There’s a well-known saying in politics that voters never “toss in” a new government; instead they “toss out” an old one.

That’s what happened in 1995 in Ontario when voters tossed out Premier Bob Rae and the NDP and replaced them with Mike Harris and the Conservatives.

It happened again in 2003 when voters tossed out Harris and the Tories and replaced them with Dalton McGuinty and the Liberals.

And that’s what’s likely to happen one year from now, on June 7, 2018, when Ontario voters go to the polls, kick out Kathleen Wynne and the ruling Liberals, and make Patrick Brown the next premier.

Indeed, the only thing at this point that could derail Brown’s path to victory would be a major political misstep on his part over the next 12 months.

Victory for Brown would be stunning, given he’s a leader who, after more than two years at helm of his party, still says little beyond worn-out clichés, makes no promises, is unknown by most voters and instills little excitement even among Conservatives.

In fact, Brown’s only real selling point with voters is that he’s not Kathleen Wynne, whose approval rating is at near-record lows.

By most measures, though, Brown shouldn’t be headed for victory. Instead, he should be in serious trouble due to a long list of nagging issues.

First, Brown’s been branded “a man with no plans” for his lack of policies on any major issue facing the province. For example, he has no real position on Wynne’s promise to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour within 18 months, saying only that it’s too much, too fast. His one main stand was to support a carbon tax, which most Tories actually oppose.

Second, he’s unpopular with social conservatives within the Tory party who feel he has misled them into believing he was one of them.

Third, a new right-wing party that threatens to pick up disaffected hardline conservatives has emerged. The Trillium Party, labelled by Brown supporters as a fringe group, already has its first MPP in Jack MacLaren, who either voluntarily departed or was kicked out of the Tory party last month.

Fourth, Brown has made a mess of the party’s nomination process, which has seen numerous ridings in open revolt against the party’s leadership. It’s so bad that Robert Elliott, the third vice-president and policy chair from Toronto, quit this week in disgust over the party’s decision to grant Brown the power to approve any candidate, regardless of nomination voting irregularities or appeals by riding associations.

Fifth, the Liberals are starting to rise again in the polls in the Toronto region, which is the seat-heavy area the Tories need to capture in order to form a majority government.

On the positive side, the Tories have lots of money in the bank, the mantra of “time for change” is strong after 15 years of Liberal rule, the party has won a string of byelection fights and potential high-profile candidates are starting to come forward, including possibly Caroline Mulroney, the daughter of former prime minister Brian Mulroney.

Also, Brown supporters argue he’s proven he can be tough, as shown by his handling of the nomination controversies, that he’s smart not to make promises he can’t keep and that talk of revolt by social conservatives is overblown.

Add it up and the path to victory for Brown is clear.

Still, the Liberals are strong campaigners, and Wynne has recently introduced a series of popular promises, from daycare spaces to hydro rate breaks and high-speed trains,

But the stark reality for Liberals is that unless he screws up badly, they’d better get used to these words: “Premier Patrick Brown.”

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UPDATE: In a column on May 10, I wrote about Kevin Smith, the health-care CEO who was holding two major jobs at the same time. Smith is the ninth highest-paid public servant in Ontario and receives $726,000 a year as chief executive officer of Hamilton-based St. Joseph’s Health System and Niagara Health System. He also had enough time on his hands to be the chairman of Home Capital Group Inc., the embattled private lending company, for which he received $357,000 a year.

On June 1, Home Capital announced that Smith, who stepped down as chair in early May, will not stand for re-election as a board member at the company’s annual meeting on June 29.

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

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