Ontario Premier Doug Ford speaks to the media following a cabinet shuffle at Queen's Park on Thursday, June 20, 2019.Tijana Martin/The Canadian Press
Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Try to keep letters to fewer than 150 words. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com
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Booed in Ontario
Re Ford Shakes Up Cabinet Amid Backlash Over Cuts (June 21): Like the emperor who executes his retainers for his own unpopularity, Premier Doug Ford makes a wholesale cabinet shuffle after being booed repeatedly in public.
Just one cabinet position needs to change; Mr. Ford only needs to look in a mirror to identify it.
John Edmond, Ottawa
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In times of great stress, great men find solutions.
In 1940, Winston Churchill formed a War Cabinet to see Britain through its darkest days. It had five members.
Obviously, Ontario’s problems are somewhat greater: a 21-person cabinet – and four new trade advisers.
A. S. Brown, Kingston
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Doug Ford’s pro-business mantra apparently does not include Ontario’s struggling tourism industry. On entering Ontario from Manitoba on the Trans-Canada highway, travellers are greeted with a huge “Open for Business” sign immediately in front of an Ontario Tourism facility – that was closed to visitors late in the morning, and during the third week in June at that.
A grumpy construction worker was, however, on hand to advise visitors that even the washrooms on site were closed “for cleaning,” but he did helpfully point to the nearby woods.
Open for business indeed!
Terry Downey, Calgary
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When last year’s election results came in, those of us who viewed them with dismay thought “well, at least there will be some adults in the room to control this man.”
Now it appears that they have failed and have been demoted – perhaps for the attempt, perhaps for annoying the Premier’s chief of staff, Dean French, perhaps for being competitors for leadership, who knows?
In any case, what now?
Perry Bowker, Burlington, Ont.
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I see premier Dean French has been busy again (Ford Gives Appointments To Insiders, Lacrosse Player With Ties To Chief Of Staff, June 21).
Just wondering: Do we know the lacross aptitude of the demoted cabinet members?
Amalie Rogers, Edmonton
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Changing the messengers does not change the unpopular message.
Doug Green, Toronto
Call the architecture police. A national icon deserves better
Re Who Can Save The Château Laurier From An Eyesore Addition? (June 20): The Château Laurier is not only an Ottawa landmark. In many ways, it belongs to the country. It is one of those grand hotels which has a Titanic connection. It has political connections – not only named after a prime minister, but witness to many political milestones.
Karsh had his photography studio there for years. CBC Radio broadcast out of there. Movie stars and rock stars have stayed there.
Trying to put a mustache on the Mona Lisa with this new addition is nonsense – but we live in a nonsensical era. Letting a small group (Ottawa’s City Council) decide on this is an affront to democracy. Either a higher power (i.e. the federal government) has to step in, or there should be a referendum on this architectural decision. Architecture defines the look of cities, and this new addition is nothing more than a fancy parking garage. Someone, please, call the architecture police!
Douglas Cornish, Ottawa
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Good luck, Ottawa, with the proposed “giant toaster” addition to the iconic Château Laurier hotel. For a decade, Torontonians have endured the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal addition, pasted onto the acclaimed Royal Ontario Museum. It appears the great brains in Toronto wanted to make a statement. They certainly succeeded: The addition has been awarded a spot in the list of the World’s Top 10 Ugly Buildings.
Marty Cutler, Toronto
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What château needs a box dominating its fairy-tale silhouette? If the new air conditioner-like addition gets final approval, the Fairmont-owned Château Laurier should be delisted as a national historic site, since it would no longer merit the “château” term.
It could keep the F-word and be renamed “Fairmont Fake Air Conditioner” or “Fairmont Faulty Towers.” Tourists’ photos from the Rideau Canal could then capture the magnificent towers of Parliament and the old Château Laurier – plus a neon-lit “Fairmont” sign atop the giant box!
Jean Duce Palmer, Ottawa
Ready, aim, legislate
Re Conservatives Decry Liberal Pledge To Ban Assault Weapons (June 18): Reading this article sent chills down my spine. Before I read it, I didn’t know there was a Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights. In my ignorance, I thought that the American NRA was an odious aberration that existed only south of the border.
That we have a group here in Canada that believes assault weapons, restricted or not, are something the common citizen should have a right to own rings a very loud alarm bell. Let moral sanity reign in Canada: Ban all assault weapons.
Susanna Uchatius, Burnaby, B.C.
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In the past three years, more than 11,000 Canadians have died from drug overdoses, mainly opioids. How many have died from gun violence in the same period?
Rather than impose new gun restrictions that really will only affect law-abiding citizens, and not the criminals who should be targeted, why doesn’t the government enact legislation that might actually make a difference? A minimum sentence of 25 years for anyone committing a crime with a handgun or semi-automatic, assault-style weapon, and the same sentence for individuals selling or distributing an opioid or any other drug that could result in an overdose, fatal or otherwise.
Gerald MacKinnon, Sarnia, Ont.
Oh dear, oh deer
Re Deer Invaders (letters, June 17): Having enjoyed a brief 15 years in lovely Victoria, we, too, had a garden that was Garden Club-tour worthy that sadly became a prime stop on the area’s then-developing free buffet for deer. What were once majestic rose gardens, shrubs aplenty, flower beds and luxuriant hostas were devoured to nothing over a three-year stretch. Deer, the charismatic megafauna of the suburbs, became resident and simply wouldn’t go away unless coerced.
The sad/funny part of this saga is that friends would bet on how long it would take me to make colourful remarks about “our” deer problem: Four minutes was the record, if I recall. Those who had never suffered the damage wrought by deer thought of them as adorable life-sized stuffies of the forest and why was I so mean?
After the inexorable march of the deer continued, and their gardens, too, were destroyed, opinions changed. We are left with two simple choices: Fence them out or change your garden to cactuses. Either way, no more deer.
Clay Atcheson, North Vancouver
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