Premier Dalton McGuinty should put an immediate
end to speculation about the privatization of the LCBO by saying
the Crown corporation is not for sale, says the union that
represents more than 6,000 liquor board employees.
“How many more times are we going to go around
the block on this issue?” asked Warren (Smokey) Thomas,
president of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union. “We
beat back privatization under Mike Harris and we were pleased
when Premier McGuinty rejected the recommendations of the Lacey
panel in 2005 that called for parts of the LCBO to be sold off
to the private sector.
“It should be a dead issue by now but somehow it
keeps creeping back,” said Thomas, responding to media accounts
Wednesday that reported the government has retained the services
of two banking investment firms to advise it on the possible
privatization of several prominent Crown corporations, including
the LCBO.
In 2008 the LCBO earned more than $1.4 billion
in profit – funds that are used to finance health care,
education and other public services. Surveys have repeatedly
found that close to 75 per cent of Ontarians want the LCBO to
stay in public hands. And without the profit motive at work, the
LCBO rigidly enforces a policy of social responsibility by
blocking sales to underage teens, intoxicated customers and
third-party purchasers.
Thomas also noted that privatization would
threaten the wages, benefits and working conditions enjoyed by
many full-time LCBO employees.
“In dozens of communities around Ontario the
LCBO is a source of employment and a “destination retailer” that
attracts other retail businesses. Why tamper with a formula that
has worked so well on behalf of all Ontarians?
“Slaughtering the goose that annually lays
golden eggs for the public purse is a half-baked strategy that
should be put to rest for good.”
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