Tony Ianno - Politics

Politics

Ianno was a long-time political organizer and helped a number of Italian-Canadians win federal and provincial Liberal nominations in Toronto in the 1980s. He also was a key figure in organizing support among Toronto's large Italian-Canadian population for Jean Chrétien during the 1990 Liberal leadership campaign.

He first ran for office in the 1988 election, as part of a group of four Liberals who, according to author William Johnson, "brought a new turbulence to the politics of Metro Toronto." The group, which included Joe Volpe, Armindo Silva, and Jasbir Singh, worked together and used aggressive tactics to secure nominations in the Toronto area. Ianno was nominated in the Toronto riding of Trinity-Spadina, but was defeated by New Democratic Party incumbent Dan Heap.

He ran again in the 1993 election and was elected in a Liberal sweep where they won nearly every seat in Ontario. Ianno continued to represent Trinity-Spadina for the next 13 years until he was defeated in 2006.

While most Ontario seats were easily won by the Liberals under Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, Trinity—Spadina was closely fought each time. Ianno narrowly held the diverse downtown riding through four federal elections, facing strong competition from New Democratic Party candidates. Much of his support came from the Italian, Portuguese and Chinese areas. Toronto's traditional Little Italy and Chinatown areas are in the ridinf. Ianno narrowly defeated Toronto city councillor Olivia Chow in the 1997 election and Globe and Mail journalist Michael Valpy who ran for the NDP in the 2000 election. In the 2004 election, Ianno again faced councillor Chow and managed to win re-election by a slim margin, as the Liberals were reduced to a minority government due to the Sponsorship Scandal.

On July 20, 2004, Ianno was appointed to the junior position of Minister of State (Families and Caregivers) in Paul Martin's cabinet following the Liberals' re-election.

During the 2006 election, Ianno faced off against Chow for the third time. This time she defeated him, winning 46% of the vote to Ianno's 40%. Some attributed Ianno's loss to his perceived support for the Toronto Port Authority and the Toronto City Centre Airport. Although Ianno did not have an official role in the Authority's creation or policies, he nonetheless defended a controversial payout to the Authority as compensation for the cancellation of the Island Airport Bridge.

His party's proposal redress the Head Tax also did not help his campaign, as the Liberals had not consulted many of the major Canadian-Chinese groups (despite claiming to), the promised amount was reduced to from $12.5 million to $2.5 million, and the pre-condition was that the government would make no apology, while the three opposition parties pledged to make a full apology. Several gaffes by the Liberals also reflected negatively on Ianno, including when Mike Klander (the executive vice-president of the federal Liberals' Ontario wing) made posts on his blog comparing Chow to a Chow Chow dog and calling her husband an "asshole". Klander apologized for the remark and resigned.