Wynne or bust

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne's desperate attempt to secure re-election next year is starting to get expensive for a whole lot of people.

In April the Premier announced a whizz-bang scheme to roll back electricity prices in the Province.  These had been rising at a staggering rate for better than a decade, thanks to the Liberals' cack-handed attempts at "going green".  This very angry blog provides some excellent analysis of just how the costs are mounting up. Opinion polls show the rising cost of power is the number one issue for Ontario voters.  Wynne's plan gives everyone a 25 percent reduction in their bills, starting next month.  

Of course, this comes at a cost, and analysis by the Province's auditor indicates that it's a very steep cost indeed.  Wynne is achieving the roll-back by instructing the distribution utility, Hydro One, to refinance its obligations over a much longer term. The plan is designed to offer an aggregate reduction in electricity bills of over $20 billion in the next few years (i.e. well beyond the June 2018 election) -- but the added interest costs in the long term will be twice as great!  Each time one of today's voters flips a light switch, a portion of the bill is going to land on their children and grandchildren -- but who cares about them when there are votes to be bought?

The whole scheme is so egregiously wrong-headed that it seems unlikely to achieve the desired effect on the electorate.  So today,  Ms Wynne is at it again.  She has announced a raft of changes in labour legislation, including better rights for "precarious" workers and a sharp increase in the minimum wage.  This currently stands at C$ 11.40 an hour, but will rise to $14 on the first day of 2018 and $15 a year after that.  Notice the timing here: most reputable studies suggest that the minimum wage increase will not damage the job market, but Ms Wynne is taking no chances.  Delaying the supposedly desperately needed increase until the start of next year will ensure that it's still top-of-mind when polling day arrives in June 2018, but any potential negative effects probably won't have materialized by then.

The labour market reforms are a good thing in themselves.  The question is this: can an unfathomably unpopular Premier, leading a government of staggering incompetence, win over voters by doing one good thing, albeit for the most cynical of reasons?  And what other expensive boondoggle does she have up her sleeve if today's announcement fails to move the dial?  Well, there's this.