Is crime a symbolic issue?

Do you support the police because you are a Conservative? Do you want to defund the police because you are a lefty?  Or maybe you don’t like “Men Giving Men Jobs”  like Premier Ford, who raised police wages while freezing nursing wages.

Is reducing crime about spending money? The 2026 annual Police Services budget is $1.7B, up from $1.17B when our “lefty” Mayor, Olivia Chow, released her first budget in 2024. 

Some politicians would have you believe that 2 people driving around in a car for 7 hours will keep us safer. Yet “The Crisis in Canadian Policing” by John Sewell and Christopher Williams points out research that says otherwise. That activity is just symbolic.

In the past 2 years, the Police have focused on car theft, and it has gone down significantly. Homicide is down, and other theft is up, as are cybercrime and hate crimes. Criminals don’t even have to meet us IRL to steal from us. We’d like to see reductions on all these crimes.

Toronto city council doe not review the detailed police budget so we are not sure what they are spending the money on. That is what has to change.