The ongoing war between Doug Ford and thousands of students who denounce his cuts to the province's post-secondary financial aid program escalated in Queen's Park on Tuesday afternoon with some choice words from the Premier himself.
It started with a brief back-and-forth between Ford and opposition leader Andrea Horwath during yesterday's question period in the legislature.
"The premier has announced an attack on post-secondary students that includes higher student debt, scrapping grants and attacks on student organizations," said the NDP politician. "Will the premier put a halt on this, reverse the decision and support, rather than attack students?"
Ontario students protesting OSAP cuts today. #CJRL715 #ONpoli #OSAP pic.twitter.com/CNZYGojlEX
— Anya (@_anya7) February 19, 2019
Ford answered by mentioning that his government is lowering tuition fees for the first time in Ontario's history, at which point the PC cabinet got up to give themselves a standing ovation.
"Not only that, we gave the students an option — do you believe this? — an actual option to opt out on [student union] fees," said Ford. "For over a thousand dollars in some cases. Fees that they don't even want to be part of, a lot of them."
The Premier began to say something about how much students at Carlton University could save, but was cut short as protesters in the gallery became too loud for the session to continue.
Un petit groupe de 5-6 manifestants interrompent la période de questions en manifestant contre les mesures prises concernant les droits et frais de scolarité #onpoli pic.twitter.com/pLEB3OPppr
— Eve Caron (@Eve_SRC) February 19, 2019
Speaker Ted Arnott called for order and warned the student protesters that they would be removed if they continued.
Despite this, they chanted things like "No cuts, no fees, tuition should be free!" and lobbed profanity-laden insults at Premier Ford.
They were ejected from Queen's Park after members of the group yelled such things as "Doug Ford can kiss my a**" and "You're a f**king cracker."
Ford made his thoughts on their behaviour clear in response to a follow-up question from Horwath after the clock had been restarted.
“They should have their mouths washed out with soap." - Ontario Premier Doug Ford in response to student protesters at Queen's Park. #onpoli pic.twitter.com/7ExZineakX
— blogTO (@blogTO) February 20, 2019
"Here is an example of indoctrination, what we just saw up there," he said. "That is how we train our kids, with a filthy mouth."
"They should have their mouths washed out with soap. That's what they should have," continued Ford. "'Cause that's embarrassing. Embarrassing."
Ford later said that the students were "gonna be good socialists," doubling down on a controversial comment he'd made last week in a PC party fundraising email.
"Students were forced into unions and forced to pay for those unions," said Ford in that email. "I think we all know what kind of crazy Marxist nonsense student unions get up to."
Uh, yeah. Okay.
by Lauren O'Neil via blogTO
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