Whatever one thinks of Dalton McGuinty’s fairly restrictive tax-credit plan to encourage the economic integration of new Canadians in Ontario, surely we can agree that the proposal should be debated on its merits.

Instead, the Ontario PCs have chosen to demonize the people for whom the plan was intended, pandering to the lowest xenophobic passions of the electorate. It’s a politics of crass, cynical, opportunistic bigotry, and they’re wearing it with pride.

The Progressive Conservative MPP for Nepean-Carleton has now joined in: as far as she is concerned, new Canadians resident in Ontario are, and will always remain, second-class citizens.

Backing bossman Tim Hudak, she beats the nativist drum with abandon:

“We are opposed to Dalton McGuinty’s affirmative action plan that will see foreign workers get subsidies from Ontario tax dollars to get jobs to the exclusion of Ontario workers,” MacLeod said.

Canadian citizens those “foreign workers” may be, and residents of Ontario too, but, in her mind, they will never be “Ontario workers.” That’s for…well, people like her. Native-born. White. Yes, Lisa, we get it.

Chris Selley rubs his eyes and wonders:

How are Canadian citizens living in Ontario “foreign,” and why on earth would the PCs direct ire toward them, rather than toward the Liberals who proposed the idea? Does the party not want their votes? Does it realize they’re allowed to vote?

Why the PCs boarded this smelly bus is beyond me, too, but now it’s damage control until E-day:

When Mr. Hudak visited Peterborough on Thursday, his candidate there - who was quoted that morning warning that the tax credit would take jobs away from “our people” - hid from reporters in the back of his campaign office before being coaxed out by the Leader’s staff. On Friday, the PC candidate in Burlington backtracked from a quote in which she asked, “When did we become for immigrants?”

“Our people” or all of the people? That’s the stark choice on October 6, and we can thank Tim Hudak for putting the matter squarely.