Schreiner's Surprised That Question Period's Not Better on the Inside

It seems that dreams don't come true in quite the way you think. After a rough month in the legislature where the new Ford government has cancelled cap and trade, ended green energy contracts, and generally thrown a monkey wrench into the best laid plans of Ontario's progressives, Guelph MPP Mike Schreiner rose in the legislature yesterday to smack everyone down for their partisan tendencies.

Horwath Hopes Hattrick Does the Trick in Guelph

Making her third stop in Guelph in six weeks, NDP leader Andrea Horwath seems to banking a lot of faith in Guelph turning out orange on Election Day. With 48 hours to go, Horwath rallied more than 75 people behind the Boathouse on Gordon Street to make every moment count to make Aggie Mlynarz the MPP for the Royal City.

"Journalist" from "Online" Disrupts Horwath Event

A man claiming to be a journalist injected himself into the Andrea Horwath campaign event today at the Boathouse on Gordon Street. After heckling Horwath during her prepared comments, the man said he was a reporter for "online" and asked the NDP leader about her party's stand on Ontario becoming a sanctuary province.

Wynne Admits She Won't Be Premier After Thursday

In a surprising moment, in an election filled with surprising moments, the current Premier of the Province of Ontario confessed that her days in the office are numbered, and that she's unlikely to emerge the victor of Thursday's vote. Instead, Kathleen Wynne wants you to send a minority message to the New Democrats and Progressive Conservatives.

Horwath Enjoys First Place and a Beer at Brothers Brewery Campaign Stop

Nothing like a cold beer on a hot day, especially when you've got frontrunner status in a contentious provincial election race! Ontario New Democrat leader Andrea Horwath rolled up to Brothers Brewery for a lunch time meet and greet following a contentious leaders debate Sunday night, and despite her success so far, Horwath's message was there's still a lot of work to be done.

Mlynarz is the NDP Candidate for Guelph

Agnieszka (Aggie) Mlynarz is the New Democratic candidate for Guelph in the 2018 Provincial Election. Mlynarz edged out two competitors to take on Liberal Sly Castaldi, PC Ray Ferraro, Alliance Party candidate Thomas Mooney, and Green Party leader Mike Schreinerin the June 7 contest.

This Week in Press Releases - April 9-13, 2018

Every week, the City of Guelph and other groups send out notices to announce new events, imperatives, and information that you need to know. Here is this week in press releases.

Leaders Debate? Schreiner Says He'll Be There With "Grassroots Demand"

Despite a grassroots effort, a Change.org petition, and the seal of approval from the Premier herself, a consortium of broadcasters announced yesterday that Green Party leader, and Guelph MPP candidate, Mike Schreiner will not be taking part in the main televised leadership debate on May 27. Schreiner, himself, is not impressed.

Horwath Hears Concerns About Local Water Taking

On the third floor of 10 Carden Street this afternoon, Guelph's water advocates continued the push to protect area aquifers from water bottlers by meeting with Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath. For Horwath, the goal of the closed door meeting was to work with community members to draft a "broad water strategy" as opposed to a "knee jerk reaction."

Top 10 Local/Provincial Stories of 2014

In completing the two-part Top 10 list of the year's biggest political/news stories, we turn to the local scene and recount the doings that had us talking locally and provincially throughout 2014. We had back-to-back elections where no matter the side you were on, they both might have had surprising results. Court matters took up a good portion of the year as both the city and a young campaign worker had their days in front of a judge. We also said goodbye to a number of politicians leaving office (or who announced that they were leaving office in the future), we said hello to new people and new circumstances, and we all reveled, or were repelled by some damn, dirty campaigning. It was a year of great change to be sure. This was the year 2014, locally and provincially, at least according to me.

My Picks for the BTBB Awards 2015

It's that time of year again. Christmas! And the Beyond the Ballot Box Awards. Fitting for the final episode of the Gang of Four, we salute the real heroes: the politicians and news stories we talk about weekly. If you were listening to the radio, you will have heard my picks already, but in case my justifications weren't clear, I decided to write them out in long form below. It was a very busy year in politics, and there were a lot of darts and laurels (mostly darts) to go around, but after considering all the factors and contenders, here are my choices for Best Politician, Worst and Dumpster Fire of the Year. 

#ONelxn14 - Everything in its Right Place?

Huh. Well, that was weird. Any reasonable estimate of last night's election results foretold another minority government, it was just a question of under who and how much of a majority. Nope. The Liberals, who we were all supposed to be sick and tired of, now return to Queen's Park with a majority government, beating all reasonable expectations about the election's outcome with Kathleen Wynne now the Premier of a political secure government. Tim Hudak, leader of the Progressive Conservatives, is stepping down after the complete and utter failure in his own mandate to unseat a besieged and unpopular government. And Andrea Horwath, despite her bold and risky campaign strategy, managed to come out quits with the same number of seats coming out as she had going in. But was it all worth it? And what happens now?

Twitter Fails for Party Leaders

This election cycle (for me) kicked off with some Twitter talk - who's on it, who's not on it - so it seems apropos to revisit the topic of social media and its impact on the election. Things went to a whole other level yesterday when the CBC posted a story about some Americans being inundated with tweets because they have the good, or unfortunate, fate to share the names of the two frontrunners for the job of Ontario's Premier: Kathleen Wynn and Tim Hudak.

Fake Protesters Strike Provincial Campaign

News on the weekend that Andrea Horwath was facing a kind of insurgency from members of her own party suggesting that the NDP has abandoned its left flank in favour of chasing undecided centrist voters. It's red meat for the media set that loves a horse race and loves a story about internal party strife. And while Horwath's done well playing it down on the campaign trail in order to keep up her attacks on the Premier and Opposition Leader, it was a point contention for a couple of NDP supports who showed up at a Horwath event in Chatham on the weekend to protest. Or was it?

According to NDP operatives, and confirmed by the Ottawa Citizen, the protesters turned out to be Liberal volunteers posing as disenfranchised NDPers. The geniuses didn't even bother to take off their lanyards.

Do By-Election Results Point to Spring Election?

Guessing whether or not if there's going to be an election if the government's in a minority position is a fool's game. In 2008, Stephen Harper decided at summer's end that the opposition parties were just too intractable to work with, and pulled the plug. In 2011, the House fell suddenly in the spring as the government cabinet was found in contempt of parliament. Here in Ontario, pretty much all last year, the Magic 8 balls were out as people supposed that within weeks of Kathleen Wynne's election as leader of the Liberals there would be an election. Not that there might be an election. But Wynne's been Premier for a year now, and with another pair of by-elections behind us the 8-balls are out again. Could they yield different results this time?

Top 10 Local/Provincial News Stories of 2013

It's that time of year for lists and rankings, and Guelph Politico is no exception to all this organizing and numerology. This week, we revisit the biggest news and political stories that affected us locally and provincially in the year 2013. What were my conditions? Mostly, stuff that stuck out in my mind. This may not be your list, or you may find yourself agreeing with some of the contents that make up my list even if you don't agree with the ranking of things. Some of these will be fairly self-evident, and some of them might leave you scratching your head, but I will say that this was an easier list to compile versus the National/International Top 10 (which I will publish next week).

Ontario By-Election: Everybody Wins-ish

The results are in from last night's quintet of by-elections in Ontario, and the news seems to be everybody wins. Sort of. In a score of 2 to 2 to 1, the five seats seemed to have ended up evenly split between the three major parties, indicative of the split-mindedness of the province in the current polls.The Liberals secured wins in Ottawa South and Scarborough-Guildwood, the NDP won in Windsor-Tecumseh and London West, and the PCs took Etobicoke-Lakeshore. So now what?

It's Not Voter Supression

It's by-election day in Ontario! And while it's tough to say how it will all work out in the five ridings going to the polls today, I will say that despite the jokes I've previously made on Gang of Four, it's neither unlawful nor immoral for Kathleen Wynne to have called an election for August 1. 

While tuning in to Global's Morning Show this morning - which I hate-watch merely because it accounts for the 10 minutes of my day before I leave for work - I was granted a rare moment of insight from the show. The comments was made that with the rain this morning, and that if it persisted, the already predicted to be low voter turnout might be lower because... People don't like to vote in the rain. And then it hit me, does it really matter when we hold an election? Because clearly there's a whole segment of people out there who are basically looking for any reason not to have to vote. 

What a Time for a By-Election

Five. There are a total of five by-elections in the province of Ontario now scheduled for August 1. The ridings of Etobicoke-Lakeshore, Scarborough-Guildwood, Ottawa South, Windsor and London West will all be going to the polls in the dog days of summer in what will be a referendum on the relatively brief premiership of Kathleen Wynne seeing as how all five of the seats were once held by Liberals.

And That's a Month of Scandal

Oh what a hectic month for political scandals. Seriously, one of things you notice doing a weekly radio show on politics is that there's really not enough time to cover it all, and it just keeps getting worse too. Happening at all levels of government, let's rundown what I like to call the Month of Scandal.