In the fall of 2023, as Premier Doug Ford looked to promote Ontario-based manufacturing, he toured a GTA industrial bakery that produces popular household brands such as Ace baguettes and Stonefire flatbreads.

“They call themselves the technology company that bakes. I call them the NASA of food production,” the premier declared in a video posted on his YouTube page.

Shortly after, the company enlisted the help of Rubicon Strategies, whose owner, Kory Teneycke, has also served as the election campaign manager for the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, looking to secure provincial funding.

“Assist FGF Brands Inc. with application to the Ontario Skills Development Fund program to upskill and train FGF’s diverse workforce,” the registration in October 2023 stated.

According to provincial records, while the company was unsuccessful during the initial three rounds of funding, its lobbying efforts eventually paid off.

In September 2025, FGF Brands was listed as one of dozens of companies that received funding from the Skills Development Fund’s training stream, which the company said would be used for training and retraining a high-performance organization.

While government records show the company received $1.064 million from Ontario taxpayers, Rubicon Strategies indicated the company received $1.25 million from the Ministry of Labour, Training and Skills Development in the previous fiscal year, which ended on March 31.

The provincial funding, however, also appears to coincide with a sudden surge in donations from key members connected to FGF Brands — all to the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party.

Elections Ontario records suggest the owners of FGF Brands — founder Sam Ajmera and his sons, Tejus and Ojus Ajmera — along with other members of the family, donated twice in 2025 for a total of $32,000.

The first donation, from five members of the Ajmera family, came during the snap winter election campaign: $3,040 per individual, for a total of $15,200.

The second donation, which came almost immediately after, was listed as the “2025 annual period”: $3,400 per individual for a total of $17,000.

In 2022, Ontario Shipyards, formerly known as the Heddle Marine Services, hired Rubicon Strategies to “educate the government on the economic development benefits that can be gained by supporting the shipbuilding industry.”

According to the lobbying records, the company targeted the Premier’s Office and a number of ministries, including finance, economic development and labour.

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Shortly after, the company was awarded millions of dollars from Ontario taxpayers from multiple government ministries, totalling $25.8 million — roughly $13.7 million of which came from the government’s skills development fund.

In July 2023, with then-labour minister Monte McNaughton in tow, Premier Doug Ford announced the company would receive $3.7 million in SDF funding to “train more people for highly skilled jobs in the shipbuilding industry.”

Elections Ontario records show company executives made multiple donations to the Ontario PC Party, along with successive ministers of labour.

In 2021, when the Ford government first opened the fund, names matching those of the company’s chief executive officer, chief financial officer, chief operating officer and director of business development donated a total of $8,594 to the Lambton-Kent-Middlesex PC riding association.

That was the riding represented by McNaughton, who was the labour minister at the time.

In 2024, the same year the company received $10 million in funding from the SDF, the same executives donated $6,640 to the Northumberland-Peterborough South PC riding association. Current Labour Minister David Piccini represents that riding.

Between 2021 and 2024, company executives appear to have also donated another $18,870 to the PC Party.

Ontario Liberal MPP John Fraser said the process appears to be a “scheme.”

“People are donating lots of money and then they’re getting millions of dollars from a government,” Fraser said. “It’s just out there for everybody to see.”

Stephanie Smyth, another Liberal MPP, said she felt the way skills development funding dollars had been handed out was shocking.

“The fact that this government is operating a circular economy of donations for taxpayer dollars – our dollars – that are then donated back again to the government is frankly gobsmacking,” she said.

At Queen’s Park, as Minister Piccini was grilled by the opposition during question period, NDP Leader Marit Stiles raised another example she said followed the same trend as other Skills Development Fund controversies.

The Ontario Harness Horse Association, which advocates on behalf of racehorse owners and trainers, received more than $6 million in funding over several rounds of the SDF.

Donation records, kept by Elections Ontario, show the president of the organization has made a flurry of donations between 2022 and 2025 to the PC party, elected PC MPPs and candidates totalling $15,548.

Stiles said those donations were just a fraction of the total.

“The association’s president, their general manager, their executive director have all donated to the Conservative Party,” Stiles said.

“Their president and his family donated about $43,000 to the Conservatives. Wow.”

James Whelan, president of the OHHA, confirmed to Global News his organization was granted more than $6 million in skills development funding, although it did not spend the full sum, and said donations made by himself and others were done so in a “personal” capacity.

“The contributions are personal contributions,” he wrote in an email. “And those Individuals have a history of contributions and supporting all four provincial parties.”

Whelan said the NDP should “cease and desist trying to make political hay on the backs of grassroots, tax paying and law abiding rural Ontarians.”

He added the program funded through the skills development fund was one the OHHA was “very proud and passionate (about) and fills a huge void that is desperately needed in the agricultural industry.”

The questions about the broader skills development fund, and who donated to the Progressive Conservative Party, come as the Ford government looks to increase yearly individual donation limits to $5,000 — which, Stiles argued, shows the premier is looking to “dig in” despite the scandal.

“If you can pay to play, then you got a place at the table, right? What this government has basically done with these changes is they’re slapping up a big for-sale sign on democracy in the province of Ontario,” Stiles said.