{"id":504347,"date":"2026-01-09T18:47:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T18:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/504347\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T18:47:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T18:47:12","slug":"ontario-sues-company-in-skills-development-fund-controversy-for-millions-in-damages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/504347\/","title":{"rendered":"Ontario sues company in Skills Development Fund controversy for millions in damages"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Ontario says in a statement of claim that it wants $25.7-millon in damages from Get A-Head, its owner Keel Digital Solutions, and some executives and directors.Eduardo Lima\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

The Ontario government is going to court to seek millions in damages from Keel Digital Solutions, a company that received taxpayer money from the province\u2019s Skills Development Fund and is facing a police investigation for its use of provincial cash. <\/p>\n

The government alleges in a lawsuit filed in Ontario Superior Court that the company, its subsidiary, and five executives engaged in \u201cfraudulent misrepresentation\u201d to secure contracts with both the postsecondary education and labour ministries, and must pay $25.7-million in damages.<\/p>\n

The office of Premier Doug Ford announced the court action on Friday morning, saying it had filed a statement of claim against Get A-Head, which runs a virtual counselling platform, and its owner, Keel Digital Solutions. <\/p>\n

OPP confirms review of reported \u2018suspicious activity\u2019 tied to company that received millions from Ontario<\/a><\/p>\n

The lawsuit also includes a demand for punitive damages of $100,000 each from five company executives, among them Keel president and CEO Rob Godfrey and chief operating officer Jay Fischbach. The allegations have not been proven in court. <\/p>\n

Mr. Fischbach said in an e-mail on Friday morning that the lawsuit was \u201cdeeply flawed, built on misstatements and outright inaccuracies.\u201d He denied the allegations and said the company would be filing a counterclaim against the government.<\/p>\n

\u201cKeel Digital has never been involved in any fraudulent activity, and we fully expect the government of Ontario to be compelled to retract its claims, apologize, and answer for the recklessness and malice that drove this case,\u201d the e-mail reads. \u201cWe caution the media to be careful with their reporting, an accusation is not proof of anything.\u201d <\/p>\n

Mr. Godfrey did not immediately respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n

The company has previously denied any wrongdoing and has said that it was being made a \u201cscapegoat\u201d amid the controversy that has surrounded the distribution of money from Ontario\u2019s $2.5-billion Skills Development Fund since October.<\/p>\n

An Auditor-General\u2019s report last fall criticized the fund, which distributes money to employers, unions and other organizations for programs to train workers, saying the office of Labour Minister David Piccini had ignored recommendations from bureaucrats and given hundreds of millions of dollars to less-qualified recipients. <\/p>\n

The office of Integrity Commissioner Cathryn Motherwell confirmed last month that Mr. Piccini will face an ethics investigation prompted by opposition complaints about his handling of the fund. Mr. Ford has said in recent weeks that he has confidence in Mr. Piccini and did not intend to remove him from his post.<\/p>\n

In Keel\u2019s case, the Ontario government said last fall that a forensic audit uncovered \u201csuspicious activity\u201d and forwarded the matter to the Ontario Provincial Police, which later <\/b>said it had launched an investigation. <\/p>\n

Keel, which operated an artificial intelligence-driven online counselling platform for students and police officers, was providing services under a contract with the Ministry of Colleges and Universities before it was awarded $7.5-million in grants from the Skills Development Fund. In all, it had been awarded $40-million in government money since 2019-20. <\/p>\n

It was still receiving provincial money as recently as October, even though it was facing a forensic audit. In November, the government said it had frozen payments and put the company under review.<\/p>\n

Mr. Fischbach told The Globe and Mail in November that he was never informed of any \u201cred flags\u201d during the audit process and that the company complied with all laws and contractual obligations. <\/p>\n

The company\u2019s links to Mr. Piccini have come under scrutiny. Mr. Piccini has said publicly that he approved the application for Skills Development Fund money from Keel, even though it had received a low score from ministry bureaucrats.<\/p>\n

Last fall, the minister attended the Paris wedding of Keel\u2019s lobbyist. And in 2023, before he became minister, he was seen rinkside at a Toronto Maple Leafs game with an independent <\/b>director of the company. Mr. Piccini has said he paid his own way for both the game and the wedding.<\/p>\n

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles, responding to the lawsuit, repeated her calls for Mr. Ford to fire his Labour Minister, pointing to Mr. Piccini\u2019s links to the company and his acknowledgement that he chose it over other more-qualified applicants for funding.<\/p>\n

\u201cRather than take accountability for this mess, Ford is once again going to court to cover his tracks, and it\u2019s Ontario taxpayers left footing the bill,\u201d Ms. Stiles said in a press release.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Ontario says in a statement of claim that it wants $25.7-millon in damages…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":504348,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2147,50,4741],"class_list":{"0":"post-504347","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-canada","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-pleasemod"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115866635158883751","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=504347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504347\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/504348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=504347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=504347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=504347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}