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March 29, 2012

40th Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcripts 2012-Mar-29 (PDF)

L031 - Thu 29 Mar 2012 / Jeu 29 mar 2012

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Thursday 29 March 2012 Jeudi 29 mars 2012

ORDERS OF THE DAY

ACCEPTING SCHOOLS ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 POUR

DES ÉCOLES TOLÉRANTES

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

MINISTER’S COMMENTS

ORAL QUESTIONS

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

JOB CREATION

HEALTH CARE

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

INFRASTRUCTURE

PROGRAM FUNDING

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

POST-SECONDARY EDUCATION

ONTARIO ECONOMY

NORTHERN TRANSPORTATION

ENERGY CONSERVATION

VISITORS

CORRECTION OF RECORD

DECORUM IN CHAMBER

CORRECTION OF RECORD

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

CONSTITUTION OF CANADA

GOVERNMENT SERVICES

CANADIAN AIR AND SPACE MUSEUM

ROTARY PLACE

ALICE HEAP

ABORIGINAL FAMILY FESTIVAL

LONDON LIGHTNING

JOB CREATION

SKILLED TRADES

VISITOR

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

CONSTITUTION DAY ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 SUR LE JOUR

DE LA CONSTITUTION

ORGAN OR TISSUE DONATION

STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 MODIFIANT DES LOIS

EN CE QUI A TRAIT AU DON

D’ORGANES OU DE TISSU

PETITIONS

GREENBELT

HYDRO RATES

SCHOOL FACILITIES

ONTARIO SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY

TO ANIMALS

DIAGNOSTIC SERVICES

GREENBELT

HORSE RACING INDUSTRY

EDUCATION FUNDING

LONG-TERM CARE

EMPLOYMENT RESOURCE CENTRE

WIND TURBINES

BAITFISH INDUSTRY

HORSE RACING INDUSTRY

ONTARIO NORTHLAND TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION

PRIVATE MEMBERS’

PUBLIC BUSINESS

ONTARIO SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION

OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS

AMENDMENT ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 MODIFIANT

LA

LOI SUR LA SOCIÉTÉ

DE PROTECTION DES ANIMAUX

DE L’ONTARIO

ANTI-BULLYING ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 SUR LA LUTTE

CONTRE L’INTIMIDATION

ORGAN AND TISSUE DONATION /

DONS D’ORGANES ET DE TISSUS

ONTARIO SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION

OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS

AMENDMENT ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 MODIFIANT

LA

LOI SUR LA SOCIÉTÉ

DE PROTECTION DES ANIMAUX

DE L’ONTARIO

ANTI-BULLYING ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 SUR LA LUTTE

CONTRE L’INTIMIDATION

ORGAN AND TISSUE DONATION

The House met at 0900.

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

Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

ACCEPTING SCHOOLS ACT, 2012 /

LOI DE 2012 POUR

DES ÉCOLES TOLÉRANTES

Resuming the debate adjourned on March 26, 2012, on the motion for second reading of Bill 13,

An Act to amend the Education Act with respect to bullying and other matters / Projet de loi 13, Loi modifiant la

Loi sur l’éducation en ce qui a trait à l’intimidation et à d’autres questions.

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

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: It’s an honour and a privilege to stand today to speak about Bill 13.

Quite frankly, this is not a partisan issue. There is, of course, sentiment all around the House that what we want to do and what we stand together on, shoulder to shoulder, as it were, is to keep our children safe, to prevent teen suicide, the kind of occurrence that happened with our friend Jamie and others who have killed themselves because of bullying in their schools. We are speaking really together around this issue.

I want to send some particular notes of respect out to a number of groups: first and foremost, the students themselves—I hosted a presser here with a number of them from our separate school system who came, and I’m going to speak about that in a minute; also to the teachers from all the teachers’ unions who have stood up for their students, stood up on behalf of their students very bravely and courageously; and for other organizations like Egale that have been outspoken about this; the Falconer report and others who have pressed this government and pressed all of us to actually take action.

As I said, I want to mention some students in particular: the students who came to Queen’s Park. This was in a presser we just had about a week ago. We had here some incredibly courageous young people. We had Trevor James, who is a straight youth from Peterborough, who “got up at 4:30 a.m. Wednesday and took a two-hour bus ride to Toronto to talk about school clubs for gay students.”

He was flanked, and I’m quoting here from the Toronto Star, “by Leanne Iskander, 17, who self-identified as queer, and Christopher McKerracher, 16, a bisexual man, both from Mississauga’s St. Joseph Secondary School.”

All of them were here speaking with one voice about, if anything, strengthening Bill 13. Here’s a quote from James. He said, “‘I love my school. It’s my home away from home.... We are not fighting. We just wanted to be treated equally. If we do not accept racism and nationalism in school, why is it okay to be homophobic?’”

“To call these clubs anything but gay-straight alliances is a denial of queer students’ existence … added James, a student at St. Peter’s Secondary School.”

And kudos to Leanne Iskander, who has organized a group of Catholic students for gay-straight alliances.

I also wanted to cite some of the studies that have been done by a number of groups interested in education. People for Education sent in some information to this government about Bill 13, again trying to strengthen the bill, trying to add to the bill. They talk about the role of principals and that special-needs students at one in three GTA elementary schools are not getting the recommended level of support. They talk, as do others, about the safe schools action team and the Falconer report, again about strengthening this bill in terms of strengthening the schools’ ability to deal with the issue.

One of the problems with this initiative is that there’s not funding attached to it: funding for special students, funding to help those principals and teachers who want to help their students, funding for special-needs students—oversight, even, because we know that bullying often happens where teachers’ eyes and education assistants’ eyes are not, so oversight for those playgrounds, those lunchrooms, those places where bullying can take place and nobody is watching. So again, funding is needed to strengthen oversight of those places. All the reports come together and speak about that, and they speak about that in some detail.

Certainly, when we’re spending $150 million on EQAO tests—tests that teachers are loath to administer and really are not fans of—surely some of that money could be redistributed to help children who are victims of bullying, to help the teachers who deal with them and, quite frankly, to help the bullies themselves, because if the only alternative is to suspend children with problems, i.e., the bullies, then that’s not an answer either. All children, even those who are bullies, need an education, and we need to deal with this as adults. We need to deal with it in a loving fashion.

I also want to acknowledge all those across the Christian spectrum, particularly those Catholic parents in our school system who have written to me and to whom I’ve responded and corresponded with. I speak as a Christian, a United Church clergyperson, and I remind everyone who is Christian, in this debate, that Jesus was very outspoken about how we should treat our neighbour. He said we should love them, pure and simple. We should love our neighbour. Implied in that is that we should not judge them; he also said, “Judge not.” He was pretty emphatic about that, and he didn’t put caveats around that.

He didn’t say, “Some neighbours, not other neighbours.” He didn’t say, “Judge not, but judge some people and not others.” He was completely outspoken; neither did he ever say anything about homosexuality. Check your Scripture.

All Christians have a vested interest. All people of all faiths and all people of no faith have a vested interest in the well-being of our students. Sadly, when you look at the suicide statistics, you see that LBGTQ students are the ones most at risk of suicide. Sadly, when you look at the statistics for that group, you see trans students at greatest risk and they grow up to continue to be at great risk. So at the age that they are in school, that’s the opportunity we have to intervene. That’s the opportunity we have to make a difference in their lives.

I know, because of working on Toby’s Law around the transgender issue, that as trans children age and grow into adults they represent a group that has a 50% poverty rate, a 50% depression rate, a 50% attempted suicide rate. Again, as you look through the spectrum of LGBTQ people, you see the same sort of heightened statistics.

Where does it start? It starts in high school. It starts in public school. It starts when children are young. That’s where we have a chance to really influence them. I proudly went out, you know, around the Pink Shirt Day—and I know that Pink Shirt Day is coming up—in our schools, and it’s a wonderful opportunity for everybody to engage; to add their support to our schools in standing up against bullying.

But I have to say, Mr. Speaker, that critically here, critically, is that we need the input of our students. We need our students to be able to define the supports they need, because what we are about here in this House, presumably around this bill, is supporting our students. We all agree on that. We want to support our students, particularly our vulnerable students, our students that have been bullied like Jamie, who was, by the way, bullied because of his sexual orientation. We want to support these students, and part of supporting these students is to support them in supporting themselves.

When they say—and they don’t all say, but when they do say—that they want a gay-straight alliance in their schools, we need to be behind them. We need to be supporting them in that. We need to be standing with them shoulder to shoulder, just like these brave young people that came to Queen’s Park, a some two-hour bus ride away, to take a risk, to stand in front of the cameras, to say, “We’re queer, we’re here and we need your love.” Because ultimately that’s what we’re speaking about as well: We’re speaking about this assembly coming together to act out of love for our students.

I want to just share some quotes, and these quotes are from various groups. First of all, let’s look at Egale. Egale Canada says, “GSAs ... demonstrably improve the lives of LGBTQ youth, increasing their safety and improving their self-esteem.”

By simply existing, GSAs present “students with the idea that LGBTQ identities have a place in the school, and society at large. Directly engaging LGBTQ youth and their allies within school, as well as those who are ambivalent regarding LGBTQ themes, is an excellent means towards addressing school climate, isolation, promoting social connectedness.” They cite a study in California that found gay-straight alliance presence and participation in high school to be highly correlated with decreased depression, substance abuse and lifetime suicide attempts among LGBTQ young adults.

I also want to quote from the Falconer report, where he again—“increase benchmark costs for all components of the funding formula ... to close gap between funding ... and actual costs...”

You know, it’s interesting, Mr. Speaker, that when I first ran six years ago in a by-election the funding formula was one of the main issues that plagued our community and our schools, our teachers and principals and students, and it’s still there. It’s still there. Unfortunately, the McGuinty government has done nothing to focus on that, and here we see, yet again, the funding formula impacting a sensitive issue here. So again, Falconer is calling on some action around that.

In 2008, the safe schools action team consultations “overwhelmingly confirmed that the most effective way to enable all students to learn about healthy and respectful relationships is through the school curriculum.” So again, curriculum changes; supervision when students are most vulnerable; allowing students to have a say in the kinds of groups that they want to form; what those groups are called; how those groups operate—these are all parts of the answer to the problem. Bill 13 goes part of the way. We want it to go all the way.

Certainly, again, we see that in the Roots of Youth Violence, an executive

summary, that was done, again in 2008. A quote here says, “Making headway on issues of safety involves abandoning the failed philosophy of addressing safety through discipline/enforcement mechanisms. It does not work.” They couldn’t be more emphatic. “While there will always be a place for discipline in identifying standards of behaviour, the reality that has thus far not been accepted in the system is that marginalized youth cannot be punished/suspended into becoming engaged....

“Hope needs to be restored through programs and initiatives that create prospects for success for youth who are currently on the outside looking in.”

Unfortunately, Bill 13 does nothing to address the inadequacy of staffing and supports for students at risk of bullying.

So again, when you look at the bully and the bullied, you’re looking at two students whom the system has failed and continues to fail. We again, I think, are of one mind in trying to address that issue. That’s the issue. We want to help the bullied, and we don’t want to marginalize the bully so that they continue to move through life using those kinds of behaviours, continuing to move through life to be homophobic or aggressive or violent. That’s not what public education should be about. Public education is for all children; it should be for all children.

Certainly, I hearken back to my own school experience and to those of my children. I can tell you that anyone around this room, if they were truly honest with those viewing, with our constituents and with themselves, would know that children who are LGBTQ are still at risk. They were at risk; they have been at risk; they were at risk for my children’s generation, for my generation; and they’re still at risk. We all have witnessed events in our educational experience where children who have identified as LGBTQ were bullied. We have all seen it happen. We’ve all intervened, or not.

We’ve all been the bullied or the bully, some of us. We know that this is a reality that touches everyone. There’s nobody who has not had an experience of this. There’s nobody who hasn’t seen it at work.

To confuse the issue and say, “Well, bullying happens for all sorts of reasons”—of course it does. It happens for weight reasons. It happens for ethnic reasons. There are all sorts of reasons. There are as many reasons as there are children to be bullied and to bully. But having said that, when we look at the suicide statistics, the most at-risk children inevitably come down to the LGBTQ community, and they were, in fact, the instigators, those who pushed this government, those who came before this government, who took the risk as they did when they came to Queen’s Park that day to stand up and say, “We’re here.

We’re not going away. We’re at risk and we’re standing with those at risk, and we need to be heard. We need to be heard.”

I know our education critic who did the leadoff speech on this, our member from Toronto–Danforth, has been very forthright about where we think this bill should go, the amendments that we will be bringing forth in committee, the support we have in our own constituencies for it, the support we have around this House and the necessity to get on with it, the necessity to get something into place—the necessity also, as I’ve said, to get into place the necessary supports, the necessary funding so that this bill can have some teeth, so that it can actually work, so that it’s not just window dressing on a problem, but it actually becomes a solution to a problem.

That’s as necessary as anything else. It’s necessary in the memory of Jamie. It’s necessary in the memory of all of those children who have suffered, and it’s certainly necessary to those three who came to Queen’s Park, and to all the brave teachers and others who stood with them.

I must mention ETFO and OSSTF, as well as OECTA. I mean, these are teachers who have been on the front lines, who have demanded of this government an action on this front, but also, of course, some follow-up, also some funding to help implement it, which is not part of this, and also have suggested ways of finding that funding.

In light of the budget and trying to find money from parcel A to pay for parcel B, might I suggest—respectfully so—that the EQAO, with $150 million worth, is one of the places that we could look in the educational funding package to fund programs for our vulnerable students, because again, this bill needs teeth; again, this bill needs clout; again, this bill needs backing

To go back to my original points, Mr. Speaker: Do we support Bill 13? Absolutely, we do, in the New Democratic Party. Do we want to see it strengthened? Absolutely, and we will be introducing amendments at committee to do so. Do we support those children who want gay-straight alliances in their schools? Yes, absolutely. We recognize that it’s not in every school they want it, but in the schools where they do want it, they should be allowed to have it. We should be standing with our students. That purportedly is what this bill is about.

And yes, we stand with the teachers, all the teachers’ unions, who day in and day out do just that: stand with their students. We recognize that whether it’s separate school teachers in OECTA or those teachers in OSSTF or ETFO, all teachers are together on this one; they support their students and the students’ voice in what they call their groups and when and where those groups take place.

I also finally want to thank the students, because without them this never would have happened. I want to thank those brave souls who have stood up against bullying and who stand up against bullying, and I want to send some compassionate messages out to those parents and those children who are the bulliers. The answer to them, Mr. Speaker, is not throwing them out of school, kicking them to the curb, taking away their right to public education, but a program that actually deals with the problems that develop into the creation of a bully—and they are myriad.

So we in the New Democratic Party, with the leadership of Andrea Horwath, stand on the side of children. We stand there with love; we stand there with compassion; we stand there with people of faith and those who don’t have faith. Finally and foremost, we stand there to prevent the deaths of our children—our children; they are our children. And we recognize the impact that this bill will have if it’s done well. That’s our common cause here.

Let’s get this bill done. Let’s get it done well, let’s get amendments in that will strengthen this bill and let’s never, ever have an instance in this province again where a child commits suicide because of harassment. Let’s stand with our LBGTQ students. Let’s stand with students who want a voice. Let’s stand with them because we know, we’ve experienced it in our own educational experience, our children have, and we stand here to prevent our grandchildren from having to go through the same thing.

On that note, I’ll close, and of course I’ll look forward to being a part of the consultation process on this matter through our education critic, Mr. Tabuns, from Toronto–Danforth. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Questions and comments?

Ms. Tracy MacCharles: First of all, I’d like to acknowledge the member from Parkdale–High Park for her deep and genuine commitment and compassion to the eradication of bullying. I agree with her completely. We are in this together and on the same page.

As a mother of two young teens, I know first-hand how bullying affects children—my own children and other children in Pickering–Scarborough East. Bullying can and does happen in many ways to children. My son was the tallest child in a primary grade, and the last person people thought would be bullied, but he was, physically. But it takes on many other forms, as we know.

As the chair of a school community council in my community for many, many years, I directly have been involved in many bullying situations, and I know how it can play out and how the process to address bullying can become very difficult for all parties if not managed properly, without proper communications, without support for everyone involved: the victims, the witnesses, the bystanders, the school staff, the parents and, last but not least, the bully himself or herself.

I’m also very aware, through my involvement with the Durham District School Board special-ed committee, of the need to be sensitive for children with special needs and disabilities, and how they can be severely affected by bullying. We must make every effort to ensure this most vulnerable population is supported.

I’ve also seen how empowered children become in our schools when they are in an environment that creates a positive learning place for them, an environment that creates accountability, an environment where everyone adopts zero tolerance to bullying and, most importantly, respect for all. But we need to do more, and that’s why I’m supporting Bill 13. Thank you.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): The member from Durham.

Mr. John O’Toole: Thank you very much. The member from Parkdale–High Park, I do respect her views. She’s well-informed and very capable, competent commentary on this file.

I do want to read a thing from the Ontario Catholic school trustees, a document called Respecting Difference. I think it’s important. There are some subtle words in here. You need to listen carefully, because I’m quoting it:

“Beliefs across a whole number of areas, including religion and cultural practices and more personal matters such as acceptable sexual conduct, will differ and these different beliefs are an aspect of living in a multicultural and pluralistic society that honours human rights and diversity. While it is an all too human temptation to insist that others share our beliefs and to eradicate the frameworks that make a variety of choices possible, forced acceptance of beliefs about which we may differ is not the hallmark of a free and democratic society but” the complete opposite.

What that’s saying is that someone forcing you to accept their

interpretation of their world is in itself bullying. That’s the philosophical argument that I believe is important. I believe all forms of bullying are irresponsible and unacceptable.

The point we’re making here is tolerance. I believe this document from the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association, Respecting Difference, summarizes particularly how I feel about the issue. I believe that the secular society forcing views on non-secular society is in fact bullying. So if you look at it, we must respect differences and in fact not be bullies ourselves, on both parties. That way we can live harmoniously, and yet in a democracy, we have freedom of choice and freedom of religion. That’s what this is about more fundamentally, not bullying someone to accept my way or the highway.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): The member from Timmins–James Bay.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Oh, I can speak volumes to that one, but I won’t respond to those comments.

I would just say, though, to the presentation—

Mr. John O’Toole: I didn’t write it.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: No, no, but I’m just saying—my point is that we can all be accused, as majority governments in this Legislature—Conservatives, Liberals and others—for exactly what you’re talking about. That’s why I was saying I’ll leave that one alone. But anyways, we all have our ideologies.

To my colleague who gave a presentation, I just want to say, as usual, bang on.

I want to put something on the record, though, in regard to bullying itself. Both Bill 13 and Bill 14, which we’re going to be discussing later on this afternoon, are obviously good steps towards trying to deal with the issue of bullying. I don’t want to argue in any way that we should diminish the value of what these bills bring to this particular issue. But I increasingly get concerned that sometimes, we’re looking for legislative solutions when really the solutions are what we do amongst each other as human beings.

I have this little bit of a fear that somehow or other, we think that if we only can only come up with the right law, the world’s going to be a better place. In some cases that may be true, but we really need to challenge ourselves. We need to do public education. We need to use our school systems. We need to, within the family, instil these kinds of beliefs that say, “Listen, bullying of any form is not acceptable. Respect and tolerance for others is the order of the day.”

I’ve got to say, as a young boy growing up in northern Ontario in the late 1950s and 1960s, we’ve come a long way; I can tell you it was a much more intolerant society back in the 1950s and 1960s as I was growing up in our community. Is our community today very tolerant? I would say it’s more tolerant than it was, but quite frankly, we still have a ways to go. I think we need to challenge ourselves. There are all kinds of “isms” out there, and we need to do more in order to educate each other on the tolerance of accepting others for who they are. Accepting and embracing that tolerance makes us better people.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Questions and comments?

Ms. Soo Wong: I greatly appreciate the remarks and examples presented by the member from Parkdale–High Park. I think she was bang on in her examples and remarks about this issue of bullying. Safety is the key to student learning. The proposed legislation is about safety in our schools, Mr. Speaker. I can tell you that as a former school board trustee with the Toronto District School Board, I’ve heard and observed many bullying incidents.

Like my colleagues, I want to acknowledge the many stories from our students, from our teachers, from our parents. It took a lot of courage for these people to come and share with us those stories because, at the end of the day, they didn’t have to. Especially some of my diverse community: It takes a lot of courage to come out and say and tell us what are their concerns, what are their recommendations.

The proposed legislation, if passed, will protect all students in our schools. Some of my colleagues have already indicated that it will, first of all, bring tougher consequences for bullying and hate-motivated actions; require all publicly funded school boards to support students who want to lead activities that promote understanding and respect for all; require school boards to have policies.

What’s wrong with having policies to support and provide resources to our students? This is what is most important for our schools. It also requires school boards to have Bullying Awareness and Prevention Week, so that it raises awareness about what bullying is and how we prevent bullying.

The proposed legislation is clear, with expectations, and increases accountability for everyone. We, as parliamentarians in this House, have a responsibility to make sure every student is safe, and this legislation is just the first step to protect every student, but together we have to do more—of course we have to do more—so that every student can be safe so they can learn, Mr. Speaker. Thank you for this opportunity to talk.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Further debate? The member for High Park, you have two minutes to respond.

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to all the members for their input—much appreciated. I want to again reiterate, this is about student choice and student safety.

So truly, if we want to “respect differences,” to use the other catchphrase, truly, if we want to respect differences, we have to—again I go back to the words of Jesus. He did not ask us to tolerate our neighbour; he asked us to love them. He did not ask us to put up with them. He said, “Judge not.” We don’t judge them; we love them categorically. That was the call upon all of us who are Christians, and certainly in all faiths that is the call upon people of all faiths. And those of no faith but who have ethics and morals, it’s a call upon you, too

So when we go from this place, I hope we go keeping our children in mind, keeping what they want in mind, not what we want for them, what they are asking for, and they are asking for the ability to define and direct their own futures. That’s called love, Mr. Speaker. That’s our call. Thank you.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Thank you. Further debate?

Hon. Glen R. Murray: I always find these particular conversations in the House extraordinarily personally difficult. I find it very hard not to be emotional about them. Because I think through most of my life this issue has unwantedly and with such great difficulty been at the centre of my life.

First of all, I just want to say some thank yous. I want to thank the member for Toronto–Danforth, if I can call him Peter. I know I’m not supposed to use first names, but I want to tell him I was both moved and inspired by his words and by his conviction.

I also want to thank the member for Parkdale–High Park, as I think she just gave—not just today—a very thoughtful, life-affirming, holistic, humanizing speech. She has dedicated much of her time in this House to the rights of gay and lesbian and transgendered people. I want to thank her publicly for that.

Gilles Bisson, my friend from Timmins–James Bay, thank you for your short, to-the-point, pithy retort. We need friends like you, and I want to thank you for your courage and your conviction.

I also want to thank my friend Laurel Broten, who has worked so darn hard on social justice issues and on leading this bill through.

I want to thank our Premier, who, in spite of what some people say, I think is a darn good Catholic. What many people never know is the kind of personal encouragement he has given me over the years when difficult issues have come up. I want to thank him for his quiet stand-behind-you kind of leadership.

I want to thank Jeff Leal and Maria Van Bommel and many of our rural members, some of whom aren’t here. I know that some of them aren’t here because of some pretty nasty robocalls that were just pure homophobia the night before the election. They know the courage it took for Maria Van Bommel to go to the Knights of Columbus and stand up for her faith beliefs about the value of human beings, their souls and a higher calling that brings us to this place.

Why is it so difficult? Because I’m tired of being—I thought we finally got past being a gay politician. I remember when we hosted the Pan Am Games in Winnipeg, when I finally no longer had to be the gay mayor, when my partner Rick and I no longer had to be the gay poster couple, when I fought every kind of horrible stereotype by religious extremists like Charles McVety when I tried to become a parent.

The hardest thing—and I mean years of hard work—was to become a parent. My son, Michael, who has fetal alcohol syndrome, is one of the most courageous young people I’ve ever met. What he has to do to get through life every day, on top of it to have a gay dad and to get bullied at school for having a gay father, to me, was just more than he needed. He kept on saying to me, “But no one else is standing with me. I’ve only got you.” I used to say to him, “I’ve only got you, Mike.”

Why are GSAs so important? I have a wonderful father. He passed away of prostate cancer at 63. He was a small-c conservative, a very prudent businessman. He worked hard his whole life, lost businesses, rebuilt them. He was one of the most incredible entrepreneurs I ever knew. He inspired me. He was one of the most honest people. He was so honest that he would go into a business and the shopkeepers would ask him just to put whatever product he thought, because my father was so honest. He would never put more stuff in the store than he thought he could sell.

You know, I grew up with John Diefenbaker and Tommy Douglas and Lester Pearson. Those are the kinds of people who I want, because my father admired those people, and he got involved in politics because of that. I admired my dad.

It wasn’t the opinions of bullies or schoolyard bullies—and when I was growing up, I became a jock. I played football. I figured out the straight guys were the ones who were very athletic, so I became a very good hockey player. I watched my straight friends. I watched my friend who was straight, Jeff, who was tall, six foot two at a far-too-early age. He was a bit effeminate, and everyone thought he was gay and they thought I was straight, so they beat the crap out of him. They tore his underwear. They spit on him. They put excrement in his locker—Jeff, who was a straight kid, who everyone thought was gay.

They treated him—they called him an F-A-G and all kinds of other horrible names and beat the crap out of him, and everybody stood by and watched. All these good Christians stood by and watched, and it happened to kid after kid. It wasn’t whether or not you were gay; it was whether people thought you were sissy or effeminate, or whether you’re the young girl who was overweight. Kids could be cruel, and parents can stand by and watch it.

I remember going for a walk with my father, who I admired, and he told me that he’d beat queers up. He made some of the most homophobic remarks I’d ever heard. And here, the safe place I thought I had in my house was to go home to my dad and my mom. Those were the people I loved, who I thought loved me.

The reason the GSAs, and not organizations for disabilities or black kids or aboriginal kids, are at the centre of this is because of our social discomfort with sexual orientation. That’s what the Hotwire—Charles McVety and a few thousand extremists are going to be out on the front lawn. They’re not here talking about kids with disabilities. They have no problem with stopping bullying against young folks who are unfortunately overweight or kids who are a little ungainly or awkward or a bit nerdy or whatever the thing is that brings on that horrible bullying. So it’s not just bullying.

I’m going to support Elizabeth Witmer’s bill, the member from Kitchener–Waterloo, because I think it’s the right thing to do, and I want to commend my friends in the Progressive Conservative Party. I don’t have any problem with the bill you’re presenting. There’s nothing in it I disagree with, and I think and I hope that we’ll support it. But what it misses—and I don’t mean this in a pejorative or a partisan way, because I think on this we have to be Ontarians first—is it’s not just bullying; it’s the indifference, the ignorance and the rejection that are more toxic.

Understanding that my father couldn’t get the fact that his son was gay—and a few years later, sadly, he came down with cancer and died. It was only in the last years of his life that we really reconciled. He couldn’t speak to me for three years. He said to me—the last time I saw him, we sat in bed. He was very ill with cancer; you couldn’t even touch him. He held my hand, which I knew was very hard for him, and said, “Glen, you know, I fear for you, and for all of the kids like you who are gay. I hated gay people. I thought they were sick and perverse. I didn’t want to even imagine that.

When I realized my son was gay, I was embarrassed and I was humiliated. And if I thought that way, and you’re my son and I couldn’t reconcile it, how were all of the other people in power—when you go to get a job, when you try to find a life or have a child or do anything like that, how are people who don’t love you, who are not your father, going to treat you? I don’t see how you can have a future.” I told him I admired him. He said, “I admire you, because”—now I was in my early 30s, and I had just gotten elected for the first time to city council in Winnipeg.

He said, “I’m not sure I would have the courage to live and walk in your shoes, knowing how people like me actually feel about you.”

My father was an amazing man. One of the reasons, if you look at my name on the thing—I put his name there, because he never got any recognition in his life. The closest I could get to getting my father’s name up there was to put my whole name up there. Every time I walk down there, I say a little prayer for my father and say, “I got there, Dad. I broke through that. I was able to fully contribute to my life.”

The reason GSAs are so important, and why I would ask my friend from Durham just to rethink this—I am a Christian. My faith is incredibly important to me. The hardest thing about being in this House is that my type of Christianity, the Anglican faith I grew up with—we’re not evangelical. My faith doesn’t stand out in front of Queen’s Park and tell everyone that they’re wrong and who’s going to hell and why Tim Hudak and Dalton McGuinty and Andrea Horwath always have it wrong.

My faith is reconciliation at the end of the day, and every day I go to bed, there are things I said in this House where I’ve become intemperate and snapped and said something to one of you, often, that I shouldn’t, and I ask for forgiveness. I’m a great fan of—Julia, I forget your riding, but Julia Munro.

Mrs. Julia Munro: York–Simcoe.

Hon. Glen R. Murray: York–Simcoe. She’s a Quaker. I was out with my friend David Crombie for hours and we were talking about this. Many of us practise a faith, on both sides of this House, that is quiet, reflective, self-judgemental. The hardest moral issue for me is not my sexual orientation; it’s how do I be a loving, gentle, kind person when God gave me such a big mouth? How do I approach everyone with a sense of love and hope and trust, even if we have differences? How do we find what we have in common and put that ahead of ourselves? That’s what this bill is about. It’s about our ability to touch our common humanity.

As my friend Kathleen and I always say, on the unique journey that we’ve had in life—and one of the reasons I came into politics was I had been such an admirer of her and her leadership in understanding education. I really think she’s one of the best education ministers this province has ever had. When you talk to students, there is a texture to our schools that she brought. When she initiated this legislation when she was minister and started the idea of GSAs and a whole celebration of diversity—it is exactly that word. And my friend from Parkdale–High Park said this: It isn’t about tolerance.

We want to love and celebrate every child. I wanted to be lifted up, when I was 14 years old, as a Christian. It was important to me. There was a sense of eternity and soul and reconciliation that’s much bigger than a reconciliation with the voters. We can debate every medieval

interpretation of the Bible; that’s not what it’s about. Christ asked us very simply to live in the middle of other people’s lives, to accept what we don’t understand and to reach out and touch the humanity of each other without fear, and to find the courage to do that. I think most of us will know in our lives, at the core of our faith, we’re searching for that courage on a day-to-day basis.

You know, it isn’t bullying. There’s no one here that’s suggesting that we shouldn’t teach a Catholic perspective in our schools. Let me read Charles McVety, who is a person who, if you had to find the philosophical polar opposite to my world—this is what he recently said in a news

article editorial he wrote. He said that Catholic teaching is defined in the document, by referring to the document Pastoral Guidelines to Assist Students of Same Sex Orientation in the 2006 CCCB statement, which the member from Durham mentioned before: “Basing itself on sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity” and a tradition that declared—he’s quoting from the bishop’s direction—“homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”

I have to say to the bishops: “You’re not allowed to do that anymore.” I’m not allowed to say to the Catholics—nor should I—or to other Christians or Muslims or Jews, that because of your faith you’re intrinsically disordered. I would never say to you that anything that goes on in your family with the person you love—can you imagine me describing a husband-and-wife relationship as inherently depraved? Can you imagine how it feels to gay and lesbian families and to our children in schools when people like Charles McVety say we’re unfit to be parents? How much do you love your children?

How would you feel, as an Ontarian or as a Canadian? You feel a little less Canadian. I feel a little less welcome in my own country every time someone like that is endorsed.

It’s not that I don’t understand it or that I think that everyone’s a homophobe; I don’t. My father wasn’t intentionally homophobic. He arrived honestly through the culture he grew up in, in the 1930s and 1940s and the war, to an attitude about masculinity and some pretty awful attitudes about the role of women. Every time I see Mad Men, it’s not that far a stretch from where women lived, and we think we’ve come a long way.

I’m disappointed when my friend from Markham-Aurora goes on Charles McVety’s show to launch his campaign for elected office, and enthusiastically embraces the endorsement of Charles McVety. So I would ask him not to do that. I would ask him to spend more time together with me and other members, and I would like to have more time to try and reconcile with people like that. Because when you take the support of folks—you will remember, this was circulated in my constituency by people. It was put out by the PC Party. It was done with Charles McVety, and it says some horrible things about gay people.

I would ask the party opposite to stop doing that. You wouldn’t like it if we put out a heterophobia. I don’t believe that most people in this House are homophobic. I don’t believe these kinds of political tactics. It is the impression that young people get, including their MPPs. You know, the only thing in this curriculum—and please read it. None of this is actually even true. Gender-bending? You know what it is? It’s young girls sometimes playing the words that young boys—in fairy tales, that the princess runs off to save the prince rather than the other way around.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: It’s Robert Munsch.

Hon. Glen R. Murray: It’s Robert Munsch. Thank you, Kathleen. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that most kids read about. If you want to call it gender-bending and make it sound like something offensive—I just think women have a right to be equally treated, like boys.

When I was a teenager the woman who ran to my rescue was a counsellor named Sue Baker, who was the only gay-positive person in my entire school, who came and told me I was okay. As a matter of fact, she said, “I think good things are coming up for you.” There was a point in my life when I had no support at home. None of the family-life education when I was in school meant gay people. Everything was negative. There were no role models. The only role model I ever had was Harvey Milk, and he was shot dead in San Francisco 11 months after he was elected. That was the first person.

You’ve got to remember, I was elected in the 1980s in the prairies. I represented fundamentalist Muslims, Christians, Filipinos. I used to go and pray on Sundays with 80 evangelical pastors who had said some of the most horrible things about me because my faith demands reconciliation and listening and not being afraid. So why don’t we try to do that? Why don’t we actually try to make this Legislature, in a motion in this session, a GSA? Why don’t we make this a gay-straight alliance? I think that would be a powerful, powerful tool.

I want to celebrate every child. The hardest issue I’ve had to deal with since I was there was in a school, one of the high schools. There was a young Pakistani boy who, unlike this—we saw these ads in the National Post, and I give the National Post credit for apologizing for them and withdrawing them. Because this also got large circulation in my constituency, given that a lot of the families in my constituency have two moms or two dads.

This family, when they found out that their son came home one day and thought he was a girl when he was going through puberty—which is a way transgender kids are—and his parents had no context to do this, I got a call because the school counsellor didn’t know how to deal with this properly and was afraid. The local police officer from the district came to my office very upset, saying, “We can’t stop this. They’re going to take this young child back to Pakistan for an honour killing.” That’s what goes on in some communities. Were these terrible parents? If you want to murder your own child, it’s pretty terrible.

But when people come from a faith culture where they have no context for this, the school can be the only rescue place. So yes, sometimes the school has to stand up to parents to protect the child. That’s where I would disagree with the person from Durham: It’s not just a matter of freedom of expression; it’s a matter of the sanctity of the child’s life.

So we were able to intervene with one of the groups, and I want to thank Susan Gapka and the many people in the trans groups, and Davina Hader and these wonderful women who got together with me.

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: Bring it in. Bring it in.

Hon. Glen R. Murray: Absolutely. You and I are there, sister.

That’s important, because this child’s life was saved. We got a judge. We got a young lawyer who helped us out. We stopped the child from being taken away and killed, and that child is alive.

You can imagine if this happened in my friend Jeff Leal’s community of Peterborough. There are some communities that have less capacity to understand this, and that child would have lost their life.

It is about celebrating diversity. It isn’t about taking Catholic teaching out of Catholic schools; it’s about putting life-affirming, positive images and stories around gay and lesbian children, Muslim children, kids and women of all shapes—that not all girls have to look like Barbie dolls. It is about having a truthful celebration of that. It’s about valuing and holding all our children up.

I think it would be wonderful, really wonderful, if both Bills 13 and 14 passed, because I think they both are good; they both have their strengths. I think this would be a good time for some forgiveness on both sides. It would be a good time for those people who have associated themselves, hopefully wrongly, maybe out of some pressure, with the folks like Mr. McVety—wouldn’t it be wonderful if there wasn’t a single member of this Legislature out there present when he does his normal thing, “Gays and lesbians aren’t fit to be parents. They shouldn’t have children,” and his whole—his web page is now called “Corrupting children.”

It’s hard for me, as a parent who struggled so hard to raise my child, and having to fight to get the right to do that; to take a child who was street-involved, who was sexually abused, who got involved in some pretty horrible things and some even more horrible things that adults did to him—I can’t imagine—when someone talks about corrupting children, I can give you a long list of how people are corrupting a child. Loving, positive gay and lesbian and transgendered parents aren’t part of the corrupting; they’re part of the loving and caring.

I want to thank all of you today—and I want to particularly thank those of you who come from communities where this is hard; people like Maria Van Bommel, my friend Jeff, many of you who come from strong faith traditions where it’s hard for people to understand why you would stand with people who have faced discrimination as so many people in our community have—for your courage.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Questions and comments?

Mrs. Jane McKenna: I stand here today to speak about Bill 13.

Minister from Training, Colleges and Universities, as a mother, my heart goes out to you. But everything that you said today echoes what my son has said—you know, fears for all kids to be accepted.

The other night, my son and I and my family were sitting down, and we were speaking about Bill 13 and Bill 14. My son was born with a vision problem, and he was out of school. Every one of us has situations with our children, people who we know. We were sitting there talking because I had to take him out of the school that he was at because he was beaten up so many times. I said to him, “Son, I’m going to take you out and I’m going to take you to another school, but at the end of the day, you’re going to have to learn the tools to deal with people who treat you the way they treat you,” because I didn’t want him to become a victim.

But as I sit here today, I’m saddened because we all are God’s children. When my son sits there and says to me, “Mom, why are you just talking about one thing when we’re all discriminated? That’s discrimination, when all of us feel the way we feel.” I know for him, he’s said many, many things that the minister spoke about, how he felt going to school and how he felt getting up every day going to school.

When I went to school one day to pick him up as he was coming out, a couple of the kids called him a few names that I won’t speak of in here. I wondered to myself, how does he get up every day? I didn’t have that situation growing up when I was a child. I was heartbroken because I thought, every day children get up, and every day as adults, we’re bullied as well in certain circumstances. How do we function, and how does he function getting up?

I want everybody to be accepted. I want everybody to feel that they’re okay and not to be in situations where they can’t get out of bed. They feel that they need to be respected and loved and cared. Every single person deserves that.

I know for my son, my children and every person sitting in here, every one of us deserves to feel that we are somebody and that we are cared about. I know it goes on, and that’s accepted, but it’s not acceptable.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Questions and comments?

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: It’s a pleasure to follow the member from Toronto Centre, the minister, with a friendly amendment. He did not describe himself as an evangelical. I do, because evangelism means sharing the Good News. I wrote a book called Que(e)rying Evangelism that won the Lambden in Washington, DC. Charles McVety does not have proprietary onus on the word “evangelism.” Evangelism means sharing the Good News. The Good News of Jesus was love. It was not judgment and it was not hatred. Christians do not hate.

When our church performed the first legalized marriage—we followed Brent in that regard—it was vetted by Thunder Bay, unlike his. But we were subjected to unbelievable torment from people from the States. I won’t mention names and I won’t say what they said. Our members were targeted. When our music director, who was a transperson, died, the outcry from the so-called Christian right was outrageous.

Forty years ago, when I was obviously only about four years old, I stood on Parliament Hill on We Demand. From those days to this day, some things didn’t change enough, and the member from Toronto Centre pointed to those things.

We need to do so much more. It’s just not enough anymore to condone any of the actions of those who pretend to be Christian—because they’re not. That’s what I’ll say: They’re not Christian. That’s not the Jesus Christ whom we read about in scripture and that’s not the Jesus who those of us who proudly carry that banner feel we follow. Again, he called us to love our neighbour. He did not define who that neighbour is. What Charles McVety and his crew do is not loving. He called us to judge not. What they are doing is judging, by any definition.

We need to finally move beyond that, to show them for who they are. It’s not just a sect. It is not Christian, it is not evangelical, it is not right.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Thank you. The member from Scarborough–Agincourt.

Ms. Soo Wong: I want to thank the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities for his remarks this morning, and sharing his personal challenges and journey with all of us. That took a lot of courage, Minister, and I want to say thank you. Not only are you passionate about this issue, but the fact that you have the courage, the leadership and the vision—because this is what this is all about. Leadership takes courage, and that was courageous this morning. So thank you for that.

Bill 13 is the first step in what our government is trying to do to address the issue of protecting and supporting every student in our schools. As the first Chinese Canadian woman in this House, I could share with you too many challenges that the minister went through—the racist remarks and the phobic remarks attacking my own family in the 1970s, the 1980s, even the 1990s. So I certainly know that this proposed legislation is to prevent more bullying and to protect our students in our schools.

The proposed Accepting Schools Act is a key component of our government, to make all Ontario schools safe, healthy and inclusive learning environments so every student not only feels accepted but also feels safe—I cannot stress enough.

I don’t know how many times, as a former school trustee, young people came to my office, and their parents, crying, begging me to do something. But there wasn’t legislation. There weren’t guidelines and policies. Yes, we have a very progressive school board in Toronto District School Board, but of course more can be done.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): The member from York–Simcoe.

Mrs. Julia Munro: On the one hand, I feel I have a very short time to make any comments, and at the other end of that is the fact that it’s difficult for people to—so I almost feel that this is too much time.

I want to talk for just a moment about the fact that we regard ourselves as a civil society. I know there’s been a great deal of discussion about our faith, and I’ll deal with that in my case in a moment. I think as members of a Parliament, as members of a civil society, what we’re really talking about is the question of tolerance. When you listen to those who are able to share individual stories, it’s the fact that other people have not been able to tolerate and understand whatever kind of difference it is. As we can think back, as children we were probably bullied at some point.

Actually, I dealt with mine in a way that today would have had me expelled. The point is that it’s got to be the question—the mark of a civil society is its tolerance.

I listened very carefully and with a great deal of emotion to the minister’s speech. I recall, as a teacher, a young student of mine who came in wearing a button that said “Gay and proud,” and you can’t imagine how much that took for him to be able to do that. It was like a beacon or a magnet. It certainly meant that he recognized his position and the importance of dealing with others. I was fortunate enough to be a confidante of his, actually, after he finished high school, and I can assure you that those issues that he had to deal with as a young gay man didn’t go away, and—

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Thank you.

Mrs. Julia Munro: It’s very important.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Minister, you have two minutes to reply.

Hon. Glen R. Murray: I want to thank my friend for York–Simcoe. I just want to pick up on something you said. Tolerance is the foundation of this. It has to be there; otherwise, people aren’t safe. But we need to move, quite frankly, past acceptance to celebration, because we have differences. To me, it’s not just about being gay; it’s the fact that the suicide rate is higher amongst gay and lesbian and transgendered youth than amongst any other subgroup. It’s just the group that is most impacted.

My journey was a different one than my friend from York–Simcoe, but I just wanted to say that this has to be a respectful place for everybody. I never chose to make being gay the issue. When I went to be a parent, I didn’t want to have a fight over being gay; someone else made it the issue. When I ran for office, I didn’t make a big deal about being gay; someone else made it the issue.

I would have been quite happy—and what we’re fighting for is nothing. I look forward to the day when it is completely inconsequential, boring, and people yawn when they find out you’re gay. We’re still not there yet.

I think anyone who has any kind of difference—a religion they believe in passionately, whatever it is—just wants to have a comfortable place and be able to contribute to society the way everyone else does.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Further debate?

Mr. Rob Leone: I want to take this opportunity to thank the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities for that very thoughtful and emotional response in furthering the debate on this issue.

I think I share with most people who listen to that the fact that you actually had to endure that. I don’t think you actually can really understand what you had to go through unless you walk a mile in someone else’s shoes. I think the minister today in his comments went a long way in telling members of this House and those who are watching this debate in these proceedings exactly what he has gone through in his life. I would share with him and I share with many members who commented on that discussion, Minister, that what you faced was deplorable.

I want to say to you and to members of this House that I want to stand shoulder to shoulder with you with respect to fighting the kind of intolerance, to fighting the kind of hate that we have been seeing going on, particularly with this issue, but in society in general.

I think we have to make sure we’re talking about this issue when we’re talking about Bill 13, that we have to stay mission-focused. This bill is about our kids. It’s about our kids being safe in our schools. It’s about our kids going to school knowing full well that when they’re there, they’re going to be in an environment that’s safe, that allows them to be the bright minds that we expect them to be: the future of this great province.

So I want to stand here today in my place as a member of the PC caucus to demonstrate my solidarity with that position, Mr. Speaker.

A few people, in the comments that we’ve seen over the last little while—one of the comments that I’ve heard on this issue has to do with, “Well, don’t we have policies in place in our schools already that deal with bullying?” I think that the comment is an interesting one and one I think that deserves further elaboration.

You see, Mr. Speaker, I know that particularly when I was going to school, which wasn’t too long ago—I was in high school during the 1990s; I’m sure they would like to elaborate on that a bit more. We on this side of the House came forth with a safe schools act. We talked about violence in our schools, something that we feel very strongly about.

Let me perhaps provide you with a definition of violence that comes from the World Health Organization: Violence is defined as “the intentional use of physical”—and psychological—“force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, mal-development, or deprivation.”

I think, Mr. Speaker, a lot of people who have talked to this issue already have listed a number of examples where people have faced violence. I think it’s very important for us to understand that we are dealing with violence, whether it’s physical violence or whether it is violence of an indirect nature, whether it’s by words or defacing property and so on and so forth.

One of the things that came out of the Safe Schools Act was a code of conduct. I want to point out three points. There were multiple points, but the three that I’d like to talk about today are sections 3, 4 and 5 in that code of conduct.

Section 3 of that Safe Schools Act code of conduct is, “To maintain an environment where conflict and difference can be addressed in a manner characterized by respect and civility.” I think if we live by those words, Mr. Speaker, it goes a long way in sort of alleviating some of the concerns that we’ve been raising in this House. This is already in legislation.

Section 4 says, “To encourage the use of non-violent means to resolve conflict.” Again, I think this is something that we like to talk about in both Bill 13 and Bill 14. Point number 5 of this code of conduct is, “To promote the safety of people in the schools.” I think that is ultimately what we’re tasked with, Mr. Speaker. We’re here to try and come up with a robust, best-in-North-America anti-bullying bill. I think that’s our goal, a goal we share on all sides of this House.

I think it speaks to a long-standing Conservative principle, which is that governments should intervene when something is happening that harms: where a person is harming another individual, a group is harming another individual, a group is harming another group or a group is marginalizing another group—the harm principle. The harm principle was first discussed by John Stuart Mill, who articulated the harm principle in his volume On Liberty. He states that “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”

Mr. Speaker, we stand committed to helping our kids go to school in a safe and nurturing environment. We produced policies when we were in government that effectively did that, and we’re certainly very interested in seeing that discussion proceed.

So what is that difference between violence and bullying? What produces a reason for us to debate this issue in this Legislature today? Let me perhaps provide a few

definitions of what bullying actually is. According to Peter Smith, who prepared this definition in a report to the OECD on bullying, it is “generally agreed that bullying is a subset of aggression: namely aggression that involves (

i) repetition and (ii) imbalance of power.” So you see, Mr. Speaker, it’s a subset of violence, some of the things that we’ve talked about in previous legislation. It’s talking about violence that’s recurring, that’s repetitive, and it speaks to an imbalance of power.

A few more

definitions: In 1993, Farrington wrote, in volume 17 of Crime and Justice, “Bullying is repeated oppression, psychological or physical, of a less powerful person by a more powerful person.”

A 1994 book, School Bullying, by Smith and Sharp suggests that bullying is “the systematic abuse of power.” Systematic abuse of power—it’s not isolated; it’s systematic and it’s all-encompassing to that degree, Mr. Speaker.

A 2002 book by Rigby that tried to apply new perspectives on bullying said that bullying involves six criteria. It involves a desire to hurt. It involves a harmful action. It involves a power imbalance. It typically involves repetition. It involves an unjust use of power. It involves evident enjoyment—this is I think one of the most unfortunate parts of bullying—by the aggressor and generally a sense of being oppressed on the part of the victim.

If there’s anything that speaks to a call to action on this file, it is very much related to those words, of trying to eliminate, if we can, this enjoyment by the aggressor when they are victimizing people. I think this is something that’s very important to suggest.

Now, the OECD report that I referenced talked about several different types of violence and bullying. There are six types. The first is a direct physical attack. The second is an indirect physical attack on belongings and property; we’re talking about vandalism. The third is a direct verbal attack, so that’s oral, or it might be a letter, might be a text message, might be an email or something you post online. There’s an indirect verbal attack, which is the spreading of rumours. The fifth is a social exclusion from normal group activities; and finally, institutional aggression/manipulation, which is setting unrealistic goals by groups.

I realize I’m out of time, Mr. Speaker. I hope to resume this debate when we do that. Thank you.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): This House stands recessed until 10:30.

The House recessed from 1015 to 1030.

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

Mr. Rod Jackson: I’d like to introduce and welcome Judy Nuttall to question period today. Judy’s a great community activist and a huge children’s advocate in Barrie. Welcome, Judy.

Hon. Margarett R. Best: Today I want to welcome Golf Road Junior Public School from the great riding of Scarborough–Guildwood to the Ontario Legislature. They are in the Legislature. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Jack MacLaren: I’d like to introduce my wife, Janet MacLaren. She’s here in the gallery. I brought her here today to prove I have a job here.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I’ll provide a Speaker’s note to that effect.

Introduction of guests?

Mrs. Teresa Piruzza: I have the privilege of introducing Kashtin Fitzsimmons and Holly Easton to the House today, who are here to watch the proceedings during question period. Welcome.

Mr. Rick Nicholls: It’s my pleasure to introduce to the Legislature this morning Mr. Jonathan Bosman. Jonathan is a regional facilitator for Gideons International in Canada.

Hon. Charles Sousa: It gives me great pleasure to introduce and welcome Fátima Mesquita from Brazil to the Legislature today. She’s been a new Canadian for over nine years. Thank you for being here.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Introduction of guests? The member from Mississauga–Streetsville.

Hon. Charles Sousa: Mr. Speaker, I’m waiting for yet another guest, but his father is here: Jeryl Jaque from Mississauga South–Lakeview. His son will be arriving in short order. His name is Charles-Etienne Jaque. Welcome to the Legislature. I look forward to having lunch with you today.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Let’s try that again: The member from Mississauga–Streetsville.

Mr. Bob Delaney: Thank you very much, Speaker. I have some very special guests to introduce today on behalf of page Alexander Ruddy, who is also the page captain today. I would like to introduce members of his family: Belva Cousens, John Cousens, Jane Cousens, Laura Cousens, Ethan Kerr, Jake Eadie, David Eadie, and of course I have a special guest, Don Cousens, a former assistant Speaker of the House and MPP from Markham from 1981 to 1994. Please welcome them all.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Mississauga–Streetsville did steal the Speaker’s thunder, but let’s make sure that this is official. The former member from Markham and York Centre in the 32nd, 33rd, 34th and 35th Parliaments is in the west gallery: Don Cousens. Welcome.

MINISTER’S COMMENTS

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): On Monday, March 26, 2012, the member from Cambridge, Mr. Leone, rose on a question of privilege concerning statements made by the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care in the course of her responses to oral questions in last Thursday’s question period.

The responses in question dealt with the minister’s ability to act during the election period on irregularities in the business practices and operations of the Ornge air ambulance service and with the role of her ministry on that file during the election period.

The member for Cambridge invited the Speaker to make a finding that the minister’s statements amounted to a prima facie case of contempt on the basis that the minister deliberately misled the House. The government House leader, Mr. Milloy, and the member for Simcoe–Grey, Mr. Wilson, also spoke to the matter.

Having had an opportunity to review last Thursday’s Hansard, the notice submitted by the member for Cambridge, the remarks of the members who spoke to the question of privilege, Tuesday’s attempt by the minister to clarify her responses and the parliamentary authorities, I am now prepared to rule on the matter.

As noted by the member for Cambridge, McGee’s Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand identifies what needs to be established for the Speaker to find a prima facie case of contempt based on a member deliberately misleading the House. Pages 653 and 654 of the third edition of this text states as follows:

“There are three elements to be established when it is alleged that a member is in contempt by reason of a statement that the member has made: The statement must, in fact, have been misleading; it must be established that the member making the statement knew at the time the statement was made that it was incorrect; and, in making it, the member must have intended to mislead the House. The standard of proof demanded is the civil standard of proof on a balance of probabilities but, given the serious nature of the allegations, proof of a very high order.

Recklessness in the use of words in debate, though reprehensible in itself, falls short of the standard required to hold a member responsible for deliberately misleading the House. The misleading of the House must not be concerned with a matter of such little or no consequence that is too trivial to warrant the House dealing with it. A misunderstanding of this nature should be cleared up on a point of order.

“For a misleading of the House to be deliberate, there must be something in the nature of the incorrect statement that indicates an intention to mislead. Remarks made off the cuff in debate can rarely fall into this category, nor can matters about which the member can be aware only in an official capacity. But where the member can be assumed to have personal knowledge of the stated facts and made the statement in a situation of some formality (for example, by way of personal explanation), a presumption of an intention to mislead the House will more readily arise.”

Satisfying the criteria to find a prima facie case of contempt based on a deliberately misleading statement to the House is difficult to do and rarely achieved. As Speaker Carr indicated in his ruling at page 102 of the journals for June 17, 2002:

“The threshold for finding a prima facie case of contempt against a member of the Legislature, on the basis of deliberately misleading the House, is therefore set quite high and is very uncommon. It must involve a proved finding of an overt attempt to intentionally mislead the Legislature. In the absence of an admission from the member accused of the conduct, or of tangible confirmation of the conduct, independently proved, a Speaker must assume that no honourable members would engage in such behaviour or that, at most, inconsistent statements were the result of inadvertence or honest mistake.”

In the case at hand, the minister indicated that she was standing for election during the election period and had not been sworn in, and that the ministry was operating in a caretaker role, making it inappropriate for the ministry to share the Auditor General’s draft report on Ornge with the minister during that period. She also indicated that “when a writ is dropped, the responsibility of the minister changes, and that the ministry is in charge of the operations.”

In a response to a subsequent question, she indicated that she took action shortly after she was sworn in as minister in October 2011. Finally, the minister indicated as follows:

“When the House is dissolved, when we are in that interim period between the writ dropping and the new cabinet being sworn in, there are limitations on the activities of ministers.... [W]hen I was sworn in as minister in October, after the election, I was made aware of the issues that were examined by the auditor and I became aware that the auditor was having trouble getting information from the people at Ornge, so I called the Auditor General and I asked him about that.”

Let me now assess these remarks. First, I accept that during the election period, the caretaker convention acts as a restraint on some governmental activities. That being said, it is not for the Speaker to decide or rule on the ambit and application of the convention, because Speakers traditionally avoid delving into constitutional and legal matters better left to governments, courts and litigants. Even if I could look into such matters, the minister’s remarks about the existence and the application of that convention in the case at hand stand uncontradicted and therefore do not satisfy the test set out in McGee’s text.

This brings me to the minister’s remarks to the effect that she was not sworn in during the election period, and that she was sworn in after the election. Many members, including myself, were surprised by these remarks. If the minister was referring to her not being resworn in as a minister until after the election, this does not detract from the fact that, based on her 2009 appointment as Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, she would still have been in charge of her ministry during the election period. She would have been in charge because ministers normally retain their ministerial status during the election period so that the province is never without a government.

The brevity or the incompleteness of the minister’s remarks on the matter of whether and when she was sworn in were unfortunate. She sought to rectify the confusion on Tuesday when she indicated that she had not intended to suggest that she was not the minister during the election period, or to suggest that she was not responsible for overseeing Ontario’s health care system during that period.

The important point about last Thursday’s remarks and Tuesday’s clarification was that the minister did not concede, and no one has established, that she both made and intended to make a misleading or incorrect statement, or that she both made and intended to make irreconcilable statements to the House.

Moreover, it is not enough to say that, in the cut and thrust of question period, a minister’s elaboration on, or clarification of, something the minister said earlier in question period points to a strategy of misleading the House. What we are left with, then, is a disagreement on the correct

interpretation to be placed on the minister’s words, and as to the nature and the application of the caretaker convention.

For the reasons I have indicated, the onerous threshold established by the parliamentary authorities on the subject of misleading statements has not been reached in the case at hand.

A prima facie case of contempt not having been established, I do thank the member from Cambridge for the very thoughtful submissions in his notice. I also thank him, the government House leader and the member from Simcoe–Grey for speaking to this matter.

ORAL QUESTIONS

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

Mr. Peter Shurman: Speaker, in the days, weeks and months before the budget was tabled, we saw the signs that the government was going to back down—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Which minister is getting the question?

Mr. Peter Shurman: Sorry; I didn’t say “To the Premier.”

To the Premier: In the days, weeks and months before the budget was tabled, we saw the signs that this government was going to back down and avoid taking the measures that are necessary to turn Ontario’s economy around and present a weak budget. They used the Drummond report to delay taking responsibility for their failed management of Ontario’s finances, and then subsequently dismissed their own economist’s recommendations for cutting government spending.

Speaker, the Premier spent another $2.5 billion he didn’t have, and the Premier said that $214 billion in debt was “not that bad.” Premier, just how deep does the debt have to go, how extensive does the deficit need to be, before your government finally stops your wasteful spending?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: I thank the honourable member for his question. Speaker, I have a concern—and I think it’s shared by more and more Ontarians—that Her Majesty’s loyal opposition keeps painting itself further and further into an ever-smaller corner of unreasonability.

Speaker, we introduced, just 48 hours ago, a budget of great significance. The budget documents themselves are 354 pages long. The budget bill itself is 355 pages long.

Former Premier and Finance Minister Ernie Eves said, “I think they made a step in the right direction. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that.” Janet Ecker, former Ontario finance minister and president of the Toronto Financial Services Alliance, said, “We strongly support their efforts to eliminate the deficit. It is an important step for Ontario’s future economic growth....”

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Peter Shurman: Speaker, two provinces released their budgets this past Tuesday. One province’s deficit was down; the other province’s deficit went up. One province is receiving $35 million less in equalization payments this year; the other province is receiving $1.1 billion more.

Given this government’s track record and spending habits, it’s not surprising that the province with the larger deficit and receiving more payments is Ontario. But I don’t know if anyone has ever expected to see the day that New Brunswick was better off financially than we are. How did your government manage to put Ontario in a position where New Brunswick is reducing its deficit and receiving less in transfer payments while Ontario’s deficit keeps going up and we’re getting $1 billion more in transfer payments?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: A couple of things, Speaker. First of all, I want to draw to my honourable colleague’s attention an important finding in the Drummond report. I forget exactly which page it appeared on, but he said specifically that in 2009, our relationship with the federal government cost the taxpayers of Ontario a net $12.3 billion. I’d recommend that to my honourable colleague.

But I want to get back to this point of the corner of unreasonability in which they continue to paint themselves. I have quotes here endorsing our budget from the Royal Bank of Canada, from TD Bank, from Scotiabank, from the Dominion Bond Rating Service, from BMO Nesbitt Burns, from the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, from the Certified Management Accountants of Ontario, from the Ontario General Contractors Association, and a host of others.

Again, I say to my honourable colleague opposite, they have time to reconsider, Speaker. Nobody in the province of Ontario is looking for an election. We’re looking for a way for all of us to work together and to move forward—

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

Mr. Peter Shurman: Premier, since you don’t seem to want to face facts, I’ll give you the answer; it’s simple. Your out-of-control spending continues. Your own economist said spending increases have to be held to 0.8%. You failed to do that. Instead of cutting your spending, you’re spending more than you did last year. You claim you will save $17.7 billion, but your additional spending adds up to $18 billion over five years. What is the Premier going to do, Speaker, to make up for this $18-billion hole?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, again, my honourable colleague is part of a political movement which has very, very little support in terms of their determination to cause an election within six months of the very last election.

I would bring to my honourable colleague’s attention some of the measures in our budget which I think are going to be very important for them to consider. We reduce our spending by nearly $18 billion. We tackle compensation in a firm but fair way. They ask that we take into account wages. We’re doing more than that. We’re tackling both wages and benefits, and then we’re going beyond that to deal with a very thorny issue, and that is the whole notion of public sector pensions.

Again, I say to my honourable colleagues opposite, don’t marginalize yourselves. Be part of the—

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

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Let’s maintain momentum. Let’s—

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

GOVERNMENT SPENDING

Mr. Peter Shurman: Back to the Premier, Speaker. You know, there’s only one person in this entire Legislature who, if an election should eventuate, is responsible, and that’s Premier McGuinty.

Ontarians were counting on this government to take real action to turn Ontario around. Our party made a series of recommendations to reduce the government’s spending, but they were all rejected. Instead, we see that the government will spend more, not less—billions more, in fact: Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs, up; Ministry of Consumer Services, up; Ministry of Finance, up; Ministry of the Attorney General, up; 14 out of 24 ministries, up. Is it any wonder that when you finally get to the line item, “interest on debt,” it’s up?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, it’s become clear that the—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Be seated, please. Attorney General, come to order. Come to order.

The member from Nepean–Carleton, please do not ignore me when I say, “Come to order.”

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: Sorry, Speaker, I didn’t know it was you.

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

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, the—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member for Peterborough is not helping.

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: The party to the right of us says that we are not moving aggressively enough; the party to the left of us says that we are moving too aggressively. That tells us, Speaker, that we probably have it just about right.

We’re holding our spending, over the course of the next three years, at 1%. The Drummond commission recommended that we hold our health care spending at 2.5%; we’re bringing it in at 2.1%. In the past, we were spending around 6% in health on an annual basis.

We are doing everything, Speaker, from tackling compensation to reducing the office space used by our public servants by one million square feet to reducing the number of workers in the OPS by some 4,900. It’s a balanced and reasonable and thoughtful budget.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Peter Shurman: Speaker, the budget that this government presented on Tuesday shows that they just don’t get it. As the old saying goes, “Denial is not a river in Egypt.” This government doesn’t want to comprehend just how deep a hole they’ve dug this province into.

Our province is in historic debt and a deficit that equals three times the total of every other province combined. Your answer to that is to spend $1.7 million per hour more than what we take in in revenue. Any reasonable person understands that to control debt, you have to rein in spending. You didn’t do that; you decided to spend more instead. We’ll go $1.75 million further into debt in this one hour of question period.

How much worse does it have to get before we finally see you take some responsible action and rein the spending in?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Again, I say to my honourable colleague that the former leader of the Conservative Party, the former Premier of the province of Ontario, in fact, disagrees with him. Mr. Tory just yesterday said—another leader of their party, Speaker; I’m sure they’d be interested in this—“I hope there is no election. I think that would be a waste of time and money, given everything.”

I say to my honourable colleagues in Her Majesty’s official opposition that they give careful consideration as to whether or not the people of Ontario want to be plunged into another election within six months of the last one. If they are truly committed to strengthening our economy, if they’re truly committed to a determined recovery, how is it that they think that a provincial election is going to contribute to that in any way, shape or form, Speaker? I ask them to consider that.

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

Mr. Peter Shurman: I say again, Speaker, that any election is on him.

You have not reduced the deficit, sir, and you are not creating jobs. The 2011 deficit is $15 billion; the 2012 deficit is $15.3 billion. You have put Ontario on a disastrous path to a $30-billion deficit, and your broken promises will cost our province 30,000 jobs.

The Ontario PC Party cannot support a $30-billion deficit. We cannot support more debt. We cannot—and we will not—support a further 30,000 job losses.

How can you stand here today and pretend that this budget makes tough choices when the deficit is increasing, when spending is increasing and when debt is increasing?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, I don’t understand the 30,000 job losses. I think it’s a matter of fiction.

Again, if they have a written plan, Speaker, if they have a written plan they’re prepared to put forward, I’d like to see that. I want to repeat: The budget documents that we put out 48 hours ago are 350 pages; the budget bill itself is over 350 pages.

I say to my honourable colleague once again, I’d ask them to take the time to be reflective, to give some serious consideration to the substantive elements that we’ve introduced by means of this budget. It does protect health care, it does protect education, it does balance the budget and it does build a foundation for jobs and growth.

JOB CREATION

Ms. Andrea Horwath: My question is for the Premier. New Democrats have asked Ontarians to join us in giving the budget some very serious consideration, and I want to share some of their thoughts.

Richard from London told us that the budget, “has done nothing to address the lack of jobs in Ontario. The lack of opportunity for young people in Ontario will have a lasting effect on the entire economy.”

In the lead-up to the budget, I put forward some concrete plans to link tax relief to job creation and training.

What does the Premier say to people like Richard who want to see action on jobs in this budget?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, I appreciate the question. Jobs are a very big component of this budget. There is a southwestern Ontario economic development fund, which I would encourage my honourable colleague to support. We had some great news in the auto sector just yesterday with Toyota announcing 400 new jobs, Ford announcing 100 new jobs and General Motors announcing 300 new jobs. I’m pleased to say, Speaker, that in every instance, we have been partnering with those companies.

I remind my honourable colleague as well that an important dimension of this budget is our new jobs and prosperity fund. It will be some $2 billion. We look forward to working with the opposition to lend focus and strategic purpose to that to ensure that it is in fact creating new jobs and enhancing our productivity.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Well, New Democrats and Ontarians disagree; we watched 4,000 jobs leave this province last month.

David from Oshawa says this, Speaker: “As a young person (age 23) with a university education, I have been unable to find a well-paying job. I find that most jobs are low paying or part-time for young people like myself, and this budget does not address this key issue....

“I was hoping to see some sort of job creation measures in this budget and was sorely disappointed that it was not addressed.”

This budget contained a lot of bad news for people, Speaker, particularly those people who are worried about jobs.

Is this Premier willing to consider changes that would actually give Ontarians like David some help and some hope?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: We are open to reasonable amendments that do not compromise our three overarching goals. First of all, we must balance the budget in 2017-18. Secondly, we must protect health care and education. Thirdly, we must build a stronger foundation for new jobs and new growth.

There is no receptivity on this part over here on this side of the aisle for new spending. I must make that perfectly clear to my honourable colleagues opposite. We’ve worked long and hard to bring forward a budget that is responsible, that puts some specific restrictions on new spending.

So there’s no room for new spending—I’ve got to make that clear—but if there’s other things beyond those measures that help us meet our objectives, then we’re more than open.

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

Ms. Andrea Horwath: James from North Bay wrote: “They should be using” Ontario Northland “as a strategic asset to grow the north and not sell it off for their bottom line. Doing this will cripple the north and have a much larger effect than the 1,000 ONTC jobs.”

A job strategy should leverage our assets, like Ontario Northland, to create jobs all across Ontario.

In the lead-up to the budget, I put forward some concrete ideas to create prosperity and jobs in the north.

Is the Premier willing to consider changes that create jobs and give people like James some hope for the future?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: We remain open; we will not back away from the decision we made with respect to ONTC.

I will remind my honourable colleague that we’re going to continue to invest over $30 billion in infrastructure over the course of the next three years. That will create, on average, 100,000 jobs every year. Our healthy homes renovation tax credit will create 10,500 jobs every year. Our OLG modernization plan will create some 6,000 new jobs. Our Ring of Fire development—we’re talking about 1,500 permanent jobs there. The Pan Am athletes’ village—some 5,200 jobs. And there’s a lot more. In fact, building jobs and creating jobs is an important component of this budget.

HEALTH CARE

Ms. Andrea Horwath: My next question is also for the Premier. People are worried about jobs, but the state of our health care concerns them as well.

Martin from Toronto is worried about the impact of frozen budgets on our hospitals. He writes, “Health care is important to every one of us since we all have someone who at one time or another is benefiting from our health care system.”

I’ve put forward some concrete ideas about changing our health care system to ensure that it’s there for people who need it when they need it. Is the Premier ready to address the concerns of people like Martin?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Again, I want to make it as clear as I can: We’re open to positive, constructive proposals, but we’re not open to new spending. We’ve got to balance that budget in 2017-18, we’ve got to protect health care and education and we’ve got to build a new foundation for jobs and growth. Those are the simple parameters. Those are the overarching goals. Those are the unwavering objectives that we will achieve and that we’re absolutely committed to.

Beyond that, I tell my honourable colleague again that in fact we’re increasing spending for health care—that’s one of our priority areas—by 2.1%. We’re going to do that in the smartest way possible. We want to begin to shift some of the increase in spending away from hospital-based care to community care, including home care. That’s something that we committed to in the campaign, and I know that’s something that my honourable colleague supports: more investment in more home care. I think we’re increasing our home care budget by some 4%. That’s a significant increase.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Andrea Horwath: People who contacted us have expressed real concern about CEO salaries. This budget does nothing to curb outrageous CEO bonuses and lavish perks. It’s a bitter pill for everyday Ontarians to swallow service cuts while CEOs get richer and richer and richer on the public dime.

Gavin from Point Edward writes this: “I was disappointed that there was no cap on CEO bonus[es] ... especially in the health field.”

What does the Premier say to people like Gavin?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Again, I say to my honourable colleague, I know that she’s been very determined on this issue and consistent, and I commend her for that. But I’d ask her to consider what we’ve done in the budget. We’ll freeze executive compensation for two more years, for a total of four years. We’re requiring that the boards of directors benchmark their salaries internally against public sector comparables around the country. We also say that when it comes to bonusing and the like, that they abide by certain restrictions that we put in place.

Having said that, if my honourable colleague has other considerations that she’d like us to put forward, other considerations that do not cost Ontario taxpayers any money, then we’re very open to considering those.

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

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Well, I look forward to the government looking at public sector comparables, particularly in health care around the country. It’s something that we advise.

Rebecca, a nurse from Sarnia, writes this: “I am really worried that the first cuts to be made to health care will be nurse layoffs. There is so much other waste in health care that it upsets me that we are often seen as a drain on the system and not an asset.”

Carlo from eastern Ontario is blunter. He says the government is “trying to make the poor pay for the mistakes ... [like] Ornge and eHealth.”

People see tough times ahead for our health system. Is the Premier ready to consider changes that will actually help build for our future for a healthy health care system?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: That’s exactly what we’re doing. And as much as possible, we want to protect those jobs, because that’s the way that we protect the quality of services for the people of Ontario.

You’ll know, for example, Speaker, that one of the things that Don Drummond’s commission has recommended is that we abandon full-day kindergarten. There are some 10,000 jobs that we would have lost doing that—and removing our cap from class sizes. He also recommended that we get rid of some 11,000 educational support workers. That’s 20,000 jobs-plus. We said that we’re not going to do that because that’s going to compromise the quality of education that we deliver to our children.

We’re going to bring the same perspective to health care as well. Our determination is to maintain jobs for our nurses so they can continue to provide great, quality service to our patients.

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

Mr. Taras Natyshak: My question is to the Premier. After the Auditor General found that the government had ignored the warning signs at Ornge, your government House leader tried to blame this inaction on the opposition; and your Minister of Health blamed everyone and everything, from the provincial election to the charitable status of the organization.

Does the Premier agree that his government’s response is irresponsible, unbecoming of his ministers or just plain sad?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: To the Minister of Community and Social Services.

Hon. John Milloy: Members will be interested to know that yesterday, the public accounts committee had a chance to question both the minister, the deputy minister and Mr. McKerlie, the acting head of Ornge, for over two and a half hours. It was an opportunity to start to ask some of the detailed questions that members have been asking back and forth. And those questions, Mr. Speaker—many of them have been about when briefings were received, when letters were received.

The only point that I’m making to my colleague from the New Democratic Party is that we had to hear for weeks and weeks about a letter that the minister received in January, and yet at the same time, the NDP forgot to tell us that they received a similar letter about two months earlier.

So I see the public accounts committee has a chance to clear the air on many of these issues.

Supplementary?

Mr. Taras Natyshak: Two years ago, members of this Legislature asked the right questions on Ornge, like why Chris Mazza’s salary was hidden from the public record. But we received no response from the minister.

Here’s what the Deputy Minister of Health said yesterday in that very same committee: “I think that what’s clear is that … the ministry has not followed its own procedures.”

Premier, why aren’t you asking your minister, who didn’t do her job, to resign?

Hon. John Milloy: I know the members of the committee will be anxious to speak about this. In December 2010, December 15, the leader of the New Democratic Party—and it was c.c.’d to the member from Nickel Belt—received a detailed letter about Ornge that they’ve never raised—no questions were raised. It talked about a number—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Please.

Hon. John Milloy: Mr. Speaker, yesterday at public accounts there was an opportunity to talk to the Minister of Health, the deputy minister and Mr. McKerlie, the acting head of Ornge. I’m pleased to report my understanding is that public accounts will be sitting—it’s now on Wednesdays that it sits. It will be sitting over the next number of weeks to continue to look into Ornge. I think all members would join with me in hoping that the discussion at the committee looks at a whole range of issues.

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

Mrs. Teresa Piruzza: My question is to the Minister of Economic Development and Innovation. Minister, the manufacturing sector in southwestern Ontario has felt the economic crush of the recession much deeper and longer than many other areas of the province. In my riding, many of my constituents once worked in the auto sector in many plants across the region.

Since the recession jobs have been harder to find, but my constituents and neighbours aren’t giving up hope. Many of my constituents are thankful for the investments made by this government that have kept the auto industry afloat during the toughest of days.

Will the Minister of Economic Development and Innovation please tell this House about the state of the auto industry today and give reason for my constituents to keep their optimism alive?

Hon. Brad Duguid: Ontario is home to five of the world’s top automakers. Within hours of our budget being released, three of those companies announced over 800 new jobs for Ontario workers in southwestern Ontario and the Niagara region.

Four hundred jobs will be added to the Toyota plant in Woodstock, where they’ll build the highly successful RAV4. The investments we made with Toyota are certainly paying off.

In Essex, Ford announced 100 new jobs and a third shift at their engine plant, where they produce motors for the highly popular F-150 pickup truck. Ford said the announcement would not have been possible without the strong support and leadership of our Premier, Dalton McGuinty. And GM just announced 300 jobs at its new six-speed transmission line in St. Catharines.

Mr. Speaker, Ontario’s auto sector is growing stronger and that’s great news for our economy and great news for Ontario workers.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mrs. Teresa Piruzza: I would agree with the minister. As a Liberal from Windsor, I’m proud to be part of a party that continues to stand behind our auto sector and create thousands of jobs in the process. It’s particularly exciting news about the expansion at Ford; to the Minister of Environment’s constituents about the GM transmission line; and I’m sure the member from Oxford would agree that the 400 jobs announced by Toyota will be welcome in his riding as well.

But it does concern me that the party opposite isn’t in line with our investments in the auto sector. In fact, they’ve referred to them as corporate welfare and the picking of winners and losers. That’s not very welcome language when talking about companies investing millions of dollars in our province.

Can the Minister of Economic Development and Innovation please inform this House why these investments are so critical to our job—

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

Hon. Brad Duguid: Ontario’s auto sector employs nearly 485,000 people and contributes at least $20 billion to our economy. The auto industry’s now bouncing back, and that’s great news for Ontario workers in southwestern Ontario and right across the province.

The investments the McGuinty government made in support of the auto sector during the heat of the recession helped save those 485,000 jobs. The Institute for Research on Public Policy called our auto sector investments a “smart one-time move” that saved the government billions of dollars in the long run.

I’m glad, Mr. Speaker, that we chose to ignore the advice of the Leader of the Opposition and the PC Party, who did not support those critical investments. I’m sure Ontario workers are glad it was us calling the shots on those investment decisions and not the PC Party.

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

Mrs. Elizabeth Witmer: My question is for the Premier. Yesterday at the public accounts committee, the deputy minister insisted that there’s nothing in the auditor’s report to indicate that a life was put at risk due to delayed or cancelled emergency aircraft. However, on page 38 of the auditor’s report, the auditor states, “We found that Ornge internally reported 20 ‘significant patient adverse events’ in 2009-10 to its board of directors, including some that”—unfortunately—“involved patient deaths.”

It is troubling that the individual the Premier has asked to oversee fixing Ornge could have missed such critical information. Does the Premier now recognize the need for a select committee on Ornge to hear from front-line staff and fix the problem?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, to the Minister of Community and Social Services.

Hon. John Milloy: As I mentioned in my previous answer, I think members will be pleased that the public accounts committee has had an opportunity to begin their hearings. They began yesterday with a session with the Auditor General and yesterday afternoon the minister, the deputy minister and Mr. McKerlie, the acting chief of Ornge, were able to be there. They talked at public accounts of the action that the minister took when she learned of wrongdoing. She of course, Mr. Speaker, called in forensic auditors, called in the police. She replaced the board, the CEO. Mr. McKerlie’s now the acting chief. She replaced the performance agreement and she introduced tough new legislation.

In terms of committee hearings, Mr. Speaker, public accounts will continue to look into this. My understanding is there’s a robust list of witnesses—

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

Mrs. Elizabeth Witmer: Well, Mr. Speaker, I would again take the question to the Premier. It was, I will tell you, very troubling yesterday to hear the deputy minister say that no lives had been put at risk or was there any cause for concern about patient safety. So I think if we’re going to restore public confidence, which has now been shattered by the minister and the government that ignored problems at Ornge for many years and were brought to our attention by front-line staff, we believe it’s critical that we have a forum where these individuals could speak freely, without fear of reprisals or threats of lawsuits.

I ask the Premier today: Will he appoint a select committee and will he demand that the health minister resign?

Hon. John Milloy: With the greatest respect to the member from Kitchener–Waterloo, I think she is doing a disservice to the public accounts committee of this Legislature. The public accounts committee is a committee traditionally, as it is in this case, chaired by the opposition. It has members from all parties who have come together to agree to look into the Ornge situation. Mr. Speaker, the public accounts committee has all the powers of a legislative committee in terms of calling witnesses and in terms of calling for papers.

I would also point out that at the public accounts committee, witnesses that appear in front of it enjoy the type of privileges and immunities of witnesses appearing before all public committees, standing committees, of this House. I know, Mr. Speaker, the member would in no way want to suggest that the witnesses that will be appearing do not enjoy those privileges.

Mr. Speaker, the public accounts committee is the forum to look into Ornge and—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thank you. The member for Nickel Belt.

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

M me France Gélinas: Ma question est pour le premier ministre. In March 2010, two years ago, New Democrats filed a freedom-of-information request asking why Mr. Chris Mazza’s salary was being hidden from the public. The response we received—and that was confirmed yesterday at public accounts—said that 32 records were found, but none were shared with us. Then, in November 2010, we asked again, during estimates, why were the executive salaries at Ornge hidden? The response, Mr. Speaker, was filed yesterday while we were in committee.

Can the Premier explain why his health ministry only requested to see the salaries in December 2011?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, to the Minister of Health.

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Thank you to the member opposite, who was of course in the committee yesterday looking at issues related to Ornge. I was very pleased to appear before that committee, Speaker.

Here are the facts: Within eight weeks of my becoming aware of the draft Auditor General’s report, I had a forensic audit team on the ground at Ornge going through every piece of paper at Ornge. Within three weeks following that, a new interim CEO, Mr. Ron McKerlie, was in place. Two weeks after that, a new board, a very high-calibre new board, was in place. The new leadership team has taken significant action to focus on issues around patient safety.

I was at Ornge this morning, Speaker. I spoke to the front-line workers and I also spoke to the board, and I’m happy to talk more about that in the—

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

M me France Gélinas: Well, the minister kept increasing the budget of Ornge year after year, without asking them to disclose any salary paid to their top executives. The government is looking to blame a faulty performance agreement, but not only did they already have the possibility to look at Ornge’s books, this agreement was modified several times since 2005.

Was the reason that no one asked about the executive salaries at Ornge because high pay for CEOs and well-connected insiders is the norm with this ministry and this government?

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Speaker, I completely reject the insinuation of the member opposite. The Attorney General has acknowledged that we have taken substantive, concrete action when it comes to Ornge. He has described the changes at Ornge as a sea change. The member from Newmarket–Aurora, not the greatest champion of the folks at Ornge, has acknowledged that the ministry intervened very aggressively.

This morning at Ornge, I spoke to front-line staff who are delighted with the changes that have happened at Ornge, Speaker. I met with the new board, where they reiterated their top priority under the leadership of Dr. Barry McLellan, the issues of patient safety. They are winding down the for-profits; some have already been wound down. Things are changing at Ornge, and the people of this province are the beneficiaries of that change.

INFRASTRUCTURE

PROGRAM FUNDING

Mr. Mario Sergio: My question is for the Minister of Transportation and Infrastructure. Minister, I was pleased to see in Tuesday’s budget that although there will be some modest decreases in infrastructure spending over the next six years, the government will continue to maintain a very robust public infrastructure investment program. I’m pleased because we have seen that properly leveraged, healthy investments in infrastructure create jobs in communities like mine and across Ontario.

The new engineering and science building at York University is a great example of a great project that will likewise generate a lasting economic and social benefit as we educate the next generation of Ontario engineers and scientists in my riding of York West.

Minister—through you, Speaker—can you share the long-term outlook, how it is for further investment in building job-creating—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thank you. Minister of Transportation.

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: I want to thank the member for raising an important question. The fact is, there were some very difficult decisions to make. Yes, there is some reprofiling of some future projects, but the member is absolutely right: We are retaining an exceptionally robust infrastructure program, with $12.9 billion on the table for the coming year and more than $35 billion over the next three years. To put that in perspective, those investments will create and preserve over 100,000 Ontario jobs in each of the next three years.

The member mentioned York University, a great example where upwards of 1,200 jobs in the construction trades are being created as a result of this investment.

So the longer-term outlook is very positive, both for jobs and continued investment in building stronger communities. A robust infrastructure program, Speaker, creates jobs, but every dollar—

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

Mr. Mario Sergio: Minister, thank you. I’ve heard from many people in the building community who believe that the budget reflected the right choices and the right priorities for Ontario as we eliminate the deficit, protect our gains in health care and education and create jobs. These are people who collectively invest billions in our economy and employ thousands of Ontarians.

They likewise find the position and priorities of the Leader of the Opposition recently rather troubling. They cannot understand why the PC Party would make the choice to oppose the budget before they had even read it.

Again, through you, Mr. Speaker, to the minister, when it comes to making responsible job-creation investments in infrastructure, will the minister continue to seek the advice of the people who actually work in that sector, people whose jobs—

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

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: Absolutely, Mr. Speaker. We already listened to the infrastructure business sectors, and they have applauded our budget.

I’m proud of the major projects that we are moving forward with, which unfortunately the PC Party has decided to vote against. Many of these projects are in their very own communities.

In Simcoe North, we are going to continue moving forward with the Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care in Penetanguishene. In Durham and Oshawa, we are going to continue moving forward with the 407 east extension, which is going to create about 13,000 jobs, Speaker, most of them local. In Whitby–Oshawa, we are going to continue moving forward with widening Highway 7. In Kitchener–Waterloo, we will move forward with the new Global Innovation Exchange for business and mathematics at Wilfrid Laurier University.

It’s just disappointing, Mr. Speaker, that we will be creating jobs in those ridings held by PC members who will vote to kill those jobs.

AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE

Mr. Toby Barrett: Speaker, to the Premier: Yesterday at the public accounts committee, the Minister of Health indicated that because Ornge is a federally regulated charity, it’s off limits to her oversight. So, now that she has declared federally regulated charities off limits to the provincial government, does that mean WSIB can’t go in and audit them to ensure proper deductions are being made, or the Ontario Securities Commission can’t ensure that investments comply with Ministry of Finance guidelines? Is the Ministry of Revenue restricted from auditing Ornge to ensure OHIP deductions are being properly made?

Do you really expect people to believe your lame excuse that you had no oversight abilities for Ornge because it was a federally regulated charity?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: To the Minister of Health.

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Now, I am no lawyer, Speaker, but I have received advice from legal counsel on this issue. The member opposite should know that what we’re talking about is the incorporation status. We’re not talking about registered charities; we’re talking about where the incorporation of the entity is. We are changing that. We are changing the performance agreement, we have changed the performance agreement, and we—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): We’re getting into the yelling again.

Minister.

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Speaker, we took decisive action. One of the pieces—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Member for Northumberland, come to order.

Hon. Deborah Matthews: —to recall is to change the incorporation status from a federally incorporated organization to something under the Ontario—as an Ontario-registered incorporated organization.

What is important to the people of this province is that we are bringing far more transparency and oversight. I will be able—

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

Mr. Toby Barrett: Speaker, this Minister of Health’s excuse she could do nothing about Ornge because it is a federally regulated charity is pathetic. It is particularly so because in the next breath, she tries to take credit for intervening at Ornge.

For weeks, she has been saying she should not be fired because she took action to get the board to resign. Just yesterday, we learned that she had done nothing to get the board to resign. The deputy minister told public accounts, “The board agreed to resign on their own volition.” The minister is starting to get quite a track record of inaccurate things she is telling this House. How is it—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I would caution the member of trying to say something that you can’t say as unparliamentary language, and I ask him to be cautious of that, please.

Mr. Toby Barrett: Thank you for the caution.

How is it that even the board at Ornge had the integrity to know when to throw in the towel and resign, but you don’t?

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Speaker, my job as the Minister of Health is to fix the problems as they arise, and I have done exactly that.

We are moving forward with important changes at Ornge. With the new legislation, if it passes, we will be able to send in a supervisor as soon as the public interest, we feel, is threatened. Under the new performance agreement and under the new legislation, we will have much stricter oversight of Ornge. There will be much higher transparency and, most importantly, we will have a rigorous quality improvement and quality reporting system.

We are making the changes at Ornge. I wish the member opposite would support us as we make these changes.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: My question is to the Premier. In the middle of a province-wide social assistance review, the McGuinty government has unilaterally decided to delay the rollout of the Ontario child benefit, to freeze social assistance rates and to cut funding for emergency home repairs for people most vulnerable on social assistance. Why is this government undermining its own social assistance review process by unilaterally imposing these changes?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: Speaker, I appreciate the question and the opportunity to speak to this very important issue. As I said a number of times, we’ve worked really hard to put together a budget that reflects the values of Ontarians, and Ontarians want to do what they can to help children who are growing up in poor families. That’s why we created the Ontario child benefit in the first instance. It’s the only benefit of its kind in the country, I am very proud to say. In 2007, when we began, it was $250 on an annual basis; today it’s almost $100 every month.

Our commitment is to increase it to $1,310. We decided that we can’t afford to do it all at once, so we’re going to increase it by $100 next year and $100 the year after that. I think that’s fair, it’s balanced, it’s responsible, and it’s reflective of our continuing commitment as a society to build a caring society.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Cheri DiNovo: Again to the Premier: The Premier will know that under his watch over the last eight years, poverty rates have soared in this province. But we’re hearing from hundreds of people across Ontario who are concerned about this government making it harder for people, so let’s listen to their voices.

These are some of their stories: Mazen from Mississauga asks why the Ontario government is “targeting the poor.” Andrea from London says, “Welfare and child benefits are essential for supporting vulnerable populations.”

Can the Premier explain—not to us, Mr. Speaker, but to Mazen and Andrea—why his government is making it harder for families to afford nutritious food or a decent place to live?

Hon. Dalton McGuinty: To the Minister of Children and Youth Services.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Thank you for the question. I’m happy to speak to it. I have to disagree, of course, with the member opposite. Perhaps she wasn’t listening to the answer that I gave yesterday, where it indicated that in the first year of our poverty reduction strategy, we actually lifted 20,000 children out of poverty.

I’m going to quote an organization that she knows well, an organization called the 25 in 5 Network for Poverty Reduction. In the annual report this government released last December, that organization said: “The first lesson to be learned is that a government commitment matched by good policy can make a big difference in people’s lives....

“In Ontario, child poverty actually fell between 2008 and 2009, inching down from” 15% to 14%.

“In Alberta, for example, child poverty soared by 25 per cent in the same period. What’s the difference? Ontario took concrete action to reduce child poverty.” That was from the 25 in 5 Network for Poverty Reduction.

POST-SECONDARY EDUCATION

Ms. Dipika Damerla: My question is for the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities. Speaker, as an Ontarian and as a Liberal I’m really proud that Ontario leads the OECD when it comes to post-secondary attainment. This is because of the hard work and investment that the Liberal government has put in, in the last eight years, to make our post-secondary education of the highest quality, to make it accessible and to make it affordable.

But there are people now saying that because these are tough times, maybe we should hold back a little. I disagree with that, Mr. Speaker, because I think the single most important thing we can do for our youth today is to continue to invest in post-secondary education so that we can all have a prosperous Ontario for generations to come.

Can the minister tell me what he’s planning to do to ensure that low- to middle-income families can continue to have—

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

Hon. Glen R. Murray: I want to thank my friend for the question. Our government is trying to address a serious challenge. Many middle-class and low-income families right now have two, three, sometimes four young people graduating from high school, entering colleges or universities or the trades. This puts an enormous stress on that.

In the last election, Premier McGuinty, listening to people, and my predecessor, the member for Kitchener, developed an idea which I think has been a very responsive and precise one, which is to offer