The woman who made Kathleen Wynne Premier of Ontario is Kathleen Wynne, but the man who helped is Tom Allison. Today is his last day at Queen's Park. Allison confirmed in an interview earlier this week with QP Briefing the worst-kept secret at Queen's Park: He's leaving the Premier's Office to help run the campaign of former Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory, who announced this week he's running for Mayor of Toronto. Allison ran Wynne's victorious 2013 leadership bid, defeating Sandra Pupatello. He spoke nostalgically Wednesday about the end of his time in provincial politics.
"It's the end of this part of my career. Leaving is always hard and sad and I'm going to be missing this place terribly," Allison said Wednesday afternoon.
Asked about the coincidence of aiming to elect as mayor the man who Wynne defeated as MPP for Don Valley West in 2007, Allison joked: "I made a commitment to Kathleen I would try to find all the people she ever defeated and help them with their campaigns."
Allison has worked at Queen's Park on and off since 1985, when he joined the office of then Liberal MPP Jim Henderson. Because coincidences abound, Allison would manage the election campaign for Henderson in 1995 — and watch Henderson lose to one Doug Ford, Sr., father of Toronto City Councillor Doug Ford Jr., who had managed his father's campaign for the seat of Etobicoke-Humber.
"I talked with Doug [jr.] a few times during that campaign. I like Doug. I hope if I need to talk to him again I'll be able to," Allison said.
Allison also has some experience running campaigns against expected candidate Olivia Chow. He managed the campaign for Christine Innes in Trinity-Spadina in the 2011 election. Innes is currently the Chief of Staff to Minister Michael Chan.
The candidate he may be least familiar with is John Tory himself.  "I don't know him terribly well yet, but I feel I know him really well from listening to him on the radio for years. I'm willing to admit to being a Liberal who listens to CFRB," Allison said.
As for the reports that Allison is leaving because he lost an internal power struggle with Pat Sorbara over the next provincial election campaign, Allison stands by the assessment of the Premier's Chief of Staff, <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/globe-politics-insider/ontario-premiers-office-faces-major-turnover-ahead-of-election/article17078175/#dashboard/follows/">as reported by The Globe and Mail earlier this week</a>. Tom Teahen said reports of friction in the Premier's Office are "just absolutely not the case."
"I'm sure that if it's in The Globe and Mail it must be true," Allison said.
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The following appointments have been made to classified agencies and non-classified entities in the past 30 days:
<a href="http://www.pas.gov.on.ca/scripts/en/BoardDetails.asp?boardID=116058">Technical Standards and Safety Authority</a> 
Susan Kushneryk

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