role="main" class="main-container container js-quickedit-main-content" id="main-content">

March 22, 2017

41st Parliament, 2nd Session

< Previous sitting day

Next sitting day >

Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcripts 2017-Mar-22 (PDF)

L056 - Wed 22 Mar 2017 / Mer 22 mar 2017

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Wednesday 22 March 2017 Mercredi 22 mars 2017

Committee membership

Order of business

Orders of the Day

Concurrence in supply

Royal assent / Sanction royale

Introduction of Visitors

Oral Questions

Government advertising

Climate change

Hydro rates

Hydro rates

Health care funding

Health care

Great Lakes water quality / Qualité de l’eau des Grands Lacs

Hydro rates

Hydro rates

Nurses

Hydro rates

Employment standards

Indigenous economic development

Highway improvement

Water quality

Notice of dissatisfaction

Introduction of Visitors

Members’ Statements

NeighbourLink Chatham-Kent

Teachers’ labour dispute

Nutrition Month

Credit unions

Water quality

Emma Harris

Bayfield

St. Patrick’s Day

Water quality

Introduction of Bills

Reliable Elevators Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 sur les ascenseurs fiables

Long-Term Care Homes Amendment Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 modifiant la

Loi Sur les foyers de soins de longue durée

Motions

Private members’ public business

Private members’ public business

Petitions

Dental care

Invasive species

Hospital funding

Employment standards

Home inspection industry

Hydro rates

Privatization of public assets

Hydro rates

Long-term care

Child care

GO Transit

Medical assistance in dying

Orders of the Day

School Boards Collective Bargaining Amendment Act, 2017 / Loi de 2017 modifiant la

Loi sur la négociation collective dans les conseils scolaires

Concurrence in supply

The House met at 0900.

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

Prayers.

Committee membership

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The President of the Treasury Board, on a point of order.

Hon. Liz Sandals: First of all, I believe we have unanimous consent to put forward a motion without notice regarding changes to the membership of standing committees.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The President of the Treasury Board is seeking unanimous consent to put forward a motion without notice. Do we agree? Agreed?

President?

Hon. Liz Sandals: I move that the following changes be made to the membership of the following committees:

That on the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs, Mr. Vanthof replaces Ms. Fife; and

That on the Standing Committee on Justice Policy, Miss Taylor replaces Mr. Mantha.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The President of the Treasury Board moves that the following changes be made to the membership of the following committees—

Mr. Bob Delaney: Dispense.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Dispense? Dispense.

Agreed? Agreed. Carried.

Motion agreed to.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): President of the Treasury Board.

Order of business

Hon. Liz Sandals: I believe we have unanimous consent to put forward a motion without notice for the arrangement of proceedings for debate on concurrence in supply.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The President of the Treasury Board is seeking unanimous consent to put forward a motion without notice. Do we agree? Agreed.

President?

Hon. Liz Sandals: I move that, notwithstanding any standing order, the order for concurrence in supply for the various ministries and offices, as represented by government orders 4 through 12, inclusive, shall be called concurrently; and

That when such orders are called they shall be considered concurrently in a single debate; and

Two hours shall be allotted to the debate, divided equally among the recognized parties, at the end of which time the Speaker shall interrupt the proceedings and shall put every question necessary to dispose of the order for concurrence in supply for each of the ministries and offices referred to above; and

That any required divisions in the orders for concurrence in supply shall be deferred to deferred votes, such votes to be taken in succession, with one five-minute bell.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The President of Treasury Board moves that, notwithstanding any standing order—

Interjection: Dispense.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Dispense? Dispense.

Do we agree? Carried.

Motion agreed to.

Orders of the Day

Concurrence in supply

Hon. Liz Sandals: I move concurrence in supply for the Ministry of Finance; the Ministry of Transportation, including supplementaries; the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, including supplementaries; the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs, including supplementaries; the Ministry of Energy, including supplementaries; the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs; the Ministry of Education, including supplementaries; the Ministry of Children and Youth Services; and the Office of Francophone Affairs.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Ms. Sandals has moved government orders 4 through 12, inclusive.

Ms. Sandals.

Hon. Liz Sandals: It’s my privilege this morning to talk about concurrence in the estimates today. As every member knows, our fiscal year begins with the budget. Our budget for this year was titled Jobs for Today and Tomorrow and was introduced February 25, 2016. In the budget, we outlined our key spending priorities for this fiscal year, including investing in our people, our infrastructure and our economy, and building prosperity that we will all benefit from.

Concurrence represents the Legislature’s approval of the estimates for a given fiscal year. This isn’t proposed new spending; it is simply a step in approving spending already outlined in the budget. Today, we are discussing concurrence for the 2016-17 fiscal year. As part of today’s discussion on concurrence, I’d like to take a look at how our budget has impacted Ontario.

Like most jurisdictions around the world, Ontario was affected by the global economic recession of 2008-09. But in the face of that challenge, instead of cutting jobs and services, like the proposed 100,000 jobs that the Conservatives would have cut, we created a plan to build Ontario up. We chose to improve schools, strengthen health care and invest in modern infrastructure. We chose to support our business community in many ways so that it can rise to the challenges of a technology-driven global economy.

Our plan to invest in the future, take bold action and be innovative, is working. Not only has Ontario’s economy continued to grow in an uncertain global environment, but our government has continued to exceed our balanced-budget goals. For the eighth straight year, we beat the deficit target in our budget projection. Our deficit is at $1.9 billion, an improvement of $2.4 billion over our 2016 budget projections. Our economy is supported by strong economic growth and a responsible approach to fiscal management.

Speaker, we will deliver a balanced budget for 2017-18. This is thanks to our government’s investment in our economy, which is helping our businesses compete and create jobs for Ontarians. Just last week, members of this House heard that we reached a new threshold in job creation, with over 700,000 net new jobs created since the recession.

Looking at economic trends, it is clear we are in one of the most exciting periods of economic growth and job creation we’ve seen in a very long time. Our unemployment rate is down to 6.2%, which is the lowest in the last 10 years. We also just passed seven straight months of job growth, a number we haven’t seen for 14 years. We are transforming Ontario for the future with our infrastructure spending and with investments in the economy.

We have been ensuring that we are creating the best value possible for taxpayers through our Program Review, Renewal and Transformation initiative, and through targeted government support for small and medium-sized businesses. Our Program Review, Renewal and Transformation initiative, or PRRT, is an ongoing fiscal planning and expenditure management approach that we are using to make sure government continues to work in the best way possible for the people of Ontario. Through this initiative, we are continuously reviewing government programs to make sure they are working in the most efficient way, with the greatest value for taxpayers.

PRRT has been designed to look at how every dollar across government is spent, using evidence to inform better choices and improve outcomes. We are asking the following questions about each program and service:

(1) Is it relevant?

(2) Is it effective?

(3) Is it efficient?

(4) Is it sustainable?

This approach is transforming how programs are delivered and identifying how resources can be reallocated to priority areas such as health care and education. We need to make every dollar count, which is why we are working across government to manage resources responsibly.

Through PRRT this past fiscal year, we have used the evidence we are gathering on programs to undertake a number of initiatives to transform and modernize program delivery. One such initiative is the work we have been doing to transform student assistance to make college and university more affordable, including making the average cost of tuition free for students with financial need whose family income is $50,000 per year or less. We estimate that by transforming the way we fund student assistance, over 150,000 students across the province will have free average tuition.

Just think what that means to average Ontarians. That is a lot of students who might have avoided post-secondary education in the past because of the cost. Now they will know upfront that those tuition costs are covered by the Ontario government. We are removing a major hurdle that could have kept too many people from their dreams and their future opportunities. For the average Ontarian, our tuition plan will help open the door to jobs that will help build the future of Ontario, along with the higher wages that usually come with post-secondary education.

Changing the way we provide tuition support unlocks the potential of thousands of Ontarians that otherwise may not have had the opportunity. While individuals will benefit from this plan directly, Ontario as a whole will also benefit. Having a highly educated workforce brings investment from companies looking for employees that will be able to handle the challenges of a globalized economy. This means greater economic potential for Ontario in the future.

Our plan not only provides economic and social benefits, but enables students to focus on learning without having to worry about borrowing or repaying money for the privilege of a good education. Our tuition promise is just one way that we are helping Ontarians while building the economy of the future.

We have also been working to simplify how transfer payments to government partners are managed to support a more modern, efficient and effective government. Through our Transfer Payment Administrative Modernization Project, we are simplifying processes for both transfer payment recipients and government staff. Our changes will allow everyone to spend less time on administration and more time on delivering important services to Ontarians.

Another key piece of PRRT has been information and information technology modernization. The government’s information and information technology systems, or I&IT systems, are the backbone of many public services, including OHIP medical claims and more than 200,000 online driver’s licence renewals every year.

While the government’s investment in information technology has remained relatively stable at $1 billion annually, we have steadily improved IT operations while managing significantly increased demand for more and new services over the past decade. Some places where we have found efficiencies are through negotiating better contract pricing, better management of fee-for-service consulting costs, consolidating data hosting operations and more efficient design and delivery of IT systems.

In the 2016 budget, we committed to achieve $100 million in savings by 2020 through modernizing the government’s information technology.

We are also making crucial investments in fostering a more innovative and dynamic business environment. One recent example of this is our commitment to the Ontario Small Cidery and Small Distillery Program. This program will provide eligible businesses with support to grow and scale up their operations, including hiring more staff and purchasing new equipment. In short, it will help create jobs and boost economic growth across the province.

We have invested in innovative and forward-looking companies across Ontario, including those in the technology sector. Just two months ago, we announced a partnership, through the Southwestern Ontario Development Fund, with Guelph Manufacturing to invest in new equipment and expand its capabilities. In a competitive auto parts industry, it is these kinds of investments that help Ontario companies stay at the forefront of manufacturing. Our partnership with Guelph Manufacturing created 31 new jobs and retained 523 positions in Guelph.

This expansion will allow Guelph Manufacturing to improve production efficiency and develop in-house design engineering to better meet the needs of their clients.

I’m proud that our government is making investments that expand local manufacturing, protect jobs and support communities. Another example, announced by the Minister of Economic Development and Growth late last year, was our investment in a new research and development lab in Ottawa. The $1.5-million investment through the Eastern Ontario Development Fund will help establish a lab focused on developing software for cloud computing, analytics and business intelligence. The lab will also create more than 100 new jobs. This is just one example of how our government is helping to create jobs and diversify the economy by encouraging regional businesses to pursue innovation and new markets.

The Eastern Ontario Development Fund, which provided the support in the Ottawa area, along with the Southwestern Ontario Development Fund, supporting Guelph and points west, have helped to create and retain more than 32,000 jobs and attract approximately $1.58 billion in investment since 2013. Sectors that are benefiting from our development funds include advanced manufacturing, food processing, life sciences, information and communication technology, tourism and cultural industries.

Finally, we are also committing to transforming Ontario to a low-carbon economy. Our current $325-million investment in the Green Investment Fund, a down payment on the province’s cap-and-trade program, is already seeing results. It has helped businesses reduce emissions by supporting a clean-tech-innovation initiative with a $74-million investment. It has also invested $92 million to help retrofit social housing, much of which is high-rise apartment towers built in the 1960s and 1970s, and which can use up to 25% more energy per square foot than a typical house.

We have also put in place a plan to ensure that funds raised from our cap-and-trade program to reduce greenhouse gas pollution will be invested in creating green jobs and helping people and businesses shift to a low-carbon economy. Through the greenhouse gas reduction account, every dollar from cap-and-trade will be invested in green projects and initiatives that reduce emissions.

Fighting climate change while supporting growth, efficiency and productivity is part of the government’s economic plan to build Ontario up and deliver our number one priority: to grow the economy and create jobs. The investments made through the greenhouse gas reduction account will help secure a healthy, clean and prosperous low-carbon future, and transform the way we live, move and work. It will make our communities stronger and more sustainable for our grandchildren and their children.

The investments I’ve outlined are just a few examples of how we have supported Ontarians through our budget. The estimates that lay out government spending are much more than just numbers on a page. They’re an indication of our commitment to build Ontario up and to do so in a fiscally responsible way. Each line of the estimates represents an investment in Ontarians and in the future of Ontario.

I urge all members to support the concurrence of our province’s estimates and support government spending that has already been transforming Ontario for the future. I urge all members to support concurrence so that spending on these critical public services can be approved.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Further debate? The member from Prince–Edward Hastings.

Mr. Todd Smith: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s good to see you this morning.

I’m pleased to rise and talk about the concurrence of estimates this morning. We did have quite a session this past spring, and in the fall, in terms of issues that were handled by the committee. I want to address a couple of those issues that were specifically raised by me and other members from the official opposition that the government failed to substantively address in the committee hearings.

The first pertains to the separate line item for cap and trade on natural gas bills, which I know has become a concern for many, many customers of Union Gas and Enbridge because the OEB has ruled that they’re not permitted to put this new tax on a line item on the bill.

The minister maintained during questioning at estimates committee, as he has in media scrums since, that he didn’t have the power to direct the Ontario Energy Board to itemize cap and trade separately on bills. Evidence, though, was presented at committee by me and others demonstrating that the process by which the OEB examined the separate line item issue should not have reached the conclusion that it ultimately drew.

The board received dozens of submissions on the separate line item—dozens—and only one submission, made by Environmental Defence, supported the position that the board ultimately came to. That submission was made by a group that has very, very close connections to the Premier’s policy team.

In addition, an

article that appeared at the same time by the Globe and Mail’s Adrian Morrow outlined a view held by the Premier’s chief of staff that opposed any visible indication on bills that special fees were being added for environmental measures. Clearly, there was evidence that this was orchestrated by the Premier’s office and wasn’t quite as arm’s-length as maybe was indicated by the minister.

It’s worth pointing out that the province’s Independent Electricity System Operator as well made a submission to the Ontario Energy Board arguing that a separate line item should be applied to natural gas bills. This is the IESO that actually said there should be a separate line item applied to the gas bills. But, of course, when it comes to ignoring its own energy experts, this government has a pretty long and storied history of doing just that.

However, the minister’s answers at committee for this remarkable series of coincidences were less than satisfactory for the committee’s purposes. This is important because cap-and-trade figures are revenue for the government which is integral to their spending plans—integral to the work being done by estimates.

However, a secondary responsibility exists with any consumption tax as well; that is, to send a price signal so that consumers can adjust their behaviour and limit the amount of tax that they pay. In this case, in addition to limiting the amount of tax they would be paying, they would be limiting their carbon emissions, which is the whole purpose for cap-and-trade in the first place. This is kind of the point of the whole program: not just to return revenue to the government, but to reduce the consumption of carbon as well.

As I have stated, the minister’s answers at committee were simply insufficient in this regard. Under Bill 135, the minister enjoys fairly broad powers with regard to directives that he can issue to the Ontario Energy Board under the umbrella of the long-term energy plan. This easily—easily—could have been one of them, and it would have made sense to everybody. The only justifiable reason which exists for not having done so is a desire to escape blame for an increase that they have imposed. It’s an increase that’s already being felt, Mr. Speaker.

The member from Sarnia–Lambton, just a couple of weeks ago, showed me a bill from a greenhouse in his riding which showed the impact that cap-and-trade was having on their business.

The other problem with the minister’s lack of transparency on this issue is that it creates a disparity in the sector. On the one hand, natural gas companies are forced to comply with energy board rulings. On the other hand, propane providers aren’t required to itemize cap-and-trade costs inside the delivery charges on their bills. So propane customers are actually seeing the cost of cap-and-trade on their bill. Why? Because propane providers aren’t subject to OEB regulations. This is the kind of thing that happens when you make an absolute hash of the energy file. And we’ve seen that in Ontario, for sure.

If I could, I’d like to move on to one other issue that we had with the government information that was provided to estimates. In my own riding of Prince Edward–Hastings, there has been substantial concern about the process regarding a new hospital campus in Picton. The process has been ongoing for years and it’s occurred at the same time as the government made severe reductions in the number of beds in the entire Quinte Health Care Corp., which operates the four hospitals in my region: in Quinte West, Trenton Memorial Hospital; Belleville General Hospital; North Hastings Hospital, in Bancroft; and Prince Edward County Memorial, obviously, in the county.

While I’ve written and questioned the minister about this issue in the past, I feel a need to once again stress the importance of this issue here in the House, not for any reason as pertains to the process. This spring, we were finally able to get assurance, after years of trying, that the government was letting the county proceed to the next phase of development in the project for a new hospital, which is great news.

Now, the government did send a backbench member into my riding to make this announcement and waited until the absolute last minute, of course, to inform my office that this was going to be happening. I don’t hold the member responsible, but I have become accustomed, as I know others have, to this kind of treatment by the government.

I do, however, believe the issue can highlight what happens when members have their non-House interactions with the government disregarded as part of the government’s response to their advocacy. I raised Quinte Health Care and its sites with the minister in committee, and then I was shocked when the minister stated in the House, in response to a question, that he never heard from me on this issue before.

Now, credit to the minister: He and I did patch up this disagreement, but the basic point remains. My colleague from Nepean–Carleton had a similar kind of issue last month when she underwent considerable correspondence with the government about the opioid crisis in her community. She heard nothing back from the government until a member on the backbench raised a question on the issue during question period. I raise this issue only to make a point: that just because events take place outside of the times when we’re all on camera here in the Legislature, that doesn’t give anyone in this place an excuse to pretend other members aren’t doing their job.

Finally, I’d like to bring up another incident from estimates hearings last fall that has a direct bearing on the discussions currently under way in this House. When the Minister of Education was before the committee, she was asked about a statement made by the ministry in the estimates briefing book, that the majority of increases in costs in education were reflected in the increases in operating costs, specifically utilities. When the minister was asked about that statement in committee, we were once again presented with answers that just weren’t satisfactory.

School boards in my riding have seen electricity costs increase over a million dollars over the last two years. What we now know is that schools and school boards will receive almost no benefit from the government’s electricity scheme that they released a couple of weeks ago. Depending on how the IESO works out the “high five” problem, with the expansion of the Industrial Conservation Initiative, the ICI, it’s entirely possible that an ever-shrinking pool of ineligible electricity users are going to end up carrying a greater percentage of the remaining global adjustment costs. So you can see the concern here, Mr.

Speaker. It’s a concern that we don’t see reflected in the current year’s estimates, though last year’s substantial increase in electricity rates—driven by the policies of this government—will no doubt be reflected in the estimates briefings that members are provided with in just a few weeks’ time.

These are just a couple of the issues raised at committee that need to be addressed by the government. There were a lot of questions that went unanswered. We were stonewalled in committee in trying to get the information with respect to many areas of concern to our constituents. We’re not entirely satisfied with the way that estimates played out in the spring and fall.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for your time this morning.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Further debate?

Mr. Gilles Bisson: I’ve got a number of comments I want to make in regard to the concurrence in supply motion. I’ll come back to the actual process of concurrence in supply after, but I want to speak to the ministry estimates.

First of all, on aboriginal affairs, I just want to touch on a couple of things before I get to energy and a few of the other ministries covered. I am glad to say this morning—this is being announced for the first time here in the House today. You will know that the reserve at Kashechewan has been working for years to get an agreement to move its community from the lowlands—where it is flooded almost every year, and the community is behind a dike—to move it upstream.

Chief Leo Friday, who was the chief in the previous administration, had gotten an agreement with the federal government, along with Charlie Angus and myself, in regard to the Kash water crisis. That sort of went astray when the Tories came to power. The Conservative government dragged their heels on this thing. Nothing ever got done. Our friend Leo Friday is back as chief again. Along with his council, Murray Trusler, Charlie Angus and others, they have been working toward getting an agreement with the federal government.

I’m glad to say that we actually have that agreement. We’re going to be moving toward signing an agreement in order to move the community from the lowland behind the dike and to move it upstream, where it should have been built in the first place.

Two comments on that: They told you that when they built the community, oh, federal government. Why they ever built a community in a flood zone is beyond me. Everybody who lived in the area understood it was a flood zone. Of course, they wouldn’t listen to the First Nations because colonial governments are smarter and know better. They built them in a flood zone.

What was worse—and I’m laughing because you kind of have to laugh because otherwise you’d cry—is that the solution was to put a dike around the community. When they started flooding the community, rather than move the community like we did in Peawanuck when there was a flood there, 25 years ago now, what they ended up doing was building a dike around the community, so the entire community lives in a dike.

For the people of Holland, that might be normal, but for the people of the James Bay, let me tell you, living behind a dike doesn’t do a lot for somebody’s mental health and somebody’s feeling of trying to be in touch with the land and enjoying the experience of what it is living in northern Ontario.

My congratulations to all those who have worked on that, and specifically Leo Friday, our chief in Kashechewan, who has been dogged on this thing from the beginning.

The second thing on the aboriginal components of the concurrence in supply, and I want to say this because I mentioned it at another meeting yesterday: This government is causing more confusion on the First Nations file when it comes to everything—how First Nations interact with mining, forestry, energy, agriculture—than has been seen in a long time.

There are some good intentions where the government says some nice words. They say they believe that we need to give First Nations the respect that they deserve—says the government; believe in the duty to consult, as per the Constitution of Canada; and believe that First Nations should be front and centre when it comes to any decisions made that affect their people or the traditional territories.

Those are the words spoken by the government. Those are words, Mr. Speaker, that you or any other members of the assembly would agree with. But the reality is that the action of what is really happening down there, at the levels of the ministries from issue to issue, is quite the contrary. The government is not providing real leadership.

I’ll give you an example, just on the duty to consult. When the Supreme Court handed down its decision, it said, “There is a constitutional requirement that governments consult with First Nations when it comes to issues that affect them and their territories.” This government’s approach is to say, “Well, private sector, go and consult.”

If you’re a mining company, a forestry company, wanting to develop a campground or whatever it might be, your responsibility from the private sector is to go out and do the consultation for the government. That’s not what the duty to consult is all about. That might be part of it. I don’t argue that there isn’t a role for the private sector developer to be involved in some way; after all, they’re the ones doing the investment. But we as a province have a responsibility to drive that process to make sure that in fact there are real, meaningful consultations taking place and there are policies in place in order to ensure that those consultations mean something.

For example, if we look at what happened in the Ring of Fire—or, I should say, what didn’t happen in the Ring of Fire—

Mr. Michael Mantha: Or what didn’t happen.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: —as my good colleague from Algoma–Manitoulin would know—we had an opportunity to develop the primary chromite deposit in the world, at a time when commodity prices were high and demand was high. It was just the perfect alignment to be able to raise the dollars necessary to build what would have been a huge operation in the Ring of Fire and for Ontario to be in the refining business, making not only steel but stainless steel, putting Ontario on a really good economic footing when it comes to the steel, stainless steel and mining industry.

This government, because it didn’t take seriously its responsibility when it comes to the accommodation for the duty to consult and to do what needed to be done by way of First Nations, said, “Private sector, you go out and do it.” So Cliffs resources, Noront, KWG and a number of other people went out there trying to, in their own way—I think of Frank Smeenk and the work that he has done and the millions of dollars he has spent trying to consult with First Nations in order to come to some sort of an agreement and a scheme that would give them a real, positive role in this Ring of Fire.

He was never able to get there because he could never get the provincial partner to do what needed to be done, because the provincial government seemed unwilling, confused or paralyzed—I’m not quite sure which; probably a little bit of all—when it came to really making some key decisions in order to allow companies like KWG, Cliffs resources, Noront and others to go forward with their projects.

So all of these players were spinning their wheels trying to make something happen. They wanted to develop mines. The First Nations wanted mining developed but wanted to be fairly compensated, and they wanted to make sure there was economic impact for them that would be positive. The environmental people wanted to make sure, rightfully so, that we protect our environment. Instead, nothing happened. So Cliffs resources walked away. They walked away from what is the richest chromite deposit in the world and sold it to Noront for, what, $26 million or something like that?

Mr. Michael Mantha: Yes.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: It was like selling your house for a thousand bucks. They were so frustrated with the process, they walked away.

My point, as it relates to concurrence in supply, is that it’s because the government didn’t really understand, was confused or was unable to come to what decisions they had to make when it came to what needed to be done to make these developments go forward.

As a New Democrat, I will tell you what needs to happen; it’s not very complicated. Number one, deal with revenue sharing. Say that for any new mining, forestry or any resource economic activity that takes place on traditional territory, there will be a sharing of resources when it comes to the taxation that we collect—income tax, sales tax, whatever taxes that come from the activity of that mine. It would be a percentage of money that would go to First Nations. Then we would say to the federal government, “You do the same.”

Imagine that we put 15% or 20%, as the amount of money that we would share as a province, towards those projects, and the federal government does the same. We would then say, “First Nations, come to the table.” They would come running to the table, because finally there would be a government prepared to put something on the table, willing to negotiate, so that they could determine, number one, if that is a fair number, and they could then determine how they want the money divvied up within their own communities. That’s not a decision we, the government, have to make; it’s a decision First Nations has to make.

Will it be regional? Will it be partly regional and community shares—all of that? That’s for them to work out. But once you put the money on the table and the concept that revenue sharing will be there, that makes a lot of things happen.

The other one is that we need to deal with land use planning. Government did—what the heck was that thing called? The Far North Act. I laughed when they did it; now I laugh again, because if not, I will cry.

Mr. Michael Mantha: It was a nice paper exercise.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Oh, it was a beautiful paper exercise. Rick Bartolucci announced it with great fanfare, the Far North exercise, where we were going to have a great plan to develop the north. Fifteen years later, we’re no further ahead than we were when they announced it.

Mr. Michael Mantha: We’re further north.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: We’re further north, exactly. The paper has gone further north. You can’t find it.

The point is that if you were serious about developing these projects, you would put a land use planning process in place that gives First Nations a place at the table and a real say about how development is going to happen in their traditional territories.

Mr. Speaker, you are on the municipal council of Stoney Creek. Can you imagine if the province said, “We’re going to determine all the planning in your community and you as a councillor and a community member don’t have anything to say”? What would you do? You’d say, “Get out of my community.” What do you expect First Nations to say?

We never, never decided, the provincial government—I would say, the Liberals—never decided, for whatever reason—unable, incompetent; I don’t know what it is—but couldn’t deal with revenue planning. A 15-year process with the Far North Act, and we’re no further ahead today than we were 15 years ago.

It’s not complicated. Give them a seat at the table. We need to figure out, when it comes to land use planning, the roles of the Ministry of the Environment, Ministry of Northern Development and Mines, MNR and forestry, and possibly agriculture. We need to carve out of those ministries some sort of administration where we set up a body that includes First Nations that are the ones that do the permitting and make the decisions around policy and recommendations to the government. Those are the two biggest components.

If the government had been serious, there would be a mine—not one; I would argue at least two mines—at least two mines running up in the Ring of Fire today, and literally thousands of jobs. It means that if we were smart as a province, we would have said, “We will do this, O Private Sector, including building infrastructure to the Ring of Fire—road, rail and hydro—in exchange for making sure that we develop a stainless steel industry in Ontario where communities like Hamilton or Sault Ste. Marie, wherever there is steel manufacturing, could participate in making stainless steel.”

Why should you mine chromite in the Ring of Fire in Ontario, pack it up as lumpy ore—because that’s what they do with it; it’s lumpy ore—and then ship it to China?

Mr. Michael Mantha: Only to buy it back.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Only to buy it back; exactly—a good point from the member from Algoma–Manitoulin. It’s ridiculous. But if we would have done those things, the people of Sault Ste. Marie or Hamilton would have a manufacturer of stainless steel. People in northern Ontario would have mining jobs. The financial district in downtown Toronto would be doing the economic activities that it takes in order to support that type of infrastructure investment and mining investment in a place in northern Ontario called the Ring of Fire. You’re literally talking billions of dollars when you open a mine like that.

This is not a $100-million manufacture of something being built somewhere in southwest, southeast or central Ontario. You’re talking billions of dollars. That’s what these projects are. They’re huge, and you can do them in a sustainable way.

I’ll give you a good little example: Detour Lake opened up a gold mine north of Cochrane in my riding. It’s not in John’s riding, by the way; it’s in mine. They opened the gold mine there some years ago, I would say—30-plus or 35 years ago. They operated that mine for 10 or 15 years. It was, I believe, Dome Campbell mine that operated it.

When the mine came to its end, the underground, the mine was shut down. As a result of the shutdown, the mine closure act that the NDP government passed while in power said, “That place has to be rehabilitated to, as close as possible, the condition that existed there before the mine was built.” They took out the head frame. They took out the mill. They took out all of the facilities that were there to operate the mine. They took out the hydro lines. They took everything out. They covered up the tailings.

I always remember that there was a—I won’t say who this environmentalist was, but a very well-known environmentalist to all of us down here some years ago said, “Gilles, it’s terrible what they are doing in mining. Look at these pictures.” He was showing me pictures of tailings that used to take place in places like Timmins and Kirkland Lake years ago, which were real disasters. But governments over the years, and my government—in 1991, I believe it was—did the mine closure act so that this kind of thing doesn’t happen. I said, “Tell you what. As you know, I’m a pilot.

I have an airplane.” This person wanted to go to Moosonee for something. There was a powwow going on. It was the summer Cree fest up in Moose Factory. I said, “Jump in the plane with me. I’ll bring you up.”

So we fly up, and on the way up I go flying over the Detour Lake gold mine. I said, “Hey, what do you see down there?” He said, “Oh, God, is it ever beautiful. Look at that. Oh, boy, is it ever nice. Look at that lake.” I said, “Do you know what you’re looking at?” He said, “What?” I said, “That’s the Detour Lake gold mine. It’s no longer there. It’s out. It’s gone.” The whole place had been rehabilitated. What used to be the tailings was grass. He thought it was swamp, but really it was grass.

Guess what’s there now, Mr. Speaker? A 60,000-tonne-a-day mine, open pit operation, employing about 800 direct jobs, and the rest contractors and everybody else who is there. We’ve now gone back in and mined it again.

But the point is, there are ways of doing it sustainably. If this government was serious about economic development for this province, you would look at northern and rural Ontario not as a drain and not as a place that, “Oh, my God, there they go; they need something again.” They should look at us as the economic drivers of Ontario. Hamilton, Sault Ste. Marie, Kitchener-Waterloo and every place in between, from eastern Ontario to southwestern Ontario, thrive when the rural and northern parts of this province are able to do the things that they do best, and that’s agriculture, mining, forestry and those activities that generate wealth. That’s what this government should do.

Let me move on to the energy component of this because, obviously, we want to talk about energy. Oh, my God. All right. So let’s remember what happened here. I listened to the government when it comes to their speeches in the House about electricity: Oh, they inherited a system; oh, my God, nobody ever invested in electricity generation or transmission in the world before Dalton McGuinty. What hogwash.

Every government since Adam Beck has been investing at what used to be Ontario Hydro, to make sure that we had a generating capacity necessary to produce the electricity needed for the Ontario economy and the people of Ontario. We determined in this Legislature that you needed about 25,000 megawatts of electricity to be able to meet the needs of Ontario. First of all, we built the system. It was a public system. You know what was interesting—as you know, Mr. Speaker, as a New Democrat—we generated electricity at cost and we were one of the cheapest places to buy electricity in North America.

Mr. Jim Wilson: You had a $34-billion debt.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, but—the old Hydro; you’re the guy who privatized it so I understand you don’t like this part. I know the Conservatives don’t like it. But you’re the guys who privatized it so—

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Well, that was quite an exchange. I’m glad I wasn’t part of it. That won’t happen again. Thank you.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: My point is that we in this Legislature—successive governments—built Hydro One in order to generate 25,000 megs of power at the best rates possible across North America so that we can meet the needs of Ontarians and industry. What ended up happening is that, first of all, the Conservatives under—not Mike Harris, actually—Ernie Eves moved towards the first parts of privatization of the system. That’s why my honourable colleague, the member from Simcoe–Grey, was so agitated, as a Conservative. It was his government that started the privatization.

So I take it, the inference by that heckling is that when you say that you are opposed to what the government is doing in hydro, you won’t take back Ontario Hydro and stop the privatization; you’re not willing to bring it back into public hands? Okay, that’s good. Now we know what part of your policy is.

What ended up happening, which is the real reason why we pay a whole lot for electricity, is the Liberals came to power and said, “We need to build all this new generation,” at a time that demand was going down. They looked at the graph, demand was going down, and the Liberals decided to add supply. So we went from a 25,000-meg system to about a 37,000-meg system, most of which, 90% of it, was built in the private sector—signed contracts that were worth two and three times the price that it cost us as a province to generate electricity. And they wonder why we pay so much for electricity. You don’t have to be a genius to figure this out. We oversupplied the system.

Now, here is what’s really funny about this—again, it’s so funny because otherwise I’d cry. We’re using public assets such as the Mattagami River basin generating stations. We have a number of them in the Mattagami River basin that generate about 1,100 megs when they’re turned on. Guess what we do with those brand new generators that we spent $2.2 billion or $2.4 billion to build? Most of the time, they are running as motors. Do you know why, Speaker? Because we have to buy more expensive electricity from the private contracts that we signed with the electricity sector.

In order to be able to buy their electricity, because we’re contracted to do so—there is so much electricity on the grid. You just can’t switch this stuff off at times. You have to balance the loads. It’s called leading and lagging power factors. As an electrician, I can get into a whole discussion on this. But we turned our generators into motors in order to balance the load. We have really expensive induction reaction processes on the system, because the Liberals have all this private power that’s online.

So when I hear the government get up in this place and say, “Oh, my God, there was nobody investing in power in this province. Thank God we came here, because we modernized the system”—listen, every government, from the time of Adam Beck to the time that Dalton McGuinty got elected, was investing in hydro, was doing what had to be done. Do you remember the various generators that were put online? Darlington was put online. Bruce was put online. It’s not as if nothing ever happened, but it was a planned system of 25,000 megs.

Now we’re oversupplying the system and we’re having to pay for electricity we don’t need at two and three times the price because the Liberals locked us into these contracts. Now Kathleen Wynne, after the NDP, starting with Howard Hampton—this is how long this goes back. I was in this Legislature with you, Mr. Speaker, in opposition, when Howard Hampton was the leader and said, “Are you guys nuts? Do you know what you’re doing? You’re going to be driving up the price of electricity.” Everybody said, “Aw, you’re a New Democrat. What do you know? You don’t know nothing about that. Come on, Howard. Come on. Stop it.

You’re making all this stuff up.” Well, jeez, it turns out that Howard’s problem was he peaked too early. He figured this out way back at the beginning when the announcements were made. It turns out that he was right and New Democrats were right. You can’t oversupply the system, pay two and three times the price on the private power and expect the price not to go up. So the price has gone up and people are mad. Kathleen Wynne, all of a sudden, who is part of the government that allowed this to happen, signed the cabinet documents in order to cancel—remember those—

Interjection.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, remember the scam Mississauga power plants? She was right in the middle of it.

Interjection.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, no. I was in government. I listened to the Liberals: You’re so factually incorrect; you believe your own spin. I was part of a government that came in when David Peterson signed a bunch of these private contracts. We ended up negotiating our way out of them and going ahead with the ones that we had to, because we recognized that oversupplying the system in 1990 was a bad idea.

You guys oversupplied the system at two and three times the price. Now, all of a sudden, because the public is waking up to, “Oh my God, my hydro bill. Honey, did you see? My God, I can’t buy groceries this month”—literally, we have that in our areas.

If you live in rural or northern Ontario and you’re not on a gas pipeline—because there are, believe it or not, places that don’t have natural gas in Ontario—and you have to pay electricity to heat your house, your bill is about, in January, what, $800 to $1,200 a month—it depends on the size of your house, the heating system and the insulation—where they used to pay maybe $400 in the winter.

If you go on a budget of $400 a month to $1,200 a month, guess what’s going to happen? People can’t pay their bills. We have disconnections going all over. The government’s response was, “Well, let’s do legislation to stop the disconnections in winter.” I guess that’s a good thing. I’m not going to argue against it. But the very fact that we had to do it points to the bad policy that the government created.

Then the government said, “Oh, but we’ve got the ICI program in order to lower the price to the large producers such as paper mills, steel mills and all those people. We’ll have the ICI program to allow them to cut their energy costs.” The fact that you had to create a program to mitigate the price of electricity says your price of electricity policy was bad. You can’t use that as a flag of pride and great accomplishments on the part of the Liberals.

You drove up the price of electricity, and in order for them not to close their doors, you had to invent a program to reduce their hydro bills so they didn’t close their doors. What a success. Maybe you shouldn’t have done what you did in the first place by oversupplying the system.

Now the Premier says, “I have learned my lesson. People in Ontario are hurting and we’re going to do something about it, because I care. I’m Kathleen Wynne.”

Mike, have you got a credit card? Give me your credit card.

Interjections.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Have you got a credit card? Give it to me.

So they took a credit card, and they essentially refinanced the debt of building this over-generation that they did, because like the OPG projects and others, we’ve had to pay to build those. We’ve oversupplied the system, so they said, “Take out a clean credit card and refinance the cost over a longer period of time. The money we’re going to save on a monthly basis as a result of extending the debt for a longer period of time—we’re going to pass on to savings.” That’s like you going home and saying, “Honey, we’re having a hard time trying to balance the budget this month.

Rather than making the mortgage payment, why don’t we take the mortgage payment that’s now 10 years and stretch it out to 30?” That’s essentially what they’ve done. Or: “Let’s take the mortgage payment and put it on the credit card.” That’s essentially what they’ve done. Well, at one point, you’ve got to pay for that, and you’re going to pay more, because guess what happens when you amortize the cost over a longer period of time? Your monthly payment goes down but the overall cost goes up. Somebody’s going to have pay this.

Now, am I going to argue that we don’t have to find relief for people when it comes to hydro bills? Absolutely not. Something has got to be done. At least if this government had said, “Okay, we’re doing this as a temporary measure, but we recognize that privatizing Hydro One is a bad idea and we’re going to stop. We’re going to do things that are permanent when it comes to restructuring hydro, such as why do we have five agencies where we used to have one?” We used to have Hydro One; now we have hydro five. We have five different agencies: OPG, Hydro One, IESO, A, B, C, D, E, F—we’ve got them all.

Mr. Michael Mantha: E-I-E-I-O.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: E-I-E-I-O.

All these people need CEOs, and guess what? Because they’re running them like private corporations, they’ve got to pay them private corporation wages: “Give the guy four million bucks.” The President of the Treasury Board says, “But that’s not bad. Don’t worry. I froze his wages.” God, you can freeze mine at $4 million any day.

But, no, the government doesn’t make any of those changes. The government doesn’t look at how we put the genie back in the box here and get away from these multiple organizations that we now have, which the Tories created when they started this privatization initiative. Why don’t we undo that and go back to a sane system like we had before, where Hydro One had a CEO and, in today’s wages, got paid about $400,000 a year? You had people who were actually there in order to work at delivering electricity at cost, because that was the purpose of Sir Adam Beck.

When you look at Sir Adam Beck and what electricity prices were at the time, it’s the same story. There were a bunch of little, private generators out there that were charging competing amounts for electricity to supply the market, and the market conditions allowed them to jack up the electricity prices. It’s a little bit of a different scenario than today; now it’s the government that jacks up the price with the contracts. But the point is, it didn’t work. So Sir Adam Beck, in the wisdom of the day, said, “Let’s create one crown corporation.” We ended up calling it Hydro One.

We provided electricity at cost to the people of Ontario: the cost it takes to generate, to transmit, to distribute and to have enough money to keep the infrastructure working. People paid a lot less for electricity.

I just say to the government across the way, your hydro plan is not a plan; it’s a credit card. It’s amortizing over a longer period. It’s like everybody who has a mortgage in Ontario has just added 10, 15, 20 years to their mortgage payment. Yes, the monthly payment goes down. There’s an initial saving; I get it. But it means to say that you’re going to pay more for your house. That’s what this means.

Interjection.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: You may not have a house.

The other thing—this is the one that really got me: Then we’re going to transfer the debt onto our children and grandchildren. The Premier actually got up and said that. I couldn’t believe it. I’ve been a member of this assembly since 1990. I remember when the debate used to be, “What are you doing? You’re going to be saddling our children with the debt.” The Conservatives and Liberals, rightfully so, would get up and rail against any debt—

Interjection.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Listen, I’m going to get to that in a minute—in the sense of making sure that you only borrow what you need, and if you borrow too much, you’re going to be saddling another generation. The Premier got up and wore it as a badge of honour. She said, “I have grandchildren,” and named the names of her grandkids and her wonderful kids. I know her daughter. She used to live up the lake from me at Kamiskotia Lake—a wonderful person. Her son-in-law is from Moose Factory; I know who he is. They’re great people; no disrespect to them.

But she named the names of the kids and said that it’s only fair that they pay. I don’t want Nathaniel, Victoria, Ellisa and Eva to pay for my mistakes. Do you want your grandchildren, Mr. Yakabuski, the member for Renfrew—

Interjection: Nipissing.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: —Nipissing–Pembroke—hey, I got there, Speaker. I figured it out.

I’m sure my good friend Mr. Yakabuski does not want to saddle his grandchildren with any debt. Would you take the mortgage payment in this House and say, “I’m going to take my mortgage and extend it so my kids and my grandkids can pay the mortgage so I can afford to live for less?” None of us would do that. Why is this government doing it?

Andrea Horwath, prior to this plan that the Liberals call a plan, actually said what we would do: We would change distribution costs so that people paid a fair distribution cost. You wouldn’t be penalized because you lived in rural and northern Ontario. Government has taken part of that, I understand. But that was part of the first part of the plan.

Get rid of that time-of-use pricing. I’ll tell you, you are going to drive me crazy, the guys across the way, the Liberal government. Like most of us here, you either fly back or drive back to your riding Thursday night or Friday morning, depending on connections. I get there. I go out to the lake. I’ve got to do my laundry. But I can’t do my laundry, because during the day I’m going to run the dryer at twice the price, so I can’t put anything in the dryer while I go off to constituency appointments and meetings. I have to wait till I get back at 7 o’clock.

But what are you doing at 7 o’clock on a Friday or Saturday night? Members, you’re at an event somewhere. None of us are home at that time.

Hon. Steven Del Duca: All day Saturday, but not Sunday.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, no, but all of us, I’m not—listen, Friday—

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Okay. Remember me, folks. You’ve got to go through me. Go ahead.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Mr. Speaker, all of us are out at events. You get home; you fly into the riding in the morning. I can’t turn on my dryer at the time that I actually go. Why? Because if I turn it on, I’ll pay double the price. I can’t do it on Friday night or Saturday night because I’m out at events. So I end up running my dryer when I get in at 12 o’clock, 1 o’clock in the morning, 10 o’clock at night, depending what time I come back from the events.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Okay, I may have to move along here to that favourite initial “W,” so let’s cut it now.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Mr. Speaker, you meant Windsor, favourite “W,” right?

So I just say, it’s totally an unpractical approach to how people utilize electricity in their homes. The minister across the way says, “Oh, well, invest in new technology.” People can’t invest in the technology they’ve got. If the washer breaks, they can’t call the repair man to fix the timer on their washer. Why do I know that? Somebody called me last week, one of my neighbours, and said, “Hey, my washer is not working anymore. Can you come over and look at it?” I said, “Fred the appliance guy lives up the road.” The person said, “I don’t have the money; I can’t afford it.” So I went over and looked at it and got it going for them.

But the point is, people can’t afford new technology, can’t afford what they’ve got now. It would be one thing if the government had an approach where they say, “Hey, listen, if you’re prepared to invest in new technology, we’ll help you out.” That’s a welcome debate; I don’t have a problem with that. But, my oh my, the government’s approach is to jack the price up, and that way it will force you to invest in the technology with money you don’t have.

I just want to come back to the debt thing for one second. I listened to the Conservative member over here make comment about debt and Bob Rae. I saw a wonderful tweet this morning by Goldstein, who talked about how Ontario is now at $300 million in debt—

Mr. Michael Harris: Billion.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Did I say “million”? Oh, sorry. I apologize—billion. As the guy used to say, billions and—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): Come on, folks. We’re talking to each other. Okay? You do it again and I won’t accept it. Go.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Sorry about that, Speaker. But the point is that the

article this morning was that Ontario has $300 billion in debt and the federal government has $600 billion in debt. Here is the irony of it: 90% of it caused by Liberals and Tories. They have the gall to point at Bob Rae? I was there. The first year, if David Peterson would have been elected and done nothing—he had a $9.5-billion debt. That is the truth of it. We added to the debt by $2 billion in anti-recession programs.

So the point is, a very small part of the overall debt of Ontario was caused by when we were in power for four and a half years; 95% of it has been Liberal or Conservative governments, if you haven’t noticed. On the federal side, unfortunately, we haven’t had the honour to be serving as government, so the $600 billion in debt is entirely Liberals and Tories. When I hear the right-wing media, or Tories and Liberals, trying to talk to us about debt, I just sort of shake my head.

I tell people this story. This is one of my favourite stories to illustrate it. Tommy Douglas: Remember that man? He was voted the greatest Canadian in the history of Canada. He was the Premier of Saskatchewan, a New Democrat—CCF at the time. I say to people, “What’s the first thing Tommy Douglas did when he was elected Premier of Saskatchewan?” People say, “Health care.” Nope, it wasn’t the first thing he did. You know what he did? He balanced the books. The Liberals had left the province almost bankrupt. They couldn’t even borrow money to operate day-to-day in Saskatchewan at the time.

The NDP government wrestled the debt and essentially paid off the deficit. So the first thing they did was to balance the books before they did anything.

What was the second thing Tommy Douglas did?

Interjection: Health.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, it wasn’t health care; it was electrifying rural Saskatchewan, because Tommy Douglas, in the 1940s and 1950s, understood that if you don’t have a strong, a vibrant and a technically capable industry, you can’t build the economy. If you don’t build the economy, you don’t have the money to build health care. It wasn’t until four terms later that he got around to doing health care.

New Democrats have always understood, social democrats understood, that social democracy is about making sure that everybody gets an equal chance in life by use of public institutions and organizations, such as health care and education—

Interjection.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): The member from Durham should get in his seat.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: —and all of those things that are important to make our economies and our people grow and prosper, but we do that in a financially sustainable way.

When I hear Tories and Liberals going on about that stuff, I say to myself, you guys should check out what’s really going on in the world.

Mr. John Yakabuski: People voting today don’t remember Tommy Douglas.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Well, that is part of the—I do agree with my friend, Mr. John, over here. I say that on that.

I’ve got about four minutes left. Just on the energy file, I want to finish on this here. Andrea Horwath and the New Democrats have put forward a plan that is actually sustainable. It doesn’t go off and borrow money on the credit card. What we do is we end up restructuring, over a period of time, the hydro mess created by the Liberals, started by the Tories. The Tories started the privatization. They’re not going to do undo it. If people think the Tories are going to undo privatization, I’ve got swampland for you. I’ve got lots of it up north, and I’ll sell you some. The Liberals accelerated the privatization by signing long-term contracts to oversupply the system.

Our approach is to make changes within the hydro system so that we’re able to take out the drivers of the increase in costs, so that what we end up doing is bringing back into the fold Hydro One so it becomes, as it was before, a public entity. Why? Because it made about a billion dollars of revenue for the people of Ontario. It would be like selling off the LCBO. Why would you sell off the LCBO? It makes oodles of money for the province. I use “oodles” because I like that better than “billions.”

The point is that we would do that. We would end time-of-use pricing, because people shouldn’t have to worry about what time they turn on their dryer. If you want people to conserve, invest in conservation programs. There are people who are prepared to put up solar panels, better windows, better furnaces, better dryers, better dishwashers, fridges—all those things. People are prepared to make those investments, but they don’t have the money to do it. Put in place conservation programs that allow people to make those investments and utilize the savings from their energy bills to pay for these things. That’s how you reduce the consumption.

Strictly driving up the cost is, yes, going to give you some conservation; there’s no question. When the price of gas is too high, you don’t drive as much. When electricity prices are too high, you turn down or turn off the thermostat. The point is, that, to me, is a punitive way of doing it, and New Democrats don’t believe that’s the way you should go.

You should first manage what you’ve got so it is as efficient as possible and it provides what it is supposed to—electricity at cost for the people of Ontario—in order to make sure that people are able to live the lives that they want to live and the economy is able to grow in the way that it should; and on the flip side, do the stuff that has to be done in the longer term in order to make sure that the hydro system is there in a way that makes sense for all of us.

Mr. Speaker, I realize I’ve only got a little bit of time left. I would just end on what I started on, for those who came into the House late because they all had meetings—and I’m not invoking any reason behind that. I’m really excited this morning in the sense that Kashechewan First Nation has finally got an agreement for relocation of their community. We’re going to be seeing that community move from behind the dike to higher ground over a period of time.

As I said earlier, the people of Mushkegowuk Cree understood what flooding was. They told the colonial government, “Don’t build it there.” The colonial government went ahead and didn’t listen. We flooded people. As a result, we had to build a dike around the community. So finally, after all these years, Chief Leo Friday, along with his council and others who were involved, like Charlie Angus, Murray Trusler and others, have finally got an agreement where we’re going to be moving that community upland.

We’re finally at a point of making sure that people can get on with their lives and not have to worry about their community flooding and us having to evacuate to where people are out of the community for upwards of two years, at a cost of millions of dollars, where those monies could have been used in order to move that community in the first place.

Debate deemed adjourned.

Royal assent / Sanction royale

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): At this time, I beg to inform the House that, in the name of Her Majesty the Queen, Her Honour the Lieutenant Governor has been pleased to assent to a certain bill in her office.

The Clerk-at-the-Table (Ms. Tonia Grannum): The following is the title of the bill to which Her Honour did assent:

An Act to reduce the regulatory burden on business, to enact various new Acts and to make other amendments and repeals / Loi visant à alléger le fardeau réglementaire des entreprises, à édicter diverses lois et à modifier et abroger d’autres lois.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Paul Miller): It being close to 10:15, this House stands recessed until 10:30 this morning.

The House recessed from 1011 to 1030.

Introduction of Visitors

Mr. Michael Harris: I’d like to welcome Dr. Khurram Khan from Hamilton to Queen’s Park this morning. Welcome.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Welcome.

Mr. Percy Hatfield: There are a number of people here today with the Credit Unions of Ontario: from the Windsor Family Credit Union, Susan Stockwell Andrews and Marty Gillis.

I also had breakfast today with Richard Davies and Elaine Simon, and I believe later I’ll be meeting with Nolan Andres as well.

Welcome to Queen’s Park, everyone.

Mr. Harinder S. Takhar: I would like to extend warm greetings to the grade 12 students of Stephen Lewis Secondary School, along with their teacher, Shona Livingstone, from my riding of Mississauga–Erindale. I wish them a memorable and educational trip.

Mr. Victor Fedeli: I’d like to welcome from my hometown of East Ferris Mr. Tim Foster, who is the board chair of the Northern Credit Union.

Ms. Teresa J. Armstrong: I would like to welcome Rick Hoevenaars from London. He is Libro’s vice-president of finance and the CFO. Welcome to the Legislature today.

Mr. Peter Z. Milczyn: I’d like to welcome a number of members of the Registered Practical Nurses Association of Ontario: Dianne Martin; Searle Schonewille; Rafael Jusi; Annette Weeres; Barbara Jones; Debora Cowie; Maxwell Hamlyn; Victoria Bertrand; Wesley Green; Anne McKenzie; Evelyn Belchior; and Linda Keirl.

Welcome to Queen’s Park, and I hope you have a good day here today.

Hon. Deborah Matthews: I am delighted to welcome Kyleigh Chandran, her sister, Elina Chandran—they’re students at Fern Hill School in Oakville—and their grandpa, Clarence Chandran.

Mrs. Gila Martow: I just want to welcome two U of T students who are visiting us today: Aaron Shulman and Ethan Heimlich. Welcome.

Mr. Granville Anderson: I would like to welcome Debora Cowie, who is here with the Registered Practical Nurses Association of Ontario. Welcome.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I’d like to also welcome RPNAO to Queen’s Park today, including Maxwell Hamlyn, president, and Dianne Martin, the CEO

Also, page captain Taylor Wilson, who is from St. Paul’s: Her mother, Catherine, is joining us today. Welcome, Catherine.

Hon. Indira Naidoo-Harris: I’d like to welcome Brenda Johnson to the Legislature this morning. She joins us from Winnipeg, Manitoba, and is the mother of a member of my staff, Sula Johnson, who is celebrating her birthday today. Happy birthday, Sula, and welcome, Brenda.

Mr. Arthur Potts: It’s a pleasure to introduce Michael Jacoby, who is an activist in East York, to the House today. Welcome.

Mr. Monte McNaughton: I’d like to welcome a number of representatives from Libro Credit Union who are here at Queen’s Park. Libro represents a lot of members across the province of Ontario.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I think they are coming in. I want to acknowledge and introduce the grade 5 classes of Thorncliffe Park Public School from Don Valley West.

Mr. Bob Delaney: I’d like to introduce Esther Kothapally, who is a guest of page captain Rajeev Danam, from the riding of Pickering–Scarborough East, on behalf of the member.

Hon. Michael Coteau: In the west gallery, I’d like to introduce Andrew, Anushka and Mya, who work in my constituency office. They’re right up there.

I’d also like to take the opportunity to welcome Terry Mundell from the hotel association and Johanne Bélanger, the CEO of Tourism Toronto. Welcome to the Legislature.

Miss Monique Taylor: I see Kelly Harris is here today with FirstOntario. Welcome to the Legislature, Kelly.

Mr. Yvan Baker: I just wanted to once again welcome the Credit Unions of Ontario, who are here for their advocacy day. They had a wonderful reception this morning. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. John Vanthof: I’d like to welcome some of the directors of the OFA who are here today. We had a wonderful breakfast this morning, and thank you very much.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I am absolutely sure that the members would join me in indicating to this gentleman, who has served the province well and has a lifetime of public service: Happy birthday, Monte Kwinter.

Applause.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thereby continuing to set his record that he keeps breaking.

I thank all of our guests for being here. Therefore it is now time for—the member from Nickel Belt to say something.

M me France Gélinas: Thank you, Speaker. I just wanted to welcome Leo Racette, puis Tim Foster, qui sont venus avec les « credit unions ». Bienvenue à Queen’s Park.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): It’s almost catchy. The member from Thornhill.

Mrs. Gila Martow: If I could just wish the member, Monte Kwinter: Yom huledet sameach.

That’s happy birthday in Hebrew.

Oral Questions

Government advertising

Mr. Patrick Brown: My question is for the Premier. By now, everyone has seen or heard the taxpayer-funded Liberal advertisements. I will ask the Premier, through you, Mr. Speaker: When will the Premier stop using taxpayer dollars to advertise for the Liberal Party of Ontario?

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Stop the clock. My resolve still remains. I will work towards civility in the House. If it continues, we’ll get to work, and it won’t stop.

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I would say to the Leader of the Opposition that I do understand why he is taking this particular tack in his questioning: because he doesn’t have a plan to reduce people’s electricity bills. We do have a plan, and that plan will cut people’s electricity bills by 25% by summer—

Mr. Steve Clark: Seventeen per cent.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: —17% on top of the 8%. And if you are a low-income person in Ontario or you live in a rural or remote area under Hydro One and a number of other distribution companies, your reduction could be 40% to 50%. We heard very clearly that those particular residents were struggling with their electricity bills to an even larger extent.

We have a plan, Mr. Speaker, and we’re going to move forward and implement it.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: The Premier speculates why we’re raising this issue. Using taxpayer dollars to advertise for the Liberal Party is wrong. That’s why we’re bringing it up. It is wrong. The Premier knows it is wrong.

The Liberals have a fascinating talking point. They say that they have to run these Liberal vanity ads so they can use this information to tell people how to manage their budgets. But for 13 years, when they raised hydro bills 400%, did they ever run ads saying, “Sorry, we’re raising hydro rates 400%. You need to manage your budget”? Not for a second. This is about one thing and only one thing, and that’s selling the Liberal Party, using taxpayer dollars to do so. It’s wrong.

My question to the Premier is: You know it’s wrong. Do the right thing. Stop running these ads.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Be seated, please. Okay. Both sides have had their chance. If it doesn’t come down, I’ll bring it down for you.

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I’m not speculating on why the member is asking that question. I know exactly why he’s asking the question: because, Mr. Speaker, if he had a plan, he’d be pushing his plan. He’d be putting his—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): As I’ve indicated before, when the Premier is answering and I’m hearing heckling from the same side, it’s very difficult for me to ask the other side to come to order. That’s number one.

Number two: Right after I finish indicating to you that both sides are getting a little bit too carried away, it continues. Therefore, I’m moving to warnings.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The Minister of Indigenous Relations is warned.

Who’s next? If you can’t get my drift, then I’ll have to point it out for you.

Premier.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

The other part of our plan, which is a real plan, which we are going to move forward to implement, is that we will hold rate increases to inflation for the next four years. So this is not about putting in place a reduction and then not holding those rates—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Leeds–Grenville is warned.

Wrap up, please.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Finally, Mr. Speaker, we’re creating a $200-million affordability fund for people who want to make investments and aren’t able to do that.

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

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: Yesterday, the Attorney General alleged that they had “strengthened legislation to provide a clear definition of partisan advertising.” But what did the Auditor General say about this? She said, “We cautioned when the government changed the law in 2015 that it was opening the door to” spending taxpayer money on ads that appear partisan. And then the Auditor General said, “Sure enough, the government walked right through that open door” that they created.

Clearly, the Liberals are using a loophole they created to abuse taxpayer dollars. This is what it’s about. They can do all the talking points they want. They can say they strengthened the laws or that it’s about budgeting. They created a loophole. They’re driving a truck through it. It’s abuse of taxpayer dollars. It’s wrong. Mr. Speaker, will the Premier stop running these ads?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: We created the legislation. We put the legislation in place in the first place, because Mike Harris’s face was all over advertising consistently.

But let me tell you about the other part of our plan, Mr. Speaker, which again is a real plan that is going to reduce people’s electricity prices, which is the issue that we are dealing with in this province, because we have made huge investments. We are in a situation where we have a clean electricity grid and clean air, because of shutting down the coal-fired plants, but there’s a cost associated with that.

So the other part of our plan is that we are removing delivery charges from all on-reserve First Nation residential consumers. That is a huge issue. As some of the leadership in the First Nations have said, this will do a huge amount to deal with electricity poverty on reserves. It’s a very important step forward.

Climate change

Mr. Patrick Brown: My question is for the Premier. Today is the first auction of the Liberals’ cap-and-trade scheme where the Liberals hope to rake in $1.9 billion. That’s $1.9 billion that taxpayers are going to have to foot the bill for. But maybe the worst part of this Liberal scheme is that it’s going to send hard-earned dollars to California.

Mr. Speaker, does the Premier think it’s appropriate that her government will be encouraging businesses to subsidize those businesses in California?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I know the Minister of the Environment and Climate Change is going to want to speak about this. It’s a very important day. This is a very important program.

We really believe that taking real action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is not just in the best interests of people today; most importantly, it’s in the best interests of the future of the planet. It has to be done and it has to be real. So what we’ve done is we have settled on the most cost-effective way to do that.

You know, the Leader of the Opposition has said that he would remove Ontario from the cap-and-trade market and put in place a program that would cost the people of Ontario, individuals, four times the amount that cap-and-trade will cost them—four times the amount. That’s irresponsible. If we look at other jurisdictions that have done just that, the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions has not been as effective as what we’ve—

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

Interjections.

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

Mr. John Yakabuski: Is Greg Sorbara going to run your campaign?

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke is warned.

Supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: This government simply wants to make up numbers. It’s more Liberal fake spin.

What we do know, factually, is that under this Liberal scheme, Ontario will be sending upwards of $300 million a year to California under this Western Climate Initiative. When businesses are struggling to stay afloat in Ontario, how this Premier thinks it’s appropriate to be sending $300 million a year to California is beyond me.

We need a government that is going to support Brantford and Halton and Toronto and Ottawa and Timmins. Right now, they’ll be subsidizing Beverly Hills and Hollywood. This Premier is the best minister of economic development that the United States has ever seen, and it has to stop. Will the Premier do the right thing and make sure we don’t send hundreds of millions to California?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of the Environment and Climate Change.

Hon. Glen R. Murray: Today is an auction—an auction that should be free of political interference or actions by any member of this House that would seek to interfere or disrupt the auction. I am not commenting on it, and I would give that strong advice to the member of the opposition. But tomorrow, when the auction is closed, I’ll have lots to say to the member of the opposition about some of his behaviour.

The member opposite is proposing a system that cannot achieve the reductions we’re getting and would move five megatonnes of leakage or see the relocation of companies. The position he has taken would see gasoline prices go up at four times the rate that they do under cap-and-trade. He is the best economic development leader for the United States that this Legislature has ever seen.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Be seated, please. Neither side is helping themselves.

Final supplementary?

Mr. Patrick Brown: Again to the Premier: Enough of the Liberals’ fake spin. What we know for a fact is that this is going to send $300 million to California. Clearly, the minister and the Premier haven’t read the Auditor General’s report. They’re talking about emission reductions. The Auditor General’s report points out that these emission reductions aren’t going to happen in Ontario; they’re going to happen in California.

We want to see climate change tackled in Ontario. We want to see real emission reductions in Ontario. This is a shell game that makes businesses in Ontario less competitive. How does it make sense to take $300 million from Ontario businesses and send it to Beverly Hills? This is as bad as the Green Energy Act. They’re signing Ontario up for another scheme that makes this province less competitive.

Will the Premier at least acknowledge that this hurts Ontario? There is still time to walk this back and say that Ontario does not need to be part of the Western Climate Initiative because it subsidizes California.

Interjections.

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

Minister?

Hon. Glen R. Murray: Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy these conversations with the Leader of the Opposition. They’re so enlightening.

Let me explain something: The market price directly reduces four megatonnes. Some $6 billion to $8 billion in proceeds goes to Nova corporation to support the reinvestment—which is a quarter of a billion dollars—in their major facility in Sarnia. Maybe you should talk to the member from Sarnia. Money is going into Goldcorp to do the first net-zero mine, which will dramatically cut their operating costs because they don’t need ventilation with electric vehicles. Maybe he should talk to his northern members.

Not only will he force out companies because it will cost $74 a tonne under your system, but you won’t have any money to reinvest in industry to decarbonize, and you will leave families with unaffordable energy bills, which you claim to care about.

Hydro rates

Mr. Peter Tabuns: I’m addressing this to the Premier. Yesterday, the Minister of Health boasted that he hadn’t heard from a single hospital complaining about massive hydro bills. Clearly, the Premier and her minister aren’t listening.

On February 2, 2017, the Ontario Medical Association said, “Hospitals like South Bruce Grey Health Centre are ... forced to use their 1% funding increase to deal with skyrocketing hydro rates instead of patient care thanks to the Ontario government.”

The Premier and her party ignored Ontarians’ concerns about their soaring hydro bills until political pressure forced them to acknowledge the problem. Clearly, they haven’t learned their lesson since they’re now ignoring hospital concerns about the same issue.

When will the Premier admit that there’s a problem in hospitals and that she and her Minister of Health know about it, and when will she do something to fix it?

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

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Unlike the third party, when they had formed government 20-odd years ago, we didn’t take their approach, where they closed 24% of acute hospital beds. We didn’t take their approach, where they closed—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Timmins–James Bay is warned.

Finish, please.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: We didn’t close, as they did, 13% of the mental health beds in the province. We didn’t decrease hospital funding, as they did in their last budget. We have consistently invested in our hospitals and in the entire health care system in this province—last year, by almost half a billion dollars—to increase the operating costs for the hospitals, as the member well knows from the conversation that I had with his leader in this Legislature yesterday.

We know that hospitals are facing a challenge. We know that energy is a component; it’s roughly 1% of operating costs—

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again, back to the Premier. Maybe she’ll answer the question. In their pre-budget submission delivered directly to the government, the Ontario Hospital Association also made the case that skyrocketing hospital hydro bills are a huge concern in Ontario. Page 4 of their submission reads, “Energy costs are putting a tremendous strain on hospitals.... Hospitals are by no means immune from the same rising hydro costs that affect all Ontarians.”

Do the Premier, or her minister, not read documents given to them by official, non-partisan and highly expert bodies like the OHA?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I acknowledge that energy costs are a concern for hospitals. It represents roughly 1% of their operating budget. We have consistently increased the operating budgets of hospitals as well as targeted funding to—

Interjection.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: We have. Despite what the member opposite is saying, we have consistently increased the operating budgets and targeted funding for hospitals.

I want to give one good example from this week, where Mackenzie Health actually received an award for converting all of their lighting to LED lighting. They are the first 100%-LED-lighting—and they’ve been financed to do that, Mr. Speaker.

Ms. Catherine Fife: They need better lighting in the hallways, that’s what they need.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Kitchener–Waterloo is warned.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: As a result, it is estimated that through that process they are going to be saving $210,000 each and every year.

So I think there are excellent examples where hospitals are finding innovative and appropriate ways to work together in partnership with us to find ways to address that aspect of their budget.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: I can tell the Premier doesn’t like these questions; she’s not answering them.

It’s not just the professional associations that have been raising a red flag about hydro costs. The CEO of the Windsor Regional Hospital alerted the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs that hydro costs at his hospitals were set to increase by $700,000 in just one year. He said, in January 2016, “Last year, for our hydro costs at Windsor Regional Hospital between our two campuses, we spent $3.5 million. This year, to the end of March, we’re projected to spend $4.2 million, a $700,000 increase.”

If the Premier and her minister just ignore the experts and say that no one is worried, how can she expect Ontarians to trust that her phantom hydro plan is a genuine attempt to provide relief to Ontarians and not just a support-grabbing occasion?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: We provided Windsor Regional Hospital with an increase in their operating budget of $9.9 million last year—significantly, astronomically more than the numbers that have been quoted over a period of time by the member opposite. It’s a 3.2% increase in their operating budget.

Mr. Speaker, we acknowledge that our hospitals are facing a number of pressures—and electricity, I have to reiterate, is roughly 1% of the total operating budget.

I think there are hospitals around the province that can look—Mackenzie Health, for example, that received from their distribution network a cheque for $125,000 to assist them in that conversion to 100% LED lighting. It’s a great innovation. It’s an innovation that’s going to save them nearly a quarter of a million dollars a year on their electricity costs.

The combination of investments that we make in innovations out there will help us address this particular issue.

Hydro rates

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again, back to the Premier: Things are not all rosy out there. Hospitals in Sault Ste. Marie, London, Windsor and Toronto are all facing massive increases to their hydro bills at the same time the Premier and her Liberal government are chronically underfunding front-line health care and promising that their phantom hydro plan will include just 2% hydro relief for hospitals.

Will the Premier tell people in any of these communities how a measly 2% savings on their hospital’s hydro bill will ensure good-quality care in their community?

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

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Mr. Speaker, we went through this yesterday, as we remember, when various examples were given. Hamilton was an example that was provided, where I referenced that last year we gave Hamilton Health Sciences a 3.6% increase in their operating budget—an additional $29.5 million to that corporation to assist them in not only providing and maintaining a sustainable operating budget but also many new and important advancements that lead to the high quality of care that they provide.

I have to say, I’m deeply disturbed that the member opposite continues to revisit Sault Ste. Marie, because that hospital had to go out publicly and oppose what had been declared and asserted by the leader of his party. The hospital had to go out publicly in the media and say that while electricity costs have risen over the past five years, those increases have not resulted in layoffs at the hospital and no decisions have been made based on those electricity costs.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again, back to the Premier: This problem is widespread. Access-to-information documents reveal that Health Sciences North in Sudbury and Peterborough Regional Health Centre both saw their hydro consumption rates reduce over the same period of time as their hydro bills went up. That just doesn’t make any sense.

Can the Premier tell us if her 2% savings at least gives hospitals enough hydro relief to stop their bills from going up while the amount of energy they use goes down?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Well, here we go again, Mr. Speaker.

Interjections.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Well, okay. Health Sciences North—you mentioned it; I’m going to respond directly to that issue.

Health Sciences North: We provided them, last year, in a budget that they voted against, Mr. Speaker, with a 3.2%—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Last chance.

Carry on.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Health Sciences North received 8.8 million new dollars last year for their operating budget.

Peterborough Regional Health Centre: a 4.3% increase in their operating budget last year; 9.4 million new dollars provided to them in a budget, last year, that they voted against.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again to the Premier: This is a widespread problem. The people of Niagara are worried about their hospitals, too. The Niagara Health System saw a 96% increase in their hydro bills over six years. That translates to $2.8 million that could have been used to invest in more nursing hours or in potentially life-saving equipment.

Why won’t the Premier just come clean and tell people in Niagara, Peterborough, Sudbury and across the province that her 2% hydro relief for hospitals is just part of her phantom plan, a not-so-thinly-veiled attempt to buy support before the next election?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Again, electricity costs for hospitals average approximately 1% of their total budget. That means that 99%, approximately, goes to all of the other expenditures.

Specifically, the Niagara Health System, as was referenced, last year received a 2.5% increase in their operating budget, amounting to $9.4 million. That was more than enough to cover their increase in electricity costs last year, but also to substantially increase their operating budget for all of those other elements, the other 99% of the activities that take place in hospitals that are so important to delivering high-quality care there and around the province.

Health care funding

Mr. Jeff Yurek: My question is to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care. This government has a long history of putting their own political interests ahead of Ontarians. Prior to the March break, it was announced that the province had come to an agreement on health transfers with the federal government, even though the offer was less than what the government originally demanded and less than what the federal government offered three months ago.

The previous Conservative government announced similar terms as the current Liberal government. The Ontario government then feigned outrage. Finance Minister Charles Sousa said that Prime Minister Harper’s Conservatives had launched “an attack on Ontario.” Mr. Speaker, where is the outrage from the minister and this government today? Why is the deal acceptable now that the federal Liberals are in power?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Mr. Speaker, there are a number of important differences in the agreement that we struck with the federal government compared to what was on offer by the Harper government. At the end of the day, do we wish it had been closer to what we had suggested? Of course we do. We had very strong third-party evidence to demonstrate that what we were asking for was appropriate to not only maintain the federal contribution but also sustain our health care system effectively.

That being said, we reached an agreement that not only provides for that annual escalator but importantly applies additional targeted funding to two areas that are incredibly important to this province, this government and Ontarians: home care and mental health.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Jeff Yurek: The former health minister, Deb Matthews, said that Flaherty’s announcement was “extremely bad news” for the province. In fact, she said, “This is devastating news for us. It’s less money to reduce wait times; it’s less money to hire nurses.”

Mr. Speaker, I have a simple question to ask the minister. Now that he has accepted the cuts from Justin Trudeau and the federal Liberals, can he tell the House how many nurses he’s going to fire and how long the wait-lists will grow, or was simply his previous Minister of Health misleading the public?

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member will withdraw.

Mr. Jeff Yurek: Withdraw.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Minister?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: We will continue to need to make important investments in our health care system, as we did last year and as we did the year before. I have to say that the party opposite consistently voted against those health care investments.

What we won’t do in the area of home care is what they did when they were in government in 2001, where they slashed our home care so that CCACs were left with a $175-million shortfall. As a result, in Hamilton, they had to cut the patient load by 32%. In Timiskaming, home care hours were reduced by 20%. In Pembroke, they cut service for 50% of their 3,000 clients. In Algoma, 25% of clients lost services. In North Bay, 20% of all visits were eliminated. Workers were fired and lost their jobs across the board.

We won’t repeat their mistakes. We invest in home care.

Health care

M me France Gélinas: My question is for the Premier. People shouldn’t have to pay up or wait longer for the care that they need, but that’s exactly what’s happening under this Premier. Companies are charging people to jump to the front of the line. They’re doing this unchecked under the Premier’s watch. Right now in Ontario, for-profit companies like Maple are charging people for services like a doctor’s diagnosis and writing a prescription.

Does the Premier believe it is okay for companies to charge Ontarians to see a doctor or get a prescription?

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

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I said yesterday and I believe the day before as well that we, as a government, are absolutely committed to the Canada Health Act, to the principles behind medicare. Fifty years ago, those important decisions were made to provide universal health care to this province and to this country, Mr. Speaker.

It took our government, in 2004, to put in place legislatively, to make it the law of this province that what the member opposite is implying or suggesting is not permitted, that those programs and services that are part of OHIP, that are publicly funded and that come under the Canada Health Act—they are not permitted to take place in this province.

There are activities that we are monitoring. I spoke to that yesterday and the day before, and I’m happy to follow up in the supplementary.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

M me France Gélinas: Why is it that if it’s not allowed, it is happening right here, right now in Ontario? This is wrong. It has to stop.

If your child is sick, you should not have to reach for your credit card to buy answers. But companies like Maple are charging people to see a doctor, to get a diagnosis, asking families to rack up those credit card bills. That’s wrong.

That means with the Liberal government in charge, parents of a sick child are basically given the choice of paying up or waiting and waiting, and watching those who pay up leapfrog ahead of them on the wait-list.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The Deputy Premier is warned.

M me France Gélinas: Maple actually says it charges fees for services like doctors’ visits and getting a prescription because those services are, from their website, “not covered by OHIP.” When did the Premier decide that people have to choose between paying up or waiting longer to get their family the care they need?

Interjections.

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

Minister?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I think it’s important for the Legislature to understand what the member opposite is talking about when she references these interactions. These are digital. These are online interactions that are taking place. Online interactions are not OHIP-insured.

Certainly it is something that I’m well aware of. In fact, I have had a conversation with the member opposite about this particular issue. I know it affects the community in Sudbury, as it does other parts of the province. I’ve asked my ministry to look at it specifically. It’s very important that the principles that were laid out in the act in 2004 be followed in terms of no payments for activities or services that are covered by OHIP.

Virtual visits are not OHIP-insured activities, but as I mentioned, my ministry—partly as a result of the member having a conversation with me about it—is looking into this issue.

Great Lakes water quality / Qualité de l’eau des Grands Lacs

Ms. Sophie Kiwala: My question is for the Minister of the Environment and Climate Change. Today marks World Water Day. It is a day not only to be grateful for Ontario’s vital resources, but a day to also confirm our commitment to protect and restore our waters.

In my riding of Kingston and the Islands, Lake Ontario is an integral part of our economy and our community, and it brings together members of my community as well. Ontario relies on the Great Lakes for our strength and success, and I am pleased to see our government take continued action to protect our lakes and restore them to environmental health.

We know that 99% of Ontarians live around the Great Lakes, making it even more critical that the health of our waters and ecosystem is looked after. Can the minister please explain to the House the efforts our government has made to protect the Great Lakes?

Hon. Glen R. Murray: It’s no surprise that the environment questions come from this side of the House.

I want to thank the Premier for reaching out to our governors. I’ve been hearing in my conversations with my counterparts that she’s been recognized for stepping up and taking a leadership role on this important issue. Thank you very much, Premier.

Some $300 million is at stake, which has huge consequences. We passed the Great Lakes Protection Act. We have source water protection and our conservation authorities, under the leadership of the Minister of Natural Resources, are kicked into action.

I also want to thank what the opposition criticized as being bureaucratic, which was the Great Lakes Guardians’ Council. This is totally volunteer. That organization, co-chaired by Grand Chief Madahbee, works with mayors, farmers, business leaders and local environmentalists and is now coordinating multi-level government action to protect the Great Lakes and engage Americans. We’re very concerned about this, Mr. Speaker, and acting quickly.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Sophie Kiwala: Thank you to the minister for that response. It’s very encouraging to hear that our province takes the health of our Great Lakes very seriously. It is also promising that Ontario has worked so collaboratively with varying levels of government, including our partners in the US, to restore the health of the Great Lakes. Shared waters absolutely requires a shared responsibility to conserve and protect.

Recently proposed funding reductions in the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative will seriously impact the progress that we’ve made so far. For more than 40 years, Ontario has worked with our state partners through various Great Lakes agreements, and given that the Great Lakes are an economic engine for Kingston and the Islands and our province, it is critical that we continue to collaborate with our existing partners.

Can the minister please explain to the House how our government plans to move forward to keep our Great Lakes well-protected?

Hon. Glen R. Murray: In addition to working with my counterparts in the eight Great Lakes states, we have a very strong relationship with Quebec.

Notre partenariat avec le Québec, c’est très important. Nous travaillons ensemble avec mon homologue, David Heurtel, et sa collègue Christine St-Pierre, la ministre des affaires intergouvernementales. On va envoyer une lettre ensemble, parce que pour nous autres, c’est un grand défi pour l’économie régionale des Grands Lacs. Le succès de notre partenariat se traduit en investissements privés et en la revitalisation économique pour des communautés telles que Buffalo, Erie et Muskegon, et nos amis américains.

Mais le même défi existe pour nous autres, parce que les petites communautés au bord des lacs confrontent les mêmes décisions. Ça, c’est très important pour une économie vivante et c’est une question économique, parce que les résultats des coupures budgétaires, c’est un grand défi pour notre—

Le Président (L’hon. Dave Levac): Merci.

New question.

Hydro rates

Mrs. Julia Munro: My question is to the Premier. Premier, 10 years ago, a local restaurant in my riding, Fork and Plate, had a hydro bill of $600 per month. Today, their bill is at least $2,200, and in the summer it climbs to $3,500. Your 25% figure includes the HST rebate you have already announced, so it’s really 17%. In the last 10 years, you have more than tripled their hydro bill. This is your legacy. Now you offer them a fraction in return. To top it all off, InnPower is asking for a retroactive rate increase.

Premier, when will you do the right thing and provide real and lasting relief to families and businesses?

We have a plan. The business that the member opposite is talking about will see, it’s true, an additional 17% reduction—17% plus 8% is 25%, Mr. Speaker. It’s very important to us that those local businesses are able to thrive, and that’s exactly why we’re bringing a plan forward. I know that the opposition doesn’t have a plan to reduce electricity bills. We do, and we’re going to move ahead so that businesses just like this one will be able to see that reduction.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mrs. Julia Munro: That’s just doesn’t cut it for the people in my riding or across Ontario. We all know margins are slim in the restaurant business. Businesses provide jobs that, in turn, provide for families. Fork and Plate proudly employs 22 of my constituents. Restaurants like Fork and Plate across Ontario look at their hydro bills and question how they can stay afloat.

Premier, enough is enough. Why are you threatening jobs in my riding and across the province?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Energy.

Hon. Glenn Thibeault: Once again, I’m pleased to rise and talk about the fair hydro plan and the 25% reduction that all families, small businesses and farms will be receiving across the province.

I know the honourable member mentioned InnPower and their rate application. I think it’s important to mention, as part of our fair hydro plan, in bringing down electricity costs our government is also providing additional support to those facing the highest delivery costs in the province. When introduced, regarding the distribution charges levied, there will be eight utilities with the highest rates which will be lowering their distribution rates to protect ratepayers in those areas. InnPower is one of those utilities whose distribution charges will be reduced.

And as we said, that 25% reduction—with the RRRP reduction that they’re going to be seeing through InnPower, they can see anywhere up to a 40% to 50% reduction.

Hydro rates

Mr. John Vanthof: My question is to the Premier. I’d like to tell a little tale about Henry Fiset and Sons Ltd. in Elk Lake. Jerome and Terry are pillars in that community. They run a machine shop. Their hydro usage in January 2011 was 391 kilowatt hours per day. They made huge changes in their business, and in January 2017 their kilowatts per day were 220. So that was a 43% decrease. They have done their part, yet the overall bill went up. Actually, the cost per kilowatt hour went up by 66%.

Will you finally admit that your hydro plan for people like Henry Fiset and sons has been a disaster for the last decade?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Energy.

Hon. Glenn Thibeault: I’m pleased, again, to rise and talk about Ontario’s Fair Hydro Plan that is specifically looking after folks who live in the rural and remote parts of our province. We have heard over the last nine months that I’ve been in this portfolio, and even longer, that there were concerns by businesses and by families that are in the rural and northern parts of our province. So we brought forward rebates at those times, but they were very targeted in source and didn’t necessarily provide the necessary relief that they were looking for.

That’s why the Ontario fair hydro plan actually reduces those bills by 25%. For businesses, if they’re time-of-use businesses, they will qualify for this.

There are also other programs out there that actually help businesses lower their rates. I know the member talked about some of the programs that they were using—lowering their bills—which is great because that actually helps everyone across the province lower their energy consumption, which allows us not to build generation, and lowers our costs.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. John Vanthof: Speaker, this government has been in power for 15 years, and now they are in danger. Their poll numbers are going down so now they implement the fair hydro plan. Were they thinking about people like Jerome and Terry, and all the other business people and all the other residents, all these years with their long-term energy plans? They never took the actual people who were paying the bills into account. It’s a little too late now.

Hon. Glenn Thibeault: We took action when we took over as government, rebuilding a system that was left in tatters by previous governments that cancelled programs, froze rates and never invested in the system. We made sure that folks in northern Ontario had access to power, Mr. Speaker, because before we had an unreliable system that was never invested in by the previous governments, and they know it.

So as we rebuilt the system, as we eliminated coal, we invested $50 billion to make sure that we have a clean system, a reliable system, and now we’re working to make it as affordable as possible.

The Ontario fair hydro plan will bring forward a 25% reduction for all families, and even more in rural areas.

Nurses

Ms. Soo Wong: My question is for the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care. Registered practical nurses play a vital role in Ontario’s health care system. As a former nurse, a nursing professor and an administrator in a long-term-care facility, I know nurses are the largest group of health care professionals who provide quality care in my riding of Scarborough–Agincourt and across the province in hospitals, communities, correctional facilities, local schools, long-term-care homes and retirement homes.

The influence and impact nurses have on patients, their families and this province can’t be quantified or measured, because they are an educated, dedicated, hardworking, knowledgeable and caring group of individuals who give so much of themselves at work and in our communities every day.

I want to recognize the hundreds of RPNs working in my riding of Scarborough–Agincourt. They include Scarborough Hospital, Birchmount campus, St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux seniors centre, Tendercare, Shepherd Village, Mon Sheong nursing home, TransCare and Carefirst.

Mr. Speaker, through you to the minister: What message did the minister want to say to the RPNs who are visiting Queen’s Park today?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: First and foremost, I want to say thank you to our nurses, and particularly to those nurses, the RPNs, who are here today with RPNAO on their Queen’s Park day. They are absolutely outstanding, and they do outstanding work.

We value the work of all our nurses. Since 2003, we have increased the number of nurses employed in this province by 26,000. Specific to RPNs, we have increased the number of RPNs working in this province by 15,700 since we came into office in 2003. That is a growth of 61%. We value the work that each and every one of those RPNs does in this province.

We continue to make those investments in all of our nurses, including in RPNs. Just since 2015 alone, there are 2,400 more RPNs employed. That’s a growth rate of 6.1% just in that period alone.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Soo Wong: Thank you to the Minister of Health for his dedication to the nurses in this province. RPNAO, who is here today at Queen’s Park, represents the voice of over 46,000 RPNs in Ontario. Our province continues to be proud to stand alongside these nurses since we came into office.

Since 2003, as the minister said, there are 15,000 more RPNs employed in this province. I want to remind the members opposite about this: a growth of more than 60%, including nearly 10,000 new RPNs since 2012. This means we have more RPNs working across the province providing high-quality care to Ontarians in hospitals, in public health, long-term-care homes, family health care teams and community health care centres.

Mr. Speaker, through you to the minister: Can he please inform the House what our government’s commitment is to continue working with RPNs in Ontario?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: She’s absolutely right that our government is proud of the track record we have working with nurses in this province. Together with nurses and associations like the RPNAO, we’ve made great progress not only ensuring there’s a stable RPN workforce, but also ensuring Ontarians are receiving the best possible care.

We also know there is more work to be done. That’s why I want to reiterate this government’s commitment to continue to work with Ontario’s nurses, not only to support them and their workforce, but also to grow their practice and their scope, to provide high-quality care to even more Ontarians. RPNAO has been clear that scope-of-practice changes would help address certain barriers and ensure patients receive faster access to the right care, and our government agrees. We know that by working together on increasing RPNs’ scope, we can further improve access to care for Ontarians and reduce wait times even further. We’re committed to working with RPNAO on this important initiative.

Hydro rates

Mr. Randy Hillier: My question is to the Premier. Many constituents are sending me their hydro bills and letters expressing their outrage and their concern. The Calberrys are a retired couple on a fixed income in Hartington. They’ve followed every step laid out by this government to help conserve energy. They

schedule their lives by their time-of-use meter.

A 17% reduction is not enough for them and many others in my riding. In the words of the Calberrys, these “so-called reductions being rolled out are nothing but a case of giving with one hand and taking with two.”

When will this government stop giving with one hand and hurting so much with the other two?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Energy.

Hon. Glenn Thibeault: I’m pleased that the member knows about the fair hydro plan and the 25% reduction that is coming to seniors. It is important to know, Mr. Speaker, that I’m assuming that these individuals are Hydro One customers. That means that they’re also going to see a significant reduction from the RRRP. That will actually reduce their bills between 40% and 50%. On top of that, they can also apply for the Ontario Electricity Support Program, which, through Ontario’s Fair Hydro Plan, is actually going to give them an additional reduction on top of that.

Do you know what? We need to ensure that couples like the seniors that have been mentioned by the honourable member ensure they know about the fair hydro plan and know about the reductions that are coming, because we actually have a plan, like that party—they do not.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Randy Hillier: I’ll try again to the Premier, Speaker. The Taylors are another retired couple in my riding in Carleton Place who have to spend their retirement living by the

schedule of the time-of-use meter. They do all their chores on the weekend. They cook in the dark during the week. The Taylors believe that retired people should not have to go to such extremes, and I fully agree. The fact is that, no matter how hard people try, hydro is just too expensive. Their last bill was over $400.

I’m going to send these letters over to the Premier. Her responses have not been adequate. Will the Premier commit to reading these letters so that she fully understands the hurt she has caused and respond directly to the Calberrys and the Taylors?

Hon. Glenn Thibeault: We’re more than happy to continue to respond to the needs of Ontarians. That’s why we acted with the fair hydro plan, something that we have brought forward to help every family in the province with a 25% reduction. That also goes to family farms and to small businesses. As I mentioned, we have the Ontario Electricity Support Program, which actually will help many, many families as well. We want to ensure that more families, more individuals that actually would qualify for this program get on it, because they can actually see their bills reduced even more.

To help families even further, we brought forward the affordability fund, a trust that will be in place to allow families to access dollars to actually increase their insulation to help them reduce their bills even more.

The fair hydro plan is the single largest reduction in electricity bills in Ontario’s history, and it’s a plan that we’re very proud of.

Employment standards

Ms. Jennifer K. French: My question is to the Premier. Hard-working Ontarians are stressed and they are becoming sick over unpredictable work schedules. These are the findings of a recent survey done by the Ontario Federation of Labour: Job prospects are getting worse, wages are down, and the cost of living keeps going up. But the Liberals aren’t willing to alleviate this stress and raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Does the Premier have the final report of the Changing Workplaces Review? And if she does, what is she waiting for? When can—

Interjections.

Ms. Jennifer K. French: I’m not finished. When can hard-working Ontarians expect changes to dangerously outdated labour standards?

Now I’m finished.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Labour.

Hon. Kevin Daniel Flynn: I’m pleased to answer that question. Thank you to the member for that question. It is important, Speaker. We know in the province of Ontario that the nature of work in this province is changing, and it’s affecting people in ways we’d sooner not see. We’re determined to do something about it. As a result of that, less than two years ago we started the Changing Workplaces Review.

We got two esteemed gentlemen to do that work, somebody who has been associated with employers in the province of Ontario and somebody who has been associated with employees and organized labour in the province of Ontario. I’m expecting to get the best advice from these people after they’ve been out speaking to Ontarians all around this province. We’re determined to bring forward a report that stands up for working families in the province of Ontario.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Jennifer K. French: Again to the Premier: Ontarians are working two and three part-time and piecemeal jobs without knowing when they’ll be scheduled next, while they are struggling to pay rent and hydro bills that keep going up even when their pay doesn’t. They deserve wages they can count on, they deserve hours they can rely on, and they deserve schedules they can plan around. They deserve better jobs. Does the Premier have a copy yet of the final Changing Workplaces Review? This government has said “spring of 2017,” and it’s spring.

These problems aren’t going away. They’re still dragging their feet. I’d like to know what the Premier has to say to Ontarians who simply can’t wait any longer.

Hon. Kevin Daniel Flynn: Thank you for that supplementary question. We’ve gone out to the people in the province. We’ve asked for their advice. We’ve talked to business, we’ve talked to employers, we’ve talked to organized labour and we’ve talked to advocacy groups. They’ve all given us the best advice. All that advice is being compiled.

We had an interim report in the spring, and we’re asking the advisers to bring forward their best recommendations. That will be done in a timely manner; I’m expecting it, within days or weeks, to land on my desk. It will be translated, it will be made accessible, and a discussion will take place that involves everybody in the province of Ontario to make sure that this province remains an excellent place in which to work.

Indigenous economic development

Mr. Arthur Potts: My question is to the Minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation.

Speaker, as you know, our government provides funding to support critical infrastructure and training to create better opportunities for indigenous people. This helps them gain meaningful employment and assists them with business development across various sectors.

Inve