Preville on Politics

This tax debate brought to you by MasterCard

Posted on October 23, 2007 by Philip Preville

Those among you with Globe access should read John Barber’s column this morning. He’s right on the mark. The only way to paint a picture of what has been lost in this debate is to consider what might have been. Pretend for just a moment that David Miller had won the vote on his new taxes back in July:

• With $350 million in new revenue flowing into city coffers, the 2008 budget would have been easy to balance.
• An emboldened Miller could have truly come on strong during the provincial election, saying that Torontonians had done their share and now it was the province’s turn.
• Council could have spent the fall dealing with future priorities: enacting an economic development strategy, moving ahead with the climate change plan, expanding transit service and generally thinking big.
• The city could have begun lifting its past hiring freezes and started rebuilding its staff.
• And onwards into the future. Torontonians would have enjoyed a true debate about what kind of city we want.

Instead, the city has new taxes but no solution to its fiscal problem. Even assuming that the province decides to upload some costs, it will surely phase in its uploading over three or four years, which means the city will be short for 2008 and 2009, probably 2010 as well. All we really got from three months of debate was one good punch line: Outdoor ice rinks open in December, courtesy of MasterCard, a company that thrives on debt.

Last thought: In council chambers yesterday afternoon, it was hard not to notice all the big union cheeses in attendance—Bob Kinnear of the TTC, Brian Cochrane of CUPE, John Cartwright of the Labour Council. Cochrane sat front-row centre like a king being entertained by his fools. I have no ideological truck with unions; indeed, I’d call collective bargaining among the most important rights our society extends to its citizens. But that doesn’t change the fact that the peanut gallery was full of people who know which side their bread’s buttered on. Incidentally, the $150 million that will be raised by the new land-transfer tax is, I’m told, roughly equal to the total cost of next year’s salary increases for the city’s unionized employees. There are many other ways of expressing the value of the land-transfer tax revenue, of course, but they all arrive at the same end point: poof. The money’s already gone.

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Mark Dowling October 23, 2007 at 4:28 p.m.

According to the Post's Toronto blog, some of the peanuts were sneaked into the gallery by the back way with insider assistance, so as to grab the available seating.

As for Barber's whining - anyone who wants to read it for free can do so at:
http://www.rbcinvest.theglobeandmail.com...

Philip Preville October 23, 2007 at 5:27 p.m.

Thanks Mark for the free link to Barber! Globe's convoluted online access system drives me around the bend.

Rational Policies October 23, 2007 at 9:02 p.m.

Phil: to have no truck with unions, you would have to have no dealings with them, usually in terms of specifically avoiding them thanks to dislike or distrust. A political columnist should really use accurate and appropriate language. Malapropisms like this, especially in writing, are rather devastating to your (already severely limited) credibility.

This is just another nail in the coffin of Toronto's economic future. Narrowing the tax base, chasing property owners out of the city, and making city revenues captive to the buoyancy of the property market are all idiotic things to do, especially together.

If we are to have platinum-plated, diamond-encrusted salary, pensions, and benefits for unionized workers, then be honest about it and put those costs directly on property taxes. Instead Miller is going after hidden taxes, hoping that he might just get one more term out of the city. We need policies to push Toronto's competitiveness, not hamper it. A Mayor captive to the public service unions is simply putting us on the express train to '70s era New York City.

McD October 23, 2007 at 9:05 p.m.

I must disagree with your acceptance of Barber's equation. He has been an appologist for Miller for several years and as a result finds cowardice in the Mayor'at opposition rather than with the Mayor. Miller has no stomach to make even the simplest criticism of the Construction Union monopoly he created as per Terence Corcoran's article in the Post yesterday.
There $100 millions in savings to be made with the simple and obvious declaration that Toronto and Hamilton are not construction companies.

The Hamilton issue exposes the "fundamental truth" that Toronto is wasting millions because the Mayor refuses to act responsibly and consider any action to confront his union allies who are bleeding the City dry.

That is cowardice.

Go to Toronto Party website and pull down link to Hamilton staff report and get back.

McD.

Mark Dowling October 25, 2007 at 10:48 p.m.

Philip re: the Globe - Google is your friend :)

Philip Preville

Veteran freelance writer Philip Preville lived much of his life in Montreal and Edmonton before he was lured, like so many Torontonians before him, by the promise of more work and a better living. A National Magazine Award winner and former Canadian Journalism Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Massey College, Preville writes Toronto Life’s politics column. He lives with his wife and one-year-old son in Riverdale, just close enough to the Don Valley Parkway that he can hear it when he steps outside his house—but just far enough away that it doesn’t keep him awake at night. On his office wall hangs a 1938–39 press pass belonging to his grandfather, Elias Gannon, who wrote for the Montreal Star.

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