OTTAWA - Amid a flurry of the same kind of pre-election spending they chastised their predecessors for, the governing Conservatives are expected to announce millions in federal funding Wednesday to help reopen an auto plant in southwestern Ontario.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper will be joined for the announcement at Ford's mothballed Essex plant by Industry Minister Jim Prentice and area MP Jeff Watson.
Ford threw 900 people out of work when it shut down the plant last year, but has been hoping to reopen it and produce environmentally friendly V8 engines.
Ontario's economy has been battered by a weakened manufacturing sector while 88,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost nationally over the last year.
On Tuesday, Deere & Co. announced it would close its farm-vehicle factory in Welland, Ont., costing the province another 800 manufacturing jobs.
Ontario has one-third of the seats in federal Parliament and the middle-class voters outside its biggest urban centres could decide a number of pivotal ridings.
The Tories have actively courted these voters with tax cuts aimed at the middle class. However, economic fears among that group could serve as a wild card in the election campaign set to begin next weekend.
Ironically, Wednesday's announcement also comes from a federal government that has clashed with the province over the idea of spending public money to prop up businesses.
While the Ontario government has already contributed $17 million to the Ford project, the federal Conservatives have been critical of government subsidies.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty will not be there for Wednesday's event. He has repeatedly crossed swords with Ontario, describing its economic policy as a recipe for disaster and urging the province to cut taxes instead.
The federal cash for Ford would come after more than a dozen spending announcements in the runup to the election.
In one single day Tuesday, Prentice's department issued four news releases, including announcements of $2 million for new municipal infrastructure in Port Hope, Ont., and $43 million for a research project led by Magellan Aerospace of Mississauga, Ont.
The government had already spent actively in the buildup to an anticipated election that never materialized in spring 2007, pumping out more than $2 billion in unbudgeted spending in a matter of days.
In opposition, they chastised the Liberals for a similar practice and called it a vote-buying spree.
In the final days of the Paul Martin government, it was raining press releases in Ottawa.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation calculated that from Nov. 3-25, 2005, the Liberals made at least 145 spending announcements totalling $24.5-billion.
In one week alone -- from Nov. 21-25 -- the government of the day churned out over $20 billion through news releases and ribbon-cutting ceremonies.
