For an hour yesterday, Queen's Park was exactly the way Dalton McGuinty's Liberals like it: excruciatingly boring. Speeches from the Throne, by nature short on specifics and long on rhetoric, are inherently unexciting. But this one, clocking in at nearly an hour, was more painful than most.
Outside of a touching tribute to late environmentalist Bob Hunter in the form of a park in his name, this was effectively a 23-page progress report. Policies that would actually generate any sort of buzz amounted to an "alternative secondary school diploma," which is intriguing, and a money-back guarantee on government services, which is plain gimmicky. Otherwise, the Liberals were mostly just interested in informing us of all the wonderful things that will come out of their longstanding policies. Throw in Lieutenant-Governor James Bartleman's monotone delivery, and it's small wonder that former premier David Peterson - seated as a guest in the middle of the legislature floor - appeared to be fighting a valiant battle to keep his eyes open.
But putting us to sleep is not something that Mr. McGuinty's Liberals do by accident. Recognizing that Ontarians ultimately grew weary of the in-your-face style of government favoured by the Tories under Mike Harris and Ernie Eves, the Grits have resisted nearly every temptation to court attention. With the exception of the controversial health care "premium" in last year's budget, this is a government that is determinedly inoffensive, favouring long-term, gradually implemented structural changes over anything flashy. When any minister dares to press a hot button that generates telephone calls to their constituency offices - as Attorney-General Michael Bryant did with his anti-pit bull crusade - Liberal MPPs get antsy.
One can only assume, then, that some of them had a knot in their stomach even as they clapped their hands during the one noteworthy unscripted moment of yesterday's address. As Mr. Bartleman announced that the province's deficit had been reduced to $1.6-billion from a reported $5.6-billion, the Liberals at first appeared to be applauding themselves. After a few seconds, it became clear that they were instead applauding Greg Sorbara's performance as finance minister. But it was a slightly uncomfortable salute, all the more so when Mr. Sorbara rose from his new backbench seat to acknowledge them - mostly because it was a reminder of the headaches awaiting the Grits outside the legislature's doors.
Forty-eight hours ago, the Liberals were right where they wanted to be. In other words, few Ontarians remembered they existed. Quietly going about their business, they were set to launch the second half of their mandate by picking up where they'd left off the previous spring - gradually moving health care, education and infrastructure in directions that would probably seem significant down the road, but wouldn't ruffle any feathers in the short term. Unfortunately, courtesy of Mr. Sorbara's woes, Ontarians are now paying attention.
Nothing wakes up a snoozing public quite like the whiff of scandal. And while the Sorbara story per se probably won't have legs (vague allegations surrounding a former minister's business dealings prior to government aren't all that relevant), all eyes will be on how Mr. McGuinty's government recovers from it.
Even if no wrongdoing has been proven, the Liberals have lost some of their squeaky-clean shine. They've lost their most senior minister, who also happened to be slated to chair their re-election campaign. And not only will Mr. Sorbara's replacement, Dwight Duncan, be taking a crash course in Finance just as the province's fiscal situation seemed to be sorting itself out; his move will leave a rookie minister, Donna Cansfield, in charge of Energy, the biggest minefield of any government department.
Yesterday, the Liberals were in full business-as-usual mode - visibly "a little sad," as Mr. Duncan put it, but acting as nonchalant about the whole thing as humanly possible. But with the opposition smelling blood, they know they'll need a flawless couple of weeks to take the heat off.
"I distinguish the interesting from the important," the Premier told reporters following yesterday's address, clearly favouring the latter. He might have been speaking about his government's modus operandi. But considering he was instead attempting to brush off reporters' incessant questions about Mr. Sorbara, matters are clearly more interesting than he'd like.
