NDP's Horwath appears at Ontario Chamber of Commerce event mere days after the gutting of rights of workers

If there was ever any doubt about the duplicitous and class collaborationist nature of modern professional "social democratic" politicians they can be safely laid to rest with the following tweet from Ontario NDP "opposition" leader Horwath on October 25.

Rocco Rossi and the Ontario Chamber of Commerce have spent months successfully lobbying the reactionary Ford government to rip up Bill 148 that granted new rights and protections to workers in Ontario and that was to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour in January.

This is all being repealed. When the gutting of the new rights and the wage increase for Ontario's most precarious and vulnerable workers was announced on October 23, Rossi said  “We are absolutely thrilled that the Government of Ontario is holding strong in its commitment to keep Ontario open for business.”.

What, exactly, does Horwath hope to accomplish here?

Tim Hudak, the former leader of the Ontario Conservatives, who pledged to fire 100,000 civil servants and introduce vicious austerity in 2014, thought her appearance was pretty groovy.

What did Horwath have to say to the assembled business audience? 

Who cares? Seriously, it does not matter at all. They could not care less what she has to say and have no intention of listening to her ideas, such as they are.

The real question leftists should ask is why, mere days after this group of reactionary cretins had managed to viciously attack the rights of workers in Ontario, would Andrea Horwath legitimize and dignify their stage and forum?   

That is precisely what she does by appearing there.

What possible motive could a leader claiming to represent workers have in appearing with Rocco Rossi? 

The answer is the craven and bankrupt desire by the new generation of fake social democrats to pretend that they can represent the interests of both the workers and the bosses, both labour and business, in a pathetic attempt to pander to people who will never support or vote for them.

As I have written previously:

This notion of 'progressive' or social democratic governance is an explicit rejection of class politics and of the idea that a 'progressive', labour or left party or government is meant to represent the workers and, yes, to take their side and act in their interests.
To the great cry of "which side are you on" it answers with "both", which is no answer at all. The principle of "evenhandedness" is predicated on a quaint idealization of capitalist "democracy" where workers and their bosses are all parts of society who need to work together for the "common good" and "shared values", etc.
But power, wealth and influence are not at all evenly distributed in our society or economy. A party or politician that says they will seek to represent "everyone" is at best going to aim at a few token reforms that will attempt to "humanize" capitalism while keeping all of the fundamentals and structures of it completely in place. Workers and their bosses do not share "common interests". You cannot be a party of the working class or a party that claims to be on their side and acting in their interests and yet represent "everyone".
At times it is like the so many New Democrats and their supporters who love to share the 'Mouseland' parable that Tommy Douglas made famous have entirely missed its point. It is not going to be a government by and for the mice if it wants to find "common cause" with the cats.

Apologists for the NDP always try to claim that it remains, somehow, a party that represents the interests of working people in the province and beyond.

But appearing on stage with Rocco Rossi for a"fireside chat" in the present context puts the lie to that.