With debates now over, only two factors could rock Ontario’s election

Most observers expected Monday’s election debate in Ontario to feature three opposition leaders in cahoots with Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford. Most observers were wrong.

A combative Mr. Ford went on the offensive, saying of Liberal leader Steven Del Duca’s time in Kathleen Wynne’s government: “You destroyed this province.”

He was no nicer to NDP leader Andrea Horwath, telling her: “You’ve lost touch, you’re out of touch with the men and women who work hard.” And in the segments of everyone speaking above everyone else, she was just as incoherent as the best of them.

Mr. Del Duca was more forceful, if not more effective, in his second leaders’ debate, while Ms. Horwath gave another professional performance that failed to connect. From this desk, neither man outpaced Mr. Ford, at least not enough to change the momentum of the campaign. But green leader Mike Schreiner? Oh my.

Time and time again, Mr. Ford was surprised by Mr. Schreiner’s sharp and sometimes devastating attacks.

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Of proposed Highway 413, which Ford wants to build but is opposed by all other party leaders, Schreiner said: “It will roll out the red carpet for the Amazons of the world and the big box stores of the world. But when it comes to supporting local farmers, it will pave their farmland.”

“If it were up to you and the three of you, you wouldn’t build anything,” Mr. Ford boasted.

And in an eloquent rebuttal to Ford’s claim that his government had improved health care, Schreiner asked, “Have you talked to a nurse lately? Have you talked to a nurse about how disrespected they are? How overworked, underpaid, and underappreciated are they? How insulted do they feel about being called heroes and essentially having their pay cut?

For a minute and a half, the Green Leader accused the PC Leader of neglecting people in long-term care during the pandemic, due to a shortage of equipment and vaccines. Mr. Ford stood there and took it.

Regardless of what you think about the performance of Mr. Del Duca and Ms. Horwath, Mr. Ford categorically lost the debate to Mike Schreiner.

But that’s probably fine with Mr. Ford. He knows that Schreiner will not be the next prime minister. At one point, the progressive conservative leader even paid tribute to the green leader.

“I can work with Mr. Schreiner,” said Mr. Ford. So maybe that silence was intentional.

With debates now over and no changes to the games, just two factors could rock the race a little more than two weeks before vote day.

The first would be an internal shock: an exposure of Tory misconduct so staggering that voters begin to waver, and people who weren’t going to vote decide they will after all. There has been none of that.

An external shock would be such a momentous event, like gasoline at $2 a liter, that it changes voter attitudes. But while people are deeply concerned about affordability, in an election campaign defined not so much by satisfaction as lethargy, they seem to fear political change more than accept it.

This must also be said: Mr. Ford knows his voters. People who live within sight of the CN Tower may be horrified by Tory’s plans to build Highway 413 through the Greenbelt, but people who drive north from the western part of the 905 region are desperate for have it They will vote for the party that delivers that path.

And despite the rantings in much of the mainstream and social media, this progressive conservative government is anything but a hotbed of conservative ideology. It has invested, not only in roads, but in transit, education and health.

That only leaves Ford’s populist personality as a problem. But show polls who is in fact the most popular of the three main party leaders.

PC Leader is not out of the woods yet, far from it. Hub also show that about half of all voters feel it is time for a change of government in Ontario. But in these eyes, nothing happened in the debate to galvanize that discontent. All he did was make Mike Schreiner look really good.

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