TORONTO – On October 6, Ontario voters will head to the polls. And the question on many minds’ is, how much influence will Toronto’s controversial mayor have over the outcome of the election?
Rob Ford stormed to victory in Toronto’s October 2010 mayoral election on a message of shaking up City Hall, respecting taxpayers, and “stopping the gravy train.”
Ford won the election with 47 per cent of the vote. His margin of victory as an incoming mayor was the highest in the city’s post-amalgamation history.
Earlier this year, he threatened to unleash “Ford Nation” – an unofficial league of staunch Ford supporters – on Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty.
“If he’s not helping out the city then I have no choice but to work against him,” said Ford.
At the time, the threat held clout. Ford took City Hall with an approval rating of 70 per cent.
However, in the months since, Ford’s star status has waned. Now sitting at a 45 per cent approval rating, questions arise over just how powerful Ford Nation is.
“Where is this Ford Nation?” asks University of Toronto professor Nelson Wiseman. “It’s down to the size of a tiny clan.”
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Wiseman says the power Ford has over voters outside of Toronto has been widely overblown. “Rob Ford will have virtually no effect on this election,” says Wiseman.
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The assumption being made is that municipal politics will spill over into the provincial election, something Wiseman says is simply not the case. “No one in the province is talking about transit in Toronto…or the garbage strike in Toronto,” says Wiseman.
While is it beneficial to each provincial party leader to appear cooperative with Ford, Wiseman says none of the parties will benefit from teaming up with Ford during the election. “Ford has been fumbling, stumbling, bumbling,” he says.
In recent weeks, the mayor has been accused by local councillors for making “backroom deals” with his brother, Councillor Doug Ford, including the decision not to bid for the 2020 Olympic Summer Games.
The Ford brothers received considerable criticism from thousands of Toronto residents after toying with the idea of closing branches of the Toronto Public Library in order to close a $774 million budget gap.
And on Monday, Ford backer, Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti, told the Globe and Mail he does not support the cut and burn mentality at City Hall.
Fishing buddies
Despite Ford’s stumbling as of late, his endorsement could still pack a punch. “People who say an endorsement by Rob Ford is a bad thing didn’t vote for Rob Ford,” says Will Stewart, Principle at Navigator, a public affairs and communications firm in Toronto.
The mayor and his brother Doug continue to hold sway with a number of GTA voters, specifically in Etobicoke and Scarborough. And Ford’s fan-base reaches beyond the greater Toronto borders.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has credited Ford’s endorsement with helping him secure crucial seats in the GTA during this year’s federal election, paving the way to a Conservative majority government.
Let’s play ball
In the past few weeks, Ford has held cordial meetings with McGuinty, Hudak, and Ontario’s NDP leader Andrea Horwath, proposing to each of them the same funding request for the Sheppard subway line extension – and each time receiving a similar reply, that it would be taken into consideration.
Ford is looking for $650 million from the provincial government to help bankroll the subway project. The mayor has also asked for
additional funds for daycare spaces and approval to sell 900 social-housing units.
Early on in campaigning, no party has seemed eager to hitch themselves to the Ford wagon. And although Ford has yet to endorse a candidate, it is widely expected that he will back Hudak. On September 2, Hudak attended a Ford family BBQ, where the two discussed the subway project in private before mingling with guests.
“Rob Ford’s endorsement can only benefit Tim Hudak,” says Stewart.
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