THUNDER BAY – NDP MPP Howard Hampton is pouring cold water atop the announcement earlier this week by both Thunder Bay MPPs Bill Mauro and Michael Gravelle. Hampton say, “Earlier this week, the McGuinty Liberals announced once again the decision to convert the Thunder Bay thermal generating station to natural gas. What they didn’t mention is that only four years earlier, in 2006, the same McGuinty Liberals cancelled the conversion of the Thunder Bay thermal generating station to natural gas and wasted $13 million of the people’s money in the process”.
Hampton states, “Nor did they mention the decision to cancel the Oakville natural gas plant, which also wasted a reported $100 million of the people’s money. This is another example of the McGuinty Liberals making up their hydro plan on the back of an envelope and changing it every second week with the most recent opinion polls”.
“But what isn’t changing is the fact that increasingly, ordinary people—whether they live in Thunder Bay or elsewhere in northwestern Ontario, or anywhere in Ontario—find it more and more difficult to pay the monthly hydro bill,” charges Hampton. “People increasingly ask, ‘What kind of government would blow $113 million of the people’s money because it can’t make up its mind if it’s going to convert to natural gas generating stations or not?’ But the price keeps on going up”.