After reading about Hamilton's last minute reprieve respecting the Dalton McGuinty government's decision to give Hamilton a $12 million grant to cover this city's "social services" deficit for the fifth year in a row, and, seven if you count the two times the previous Progressive Conservative government gave Hamilton a similar hand-out instead of a hand up, it leaves me wondering why this problem has persisted so long without a remedy?

As this "grant" was outside the province's budget process and not included in the hundreds of budget papers posted on the Ministry of Finance's web site, I'm left wondering what's wrong with Hamilton's "social services" or why no other municipality in Ontario has a "social service" deficit requiring a $multi-million hand-out like Hamilton always does?

Is it the actual social services mandated by the province that are in deficit or is it the financial cost of "delivering" these services that are in a deficit position?

How was this deficit created in the first place, by providing social services that aren't mandated by the Province and paid for by the local taxpayers?

Is it fair to all those taxpayers in other municipalities in Ontario, that don't have social service deficits like Hamilton's, have to chip-in their hard-earned provincial tax dollars to cover the cost of social services in Hamilton?

Only a line by line accounting of the documents given to the province that prompted Dwight Duncan, the Finance Minister, to give Hamilton millions in return will get to the root cause of Hamilton's "social service" plight so that it can finally be "fixed" so the clients who receive these social services are better served.

Mark-Alan Whittle

Hamilton