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Canada's next Prime Minister?

Who would win in the Federal Elections?

  • Total voters
    68
  • Poll closed .
I would not dispute this. These countries do this in the framework of national transit strategies, etc. However, only in Canada, do our municipalities refuse to launch transit programs and build new infrastructure without federal cash. Would New York or London or Paris or Hong Kong, etc. not build a subway line if there were no federal funds coming?
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Well, not Hong Kong given that is it's own country in everything but foreign policy. But the other ones, definitely not. London, NYC and Paris never start a subway line if gobs of federal (in NYCs case, State as well) money aren't coming. The "new" 2nd Avenue line in Manhattan only went ahead after the Federal Transit Administration gave the MTA 1.3b dollars. The MTA had been arguing for that line since the 70s. London's Crossrail is only going ahead because Gordon Brown and British Parliament, not London Council, approved it. Paris is much the same. In Tokyo, the metro is jointly owned between the National and Tokyo (which is more like a province).

Ideally, the best solution for Toronto's transit woes would be to govern Toronto under a Hong Kong like framework. Make the GTA it's own self administering region, and remit enough taxes to cover our share of foreign policy, military ect. I understand the impetus behind getting the federal government out of "the pothole business" as it were, but you have to give the appropriate taxing resources. You can't have the Federal & Provincial governments collecting 93% of taxes, and then be surprised when municipalities are reluctant to engage in infrastructure mega projects.
 
Whoaccio said:
Well, not Hong Kong given that is it's own country in everything but foreign policy. But the other ones, definitely not. London, NYC and Paris never start a subway line if gobs of federal (in NYCs case, State as well) money aren't coming. The "new" 2nd Avenue line in Manhattan only went ahead after the Federal Transit Administration gave the MTA 1.3b dollars. The MTA had been arguing for that line since the 70s. London's Crossrail is only going ahead because Gordon Brown and British Parliament, not London Council, approved it. Paris is much the same. In Tokyo, the metro is jointly owned between the National and Tokyo (which is more like a province).

Ideally, the best solution for Toronto's transit woes would be to govern Toronto under a Hong Kong like framework. Make the GTA it's own self administering region, and remit enough taxes to cover our share of foreign policy, military ect. I understand the impetus behind getting the federal government out of "the pothole business" as it were, but you have to give the appropriate taxing resources. You can't have the Federal & Provincial governments collecting 93% of taxes, and then be surprised when municipalities are reluctant to engage in infrastructure mega projects.
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I made the previous point that many of those places such as the UK and France lack the intermediate provincial government. So its more the fed acting like the province in many of those places.

Also, like I said, they give out the funding under a national transit strategy, not on a case by case basis. What people are arguing here is that we should not do anything without federal involvement. I think that's just bad policy. On the one hand we complain when they do get involved (island airport, peterborough rail line) and on the other we complain that they are not involved enough. We have to recognize reality, no federal party will invest in Toronto if there is nothing to gain. As long as Toronto is comprised of safe Liberal and NDP ridings, 2 of the 3 major parties could not care less about Toronto. And the third can promise whatever they want with no chance of forming government.

I happen to believe that the government services closest to me are best delivered by my local government. We should be getting more involved at that level. Instead we demand involvement from bureaucrats 400 km away. How accountable are they?

I do strongly agree with your suggestion of autonomy for the GTA....super regional governments? Perhaps we should look at splitting up Ontario: Southern Ontario, Northern Ontario, Eastern Ontario, the NCR. It's fairly ridiculous that Thunder Bay is governed from downtown Toronto. And there is no common viewpoint between the bilingual communities in Eastern Ontario and ethnically diverse Toronto.

Till then, the simple solution for Toronto's revenue woes is the one McGuinty promised but failed to implement: reversing the Harris downloads. That alone would balance the city's books and probably allow Toronto to go on a subway building binge.
 
Till then, the simple solution for Toronto's revenue woes is the one McGuinty promised but failed to implement: reversing the Harris downloads. That alone would balance the city's books and probably allow Toronto to go on a subway building binge.
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yeah but what would happen to Dalton if he took Toronto's back only??

the whole province will be screaming at him and he would have to take it all back.

That would put him in serious deficit situation.
 
lordmandeep said:
yeah but what would happen to Dalton if he took Toronto's back only??

the whole province will be screaming at him and he would have to take it all back.

That would put him in serious deficit situation.
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I was never advocating special treatment for Toronto. T.O. is not the only municipality in trouble in our province. He will of course need to raise taxes in conjunction with uploading services, to avoid a deficit. Nobody said being Premier of Ontario was going to be easy.
 
CGM said:
Harper's 2 cents/liter diesel tax cut proposal just shows how dumb he is. If your paying $1.20+/ liter, 2 cents will not impact your budget in any meaningful way... He should be passing that $600 million to cash strapped municipalities like Toronto for public transit, schools, etc.
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A 2 cents a litre reduction saves me about $75 a year. Not much, but money's money. Trick is making sure the gas companies just don't increase their prices to offset the tax decrease.
 
and what can stop them from doing that...

nothing...
 
is it just me or am I generally not seeing too many election campaign signs around the City for the Liberal candidates? seems like so far only the Conservative (and some NDP) signs are out there
 
Solaris said:
is it just me or am I generally not seeing too many election campaign signs around the City for the Liberal candidates? seems like so far only the Conservative (and some NDP) signs are out there
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Given how T.O. votes, why would the Liberals waste time and funds campaigning in Toronto....its not like the tories campaign in Alberta....
 
Its funny how Albertans calls people in Toronto Liberal Sheep.
 
Oh, there are many Albertans and call Albertans sheep. There's a growing movement there to ditch the Conservatives and replace them with something more akin to the Bloc or what Reform was at the beginning.
 
Keith, I think he's learning from McGuinty.

Beez, do you drive a diesel? If not, Harper is not cutting the cost of fuel for you. Also, I thought you said that you use relatively little fuel (less than average, say). If that is the case, you will be worse off with a excise tax cut than say, an equivalent income tax cut.
 
Solaris said:
is it just me or am I generally not seeing too many election campaign signs around the City for the Liberal candidates? seems like so far only the Conservative (and some NDP) signs are out there
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Though it may be "Avis" strategy, i.e. when you're #2 (or #3), you "try harder". And I know some Liberal candidates in the past (Carolyn Parrish for one) were prone to Tantrically withholding election signs until well along in the campaign.

Where are you? I noticed that in Etobicoke North, f'rinstance, Tories and NDP were the only ones visible (mostly on ROWs) until recently...
 
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