Ontario legislature resumes with opposition keeping focus on two Liberal trials
TORONTO — Ontario politicians returned to the legislature Monday after a three-month summer break under the shadow of two Liberal trials happening simultaneously in Toronto and Sudbury.
The Liberal government is planning a packed fall agenda, with a major labour reform bill, a marijuana distribution law and various other pieces of legislation to be passed, but with an election less than nine months away the opposition parties will try to keep voters’ attention on the courts.
One trial began Monday in Toronto, with two former staffers to ex-premier Dalton McGuinty facing breach of trust and mischief charges over allegations they illegally destroyed emails related to the government’s decision to cancel two gas plants before the 2011 election. David Livingston and Laura Miller pleaded not guilty.
In Sudbury, Ont., another Liberal trial entered its second week. Pat Sorbara, the Ontario Liberal Party CEO at the time of the allegations, and Gerry Lougheed, a local Liberal fundraiser, have pleaded not guilty to bribery charges under the Election Act. They’re accused of offering a would-be candidate a job or appointment to get him to step aside for Premier Kathleen Wynne’s preferred candidate in a 2015 byelection in that city.