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November 30, 2022

43rd Parliament, 1st Session

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Hansard Transcripts

Votes and Proceedings

Orders and Notices

Hansard Transcript 2022-Nov-30 (PDF)

L036 - Wed 30 Nov 2022 / Mer 30 nov 2022

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO

ASSEMBLÉE LÉGISLATIVE DE L’ONTARIO

Wednesday 30 November 2022 Mercredi 30 novembre 2022

Wearing of shirt

Orders of the Day

Less Red Tape, Stronger Ontario Act, 2022 / Loi de 2022 visant à réduire les formalités administratives pour un Ontario plus fort

Members’ Statements

Santa Claus parades in Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke

Events in Mushkegowuk–James Bay / Événements à Mushkegowuk–Baie James

Central York Fire Services

Cost of living

Boating safety

Health care

Santa Claus parades in Kitchener–Conestoga

Simcoe Christmas Panorama River of Lights

Long-term care

Harvest Hands

Introduction of Visitors

Annual report, Auditor General

Independent members

Question Period

Court decision

Land use planning

COVID-19 immunization

Curriculum / Child care

Government accountability

Skilled trades

Affordable housing

Court decision

Northern highway improvement

Child care

Ontario Trillium Foundation

Land use planning

Police services / Services de police

Health care funding

Housing

Health care

Broadband infrastructure

Scottish Heritage Day

Visitor

Introduction of Visitors

Reports by Committees

Standing Committee on Social Policy

Introduction of Government Bills

Legislative Assembly Amendment Act, 2022 / Loi de 2022 modifiant la

Loi sur l’Assemblée législative

Introduction of Bills

Public Health Accountability Act (In Honour of Dr. Sheela Basrur), 2022 / Loi de 2022 sur la responsabilité en matière de santé publique (en hommage à la Dre Sheela Basrur)

Statements by the Ministry and Responses

McIntyre Powder Project / Projet de la poudre McIntyre

Petitions

Injured workers

Economic development

Prix de l’essence

Home care

Access to health care

Land use planning

Injured workers

Volunteer service awards

Orders of the Day

Less Red Tape, Stronger Ontario Act, 2022 / Loi de 2022 visant à réduire les formalités administratives pour un Ontario plus fort

Private Members’ Public Business

Domestic violence

The House met at 0900.

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

Prayers.

Wearing of shirt

Hon. Kinga Surma: Point of order.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Infrastructure on a point of order?

Hon. Kinga Surma: I’m seeking unanimous consent to wear my Polish shirt in the House. Poland is playing this afternoon, and I want to cheer them on today, if that’s okay.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Infrastructure is seeking the unanimous consent of the House to wear the T-shirt in the House today. Agreed? Agreed.

Orders of the Day

Less Red Tape, Stronger Ontario Act, 2022 / Loi de 2022 visant à réduire les formalités administratives pour un Ontario plus fort

Resuming the debate adjourned on November 29, 2022, on the motion for second reading of the following bill:

Bill 46,

An Act to enact one Act and amend various other Acts / Projet de loi 46, Loi visant à édicter une loi et à modifier diverses autres lois.

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

Mr. Dave Smith: I want to acknowledge that today is Scottish Heritage Day in Ontario. It’s the second time that we’ve had it, and I want to thank former member Jimmy McDonell for putting it forward as part of a private member’s bill. I suspect that Mr. McDonell will be watching at some point today, so I’m proudly wearing Scottish attire. This is Black Watch. It is universal; anyone is welcome to wear it. And I am wearing my McPherson clan tie because I am part of the McPherson clan.

What we’re talking about today, though, is red tape reduction.

One of the things that our government embarked upon four years ago was reducing the amount of red tape. When we first were elected, we took a look at how many regulations we have in Ontario. What did we have in comparison to other provinces? We had more than 350,000 regulations in Ontario. As a number, 350,000 could be fantastic; it might be low—or it might be high. Just looking at it by itself, when you think about the amount of legislation that there is, the amount of things that government has to do, 350,000 could be a legitimate number.

But upon further inspection, we found out that the province that had the second most regulations was British Columbia, at 169,000 regulations. We had about 150,000 more regulations than the number two province. I don’t think there’s anybody who would say that British Columbia has a low standard of living or that British Columbia isn’t a safe place to live. They are able to do with 169,000—that’s number two. Ontario had the most regulations of any province.

When we looked at what those regulations did, what it meant for people in Ontario, what it meant for business in Ontario, we found that a lot of the regulatory burden existed in a way that stifled innovation, in a way that stifled business, in a way that made it more difficult.

I’ve said a number of times before that government’s role is to regulate to the point of integrity but not to the point of interference. I think the Ontario government, over the years, has gotten to the point where we’re beyond interference now. It’s very difficult for different industries to be nimble.

This morning, I was downstairs, in the legislative dining room, and there was a reception being held by OBIO—an organization that helps start-up companies in health care—and what we heard today was a prime example of that red tape and why red tape needs to be reduced, why we have to cut through so much of it. We have a large number of Ontario-based companies that are innovators in health care, that have done fantastic work.

Their products are being sold in the United States and Europe, but they don’t meet the procurement requirements in Ontario—where the company exists, where the technology was developed, where the innovators live. They can’t do business in their own province because of some of the burdens that government has placed on simple things like procurement.

This is why we have embarked on red tape reduction bills. We can’t find ourselves in a position where Ontario has great innovations, where Ontario has fantastic intellectual property, where Ontario leads the world in something, but Ontario will not support the businesses from Ontario that are doing that. That’s why there’s a need for these red tape reduction bills.

When we were looking at the history of it, we discovered that the regulatory burden for compliance in Ontario in 2017, before we were elected, was about $33,000 per business. Granted, there are small businesses and large businesses, and the larger businesses obviously are paying more, and the smaller businesses may not pay quite as much—but when you divide it up, $33,000 a year in regulatory burden for the average business.

We know that more than 95% of businesses in Ontario are small and medium-sized businesses that employ the most people. The vast majority of companies in this province found themselves in a position where it was costing close to $35,000 a year, before they opened the door, before they turned the lights on, before a single person walked into the office, walked into the store, walked into the business—$33,000 a year. Think about that in terms of the small mom-and-pop shop. Think about that in terms of the corner convenience store.

Think about that in terms of the landscaping company that’s employing a number of students over the course of the summer. Before they turn the lights on, they’ve got a $33,000 bill that they have to pay. Through some of the things that we have been doing so far, we have reduced that by about 6.5%. We’re making it easier for business to function.

This bill is no different than all of the others; this bill is making it easier to do things—and I want to touch on one of the things, in particular, on it: the Grow Ontario Strategy.

We know that we’ve got some of the greatest farmers in the entire world. Ontario feeds the world. There has been an expression for a number of years, “Farmers feed cities.” It is so true. And why is it that Ontario farms are so productive that way? Because of the innovations. I’ve talked about some of them in the past: automated milking, robotic milking, high-tech in dairy farming. I’ve made the statement before; I’ll make it again, because it is so true: Happy cows produce more milk.

In my riding of Peterborough–Kawartha, we have a number of dairy farms that have switched over to robotic milking or automatic milking. What all of them have said is, they’ve been able to reduce their herd by 50%. That’s 50% less cattle that are being fed, 50% less cattle that have to be looked after, 50% less cattle that have to see a vet—reducing the operating costs for that farm, but producing as much or more high-quality Ontario dairy products.

This is what can be done in a province when we reduce the amount of red tape that there is. The Grow Ontario Strategy is one of those things that’s going to help with that, because it’s taking that agri-food business and it’s making it that much more efficient. It’s going to add to how we produce things in Ontario.

And we’re not stopping just there. We’re embarking on a tour of northern Ontario. As the parliamentary assistant to northern development, I get the pleasure of being involved with the Ministry of Agriculture and going up to northern Ontario, to the Clay Belt, to see what we can do there to help improve Ontario’s ability to feed the entire world.

We’ve seen what has happened in Russia and Ukraine. Food insecurity is something that exists around the world. It’s not something that we’ve had a problem in producing enough food in Ontario for—but because we produce that extra amount, we have the ability to help with that food insecurity across the entire world.

There are a couple of really interesting things—potatoes, for example. I know; who gets excited about something like potatoes? I’m Scottish, so I don’t get excited about potatoes quite the same way that the Irish do. At one point, Ontario produced the most potato seedlings of any province in Canada, and we’ve got the ability to get back to that. We’ve got the ability to store, through innovation, those potatoes, so that they can be used year-round, instead of having to go to a southern state to pick up their crop in the winter.

These are all innovations that are done because you reduce the amount of red tape. When we reduce red tape, it means that our businesses have the opportunity to be more innovative, to pivot, to do things that are going to help the entire province, the entire world.

The Ontario government should not be the burden; we should not be the reason why Ontario businesses cannot thrive. With the amount of red tape that has been put out there, the amount of regulations that we have, we are not at the point of regulating for integrity; we’re at the point of interfering. Governments need to get out of the way.

Businesses will innovate; businesses will improve; businesses will employ more people, giving a higher quality of life to the people who live in this great province, as long as we, the Ontario government, take that step back, remove those unnecessary burdens, make it easier for businesses to thrive, and make it easier for businesses—like in the health care sector—to actually sell their products to Ontario instead of having to rely on foreign markets.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Questions?

MPP Jamie West: Thank you to the member from Peterborough–Kawartha for his discussion this morning. He talked a lot about the importance of removing red tape.

We’ve heard recently at Queen’s Park, and last term, about the red tape surrounding getting medications—for cystic fibrosis, for example. Last term, we talked about the red tape surrounding take-home cancer medication. If you’re in the hospital, the cancer medication is covered, but if you take it home, you have to pay in advance and get a rebate.

I’m wondering if the member from Peterborough–Kawartha would talk about the importance of removing red tape for people who need medication and have to go through this unnecessary burden of paying for it in advance in order to get reimbursed afterwards.

Mr. Dave Smith: That’s a fantastic point that reiterates exactly what I was saying at the very beginning. I talked about OBIO, who are here for a lobby day today, talking to us about how we change things in health care so that those great innovations can get to hospitals, can get to health care, can be used by the people of Ontario. These are all things that we have to do, absolutely; I agree 100%. We need to make sure that the Ontario government’s procurement rules do not get in the way of the fantastic work that’s being done in Ontario.

We’re promoting a made-in-Ontario approach for pretty much everything that we’ve got, and the previous governments made it so difficult for companies in Ontario to get their product to consumers in Ontario.

We’re embarking on an entire process. We’ve worked on it for the last four years, and we’ll continue working on it to reduce that burden, so that great innovations from the province of Ontario get to be used in the province of Ontario by the people of the province of Ontario to the benefit of everyone who lives here in Ontario.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Question?

Hon. Parm Gill: I want to thank the member and my colleague for that very passionate speech. He talked about some of the costs to an average business out there—to the tune of $33,000.

We know that when we inherited government back in 2018, Ontario had the highest burden across the country—and the work that we have been doing over the last four and a half years in terms of reducing red tape.

I’m wondering if the member can speak to some of the items that we have introduced in this piece of legislation—how those might help his constituents and businesses in his riding.

Mr. Dave Smith: In total, we have reduced the cost of doing business in Ontario, through red tape in particular, by $576 million per year—$576 million of funding that would have come from businesses, that accomplished nothing more than filling out paperwork.

What we’re doing in this bill is, we’re taking 28 different actions across 11 different ministries to reduce the cost of doing business in this province, to make it easier—something as simple as filling out a form online rather than having a paper copy of it, something as simple as having jury descriptions being made available online, having the ability to fill that information out. Why is that important?

I’m going to go back a little bit to something that happened with our Minister of Finance—he was actually President of the Treasury Board at the time. Fax machines were something that were constantly in use. Someone had to physically take that paper, feed it into a fax machine, take it from the other side, and then retype it into a computer. Simple things like that make a massive difference in the operating costs for companies, and these are things that we’re making changes to.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further questions?

Ms. Teresa J. Armstrong: I have a question for the member, specifically on

schedule 9 in the bill.

WSIB is now moving from Toronto and going to London. I understand that there are talks happening, but no one knows what prospects there are of where they’re going to relocate. There are also questions around the selling of the property here in Toronto. Is it going to stay in public hands so it can be used for things like true affordable housing?

Can the member talk about why they feel transparency and lack of openness about what’s going on in that process is red tape? I’d like to know why we can’t have those open discussions to eliminate red tape there.

Mr. Dave Smith: I’m going to talk about my previous life as a software developer. We were in a niche market. All the products that we developed were for the education sector here in Ontario. One of the things that we loved, as a vendor of record, was, the Ministry of Education would post something that said, “We’re going to spend X amount of dollars for software that does this.” Guess how much my response to that RFP was every single time? It was $1 less than what the ministry said they were going to spend to do whatever it was that they were going to do.

What we would be doing is—if we broadcast how much money we’re going to spend to do this, all of the bids would come in at $1 less than what we have said that we’re going to spend on it.

Anyone in business knows that when you’re going to put a procurement out, you do not lay on the table how much you’re going to spend on it. You want a competitive bidding process, where people are bidding to get to the lowest price, to save the taxpayers of Ontario as much money as possible and deliver the best possible service.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further questions?

Mrs. Daisy Wai: Thank you very much to our member sitting opposite there. It’s music to my ears when I hear how the red tape bill will support and benefit businesses.

I’ve run my own business before, and there were many times that I finally gave up doing some of the work for the government because of the red tape and the amount of time I had to spend there.

I would also like to know who else will benefit from these changes and how.

Mr. Dave Smith: I like to say that I’m in the productive middle and there are the fringe corners on either side of this side—because our government is so big that we span that entire side as well as a large chunk of this side of the House.

There are so many things that are in this red tape reduction bill that are going to help so many different businesses. I’ll touch on two of them.

If you’re doing jury duty, for example—if you get called to that, not having to waste your time filling out paper forms for it, being able to go on and do it electronically at your ease, at your comfort, is one of those things. It doesn’t sound like it’s a big deal, but all of those small things start to add up.

On the agriculture side: Our Grow Ontario Strategy is something that’s not only going to help agriculture, it’s not only going to help husbandry and livestock, but everyone who consumes all of those. There’s an expression in Ontario that one in eight work in agriculture, but I can guarantee you, eight out of every eight people eat what comes from agriculture.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further questions?

Mr. Wayne Gates: Just to your last comment—I don’t know if you realize we’re losing 315 acres of prime farmland every day in the province of Ontario. If we can’t feed ourselves—I thought COVID-19 would have taught us something—we’re going to be in big trouble. So my suggestion is, stop attacking our farmers and protect our farmland.

I think we’re all happy in here—and I’m talking about all my colleagues—there was an important victory for workers yesterday. I don’t know if you all heard about it. I know the PCs say they work for workers; they have bills for workers. The Ontario Superior Court of Justice has struck down Bill 124 in its entirety.

Interjections.

Mr. Wayne Gates: You guys can clap, too, on that side—the guys in the middle as well.

It violates the fundamental constitutional rights of collective bargaining.

Do you agree with that decision?

Mr. Dave Smith: Since we are talking about a red tape reduction bill and that has absolutely nothing to do with what we’re actually debating today, I’m going to talk about the great things that this bill does for the great people of the province of Ontario.

The NDP can virtue-signal all they’d like. They can throw out all kinds of different things to distract from the great work that we’re doing.

This is one of those bills that will make a positive difference for the people of Ontario. This is one of those bills that will reduce the cost of doing business, which will reduce the cost to every single person in this province. This is one of those things that’s a good-news story.

I’m sorry that the NDP doesn’t want to talk about the good things that this government is doing for the people of this province.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further questions?

M me Dawn Gallagher Murphy: I’d like to ask a question of the member with regard to the Ministry of Health, the Mandatory Blood Testing Act, and what the ministry is proposing and if there are any financial implications associated—

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Thank you. Further debate?

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: I want to start, definitely, with Bill 124 and the decision of the Superior Court of Justice. I’m asking the government not to appeal the decision—

Mr. Dave Smith: Point of order. We’re discussing a different bill today, Bill 46, and I would respectfully request that the member keep his remarks relevant.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Order.

We’ll allow the member to start. Please remember that we are discussing a different bill.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: If they would have let me, they probably would have seen where I’m heading with that.

I’m asking the government not to appeal it. The court recognized the unconstitutionality of Bill 124. So make it right. Stop hurting the workforce, and encourage it. We need more hands on deck.

When you look at a title like Less Red Tape, Stronger Ontario Act—well, repealing Bill 124 will help that. ERs are crowded. Surgeries are postponed. Let’s cut the red tape for the 15,000 international nurses and have them accredited to work in Ontario and help our hospitals. Why isn’t that the plan?

The province is facing many issues at this moment, and this bill does not address any of them—the crisis of workers in health care, or the multiple issues that First Nations communities are facing, such as boil-water advisories and contaminated soil; shortage of housing; access to benefits under the workers compensation board, the deeming; the need for development of more affordable housing; the backlog with the Landlord and Tenant Board and in our court system.

This government chooses to ignore the proposals of hospital administrators that came from my constituents. They asked for help, they brought help—yet no answers. It has been a year and a half—and still no answer. I asked two questions in the House to the minister, delivered in their hands, asking them to respond—still no response. It chooses to ignore the concerns of the environment while waiting to carve up the greenbelt, by big developers. And they are doing nothing to help alleviate the financial burden of students with their post-secondary tuition fees. We have the highest tuition fees in the country.

This bill is simply a list of housekeeping items and amendments. This doesn’t address the immediate needs of Ontarians. I call it a “change the channel” bill.

Ontario is signatory to Treaty 9. This government seems to forget that.

Four years ago, Kashechewan signed a new agreement to relocate the community. When you were elected four years ago—this is one of the changes you’ve done. You pretty well changed the colour of the agreement and then signed it—still, nothing has been done. Yet, we hear about how fast it’s going to go with the Ring of Fire, how fast it’s moving ahead. But that community is still waiting. Every spring, they’re threatened to be evacuated, and yet we have an agreement that was signed by this government to move this community that are facing—every year, they’re threatened by flooding.

Attawapiskat still has fuel contamination. Some of it was fixed, but they still have fuel contamination in their community. The community wants to expand. There’s nowhere to expand—because there’s a road and the De Beers mine put a bump on it in protest, so now they can’t build. That’s the only way they can expand. It’s on their traditional territories, and yet they’re not permitted to expand. The other option they have is to move the airport. The airport is right by the community, and they’ve been complaining about the fuel and the dust and the noise.

A lot of communities have water advisories. My colleague Sol Mamakwa, the MPP for Kiiwetinoong, has said that the community has a 27-year boil-water advisory. If you want to remove red tape—that’s the red tape you need to remove. Fix boil-water advisories. In my community of Attawapiskat, people have to open windows to take showers because there are too many chemicals in the water. That’s reality.

If you want to help communities, if you want to do good red tape—these are examples of good red tape. Attawapiskat declared an emergency on the lack of housing that there is on their traditional territories, and yet they’re not permitted to expand. You go into First Nations communities, and they’ve got a stack of mattresses in their living rooms. Tell me that’s all right. Tell me that is fair.

WSIB and the deeming: You want to remove red tape that will help? That is good red tape—injured workers who are living in poverty. There is no work. You need to realize that up north, communities are sometimes an hour away and more. So they’ve been deemed to do, let’s say, I don’t know—

Mr. Wayne Gates: Park cars.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: Park cars. Or hotel clerks. Because the jobs are not available in their community, they’ve been deemed, so they pay 85% of the difference between the job—not the whole thing. So they’re being deemed, when the jobs don’t exist in their community. And that’s fair?

That is good red tape you could reduce. You need to do better, as a government. You know about this, because injured workers have come to you. They’ve knocked on my door. I’m sure they knock on your door.

Yesterday, we all met with paramedics. What they’re asking for is to have a regulated college for professional paramedics. Right now, paramedics are working outside of their scope, because they’ve been asked by this government to work outside of their regulations. So they’re working unregulated. And you think that’s fair? You want to make good red tape reduction? Make that—you’ll save $21 million. We don’t hear you on this. Why aren’t we hearing this? If something happens to any of these paramedics, guess what? It will be on them, because you’ll all wash your hands of it.

I think it happened in Windsor, the situation they were telling me—and the paramedic was the one who was dinged for it. Where is the fairness when you’re asking paramedics to work outside of their scope, unregulated? Where is the fairness in that for these workers? You say you’re for the workers.

I heard one of the government MPPs saying that it’s music to her ears when she hears about red tape reduction. Well, it’s not music to the injured workers’ ears when they’re being deemed; I can tell you that much. It’s not music to the paramedics’ ears when they’re being asked to work outside of their scope or in unregulated places and they’ve been stepping up to the plate over and over and over again. I can tell you it’s not music to the ears of First Nations communities when they can’t expand their communities, when they have a lack of housing.

Two or three generations are living in a house that was only made for a small family, because they have nowhere to go. That is not music to our ears. It shouldn’t be music to your ears. And yet, you don’t address that red tape. You always play political Ping-Pong—“Oh, it’s federal.” I’m sorry, but it’s not federal—you’re a signatory; we’re all signatories to Treaty 9, for that matter. Boil-water advisories should not exist in Ontario. That is not music to our ears. It shouldn’t be music to your ears, either.

Do the right thing. Fix boil-water advisories in First Nations. Fix the housing crisis in First Nations. Fix deeming. And repeal Bill 124.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Questions?

Mrs. Robin Martin: Our government is cutting red tape to improve the WSIB’s operational efficiency, and it will have a direct and positive impact for workers and their families, because WSIB would then be able to focus more on supporting injured workers, rather than dealing with duplicative reporting processes. From the comments made by the member opposite, I assume that this is something he would support because it should help workers and their families.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: What I would support is this government stopping sending WSIB money to companies when we have injured workers who are living in poverty. Workers’ compensation was created because injured workers were suing employers. Now injured workers are suffering. They are not getting what they are supposed to get.

Did you know that if you lose hearing in one ear, you’re not qualified because you hear in the other ear? And yet, if you hurt a shoulder, they take that into consideration. How does that make sense?

Deeming doesn’t make sense. Deeming should be—

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Response?

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: Injured workers should be compensated. If the work is not available in their community, they should not be penalized. The government should fix that.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): The member from Niagara.

Mr. Wayne Gates: It’s always a pleasure to rise.

In this bill, they’re talking about WSIB selling their office in Toronto and moving it to London. And yet, nothing in the bill talks about that money going to injured workers.

My good friend just talked about injured workers. Speaker, 50% of injured workers today are living in poverty. The main reason they’re living in poverty—he’s right on the money, because it has been brought to this House—is deeming.

You had the opportunity, with a majority government, to pass Bill 119, and you chose not to.

Injured workers go to work every day and get hurt, through no fault of their own. They are deemed, and they are forced to live in poverty. Do you know what happens to them? They lose their family. They lose their kids. They lose everything.

Why isn’t that in the bill? Why aren’t you helping injured workers in the province of Ontario?

If we remember the last time, under this government—

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Thank you. The member from Mushkegowuk–James Bay.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: Great question. Très bonne question. They should invest.

When you look at northern Ontario, because of the isolation—they shouldn’t be subject to have to move because there is not work in their community. The government should pass a bill saying that for anything farther than 60 kilometres, people should not be—because it affects the family. They lose their family, unfortunately—

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Thank you. The member from Peterborough–Kawartha.

Mr. Dave Smith: I want to touch on some of the things that you talked about in your speech—or rather, that you didn’t talk about in your speech. You talked about things that weren’t in this bill, but I’d like to remind the member that every time we’ve introduced an omnibus bill, the NDP have objected to it and said that we’re piling everything together.

In my speech, I mentioned that we had more than 350,000 regulations in Ontario—the next largest province was British Columbia, at 169,000. Would the member opposite change his mind and support an omnibus bill that wipes out almost 200,000 regulations so that we could get back down to what was in other provinces, and that includes a number of the things he’s asking for, if we were to do that?

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: When you look across, there’s the eagle for the government side, and there’s the wise owl—that’s our job, to question. For some reason, you don’t like us questioning. And if—

Interjections.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: Please, you have to understand: We remember Walkerton. So we have to be a little bit—

Interjection.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: Yes. It didn’t work out very good, as you know. A lot of people died.

Our duty, as the official opposition, is to question—and recommend. We do a lot of recommendations in committee and all this—and how much do you take? Absolutely zero. So I’m sorry, but no, unfortunately, this is our job, and we want to make sure that we tell the government what needs to be done.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Question?

MPP Jamie West: I want to make sure that I compliment the member for Mushkegowuk–James Bay on his conversation. On this side, we regularly talk about the need for boil-water advisories in Ontario and how shameful it is—for a very long time, 27 years, which goes back through multiple governments, so I’m not pointing the finger. But I am saying that the government of the day, the Conservative Party, has been in power going on five years now. This is your opportunity to take just one of those boil-water advisories and fix it. He mentioned that one of them has been there for 27 years.

Does he think there’s any reason that the Conservative government couldn’t tackle one of these and get rid of the boil-water advisory? And would that cut down on red tape and burden for businesses?

Définitivement, il n’y a aucune raison. Si on se souvient de Walkerton—j’en ai parlé un petit peu—ça s’est réglé assez rapidement. On a une communauté dans Kiiwetinoong où ça fait 27 ans qu’ils font bouillir leur eau. On ne parle pas, là, d’en dehors, d’un autre pays dans le tiers-monde; on parle—en Ontario—d’une communauté dans le nord-ouest de l’Ontario.

Une chose qu’ils pourraient faire pour le régler : on le fait, et on envoie une

partie de la facture au fédéral. On l’a mis dans notre plateforme, nous. Pourquoi le gouvernement ne fait-il pas la bonne chose? Pourquoi le gouvernement ne dit-il pas : « Non, ça fait assez longtemps que ça dure. Le fédéral ne veut pas faire sa part. On va régler le problème. On va donner de l’eau potable à la communauté, puis on va envoyer la facture »? Parce qu’on a beaucoup plus les reins solides—une petite communauté comme Kiiwetinoong. Dans Kiiwetinoong, où ils sont obligés de payer l’eau ou d’attendre, où les enfants ne connaissent même pas c’est quoi—ils ont peur de boire de l’eau potable quand ils sortent de leur communauté. Irresponsable.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): The member from Scarborough–Agincourt.

Mr. Aris Babikian: By cutting red tape and lowering the cost of doing business in Ontario, our government has created an environment where we are seeing record job creation and growth. These successes are powered by reliable access to energy.

Does the member opposite agree that as we continue to grow the economy, it will remain critical that we remove red tape barriers that prevent access to energy for our businesses and job creators?

M. Guy Bourgouin: Je ne pense pas, sur ce côté de la Chambre, qu’on dit qu’on est contre toute la question du « red tape ». I don’t think we’re saying we’re against removal of all red tape. I don’t think the government heard that from this side. But we do have a responsibility to tell the government what we believe should be addressed.

I’ve talked about different points. Deeming should be fixed. We have injured workers who are starving, going to food banks.

Mr. Wayne Gates: No fault of their own.

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: No fault of their own. Yet we are turning a blind eye to this. But we didn’t turn a blind eye to taking billions away from the WSIB and sending it to employers.

If you want to send money to employers, fix the problem with deeming and fix the problem with injured workers. If there’s money left, yes, return it to employers, but until then, injured workers come first—because this is what the WSIB was made for: to compensate injured workers so that their families can thrive and they can thrive. Take away the mental stress—

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Thank you. Quick question, quick response?

Mr. Michael Mantha: We see this as a red tape reduction bill, but again I want to point out that there’s something that is very much missing, that we know has backlogged a lot of landlords and tenants.

What would it mean to landlords and tenants across this province if we were to deal with the backlog at the landlord and tenant tribunal?

M. Guy Bourgouin: Merci à mon collègue. Ça voudrait dire qu’on aurait bien moins de monde qui viendrait à nos bureaux pour nous demander ce qui se passe. Ça voudrait dire qu’il y aurait du monde qui se ferait adresser le problème qu’ils ont eu avec soit des « landlords »—on a les « landlords » aussi; il y a des « landlords » qui ont eu bien de problèmes avec leurs « tenants » aussi. So we have both problems. But if we could fix that problem, it would alleviate so much stress on families, and then maybe we would fix the problem that these tenants are asking—because they are living in conditions that landlords have been abusing, and also being evicted for no reason.

Ms. Andrea Khanjin: Point of order.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Point of order, member from Barrie–Innisfil.

Ms. Andrea Khanjin: Pursuant to standing order 7(e), I wish to inform the House that tonight’s evening meeting is cancelled.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Thank you. Further debate.

Ms. Jess Dixon: I am, of course, standing today to speak about the proposed Less Red Tape, Stronger Ontario Act.

It’s no unusual news to any of us here that red tape causes a significant amount of frustration, unnecessary expense and complications in everyday life, not just for governments, but for regular people in Ontario—for our non-profit organizations, individuals, families etc. It stops productivity, it reduces our economic competitiveness and development, and it also tends to put a chilling affect on innovation.

It’s a bit of a niche reference—but what’s the point of having the floor if you can’t throw in a niche reference here and there? I’m a big fan of Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. When I think about red tape, I’m reminded of the Vogons in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which Adams describes as one of the most unpleasant populations in the galaxy due to their bureaucratic and officious nature.

I’ll quote it directly: The Vogons “wouldn’t even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public inquiry, lost again, and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as firelighters.” That sounds a lot like some of the red tape that we’ve been cutting through.

To go to another great, Oscar Wilde said, “The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.” That is what we are trying to stop here.

It also reminds me of one of my favourite questions to ask when I meet with stakeholders or constituents. I’ll say, “We’ve talked about a lot of the big issues, the overarching academic issues. Now can you please tell me the little tiny thing about a government process that makes you want to bang your head against the wall? Because we don’t necessarily know about it, and we won’t be able to do anything about it unless you tell us.”

Really, that’s what this bill is—this bill is the result of the government having a very clear mandate and acting on that to consult, to learn, to listen and to identify those things that make people want to bang their heads against the wall. It’s about red tape. It’s about bureaucracy. It’s about not burying everything in soft peat and recycling it as firelighters.

I’m going to talk about a few of the parts of this bill that are of specific relevance to me, whether in my position in energy or some of my more personal interests and projects.

One of the aspects of this bill—I’m parliamentary assistant to the Minister of Energy—is about the leave-to-construct thresholds. Currently, under the Ontario Energy Board Act, the OEB will review leave-to-construct applications for these electricity transmission projects and will grant leave, or permission, to carry out the work if it’s in the public interest to do so, looking at the needs of the project, the proposals, their price etc.

Prior to what is set out in this bill—or what this bill will change, if passed—electricity transmission projects that are greater than two kilometres in length have to go through the leave-to-construct proceedings. That includes self-funded connection lines for generators as well as industrial load consumers such as electric vehicle battery manufacturing plants or mines that are trying to connect to the grid. My ministry, energy, has heard time and time again from businesses and various industry groups that this poses an unnecessary regulatory burden, as these projects don’t impact ratepayers,

whereas reliability, quality etc., are assessed through other mechanisms. It’s important to understand that the costs associated with these proposed exempt projects are not recovered from electricity ratepayers; they are customer-funded. They also remain subject to any environmental assessment processes and other approvals, which is important to understand.

One of the things that’s so important about this simplification of the leave-to-construct procedures is, we’ve made it clear time and time again that Ontario’s economy is booming, and we want to keep it that way. Making Ontario a province that is attractive to companies choosing to come here, and attractive to companies that want to have a green initiative, is incredibly important.

I know it can sound dry to hear a Conservative yet again speaking about the economy, but the truth is, it is the economy and the workers and the taxpayers who provide all of the wonderful things that our province has to offer, including the projects that fund those who are struggling, those who are dealing with disease, those who are dealing with poverty and systemic inequalities. It’s through our economy, through attracting these businesses, that we become the type of province that is actually able to turn around and make sure that we are caring for Ontarians.

We’ve heard stories in the past about electricity concerns preventing investment in Ontario, and that’s really what we are focused on dealing with. This sort of minor change is a really important part of that, and something we should be proud of. As I said, it’s really an example of this government and of the ministry listening and paying attention. But the other aspect of that is, again, when I’m talking about making sure that we are attractive to businesses—this specific project about the leave to construct has a lot to do with electrification.

Electrification is a really essential part of our journey to net zero and our environmental commitments. We won’t be able to get down to net-zero energy uses without these types of projects, without identifying these problems, focusing on them, and making sure that we are removing them. So, while it may sound like a somewhat dry topic, the leave to construct energy lines more than two kilometres—it’s actually an important fact, and it’s definitely evidence of this government listening.

I also want to talk a little bit about two other parts of this bill that have nothing to do with energy but that I find particularly heartening. One of those is the invitation to open the 1989 Veterinarians Act. We are dealing with a significant veterinarian shortage in this province that impacts everybody. It impacts our farmers and our agri-food sector, but it also impacts people like me who consider themselves “pet parents,” who have gone through the struggles of trying to find a veterinarian. We have veterinarians who are struggling or burning out.

We have vet techs who are capable of a vast amount of care, who are incredibly skilled, intelligent, caring people, but who are limited by a very archaic—1989—definition of the stratification of work within the veterinary sphere. Once again, this is definitely an example of this government listening. I think the College of Veterinarians of Ontario, back in 2016 or 2017, put out a request for input from their own veterinarians. They’ve been working on some policy suggestions since then.

This, again, is evidence of our government listening to that, listening to stakeholders and saying this is important—“Your opinions are important; your input is important”—and making sure that we are getting that.

Finally—these aren’t related, but it’s of interest to me, what this bill is proposing to do when it comes to the Provincial Offences Act and convictions in absentia. As many know, I was a crown attorney. I’ve worked in a couple of small jurisdictions where I was also a provincial offences prosecutor, so I prosecuted Highway Traffic Act offences. In the Highway Traffic Act, you can be convicted in absentia. A trial can be held without you; you can be convicted in your absence.

With COVID, we had a very challenging balance between trying to keep cases moving while understanding that there were a lot of legitimate factors that might be preventing people from accessing court services, understanding the process was still ongoing, that type of thing.

What the case was until what’s proposed in this bill—if a conviction was registered, the only person who was able to essentially vacate that conviction was a justice of the peace, which put a huge amount of burden on our JPs, who are already extremely overtaxed by the sheer volume of cases in our Provincial Offences Court. What this proposes to do is to give the clerk of the court the authority—obviously, following the same process—to vacate that conviction, which is going to be incredibly helpful. That’s something that we did see a lot of during COVID. Again, I’m very pleased to see it, as it’s evidence of this government listening and learning.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): The member for Algoma–Manitoulin.

Mr. Michael Mantha: I really enjoyed the member’s comments this morning.

I looked at this bill quite intently, and a lot of it is just housecleaning, and some of this red tape bill will help some individuals.

I looked at the changes that are being done under

schedule 4, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Act, providing the opportunity for others to be eligible for certain programs. That’s good news.

I will go to

schedule 9. Here was a perfect opportunity. Many times we raised in the House the challenges that a lot of injured workers are facing in this province when it comes to deeming.

Would a review, would us looking at what deeming is, having that hard discussion—would that benefit anyone in this province?

Ms. Jess Dixon: When we’re looking at this bill, we’re looking at the things I mentioned that are the comparatively small and niggling issues that make people bang their heads against the wall. The issues that you are raising are obviously things we all care about, but they’re not what we are talking about today.

What we’re talking about is—I’m almost tired of hearing the words—red tape. It’s bureaucracy. It’s layers upon layers of regulation. So I think that it’s unfair to assess this particular bill against bills that have a much grander scope. This is about red tape. And housecleaning is not something to dismiss as unimportant, as it has a significant impact on Ontario businesses and families.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Member for Markham–Thornhill.

Mr. Logan Kanapathi: Thank you to my colleague from Kitchener South–Hespeler for the wonderful presentation.

Madam Speaker, my colleague from Peterborough–Kawartha mentioned the more than 350,000 regulations and the regulatory burden on businesses, impacting our businesses.

This red tape reduction bill is trying to make things easier for our small businesses, fairly clearly.

There are over 1,800 small businesses in my riding of Markham–Thornhill.

I’d like to thank the minister for introducing this bill, and our government and our Premier.

My question to my colleague: You passionately talked about the energy industry. How would this proposed bill bring changes to the energy industry?

Ms. Jess Dixon: Like I said, I think this is so important. This leads us to construct transition lines over two kilometres. It may sound like a somewhat dry accomplishment. However, it means a lot for a lot of small businesses and large businesses, as well as individuals.

Again, what this is about, and what I think that part of the bill symbolizes, is our government listening to people, listening to stakeholders, and going in and making the small but necessary changes that are going to make life easier for Ontario businesses and Ontario families, and also make it very clear that Ontario is a very open and welcome environment for people to start a small business, to bring a big business to. It’s clear that we listen to our families and our businesses and we respond appropriately.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Question?

MPP Jamie West: Thank you to the member from Kitchener South–Hespeler—and my congratulations on talking about The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy as part of debate.

Very often, the Conservative Party, when they talk about removing red tape—in another cultural reference, I think of Thanos doing the snap and getting rid of half, and the danger of just eliminating red tape.

I think for the most

part in this bill, we’re just cleaning things up. But when I think back to removing red tape and what happened in Walkerton and the deaths that happened there—how do you ensure a balance between that? Very often, when there is consultation for bills, the notification comes out at the very last minute; people have to register within a short amount of time, and there’s only five hours to hear discussion from stakeholders. So how do you ensure that you have good debate, you have good bills, and that the bills and the red tape you’re removing don’t cause issues like we had in Walkerton?

Ms. Jess Dixon: My point would be the same: We are talking about a red tape bill. It’s not just housecleaning; it’s an essential part of government business. It may not be particularly exciting, and it may not make for the best headlines, but this is material that is incredibly important for Ontario. It shows that we are taking our duties to Ontario very seriously and that we are listening.

When we’re talking about larger issues—they’re valid issues, but they’re not the purpose of what we are discussing here.

Again, I would say that it’s not just housecleaning, it’s not just housekeeping. Those things are actually very important—or we would be living in quite a disaster. That’s what we’re here to do—to clean house.

M me Dawn Gallagher Murphy: I’d like to thank the member for Kitchener South–Hespeler for her comments today on this red tape bill.

She spoke ever so eloquently about the Veterinarians Act, so I would like to ask a question about what the ministry is consulting on—and why is the ministry modernizing the Veterinarians Act? I do understand that it has been 30-plus years since this act has been looked at. If she could comment on that, that would be great.

Ms. Jess Dixon: Thank you for the question.

Yes, it’s definitely something I’m passionate about.

You’re correct; it has been in place for a very long time, since 1989, when I was two. So it’s really time to look at it. What’s important to understand is that this is a call to veterinary professionals to give their opinion on a—there is no sort of specification about what, in particular, they must give input on. What we’re looking at is streamlining it, making sure there’s a reduction of compliance burden for our already overworked veterinarians, vet techs and vet clinics. We’re also looking at how we deal with complaints, quality assurances, that type of thing.

But ultimately, the overarching goal is improving access to care for animal owners. This isn’t something that’s like a top-down imposition of change; it is a request from that community—to say, “What do you need changed? Come tell us.”

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further questions?

Ms. Teresa J. Armstrong: The member talks about housekeeping, cleaning house, all that kind of stuff.

I have to say,

schedule 2, the Courts of Justice Act, where they’re going to cut some red tape by having retiring judges coming back and helping clear that backlog—that’s good. But what they don’t understand is that by cutting legal aid by 30%, they’ve affected the most vulnerable people.

When you talk about saving money and that kind of issue when it comes to red tape—how does cutting 30% from legal aid help the most vulnerable people access a basic right like justice?

Ms. Jess Dixon: Once again, we are talking about a red tape bill. We’re not talking about legal aid. I know this because I have come from the courts quite recently. We are dealing with a massive COVID backlog. The courts had to modernize overnight. Minister Downey did an excellent job with that—which I can say, because I was here.

Per diem judges, bringing them in—part of access to justice is access to swift justice, to actually getting your case resolved. That’s incredibly important.

I’d also comment again about the POA matter. Convictions in absentia were a huge issue as far as access to justice because of people not having representation, not understanding the process. By allowing clerks of the court to vacate convictions, it means that provincial prosecutors are able to deal directly with individuals and basically cut through all of the red tape that would prevent us from reopening their cases and dealing fairly with their matters.

Mr. Mike Harris: To my colleague from Waterloo region, from Kitchener, my next-door neighbour: It’s great to have you elected here in this chamber. You bring a wealth of experience when it comes to these things.

And I’m glad the member for London–Fanshawe is bringing up things that we see with our provincial courts and our Provincial Offences Act.

I’d like to give the member for Kitchener South–Hespeler a few minutes to talk a little bit more about some of the things that she sees in this bill, in regard to the Ministry of the Attorney General, that she thinks are going to help the people of this province.

Ms. Jess Dixon: The member for Peterborough spoke a little bit about the electronic juries questionnaire. Again, this is very important. Trying to have a representative jury means that a big part of that is making access to the jury pool more equitable and easier. By being able to do this virtually, we are making it far more likely that we’ll have more people who are responding, who are engaging, and we will therefore have much better access to that representative jury that is really essential when we’re talking about access to justice.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Patrice Barnes): Further debate?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: It’s a pleasure to rise today, on behalf of the people I represent in London West, to participate in this debate on Bill 46. Just so people understand the context, this bill is part of a red tape package of measures that the government just introduced, which includes 28 different initiatives; some are legislative, some are more policy-related. Given the limited time I have this morning, I just want to highlight a couple of those measures that are included in the red tape package, and specifically, the ones that are of most concern to the people of London West.

One of the initiatives that the government has announced with this bill is the Grow Ontario Strategy. We heard the Minister of Agriculture talk about the strategy as the province’s plan to build consumer confidence and support farmers and Ontario’s food supply.

I have to say that there are a lot of concerns about what this government is doing, in fact, to undermine Ontario’s food supply and to undermine the ability of farmers to continue to feed the people in this province.

As we know from the committee hearings on Bill 23, Ontario is one of the few jurisdictions that actually is able to produce surplus food so that it can be sent to other jurisdictions to help feed people.

A couple of days ago, we all received a media release from the Ontario Federation of Agriculture showing that more than 50,000 people have signed on to the OFA’s campaign to support farmers and Ontario’s food supply, which they are calling the Home Grown campaign. They are highlighting the fact that every day in this province we are losing 319 acres of farmland. That is equivalent to losing nine family farms every week—and the reason we are losing this is because of the policies that are brought forward by this government.

We have seen, over the last five years, a doubling of the rate of farmland loss that is occurring in this province. That is not the way to support farmers and ensure that Ontario has a sustainable food supply.

On the one hand, the government is announcing a Grow Ontario Strategy, but on the other hand, they’re opening up the greenbelt, they’re paving over farmland, they are bulldozing forward with the 413, and all of these initiatives are going to continue to expedite the loss of farmland in this province.

The next feature of this bill that I want to comment on is the commitment to open up the Veterinarians Act. I did want to give a shout-out to Dr. Martha Harding, a London veterinarian who established the East Village Animal Hospital. That East Village Animal Hospital now has locations not just in London, but also in Kitchener and Sudbury and Hamilton. Dr. Harding runs the East Village Animal Hospital as a veterinary service that low-income people can take their pets to to get very low-cost basic veterinarian services. One of the barriers that Dr.

Harding has encountered in providing this service is that, currently in Ontario, there is no ability for a veterinary clinic to be registered as a non-profit. There are a lot of people across the province who would like to support veterinary clinics like the East Village Animal Hospital, to provide those low-cost services to people on low income. Everyone should have access to a pet. We know the benefits of pets. We hear of low-income people who have to surrender their pets because they can’t afford the veterinary fees.

So I urge the government to look at introducing that non-profit status for veterinary clinics like the East Village Animal Hospital.

I also want to comment on one of the schedules of this bill that temporarily allows retired judges to work longer in the court system. This is in

schedule 4. It allows retired former provincial judges serving on a part-time basis to go from 50% of full-time service to 75% of full-time service, but that is only until April 2024, I believe.

In London, we have a crisis in both Small Claims Court and in civil courts. I heard from a labour lawyer in London who uses the Small Claims Court many times to pursue wrongful dismissal cases on behalf of workers in the community. He said, “I have a case where the claim was filed in 2019, a settlement conference was held pre-COVID and, for over two years since, it has been radio silence from the court.”

The Small Claims Courts are simply not able to deal with the huge backlog that has grown, and as a result, people are not getting justice through the Small Claims Court process. I have concerns that

schedule 2, allowing retired provincial judges to serve a little bit more time in the courts, is not going to effectively deal with that backlog in our court system—and it’s not just Small Claims Court; it’s also the civil courts.

Earlier this fall, we had a number of prominent lawyers from almost every single major law firm in the city of London write to the Attorney General, Doug Downey, to urge him to take action on the trial backlog in the civil courts in London and southwestern Ontario. They pointed out that the regional senior justice declared in a ruling that trials of over two weeks have no prospect of being heard until late 2024. They gave some examples of the consequences of the backlog in the civil court system. They said, “A business making $50 million a year with dozens of employees failed because the court could not find time to hear a dispute about the ownership and control of the business....

“A small business was lost while a contracted dispute remained unresolved.”

Clearly, dealing with the backlog in the civil court system is something that would—that is red tape reduction that would really help businesses move forward.

These lawyers who sent this letter to the Attorney General have called for a couple of things. They’ve called for two more Superior Court justices to be appointed to the regional court and two more justices to London specifically to deal with civil matters. They also argue in support of a specific earmarked civil legal aid fund. We know that the cuts to legal aid have really had a major impact on people’s ability to pursue justice through the courts.

In the limited time I have left, I want to highlight the irony of this government saying that it is moving forward with red tape reduction when other things that they are doing are adding red tape. They are adding barriers to businesses and municipalities in the province. I want to use the example of Bill 23.

We had a letter from the Upper Thames River Conservation Authority, and they pointed out that when “municipalities are prohibited from seeking advice from conservation authorities, they will need to acquire additional resources and expertise related to natural heritage review, protection and management to replace the substantial technical and science expertise provided by conservation authorities. This will increase costs and delay development.”

So on the one hand, the government says they’re all about red tape reduction—they’re bringing forward this bill—but other bills like Bill 23 have actually added red tape and added barriers to businesses in the province.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Members’ statements.

Members’ Statements

Santa Claus parades in Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke

Mr. John Yakabuski: The Christmas parades are back, and the world is better for it. All across the valley, communities are getting together to do something that everyone loves but that has been missing for the last couple of years. In my riding of Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke, each and every parade is a special experience that speaks in a very visual way about the people, the organizations, the businesses and their expressions of community spirit.

This past weekend, I was able to attend parades in both Cobden and Pembroke.

The Cobden parade is a daytime parade that brings out people from all around the area and sends out the message that Christmas is near. As the first parade of the season in our area, that is most appropriate.

For many years now, the Pembroke parade has been an evening parade, and this year’s edition was truly spectacular. As many as 70 floats took

part in the parade, witnessed by the biggest crowd I’ve ever seen in Pembroke.

The floats and the work that goes into them are something to appreciate, and my hat goes off to all those who work so hard to make these parades so very special.

But what really is the most wonderful part of the Christmas/Santa Claus parades is the joy and excitement shown by the children as they anxiously await the arrival of the jolly old elf. As I move along the parade routes exchanging greetings with so many people, it is the reactions of the children that leave the most lasting impressions. The joy of children—isn’t that what it’s all about? I look forward to experiencing more of it this weekend.

Merry Christmas to one and all.

Events in Mushkegowuk–James Bay / Événements à Mushkegowuk–Baie James

Mr. Guy Bourgouin: The holiday season is upon us, and today I would like to take the time to commend the communities in my riding for their efforts in offering wonderful activities for the residents. Here are a few events I had the opportunity to attend, just to name a few:

Centre de Loisirs had their annual craft expo, with merchants and artists selling their goods, and a visit from Santa.

La ville de Hearst avait la Magie de Minuit pour encourager l’achat local, ainsi qu’un village des fêtes pour les familles avec du curling, du hockey, du chocolat chaud et une rencontre avec le Père Noël.

La ville de Moonbeam a organisé un souper et une soirée musicale pour célébrer les commerces et leurs employés.

The Rotary Club of Kapuskasing had its second annual Winter Wonderland Parade this past Sunday. Many local businesses participated in the floats and gave out candy to children and families along the road.

There is a lot more to come, with markets and craft shows in Fauquier and Val Rita, holiday office parties for the communities, and the festival of lights in various towns across the riding.

It is time to spread some holiday joy and reflect on what we are thankful for this past year. Remember to support your local businesses.

This time of year is difficult for many families and individuals, so let’s not forget about our food banks, our angel campaigns and our toy drives. I urge you all to be kind and donate where you can. A simple gesture can go a long way.

I would like to wish everyone a safe and happy holiday season. Je vous souhaite, tous et toutes, une belle fête.

Central York Fire Services

M me Dawn Gallagher Murphy: Speaker, I rise today in the chamber to tell you about an event in my riding of Newmarket–Aurora that happened earlier this month. The Central York Fire Services invited me to attend their annual recognition ceremony. I had the honour of speaking at this great event and congratulating our community’s unspoken heroes.

I would like to begin by thanking Chief Ian Laing and Deputy Fire Chief Rocco Volpe for all their great work and the encouragement that they provide to the Central York Fire Services team.

Thank you to all our firefighters and all our first responders for your selfless commitment and dedication to the safety of our community.

During this event, Captain Chris Airey, an expert in ice water, rope and high-angle rescues, was recognized for his contributions in leadership and supporting the training of his fellow firefighters and community members by being awarded the Jim Allen Award. This award was introduced in 2018 to honour Captain Jim Allen for his dedication and contributions over his 37-year career.

This event was also the first time the fire services awarded “wings” for their new air division, which uses unmanned aerial drones to assist in the firefighting process. I would like to personally recognize the Central York Fire Services for embracing technology to modernize their service and approach to firefighting.

To all the firefighters at the Central York Fire Services, thank you.

Cost of living

Mr. Terence Kernaghan: The cost of living in Ontario is out of control. People feel it every day, and many middle-class families are doing things they never expected.

The Feed Ontario report reveals record-high food bank use. Since the pandemic, first-time visitors are up 64%, with one in three people accessing food banks for the very first time. In its report, Feed Ontario cites precarious employment, underfunded disability supports, and unaffordable housing as reasons why middle-class people are turning to food banks in numbers never seen before. They say, “The reason that so many people must turn to a food bank is because our once-strong economic foundation has weakened.”

In my community of London, average rent jumped 36.9% last year, one in four children are living in poverty, and 6,230 individuals and families are on social housing wait-lists.

People are being crushed under the skyrocketing cost of living. Families shouldn’t have to turn to food banks to help feed their kids when they work hard for a living, but that is the reality in Ontario right now.

The middle class built Ontario because of public health care, because of public education, and because they earned good wages. The Ford government is strangling these public systems, while more and more people are being pushed into poverty.

This government should take Feed Ontario’s recommendations: improve the quality of work, improve social assistance, invest in social housing, and put people at the centre of policy and program design.

To this Conservative government: Protect Ontario’s middle class; not just wealthy, insider donors.

Boating safety

Ms. Goldie Ghamari: I rise today to speak about a constituent of mine from Stittsville, Cara McNulty. Through her advocacy group, Life Jackets for Life, she is a tireless and hard-working advocate for children’s safety. Her group’s goal is to change the law to require children to wear life jackets on small vessel boats. Just over four years ago, her 11-year-old son, Joshua Steinburg, passed away in a drowning accident. The 26-foot speedboat he was riding hit a wave, and Joshua had removed his life jacket just minutes before the accident.

Joshua’s story is not the only one—hundreds of boat drowning accidents happen each year. According to the OPP in 2020, over the last decade, 80% of the people who died in investigated boat drowning incidents were not wearing a life jacket.

These deaths are preventable.

Norm Miller, the former MPP for Parry Sound–Muskoka, introduced legislation in this House, in the form of a private member’s bill, in order to make the wearing of life jackets mandatory. That bill never made it through the House. I’m hoping that I can work with members from all sides of the House and all parties to reintroduce Norm Miller’s legislation.

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of Cara and every person who has lost a loved one to drowning: Whether you are fishing or riding your speedboat, always wear a life jacket. It saves lives.

Health care

MPP Kristyn Wong-Tam: Today is the last day this government can choose to save Connect-Clinic, the only virtual clinic in Ontario dedicated to delivering gender-affirming health care. An alternative funding plan could save the clinic. They are commonly used in academic, northern and specialized health care settings already. Connect-Clinic checks all three boxes.

Tomorrow, 3,500 trans Ontarians will lose access to life-saving care. And I cannot stress this enough: They will have nowhere to go for this specialized care.

Losing virtual health care does not only affect patients in the north or rural areas of Ontario; I’ve heard from my own constituents in Toronto Centre who are reeling at the loss of virtual health care.

My constituent Andrew shared, “My partner and I are among 1.8 million Ontarians who don’t have a family doctor. We’ve registered multiple times for the Health Care Connect and contacted doctors’ offices with zero responses to date. My partner and I have just found out that we’re expecting a baby. So this weekend we booked a virtual appointment to be referred to an ob-gyn. If this service is no longer supported after December 1, we would lose access.”

Speaker, this government brags about their embrace of innovation, and yet they’re throwing away that same innovation that enables virtual care.

Funding cuts to virtual health care will not all be replaced with in-person appointments—they’ll be replaced with Ontarians without access to health care.

I urge this Conservative government to change course.

Santa Claus parades in Kitchener–Conestoga

Mr. Mike Harris: I’m not sure if he’s watching today, but a former—well, he’s not a former friend of ours; he’s still a friend of ours, Percy Hatfield.

Percy, this one’s for you, if you’re keeping an eye:

It’s always a pleasure to stand up for my riding.

But this morning my statement seems to be rhyming.

‘Twas the day before December, and all through this House,

Members got so quiet, you could even hear a mouse.

And if you’re looking for plans to be made,

Come to Kitchener–Conestoga for a Santa Claus parade.

The floats and decorations have been made with care.

In hopes that St. Nicholas would soon be there.

Elmira this Saturday, New Hamburg on Sunday.

Bring the whole family and you’ll have a fun day.

If you’re busy this weekend there’s no need to take fright.

Wellesley has their parade on December the 9th.

And if you still think Santa will never be seen,

He’ll also be in St. Clements on December 17.

You’ll see me or my helpers, I call them my staff.

Like Santa’s own elves they work and they laugh.

Keep an eye out for Cupid, for Donner and Blitzen,

And my new friends MPPs Riddell and Dixon.

Look for this jolly old elf with a brightly lit sign,

Propped up by hockey sticks and held together with twine.

As I look at the clock I can see my time’s tight.

So Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

Simcoe Christmas Panorama River of Lights

Ms. Bobbi Ann Brady: That’s a bit of a tough act to follow this morning.

As we embark upon the Christmas season, we all have memories that are stirred by certain decorations, events, foods and drinks. I have fond memories of being bundled up so warm and so tight I could barely move, as my entire family made its way to Simcoe to walk through the River of Lights at the Simcoe Panorama. My brother and I looked forward to the night, especially when there was enough snow that we could be pulled in our little wooden sleigh.

This Saturday night, in my riding of Haldimand–Norfolk, the 60-year tradition riding continues as Simcoe Panorama flips the switch to over 200,000 lights, numerous displays and hundreds of decorated trees. Downtown Simcoe and its parks will be transformed into a magical winter wonderland. Horse-drawn trolley rides, character meet-and-greets, a festive market and, of course, a cup of hot chocolate await.

Hundreds of volunteers do their part to ensure the month-long River of Lights shines each and every night, but there are also those who work behind the scenes throughout the year to ensure displays are retouched and lights are in working order. The past few years have been difficult for the Panorama, given the challenges the pandemic presented, but this tireless group of volunteers have soldiered through, and I know they are looking forward to this season for a return to a full slate of festivities.

Panorama runs from this Saturday, December 3, until January 1, from 6 to 10 each day.

Thank you to all who make this winter wonderland happen.

And to all members, I invite you to come take in this extraordinary exhibit. It’s sure to make even the grinchiest of members feel the warmth of the season.

Merry Christmas to you all.

Long-term care

Mr. Anthony Leardi: Mr. Speaker, I have a good-news story from Essex county about long-term care. Arch Long-Term Care operates a 75-bed facility in Tilbury, but the building is old, and they want to build a new one only 15 minutes down the road, in the town of Belle River. It’s going to be brand new, state-of-the-art. It will have private rooms. It will have 160 beds—twice as many as the old facility. Of course, the NDP member before me opposed that idea. But because of this government’s progressive and compassionate policies, Arch applied for and received a licence to build the new facility in Belle River.

That means the people of Tilbury and Belle River will now have twice as many beds, in a state-of-the-art facility that they didn’t have before.

I want to thank the Minister of Long-Term Care for ensuring that the people of Essex county—and indeed all Ontarians—receive access to the quality long-term care they deserve, in a safe, homelike setting, when and where they need it.

Harvest Hands

Mr. Rob Flack: It’s my pleasure to rise in the House today and acknowledge an extremely worthwhile organization in my riding: Harvest Hands.

Speaker, did you know that close to 50% of all food produced in this country is wasted or lost to landfills? It’s a staggering and unfortunate reality.

That is exactly why Jim and Jacintha Collins founded Harvest Hands in St. Thomas in 2020. Their mission is to rescue surplus food from retailers, bakers and growers to help feed families. Nutritious, bountiful and perfectly edible food is rescued from landfills. Fresh produce, frozen food, packaged and canned goods all end up in homes throughout southwestern Ontario.

As a non-profit food distribution bank, Harvest Hands’s purpose is to help agencies gain access to good food. Funded entirely by donations and volunteer-driven, Harvest Hands provides food that feeds over 24,000 families a year in southwestern Ontario. Since its inception, Harvest Hands has delivered over $8 million—$8 million—of food from Windsor through to Oshawa. The distribution network that Harvest Hands serves is comprised of more than 80 agencies.

With Christmas fast approaching, many food banks across this province will face an even greater need for volunteers and food donations to meet increased holiday demand.

Waste not, want not.

Thank you, Harvest Hands, for a job well done.

Introduction of Visitors

M me Dawn Gallagher Murphy: I’d like to introduce the Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization to the Legislature this morning, and thank them for bringing Ontario-made, innovative health care solution providers Oncoustics, Able Innovations and Huron Digital Pathology to Queen’s Park this morning to showcase their great technologies.

Ms. Bhutila Karpoche: I’d like to give a warm welcome to Patty Coates, president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, Carolyn Ferns of the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care, Rachel Vickerson of the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario, and the many, many members of CUPE and other child care workers and ECEs who are here as part of the national day of action on child care.

Hon. Stephen Lecce: I want to give a warm welcome to my father, Ray Lecce; my brother Michael Lecce; and two future Prime Ministers: my nieces Valentina and Vivienne. Thank you for coming today to watch Queen’s Park.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: I’d like to acknowledge Aiden Perritt, the legislative page from my riding, who is the page captain today. Today in the members’ gallery, we have his father, James Perritt. We also have his grandparents: Brian Cole, a Knight of Justice in the Order of St. John and CEO of the St. John Council of Ontario; and Sharon Cole, a Dame of Grace in the Order of St. John and chair of the St. John Canada Foundation. Welcome all.

Ms. Goldie Ghamari: I’d like to welcome, from Diabetes Canada, Russell Williams, Ashley Bergwerff, Terezinha Hignett, Walter Robinson, and John Whitehead. My caucus colleagues and I, and some other members as well, look forward to meeting with them during lunch today. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Catherine Fife: I’d like to welcome my staffers Dayna Prest, Jonathan Cassels, and Robyn Fishbein. I’m so pleased that you’re spending today at Queen’s Park with me.

Ms. Mary-Margaret McMahon: Today I would like to welcome an amazing young city builder and resident of the beautiful Scarborough North riding, Amina Mohamed. It’s always great when you come here.

Ms. Marit Stiles: I’m very pleased today to welcome many people here from the teachers’ unions and education unions.

But I want to make a special point—to point out Paul Kossta, in the members’ gallery. He has been the legislative observer for OSSTF for many years and is going to be retiring soon.

Interjection: What?

Ms. Marit Stiles: Yes. So I just wanted to give him a personal greeting.

Thank you for all you do for the people of this province.

Mr. Will Bouma: I’d like to welcome to our House Kevin Davis, mayor of the incredible city of Brantford, and his key staffer, Sasha Hill. Welcome to the people’s House.

MPP Jamie West: I want to welcome Janice Folk-Dawson and Patty Coates, the vice-president and president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, to the Legislative Assembly.

Mr. Dave Smith: I’d like to welcome today’s page co-captain Isabelle Casselman and her family, who are here as well—her mother, Melissa; her father, Stephen; and her younger brother Nolan.

MPP Jill Andrew: I’d also like to welcome Patty Coates and Janice Folk-Dawson from OFL.

I’d also like to say thank you very much to all the education workers, ECEs and health care workers outside who came out in support.

Mrs. Nina Tangri: I’d like to welcome Upasna Kumar, my executive assistant—the first time in the chamber watching question period.

Mr. Deepak Anand: It is always a special day when community leaders from Mississauga–Malton come to Queen’s Park. I’d like to introduce Avtar Sandhu and Roshan Pathak from the Council of Heritage and International Peace. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Ms. Laura Smith: I have a very special guest to present today. I would like to introduce Currie Dixon, the member of the Legislative Assembly for Copperbelt North—and he is the leader of the Yukon Party—and his chief of staff, Danny Macdonald. They’ve come a long way. We’re so happy they’re here.

Mr. Rob Flack: The Ontario Greenhouse Alliance is here today. I’d like to welcome Jan VanderHout, Joe Sbrocchi, Jim Meyers, Ed Vermolen, and Kevin Safrance.

Welcome, gentlemen. Thank you for coming to Queen’s Park.

I’ll remind everyone there is a reception tonight in the dining room.

Ms. Bhutila Karpoche: I apologize—I didn’t even recognize Janice Folk-Dawson, executive vice-president of OFL. She’s also here with us today. Welcome.

Annual report, Auditor General

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I beg to inform the House that the following document has been tabled: the 2022 annual report from the Office of the Auditor General of Ontario.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Point of order.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I recognize the Leader of the Opposition on a point of order.

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Thank you, Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to move a motion calling on the Ford government to respect yesterday’s ruling by the court that found Bill 124 to be unconstitutional, stop the attack on public services, and immediately return to the table to reach a fair deal with Ontario’s public sector workers.

Interjections.

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

Mr. Tabuns is seeking the unanimous consent of the House on a motion calling on the Ford government to respect yesterday’s ruling by the courts that found Bill 124 to be unconstitutional. Agreed? I heard some noes.

Independent members

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): I understand the member for Ottawa–Vanier has a point of order.

M me Lucille Collard: I do have a point of order, Speaker. I am seeking the unanimous consent of the House that, notwithstanding standing order 40(e), five minutes be allotted to the independents as a group to respond to the ministerial statement by the Minister of Labour regarding McIntyre Powder this afternoon.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Ms. Collard is seeking the unanimous consent of the House that, notwithstanding standing order 40(e), five minutes be allotted to the independents as a group to respond to the ministerial statement by the Minister of Labour regarding McIntyre Powder. Agreed? Agreed.

Question Period

Court decision

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Speaker, my question is to the Premier.

Yesterday was an historic victory for Ontario workers. The courts recognized what 800,000 public sector workers and New Democrats have been saying for years: that Bill 124 is unconstitutional. That was affirmed by the courts. This is a hard-fought and long-overdue victory for workers, who deserve a government that will respect this decision and work with them to move forward.

Why won’t the Premier respect the court ruling and stop appealing yet another court loss for this government?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): To reply, the Attorney General.

Hon. Doug Downey: I think the member opposite knows that we’re reviewing the decision. We intend to appeal, so I can’t comment further. Pas de commentaire.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Speaker, we have seen the consequences of this government’s wage restraint across the public sector, but nowhere have the effects been more acute than in our health care sector, where Bill 124 has directly contributed to our province’s current health care crisis.

Given yesterday’s ruling, will the government finally admit that Bill 124 has had a negative impact on our health care system?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): To respond, the President of the Treasury Board.

Hon. Prabmeet Singh Sarkaria: As the Attorney General said, we are reviewing this decision. Our intention is to appeal.

But we will speak to our investments in health care, especially in health human resources.

Since March 2020, we have added over 12,000 health care professionals to the system.

Just this year alone, the Ontario College of Nurses has registered over 12,800 nurses—and we still have two months to go.

Mr. Speaker, we will continue to make these historic investments to support health care workers and the delivery of health care services all across this province.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The final supplementary? The member for Sudbury.

MPP Jamie West: Speaker, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice threw out Bill 124 in its entirety, ruling it absolutely null and void. Justice Koehnen found that Ontario was not facing an economic situation that “justified an infringement of charter rights,” and that the law was “substantial interference” with the constitutionally protected bargaining rights of hundreds of thousands of workers.

Bill 124 has been bad for workers in Ontario—period. It should never have seen the light of day in the first place.

Speaker, it’s long past time the government started showing workers the respect they deserved from day one.

With the cost of living skyrocketing, my question is, will the government get out of its own way, get out of the way of workers’ protected right to freely bargain a fair wage and finally respect this decision?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development.

Hon. Monte McNaughton: Mr. Speaker, we’re continuing to work for workers every single day in Ontario.

That’s why we partnered with private sector unions, employers and tradespeople to bring in the Building Opportunities in the Skilled Trades Act, to get tens of thousands of people into well-paying jobs in the province.

That’s why we brought in historic legislation in Working for Workers 1 and Working for Workers 2 to ensure that workers have the right to disconnect, and that, for the first time in Canadian history, we’re recognizing international credentials, so when newcomers come to this province they can work in professions that they’ve studied.

We became the first in Canada to give truck drivers access to washroom facilities across this province.

And we are the first in North America to move forward with expanding portable benefits so millions of workers who don’t have health and dental benefits today are going to get those benefits under Premier Ford.

Land use planning

Mr. Peter Tabuns: Again to the Premier: Today’s Auditor General’s report showed a sad state of affairs on this government’s stewardship of the environment.

Under the Liberals, Ontario lost an average of 1,825 hectares of wetlands per year, and the wetlands that do remain have very little, if any, protection.

Now nearly half of southern Ontario’s remaining wetlands are at risk of being lost, with no requirements for wetland evaluation before land use changes.

To the Premier: What does this government have against wetlands? Seriously—what do they have against them?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry.

Hon. Graydon Smith: Thanks for the question.

The other side likes to talk about what could happen, might happen.

Mr. Speaker, I’ll tell you what will happen: We’re going to continue to protect wetlands here in Ontario. We’ve got a plan to build 1.5 million homes in this province over the next 10 years and keep a robust ecological footprint. Home builders will still go through a process. Species at risk—there’s legislation to cover to that. Wetlands are disappearing; we’ve heard that. We’ve got an opportunity to not only preserve them but expand them, and a plan to do that as well.

Don’t believe the hype. Wetlands are here to stay in Ontario.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: That was pretty amazing.

Again to the Premier: The auditor found that along the Niagara Escarpment there is no environmental monitoring because there are no staff. Reports of violations—includeing high-risk incidents of construction of buildings—have gone unenforced. And nearly all development permit applications have been approved in the past five years, even when they went against the Niagara Escarpment Plan.

Why isn’t the Premier doing anything to protect the Niagara Escarpment?

Hon. Graydon Smith: Thanks again to the member opposite for the question.

The Niagara Escarpment is an arm’s-length body that does great work—and we know the Niagara Escarpment is a beautiful and wonderful area in Ontario that we want to protect. We get feedback from the escarpment folks all the time, and we talk with them constantly about what can be done to make things better. We’ll continue to speak with them. But, again, they’re their own body—they make their own decisions, and we respect those decisions.

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

Mr. Peter Tabuns: How is it that in just a few short weeks we’ve seen this government attack the greenbelt, conservation authorities, farmland, wetlands, and do nothing to protect the Niagara Escarpment?

Today, the auditor found that the province is missing in action on addressing urban flooding risks. There is no coordinated approach, no effort to protect against the loss of green space, and basically nothing to address aging stormwater infrastructure—all while this government strips revenue from municipalities and the effects of climate change are felt more every year.

Why isn’t this government doing more to protect homeowners from the devastating impact of flooding?

Hon. Graydon Smith: Thanks for the question. Flooding is something I’ve lived personally in my community—members will recall that before I got here my community suffered two very significant floods.

That’s why I was so excited to see the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry step up their game over the years. Go to Water Street and see the facilities that are there to ensure that Ontarians are protected against flooding. It is amazing. They’re doing an amazing job.

Conservation authorities: We’re asking them to focus on flooding in hazard lands to keep people safe. That’s the focus and the priority.

Build homes, keep people safe, build Ontario—that’s what we’re going to do.

COVID-19 immunization

M me France Gélinas: Ma question est pour le premier ministre.

Today’s Auditor General’s report put in writing what we already knew: Ontario’s vaccine rollout was sloppy and uncoordinated. The government didn’t listen to public health experts and let 3.4 million vaccine—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order.

Stop the clock.

The House will come to order.

Start the clock.

The member for Nickel Belt has the floor.

M me France Gélinas: The government didn’t listen to public health experts and let 3.4 million vaccine doses go to waste. Poor planning resulted in nine high-risk neighbourhoods being left out of the province’s targeted hot spot strategy while low-risk neighbourhoods received early vaccine access. The Premier assembled a vaccine task force but neglected to include any public health experts on it for weeks.

Why did the government not listen to public health experts during the vaccine rollout?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Deputy Premier and Minister of Health.

Hon. Sylvia Jones: While I have a great deal of respect for the Auditor General, on this, I cannot agree with her. The numbers show that we have done an incredible job protecting our most vulnerable, through a vaccine rollout that is second to only Japan across the world.

The member speaks about things that we can look at and point to as successes—GO-VAXX buses that were going into communities that had lower vaccine uptake; Operation Remote Immunity, where we partnered with Ornge air ambulance to make sure, at the very beginning of the pandemic, when we had limited supplies of vaccines—that they were going in with our partners at Ornge to vaccinate remote and fly-in communities; other opportunities that, frankly, other provinces looked at and wanted to emulate, because Ontario was leading in ensuring that our most vulnerable, that our individuals who were at highest risk, were getting access to those vaccines as quickly as possible.

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

M me France Gélinas: The auditor found that the ministry’s approach to communicating factual information to the public was disorganized, inconsistent, and lacking details about the benefits of COVID vaccines and vaccination. She also found that the ministry missed out on opportunities to educate and inform the public of the benefits of the COVID-19 vaccine, and, ultimately, this government undermined public confidence in vaccination.

Why did the government undermine public confidence in COVID-19 vaccination?

Hon. Sylvia Jones: The numbers don’t add up. When you talk about that, you’re suggesting that we don’t have over 80% of Ontario adults over the age of 12 who are fully vaccinated.

We have led the world, because we ensured that we had mass vaccination clinics; we had clinics in businesses, in manufacturing facilities. We had GO-VAXX buses going around to higher-risk neighbourhoods to make sure that they understood the value and had those conversations. We had SickKids hospital open up a phone line to talk to parents and caregivers about the questions that they had when we had vaccines available to children.

I will not apologize for our vaccine rollout. We have a lot to be proud of, and the numbers prove that out.

Curriculum / Child care

Ms. Natalie Pierre: Speaker, parents in my riding of Burlington want to know that their children are well-positioned for success. They want assurances that their children are being taught a modern curriculum by the most qualified educators, in schools that are technologically connected and safe.

I’m proud that our government is determined to support our children by ensuring they have all the necessary learning tools.

Everyone wants to see our students succeed in and outside of the classroom.

Can the Minister of Education please provide an update on how our government is taking the right steps to ensure our students have everything they need for a successful and fulfilling education?

Hon. Stephen Lecce: I want to thank the member from Burlington for the wonderful question and her continued focus on young people and their success.

Mr. Speaker, under our government, we have undertaken a focus on helping young people graduate and get access to good-paying jobs. From a modern curriculum to modern schools to merit-based hiring of our educators—we are overhauling our curriculum, with a focus on increasing outcomes, graduation rates, results and better jobs for the young people we represent.

It’s why we have reformed our curriculum—labour market-aligned for the first time—including mandatory learning on financial literacy, on coding, on real-life application, on learning about the importance of balanced budgets—because we know, on this side of the House, that budgets do not balance themselves. We also know about the costs of debt and inflation and paying taxes. We’re teaching kids about problem-solving skills and leadership development.

We’re investing to build modern schools, with over $500 million every year.

And we’re ensuring the best educator gets hired in a meritocracy, so that the best leaders are in front of children in this province.

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

Ms. Natalie Pierre: Young families in my riding of Burlington are facing economic hardship due to rising inflation and economic uncertainty.

Child care has long been a significant expense for working parents who want to ensure that their children receive top-quality care while they’re at work.

We know that under the previous Liberal government, child care costs became too expensive and inaccessible for many. This was unacceptable and created a tremendous burden on individuals and families.

To the Minister of Education: What is our government doing to provide much-needed relief for our working families across the province?

Hon. Stephen Lecce: At a time of rising national inflation and the rising cost of living, our government is stepping up in a big way to deliver financial relief for Ontario families.

It’s why we signed a better deal, with three billion more dollars and an additional year of investment on the table to ensure every parent—for-profit and non-profit parents, which would have been excluded by the New Democrats and Liberals—that they have access to the financial relief of roughly $10,000 by the end of this year alone.

Four times, our government has stepped up with direct financial relief to parents. We just rolled out another catch-up payment which is going to deliver $1.6 billion in total into parents’ pockets, where we know they need it, to face the rising costs.

We’re also standing up against the federal Liberal carbon tax, which has raised the cost of home heating, of baby supplies, of food, and making clear this regressive tax hurts the most vulnerable within our communities.

We are standing up for affordability. And we’ll continue, under our Premier’s leadership, to make life more affordable and child care more accessible for Ontario parents.

Government accountability

Mr. Jeff Burch: My question is to Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

Over the past few weeks, this government has been dealing with some issues regarding insider information and plans to open up the greenbelt and the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve, with certain parcels purchased just weeks before the government’s announcement.

Some of the Premier’s most loyal developer friends—the De Gasperis family—own 20 properties on the land this government is opening up for development.

Just this week, we learned that TACC Developments, controlled by Silvio De Gasperis and members of his family, borrowed $100 million at an interest rate of 21% annually to purchase greenbelt land, of all things, in 2021.

In the minister’s experience, is a 21% interest rate on $100 million a good deal?

Hon. Steve Clark: The government has been very clear in our postings on what our intention is regarding the property. We’ve been open, clear and transparent, and we look forward to receiving comments from the public.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary.

Mr. Jeff Burch: It turns out that the loan was in fact a very good deal for the De Gasperis family. In 2020, they bought 475 acres of greenbelt land for around $24,000 an acre. They own nearly 2,000 acres within the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve. They bought this land cheap because it was protected as farmland in perpetuity. Early estimates find that the soon-to-be-newly-developable land could be worth at least $380,000 an acre. That’s a big payoff for a greenbelt gamble.

Did the minister or any other government or PC Party official share with any landowner or developer or any of their lobbyists or representatives information about the government’s plan for removing lands from the greenbelt before it became public on November 4?

Hon. Steve Clark: No.

Speaker, I’m going to be assisting the integrity commissioner in his investigation. I look forward to being vindicated, and I look forward to the apology from the official opposition.

Skilled trades

Mr. John Yakabuski: Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development.

Like many provinces, Ontario is facing our most significant labour shortage in a generation. This labour shortage greatly impacts our economy and communities, particularly in the skilled trades sector.

As our province plans to build for the future, we must ensure that we have enough workers with the right skills to help us meet this challenge. Every skilled trades job that remains unfilled represents unmet economic opportunities for our great province.

I ask the minister: What is our government doing to address the ongoing skilled trades labour shortage?

Hon. Monte McNaughton: I want to thank the member for Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke for that very challenging question this morning.

Our government, from day one, has been on a mission to train more workers, so they can build better lives for themselves and fill the jobs that families and businesses across Ontario rely on.

That is why we are reinventing our programs so that welfare and disability support recipients are no longer left on their own. Instead, the changes we’re making are providing tailored solutions—like workboots to get them started, and a transit pass to get them to their first shift.

Mr. Speaker, our message is clear: For anyone looking to find well-paying and meaningful work, our government will give you a hand up.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary?

Mr. John Yakabuski: I want to thank the minister for his answer.

Helping people gain the skills employers need means they can support themselves, their families and our entire province.

For far too long, people eager to work hard and contribute to our economy faced difficulties navigating bureaucratic processes, leaving them discouraged.

Nothing gives a person a greater sense of pride and worth than the ability to contribute through their work.

Our government should act to remove burdens and lift barriers to help people find work opportunities

My question to the minister: How has our government helped more individuals find meaningful employment in this great province?

Hon. Monte McNaughton: Thanks to the member again for this question.

Mr. Speaker, under the previous government, only 1% of people on social assistance were finding employment each year. That might be good enough for those across the aisle, but it’s not good enough for us.

In the parts of Ontario where we’ve started our new approach, the results are outstanding: 79% of job seekers are working at least 20 hours per week, and 55,700 people are now on a path to finding employment.

This is how we lift people up, and this is how we’re going to achieve our ambitious plan to build Ontario.

Affordable housing

Ms. Catherine Fife: My question is for the Premier.

Municipalities are reeling from the alarming passage of Bill 23 on Monday. The lack of consultation and the absence of respect and facts have resulted in a deeply flawed piece of legislation that will undermine housing affordability, increase homelessness, and compromise the integrity of the greenbelt ecosystem.

Last week, the member for Kitchener–Conestoga claimed that seven Waterloo region municipalities were “sitting on over $200 million ... of reserve funds from development charges that have already been collected.” Specifically, he went on to say that the township of Woolwich was sitting on $6.5 million of DC charges that they didn’t know about. In fact, all of the DC reserve funds are allocated and are in the municipal five-year economic forecast. You just have to learn how to read, I guess.

The drastic reduction in development charges will—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order.

No personal attacks in the House.

Conclude your question.

Ms. Catherine Fife: Well, you just have to meet with the council and you can see the numbers.

The drastic reduction—

Interjection.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): The member for Kitchener–Conestoga will now come to order.

Member for Waterloo, conclude the question.

Ms. Catherine Fife: —will negatively impact the municipalities’ ability to facilitate housing, which is so important in the province of Ontario.

Why is the government implying that these funds are not being used and that municipalities are negligent in their duties?

Hon. Steve Clark: The member opposite is incorrect; the member for Kitchener–Conestoga is a great member. He meets regularly with his municipalities. He was merely quoting the financial information that’s provided to the ministry. If, in fact, the numbers that municipalities are giving us for the amount of DC reserves they have is incorrect, perhaps we should have a deeper dive into the documentation that the minister is being sent.

Clearly, there were councils in every council chamber, in every corner of the province, that campaigned in advance of the October 24 election that said they wanted to prioritize affordable housing.

Bill 23 provides the opportunity to incent having more affordable housing, having more attainable housing, having more inclusionary zoning units. It’s doing the exact opposite of what the member for Waterloo is suggesting.

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

Ms. Catherine Fife: Following the shocking comments by the member from Kitchener–Conestoga, I wrote municipalities about the government’s assertions.

Woolwich Mayor Shantz set the record straight:

“Based on the pace of our growth ... we will actually require additional funding to be able to do all of the forecasted work. We are staying with the best practice approach that, as much as possible, growth should pay for itself.

“We do not want existing taxpayers to pay that heavy burden. That’s neither fair or appropriate.”

Mayor Crombie herself said that Mississauga will lose $885 million over 10 years in development charges because of Bill 23. She said that it’s equal to losing 20% of their capital budget.

Why is this government undermining municipalities and their ability to facilitate affordable housing?

Hon. Steve Clark: The member for Kitchener–Conestoga is actually standing up for the dream of home ownership.

We’ve got young people here. I want to make sure that there is a generation of potential homeowners who have a home that meets their needs and their budget.

Any mayor—like Mayor Crombie, who the member opposite is quoting—who doesn’t think that a $132,000 development charge on a semi-detached home in Mississauga isn’t going to get turned over to the buyer is living in a dream world.

Those mayors who speak against our bill have one message: They’re saying to that young family, “Stay in your parents’ basement. You’re never going to have a home that meets your needs.”

On the government side, we will realize the dream of home ownership—

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Order. Opposition, come to order.

Interjections.

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

The member for Kitchener–Conestoga will come to order. The member for Waterloo will come to order. The Minister of Municipal Affairs will come to order.

Start the clock.

Next question.

Court decision

Mr. Ted Hsu: Picture this grim scene 2,300 years ago in Asculum: The Macedonian general Pyrrhus surveys the battlefield. Roman legions, Greek phalanxes, elephants, archers and cavalry lie wounded and dying—a battle so costly that historical accounts disagree on whether any side won. Pyrrhus himself said, “If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined.”

Today, picture this: paramedics lined up in overcrowded emergency rooms, overwhelmed ICU nurses, cancers going undetected, tent communities across Ontario, educators in physical danger because of understaffing, even idled ferries.

Why won’t the Premier accept the Ontario Superior Court ruling against Bill 124 and realize that any appeal would be at most a Pyrrhic victory? Don’t start another battle. Renegotiate a fair deal, and get to work on our real problems.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): To respond, the President of the Treasury Board.

Hon. Prabmeet Singh Sarkaria: As the member opposite knows, we are reviewing the decision that is before us. As the Attorney General said, we have the intention to appeal that.

Let’s compare our record of investments into this province against 15 years of the previous Liberal government. Let’s look at health care. They left this health care system on life support. They cut residency spots. This government is building two new medical schools—a new medical school in Brampton, a new medical school in Scarborough; increasing the amount of doctors in the north. That is in stark contrast to the members opposite.

We will continue to make these historic investments supporting health care, health human resources across this province, and we will take no lessons from the members opposite on how to make those health care investments.

Interjections.

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

Supplementary question.

Mr. Ted Hsu: Well Mr. Speaker, you could either try to learn from history or try to rewrite it, like this side does.

What does the Premier hope to gain for the people? He should be sitting down with unions. He should stop fighting the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, negotiate a fair deal, and focus on real problems of working families. What do the Conservatives hope to gain from appealing the Ontario Superior Court’s ruling against Bill 124?

Hon. Prabmeet Singh Sarkaria: Mr. Speaker, as we said, we intend to appeal this decision, as it is before the courts.

We will stand on our record of investments that we have made—which is, again, in stark contrast to the members opposite.

Let’s look at health human resources. Since March 2020, we have added over 12,000 health care professionals into the system—just this year alone, over 12,800 registered nurses at the Ontario college of nurses.

The members opposite oversaw firing of nurses across this province. They cut hospital budgets. They closed hospitals. They stopped building hospitals in Brampton, in communities like mine that were neglected for 15 years.

We’re building hospitals in Brampton; we’re building hospitals in Windsor, in Niagara, in Mississauga, because the previous government failed to make those investments. We will take no lessons from the members opposite on how to make those investments.

Northern highway improvement

Mr. Kevin Holland: All of us in this House share a common goal: keeping Ontario’s roads safe for all drivers.

In the last year, we have seen an alarming increase in fatal collisions on our roads, particularly in the north.

Injuries and fatalities are twice as likely to occur on a northern highway as compared to a highway in southern Ontario. This is unacceptable.

As the winter season is upon us, drivers in my riding of Thunder Bay–Atikokan and across the north deserve certainty that the government is taking action to put their safety first.

Can the Minister of Transportation please tell the House what our government is doing to support transportation safety in northern communities?

Hon. Caroline Mulroney: Thank you to the member from Thunder Bay–Atikokan for the great question.

Under Premier Ford’s leadership, our government is taking concrete steps to make roads in northern Ontario safer.

Just a few weeks ago, I was pleased to announce that our government took another step forward to deliver the first ever “2+1” highway pilot in North America. This model is used in jurisdictions around the world, and it has been shown to improve road safety and enhance traffic flow. By issuing the request for proposals for the new pilot on Highway 11 north of North Bay, our government is demonstrating real progress to get shovels in the ground on this critical project making roads in the north that much safer.

A “2+1” highway pilot is part of our government’s plan to build Ontario, and we’re getting it done.

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): Supplementary?

Mr. Kevin Holland: Thank you to the minister for her answer and for the great work she’s doing in her ministry. I want to commend the minister for her leadership in delivering much-needed safety improvements in the north.

After 15 years under the previous Liberal government, life became more difficult for people living in northern Ontario. The previous Liberal government failed on winter road maintenance, cancelled northern passenger rail service, and neglected to make the meaningful targeted highway investments our region desperately needs.

Can the minister please elaborate on her newly announced innovative project and how it will support the communities of northern Ontario?

Hon. Caroline Mulroney: Thank you again to the member for the question.

Speaker, we have received resounding support on the “2+1” highway from local stakeholders, including Mark Wilson from Going the Extra Mile for Safety, as well as members of our government’s Northern Transportation Task Force. The “2+1” highway pilot will support northern development and boost economic growth in the region, after decades of neglect by the previous Liberal governments. And this builds on other initiatives championed by our government to support and grow the north.

Just recently, we created a new highway level of service that requires Highways 11 and 17 in northern Ontario to be cleared within 12 hours after a winter storm, four hours faster than the previous standard.

Speaker, this is not a one-and-done deal for northern drivers. We will continue to look for even more ways to support safer and more prosperous communities in the north.

Child care

Ms. Bhutila Karpoche: According to the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care, the province will need at least 65,000 new child care staff over the coming years to meet the expected demand for $10-a-day child care. Sixty-five thousand child care staff is an enormous number. To get anywhere close to that will require a long-term strategy to retain and recruit child care workers. Without a strategy, parents and families will lose access to $10-a-day child care.

My question to the Premier is, where is that strategy?

The Speaker (Hon. Ted Arnott): To reply, the Minister of Education.

Hon. Stephen Lecce: Mr. Speaker, because of our Premier’s leadership, we have been able to deliver a better deal, with $3 billion on the table more, and an additional year of funding guarantees that will ensure child care remains more affordable and accessible for all Ontario families.

It’s fundamental that we remind the people of Ontario that had the New Democrats and Liberals had their way, we would have omitted literally 30% of operators in all of our communities that are depending on government to come up with a sustainable, inclusive program that reduced costs.

On average, by Christmas of this year, we’re looking at $12,000 per child. This is a monumental step forward.

The member opposite is right; we will need more ECEs to fulfill the 86,000 spaces this government is working to create. It’s why we have a plan. We’ve launched a specific advisory group that has been established over the fall of non-profit, for-profit and technical experts coming together to ensure we’ve got the requisite staff. We continue to increase wages, and we continue to roll out a program that has 92% of operators enrolling, because they believe in this program.

The people of Ontario are depending on this government to get the job done.

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

Ms. Bhutila Karpoche: Speaker, any advisory group on the workforce has to include the voices of workers.

I want to remind the minister that in

section 4.2 of the child care agreement that he refers to, Ontario committed to consulting on a comprehensive recruitment and retention plan for child care workers this past summer.

I have tabled a bill to start addressing the child care workforce crisis by ensuring that the solutions put forward by workers and advocates are listened to.

My question to you, Minister: Will you listen to child care workers?

Hon. Stephen Lecce: What I can confirm is that the workplace stabilization advisory group is going to be launched this winter with the aim of including the voices of all those working in our child care space, because we want to rely on their expert experiences, ensuring that we have the right staff who are trained and supported, with the right levels of salary, so that we can retain and recruit these high-quality workers.

Mr. Speaker, we’re going to hire thousands of additional ECEs in our province because we will need more people to staff the 86,000 more spaces this government will create—more access, in addition to more affordable child care. It rose by 400% under the former Liberal government—an indefensible record.

This government and our Premier know we can make child care affordable for families for future generations, and we’re going to get the job done.

Ontario Trillium Foundation

Mr. Ric Bresee: My question is for the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport.

I recently learned of a wonderful grant to a local theatre group called the Tweed and Company Theatre, a fine organization that has benefited from support provided by the Ontario Trillium Foundation. The support they received likely won’t make headlines in the news, but that funding will have an immense impact on ensuring the sustainability and the expansion of this fine organization’s productions.

I’m always impressed by how much can be accomplished when non-profit organizations receive the funding they greatly deserve.

Can the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport please tell us more about the resources available, so that other community organizations across the province can realize the same benefit?

Hon. Neil Lumsden: I’d just like to add that we don’t look for headlines; we look for results.

I’d like to thank the member for his question and for his strong leadership representing the residents of Hastings–Lennox and Addington. He will be interested to know that our government agency, created 40 years ago under the great leadership of PC Premier Bill Davis, continues to build healthy and vibrant communities across Ontario. Since the voters in Ontario entrusted Premier Ford to lead the PC government in 2018, $2.4 million has been invested through the Ontario Trillium Foundation in the non-profit sector of Hastings–Lennox and Addington.

I’ll go to the numbers a little later, because I’m running out of time, but I’ll go back to the point: We get results. We’re not worried what people talk about; we’re—

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

Mr. Ric Bresee: Thank you to the minister for that response.

Speaker, $2.4 million for my riding is absolutely wonderful.

In my previous role as a municipal mayor, I was fortunate to witness the many impressive achievements made possible through support from the Ontario Trillium Foundation. Whether it’s replacing benches and bleachers in three of our sports facilities in Tweed, or support for the Royal Canadian Legion in Bancroft, or providing assistance to the Heart of Hastings Hospice—all of these programs have greatly benefited.

Once again, can the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport please provide additional details on how the Ontario Trillium Foundation can help non-profit organizations across the province?

Hon. Neil Lumsden: Mr. Speaker, I’d be happy to do so.

I joined representatives from all parties in this House for a breakfast celebrating the Ontario Trillium Foundation’s 40th anniversary just over a week ago. Recognition of the OTF’s value is universal, and I’m happy to promote the foundation, whenever p