Not fooled by Conservatives’ scapegoating school boards, Ontarians blame Ford’s underfunding for school cuts: poll

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Just weeks after students returned to class and a month since Education Minister Paul Calandra began his scapegoat-the-school-boards media blitz, a new poll has found that a decisive majority of Ontarians lay the blame for cuts to public education and the lack of support services in schools at the door of Doug Ford’s Conservatives.

The public opinion survey by Abacus Data confirms that most Ontarians hold the Ford Conservative government – not local trustees – responsible for the underfunding that denies vital classroom services to students across the province.

“Ontarians know that the biggest problem for education is provincial underfunding; the cuts that hurt students, schools and education workers aren’t the fault of local and accountable school boards trustees. In fact, Ontarians value the people who are democratically elected to represent communities’ and parents’ interests,” said Fred Hahn, a social worker and the president of CUPE Ontario.

For many years, provincial funding for education has failed to keep up with inflation and higher enrollments. However, the inadequacy of education funding has gotten even worse since the Ford government took power in 2018, resulting in lasting damage to students and workers.

Joe Tigani, an educational assistant and the president of CUPE’s Ontario School Board Council of Unions (OSBCU), said: “The Ford Conservatives have underfunded public education in Ontario by billions of dollars since 2018, and students and the education workers who support them are at a breaking point.

“It’s time for Premier Doug Ford to listen to workers. After all, he has claimed to be ‘for workers’ and we’re telling him: fix the problem by filling the funding gap you’ve made so much worse. Parents know the problem, and they aren’t buying your attempts to blame democratically elected local trustees for shortfalls.”

“We were shocked by the numbers of people so angered by Conservative plans to scapegoat school boards that they’d rather get rid of the Minister of Education than their democratically elected trustees,” said Hahn, noting that two-thirds of those polled want Education Minister Paul Calandra fired “for his attempts to undermine Ontario democracy through this anti-parent power grab to eliminate local school trustees.”

“I don’t think the Conservatives realize the nerve they have hit here,” said Tigani. “Now is the time to change course, to fund our schools and quell the righteous concerns and anger of parents and education workers.”

Top-level findings from the Abacus Data public opinion research:

• the main problem for Ontario schools is underfunding, not school board trustees (57% agree, 25% disagree)
• the Ford government has underfunded schools by billions of dollars since they first took power seven years ago in 2018 (51% agree, 31% disagree)
• school board trustees provide local accountability and give parents and communities a voice in education (57% agree, 24% disagree)
• eliminating trustees will not add educational assistants or early childhood educators (ECEs) to classrooms, reduce class sizes or fix crumbling schools (56% agree, 28% disagree)
• the Ford government is manufacturing a controversy about school boards now to distract from their own poor record (46% agree, 30% disagree)

This survey was conducted online with 2,000 voting age Ontario residents from September 11 to 13, 2025. It was commissioned by CUPE Ontario. The margin of error for a comparable probability based random sample of the same size is +/- 2.19%, 19 times out of 20.

CUPE Ontario is the province’s largest union, with over 300,000 members who work in municipal services, public transit, public health and public housing; hospitals, Ontario Health at Home, and long-term care; community health care and paramedicine; schools, universities, and libraries; and social services from child protection and child care to supports for persons with developmental disabilities and services for the Deaf, deafblind, and hard of hearing.

CUPE’s Ontario School Boards Council of Unions (OSBCU) unites more than 57,000 education workers across this province’s public, Catholic, English, and French school boards.

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