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May 7, 2019

42nd Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcript 2019-May-07 (PDF)

L102 - Tue 7 May 2019 / Mar 7 mai 2019

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Tuesday 7 May 2019 Mardi 7 mai 2019

Notice of reasoned amendment

Orders of the Day

Fixing the Hydro Mess Act, 2019 / Loi de 2019 pour réparer le gâchis dans le secteur de l’électricité

Notices of reasoned amendment

Introduction of Visitors

Oral Questions

Health care funding

Child care

Education funding

Nurses

Government spending

Mental health and addiction services

Autism treatment

Fundraising

Dental care

Legal aid

Addiction services

Red tape reduction

Tree planting

Asthma

Research and innovation

Notice of dissatisfaction

Report, Integrity Commissioner

York Memorial Collegiate Institute

Members’ Statements

Noront ferrochrome facility

Asian Heritage Month

School nutrition programs

GO Transit maintenance facility

Climate change

Contaminated soil

Names

Nordion

Chinese community

Adjournment debate

Reports by Committees

Standing Committee on Government Agencies

Introduction of Bills

Oil, Gas and Salt Resources Amendment Act (Anti-Fracking), 2019 / Loi de 2019 modifiant la

Loi sur les ressources en pétrole, en gaz et en sel (anti-fracturation)

Speaking Out About Workplace Violence and Workplace Harassment Act, 2019 / Loi de 2019 sur la dénonciation de la violence au travail et du harcèlement au travail

Statements by the Ministry and Responses

Mental health and addiction services

Petitions

Education funding

Lupus

Long-term care

Emergency services

School facilities

Tuition

Education funding

Education funding

Long-term care

Autism treatment

Tuition

School facilities

Injured workers

Child care workers

Orders of the Day

Fixing the Hydro Mess Act, 2019 / Loi de 2019 pour réparer le gâchis dans le secteur de l’électricité

Adjournment Debate

Education funding

Public transit

Tree planting

The House met at 0900.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Let us pray.

Prayers.

Notice of reasoned amendment

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Before I call orders of the day, I beg to inform the House that pursuant to standing order 71(c), the member for Guelph has filed with the Clerk a reasoned amendment to the motion for second reading of Bill 108,

An Act to amend various statutes with respect to housing, other development and various other matters. The order for second reading of Bill 108 may therefore not be called today.

Orders of the Day

Fixing the Hydro Mess Act, 2019 / Loi de 2019 pour réparer le gâchis dans le secteur de l’électricité

Resuming the debate adjourned on May 2, 2019, on the motion for third reading of the following bill:

Bill 87,

An Act to amend various statutes related to energy / Projet de loi 87, Loi modifiant diverses lois en ce qui concerne l’énergie.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Further debate?

Mr. Will Bouma: It’s a great honour to be able to rise today and speak about Bill 87, fixing the hydro mess, and to speak on behalf of the people of my riding of Brantford–Brant about this very important initiative.

First off, I would like to thank the Minister of Energy, Northern Development and Mines for this bill. It will undo the mess created by the previous government. I also want to thank the parliamentary assistants for working on this bill. Thank you very much for all of your hard work.

Speaker, Bill 87 focuses on a few areas of concern. It focuses on energy conservation, it focuses on modernizing the Ontario Energy Board, and it talks about changes to the rate structure and how we finance some of the horrendous policies that were brought in by the previous government.

The first thing that we see in this bill is how we deal with energy conservation. Without a doubt, there is a real role for conservation in the energy sector. This is crucial and it is something that consumers and all of us focus on daily. Part of the reason we focus on it so much is because of the horrific cost of electricity that was burdened on us by the previous government and that forced Ontarians into looking at different alternatives. There are some programs that work and there are many others that do not work, and that is what we, as a government, have looked at.

We looked at how the financing of this was handled. Under this bill, we’re eliminating those energy conservation programs that don’t make sense, the ones that are too costly, that cost the ratepayers more than the benefit they get back.

These changes will have no impact on the environment. Over 95% of Ontario’s electricity is already produced greenhouse-gas-free thanks to its reliance on nuclear and hydro generation. Of course, a couple of decades ago, Ontario began a process of phasing out coal. We think back to Progressive Conservative governments of old who started that process, and, in fairness to the now independent members who ran under the Liberal banner, a continuation of that policy was probably the only thing that they did right in the energy sector over those 15 years. It has put Ontario in a really good position. We can now boast that our electricity system is 95% GHG-free, and I think that’s pretty impressive.

Our government has decided that we need to centralize many of these energy conservation programs. We’ve decided we have to eliminate the ones that don’t make sense and focus on where the demand is the greatest, where the need is the greatest with respect to programs that actually work. We’ve also lifted the program up to the IESO. The reason we’ve done that is so that we can centralize and have a more focused program, a program that allows our local distribution companies access and we can work through the IESO so that demand and conservation work together and not against each other. The outcome of this is going to be saving somewhere in the neighbourhood of $442 million.

Some will say that that seems to be a very practical approach and that conservation should work closely with generation so that trying to do the right thing does not add additional cost to the ratepayer. Mr. Speaker, this is our approach. This government is working closely with our small, medium, and large job creators. Despite the fact that we’ve had tremendous job gains since this government took office, removing red tape is equally as important. But the high cost of energy in Ontario is something that we all, on all sides of this House, continue to hear about over and over again.

Now, let us look at some of the benefits of transitioning this program. It has been estimated that by doing this, some of our small, medium, and our medium-large job creators could save somewhere between $15,000 and $30,000 a month in electricity costs. Let that sink in: $15,000 to $30,000 a month in savings. Think of what this can do for businesses like Patriot Forge in Brantford, who heavily rely on electricity for production.

Speaker, I want to move now to the OEB, the Ontario Energy Board. We are making some changes to the Ontario Energy Board. If there is one board that requires change, it is the Ontario Energy Board. Our proposal would establish a new governance structure, including a board of directors and a CEO to better separate the board’s management, administration and adjudicative responsibilities.

It seems that every time a request for a rate increase has been submitted to the Ontario Energy Board, the OEB grants that request. We must change this. We want to restore the independence of the Ontario Energy Board, and that’s what this bill does. We separate the adjudication functions from the administrative functions, and that’s crucially important, but it’s important because not only does there need to be oversight, but there needs to be a clear distinction between the two.

Now, we’ve heard time and time again about the outrageous amounts of paperwork that are required for OEB decisions. This government has had local distribution companies come to us and tell us that for even the smallest of applications thousands of pages of documentation have to be put together; thousands of hours of staff time have to be utilized in order to get even the simplest of decisions. This is completely inefficient and completely not acceptable.

When we ask a local distribution company to come before the OEB and the company has to provide thousands of pages of documents, it’s us, it’s we, the ratepayers, who are paying for it. The ratepayers are the ones who end up paying for it. This is why we are making changes to the Ontario Energy Board. We will be streamlining the processes and separating the administrative and adjudicative functions within the Ontario Energy Board. We have listened and we are making the proper efficiencies.

Now, Speaker, let’s talk about the previous Liberal government’s disastrous Green Energy Act. I’m happy to say that we cancelled this failure of a plan. Some people may say that it was short-sighted of us to cancel it, that it was wrong of us to cancel 700 power contracts, but, Speaker, it was 700 power projects that we did not need in Ontario, and it was almost $1 billion worth of contracts that we could not afford.

I can recall reading a column by my colleague the MPP from Haldimand–Norfolk in the Simcoe Reformer back in 2014. He met with a couple who lived in a modest 790-square-foot house. They were heating with one electric space heater, had been wearing heavy sweaters all winter and were doing absolutely everything they could to keep their electricity costs down. But you know what, Mr. Speaker? Their hydro bill for January 2014 was $641.67, of which $233.89 was just the delivery charge. During the meeting, the MPP was told by the constituent, “All of my pension goes to pay my electricity.”

This is not just a one-off case. Many of us have heard and met with people over the past few years who have struggled to pay their electricity bills. I remember when I was canvassing and I talked to people who had to move out of their home and look for a cheap apartment because they could no longer afford the cost of the hydro in their home.

It was in 2009 when the McGuinty government bulldozed regulatory regimes and plowed ahead, without cost-benefit analysis, allowing the green lobby to restructure Ontario’s energy sector. Then-opposition leader Tim Hudak informed the Premier during question period, “You created a gold rush that made your friends very rich,” leaving the rest of us out in the cold, paying exorbitant rates and without the ability to have a say in the matter.

When the Green Energy and Green Economy Act was passed in 2009, Premier McGuinty promised modest increases in electricity of about 1% annually, but according to the Auditor General, “Electricity prices for the average Ontario consumer ... are projected to rise 46% in the next five years.” Speaker, many were in shell shock after that revelation. The Green Energy Act feed-in tariff program, providing renewable energy generators with attractive contract prices, ended up costing us billions. In fact, we would be paying $4.4 billion more in costs for wind and solar.

The cost becomes even more concerning when you consider the Auditor General’s finding that many of these costly projects were approved without proper oversight, including regulatory and planning procedures. The report also indicates guaranteed FIT contracts for wind mean we’re paying other jurisdictions big bucks to take our power. The Auditor General says that between 2005 and 2011, Ontario received $1.8 billion less for its electricity exports than what it cost the electricity ratepayers of Ontario. We have subsidized Quebec and New York $1.8 billion to take our power. This is unacceptable.

In 2017, the Auditor General said that it was known that the planned financing structure undertaken by the former Liberal government could result in significant, unnecessary costs for Ontarians. She continued, “The substance of the issue is straightforward. Ratepayers’ hydro bills will be lower than the cost of the electricity used as a result of the electricity rate reduction. However, power generators will still be owed the full cost of the electricity they supply, so the government needs to borrow cash to cover the shortfall to pay them.”

Both the Financial Accountability Officer and the Auditor General raised concerns and red flags about this program, and that it wasn’t in the best interest of Ontarians. Due to the Green Energy Act, we saw electricity prices skyrocket. We saw over 300,000 manufacturing jobs leave Ontario, and it sent a message to potential investors that Ontario did not want to be competitive.

Speaker, let me say again, those days are now behind us. Ontario is open for business and open for jobs. By following the advice of the Auditor General and the Financial Accountability Officer, there’s close to $4 billion in savings for Ontario taxpayers—$4 billion in savings—and that is a lot of money to put back into the pockets of my constituents in Brantford–Brant.

Moving on, this bill will also end the so-called Fair Hydro Plan. Our government is reforming the electricity system to reduce costs, drive efficiencies and lower electricity rates.

We were elected on a promise to fix this mess, and fix it we shall by building an electricity system that’s modernized and efficient, using a consistent approach to conservation and avoiding unnecessary duplication and administrative costs, improving transparency, stabilizing residential electricity bills, providing opportunity to stakeholders for giving their input on streamlining the process, and expanding the Ontario rebate for electricity consumers.

Through Bill 87, people will see a rebate, effective November 1, 2019, which would replace the Fair Hydro Plan that hid the true cost of electricity from consumers. Starting this fall, the people will know the true cost of power. The new rebate will be clear, and it will be fair. It will display every single item line by line.

During the election, when knocking on doors and canvassing, a lot of constituents were saying, “Well, sometimes we don’t know if we will have enough money to heat our homes and to put food on the table.” It had become difficult for the people of this great province, under the previous Liberal government, to make ends meet. Many people struggled, and there was uncertainty. This legislation will stabilize Ontario’s electricity rates. The government is also introducing regulatory amendments to keep ratepayers’ bills stable. Increases to the average residential electricity bill would be held to the rate of inflation.

This just started at the beginning of the month. Clearly, these actions are part of the government’s plan to increase transparency and accountability in the electricity system while working to make life more affordable for all Ontarians.

Reliable and affordable energy, free from political interference, is fundamental to a thriving economy, and it starts by treating energy as an economic policy, not a social program. It’s not the role of government to micromanage the day-to-day technical decisions of any sector in the economy. Government’s responsibility is to promote transparency, set the rules of the game and then get out of the way.

While renewable energy can be desirable as part of a balanced supply mix, the problem is that the previous Liberal government was awash with wind and solar at a time when demand was declining. This created a substantial and expensive surplus, which we sold at a loss to Quebec and to US states. Countries around the world where this type of energy policy began decades ago have backed away. Premier Kathleen Wynne said, in November of 2016, “‘Our government made a mistake. It was my mistake. And I’m going to do my best to fix it.’

“But 4,000 pages of internal emails and documents, which Global News obtained from the now defunct Ontario Power Authority,” or OPA, “suggest billions of dollars in unnecessary spending could have been avoided had the government followed the early advice of the OPA, which was tasked with designing many of Ontario’s energy policies.”

Speaker, I want to talk briefly also about what the New Democratic Party wanted to do with the hydro mess. The NDP didn’t really have a plan. Their plan during the election was to basically reduce the cost by 30%. But how were they going to do that? They were going to adopt the plan from the Liberals, and then they were going to ask Prime Minister Trudeau to somehow waive 5% off the HST. That’s not much of a plan, if you ask me. While they were going to do that, the NDP proposed to shut down the Pickering nuclear station, which would have wiped out 4,500 jobs in Durham region. So much for protecting jobs.

Let me remind you, Speaker, and those at home watching: The NDP are partly responsible for the hydro mess that we are in. They backed the Liberals 97% of the time in this House. They allowed the Liberals to do much of the damage with their support.

As I wrap up my time here today, again, I want to mention that Bill 87 is focused on three main fronts: (1) keeping electricity affordable and improving transparency, (2) reducing costs by centralizing and refocusing conservation programs, and (3) building a modern, efficient and effective energy regulator for all Ontarians. Through Bill 87, the plan will see savings of up to $442 million and will make regulatory changes to the Ontario Energy Board to make it more efficient and accountable.

This legislation will bring electricity bills to the rate of inflation and save billions in borrowing costs that were tied to the Fair Hydro Plan. This will clean up the mess and replace failure with a new transparent rebate on consumers’ bills. After 15 long years of mismanagement, relief has finally come to the people of Ontario.

We know how critically important fixing the hydro mess is for hard-working families and the bottom lines of businesses that create jobs and contribute to Ontario’s economic growth and development. I am proud of the work of our government, our minister, and the work that the parliamentary assistants are doing to bring relief for the people of Ontario. I can assure all the people of Ontario and my constituents in Brantford–Brant that the work our government is doing to bring electricity relief is something that we can all be proud of.

Mr. Speaker, I’d just like to wrap up and, again, say that it’s time that we took this matter in hand. It’s a very difficult problem, and this is just the first phase of what we’re hoping to do for the province of Ontario to bring relief to people, to bring affordability to people, to allow businesses to grow, to allow Ontario to flourish. To do that, we need to take care of this hydro mess.

I trust that every member of this House will vote in support of the Fair Hydro Plan.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

M me France Gélinas: It was rather disconcerting to listen to some of the information that the member just shared. We do have a serious problem with the cost of electricity in our province. For many of my constituents, their hydro bills have gone through the roof. Why is this, Speaker? The answer is clear: It is because of privatization.

When Mike Harris was elected—you remember that was the last Conservative government that we had here in Ontario—he decided that the private sector was going to do things better, cheaper, faster, whatever. The only thing that the private sector did is jack up our hydro rates.

So we have three parts to our electricity system: the generation of electricity, the transmission—those are the big transmission lines—and then we have the distribution; those are the people who bring the lines to your house. We have no choice; we have to have electricity to live and we all have to pay an electrical bill. What Mike Harris did is that he took the generation part and privatized it, he took the distribution part and privatized it, and we stopped him in time to keep the transmission still in public hands.

Come the Liberals: The Liberals continued right down the same path and continued to privatize parts of our hydro system that we had been able to keep in public hands. What did it do? The exact same thing as when Mike Harris was there: Our hydro bills shot up again. Then they tried some borrowing scheme to try to borrow money that we don’t have to pay down some of our electrical bills. None of this worked.

How do you bring the electrical bills down? You bring it back into public hands where nothing goes to profit and everything goes to bringing our hydro bills down.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Mr. Paul Calandra: I appreciate the member from Brantford–Branch’s speech, but I can’t not comment on what we just heard from the NDP member, because it’s actually 100% completely false. Every aspect of it is wrong. The reason we have such high hydro prices right now—full stop; 100%—is because the previous Liberal government, in co-operation with the NDP, in co-operation with organizations such as the Suzuki foundation, put in place a program for green energy that was unlike any program anywhere else in the world. They signed contracts that we should all be embarrassed about.

They signed contracts 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 times higher than other jurisdictions would pay, and the result is that taxpayers are having to foot the bill.

The member is correct: The Liberals then brought in a scheme to try to offset those costs, to try to hide the costs. It’s a scheme that the Auditor General rightfully pointed out was wrong. It needed to be replaced. The Auditor General rightfully pointed out that it cost Ontario taxpayers billions of dollars more than it should have because of the way the plan was brought forward.

But what is most troubling—you might not agree with this bill, and the NDP have said they don’t agree with the bill, but what they did also is they voted against every single one of those sections that would disentangle, that would shine the light on the Liberals’ Fair Hydro Plan. You might not agree with the OEB reforms; if you want to vote against that, fine. But in committee, they voted against every single one of those sections meant to save Ontario taxpayers billions of dollars, meant to shine the light and follow what the FAO and the Auditor General did. They voted against it. They voted to keep the Liberal fair hydro scheme in place, and I think they have to answer for that.

I thank the member for a great speech and for outlining all the things we’re doing to change it.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Mr. Michael Mantha: I listened very closely to the member from Brantford–Brant in regard to the comments he brought forward. What he just finished off on, I think he might have made an error in words. He said, “I hope everybody supports the Fair Hydro Plan.” Wasn’t that a Liberal tagline? Isn’t that something the Liberals had introduced? I’m sure he meant “fixing the hydro mess” or the act to amend various statutes related to energy.

Again, it goes to what I was saying: Liberals, Tories, same old story. That’s what this bill is doing. It’s actually doing the same thing. It’s just rebranding things we’re doing.

The member who just spoke talked about how—and I agree with the member and a lot of the points he brought forward in regard to how badly the previous government brought in the green energy rollout. They did a horrible job. I agree with a lot of the comments that are coming from both sides on this one. We’re not disputing that. But it attributes to 3% of generation. How can 3% of generation equal a 100% increase? The math just doesn’t work.

This was an opportunity, under the Green Energy Act, for municipalities to look at generating revenues. And I agree with the member: It took away the democratic right of municipalities to determine where they wanted, if they wanted, how they wanted. Well, wouldn’t it be nice to have those extra revenues now with the downloading this government is doing on these municipalities to pay for these services? I’m just thinking.

Again, I like facts. The member talked about certain percentages in regard to how the NDP supported the then Liberal government. Well, last time I checked, this is a majority government and the previous government was a majority, right? When you look at the facts—here are the facts. You don’t like these numbers: 56% of the time the Conservative government supported the Liberals.

Interjections.

Mr. Michael Mantha: Oh, sorry. Let me correct my record: 48% of the time—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Thank you.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): We are getting a little rowdy, and it’s—

Mr. Michael Mantha: Do I get a second to finish?

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): No, you’re not getting any more time.

Now is a good time to come back and relive civilized debate once again. I’m sure we all want to listen to the member from Mississauga—Streetsville.

Mrs. Nina Tangri: It is extremely important for our hard-working families and businesses to fix this hydro mess. Our province lost many companies, and others who chose not to open or grow here in Ontario due to the significant increases and uncertainty of hydro rates. With that, Mr. Speaker, jobs were lost, and others not created.

Our government has taken real action to fix this mess. Rates will be affordable and predictable. We will build a modern, efficient and effective energy regulator with changes to the Ontario Energy Board. We heard time and time again how many families had to choose between heating and eating. We heard how people were worried about losing their jobs, as costs to the companies they worked for increased. We heard from businesses how Ontario was not somewhere that welcomed them.

We also heard about how other jurisdictions offered many incentives, including low and predictable hydro rates, to have them go there and create jobs. As mentioned by my esteemed colleague from Brantford–Brant, the previous Liberal government, supported by the NDP, turned our hydro into a complete mess. They mortgaged our children’s future.

I encourage all members of this Legislature to support Bill 87 and, together, let’s fix this hydro mess.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): We’ll return to the member from Brantford–Brant for his two-minute summation.

Mr. Will Bouma: I’d like to thank everyone for participating in the debate today.

I wanted to start with the member from Nickel Belt to say, first of all, that we all agree here that we are in big trouble with hydro, and that hydro is too expensive for the people of Ontario. She talked about privatization as a solution to this. To comment back to that, the NDP plan to just buy Hydro back—I think it would be much too expensive to borrow the money to do that for the people of Ontario. How much would it cost? I think they estimated $6 billion, but we don’t know what that would cost.

Thank you to the member from Markham–Stouffville. I completely agree that we paid too much for the contracts, especially when you see that there are so many jurisdictions in the world where they’re signing contracts now for reasonable rates for hydro. We just pushed this too early, too fast, and it was much too expensive.

To the member from Algoma–Manitoulin, I have to say thank you for allowing me to correct my record. I meant to say “fixing the hydro mess.” I appreciate that you agree with so much of what we have to say in this bill, and I look forward to your support.

To the member from Mississauga–Streetsville, thanks for pointing out the devastating effect that Liberal energy policy had on the businesses and the hard-working families of the province of Ontario.

Mr. Speaker, we have a long way to go. I would say that this bill is just the first step as we move forward. I look forward to seeing what the hard-working minister and the parliamentary assistants bring forward in the future, as we bring affordability and an open-for-business-and-jobs attitude back to hydro in the province of Ontario.

I look forward to the rest of this debate, and I look forward to passing this bill.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Further debate?

Mr. Mike Schreiner: I rise to contribute to the debate on Bill 87. I wish this bill fixed the hydro mess, as the title suggests, but it actually doubles down on the Liberal’s unfair hydro plan, though I will admit that it does fix the worst of the accounting tricks that the previous government did use. But I don’t see how this government can cut funding for flood prevention, children’s services, education and a whole bunch of other public services while continuing to borrow over $3 billion every year to subsidize electricity bills in a way that benefits the wealthiest consumers the most.

The total cost of the previous government’s unfair hydro plan will be between $40 billion and $90 billion, according to the Financial Accountability Officer, over the next two years. I find this especially infuriating when the government voted down every amendment that the opposition put forward at committee to require a cost-benefit analysis when making regulatory decisions. Requiring a cost-benefit analysis just makes sense. That’s the same mistake that the previous government made, so why did this government vote that down?

That said, I’m going to do something that opposition parties don’t often do: I’m going to compliment the government. I think they made a good move, separating the governing process and the adjudicating process at the OEB. But then why did they create an energy czar by concentrating so much power in the hands of the CEO? George Vegh, the former general counsel to the Ontario Energy Board, has warned that Bill 87 gives the CEO “unconstrained” and “incredible” powers to “unilaterally set rules that are binding on the entire sector.” He warned that this could undermine the OEB’s independence.

The Toronto Region Board of Trade warned that the CEO has “no explicit criteria or process to be followed when exercising rule-making powers.”

I tried, and my NDP colleagues tried, at committee to fix this by putting forward reasonable amendments supported by a diverse group of stakeholders, from the Toronto board of trade to the vulnerable energy consumers association and the association of major power producers, to fix this, and they were voted down every time by the government.

It makes no sense to give one person so much power over Ontario’s energy system. That’s why I’ll be voting against Bill 87.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Mr. Sam Oosterhoff: It’s an honour to be able to stand and respond to the debate from the member from Guelph. I have to begin by congratulating his party, or the party that he is a member of, on their by-election win last night in Nanaimo–Ladysmith. I know it’s a difficult loss for the New Democrats, but it’s an exciting time for the Green Party. I do want to congratulate him and his party on that win, which is quite historic, being only the second member to enter the House of Commons for the Greens.

But I want to say, Speaker, that we heard the member opposite reference some of the things that he agreed with. I have to say, I’ve had the opportunity now to hear different debates in the House where people get very fired up. They get very upset either with us or when the Liberals were in power. But a lot of the things that they’re getting upset about—and they’re agreeing with most of what we’re doing—are things that the Liberals did. I agree that the Fair Hydro Plan cost tens of billions of dollars more than it should have. I agree that there was a mess at Hydro One that we needed to clean up.

I agree that there is a significant amount of problems in the way the distribution system is set up and the need to improve efficiencies along that sector.

But, Speaker, what I hear from members of the opposition in their responses to the speech from the member for Brantford–Brant, as well as in the speech this morning from the member for Guelph—I don’t hear a lot of concern with what we’re bringing forward. In fact, I hear more concerns around what the Liberals, backed by the NDP, actually brought forward in the last Parliament.

I want to thank the member for his willingness to stand on principle so often in this House and to be able to speak from a unique perspective as a member of the Green Party. But I do want to encourage him also to realize that many of the changes that we’re making are ones that are needed, that are necessary to ensure the viability and affordability of hydro in the province of Ontario. That’s why we’re going to be supporting Bill 87 when it comes forward later this week.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Mr. Joel Harden: I want to congratulate the member from Guelph for his comments.

Following on my friend from Niagara West, I want to say something off the top, because my friend from Algoma–Manitoulin wanted me to make sure it was clear to all of us. Our friends opposite often like to say, when we consider energy and other subjects in this place, that we voted with the previous government 97% of the time. The actual fact is that that might have happened 53% of the time, if you look at that silly thing called Hansard which has within it facts. I also know that in that same document, it finds that the current government voted with the previous government 48% of the time. You’re big on math; you’re big on math scores. I invite you to embrace your own ideology.

It’s a funny thing, Speaker. I’m married to a psychiatrist back home. What I’ve learned a lot through people in mental health is that often what folks will say unconsciously is profound. When the member for Brantford–Brant named the government’s plan as the Fair Hydro Plan, that was very instructive for me, because what this government is doing with this bill is agreeing to—granted, on the books—borrow billions of dollars going forward to subsidize energy prices to deal with the heating-or-eating issue.

The people of Ontario, and the people of this country, are looking to governments to do more to encourage sustainable energy. What has this government done on that front? Nothing. They have had advice before them from people in Ottawa, like the Ottawa Renewable Energy Co-operative, that have been encouraging this government to embrace virtual net metering and other sustainable low-cost practices. What audience have they had with this government? Zilch.

We are having students walk out of their class every Friday to bring awareness to legislators like us that we need urgent action on climate change. Two thirds of our emissions in this country are linked to energy costs, so either we embrace a transformative approach to energy or we don’t. This government doesn’t, and that’s why I’ll be voting against this bill.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Ms. Goldie Ghamari: Mr. Speaker, before I comment on the member’s speech, I just wanted to point out that I think what the member from Ottawa Centre said was a little bit offside and inappropriate. Just because someone’s spouse is an expert in a particular field doesn’t necessarily make them an expert. My husband is a statistician. He teaches statistics at Carleton University. I do not purport to be an expert on statistics at all, and so I think that’s really important to just point out there.

With respect to the member’s speech, I just wanted to thank him for the kind words he said about some of the positive things. I look forward to, through an engaging and rowdy debate, convincing him on all the other points and bringing him over onside on all those points. Because I think, at the end of the day, what’s really important is that we’re here for Ontarians and we’re here for people, and we’re here to protect what matters most. That means maintaining an electricity system and a hydro system that is maintainable, that’s affordable and is something that can serve Ontarians well into the future. At the end of the day, we’re here to protect what matters most.

With that said, Mr. Speaker, some of the things that our bill is doing we campaigned on. Our government campaigned on lowering hydro bills. It campaigned on fixing the hydro mess. We campaigned on getting rid of the six-million-dollar man. Mr. Speaker, it hasn’t even been a year yet and we’ve done all of that and, in fact, we’re going to be doing even more. I can’t believe it’s already been almost a year that we’ve been in government. Time seems to fly when you’re having fun.

But we have three more years ahead of us, and I’m so excited to see what we can do to promote our mandate and to act on all the promises that we made, because we are here for the people and we’re here to serve the people and we are here to protect what matters most.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): And we’ll return to the member from Guelph—oh, I’m sorry. The member for London West hasn’t spoken yet. I recognize the member for London West.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: I’d like to congratulate the member for Guelph on his remarks. I think he highlighted the fact that this government had multiple opportunities to try to actually fix the hydro mess, but decided not to do that. Instead, they have a bill that simply relabels the disastrous Liberal plan with a new name.

We know that that Liberal plan involved borrowing $40 billion against this illusory scheme that was supposed to lower hydro rates, and cost Ontarians $4 billion more than it should have, as the Auditor General points out. This bill that we have before us is basically the same kind of approach: It subsidizes hydro bills by borrowing billions of dollars in debt.

The unfortunate thing, Speaker, is that hydro bills are not actually going to go down. So we have this taxpayer subsidy for hydro bills that are going to keep going up.

If we really—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): I’m sorry to interrupt, but are you in your proper seat?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: No.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Now you are. Please continue.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Thank you, Speaker. Apologies for that.

If we really wanted to lower hydro bills, we would do some of the things that the NDP had proposed in the last election, including ending mandatory time of use. Now there is an initiative that would have really helped lower hydro bills.

Most of all, Speaker, we need to bring hydro back into public hands. That is the fundamental issue that has caused hydro bills to skyrocket, and that is what needs to happen if we are truly going to fix the hydro mess.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): And now we’ll return to the member from Guelph for his summation.

Mr. Mike Schreiner: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that, and I appreciate all my colleagues for participating in the debate. I would like to thank the member from Niagara West for his congratulations and I’d like to extend my congratulations to Paul Manly, who won the by-election in Nanaimo–Ladysmith and will be the second elected Green MP in Canadian history.

My colleague from Ottawa Centre talked about the importance of renewable energy and the fact that young people, in particular, all across the world, but especially here in Ontario, are marching for urgent action on climate. One of the mistakes the Liberals made, quite frankly, is they bought a bit of renewable energy when it was really expensive, and now that the price has dropped dramatically this government is getting out of the game. Nobody who knows anything about investing would say, “Buy high and sell low,” but that’s exactly what is happening right now. So thank you for reminding us of the importance to be looking at all sources of energy, and so—

Mr. Paul Calandra: That’s 100% inaccurate.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Order, please. The member from Markham–Stouffville, come to order please.

Interjection.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): I’m sorry to interrupt. Stop the clock, if you would, please. The member from Markham–Stouffville will come to order. Next time you will be warned, and the time after that you’ll be gone for the day.

I return to the member from Guelph.

Mr. Mike Schreiner: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Both the member from Carleton and from London West talked about the importance of lowering electricity bills. I couldn’t agree more, but the problem is, all the independent experts who came to committee on Bill 87 said that this bill will do nothing to lower electricity prices.

What I would ask the government to do is to act on something that the Green Party has been calling for for years; the previous government refused to do it and I’m hoping this government will: To conduct an independent public review of the cost, present and future, of all sources of electricity generation in Ontario so we can make an informed decision that’s not based on ideology, but based on the evidence.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Further debate? I recognize the member from St. Catharines.

Mrs. Jennifer (Jennie) Stevens: Good morning, Speaker. It is a pleasure to be able to rise and discuss fixing the hydro mess. I don’t believe we’re doing so this morning; however, it is something each and every one of us can relate to. We all pay hydro bills, we’re all affected when prices rise, and it’s something that definitely needs to be reformed.

Paying hydro services is not like buying a car, however. You can’t shop around and choose the best deal or get it on sale; it is what it is. When Ontarians are forced to use Hydro One or its distributors, we need to ensure we are doing our best to control the prices Ontarians pay.

This province, the people of Ontario, are trying to move into a greener society. They are pushing for electric vehicles and greener energy overall. Well, that means energy needs are to be affordable. This government needs to implement rebates to entice Ontarians to want to switch over. With this bill, this government is simply adopting the Liberal ideologies and their previous hydro plan—absolutely zero consultation with Ontarians, once again.

This government is far gone. It’s so out in left field when it comes to connecting with the people, knowing what they want and analyzing the issues they face day to day when it comes to hydro. How does their new plan even differ from the Liberals’? How is it going to work to make changes, or make even a slight difference in the people’s lives in Ontario? I do not believe that this government has any intention to please people; it’s about pleasing their own agenda and getting this bill approved as soon as possible to avoid any backlash.

This government is known for quickly moving—very quickly moving—getting bills through this Legislature just to completely avoid public consultation. All concerns and critiques of this bill by the people, the Ontario Energy Board, specialists and many more, were and have been ignored. This government blatantly ignores experts in this field, showing all of the Ontarians that it is more of a power move than genuine desire to untangle the Liberals’ mess and reduce costs for Ontarians.

This government says they’re aiming for transparency, saying the NDP is voting against being transparent, but we were all about transparency. We, the NDP, are voting against doing the same thing over and over again. The definition of insanity is making the same mistake over and over, expecting a different outcome each time.

It’s hard to understand what this government means when they talk about transparency. Constituents are confused about what really is going on with this hydro mess. Key questions need to be asked like, “How will you make sure transparency remains a priority?” Or, “What aspect of this hydro bill will make more transparency?” I’m sure we all know Ontarians appreciate the idea of open, honest communication with this government.

Let’s be clear: That isn’t the biggest issue here. The Liberals’ mess was built upon privatization, forcing people into less than ideal solutions. What is this government doing to combat privatization? Phasing this out is the only way to truly reduce hydro costs for Ontarians. The monopoly that is currently the hydro sector allows rates to skyrocket with no real accountability.

Issues of reform are not covered in this bill either. It’s clear that this government only wants to slap their name on something already established by the previous government and repeated by this one, and to forget about the root issues with the hydro sector. All that Conservatives have actually done is they have changed a few words, dotted a few more i’s, crossed a few more t’s, and now they are trying to sell it to the people of Ontario.

Attacking the monster that is hydro is no small feat; we all understand that. All we’re asking for is for this government to focus funds and manpower into reforming the structure of the system. There should be an ongoing effort to access the least expensive form of energy production—something that is sustainable long term, something that would not cost taxpayers even more money down the line.

Speaker, we all can find humour in the words of the Minister of Energy when he said, “We’re continuing to find hundreds of millions of dollars in savings. These savings will help lower rates for large employers, allowing them to invest in their company to create more ... jobs.” Once again, it’s the large corporations that are getting the breaks. Let’s not kid ourselves here: Large employers will not invest savings to employ more people, or give back to their current employees, for that matter. More often than not, they’ll pocket the difference and conduct business as usual.

It’s a nice sentiment to believe that jobs will be created with millions in savings, but Ontarians are smarter than that—much smarter than that. Just like with cuts to education, didn’t the Premier time and time again reassure our Ontarians that jobs would not be lost? But hundreds of teachers across the province, if not a few thousand at this point, have received surplus notices and have no jobs moving forward into September, so it’s clear that whatever this government claims should be taken with a complete grain of salt.

Their claim of lowering hydro costs by 12% is, again, relative to larger businesses. This government, the PC government, always says just enough so that the average person reads their claims, looks at the numbers and goes, “Wow, what a great job the Premier is doing.” This is the problem. Numbers are thrown around by the members across so much that they mean nothing anymore, and that is as deep as the thought goes for many. Reading this bill, the Fixing the Hydro Mess Act, taxpayers are getting lost in the rhetoric trying to understand what the Conservatives are really doing.

We are here at Queen’s Park every day listening to this rhetoric first-hand, and we’re lost in the rhetoric. Imagine what Ontarians, the people of Ontario, are going through.

Through this bill, there’s a shift from the LDCs, local distribution companies, to a central IESO-led approach: once again, number one, cutting jobs. I’ve heard from constituents who work in conservation departments at an LDC, and there’s talk of inevitable job cuts—what? Job cuts?—since winding-down documents have been made available to the LDCs. Everything is up in the air. Conservation and demand management—or CDM—programs run through LDCs are now mainly the responsibility of the IESO.

These conservation programs are targeted to commercial, institutional and industrial consumers, low-income residential consumers and on-reserve First Nations communities. There is no doubt that low-income residents and First Nations communities absolutely need these programs in place. But Ontarians in general look to incentive programs and rebates as well. Energy-efficient replacements can make all the difference on someone’s hydro bill.

These policies need to be inclusive of the majority, not with a large focus on corporations. You see, Speaker, this government loves to talk about the numbers, yet hides them all at the same time. If we’re to transition to an IESO-led approach, then the people should be privy to cost structures, estimates, annual payments and how much money will be used to subsidize the system. Yet this motion was rejected by this government at committee.

Every time I speak on a bill brought forth by the government, I speak about the lack of transparency. I speak about being transparent. Transparent means being open, even when it’s not convenient for your government or for you. As my colleague the member from Toronto–Danforth has spoken on recently, the government has no intention of releasing cost information to the people of Ontario.

Let’s be honest, people do not necessarily care about how the system is run. They don’t care about super-specific details of the IESO, the LDCs and the CDMs; to many, those are just random acronyms. But people do care about the changes, or the lack thereof, that will impact their monthly electrical bill. Show us the estimated monthly charges for households, whether that’s an increase or a decrease from the current rates. People are wondering if they need to tinker around their monthly budgets to live. They just don’t know what to expect on their bill in the future. It is so unclear.

The Conservatives shut down anything that could make them put their words in writing, or their promises down on paper. They do not want to be held accountable. Whether that’s cost estimates or cost-benefit analysis, they dodge every request from the opposition to put it up on the Ontario Energy Board—OEB—website. I thought that would be standard practice in proving their goal to be transparent, but I guess it’s not.

In St. Catharines, Mr. Speaker, I met a constituent in my office. She was a single mom who lived in the same townhome unit for over 15 years. Over the years, tenants beside her have come and gone, ranging from families of three for a few years, and then most recently a family of five—two parents and three teenagers—so you can imagine the amount of energy they probably were consuming. Anyone with teenagers in their household can attest to that. The constituent told me how over the years she noticed her bill was always high, higher than usual, higher than she anticipated, and she couldn’t figure out why.

One day, she called the hydro company, a distributor in St. Catharines; they assured her that the meter reader was always correct.

She always paid the bill like she should, and life went on as normal—so she thought. However, within the last year, the bills were significantly higher. Even after she made an effort to conserve electricity in her home, it just kept increasing month to month. Well, get this, Mr. Speaker: In February 2019, she discovers that her meter and the neighbour’s meter were mislabelled. All this time she was paying for the neighbour’s usage with those teenagers. She was paying for the neighbour’s usage, and they were paying for hers.

What’s unfortunate is that when she called the LDC for the Niagara region, they gave her a $30 credit towards her account. Now, if that’s not a slap in the face, I don’t know what is. Clearly it was a mistake, human error, but where was the accountability? Where is the legislation that forces hydro companies to do the right thing? Through no fault of her own, this poor mother was overpaying for years to a tune of at least a few thousand dollars. I’m almost certain that with proper legal counsel, she would have a case against them. But why does it have to come to that?

Why can’t—why won’t—this government implement policies that protect Ontarians from situations vastly out of their control? There’s a clear lack of regulation, and even when tenants or owners feel that they’ve been wronged, this government is making it hard for anyone to act upon it. There’s more to it than just controlling high hydro rates.

This new hydro sector, set up to favour certain classes of consumers, needs to collaborate with the people. Again, reiterating what the member from Toronto–Danforth brought up on May 2, amendments were brought forth—amendments that seemed pretty obvious, in my opinion. I mean, if I were trying to show constituents that I mean business, I would use this opportunity to create open dialogue.

We asked that, annually, the minister publish information online pertaining to how much money is going to each class of consumer, how long each consumer type will continue to receive financial assistance from distribution programs, and updated long-term analysis showing how providing assistance to consumers will impact the province as a whole. I fully agree with my colleague’s statement. These amendments are/were completely reasonable. Ontarians deserve full disclosure. That’s why they elected this government, no?

It’s time to live up to your promises. The government is too busy worrying about updating ministry logos, changing vehicle licence plates, 9 a.m. tailgating, drivers’ licences and now plastering partisan messages all over utility bills. You would think that the Premier and his minister were starting up a graphic design business together. Let’s worry a little less about colour schemes and more on why the heck utility bills need Conservative messages all over them.

We get it: You’re kind of open for business. But are you really? Are you open to actually amending this bill rationally?

Time and time again, we get back to talking about privatization. When it comes to health care, the impact of private services is well known, discussed and largely opposed by the people of Ontario. That’s because when people understand the issue, it’s easy to point out the flaws in the system. But with this hydro sector, it is what it is, as I mentioned earlier on. The government doesn’t want to actually change how energy is consumed and they don’t want to go green. Actually, they’ve made it clear that going green drove up hydro costs. While that may be true, green energy—electric energy—is the future, and maybe the environmental impact very much outweighs the increased costs.

At the same time, we’re trying to lower the costs for Ontarians, but I feel as though the minister is not exploring the most effective and cost-efficient forms of providing electricity to the people.

My CO staff have been dealing with a few constituents within the last few months who have had heating systems installed with the promise of a rebate program. That’s a huge reason why people even get new and improved heat and cooling systems installed in their homes. We all know it’s not a cheap venture either. I’ve had seniors come to my office with high stress and anxiety because they had furnaces installed, never got the rebates or expected lower bills, and yet the price per month for the rental equipment is higher than what was promised to them by shady companies—a lot of shady companies.

Is there any regulation around here? It seems like a free-for-all to me, Mr. Speaker.

This whole system is a mess. This bill should be called “Making the Hydro Mess Messier, 2019.”

Not everything in this province needs to be privatized. There is zero need to collapse local distribution and give full responsibility to the IESO to manage and distribute power to Ontarians.

You know what? The public wants the 12% lower hydro rates the Conservatives have been advertising so proudly. Nothing is being changed in this bill, nothing that the Liberals brought forward. The Conservative government is simply moving this bill along to get it over with, like every other bill in this House, and to dodge responsibility—no regulations, no transparency, no accountability, no effort, no anything—I could go on and on all day.

Essentially fluffing up the numbers and forcing the information down Ontarians’ throats is not going to work this time. The people are smarter than that. You would think you would realize that.

Once and for all, stop pushing your own agenda. You yourselves pay hydro, but I guess it’s less concerning when you have disposable income. It’s the middle-low, working-class people that are hit the hardest, and someone like our party, the leading opposition, needs to be there for them. We need to listen to their voices—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Thank you. Questions and comments?

Mr. Daryl Kramp: It was interesting. I heard the member from St. Catharines there today, and she made the one comment I found a little bit interesting. She said she thought our government was out in left field. I can assure you we would be out in right field.

It’s maybe fortunate, maybe unfortunate, maybe not long enough, maybe too long, but I’ve been around the political scene for a while—municipal, provincial and federal—and I can tell you, I’ve seen hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of bills and motions put forward by various governments in opposition. But I can honestly say I had never in my life seen anything as disastrous as the Green Energy Act.

The impact of the Green Energy Act literally turned this province right on its heels facing backwards, and put an unbelievable yoke of debt on every citizen in this province, quite honestly affecting the entire country.

How can you produce energy for five, six, seven or eight cents a kilowatt hour through your traditional sources of energy, and then go ahead and pay corporations or companies in private 50, 60, 70 or 80 cents a kilowatt hour. It’s unconscionable, absolutely not real, not acceptable, not doable. Yet the sad reality is, the members opposite here supported the government of the day doing just that, and now have the audacity to stand in the House to say, “We don’t like how you’re trying to fix that.”

Quite frankly, I’m a strong, strong supporter of renewable energy, but not at a cost that absolutely handcuffs not only a party, a country, a province, but every individual citizen in this country. It has to stop. The Green Energy Act has to go, and we will fix this hydro mess.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments?

Mr. Kevin Yarde: I want to thank my colleagues from St. Catharines, London West and Nickel Belt as well as Algoma–Manitoulin.

The plan from the government will require the province to take on billions in debt to lower our hydro rates. This effectively is the Liberal Fair Hydro Plan. It has got a new name, but it’s still subsidizing hydro bills in a way that people are not going to be able to afford in the long run.

Let’s give you a look at some of the numbers here. They’re going to borrow over $4 billion to subsidize electricity. What’s going to happen here is, disproportionately, our bills are going to go up, and it’s going to benefit the wealthy. We should be saving this $4 billion and investing it to support low-income, rural, and remote communities, and use the rest to balance the budget.

The government will also discontinue programs that include rebates for energy-efficient heating and cooling equipment, and discounts for buying energy-efficient products such as LED bulbs, if you can believe that. It will also eliminate incentives for builders to improve energy performance in new residences.

My colleague from St. Catharines talked about some of the concerns with regard to landlords. This bill is basically going to affect the most vulnerable in our society, scrapping the rate protection for more than 325,000 Ontario hydro customers, and this has sparked fears among many people. Removing price protections is wrong. There will no longer be controls on what sub-meterers can charge. That means that sub-metering companies will be able to allow landlords to shift the cost of electricity to tenants and condo owners by installing suite meters in each unit—

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Thank you. Questions and comments?

Mr. Paul Calandra: Mr. Speaker, I listened to the speech, but I’m not sure that the member was actually talking about the Fair Hydro Plan and fixing the Liberal hydro mess. I think the member was talking about something completely different, because this bill does not talk about privatization at all. There’s nothing about privatization in it.

What the NDP now are saying, and we just heard it again from the member for Brampton South, which I think is his riding, is that they want to increase hydro rates immediately. They want to see a 25% increase to everybody’s hydro rate. That’s what they just said. That is absolutely incredible. They want to have an absolute increase immediately.

When they talk about this bill—in committee, they voted against every single measure that would untangle the Liberal fair hydro mess. They voted against every single measure.

They may disagree with the OEB changes. We’re making changes to make the OEB more accountable. They voted against that; that’s fine. But how can you possibly vote to keep what the Liberals put in place—something that the Auditor General politely said was a scam, something that no other jurisdiction in the world could do. They voted to keep that in place, and now they’re talking about increasing hydro rates by 25%.

Make no mistake about it: This isn’t about privatization. This isn’t about policies. This is about one thing. The reason rates skyrocketed is because you helped the Liberal Party bring in a green energy program that has cost taxpayers billions of dollars. That’s why we’re faced with hydro rates where we’re at right now, and that’s what we’re trying to disentangle.

We want to bring in green energy, but we want to have green energy that is affordable. We don’t want to continue the mistakes that were brought on by the Liberal and NDP coalition of the last 15 years.

So vote against the OEB changes. But how can you rise in this place today and vote against the changes that would untangle the Liberal fair hydro mess? It’s unconscionable, and it’s a continuation of bad policy. I hope you’ll think twice about that.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Questions and comments.

Mr. Joel Harden: I want to thank my colleague the member for St. Catharines. If the government was actually listening to what the member said, they’d know that what she asked is for this government to be honest about who it stands for when it comes to energy.

This government expended a lot of rhetoric about a six-million-dollar man. But you know what, Speaker? When they fired that person, Mayo Schmidt, because of the terms of that person’s contract and the rules this government observes, that person, according to sources from the Globe and Mail, is going to have a compensation package of $11 million this year. Thanks very much for that.

Where is your outrage around Jeffrey Lyash, the current CEO of Ontario Power Generation, raking in over a million dollars?

You know what the problem with this government is, Speaker? I’ve identified it in the member for Markham–Stouffville’s response to this debate: selective outrage. They get really upset at the notion that we won’t support everything they do. But when regular, working-class Ontarians want a government that will be on their side, what do they preside over? A privatized energy system.

This bill does nothing to change the disaster that the Mike Harris government started when they started parcelling the system off, and the Liberals kept that going. That is the driving force behind energy prices, and they will not fix it. Why? Because of their ties to industry, because of their ties to Bay Street.

They don’t mind that Jeffrey Lyash is dining at the trough of the Ontario taxpayer. They have selective outrage on certain people they want a bumper-sticker campaign against. But when the people of Ontario want to bring hydro back into public hands—which was a Conservative legacy decision—they’re nowhere, because they’re much more interested not in truth, but in truthiness, Speaker—the Donald Rumsfeld kind of conservative.

I’m starting to think that this Conservative government is rather an insult to conservatives everywhere. They’re not about conserving anything. They’re about lavishing their friends with insider deals and not standing up for the average worker. But my friend from St. Catharines will.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): Now we’ll return to the member from St. Catharines for her two-minute summation.

Mrs. Jennifer (Jennie) Stevens: I’d like to thank the member from Hastings–Lennox and Addington. I’d like to thank the members from Brampton North, Markham–Stouffville and, of course, Ottawa Centre for their remarks on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, this government says they’re aiming for transparency, saying the NDP is voting against transparency. That’s what they’ve been saying. I will argue that this side of the House is only about transparency. I’d also argue that we, the NDP, believe in green energy. We haven’t tried to push any bills through, like the Conservatives have. We would like to have open conversation, if we could have the chance, but we have not been able to have the chance on all of the bills that have come across this term.

Anyway, Speaker, I find it funny, again, when the Minister of Energy says, “We are continuing to find hundreds of millions of dollars in savings.” I’d like to find out when the people of Ontario will see the hundreds of millions of dollars in savings that the government is claiming they’re going to see.

I’d also like to say good morning to my grandson—my grandson who is going to be growing up in Ontario; my grandson who will only benefit from green energy, not like the Conservative government that’s not going to give that opportunity to my grandson. He’s going to be paying for that, and he’s going to be paying it through bumper slogans and bumper stickers and any chance that the Conservative government can get free advertisement, especially on his hydro bill when he gets older. Good morning, Greyson.

Third reading debate deemed adjourned.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Percy Hatfield): The time being such, we will now stand in recess until 10:30 and question period this morning.

The House recessed from 1016 to 1030.

Notices of reasoned amendment

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Before I invite members to introduce their guests, I beg to inform the House that, pursuant to standing order 71(c), the member for Timmins has filed with the Clerk a reasoned amendment to the motion for second reading of Bill 107,

An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act and various other statutes in respect of transportation-related matters. The order for second reading of Bill 107 may therefore not be called today.

I also need to inform the House that, pursuant to standing order 71(c), the member for Timmins has filed with the Clerk a reasoned amendment to the motion for second reading of Bill 108,

An Act to amend various statutes with respect to housing, other development and various other matters. The order for second reading of Bill 108 may therefore not be called today.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry will come to order.

Introduction of visitors.

Introduction of Visitors

Mr. Chris Glover: It’s my pleasure to welcome to the House Jenna Reynolds, Orville Burke, Oksana Chetveryk and Michael Duchesne from Asthma Canada.

As well, I’d like to welcome Christina Gilligan from my riding of Spadina–Fort York and Kalinda Jessett and baby Luke. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Finally, I’d like to welcome John Gilinsky for world autism day.

Mr. Randy Pettapiece: I’d like to welcome a grade 8 class from the Living Hope Christian School in my riding of Perth–Wellington.

Mr. Faisal Hassan: I would like to welcome Darren Parberry, who is a member of the Royal Canadian Air Cadets, former flight surgeon, current member of the Royal Canadian Legion, Branch 31, Mount Dennis, and member of the Ontario Métis Aboriginal Association; and Kowthar Dore. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Sam Oosterhoff: I have the privilege of welcoming to the Legislature today my former boss the member of Parliament for the riding of Calgary Shepard, and the deputy shadow cabinet minister for finance. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Rima Berns-McGown: I’d like to welcome parents and early child care educators from Little Prints Daycare, which operates child care centres in Don Valley West, Don Valley North, Willowdale and Etobicoke Centre: Irene Udo, Kala Rajaratnam, Shamara Taylor, Maria Alberoni, Margaret Udo, Pamela Taskinen, Pinar Tugay and Valter Paco.

I’d also like to welcome the former city councillor from my riding of Beaches–East York and a fierce advocate for high-quality, affordable child care, Janet Davis.

Welcome, all of you, to Queen’s Park.

Hon. Michael A. Tibollo: I’d like to welcome a couple of special guests to the House this morning. I would like to introduce my son, Michael Tibollo Jr., and his classmate from law school visiting from the beautiful city of Calgary, Alberta. Michael and Neil, welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Jessica Bell: I would like to welcome to Queen’s Park some people from Orde Day Care, which is in my riding of University–Rosedale: Anna Gionet, Chauleyne Bell, Liz Dias, Indrani Sabessar, Valerie Jeremiah, Francesca Del Duca and Kyle Fabroa. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mrs. Gila Martow: I’m expecting some visitors from Stephen Lewis Secondary School in Vaughan. I don’t know if they’re here yet. Wave to me if you’re here. I looked for you on the staircase. Take a picture. Maybe I’ll catch you after. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Tom Rakocevic: I’m proud to welcome Milan Petković, Glendon College and York University student, a colleague in political science. He’s also son of Vasilije Petković, consul general of the Republic of Serbia.

I’d also like to recognize my friend Janet Davis and my good buddy Michau over there.

Hon. Laurie Scott: I’d like to introduce, from the riding of Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock, Greg and Nancy Ward, who are here to see question period today and maybe have a few words with the Premier. Thanks so much for coming.

M me France Gélinas: I would like to welcome volunteers from Asthma Canada who are here today: Jenna Reynolds and Gillian Kennedy from High Park. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Doug Downey: I’d like to welcome my constituents from Springwater, also here with Asthma Canada, Michael and Tracey Beaudry and their son, Matthew Beaudry. Thank you.

Miss Monique Taylor: It gives me great pleasure to welcome back again Michau van Speyk, Amy Moledzki, Kowthar Dore and Faith Munoz. Welcome back to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Parm Gill: I would like to introduce a very promising young man from my good riding of Milton, Jedd Peralta, who is the page captain today. I would also like to acknowledge his family: his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Peralta, and their younger son, Ram Peralta, also present in the members’ gallery. Mrs. Peralta is a great community leader, working at the Halton Multicultural Council, which supports newcomers to Canada in the Halton region. Please help me welcome the family.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Speaker, I’d like to welcome Henry Roberts and Sarah Burke Dimitrova, constituents of mine who are here today with Asthma Canada. Welcome to the Legislature.

Mr. Daryl Kramp: On behalf of the member from Bay of Quinte and myself today I’d like to welcome here Rory Facette-Grondin, Cara Facette-Grondin and Carolyn Grondin. Welcome, on behalf of both of us.

Ms. Suze Morrison: I’d like to welcome Maya Roy, the CEO of YWCA Canada, as well as Anjum Sultana, Jennifer Lockerby, Jasmine Ramze Rezaee and Colette Prevost from the YWCA Canada team.

I also have some constituents here today: Erin Filby, who is here representing the Association of Early Childhood Educators, and lastly Zhen Liu and Kate Foran, who are also two Toronto Centre constituents here for World Asthma Day. Welcome.

Mr. Stephen Crawford: I’m pleased to introduce to the Legislature two constituents from Oakville from Asthma Canada who are here to raise awareness for World Asthma Day: Leigh Fuston and Mehnaz Rahman. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Doly Begum: Today we are joined by some wonderful parents and ECEs from Compass Early Learning and Care, which operates centres in Peterborough, Kawartha Lakes and the Durham region.

I would like to welcome Lorrie Baird, Samantha Monteith, Emily Warren, Loretta Shaughnessey, Jill Wickins, Hannah McFarlane, Amanda Camacho—I’m sorry if I didn’t pronounce that right—Jenny Duley, Bethany Carter and Sheila Olan-MacLean, who is the CEO of Compass and also the president of the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Hon. Christine Elliott: I would like to welcome representatives from Asthma Canada who are here today, and I believe we have unanimous consent to wear these pins, Speaker, in recognition of World Asthma Day.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I think you’ll have to ask for the unanimous consent of the House to wear the pin.

Hon. Christine Elliott: Thank you, Speaker. May we have the unanimous consent of the House to wear these pins?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Agreed? Agreed.

Ms. Christine Hogarth: Speaker, good morning. I have two constituents visiting this morning to talk about World Asthma Day: Felicia Flowitt and Michael Duchesne. I had the opportunity to meet with them this morning. Thank you very much for being here.

Hon. Monte McNaughton: I’m proud to welcome my constituency assistant from our Wallaceburg office, Judy Listhaeghe, who is here today, as well as two other constituents who are going joining us later, Richard VandeWetering and Barry McKeon. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Natalia Kusendova: I’m thrilled to welcome three very special guests this morning. We have Mr. Tom Kmiec, member of Parliament for Calgary Shepard. Welcome to the House.

As well, we have Kiran and Keerthi Jarajapu, mom and sister of the Mississauga Centre page Rishi Jarajapu. Welcome.

Mr. Robert Bailey: It’s my pleasure today to introduce the mother of our page Kate Rabideau, Renata Rabideau—who is here actually with her mother, Judy Listhaeghe.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I believe that will conclude our introduction of guests this morning. It is now time for oral questions.

Oral Questions

Health care funding

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Speaker, before I begin, I just want to relay, on behalf of all the MPPs in the Legislature, our sincere concern and worry about the fire that’s happening at York Memorial Collegiate Institute, and all of the staff and faculty and students who attend there and who work there. It’s devastating to see that institution go up in flames on its 90th anniversary. I think it’s just important to acknowledge that.

Speaker, my first question is to the Premier: Does the Premier think getting beer into corner stores is more important than vaccinating children or providing school breakfast programs?

Hon. Doug Ford: Through—

Interruption.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): You can’t make those kinds of interjections in the House. We’re going to ask you to leave.

Interruption.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order. The people interjecting have to leave.

Interruption.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Stop the clock.

I am going to remind everyone who is here as a guest that we’re pleased to have you here to view and listen to the proceedings of Parliament, but you can’t interject and you can’t yell at the members on the floor. To do so disrupts the proceedings of Parliament, and we have no choice but to ask you to leave if you do that. All of you know, and you’re informed when you come in, that you can’t do that. Please respect Parliament, those of you who are left.

Restart the clock. The Premier had the floor.

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: We’re putting $433 million into Toronto Public Health. We’re putting $2 billion right across the province. Why are we doing this? We’re doing this to make sure that we support the things that matter to people, things that matter to families, matter to their children. It’s not sustainable if we continue spending. We have a $347-billion debt. We have a $15-billion deficit.

Mr. Speaker, the students in the stands up there are worried about their parents making sure they keep a job. We’re creating jobs. We created 123,000 jobs. We lowered their taxes. When they go home, their parents will see a lower heating cost instead of a higher heating cost. We’re putting money back into their pockets. It’s unsustainable. You can’t keep spending. All the opposition wants to do is spend the taxpayers’ money—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Supplementary question.

Ms. Andrea Horwath: It seems to me the Premier wants to spend the people’s money on campaign stickers on gas pumps, Speaker. That’s not a priority for Ontarians.

The mayor of Toronto yesterday challenged the Premier’s misplaced priorities and his reckless cuts to public health, but he is not alone. Mayors across Ontario say the Premier is engaged in downloading by stealth. Just yesterday, the city of London announced that the Ford government cuts have created a $4-million hole in their budget. Meanwhile, doctors and front-line health workers say cuts to public health will put families at risk and make hallway medicine even worse. Does the Premier really believe all these people are, to use his own words, irresponsibly wading into issues that they don’t understand?

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: The only thing irresponsible is the rhetoric coming from the other side. All they want to do is continue to spend the taxpayers’ money. As they run their households, as they run their small businesses, people around this province—you can’t spend more than what you take in. It’s very simple. They don’t understand math. We understand math. The only way we’re going to protect health care, the only way we’re going to protect education—by the way, we’ve put $700 million more into education. Every teacher is keeping their job because we’ve put in a safety net of $1.6 billion.

The only way you can do that is to take care of your balance sheet. They don’t understand that. They would spend, spend, spend. They’ve bankrupted this province. We inherited a bankrupt province through the Liberals that the NDP supported 98% of the time.

It’s irresponsible. They would not know how to run a fiscal balance sheet if their life depended on it.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Final supplementary.

Ms. Andrea Horwath: These would be the same small businesses that don’t want the Premier’s campaign stickers on their gas tanks.

At some point, the Premier has to realize that funding cuts and insults are no way to build a health care system. Yesterday, the chair of the Kingston, Frontenac and Lennox and Addington Board of Health laid out the dangers of public health cuts: “We simply cannot afford to have any infectious outbreak, like SARS, or water contamination event, like Walkerton....

“History tells us the next threat is just around the corner.”

These cuts to our health care system put all of us at risk, Speaker. Do we have to wait until the next disaster before the Premier understands what happens when you roll the dice with health care cuts?

Hon. Doug Ford: Deputy Premier and Minister of Health.

Hon. Christine Elliott: The reality is that we are investing more money in health care, over $1 billion more in health care. But I think it’s important to note that we are focusing on what matters the most, what counts the most. We were elected by the people last June to do that. People know that we were spending over $40 million a day more than we were taking in. That is not sustainable.

We are asking our public health units to do the same: to focus on the key priorities; to focus on the things that count the most; to make sure that children get vaccinated; to make sure that the school breakfast programs continue; to make sure that children with special needs continue to get the help they get. If they continue to focus on those priorities, there will be enough money to make sure those basics are covered.

But what happened with the city of Toronto? What have they done? They’ve had a surplus in their public health budget over the last 10 years to a total of $52 million. In other parts of their budget, they’ve spent money with tree maintenance programs—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Next question.

Child care

Ms. Andrea Horwath: My next question is to the Premier. But I have to say, it’s pretty disgusting that this government promised no cuts to health care and no cuts to education in that campaign, and yet that’s exactly what they’re doing. If public health is not the most important issue, I don’t know what is.

Parents across Ontario are worried about the Premier’s reckless cuts to child care across Ontario. Yesterday, the Premier dismissed concerns from his former ally, the deputy mayor of Toronto, but virtually every municipality across Ontario is facing direct cuts to child care funding.

Today, mothers from across Ontario have come to Queen’s Park to express their concern. Will the Premier listen, or will he tell them not to meddle in issues that they don’t understand?

Hon. Doug Ford: Minister of Education.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: First of all, I would like to share a quote from a press release titled “Licensed Day Care Operators See Opportunities for Municipal Savings.” I’d like to quote specifically what I shared with you yesterday: “‘The reaction by some municipal officials has been totally over the top,’ says Andrea Hannen, executive director of the Association of Day Care Operators of Ontario. ‘It’s like they want families to start panicking. The fact of the matter is there has been a lot of waste in the system for a very, very long time.’”

The fact is, we recognize that there’s opportunity to realize efficiencies, but most importantly, we recognize that we must make sure that parents are the centre of every decision around child care for their families, as opposed to governments telling them where they need to go and what they need to do.

More importantly, making sure that parents are part of the decision-making is central, but we also want to make sure that we’re leaving money in parents’ pockets. Our child care plan is going to enable 300,000 families—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Supplementary.

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Apparently, parents in this minister’s own riding wrote an open letter today, begging her to fund child care. Not-for-profit, high-quality, affordable child care is what parents want.

The Premier is creating a crisis here, and it won’t disappear just because he denies that it’s happening or insults people who raise concerns.

One parent joining us today is from the riding of Huron–Bruce. She warns that the government cuts to child care will “make child care harder to access, more expensive and will put young children and families at risk.”

Does the Premier deny that his cuts will impact families who rely on programs that are losing funding?

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: Again, just like any MPP in our government, we encourage all our constituents to come to us directly and work with us. The fact of the matter is that we look forward to meeting with our constituents, because we are absolutely listening to our grassroots. Our grassroots have told us that they are tired of government taking money out of their pockets left and right, and so the fact of the matter is that we’re making sure that families feel supported like no other time before over the last 15 years.

We’re investing over $2 billion, as I said. Any family that has children or has a child between the ages of zero and seven actually gets support of $6,000 a year per child in the family. Over and above that, from ages seven to 16, they get a supportive tax credit of $7,750, and families with special-needs children can get a $8,250 tax credit.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Final supplementary?

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Speaker, the fact is that this government kept these cuts hidden from families, because they know how shameful and heartless they really are, and they know they are targeting families who are in the most need in our province.

The Premier did not receive a mandate to slash not-for-profit child care funding for families across Ontario. That was not what he promised on the campaign trail. Nobody voted to see fewer options for affordable child care. Why is the government targeting children and low-income families with these cuts?

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Members please take their seats.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: Again, this is about getting things right, and we know that across the province there are opportunities not only for the likes of the city of Toronto but municipalities across Ontario to take a look at their administration and realize some efficiencies, to make sure that the focus of child care supports coming from my ministry is focused on families.

The fact of the matter is that we are getting it right. We’ve listened to parents, and shame on this govern—this opposition for—

Interjections.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: —the official opposition of government—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I’m going to ask the opposition to come to order.

Mr. Taras Natyshak: That was a Freudian slip.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order. Next question?

Education funding

Ms. Andrea Horwath: My next question is for the Premier, but I have to say it is not right; it is wrong to cut on the backs of the most vulnerable families and children in our province. It is wrong, not right. It’s wrong.

The Premier’s cuts are being felt across Ontario in schools from one end of the province to the other. Just this week we’ve seen reports of nearly 40 classes being removed from a secondary school in Stouffville, with subjects like media studies, music, history and French all being scrapped because the Premier fired the people who teach those courses.

Does the Premier really think it’s appropriate to target cuts at our students?

Hon. Doug Ford: Mr. Speaker, it’s very difficult to sit here and listen to the inaccurate statements—just totally inaccurate. I’ll tell you what we did promise: We promised to get a bankrupt province out of bankruptcy, to make sure we protect the real people in this province, the people who are working in the factories, people working in offices, struggling to pay their mortgage. We’re lowering their taxes.

We created 123,000 jobs. There are 123,000 people who weren’t working before, because before, businesses didn’t have any confidence in the Liberal government or the NDP government. They’re as happy as punch right now that we’re being fiscally responsible. We’re driving the economy. We’re making sure we’re creating good-paying jobs. Companies are flooding in all over the place.

So the students up there—their parents are going to have a sustainable job. They’re going to have lower taxes, they’re going to have lower bills because of our government, not because of the spendthrift NDP and Liberal policies.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Stop the clock. The House will come to order.

Restart the clock. Supplementary question.

Ms. Andrea Horwath: Well, Speaker, struggling families are struggling even more under this government, and you know what? They’re struggling because they didn’t get their $15 minimum wage, which is what they should have got to help actually pay the bills.

But look, the question was about students, and so I’m going to get back to that. For many students, these classes laid out a clear path toward fulfilling post-secondary education and a career. Now they are being left to try to piece together a

schedule that doesn’t reflect their interests or their potential.

Ontario students are watching as the Premier tears up their plans for their education, leaving them to pick up the pieces. Why is the Premier so determined—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Stop the clock. There is a standing order that says that interjections are out of order. That means you can’t yell across the floor at the person who has the floor.

I apologize to the Leader of the Opposition for interrupting. Restart the clock. She has the floor.

Ms. Andrea Horwath: The question is, why is the Premier so determined to leave Ontario students with less options in our schools and fewer prospects after they graduate?

Hon. Doug Ford: Minister of Education.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition is doing nothing but filling people with absolute rhetoric. That is nonsense. It’s not true.

She and the opposition party behind her are actually doing a disfavour, because the fact of the matter is, we’re going to be working with school boards. We have an attrition protection program, for goodness’ sake—$1.6 billion. Not one teacher is going to involuntarily lose their job. If there is a teacher who is going to be retiring who perhaps teaches math, perhaps teaches a technology program or perhaps teaches arts, we are going to make sure that—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Education will take her seat.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I had to interrupt. I’m going to call the member for Davenport to order and the member for Waterloo to order.

Next question.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: Shame on you guys.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Education will come to order.

Hon. Lisa M. Thompson: Fearmongers.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Education will come to order.

Next question.

Nurses

Ms. Natalia Kusendova: My question is for the Premier of Ontario. Nurses are an incredibly important and valued part of Ontario’s health care system. In fact, they are its backbone. They deliver high-quality, compassionate, patient-centred care that Ontario’s patients and families can rely on.

That is why I am so proud to stand in this Legislature to celebrate National Nursing Week. I am also proud to be a part of a government that values the hard work of Ontario’s nurses.

Mr. Speaker, could the Premier please explain to the members of this Legislature why it is so important to celebrate National Nursing Week in our province?

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: I’d like to thank the great member from Mississauga Centre for the question. You do an incredible—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Premier, I’m going to have to interrupt. Stop the clock. I’m going to have to interrupt.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I have to interrupt. Please take your seat. The clock is stopped.

The member for Waterloo and the Minister of Education have to come to order.

Start the clock. Premier?

Hon. Doug Ford: Thank you, Speaker. We have to recognize National Nursing Week, because they’re incredible people. I said throughout the campaign, and the opposition wants to make fun of me saying, I love the nurses. I truly do love the nurses, because I’ve had many experiences—like all of us have. When you take a loved one into the hospital, of course, the doctors are there overseeing everything, but the backbone of every single hospital is the nurses. The nurses are there around the clock. The nurses are taking care of the patients and making sure they’re feeling better.

There is no one that appreciates nurses more than our team, our caucus, our PC government. We’re going to make sure we take care of the nurses because, again, they are the backbone of every hospital throughout—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Supplementary question.

Ms. Natalia Kusendova: I thank the Premier for his response. There is no doubt that our nurses right here in Ontario are the best. I know that it means a lot to everyone in the health care sector that we have steadfast leadership in our Premier and our Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, who care so deeply about what matters the most. That is why I am proud to be part of a government that supports the hard work and sacrifices of our nurses across Ontario. Our government is committed to supporting front-line nurses by ensuring that they have the tools they need to provide the highest quality patient-centred care for Ontarians.

Could the Premier please inform this House what our government is doing to support nurses across Ontario?

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker, I forgot to mention that the MPP from Mississauga is actually a nurse. She’s actually a nurse. No one understands it better. My Minister of Labour was a nurse. We have lots of nurses, so we hear first-hand their needs—first-hand. When it’s in the middle of the night and they have two nurses on duty on a whole floor, that’s what concerns our government. We need to support our nurses and we will support our nurses because, again, when the patients need help and they need to be taken care of, who takes care of them? The nurses. So we need to take care of the nurses.

I can assure the nurses out there they will be well taken care of. We’ll listen to their concerns because no one understands the health care sector better than the front-line people, the nurses that are there day in and day out. They see the struggles. They see the struggles with the patients; they see the struggles with the doctors and the nurses. Nurses are absolute champions.

Government spending

Mr. Taras Natyshak: My question is to the Premier. Yesterday, John Tory, the distinguished mayor of Toronto and former leader of the Premier’s party, said that, since the Premier had so many budgeting suggestions for the city of Toronto, maybe the city of Toronto would reciprocate by helping the Ford government find waste in their own budget.

New Democrats would like to help the mayor identify the most wasteful spending in the Ford government’s budget, but we’re struggling to decide between them, which ones. There’s the House leader’s secret junket to India, the finance minister’s visit to the Big Apple, the current billion-dollar Beer Store boondoggle, and, of course, who could forget the Premier’s off-the-books personal pleasure wagon?

Can the Premier help us help Mayor Tory?

Hon. Doug Ford: I’d be more than happy to help the city of Toronto find savings. I was down there for four years. We saved over $1 billion. Where’s the savings now? All you’ve seen in the city of Toronto is the budget go up by billions of dollars over the last number of years. The services have gone down and the spending’s gone up. Who goes out and buys a $10-million fleet and has it sitting in the basement and does nothing? Who goes around paying people to water stumps of trees?

The auditor from the city of Toronto has given them a lengthy list of savings, and guess what, Mr. Speaker. The city of Toronto has ignored them. Name one efficiency, anyone in this room, one efficiency Toronto has found in the last five or six years. I can tell you, not one—not one single efficiency. All they do is waste money. They’re part of the NDP-Liberal little gang over there that loves to spend—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Supplementary question.

Mr. Taras Natyshak: Speaker, we know that we’ve barely scratched the surface when it comes to this government’s indefensible spending, but we understand the Premier has asked Mayor Tory not to meddle in provincial affairs. The Premier has criticized the mayor for “irresponsibly wading into provincial issues” that he is either not involved in or doesn’t understand. We get it, Speaker. It’s annoying when another level of government irresponsibly wades into issues that they aren’t involved in and they really don’t understand. Speaker, can the Premier explain why he does it so often?

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Members of the opposition, please take your seats.

Premier.

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: The city of Toronto has over a $13-billion budget. We just took over $20 billion off their books on backlog repairs.

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Member for Essex, come to order.

Hon. Doug Ford: We’re delivering a $28.5-billion transit system. We’re giving Toronto health $433 million. We’re supporting the city of Toronto like no other government.

I remember one thing, Mr. Speaker: When I was at the city of Toronto, we never came hat in hand to the government, not once, because as they were spending, we were saving; as they were raising taxes, we were lowering taxes. As a matter of fact, the first year, we delivered a 0% tax increase. They don’t understand that.

Just imagine if they took care of all their constituents who voted for them and ran their government, and we ran ours. They’d be bankrupt in a month, absolutely bankrupt.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The member for Essex has to come to order. The member for Ottawa Centre has to come to order.

Next question.

Mental health and addiction services

Mr. Vijay Thanigasalam: My question is for the Deputy Premier and Minister of Health and Long-Term Care.

This week is Mental Health Week. It is an important time to raise awareness to help end the stigma around mental health. That’s why I’m very proud to be part of a government that is committed to developing and implementing a comprehensive and connected mental health and addiction strategy, not just this week but every week.

I hear time and time again from my constituents of the riding of Scarborough–Rouge Park that people cannot access the mental health and addiction services when and where they need it. We need to do better.

Mr. Speaker, would the minister please inform the members of this Legislature what is being done to support Ontarians living with mental health and addictions challenges?

Hon. Christine Elliott: Thank you very much to the member from Scarborough–Rouge Park for this question. I know this is a really important issue for you as well.

Ontario’s mental health system is disconnected, making it difficult for patients and families to get the care they need when they need it. This fragmented approach to treating Ontario’s families is simply not good enough. That’s why our government has added desperately needed mental health and addiction services on the ground, in schools, communities and health centres across the province.

I was proud to announce yesterday that our government is investing $174 million in new funding to address the critical gaps in Ontario’s system and to support patients and families living with mental health and addictions challenges.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary.

Mr. Vijay Thanigasalam: I thank the minister for her response. There is no doubt that our mental health and addictions system needs immediate action. We need better wraparound services so that the people of Ontario are supported in their mental health and addiction challenges. My constituents and everyone in Ontario will certainly benefit from these community services. I’m proud to be part of a government that takes mental health very seriously.

Mr. Speaker, could the minister please inform the members of this Legislature what this investment of $174 million will be used for?

Hon. Christine Elliott: Thank you very much again to the member. Our government is keeping our promise to the people of Ontario to make mental health and addiction services a priority. That is why we are taking a multi-ministerial approach to Ontario’s mental health and addictions challenges.

This funding will go directly toward services for patients and families, and help reduce wait times, enhance opioid and addictions services, create additional housing, build capacity in child and youth mental health, support our men and women in uniform, and add services for seniors, Francophones and Ontario’s Indigenous peoples.

These investments are part of our government’s commitment to spend $3.8 billion over 10 years in mental health and addiction services. Together, we will create a connected system of care that will make sure that services are available for individuals and families throughout their journey to mental wellness.

Autism treatment

Miss Monique Taylor: My question is for the Premier. The new Ontario Autism Program was supposed to start April 1. Thousands of families across the province have waited anxiously for the new programs. Yet, to date, not one family in Ontario has received their childhood budget.

This government’s reckless rollout of their autism program has actually left parents waiting longer. Families feel like they have been shifted from a bad Liberal wait-list to a Conservative one, with absolutely no end in sight. Premier, how much longer will families have to wait to get the funding for services for their children?

Hon. Doug Ford: Minister of Transportation.

Hon. Jeff Yurek: Thanks very much to the member opposite for that question.

Last year, we came out with a new program for autism in Ontario. Not only did we double the funding, but we went to work at a system that clearly wasn’t working for Ontarians. Only one out of four children received treatment from their government. We worked to end that wait-list so that four out of four children are going to receive treatment—to support the children with autism throughout this province. We’re doing just that, not only with our ways to clear the wait-list, but also we’re going to support it with clear funding. We’re upping the funding to $600 million.

We’ve just started a consultation process to see how we can best move forward towards a needs-based program. This is what parents have been asking for, and we’re going to deliver that.

I hope the opposite member will join us in that consultation to develop a program together to ensure that children with autism are truly supported.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary question.

Miss Monique Taylor: Just so the minister knows, I’ve been talking to families for eight years. You can’t put out programs before you talk to parents. It’s backwards.

Families have no idea when they will receive funding for their children with autism. Families who were next on the list under the old OAP are still waiting. It’s not clear if this government is withholding funds deliberately or if they’re delayed just because they design programs on the fly.

Families shouldn’t have to wait for the Conservatives to get their house in order. Premier, when can families expect to receive not just application packages but actual funding to purchase the services that their children need?

Hon. Jeff Yurek: Thanks very much for that question. Previously, prior to our changes, three out of four children in this province were not receiving any funding and were indefinitely placed on a wait-list. It seems like the member opposite and the opposition want to return to that type of system, where three out of four children in this province do not receive any funding and have zero hope to get off of that wait-list.

We’re making the change in this province. We’re putting more money, and the minister has put more money, into the system. We’re working to make sure that four out of four children with autism receive the support and care that they need in this province.

Not only have we started consultations for a needs-based system, but we’re working with the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education to create wraparound services. It’s something the opposition has been asking for: wraparound services for children with autism. We’re going to continue to deliver on that program. We’re consulting right now. We’re listening to parents. I would hope the members opposite would work with us to help parents with children with autism get the supports and services they need.

Fundraising

Mr. John Fraser: My question is for the Premier. Speaker, through you to the Premier: Premier, I hope you slept well, to dreams of your double-dip dodge.

I want to follow up on that question that I asked you yesterday. Now that you’ve had time to think about it, I’d like to present to you some new facts: On April 29, $85,000 was deposited to your leadership campaign, on the way to Conservative Party coffers. Forty-six people donated the maximum. That’s just in the last two weeks.

Speaker, the Premier knows this is wrong. It’s an unfair advantage. He knows that not any other member in this Legislature can do this. It’s wrong, and he knows it—I know that.

Through you to the Premier, Speaker: Does the Premier believe there’s one rule for him and another rule for the people?

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: I think our MPP the leader of the Liberal independent party or Liberal Party—whatever you want to call them—forgets the $20,000-a-plate dinners that he would go to with the Premier, with the minister, running around. They actually had to change the rules because of what was going on for the pay-to-play. It was called pay-to-play under the previous Liberal government. You go spend $20,000 and you get to have a one-on-one with the minister. You might even be able to get a one-on-one with the Premier.

We’re raising money around the province with $25 spaghetti dinners. The majority of our—we’ll put out a statement, Mr. Speaker, and between $5, $10 and $25, we’ll raise $100,000 because people believe in our message. They believe in what we’re doing. They believe we’re turning the province around and putting more money in their pockets.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary question.

Mr. John Fraser: The Premier might want to check his own website, because the LCBO chair is raising money for his finance minister, and it’s not a $25 spaghetti dinner.

Premier, on April 29, 34 people exceeded their annual contribution limits. You asked them. You said, “Give me money for my leadership and then give me some more money for the Conservative Party.” And you know that this is wrong—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): You have to make your comments through the Chair, and the question has to be relevant.

Mr. John Fraser: Thank you, Speaker. The Premier knows that this is wrong. Okay?

You’re closing in on three quarters of a million dollars to a leadership campaign that was paid off a year ago. The millionaire Premier and the millionaire finance minister may believe that this is okay; for regular folks, this is a lot of money.

So I want to ask the Premier one more time: Does he believe there’s a rule just for him—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. The Premier to reply.

Hon. Doug Ford: Through you, Mr. Speaker: We had to change the rules because of all the nonsense going on with the Liberal Party. They were filled with scandals, deceit, backroom deals—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I’m going to ask the Premier to withdraw.

Hon. Doug Ford: Withdraw.

Mr. Speaker, they were attending $20,000-a-plate dinners. We’re raising money from people, again, with $5, $25, $30 donations.

They actually changed the greenbelt boundaries to suit their developer buddies. They switched them. As a matter of fact, they switched the greenbelt 19 times to suit their development buddies—19 times. We would even mention it, and people go wild. They changed it 19 times, because it’s called pay-to-play under the Liberal Party.

Dental care

Hon. Raymond Sung Joon Cho: Mr. Speaker, through you, I’d like to thank the very hard-working member for raising a very important question.

Our government is protecting what matters most: our seniors. We recognize that living on a fixed income can create gaps in care, something that many seniors in Ontario face. That’s why we introduced our dental care program for low-income seniors, which will help reduce unnecessary trips to the hospital, prevent chronic disease and increase quality of life for our seniors.

During the campaign, we promised dental care for our low-income seniors, and this government introduced the program in our—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. I’m going to ask the minister to take his seat.

Supplementary question.

Mr. Daryl Kramp: I certainly thank the minister for his response. I know seniors in my constituency, and literally in every constituency of every member here, certainly need a program such as this. This is a program that takes the health needs of our seniors seriously. Not only, though, is it beneficial for our seniors, but it’s also beneficial for our larger public health care system here in the province of Ontario.

So, can the minister as well please explain how this program contributes to our government’s larger plan that’s going to modernize the Ontario health care system, end hallway health care, and finally bring proper care back to our seniors in this province?

Hon. Raymond Sung Joon Cho: Thank you for the supplementary question. I would like to refer that question to the hard-working and my favourite Minister of Health and Long-Term Care.

Hon. Christine Elliott: Thank you very much. Thank you to the member from Hastings–Lennox and Addington as well for the original question.

Preventable dental issues lead to more than 60,000 emergency room visits per year, a significant portion of which are seniors. This puts a strain on our hospitals and is a failure to our seniors.

No senior in Ontario should go without quality dental care. That’s why we are investing nearly $90 million per year in dental care for low-income seniors. Public health units, community health centres, Aboriginal health access centres and mobile dental buses will assist Ontario seniors with their dental needs. Ontario seniors can be confident that their public health care system will be there for them when and where they need it.

Legal aid

Ms. Sara Singh: My question is to the Acting Premier. Speaker, legal aid clinics are looking at an approximate $16-million cut to their overall budgets.

The South Asian Legal Clinic is but one of 73 legal aid clinics in this province. They, like others across our province right now, provide counsel and legal representation to some of the most vulnerable people here in our province, like a woman they refer to as Miriam, a new immigrant and a tenant in Mississauga. Her landlord kept turning up at her unit without a notice. On one occasion, she complained that her landlord even assaulted her. After that came a threat of eviction. The legal aid clinic worked with Miriam to ensure that she was not evicted, and to get the compensation that she deserved for her injuries.

Speaker, where does the Premier suggest thousands of people like Miriam go to get the help they need?

Interruption.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Stop the clock. You have to leave. Those of you who are protesting have to leave.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order. The House will come to order.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The House will come to order.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The member for Northumberland–Peterborough South is warned.

The member for Sarnia–Lambton will come to order. The member for Niagara Centre will come to order.

Mr. Taras Natyshak: Do you want to kick the media out?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The member for Essex will come to order.

Hon. John Yakabuski: The media is right there.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry will come to order.

Where were we? Start the clock. The Deputy Premier has the floor.

Hon. Christine Elliott: To the Attorney General, Speaker.

Hon. Caroline Mulroney: I will be very happy to answer the question from the member opposite and speak to the vital services that legal aid provides, including to people such as Miriam, but I do want to point out that the photographer from the opposition party has been in the gallery today and it looks as though the opposition has been coordinating an effort to disrupt this House—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Stop the clock. The government side will come to order.

Start the clock. The Attorney General, please conclude your response.

Hon. Caroline Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, legal aid provides vital services, and that is why it is essential that we do everything we can to ensure that it has accountability and transparency and that it is sending the hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to the front-line services that are so desperately needed. Over the last few years, we have seen legal aid spending almost $100 million more. Legal aid clients and taxpayers have not been seeing the results that they should expect from that kind of investment, Mr. Speaker, and therefore—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. Supplementary question?

Ms. Sara Singh: A worker we will refer to as Imran worked for an employer who paid him only $7 an hour, even though our minimum wage here in this province is $14. The legal aid clinic helped Imran make an employment standards claim for his wages, overtime and termination pay. Imran says that without that help, he would not have been able to get what was owed to him, and he is grateful for the clinic’s support.

This government’s cut put these clinics at risk of closure, and the Attorney General knows that this is the case. Is it the Premier’s intention to close legal aid clinics so that people like Imran can’t get the wages that they are actually owed?

Hon. Caroline Mulroney: Mr. Speaker, legal aid has said itself that front-line services will continue to remain strong, so the services that people such as Imran have received will continue to be offered. Legal aid has a budget of over $400 million this year and will have even more if the federal government commits to pay the funding that it is responsible for. While some lawyers may not welcome this renewed accountability at legal aid, it is essential for legal aid clients and for the taxpayer of Ontario that is spending so much money to ensure that those people in Ontario who cannot afford legal representation are able to get that.

Addiction services

Mrs. Marie-France Lalonde: Ma question est pour la vice-première ministre. For 20 years, Gambling Research Exchange Ontario has been studying problem gambling and finding ways to help reduce the harm of gambling, providing resources to front-line agencies to prevent gambling addictions. Last week, the government announced that it is cutting their entire budget, shutting down the organization.

Speaker, as this government continues its crusade to expand alcohol and gaming access across Ontario, including free alcohol in casinos, why is this government not concerned about those most vulnerable people affected by gambling addictions?

Hon. Christine Elliott: I thank the member very much for the question. Of course, we are concerned about people with gambling addictions, but we are also concerned about making sure that we put resources on the front line where people really need the assistance. We have made the decision to redirect all available resources to the front lines. We have to wind down some of the research programs. We are committed to supporting an effective and respectful wind-down period for the gambling research exchange organization.

However, we are continuing to invest in programs to prevent gambling addiction and to ensure treatment programs such as, with respect to prevention, funding of the Responsible Gambling Council, YMCA, and the Ontario Aboriginal responsible gambling program made up of seven Indigenous organizations to implement community-based gambling prevention initiatives targeted at populations at risk, including children and youth and ethno-cultural and Indigenous communities.

I will have more to say in the supplementary.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary question.

Mrs. Marie-France Lalonde: I appreciate the Deputy Premier’s answer, but compared to the net profits of gambling of over $2.4 billion, the $2.5-million annual budget to fund research into problem gaming, I would say, is fair and reasonable, especially since we know all too well in this House the effect that problem gambling can have on individuals and families.

Speaker, this cut follows the trend of this government’s retreat from its responsibilities to Ontarians’ public well-being, from public health, autism, child care, legal aid, children with disabilities—the list goes on, Mr. Speaker. On top of that, we can now add problem gambling.

This government has talked about paying down the deficit. It is willing to pay the cost to have beer in corner stores, but it is unwilling to deal with gambling addiction. Can the Deputy Premier explain the rationale of not looking—

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Thank you. The minister to reply.

Hon. Christine Elliott: Thank you. Our government is committed to protecting what matters most. We are committed to protecting our education system, with an additional $700 million going into that, and with protecting our health care system, with an additional $1.3 billion going into our health care system.

But we also are committed to respecting adult choices by allowing people to make responsible choices that work for them. This includes ensuring that the people of Ontario have access to safe and legal gambling options. We’ve already spoken about prevention, but in terms of treatment, it’s also important to note that we fund 94 agencies across the province who offer problem-gambling services, including treatment for co-occurring substance use programs.

So we are addressing the problem, but we want to make sure that the services go directly to the front lines. That’s what we’re committed to doing, and that’s what we are going to make sure happens across the province.

Red tape reduction

Ms. Christine Hogarth: My question is for the Minister of Transportation. Last week, the Minister of Transportation introduced legislation called the Getting Ontario Moving Act. It includes a number of proposed measures that, if passed, will cut red tape, reduce regulatory burdens and keep Ontario open for business.

Our government for the people was elected last June with a mandate to grow our economy and make life easier for Ontarians. We have been acting fast to attract new investment, to create and protect jobs, and to reduce regulatory burdens by cutting red tape for businesses.

The majority of us in this Legislature can all agree that a successful business cannot run when they are burdened with debt and red tape. I know that last week’s proposed legislation contained a number of measures that, if passed, would cut red tape and reduce burdens for businesses and Ontarians. Can the Minister of Transportation share some of the proposed measures in the Getting Ontario Moving Act and regulatory postings?

Hon. Jeff Yurek: I’d like to thank the member for Etobicoke–Lakeshore for that question. Last week, I was proud to introduce the Getting Ontario Moving Act. This comprehensive piece of legislation, if passed, will cut red tape, save businesses and taxpayers time and money, and help keep Ontario’s roads amongst the safest in North America. In addition to the legislation, we’ll also be changing many regulations to meet these goals.

We are doing this because it’s fundamental to our efforts to put people first, getting Ontario moving and ensuring businesses are not bogged down by red tape.

Some of the measures we are proposing to cut and reduce are: making life easier for people with personal-use pickup trucks and trailers by changing regulations to exempt them from burdensome annual inspections; and reducing the burden on the short-line railway industry by addressing concerns from the industry for the ministry to develop a risk-based short-line rail oversight burden reduction strate