Chris Savard

Chris Savard
Seaway News

April 12, 2007

Once again in the past few weeks, Ontarians have witnessed two more examples of how Dalton McGuinty has failed the test of leadership. Unfortunately, McGuinty's bad management has resulted in bad consequences for ordinary people. The $100 million lottery scandal and the defection of a Liberal Caucus member are proof of the inadequacy and poor leadership of this provincial government.

$100 MILLION LOTTERY SCANDAL - On October 25, 2006, TV program Fifth Estate revealed the story of Bob Edmonds, a 78-year-old lottery customer and cancer survivor whose $250,000 prize was ripped off by a lottery ticket retailer. The broadcast also detailed an unusually high number of major lottery wins by ticket sellers and their employees. Edmonds had to wage a costly, three-year battle against the lottery corporation. Last week, on March 23, 2007, Ombudsman Andre Marin released a scathing report that the Ontario Lottery Gaming's measures guarding against retailer fraud were "woefully inadequate."

Marin went on to say in his report that "As soon as the insider-win scandal was exposed, the OLG took action - but instead of investing what went wrong, it reacted like a business facing a public relations nightmare, it hired experts to dispute the CBC's findings, even though as our investigators discovered, it knew full well that Mr. Edmonds was far from alone." Progressive Conservative Party Leader John Tory has said during Question Period that the Ombudsman report shows neglect and inaction by Dalton McGuinty, which in turn has created a scandal and destroyed confidence in the province's lottery system. Tory has pressed hard during Question Period over the last two weeks for David Caplan, Minister responsible for Ontario Lottery and Gaming, to resign after the Minsiter repeated his claim to not have known about the problems until 10 days before a CBC report. However, the Globe and Mail reported last week that he's known about this $100 million lottery scandal for at least six months.

Ontarians have also learned that Dalton McGuinty has paid the CEO of this scandal-plagued organization $720,000 to keep quiet and quit. He joins Ontario Hydro CEO Tom Parkinson as the latest public employee to be paid a huge amount of money to quit on the backs of the taxpayers. If he did something wrong, he should have been fired The odds are long at winning the lottery, but they're even worse in Dalton McGuinty's Ontario. Unfortunately, his first instinct is to cover-up the problem instead of fixing it. Hard working ticket buyers, have been ripped off and the Ontario public has lost confidence in the system.

LIBERAL MPP CROSSES THE FLOOR - Mississauga South MPP, Tim Peterson, has left the McGuinty Liberal caucus and crossed the floor. He will run as a PC Candidate in the next election but will sit as an Independent for the rest of the legislative session. Tim Peterson is the brother of former Liberal Premier David Peterson and Chretien Cabinet Minister, Jim Peterson.

It says something about Dalton McGuinty's weak leadership that he has lost a Peterson from the Liberal caucus. During his media announcement, Peterson had this to say about John Tory, "In my discussions with John, I became aware of what a decent, caring, humorous and charismatic person he is. In short, a natural leader. A leader who is not afraid to bring together the best and the brightest minds in Ontario, to help manage Ontario's $90 billion budget. He is one of the best and brightest."