Steve Pacin: Welcome everyone to the OnPy podcast.

John Michael McGrath: and I'm John Michael McGrath.

Steve Pacin: Today on the pod, have you been on the new Egllandon Cross Town LRT yet? Well, we have and we're about to give you a tour of Ontario's newest light rail transit line across the middle of the capital city.

John Michael McGrath: Surprise, surprise. Donald Trump is picking a fight with Ontario again. This time over the Gordy How Bridge connecting Windsor and Detroit.

Steve Pacin: Some shocking developments on the Toronto Police Service have prompted Queens Park to step in. We'll tell you how the province plans to investigate potential police corruption.

John Michael McGrath: And in your column, my column, I'm going to look at some of the politics around the Ontario Liberal Leadership Race.

Steve Pacin: And I am focused on one of the juiciest political stories ever to come out of Scarbor, Ontario, replete with betrayal, ambition, two levels of government, two political parties, and a lot of broken hearts.

Steve Pacin: It's Friday, February 13th, 2026. So, let's get to it. Okay, my friend JMM, a little sugar to start us out with.

John Michael McGrath: as always. Yes.

Steve Pacin: And a second sugar.

John Michael McGrath: Happy birthday to you.

Steve Pacin: Thank you.

John Michael McGrath: How old are you now, darling?

Steve Pacin: Uh, I I turned 45 on Monday.

John Michael McGrath: 45?

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: Oh my gosh. And I remember you when you were a we lad when I first came to TVO.

John Michael McGrath: Good for you. 45 years old.

Steve Pacin: Uh, yes. Yes, indeed. And I'm wearing one of my birthday presents if I can get up here. Uh, this is a Star Wars joke on a t-shirt. Uh, the 5-day weather forecast for Aldderon.

John Michael McGrath: You you you got to Okay, Sheldon, you got to put the camera on that again because that that takes some explaining and it's really good.

Steve Pacin: Uh, right. So, uh, the the uh Whoops. Sorry. The weather forecast for Aldderon, it's uh, you know, sunny, cloudy, sunny, exploding, and then Thursday and Friday, the planet no longer exists. Uh, Aldderon being the planet destroyed by the Empire in the movie Star Wars. So,

John Michael McGrath: and we remember it. That was the first Star Wars episode, right?

Steve Pacin: Uh, yes. For

John Michael McGrath: episode four,

Steve Pacin: which is actually the first Star Wars movie, even though it's called Episode 4.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: A New Hope.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: Oh, yeah. That's very clever.

Steve Pacin: It's It's a good t-shirt. We were I I have gotten to the point in my life where I'm kind of difficult to buy for cuz I like I don't need things. But we were walking through the mall and and I saw this t-shirt on the rack and I was like, "Okay, this I said to my wife, you can you can buy me this. This can be my birthday present. This I need to have." So,

John Michael McGrath: well, I am doing one of my premier t-shirts today. Um, not surprisingly, and the reason is 55 years ago yesterday. And I'm going to stand up now. For those listening on podcast, you'll hear my voice get a little fainter for a little while. That's Bill Davis on the front of my t-shirt because 55 years ago yesterday, William Grenville Davis won the leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party at Maple Leaf Gardens. If you can imagine, on the fourth ballot by 44 votes, very close, at 2:00 in the morning, he beat Alan Lawrence. This was one of the most historically interesting leadership contests ever. In part because this was the first attempt any political party made. This is 1971, remember? The first attempt to bring kind of mechanized or computerized voting into a convention. It wasn't fill out the ballots. They had actually purchased voting machines so that people could vote on machines. And there was a guy named Wendy O'Neal. Doesn't that just sound like Chicago corruption to Wendy O'Neal was the guy who who uh whose company brought these machines in and guess what? They did not work.

Steve Pacin: They flamed out

John Michael McGrath: phenomenally. And what happened in the middle of the convention was they sent somebody down to Toronto City Hall and with the old Gestner machines, they had to run off a whole bunch of ballots and then run them back. So, the convention was a disaster. They ran hours and hours behind schedule, which is why it ended at 2 am. There was a blizzard that night as well. And that is important to the story because Allan Lawrence, the guy who came second, was the mines minister. And a lot of his support was from Northern Ontario. And because of the blizzard, a lot of people from the north feared they were not going to be able to get the last bus out to get home to northern Ontario. And so, they left early. And by leaving early, Lawrence lost some key support. And as a result, Mr. Davis won on the fourth ballot. Remember, 44 vote difference is 23 people deciding to vote a different way.

Steve Pacin: It could that could have been the margin.

John Michael McGrath: And that could have indeed been the margin. Like 23 people from Northern Ontario go home. Um, you know, there's Alan Lawrence's defeat right there.

Steve Pacin: Interesting that, you know, the PC party always in history has usually a champion of the progressives and a champion of the conservatives. And even though Bill Davis has this reputation today of being a very pink Tory, red Tory, pink Tory, whatever, he was the conservative in the race. Al Lawrence was the progressive in the race. And yet, as he won and then went to the polls in October, won a big majority, and then through the 14 years he was premier, Mr. Davis really did change his governing style and his vision of what progressive conservatism meant. And he did become more progressive the longer he stayed in office. and you know he's the last guy to win four straight elections uh 1971757 and 81 and of course Doug Ford is going to go for the four Pete whenever down the road. So whatever magic formula Mr. Davis had figured out through his time in office. It worked because he ended up being the second longest serving premier of all time and it all started 55 years ago yesterday.

John Michael McGrath: Now of course the the picture on your shirt is not from the day he won office. It's from a bit later in his tenure. Um but you know I think um

Steve Pacin: one of our colleagues at the Star Rob Benzy has periodically phrased it as you know when he started school into kindergarten Bill Davis was the education minister and when he graduated high school or or when he graduated university Bill Davis was the premier right it was like

John Michael McGrath: he was around for 25 years.

Steve Pacin: Yeah. such a an extraordinary uh career and uh really you know uh shaped the the province uh to an incredible degree. Uh I you know I would argue certainly in the in my life the only premier you could compare to somebody who had such a structural effect on uh the province is probably Mike Harris who in 8 years uh obviously took the province in a very different direction uh than Davis did in terms of changing the the the institutions changing the fiscal state of the province. Even Mike Harris, I think, would fairly say that his record would come second to Bill Davis's.

John Michael McGrath: Bill Davis um was the leader of the party when Mike Harris ran for the first time in 1981. And on Mike Harris's signs in North Bay, Ontario, in Nipping Writing, it said in the French neighborhoods, Akeep Davis, right? In the Italian neighborhoods, on Mike Harris's signs, Squadra Davis, right? Team Davis. He ran as a Davis conservative. He became a little more conservative, but he would argue the Times called for it. But yes,

Steve Pacin: anyway, that's another discussion for another time.

Steve Pacin: Before we get to issue one, let's just do a quick setup here because we decided, when did we do this? A couple days ago, we decided to get out of this studio and walk about 200 yards north, or should I say 175 meters north.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: Because that's where ground zero, if I can put it that way, of the new Egllandon Cross Town LRT, or Line Five, as the Toronto Transit Commission calls it.

John Michael McGrath: New with an asterisk.

Steve Pacin: Yeah, that's right. That's right. Uh that's that's ground zero for it. And we have you and I have watched as has everybody else in this neighborhood with tremendous interest over the last 15 years as this thing, you know, either did or did not get built or did or did not get open and missed deadlines over the course of of many many years. And so we decided to go for a spin on the LRT from here to Dawn Valley Station in the East.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: So how about we do that?

John Michael McGrath: Let's uh I guess roll it.

Steve Pacin: Let's check it out. Here comes issue one. It's a huge day and

John Michael McGrath: you know this is a huge day.

Steve Pacin: Why is this a huge day?

John Michael McGrath: This is a huge day because this will be I don't know about for you but for me the very first time we're ever going to get on this Egllandon cross town which we remember you and I both

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: the previous government announcing how many years ago?

Steve Pacin: Uh I guess the earliest announcements I remember covering were in 2010. So that's 16 years ago.

John Michael McGrath: 16 years ago.

Steve Pacin: Yes. Should we go take a look and see what 122.7 billion buys you these days?

John Michael McGrath: Back when Kathleen win was not premier, she was the transportation minister. That's how long ago uh we've been talking about this.

Steve Pacin: Let's check it out.

John Michael McGrath: Absolutely.

Steve Pacin: Let's go.

John Michael McGrath: They're calling it line five. They're not calling it the Egllandon cross town.

Steve Pacin: Uh at least on the signage, they're calling it line five.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. As to be distinct from line one, which is Young University

Steve Pacin: Spadina.

John Michael McGrath: Spadina. Line two, which is Blure. Yes. Line three used to be the Scar Bro uh SRT uh which no longer exists.

Steve Pacin: Right.

John Michael McGrath: Four is Shepard.

Steve Pacin: So this is line five. And then line six is

John Michael McGrath: Finch.

Steve Pacin: Finch. Right.

John Michael McGrath: Yes. The uh Finch West LRT which opened just a few weeks ago as well.

Steve Pacin: And is having a bit of a rough start.

John Michael McGrath: Uh yes. Uh say it has not had a charmed beginning.

Steve Pacin: Now I guess what distinguishes this from the subway is that part of it is underground. Oh, mine just slows the subway. Part of it underground, part of its overground.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: And this will be, too.

John Michael McGrath: Where are we going? East or west?

Steve Pacin: We are going eastbound.

John Michael McGrath: Okay.

Steve Pacin: I like the the the signage there. I don't actually love the layout of the map. I find this very confusing.

John Michael McGrath: Um because it's not actually telling you the the direction of the east west, right? Like we're we're traveling. It's opposite.

Steve Pacin: It's showing you the direction of travel, but that happens to me. In this case, it's flipped. So, it is

John Michael McGrath: now Dennis is west of here, but they've got it on the right end.

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: Kennedy is east of here and they've got it on the left end.

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: Why would they do that?

Steve Pacin: Every other map of the TTC is, you know, north, south, east, west, standard orientation. So, the first time I took this train, I

John Michael McGrath: I was I was momentarily confused and then I've been irritated for days.

Steve Pacin: Well, I'll tell you what, the new trains are much quieter than the old trains.

John Michael McGrath: Uh, yes.

Steve Pacin: Okay, here we go. Let's get in. Well, we got to let the people off first because we're very courteous transit users, right? Let the people off the train first, please.

John Michael McGrath: Nice seats.

Steve Pacin: Uh, yes. Uh, you approve of the decor.

John Michael McGrath: They haven't yet been spoiled by years of use. People of a certain age may remember that uh there was a previous Eglinton tunnel uh where the subway had uh started construction in the 1990s before that project was abandoned and the tunnel was filled in.

Steve Pacin: That's right. That was the Bob Ray government that started that one. And then Mike Harris came into power, decided we couldn't afford this, and filled in the hole.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: I also did notice the signs are bilingual. They are in English and in French, which is not the case on the other lines.

John Michael McGrath: So, for whatever reason, they've decided that there are enough French-speaking people in and around Toronto that they should have all the information in both languages. Well, and of course, you know, Ontario does statutoily have a commitment to serving both English and French,

Steve Pacin: but you can see that they have not I mean, the stations are clean and they're fine looking,

John Michael McGrath: but they've not blown a lot of money on making them look really gorgeous, right? It's pretty

Steve Pacin: spare, minimalist, yes,

John Michael McGrath: Metroinks was balancing a lot of different things, including trying to contain costs, which yes, uh this transit line did uh come in substantially over budget. Um,

Steve Pacin: I heard something about that.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. Over budget and behind schedule. Here we are at the Dawn Valley Station.

Steve Pacin: We're at Dawn Valley Station. Formerly the Ontario Side Center.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: Very formally.

John Michael McGrath: So, here we are.

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: It's been 15 years.

Steve Pacin: It's been more than what 12 billion,

John Michael McGrath: something like that. Yes.

Steve Pacin: Um, I mean, admittedly, we're in the first week.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: Early verdict. What are we thinking?

John Michael McGrath: Well, the cross town has had a better opening than the Finch Line did. The Finch Line had a really rough start. Um but I think you know if I can sort of zoom out for just a moment here and say you know having covered the uh the years of argument about whether and even how to build this uh line uh you know people might remember the late Mayor Rob Ford uh you know arguing vehemently against light rail transit um to see it actually uh open and operating um I'm not sure what what word is to describe it, but it just feels like like something has finally completed. Um, it's it's it's a real uh nifty feeling to actually be able to write it. Uh, having covered uh so many of those opening arguments. Um, and it seems to be running very well. Quite aside from my sort of nostalgia about the beginnings of my journalistic career, uh, it it actually seems to be operating very well. What are your thoughts? Yeah. The first thing I was thinking of, and you will appreciate and understand why my head goes here,

Steve Pacin: I I was thinking back to the 1950s, okay? And I was thinking back to the time when Lesie Frost, who was the premier of the day, opened what was then the first subway line built in the city, which was to Union Station to Eglinton. It was the Young Line and just a chunk of it, not all of obviously what it is today. And what a big deal that was when the premier got on that line and rang the bell and opened it up for everybody to go on. And in some of the coverage that I've seen of the opening of this line five, there has been some of that same kind of excitement and anticipation. You know, there were people who actually camped out all night long in order to be the first people to ride on this new East West line,

John Michael McGrath: like the opening of a new Star Wars film.

Steve Pacin: Uh, yeah, I guess something like that. So in that respect it's it's kind of an exciting moment. I you know TVO is right at Young and Eglinton. Yes.

John Michael McGrath: And this line is right at Young and Eglinton. So obviously those of us you and I who have worked at TVO for a while have been able to watch the progress or lack thereof of this thing for quite a long time.

Steve Pacin: And I'm sure there were days when we thought to ourselves, this is never going to happen. This is never going to open.

John Michael McGrath: Yes. But finally it has.

Steve Pacin: And here it is. And it looks pretty good. Could look a little better. They could they could do a little more color somewhere, but hopefully that will come along.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. Yeah. But otherwise, okay.

Steve Pacin: Yeah. I I think one other thing that uh I wanted to add was um there's a very smart uh transit uh planner uh in the United States, a guy named Jarrett Walker, and he said, you know, one of the important things about the cross town opening is that it's really the first line that we have built. The Shepherd line is maybe arguable, but it, you know, it's the first line we built that is not focused about build bringing people from the suburbs into the downtown core as a, you know, uh, functionally like a a line for people commuting into their downtown offices, right? This is a line that gets people from one end of the city to the other and it reflects a city where increasingly, you know, the work is not just in the downtown, right? People are not just traveling from the suburbs into the downtown. they are going from everywhere to everywhere. And so the cross town more than frankly even the Ontario line uh reflects uh the ways that the city is changing and uh that is uh that is an important thing to keep in mind as we uh hopefully ride it many more times in the future.

John Michael McGrath: I think we have to ride it back to work now, shall we?

Steve Pacin: Yeah, I I think we got to go back. I I got stuff waiting for me at my desk.

John Michael McGrath: There we go. All right, let's go.

John Michael McGrath: Let's go back in time to when Steven Harper was prime minister and decided we needed more bridge capacity between Windsor, Ontario and Detroit, Michigan. He asked the Obama administration for help in paying for that new bridge. The Obama administration said no. So Harper said fine, we'll build it. We'll pay for it. And that's what happened. Now the bridge is about to open and suddenly President Obama's successor is interested in what's going on with the GordyHow Bridge. Okay, Jim. And what is going on with the Gordy How Bridge?

Steve Pacin: Right. So uh earlier this week uh via posts to his social media account uh President Donald Trump threatened to block the opening of the Gordy Bridge uh because it is a bridge that crosses an international border. The federal government in the US has a role here in terms of uh licensing and permits. Uh, President Trump cited Canada's recent trade deal with China and uh then made some false claims about how much US content was uh uh used to make the bridge to to build the bridge.

John Michael McGrath: There actually was

Steve Pacin: there was he he said that there was no American content uh American steel, American labor was used to to uh help uh not just build the bridge but uh particularly Canada did not just pay for the bridge. We paid for the land acquisition on the US side uh of the border and we paid for the upgrades to the US interstate system. uh like we really did pay for the whole package here, which is why it cost $3.8 billion uh to do so. And separately from that, Ontario also paid to upgrade the 401 uh connection and extend it with uh what is now the uh right honorable Herb Gray Parkway uh in Windsor.

John Michael McGrath: You should say a word about who Herb Gray was for those kids who don't know. a longtime federal liberal MP uh for the Windsor area and uh uh he did pass away and then the Parkway uh was named in his honorde. Um so you know north of $5 billion had been uh paid to build this bridge and the associated uh infrastructure. uh and back in 2017, we will recall that President Trump was president back in 2017 and he was all for the bridge and uh not just uh being built but but opening uh promptly. Uh people might remember the running joke of infrastructure week during the uh Trump presidency. There was a time when uh the the Trump White House was very enthusiastic about this bridge. Uh issued a joint statement with then Prime Minister Trudeau on the bridge's importance to trade uh reading in part, we affirm the importance of building on this existing strong foundation for trade and investment and further deepening our relationship with the common goal of strengthening the middle class. Uh things have changed,

Steve Pacin: you think? Yeah. So what's the president all riled up about anyway? Well, so the whole reason for the bridg's existence is that Canada or Canadian policy makers have been nervous for a long time that this major trade artery, the Ambassador Bridge uh between uh Detroit and Windsor is owned by a a privately held company uh which is owned by a family, the the Maroon family of Michigan uh of Detroit. uh that family uh no fools, they have strongly opposed any publiclyowned uh competing bridge uh being built uh that could make their own bridge less lucrative, right? They collect uh very substantial toll revenues uh from the Ambassador Bridge. Uh and wouldn't you know it, uh according to the New York Times uh reporting earlier this week, uh the owner of the Ambassador Bridge, Matthew Maroon, uh lobbyed Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnik about the bridge's opening shortly before Trump's um eruption. Uh the family has also mounted legal challenges uh in both US and Canadian courts uh to to try and stop this project now going on for certainly more than a decade. There is in fact a court case uh in Ontario as we speak before the superior court about it's it's kind of a finicky interpretation of uh federal law about uh what privileges were granted to the uh company owning the ambassador bridge uh when it was created back you know the company was created almost a century ago. That's a whole other thing. The case ought not stop the bridge from opening. uh the president could in theory. But that said, uh Mark Carney, Prime Minister Mark Carney uh spoke with Donald Trump uh after the social media posts. I'm sorry. I I still cannot believe we are dealing with like national and international policy that is getting swayed by social media posts, but here we are.

John Michael McGrath: This is the age in which we live.

Steve Pacin: Yes. Um, so Prime Minister Mark Carney spoke with uh Trump about this and explained that uh while Canada paid for the whole thing, uh, the state of Michigan owns half of the bridge, uh, I assume that Carne also explained that once Canada has recouped its costs for, uh, the bridge, uh, Michigan will in fact get half of the toll revenues, uh, we are also giving, uh, we are not charging tolls on the American side of the bridge either. like it's it's an incredibly good deal for the Americans who again did not have to pay one red cent. Uh so

John Michael McGrath: yes, uh hopefully that has been explained to the president and hopefully that will uh uh dial things down.

Steve Pacin: Let me call a bit of an audible here. In as much as I'm I'm always reminding myself when we do this show that uh we have a lot of younger people who watch and listen and who may not know as heretical as this sounds. Yes. They may not know why the bridge was named after Gordy How and Gordy How, we should explain, was, you know, one of the greatest players in the history of the National Hockey League. The reason Wayne Gretzky wears 99 is because Gordy How wore number nine. So Wayne put two nines on his back to pay tribute to Gordy. Gordy How was from Canada originally. Yes. Born in Floral, Saskatchewan, but of course played many decades for the Detroit Red Wings. So Steven Harper, big hockey fan, uh decided to name it the Gordy How Bridge because Gordy How represents Canada. Gordy how represented Detroit. That's the background behind that.

John Michael McGrath: Relevant to contemporary Canadian politics. Gordy How also was the one who gave us the phrase elbows up.

Steve Pacin: Yes, he was. His his elbows were the sharpest in the game. There's no doubt about that. Uh anything else we have to know here before we move on? not directly related to the bridge, but something else happened in the US Congress this week that is relevant to um uh current US Canadian relations. Uh there was a vote in the House of Representatives to end the declared state of emergency that Donald Trump used to uh justify part of the tariffs that he has imposed on uh Canadian goods. uh a small number of Republicans broke with their party's leadership to vote with the rest of the Democratic uh representatives,

John Michael McGrath: but that's worth noting.

Steve Pacin: It is worth noting. Uh I I

John Michael McGrath: I don't think we have a ton of friends in the Republican party uh here in Canada, but we we do have some at least.

Steve Pacin: We have six. We have six on that vote.

John Michael McGrath: Um it turns out uh that CNN pointed out that uh uh Canada is more popular than Donald Trump is among Americans right now. So maybe that helped us. Um now uh this vote on its own does not end the tariffs. Uh the Senate would have to uh affirm this vote as well and then of course uh the president can veto these kinds of motions. Historically uh Congress has uh very often uh you've seen votes where a much larger majority of of congressional votes uh uh will will assert their privilege to reverse a presidential veto. Uh we have not seen that kind of behavior uh in the current Congress. So I'm not like super optimistic. Uh but it's a useful symbolic uh rebuke to the president.

Steve Pacin: Well, there is an expression in our business, John Michael. One, two, trend.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: One was Marjgery Taylor Green.

John Michael McGrath: Two was Ross Dowad in the New York Times. Both of whom have broken with Trump. Yes.

Steve Pacin: And now here's number three. A bunch of congressmen have have broken with Trump on this issue as well.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. You know, the Republican party is plenty I know we're supposed to be on Paulie, but as long as we're here, the Republican party is plenty nervous about the upcoming midterms in November and the way the president's polling numbers are going into the dumper right now. There are a lot of seats at stake. So, this is not necessarily a surprise.

Steve Pacin: And some of those seats are in the state of Michigan. You're here.

John Michael McGrath: Just to bring us back to the bridge, uh the Michigan Republicans are absolutely uh aware of the potential uh damage this could do for them. there is in fact an open seat uh that they are uh very interested in in uh competing for and this latest news is not helping their chances.

Steve Pacin: And Doug Ford got a little bit of the president's attention again this past week, did he not?

John Michael McGrath: Oh, we're talking about the LCBO again. Yes. uh the part of these social media posts uh the the uh erring of grievances, the litany of CA Canadian sins uh that the the president invoked included uh Ontario's uh refusal to stock American alcohol uh on the shelves. Uh once again uh this this seems to be an irritant that is playing an outsized role in the American conscious. it got mentioned alongside like dairy supply management. Um and uh yeah, the the premier's position is

Steve Pacin: the moment the tariffs are gone, the US booze can be back on LCBO shelves, but so long as they're there, uh no no Kentucky bourbon for Ontarians. Well, uh, you said Kentucky and let me do one last followup on that, which is to say Steven Marsh, who's, you know, very fine writer and journalist, uh, here in Toronto. He did a piece in the New York Times last Friday in which he pointed out that I think the production of Jim Beam in the south is down 85% in large measure. And of course, people are being laid off and that manufacturing is not happening in the way it used to. In large measure because the LCBO, one of the biggest alcohol purchasers in the world, has decided not to keep any more Tennessee whiskey or Kentucky bourbon on our shelves. So, it's having an impact. Yeah, it's absolutely getting people's attention, including uh the president. And uh you know, we were good customers for a very long time. There are Ontarians who would love to, you know, uh, buy these bottles again. Uh, just drop the tariffs, man.

John Michael McGrath: Be a good neighbor. There we go. And with that, we're off to issue three.

Steve Pacin: There have been some shocking developments on the law and justice file in Ontario over the past couple of weeks. Several current and former Toronto police officers have been charged with an array of serious offenses linked to organized crime, including drug trafficking, conspiracy to commit murder and bribery. Although the premier was quick to dismiss those charged as quote just a few bad apples, someone has decided this is concerning enough to take further action. JMM, who and what? So, the Inspector General of Policing is a kind of oversight officer created by a law the Ford government uh introduced back in 2019. The office itself wasn't actually created and staffed until 2023. Uh folks may remember a little thing called CO 19 that got in the way of uh certain other priorities. Um and the office's actual powers only kicked in in 2024. Uh so this is still a a relatively recently created office with uh new powers. Uh importantly I want to just say the inspector general is not an officer of the legislature. Uh they are both hired and fired by the government. So that's different from like the auditor general or the ombbudsman of Ontario. Those are officers who are uh named by the legislature and can only be uh dismissed by the legislature.

John Michael McGrath: Meaning the opposition gets a say in their hiring.

Steve Pacin: Correct. Yes. So that said, uh the uh inspector general of policing still has broad powers to investigate both uh police forces and the police service boards. Uh folks may not always be aware that you know we we refer to like the Toronto Police Service, but the the police who work for in the city of Toronto are not municipal employees. They work for the Toronto Police Service, which is a proincially constituted body. The mayor has a a seat on the uh the board. uh sometimes so do city councilors, but it's all proincially appointed. So, it's a bit of a a detail about police governance that I I'm sure we'll go into in the future, but just worth uh emphasizing there. The inspector general has the powers to uh investigate both police services and police service boards. Uh and earlier this week, the uh current and still first ever inspector general of policing, Ryan Tessner, announced that he will be doing just that in the context of these uh very serious charges that have been announced. Okay, let me make an analogy here just to set up this next question, which is to say in Ottawa, the prime minister has a conflict commissioner who sort of keeps tabs on what he's doing, and it's the prime minister's appointment, which means that the opposition often says you're letting the prime minister off the hook when he is in clear conflict on various things. This was a problem when Justin Trudeau was in power. He was found to be um in conflict on some things but not on others which many people thought he ought to be. Why do I ask this? Because when you're hired by the government or by the prime minister or premier of the day,

John Michael McGrath: you may see your loyalty as being to them as opposed to the public good.

Steve Pacin: You've just told us this guy was not hired by the legislature. He was hired by the government of the day. So how worried should we be that his report is going to reflect rather the interests of the government as opposed to the entire legislature andor province? So for now Teshner has said he told reporters at Queens Park this week that you know his report will be made public and that his office will be uh working to make that report uh public as quickly as possible. But uh you know that doesn't necessarily mean that we should expect um a a speedy report. Uh and and I'm not sure we would want uh something uh uh hastily done. Let me put it that way. You know, Tesner actually needs to appoint an inspector to uh run this this investigation. Um that inspector has been at least the the shape of the investigation that Tesner has described uh this week is that it's not just going to look at uh the Toronto Police Services. He's actually going to look uh take a very broad lens. He's going to look at all 45 police forces in Ontario. So that's uh the the local municipal police forces as well as the OP and he is not intending to do a a criminal investigation. He's not going to duplicate the the criminal investigation that is underway uh in uh the GTA. That's not the purpose of his office or uh his his powers. you know, he is looking at structural systematic questions of uh whether police forces have the systems in place to prevent these kinds of uh uh incidents before they take place. So, you know, are there proper checks for uh new recruits? Are there safeguards to uh prevent internal corruption? These kinds of things, right? Uh the inspector general's office, as I mentioned, is still quite young, but they have issued a previous report taking a very wide look at Ontario policing that was specifically about the challenges around um policing uh public protests and public disorder in Ontario's big cities. Uh that report is public and is on their website. So if people want to see the kind of document that this office produces, uh that is so far the only example of of the kind of document we might expect. And if he finds something that needs doing, does he have the power to make it so?

John Michael McGrath: Actually, this is interesting, right? Like I've mentioned the the auditor and the ombbudsman, their only powers are to make recommendations and the government can take those recommendations or ignore them entirely. And you and I have discussed with the auditors reports that you know the auditor might make, you know, 23 recommendations and most of the time the government says, "Oh yes, the we agree with these recommendations. we agree with these recommendations and it's big news if the government disagrees with uh a recommendation then the question is always why right uh Teshner or the inspector general's office does actually have the power to issue directions to both uh police service boards and police forces uh in any issues that uh breach uh the provincial law that we're talking about here which is the I'm sorry that's the community policing and safety act I believe uh 2019

Steve Pacin: uh so that's that's one big difference. Tesner does have the ability to uh make uh make changes on his own. Now, of course, there is a criminal investigation underway. We are going to see how that uh proceeds. Uh just as a you know, a matter we're always careful to emphasize that uh people are uh innocent until they are proven guilty. None of these charges have been proved in a court of law. Uh but the way trials proceed, I'm sure we are going to learn more about these things. Some of those details could very well end up being shocking. Then Tesner's investigation will attack some of the same uh facts from a different direction. I I think it's quite possible we would see not just uh obviously the resolution of a criminal investigation probably years hence. Uh not just Tesner's report, but the government may feel the need to introduce new legislation as well.

John Michael McGrath: Gotcha. And with that, we're off to your column, my column.

John Michael McGrath: All right, it's time now for our regular feature. We call it your column, my column, in which JMM and I reminisce about the stuff we wrote for tvO.org this past week. You can always go online, find our columns. We hope that we titilate you a little bit by discussing these columns and then you'll go and actually read them. And normally I start with you, but I think this week I'm going to go first if that's okay.

Steve Pacin: Because the juiciest political story of the year is taking place in the southwest end of Scarboro, Ontario right now, and we got to talk about it.

John Michael McGrath: It started while you were away.

Steve Pacin: It happened when I was away. I know. Why does the best stuff happen when I'm away? But anyway, we're catching up to it here. And of course, the story is going to go on for many, many more months. Yes. So, let me set it up. Uh if you've been following this, you will know that the deputy leader of the New Democratic Party of Ontario, woman named Dolly Beum, who was the first ever Bangladeshi Canadian elected at any legislature in the country, first ever. So was a person of some historic significance to that community. She decided that she wanted to quit the Ontario legislature as an MPP and because there was a vacancy federally in the same writing, yes,

John Michael McGrath: she wants to run federally. Not necessarily any news there because that happens all the time where people at the province at the provincial levels see a vacancy federally and they may want to as they say move up to a different level of government which happens to pay twice as much as well.

Steve Pacin: However, she switched parties and that's what makes this interesting. She is running for the Liberals federally for Mark Carney's government.

John Michael McGrath: They kind of poached her.

Steve Pacin: Yes.

John Michael McGrath: And they have appointed her the seat. So there'll be no nomination. She's the nominated candidate. That started a series of events where the federal liberal MP for Beaches East York, Nathaniel Erskin Smith, says he now is going to contest the provincial bi-election for Scarbor Southwest. That's not his writing federally obviously, but he's right next door in Beaches East York. So he thinks, well, I'm just going to move across the border, so to speak, and I'm going to run there, and I'm going to plant my flag there, hopefully win that bi-election from which to launch my leadership campaign because he wants to become the next leader of the Ontario Liberals. What's happened here? Dolly Beum has really broken the hearts of a lot of New Democrats. And I give Mara Styles, the opposition leader, leader of the NDP, a lot of props for keeping her cool. She put out a press release saying, you know, we thank her for her service to Ontario. We wish her well in her future endeavors. But then in the press conference that was held later, she did say, you know, there are a lot of broken hearts in New Democrat neighborhoods in Scarbor Southwest because, you know, crossing the floor is still a big deal. She hasn't crossed the floor from the same legislature, but she switched parties to go to another one. Now, suddenly the Liberals have a decision. So, the day one story was the NDP. The day two story is now what are the Liberals going to do? Are they going to have a nomination meeting in Scarbor Southwest or are they just going to appoint Nate Erskin Smith as their candidate to run in that bi-election? It gets tricky because the candidate who ran for the Liberals in the last provincial election says, "I want another shot at this." She didn't do very well when she ran last time. In fact, she ran seven points behind the party provincewide. So, the Liberals might be thinking to themselves right now, "We don't really owe you a second shot. You didn't do all that well last time and we got a bit of a star here in Erskin Smith who we could just parachute in there. This could get a lot messier before it gets cleaned up. But the reality is interessent warfare crossing the floor, multiple parties, multiple levels of government, ambition, broken hearts, it's all there. So I like this story.

Steve Pacin: Yeah. So I also wrote about some of these events last week and uh so I'm just going to continue riffing on this if we can. You know, we also learned that uh the Liberal Party has announced what the the the rough rules for their leadership contest. Uh they will uh vote uh up to November 20th. The winner of the leadership contest will be announced on November 21st.

John Michael McGrath: What kind of conventions are it going to be, JMM?

Steve Pacin: Uh it's it's not going to be a delegated convention. It's going to be ranked ballots. Um the the

John Michael McGrath: right here, folks. Right here. Bill Davis, four ballots, 1971 delegated convention. Exciting. Ended at 2:00. We just don't do delegated conventions anymore.

Steve Pacin: No, I I I suspect we're not going to.

John Michael McGrath: And I watched last week when you were on with your two colleagues and you talked about delegated convention and thank you for giving me the shout out when you said, I know Steve's going to be very unhappy to hear this is not going to be a delegated convention, but uh they just don't listen. So, you know, one of the the issues that liberals were debating was how long should this contest be? There were uh many voices. I would say I think I can fairly say many of them uh were people supporting Nadskin Smith who wanted a quick contest. They believe that would be uh to his advantage. But there was also a I I think a a principle here that a a longer contest was going to interfere with the municipal elections that are coming in the fall. Um it had already been several months since Bonnie Crombi announced her uh resignation and that you know the the party was just burning time. Uh I know uh many of them were quite public that a November contest they they see as um being somewhat ridiculous if I can put it gently as one person uh put it on uh social media. uh on the day that the rules were announced, which was last uh last weekend and last Saturday or Sunday, uh there were children not yet conceived who will be born before November 21st. And I I went and did the math on what the the average uh term of a pregnancy is, and that checks out.

Steve Pacin: Um so, a bit of a long runway then till the next convention.

John Michael McGrath: Yeah. So I mean it will it will have been more than a year since Bonnie Cromby's uh not quite victory uh in that uh leadership vote. So you know it it's it's going to be a long contest that uh has upset some people. The other thing I will say is that I think some people are being very weird about Erskin Smith's candidacy. um the idea that he would run for this provincial bi-election, people are screaming about like, oh, it's just I I think you use the phrase in your piece about, you know, the criticism of him is that it's all about him.

Steve Pacin: All about me. Yeah.

John Michael McGrath: And and I like first of all, like I'm sorry, are people scandalized by ambition in politics? Right. Uh, and secondly, the Ontario Liberal Party is they're doing better right now than they have for much of the last decade, but they're still not doing so fantastically well in provincial politics that they can afford to be choosy about who wants to run under their banner. And so I I would not recommend that they just appoint Erskin Smith uh to be the candidate, but he says he wants to run, so make it a contested nomination. and and like that would also be a good sort of beta test for Erskin Smith's politics, right?

Steve Pacin: There's no question that you have added legitimacy if you subject yourself to a nomination meeting and you win the nomination. I have heard from many politicians in the past where if somebody gets appointed to a nomination and then wins in the bi-election or general election, the first time they walk into that caucus meeting, there are other MPs who look at them and said, "Geez, I had to run for my nomination to get here and you didn't." And that is a bit of an irritant among many people. Yes.

John Michael McGrath: Having said that, I note the federal liberals uh I guess in the past week or two have appointed Dr. Danielle Martin to the University Rosedale liberal nomination. there will not be a contested nomination there. Um, so you know, they make their judgments and they live with the consequences here. She's a fine candidate. Um, immensely bright, has a lot to bring to public life, and they didn't want to take the chance that she might lose a nomination. Okay, fair enough.

Steve Pacin: Um, I'll tell you what, um, I think with the advice of the Liberal executive, I think this is John Fraser's call. He's the interim leader and he can decide whether it will be a contested nomination or whether he wants to assume the right of appointment which he can do. And uh so all eyes on the Liberals for the next little while till they figure that out.

John Michael McGrath: I I did ask Fraser's office this week if uh there was going to be any any decision announced before we started taping. Uh as of now I have not heard back. Um so uh yeah I I the last time I asked last week uh there no decision had been made. So, uh, yes. So, we're waiting on, uh, any decision in Scarbo Southwest about whether to name a nominee or whether to have a contested nomination. Uh, we then will watch as, uh, various candidates make their kind of quasi unofficial campaigns more official. Uh, Erskin Smith not the only one by any means. Uh, we've mentioned Andrew Bazar uh, on the podcast as as one potential uh, leadership candidate. he has taken his name out of contention, said he will not be running. Uh so uh candidates have until July 31st to uh submit all of their nomination papers and I guess uh file the initial uh entry fee. Uh and then uh as we say members will be uh using uh weighted ranked ballots to uh uh choose the next leader. Uh the other thing to note is one of the requests from some of the party grassroots was that uh they wanted an electronic uh option to vote this time around. The party has said they will do that. So that will be, I believe, slightly different from the last time when it was it was still ranked ballots, but I believe it was all paper ballots.

Steve Pacin: So Danielle Martin was considering a run for the provincial liberal leadership. She's now going to run federally. Andrew Bazari was considering a run for the provincial liberal leadership. He's now taken himself out. Yes. Ivonne Baker, who's a member of parliament from Atobbico for the Liberals

John Michael McGrath: and former MPP.

Steve Pacin: And former MPP as well. That's right. He has also taken himself out of the fed the provincial liberal leadership. So, at the moment, we have more people making announcements that they're not running than who are running, which is not necessarily a good sign, but anyway, that is uh that is the way things are.

John Michael McGrath: Toco M P Lee Faircloth is has not officially said she is running, but started collecting names. So, yeah,

Steve Pacin: she is.

John Michael McGrath: Okay. Shall we do the mailbag?

Steve Pacin: Yes, let's All right, let's do that. If you've got a burning question or insightful comment, we always love hearing from you at on politics at tvo.org.jmm, JMM, what's up this week?

John Michael McGrath: Uh, we have a question from a listener Eli from Missaga who writes, "Hi, Stephen and JMM. As both the son and brother of teachers, education is an issue close to my heart. I know Dalton McGinty is often touted as the education premier, but has there ever been a premier in Ontario or anywhere in Canada for that matter who was actually a former teacher or educator. When I think of how school board trustees may not exist for much longer, we've talked about that on the podcast. I cannot help but think about how we might be better served with more people who have actual experience in schools with children being the ones making decisions that will affect them. Big fan of the pod. Keep it up. Best Eli from Missaga.

Steve Pacin: Okay. Just off the top of my head, Kathleen Wyn, I think was a teacher once upon a time. Mike Harris was a teacher once upon a time. Kathleen Wyn was also a trustee.

John Michael McGrath: Yes.

Steve Pacin: Mike Harris was also a trustee. in fact chair of the Nippasing school board as I recall. Okay,

John Michael McGrath: so there's two premers just off the top of my head who uh were also teachers. I know Bill Davis was not a teacher. He was an education minister, but he had kids who were teachers, right?

Steve Pacin: And yeah, I mean we could go on, but there you go.

John Michael McGrath: And I certainly if uh if anybody prior to Daltton McGinty could fairly claim to be an education premier, Bill Davis would have to be on that list.

Steve Pacin: I think so. And you know there there certainly have been education ministers uh who went on to become premier. Bill Davis being one, John Roberts being one.

John Michael McGrath: So that used to be quite and Kathleen Wyn of course uh a former education minister went on to become premier. So that does happen.

Steve Pacin: Yeah. And I I mean it's interesting you know you mentioned Kathleen win and Mike Harris uh I I think I can say without fear of contradiction uh had a wildly divergent effect on the education system.

John Michael McGrath: You think so? Uh and so you know as much as we um we we want to talk about uh and Eli is asking about you know the the effect of if we can call it lived experience uh in in how people then apply uh their uh their experiences to their time in politics right um the reality is that your lived experience is just one part of what you bring to politics right also brought uh very different ideas about what the role of government uh should be

Steve Pacin: and teacher unions, the role of teacher unions.

John Michael McGrath: Yep. And and and even the the ro role of school boards, right? I mean uh the one of the things that the Harris government did that uh this uh current uh government is uh maybe uh continuing was they dramatically weakened the role of school boards, right? As school boards uh lost the ability to uh set their own tax rates, for example, uh they became functionally, you know, part-time positions. Um and uh you know there are people to this day who uh would tell you that they they would uh want to see all of those uh changes reversed. But you know in 15 years in power the liberals you know what I was saying earlier about u you know the the structural changes that Mike Harris made uh to this province. Right? In 15 years in power the liberals never really restored many of the powers of the school boards. They they found a system uh and you know by no means did they only make cosmetic changes. We got full day kindergarten as a a for example uh but uh as as far as the the powers of the school boards themselves. They were happy to let a lot of those changes stay in place.

Steve Pacin: Why don't you give the email address and we'll get out of here.

John Michael McGrath: Right. Again, if you would like to ask about content on the show or ask about the professional backgrounds of premers, you can please email us at onp politics@tvo.org.

Steve Pacin: And that is the OnPy podcast for this Friday, February 13th, 2026.

John Michael McGrath: You can follow our show wherever you get your podcast so that you can get notified each time a new episode is available. And you can see the video version of the podcast on the TV today YouTube channel.

Steve Pacin: Any feedback you have, we're always happy to hear it, good, bad, or indifferent, as Prime Minister John Turner used to say. Write us an email at onp politics@tvo.org. Please be sure to include your first and last name and where you're located.

John Michael McGrath: This week's episode was produced by Matthew Omera, editing by Colin Kish. Additional camera work by Max Stussy.

Steve Pacin: Production support from Jonathan Hollowell and TVO's digital media services team.

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

Steve Pacin: We always love to give a shout out to our crew for the work they do to make the set look so nice. And boy, this studio absolutely looks gorgeous. Now, this is a few weeks in a row now we've been in our new digs and we quite like it down here.

John Michael McGrath: Really, it's nice to be back.

Steve Pacin: Absolutely. So, until next Friday, everybody, bye-bye. Bye-bye.