Doug Ford's Latest Hits

Doug craning his neck to watch our cost-of-living soar beyond what was previously thought possible. Copyright: King's Printer for Ontario, 2026

Just over a year's gone by since Doug and his PCs were elected for the third time. Since then, our premier has continued to work tirelessly to protect Ontario.

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Give that strip club owner $10 million

Since the pandemic, our province has given grants to support training and hiring programs for workers via a program called the Skills Development Fund. The idea behind it is admirable: unemployment is high and jobs remain under threat from American tariffs.

Unfortunately, like with any good idea Doug touches, the execution has been awful.

Last October, Auditor General Shelley Spence released a report that concluded the SDF's selection process wasn't "fair, transparent, or accountable." I mean, did anyone expect it to be? Unlike similar programs in other provinces, Ontario allows the Minister of Labour's Office (aka political staffers) to select which applicants get funding and how much they'll receive.

According to the report:

• $742 million of taxpayer money was doled out to organizations rated as poor, low, or medium against selection criteria by non-partisan bureaucrats.

• In the first two years of the SDF's existence, the Minister's Office didn't bother explaining why they'd chosen any of the organizations they'd funded (because everyone knows how little the public cares about where hundreds of millions of our dollars are going).

• During the 2022-23 round, someone applied to train a single person, who was, at it turns out, that applicant. But the application was promptly rejected. Nah, I'm kidding - it was selected.

But most damning of all is a finding by independent news outlet The Trillium regarding the Ministry under David Piccini, who Doug appointed in late 2023 and who remains minister to this day. Since then, out of the $224 million in SDF funding earmarked to support for-profit businesses, a staggering 80% has gone to organizations led by donors to the PC party. The Minister's Office keeps insisting that political donations or other ties to the PC party have no bearing on the selection process, but c'mon. We can put two and two together.

The SDF - a government program using our tax dollars, mind you - has also given money to a strip club owner.

Beginning in 2022, the Ministry has given $9.8 million to a non-profit called the Social Equality and Inclusion Centre. SEI says it "supports women re-entering the workforce." Its "training" and "employer" partners are two companies called Grand Bizarre and the Toronto Event Centre, both owned by entrepreneur Zlatko Starkovski.

Starkovski owns FYE Ultraclub too, which he denies being a strip club. This is despite reports of women working there being made to wear fishnets and bikini-thong bottoms (sometimes without tops), descriptions of private rooms available for $400, and first-hand accounts that lap dances are on offer. Instead, Starkovski refers to the women working there as "performance artists" specializing in "burlesque and theatrical dance." Right.

Also important to note are the deep, long-standing connections between the PCs and Starkovski:

• In 2013, Starkovski supplied alcohol to two Ford Fest events.

• In 2022, the PCs paid Starkovski's Grand Bizarre $32,000 to hold a fundraiser at one of their venues.

• In 2023, Starkovski was part of a group called Ontario Live that Doug initially planned to award the food-and-beverage contract for Ontario Place to.

• That same year, the PC's chief campaign manager celebrated his wedding via Starkovski's Toronto Event Centre.

Doug, Starkovski, and the Labour Minister have all vehemently rejected claims of wrongdoing. We'll just have to see what the Integrity Commissioner's ongoing investigation into the whole affair will conclude.

We're out of money, by the way

This February, Doug decided to celebrate another year in office by taking a sledgehammer to OSAP. His government slashed grants from up to 85% to just 25% of a student's potential funding and replaced the rest with loans.

Doug claimed that the old system was no longer financially sustainable. He also ranted against students taking what he called "basket-weaving courses" and said that plenty of people were using their OSAP funds to buy "fancy watches" and "cologne". Ignore the fact that a Toronto Star investigation later discovered that out of the $2 billion OSAP distributed for the 2024-2025 fiscal year, only 0.4% of that was wrongly allocated because of false info or other discrepancies.

But it gets worse. Doug, ever the champion of fiscal responsibility, is the same man looking to build:

• An $18 billion highway that'll save commuters 30 seconds each trip,

• A $650 million privately-operated luxury spa,

• A new $1.4 billion science centre smaller than the original, and

• A $100 billion tunnel under the 401 that no one asked for.

Again, in the last fiscal year, OSAP distributed a grand total of just $2 billion.

Would it kill Doug to actually listen to the thousands of students protesting this disastrous change? Ask them if they'd rather have their OSAP back or a vanity tunnel to nowhere, or perhaps a mega-spa. It is absolutely vile that a government claiming to be "for the people" would turn around and spit in the face of the people's next generation.

It takes a different kind of man to strip funding from the school supplies, groceries, and tuition of low-income students. They should've been better-connected with the PCs, I guess.

But I really want a private jet

A solid three months after gutting OSAP and blaming it on empty government coffers, Doug spent $28.9 million in taxpayer funds on a private jet for the premier's office.

It had apparently taken months of planning for his government to buy the jet, during which time no one managed to notice that it could only be used at 10% of Ontario's airports. Which, I mean, incredible job.

What pisses me off the most about this is that this purchase was made in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. 78% of Ontarians say that they're financially stressed from rising expenses. 68% say they're experiencing "financial whiplash". Almost half of all Canadians say they're living paycheque to paycheque. Everyday life grows more and more unaffordable for the rest of us, but Doug evidently has better things to care about - he's out here daydreaming about soaring through the skies in his very own jet, living out his fantasies of being a billionaire.

It's worth noting, I think, to point out the fact that every other Canadian premier mostly flies commercial, and whenever they do fly private, it's only on chartered flights.

It's also worth nothing that Doug already has access to not one, not two, but three OPP planes.

After getting rightfully slammed by the public, Doug reluctantly did a 180 and sold the jet straight back to Bombardier. Unfortunately, although it was sold back at the initial buying price, taxpayers are still on the hook for $190,000 in non-refundable expenses like aircraft management and legal counsel. Imagine what a shelter or a food bank could've done with that money. Way to go, Doug.

I'm doing a fantastic job

Nothing says everything's going to plan like insisting it to everyone you meet.

According to a December 2025 report by Auditor General Shelley Spence, Doug's government spent an eyewatering $112 million purely on ads in the last fiscal year. Of that, $43 million - almost 40% - was devoted to ads meant to foster a "positive impression" of the PCs. Doug has also refused to divulge the cost of the current round of ads, so I guess we'll only find out about that in Spence's next report.

Every time I turn on the radio in my car, I hear a dramatic voiceover talk about "investments in nuclear energy" or "diversifying our economy" over heroic music. There is not a single universe where this is a better use of over a hundred million taxpayer dollars than funding schools, hospitals, or literally anything else. The sole purpose of these ads is to gaslight us into thinking everything in Ontario is rainbows and unicorns when no the hell it isn't.

Doug has tried defending himself by arguing it's "important people understand how their money is being spent." If he cared half as much as he claims he does about our taxpayer dollars, he'd pull these ridiculous pieces of propaganda off the airwaves and never look back.

Shred everything

Tucked away within the 2026 spring budget was a measure that would exempt the premier, cabinet ministers, and their offices from releasing information under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. It would be retroactive, applying all the way back to 1988. After being fast-forwarded through the legislature and without public hearings, the budget - and thus this new law - was passed in April.

Now, Doug won't have to release any of the 219 records of meetings related to the Greenbelt held between government officials and lobbyists or developers. He also won't be forced to release documents that may have shone a light on the Ministry of Health's latest round of potential funding cuts.

Doug has repeatedly claimed that this law is simply bringing Ontario in line with how other Canadian jurisdictions handle FOI requests. But that's just blatantly false. According to Patricia Kosseim, the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario, our pre-budget FOI measures were consistent with those of the federal government and most other provinces. There were also already comprehensive exclusions for personal and confidential information.

The provincial Finance Minister even had the audacity to say that he's "proud" that the government is "listening to the people of Ontario." A poll found that only 24% of Ontarians support the FOI changes, by the way. Listen harder.

Shame on the PC MPPs - including my very own Sheref Sabawy - who voted for this bill, who claim to represent their constituents but instead plug their ears, swallow their conscience, and quietly follow Doug to hell and back. This is a slap in the face to democracy and does nothing but destroy trust, transparency, and accountability in government. It's disgusting.

Now that we've been blinded to the happenings of the government, there's only a single question left to ask: what does Doug have planned for us next?