In December 2023, Ontario Liberals embraced Bonnie Crombie as their new leader, after the former mayor spent a decade guiding Mississauga from its stagnating suburban past into a booming urban future.
Healthcare has been a focus of her campaign and if elected premier on February 27th she pledges to spend $3.1 billion to ensure everyone in the province has a family doctor in four years.
The province is no longer affordable for many and home ownership has become out of reach for most. Doug Ford's highway plan will only lead to more traffic chaos, according to research, and economic indicators suggest Ontario is becoming a 'have not' province.
The Pointer sat down with Crombie to discuss her plan to get Ontario back on track and convince voters why she’s the right person for the job.
How are you trying to revive the Ontario Liberal Party?
I think I spent a year doing that, building back up to the point where people feel proud to be talking about being a Liberal again. We were able to raise a lot of money last year, $6 million, and we're raising more now to add to this campaign. But we're fully funded and that hasn't happened in a long time. Liberals haven't raised this kind of money in many, many years, probably since they were government under Dalton [McGuinty]. We’ve had the opportunity to speak to people, small towns, rural towns, northern towns, and go to the Francophone areas as well just to build that back up.
I have a reputation that precedes me. Everyone knew that I had been mayor and had heard of me in the GTA. But I wondered how far reaching my name recognition was. When we were on tour and we were going up to Timmins, we stopped in a small town called Chapleau, which has about 1,200 people, and when we walked into the town pub and there was a woman wiping a plate and she looks up and says, ‘What's the mayor of Mississauga doing here?’ It was shocking, up in Chapleau, that she actually knew who I was.
I plan to challenge [the PC] record. They're not new and they've had seven years to fulfill the promises and the pledges that they've made. They said they'd end hallway medicine. It's worse. They didn't get it done. They said they'd cut taxes — the same tax cut pledge I made — to cut middle income taxes by 75,000 and less by 22 percent. They made that pledge. They didn't get it done. They said they'd build 1.5 million homes. Home building here is a drag on the national average of building. They didn't get it done.
You vow to fix healthcare in Ontario and match every resident with a family doctor over the next four years. What is your strategy?
The most poignant number for me is the fact that two and a half million people don't have a family doctor, and that's shameful. Doctors are aging out. We're not training them fast enough, so three million more people are in jeopardy of losing their family doctor. We need to bring more people who are trained abroad. To do that, we're going to double residency spaces. We're going to get them through Practice Ready Ontario, the mentorship program. We're going to put more money aside to properly compensate family doctors.
We have a plan that's going to be $3 billion to attract, retrain and retain family doctors, and incentivize them to go to the lesser served areas, Francophone areas where it's necessary if they have French language skills, and incentivize them to stay beyond retirement a few years until we can get more in the system and come back to family medicine.
We're going to take away fax machines. Only doctors still use them and I think pharmacies have to have them because doctors use them. We're going to eliminate that. We're going to implement a centralized referral system. We have really concrete plans of making sure people have access to family medicine.
So you want to move away from privatization in the healthcare system?
We're all about investing more in the public health care system, not privatized investment. I would figure out how to roll that back if [the PCs] do more of it.
For Mississauga’s new hospital would your government cover the $450 million gap City Hall was asked to pay?
As a former mayor, I know how acutely that is punitive for cities because that number could be very large. We know it's $450 million. That’s a lost opportunity cost. That money could be invested in city priorities. All cities will have infrastructure deficits. It could go into building infrastructure. It could go into a new community center. That money is needed. It's not a municipal responsibility to be contributing to a hospital. So that is something I’m going to look very closely at.
I know that commitment to build a new community hub, a new hospital, a new health care hub, is vitally important to your city for the reasons of investment and setting yourself up for growth and prosperity. But at the same time, it's not their responsibility. Why is it being done? It's another form of downloading onto municipalities. They have their own priorities to be investing in.
[Ford’s] made the commitment for the hospital, made the commitment for the downtown loop, made the commitment for all-day-two-way Go Train service on the Kitchener Line, so there are a lot of things he's promised, but he hasn't delivered. But this one, that's something I have to look very closely at, because I know how onerous that will be for the city, and it comes at the price of their own priorities. That money could be towards a new community center or road maintenance, whatever their priorities are.
You're just giving money that's otherwise the responsibility of the province. Again, I see it as more downloading to the cities.
Why would you be a better leader for Ontario’s municipalities?
It's just a big encroachment into authority that is not his own domain. We know what provincial responsibilities are, and he has always liked to meddle. Even the bike lanes, let the municipalities decide. And now he's going to take them out at his expense at $45 million; a provincial fund was used to put them in. It’s a waste of money because he feels he has to encroach.
All the housing legislation, one repealed the other. And I was that person, as the former chair of the Ontario Big City Mayors, who was always standing up and saying there are unintended consequences on municipalities. This is more downloading. This is gouging our revenue stream. We too are going to remove development charges but I have a fund to make the cities whole; there was never that component. It was always ‘if you build housing, you'll get that money, and we'll give you a bonus if you do’ and it's like, ‘no, we don't need a bonus, we just need to know we're going to be made whole.’ You can't do that. So there was always the encroachment into what I consider municipal authority and it’s one of many reasons that I ran for leadership.
The one that really hits my heart is the homelessness, mental health and addiction issues that've been completely downloaded onto the cities without a provincial strategy. Then it's siloed, because sometimes money comes from health and sometimes it comes from somewhere else, but it's not on the back of the property taxpayer. It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be up to mayors and reeves and councillors to be building shelters and to be building supportive housing with wraparound services or tiny homes or modular homes, they're filling a gap. That's just not right. It's not the responsibility of municipal government, yet they're the ones that see it on their streets; the encampments, the homelessness, the mental health, the addiction issues, the overdoses. So they started trying to address it themselves because there was no strategy and no funding.
I've worked with these mayors, they're trying all kinds of things because there's a void of leadership. They're ignoring it, and they're shutting down the safe consumption sites. They're putting in the HART hubs. But they're not enough, and you need supportive housing with wraparound services but where’s the provincial strategy?
How would you help municipalities?
A plan for supportive housing with wraparound services, much like these providers are doing everywhere. Belleville created a crisis because they needed detox beds. They asked for $2 million. They never got it.
Would you repeal strong mayor powers?
I'm going to look at it. I never favoured it. I came back and brought back a motion on the four Plexus as of right. But it passed eight to four. I didn't need to. I don't think mayors need it. I don't think they want it. I can see across the province how it's been used, mostly for termination purposes. I've seen the examples. I'm not comfortable with that.
The only thing that gives me pause, because I don't think they're needed, is there were some mayors across the province that said, ‘Bonnie, we have dysfunctional councils.’ We’ve seen it in Pickering and there are some others where there's a small group that are always kind of trying to be disruptive or oppose the mayor's platform, and in those cases, it's good, because if you want to be mayor and run for mayor, run for mayor, not try to obstruct on the council. So they said there are times where you have some obstruction that it's helpful to have. So I need to balance that. But on the whole, I don't like what I've seen.
I never thought it was necessary. I used it for the purpose it was designed to be used, which is to build housing. And it didn't even need it at the end of the day because it was going to pass.
Readers are concerned that your campaign isn't connecting with people. Is that a problem of our media landscape or something else?
I actually haven't heard that. I think we have pretty good engagement. I'm a very accessible person. I'm very personable. People come up to me and hug me and take selfies with me everywhere I go. So I haven't really heard that. I think the message is really resonating: the fact that we're going to get you a family doctor. We're here for the basics. I see it getting through. I mean, our numbers have always been stronger than the other opposition parties, and the polls are all over the place. But I really feel the sense of momentum, so I don't feel that that's the case.
[When the snap election was called] we were building out and announcing our platform. Fortunately, we had always already talked about our health care commitments, we talked about our tax commitments, our affordability commitments and housing. We have gotten the major pillars out, thankfully. Did we flesh it all out completely and have it costed yet? (because everyone's saying it's not costed); it will be.
Doug Ford tries to frame you as someone who lives a wealthy lifestyle and raised Mississauga’s taxes exorbitantly.
People know me in Mississauga and I know that I'm personable. I worked hard for everything I've achieved, so maybe I've had some success. Isn't that what we want for the Canadian dream, that newcomers come to this country? My parents and grandparents did. Growing up we lived in a rooming house, and my dad left my mom because he had addiction issues. I was able to put myself through school and get great jobs and work hard and attain something, and that's not something I'm ashamed of. It's something I'm proud of. I don't quite understand what the messaging is there? What is he trying to say? Is it bad to be successful?
Some of the allegations are lies. I don't have a $5 million house in the Hamptons. I don't have a fancy sports car. I've been a passenger in one. But the framing is all a lie, and why? What does that say about them, trying to paint a picture of me that's a lie to people?
People know me. They know that I'm the child of Polish immigrants and I had a very typical upbringing of immigrants. We lived in the area that was predominantly Polish, going to the Polish church and going to the Polish butcher shops and didn't travel. We didn't have a car, we rode the street car, and didn't have vacations and didn't go for dinners. My mom remarried when I was 10, and we left my grandparents' rooming house and we moved to Etobicoke. So I grew up in Etobicoke, and I went to high school Etobicoke. From there I went on to university and worked hard and did pretty well but back then, when you worked hard and got a good education you could get ahead. You could buy a house. If you and your partner both work you were doing okay, it's not true anymore, not in Doug Ford's Ontario, for sure. So the framing, it's false. It's absolutely false.
Are you committed to cancelling the 413 Highway?
Mississauga council was the first to pass a motion opposing it, and then we took it to Peel Regional (council) and got it passed twice. I know the Mayor of Brampton doesn't support it anymore. I am consistent that I never saw the need for it, because there were other alternatives like truck only lanes on the 407 and expanding the 427. I know how this government operates and we saw some of the contracts at Ontario Place and all the penalties that are involved with cancellations down the road. What if they do that on the 413?
I would like to fight it, yes, because it's unnecessary, but if it's far enough down the road, maybe we wouldn't be able to. We will fight as long as we can, because we don't agree with it. I don't agree with it ideologically, philosophically, paving all over that meadowland and farms. We’ve got to protect farms.
Earlier this year, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance asked all parties to finally commit to changes the PCs have failed to make. Will you commit to the plan?
We are doubling ODSP and phasing it in over two years. With the OW, there is a component of employment insurance with the federal government. So we're going to look at this first. One thing at a time, I don’t want to over commit. I think there are other parties that are making lots and lots of announcements that are very large.
Editor’s note: Since this interview was conducted, the Ontario Liberal Party has committed to the AODA Alliance’s Accessible Ontario Pledge, which lays out a strategy with specific action items and deadlines for improving accessibility in the province.
Brampton needs funding for the Peel Memorial expansion to create a second hospital in the city. Would you include it in your first budget if elected?
Right away. It’s overdue. Again, notwithstanding the mayor’s endorsement (Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown) of (Doug Ford), he made this announcement seven years ago and still hasn’t delivered. This is a commitment I would honour, of course, and get it done right away. It’s critical. Brampton needs more hospital beds. They need a third hospital. I think William Osler was built too small. We need those beds.
What are your plans for education? We haven't heard too much about the file, including special education.
It's a pretty key part of our plan as well. In April I gave that speech to the Empire Club of Canada. It was all about education being the foundation of our economy and how we have to train our kids for the jobs of tomorrow, and we have to invest in our colleges and universities to the same degree that other provinces do because the operating funding they're receiving is only up to 30 percent and other provinces are 60 percent. For instance, we see them closing departments and laying off or people laying off professors, that can't happen.
Also in our elementary schools, we have to invest in education and educators because classrooms are overcrowded. Kids can't learn that way. There aren't enough special education teachers, and they're not coming into work because, let's be honest, they're not well compensated. It's difficult work. It can be violent, and that has to change. The children who need the support need to have it in the classroom.
We have teachers unions here supporting us and helping because they know that it's a big part of what we're going to do. I believe, personally, that we’ve got to train our kids for the jobs of tomorrow, and to do that in our skills training is great, and I believe in that too, but I believe in critical thinking too in colleges and universities. But it starts with the little ones and the atmosphere is different in school classrooms now, and the classrooms are way too overcrowded. Special ed teachers aren't there, and we need that. The crumbling infrastructure as well has to be addressed.
Paige Peacock is a Local Journalism Initiative Reporter based at The Pointer.