Liberals pledge mental health coverage, PCs take on trade barriers

By Canadian Press on February 20, 2025.

MILTON, Ont. — Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles cast her ballot in the advance polls that opened Thursday, as her party lost a second election candidate, while the other party leaders talked mental health, interprovincial trade and rental housing policies.

The Progressive Conservative, Liberal and NDP leaders have all said their full platforms will come “soon,” with the election now one week away.

Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie said a Liberal government would cover mental health care under the Ontario Health Insurance Plan. It would cost about $1 billion, she said, and would fill in the gaps of private coverage rather than replacing it.

“There will be more explanation as we roll out the platform,” she said after her speech at the Canadian Club in Toronto. “I will say that it will serve those people who don’t have coverage today.”

Stiles also said her platform release would be “imminent,” offering the snap election timing as a defence for not having it out sooner.

“Doug Ford called an election three weeks ago,” she said after voting at an advance poll in the morning. “His intention was to catch us all off our game.”

Later in the day, the NDP candidate for Elgin-Middlesex-London announced that she is resigning her candidacy. It came after the Progressive Conservatives dug up comments Amanda Zavitz — who is white — made saying that she wishes she was a Black woman and that she wishes she had lived experiences of poverty and addiction.

“After further reflection and discussions with community members, I have decided to resign as the Ontario NDP candidate for the upcoming election,” Zavitz wrote in a Facebook post. “It has become clear that my past comments are distracting from the critical task of defeating Doug Ford and electing an Ontario NDP government.”

Earlier in the day, Stiles called Zavitz’s original comments “deeply concerning.”

The Progressive Conservatives have dug up dirt on a series of Liberal candidates over the past week, but have also been turning their attention to NDP candidates as well, branding them as “radical.”

PC Leader Doug Ford has focused much of his attention stateside this election, suggesting the ballot question is who will best protect Ontario from a Donald Trump presidency in the U.S. and threats of tariffs. He shifted focus slightly Thursday.

Standing beside Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston at an announcement in Milton, Ont., he said a re-elected Progressive Conservative government would break down interprovincial trade barriers and cut associated red tape, blaming the federal government for existing logjams.

“The biggest barrier blocking us from getting our immense resources to market, to getting our critical minerals out of the ground, or building the nuclear power plants that will fuel our economic growth for decades to come, it’s not in Washington, Moscow or Beijing,” he said.

“It’s right here in Ottawa. We need the federal government to get out of the way. We need the federal government to cut its layers and layers of bureaucracy and red tape by scrapping impact assessment requirements that raise costs, slow down approvals and stop provinces and territories from building.”

It was the first time in 10 days that Ford took questions on the campaign trail, and he fielded a variety of them on Thursday.

On previous comments suggesting he supports the death penalty, he said he was just joking.

On a promise to spend $1 billion to build a new police college, he said the current one is “as old as Moses.” On the cost of ads the province is running in the U.S., he said reporters should file a freedom-of-information request.

On an uncosted promise to build a tunnel under Highway 401 that experts say could cost tens of billions of dollars he said he and his team are “visionaries.”

And on the $200 cheques his previous government mailed out, he said he hasn’t received his, but once he does he will donate it to a food bank.

Ford heads back to Washington, D.C., on Friday for the second time during the campaign, to meet with governors and officials in a push against tariffs.

Crombie said the country definitely needs to get rid of interprovincial trade barriers, but she questioned why Ford didn’t do it during his previous time in government.

“He’s had seven years, but now on the eve of a crisis with a trade war threat and tariff threat, now he’s moving on it,” she said.

Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner highlighted his plan to help renters, including expanding rent control to all buildings, placing a moratorium on above-guideline rent increases and strengthening rules and penalties for renovictions and bad-faith evictions.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 20, 2025.

Allison Jones, The Canadian Press