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March 6, 2014

40th Parliament, 2nd Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcripts 2014-Mar-06 (PDF)

L111 - Thu 6 Mar 2014 / Jeu 6 mar 2014

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Thursday 6 March 2014 Jeudi 6 mars 2014

ORDERS OF THE DAY

ENHANCING PATIENT CARE

AND PHARMACY SAFETY

(STATUTE LAW

AMENDMENT) ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 MODIFIANT DES LOIS

AFIN D’AMÉLIORER LES SOINS

AUX MALADES ET LA SÉCURITÉ

DES PHARMACIES

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

LEGISLATIVE PAGES

ORAL QUESTIONS

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

MANUFACTURING JOBS

ENERGY POLICIES

EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

GOVERNMENT’S RECORD

ENERGY POLICIES

TEACHERS’ COLLECTIVE BARGAINING

WIND TURBINES

HOSPITAL SERVICES

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

HORSE RACING INDUSTRY

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN

SPEAKER’S BOOK AWARD

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

MEMBERS’ STATEMENTS

ADVANCED AGRICULTURAL LEADERSHIP PROGRAM

NORTHERN ONTARIO

MINING SUPPLY SHOWCASE

SCHOMBERG FARM TOUR

DISASTER RELIEF

NORMA BERTI

RANKED BALLOTING

LOCAL FOOD FUND

VAUGHAN FILM FESTIVAL

TRANSFORMER STATION

VISITORS

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY

AND RESPONSES

CANADIAN AGRICULTURE

LITERACY WEEK /

SEMAINE DE SENSIBILISATION

À L’AGRICULTURE CANADIENNE

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

CANADIAN AGRICULTURE

LITERACY WEEK

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

CANADIAN AGRICULTURE

LITERACY WEEK

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

PETITIONS

ONTARIO DRUG BENEFIT PROGRAM

HYDRO RATES

CHILDREN’S AID SOCIETIES

AIR QUALITY

TENANT PROTECTION

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

DOG OWNERSHIP

ONTARIO DRUG BENEFIT PROGRAM

TAXATION

LCBO OUTLET

CYSTIC FIBROSIS

ALL-TERRAIN VEHICLES

GOVERNMENT SERVICES

PRIVATE MEMBERS’

PUBLIC BUSINESS

FEDERAL TRANSFER PAYMENTS

FINANCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY

ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR

LA RESPONSABILITÉ FINANCIÈRE

VISITORS

TORONTO RANKED BALLOT

ELECTIONS ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR UN MODE DE SCRUTIN

PRÉFÉRENTIEL POUR TORONTO

FEDERAL TRANSFER PAYMENTS

FINANCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY

ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR

LA RESPONSABILITÉ FINANCIÈRE

TORONTO RANKED BALLOT

ELECTIONS ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR UN MODE DE SCRUTIN

PRÉFÉRENTIEL POUR TORONTO

FEDERAL TRANSFER PAYMENTS

FINANCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY

ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR

LA RESPONSABILITÉ FINANCIÈRE

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PROTECTION OF PUBLIC

PARTICIPATION ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 SUR LA PROTECTION

DU DROIT À LA PARTICIPATION

AUX AFFAIRES PUBLIQUES

The House met at 0900.

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

Prayers.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

ENHANCING PATIENT CARE

AND PHARMACY SAFETY

(STATUTE LAW

AMENDMENT) ACT, 2014 /

LOI DE 2014 MODIFIANT DES LOIS

AFIN D’AMÉLIORER LES SOINS

AUX MALADES ET LA SÉCURITÉ

DES PHARMACIES

Resuming the debate adjourned on November 21, 2013, on the motion for second reading of the following bill:

Bill 117,

An Act to amend certain statutes with respect to the regulation of pharmacies and other matters concerning regulated health professions / Projet de loi 117, Loi visant à modifier certaines lois en ce qui concerne la réglementation des pharmacies et d’autres questions relatives aux professions de la santé réglementées.

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

Mrs. Christine Elliott: I am very pleased to have the opportunity to resume the debate on Bill 117, the drug and pharmacies regulation act, which was actually introduced last October—October 10, 2013. My colleague Mr. Yurek, who is the member from Middlesex—the St. Thomas area; I can’t remember the name exactly—did the leadoff for us on October 22, 2013. Being a pharmacist himself, he was an invaluable resource to us as we reviewed this bill as a caucus, and we are certainly prepared to support this bill.

I think the last time it was spoken to was November 21, when Madame Gélinas, from the third party, did her leadoff as well. I think it’s important to note that there have been several responses to what happened.

I think that, before I go through the debate, I’d like to just indicate what led to the introduction of Bill 117 and why we’re dealing with it here and now. It arose from a tragic case of underdosing with respect to two chemotherapy drugs, gemcitabine and cyclophosphamide, which took place between February 2012 and March 2013 at four Ontario hospitals, in addition to a hospital in New Brunswick. The four affected hospitals were the Windsor Regional Hospital, the London Health Sciences Centre, Lakeridge Health and the Peterborough Regional Health Centre.

It wasn’t until March 2013 that the error was discovered: The chemo drugs had been diluted and had affected almost 1,200 patients across the province of Ontario, and it was discovered that an error had been made. At that point, I would say that all officials acted quickly, and I would like to commend the Minister of Health for taking quick action in this and for appointing Dr. Jake Thiessen, who is a well-known expert in the area of pharmacy, to conduct an investigation into what went wrong so that we can make sure such an event never happens again.

Dr. Thiessen did a thorough examination and issued his report in July 2013. It was a very timely response, and he came up with a number of recommendations but concluded essentially that, “The problem boiled down to gaps in communication and its unintended consequences.” What happened? How did we end up with so many people receiving diluted chemotherapy drugs? We’ll never really know the consequences of it, whether people were adversely affected—some people have passed away since then. Whether they died because of that we’ll never know, but we owe it to those patients and their families to conduct a thorough investigation, and that has been done.

Dr. Thiessen’s report is very thorough, but I would also like to indicate to people who may be watching this debate this morning that the social policy committee has also undertaken a very extensive review. We also called witnesses; heard testimony from a variety of individuals and organizations involved. We will be issuing a report in the next short while. While I can’t speak to the specifics of that, because it hasn’t been made public yet, I want to assure the public that we have taken that very, very seriously, and we have examined it to the extent to which we can as legislators.

I think when you take a look to see what actually happened, we have to look at the circumstances around the purchasing of these drugs. What we now have in the province of Ontario are organizations known as group purchasing organizations, which act on behalf of hospitals in order to get better volume discounts for the drugs that are purchased. In order to contract these services, the group purchasing organizations issue tenders for certain drugs. In this case, it was admixtures of chemotherapy drugs, which are drugs that have to be mixed with saline in order to be used.

A lot of the hospitals are contracting this out because it saves time. It’s something that can be readily used by pharmacy staff, and it’s fairly commonplace that this has been done.

The group purchasing organization here—in this case it was called Medbuy—put out the tender for these two admixtures for these two chemotherapy drugs. They hired a group of 11 pharmacists to review the tender, and three different companies submitted bids. Ultimately, the bid from Marchese Hospital Solutions was selected. It was a different company that had had the previous tender. I think this is where there was a fundamental mistake that was made.

The previous company had made concentration-specific admixtures; in other words, they could be used in the form that they appeared and could be administered to patients requiring chemotherapy solutions. It’s commonly known, though, that generally speaking, these compounds are overfilled. So in many circumstances they may be filled to 107 millilitres rather than 100 millilitres. They’re not concentration-specific, so they would have to be specifically measured for use by each patient.

There was a fundamental misunderstanding here between Medbuy and Marchese as to whether the entire bag of concentrated solution was going to be used for one patient or whether it was going to be used for a number of patients.

Generally speaking, I understand that there is a great variety in the amounts that can be administered to any one person. It wouldn’t generally be common to use one full bag for each person, because the amount of medication or chemotherapy drug that each person would require would depend upon their height, weight and so on and various other circumstances. But that wasn’t the case for the solutions that were prepared by Marchese Hospital Solutions.

They understood that they were responding exactly to the tender that had been put out by Medbuy, and Medbuy understood that they were producing the solutions in the same way that the previous contractor had done. As a result, people were given these overfilled bags, and that’s how the underdosing happened.

It wasn’t until some of the front-line workers at the Peterborough Regional Health Centre discovered this problem in March 2013 that this whole matter came to light. As it happened, they had just recently run out of their supply of bags from the previous vendor, and they noticed that the label on the new IV bag from Marchese wasn’t labelled in the same way that previous solutions had been, and they were concerned about how they should be administering this drug. So they were the ones that raised the alarm bells, and they were the ones that brought it to the attention of the authorities in the first place, and action was taken after that.

In his report, Dr. Thiessen took a look at a number of things. I’d just like to take a look at what his actual mandate was, before I go any further. His mandate was three things: first of all, to conduct a review to determine the causes of recently discovered instances of underdosing of chemotherapy drugs at Windsor Regional Hospital, London Health Sciences Centre, Lakeridge Health and Peterborough Regional Health Centre; secondly, to provide recommendations to prevent future incidents of this nature; and, third, to provide a report to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care no later than July 12, 2013. Dr. Thiessen certainly did that.

Dr. Thiessen did come forward with a total of 12 recommendations, one of which is the subject of Bill 117, which gives the Ontario College of Pharmacists authority over hospital pharmacies in addition to community pharmacies. This is an important first step. As I said before, we are certainly prepared to agree with this and to vote in favour of Bill 117. But I think it’s important to note that there were 11 other, equally important recommendations that weren’t followed, which I’ll get to in a moment.

In the sense of what we have here, giving the Ontario College of Pharmacists jurisdiction over hospital pharmacies, I think, completes the picture and makes sure that patient safety is going to be given paramount consideration.

The other aspects of the bill: It puts in measures intended to enhance the system’s ability to prevent one or more events that can jeopardize patient care and safety. It appoints a contact person, at every hospital with a pharmacy, whose job is to facilitate communication with the Ontario College of Pharmacists. We know that that was an issue in this case, and this makes a lot of sense.

Secondly, the bill also allows health regulatory colleges to share information with public health authorities and with public hospitals. Finally, the bill would also enable regulatory colleges to provide a faster response to complaints. So now the OCP, Ontario College of Pharmacists, can accredit, inspect and enforce hospital pharmacies’ operations as well as make regulations and bylaws to establish the standards and requirements for accreditation and inspection.

It’s great as far as it goes, but there are several other issues that Dr. Thiessen reported on that I would just like to spend a few minutes speaking about.

His first recommendation was: “Notwithstanding the underdosing incident, the continued use of group purchasing organizations ... to negotiate vendor product preparation pharmaceutical services shall not be discouraged. However, improvements are needed in the GPO-based processes.” We would certainly agree with that. I think it’s fair to say, without divulging anything specific, that that was something that the social policy committee did take a serious look at and will have some recommendations concerning.

Secondly: “Every GPO shall review its procurement process to ensure that risk for patients is considered an essential evaluation and adjudication criterion when considering proposals.” Again, this is just, I think, a matter of common sense, that patient safety has to be the paramount consideration. Of course, price is an important consideration, and we need to make sure that we get good value for every taxpayer dollar that is spent in health care, but the paramount consideration must always be patient safety.

The third recommendation was: “Every GPO shall develop and adopt a standardized product and/or service specification description that outlines the requirements for contracted sterile or non-sterile pharmaceutical product services.” I think this really gets to the crux of the matter here: That fundamental misunderstanding between Medbuy, as the group purchasing organization, and Marchese Hospital Solutions about what type of solution was to be prepared—whether it was to be used for single patient use or whether it was concentration-specific and could be used for a number of patients—really led to the tragic circumstances that we’re faced with.

Had that not been a question, arguably the events that transpired probably would not have.

The fourth recommendation: “Annually in January, each GPO shall publicize information regarding the contracted pharmaceutical services provided by all its vendors.” Again, this is aimed at transparency and accountability, just knowing what has been contracted and what is being prepared in-house. We want to make sure that the pharmacies are going to be able to operate as efficiently as possible, but certainly it is also possible that not every service provided by a pharmacy should be contracted out.

Recommendation number 5: “Marchese Hospital Solutions … shall review and revise its product preparation processes to ensure that all its products meet the specifications required by professionals in treating patients effectively and safely.” We want to make sure that at every step along the line, all of the parties that are involved in preparing these types of solutions, whether they’re in the hospital pharmacies or whether they’re contracted out through the group purchasing organizations to another provider, make sure that patient safety is in place and that the proper processes to ensure that are in place all along the way.

Recommendation number 6: “The Ontario College of Pharmacists … (and by extension, the National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities …) shall work quickly with Health Canada to define best practices and contemporary objective standards for non-sterile and sterile product preparation within a licensed pharmacy.” We need to make sure, again, anywhere, that we’re dealing with these types of products, whether they are non-sterile or sterile—that it’s organized and coordinated, both federally and provincially. Of course, there is a role to play by Health Canada as well.

Recommendation number 7: The OCP “shall stipulate specialized electronic material records and label requirements for non-sterile and sterile product preparation within a licensed pharmacy.” Again, the labelling issue was a significant issue that was spoken about both by Dr. Thiessen as well as in the social policy committee. I think it’s of note that though this preparation had been used for some time in some of the other hospital facilities, it was really only the front-line workers at the Peterborough Regional Health Centre’s cancer centre who were the ones that noticed the discrepancy.

I think there is some confusion out there as to appropriate labelling. We need to have standardized labelling to make sure that anybody who’s working with these preparations, whether it’s the pharmacist, the pharmacy technician or anyone else, knows exactly how the preparations are going to be used.

Recommendation 9: The OCP—the Ontario College of Pharmacists—“shall specify credentials beyond education and licensing for personnel engaged in non-sterile and sterile product preparation practices within a licensed pharmacy.” Again, it’s just making sure that everyone who is within the hospital pharmacy system—because this is a new thing for the Ontario College of Pharmacists—is reviewed to make sure that they all have the appropriate credentials, because they are working with medications that can allow someone to live or die if they’re not used appropriately.

Recommendation number 10: “Health Canada shall license all enterprises that function beyond the product preparation permitted within a licensed pharmacy; that is, all product preparation enterprises not within a licensed pharmacy shall be licensed” by Health Canada.

Here, there was a discrepancy between what is considered to be a pharmacy and what is considered to be a manufacturing facility. The Ontario College of Pharmacists has jurisdiction over the former; Health Canada has jurisdiction over the latter. But unfortunately, the situation here with Marchese Hospitals Solutions fell into a grey area, sort of a no man’s land, where nobody really knew who had jurisdiction, and as a result, it fell through the cracks.

I think it should be said that Marchese Hospital Solutions was very proactive in this matter. They did actively seek to find out who had regulatory authority over them and they weren’t given a complete response at the time; so as a matter of fact, this issue of regulation fell between the cracks. It is something that needs to be clearly defined, as to what a pharmacy is and what a manufacturing facility is so that the appropriate jurisdictions know in the future who is going to be responsible for these entities.

Recommendation number 11: “The Ontario Hospital Association … shall conduct a formal review/audit to determine the efficiency and traceability of computer-based clinic and hospital records for patients and their treatments, and report the findings to the” Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. That’s an interesting one, because I think part of the problem here is that we don’t have an ongoing, up-and-running system of electronic medical records here in the province of Ontario.

While I don’t think one can say that if we had them, it would have prevented this chemotherapy underdosing incident, it certainly would be helpful, within the hospitals, to be able to have a functioning system to track medications for patients; to make sure that there are not toxic interactions; to make sure that people are being dosed at appropriate levels; to make sure that physicians and other health care providers can have the appropriate information at their fingertips to know whether patients are receiving toxic doses, toxic mixtures and so on.

I think that it’s fine to tell the Ontario Hospital Association to conduct this audit, but in all fairness, I believe they need to have the tools in hospitals in order to be able to carry out their business efficiently and to maintain, over and above all of that, patient safety.

Then the last recommendation, of course, was recommendation number 12: “The Ontario College of Pharmacists shall license all pharmacies operating within Ontario’s clinics or hospitals.”

Dr. Thiessen concluded: “This review has uncovered the cause of the oncology underdosing. The recommendations are intended to prevent future oncology incidents of this nature and to mitigate identifiable risks in the broader realm of non-sterile and sterile product preparation within licensed pharmacies and other enterprises.”

Again, in conclusion, I would say it is commendable that the government has brought forward Bill 117, but because it only deals with one of the 12 recommendations made by Dr. Thiessen, I would certainly urge the government to move forward with the rest of the recommendations and to give a good, hard look at the social policy committee’s report when it is issued. It contains some additional recommendations that we hope will be helpful in making sure that such a situation never happens again.

Nobody wants to have this sort of thing hanging over their head. A diagnosis of cancer is difficult enough, but to never know whether you received the right dosage—and for those families who may have lost loved ones, for them to never know—had they not received the underdosing; had they received the appropriate level—whether this might never have happened.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak this morning on this, Mr. Speaker.

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

Mr. John Vanthof: It’s an honour to be able to rise in this House and comment on the remarks by the member from Whitby–Oshawa regarding Bill 117, Enhancing Patient Care and Pharmacy Safety Act. Her remarks were very well thought out.

This is such a personal and tragic issue, because the people who received the mis-dosed chemotherapy drugs—their lives are on the line. They gave their trust to our medical system that they were diagnosed and that the treatments would be the best available to treat their affliction. Their trust was shattered by mistakes made in our system. This bill is meant to address that, and it takes into account some of the recommendations that Dr. Thiessen made.

We are concerned that the bill was brought forward before the social policy committee had a real chance to look at the overview of the whole situation. We hope, as this bill goes forward, that it will take into account the recommendations, because these recommendations are still not out.

We are very confident that, hopefully, we can regain the public’s trust by implementing measures that will stop this from happening again, because, as I’ve said before, the people’s trust has been broken. People’s lives have been shattered. Lives might have been lost from this mistake. It is our duty to do everything in our power to make sure that mistakes like this don’t happen again.

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

Hon. Madeleine Meilleur: It gives me great pleasure to speak today on Bill 117, the Enhancing Patient Care and Pharmacy Safety Act.

As a former nurse myself, I cannot imagine how the health professionals and the patients who discovered that patients had received the wrong dosage, and also the health care providers who have given the wrong dosage without knowing about it—just imagine: You’re a patient, and you are suffering from cancer. You put your life into the hands of a professional you believe very highly in, and then you discover later on that you were not given the proper treatment. I cannot imagine, because I have friends and colleagues who have suffered from cancer. Right now they are under treatment.

I’m very pleased that the minister reacted so quickly and asked Dr. Thiessen to look into and to bring about a recommendation that will hopefully prevent such an incident from happening again. I want to also thank the health professional who reacted so quickly and recognized that there was something wrong with what she was prepared to give to one of her patients. It shows that we have very conscientious and very good health professionals out there who want nothing but the best care for their own patients.

We have accepted and endorsed all 12 recommendations from Dr. Thiessen. I hope that we will all help to speed up the approval of this bill.

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

Mr. John O’Toole: I listened closely and attentively to the member from Whitby–Oshawa, our critic of health. Back in October 2013, I think our lead speaker was Jeff Yurek, the member from Elgin–Middlesex–London, a pharmacist. Ms. Elliott outlined the 12 recommendations in the Thiessen report.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): I would ask the member to stick to riding names and not personal names.

Mr. John O’Toole: Okay. I appreciate that, Mr. Speaker.

In fact, it’s important to put on the record that patient safety being put at risk—especially families when they have the greatest trust, as has been said by many members—we have to get it right. It’s unfortunate. I think it was discovered at the Peterborough Regional Health Centre; one of the persons in the pharmacy in the hospital, I gather, realized that there was underdosing. It’s very troubling, in that confidence in the health care system is paramount when you discuss it.

Section number three of the bill and act is amended by adding a

section saying that where drug compounding or dispensing of supplies in a hospital, by hospitals and on the premise of the hospital, it’s considered to be a pharmacy. That, perhaps, as has been said, is one of the loopholes.

Another

section very specifically: If a person resigns from the profession, there’s a duty to report it within 30 days to the college. So hopefully this will correct the problem and re-establish the confidence in our health care system, which is badly shaken at this point in time in Ontario.

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

M me France Gélinas: I want to congratulate the member from Whitby–Oshawa for her speech this morning that basically gives a very accurate description as to what has happened so far. I also want to support my colleague from Timiskaming–Cochrane, who really focused on the effect that this has had on the 1,202 people who were affected by the diluted chemo drugs.

Now, my comments are disappointment. We have a committee of the Legislature that has spent an entire year looking at where the mistake happened, why the mistake happened, why it was not detected, what the mechanisms were in place that failed so that we did not pick up this error before this product was actually used to offer chemotherapy treatment to all of those people.

I’m quite proud of the work that the committee has done. We are coming forward with recommendations that I feel will assure the people of Ontario that what went wrong will never happen again, and if something of the sort was to happen, the mechanism in place will catch the problem way, way before it even reaches close to the bedside.

The bill has been brought forward before the work of the committee has been made public. The problem is that the recommendations of the committee are substantive, will need legislation, and yet this bill came before the work was done. There is a disconnect there that can only be detrimental to the trust that those people have lost in our health care system.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): The member for Whitby–Oshawa, you have two minutes.

Mrs. Christine Elliott: I’d like to thank all of the members who have commented this morning. The member from Timiskaming–Cochrane spoke about the public trust being broken, and I think that is fundamental to this whole discussion because people do put themselves in the hands of health care professionals when they’re sick. A cancer diagnosis is terrifying, and they absolutely trust the health professionals to do the right thing for them—which of course they intended to do here, but there was this breakdown that absolutely needs to be fixed, if we can go about regaining public trust in the system. We owe that to the people affected and their families.

The Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services also congratulated the health professionals for bringing this matter to light and for taking such quick action. I can only imagine the people in Peterborough who were pharmacy assistants and technicians who brought this forward. It must have been a very difficult thing for them to do. They showed a lot of courage in bringing this forward, and I thank them as well.

The member from Durham talked about the need to enact the rest of the recommendations. I would certainly agree with that. The minister indicated that the government has endorsed all 12 recommendations. We certainly hope that we’ll be able to move forward with them.

Finally, the member from Nickel Belt has been my colleague on the social policy committee, and I agree with her: We have spent a lot of time in analyzing the information we’ve received from the various witnesses. We do have a report that is quite substantive that is going to be coming forward. But I would really like to commend her in particular for her excellent work on this. I would say she, more than anybody else in the committee, has put countless hours into this, using her knowledge as a health care professional.

I would really like to commend her for her dedication to this, because I think that the work that is going to come out as a result of the committee working together owes a lot to the work that she’s done.

I thank everybody for the comments. I think we’re all aligned in wanting to protect patient safety and move this bill forward, but let’s not forget the rest of the recommendations that have to come forward, too.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Further debate? The member for Windsor–Tecumseh.

Mr. Percy Hatfield: Thank you, Speaker. Indeed, I welcome the opportunity to stand in the House today to speak to Bill 117, the Enhancing Patient Care and Pharmacy Safety Act, 2013. As you know, this was first introduced back on the 10th of October last year. It’s

An Act to amend certain statutes with respect to the regulation of pharmacies and other matters concerning regulated health professions.

By way of official explanation, the government wishes to amend the Drug and Pharmacies Regulation Act, the Public Hospitals Act, as well as the Regulated Health Professions Act. For the most part, we’re discussing this because, as we all know, for close to a year, more than 1,200 cancer patients at five hospitals received doses of chemotherapy drugs that were weaker than caregivers realized.

We know that this bill is a direct response to recommendations made by Dr. Jake Thiessen’s report on chemotherapy underdosing. Dr. Jake Thiessen is a pharmacy expert, and he was appointed to conduct an independent review of Ontario’s cancer drug supply chain. Four of those hospitals were in Ontario; the other one was in New Brunswick. One of the four hospitals was in my community of Windsor, and 290 patients from Windsor-Essex county were among the 1,200 who didn’t get what they were supposed to be given. Many of those patients were constituents of mine and also of my colleague, the member from Essex, of course, as well as the member from Windsor West.

First, allow me to thank the three sharp-eyed pharmacy assistants in Peterborough who discovered the problem within a couple of hours of cracking open their first batch of this weaker stuff. While the drugs were mistakenly allocated in Windsor and elsewhere, the three assistants in Peterborough couldn’t figure out the specifics of the labelling on their first shipment of outsourced chemotherapy drugs from a new supplier.

According to the Toronto Star, they asked for advice, and apparently a pharmacist from a regional cancer centre in Durham told them not to worry about it because the discrepancy in the recommended dosage was not considered to be clinically significant at first glance.

One patient in Peterborough was given the diluted mixture, but because the pharmacy assistants there were used to working with intravenous drugs that clearly spelled out the total concentration of the drugs, the total volume of saline as well as the amount of active drug per millilitre of saline, they asked for another opinion, a second opinion, if you will, from another pharmacist. Thankfully, an hour and five minutes later, the entire supply was ordered quarantined.

That brings us to today, except to acknowledge—and in no way am I assigning blame—that 150 or more of the 1,200 patients who were administered the weaker, diluted drugs have died. Now, it’s not known—I repeat, not known—what, if any, role the weakened mixture played in those deaths. I know, though, in the Windsor region, there is still a big cloud of uncertainty. Marlene Roy, who was having treatment for breast cancer—by the way, the drugs in question are used on a regular basis to help treat patients with cancers of the breast, ovaries and pancreas.

But 60-year-old Marlene Roy was quoted in the Windsor Star, actually a week after I was elected in my by-election last August 1, discussing the impact of her—after receiving the diluted mixture, she said, “You’re left wondering, did this cause my life to be shorter?” This is a huge question. When you get a medication that’s weakened, over-diluted by 7% or 10% or more, what will be the short- and medium- and long-term effect of that underdosing? You talk about stress. Now on a daily basis, stress governs her life. Mrs.

Roy told Brian Cross of the Windsor Star that she can’t sleep at night now, because she’s so troubled about all of this.

Another Windsor-area cancer patient, Diane Marley, whose husband, Ken, is a good friend of mine—he’s a criminal defence lawyer in Windsor—says, when speaking of the report by Dr. Jake Thiessen, which led in part to this bill being introduced by the minister, that the report doesn’t remove the big question of whether receiving the diluted drugs will affect her survival. But she says, “The only good that can come of it is if these recommendations are followed through on and things really are tightened up.” I agree. I couldn’t agree more with that statement.

So that’s what’s on the table. Will there be improvements to the system? Will there be protections for the patients? Shelley-ann Meloche is certainly hoping so. She was diagnosed with breast cancer last year. She has been riding on an emotional roller coaster ever since being told that she was given the diluted chemo drugs by mistake. She was quoted in that Windsor Star story as saying, “You have a double mastectomy, you have months of healing and then they’re putting ports in and giving chemo. You’re just starting to feel better and this hits you.” Imagine, Mr.

Speaker, imagine the shock, the uncertainty, the unknown, the fear. Shelley-ann Meloche adds, “And nothing anyone says is going to make you feel better.”

The hospital where these patients were given the wrong doses was Windsor Regional. The hospital CEO was quoted as saying, “Everybody plays a

part in fixing this. That includes Windsor Regional Hospital, hospitals across Ontario and Canada. Every entity plays a part.” Speaker, that includes this Legislature.

We have a role to play. This is a non-partisan issue. This is an issue that demands our attention and that we must take very seriously. We have to do what is right. We have to do our part to make sure nothing like this ever happens again. We have to make sure patients will not be asking themselves, “I wonder how much longer I would have lived if I hadn’t experienced this situation.”

In order to not repeat these mistakes, we have to understand exactly what happened and put in place supervisory controls and oversight accountability. We need regulations and amendments, and we need to question how this came about so that we don’t have another replay of this horrific story.

Dr. Thiessen found shortcomings at all levels of the drug chain. He didn’t find any evidence of malicious or deliberate dilution of the drugs.

Speaker, mixing chemotherapy drugs with saline solution for intravenous use is time-consuming. It’s potentially hazardous. We all know it’s becoming increasingly common for hospitals to outsource the process to private companies operating with little regulation or oversight.

I must point out that our party’s health critic, the member from Nickel Belt, has questioned why it took a public health crisis for the government to notice the dangers posed by gaps in oversight. Our health critic has pointed out that hospitals are outsourcing more and more services, from heart diagnostic testing to urology. The member from Nickel Belt questions whether proper oversight is in place across the entire health care system in Ontario.

It leaves us wondering, what else is out there? To date, no one involved in all of this has ever said, “It’s my fault. I’m responsible.” Sure, people have apologized, but no one wants to accept the blame.

Let’s go back for a moment and look at the chain of events. A middle man, if you will, Medbuy, put out a tender call for a non-concentration-specific drug mixture. But what should have been put out for bids was a tender for a concentration-specific mixture, which could have been customized for the individual user. That’s where the blame begins.

Marchese gets the contract. This company, Marchese, the company that mixed the drugs, was not overseen by the College of Pharmacists. It was not under the direct supervision of Health Canada either. We know the former supplier had no problems. We know their bags were properly labelled and easily understood. We know there was a tender call and a new supplier chosen—a low bidder.

Some of us still find it troubling that this new supplier, Marchese Hospital Solutions, the company that mixed and supplied the intravenous bags of chemotherapy drugs—the drugs involved in this massive medication error—got the contract despite the fact it wasn’t a licensed pharmacy or drug manufacturer. Where was the oversight?

Some of us still find it troubling that, despite recognizing the need for new regulations, the bill was drafted and introduced prior to the committee studying the issue and Dr. Thiessen’s report, prior to the committee making its recommendation.

So what do we have in this bill? Well, there are provisions to allow the Ontario College of Pharmacists to accredit, inspect and enforce various measures of the Drug and Pharmacies Regulation Act in regard to hospital pharmacies, and those in our provincial institutions. These institutional pharmacies could be located in prisons or in long-term-care homes.

We’ll have separate classes of certificates of accreditation. Hospitals will now have to report to a regulatory college when a member resigns and there is a reasonable ground to believe the resignation is related to a member’s professional misconduct, incompetence or incapacity. It makes you wonder, Speaker, why this hasn’t been in place before now, but let me continue.

The changes will allow health colleges to share information with public health authorities when public health implications are suspected. It will be easier to appoint a supervisor to a medical college if it’s deemed to be in the public interest.

In order not to waste the time of the people who are obligated to investigate complaints, it removes the obligation of a health college to investigate every complaint where it’s believed by the registrar of that college that even if that allegation was proven, it would not constitute misconduct. Apparently, there are just too many complaints coming in that would be more in the class of neighbour-to-neighbour conflict and not based on medical misconduct.

The intent is to tighten up a lot of loose ends, and that is a good thing. What isn’t necessarily a good thing is that the Standing Committee on Social Policy continues to look at the diluted chemotherapy drugs scandal, and this bill was drafted and introduced before members of that committee made their final recommendations.

I don’t have a crystal ball, and I can’t predict the future. But, Speaker, like you, I can guess this likely could mean that Bill 117 will only partially address the problems that led to this tragic error.

Earlier I referenced a story done by Brian Cross in the Windsor Star. Let me conclude by quoting once more from that story. Kate Warner is another cancer patient from the Windsor-Essex county area. When asked what she thought of Dr. Thiessen’s report, she wasn’t pleased, Mr. Speaker. She said, “Somebody’s got to step up and say, ‘Yes, we’re responsible for this and it won’t happen again.’” She further added, “It sounds to me like [no one is] really accepting the blame, but they’re still apologizing for it. I don’t see that it’s going to do us any good at all.”

Speaker, this bill doesn’t assign responsibility for what happened to more than 1,200 unsuspecting cancer patients. No one is stepping up and saying, “It’s my fault.” Medbuy hasn’t explained how it could put out a call for a non-concentration-specific solution when what was needed was a concentration-specific mixture which could be customized, patient by patient.

For many patients—people such as Kate Warner—this bill is too little, too late. That’s not to say it can’t be improved upon, because, despite its many shortcomings, it does deserve support from all three parties. My party’s health critic, the member from Nickel Belt, has recommended that we in the New Democratic Party support this legislation.

I, for one, certainly hope that what occurred with the diluted chemotherapy drugs scandal will never happen again. This bill will bring Ontario in line with other provinces, such as British Columbia, that already regulate hospital pharmacies, and I will be voting in favour of it.

Thank you for the opportunity, Mr. Speaker. It’s always a privilege to stand in this chamber and provide input, and I never take my position here for granted. At times such as these, however, I wish there was more we could do. I wish we could get the responsible parties to admit their guilt, so that apologies would have a ring of truth and patients—those who survived—might finally be able to get a start on their road to closure.

What happened wasn’t their fault. They put their faith into Ontario’s medical system, Ontario’s health care system. When it works, it’s one of the best in the world, but it’s not perfect. It can always be improved upon, and this is a start, Speaker, but there’s still more that could be done.

When the Standing Committee on Social Policy concludes its hearings and makes its recommendations, perhaps that bill will be stronger and this never will happen again.

Speaker, I hope I’m not breaking any confidences here, but I am of the understanding that the report from the standing committee will be released within the next three weeks or less.

To those who were affected directly: I have full confidence in the two New Democrats on that committee: the member from Nickel Belt and the member from Welland. They have been working to ensure nothing like this ever happens again and if there’s any hint of it, it will be caught quickly, remedial action will be taken immediately, and we’ll never get to the point where we have to have an investigation such as this.

We need to believe in our health care system. We need to believe again in our health care system. We put our faith in it. We take ourselves to the hospital or we send our loved ones to the hospital, and we do so with full faith that the system is there to look after them, to take care of them and the treatment that they’re given when they’re in our hospital system and within the medical system is top-notch. We’re paying good dollars, good money, for the best system. We deserve the best attention.

We can’t have uncertainty, and this has caused a lot of uncertainty throughout the entire medical professions. It has caused people around the world to learn of it and to question how this can happen in Ontario, Canada. My friends in America look upon Canada and our health care system with envy. They can’t believe our health care system is so affordable and so reliable. Then something like this happens and they say, “Ah, maybe it’s not so good. Maybe we’re better off where we are.”

We do have the best system. It’s proven time and time again. I do have faith in the system. I hope, after the committee makes its report, that the recommendations are followed through; that the ministry takes those recommendations and improves upon and implements them; that the system we end up with will once again send out a message that what has happened will never happen again and that we can all put our faith in the system, and that Ontario’s health care system continues to be the very best in the world.

Thank you for your time, Speaker.

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

Hon. Madeleine Meilleur: I want to commend the member from Windsor–Tecumseh for his input into this bill.

Yes, in Ontario, we’re very lucky. We have an excellent health care system. To have worked in the system for many years, and to have seen the improvement in treatment for patients who are suffering from cancer—it’s just unbelievable.

Before, if you were diagnosed with cancer, there was one way to go. But now there is hope for people who are diagnosed with cancer, thanks to the investments that all Ontarians have made into the health care system, and thanks to the health professionals, those who have done research and all of those who, on a daily basis, work with patients with cancer.

We all hope that this incident will not happen again. That’s why the minister did not wait for a report of a committee but took swift action to correct the situation. If the committee comes with good recommendations, I’m sure that she will listen to it and also take action.

Again, to these health professionals who get up every day to do good work, and to those who identified that something was wrong with the medications that they were about to send to the floor or to administer, I say thank you. Thank you. You have contributed to improving the health care system, and you have contributed also to helping these patients who did receive the wrong dosage to be looked at a second time by their health care professionals.

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

Mrs. Julia Munro: It certainly gives me great pleasure to be able to take the next few moments to comment on the bill before us today.

I think all of us—as MPPs, as Ontarians—were shocked when we found that this, in fact, could take place. We’re all vulnerable when we walk into a hospital, when we walk into a doctor’s office. We have a sense of the professionalism that stands within those walls. Obviously, to a very large degree, that is well founded; I don’t want to suggest anything otherwise. But just the very fact that something such as this could happen sends shock waves within the community. I think it demonstrates how good governance and oversight are always paramount, or should be.

I think that the discussions that the committee had on this topic again demonstrate the fact that people forgot how important it is to have a system of oversight that ensures that this doesn’t happen. What we have in this piece of legislation is a directive, if you like, to be able to provide that kind of oversight.

But I want to just add a word of caution: It doesn’t matter how many rules you write or how many pieces of legislation you have; it is always the responsibility of individuals who are charged with the responsibility of making sure things happen. What we see here is a breakdown in that sense of responsibility that has to be shared by everyone who’s involved, whether it’s making a safe car or providing chemotherapy.

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

M. Michael Mantha: C’est avec plaisir que je me lève avec des commentaires sur le projet de loi 117, la Loi visant à modifier certaines lois en ce qui concerne la réglementation des pharmacies et d’autres questions relatives aux professions de la santé réglementées.

Mon collègue de Windsor–Tecumseh a vraiment démontré et puis nous a donné le portrait et le visage des gens dans sa région qui ont été affectés par certaines décisions qui n’ont pas été prises, et de certaines actions des personnes qui ont fait le mélange des médications nécessaires pour le traitement du cancer qui n’ont pas été portées responsables. Tu vois avec ses commentaires comment ça a touché certaines personnes de sa communauté, le montant de frustration et de désespoir, on peut dire, qu’il y a eu dans la communauté, et puis comment ça a affecté les gens.

Mais dans ses commentaires, il a vraiment indiqué aussi qu’il faut qu’on mette notre focus et notre attention sur faire ce qu’on devrait faire en tant que personnes ici dans des positions de responsabilité, et puis d’agir et de faire certain qu’on mette les étapes et règlements nécessaires pour faire certain que ces situations-ci ne se représentent pas.

Je veux aussi donner un vraiment bon crédit à notre critique de Nickel Belt pour la santé et les soins de longue durée, une personne qui a vraiment allumé et emporté beaucoup d’attention. Sa ténacité sur le sujet et les commentaires qu’elle a aussi apportés, c’est de faire certain que les recommandations qui vont venir du comité dans les deux, trois ou quatre prochaines semaines—qu’on fasse certain d’avoir une façon d’implémenter ces régulations et recommandations-là dans le projet de loi. C’est de valeur que le projet de loi soit en devant nous comme il est, mais on espère voir du changement.

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

Mr. Mike Colle: It’s important to comment on Bill 117 and the comments from the member from Windsor–Tecumseh. This is a matter of great importance.

I’m a member of the Standing Committee on Social Policy. I’ve been listening to the presentations for the last number of months, and I do concur. I think this committee is an example of the three parties coming together and working on this. The member from Whitby–Oshawa has been excellent. The member from Oak Ridges–Markham, Dr. Helena Jaczek, has been very, very involved in this. Also, France Gélinas has been excellent. So it’s really an example of intelligent co-operation. Very decisive and penetrating questions have been asked.

It just reminds us all that sometimes, when we look at our health care system and our ministry—I think it’s the largest health ministry in North America. All the doctors, nurses, front-line people, lab technicians and everyone that supplies everything from the chemo drugs to all the other medications that are required—the immense responsibility we put on our health care workers, from our doctors down to our lab technicians. We can’t take for granted for a minute—this is critically important work. It doesn’t happen automatically.

There have to be constant improvements, monitoring and supervision, because these things can happen. But we should appreciate the incredible responsibility they have—life-and-death responsibility—over our loved ones.

I think we owe it to them to thank the front-line workers that are doing this kind of thing for 13 million Ontarians every day, because without their dedication and professionalism, many, many health care issues would be tragic. Let’s thank them for the work they do. Maybe this will help them do better work.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): The member for Windsor–Tecumseh, you have two minutes.

Mr. Percy Hatfield: Thank you, Speaker, and to the Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services, the minister responsible for francophone affairs, and the members for York–Simcoe, Algoma–Manitoulin and Eglinton–Lawrence. Thank you for those additional comments on this very important issue.

Also, thank you to Brian Cross at the Windsor Star for making public the voices and the concerns of Marlene Roy, Diane Marley, Shelley-ann Meloche and Kate Warner, because I believe it’s through their eyes, their hearts, their passion and their fears that we get a sense of what this mistake has cost individuals and cost us all throughout the system because they have given us their voices.

I know that the members of the social policy committee looking into this are taking this very seriously. I’ve had direct communication with the member from Nickel Belt and the member from Welland. I know that everybody on that committee is putting long hours and hard work into this because it is a non-partisan issue.

What happened was a huge embarrassment, but it would be even more embarrassing if we played politics with it and if we didn’t do everything that is required to fix the system again, to bring faith back to the system and to let people trust Ontario’s health care system again.

I think the member from Eglinton–Lawrence hit it right on the head when he said that we all should be giving a big thank you, day in and day out, to the people on the front lines of Ontario’s health care system who provide the service that we respect and value so much. I think that’s very important. In all of this, the people who are working every day on our health care system deserve our respect. Thank you very much.

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

Mrs. Jane McKenna: I’m pleased to rise this morning to join the debate around Bill 117, the Enhancing Patient Care and Pharmacy Safety Act. This bill, if passed, would give the Ontario College of Pharmacists the authority to accredit and inspect pharmacies within public and private hospitals in the same way that it currently accredits and inspects community pharmacies.

Bill 117 would give the Ontario College of Pharmacists the ability to enforce accreditation requirements. That college would also be granted the authority to make regulations and bylaws to establish the requirements and standards for accreditation.

Bill 117 would also provide the Lieutenant Governor in Council with regulation-making authority to designated dispensaries and pharmacies, and it would require all pharmacies to designate a specific contact person for the college.

Throughout the spring of 2013, I had the honour of serving as part of the Standing Committee on Social Policy, which was given the responsibility of looking into the matter of oversight of pharmaceutical companies. For those who served on committee, who stopped by in person or who followed it closely in the press, it’s hard now to remember where this all started. We have the benefit of hindsight. The Minister of Health has made much of her response to the situation in question, and there was certainly an element of truth to that. But it remains to be said that, as with so many things that this government undertakes, the follow-through is less impressive than the initial reaction.

The underdosing episode in question, which involved two specific chemotherapy medications, came to light almost a year ago: March 20, 2013. In all, over 1,200 patients were affected. Most of them were undergoing treatment for cancer. Dr. Thiessen’s report came in July, 2013, and the bill was introduced and called for second reading debate in October, 2013. It was last debated three weeks before the House rose for the holidays, and it is now three weeks since we returned. As I say, we are coming up on the anniversary of the discovery, and here we are.

This act, of course, arose out of the tragic chemotherapy underdosing incident and also out of the report put forward by Dr. Jake Thiessen, which contained a number of excellent recommendations. Dr. Thiessen was appointed by the Minister of Health to provide an independent assessment and expert opinion on the circumstances surrounding the urgent and highly charged situation. His investigation set out to find the basic cause of the underdosing.

He set out to assess how hospitals responded to the incident, to size up the broader realm of pharmaceutical product preparations, and to examine the influence of the various regulatory and oversight bodies, such as Health Canada, the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, Cancer Care Ontario, the Ontario College of Pharmacists and the Ontario Hospital Association.

Dr. Thiessen also looked at the two key players at the heart of the medication incident. These would be Medbuy and Marchese. It was a very ambitious undertaking but, given the nature of the incident, anything less would be unthinkable and probably not that instructive. His task was to draw some practical wisdom and solutions out of the situation; to make a story told in shades of grey more black and white; to clarify the landscape so that government, health care officials and the public at large would have a better understanding of what went wrong and what we might do to prevent something like this from happening again.

Importantly, he found no evidence of any malicious or deliberate dilution of the chemotherapy drugs. It’s worth mentioning yet again that Dr. Thiessen also voiced the opinion that the way the front-liners came together under the circumstances was outstanding. I share his view that dedication and innovation allowed this matter to be brought to light in short order.

This crisis was a warning sign, but it was also an opening to do things differently, to discard what is not working and to improve our health care system not just for a short-term win, but for the long-term well-being of all who call Ontario home. Don Drummond, the government’s go-to economist, has previously raised alarms about the province’s health care system, its costs, its effectiveness and its sustainability. A health care system that demands an even larger share of precious resources can’t help but lead to erosion elsewhere in the system. That’s not what anyone wants, so this government needs to set aside the standard spin and take seriously the work before it.

Pharmaceuticals have been the fastest-growing component of health care costs in recent decades. Here’s a little perspective: Between 1975 to 2006, our inflation-adjusted expenditure per capita on hospitals ticked up by a respectable 51%. Considerably above this, the cost of physician services almost doubled, rising by 98%. Pharmaceutical costs, meanwhile, increased by a whopping 338%. In other words, by 2006, we were spending more than four times as much on prescription drugs than we were in 1975.

The diversity of pharmaceuticals, the fact that it is an R&D-intensive field, and the increasing range and diversity of applications has contributed to this reality. In fact, the rising cost of prescription drugs has outpaced overall growth for health care spending consistently and for decades. Spending under the Ontario Drug Benefit Program has, of course, grown right alongside that. The program makes up around 10% of what we now spend on public health.

But clinical pharmaceuticals have also taken on an increasingly prominent role in our hospitals and our health care system. This has had the effect of making competitive pricing a central concern for administrators and bureaucrats alike.

Even though the health care system commands a huge chunk of our province’s budget, there is always an intense competition for limited resources. Everyone is looking for innovative efficiencies, but however central that drive becomes, this crisis should serve to remind all of us that we cannot—absolutely cannot—forget our core mission. The safety and well-being of the people of this province must be our most basic concern.

This factored into the first of Dr. Thiessen’s recommendations that despite the alarming underdosing incident, the continued use of group purchasing organizations to negotiate vendor product preparation pharmaceutical services should not be discouraged. That said, he also says what should be obvious to anyone who followed this story, which is that the process could stand to be improved and standardized.

Potential risk to patients should be one of the criteria considered when evaluating proposals, and every group purchasing organization should develop and adopt a clear, standardized product and/or service specification description. This is important for the very basic reason that this crisis was not caused by malicious will or calculated effort. It was the result of botched communications that outlined the requirements for contracted sterile or non-sterile pharmaceutical preparation services.

This act follows up on recommendation number 12, which recommends that the Ontario College of Pharmacists inspect and license hospital pharmacies. Currently, they only have the ability to do so with respect to community pharmacies. As such, Bill 117 is an important step forward.

But while the Minister of Health has had high praise for the expertise and work of Dr. Thiessen, and while she has endorsed all 12 of the recommendations contained within Dr. Thiessen’s report, this bill only directly addresses the last of his recommendations. She has only chosen to act on recommendation 12, which notes: “The OCP shall license all pharmacies operating within Ontario’s clinics or hospitals.”

Recommendation number 12 also calls for specialized electronic records and label requirements for non-sterile product preparation within a hospital pharmacy. In addition, all hospital pharmacies’ labels must comply with comprehensive barcoded identification for all products and all patients. This bill fails to establish these recommendations.

However, Bill 117 fails to address Dr. Thiessen’s first recommendation, recommendation 1, which addresses the role of the group purchasing organizations, or GPOs, in distributing drugs to hospitals, and the improvements needed in the GPO-based process. Bill 117 does not address the role of the vendor to the GPO and the guidelines they will follow.

In the particular chemotherapy underdosing incident, the vendor—Marchese Hospital Solutions—and the GPO—Medbuy—mistakenly delivered diluted chemotherapy to four Ontario hospitals. It is hard to fathom why the ministry would not deal directly with one of the most basic factors that led to the underdosing situation. This omission is critically important. Despite what the public might be led to believe, if Bill 117 was enacted as it stands today, this legislation would not—I repeat, would not—prevent the underdosing of chemotherapy drugs from happening all over again.

Bill 117 changes some things but it does not alter what most people would agree is the most important thing. In his report, Dr. Thiessen pointed out that, “It is clear that the contractual elements and specifications surrounding the agreement between the GPO—Medbuy Corp.—and vendor are pivotal to the underdosing incident.”

Despite this sound and well-considered insight, Bill 117 goes on to address—

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

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bas Balkissoon): Seeing the time on the clock, this House stands recessed until 10:30.

The House recessed from 1015 to 1030.

INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS

Mr. Rob E. Milligan: Today with us in the west gallery I have my very good friends from the Warkworth correctional institution: Toby Van Roon, Aaron D’Onofrio-Jones and Kim McClinton. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

M. Grant Crack: Monsieur le Président, mes collègues élus, il me fait grand plaisir et grand honneur de souhaiter la bienvenue à tous les participants du huitième Parlement jeunesse à l’Assemblée législative. Ils sont assis en haut dans la galerie ouest. J’aimerais que nous les accueillions avec une chaude main d’applaudissement. Bienvenue, tout le monde.

Mr. Victor Fedeli: Two sets today: First of all, the mother of page captain Jaclyn Hurley is here today: Mary Beth Hurley from my riding of Nipissing.

We also have six students who are here for the francophone model Parliament: Maxime Pagé, Émmanuelle Faucher, Mathieu St-Jules, Rachel Robertson, Cassidy Villeneuve, Adèle Orr and Daniel Orr.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: I’d like to welcome Jim Sullivan from the Enniskillen Environmental Association to the chamber today.

Mrs. Amrit Mangat: It is my pleasure to welcome the page captain’s mother, Manpreet Walia; father, Randhir Walia; sister Ekroop Walia; brother Keerat Walia; aunt Simran Puri; and uncle Gurjitpal Singh, from the great riding of Mississauga–Brampton South. They are in the east members’ gallery.

Mr. John O’Toole: I’d also like to introduce members from the Enniskillen Environmental Association. There’s Doug Taylor, Clint Cole, Jim Sullivan, who has been introduced, and Pedro Pelletier. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

M. John Vanthof: C’est avec plaisir que je présente les étudiants qui viennent de ma circonscription: Étienne St-Jean, Alexandra Paquette, Brittanny Pepin, Danielle Roy, Alexa Leduc, Lionel Lemieux, Nicolas Roy, Zakarie Robert et Émilie Séguin. Ils sont ici présents en fonction du Parlement jeunesse. Bienvenue à vous.

M. Mike Colle: Je veux dire bienvenue à mon collègue, le grand bonhomme d’Ottawa–Vanier, Gilles Morin, qui est ici aujourd’hui. Bienvenue.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): I thank the member for stepping on the Speaker’s role.

Ms. Soo Wong: I’m pleased to welcome two classes of grade 5 students from Kennedy Public School along with their teachers, Jeff Hui and Vivian Gadanidis. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Garfield Dunlop: I’d like to introduce to you, in the members’ gallery, Steve and Don Crouchman from Stayner and Washago. They’re here to watch the proceedings here at Queen’s Park today.

Hon. Linda Jeffrey: I wish to introduce my good friend Joanne Barnett, a good friend for many years and the first planner I ever met in the city of Brampton. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Mr. Norm Miller: I would like to wish my seatmate, the member from Newmarket–Aurora, a happy birthday today.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Thirty-nine and holding.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: Well, we have a couple of birthdays here today. I call him my adopted little brother, Rob Leone; I call him MacLeone. It’s his birthday today, too, the member from Cambridge.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Happy birthday.

Last call for introductions from the members.

With your indulgence, I’d like to reintroduce the gentleman from Carleton East from the 33rd, 34th, 35th and 36th Parliaments: Gilles Morin. Welcome.

Also with us today in the Speaker’s gallery is Ms. Patricia Clarke, the consul and head of post for the Consulate General of Grenada at Toronto. Please join me in welcoming our guest.

Mr. Todd Smith: Point of order, Speaker.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Point of order from the member from Prince Edward–Hastings.

Mr. Todd Smith: I’m very pleased to stand today and seek unanimous consent to move a motion without notice regarding Bill 156. That’s

an act to proclaim Tamil Heritage Month. I know there’s full support in the Legislature, and I would seek unanimous consent to pass Tamil Heritage Month Act, Bill 156.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Prince Edward–Hastings is seeking unanimous consent to pass Bill 156. Do we agree? I heard a no.

Interjections.

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Point of order, Speaker.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Member from Timmins–James Bay

Mr. Gilles Bisson: In an attempt not to have any partisanship tricks, I want to note that we did not say no. We actually are in agreement of passage.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): That is not a point of order. I believe I’ve already made a statement on this issue, and I request that all members re-read it.

LEGISLATIVE PAGES

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): On a brighter note, I would like to announce to the assembly that this is the last day for our pages, and we want to thank them for their hard work and efforts.

Applause.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: We want them back, Speaker. Unanimous consent for three more weeks.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): In this case, I have to confess to being one of the biggest hecklers asking them to stay.

However, that said, it is now time for question period.

ORAL QUESTIONS

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

Mr. Tim Hudak: My question is to the Premier. Chrysler has now announced they’ll be making investments in Windsor and Brampton and not going to taxpayers for $700 million. I want to celebrate that. I think that is a real testament to the quality of work from the Chrysler workers and the product they make.

Premier, your reaction was one of shock. I was pleased, and I wasn’t surprised by the announcement because it’s an outstanding product—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Order.

Mr. Tim Hudak: —workers.

The problem I had, Premier, is, it looked like you were going to hand out hundreds and hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in a corporate giveaway, when in fact it looks like it wasn’t needed.

Premier, how do you make that judgment call? How do you determine when you hand out suitcases full of cash? How do you make the determination that it’s a good project based on the quality of outstanding work that Chrysler workers do? I think it’s good news; why don’t you?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: All I can say to the Leader of the Opposition is that our position on this side of the House is that working in partnership with business in this province and competing in the global marketplace is what we believe is critical and will keep the auto sector here.

The comments that were made by the Leader of the Opposition were reckless, and they were ill-thought-out. They did not acknowledge the decades of support and partnership that we have had with the auto sector. What I have said is that our door is open. We will continue to work and negotiate with the auto sector to keep those jobs here into the long term.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Tim Hudak: Let me get this straight: We’re getting the investment, we’re getting the jobs, we’re getting the new generation minivan, and the taxpayers are saving $700 million? Isn’t this a good thing? Your answer troubles me, Premier, that you and, actually, your colleague in the NDP, Andrea Horwath, just seem to want to hand out suitcases full of cash, even if they’re not weighted. You don’t seem to have any kind of judgment if the project requires provincial cash. I worry that the Liberals have been nothing more than pushovers when it comes to these sorts of corporate handouts.

I’ll ask you again, Premier: Since you were willing to give away hundreds of millions of dollars when it wasn’t needed, how do you actually decide, when you give out your $3 billion a year in corporate handouts—how do you make a judgment whether it’s actually needed or not or if the business would make the investment anyway?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: The fact is that we were working very closely with the federal government, which, last time I checked, was a Conservative government—friends of the Leader of the Opposition. They seem to understand that it’s very important that all levels of government work with business, particularly the auto sector, not just this company, not just Chrysler, but with the auto sector in general, to make sure that the conditions are in place to bring jobs to Ontario, keep the jobs that are here and, more importantly, secure a future footprint for the auto sector in the province.

That’s the piece that the Leader of the Opposition does not seem to understand, to the detriment of the discussion of the auto sector in Ontario.

Interjections.

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

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Leeds–Grenville will come to order.

Final supplementary.

Mr. Tim Hudak: It’s odd, Speaker. The Premier seems angry because she doesn’t get to hand out $700 million and a briefcase full of cash. I don’t understand. My point of view: Let’s actually make Ontario attractive for all investment, get taxes down, get energy under control and reduce the red tape burden. I think the fact that companies are investing because of the quality of our workers without a government handout is a good thing. I don’t know why the Premier is angry about that.

Let me ask you this, Premier. You seem to view that the fact that we’ve lost 300,000 manufacturing jobs is because we didn’t have 300,000 more corporate giveaways. I disagree. In fact, I think the greatest threat to auto jobs, agri-business, and manufacturing jobs is a continuation of the Liberal-NDP coalition in this province of Ontario. That’s the greatest threat.

I want to ask you too: You gave Kellogg’s corporation $2.5 million in a corporate handout, and then they closed down the London plant, throwing 550 workers out of a job. Do you think that was a wise investment—

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

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I am very pleased that Chrysler will proceed with its investments in both Windsor and Brampton. We’re pleased with that news. That’s very good news.

But what the Leader of the Opposition needs to acknowledge and doesn’t seem to understand is that we need, as a province, to have a relationship with the auto sector that will be a long-term relationship, that there will be commitments long-term and that there will be the ability to continue to partner with the auto sector.

I met with the Governor of Missouri this morning. It’s very important to the economy of Missouri that we have the auto sector thriving in both our jurisdictions. There’s an interdependence between us and states like Missouri that are dependent on a strong auto sector, not just today, not just to 2016, but into the future. That’s the piece that the Leader of the Opposition seems to be missing.

MANUFACTURING JOBS

Mr. Tim Hudak: Here’s the difference: I believe in attracting businesses across the board through lower taxes, affordable energy, working with the colleges for more skilled trade workers, knocking aside the red tape barriers by reducing the number of rules and regulations by a third. The Premier believes in raising tax on energy for everybody else to hand out suitcases full of money. The problem is, Premier, that that will only last until the suitcase of money runs out, and they’ll come back for more.

I’ll ask you again: If you believe that your corporate giveaways works, why then did Kellogg’s Co., that you gave $1.5 million to in a big grant, then close down their factory throwing out of work 550 men and women? How is that, a wise investment of taxpayers’ dollars if they took the money and ran?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I think the Leader of the Opposition knows that there are particular circumstances with every company, but I think he also knows that, since 2009, we have gained 440,000 net new jobs in this province.

I think he also knows that if he listens to the leadership of companies like Cisco about why they are here and why they are expanding their businesses here, he will hear, for example, Robert Lloyd, president of development and sales, Cisco: “We find a very educated and loyal workforce here....” He goes on to say: “We just go where the talent is and have the best environment ... the predictability for us to build a workforce here in a good tax environment.” That is what Robert Lloyd said about Ontario. That is why businesses are coming here. That is the solid foundation that we have built and will continue to enhance.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Tim Hudak: I agree with what Mr. Lloyd said. I think we have tremendously skilled and educated and hard-working people here in the province of Ontario. I’d put our workers against anybody else’s in the world. I’ve got faith in them. But I ask you, if that’s the case why Cisco came here, why the heck did you give them $200 million in a corporate handout? They are coming here for the quality of our workers. Why are you giving away suitcases of cash? I think because you want to cut a red ribbon because you’ve lost 300,000 jobs.

You say Kellogg’s is a particular circumstance. You say Cisco came here for the workers, but you still gave them $200 million.

Let me ask you about WindTronics in Windsor. You gave WindTronics in Windsor $2.7 million in a corporate giveaway and WindTronics said they would create 200 jobs. Two years later, they’re gone. The plant has been shuttered. It is empty. The lights are off. Premier, do you think that was a wise investment of money: $2.7 million for zero jobs?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I really believe that the question that has to be asked of the Leader of the Opposition is, if we are competing in a global economy where other jurisdictions are putting on the table conditions like tax regime, like wages, but also cash that actually would draw businesses in, Mr. Speaker, does he believe that we need to compete with those other jurisdictions around the globe? Or does he believe that we can just blinker ourselves and make a decision that we are not going to play on that playing field, that we are going to make up our own rules and we’re not going to compete with other jurisdictions?

We’re going to compete with other jurisdictions. We’ve got a terrific workforce. We are not going to undermine it the way the Leader of the Opposition would, and we are going to acknowledge that those other jurisdictions are competing with us.

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

Mr. Tim Hudak: Premier, we’re going to compete and win against the best in the world when we get rid of a lousy and corrupt Liberal government—

Interjections.

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

Mr. Tim Hudak: I withdraw.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Carry on.

Mr. Tim Hudak: Look, I’ve got tremendous faith in our workers. I think that we’ve got a reckless, expensive and corrupt government that’s put us deep in debt. It’s under two OPP—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): You cannot. Withdraw, please.

Mr. Tim Hudak: Okay, I withdraw, Speaker.

So Chrysler made the investment without government cash and you wanted to give them cash from taxpayers. You say Kellogg’s was a particular circumstance. I’m not sure what your excuse is for WindTronics. I think the latest—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Minister of Immigration, come to order.

Mr. Tim Hudak: —Nestlé in Trenton, Ontario, received $3 million in a suitcase full of cash from the Liberal government, two grants of $1.5 million each. You said that would create 28 new jobs. Premier, yesterday they laid off 25 more workers.

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

Mr. Tim Hudak: Please tell me that you’re going to actually change your mind and adopt our—

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

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Mr. Speaker, what we’re not going to do is fire 10,000 people from the education sector. We’re not going to fire 2,000 health care workers. We’re not going to drive down wages. We’re not going to weaken pensions. We’re not going to cancel infrastructure projects in Mississauga, York region, Toronto and Durham, and we’re not going to cancel job-creating green energy jobs that will create clean, renewable energy. We’re not going to do those things, Mr. Speaker. That’s what the Leader of the Opposition would have us do, and we’re not going to go there.

What I would ask the Leader of the Opposition to do is to speak to the people in Ford in Oakville, who are working for Ford, Mr. Speaker—the securing of 2,800 jobs that we did by investing $70.9 million. I’d ask him to speak to the people who are working for Toyota in Cambridge, where 400 new jobs are being created because of our partnership. I’d ask him to speak to Original Foods in Dunnville: 150 new jobs. I’d ask him to speak to Conestoga Meat Packers’ employees in Breslau, where 100 new jobs are being created. I’d ask him to speak to those people and ask them if they think that government partnering with businesses is a good idea, because that’s what has created those jobs, Mr. Speaker.

ENERGY POLICIES

Mr. Peter Tabuns: My question is to the Premier. Yesterday, the Acting Premier and the Minister of Energy continued to defend Ontario’s $1-billion annual subsidy for exports. Families paying some of the highest bills in Canada have a simple question: Why is the government unable to admit that this is not working for ratepayers?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Well, I’m quite sure that the Deputy Premier and the Minister of Energy said no such thing. What I know is that there are relationships and contracts with jurisdictions and that, last year, there was a $300-million net profit from those energy conracts, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Just a note to the Premier: Your ministers had to correct that word on the record previously, and you may want to check at the end of this session.

On average, Ontario families pay eight and a half cents a kilowatt hour to make electricity, and we’re selling it to the United States at two and a half cents. Where do you make the profit on that?

To our east and our west, provinces are getting nearly double that price for the electricity they sell. They’ve cut out the middlemen and the Wall Street energy traders. Why is this government so unwilling to consider the same?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I know the Minister of Energy is going to want to respond to this in the supplementary, but I just want to say this: When this government came into office in 2003, the energy sector was in a mess. We have made investments that have made the energy sector stable and predictable. We have invested in clean, new renewable energy. We have shut down the coal plants.

The other day—yesterday, or the day before—the third party suggested that they would hand a $100 cheque to folks across the province in the next couple of years, Mr. Speaker. That will not enhance the energy grid. It will not improve or connect people in the north, and there is no long-term plan in that to control energy prices. It does not promote conservation. It is not a responsible plan.

We have that responsible plan. Our long-term energy plan will do all of those things, Mr. Speaker, and we’re going to go forward with it.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Well, Speaker, thanks to 10 years of mismanagement, Ontarians feel like they’re working harder than ever to support the hydro system. They don’t feel the hydro system is working for them, and this is the truth. Your Minister of Energy has had to correct himself on the record about a claim that we’re making profits on those sales. They’ve seen public data from Manitoba Hydro showing Ontarians are paying amongst the highest bills in this country, and they know bills are going up.

Why is the Premier so determined to keep a broken status quo when people demand change to the system?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Energy.

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the fact that we provided a briefing for the critic with the IESO, who is responsible for this particular issue, and, yes, they clarified—I want to read what they clarified: Revenue from electricity exports reduced costs for Ontarians by $300 million in 2013, and, since 2006, the costs were reduced by $2 billion. There’s a debate whether it’s a profit or not, but the fact of the matter is, our export of electricity is reducing costs to ratepayers in the province of Ontario. Our IEI Program is using surplus electricity to reduce electricity rates for industrial consumers in a big way, and he doesn’t even appreciate that.

EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION

Mr. Gilles Bisson: My question is to the Premier. Once again today, Premier, we’ve heard the Liberals promising to get public sector salaries under control. My question is this: What’s your cap? What is it going to be?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Government Services.

Hon. John Milloy: We’ve addressed this before, Mr. Speaker. The opposition likes to come up with kind of a bumper-sticker slogan for all this. The fact of the matter is, the leader of the third party went out and put forward a hard cap, then had to swallow herself whole when people started to raise exceptions.

The fact of the matter is, public sector salaries are a complex issue. What this legislation will do is allow us to collect all the relevant information to do the analysis and to come up with caps for different sectors, caps that make sense based on what’s happening in the private sector and other jurisdictions.

Unfortunately for our side, it doesn’t fit nicely on a bumper sticker, but it’s the responsible thing to do, and I’m not going to have to swallow myself whole at a press conference.

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

Mr. Gilles Bisson: Speaking of bumper stickers, this is like a drive-by by Liberals. You’re going to have legislation so that we can figure out what those salaries are, so we can figure out what we’ve got to do? My God, we could do that now. You don’t need legislation.

I’m going to ask you again: What is going to be the hard cap that comes out of this? Or is this just more cynical Liberal politics that we’ve seen as of late?

Hon. John Milloy: Mr. Speaker, I’m a little bit surprised. I guess the honourable member didn’t watch his leader’s press conference, because she went out and proposed a hard cap, and then someone brought up an exception—I believe it was a senior power executive—and she said, “Oh, well, we’ll have to have exceptions for it. It won’t apply there.” The fact of the matter is that we have a range of leaders within the public service whose salaries need to be based on private sector comparators, as well as comparators in other public sector agencies.

As I said, it’s not simple. It doesn’t fit on a bumper sticker, but it’s fair and responsible to make sure that we have public sector leaders who are paid appropriately but are not paid excessively. That’s what this legislation will do, and I look forward to the New Democratic Party supporting it so that we can get it through the Legislature and get on with this work.

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

Mr. Gilles Bisson: I think people are going to find it hard to swallow this. This is coming from the same government who’s been happy to burn money for years and is claiming they’re going to put out the fire. Give me a break. This is not a solution; this is a crass political exercise on the part of the Liberal Party in front of what might be a spring election.

I ask you again: Give us a number. What is the cap that you are prepared to propose when it comes to salaries for these individuals who are extremely overpaid?

Hon. John Milloy: As I say, we will come forward with a set of caps, depending on the circumstances. I’ve answered that, Mr. Speaker.

But what I was surprised by is that my honourable friend didn’t stand up and talk about the rest of the legislation that we propose to bring forward to this Legislature and suggest the New Democratic Party, I am hoping, will support it. It encourages things such as the putting online of expenses by cabinet ministers and the Premier, something that’s done right now, but extends it to the leaders of the opposition and their staff, something—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): The member from Timmins–James Bay, come to order.

Hon. John Milloy: —that the New Democratic Party has been a bit forgetful in doing over the past couple of years.

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

Mr. Douglas C. Holyday: My question is for the Premier. About a month and a half ago, we requested a freedom-of-information request on your expenses for the year 2013. Then the letter came back February 6 saying that if we paid $1,200—actually, $1,185, to be exact—we could probably get the information.

We also know—and this has happened since I’ve arrived here—that Tim Hudak and this caucus have been trying to get information on the gas plants and the cost of them, and it’s been like pulling teeth. It wasn’t until the auditor finally showed up with the information that we had anything to go on at all. Now we know the police are involved in this.

I want to know: How did you finally arrive at an accountability position where you’re finally going to come forward and put information and make it open and transparent, when all along you’ve been hiding everything?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I know that the member opposite was not a member when I came into this office a year ago, but what I said when I came in a year ago was that we were going to open up the process. At that point, we talked specifically about opening up the committee and providing information on the relocation of the gas plants, to which all parties had agreed. We said that we wanted to open up the process.

Hundreds of thousands of documents have been placed before the committee. There have been dozens of people who have come before the committee to answer questions. I have been there twice, so we did open that process.

On the issue of expenses, I think the member opposite would need to know that he’s just wrong about that. My expenses are online. They’re up to date. They were posted voluntarily, along with the expenses of ministers and staff. We did receive a freedom-of-information request and it will be released through the normal freedom-of-information process.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Douglas C. Holyday: Again, to the Premier: The information on total dollars might be online, but the details that are required, and that should be in your openness provision here, are not there. I just wonder why it’s taken a whole year or even 10 years before this information finally comes forward. I think it’s high time that this was done.

You talk about your openness as far as the gas plants are concerned, but you know full well that it took the auditor and the police to finally get to the bottom of the matter. Whether you’ve been here a year or six months, it doesn’t matter. You weren’t open. When are you going to be open?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I think the member opposite knows that we have complied with all of the requests that the committee has asked of us. We have provided thousands of pages of documents. As I said, there was a freedom-of-information request put in and the information will be released as part of that.

There is a cost associated with those requests and, in fact, there was a cost paid to obtain the Leader of the Opposition’s expenses, many of which are not online. There are very large gaps, and a freedom-of-information request was filed and there was a cost associated with that.

I hope that this line of questioning from the member opposite implies that they will be supporting the legislation when it’s introduced in the House. I fully expect that they will do that.

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY

Mr. Percy Hatfield: My question this morning is for the Premier. Good morning, Premier.

First, I want to thank you for the phone call last night and keeping me in the loop in the situation at Chrysler. When there are jobs on the line, we need to set aside our political games and grandstanding and work to make investments happen.

People in Windsor and Essex county are very concerned about the long-term future of our Chrysler plant and the jobs of the thousands of people who work there. What assurances can you give, Premier, that your government is doing everything possible to work with Chrysler to ensure its Windsor operations will remain viable?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: I thank the member opposite for the question. I know that the Minister of Economic Development and Trade is going to want to speak to this.

I want to just say that I want to let everyone in this House know and the public know that the member for Windsor West has been—Windsor West; right?

Hon. Teresa Piruzza: Yes.

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: The Minister of Children and Youth Services has been an absolute champion on this file. She has worked tirelessly to make sure that our policy of having an open door and working for those long-term commitments was absolutely what we were doing at the table, in conjunction with the federal government. The auto sector in this province and in Windsor has a huge champion in our member, and I hope that we will be able to continue those negotiations. We have our door open.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Percy Hatfield: I want to assure this House that my New Democratic colleagues and I take our responsibilities seriously when it comes to securing good auto sector jobs in this province. We’re calling on all parties at all levels of government to set aside their political differences and pull together on this one.

Premier, can you assure our Chrysler employees, indeed our entire community, that your door remains open for future dialogue with Chrysler officials about the long-term viability of Windsor’s assembly plant operations?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Employment.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I hope the member opposite walks over and provides the leader of the official opposition a copy of that letter right now, because currently, the leader of the official opposition is living in a fantasyland where he believes that his irresponsible and negative comments about the Chrysler negotiations at a particularly sensitive time in the negotiations—he’s living in a fantasyland where he actually thinks that Chrysler’s decision validates his irresponsible behaviour, and it’s not simply our view on this side of the House.

The federal Minister of Industry, James Moore, who has been working very closely with myself and supportive of this deal with Chrysler, has indicated that the Hudak comments have been detrimental to the negotiations. That’s not just his opinion; he heard that directly from the head of Chrysler Canada.

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

Mr. John Fraser: My question is for the Minister of Government Services. I was pleased to be part of an announcement this morning in which you and the Premier spoke about our intention to introduce major enhancements to accountability for both our government and for members of this Legislature. Under Premier Wynne, our government has committed to leading by example and being as transparent and accountable as possible.

I was encouraged to hear this morning that these new proposed improvements would bring the same high level of transparency to members of this House. Since being elected to the Legislature last fall, I’ve worked hard to bring the issue of accountability of elected members to this House. Ontarians have a right to access, in a clear way, the information on how elected officials are spending their tax dollars.

I was very happy to learn that the government plans to introduce new legislation that, if passed, would create a climate of open government and enhanced accountability here in Ontario.

Minister, can you outline to this House how the government will be proposing to make the important improvements that will make posting expenses mandatory for all members?

Hon. John Milloy: I really sincerely want to thank the member for Ottawa South for his advocacy on this issue. I think members are aware of the private member’s bill that he put forward on this.

As members are aware, today the Premier announced our proposed plan to introduce legislation to enhance accountability and transparency in government. Within that is our intention to introduce amendments which would require expense information for cabinet ministers, parliamentary assistants and opposition leaders and their respective staff to be posted online for anybody to see.

As members may know, expense information for cabinet ministers, parliamentary assistants and their staff has been posted online on a voluntary basis by the government since 2010. The proposed amendments would, if passed, turn these voluntary practices into a mandatory requirement and extend the same requirement to opposition leaders and their staff. We expect the same level of transparency from everyone in the House.

Mr. Speaker, at the same time—

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

Supplementary?

Mr. John Fraser: Thank you, Speaker; it’s very encouraging news. Through you to the minister, I’m glad to hear that under this proposal all members of this House would be required to embrace the same level of accountability as members of cabinet and parliamentary assistants.

I am especially impressed that the leaders of the opposition parties would be required, if the legislation passes, to be as accountable as the Premier and cabinet ministers. As representatives of the people, we must all hold ourselves to a higher standard.

Ontarians not only expect transparency from their elected officials but also from the people working in the agencies funded by their tax dollars. In speaking to Ontarians about my private member’s bill on this issue, they often ask what is being done to enhance accountability not only for elected officials but for officials working in agencies.

Hon. John Milloy: Since 2010, expense information for senior executive appointees and the top five claimants in 21 of the government’s largest agencies and organizations are required to be posted under the government’s travel, meal and hospitality expense directive. Ministry senior managers are covered under this directive as well. Expense claims undergo a rigorous approval process, first within each of the organizations and then by the Integrity Commissioner.

In our announcement today, we’ve committed to proposing new, improved oversight powers of the Integrity Commissioner to review the expenses of all of Ontario’s 197 classified agencies. If passed, this proposed legislation would allow the Integrity Commissioner to select any number of these agencies and review the expenses of their executives.

The Premier has committed to making the government of Ontario the most accountable government in Canada. Measures like these would, if passed, go a long a way to ensuring that Ontarians can access this important information.

GOVERNMENT’S RECORD

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: My question is to the Premier. Hopefully I won’t have to pay $1,200 for an answer.

The government has found itself in the middle of a white collar crime investigation by the elite OPP anti-rackets squad for its role in the cancelled gas plants and its role in the deleted emails that attempted to suppress opposition concerns. Yesterday, hard drives from government computers were seized. We know 20 Liberal officials have been interviewed by the OPP. We know the Premier’s own office was visited by the OPP. We know that if charges are laid, those responsible could face up to 14 years in jail.

Ontario Liberals have now seen their government under investigation twice by the OPP. They have broken international law. The Premier herself refuses to hand over her expenses unless you pay $1,200.

What makes this more vile is that she has no mandate from the people. The honourable thing is for her to call an election. Will she do it? Will she seek a mandate from the people?

Interjections.

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

Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Government House leader.

Hon. John Milloy: Mr. Speaker, this question really is beneath the member. It really is.

The Ontario Provincial Police are undertaking work, and I think all members of this House recognize the fact that we allow the Ontario Provincial Police to undertake their work. We don’t reach conclusions on our own. We don’t speculate.

Perhaps in the supplementary, the honourable member can talk about our new piece of legislation, because she mentions some of the concerns around emails. In fact, that legislation contains responses to the Information and Privacy Commissioner’s recommendations in that regard. So I look forward to her support on it.

The other thing it does, Mr. Speaker, is it makes it mandatory for the Leader of the Opposition to post his expenses, something, through our access-to-information request, we found out he hasn’t been doing. In fact, we found $15,000 of expenses that he forgot to put on his website. Perhaps she wants to address that in her supplementary.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I’d gladly address that. It was the Truth in Government Act put forward by the Ontario PC caucus four years ago that would have addressed that.

I’m going to have the page take this over to the Premier. This is the $1,200 bill she sent the Ontario PC caucus to get access to her information and her expenses. I’ll throw in all of Tim Hudak’s expenses as well, just so they have them.

But the facts speak for themselves: two OPP investigations, one broken international law and a government without a mandate. The Premier appears to be clinging to the wood panelling in her office with clenched fingernails. She can’t leave the office because she wants the power. The right thing to do, the honourable thing to do, is to call an election, get rid of the scandal, get rid of the controversy, create the jobs, reduce the taxes. That’s what Ontarians want. They can’t deliver it. Will they do the right thing?

Interjections.

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

Minister?

Hon. John Milloy: I wish that the opposition had been as forthcoming when it came to the leader’s expenses when we had to go through the freedom-of-information process to get them and wait for the requisite amount of time.

I do want to correct my record: I think I said $15,000 but, in fact, there was $13,271.30 charged to taxpayers by Mr. Hudak that was missing from his public postings, including flights and accommodations.

Again, I listened carefully and didn’t hear the honourable member express her support for this legislation. The point behind this legislation is to encourage—shall we say, force—the leaders of the two opposition parties to do what our government has been doing voluntarily since 2010.

ENERGY POLICIES

Mr. Wayne Gates: My question is to the Premier. Last week, 4,000 people showed up at a job fair for the opening of a new mall of Niagara-on-the-Lake. That’s a testimony to how much our region needs jobs. Instead of helping businesses in Niagara create jobs, this government is raising their costs with skyrocketing hydro bills while subsidizing private companies in western New York with cheaper hydro. What is the government’s plan for Niagara businesses when competing against western New York in relation to electricity prices?

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Premier?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: To the Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Employment.

Hon. Eric Hoskins: I’m pleased to take this question as well and talk about the important progress that we’ve made in job creation right across this province. Since the bottom of the recession, we’ve added nearly 450,000 jobs. The most recent data—and I’m looking forward to the jobs data coming out tomorrow—show that we’re making progress, not just generally in terms of bringing those jobs back—6,000 jobs last month, for example, or rather in the month of January; we’re going to hear about February tomorrow—but also, importantly, 7,800 new jobs for our young people.

I can’t help myself but to reference my colleague in the back, the Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities. An important part of that progress that we’re seeing on youth job creation is our youth jobs fund. Under his careful stewardship, we have more than 8,000 young people across the province who now have training positions, in those first opportunities with employers across the province, including in the Niagara region.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Mr. Wayne Gates: My question is to the Premier. A new report shows that one in every two residents in Niagara Falls is struggling financially. At the same time, we saw 4,000 people standing in line in hopes of finding a job, any job, even part-time. Niagara Falls has a massive amount of cheap hydroelectricity in our own backyard, yet businesses and ratepayers are paying the highest energy prices in the country—much higher than western New York. Premier, why are ratepayers subsidizing the export of electricity so businesses in western New York can hire while people in Niagara face the highest unemployment in the province?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: To the Minister of Energy.

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: First of all, we do have surplus energy, and that’s good. We came from a deficit situation. We invested heavily in the system. We do sell electricity, and we reduced the cost to our system last year by $300 million, but we also are turning our thoughts and our direction towards using surplus electricity to support Ontario businesses. We created the Industrial Electricity Incentive Program, and that is providing electricity to companies that want to expand or settle in Ontario by giving them electricity at about a 50% reduction, a 50% discount.

We’ve announced about six or seven of those companies. We are also not supporting New York companies anymore. That surplus energy is in Ontario for Ontario businesses.

TEACHERS’ COLLECTIVE BARGAINING

Ms. Dipika Damerla: My question is to the Minister of Education. Minister, a lot of parents in my riding are a little confused and concerned as to what is going on with collective bargaining in the education sector. My parents understand that there is an urgency for the speedy passage of the government’s proposed Bill 122, the School Boards Collective Bargaining Act, but do not understand why legislation that was introduced back in October is still stuck in the legislative process.

We’ve heard you say many times that this is a bill you’ve been closely working on with all of our partners in education when it was developed. So could the minister please explain why such a bill, which is the result of such extensive consultation and collaboration, has come to a standstill in the legislative process?

Hon. Liz Sandals: Thank you to the member for raising such an important issue. First, this member is absolutely correct that the speedy passage of this bill is extremely important. This bill would create central tables for collective bargaining with formal roles for the province, the trustee associations, school boards, teacher federations and support staff unions. This new process would encourage discussion, promote innovative ideas and ensure every partner has a clear role to play. The proposed model would help us promote constructive dialogue and maintain positive, respectful relationships with our education partners in the best interests of the students who are here today.

Speaker, it is important to understand that this is a made-in-Ontario approach to collective bargaining that was developed through extensive consultations with our education partners. It will help us with collective bargaining, and we need it passed now.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Minister. Listening to your response, it struck me that instead of the opposition holding the government to account, we’re now in a situation where the government is having to hold the opposition’s feet to the fire to ensure our children’s education is not sacrificed at the altar of petty political gamesmanship. My understanding is that things have come to such a pass that, yesterday, we had to vote in this Legislature to seek permission for the committee to sit during constituency week. Now I understand that that sitting is also at risk.

Could you, Minister, please tell us yet again why this legislation is at risk of the official opposition’s political games?

Hon. Liz Sandals: I’d be happy to explain what’s going on here. As the member mentioned, when a similar motion passed in this House last fall, allowing the committee to sit during the winter break, the official opposition chose to boycott the process. This is the same risk that we are now facing from the same party that finally, yesterday, decided it had an education plan.

Speaker, I am calling on all members of this Legislature to ensure that what happened in the winter break doesn’t happen next week, and that the committee will sit for clause-by-clause consideration so the legislation can move through the process. Throughout the course of the day, I’ve seen the Chair and the subcommittee members sitting here, and I call on those subcommittee members to meet immediately after question period and get this sorted out so they can meet next week and do clause-by-clause.

Interjections.

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

New question.

WIND TURBINES

Ms. Laurie Scott: My question is for the Premier. Premier, I have a letter from Trent Gervais, the manager of the Peterborough airport, expressing his strong objections to the approved Sumac Ridge wind turbine project. This airport is a great source of economic development for not only my riding of Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock, but for the city of Peterborough. It boasts the longest paved runway between Ottawa and Toronto, at an astounding 7,000 feet.

Millions of dollars have been invested by all three levels of government to see this airport grow. Seneca College’s school of aviation opened its doors there in January, and it’s expected to generate $12.32 million of economic activity in the community each year and support 151 jobs. With Seneca and five other flight schools operating out of the Peterborough airport, the safety of new pilots is now at risk because of the siting of this wind turbine project.

Since the Minister of Rural Affairs won’t stand up for the people of his riding in Peterborough, I’m standing here today on behalf of his—

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Stop the clock, please. I’ve made a comment about this before—about talking about other people’s ridings. I would caution the member not to do that again.

Please finish your question; you have time for wrap-up.

Ms. Laurie Scott: Will you stop the Sumac Ridge project and let the Peterborough airport get back to the business of creating much-needed jobs?

Hon. Kathleen O. Wynne: Minister of Energy.

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: Mr. Speaker, the member knows that FIT contracts, renewable contracts, allow for termination only in cases where project developers do not meet their contractual obligations, and the OPA could be subject to legal action if it terminates FIT contracts for projects which have met their obligations.

Having said that, there is an environmental process, and an appeal to that environmental process to deal with issues. The Leader of the Opposition in his Million Jobs Act has indicated that he would give the Minister of Energy the authority to cancel those contracts. Mr. Speaker, that would expose the provincial government to over $20 billion in liabilities. We’re not prepared to do that.

We are prepared to adhere to the environmental process, the appeal process that’s in place, and I will hopefully be able to refer the supplementary to the Minister of the Environment on that issue.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Laurie Scott: To whichever minister is going to take the next question, I guess: There are certainly lots of Ministry of Environment outs for that contract. I asked the Premier on Monday to call a moratorium on wind turbines, to which you responded that the Liberal government has “put new rules in place,” and that you would “give communities more input” on siting. In the letter from the manager of the Peterborough airport, he says these wind turbines are threatening the success of the business, putting up barriers to job creation and risking the safety of flight patterns and approaches—it’s kind of important.

Your government clearly did not have the necessary guidelines and regulations in place before siting this project.

You claim your government has new rules in place. Why is it that you cannot listen to this community, like you said you would, and cancel the wind turbines at the Sumac Ridge and Peterborough airport location?

Hon. Bob Chiarelli: Minister of the Environment.

Hon. James J. Bradley: There is a process which has been established to allow people to have the appropriate input on matters of this kind. The proponent has to go through a very rigorous regime to ensure that that proponent would be in compliance with the regulations set out by the Ministry of Energy and by the Ministry of the Environment.

I am confident that all aspects of this issue will be dealt with appropriately through the process. Ministry of the Environment officials and, indeed, officials of other ministries, who provide comments in these circumstances, are always pleased to hear from those who have views to express and are respectful of those views being expressed by those individuals, and give serious consideration to them.

I encourage all to participate in that process and ensure that those views are put forward. I can tell you that they will be considered seriously, as they always are.

HOSPITAL SERVICES

M me France Gélinas: Ma question est pour la ministre de la Santé et des Soins de longue durée.

Last week, the minister met with the mayor of Thunder Bay and city councillors, who expressed their concern over the ongoing problems with their local health care system. After 50 long days of gridlock, caused by an overwhelming number of patients who should not be in their hospital but have nowhere else to go, the hospital is now facing a deficit. Will the minister recognize that the hospital should not be forced to cut services because of a lack of capacity in their community?

Hon. Deborah Matthews: Thank you to the member opposite for the question. This is an issue that I have been discussing daily with the members from Thunder Bay–Superior North and Thunder Bay–Atikokan. They are keeping me informed on a daily basis about the challenges in Thunder Bay. I’m very much aware of it. I know the hospital, the community care access centre, the LHIN, the city—everyone is working together to develop a plan to rectify the situation.

It is unacceptable, what’s happening at Thunder Bay; I will be the first to admit that. I look forward to being able to speak directly with the people of Thunder Bay on how we’re going to move forward.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

M me France Gélinas: The minister is partly right: The hospital is working with the community care access centre, with the LHINs and with any other community-based organization to try to address the community problem. But the weeks of gridlock have taken their toll on the hospital budget. Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre is running a deficit of about $2.4 million and is looking at cutting services to balance their books, like they are mandated to do by law.

What is the minister going to do to address this ongoing problem and the hospital deficit that comes with it?

Hon. Deborah Matthews: As I said in the initial question, the situation in Thunder Bay is not acceptable. That’s why we are working to support the community, because they have come together and offered some solutions.

This is very much a project that’s under way. I am very much focused on finding a resolution to this. As I say, I look forward to being able to communicate with the people of Thunder Bay about some of the steps we can take in addition to those we have already taken to rectify the situation.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

Ms. Mitzie Hunter: My question is for the Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Employment. Ontario’s tech sector is a vital part of our economy, both across the province and locally in my constituency, with thousands of tech grads from institutions in and around my riding of Scarborough–Guildwood.

I know first-hand the importance of a strong tech sector in Ontario. Just recently, Cisco has renewed their commitment to continuing their R&D operations. As a significant employer, they are an integral part of Ontario’s economy. It is important that we continue to create and retain jobs across the province and ensure that we are supporting key sectors like tech.

These are competitive times, and Ontario has proven it can compete globally on the world stage, remaining one of the highest-ranking jurisdictions in North America when it comes to foreign direct investment. With Cisco’s recent announcement to create an R&D hub in Toronto, could the minister please update the House on what our government’s recent partnership means for Ontario?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Thank you to the member from Scarborough–Guildwood for this important question. I have to say, I’m very excited and proud of this announcement yesterday by Cisco. I had the honour of attending, along with the deputy mayor of the city of Toronto and other business leaders and dignitaries, where Cisco announced its quite remarkable $100-million investment in this city to create what they’re calling the Internet of Everything Innovation Centre. This is a centre which is going to be available to support start-ups, to work on business-to-business relationships and really to significantly grow the economy and grow the IT sector in Ontario.

I should mention that this is only the fourth of Cisco’s innovation centres in the entire world, so we’re following. They have one in South Korea, one in Brazil, one in Germany, and we are the only innovation centre for Cisco in all of North America, so this really was an important announcement. Of course, it comes on the heels of our important and positive announcement in December with Cisco: They’re investing $4 billion over the next 10 years to create as many as 3,700 jobs.

The Speaker (Hon. Dave Levac): Supplementary?

Ms. Mitzie Hunter: Thank you, Minister, for the update. While the tech industry in my riding and across the province will continue to see the strong commitment our government is making in the industry, there are still some concerns from my constituents about the overall growth of the tech sector. We know Ontario has fared better than many other jurisdictions in North America and that our economy is back on track, having recovered all the jobs lost during the global recession.

We know having a good job to wake up to every day is what keeps Ontario strong. Speaker, through you, back to the Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Employment: What is the government doing to support the continued growth by helping to create good, meaningful jobs in Ontario’s tech sector?

Hon. Eric Hoskins: Thank you again for the question. Although I know that the PC Party does not support our partnership with Cisco and didn’t support the investment that we made to secure that $4-billion investment and the creation of 3,700 jobs, this partnership is the largest job-creating investment in the history of Ontario’s and Canada’s tech sector. It really is unprecedented and it will certainly enhance Ontario’s reputation as a leader in research and innovation.

It’s also a great example of how the government of the day can work together with the private sector to realize these important investments. We have more than a quarter of a million people working in the high-tech sector in Ontario. Last year, we were third in North America, after California and Texas. Well, I’m happy to say that we’ve taken that second-place spot away from Texas. We’re actually number two in all of North America, after Silicon Valley, in terms of IT investments.

HORSE RACING INDUSTRY

Mr. Randy Pettapiece: My question is for the Premier. Premier, your government’s 2012 budget dev