February 6, 2025
Ontario Liberals show they're still all about heavily progressive virtue-signalling
There is an opportunity for the Liberals to run as a sensible party of the middle, but that seems unlikely.
There is an opportunity for the Liberals to run as a sensible party of the middle, but that seems unlikely.

It has taken more than two years, but the beleaguered Ontario Liberal Party has finally done something worth talking about. Normally, a party’s nomination rules would represent the ultimate in insider politics. But the Liberals’ newly announced plans are a timely reminder that they are still the party of heavy virtue-signalling.

The Liberals say their goal is to produce “the most inclusive team of candidates in Ontario history,” and to that end, the party will be nominating candidates by giving special advantages to women and young people, and providing enthusiastic outreach to potential candidates who are Black, Indigenous or LGBTQ. Leader Steven Del Duca has promised that at least half of the Liberal candidates in 2022 will be women, and 30 of the overall group will be people under 30 years old.

The commitment to women is so strong that the party is willing to declare some nomination races open to women only. It’s a move that would seem somewhat less hypocritical had the Liberal membership not just chosen a middle-aged white guy to lead the party, rejecting five other candidates, each of whom fit the Liberals’ desired profile, being either women, non-white, or both.

Presumably, Del Duca’s first-ballot victory signified that Liberal members thought he was the best person for the job, despite his apparent gender, race and age handicaps (he’s 46 years old). Finding the best person for the job also seems to have been the standard when Liberals chose Kathleen Wynne as their leader.

It’s disappointing to see a party whose last leader, Wynne, proudly became the province’s first female premier now resorting to a patronizing quota system for women. As a further boost, female nomination candidates will only pay half of the Liberals’ standard $2,500 application fee for potential nominees. Does anyone think $1,250 is a major barrier to getting more women into politics?

[…]

See Also:

(1) Court rules that Ontario mental-health program amounted to assault

(2) Blue Jays need to prove they can stay safe at camp to remain in T.O. for regular season

(3) Under 5 years for man claiming he was provoked into killing stranger

(4) Hordes spend Canada Day at Wasaga Beach, Niagara Falls

(5) Day of Rage hits Toronto Saturday