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When Premier Doug Ford cut the measure this month, it wasn’t just a cruel jab at Kathleen Wynne’s past government. It was an action that slew one of the great political achievements of the past two decades — one that crossed all party lines and held out hope as an example of a new kind of democracy.

But the greatest victims are the 4,000 citizens in low income and pressing circumstances who enrolled in the pilot. It was a trial government program, so naturally they believed it would finish its brief cycle, trusting they would get the opportunity to make a stable life for themselves and their kids. That trust is now shattered and only adds to the deep disillusionment that many of those families and their supporters held following decades of effort.

“Trust but verify,” conservative godfather Ronald Reagan was fond of repeating when he was U.S. president. And he was right.

The basic income guarantee was built on that formula: Trust that government, civil society and those families in the program would come together in good will, have their efforts researched at all levels, and then deliver to the public the results of its effectiveness. With the “verify” portion gone, trust itself will decay even further.

There are many voices out there both demonizing and praising the possibilities of the basic income guarantee. But there was another concept on trial during this period, and it was politics itself.

A largely Conservative-led effort over the decades that crossed party lines and ended up as a pilot project is the stuff democratic dreams are made of and something rarely seen in the modern era. This wasn’t just about assisting people to rise out of poverty; it was a test of politics and democracy. In harshly crushing the hope and sound work of the left, centre and right by the project’s cancellation, the Ford government has dashed the legitimacy of effective compromise.

A lot of social justice dreams died last week. And so did a large number of political ones.

Glen Pearson is co-director of the London Food Bank and a former Liberal MP for the riding of London North Centre.

glen@glenpearson.ca