Peter Turkington

The Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario paid roughly $3,000 to send an operative to two Jamaican resorts in December 2023 to surveil newly elected Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie on a private vacation. Doug Ford said he learned of it only on August 12, 2026, did not approve of it, and then defended it as "politics."

PC Party spokesman who publicly defended the Jamaica surveillance operation as opposition research.

A Toronto Star analysis of Elections Ontario filings found five Ontario cabinet ministers' riding associations spent a combined $356,312 on "meetings hosted" across 2024 and 2025, at venues including a sashimi restaurant, a tequila bar and an axe-throwing establishment. The money came from donations that qualify for provincial tax credits.

PC Party communications director who gave the party's defence, saying the Star did not provide a proper explanation and describing the Beretta Farms event as a "community barbeque, with hamburgers, snacks, and fun for the kids, hosting hundreds of residents, and local stakeholders, and first responders." He added that "context is necessary... It was a well-attended barbeque with food sources from the farm host, a proudly King company using 100% Canadian meat."