While National Newswatch does not keep an archive of external articles for longer than 6 months, we do keep all articles written by contributors who post directly to our site. Here you will find all of the contributed and linked external articles from Rob Ferguson.
A staffer and volunteer for MP Nate Erskine-Smith, a presumed frontrunner in Ontario’s Nov. 21 Liberal leadership race, has been hit with $2,400 in fines for violations under the Canada Elections Act. The administrative monetary penalties against Andrew Goodridge were for failing to comply with political financing and reporting requirements.
Almost half of the 17 unions that endorsed Premier Doug Ford for re-election got nearly $40 million from the controversial Skills Development Fund despite low-ranked applications, according to secret data obtained by the Star.
Premier Doug Ford is taking another step in his push for an east-west energy pipeline, ordering a feasibility study into the potential project amid a tariff war with the United States. To be completed next year, the study will look at costs as well as route options linking oil and natural gas from Alberta and Saskatchewan to “new and established...
The criteria used by the Ford government to hand out millions of dollars through its controversial Skills Development Fund remain a secret as a new Star analysis shows 17 unions and industry groups that endorsed the Progressive Conservatives in the February election received $237 million. There is no transparency on how the various labour and trade organizations were graded despite...
As Prime Minister Mark Carney prepared to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump, Premier Doug Ford took a thinly veiled shot at his Alberta counterpart over her threat of a referendum on separation. “This is a time to unite the country, not people saying, ‘oh, I’m leaving the country,’” Ford said Tuesday morning in a speech to a group promoting...
As the federal Conservatives assess a campaign that saw leader Pierre Poilievre lose his Ottawa-area seat of Carleton, they are pointing fingers at the most powerful Tory in Ontario. Let the blame begin. As the federal Conservatives assess a campaign that saw leader Pierre Poilievre lose his Ottawa-area seat of Carleton, they are pointing fingers at the most powerful Tory...
The tone has changed, but the threats remain. While Doug Ford says “the temperature is being lowered” in the trade war with U.S. President Donald Trump, the premier is reserving the right to reinstate his 25 per cent surcharge on Ontario’s electricity exports stateside.
Doug Ford took his tough-on-crime talk to new heights in a campaign speech where he pushed for a return to capital punishment, the Star has learned. Musing about stiffer penalties for home invaders who kill victims, the Ontario Progressive Conservative leader called for changes in the federal Criminal Code that would empower judges to “send ‘em right to sparky.”
Doug Ford‘s hot mic admission that he “100%” wanted Donald Trump to win the U.S. presidential election has jolted the snap Ontario vote. That’s because Ford framed the Feb. 27 campaign as a referendum on who could best deal with Trump’s threatened tariffs against Canada.
A defensive Doug Ford insists it was not reckless to call a provincial election against the spectre of a trade war that could devastate Ontario’s economy. That came as Ford was caught on a hot mic Monday saying that he “100 per cent” wanted Donald Trump to win the American presidency last November.
Doug Ford is taking a veiled shot at federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, saying whoever is the next prime minister must continue Canada’s supports for the auto industry — particularly in electric vehicles. On the second day of Ontario’s Feb. 27 election campaign, the Progressive Conservative leader, who is seeking a third term in office, said Ontario would maintain its...
Will there be dinner at Mar-a-Lago? Premier Doug Ford says he’s pressing U.S. contacts for a face-to-face meeting with Donald Trump to persuade the president-elect his threat of 25-per-cent tariffs is a bad idea on both sides of the border.
Canada’s provincial and territorial leaders are meeting Monday to discuss U.S. president-elect Donald Trump‘s threatened 25 per cent tariffs against Canadian products. Premier Doug Ford, chair of the Council of the Federation, is hosting the meeting at the Hilton Hotel near Pearson International Airport.
Premier Doug Ford went on Donald Trump’s favourite TV network to convince the incoming U.S. president that his threat of 25 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods is a bad idea. “It’s unfortunate,” Ford told Fox News in a telephone interview Wednesday after his video feed conked out.
Taking aim at Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s carbon price as “wrong,” Bonnie Crombie says her Ontario Liberals need to go their own way with an early provincial election looming. “We have to get our elbows up,” she said in a Tuesday night speech prepared for the first Liberal leader’s fundraising dinner in eight years, putting $1.65 million into the party’s...
Premier Doug Ford is spending nearly half of a $6.9-billion tax windfall on $200 pre-election “rebate” cheques. Bolstered by higher than projected revenue from personal income tax, corporations tax and sales tax, Ford’s Progressive Conservatives have earmarked $3 billion to send cheques to 15 million Ontario adults and children in the new year.
Premier Doug Ford’s nephew Michael Ford is taking a leave of absence from his post as Ontario’s minister of citizenship and multiculturalism for health reasons. The move comes a month before the legislature is slated to return from an extended summer recess on Oct. 21, and as the premier considers whether to call an early election next spring instead of...
The warning was frank. Four years after a Queen’s Park statue of founding prime minister Sir John A. Macdonald was boarded up for protection from vandals, a committee of MPPs slowly gathering input on its future has been scolded and schooled by a First Nations equity consultant.
Todd Smith’s surprise resignation after just 10 weeks as education minister has forced Premier Doug Ford to shuffle his cabinet, promoting Colleges and Universities Minister Jill Dunlop to that key post. Smith, 53, a Progressive Conservative MPP since 2011, stepped down Friday in a stunning move that will trigger a byelection in the riding of Bay of Quinte within six months.
Ontario Health Minister Sylvia Jones is taking issue with federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s talk of forcing people with drug addictions into treatment as the country grapples with a deadly opioid crisis. In another sign of tensions between the provincial and federal Tories, with polls suggesting Poilievre is poised to become Canada’s next prime minister, Jones said mandatory rehab is...
Are the days of multibillion-dollar government subsidies over in Canada for international automakers making the hot new thing — electric vehicle batteries? That question lingers as Honda holds talks with federal officials this week on a potential $18.4-billion auto assembly and electric vehicle battery factory at its complex in Alliston, Ont., which now makes piston-powered Civics and CR-Vs.
A former General Motors executive is putting the pedal to the metal as Ontario's new representative to Washington, D.C., helping the province on the road of "accelerated industrial renewal" sparked by two new electric vehicle battery plants. "This is not one and done," David Paterson says of the massive Volkswagen and Stellantis EV factories under construction in St. Thomas and...
Mike Schreiner was never so happy to be so wrong. The Green leader predicted last week’s byelection in the NDP riding of Kitchener Centre would “go down to the wire," but his candidate won by a whopping 5,022 votes in a stunning blow to the New Democrats soon after dumping Hamilton Centre MPP Sarah Jama from their caucus for