TORONTO -- Ontario's Progressive Conservatives are urging Premier Kathleen Wynne to release all documents related to the bailout of a Toronto real estate project ahead of Tuesday's leaders debate.
The Tories this week released documents they said show the governing Liberals approved a $317-million bailout of a downtown project by a private developer and a charity.
PC finance critic Vic Fedeli says taxpayers could be on the hook for more than three times that amount once all costs for the Phase 2 tower of the MaRS innovation and research complex are factored in.
In a news conference outside the complex on Sunday, he repeated the Tories' call for Wynne to "come clean" about the deal -- and the total price tag.
Wynne has said the deal to bail out the real estate developer and charity behind MaRS was not made public because it hasn't been finalized.
She has also said the fact that the province now has to buy the MaRS office tower to stop the charity from defaulting on government loans will give the government more office space across the street from the legislature.
But the Progressive Conservatives have railed against her reasoning.
"Kathleen Wynne has just used your tax dollars to purchase the Trump Tower of Canadian bureaucracy," Fedeli said on Sunday.
"The money that was blown on Kathleen Wynne's secret real estate deal could've gone to hire nurses or teachers for special ed kids."
Voters deserve to know the full details of this deal before they go to the polls on June 12, he said.
The province gave $71 million to buy the land to expand the MaRS centre, and a $234-million loan for a new tower, but the Tories have said documents show MaRS and the developer couldn't repay the money.
According to the documents, the development's $317-million purchase price would include the $234-million government loan.
