TheBulletin.ca Journal of Downtown Toronto
Frank Touby —
You’ve seen the type. A spoiled brat, youngest son of a rich family who was granted enviable freedoms and privileges by busy or lazy parents who’ve let him go his own way and supported him with money and inattentiveness.
That’s the likely upbringing—if you can call it such—that helped produce the trainwreck that is Rob Ford, Mayor of Toronto, crackhead, drunk, sudden and unaccustomed loser.
Some young people can take that blessing of a wealthy and liberating upbringing and ascend, leveraging their advantages to achieve great things. Not Robbie.
Mayor of Toronto may be the culmination of his life’s successes unless he shapes up
Now in utter disgrace, abandoned by those who once courted his favour, Robbie is still trying to uphold the highest position he’s ever held in his life and perhaps the last great success he may win.
Of course you can’t write off the reality that any human being can redeem him or herself and recover the essential decency and excellence smart people can muster and groom in themselves. So there’s a possibility that Robbie, an utterly self-indulgent fat slob with a better brain than he currently manifests, can do amazing things.
But whether Rob Ford will be able to make a comeback in Toronto isn’t up to him.
He has cursed his brand. Pissed in his soup.
His politics were the same dopey, rightwing litany of “save taxpayers money” and “stop the gravy train” without any of the sensitivity he would show people face to face.
He wouldn’t tell a poor individual he encounters to “go out and get a job” in a market where jobs just aren’t available. But he’ll say that into a microphone because he can’t relate the same way to the public as he does in person.
He’s an ideologue with a face-to-face conscience, but none in the actual practice of doing damage to people.
He’s Baby Huey in human form: A callow, naïve blubberbutt who’s learned too little about who he is and what he can get away with and still retain an audience that doesn’t get drunk with him or fucked up on dope.
Councillor Adam Vaughan: The last few days, the last few weeks, the last few months have seen this city plunged into an unbelievable situation. Unbelievable, but unfortunately real.
Rob Ford is oblivious to the damage he is doing to local government, the city and himself. It is clear that he has no shame, no intention of stepping aside or to listen to the many calls for him to get help.
My job is not to stage an intervention nor am I interested in how Ford is responding. My work — in fact our work — is to ensure the needs of Ward 20 and the city are being met.
Since November 13th, we have held a regular City Council meeting and three Special Meetings of Council. At all of these meetings we took steps to protect the integrity of our city government and address the behaviour of Rob Ford.
An overwhelming majority of City Council supported changes to sanction the Mayor:
Asking the Mayor to step aside and condemning his behaviour;
Amending the Procedural Bylaw to remove the Mayor’s power to appoint and remove Committee Chairs, and to act as an ex officio member of Council Committees;
To remove the Mayor’s powers in the event of an Emergency;
To reallocate a portion of the Mayor’s office budget, and place supervision, as well as control of the hiring, firing, and discipline of Mayor’s office staff, in the hands of the Deputy Mayor and City Clerk.
A formal request has also been filed by City Council to the Integrity Commissioner to investigate the Mayor’s conduct as it pertains to the Code of Conduct.
These actions taken by Council limit the damage Rob Ford can do to the City.
Ford’s record of failed leadership speaks for itself: including the sale of public housing, opposition to new investments in affordable housing, squandered transit investment, failure to invest in transportation infrastructure, service delivery, protecting and enhancing our waterfront and managing the city budget.
I also believe his behaviour has caused real damage in the lives of vulnerable people and communities in our city.
As the Prime Minister Stephen Harper visits Toronto today, the Toronto & York Region Labour Council calls on both the federal and provincial Conservative leaders to break their silence on the behaviour of disgraced Toronto Mayor Rob Ford.
“The silence is deafening from the ‘tough on crime’ guys like Harper and Hudak when it comes to their fellow Conservative Rob Ford” said Labour Council President John Cartwright. “Why haven’t the PC leaders distanced themselves from Ford brothers, particularly the Mayor who has been exposed as a compulsive liar and who consorts with drug dealers and gangsters?” Cartwright added, referring to the fact that the Conservatives are still clinging to Doug Ford as a possible provincial candidate.
Following the debacle at City Hall, politicians of all parties along with Ford Motor Company, CFRB and the Argonauts football team have dissociated themselves from the Fords. Even the Santa Claus parade has asked the Mayor to stay home on Sunday. But Harper and Hudak have yet to commit to help Torontonians clean up the mess that the Conservative political machine contributed to create.
“This is a clear double standard, with one rule for a millionaire for Etobicoke, and a different rule for racialized youth in our communities.” Said Andria Babbington, Vice-President of the Labour Council. “For the millionaire, these Conservatives say he needs help, but for the youth from our communities, the Conservatives demand jail time and zero tolerance.”
The Labour calls on Harper and Hudak to publicly repudiate the actions of Rob Ford.
Contact:
John Cartwright, President, Toronto and York Labour Council