Mayor John Tory is calling for a referendum on the size of Toronto’s city council, even though the move would not stop Premier Doug Ford from slashing seats in the upcoming election.

“It is my job to stand up for the people of Toronto,” Tory said in his city hall office. “You don’t change the rules in the middle of the game. That is not right and that is not fair.”

Tory’s spokesman later said the mayor wants a referendum before the election. According to provincial rules, the deadline for a referendum question to be put on this fall’s ballot has already passed.

Asked if Toronto should launch a legal challenge of Ford’s plan to unilaterally cut the number of council seats from 47 to 25, the mayor said he wants to hear from city legal staff but suggested provincial legislative powers make success unlikely.

Moments after Tory’s morning news conference, Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam branded the mayor’s response as weak.

“For somebody who actually wants strong mayor powers, I wish he actually acted more like a strong mayor right now,” said the downtown councillor.









“You can’t respond meekly to a bully from Queen’s Park. I think the residents of Toronto expect city council to respond with strength. We always need a mayor that’s going to fight for Toronto.”

Some councillors support shrinking council during the election campaign that started May 1, including Jim Karygiannis. He told reporters that the 47-ward model, including new seats downtown, was going to transfer too much power away from the suburbs.

Have your say

“This is for me about my voices in Scarborough being represented and being heard. Unfortunately the former city of Scarborough and North York were treated like second-class citizens,” in the four-year process that led to council choosing 47 seats, said the Scarborough representative and ex-MP.

“You had more downtown councillors. We’ll certainly be in the boonies. We’ll not be heard.”

After Tory spoke, Ford told reporters at Queen’s Park he is fed up with the “hours and hours of endless debate ... all of it taking place on the taxpayer’s dime.

“It’s clear that the size of government is just too large,” and Toronto is “the most dysfunctional political arena in the country,” Ford said, adding the move will also save taxpayers money.

Under rules set by the provincial Municipal Elections Act, council can vote to add a question to the election ballot. But the act says a decision by council must be made “on or before March 1 in the year of a regular election at which it is intended to submit the question to electors,” meaning council is too late to add a question for this election. The province could amend those rules.

Tory suggested that a referendum could be held on the ballot or by some other means, but did not specify what he meant. “The people should decide” the size of council, he told reporters.

Tory also revealed that Ford suggested to him in a private meeting more than two weeks ago that he would cut council almost in half during the election. But the mayor said he dismissed it as something Ford wasn’t actually pursuing. Ford later told reporters they spoke about cutting council more than once and their staffs also talked.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

If enacted, the changes would throw the current council races into chaos, eliminating new wards created under a council-approved 47-ward structure and pitting incumbent councillors against each other across the city.

Under Ford’s plan, the election date remains Oct. 22, but the deadline to register as a council candidate in the 25 wards becomes Sept. 14. The registration deadline to run for mayor, however, remains 2 p.m. Friday, meaning Tory will likely continue in his re-election bid without a high-profile challenger.

Speaking for the federal government, Toronto MP and former city councillor Adam Vaughan blasted Ford’s move as “the most reckless and destructive thing I’ve seen done to the city of Toronto and this shows you how vindictive (the premier) can be.

“This plunges Toronto into political, economic and social chaos for the next year and a half or two years,” Vaughan said, scoffing at the idea 25 councillors could keep tabs on Toronto’s 120-plus agencies boards and commissions, including the TTC and police services board.

“The Fords only do one thing in politics — they break things. They’ve never built anything and now they’re breaking Toronto and its unacceptable,” he said, saying Ford’s move threatens intergovernmental co-operation on refugee claimants, housing, transit and public safety.

If Ontario or other provinces are going to harm cities, Vaughan said, the Trudeau government will bypass them and deal directly with cities.

“The national housing strategy, the $13 billion co-investment fund does not require provincial consent or participation,” Vaughan said.

“At the end of the day, Torontonians are Canadians and they can count on their national government to support the protection and construction of a good strong city.”

The council-approved 47-ward option followed a years-long study and large public consultation by outside experts, who recommended that size as the best way to achieve effective representation and other goals.

The consultants’ team met face-to-face with 100 stakeholders and held 24 public information sessions involving more than 2,000 people.

TOP STORIES. IN YOUR INBOX: For the day’s top news from the Star’s award-winning journalists, sign up for our daily headlines newsletter.

In considering a 25-ward option that aligned with federal and provincial boundaries, the city’s consultants concluded achieving voter parity — the principle that all votes should have equal weight — beyond 2018 was problematic even if a 26th ward was added. Currently, the population across wards is very unbalanced.

“There was little support for this option at the public meetings and from members of council,” the consultant’s final report said of the option aligning with federal/provincial boundaries.

An online survey saw “considerable” but not majority support for that option from respondents, the report said.

City council is expected to debate its response to the pending provincial legislation on Friday afternoon.

With files from Robert Benzie

Read more about: