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Liberals can't be trusted to do Hydro One sale right

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TORONTO

Now we know what it feels like to have our assets whupped.

Yep, Premier Kathleen Wynne revealed Thursday this province will sell off 60% of Hydro One — the giant utility that owns the transmission system in Ontario.

And, oh, by the way, we’ll be able to buy beer in the grocery store.

And, oh, by the way, the price of beer is going up.

The province’s privatization guru, former TD Bank CEO Ed Clark, revealed details of his report Thursday on how to cash in on billions of dollars worth of Crown assets.

Oddly enough, when it comes to liquor, the province hasn’t touched the asset it owns — the LCBO. What it did was open up the asset it doesn’t own — the Beer Store — for competition.

The government will allow 450 grocery stores to sell beer in direct competition to the 450 Beer Stores already in existence.

And while Hydro One isn’t as sexy, by far the biggest part of Thursday’s announcement was the sale of the giant utility at fire sale prices. It’s worth $9 billion. It owes $5 billion — so the government will only net $4 billion.

Clark said the government will have an Initial Public Offering (IPO) of Hydro One and incrementally will sell off up to 60% of it. In his preliminary report last October, he specifically said the government would not have an IPO on Hydro One because he didn’t want Bay St. financiers cleaning up.

So now they’re handing over this massive asset for the Liberals to sell. Yes, this is the same Liberal Party that negotiated the Ornge air ambulance privatization boondoggle. Yes, this is the same Liberal Party that scrapped two gas plants being built by the private sector. Taxpayers got a $1-billion bill for that — and the companies building the plants made out very nicely, thank you.

What chance is there that taxpayers are going to see value for money this time?

“It’s a joke to think the Liberals have any ability whatsoever to do right by the people of Ontario in this deal,” said NDP Leader Andrea Horwath.

“They haven’t done right by the people of Ontario yet when they cook up these harebrained schemes.”

Horwath had the best line of the day when she commented we’ll have more access to beer, but we won’t be able to keep it cold because we won’t be able to afford the electricity.

Look, Hydro One is a bloated, out-of-control monstrosity that deserves to be sold off.

The way it screwed up its billing system, causing untold hardship to thousands of homeowners, is a disgrace. The only way to knock any sense into it is to have the private sector take over.

They can bring accountability in staffing, salaries and pensions.

But we need more than a wing and a prayer that this will be done on the up and up.

We need guarantees taxpayers won’t once again get taken for a ride by a bunch of well-heeled Liberal insiders. We need to know this isn’t going to turn into a windfall profit for friends of friends. We need assurances this isn’t going to end up in the laps of the OPP fraud squad.

We need those guarantees because the Liberal track record has been that the lucky few are enriched at the expense of the many.

That’s got to stop.

I asked Wynne what she’s going to do to ensure taxpayers don’t get taken to the cleaners again.

“We’ve made sure that the protections that need to be in place are in place and that this new company will be one that will perform in the best interest of the people of the province by retaining ownership, by having the regulatory system in place, by having the price controls in place that we know will protect people,” she said.

Well, that sounds warm and fuzzy.

I’ll believe it when I see it.

christina.blizzard@sunmedia.ca

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