Steve Pagan: Welcome everyone to the OnPoli podcast. I'm Steve Pagan and I'm John Michael McGrath.

Steve Pagan: Today on the pod, it looks like Premier Doug Ford won't have to pour any more Crown Royal down the drain. He's made peace with that brand's manufacturer. After critics complained about more than seven years of starving the postsecondary system, the province is giving colleges and universities a lifeline but making significant changes to OSAP.

John Michael McGrath: Not the case for school boards, however. Rumors persist that the education minister is going to get rid of them. And none of his recent actions is disabusing anyone of that notion.

Steve Pagan: And in your column, my column, I will make the case for reprohibiting online gambling.

John Michael McGrath: Rep-prohibiting. Okay, that's a neat word. And I'm focusing on something I still think is important and not some old-fashioned notion, and that is civility in public life.

Steve Pagan: It's Friday, February 20th, 2026. So, let's get to it. JMM, good to see you, pal. Little sugar to start things off as always.

John Michael McGrath: Good to see you.

Steve Pagan: Now, I see that you're in morning and you know, it's for those who are listening on podcast and can't see this.

John Michael McGrath: You are wearing a shirt.

Steve Pagan: Yes.

Steve Pagan: Which says Pluto.

John Michael McGrath: Never forget 1930, which I presume was the year the planet was discovered.

Steve Pagan: Yes.

Steve Pagan: To 2006, which I presume is the year that it was determined it is no longer a planet.

John Michael McGrath: Yes. The year that astronomers sinned against us all and demoted Pluto from the ranks of the nine planets. You know, I periodically in this podcast take a little bit of fun, I hope I'm never cruel or unkind about it by emphasizing the age difference between you and I, but things are starting to crop up that increasingly make me feel old. And I was walking through a mall and I saw this t-shirt and had that sort of realization that this year, this August, will be 20 years since the Astronomical Association stripped Pluto of its rightful god-given title. And that made me feel really old.

Steve Pagan: And so, in a bit of solidarity, I thought I would wear this t-shirt. And also just because it's a nerdy thing and we wear nerdy t-shirts here.

John Michael McGrath: We do. Well, okay. Time for time for me to plead guilty to that.

Steve Pagan: Yes.

Steve Pagan: Here we go. I am wearing David Peterson today. And let me just stand up and you can take a look. That is actually his portrait at Queens Park. That is what's on the front of my t-shirt today. And why am I wearing a t-shirt with Ontario's 20th premier on it? Well, I'm going to tell you because there's a lot of talk these days about the Ontario Liberals who are in the midst of yet another leadership convention. And I will tell you that 44 years ago tomorrow, February 21st, 1982, David Peterson won the Ontario Liberal Leadership. There is a lot of discussion this time round as well about how old you have to be to run for the leadership because there are some people in their 30s who are running for it. And I'm hearing I'm hearing a lot of discussion from older Liberals who are saying, "Yeah, well, you know, sure, the 30somes can take a run at it, but nobody takes them seriously." David Peterson won the leadership of the Ontario Liberals when he was 38.

John Michael McGrath: Right?

Steve Pagan: And it wasn't his first goround. He'd actually run the first time, the previous leadership convention, and he was 32 the first time. So take that. It was a delegated convention. I want to remind everybody of that, which are the best kind, of course. He was the clear favorite.

John Michael McGrath: The only kind you will ever acknowledge.

Steve Pagan: I agree. I agree. He got 46% on the first ballot. So it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that he was going to win this thing. He came in very strong. Do you remember who he beat?

John Michael McGrath: I don't off hand.

Steve Pagan: He defeated Sheila Copps.

John Michael McGrath: Oh.

Steve Pagan: Who was an MPPP from Hamilton at the time and who would eventually abandon Peterson, go run federally and eventually became the deputy prime minister for Jean Chrétien. But she came second in that convention. And just to show you how strange politics can be, when they did some polling in January of 1985 and they asked Ontarians, can you identify the leader of then her majesty's loyal opposition, which was him?

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pagan: 10% of the people could identify him. 10 meant 90% of the people had no clue who David Peterson was.

John Michael McGrath: And of the 10% who could identify him, 90% of those worked in Queens Park in some capacity.

Steve Pagan: Or were related to him. Six months after that poll was taken, he was the 20th premier of Ontario. It just shows you how quickly things can turn around. He's the guy who ended the 42-year long PC dynasty, which ended in 1985. Incidentally, I can scarcely believe it as I say this, he is now 82 years old. He is the chair of the board of Torstar, which of course publishes the Toronto Star, and he is still a very influential force in politics and in the country. So, there we go. David Peterson, and that's his portrait at Queens Park. If I don't know if I'm allowed to plug another podcast here, but why not? There's a podcast from I would say the center left or progressive view of Think Progress Canada. They did a lengthy interview with David Peterson specifically on the topic of rebuilding a party in the wilds, if I could put it that way and obviously relevant to the current predicament the Ontario Liberal Party finds itself in.

John Michael McGrath: No question. And I remember the like one of the funniest things about this was he was born in 1943, which is the year the Tory dynasty started. Meaning until he became the Liberal premier of Ontario, there were exactly zero Liberal premers of Ontario in his lifetime.

Steve Pagan: Yeah.

John Michael McGrath: Just goes to show you things can change. They can. And with that, let's get off to issue one.

Steve Pagan: It was one of the most iconic images of Doug Ford's current third term as premier excoriating the British liquor manufacturer Diageo in front of all the cameras. Ford emptied a bottle of Crown Royal all over the pavement to indicate his opposition to Diageo's closing one of its plants in Amherstburg, which is near Windsor. But it seems the premier and the manufacturer have found a $23 million peace offering. JMM, what's up?

John Michael McGrath: Peace in our time, right? The government says that Diageo has agreed to make $23 million in investments in Ontario to offset the jobs lost from the closure at the Amherstburg plant. Now to be clear, that closure is still going ahead. Those union jobs are for now still being lost. The plant may reopen under new ownership, but that is still up in the air. The government is touting this as a win, saying that these investments wouldn't have happened without the pressure campaign that the premier put on Diageo and for its part Ontario says that because of this settlement, Diageo brands will stay on the shelves at the LCBO. That of course was the threat that the premier had made that he would pull all of their liquor from LCBO shelves.

Steve Pagan: So $23 million bucks. Where are they spending it on on what?

John Michael McGrath: I don't want to scandalize you, Steve, but sometimes governments say things that are not strictly accurate.

Steve Pagan: Wait a minute. Say that again.

John Michael McGrath: So, we're going to go through this in a bit of detail, but I just want to sort of say that the headline here, at least to me, is that a very large fraction of what is being touted here, is not really an investment by Diageo. But let's give the government it's due first. There's $1 million in this package that is being spent on economic development and other community projects in Amherstburg itself. By the usual standards of government spend, I think we can fairly call that at least an investment.

Steve Pagan: $1 million.

John Michael McGrath: $1 million of the $23 million. I would say is uncontroversially an investment. Then there's $3 million in a new ready-to-drink alcoholic beverage package that will be supplied via a Toronto partner company and another $2 million for a packaging partner in Scarborough.

Steve Pagan: So what what are we up to? We're we're five bucks right now being invested outside of southwestern Ontario for every $1 invested in southwestern Ontario.

John Michael McGrath: Yes. So 5 to1 so far the benefits are going to Toronto as opposed to Amherstburg.

Steve Pagan: Which will make them thrilled no doubt.

John Michael McGrath: Indeed right Toronto real tumble weeds strewn city that needs all the help it can get. And things get squishier still. There is a promised $1 million for organizations that support the growth and sustainability of Ontario's agricultural sector and a commitment to spend $5 million on marketing and promotion here in Ontario.

Steve Pagan: Okay, that gets us about halfway there. Where's the rest of mine?

John Michael McGrath: So, this is the thing. Fully $11 million of these so-called investments in Ontario. $11 million is a single large purchase by Diageo of alcohol for blending in their products. Right. This is what I imagine is a pretty substantial purchase, but it's a volume purchase from Greenfield Global which is a distillery in Eastern Ontario. And I say distillery, but this is like what I think most people would see as an industrial ethanol plant. This is not a mom and pop batch distillery. This is a large industrial plant. Now, you know, this is a big purchase. I'm sure that Greenfield Global is happy to take Diageo's money, but it is at the end of the day just the bulk purchase of a commodity. This is not what you or I would normally describe as an investment. Even by the standards of government spin. And to go back to what we were talking about earlier, for those keeping track at home, the overwhelming beneficiaries of this entire package, again, these are all the numbers that the government laid out in its own press release. The overwhelming beneficiaries of this package are Toronto and this Eastern Ontario distillery. About 4% of the money is going to Amherstburg and jobs and community projects around the plant where these jobs are being lost. I suspect I don't even need to ask this question, but I will anyway. How's that going over in Amherstburg?

Steve Pagan: Uh, yeah, funny you should ask. Amherstburg Mayor Michael Pru panned the deal, telling the CBC that none of this is going to help a single soul in Amherstburg. Uh, a note for our audience, you may not recognize the name Michael Pru, but he was a New Democrat MPP at the legislature. He previously represented Beaches-East York. He was actually my MPP when I became a Queens Park reporter.

John Michael McGrath: He was the last mayor of East York, too, I think. I

Steve Pagan: I believe that's correct. Yes. Before the mega city came along.

Steve Pagan: He he has had this I don't know what you would even call it, a third or fourth act in politics. He is now the mayor of Amherstburg. Also the local representative for Unifor for these workers who were at the Diageo plant was also disappointed telling the CBC it's a pretty weak deal when Diageo makes so much money in the province every year.

John Michael McGrath: I I'm trying to remember now. I remember there were other premers in Canada who were saying to Doug Ford, "This is really not fair that you were doing this, making a big display of pouring the booze out all over the, you know, and throwing it out because as if that were a metaphor for what this company is doing to the province of Ontario because we're supposed to be now in a new era in Canada where we're supposed to be less concerned about which province in particular has the manufacturing capability. The bigger deal is provincial boundaries down. Keep the manufacturing somewhere in Canada. And Diageo does have a plant in Manitoba and it does have a plant where else? Newfoundland, I think. Newfoundland and Labrador somewhere down in Atlantic Canada. Anyway,

Steve Pagan: Um and yet Doug Ford was making a big display of this and he was saying, "Oh, no, no, no. Doug, don't don't don't get suckered into believing that this is going to stay in Canada. Before you know it, they're going to move everything to Alabama." Now I like to kind of test the veracity of politician statements when they make them. Do we have any idea whether that is potentially true?

John Michael McGrath: You know we have no evidence yet. Let me put it that way. Um one thing we are seeing an increasing trend and I you know who knows how long it will last given how intertwined it is with American politics right now. But a lot of manufacturers are um going along two tracks if I can put it that way. Right. They they are of course locating production in the United States to maintain access to that market with a US administration that is very fond of tariffs. But they are also rationalizing their production and that's what Diageo says it's doing in this case. Uh they are also consolidating their production, rationalizing it outside of the US market as well. Uh so they're they're they're sort of islanding their their plants in the US while also maintaining production outside the US in the uh the rest of the free world if I can put it that way.

Steve Pagan: They got plants all over the world.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. Um and and you know who who knows how far this will go. There's been some interesting reporting just in the last week about Mark Carney trying to build a sort of a bridge between the European Union and some of the market economies of the what we used to call the Trans-Pacific Partnership but a lot of Asian countries and you know in theory you could see a trading block of something like one and a half two billion people. Um, and whether that materializes is obviously a very open question, but I do think you're seeing a lot of companies sort of hedge their bets and put production both in the US and also outside of the US. So, I I to get back to your question, I don't think it's obvious that the Canadian plants that Diageo says it's maintaining, I don't think that there is a ticking time bomb awaiting them. I think a company like Diageo would see those as assets to use outside of the US to serve markets outside of the US.

Steve Pagan: We're not hedging here either. We're right off to issue two.

Steve Pagan: When the Progressive Conservatives took power nearly eight years ago, one of the first things they did was freeze college and university tuition rates, thereby starving the post-secondary system of the money it needed to keep the lights on. The result, courses were cancelled, staff laid off, and students disappointed. Yes, their tuition was not going up, but their courses and the course choices that they had available were significantly reduced. Nearly eight years later, the government seems to be changing course. What are they doing, JMM?

John Michael McGrath: So, the government is allowing tuitions to increase again. They are ending the freeze, and we'll get to that in a moment. But they are also making more provincial money available to universities. They are increasing the funding for universities and colleges from $5.4 billion to $7 billion annually. So over the course of four years that will amount to $6.4 billion in new money. So the more controversial side of this of course is that they are in fact ending the tuition freeze. They are going to allow universities to increase tuition by 2% over the next 3 years and then after that it will be either 2% or the rate of inflation whatever is lower.

Steve Pagan: That's not the most controversial part. Well, indeed, the most controversial change is, I think almost certainly their changes to OSAP, the student loan and grant assistance that, I actually don't even know, but I assume the vast majority of Ontario students access it in one form or another. Currently, the students who access OSAP are able to receive up to 85% of their assistance in the form of grants, right, that do not need to be repaid. The that amount that threshold is being lowered to 25%. The maximum you will be able to get from OSAP as a grant will be 25%. The remainder would be made as a loan that would have to be repaid. So obviously the financial assistance they receive will be more difficult for them to repay than it previously had been. Obviously they see that as kind of a raw deal.

John Michael McGrath: A little historical perspective here. 50 years ago, Ontario was funding per pupil in the post-secondary system 10th out of all 10 provinces. 50 years later, would you care to guess how well Ontario is funding on a per capita basis the post-secondary students of this province?

Steve Pagan: Are we still 10th out of 10?

John Michael McGrath: We are still 10th and I think maybe we jumped up to ninth for a what do they call for a New York minute, but that was about it. We've basically been 10th out of 10 for for the last 50 years.

Steve Pagan: Students naturally have been very upset about that. Here is some new money going into the system, which I suspect everybody will appreciate.

Steve Pagan: The premier had some things to say to students who are very unhappy with the changes to OSAP that are coming down. So, let's see what he had to say. Doug Ford,

Doug Ford (quoted): You're picking basket weaving courses and there's not too many baskets being sold out there. Go into healthcare. Go into trades. Go into jobs of the future.

Steve Pagan: Did you take basket weaving in post-secondary? I didn't take that. Basket weaving was not available to me in either my bachelors or master. Anyway, what's you know sometimes the premier can't help himself. What's the reaction been this time?

John Michael McGrath: You know, I have to say there is a technocratic argument that the government is making smart moves here and a quote like the one offered by the premier does not help sell it, if I could put it that way. Um you know ending the tuition freeze I think most observers said like it had to come to an end one way or the other and it probably would have been better if the government had ended it earlier in fact um the changes to OSAP are more arguable they will probably disproportionately make it harder for low-income students to access post-secondary education that's a genuine problem and and you know hopefully the government can make policy to lessen that burden obviously students students are not going to be happy about this. But educating students is only one part of what the university and college system does, right? We also hope to fund world-class research institutes and you know it's a a much more important pillar of the economy in that sense than simply educating students as much as it's also kind of like educating students is what keeps the lights on for a lot of these places. So you know as I say there are arguable benefits to a lot of these changes but that line from the premier about basket weaving maybe not helpful.

John Michael McGrath: We have talked on this show I think on more than a few occasions about a blue ribbon panel so-called that the premier's own government struck. It's got to be a couple of years ago already that that happened. And this was again the premier's own appointees to its own blue ribbon panel. They came back with a recommendation a couple of years ago saying you got to up the amount of money going into the post-secondary system because we're on the verge of having you know a significantly deteriorated system and okay I'm going to do it here. Bill Davis used to say get education right and everything else falls into place. A better educated population means a healthier population, better jobs, more income. You know, all of all of the things we want, we get when people are better educated. The things we don't want, we don't,

Steve Pagan: You know, if people get less education, that's what you get. So, let's go back to that blue ribbon panel. How does does this get closer to what that panel ultimately recommended?

John Michael McGrath: You know, as I mentioned, the end of the tuition freeze is something that the panel recommended and that universities and colleges desperately wanted to see. Um but the the increase in funding available from that tuition increase on a per student level it's it's I mean you know for some people of course every marginal dollar is a burden and I don't want to minimize that but the relative change certainly in the first few years is not going to be huge but you know as we say Ontario is is still even with these changes on Ontario is still on track to be 10th out of 10th 10th out of 10 rather um in terms of provincial per capita spending QP the union that represents most workers in universities and colleges noted of course that Ontario's funding is still well short adjusted for they once you adjust for inflation and the change in student population they estimate that the system will still be about $1.5 billion short of where it was in 2018. That's just the cumulative effect of tuition and other funding not keeping up with demand. They are saying that even with this new money, there will still be cuts to jobs and of course we've seen both layoffs and the both a threat of and in fact the start of some strikes through the system. QP says we can expect more of that unless more money is made available. Not quite a peace settlement here yet.

Steve Pagan: Not quite. No. And we should not forget the other piece of this which is the federal government had a role in a lot of the starvation if you want to use that word of the post-secondary system because when they cut back on the number of student visas from foreign students that was money and remember these foreign students were paying three four five times the tuition rates that made in Ontario kids were paying and um as a result the loss of that money really hurt as well. It was a perfect storm.

John Michael McGrath: Dynamic in the sense of like the province froze tuitions. So, universities and colleges uh sorry, because of course they froze domestic tuitions. Universities and colleges went and recruited foreign students to make up that gap. The federal government threw the doors open and and said, "Hey, great. You know, we want more people. We want more students coming to Canada and studying here." that created this huge surge, but then provinces didn't for example address like housing issues. The immigration wave became incredibly unpopular. The federal government then pulled back on student visas. The and then then the universities and colleges who let's you know go back to the beginning were trying to fill the hole created in part by the tuition freeze suddenly found themselves looking at bare shelves, you know, empty wallets if I could put it that way. Um, so yeah, more than enough blame to go around for everybody.

Steve Pagan: What was Newton's third law? Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

John Michael McGrath: Yes, true in politics.

Steve Pagan: True in politics as well.

Steve Pagan: Let's move on to issue three. Well, we've got some more evidence this week that school boards are deeply concerned that they're about to be legislated out of existence by this provincial government. Mith Radlin is the chair of the Waterloo Region District School Board and she has written the education minister formally requesting his ministry undertake a comprehensive provincewide consultation or even a referendum before making any irreversible decision about the future of school boards. Radlin has also written the Ontario Ombudsman asking him to intervene and review what's going on. This is, I suspect, the clearest case yet that school boards think their ultimate demise is coming.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. So, this is builds on a number of signs we've seen from the government. Uh, you know, the the most obvious being that I believe now seven school boards are under provincial supervision with a a director appointed by the Minister of Education functionally taking over the roles of the school board trustees. Um many rumors that the province will simply as you say legislate the school boards out of existence and the the minister when he's been when he's spoken about this publicly has always caveed it by saying that he is going to leave the Catholic boards alone and leave the French language school boards alone because they have constitutional protections. The Catholic board since Canada's inception in 1867. The French language boards have protections under the Charter from 1981. So now we have this letter from Radlin specifically asking the government to preserve English language public boards and asking for public consultation and asking for the Ombudsman to investigate.

Steve Pagan: Well, the Ombudsman has influence but I don't know if the Ombudsman has power. Can the Ombudsman demand anything here?

John Michael McGrath: No. No. Even the Ombudsman could write an extremely critical report about this but the Ombudsman does not have any direct power to alter the course of government policy. That is not the role that we generally give officers of the legislature. In so far as there is a role for the Ombudsman here, I think it would be looking at whether students and parents in the education system are being treated fairly by administrators. And you know, we've already heard from some advocates that there's a real concern they have that if they no longer have elected trustees on their side that they could get into disputes with school administration about let's say for example matters of you know um student discipline or whether students have proper access to extended services that they might need. without an elected trustee on their side, they're worried about just getting swallowed up in the bureaucracy of the education system. And that's exactly the kind of issue that an Ombudsman would be well suited to address and and perhaps write a report about. But no, they can't stop legislation.

Steve Pagan: Well, I know when we have municipal elections that the number of people who vote for trustees is kind of embarrassingly low. Having said that, if you have a problem either with your school or with the system or with a, you know, a director of education or whatever, I mean, at the moment, the person you call is your trustee. And your trustee is supposed to be your advocate to try to make things make sense in the public education system right now. If they get rid of trustees, I mean, who do you call if not Ghostbusters? I don't know.

John Michael McGrath: Well, I mean, and that that is one potential political problem for the government, right? If if you legislate away school board trustees, then the Minister of Education becomes the person who you call, right? Um like this all becomes the government's fault and the government's problem, right? Um you know,

Steve Pagan: You break it, you own it.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah, exactly. Like at the moment, I don't think many people are like calling up Paul Kandra and screaming at him because the school bus didn't pick up their kid.

Steve Pagan: Well, first of all, you can't get to him. I mean, number one, but number two, yeah, you're right. They don't call the Minister of Education. They call their trustee.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah, we can make the argument that it would be, I think, wise for the government to engage in broad consultation if they're going to make a very big change like this, but there is also a time limit here in that we are holding a municipal and school board trustee election in October. So, I frankly don't expect them to um consult very lengthy.

Steve Pagan: You don't see provincewide public hearings in the near future?

John Michael McGrath: Uh no, no. Um and you know, it's it's not a requirement, right? um just as a like a if I could put it as a procedural or a constitutional you know matter right this is squarely in provincial jurisdiction the legislature can make law regarding uh matters of provincial jurisdiction so long as the bill is properly introduced and gets three readings and three votes at the legislature and is signed by the left tenant governor that is a good bill that is a good law and courts have tended to defer to it now I say that but the Canadian Civil Liberties Association did speak at Queens Park this week and one of the things that they mentioned is that of the school boards that have been placed under supervision by the province at the moment. Uh many of them are the most diverse school boards in Ontario and they serve some of the highest populations of low-income people in Ontario. And so

John Michael McGrath: I I I definitely don't want to get out on a limb here, but

John Michael McGrath: One of the only potential avenues I could see for successfully challenging this in court would be to argue that dissolving the English language school boards but not Catholic or French language school boards is a form of unequal treatment of certain demographics in Ontario that is not permissible under the Charter.

Steve Pagan: Is this an argument? It's an argument. Um I I have no idea uh how the the the courts would handle that argument, but you know it is something that I would flag for our audience is something to keep in mind because I do suspect that if the government brings forward legislation it will in fact get challenged because I mean almost every major policy this government presents does get fought in court.

John Michael McGrath: And I think we should be clear here you and I are not taking a position on whether they should or should not abolish school board trustees. I think what we are saying is the position of school board trustee is the oldest elected position in Canadian history. They predate Confederation and if you're going to get rid of something that has existed for literally more than 158 years,

Steve Pagan: You better have thought it through. So that's I think that's all we're saying.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. And you know you used the words irreversible changes in the setup to this and and it's funny because other provinces have abolished school boards only for an election to ensue a different government to be brought into power and then have school boards reestablished in some cases. So you know

Steve Pagan: That's rare. Usually usually when the toothpaste out of the tube it stays out.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. And and I would not expect necessarily like a future government if we get down this road where this government abolishes school boards. I don't necessarily expect a future government to restore them, but all I would say is it's rare to find a truly irreversible change, right? A government that was motivated could in fact bring school boards back if they wanted to.

Steve Pagan: That's true. Although I noticed the mega city still exists. I noticed that closed hospitals from 30 years ago did not reopen.

John Michael McGrath: I noticed that welfare rates that were cut 30 years ago have not been reestablished. I've noticed that anyway. I won't go on. Well, and and we'll get to the next segment. I won't belabor this, but you know, the if the next government does not restore school boards, that will also tell us something about how valuable and useful any government sees them as in the administration of education.

Steve Pagan: And with that, let's get off to your column, my column.

Steve Pagan: Time now for our regular feature, your column, my column, in which JMM and I have a little chat about the columns that we wrote for the TVO website over the past week. We love it when you hear about the columns here and then you go online to tvo.org and you click on our pictures and you find the columns and you read them and say, "Oh, I feel so much better informed about all of these issues now. So, what are you going to better inform us about right now?" Uh well, I got on my soap box a little bit this week where you wrote something a week or two ago about a group of people who are trying to ban the advertisements for sports gambling in during sports broadcasts. And um I not only do I support that, I honestly think we need to go even further. So like just to set the table here, I mean not only do we have plenty of evidence that the explosion in online sports gambling is corrosive to sports, we know that it is disproportionately creating financial harms for people with lower incomes. Um it is particularly harming young men on low incomes and there's just almost nothing to recommend it as a policy decision at this point. Uh we are not even frankly making a ton of money at least on the public side of things from having legalized and and and regulated sports gambling. The most recent figure from the province of Ontario is that for the current fiscal year we are expected to make something like sorry the province is expected to collect something like $250 million $230 million I forget exactly um which is objectively a large sum but it's also about what Ontario spends before noon on any given day right it's it's just not that much money in the the scale of the provincial budget and so with all of the evidences of the harms that online gambling grid and frankly the the spread of what I would call sort of gambling adjacent like things and I'm talking here about things like prediction markets where we have seen I mean probably like the one that sticks in my brain as like maybe one of the most alarming cases was um think tanks that have been maintaining maps of the warfront in Ukraine. there was an allegation that some of the the information being provided and like this is an incredibly useful public resource and there was an allegation that some of that that information was changed in order to capitalize on online betting in these prediction markets. I mean, stuff like that is just scheaving me right out.

Steve Pagan: And so, obviously, some of this stuff is just not within Canadian jurisdiction and it's not something that we can change. But in so far as there is stuff within Canadian and Ontario jurisdiction that we can regulate, I really have come down pretty securely on the side of not only do we need to prohibit advertising of online gambling. I really think we need to consider the last decade something of a bit of a mistake and we were never really meant to have casinos in our pockets and that is what we have now. We have, you know, they're on our phones through online gambling. We have slot machines in our pockets and I don't believe that is healthy for individuals and I don't believe it is healthy for us as a public and you know people say oh well you know if you try to prohibit it people will just go back to using you know off uh offshore websites and stuff and I just don't think that's true right like the the actual history when it was more difficult to gamble online fewer people gambled online the whole explosion of access has become a problem precisely because it is so easy. And if we make it more difficult for people to gamble online, I really do think we will just see fewer people gambling online and that that will be better for as I say, better for individuals and better for the public.

John Michael McGrath: Fascinating. Good.

Steve Pagan: How about you?

John Michael McGrath: Well, a little background before we start here. For 50 years, there was a former Ontario cabinet minister named Darcy McHugh. He was the treasurer back in the Bill Davis days. He used to host a lunch in downtown Toronto in honor of the first premier he ever served, which was Mr. Davis's predecessor, John Robarts. Mr. Robarts was the premier from 1961 to 71. You all, of course, know about the big library at the University of Toronto that's named after John Robarts. It was a very particular kind of lunch. It was men only. It was pretty much Tory men only. It was lots of pipe and cigar smoking, right? and a lot of booze, but also a lot of good stories. And I know about this because I used to get invited to go to this lunch because I wrote a book about Mr. Robarts, but I don't know 15 20 years ago. So, I attended and even though I was probably 15, 20 years younger than everybody else. I I kind of like the stories and I thought it was um you know there was a lot of history that I learned listening to all these stories and so on. Darcy McHugh died in 2023, and I thought, I wonder if we can somehow keep this lunch going, albeit with some changes to modernize it. So, I spoke to both of Darcy McHugh's sons, Stuart and Jamie, and I said, "Would you mind if I try to keep this going?" And they said, "No problem at all." And I said, "Great. I want to honor your father as well." Well, so we're going to call it now the Robarts-McHugh lunch and it's going to be an annual thing and it's going to be obviously men and women and it's going to be all parties represented and it's going to be okay a little booze but no smoking and sorry Darcy but that's just that's what we got to do now. We had our third annual Robarts-McHugh lunch last week. Greg Lyall from the Innovative Research Group, one of the country's better pollsters, came and he shared some fresh data with us on whether the public cares about something that you and I care a lot about and talk about from time to time here, namely civility in politics. And do we care about it, particularly in this age of political toxicity? And I am delighted to report that apparently yes, we do across all party stripes and supporters in all age demographics. Now, read the column if you want more specifics. There's all sorts of charts in there that'll tell you, you know, break it all down for you. But as an example of something we just saw, the picture in British Columbia of the prime minister of Canada and the leader of the opposition who are after each other hammer and tongue almost every day, standing there at this vigil after the mass murder in British Columbia holding hands,

John Michael McGrath: United in their grief, trying to project an image of unity for the country. That means a lot to a lot of people and the polling proves that. So go to the website, check a look at at this column. We need civility in politics. We need, of course, a clash of partisan ideas as well. I'm not saying we don't, but less toxicity, more civility would be a good thing. I'll share, if I may, one more story about this Robarts-McHugh lunch, and that is you're a Star Trek: Next Generation fan.

Steve Pagan: I am indeed.

John Michael McGrath: Okay. We happen to be meeting on the actual date of the 55th anniversary of the leadership convention in 1971 at Maple Leaf Gardens that picked Bill Davis as the leader of the Ontario PC party on the fourth ballot at 2 in the morning by 44 votes in a good old-fashioned delegated convention. Sean Robarts was the premier at the time. Mr. Davis was elected to replace him and he won that convention on the strength of Darcy McHugh dropping off the penultimate ballot and getting some of his delegates to support Mr. Davis. He was the kingmaker. Sheldon, can I have this picture up here, please? Because here we have a picture of Neil Davis, the son of Bill Davis in the middle, Stuart Mchugh, the son of Darcy McHugh on the left, and Richard Robarts, who is a cousin of John Robarts's on the right. 55 years to the day that the older generation made history at Maple Leaf Gardens, the younger generation, the next generation met at this Robarts-McHugh lunch. And interestingly enough, these three had never met before.

Steve Pagan: Oh, wonderful.

John Michael McGrath: So, this was kind of Yeah, I thought so, too. I thought it was kind of a lovely, wonderful moment. So, there we go. This is the kind of political nerdery you two can experience if you come to the lunch next year, and I hope you will.

Steve Pagan: All right, with that, let's go to the mailbag.

John Michael McGrath: You got it. If you've got a burning question or insightful comment, please send it along to us at onpolitics@tvo.org. What do we got up this week?

Steve Pagan: This is an email from listener Kathleen from Whitby who writes, "I'm looking at a full page ad for Intersect 2026. This is a conference put on by the Globe and Mail. Doug Ford is going to be a speaker at this future-based dialogue and tickets are $1,000. Is this ethical? He's speaking about key issues impacting Ontario and our nation. It seems like he's already getting paid to do that. I'm just curious about the ethics of this and if other premieres have done similar things. It seems like something you should do after you're done being the premier. I love your podcast. Thank you for doing it and I will be listening. Thanks, Kathleen. Uh for those who don't know, as I mentioned earlier, Intersect is hosted by the Globe and Mail newspaper. Doug Ford is both speaking there and being interviewed by our Queens Park colleague Laura Stone.

John Michael McGrath: And I'm willing to bet that of the thousands that people have to pay to go to this, none of that's going to end up in Doug Ford's pocket. So, I did reach out to the premier's office to confirm the premier is not accepting any kind of speaking fee. They also emphasized he has never accepted any kind of speaking fee for these kinds of public engagements. But for the sake of some remedial civics, let's say that wasn't true and that Premier Ford accepted a speaking fee for this engagement, this falls under the Members Integrity Act. And generally speaking, MPPs are forbidden from accepting gifts or fees that are connected either directly or indirectly with their duties as MPPs. The principle being as Kathleen says, you get paid to be an MPP and you should not be taking money from outside of that to do your job. Now, there are exceptions to the rule. First, if it's incidental or a customary gift that is normally connected to what the act calls social obligations accompanying the office. So, if the premier goes to a catered event to represent Ontario's interests in Washington DC, for example, he's not breaking the law if he eats a canopy, you know. Um or you know another example

Steve Pagan: Even takes a gift.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. And so value periodically you know when a Toronto based sports team is doing well right there's there's always like some bet between you know like the premier of Ontario or a premier of another province or a state governor that you know somebody has to wear the other's shirt if Toronto wins or loses.

Steve Pagan: Jersey.

John Michael McGrath: Sorry. Jersey. Yes. Uh this is what I get. And and so like if if Doug Ford were to accept the gift of a jersey from the governor of California or whatever, that would not violate the law, right? So the other exception, political parties are allowed to provide gifts and other benefits to their members. So for example, the Liberal Party could provide money to top up an MPP's salary if that person was their leader. They could do that without breaking the law. And third, this is sort of a bit of a catch-all term, the integrity commissioner can determine that a gift is okay if it won't give rise to the perception of a conflict of interest. This is important though because the integrity commissioner does not actually enforce the Members Integrity Act in the usual sense of the word, right? The you know if an MPP believes that the law has been broken, they ask the integrity commissioner to conduct an investigation. The commissioner then reports back to the legislature whether the law has been broken and it's up to the legislature to determine whether the MPP will be punished or not. So just to bring it back to Kathleen's email, first of all, the premier does not seem to have broken any rules here. Even if he were, it would be up to the legislature to determine his ultimate punishment. And I don't need to remind everybody listening to this podcast that the Doug Ford currently leads the party that holds a very substantial majority in the legislature. So I do not expect he would be punished even if an integrity commissioner report came out saying that he had broken the law.

Steve Pagan: Kathleen's question is a good one because once upon a time and it wasn't that long ago, I think it was before 2015 and I'll tell you how I remember it's before 2015. This was a thing in the nation's capital because there was a backbencher in the Liberal caucus, which was the third place party in Parliament at the time, a backbencher by the name of Justin Trudeau, who was so famous that he was being asked to speak at a lot of events for which speaking fees were paid. And when that emerged, it did create a bit of a firestorm.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pagan: Because people were saying exactly what Kathleen was saying, namely, "Wait a second, you're paid. This is presumably part of your job as a paid member of parliament to do this. And after that sort of got out um Mr. Trudeau had to stop taking speaking fees. And um and then he won an election, became prime minister, and he didn't need to worry about it anymore after that. Anyway,

John Michael McGrath: And and you know, I think the history of integrity rules and ethics rules both federally and at Queens Park is fascinating. The decisions and the behaviors that used to be allowable under provincial law today read as kind of hilariously corrupt. Um and so you know as you can probably guess from my summary like the Members Integrity Act has some weaknesses in terms of actually controlling the behaviors of MPPs but it is certainly better than what has existed in the 1960s and 70s where some of these stories come from.

Steve Pagan: There we go. Give the email address sir and let's get out of here.

John Michael McGrath: Yes absolutely. Again if you'd like to ask about any content on our show please email us at onpolitics@tvo.org. And that is the OnP podcast for this Friday, February 20th, 2026.

Steve Pagan: You can follow our show wherever you get your podcasts so that you get notified each time a new episode is available. And you can see the video version of the podcast on the TVO Today YouTube channel.

John Michael McGrath: Any feedback you have, we're always happy to hear it, good, bad, or indifferent. Write us an email at onpolitics@tvo.org. Please be sure to include your first and last name and where you're located.

Steve Pagan: This week's episode was produced by Matthew Omera, editing by Colin Kish. Production support from Jonathan Hoell and TVO's digital media services team.

John Michael McGrath: Lori F is the executive producer of digital. John Ferry is vice president programming and content.

Steve Pagan: Okay, the next thing I'm going to say is to give props to our wonderful studio crew for getting everything organized here so we can do this. And I want to give one person a shout out and I want to give one person a shame. The shout out goes to I don't Where's Tony Burke right now? Tony, is he in the control room? I'm giving a shout out to Tony Burke because he's a big Montreal Canadians fan and I suspect there was nobody around TVO who was happier to see Nick Suzuki tip that puck into the net which saved our day against the Czech Republic couple days ago which meant that Mitch Marner could be the hero in overtime. So that's my shout out and my shame is this guy who didn't even watch the game. How could you not watch the game? That's pathetic. I was writing. I was doing my duty to the people of Ontario.

John Michael McGrath: I don't care. You have a bigger duty as a Canadian to be watching our men and women in the gold medal. Well, it's not gold medal yet, but in their quest for gold.

Steve Pagan: It was one of those things where I was I was, you know, as I I'm want to do even when I'm writing. I I was keeping an eye on social media in case anything blew up that I I missed. And it was one of those things, you know, everybody's talking about their own things on Twitter and Blue Sky and all these other places. Everybody has their own topics. And then suddenly everybody was only talking about one thing and it was this game and I was like I should be paying some attention to yes you should.

John Michael McGrath: I was on deadline and I had to to write. So no I was not able to watch the game.

Steve Pagan: You know John Michael if Answell were here it would say some honorable members colon shame shame shame. Anyway you still have a chance to redeem yourself because there are god willing two more games still to come.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pagan: We shall see. Anyway that's it for us until next Friday everybody. Bye-bye.

John Michael McGrath: Bye-bye.