Reprinted with the permission of the author.
Funding priorities mixed up
Funding priorities mixed up
By Leonard Baak, The Windsor Star February 10, 2010
Re: Don't outsource to private providers, by Andrea Horwath, Feb. 5.
Let's save municipal child care, says Andrea Horwath, Ontario NDP leader. Wonderful idea, but does she have any
creative and imaginative ways to pay for it?
I guess no one has told her that Ontario has a $25-billion deficit and a debt that will soon top $200 billion. Ontario pays over $10
billion a year in interest, sure to rise when interest rates rebound from historic lows.
Here's an idea for her. How about we eliminate the enormously wasteful duplication in our school system? Oops, I forgot, her party's Education Funding Task Force is allowed to consider everything, except that.
Wake up, Ms. Horwath. Ontario's budget crisis means a lot of tough either/or choices lie ahead. One choice should be easy. Catholic school funding is far less important to most Ontarians than the health care, elderly care, child care, and education sectors that will face the axe instead.
Polls conducted during the 2007 election indicated that most Ontarians want Catholic school funding eliminated. It is time for politicians, even ones like Ms. Horwath, to listen. It is immoral to cut essential services that contribute to the well-being of all Ontarians while continuing to fund a non-essential service for a favoured few.
LEONARD BAAK, president, Education Equality in Ontario, Stittsville, Ont.
By Leonard Baak, The Windsor Star February 10, 2010
Re: Don't outsource to private providers, by Andrea Horwath, Feb. 5.
Let's save municipal child care, says Andrea Horwath, Ontario NDP leader. Wonderful idea, but does she have any
creative and imaginative ways to pay for it?
I guess no one has told her that Ontario has a $25-billion deficit and a debt that will soon top $200 billion. Ontario pays over $10
billion a year in interest, sure to rise when interest rates rebound from historic lows.
Here's an idea for her. How about we eliminate the enormously wasteful duplication in our school system? Oops, I forgot, her party's Education Funding Task Force is allowed to consider everything, except that.
Wake up, Ms. Horwath. Ontario's budget crisis means a lot of tough either/or choices lie ahead. One choice should be easy. Catholic school funding is far less important to most Ontarians than the health care, elderly care, child care, and education sectors that will face the axe instead.
Polls conducted during the 2007 election indicated that most Ontarians want Catholic school funding eliminated. It is time for politicians, even ones like Ms. Horwath, to listen. It is immoral to cut essential services that contribute to the well-being of all Ontarians while continuing to fund a non-essential service for a favoured few.
LEONARD BAAK, president, Education Equality in Ontario, Stittsville, Ont.