Call it the “Steeltown Showdown.”
Progressive Conservative MPP Donna Skelly is accusing Andrea Horwath of pushing her in the legislative chamber on Tuesday afternoon — but the NDP leader says it was no more than a tap that the Tories are trying to exploit for their own political ends.
The two MPPs represent the Hamilton area — Skelly Flamborough-Glanbrook and Horwath Hamilton Centre — and have know each other for a couple of decades.
“Andrea Horwath crossed the floor, came up to me yelling and screaming, and pushed me,” Skelly told reporters on Wednesday after Question Period.
Skelly alleged the incident occurred as the bells were ringing ahead of the final vote of the day — meaning the house cameras did not capture it, and so when push comes to shove there’s little evidence outside of the statements of the few MPPs who remained in the House at the end of Tuesday’s sitting.
“She was just screaming and yelling,” said Skelly, who described Horwath crossing the centre aisle of the chamber to come and “accost” her.
“I told her to get her hands off me.”
For her part, Horwath has embraced her “Steeltown Scrapper” nickname in the past, but in this case she denies Skelly’s account. She said she did “tap” Skelly on the shoulder to discuss Skelly’s behaviour — she alleged Skelly had been purposefully blocking the cameras in the House as Horwath gave a speech on her motion calling for the funding of a new hospital in Brampton.
The camera incident is captured in the Hansard.
“Excuse me. Will you please sit down? You’re blocking the camera,” acting Speaker Percy Hatfield said, shortly before the bells were rung and incident took place. “You know what you’re doing. And please don’t do it again.”
Skelly said the issue isn’t that she was injured, it’s about Horwath’s behaviour.
“I mean, am I physically harmed? No, Andrea Horwath does not intimidate me. I can tell you that. But it is absolutely inappropriate behaviour. Nobody should feel threatened where they work.”
She said another female NDP MPP — Monique Taylor — had done the same thing on a prior occasion but she did nothing about it, not wanting to be known for complaining about it.
“Could you imagine if that had been man?” she said. “They would be screaming, we’d have protests outside these doors.”
Skelly has asked the Speaker to rule on a breach of her privilege, but said she also has another suggestion for what consequences Horwath should face.
“I think she should probably consider some anger management,” said Skelly. “She’s clearly an angry woman.”
Energy Minister Greg Rickford said he witnessed a red-faced and angry NDP leader crossing the floor and making “a physical movement toward her shoulders, tapped them a couple of times,” he said, later characterizing it as a “push.”
“I just find it aggressive and unacceptable,” he said, adding there should be a “bright line” that stops MPPs from touching each other.
After the tap or push, Horwath was then corralled by some of her colleagues, according to Rickford.
Treasury Board President Peter Bethlenfalvy was sitting next to Skelly when the incident occurred.
“I saw the leader of the opposition come across (the aisle) and grab our colleague by the arm and get pretty aggressive,” he said.
Horwath said she went over to talk to Skelly and merely tapped her shoulder because her back was turned, and it was Skelly who “went ballistic.” Horwath explained she approached Skelly to address her behaviour — blocking the camera during Horwath’s speech — which she found “despicable.”
“This is nothing more than me going over to tap an old colleague on the shoulder,” she said. “The fact that they’re blowing this up into some kind of scandal just goes to show that this government cannot resist being hyperpartisan in the way that they behave. First of all, it’s despicable, second of all, it’s unnecessary.”
Asked about Skelly’s comment that Horwath needs anger management, Horwath said, “I think she needs to look in the mirror.”
- With files from David Hains

Hamilton MPP Donna Skelly accuses NDP Leader Andrea Horwath of pushing her in the House

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