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October 24, 2017

41st Parliament, 2nd Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcripts 2017-Oct-24 (PDF)

L109 - Tue 24 Oct 2017 / Mar 24 oct 2017

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Tuesday 24 October 2017 Mardi 24 octobre 2017

Visitor

Orders of the Day

Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 renforçant la qualité et la responsabilité pour les patients

Introduction of Visitors

Annual report, Environmental Commissioner of Ontario

Montgomery Davidson

Oral Questions

Government accountability

Government accountability

Long-term care

Long-term care

Long-term care

Government accountability

Public transit

Northern Ontario

Environmental protection

International trade

Child protection

Labour dispute

Arts and cultural funding

Community newspapers

Visitors

Correction of record

Deferred Votes

Representation Statute Law Amendment Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 modifiant des lois en ce qui concerne la représentation électorale

Introduction of Visitors

Supplementary estimates

Visitor

Members’ Statements

Disaster relief

Labour dispute

United Way of Peel Region

Child welfare

Labour dispute

Ross Skene

University and college convocations

Legislation in Quebec

Affordable housing

Visitors

Reports by Committees

Standing Committee on General Government

Statements by the Ministry and Responses

Rouge National Urban Park

Child Abuse Prevention Month

Rouge National Urban Park

Child Abuse Prevention Month

Child Abuse Prevention Month

Rouge National Urban Park

Petitions

Anti-smoking initiatives for youth

Long-term care

Elevator maintenance

Abortion facility legislation

Long-term care

Pharmacare

Employment standards

Road safety

Energy policies

School closures

Opposition Day

Government accountability

Adjournment Debate

Workers’ compensation

The House met at 0900.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Good morning. Please join me in prayer.

Prayers.

Visitor

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Point of order: the Minister of Labour.

Hon. Kevin Daniel Flynn: I didn’t realize we couldn’t do introductions, but somebody we haven’t seen in this place for a long time, my son, has joined us today: Nigel Flynn. Please welcome him to the House.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Welcome.

Orders of the Day

Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 renforçant la qualité et la responsabilité pour les patients

Resuming the debate adjourned on October 18, 2017, on the motion for second reading of the following bill:

Bill 160,

An Act to amend, repeal and enact various Acts in the interest of strengthening quality and accountability for patients / Projet de loi 160, Loi visant à modifier, à abroger et à édicter diverses lois dans le souci de renforcer la qualité et la responsabilité pour les patients.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Further debate?

Mr. John Yakabuski: I see I only have 10 minutes. We’re going to have to speak quickly.

It’s a pleasure to join the debate on Bill 160—what do we call it? I’ve got it right here—An Act to amend, repeal and enact various Acts in the interest of strengthening quality and accountability for patients.

It’s always interesting that, somehow, this government, as we near that judgment day of June 7, 2018, they’re working the word “accountability” into just about every bill that they introduce in this House. Every time a minister speaks or a backbencher is asking a fluff question of a minister, they try to somehow work the word “accountability” in there. It’s precisely because this government has talked the talk on accountability for 14 years but has done little in the way of actual action to make Ontarians feel that they’re more accountable. In fact, most of the things that they have done recently would indicate that they are not accountable.

I just did a rough count here. This bill amends over 40 acts. Even by the most generous of standards, someone would have to say that is what we would call an omnibus bill. We seem to get hit with these omnibus bills as we near an election, because the government is trying to do a whole lot of housecleaning and a whole lot of housekeeping before, as I said, judgment day.

There is a movie, I think, called Judgment Day. Maybe we’ll make one about the Ontario Legislature and the Ontario election, and we’ll call it Judgment Day. I’d love to have it phrased or referred to as that, because that’s what elections are. They are a judgment on the current government and what they have done in their term of office.

This bill, as I said, brings forth so many changes. Here’s the one thing I’m concerned about: In my time here, which is also 14 years—ironically, I was elected at the time that this government took office.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: Thank God you were.

Mr. John Yakabuski: Well, I was glad I was elected, but I would have liked to have seen a whole lot more of my colleagues elected at that time. But we’re not here to talk politics, Speaker, of course, as you know.

What I learned is just how many regulations we have in this province of Ontario, and this bill introduces so many more. I think there’s a genuine desire on the part of the Minister of Health to try to make our system work better. I think we all want that. We all want our health system to be the most efficient, effective and reliable that it possibly can be.

Here is my concern. Since I got here, I realized that we’re supposed to be talking about the client. We’re supposed to be talking about the patient or the resident or the client, whatever the case may be. Whether it’s a patient in a hospital, whether it’s a resident in a long-term-care home or retirement home, or whether it’s a client, we might refer to them as in the home care system.

I see that the Speaker has changed. The gentleman in the Speaker’s chair has also been a community safety critic, so he knows what regulations have done, for example, to rank-and-file police officers. The current community safety critic, my colleague from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock—they know what regulations have done to the work that our police officers and our first responders do.

Our long-term-care workers—we’ll just use that as an example—and I recognize that my colleague from Nickel Belt reintroduced private member’s legislation about hours of care and minimum hours of care for our folks in long-term-care homes. But here’s the rub: When we keep passing more and more regulations and saying, “We’re going to be watching you about this, and we’re going to be watching you about that, and you’re going to get fined if you don’t do this, and you’re going to get fined if you do that”—when do our front-line workers have time to look after the patient, the resident, the client?

Or in the case of first responders and police officers, how do they have time to actually be on the streets protecting us and fighting crime when they’re sitting at their desks filling out every possible form you can think of?

I understand that we need checks and balances. We all want checks and balances. But in our society, we’ve become so fixated on the paperwork that we forget the work—paperwork over work. And the work that our first responders, our professionals, our health care workers do is the most important part of their job, their vocation, their career, their passion. It’s what they deliver to the people.

A friend of mine, Dr. Vaughan Glover, a dentist from Arnprior, wrote a book called Journey to Wellness. Can I show this? Apparently, I can’t show this. The Speaker is shaking his head that I can’t. Vaughan Glover wrote a book called Journey to Wellness about patient-centred health care. I gave a copy of that book to then-Premier Dalton McGuinty and the health minister at the time, George Smitherman. Here’s what we’re talking about: We are in a health care system that is currently swallowing itself.

It is so big, it is such a behemoth, that it is swallowing itself in its administration and in its own bureaucracy, and we are failing to allow the people on the ground to get the care to the patient, to the client, to the resident that is so absolutely needed and necessary.

It is important to be able to have checks and balances. It is important for everyone to be accountable. It is important that for those who fall outside the rules, there is a mechanism to penalize them, so that they do—because that’s about patient and client and resident protection as well.

But we have to ask ourselves sometimes: Have we become so bureaucratically-centric that the most important thing we do is pass a whole lot of regulations, where it’s yet to be shown that any one of them lead to better care for the people who we’re supposed to be identifying at the top of the pyramid, at the top of the food chain, at the top of our list of priorities? That’s what we need to do with our patients and our health care system.

What is the saying that we all knew as children? The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I’m not questioning the intent of the minister here. I think his intentions are honourable and pointed in the right direction. The problem is how we write legislation and how we bring in bureaucracy, rules and regulations. We think rules and regulations are going to solve all the problems of the world.

We just need two: We need to make sure that the patient is the centre of our health care system; and we need to realize that the fix in our health care system is to ensure that the people on the front line have the tools they require and the resources necessary, and to create the environment that allows those two things together to flourish, so that our patients are indeed given the best health care possible here in the province of Ontario.

We all want that, but we must remember that we cannot regulate better health care. We cannot force more legislation. Legislation doesn’t change anything. What we need to do is have a system where the people on the front line recognize that it is their commitment, their passion and their compassion that, indeed, make the best health care system we can have. The people we have are the ones we need to make sure are bringing that health care to the people of Ontario, so that we can all live in what we believe to be the best place in the world to live, work, raise a family and prosper. This is Ontario.

We’ve got to make sure that the front-line people in our health care system—and our administrators, from the minister on down—are the ones that recognize that the patient comes first. Let our front-line people deliver that care to the patient.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Questions and comments?

Mr. Taras Natyshak: I’m always interested in the words of our colleague from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke. I agree with his assessment of the overall status of our health care system. I believe it is top-heavy on the bureaucratic side. We’ve seen that with the imposition of the local health integration networks, which don’t necessarily focus on the local part and don’t certainly put emphasis on the health part. More often, you see them talking about integration and amalgamation of services to look for potential savings.

What that does is it compromises services on the back end, whether you’re talking about health care providers or service providers in our communities. They are forced, after these integration proposals and integration experiments, to do less with more. That, again, creates a strain on our community and a strain on the health care system in general.

It has often been said that you can’t fix a problem by just simply throwing money at it. You can’t do that. That’s just a general consensus that everybody says. But in fact, when it comes to health care, putting money into it and investing is exactly the way you can fix the problem around health care. I heard the member talk about having the adequate resources. What that means is the adequate revenue, the adequate money. Let’s be plain and simple here and talk about funding our health care system. We’ve seen drastic cuts over the 14 years that this government has been in power: cuts to hospitals; frozen budgets; nurses being fired; beds being closed. That’s what we’re talking about.

Let’s get down to brass tacks here. Where are you going to find the money and how much are you going to invest in those front-line services? New Democrats have always been prepared to invest so that people get the best care they deserve and need in our communities.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments? I recognize the Minister of Seniors Affairs.

Hon. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Chair. Good morning. I’m delighted to rise here and speak yet again to the Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act.

I was just listening to the members opposite speak, and I agree that to improve a system you need to add monetary resources, but you also need to sometimes add legislative resources or enforcement resources. Those kinds of tools are really important. They’re not mutually exclusive from one another. So I was kind of surprised to hear them suggest that somehow, just because this omnibus legislation adds a number of tools to the health care system to ensure patient and resident safety—that is not exclusive to adding resources in other places.

In fact, I can tell you that in Mississauga, we are adding 350 beds to the local hospital. So absolutely, we are doing both. We are giving our health care partners the legislative and enforcement tools that they need to improve patient safety in long-term-care homes and resident safety in retirement homes.

At the same time, as a government, we are investing in resources. You heard the Minister of Health yesterday in question period talk about a number of hospitals across Ontario that are getting new beds and new resources. I can speak to my own riding of Mississauga East–Cooksville. We are going to benefit from about 500 new beds: 350 in Mississauga and about 150 in neighbouring Etobicoke, which is used by people who live in Mississauga.

I do want to say that one of the things that I like about this bill is that there are a lot of common-sense pieces. That’s something that the PC Party, I would have thought, appreciated: the fact that we have all of these common-sense pieces. One example is giving our paramedics the discretion to say, “This person doesn’t need to go to the emergency department after all.” To me, that’s just a common-sense move. So I really support this bill.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments? I recognize the member from Nepean–Carleton.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: Oh, thank you very much, Speaker. I do apologize. On this side of the caucus, we decided that I was getting the hit. On that side of the caucus, I guess they decided you were getting the hit. So I do apologize; I jumped up without noticing.

It’s always a pleasure to be able to rise in the debate to talk about health care in the province of Ontario. Obviously, it was—

Interjections.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: You are eating into my time, people.

It’s always, obviously, good to engage in debate with my colleague from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke. He made some very valid points about the clients that we have and the customers, if you will, in our health care system. They do expect more.

You will recall, Speaker, that when this government came to office, they brought in the single largest income tax increase in Ontario’s history by bringing in the health tax. Of course, the health tax really never went to health care. It went into roads, sewers and general revenue, so it didn’t do very much to improve health care in the province of Ontario. Agreed, most of us will say we’ve made great strides, but of course technology advances and those types of things are very important.

What I will go back to, when I look at the name of this bill—the Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act—this is not the first time myself or the member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke has seen an accountability piece of legislation aimed at health care in the province of Ontario as a result of things like eHealth, Ornge and some other scandals at Cancer Care Ontario. It is rich for the government to put forward this accountability for patients act, given that we’ve seen this movie many times before. It seems to be a rerun.

They appointed a Patient Ombudsman. They didn’t make that individual an independent officer of the assembly like so many other advocates that we have. I think that that speaks to some of the failings of this current government as well.

Certainly, we do acknowledge that we need to ensure that we do have timely, accessible health care in the province of Ontario, and that the money that we send here from Queen’s Park through our constituents gets to them.

Thank you very much and also to the member from Leeds–Grenville—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Thank you very much. Further questions and comments?

Mr. Michael Mantha: As always, it’s a great privilege to stand on behalf of the good people of Algoma–Manitoulin.

The member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke just brought up a couple of points that I’m wholeheartedly in full agreement with: Patients come first, and our focus should be on delivering that care appropriately to those individuals when they need it.

My colleague from Essex really hit it right on: This issue needs to have money put into it in order to provide that care that we need, but that money needs to flow at the right place for the right individuals. A lot of the money that we see going into our health care system, due to the opening up of privatization further—and this bill does open it up for further privatization—leads to bureaucrats, leads to boards, leads to profits that will not get to the front-line workers who are actually the people who are delivering that work, who are delivering that care and who need the investment into what they do each and every day caring for our loved ones.

When you look at this, there are a lot of components that are within this bill and there are way too many schedules in here—some good, some bad. But this is a common theme that we get from this Liberal government: Here are a couple of nuggets but there’s a poison pill in here.

What we’re seeing in here—particularly, one that really stands out to me is under

schedule 10, where we’re actually opening up the door to self-governance and self-oversight, taking it away from our agencies, our government, our people to really look into what’s happening out there. What does that do? That puts the patient in the home, in care, at risk. That’s a huge concern that I have with this particular piece of legislation.

I’m going to end there but I’m looking forward to having my opportunity to speak to this bill. There are a lot of people who are really concerned, or have potential to be concerned, for what’s going to happen.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Back to the member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke for final comments.

Mr. John Yakabuski: I want to thank the members from Essex, Nepean–Carleton and Algoma–Manitoulin, and also the Minister of Seniors Affairs.

The minister herself actually called it an omnibus bill, which speaks to one of the challenges that we have as opposition in dealing with pieces of legislation that amend so many acts simultaneously, making it very difficult to make a decision on whether or not you support it. There are components of the bill you like; there are components of the bill you don’t like. At the end of the day, regardless of how you vote on it, it isn’t really a true picture of how you see every component of the bill. We have too many bills like that these days.

They all referred to them as “clients” and my colleague from Nepean–Carleton actually used the word “customers.” You know why you might want forgiveness for calling anybody a customer in the health care system. If looked at in the proper way, that’s exactly what we all are. If you’re a business person in this country or anywhere in the world, you ascribe to the creed that the customer comes first. If we accept that as government when we’re delivering government services through our bureaucracy or through the political side of government, if we take that mantra that the customer comes first, we’ll all do a better job of delivering whatever service it may be.

I encourage everyone in this House, and particularly the members on the government side—I’m sorry; I’ve got the book up again. I guess I’m not supposed to do that—the book, Journey to Wellness by Dr. Vaughan Glover from Arnprior, which talks about designing a people-centred health care system. If we keep that in mind and put the people, the patient, the client, the resident and, yes, the customer at the top of that priority list, we’ll do better in the end than what we’ve been doing for some time.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further debate?

Ms. Jennifer K. French: I am also glad to be able to stand and make some remarks on behalf of my constituents in Oshawa on what is an immensely important topic. This is a very involving conversation about strengthening quality and accountability for patients, as this Bill 160 is so beautifully named. If only. If only this bill indeed strengthened quality and accountability for patients.

I start a lot of my talks in here with the same thing: pointing out how lovely the titles are. But, again, this is another bill that is wanting—coulda, shoulda, woulda. This is a bill that has 10 schedules in it but it isn’t addressing the heart of this, and that is about providing predictable, better, hands-on care and strengthening our health care system for Ontarians.

I called my constituency office yesterday and said, “Is there anything new that has come in in the last couple of days? I’d like to be able to share in the Legislature.” It’s the same conversation we always have. It’s folks who might feel they have been pushed out of hospitals too early. It is cases of still inadequate post-stroke care. That has come up a few times in the last few weeks, despite the changes that have been made.

This is one: We have a 71-year-old requiring spinal fusion surgery, if you can imagine, that was diagnosed back in July 2015, and there’s still no date booked for the surgery. Spinal fusion surgery: I don’t know exactly what that entails, but I hope I don’t ever have to go through that. But the quality of life would be seriously impacted by that condition—and that was just off the top of the head of one of my constituency assistants. I have letters here that I’ll be sharing.

But it comes down to the same: This is a bill that has 10 schedules, that is an omnibus bill, and it doesn’t get to the heart of it. This government isn’t willing, again, to do the work to make the changes when it comes to long-term care, when it comes to our hospitals, when it comes to appropriate access to health care services, when it comes to pharmacare—like I said, coulda, shoulda, woulda.

Anyway, we’ll help them out with that, though, because we will all be looking forward to committee. At committee, I really hope that this majority government will listen to the folks that we’re hearing from, that we will hear from the front lines, that we will hear from caregivers and health care providers and that they will listen to the patients, because they don’t seem to. If they did, it would be reflected in this piece of legislation, I think.

But also, as we heard earlier, the Patient Ombudsman, or patient ombudsperson—even her office has called for the ability to be independent and to have the kind of oversight that would be required to make a difference. Again, I won’t call it a token position, but it could have been what we need in Ontario, which is that independent layer of oversight. I hope that they listen to her at committee as well, because I know she has been connecting with folks in my community and, I’m sure, others.

For years, we have seen this Wynne government, we’ve seen the Conservatives chipping away at medicare and letting people down when they need it the most—

Mr. John Yakabuski: Easy with the Conservatives.

Ms. Jennifer K. French: I saw the Conservative member over there. I think he was giving me a high-five; I’m not sure. But if he’s wanting me to further clarify, I’m happy to do that.

More than 1,600 registered nurse positions have been eliminated inside Ontario hospitals since the start of 2015. The last time that the Conservatives were in office, Speaker, I’m happy to remind you, they cut 6,000 nurses, closed 28 hospitals and shut down over 7,000 hospital beds.

If we’re going to talk about cuts, as my colleagues in the other parties appreciate cuts so much, cuts aren’t just numbers. Cuts aren’t numbers on a balance sheet. They’re people; they’re families. When we cut beds, it means that people get treatment, if they get it at all, in the hallways. If we don’t have the mental health beds and services, it means that people are in our streets and our nooks and our crannies, and we know what that looks like in our communities. I was talking to some of our police members of the community, and they deal with it on a regular basis.

When we are not supporting our mental health system and our health system in general, then we are expecting our public services, our police, our partners in the community, like the John Howard Society, to address the issues. Again, we have an omnibus bill here that could have put more focus on these issues, and it doesn’t.

We need to be seeing minimum standards of care. This is a bill that opens the door to privatization. No, Speaker, that is the wrong direction to go. When we look at our hospital system—and out in Durham, there are lots of talks about mergers and amalgamating and all of that, and we see such pushback from the community, because all of these plans happen without doing the math on where the growth is and what the need is.

When you’re going to take services out of hospitals—strategically or just let it happen—and pull those services out and place them in little specialized clinics here and there, not only do people not have the access that they need and the health care that they deserve at the hospitals, but then they have the further burden of having to pay for the travel to get from A to B to C to D.

Up in Peterborough, when my grandmother was living there and having to go from one place to another for different appointments, she was, at 90—I guess then she would have been 94 or 95—fully capable of making the appointments and then had to take a taxi and pay for that herself, all across the community, to get to her necessary appointments instead of going to one hospital, the way that it used to be.

Folks who have a hospital near them go there, expecting that they have access to services. Oh, no, just kidding. You’ve now got to go maybe to Bowmanville or wherever. People don’t understand that this building right here, that is supposed to be about health care, is actually just one point on their health care map, and they’re going to have to navigate all over, at a cost to themselves. Hopefully, they have the money for transit.

Again, here we are planning our health care—I say “planning.” That was really generous of me. We are creating a health care system without doing the planning and looking at where people are living, where the growth is and how they can travel. It’s not keeping up with our bus system and all that. But, Speaker, that’s another conversation I’ll move over here, for another day.

I’d like to talk about long-term care.

I have folks in my office on a constant basis with long-term-care needs. They are concerned about their loved ones, their parents, their spouses who are not able to get the care that they deserve.

I’ve had folks who are PSWs, working in our long-term-care system, in tears in my office, saying, “I went into this 10, 15, 20 years ago because I care, and now I have to let my residents sit in their own waste, waiting for care, because there aren’t enough staff on the floor to attend to them.” They are forcing people into incontinence who otherwise could use the facilities with help, but because there might only be two people on the floor to lift someone down the hall—“Sorry, you’re just going to have to wait.” That’s just one indignity that happens on a regular basis.

I had a woman in my office who put cameras in, who did all sorts of things, who was trying to work with the home to make adjustments, to accommodate her mother’s specific needs, and they just couldn’t. They couldn’t meet those needs. Her mother has since passed under terrible circumstances.

This is a government that has said over and over that they are not willing to expand the scope of the inquiry into long-term care. We need to. We need to look at the whole system and say what is right, what is wrong, what is working, where we need to invest and where we need to shift resources.

Actually, Speaker, were you here that day? Never mind. Maybe you were here that day. We voted. It was a weird day. You might recall that the opposition parties won the day. Well, the NDP won the day, really. There were three NDP bills and motions on the table. Am I allowed to say there weren’t enough Liberals to form the majority? I don’t remember who was and who wasn’t here, but they weren’t the majority that day. We won. We had those three bills and motions passed.

One of them was the motion to expand the scope of the long-term-care inquiry. Even some of their members voted for it, because it was a free vote. Again, it was a magical day. But then they acted like it didn’t happen. “Oh, well, the will of the House—who cares? We’re still not expanding it. We’re the government. We’re the majority. Nah-nah, nah-nah-nah.”

It’s so frustrating that the people of Ontario want care, want access to care, and this government says, “Meh. Nope.” In fact, it’s worse than that: They are putting forward a bill that is potentially doing damage, that is making it easier for the government to privatize hospital services, which is wrong.

We are concerned about the crisis in seniors’ care; they are not. Another day, Speaker, I’d love to tell you all about universal pharmacare, but I’m out of time.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Questions and comments?

Mr. Granville Anderson: I wish to thank the member from Oshawa for her comments on the matter.

I’m going to speak a little bit about long-term-care homes. Yes, there are 78,000 residents in Ontario who are in long-term-care homes. That’s going to increase—we all know that—as the population ages.

There are pressures to remedy the situation. This government has taken steps to remedy that situation. The opposition parties opposed every effort we have made to improve that.

I know it’s not enough; it might not be enough to begin with, but it’s a start. You should applaud the work this government is doing around long-term-care homes.

There is a lot more work to be done, Speaker. We know that. We are aware of that, and we are trying to address that as a government.

I have had residents come into my office as well. They complain; they talk about the long-term care and some positive, some negative effects of that. But that’s something that’s improving and that’s something that we need to improve to make our most vulnerable citizens have the comfort and the quality of life they need and they deserve. That’s what we strive to do as a government and that’s what we are working hard to get accomplished. It’s not an easy task. It’s a task that requires a lot of funding and, in some cases, more modernized homes and more staff, which we are trying to address. We know there’s a problem with long-term-care homes.

My mom didn’t want to go into a home a couple of years ago. She had home care. The quality of home care was to be commended. We had PSWs coming in and nurses coming in. Not everyone can stay at home, but we are also emphasizing home care as well, as a remedy to this situation.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Mr. Steve Clark: I want to use my short time this morning in debate for Bill 160, the Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act, to talk about a letter that I wrote last week to Minister Hoskins about one of my constituents, Barbara Woodman. Ms. Woodman asked me to write to the Minister because she wants access to a drug called Uptravi. Ms. Woodman wants to slow down the progression of pulmonary arterial hypertension—or PAH—which she suffers as a complication of her systemic scleroderma. Despite the support and medical evidence that has been provided by her doctors, regrettably the ministry has denied her request.

I wrote on a compassionate basis to the minister. This is a drug that has been approved by Health Canada for, I think, over 18 months. It’s a drug that her doctors feel would be of benefit to her. This disease is taking a tremendous toll on herself and her family.

I think we need to take a step back sometimes, when we’re debating these bills, to get some of the comments from our constituents on the record and the fact that we need to do a better job. We need to have a system that is more compassionate so that when a drug like Uptravi has been given approval by Health Canada, our process to have our constituents have access to this should be looked at.

She deserves every opportunity to stay at home. I’m pleased to advocate for Ms. Woodman today. But I really do believe that when we talk about strengthening quality and to try to strengthen accountability for patients, access to these drugs is critical. So I want the ministry to take this into consideration.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Mrs. Lisa Gretzky: It’s my pleasure to follow my colleague from Oshawa and add some comments to her debate.

I want to start with what the Liberal member from Durham said, where he recognized that there is more money that needs to go into our health care system. But I have to point out that it has actually been his Liberal government, for the last 14 years, that has cut funding and frozen budgets to our health care system.

I also want to point out that it is their increased drive to privatize everything in this province if they have an opportunity—but it’s their drive to privatize our health care system that is causing a crisis in health care. You only have to look at what happened in my city, in Windsor, with the Medical Laboratories of Windsor, where workers were on strike for three weeks, trying to get a living wage.

I have to point out that this is a privately run lab that receives public dollars. The Ministry of Health gives them money to do medical testing. Yet they have workers who weren’t even making a living wage. You have other privatized labs that were paying their workers better. You have those who are doing the exact same work in a hospital—another publicly funded institution—who are making double what these workers were making.

Yet we have, in this bill, a drive to further privatize our health care system, to turn over the care of patients to private labs, who will—bottom line—try to make money for those who own the lab. The result of that is that they are not paying their workers a fair or equitable wage, let alone a living wage. Their goal is to make sure that, at the end of the day, the owners or the shareholders in that company are making as much money as they possibly can.

The member from Durham is right: The health care system needs more money; we don’t need more money going into private hands.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Hon. Helena Jaczek: I’m pleased to rise and make a few comments in regard to the remarks from the member for Oshawa.

I think we all agree in this House that there is more to do when it comes to ensuring that our loved ones in long-term-care facilities receive the appropriate type of care that they need and that they deserve. Of course, this is exactly what this bill is doing. It would guarantee that all long-term-care-home operators are providing safe and quality care for residents through a stronger inspection program with more robust enforcement tools, including some really quite dramatic financial penalties and new provincial offences.

Of course, we do know that the vast majority of long-term-care homes are in compliance with provincial rules and regulations, but those who do have recurring issues will not be tolerated. These new enforcement tools, I’d like to remind the member, would ensure long-term-care-home operators with recurring care and safety concerns need to urgently address these issues.

We are increasing fines so that the maximum fines for all offence provisions under the Long-Term Care Homes Act will be raised to $100,000 for first-time offences and $200,000 for subsequent offences. For the corporations involved, the fines will be up to $200,000 for a first-time offence and $500,000 for subsequent offences.

We’re also going to be establishing new offences that will directly address some of the concerns of the member from Oshawa, new offences that would provide additional protections for residents: failure to protect residents from abuse and neglect; and failure to comply with an order.

This is good legislation. It’s certainly a step in the right direction. I urge everyone in this House to support it.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Back to the member from Oshawa for final comments.

Ms. Jennifer K. French: I appreciate the comments from around the room. I’m glad to hear the members on the other side talk about home care, recognize the need to do more and recognize the need to put in more money. I’m back to “if only.”

Anyway, to hear the Minister of Community and Social Services read me this

section of the bill about increasing fines or giving this more teeth—there’s an old adage that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The thing is, we’re not talking about something obscure; we’re talking about people. We need to invest on the prevention side, not just go get them after the fact. We need to look at the entire system.

I had been asked months ago to comment on issues in Ottawa. I’m now being asked to comment on them locally about long-term-care homes putting up all these walls and stops against advocating families and trespass orders and things like that, and the government’s sort of, “Oh well, do what you got to do.” That’s not appropriate. We need all eyes on the situation to ensure that everyone is safe and cared for.

We see overcrowding, underfunding and undermining by this government of our health care system, of our long-term-care system. We need to be expanding the scope. We need to actually be talking about quality and accountability, not more layers of bureaucracy and more in admin. We need to be talking about front-line care. We need to be talking about health.

I appreciated the comments from the member from Windsor West about privatization, and what it looks like when public dollars are going into private spaces and we see ballooning profit margins instead of improving health outcomes. That is fundamentally problematic.

The member from Leeds–Grenville reminded us that we need a more compassionate system and talked about advocating for individual patients. I have folks who write letters about their unbelievably long wait-list. We hear from folks all the time. We need to remember this is about them.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further debate?

Mr. Yvan Baker: I’m proud to be able to stand up and speak to the issue of health care here in the Legislature.

As you’ve all heard me say many times before, health care is an issue that obviously touches every single one of our constituencies, but it’s one that occupies a great share of my time because we have one of the largest populations of seniors in the province. When I have my monthly seniors’ advisory group meetings in my community, in Etobicoke Centre, I hear about the issues, the opportunities, around health care every day.

Speaker, before I go on, I just wanted to indicate that I’ll be sharing my time with the member for Mississauga–Streetsville.

Health care is important in Etobicoke Centre. It’s important across the province. This bill has been developed in an attempt to make our health care system better.

When you listen to the members opposite, it’s really difficult to follow what’s happening on the other side of the Legislature. When I walked into the Legislature this morning around 9 o’clock, I heard members complaining that the bill is too big—they’re complaining that we’re doing too much to improve the health care system, apparently—that it’s an omnibus bill. I like to call it an omni-results bill. We’re here to get stuff done for people, and that’s what we’re doing.

It’s funny; I remember debating a bill not so long ago here when the members of the opposition, the PCs and the NDP, were complaining that the bill wasn’t doing enough, that the bill was too light, that there wasn’t enough in that particular piece of legislation. Now they’re complaining that there’s too much in this piece of legislation. I really wonder what the opposition is thinking. Do they want us to get results, or do they not want us to get results?

I would ask the members of the opposition, when they get up, to indicate whether they want us to help improve the health care system or not, because it’s not clear, based on the debate that I’ve just watched, whether they are actually serious about improving health care or just serious about obfuscating. It appears to me that they’re obfuscating.

The other thing, Speaker, when you listen to the members opposite, is you hear a lot about—this morning I heard some members say we’re cutting health care. I would urge the members of the opposition to get a briefing, to open the budget. There’s a lot of information out there, where they would discover that we’re not cutting health care. In fact, health care is the largest component of the provincial budget. We spend about $52 billion a year, so it’s our single largest expenditure and it’s one of the fastest-growing.

So for the members opposite to walk in here and try to suggest to the people watching at home that somehow health care is being cut—it’s hard to imagine something further from the truth.

So I urge the members opposite to get a briefing, maybe read the budget, maybe just google “health care budget Ontario.” They’ll discover that the health care budget is actually growing quite rapidly. It’s not that hard. I think the members opposite need to make that effort before they stand up here and say these things, because the people of Ontario may not realize that what they’re saying is not accurate.

The last thing, Speaker, I want to talk about is the quality of health care, which is what this bill is about.

Yesterday morning, I had the opportunity to visit Etobicoke General Hospital. I have a riding that’s served by four LHINs, so many hospitals serve my community, but Etobicoke General Hospital is probably the one that people rely on the most. It was really exciting for me. I had the opportunity to meet the new president of the hospital. He and his team gave me a tour of the construction that’s being undertaken at Etobicoke General: a new emergency department, a new intensive care, maternal birthing units, dialysis centres. This is really exciting for our community in Etobicoke and the communities beyond that get served by this hospital.

The reason I raise this, Speaker, is because this is just one example of the kinds of investments that the government has been making over the course of years to improve health care in our province—not just in terms of funding home care or long-term care or those other services that people rely on every day, but in terms of building the infrastructure to support that care.

When you look at the record of the parties opposite and how they closed hospitals, how they cut services—for them to now stand up and complain that we have an omni-results bill that’s doing far more than they ever did in their time in office is really disappointing.

So I’d point the members opposite to a tool called Google, and I suggest that they look up “health care budget.” They’ll discover the facts. The facts matter, and they should use them here before they speak to the people of Ontario, before they lead them astray.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Continuing with debate, I recognize the member from Mississauga–Streetsville.

Mr. Bob Delaney: I definitely want to acknowledge the contribution by my colleague from Etobicoke Centre, an absolutely great member in his first term who certainly does have the pulse of his community and actually works at the issues that we’re discussing here.

Over the summer, while I was on a conference in the United States, one of the opportunities I had was to meet a couple of the local people in the Midwest. One of the things that they asked me was, “Can we see your health care card from Canada?”—or as they said, “Kin-ada.” So I showed them my OHIP card. They said, “Let us understand here: There are no deductibles.” I said, “No.” They said, “There is no screening out for pre-existing conditions.” I said, “No.” They said, “There are no lifetime spending limits or no term limits on this?” I said, “No.” They said, “Ah, that’s what we need to have here.”

So there are a number of things that this bill does; it’s a big bill because it does a lot of things. It delivers results in a manner which my colleague from Etobicoke Centre encapsulated very accurately with his expression “an omni-results bill.”

There are a couple of things that I wanted to talk about. One of them is transparency. I have a lot of friends who are doctors and they are great people. They are hard-working and they are effective, and they live very well on top of that. Part of what’s in this bill says that the legislation, if passed, would make payments from the medical industry to health care professionals and organizations available to the public. This is something that’s done in other jurisdictions and it’s done very well. For example, Ontario wouldn’t be breaking a lot of ground here.

France, the United States, Belgium, Denmark, Portugal and Slovakia have all addressed this issue through legislation. So there is, in fact, a template to work on. What this essentially says is that as residents of Ontario, we deserve some openness and accountability.

One of the things that this bill does is work to make that openness and accountability happen and make it happen quickly. It would require the medical industry to annually report payments that are submitted to health care organizations and to individual professionals, which would include such things as paid meals, travel, research grants and fees for services such as consultation or sponsored speaking engagements. None of these things are wrong. All of them should be aboveoard and they should be seen to be above board. But what we want to know is: How much?

If passed, this new legislation would allow for the payment information to be publicly posted on a database. What this would do for the people of Ontario is measure the extent of medical industry transfers of value to health care.

The bill does something that, as a former swimmer, I think is an excellent idea. Within it are proposed changes that would affect recreational water settings that are not currently regulated under the Health Protection and Promotion Act. These amendments must be made to coincide with some advances in technology and also with business operations. So it would, for example, allow public health inspectors to follow best practices and to inspect recreational water settings such as splash pads and wading pools at least once a year, again, based on good practices. At the moment, unlike personal services businesses, there is no requirement for operators to actually comply with almost anything.

If you’re watching television, people will show you that there is a connection between hepatitis A and/or hepatitis C and what you could pick up if you’re swimming in water that hasn’t been properly treated. I think these proposed changes will allow inspectors to gradually escalate actions against non-compliant businesses by allowing inspectors to enforce these regulatory requirements. This aligns Ontario with other jurisdictions in Canada, certainly with some that I’ve travelled to. It’s fair to businesses and it will equip public health inspectors to continue to protect patrons of these businesses.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Questions and comments?

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: It’s my pleasure to rise again today in debate to talk about the Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act. Obviously we have discussed this at length and we are into 10-minute rotations. But I think it’s important for us to continue to talk about accountability to the patients across Ontario. I’ll speak, in particular, to my constituents in Nepean–Carleton within the city of Ottawa and some of the challenges that we see from time to time.

I’d like to talk a little bit about mental health, because I think that’s an area where we have not necessarily provided—I think quality is something that we do have, but I think it’s the quantity that we don’t have. In addition, I think we have not been necessarily the most accountable to those seeking mental health treatments.

In fact, I happen to be on the public accounts committee, so I do read the Auditor General’s reports, and then I have the opportunity, for a year afterward, to study those reports and make comment. One of the areas that the Auditor General has brought up is children’s mental health and the fact that in, I want to say, the 2003 report of the Auditor General—effectively 14 years later it remains unchanged with some of the criticisms with respect to that.

I have been urging members of this assembly to do more on children’s mental health. I think that collaboratively, all together, in a non-partisan, objective way, we can work together to strengthen the system. If there’s one thing that comes out of this particular Parliament before the next election, I think it needs to be quality and accountability not just for patients, but in particular for children with mental health issues, particularly those who have very complex mental health requirements in the province of Ontario. I think that’s something that could unite us all and bind us together as we move toward strengthening that system.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Ms. Catherine Fife: I do want to comment on the five minutes that the member from Etobicoke–Lakeshore brought to the floor of this Legislature. I want to respectfully say that it is that kind of arrogance which breeds the kind of cynicism that exists in the province of Ontario right now.

Let’s talk about the omni-results bill. Let’s talk about what’s in it. It gives landlords of retirement homes the permission to confine residents in retirement homes, despite the lack of proper public oversight of retirement homes. That’s not something that I would be bragging about.

Mr. Taras Natyshak: Omni-awesome.

Ms. Catherine Fife:

Schedule 9 further privatizes health care in the province of Ontario. When you watch where the money is going, it is going to profit and clearly not to the people who we are elected to serve. It gives long-term-care facilities the ability to be penalized with fines up to $100,000, but it doesn’t fund a minimum standard of care in our long-term-care facilities for seniors to ensure that they have the appropriate amount of care, that they have the appropriate amount of time to actually be cared for. That would be omni-awesome, as my colleague has said.

I think people in this province know what’s going on. When they go to a hospital, when they go to a clinic, when they pay more out of pocket for services that should be covered by the universal health care system—which this Liberal has now taken credit for, when Tommy Douglas was the member who actually brought this concept of quality health care for everyone—that really is not the reality for the people of this province, with great disparities in services across this province. Actually, the Auditor General has already identified that. We believe the Auditor General.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Hon. Bill Mauro: I’m pleased to have a couple of minutes on Bill 160 and to comment on the remarks by the members from Etobicoke Centre and Mississauga–Streetsville.

It’s no surprise, I suppose, for any of us here this morning that the opposition parties will not have anything good to say, any time, when it comes to health care issues. We understand the challenges and the difficulties in putting in place a very broad, expensive, multi-faceted health care system in the province. It won’t matter to anybody that we have hired 28,000 or so more nurses since coming to government. It won’t matter to anybody on that side of the hall that we’ve hired about 6,500 more doctors.

It won’t matter that we brought in nurse practitioner clinics to help with the orphaned patient population and increased their scope of practice. None of that will matter to them, and I understand that. They’re not likely to put that in their remarks. They’re not going to talk about much of the positive work that has occurred under this minister and, I would say, other ministers as well.

Speaker, an old friend of mine—I said this just the other day in the Legislature—once said, “Billy, health care is a political loser. It doesn’t matter what you do”—and it’s understandable. It’s a very emotional thing. When people experience, when they interact, when they interface with the health care system, it’s a very difficult thing to always come away with a very positive experience. There are going to be times when it doesn’t work for you. But as an expression of our priorities, I think that over the breadth of time we’ve been in government, people see that this has, in fact, been our number one priority.

In my own riding of Thunder Bay–Atikokan, we’ve got a great-news story. We’ve increased the capacity for long-term care and supportive housing greatly, but we still have pressure on our hospital because we have 64 long-term-care beds sitting empty in Thunder Bay because the LHIN and St. Joseph’s Care Group can’t fill the PSW spots that are necessary to staff those 64 beds. There’s a shortage of PSWs right across the province.

So even when you do a good-news story in the health care system, it’s always difficult to land it all the time. The work continues. It always has; it always will.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further questions and comments?

Ms. Laurie Scott: I’m pleased to rise today to speak to Bill 160, Strengthening Quality and Accountability for Patients Act, 2017—always great titles by the Liberals, but, actually, where is the action? I will give a few examples.

The minister just spoke about nursing and the hiring of nurses. I don’t know; if that’s all true, then why are the Ontario Nurses’ Association and the RNAO advocating for more nurses? This Liberal government has cut nurses. That’s a contradictory statement that he can take up with the nurses’ association. I think I’ll believe the nurses’ association before I believe the minister.

I want to talk quickly about the mid-sized hospital funding formula that does not work. It affects 22 mid-sized hospitals in the province of Ontario. I have Ross Memorial Hospital. They have been working to counter this flawed funding formula that discriminates against mid-sized hospitals in the province. You have larger hospitals receiving the benefits of the formula, but mid-sized hospitals are suffering. For example, we can’t provide enough knee and hip surgeries. Sometimes the government will give you one-time funding to fix your wait-list, but it doesn’t solve the bigger problem of operational costs.

What has happened is that patients in rural Ontario don’t get care as good as patients in an urban centre, and that is not right. We are stretched to the limit at the Ross Memorial Hospital. The minister himself realizes that. He even said he’s going to address the mid-sized hospital funding formula, and we are still waiting. But patients in my area are suffering, and that’s not acceptable.

I want to talk quickly about the rural hospital that I have in Haliburton and the fact that they have a long-term-care centre attached to them, yet they can’t get dollars to help increase their upgrades to the long-term- care part of it because they’re attached to the hospital.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Thank you.

Ms. Laurie Scott: So there’s a lot of work that needs to be done. I appreciate the Speaker’s grace in giving me a few extra seconds.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Thank you. Back to the member from Mississauga–Streetsville for final comment.

Mr. Bob Delaney: Thank you very much, Speaker. I’m pleased to acknowledge the contributions of my friend and colleague from Nepean–Carleton, the member for Kitchener–Waterloo, the member for Thunder Bay–Atikokan and the member for Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock.

This is a bill that strengthens the pillars of Ontario health care. It ensures that a public system stays public. It promotes transparency within the system.

There’s one other thing it does that I wish I had had more time to talk about during my five minutes in speaking on the bill. Most of our members are very diligent in visiting long-term-care homes and retirement homes within their respective ridings, and most of us take a real personal interest in them. We’ve all had constituents who have told us stories of when things have not gone right. For many of us, we think, “Well, I’ve been to that home and that may be the exception.” You would ask yourself, “Is there something in this act that would assist in more effective regulation of retirement homes?”

One of the things the province did was consult on the ways in which Ontario could improve the oversight of retirement homes. Based on what the ministry heard, they proposed some changes in this act. It would include, for example, permitting the Auditor General of Ontario to conduct value-for-money audits based upon the Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority. It would also increase transparency, accountability and governance through a number of other changes proposed in the bill. And it makes other amendments to improve the operation of the Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority, such as establishing deputy registrars to maintain some business continuity.

I’m out of time. I wish I could go on. There’s a lot in it, and I look forward to this bill’s support and passage.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): Further debate?

Ms. Lisa M. Thompson: It’s my pleasure to rise today and speak to this important bill, because we need to get back on track here, Speaker.

We have heard a variety of comments today, but we have to make sure that the people watching today know that the intent of Bill 160 is to strengthen quality and accountability for patients. This bill will do good for vulnerable people throughout Ontario, especially when the bill includes provisions for people as important as our seniors. I know that my colleague the member from Bruce–Grey–Owen Sound already took the government to task for the fact that they are well behind on their goal to provide 30,000 long-term-care beds.

We heard earlier this morning that patients come first. I want to focus on that for a moment, because in the spirit of this bill and in the spirit of accountability, I just want to offer my support and share with my colleague from Elgin–Middlesex–London that I totally agree with him: Recently the South West Local Health Integration Network, the South West LHIN, parted ways with its CEO, and it’s simply wrong to be silent. The South West LHIN is responsible for almost one million people. To have the leadership disappear in a matter of days and for the board to go silent over the weekend is wrong.

People in southwestern Ontario need to hear from the board, so that they have confidence in how our health care is being facilitated throughout that region. So do the right thing: Come forward, talk about the parting of ways with the CEO and please share your vision as to how to keep the confidence of those almost one million people throughout the region, because this debate is to help protect and bring awareness to our vulnerable people, as I mentioned before.

I want to talk about our seniors, because sometimes we hear stories where, in long-term-care homes, residents are restrained. In this legislation, the one thing that popped out for me is that the legislation will bulk up the penalties and the wording surrounding restraining and confining of residents in long-term-care homes. Treating people with constraints and restraints is way out of date, and it’s cruel, especially considering the fact that many of these people may have some aspect of dementia and may not have all their mental faculties. Limiting the use of restraints and confinement should be viewed as a priority.

I have to give a shout-out to a person in my office, Ben Menka. Through his high school years, he actually worked in a retirement home. He lived it, and he really cares about how seniors are treated. I do thank him for sharing his thoughts with me as we prepared for this debate today.

The impact of physically restraining a senior can lead to a number of health concerns. Restraint and confinement could mean decreased physical functioning at a point in someone’s life where maintaining physical activity is the difference between a healthy and active lifestyle and weakened muscles, which can lead to a devastating fall. Even when completely sound of mind, being physically restrained would be incredibly unpleasant. Now, just imagine the fear and the confusion if you did not have all of your mental faculties about you.

The resolution can be so simple at times: It could just be a little bit more supervision or more hands-on engagement. I’m sure this is how we would all expect to be treated when we are of old age, and I’m sure this is the care that we want for all of our parents and grandparents. The same goes for a resident of a long-term-care facility who requires confinement.

Making sure that a resident or the person acting on their behalf is given a meeting with a rights adviser means that the consent process is more informed and streamlined. This is a good step. We need to have that access. The two schedules of the bill that will directly protect our seniors are admirable goals and they have my support.

Contrary to what we heard earlier today, where it was suggested by government that the opposition just stands up and rails and opposes what the government brings forward, I would suggest that if they took the time and interacted with us, they would hear us and understand that we do like some legislation that comes through the pipes in this House. I just shared with you one example of something that does have my full support.

I would like to suggest that in light of all that, one thing we have not seen from government are recommendations for how the sector will be educated about these new obligations. Any time rules change, internal policies at a long-term-care home and seniors’ home will need to be updated. I hope that the government has developed a plan to make sure that everybody is updated, educated and trained so that they’re prepared to move forward with what has been suggested through this legislation. What’s so important is that everyone is 100% aware of what their new obligations will be in situations that sometimes can require a fast response.

One constituent of mine has a child who is on a wait-list, and will need to eventually take his child to London, which is well over an hour away. In rural Ontario, community-based services are underfunded and few and far between. This government has to do better in that regard. The closest thing this particular child has to community-based services right now is their parents and their school.

I’ve been hoping to see more from this government on mental health, but, unfortunately, the depth which I hoped we could see coming from this government at one point is totally missing from this bill. That is one area of constructive feedback I’d like to give to this government that they may consider at committee level with amendments.

Beyond mental health, there is one more lingering concern I have, and that is with

schedule 4. This concern surrounds the inevitable database that will need to be created in order to publicize information that is collected. For example, a similar database in the United States costs around $300 million annually.

The people of Ontario have short memories when it comes to the Liberal government and databases, so I’ll remind them by saying “eHealth.” The eHealth scandal is an example that comes to mind when we think about what happens when a health database goes off the rails. What happened to Ontario taxpayers? It cost them $1 billion, because this government missed the mark.

I hope the government takes into account lessons learned in that regard, in how eHealth was a debacle and, through mismanagement, absolutely wasted $1 billion of Ontario taxpayer dollars, and, with regard to embracing lessons learned, provides the people of Ontario a government that actually will have the ability to get the project right and not waste millions and billions of dollars like what has become the norm, unfortunately, with this government.

Another major component of

schedule 4 specifically is that the penalties, even for first-time offences, can be quite severe, and we need to take a look at that. We need to make sure that Ontario doctors and their offices are given ample time and education to ensure that they can comply with the new rules.

My colleague from Elgin–Middlesex–London made a great point last week. Some payments that exist within the health care system require context. One example that he offered was when pharmacies rent out space to doctors. When this government rushes out omnibus bills, sometimes there will be issues and we’ll see things fall through the cracks. I’m worried that this particular example could be one of them.

When Ontario doctors have been pinched by this government and their federal counterparts, we need to make sure that we stand up for them. In fact, the federal government has gone after doctors as well, treating them like tax dodgers and going after their practices.

We need to make sure that the penalties in this legislation do not become another tax grab, but instead are used as an enforcement tool to ensure that Ontarians have complete confidence in their health care system.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Rick Nicholls): I would like to thank all members for debate this morning. Questions and comments pertaining to Bill 160—that opportunity will be granted the next time this bill is debated.

It is now 10:15. This House stands recessed until 10:30.

The House recessed from 1015 to 1030.

Introduction of Visitors

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): This morning, colleagues, we have with us in the Speaker’s gallery—joining us to pay tribute to a fallen member—David Warner, former MPP for Scarborough–Ellesmere during the 30th, 31st, 33rd and 35th Parliaments and Speaker in the 35th; also, Mr. Mike Farnan, MPP for Cambridge during the 34th and 35th Parliaments. Welcome.

Mr. Randy Pettapiece: I’d like to introduce Sue Christiansen, who lives in my riding of Perth–Wellington.

Hon. Kevin Daniel Flynn: We have a delegation today from the Republic of Ireland. Patrick O’Donovan, Minister of State for Public Procurement, Open Government and eGovernment, is joined by the Irish ambassador to Canada, Ambassador Jim Kelly. Please welcome them to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Robert Bailey: I’d like to introduce to the House today Chief Joanne Rogers, who is here with a delegation from the Aamjiwnaang First Nation for the Environmental Commissioner’s report. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Arthur Potts: My page from Beaches–East York, Colin Angell, is joined here today by his mother, Gail Angell, to make sure he’s doing a good job. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Michael Harris: I’d like to welcome those with the Prompt Payment Ontario delegation today: Sandra Skivsky, Ron Johnson, Jeff Koller, Ania Paliwoda, Dan Lancia, Cathy Frederickson, Ian Cunningham, Ted Barron, Margaret Taylor, Jeff Smith, Jo-Ann Gauthier, and Patricia Penney-Rouzes. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I’d like to welcome Brock and Akira Labadie, as well as their dad, Ben, to Queen’s Park today. I met Brock when I was in Chatham-Kent this summer and invited him to come to visit. I’m thrilled that they were able to make it today. Welcome.

Hon. Kathryn McGarry: I’d like to welcome to the House today Robert Kearns, founder and chairman of the Ireland Park Foundation; John Healy, principal officer, Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht; and Niamh Collins, private secretary to the minister. They’re visiting as part of the International Famine Commemoration for 2017 and will be laying a wreath in Ireland Park in Toronto. Thank you for visiting today.

Mr. Bill Walker: I’d like to introduce Francesca Grosso, mother of a former page, Giulia. You might recognize her husband’s name—Steve Paikin. He’s at the Legislature every now and again.

Mr. Wayne Gates: I’d like to welcome a couple of teachers from my riding: Heather Kiemele and Antoinette Lambert.

I’d also like to welcome and celebrate our page captain Thomas, who is from my riding, from Fort Erie. His mother, Fran, his father, Pat, and his brother Nicholas are all here to celebrate today with Thomas. We enjoyed a great Leafs game last night as the Leafs won 3-2.

Hon. Yasir Naqvi: I also want to welcome members of Prompt Payment Ontario who are visiting Queen’s Park. Please welcome Sandra Skivsky and all other members. There will be a reception later tonight at 6 p.m., and I hope all members will attend.

Hon. Kathryn McGarry: I would like to give a shout-out to page captain Eliana Wallace from Cambridge, and to welcome her parents, Eva and Mark Wallace, who are here in the east members’ gallery this morning. Thanks for coming today.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): A point of order from the Minister of Agriculture.

Hon. Jeff Leal: I want to correct my record from yesterday. In response to the question I gave to the member from Huron–Bruce, I mentioned that the Premier’s growth challenge has created 59,000 jobs. The answer is actually that more than 57,900 jobs have been created to date.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thank you. Members all have the right to correct their records.

We have in the Speaker’s gallery today a delegation from the United States representing the National Conference of State Legislators led by Senator Ann Millner. Please join me in welcoming our visitors from the United States.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Remind them it’s question period, not answer period.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Also, we don’t heckle.

Annual report, Environmental Commissioner of Ontario

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I beg to inform the House that the following document was tabled: the 2017 Environmental Protection Report from the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario.

Montgomery Davidson

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The government House leader on a point of order.

Hon. Yasir Naqvi: Speaker, I believe you will find that we have unanimous consent to recognize the former member of provincial Parliament from Cambridge, Mr. Montgomery Davidson, with a representative from each caucus speaking for up to five minutes.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The government House leader is seeking unanimous consent. Do we agree? Agreed.

Before we move to those tributes, would you please join me in welcoming the family and friends of the late Montgomery Davidson, MPP for Cambridge during the 30th and 31st Parliaments, who are seated in the Speaker’s gallery: his wife, Margaret, son Dean Davidson and his wife, Sharon; daughter Debbie Davidson and her husband, Peter Hugo; son Brad Davidson and his wife, Angelina Johnson; son Glenn Davidson and his wife, Dolly; son Gregg Davidson and his wife, Marianne; and many, many friends and family members. Welcome. We’re glad you’re with us for the tribute.

The Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry and the member from Cambridge.

Hon. Kathryn McGarry: I’m a proud member of Cambridge, and I stand today on behalf of my constituents to really speak about a great man from Cambridge and a great representative of my community of Cambridge. I’m also happy to welcome his family today: his wife, Margaret, and five of his six children are here today: Dean, Debbie, Brad, Glenn and Gregg; I understand Brett could not be with us today.

Montgomery “Monty” Davidson was first elected in 1975 at the age of 39, but his history and advocacy in representing his fellow citizens of Cambridge started much earlier than that. Monty had an early entry into the workforce, and by the age of 17 he was already a shop steward at Stauffer-Dobbie, a textile factory in Galt. It was here on the shop floor and working alongside everyday working people that he gained an appreciation for and a lifelong desire to improve the standard of living and working conditions of the workers, particularly of textile workers.

Cambridge was a hub for textile factories at that time and has a rich textile industrial heritage. Interestingly, my constituency office was originally built as the head office of the George Pattinson Woollen Mill in 1916.

From his textile mill in Galt, Monty became a trade union organizer, working to further the union movement as a representative for the Textile Workers Union of America. Monty often spoke of the leadership opportunities that the trade union gave him, and it was during these years that he developed his well-heeled sense of helping the average worker, the less fortunate and the vulnerable. Eventually, with much support, he decided to run for the provincial NDP. Monty’s “Tomorrow Starts Today” campaign resulted in a historic win: the first NDP member elected to Cambridge in 1975. He proceeded to spend the next two terms continuing to advocate on behalf of his constituents.

At that time, Cambridge was an NDP fortress, as the federal member was the equally well-regarded Max Saltsman. But Monty worked hard, bringing the shop-floor work ethic to Queen’s Park and carrying the trade union movement from the meeting halls to the Legislature.

He was our provincial representative at a very interesting time when Cambridge was formed out of the shotgun marriage of Galt, Preston, Hespeler and the village of Blair. His personality and his desire to do what was best for the people he represented allowed him to make connections between the newly formed communities. Monty was always looking out for the little guy.

His son, Dean, spoke about his dad last year at an NDP event. He said that Monty had so much to do and so much to say but he never did it alone. Dean recalled his parents’ strong relationship and said the philosophy in their home was, “It’s not behind every successful man or woman, it’s beside every successful man or woman is a man or a woman.” He recounted how his parents would sit at the dinner table and write Monty’s speech together, jokingly referring to his mother as “My father’s greatest critic.”

He also spoke a bit about his father’s unique way to deliver a speech; how he would connect with the audience by pacing up and down on the stage and how he would sometimes be so focused on what he had to say that he would put his hand in his pocket and absentmindedly jingle the coins and the keys in his pocket. Sometimes I think that made his family cringe.

After the 1981 election, he went on to work for the Ontario Federation of Labour Workers Health and Safety Centre. Here he would continue to fight for safe workplaces and for owners and management to take the steps necessary to give their employees the right opportunities to succeed.

In remembering Monty, former NDP MPP Mike Farnan, who is here with us today, said, “Monty never forgot where his roots were and he was always concerned about his workers.”

Fittingly, last year, Cambridge’s NDP members created an award in his honour: the Monty Davidson NDP-Labour Award. This award recognizes an individual who reflects the values that Monty pursued during his life: a passion for workers’ health and safety and a passion for the NDP. His son said he was deeply humbled and honoured by this award.

Monty passed peacefully at his home this past March surrounded by his friends and his family. He leaves behind a legacy of advocacy, leadership and achievement, not only for the trade union movement he loved so much, not only for the family he loved so much, but for the people of Cambridge who he was so actively caring about here at Queen’s Park and in everything that he did.

His election slogan remains relevant today for both his family and a grateful community: “I’m with Monty.” Thank you so much for sharing him with us.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Further tribute?

Mr. Michael Harris: I’m honoured to stand amongst the family, wife, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of a man whose roots and political activism took him from the shop floor in Galt to Queen’s Park and beyond as he championed our most vulnerable both in his home riding and throughout Ontario, former Cambridge MPP Montgomery “Monty” Davidson.

While Mr. Davidson’s political work often came from the other side of the floor from where my Conservative predecessors in the then Davis years stood, there is no doubt that when it came to looking out for the people of Cambridge and beyond, all should be proud to pull up a chair to the kitchen table where Monty’s political passions, debate and fight for the rights of his fellow brothers and sisters took form as he fought to make a better life for all.

From attending Galt Collegiate, Monty Davidson set out at 15 to work for the Stauffer-Dobbie Ltd. textile plant in Galt. Already a union steward at 17 and a leader in the struggle to organize with the TWA, Monty’s direction toward fighting for the rights of his fellow workers was set early on.

As an 11-year international representative with textile workers and the national chairman of the political action committee, Monty soon turned his attention to both provincial and federal politics: a founding member of the provincial NDP, president of the Waterloo South federal association, president of the Ontario young New Democrats and director of the provincial party—a lot of hats to wear, Speaker, but Monty’s clear dedication to the cause was enough to ensure that they all fit perfectly.

As his youngest son, Gregg, told me, even in his years before arriving at Queen’s Park, “Dad was a constant worker for the people. If we went by a picket line, he would stop and talk to workers. He’d get cigarettes and coffee and bring it to the picket line.” Often on the way to a hockey game for the kids, his picket-line stops meant the young Davidsons were putting their hockey equipment on in the car as Dad talked to those on the line.

From youngest to oldest, the story is the same. Eldest son Dean Davidson has noted: “We were born into a household where social, political and union activism were the norm. Handing out leaflets for various causes was a common activity,” a task he recalls first doing at the young age of four.

All the while, as Dad talked at picket lines, and his children handed out leaflets, it was Monty’s wife, his partner, Margaret Davidson, who, through those early years and beyond, into Queen’s Park, helped guide the Davidson team ahead.

As all members in this House recognize, the special position we hold here is never achieved without the work and sacrifice of many. When it comes to family, spouses—in this case, Margaret, Monty’s wife—are not just part of the team; they in fact are the team.

Dean told a crowd years later on the occasion of the establishment of the Monty Davidson NDP-Labour Award that as Monty and his family grew, so too did the discussions and debates that emerged from the centre of all action of the Davidson household, that kitchen table. Dean describes vividly the blue-smoke-tinged air, common in many 1960s kitchens and living rooms, that provided the backdrop for the kitchen table debates where pre-NDP members of the CCF—Stephen Lewis and others—devoted evenings, weekends and indeed years towards planning next steps forward.

Discussion and debate often led to action. In June 1975, Monty the union representative became Monty the provincial Cambridge candidate. Months later, after weeks of family members toiling over silk-screened handmade signs in the backyard, his “Tomorrow Starts Today” campaign helped him become Monty the Cambridge MPP. All the while, the kitchen table discussions continued, planting seeds for issues Monty would bring to Queen’s Park, on foolscap and folded into his jacket pocket, before heading out to speak directly from his heart.

Some of those heartfelt words in 1978 were dedicated to a young Cambridge-area boy suffering from a growth-hormone deficiency. The boy’s plight prompted Monty to lead the charge to amend the Coroners Act in preserving pituitary glands for production of serum and treatment.

There are many others Monty worked to help in his community. As Gregg mentioned, “He jumped in because he saw there was a need. It wasn’t about ‘I want to be an MPP’; it was about ‘What can I do to help?’ He saw inequities, and he wanted to right them.” He would go on to right them both in and, later on, out of this House, in work with the Ontario Federation of Labour’s Workers Health and Safety Centre before retiring in 1999.

As the years progressed, Monty continued to champion local causes and, in later years, would debate with Gregg the merits of his police officer son’s attempts to deal with picketers. Gregg understood that his dad was doing what he always did: standing up for his fellow brothers and sisters on the line.

Monty Davidson was a fighter and a voice for those in need, in Cambridge and throughout the province, to the end. So today I join with all in this House to thank you, Margaret, and the many Davidson generations, for allowing us to share, of course, in Monty’s legacy today.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Further tribute?

Ms. Catherine Fife: It is an honour to stand up in the House today to speak about the former member Monty Davidson.

We are joined today, as you’ve heard, by Margaret Davidson, Monty’s spouse of 62 years, as well as their children Dean, Debbie, Brad, Glenn and Gregg, and their partners and their children.

We are also joined by former MPP Mike Farnan and his family, who are here to celebrate Monty’s life and legacy.

Monty was a tireless and lifelong activist with the Textile Workers Union of America. He started his career at the young age of 15, when he got a job at Stauffer-Dobbie Ltd., a prominent textile mill. By 17, he was a shop steward. From there, he went on to be the local union president. His time at the textile mill defined his life’s work of improving the experience of working people, the less fortunate and the most vulnerable in Ontario.

In 1975, Monty went from the shop floor to the Legislature, where he served two terms. During his six years at Queen’s Park, the values and principles of the trade union movement never left him. They were an integral part of his character and his work ethic.

After his time at Queen’s Park, he continued to be a champion for the vulnerable through his work with the OFL and, later, the Workers Health and Safety Centre in Cambridge.

While preparing for this tribute, I had the opportunity to speak with a few people who worked closely with Monty throughout his life. One of them, former Cambridge MPP Mike Farnan, said, “Monty Davidson was a special man. He was bright and intelligent and recognized the role that his union played in his development. He loved negotiating on behalf of his fellow workers and was immensely respected. People trusted him. He never forgot his roots and he has a special place in the hearts of the workers of Cambridge and in the history of textile workers.”

During these tributes, we often reflect on the impact that our work has on our children and our families. We could not do this work without their support, and it was emotional to read how Monty’s family viewed him and his life’s work. One family member commented, “The health and safety of workers was a cause near and dear to our dad.” Another remembered never driving past a picket line without stopping and delivering supplies: “Why? Because he believed in those people, their rights and their futures.” Another said, “As a family, we have been fortunate to have had a person of strong values and beliefs who has touched our lives and the lives of many others.”

Reflecting on Monty’s years of activism, one of the Davidson children also said, “I remember the sacrifices that Dad and Mom made together for their cause. Indeed, the sacrifices for a better life for working people were made by our whole family.”

All of us in this House know the sacrifices that the families of MPPs make. On behalf of the entire NDP caucus, I want to thank the Davidson family, and Margaret in particular, for the sacrifices and the contributions that they made not only during Monty’s years as an MPP but throughout his life as a labour activist.

Monty was also one of the founding members of the provincial NDP, which could not have been easy. Whether inside or outside the Legislature, he was a strong advocate for our province’s most vulnerable.

I want to share a story with the House about Monty’s time here as an MPP that exemplifies this commitment. Monty fought tirelessly on behalf of children who were not receiving adequate treatments for growth hormone deficiencies, which you’ve just heard. Eventually, Monty tabled a private member’s bill in the House that would have allowed for new and innovative treatments for these children. Monty’s private member’s bill was rewritten as legislation by the governing party, a story some of us know too well, and was passed by Premier Bill Davis’s PCs.

After the bill was passed, Premier Davis crossed the floor and shook Monty’s hand, acknowledging Monty’s hard work on behalf of children with growth hormone deficiencies. This was one of Monty’s proudest moments as an MPP.

Monty would often say that he was a fortunate man to be doing what he loved: standing up for what was right. Indeed, we are thankful for Monty’s commitment to workers in the province of Ontario, to his community of Cambridge and to his work here at Queen’s Park. Thank you to the Davidson family.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I thank all members for their very heartfelt and very kind words. As this tribute takes place, I would also like to thank the family and let them know that we will make a DVD and the Hansard comments available to the family members for their future use. And finally, we thank you for the gift of Montgomery “Monty” Davidson.

Oral Questions

Government accountability

Mr. Patrick Brown: My question is for the Premier. Let me share a quote from the recent Auditor General’s report: “The government created a needlessly complex accounting/financing structure for the electricity rate reduction in order to avoid showing a deficit or an increase in net debt.”

We understand that they created this needlessly complex scheme and it’s going to cost us $4 billion, but what the government has not answered is who’s going to pay that $4 billion. They like to be a little too cute about that. I want the Premier to stand up here today and tell Ontarians exactly who’s going to pay that additional $4 billion due to her schemes.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: As I have said in this House and I have said in public outside of this House, there were massive investments in an electricity system that had been degraded. When we came into office under the previous Premier in 2003, there was a system in this province that had been neglected. There were brownouts and blackouts. There were thousands of kilometres of line that needed to be rebuilt. We made those investments. We made those investments, and there was a cost associated with that.

What we know is that that cost was being borne by people in the province today. They were saying to us, and they were saying to all of us in the Legislature, that their electricity prices were going up too quickly and they were going up too high. We addressed that. People are seeing a reduction on their electricity bills.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: That’s some pretty clever spin for how you made the decision, a calculated decision, to blow $4 billion.

Interjections.

Mr. Patrick Brown: They may be laughing about this $4 billion, $1 billion here and $1 billion there, but it’s not a laughing matter. People can’t afford their hydro bills.

Let me share a quote from TVO: “This isn’t an ‘accounting disagreement’: it’s not even particularly advanced civics. Leaders should be held to account for the decisions they make, and governments should make it easy for voters to do so by ensuring their decisions are clear and understandable.

“The fact that the Liberals disagree on this point says a lot about where the party that ran on basic, no-nonsense good government reforms in 2003 has ended up 14 years later.” That’s a direct quote from TVO.

My question for the Premier is: When did this happen? When did they stop caring about the people of Ontario, and more about the self-interest of the Ontario Liberal—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Be seated, please. Thank you.

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Mr. Speaker, I think any party in this province that cares about the people of Ontario would have a plan to reduce electricity prices, as well as a plan to have an efficient and reliable electricity system. Anyone who cares about the people of Ontario wants to make sure that the lights go on when you flick the switches, that we don’t have brownouts and blackouts, and that the cost of that be borne in a reasonable way.

We were very clear, when we brought forward our fair hydro plan, that the cost of the upgrades that had to be made to the electricity system would be borne over a longer period of time. I think it’s fair, when government after government after government neglected the electricity system, when it was finally upgraded—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Stop the clock. The banter going back and forth is enough. If it continues, I’ll immediately move to warnings. It’s pretty early.

Finish, please.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: We’ve been clear that our plan does this, provides for the reasonable bearing of these costs—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): All right, you want to challenge me? The member from Prince Edward–Hastings, come to order. We’re now in warnings.

Carry on.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: —the cost of those investments moved over a longer period of time. We’ve also been clear that the fair hydro plan keeps the cost of borrowing within the rate base, not the tax base, because that is the logical thing to do.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Final supplementary.

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: What I can’t get an answer on is, we have an Auditor General’s report that says that you are wasting $4 billion because of the manner that you’re doing the scheme—$4 billion that Ontario families can’t afford. Now, in the midst of this—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Okay. Minister of Finance, you’re warned.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I’m sure you don’t want to be next.

Finish, please.

Mr. Patrick Brown: In the midst of this bombshell that the government is wasting $4 billion, the Auditor General has still not gotten the emails she requested.

I’m worried this is Pete’s Project 2.0. Why is it taking so long? Are there Liberal staffers furiously deleting emails? Why is it taking so long to have the proper disclosure? Wasn’t this supposed to be the most transparent government? What have they become?

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Be seated, please. Thank you.

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: President of the Treasury Board.

Hon. Liz Sandals: Speaker, I totally disagree with the characterization of the accounting.

Let’s stop and think about how the electricity sector works and what the norm is for accounting in the electricity sector. In fact, when OPG borrows to finance nuclear generators or hydro or whatever, it appears on OPG’s books. When Hydro One borrows to fund new transmission lines or in the areas where they’re the local distributor, it’s on their books. Toronto Hydro—it’s on their books. Guelph Hydro—it’s on their books. It is the norm in the electricity sector that the borrowing done by that electrical utility goes on that utility’s books.

It is further true that OPG and Hydro One already have rate-based accounting, and that has been approved by the auditor—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thank you.

New question.

Government accountability

Mr. Patrick Brown: My question is for the Premier. When the FAO, the Financial Accountability Office, was introduced, the Liberal minister said, “I wish there was someone at the beginning, a neutral third party, whom we could have gone to, to get the type of advice and input that would have allowed us to foresee any of the challenges or problems that arose.” They celebrated the creation of this office. Now we have a situation where they’re ignoring the FAO. They’ve been in a year-long battle with the Ombudsman. Every chance they get, they attack the Auditor General. There doesn’t seem to be a non-partisan officer of the Legislature that they don’t disagree with.

My question is: Is there a single legislative officer that this government can actually support? Is there a single legislative officer that they’re not willing to disparage?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: The reality is that we work with all of the officers of the Legislature, Mr. Speaker. Our officials work with them, our ministers work with them and we do our utmost to answer their questions and to provide the information that they need.

From every single report that comes to us from officers of the Legislature, we can make improvements. It is a very important process. We value the input, we value that critical eye on the work of government, and we will continue to work with all of the officers of the Legislature, as we have done throughout our term.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: They say they enjoy working with the legislative officers, yet on every single occasion they disparage them. They say they thank them for their reports, but the reports are saying that this is a house of cards. Their numbers do not add up. You even had one report that said they make up their own accounting rules. Mr. Speaker, that’s not working with them, that is ignoring them. That is attacking them.

There was one

article I read yesterday that said, “Ontario’s War on Truth.” The government only likes to deal in truths or facts if it suits their political survival.

I know in a debate who I’m going to believe. Do I believe the facts of the Auditor General or do I believe the facts of this Premier and this government? Because the track record is, again and again, our legislative officers are correct and this government’s numbers are wrong.

My question is: When will this government stop their war on our independent legislative officers?

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Stop the clock. Be seated, please. Thank you.

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I am always happy to debate the truth. I’m particularly happy to debate the truth with the Leader of the Opposition—any time, Mr. Speaker.

The truth is that we had a situation in terms of electricity prices in this province that needed to be addressed. There was question after question after question in this House from a party that had no plan to address the electricity prices in the province about what our plan was. We brought a plan forward and people across this province are seeing a 25%, on average, reduction on their electricity bills.

We were very clear that over the period of—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Finish, please.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: —that over the period of the next generation, we would smooth the costs and there would be a premium attached to that, as there is with a mortgage. We were also clear that—

Interjections.

Mr. John Yakabuski: A $6-billion smoothie.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Nepean–Carleton is warned, the member from Niagara West–Glanbrook is warned and the member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke is warned. We’ll go down this road if you’re choosing.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Oh, if I knew who that was. It might even entice me to go to naming.

Finish, please.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: It’s also clear that we believe it was fair; that when a huge investment in upgrading the electricity system was made, it would be fair for not just this generation but the next generation, who will also benefit from that asset, to pay part of that cost.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Final supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: The Premier stands in this House and insists that her government is not attacking our independent legislative officers. That same article, “Ontario’s War on Truth,” said, “The Ministry of Energy went so far as to personally contact journalists the day before her report was released to say the auditor’s

interpretation is flawed.”

Even before they had seen the report, senior ministers in this government were calling journalists to attack the—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport is warned.

And for the House, we’re really close to naming. If you don’t think I will, I will. I might even bypass warnings. It’s going to be civil here.

Finish, please.

Mr. Patrick Brown: Calling journalists the night before to attack the Auditor General does not sound like a government that’s working with our legislative officers.

My question, Mr. Speaker, is, for a government that said they were about openness and transparency and working with our legislative officers, I want to know if the Premier condones her ministers calling journalists the night before an Auditor General’s report to attack the Auditor General. Do you condone that?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Mr. Speaker, as I said in my first answer, it is extremely important that we respect and work with the officers of the Legislature, which we do.

As a minister, I would sit down with officers of the Legislature and have conversations about what was going on in the ministry before reports were written. Ministry officials work with the officers of the Legislature to make sure they have all the information they need. It’s a very important function.

Today the Environmental Commissioner’s annual report is going to be out. There will be criticisms of the things that we have done as a government; there will be acknowledgement of progress that has been made; and, most importantly, there will be a direction forward in terms of how to improve. We will continue to work with the Environmental Commissioner, as we do with all of the officers of the Legislature. It’s a very important function and we’ll continue to work with them as we have in the past.

Long-term care

M me France Gélinas: Ma question est pour la première ministre. This morning, we learned through media reports that 14 long-term-care homes in the city of Toronto are either planning to move out of the city or seriously considering it. That means there are 1,800 frail, elderly people in Toronto right now who could be forced to move or risk losing their homes.

What is the Premier’s plan to make sure that these 1,800 seniors aren’t forced out of their homes?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I appreciate the question from the member opposite, and I understand that the Long Term Care Association, I believe, is going to be coming out tomorrow with some information about some of the challenges that they believe the sector is facing.

What we know, Mr. Speaker, is that we need more long-term-care beds. We need more support for people who are aging in the province, including more home care. We continue to increase funding to home care. We know that as the long-term-care sector goes through a transformation to upgrade beds—because that’s what this is about. This is about making sure that frail, elderly seniors have the very best environment in which to spend their days.

We will continue to work with the Long Term Care Association. We understand there are challenges, and we’re going to work with them so we can solve those challenges.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

M me France Gélinas: Ontario has 30,000 people on a wait-list for a bed in a long-term-care home right now. If every home that is considering leaving Toronto actually does, what will that mean for the 1,800 seniors in those beds? What is the Premier’s plan to make up the loss of those beds for Toronto seniors and their families?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Health and Long-Term Care.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: From the outset, I want to emphasize that of the 20 long-term-care homes in Toronto referenced by the CBC today, we have not received a single application or proposal that suggests or advocates for any beds whatsoever to leave Toronto. I want to emphasize as well that no long-term-care beds can leave any community without my explicit written approval.

Also, in June of this year, I was very proud to be in downtown Toronto in West Don Lands announcing a brand new redevelopment in Toronto, and I’m happy to speak more about that in the supplementary.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Final supplementary.

M me France Gélinas: Back to the Premier: The Premier’s legacy when it comes to long-term-care beds can be described in one word: less. There’s less funding, there’s less oversight, there are less beds available, and there is less dignity for the parents and grandparents.

When will the Premier finally acknowledge the crisis that she and her government have helped to create in our long-term-care system and do something to help seniors meet the care needs they have?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: To reiterate, it is not my intention, nor will it be, for long-term-care beds to leave a community—any community.

The member from Nipissing knows that we’re working very closely together on a long-term-care solution for Trout Lake to keep those beds in that community.

The member for Brant—Mr. Speaker, I won’t reference you directly on this. But there are many communities around the province where I’m working directly to ensure that the communities retain those.

Earlier this year, in downtown Toronto and West Don Lands, Rekai, a not-for-profit long-term-care operator, announced and celebrated a brand new redevelopment on new land that they purchased in downtown Toronto. It can be done.

But most importantly, there can be no movement of beds without my explicit written approval. We’re working with all of our stakeholders to find solutions that work for them and for their clients.

Long-term care

M me France Gélinas: Ma question est pour la première ministre. These 14 long-term-care homes are considering moving because the Premier and her Liberal government have failed for decades to provide the proper planning and to make the investments in our long-term-care facilities. Back in 2007, the Liberal government promised to redevelop 35,000 long-term-care-home beds by 2017, so that the residents would have the facilities they need to live in. But by 2014, seven long years later, there were only 5,000 beds under redevelopment, and 30,000 of them had not changed a bit. Those residents were still waiting for appropriate care.

Can the Premier tell us how many long-term-care beds are still in need of redevelopment today?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Health and Long-Term Care.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I’m proud of the changes and improvements that we’ve made in our long-term-care system since coming into office in 2003. We have built, or our partners have built with licences provided to them from the government, 10,000 new long-term-care beds across this province. Our partners—for-profit and not-for-profit—have already redeveloped 13,500 long-term-care beds. We’re on track for a total of 30,000 over a 10-year period.

We’re working with virtually every community. We’re finding those important, creative ways that reflect and appreciate and respect their requirements for the operators and the business models that need to work for them. But most of all, both parties come together because we’re focused on client care, on resident care, and providing the best-quality long-term care for the residents.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary.

M me France Gélinas: It’s not just the redevelopment of beds that this Liberal government is failing at. We hear horror stories daily: seniors being left in beds for 16 hours straight, not being able to reach the bathroom in time, or being left to sit in soiled clothes for hours on end because no one is there to help them, not to mention the cases of abuse that make the front page of the papers.

The Premier has a chance to do the right thing right now for the seniors and their families. Will the Premier expand the government inquiry into the murders committed by Elizabeth Wettlaufer to include the broad, systemic issues that need to be fixed in our long-term-care system?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: The member opposite knows, and we have spoken about this many times in the Legislature, that in the public inquiry, the justice has the scope within the terms of reference to address whatever issue in long-term-care homes she believes is pertinent to reaching the conclusion that will result in the highest level of safety, security and quality of care for residents of this province who call long-term care their home.

I am increasingly frustrated that the third party appears to be opposed to virtually everything we do and everything we propose, like the Humber River redevelopment site for restorative care, the 150 beds there that will open up this calendar year that I spoke to yesterday.

I wonder if the members from Windsor are opposed to the 20 additional acute care beds that we’re adding to Windsor Regional Hospital. I’m wondering if the member from Welland is also opposed to the 26 new beds that we’re adding in acute care at the Welland site. It just is very difficult to see what they’re for and what they’re against.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Final supplementary?

M me France Gélinas: Front-line long-term-care workers are doing the very best they can, but they need help from this Premier. We need a find-and-fix approach to this crisis, and we need a Premier who will tackle these problems head on instead of turning a blind eye. She has heard the call of families with loved ones in care in this chamber many times. Will the Premier finally stop ignoring them and expand the scope of the Wettlaufer inquiry?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: With the fearmongering of the NDP, they would likely close every single long-term-care home in this province. That’s the narrative they’re creating. That’s the rhetoric that they’re responsible for.

I’m still wondering if the members from London in the third party agree or disagree with the 24 new acute care beds that we’re opening this calendar year at London Health Sciences or the 24 new acute mental health beds that we’re opening as well at London Health Sciences Centre. Or in Hamilton, if the leader of their party agrees or disagrees with the three new neonatal intensive care beds we’re opening this calendar year or the 30 new acute care beds at Hamilton Health Sciences or whether at St. Joseph’s in downtown Hamilton, the 24 new acute care beds.

I need to know because they seem to oppose virtually every good solution that the public, patients, residents and clients appreciate, respect and applaud. They seem to be against every solution.

Long-term care

Mr. Bill Walker: My question is for the Minister of Health. Minister, you and your Premier found $25 billion for an election scheme to cover up your hydro issues. Today we have 1,800 seniors in 14 homes that could possibly close.

You’ve said on record you will not allow any homes to move. Will you put that in writing? Will you not give express written permission for a home to move? Seniors have lost trust. The long-term-care industry has lost trust. Minister, today, I want you to again reiterate that you will not allow any home to move, with your express written permission.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I will not allow any home to move beds without my explicit written permission. That’s what is required in the legislation. That has been the case every single time when an operator has come forward.

I think it’s critically important that Torontonians and those in the GTA who rely on these beds in Toronto and the surrounding areas know clearly, and that there’s no rhetoric or narrative that opposes this truth, that is the reality, that I need to approve them. But of the 20 long-term-care homes in Toronto referenced by the CBC this morning, I have not and the ministry has not received a single application from them which advocates or requests a movement of beds outside of Toronto.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Bill Walker: My question is going to the Premier. Today, 32,000 seniors are on a wait-list, 20 homes have threatened to close and that could just be the tip of the iceberg; 1,800 seniors are at risk of losing their long-term-care beds just in Toronto, let alone the rest of Ontario.

Lorraine Purdon, executive director of Family Councils of Ontario, has said, “It is always a concern that homes may have to move outside the city, because it involves moving a vulnerable population from their home and creates stress for the family caregivers.” It’s an unneeded stress you can end today.

Mr. Speaker, through you to the Premier: Will you guarantee the residents and their families that their nursing homes won’t be closing? And equally, how many beds will you build to get those people off that 32,000 wait-list?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: We fully understand, are cognizant of and appreciate the challenges that our partners in the long-term-care system have. The investment that the government makes toward the capital cost of redevelopment is between 60% and 80% of that total capital cost. That is a significant contribution; I think we can all agree on that.

But we are working with our partners. We are working with both the not-for-profit and the for-profit operators that are looking at creative solutions to provide the highest quality of care and upgrade their facilities through redevelopment so that they can provide that standard of care that all of us would expect for our loved ones. We’re doing that.

We’re cognizant of the different challenges that exist across the province. I have referenced one example with Rekai in downtown Toronto. Mark my words: There will be other examples in Toronto because we’re working so closely to make sure that this works for everyone.

Government accountability

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Speaker, to the Premier: This morning I moved a motion to force this Liberal government to release emails to the public that were examined by the Auditor General in her recent report on hydro. These emails show that the Liberal government spent an extra and unnecessary $4 billion to hide the damage that their $40-billion hydro borrowing scheme will visit on the people of Ontario.

Unsurprisingly, Liberals voted against the motion to avoid having to disclose these embarrassing emails. Will the Premier release the emails to the people of Ontario right now, of her own accord?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Economic Development and Growth.

Hon. Brad Duguid: Mr. Speaker, this is the kind of questioning that comes up from time to time when a request is made for information. The government does everything that it has to do and wants to do to comply. That’s exactly what’s happening now.

The emails that have been requested are being complied with. In fact, as of today, over 30,000 emails have been moved forward, and whatever is left, they’re to come. I think the commitment that the minister has made is best as they can—to have these emails to the Auditor General, I believe, by November 1.

It takes time to do this. It’s not something we do in our offices; it’s something that our public servants do to ensure that the emails that are requested are indeed the emails that are provided. So it takes a little bit of time. Those are just the mechanisms of how these things work.

We’re happy to comply and we will.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again to the Premier: This is a question of emails coming to the public so the public can actually see for themselves what’s going on. The people of this province have the right to know who authorized this $40-billion accounting trick.

That Premier has told Ontarians over and over again that she is the most open and transparent person to ever occupy her office. She talks a good game, but when it comes down to actually doing the things that are open and transparent, the people of this province have been let down every single time.

Why won’t the Premier take this chance to show the people of Ontario that she can, in fact, keep her promises and release these emails now?

Hon. Brad Duguid: Mr. Speaker, I think I responded pretty straightforwardly to the member in his first question.

But let me say this about the other part of his question: The fact is that three of Canada’s leading accounting firms, Ernst and Young, KPMG and Deloitte, completely agree with the approach that this government has taken. This isn’t a unique approach for this government; it’s not a unique approach for any government. It’s called a rate-regulated accounting approach. It’s taken by six out of the eight independent system operators across North America. It’s perfectly normal.

If the member is accusing something of being untoward here, then I guess he’s saying that there is something going on in Alberta that’s untoward, or something in New England that’s untoward, or something in New York state that’s untoward, or something in Michigan that’s untoward, or something in the Midwest and eastern seaboard, or maybe Texas.

Mr. Speaker, this is a regular accounting process. It’s time for the NDP and the opposition to understand that this is a very legitimate way to account for these costs.

Public transit

Mrs. Cristina Martins: My question is for the Minister of Transportation. We all know that Ontario is a competitive jurisdiction where people want to invest. This is something I hear from different sectors whenever I cross this province. People want to come and invest in Ontario.

Waterloo region, for example, has an ever-growing number of high-quality jobs, particularly in the innovation and tech sectors. In fact, Ontario is home to two of the largest start-up ecosystems in the world, one of them being in Waterloo and the other being in my town of Toronto.

But in order to maintain our competitive edge, we need to make sure we have a world-class transportation network that connects commuters to these opportunities. That is why I am very pleased to know that our government is moving forward on high-speed rail all the way to Windsor, with stops along the way, including one in Kitchener.

Would the minister please provide more information on what exactly our government has done to date to make high-speed rail a reality here in Ontario?

Hon. Steven Del Duca: I want to thank the member from Davenport for her question and for her advocacy on this particular topic and others. Our government has been very clear about our commitment to build high-speed rail between Toronto and Windsor, and we continue to make progress on this historic project.

In May, I was very pleased to join the Premier to announce an initial $15-million investment for a comprehensive environmental assessment. Just yesterday, the Premier announced the next important step, which is the establishment of a high-speed-rail planning advisory board that will provide strategic support for this important project.

A project of this size, the first of its kind in Canadian history, cannot be taken lightly. That’s why we need the skills and expertise of a dedicated board with members from the innovation, planning and infrastructure sectors, just to name a few. The board will also play a critical role in engaging key partners, including the private sector and our indigenous communities. I know that through their hard work and our government’s ongoing commitment, we will deliver high-speed rail.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mrs. Cristina Martins: Thank you to the minister for his answer. It is clear that high-speed rail is truly a historic project. We need to make sure that we get it right. This is a project that will support not just today’s generations, but generations to come.

As the minister made absolutely clear in his answer, our government is committed to seeing this project through. But unlike the members on this side of the House, the parties opposite continue to flip-flop on their support for high-speed rail. One day, they like it; the other day, we don’t know. That is truly disappointing to so many communities along the future line, including communities like London, Windsor and Chatham that have representatives on the other side of the House.

Would the minister please provide more information on why our government is absolutely clear on the fact that we need to move this project forward?

Hon. Steven Del Duca: Again, I want to thank the member from Davenport for her follow-up question. I also want to take a moment to thank the members in our caucus from communities like Guelph, Kitchener, Cambridge and London for their staunch advocacy for this particular project. On a regular basis, these members join with the Premier, myself and our entire team to make sure that we actually get shovels in the ground and build high-speed rail.

We know from an economic development standpoint and from a transportation standpoint that it’s absolutely essential that we get this job done. I can say once again very clearly, on behalf of the Premier and our government, that we are steadfast. We will make this happen, Speaker. We understand the critical importance of making sure that we do get it right and that we do get those shovels in the ground. We are going to work with our advisory board to make sure that we get it done the right way, in a way that makes the most sense for the communities that we’re proud to represent.

Again, to my caucus colleagues, I want to say: Keep pushing and keep prodding. Together, this