In full: Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s 2018 mandate letters | 24CA News

In 2018, Ontario Premier Doug Ford gave his cupboard ministers a sequence of directions they had been anticipated to hold out or discover throughout the federal government’s first time period in workplace.

While the Ford authorities has been preventing in court docket to maintain these mandate letters a secret, Global News obtained and independently verified the letters and has been revealing them in a brand new sequence known as ‘Mandated’.

As the sequence unfolds, Global News will launch the letters, in full, right here.

Dear Minister ___ :

Welcome to your new function as Minister of ___ .  Thank you for accepting this place.

As we embark on the obligations of presidency I need to start by emphasizing one level, we ran for election on a plan for the individuals. I’m adamant that this will probably be a authorities for the individuals.  Let me clarify precisely what this implies.

For far too lengthy, too many individuals have been uncared for or ignored by earlier governments who grow to be entrapped in a bubble of elite pursuits.  I’m decided that this is not going to occur to us.

As you assume the accountabilities of your portfolio you can be requested to make many essential selections.  Before you’re taking any motion, make sure to ask your self a easy query “is this good for the people?” and solely pursue programs of motion that, instantly or not directly, will make a optimistic distinction for the sort of people that can not afford costly lobbyists or a profession in full-time activism.  These individuals will solely have one voice in authorities — and that voice will probably be you.

[…]

This would require a brand new strategy to resolution making.  Always guarantee officers in your Ministry take the time to element how any proposed coverage or initiative will affect individuals on a person foundation.  This is especially true for any initiative that proposes a rise in direct or oblique value on people, households or small companies.  That just isn’t what we had been elected to do.

In your communications on behalf of the federal government I encourage you to do what I try to do and get rid of the intermediary.  You are speaking on to the individuals, and providing them actual change, alternative and hope.  Put greenback figures, legislative initiatives and regulatory selections in language that on a regular basis individuals perceive.  Always emphasize the top advantages of our selections for individuals over secondary particulars about protocol or course of.  Everyone, no matter their schooling, background or expertise, ought to really feel like they perceive our agenda and have a stake within the consequence.

Our plan for the individuals was rooted in 5 core commitments to Ontarians.  They will contact on totally different Ministries in several methods.  I count on each single member of my Cabinet will know all 5 commitments by coronary heart.

We will put more cash in your pocket by scrapping the carbon tax, decreasing fuel costs by 10 cents per litre and giving actual tax reduction to decrease and center class households.

We will clear up the hydro mess by firing the CEO of Hydro One and reducing Ontario hydro payments by 12%.

We will create good jobs by sending the message that ‘Ontario is open for business’ and by bringing high quality jobs again to Ontario by reducing taxes, stabilizing hydro payments and reducing job-killing pink tape.

We will restore accountability and belief by ordering a line-by-line audit of presidency spending and by bringing an finish to the tradition of waste and mismanagement in authorities.

And, we are going to minimize hospital wait instances and finish hallway well being care by creating 15,000 new long-term care beds over the following 5 years and including $3.8 billion in help for psychological well being, addictions and supportive housing.

As we start our work restoring Ontario’s financial power, the taxpayer should come first. We will ship for Ontario’s households and companies. We should at all times keep in mind we maintain many obligations – before everything – to serve the individuals of Ontario and the problems that matter most to them.

As we transfer forward with our plan to revive a powerful financial system and to make life extra reasonably priced for the good individuals of this province, we are going to start to take action by eliminating wasteful authorities spending, reducing pink tape and by making authorities extra environment friendly. We will do that onerous work in order that we will spend money on priorities for our most susceptible and to assist Ontario households and companies make ends meet.

As Premier of this province, I count on that every ministry and its respective minister keep our dedication to bringing reduction to households and making Ontario a spot that’s open for business once more. As minister, I belief that your ministry will adhere to the program-spending pointers which have been established. It is my responsibility to tell you that the President of the Treasury Board – in collaboration with the Minister of Finance – will probably be working alongside you and your new fellow ministers to make sure that our new authorities will obtain the fiscal positions that we now have dedicated to. Ultimately, we are going to return the province to price range steadiness as shortly as attainable.

I additionally count on you to be accountable in your guarantees and to work collaboratively with officers from my workplace to make sure that our authorities will at all times converse with one voice in delivering on our shared plan.  I additionally count on you to carry your self to the best moral commonplace, each on and off the job, and lead by instance in fostering a tradition of respect inside your workplace and in your ministry.

We should present Ontarians why they will imagine in authorities once more and why they will belief their publicly elected officers. I count on the opposition to carry us to account – and rightfully so – however I will even personally be holding you accountable in your actions.

[…]

Throughout the following 4 years, we are going to get this province again on monitor.  I’m dedicated to this purpose, and I do know that you’re dedicated to this purpose as nicely. Together we are going to as soon as once more make Ontario the financial engine of Canada.  We will use a rising financial system to offer high-quality providers which might be the envy of the world.  And we are going to govern as a united crew who’re loyal to 1 one other and to the individuals who elected us.

While the insurance policies I’ve listed on this letter will probably be your prime priorities, I ask that you simply be able to take care of challenges that may inevitably come up throughout our mandate. As minister, your ministry could also be chargeable for finishing up different goals that we set up whereas we transfer ahead with our plan for Ontario. With this mandate letter, you’ll be able to start to guide your ministry in attaining the coverage goals that we now have established, and people who could ultimately come up.

Our new authorities is dedicated to undoing the injury that was executed by the earlier administration. Therefore, I request that you simply work on constructing efficient working relationships with the Ontario Public Service, the broader public sector, varied ranges of presidency, and the non-public, non-profit, and voluntary sectors.

We will probably be accountable for our actions. We will ship outcomes. We will fulfill our guarantees. I look ahead to working in partnership with you, in order that we will get this province again on monitor and ship our dedication to respect the good individuals of Ontario.

Sincerely,

Premier Doug Ford

•       Provide further sources to the Ontario Autism Program and seek the advice of with households and stakeholders to make sure it helps as many households with kids with autism as attainable.
•       Work intently with the Minister of Health and Long-Term care to greatest deploy the $3.8 billion complete funding in psychological well being helps. For our most susceptible, your work ought to concentrate on potential investments in supportive housing and anti-addiction applications. For Ontario’s kids, your work ought to concentrate on potential investments in psychiatric amenities for teenagers, kids’s psychological well being helps inside and out of doors the college system and stopping youth suicides.
•       Stand up for Ontario within the face of an ever-changing immigration panorama whereas asserting respect for authorized immigration channels within the face of rising immigration points.
•       Work with the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care to implement free dental providers for seniors with lower-incomes. Consider the interplay between this program and present dental help applications for low-income Ontarians.
•       Work with the Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services and the Attorney General to struggle human trafficking in Ontario and enhance consciousness of the difficulty with the last word purpose of defending our youngsters.
•       Review the connection between authorities help applications (Ontario Works and the Ontario Disability Support Program) and earned earnings. Report again with reforms that ease the transition again to the workforce, take away limitations to discovering employment, and make sure the elimination of advantages is transitioned out correctly and successfully to permit people to remain within the labour drive as soon as they return to it. This evaluation ought to concentrate on decreasing the variety of individuals on social help and reducing the price of administering these applications by contemplating reforms equivalent to the mixture of the administration of Ontario Works and the Ontario Disability Support Program.
•       Work intently with the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Labour to contemplate the affect of our new minimal wage tax credit score.
•       Take possession of Ontario’s poverty discount technique and consider reforms to higher enhance the lives of Ontario’s poor and assist them get away of the poverty cycle.
• Improve co-ordination between kids’s assist societies and consider how you can correctly implement the Child Protection Information Network to cut back prices and enhance the effectiveness of our youngsters’s assist societies.
• Re-examine Ontario’s adoption system and be sure that it protects the perfect pursuits of Ontario’s kids whereas making it simpler for households trying to give these kids a everlasting dwelling.

This story is a part of the brand new Global News sequence ‘Mandated.’ Over a number of days, a sequence of tales will reveal the contents of the Ford authorities’s first set of mandate letters, handed to ministers after the occasion fashioned authorities in 2018. The letters have been stored secret since Doug Ford’s first election — a battle that has gone all the way in which to the Supreme Court of Canada.

Photo illustration by Janet Cordahi