‘Peace and Stability’ Campaign Prevails for Ontario’s Unions

Premier’s policies, including funding, engendered trust.

When Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty came into office four years ago, he had to overcome a decade of bitter labor-management relations that had alienated teachers and parents alike in the Canadian province. He quickly formed a “guiding coalition” of key education and political leaders within the government to agree on a strategy.

Among his first actions was to eliminate a paper-and-pencil test for teacher licensure that most educators found demeaning; a mentoring and induction program for new teachers replaced it in 2005.

And, in an unprecedented move, as local teachers’ union contracts expired throughout the province in 2004, the government reached out to the leadership of the teachers’ federations to engage in talks to move...