Protest At MPP Jill Dunlop’s Office Saturday, April 25
By John Swartz
Round 2 of a series of province-wide protests against Doug Ford’s governing actions is taking place Saturday April 25. Like the one in March it will be at Simcoe North MPP Jill Dunlop’s office at 575 West Street South. It is set to happen at 1 p.m.
Last month protests were organized in 32 municipalities. This time 55 municipalities have locally organized protests happening.
The March protest began with a small group of about 40 people and grew over the next half hour to more than 70. There were a range of messages on signs protesters waved to motorists passing by on West Street.
“This crowd is pretty big for this short notice on a Saturday in cold weather. There’s two or three other events also going on so we switched it to 2 o’clock. We’re happy,” said one of the three local protest organizers of last month’s protest, Dennis Rizzo.
This time they will leave something behind. They plan to leave paper airplanes on the windows of Dunlop’s office. This is in reference to Ford’s plan to expand runways and take over municipally owned land and freeze out the City of Toronto’s management stake in Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, which critics say is not only heavy handed, but poorly thought out regarding the capacity of landside services to accommodate increased traffic to the airport.
Another issue protesters are advocating online is opposition to Bill 97, the Plan to Protect Ontario Act, which is primarily the budget bill, but also contains a number of changes to other legislation. One change many are shocked by is to changes to Ontario’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, which will shield access to records created by the premier, cabinet ministers, elected officials, and political staff from access to information law, making this group the only Ontarians benefiting as the Bill title suggests. Interestingly the public’s right to information from that exact group of people is the reason the FOI law was originally created. Many people are also upset the bill was passed in the early morning hours of April 23 of an unusual overnight session, and then given Royal Assent the next day, also unusual.
(Photos by Swartz – SUNonline/Orillia) Main: Early bird protesters at March’s protest against actions by the Ontario government.
