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How Merrilee Fullerton fell out of favour within Doug Ford’s cabinet

The social services minister’s political career hadn’t played out as expected, long before her surprising day-after-budget-day resignation
2021-01-19 Merrilee Fullerton GL
Merrilee Fullerton, then-Ontario's minister of long-term care, answers reporters' questions at Queen’s Park in Toronto on May 28, 2020. Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press

Merrilee Fullerton’s sudden resignation from the Ford government sent confusion through Queen’s Park last Friday.

Although the abruptness and timing of her decision — coming the day after budget day — has sparked suspicions in political circles, the only rationale The Trillium has heard substantiated by sources is that Fullerton left the government over a serious health matter within her family.

Nevertheless, the now-former minister’s departure from the Ford government brings to an end a political career that never quite seemed to go as planned.

Before running for the Progressive Conservatives, Dr. Merrilee Fullerton practised as a family physician for the better part of three decades. She was a doctors’ advocate, serving in roles with provincial and national associations. And she also wrote about health care, both on her own blog and as a freelancer for the Ottawa Citizen.

At the time of her nomination in Kanata—Carleton in the summer of 2017, she was presented as a star candidate for the PCs.

She had seen herself as a potential future health minister in the early goings of her political career, The Trillium was told by one source in the government, plus two others with ties to it, who were granted anonymity.

Fullerton didn’t respond to several attempts this week to reach her before this story was published.

Only a few months after Fullerton’s nomination, her trajectory was jolted, along with that of the whole PC party’s. In January 2018, then-opposition leader Patrick Brown — whom Fullerton was recruited under — resigned after CTV News published allegations from two women who described Brown as having acted in sexually inappropriate ways while he was an elected official. (Brown denied the allegations and sued CTV. They reached a settlement in 2022 that saw no money switch hands, and CTV correct its story to state that one of the women making allegations was of legal drinking age, instead of under it, as the original version said.)

About a week after Brown’s resignation, Christine Elliott announced she was joining the race to succeed him atop the PCs, leaving her appointment as Ontario’s patient ombudsman. Elliott had left elected politics in 2015 after nine years as a PC MPP.

In the 2018 leadership race, Fullerton supported Caroline Mulroney, the Citizen reported at the time.

Mulroney finished a distant third place. Doug Ford ultimately bested Elliott in a close and controversial outcome. In the last round of voting, Elliott got more votes than Ford, but Ford placed first in points, which decided the contest’s winner.

Elliott refused to concede on the night of the PC leadership convention on March 10, 2018, but after meeting with Ford the next day she accepted the results, and promised to run in the upcoming election for the PCs.

On June 7, 2018, Fullerton handedly won Kanata—Carleton with 43 per cent of votes, and almost 7,500 more than her closest challenger. Ford’s PCs swept into power with a majority, winning 76 of Ontario’s 124 seats.

In naming his cabinet later that month, Ford appointed Elliott deputy premier and minister of health and long-term care. Fullerton was named minister of training, colleges and universities, which one source in the government and another with ties to it said she was given to “prove herself.”

Ford also appointed Fullerton as one of eight members of the Management Board of Cabinet and of the Treasury Board, a powerful subcommittee within the larger cabinet that has significant influence, including over government spending.

But throughout her time in government, Fullerton never made the same inroads with Ford and his inner circle that other PC MPPs did, said one source in the government and four others with ties to it.

One issue that sources said drove an early wedge between Fullerton and Ford’s inner circle was the proposed redevelopment of the Kanata Golf and Country Club in her riding.

In December 2018, ClubLink, the private golf club’s owner, announced that it had partnered with two developers, Minto Communities and Richcraft Homes, to transform the golf course into new housing. 

The proposed development would see 1,500 homes built on where there’s currently a 71-hectare course. Although it hasn’t started yet, the proposal has gone through a winding and complicated legal journey involving the city — the jurisdiction it falls under — that’s brought it closer to fruition. The previous iteration of Ottawa’s city council called on the Ford government to step in and block the course’s redevelopment.

To help their bid, the companies hired consultant Chris Froggatt.

Froggatt vice-chaired the PCs’ 2018 campaign and then led the transition team that helped set up the newly elected Ford government, before launching Loyalist Public Affairs, a lobby firm. He’s also a longtime friend of Dean French, Ford’s chief of staff during his first year as premier.

Fullerton, meanwhile, opposed the redevelopment of the course, coming out against it days after ClubLink-Minto-Richcraft announced their plan in December 2018. She continued advocating against it over the following years, as well.

Froggatt told The Trillium in an email that he “never had any discussions with her (Fullerton) about the proposed redevelopment of Kanata Lakes (where the golf club is),” and that it was “false” that they butted heads over the issue.

However, being an opponent to Froggatt over the development complicated Fullerton’s standing within the Ford government, three sources with ties to it said.

After leaving his role on the transition team for Ford’s government, Froggatt remained a “powerful backroom adviser” to Ford, reported the Globe and Mail in July 2019, which three of The Trillium’s sources with ties to the government substantiated.

The Globe also reported that Froggatt was among Ford’s external advisers who provided the premier opinions on cabinet appointments. Asked if he ever recommended Fullerton be removed from cabinet, or given a particular appointment, Froggatt wrote on Wednesday that “I never advocated for her to be removed from cabinet.”

The premier’s office didn’t address questions The Trillium sent on Wednesday, including about whether Fullerton’s position toward the redevelopment of the Kanata Golf and Country Club affected her standing. Instead, a spokesperson sent a link to Ford’s statement from the day Fullerton resigned.

On June 20, 2019, after the Ford government’s first year in power — which was widely seen as tumultuous — the premier shuffled his cabinet. Fullerton moved to long-term care and the ministry was split off from Elliott’s.

Prior to being broken off into its own ministry, long-term care had operated as a branch under Elliott’s purview. Some senior public servants continue to work for both ministries, but this practice was even more common when Fullerton took over long-term care, organizational charts show.

The lack of autonomy in her new ministerial position frustrated Fullerton, one source in the government and two with ties to it said.

She and Elliott also at times clashed, two sources with ties to the government said.

On Jan. 14, 2020, about a year-and-a-half into the Ford government’s first term, Fullerton was replaced on the Management Board of Cabinet and of the Treasury Board. Two sources with ties to the government said Fullerton quit the cabinet subcommittee, further hurting her standing within the wider executive council. Then-solicitor general Sylvia Jones replaced her.

Another of The Trillium’s questions that the premier’s office didn’t answer was about whether or not it was Fullerton’s decision to leave this cabinet subcommittee.

Soon after COVID-19 spread to Canada in early 2020, Fullerton became one of Ontario’s most-watched ministers. She oversaw the government’s management of long-term care for the first year and a half of the pandemic. During that time, the military deployed to some of Ontario’s hardest-hit long-term care homes, uncovering horrifying conditions.

In June 2020, Toronto Sun columnist Brian Lilley reported, citing unnamed sources, that Fullerton had sought funding from the cabinet subcommittee she had been a member of to improve staffing in long-term care and was granted some of it, but not all. After its publication, Ford offered a broad denial, saying “it was riddled full of errors and it’s simply not true — about us saying we aren’t going to fund hiring staff at long-term care,” Queen’s Park Today reported at the time.

One government source and another with ties to it told The Trillium that Fullerton had attempted to better bolster Ontario’s long-term care homes ahead of the disaster that unfolded but failed to compel support within the government.

While she was long-term care minister, around 4,000 residents died.

In June 2021, Fullerton was shuffled again, this time from long-term care to become Ontario’s minister of children, community and social services.

Upon taking over as long-term care minister, Rod Phillips apologized for how “past governments and the current government” handled the sector.

“It was over decades that this sector was neglected, that investments weren’t made and so accountability rests with all of us who’ve been in government,” Phillips said in June 2021.

As social services minister, Fullerton was responsible for managing for the better part of two years the government’s program for families with children with autism. Its waitlist grew by thousands when Fullerton was minister.

Fullerton was easily reelected last spring, winning with about the same percentage of votes as in 2018. Elliott didn’t seek reelection. Like most of Ford’s ministers, Fullerton stayed put in the same ministerial position as before the election. Jones became health minister and deputy premier.

As social services minister, Fullerton was also tasked with following through with the PCs’ election promise to increase Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) payments by 5 per cent, and indexing future increases to the inflation rate. She and the government have faced regular criticism for not budging on this promise and offering more. For many ODSP payment recipients, the maximum of $1,228 that they receive through the program per month is their primary income.

The sources who spoke to The Trillium for this story offered various opinions of why Fullerton never ascended within cabinet. Some blamed her, saying she was difficult to work with, or that her communication skills couldn’t match other PC ministers, overshadowing her pre-politics qualifications.

Others were more sympathetic, saying her relative disinterest in inner-party politicking cost her, or blaming the circumstances she was put in. “Look at the cards she was dealt,” one government source said.

“A strong sense of duty brought me to politics after decades as a family physician serving my community, to continue my work towards solutions that would address the shortcomings of our health-care system and improve health services for individuals,” Fullerton said in the letter she posted on Twitter announcing her resignation last Friday.

Neither the letter Fullerton posted on Twitter nor the one that was tabled in the legislature stated specifically why she resigned. She did thank Ford and her fellow PC MPPs and cabinet ministers in the letter she posted online.

“To serve the people of this province has been a profound honour,” it finished.

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