Mayor Rob Ford says union contracts are preventing him from pushing city council to contract out garbage collection east of Yonge St., but city staff say no such impediment exists.

Ford’s administration is holding back on privatization expansion that could be saving Toronto millions of dollars a year, sources suggest, so he can use it as a 2014 re-election plank to fight likely challenger Olivia Chow.

Asked this week at an event what is preventing the expansion, given that city staff say privatized collection between the Humber River and Yonge St. is working well, Ford said: “I’m going to, in the second term, contract out garbage, like I promised in the first term.

“And there’s union contracts that we negotiated in good faith, and we have the best union contract that anyone could ask for.”

Ford promised during his 2010 campaign to outsource collection and successfully convinced council in 2011 to have a private firm, GFL Environmental East Corp., collect garbage west of Yonge.

The move is forecast to save the city $11 million a year.

In May, when a caller to Ford’s radio show asked about pushing east, the mayor replied: “That’s going to be part of the next part of my platform, so when I’m running for re-election. You’re going to have to be patient.”

Outsourcing options used to be limited by a CUPE Local 416 contract clause that said the city had to find new jobs for all permanent workers displaced by contracting out. However, the contract signed in 2012 shrinks that pool of protected workers to only those with 15 years’ experience.

Jim Harnum, the city’s general manager of solid waste services, told the Star: “The City could contract out (districts 3 and 4) if Council directed us to.”

Harnum personally favours a mix of private and city-provided collection across the city to ensure competition keeps both efficient. He noted that city workers east of Yonge are now filing less overtime, are off sick less often and are generating fewer customer complaints.

Chow, the NDP MP considering running against Ford next year, would handily beat him in virtually any combination of challengers, say opinion polls that are hypothetical and can’t foresee future events.

The strong advocate of union rights would almost certainly be backed by organized labour, making it tough for her to advocate privatization.

Councillor Doug Ford, the mayor’s closest adviser, has told associates that making collection privatization east of Yonge conditional on his brother’s re-election will help neutralize Chow, says a source who heard the remarks.

Councillors who oppose such a move said the city could end up paying more if it sells all its trucks and exits garbage pickup altogether.

“The contractors may come back to us at renewal time and double the price,” said Councillor Glenn De Baeremaeker. “We’ll be held hostage because we’ll have no in-house ability to protect ourselves.”

Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, the public works chair, stickhandled the privatization west of Yonge for Ford. However, he is considering running for mayor himself and predicts expansion of private trash collection will be a central campaign issue — and a major problem for Chow.

“Do you want to go back to the days of David Miller, where the unions had the keys to city hall, or do you want to go in a different direction, where the taxpayer is put first?” he said.

There are good reasons for waiting, though, said the Ward 34 Don Valley East councillor, including the need for serious debate about how much of the two city-collected districts should be privatized.

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“My feeling is that you want to get a clear win in District 2 (west of Yonge) and not move too quickly. I think you want to make sure you get competitive bids and that service is maintained,” before pushing east.

Minnan-Wong said another impediment to moving before the election could be Ford’s reduced ability to get a majority of council behind him.

“Now, the mayor may not have the strength to push this through.”

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