Fake DECO Labels Website Launched to Bring Attention to Doug Ford’s Lockdown Profiting

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 situation in Canada, and especially Ontario, many people have raised concerns with a conflict of interest Premier Doug Ford is in when it comes to incentives to keep the lockdowns going and make new and complicated public health orders. 

The Ford family is well-known to own the Ontario-based label printing company DECO Labels which has gotten a lot more business since the start over the past year and a half, printing new warning labels and signs mandated by the government that businesses and the public institutions must display on their property. 

Clearly, one or more individuals are frustrated by the way the Ford family has naturally enriched itself through the way lockdowns rules have been implemented in Ontario, and they have taken action by registering decolabels.ca to display anti-Ford messages. For context, the real DECO Labels site is registered as decolabels.com so the slight difference has likely had many people see the activist-made website by mistake.

The large text at the top of the DECO page reads “ONTARIO IS LOCKED DOWN SO RECORD PROFITS MAY BLOSSOM” as well as “SELF SERVING SLEAZE BAG”.

The video uploaded to the page that can be seen in the above-posted screenshot is a recording of presumably the creator of the site recording themselves speaking to a DECO Labels representative on the phone to complain about Ford’s PC government’s draconian lockdown orders and how the complexity and seemingly never-ending nature of the lockdowns are clearly making massive profits for DECO and that it is a blatant conflict of interest on the part of Doug Ford. 

As you scroll down on the page further evidence that Doug Ford is involved with the DECO directly, is displayed with articles referencing Ford threatening to sue over allegations of DECO lobbying the Toronto city government while Doug’s brother Rob was mayor. 

The activist creator also shows a business card displaying Doug Ford’s name and title at DECO as president of the company which likely is indicating that in the past Doug Ford has been directly in charge of the company and it has not just been run by other members of the Ford family. Next to that photo it also shows that when Ford was registering to run for city council in Toronto he was still using his DECO email proving crossover between his time as president of the company and his time in government.

It does seem that there has been relatively little attention paid to Doug Ford’s connection with the Ford family business and whether or not the sort of lockdown orders the PC government has been putting in place not only unfairly hurts small businesses but at the same time is good for the DECO business model and if that may be influencing Ford’s lockdown strategy.