By Matias de Dovitiis
Kathleen Wynne was elected with a majority government last summer with the promise that she would step away from the Dalton McGuinty type scandals that led to his early retirement. Her previous accomplishments as a Trustee who advocated for public education made Ontarians feel like she could serve as an honest, hard working leader that would not fall in the same trappings of power politics that sunk her predecessor. That optic is now being transformed, and we are all the worse for it. It is unfortunate that it took such a short time for this other side of Wynne to appear. The old Wynne was all about participatory democracy, and having transparent, clean processes in place.Premier Wynne, apparently is not below having her power brokers push people aside with promises, something which the chief electoral officer in Ontario stated recently appeared to be a breach of the Elections Act, and which the Ontario Provincial Police anti-racket wing is currently investigating. At issue is what transpired in the lead up to a recent by-election in Sudbury, where an NDP MPP quit after only a few months on the job for family reasons. The open seat presented an opportunity for the Liberals to expand their seat margin. In order to convince the much more high profile candidate (a seating MP for the NDP) to change parties, the Liberals decided to bypass the nomination process, and asked the previous candidate in the area not to run. This is where things become controversial and where the question of legalities comes into play. The previous candidate in the Sudbury seat for the Liberals was Andrew Olivier, who was interested in running for the open seat, but two senior Liberal party organizers met with him, and tried to convince him not to run. We know this because he recorded the conversation; Olivier is a quadriplegic and often records conversations as a means of keeping notes. Since that encounter he has made the recording public. The recording has led to an OPP investigation into Wynne’s Deputy Chief of Staff, Pat Sorbara and Gerry Lougheed, another party operative. Wynne is defending her staff stating that there were “no specific offers” or favours granted during the conversation with Olivier. Unfortunately, for the people of Ontario Wynne has two political agendas, one for the Government and one for her political party. Wynne is standing by her staff saying they will not be asked to step aside, unless the investigation proves that there was some wrongdoing. It is important to consider that the issue is not only about whether something illegal took place. At this level of government our expectations and demands are higher of our elected officials and the people that do their bidding. It is therefore insufficient to say that there was nothing illegal that took place, when in fact the actions that were taken are unethical. Whatever the legal positioning Wynne’s staff is taking, they should take a leave of absence, and should only be allowed back to work if an investigation clears them.