A Good Compromise Leaves Everyone Angry

That seems to have been the prevailing wisdom that guided John Tory's new half-step back from faith-based funding. This is worse for him now than where he was before. Those opposed to faith-based funding are not going to rush to embrace the idea that it might not pass a free vote. Those supporting faith-based funding are now witness to the readiness of Tory to walk away from them. Tory just dug himself a deeper hole. He has now lost everyone on the schools issue. If he has a prayer (no pun intended) he's going to have to change the channel quickly.

In the end I think this was an incredibly poorly conceived plan, regardless of what you think of the objectives. For many parents the idea of putting their children in a faith-based school is to get away from the Ontario curriculum in one way or another. Tory would have brought faith-based schools further under the purview of the Ministry of Education, and while some faith-based school parents (FBSPs?) would have endorsed that, for others that was precisely the wrong thing to do.

Even Harrisites are Doubting Tory's Faith-based Plan

According to the Star, former Harris-era education minister, Diane Cunningham is expressing concerns about Tory's plan:

"He has kind of got himself into something. ... He may go down on this but he will go down as a straight shooter,"

She continues:

"I am hearing more and more people say that religion should be taken right out of the school system,"

In other words, Tory is going in the opposite direction from that of the electorate. There is a fairly narrow band of people who would surely like to see faith-based school funding, but the fact that Tory wants to bring these schools under the auspices of public boards makes them suspicious. Tory took a major hit just by mentioning creationism, but beliefs like creationism (among many, many others you wouldn't see in a public school) are the very reason why there are religious schools.

Tory is going to have to accept - even embrace - the reality that faith-based schools are going to be teaching, well, a faith-based curriculum. What this does not only to science class, but also to, say, history class is going to be significant. If Tory wins (a prospect that I'm so far not bullish on) you can bet the opposition will go through every faith-based curriculum in an attempt to embarrass the government.

John Tory's "Stanfield" Moment

That's what I call what he did today with his teach-what-you-want approach to science in the newly taxpayer-funded religious schools of this province. Many religious schools may want to dispute evolution but now that taxpayer money is involved, it's a different story. Moreover what if Scientology sets up a school teaching children that Lord Xenu dumped a bunch of alien souls in volcanoes and that's where we came from? I'm sure there are other examples and indeed ones that just about anyone would not want to be supported by their tax dollars. John Tory this is your Robert Stanfield fumble. Not as spectacular as telling people not to vote for Chretien because he's ugly, but pretty bad nonetheless.