The Ontario Liberal Party platform was released today, with a press conference held at the Marriott hotel in Toronto.

Highlights of the platform include:

“A drive to completely implement North America’s first, full-day kindergarten program by 2014, followed by provincewide after-school programs for children aged 6-12;

A new tuition grant for full-time undergraduate students from lower- and middle-income families that will save $1600 per student in university and $730 per student in college, annually.

Increasing postsecondary attainment by adding 60,000 new spaces including three new undergraduate satellite campuses;

Helping seniors stay healthy at home, with a seniors’ healthy home renovation tax credit for things like ramps and walk-in baths;
Returning house calls for the frail and elderly and providing an additional three million hours of homecare from personal support workers;

Creating 50,000 new, clean-energy jobs through Ontario’s world-leading FIT program; and

Reducing electricity bills by 10% through the Ontario Clean Energy Benefit.”

2011 OLP Platform

The Ontario Liberal Party held its Annual General Meeting this weekend in Toronto.

A major theme for the conference was social media initiatives, including the launch of fRed, a social media platform and aggregator dedicated to Liberals.

Chris Drew took photos of attendees throughout the conference and Tweeted the pictures.

Omar Ha-Redeye and Chris James Drew

Rahaf Harfoush, author of Yes We Did: An Inside Look at How Social Media Built the Obama Brand, spoke on how to effectively organize online engagement.

Christine McMillan and Matthew Lombardi offered an introductory session to social media, and Janice Nicholson and Graham Rivers presented an advanced social media session.

Warren Kinsella provided war-room strategy and opposition watch.

OLP AGM Friday, October 15, 2010 from Ontario Liberal Party on Vimeo.

OLP AGM Saturday, October 16, 2010 from Ontario Liberal Party on Vimeo.

The 2007 Ontario provincial elections was a great success for the Liberal Party, winning 71 out of a possible 107.

Liberals were especially successful in the Toronto region, where they retained all of their ridings and gained an additional riding in York South—Weston.

Another new riding that Liberals nearly won was Trinity-Spadina. It’s one of Toronto’s most ethnically diverse ridings, including Chinatown, Koreatown, Little Italy, and Little Portugal. It also has considerable economic diversity, with the prosperous Annex in the northern part.

And so it was in the Annex that the riding association was preparing well in advance for the 2011 election.

The NDP incumbent had defeated the Liberal candidate, Kathryn Holloway, by a narrow margin of less than 5% votes. In an election which had the lowest voter turnout in Ontario history, the opportunity to win this riding for the Liberals seemed imminent.

Guests of honour included Greg Sorbara, MPP, and Hon. Chris Bentley, M.P.P. for London West.

The event was held at The Manyata/Spice Room, in Hazelton lanes.