Hudak plan could hit Sudbury hard: Analysis – by Ben Leeson (Sudbury Star – May 23, 2014)

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

Economists and union officials say Greater Sudbury will be particularly hard hit if Tim Hudak follows through on his pledge to cut 100,000 public-sector jobs in the province.

David Robinson, a professor of economics at Laurentian University, said based on population, he can see at least 1,000 local jobs being eliminated if the Progressive Conservatives take power in the June 12 provincial election.

Officials for the Ontario Public Service Employees’ Union (OPSEU) predicted even bigger cuts for the Nickel City, due to its disproportionately high number of civil service jobs here, pegging losses at more than 1,600, along with more than 1,100 lost in the private sector as spin-off

But Sudbury PC candidate Paula Peroni said while her party is still working on its own numbers, she expects local public-sector losses to be much lower, and for private-sector jobs to be created by other elements of Hudak’s platform.

The Tory leader pledged earlier this month to eliminate 100,000 jobs in the province – a 10% cut in the size of the public sector – as part of his plan to eliminate Ontario’s $12.5-billion deficit by 2016.

Hudak said he’d avoid cutting “vital” services, such as nurses, doctors and police, but confirmed he’d make cuts to education and give less money to municipalities.

David Robinson said the cuts would be particularly hard on Greater Sudbury, which according to Statistics Canada had about 18,700 public-sector employees last year, and on other Northern Ontario towns.

“The North is relatively heavy on civil service,” he said. “When you take out the municipal level, which (the province doesn’t) directly control, and so on, you’re ending up pushing really heavily into teaching and all kinds of services. You’re talking closer to 18% of some of the key services people are expecting. (Hudak has) got himself in a bind, because he’s effectively saying the things people demand the government spend most on, which are education and health care, are the things he’s going to end up cutting.”

He expects many of the cuts would be made in the Ministry of Northern Ontario and Mines, “which doesn’t carry a lot of weight down south,” as part of an attempt to combine MNDM and the Ministry of Natural Resources into one “super-ministry,” which he expects would mean laying off about 20% of people in those ministries, along with significant cuts to the Ontario Geological Survey and social services, which the city is also heavy in.

Overall, if 5% of the 100,000 jobs come from Northern Ontario, as David Robinson estimates, then Sudbury, with about 20% of the Northern population, would lose some 1,000 jobs.

The LU prof recalled the city’s steep population decline following cuts by Mike Harris’ provincial PCs and Jean Chretien’s federal Liberals in the 1990s, and said we could see a similar phenomenon if Hudak puts his plan into action.

OPSEU, which has about 5,000 members in the city, between the Ontario Public Service (including the MNR, courts, jails, Community and Social Services and other ministries), as well as Cambrian College and College Boreal, the Children’s Aid Society, property assessment, the Greater Sudbury Association for Community Living, Health Sciences North and the LCBO, among others.

Randy Robinson, a political economist for the union, presented a city-by-city breakdown, compiled by Toby Sanger, senior economist for the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), which has Greater Sudbury’s share of the job cuts at 1,668.

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