Martin Regg Cohn: Doug Ford’s huge cabinet is another massive mistake he’ll survive — for now - Toronto Star

Good fortune may have left Ontario's premier thinking he doesn't have to worry about his government's failings, writes Martin Regg Cohn.

Premier Doug Ford operates a laser line probe in Kitchener in 2024 as David Piccini looks on. Piccini’s persistence in cabinet after Thursday’s shuffle surprises Martin Regg Cohn.

Martin Regg Cohn is a Toronto-based columnist focusing on Ontario politics and international affairs for the Star. Follow him on Twitter: @reggcohn.

Doug Ford is hoping a nip and a tuck will nip all those provincial scandals and scoundrels in the bud.

But cosmetic surgery is only skin deep. Deep down, the premier couldn’t give a damn how it looks on the outside.

How else to explain his hubris, arrogance and defiance this week when unveiling a bloated, bloviating, 37-member cabinet — the biggest in Ontario history — that papers over the cracks at Queen’s Park?

Until Thursday, David Piccini was Ford’s mighty minister of labour who got caught doling out millions of dollars to unqualified recipients — especially those private labour unions with an affinity and loyalty to the ruling Progressive Conservatives.

Piccini is still the subject of an ethics investigation by Ontario’s Integrity Commissioner. Yet the premier has handed him the equivalent of a get-out-of-jail card for any and all political misdemeanours, policy missteps or probity misjudgments.

The sick man of cabinet has been issued a clean bill of health. Instead of a demotion or expulsion, Piccini now commands a bigger empire as the even mightier minister of infrastructure.

At the labour ministry, Piccini presided over the systematic gutting of standards for the $2.5-billion Skills Development Fund. The Star found he undermined and overruled the civil servants who cautioned against disbursing public funds to those who didn’t meet government standards.

Now, he will bestride a portfolio brimming with billions more dollars, overseeing infrastructure across the province. This is the governing equivalent of putting the fox in charge of the taxpayer’s henhouse, poised for slaughter.

“It’s a natural move to go into infrastructure,” the premier said with a straight face as he presented his cabinet.

Why does Ford believe his PC government remains above the laws of gravity?

The answer is that he is riding high in the polls, basking in byelection victories last week that incumbent governments can’t usually count on at the midpoint of a mandate. Ford’s mistake is that he confuses good fortune with good governing.