evidence is quite clear. The McGuinty Liberals will raise your taxes. There is no dispute about that. He just doesn't want to tell you that before October 2. I will reduce them. With his plan he has served notice that he's prepared to take the easy road--the road paved with higher taxes--rather than making tough decisions. And I can tell you that this is the road that will only make Ontario's economy worse. We have seen it firsthand. We know from personal experience that you cut taxes to give the economy a boost. When you raise taxes you stifle economic growth and you kill jobs.

We have seen those kinds of governments in this province before from 1985 to 1995 under both the Liberal and the NDP governments. They both felt they could tax and spend their way to prosperity and instead they drove this great province into a deep and long recession.

You remember back to 1995? I will never forget the day I became finance minister of this province. The government was spending a million dollars an hour more than it was taking in in revenue. We had an unemployment rate in excess of 11 per cent. There were a disgraceful 1.3 million people on welfare in this province and we had an $11.3-billion deficit.

But, you know, a financial or fiscal deficit wasn't all that we inherited in 1995. We inherited a deficit in our health-care system and in our education system. There were crumbling schools. Ten thousand hospital beds had been eliminated--the equivalent of 35 medium-size hospitals--but nobody had restructured the health-care system. Community-based health care was not even mentioned. And there hadn't been a single long-term care bed built in this province in 10 years when we assumed office in 1995.

This is the wrong way to go ladies and gentlemen. It reminds me of something Winston Churchill said: "We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handles." Well with all due respect, that's what Mr. McGuinty and Mr. Hampton are trying to do.

I know that only through lower taxes, by being competitive, and responsible management of our economy can we have a strong economy. Even Paul Martin seems to get it now. He recently, about a week ago, spoke at the Montreal Board of Trade and he confirmed that if you want to be competitive, if Canada's going to be competitive in today's economy, we have to lower taxes and we have to pay down debt. Mr. McGuinty and Mr. Chretien are in the way of the past. They still believe in a forties and fifties mentality: you have to raise taxes to get more money. We have proven beyond any reasonable doubt in the last eight years that that is not the case. And if I haven't made it clear already let me make it clear again. I will cut your taxes to keep the economy strong.

We have to do that so we can continue to invest in high-quality health care and public education for our children so that we can keep people working in this province. We have to start on the next million jobs in the Province of Ontario.

Being premier of this great province is not an easy job. You don't get to pick and choose the issues that you want to deal with. They're presented to you every day. You have to do the heavy lifting yourself. I'm committed to finding further savings in government. We will find approximately one penny's worth of savings in every dollar the government spends each and every year. Making government work better and smarter is a tough job. It requires vigilance and determination. Being premier means dealing with all of the issues, not just the ones you want to talk about. Good and bad, easy and difficult. It's about taking the tough road, tackling the difficult issues, getting things done, not looking for ways it can't be done. Leadership is about standing up for people; not standing in their way. Leadership is backing up what you say and what you do; not backing off or backing down.

Mr. McGuinty has been quoted repeatedly this past week about how his numbers might have to change, how he might not be able to keep all of his promises after all. Has anybody told him this election is not over yet? I have spent my entire 22-year political career believing that if you care about something strongly enough, if you actually believe in what you're doing and what you're saying, you will find a way to get it done. That is why in this election I have chosen to embrace the difficult issues, to take on controversy, to tackle it head on, to stand up to unions, to pundits, regardless of how hard they may want to fight back. This job requires someone who can make tough difficult decisions every single day of the week; someone who shares your values, who shares your beliefs. I believe that you should be able to keep more of your own hard-earned money. It's your money. You earned it. You should be able to keep more of it.

I believe in equality of opportunity for every student in this great Province of Ontario no matter where in this province they happen to live. Every single student surely deserves the right to be funded equally and fairly regardless of where they live geographically, the economic circumstances of their parents, their ethnic background or their religious belief and we introduced fair funding into this province in 1998. Mr. McGuinty and Mr. Hampton and every single member of their parties voted against it. They do not believe that every student in this province should be treated fairly. You want to talk about two-tiered stuff. I don't believe in second-class students in the Province of Ontario. It has no place in my Ontario.

I believe that our students should be in the classroom every day of the school year; not just the first day of the school year. Our students should not be used as pawns in labour disputes between school boards and teachers' unions. I really don't care whose fault it is that the student isn't in the classroom; whether it is a teachers' union that decides to go out on strike or whether it is a school board that decides to lock teachers and 70,000 students out of the classroom as happened this spring in Toronto. At the end of the day haven't we lost sight of what's important in education? Students should come first in education.

I believe that we should reduce the property taxes that our seniors pay. We owe seniors in this province a tremendous debt of gratitude. They fought for this country in wartime. They have built this country in peacetime. Isabel and I had the opportunity to attend Juno Beach this year on the 59th anniversary of D-Day and to see those 4,000 veterans who fought for the freedoms and rights that you and I enjoy every day in the best province in the best country in the world. The very least we owe them is the ability to live out their later years in life with dignity and respect in their own homes. If I can make that happen I will and I'm not going to make any excuses for it.

I believe that Ontarians should be able to deduct some of the interest they pay on their mortgage from their provincial income taxes. Around this great Province of Ontario in the last few weeks, Isabel and I have had an opportunity to meet with many young families and they don't have large incomes. I can remember two families in particular we met in Hamilton a few weeks ago. One family: two children, both spouses working, combined income of less than $30,000 a year. Another family: combined income, same situation, less than $50,000 a year. Owning a home is a Canadian dream. If we can make that dream come true for so many thousands of young people and families across this great Province of Ontario, surely we have an obligation to do that.

I believe that Ontario's communities should be safe. People should be able to walk in their neighbourhoods or drive on their streets and be free from fear. Yesterday Isabel and I had the occasion to attend a police officer's funeral. This is the fourth such funeral that I've had occasion to attend in about the last 10 months as premier of this great Province of Ontario. I say to my friends in the other two parties, when they don't think that this is an issue, when they don't think that we should be supportive of our law enforcement officers all across this great province, whether they belong to the OPP or many of the excellent municipal forces we have, these people put their lives on the line every single day when they get up to go to work. l think it's about time we as a society gave them the respect that they deserve; not just at election time because it's convenient.

As your premier, I will fight each and every day for your values and your beliefs because they are beliefs that we share. They are beliefs that I hold dearly as a father, as a citizen and as the premier of this great province. I have said it before and I will say it again. We have come too far to turn back now. This is what is at stake. Do we fight for what we have worked so hard to accomplish, all Ontarians, over the last eight years or do we let it all slip away? I am determined to fight for the gains that we have made, the things that we value most in society. We've come a long way on the road to a better Ontario but there is so much more yet to do. As premier, I will continue to reduce taxes on people and on jobs, to keep our economy strong. We need a strong economy to create jobs for our young people, to provide health care for our families and give opportunities to our children. I will put students first in our education system. I will ban teacher strikes, lock-outs and work-to-rule campaigns from the classroom. I will give homeowners a break on the mortgage interest they pay. I will give seniors the respect and dignity they deserve by reducing their property taxes.

My friends, we live in the best province in the best country in the world. Ontario is on the verge of even greater success, where every individual has the opportunity to be the best that they can be to fulfill their potential in life. An Ontario where no one is left behind.

I would be honoured to be your premier as together we meet the challenges of tomorrow on the road ahead. Thank you for coming this afternoon.

The appreciation of the meeting was expressed by John Koopman, Vice-President, Spencer Stuart and President, The Empire Club of Canada.

Mr. Premier, distinguished Past Presidents, members and guests of both clubs, this is the sixth time that the Premier has addressed a joint meeting of our clubs. On the first five occasions it was in his prior capacity as Minister of Finance for the province.

There are two interwoven themes that form the cloth of each of those five earlier addresses, and those themes are evident again today.

The first theme is the focus on our common social fabric, our commitment to the larger community, and the obligation we all have to help and support fellow Ontarians who are not as fortunate as ourselves. In the words of Premier Eves, "to ensure that no one is left behind."

In his addresses as Minister of Finance, Mr. Eves did not speak of macro-economic gobbledy-goop, although he does understand it rather well; instead his speeches were littered with phrases like "major new commitments to children and families," "breaking the cycle of dependency," "removing barriers for people with disabilities," "project for the learning disabled," and "protection for children at risk."

Today is no different. Today Premier Eves has spoken to us about "respecting seniors," "assisting home-owners," "the dignity of work," "building new schools and hospitals," and "equal access to education."

The second theme is his commitment to the economy. Not the economy for its own sake, but because compassion without the ability to help is hollow comfort to those in need. As Margaret Thatcher so eloquently said a decade ago: "The good Samaritan must first earn the means to be generous."

There is a compassionate conservative in North America, and we have been blessed to have him as Premier of this province, and to have him speak to us today.

On behalf of all of us, thank you Mr. Premier.