For much of his career, John Tory has faced heavy criticism about his political instincts, his dithering and his sometimes frantic, last-minute decision-making.

Such criticisms have dogged Tory for more than 20 years, dating back to the early 1990s and crossing over between his business career as a top executive at Rogers Communications and his political career as a campaign manager and Ontario Conservative leader.

To his detractors, these traits are not the marks of an experienced, capable leader.

Today, with Tory locked in a close fight with Olivia Chow in Toronto’s mayoral race, Tory’s critics are once again dredging up his past, suggesting it’s proof that he’s not the right person to lead the city.

The criticisms centre on what are arguably the three biggest blunders of Tory’s career, namely his approval of a 1993 attack ad against Liberal leader Jean Chrétien; his days at Rogers when the cable TV giant was locked in a nasty fight over negative billing; and his pledge as Conservative leader during the 2007 provincial election to bring in full faith-based school funding.

Because these issues are so old, many Toronto voters, especially newer residents, have never heard about them, don’t recall them or don’t understand them.

But many other voters have long memories, which may hurt Tory in the Oct. 27 election. “I just got my Rogers bill and I’m still furious at Tory for that negative billing fiasco,” a woman said recently in an email to me after I wrote a column about Tory. “There’s no way I’ll ever vote for this man.”

For her part, Chow faces a similar problem with voters who still criticize her for living in the 1980s with her late husband, Jack Layton, in a subsidized Toronto co-op housing building . And who can forget any of Rob Ford ’s many personal and political disasters?

Here’s a closer look at Tory’s biggest blunders:

Canada’s nastiest attack ad: As campaign manager for prime minister Kim Campbell in the 1993 election, Tory approved a TV ad that has been branded the nastiest in Canadian history. It seemingly made fun of Chrétien’s facial paralysis caused by Bell’s palsy. “Is this a prime minister?” a voice in the ad asked.

Tory has said he never saw the ad before it appeared, but concedes he might have approved it if he had.

Campbell killed the ad after a storm of protest. The Conservatives were trounced on election day, reduced to two seats. Tory has called the ad “a disaster.”

Negative billing: In the 1990s, Rogers launched negative option billing plans for subscribers. Under its plan, Rogers added new stations and new fees without consent and would only drop them if a subscriber specifically declined the new stations. The move sparked massive consumer outrage and led to Parliament passing a law in 1999 effectively banning the practice.

Some may argue this wasn’t a blunder for Tory because he wasn’t responsible for Rogers initially implementing negative billing. Unfortunately for Tory, though, became the lightning rod for a storm of public protests after he was named president of Rogers Media Inc. in 1995. Tory was hired partly to deal with the existing mess, but spent years viewed by subscribers, albeit unfairly, as the man who raised their cable fees.



The issue is still so sensitive that Tory doesn’t even mention Rogers in his official bio on his campaign website . Instead, he just says he was CEO “of one of Canada’s largest publishing and broadcasting companies.”

Faith-based school funding: In the 2007 Ontario election, the Conservatives under Tory’s leadership was considered to have a solid chance of beating the governing Liberals.

But going against advice from within his own party, Tory pledged to extend $400 million in public funding to all faith-based religious schools, not just Catholic schools.

His promise split Ontario deeply and the Conservatives plunged in the polls. Sensing defeat, Tory made a desperate move to save his party just days before the election by vowing to hold a free vote in the legislature on the issue if he won.

The move backfired because it came too late to help the party and only solidified negative views of Tory as indecisive.

In the weeks leading up to Toronto’s mayoral election, Tory will face even more questions about his past record, especially if he remains neck-and-neck with Chow for the lead in the polls.

Tory will stress that his record as a business leader, a political party leader and community activists for such organizations as the Greater Toronto Civic Action Alliance, United Way and St. Michael’s Hospital makes him an ideal candidate for mayor.

Ultimately, though, voters will vote for Tory based on how they perceive him as a leader today — and in the past.

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Correction: Aug. 11, 2014: This article was edited from a previous version that mistakenly said John Tory did not stop negative billing at Rogers Cable as soon as he took office. In fact, Rogers Cable announced that it was reversing the practice of negative billing on Jan. 5, 1995. Tory joined Rogers in February of 1995 as the president of Rogers Media, a separate division from the cable unit.

Bob Hepburn’s column appears Thursday. bhepburn@thestar.ca

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