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Questions We'd Like You and the Media to Ask:
By Anas Melhem, Director, Working Families Watch.
What if the so-called "Working Families" were to actually sit down with you and the media and be totally honest and transparent about who they are and what they really stand for? At Working Families Watch, we believe that the so-called Working Families would be giving an entirely different story were they had to be open and honest.
Working Families has been getting away with spinning the Media when interviewed. In order to help the public and the media hold this organization to account here is our list of questions we would like to see asked - plus my analysis of what the actual answers would be if they had to answer truthfully, plus a reality check of facts to put the response in context:
1. Question: Since your organization is massively involved in electioneering, it would seem reasonable that you parallel Ontario Election laws and declare publicly all your donations and expenses. Will you commit to publishing all donations and expenses to your organization in a timely manner? Where can a member of the public obtain this information?
Response: Even though Ontario's political parties have to declare all their donations and expenses, we do not have to because we are not subject to the same rules. Besides, if we published this stuff, you would see how much we just represent big unions and how few working families actually give us money.
Reality: The Working Families $5-million attack campaign will remain outside the same level of public scrutiny that is applied to political parties, and there is nothing the people of Ontario, nor institutions like Elections Ontario can do about it. The Working Families' high priced lawyers like Paul Cavalluzzo are making sure of it.
The spending limit in this election for each of the political parties is roughly $5-million, roughly the same as the Working Families campaign, showing what a massive and unfair impact this campaign is having.
2. Question: According to a June 15th Toronto Star Article, some 88 per cent of the funding for your organization is receiving is coming from unions affiliated with the organization that is also led by Working Families spokesperson Pat Dillon - The Provincial Building and Construction Trades Council of Ontario (Building Trades). Since the vast majority of the funding for your coalition is coming from essentially the same source, which is also the organization that you lead - why do you not just use your actual name when doing this advertising?
Response: Because if we did, then we would have to explain why we are not talking about construction issues and the people of Ontario we realize what a great deal the Building Trades are already getting from McGuinty.
Reality: The Provincial Building and Construction Trades Council of Ontario has something to hide from the people of Ontario and that is why it will not use its actual name in a campaign that it controls and funds. The fact is Building Trades leadership in the Working Families aims to protect their already existing favoured status.
3. Question: It seems odd that you are funded by construction organizations and yet in the $5-million attack campaign that you control you do not once mention construction issues. Why don't you mention construction issues?
Answer: Yes, we know we should be talking about construction issues, but then we would have to talk about what a great deal we already have with McGuinty - and that isn't going to mobilize anybody is it?
Reality: Since 2003, the Building Trades have received such favorable and preferential treatment from the McGuinty government that it is tough to find a construction issue that could be spun by the Building Trades to mobilize the general public. An example of this favoritism is the $440-million in extra construction costs faced by the taxpayers of Hamilton. Instead, this $5-million attack fund is a payoff to have the McGuinty government keep favoring the Building Trades, at the expense of the people of Ontario and the non-Building Trades unions and contractors.
4. Question: You say you are not a Liberal Front group - yet the PC Party has filed documentation with Elections Ontario that says key suppliers to your Coalition have strong Liberal ties - specifically Marcel Weider and Don Guy. In addition, your organization has picked a fight with the NDP over the use of the term "Working Families" and the content of your ad campaign is clearly to stop Ontarians from voting Conservative. Am I to understand that in spite of the fact you are staffed by Liberals, attacking the NDP, and your ads are anti-PC, you are, nonetheless, not a Liberal Front?
Answer: Yes - but I will not elaborate or prove to you how we are not a Liberal Front. I will just state that as a fact with no collaborating evidence. If I were to rebut your assertion, I would have to provide you with ads that support New Democrats, or give you a list of the staff of Working Families that gives you the names and phone numbers of senior NDP supporters who you can call and verify my assertions with. Since you know we have neither of these things, I am just going to keep stonewalling you.
Reality: The so-called Working Families have made a cynical decision to deny the obvious. To date they have gotten away with it.
5. Question: Just what relationship does Working Families have with real working families? It seems like you are actually an organization of provincial unions dominated by the Building Trades, which is evidently a legitimate lobby group. But you have appropriated the word "Working Families". Can you explain just how do you have a real claim to the title "working families" that other Ontario unions or corporations for that matter would have a claim to?
In fact, if I look at the source of your funding, a better title for your organization would be "Provincial Unions" or better yet "Building Trades". Why is your label not representative of what you really are?
Just what percentage of your funding comes from actual "Working Families" and not from big unions - and can I please have copies of your donations lists to prove it?
Answer: Our members work and they have families - hence the word "working" combined with the word "families". People that we disagree with, whom also "work" and who also have "families" are not "working families" because that is our term and we had it first. We are not publishing our finances, they are private.
Reality: The so-called "Working Families" have no more valid a claim on the phrase "Working Families" than do hundreds of other public groups. The fact is this group has paid a lot of money to one of their Liberal suppliers to come up with the term "Working Families" as part of a professional branding exercise. It has served them well until now, and regardless of the facts they are going to continue to use it.
And since Working Families is in fact a lobby group funded by unions, it would be impossible for them to make public a list of actual families who have indeed funded the organization. Besides, Working Families, unlike an official political party, is keeping its actual donations and expenses private.
6. Question: On the Working Families website you say, "No spin, just the facts", can we honestly believe that Working Families doesn't spin?
Answer: Yes,
Reality: Spin is a fundamental part of any political attack campaign, regardless of our public statement to tell you we are not spinning. Like any other lobby group, Working Families has an agenda and its professional spokesperson is not going to deviate from the official script. You can bet that if their spokesperson actually stopped spinning and told the truth about the Working Families agenda he would be replaced in a matter of days. Cynically, the "no spin" comment is just more spin.
7. Question: I understand that the Building Trades unions are some of the shrewdest negotiators in Ontario's Construction Sector. Am I to understand, that you have launched a $5-million attack fund in return for no specific promises or commitments from the McGuinty Liberals. You are just giving them the money with nothing back in return?
Answer: Yes.
Reality: Anyone who has negotiated with the Building Trades will tell you they never give you something for nothing. Ontario's Construction sector in particular has a reputation for sharp dealing. There is a hidden deal here, and it is one that is worth much more than $5-million to the Building Trades. To date, they are getting away with this.
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