The NDP will create a training tax credit for companies that help their staff upgrade their skills. They would amend Ontario’s mining act to make it law that resources mined in Ontario must also be processed in Ontario.

Mike Schreiner and the Green Party will increase investments in apprenticeship, co-operative and mentorship programs and expand training and certification programs in job growth areas like green buildings, biomedical technology, renewable energy and sustainable transportation.

When it comes to transit and infrastructure, the parties’ platforms vary in terms of funding roads and public infrastructure.

The Liberals plan includes $35 billion of infrastructure spending over three years, focusing on economic growth, improved asset management, an expanded role for Infrastructure Ontario and identified preconditions for capital ministries to ask for new funding.

Hudak’s plan will give all Ontario communities a share of the provincial gas tax for their own transportation projects and increase the dedicated revenue from the gas tax to transit, roads and other infrastructure projects.

Horwath proposes to freeze transit fares and expand transit options. The NDP will share the cost of operating transit equally with municipalities, invest in new transit projects and upgrades for public transit systems.

Schreiner plans to promote efficient, livable communities, support transit and give incentives to commuters who ride-share, more high-occupancy vehicle lanes and tax credits for public transit users.

The provincial parties have substantially different platforms on the green energy issue.

The McGuinty government introduced the Green Energy Act, which includes the Feed-in Tariff (FIT) program that provides guaranteed rates for renewable energy. The Liberals have said they’ll ensure this program continues so the price of renewable energy decreases. Over the next three years, the Liberals say they will finish replacing coal plants and move forward on clean sources of energy like wind, solar and pumped storage.

Hudak pledges to remove the HST and the Debt Retirement Charge from hydro bills and will remove the HST from the cost of home heating. Hudak will eliminate the Ontario Power Authority (OPA), end time-of-use pricing, FIT and the province’s $7 billion Samsung deal. Their goal is to close all of Ontario’s coal-powered plants by 2014 and they will have an open and fair process for alternate energy sources like solar, wind, and biomass.

Horwath says the OPA, Hydro One and the Independent Electricity System Operator duplicate efforts and she will merge them into a publicly-owned generating company to reduce costs.

Horwath said she will respect the contracts the government has already signed and make changes over the next four years to ensure future large-scale generation will be publicly owned and openly accountable to ratepayers. She would remove HST from necessities like electricity and home heating and remove HST from has prices by one percentage point each year. She will extend the Northern Ontario Industrial Electricity program.

Schreiner would reinstate and expand the home energy savings program, capture waste heat from chimneys in large buildings and turn it into electrical energy by increasing generation targets for combined heat and power.

Now it’s a waiting game to see whose platform will prevail.

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