Ontario Public Sector Employee Union workers are terrified the government plans to fully privatize the organization that issues driver’s licences and health cards in the province.
On Friday workers took to the streets in protest in front of two Thunder Bay provincial buildings, warning passersby that switching to a full, for-profit corporation means the private sector will have access to everyone’s information and the province could lose up to $2.7 billion in annual revenue.
James Tocker, OPSEU regional vice-president, said the information picket was a reaction to the recently released Drummond Report.
“The solution is to keep it in-house. The McGuinty government at this point in time seems to be looking at how they can generate a lot of money really quick. ServiceOntario generates about $2.7 billion annually toward taxes,” Tocker said.
“To give you some comparators to that, the LCBO bring forward $1.2 billion a year and the gaming commission brings in $1.9 billion a year.”
Tocker said should the province decide to sell, it’s little more than a cash grab, an attempt to balance the books at the expense of all Ontarians.
“Who’s going to pay that extra $2.7 billion that went into the Ontario coffers before? The taxpayers, but they won’t be there, so what happens, taxes go up. And not just that, but your personal information, my personal information will be in the hands of somebody in the private sector,” Tocker said.
MPP Bill Mauro (Lib., Thunder Bay-Atikokan), on Friday said the protestors were getting a little ahead of themselves.
The Drummond Report, he said, is just a series of 362 recommendations, none of which the province is bound to implement.
“At this point it is nothing more than that,” said Mauro, pointing out that there is heavy private-sector involvement in ServiceOntario already, with few problems emerging from the decision to go that route.
“We already have a very significant mix of private involved in what is done at ServiceOntario … I think that’s really the only thing necessary to say at this point.”
According to information provided by OPSEU, 200 ServiceOntario branches are already under the control of for-profit private contractors, paid a fee per transaction who depend on more business to generate profits.
There is also no incentive for private issuers to verify documents, they claim, with no more than 30 provincial auditors in place to monitor ServiceOntario transactions.
