Ah, it must be the time of year for Toronto Hydro to lose its collective shit and start the crazy talk:
Last week, the Ontario Energy Board denied Toronto Hydro’s request for a rate hike for homes within the city limits. The hike, which would have meant a monthly increase of five dollars for a typical household, was necessary, Toronto Hydro said, to renew the city’s electrical transmission grid. Failure to do so, they warned, could result in more, and longer, blackouts.
Not so, the Energy Board ruled. They said that Toronto Hydro had not demonstrated that Toronto’s power grid needed the kind of urgent repairs that were being proposed, and also chided Toronto Hydro for failing to make necessary productivity gains, implying that the requested money was not so much about urgent repairs as needing more cash. Toronto Hydro’s response has been swift: 700 contractors have been let go, and 20% of its workforce is being told that they’re next — that’s another 350 or so jobs. Oh, and without the cash, the city is probably going to go dark.
Do these guys know how to play hardball or what?
