Kathleen Wynne and Loblaw’s Subsidy Bobble

Photo Credit: Nathan Denette/The Canadian Press

By Josh Lieblein

Woke Ontarians have been going on for weeks about all the ethically responsible and socially conscious things they’re going to do with the $25 gift card that the soulless corporatist monsters at Loblaw Company Ltd. have been giving out to get themselves off the hook for fixing the price of bread over the last fourteen years.

Let’s not exaggerate the situation: being caught with one of these gift cards in your wallet is the equivalent of branding yourself with a scarlet letter “A” for Asshole. Lynne Beyak wearing a MCGA (Make Canada Great Again) hat tweeting that we should just raise the minimum wage to $1M/hour so that EVERYBODY can be rich would be more popular in today’s Ontario than these gift cards.

There seems to be a widespread consensus that going along with Loblaw’s slimy attempts at reputation management schemes is NOT who we are as Canadians. And as is the case with the Tim Hortons’ minimum wage fight or the brouhaha over Beyak, the speed and alacrity with which the left went into formation over Loblaw’s price-fixing suggests to me a co-ordinated campaign by the Liberals and their union allies in achieving that consensus.

The thing about these full-court presses is that even the Liberals can only focus on a few at a time, and they tend to forget that Loblaw recently bought 25 of Tesla’s new all-electric trucks “as part of our commitment to electrify our fleet…” — trucks that Premier Kathleen Wynne offered a rebate of up to $75,000 for.

(I won’t get into the somewhat related issue of former Liberal MPP Glen Murray’s former chief of staff landing a job with Tesla early last year, or how in that same month the former chief of staff joined Tesla then-Environment Minister Murray announced rebates of up to $14,000 for luxury cars, including Tesla models. Woke leftists can only manage a few selective outrages at a time and I don’t want to overwhelm them any further, especially with an issue surely to leave them with cognitive dissonance in feeling happiness over more money being thrown at new green schemes and anger over Loblaw getting a gift of nearly $2 million from the government.)

So, I have to ask: is Loblaw’s attempt to green-wash their image by buying Liberal-subsidized, i.e. discounted trucks courtesy of Ontario taxpayers (some Loblaw’s customers or former customers), trucks less reprehensible than their attempt to buy goodwill with $25 gift cards to fix the PR disaster of them admitting to fixing the price of bread? Or does the fact that the Liberals gave the electric trucks their seal of approval over a supposed green energy initiative excuse Loblaw in this instance?

I think I may have an answer to this conundrum. You see, while Tesla’s electric vehicles aren’t economically viable to exist without some form of government subsidy, Loblaw Companies Ltd. has received no corporate welfare from Industry Canada.

While the left sneers at big business partnering with the state, it seems that they have much more time and energy to go after companies that the government can’t control. So while it’s convenient for the Liberals to have Loblaw opt into their subsidy scheme, the fact is that Loblaw could, until recently,  fix the price of bread behind the government’s back — and that’s a big no-no. Lucky for Loblaw corporate that they admitted their sin and apologized, so they only got their chains yanked on social media, instead of getting pummeled by the full wrath of the Liberals and their union overlords that Tim Hortons is now in the midst of receiving.

The selective outrage at Loblaw and Tim Hortons from those on the left is really the Liberals whining that there are still barriers to them achieving absolute control over businesses in Canada.