Dr. David Robinson

The formula I use for this column is simple: take an issue relevant for Northern Ontario, add some real economics, and try to make it entertaining. Unfortunately, I want to talk regional accounting.

Northern MPPs have come to a time of reckoning. They hold the balance of power in Ontario. The five NDPers and one Conservative can change the North. In the next few months we get to see if they have the vision and the guts to act.

You can send your kid to camps that specialize in kayaking and leadership; martial arts and leadership; crafts, sailing and leadership; or leadership and horseback riding. Business schools offer programs in leadership.

Ontario’s northwest is one of the last great frontiers. It is a country-sized chunk of land still outside of the transportation network that links productive communities to the global economy.

He was infected with the brainworm when he unleashed it on the country. The brainworm infected millions more then. It helped him win the election, but at a terrible cost. Infected Canadians would never again be able to talk rationally about taxes.

Here is an update on the Northern Growth Plan. The population of Northern Ontario in 1991 was 822,000. Twenty years later almost 30,000 Northerners had disappeared. The population had fallen to 775,000.

Once upon a time Britain had a colony. And this unusual colony had a colony of its own. Then the colony-with-a-colony joined with other colonies and got some more colonies.

Message for Liz Sandals, the new minister of education: we can solve the great labour market problems. You’re facing panic in the land.

Kathleen Wynne made her first serious mistake in dealing with Northern Ontario even before she became premier. Asked wheth­er she supported regional government for the North, she said no. She said she didn’t want to support Northern separation.

Henry Ford once said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” It is interesting to think about how Henry would have run Northern Ontario’s forest tenure reform.