Ontario Liberals at it again (Ontario Tire Stewardship this time) | GTAMotorcycle.com

Ontario Liberals at it again (Ontario Tire Stewardship this time)

mxs

mxs

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Another month I guess, another incompetence delivered by the Ontario Liberals. It's getting to the point that the other parties don't have to come up with anything smart and electable since the OnLibs are simply self-destructing. Unbelievable level of incompetence.

https://www.thestar.com/news/queens...m-charged-with-alleged-theft-of-eco-fees.html


Why do they need until Dec 2018 to shut the tainted program down, is beyond me though ... https://www.thestar.com/news/canada...ut-down-ontario-tire-stewardship-by-2018.html

Somebody pls have the decency and bail the decent taxpayers of Ontario out .... you hear me conservatives? How many "gifts" from the Ontario liberals do you need? Looks like they will keep them coming ....
 
I bet Ontarians vote Liberal again. They'll get rid of Wynne and the press will pretend everything is all good again.
 
I'm not really against eco-taxes in principle, as long as the funds are specifically ear marked for something. Ontario has a poor history with any kind of slush fund
 
mxs said:
Another month I guess, another incompetence delivered by the Ontario Liberals. It's getting to the point that the other parties don't have to come up with anything smart and electable since the OnLibs are simply self-destructing. Unbelievable level of incompetence.

https://www.thestar.com/news/queens...m-charged-with-alleged-theft-of-eco-fees.html


Why do they need until Dec 2018 to shut the tainted program down, is beyond me though ... https://www.thestar.com/news/canada...ut-down-ontario-tire-stewardship-by-2018.html

Somebody pls have the decency and bail the decent taxpayers of Ontario out .... you hear me conservatives? How many "gifts" from the Ontario liberals do you need? Looks like they will keep them coming ....
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They need time to allow the industry to develop their own programs. It's not getting rid of the fees etc, it just getting rid of the monopoly of 1 entity.
 
TwistedKestrel said:
I'm not really against eco-taxes in principle, as long as the funds are specifically ear marked for something. Ontario has a poor history with any kind of slush fund
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There are lots of things that "in principle" make sense. The problem is government isn't about doing the right thing, it's about power and control and hence hysteria around MMGW and the predictable government response to taxing things because doing anything to "pretend" to be helping the environment, regardless of how mis-guided, is of course rationalized as being better than doing nothing.
 
We can keep MMGW out of this argument as this was for responsible disposal of waste (in theory), just the old school pollution gig. And we're not even arguing, this was a bad idea from day one.
 
bakaboy said:
They need time to allow the industry to develop their own programs. It's not getting rid of the fees etc, it just getting rid of the monopoly of 1 entity.
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I think it's understandable they (whoever that is in the future) need time. What I am saying is we don't need to fund this boondoggle for another almost two full years. Get rid of it now, and start working on something better. When you have that something better, launch it whenever it's ready. I feel that the OnLibs want it on life support until end of 2018, so it survives the election ... if they win it stays in some shape or form. Because if they lose, we will not see anything of this sort for long time ...
 
The Liberals would have done better in the face of the public to have nuked the stewardship program NOW vs waiting until an inexplicable date a year from now...unless there's contractual reasons that would make it financially unwise or disastrous if they did. That was unclear.

I'm not against the idea of the program and what it accomplished - you don't see used tires dumped in ditches and in huge piles on back country roads anymore like was common before the program because tires are no longer a pain (or an expense) to dispose of like they were before. I remember trying to get rid of a set of 4 used tires in the 90's and they were like Kryptonite, and the dump/transfer station wanted a kings ransom to take them, so it was no surprise that people would just take a late night drive down a country road and pitch them into the ditch instead.

That said, it seems that this was a system that was left without sufficient oversight, and the rest is history. It's happened before, it'll probably happen again. It would be nice to see the government spend some money on making sure these sorts of agencies and programs are operating (and continue to operate) as designed, because clearly just setting them up with the best intentions and then leaving others to operate them doesn't always pan out as hoped. Case in point here.
 
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PrivatePilot said:
The Liberals would have done better in the face of the public to have nuked the stewardship program NOW vs waiting until an inexplicable date a year from now...unless there's contractual reasons that
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They had no problem blowing $1Billion on power stations that didn't materialize, I can't think of any contractual obligation that would be much more expensive than that to keep them from killing this now.
 
Especially if the CEO who was supposed to run and manage it, turned out to be a bonafide crook. It's not like a political party trying to kill a functioning program which is against their political agenda.
 
Snobike Mike said:
They had no problem blowing $1Billion on power stations that didn't materialize, I can't think of any contractual obligation that would be much more expensive than that to keep them from killing this now.
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Unless the public is made privy to the fees for cancelling all the related contracts, that's impossible to factually comment on. I'm reasonably confident the program is probably contractually obligated with not only senior staff but all sorts of hauling and disposal companies as well.

Haphazardly cancelling the gas plant to buy votes didn't exactly work out so well from a cost perspective, so perhaps despite the reasoning behind this "orderly wind down" is to avoid a repeat all over again. I know the "nuke it now" approach would yield the best public response NOW, but a year from now (not coincidentally during elections) when it comes out that the this approach cost taxpayers umpteen millions in lawsuits and cancellation fees to accomplish, well...the optics would suddenly shift.
 
mxs said:
Especially if the CEO who was supposed to run and manage it, turned out to be a bonafide crook. It's not like a political party trying to kill a functioning program which is against their political agenda.
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One can only hope that they put him through the wringer like he damn well deserves. Just letting him go with a slap on the wrist, and then worse yet, a golden handshake will just make an already bad situation worse in the eyes of the public.

They can save face by seeing that he does jail time at least.
 
If they killed it without a replacement used tires would be hard to get rid of again and end up back in the ditches.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk
 
Scuba Steve said:
If they killed it without a replacement used tires would be hard to get rid of again and end up back in the ditches.
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Hopefully the industry will to some extent try to continue with the actual disposal system (that was working) without the in-between bureaucracy that wasn't.
 
PrivatePilot said:
Hopefully the industry will to some extent try to continue with the actual disposal system (that was working) without the in-between bureaucracy that wasn't.
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2 executives charged. One CEO who has not been fired yet for some reason. An auditor that should become outcast but they are still untouched

Yes the disposal program will remain

Bigger questions too like why they have a $49 million surplus? What will become of it?

Tire Stewardship had ongoing fights with industry since day one. 5 year fight since they thought that they should collect fees on every tire that a retailer brought into Ontario. Even though most were then sent across Canada. 5 year fight. Wasted resources fighting a monopoly above accountability
 
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PrivatePilot said:
One can only hope that they put him through the wringer like he damn well deserves. Just letting him go with a slap on the wrist, and then worse yet, a golden handshake will just make an already bad situation worse in the eyes of the public.

They can save face by seeing that he does jail time at least.
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I wish, but I somehow got learned to expect so little ... the bar is so very low right now.
 
Scuba Steve said:
If they killed it without a replacement used tires would be hard to get rid of again and end up back in the ditches.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk
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They should take the surplus they somehow generated (makes you think, eh?) and keep collecting tires without charging us.
 
I saw an article today (Toronto Star I think it was) that mentioned support for the Liberals has collapsed throughout the province except in the 416 where it's 50/50.

I suspect many of the people of Toronto are untouched by many of the effects of this government - hydro rates being the biggest - those are things that apartment/condo dwellers/renters who don't pay their own hydro bills are not experiencing first hand. For many who rely mostly on public transit and may not even own a car the increased gas prices (courtesy of the carbon taxing etc) is also unseen.

I see no other reason why there could still be any shred of support left for them there, honestly, aside from just sheer stupidity.
 
The 416 crowd would be disillusioned thinking the OnLibs policies do not affect them. They unfortunately affect every taxpayers of Ontario. Yes some of the affects will be mild in 416, but it still counts.

It's incredible hard to come up with any notable benefits OnLibs implemented in the last long while and which would positively affect most tax payers. I am sure the tire people used to like them, the solar industry still loves them (who wouldn't with those contracts in place), EV (Tesla) enthusiasts probably have good things to say about them as well. Where is the average Joe? ... getting ready for the next hydro rate increase, or license registration fee increase.
 
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