The morning after bitter accusations were flung within City Hall's council chambers, Ward 19 Councillor Mike Layton says it's time to move on and work alongside Mayor John Tory to fight Premier Doug Ford's proposed changes to cut city council nearly in half.
"We have a common enemy in this, and that's fighting for the democracy of our city against a totalitarian dictator in Premier Ford," he told CP24 Saturday morning.
Friday evening, Layton had accused Tory of already being aware of Ford's plan before the announcement this morning, prompting the Mayor to demand an apology for "[calling] my integrity into question," then telling Layton to "get up and say it if you have the balls to say it."
"All along he said he had a conversation with the premier about it," Layton said Saturday. "We didn't know what the substance of that conversation was. He revealed [Saturday] morning that it was about changing the size of council."
"Now that we have that established, if he didn't take it seriously, that's a whole other matter. So let's move on. We need to push hard back against the province to make sure Doug Ford reconsiders this position and in fact, gives the power back to Toronto residents.
Earlier Saturday morning, on the Dave Trafford show, Tory said that Layton had spent the day Friday making accusations against him on social media.
"I'm just not going to put up with it," Tory told NEWSTALK1010. "He should have the courage to get up and say what he's got to say.
"If he wants to make an accusation, make it directly instead of subtle innuendo. I just won't put up with it."
However, Mark Towhey, NEWSTALK1010 host of the Best Show Ever, told Ted Woloshyn that Tory made his support of a smaller council clear in the past.
"It's on record saying he'd prefer a smaller council," he said, adding that in consultations in the past, "when it came down to the final choices, once they'd eliminated the smaller council - which was vastly preferred by the citizens - the Mayor voted for an option that would have just redistributed the wards but kept the number the same."
Meantime, Hamilton Mayor Fred Eisenberger is reacting to Ford's plans, denouncing the Premier for appearing to come out of the blue to legislate the change - without feedback and less than three months before Ontario's municipal elections.
He says while reducing the size of council makes sense, the way Ford is going about it is inexcusable.
He echoed the words of Calgary's Mayor Naheed Nenshi who on Friday, compared Ford to a "tinpot dictator."
Ford has said he will be tabling the legislation involved with trimming council on Monday.