It’s Niagara Week, and we’re very excited. I’d like to give a warm welcome to some of our elected representatives from Niagara who are here today. We’ve already met Regional Chair Jim Bradley, who I was looking for on this side; he’s over there, so I apologize for that. Also, I’d like to welcome the mayor of the town of Fort Erie, Wayne Redekop, the Lord Mayor—and the only Lord Mayor in the province of Ontario—from the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake, Gary Zalepa, and the mayor of the city Niagara Falls, Jim Diodati.

I’d also like to welcome my two staff members who are here today, Quinn and Gillian. Gillian is a student who has been working in our office for the last six weeks, and she’s now going on to university. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Back to the Premier: Those stats should be concerning to any government, and it’s the result of a health care crisis. This crisis, fuelled by the government’s disrespect of front-line health care workers, has created those significant off-load delays in our hospital. Niagara deserves to be refunded the $1.7 million of taxpayer dollars that have gone into the off-load delays. We can’t continue to go down this road. Three of Niagara’s hospitals consistently rank in the bottom quarter of off-load times.

Speaker, with the local leaders from Niagara here today, will the Premier listen to their solutions and commit to ensuring long-term solutions to EMS off-load delays immediately?

This isn’t where I was going to start, but I want to welcome the mayor of Fort Erie, who’s here today, Mr. Wayne Redekop.

Before I get into my complete speech, I just want to say to my colleague from Niagara, you’re seeing a different Niagara than I’m seeing on the streets of St. Catharines and Niagara Falls and Welland. We’ve got to do better for people on our streets. But I’ll address that during my speech.

But because the mayor of Fort Erie is here, I want to start by talking about the Fort Erie Race Track. I’m hoping that the Minister of Finance is listening in his office because it’s so important. What’s happening is—and I brought this question up last week—Woodbine is bullying the Fort Erie Race Track as they try to close us down. They’re trying to close us down. There’s no doubt about it. We’ve been fighting this for a number of years. The mayor knows this.

What they started with—and it’s a little complicated, but I’m going to explain it the best I can—is that horses that are in Fort Erie and Woodbine, they stable at Woodbine; they can come and race in Fort Erie. Under Jim Lawson’s leadership—the CEO—he has put a policy in place that if they stable in Woodbine, they can’t come to Fort Erie, which means that’s going to hurt us trying to get horses to come to our track. They are an A-level track. They’re the best of the best. We’re a B-level track, so we run claiming races for $5,000, $7,500, and some allowance races. But the problem is, once they say, “You can’t come to Fort Erie,” where are they going to go?

What Lawson has done is he’s now running races that are B-level races at $5,000 to $7,500 claimers. So he’s keeping the horses in Woodbine to run in those races. He knows he’s not supposed to do it. Here’s the catch—and this is why it’s important to the ministers that are here, because you guys talk about money all the time; taxpayers’ money is important. Woodbine is getting $110 million of taxpayers’ money to run that track, and the money can only be used for purses at Woodbine, which means your purses would run the higher races—$16,000 claimers, sometimes allowance races. So what I am saying to this government: We need your help. Fort Erie has been there for—I think it’s 116 years. It’s by far the prettiest racetrack in the entire country—actually, I think in North America.

The other thing that they did with us—we have a race called the Prince of Wales, and they have the Queen’s Plate. And it’s usually spread out so that you can run the—Triple Crown race is what it’s called. It’s similar to the one they have in the States. But what you can do is they spread it out so the horse that runs in the one race—the Queen’s Plate—then can run in the Prince of Wales. We get 15,000, 16,000 people coming to the beautiful track in Fort Erie. They put the races so close together those horses can’t even run in Fort Erie for our biggest race of the year, the Prince of Wales. It’s called bullying. And you know what? Fort Erie deserves better. Fort Erie has supported that racetrack, including through the town council, including when we had the slots here—which was a big mistake, taking the slots out of Fort Erie. That was done under the Liberals; it wasn’t done under you guys. So I’m asking all you guys, when you guys go to your caucus meeting—Sam, you go to your caucus meeting. You know about the Fort Erie racetrack—

Sorry, Niagara West—I apologize. All I’m saying is, take a serious look at what they’re doing. It’s wrong in the province of Ontario. What we should be doing is growing the industry. We have two thoroughbred tracks in all of Ontario—just two—and if you get rid of Fort Erie, you will have one. And you’re going to hurt all of the small municipalities right across rural Ontario that have horses. That’s where the breeding is all done.

So I wanted to raise that because the Fort Erie mayor is here, and he came out of his way. To the Fort Erie mayor, I’m going to continue to do everything we can, and I’m asking the Conservatives to really take a serious look at what Lawson is doing to a beautiful track down in Fort Erie in my riding, but quite frankly, what he’s doing to Ontario. Because it’s all about Ontario with horse racing: It’s rural Ontario; it’s the small communities that, quite frankly, support some PCs here. Anyways, I wanted to get that out, Mayor, and hopefully you will continue to support us on that.

I’m going to start with affordability on the budget. Like I said, I’m seeing different results in Niagara. Niagara is a wonderful place to live, great place to raise a family—all the things that we’re talking about. We have jobs there; some manufacturing is coming back. I believe it’s coming back—it has nothing to do with your government, by the way, with no disrespect. It has to do with the dollar. I said this about the 300,000 jobs that we lost under the Liberal government: It was about the dollar, the petrodollar. It was the petrodollar. Nobody on your side, if they know anything, including the labour minister, who is here—nobody can deny that the dollar plays a major role in bringing investment into the country. If you have a dollar that’s worth 110, and now you have a dollar that’s worth 72—the manufacturers left the province of Ontario under a petrodollar, and that was under Harper when he took care of the west at the expense of Ontario. I can tell you today they’re coming to this province because our dollar is 72 to 74 cents. We’re competitive, by the way, in the manufacturing sector at 80 cents. We’re competitive at 80 cents, and actually, we could live to go to 84. So think about that: That’s another 10 cents that these manufacturers are coming from all over the world and investing in Ontario—they’re making more money.

The thing that we have to be careful with—and I’m saying this again to my colleagues that are here, in particular, the labour minister who is here, and I really appreciate him being here—our big advantage in manufacturing, do you what it is? Speaker, I’m looking right at you. I’m not looking at anybody else. Do you what our big advantage is? It’s our health care costs. You talk to any bargaining team that’s bargained in the last 30 years, they’ll tell you the same thing I’m telling you. It’s the envy of the world, but it’s a big cost advantage when you’re trying to bring manufacturing back to Ontario, and if you privatize it, we lose that advantage. And then if the dollar goes back up, I’d hate to see what’s going to happen to the province of Ontario. So you really have to rethink your position on Bill 60, for sure.

I’ll get back to affordability. I can tell you rents in Toronto, as we all know, most of you—I have a one-bedroom apartment in Toronto, and I talked to people that are living in my apartment—$3,000, $3,200, $3,400 a month. I challenge any of you guys who are here: How many of you could afford that? Even though you got a 16% raise—we know that—how many can afford $3,000, $3,200 or $3,400 in rent?

In Niagara, a one-bedroom apartment—my good friend from Fort Erie, the mayor—is $1,300, and how many times has the mayor gone and they had renovictions? I think we had two or three of them in Fort Erie. We had renovictions where they got rid of seniors who were paying $800, $900 and $1,100, and then you see it advertised in the paper less than a week later, that same apartment, for $1,700, $1,800, $1,900 or $2,000.

Where is a senior going to go? There are no senior apartments out there. They’re not getting raises. As a matter of fact, our CPP and these types of things—old age—that’s what they’re trying to live on. They don’t get increases of 6% and 7% when inflation rises, so we’ve got a crisis in affordability for our seniors.

Take a look at our groceries. Has anybody gone to the grocery store lately? Put your hand up. We can have this kind of participation if you want. I’ll put my hand up. Grocery stores are going on—I put a video up. I’m sure you all watched it, because I’m sure you follow me on social media. I see some of your comments. I thank you for that too, by the way, all the compliments.

But groceries: I went and checked the price of bread. I try to eat healthy; I’m not very good at it, because I really eat a lot of hot dogs that I shouldn’t. But at the end of the day, I buy 14-grain bread. I went to the dollar store. Madam Speaker, I don’t know if you’ve ever been to the dollar store, but I went to the dollar store, which is just around the corner from where I live. It was $3 for that bread. Then I went to Shoppers, which is owned by the Weston family, who are gouging people—we all know that; the government should never have taken them on, because they’re friends. I went to Shoppers. I went right into the store, and I videoed it—they ran over, by the way; they weren’t happy that I was trying to video the price of it. It was $4.49, and they’re not a block away. They’re not a block away, in the same area.

That’s price-gouging. That’s the reality. I had some people say, “No, that’s competition” and all that. No, it’s not. It’s price-gouging. Do you know that the Weston family has made more profit during COVID than at any time in their history? They’re making so much money, they don’t know what to do with it—well, I apologize; that’s wrong. They do. They gave the Weston CEO a million-dollar bonus for doing so well.

We see it at the gas pump; $1.50 a litre is what I saw today. And do you know what else? This all should be taken care of with the budget. Do you know what else? Guess who is making record profits? The oil companies. They’re making more money than at any time in their history, and we’re not talking millions, like we were talking with the Weston family; we’re talking billions, with a B. Where is that coming from? It’s coming from us, who can’t afford rent. We can’t. We’re lucky; we’re probably—well, we’re not fairly compensated, but I know you guys are. But at the end of the day, what do you do with it? You can’t continue it. They’re making billions in profit. What’s that called? It’s the same like groceries: It’s called gouging. They’re gouging us at the pump. They’re gouging at the refineries, is really where it’s really starting.

Your Ontario might not be the same as mine and what I’m seeing. And yes, are some people doing really well? Absolutely. CEOs are making more money than they ever have in their lives. Some of the people at the higher scales are doing fine. They’re the same ones who love Bill 60. They love our health care. They love your bill around health care, because they can afford to pay. But there are people who can’t afford to pay for their health care. There are people who can’t afford to pay for their rent. They can’t afford to pay for their groceries. Seniors are being pushed out of their homes.

So when you stand up and say everything is wonderful, it’s not, and I can’t be the only one seeing it. You go walk down the street in St. Catharines. I’m going to use my whole riding. I haven’t been to Sam’s riding. I’ll be honest, I’ve been to Sam’s once to talk about the greenbelt and what you guys are doing with selling off the greenbelt. I had a town hall in Niagara West, in his riding, talking about the greenbelt. Talk about another mistake you guys are making.

And I want to be clear, because the Minister of Housing is here, and I’ve said this to him many times: I believe we should be building 1.5 million homes. As a matter of fact, the studies are saying we can build two million. Every study says there’s enough land to do two million. Here’s where we differ: I don’t believe we need to do it on the greenbelt. That’s where we differ.

And do you know today, under your leadership, under Premier Ford’s leadership—Madame Speaker, you may know this. I’m not sure, but you might know this. Do you know, today, we’re losing 319 acres of farmland every single day in the province of Ontario? I might be wrong on this, but you might think that we would have learned our lesson with COVID. When we got COVID, we didn’t have PPE. Do you remember that? We were scrambling. China wouldn’t send us any PPE and we had shut down all our manufacturers who were making PPE. We had to start that all back up really quick. Well, what are we going to do when you get rid of the greenbelt? What are you going to do when you get rid of all the farmland? Who’s going to feed us? Where are we going to get our food from? Are you going to rely on China or Mexico or another country? We already see some countries trying to get involved in our elections. It’s a mistake. Because once it’s paved over—any one of my colleagues know what happens when it’s paved over?

Interjection: It’s gone forever.

It’s gone forever. That will be your legacy. That’s what we’re going to remember about you guys—well, there’s going to be another thing: I believe you’re going to get defeated on the private health care.

The one that tears at my heart—and I know some of my colleagues kind of make fun of my voice or whatever when I get passionate around long-term care. I want to be clear, because the Minister of Long-Term Care said that the NDP doesn’t believe in building long-term care. That’s a lie. I supported building long-term care long before you guys came into government in 2018. I can hold up picture after picture where I was cutting the ribbon in Fort Erie, again in Fort Erie, in St. Catharines. We supported long-term care, but what we didn’t support and we still don’t support is the fact that it’s for-profit.

Regional homes—which Mayor Redekop would know about; he’s a regional councillor as well as being a mayor. He knows all about this. But let’s talk about the one that I raised the other day. I challenge anybody—you can ask me a question on this; I’ll write it for you, if it helps you out. Orchard Villa, a long-term-care facility, privately run—I want to be clear: I’m not blaming the staff; I support the staff. But the problem with that place is that it was about profit, not about care. They didn’t have enough staff to take care of those residents. People were dying. And guess what we had to do? We had to call in the Canadian military into a long-term-care facility. Madam Speaker, here’s what they found: 80 people died in the long-term-care facility, some from dehydration. You see this water here? That would have kept them alive. They didn’t have it. They sat in soiled diapers for days. They found somebody dead 24 hours after that person had died. They had rotten food. So when they brought a proposal forward to the Pickering city council, they turned it down because the government was going to give them a 30-year lease—the same company that had to have the military called in where 80 people died.

I’m asking my colleagues over there: Does anybody think that’s fair and reasonable? Would you want that to happen to one of your parents? Your mom, your dad, your grandparents, your brother, your sister? I hate to break it to you, but there’s a good chance that a lot of us are going to end up in a long-term-care facility, and it should be at a point and time in our lives when we can enjoy the last part of our lives. It shouldn’t be a place where I’m going to be mistreated, disrespected, allowed to die from a simple thing of not having a drink of water. So yes, I’m opposed to building that and I’m supporting the council. I’m supporting that area. But I actually think it’s fair and it’s reasonable and it’s consistent with what I’ve been talking about for the last eight or nine years that I’ve been here. So I’m saying to my colleagues across there: Don’t support that.

The other part I don’t support: I don’t think we should be handing out 30-year leases, or 99-year leases, by the way, at Ontario Place. We thought we would have learned our lesson with the 407. That was another 99-year lease that, quite frankly, is a disgrace. Have you ever tried to drive down there? You have to get a loan to go from one end of it to the other with how much they’re charging us, because we didn’t put any safeguards in place. We didn’t put anything in where we can buy it back. I remember that it was the Conservatives who said, “If we get in this government, we’re going to buy it back.” Actually, it was the Liberals; I apologize. It was the Liberals who said that.

What else do I have on my page? I’m not going to get to my speech; it’s pretty obvious. Oh, Bill 124: spending taxpayers’ money over and over and over again in the courts fighting Bill 124, as you say that nurses are heroes. How do you say that when you bring in Bill 124 and attack their collective bargaining rights? As a matter of fact, even in their bargaining rights, they don’t have—in their agreement, they had mental health, but because of Bill 124, they don’t have that now. And they capped their wages at 1%. And when my colleagues stand up and say, “Hey, everything is great in the province of Ontario,” they got capped at 1%. Inflation was running at 6.5% to 7%. It looks like it has cooled down a bit, but at the end of the day, can you afford a mortgage at 5%, 5.5%, 6%, 7%? Can you now buy a car that’s now running at 7%? Can you afford that? The answer is no—but Bill 124.

The last one I’ll talk to—I’ve only got a minute—is Bill 60. This is the worst piece of language. I thought privatizing hydro was terrible—even though the Conservatives started it—under the Liberals. Bill 60 is the worst bill ever. You’re going to privatize our health care system. I’ll give you an example of exactly what’s going to happen in hospital after hospital that’s publicly funded. Take a look at the Ottawa: 21 doctors put together a corporation. They’re now operating on the weekends in a publicly funded hospital with the same nurses that are working Monday to Friday. The difference is they’re being paid more money or they’re agency employees, agency nurses that, by the way, are between $150 to $300 an hour. Some friends of the Conservative government are probably getting pretty rich under that deal.

And then what really tops it off—I’ve got 30 seconds left—on the Friday night before they do the operating on Saturday, guess what staff they use to clean the operating rooms? Public nurses and public cleaners. And on Sunday, after they finish doing their operations, guess what they use? Publicly funded, publicly delivered nurses and janitorial workers. It’s a terrible bill.

I’ve still got a few more that I’m not going to get to. I do appreciate the intense listening by my colleagues. I’m looking forward to any questions they may have.

But I can tell you exactly when—you guys are standing up talking about the 300,000 jobs that you lost. I can tell you what it was—the dollar was $1.10 when they lost the jobs. Do you know why I know that? I was the president of a local union, and I had to go to Edshaw and watch them lose 300 jobs because the German company said, “We can’t afford that, to continue doing that work.” I had to watch as some of our plants closed in the province of Ontario because the dollar was a $1.10. And you can’t deny that. It was a petrodollar. All it did was support the west, and it divided Ontario into a manufacturing crisis that we had—and we’re just starting to get it back now. Do you know why? The dollars is at 72 cents. If it had been at 72 cents, I wouldn’t have lost Edshaw, I wouldn’t have lost those manufacturing plants, because they would still be working there. People would have retired out of those plants. I wouldn’t have had to go get them other jobs.

I actually have a 20-minute speech that I could do for you. I think the key issues that I didn’t get to are the things I talked about, in St. Catharines and Niagara Falls, in my area—and I’m not blaming anybody, but mental health is a huge issue in Niagara. The opioid crisis that we’re all facing in every one of our communities—I don’t think there’s anybody over there who isn’t facing an opioid crisis in the province of Ontario. These are two things that I think we have got to do better on. That’s for sure.

And Bill 60—I didn’t get to tell you what happened to the Americans. Do you know, today, in the United States of America, because of the cost of health care—45 million people today claimed bankruptcy because of health care costs in the United States, and people died, particularly those who are on the lower scale. They die earlier because of the cost of health care. We can’t go down that road.

You want to talk about Oshawa? They had 21,000 working in that Oshawa plant when I was president of the local union in 1999. Do you know what they’re down to now? A few thousand.

What about Brampton?

Do you want me to go on? Do you want me to talk to the parts sector?

I can talk about every sector—and it was because of the high Canadian dollar. The reason why they’re coming back is because of the dollar. There’s no doubt about that. You can’t argue—

Your second question was about—what was it? Help me out here.

Think about it: Every new build since 2018 can charge whatever they want.

We’ve already said as a party—I’ve said it many times here—we should have rent control on all units—

Interjection: And when people move out?

Why did it change? Because they made sure that they helped their corporations and developer friends—that they could make money, to a point that they can’t wait to build rental units because they’re going to make more money on the rental units, because they’re charging $3,200, $3,500. And it won’t be long before it will be $4,000 to get a rental in Toronto.

I know the Speaker is from Toronto. Your area is probably one to talk about, quite frankly, when you get a chance to talk over here.

We need rent controls. We need to make sure we take them off new builds from 2018. And we’ve got to make sure that we take care and get rid of renovictions, which is really, really—

I’m going to tell you that when I was the president of the local union, I was arguing for incentives for small businesses, quite frankly, and small manufacturers. As a matter of fact, when we got our V6 plant in 1997 bargaining, it came with incentives. The same way that you’re doing with the Chrysler plant now in Windsor, where you’re giving them X number of dollars to invest here—well, we did the same thing at the bargaining table in 1997. It’s one of the reasons why the Big Three stayed in Canada.

Even though, in 1997, we bargained the collective agreement—no, sorry; it was 1999—and we were number three in the world of manufacturing of auto parts and auto assembly; we dropped to 21. A lot of it had to do with the cost of the dollar and some of the bad policies that were brought forward by the Liberals—I’m not blaming it all on one. The Liberals were not very good at handling that, as well, when it came to jobs.

So I appreciate that, and I agree with you. Check the date. Write it down. We agree on it.