EDITORIAL: No cajones !

It’s your money they are playing with!

Here we go again, another example of government ineptitude, narrow vision, and inadequate research, all at your expense, the taxpayer.

The Ontario government has announced a plan to combat auto theft. Every 48 minutes a vehicle is stolen in Ontario, between 2014 and 2021, there was a 72 percent increase in auto theft across the province, while there has been a 14 percent increase in the last year alone.

The province has announced a plan to tackle the issue:

  • $51 million over three years into a new multi-point plan that includes auto theft prosecution teams that will investigate and prosecute criminal organizations that profit from stolen vehicles;
  • $1.4 million over three years is to be dedicated to help stop the exporting of stolen vehicles;
  • $13.4 million is designated this year into the Guns and Gangs Violence Reduction Strategy which officials say will continue to target organized crime that fuels gang operations, such as vehicle theft rings;
  • the provincial government is looking at opportunities to further combat the issue by working with the Canada Border Services Agency, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and shipping container and rail companies.

The criticism of this government is that the policies are wrong, more accurately they are inadequate.

No accountability; no tracking of the results; no timelines for a follow-up.

Political puffery
Political leaders proudly puff themselves up with such boastful policies but none proposes any follow-up to see confirm their effectiveness, test their impact, monitor their effects, or scrutinize their results.

These politicians seem very satisfied with making their policy proposals as if these things will automatically bring success. They do not. If they supposedly do, prove it. Show it. Publish the results. These politicians cannot because they do not do follow-ups to confirm the results they expect and hope the public will believe will happen.

The above criticism is not naivete. It is confirmation of the rule: You can’t expect what you don’t inspect.”

Lack of backbone
As Latinos would say, “lack of cajones.” Politicians are quick to offer policy platitudes, make work policies, and band-aid solutions but they have no spine to put “their money where mouths are.” If they had backbones, they would attach accountability clauses to these policies, salary penalties to their salaries: if their proposed policies do not meet certain generous result levels, they would have their salaries reduced. If they operated with those accountability clauses, many political leaders would receive deficit salaries. Likely, even fewer people would run for office, or the ones who would, would do more carefully considered work. The current modus operandi for political leaders is to spend taxpayer money as if dipping into a bottomless pit with no personal consequences if they are wrong.

Should people express their dissatisfaction with tax increases without justification?

 

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