 He was accused by one major newspaper of taking a "vehement anti-French stand" during the campaign ("Toronto Star", 3 June 1997), following an all-candidates' meeting where he blamed the Liberal government for "making a conscious decision to set up multiculturalism and putting French on cereal boxes" ("Toronto Star", 24 May 1997).He was also criticized for blaming child poverty on alcoholic parents, saying "If a family unit is receiving a certain amount of income and the husband or wife goes out, buys a bottle of booze and drinks it and because of that the children don't have enough to eat, I mean, how can governments control such things?