Point of order.

Resuming the debate adjourned on May 16, 2023, on the motion for third reading of the following bill:

Bill 85, An Act to implement Budget measures and to amend various statutes / Projet de loi 85, Loi visant à mettre en oeuvre les mesures budgétaires et à modifier diverses lois.

Good morning. Let us pray.

Prayers.

In my remarks on the budget this morning, what I would like to do is continue the conversation in this chamber we’ve been having about community safety. As I do that, I’m mindful of the fact that this is a challenging moment in our province, certainly challenging in eastern Ontario back home.

Today is one of the days that we are going to be remembering Sergeant Eric Mueller, who was tragically killed in Bourget, Ontario. I know members of the government are going to be going to the funeral service today. I’m glad they are. I just want to say from my perspective, as an eastern Ontario politician, days like this are hard. But I want us to think about how we preserve community safety and honour Sergeant Mueller and his family.

I also want to be thinking about Carl Reinboth. Carl Reinboth was a street outreach worker from the Somerset West Community Health Centre, one of three terrific community health centres we’re blessed to have in our community, who was tragically killed as well in a truly tragic accident—a gentleman in a psychotic episode.

We miss Carl. We miss Sergeant Mueller. We miss all people who devote themselves to public service and first response. There are so many first responders, Speaker, and today I just want to begin my remarks on the budget thinking about community safety by paying respect to Sergeant Mueller and to Carl.

What I want to ask, Speaker, is a rhetorical question, before I get into some details on two aspects of what the government has proposed in this bill: How do we keep each other safe? It’s a rhetorical question I asked in my community column last Friday. We publish a newsletter every week online—I know a lot of members do—and I asked community members to give me their two cents about what we could do as a province to keep each other more safe. I got a lot of comments back from people remarking on the amount of neighbours in our community in Ottawa who are suffering openly in the street, living in the street.

What we know is that, in Ottawa at least, there are 1,400 people in Ottawa every day who are homeless, about 8,000, if you think about the city in the course of the year, who interact with that position and find their way out one way or another. What we know is those neighbours—and they are neighbours, Speaker—who are living on the street are disproportionately drawn from certain communities as opposed to others. About 2.5% of our city in Ottawa are Indigenous, but 24% of the homeless population are Indigenous. About 6% of our city are Black Canadians, but 21% of the people who are homeless on the street are Black.

What I hear from community service providers, when they talk about folks who are chronically underhoused, chronically homeless, and folks who for whatever reason, for whatever trauma they are carrying around with them, as people have told me, live their lives in plain sight all day, all times of year—what life is like for them. People who wrote me after my column last Friday were saying they were noticing alarming behaviours that researchers tell me are linked to the toxicity of the illicit drug supply in our streets, alarming behaviours that are linked to the mental health crisis in our community.

Ana from old Ottawa South wrote me about a neighbour she knew who had been assaulted outside a coffee shop and is still in hospital after receiving several injuries, including a face fracture that people believe may not fully heal. I also know of another neighbour outside Hartman’s grocery store—you know Hartman’s, Speaker, in Somerset West, at Somerset and Bank—who was just walking to get her groceries and encountered a neighbour in significant psychotic duress and was assaulted as well.

In each of these situations, what we know is that the first-response capacity we have in our community is overtaxed. What do I mean by that? What I mean by that is, at the moment, what the Ottawa Police Service tells our community is the cost of interactions with homeless folks in our community—there are about 60,000 interactions per year—is $25 million. But if we think about the amount of money we are spending taking police first responders into interactions with homeless neighbours, when those are the exact folks we need when there’s a pileup on the 417, the exact folks we need when we have a major weather event like the wind storm that hit our community last May—the police so aptly and efficiently and effectively ensured our safety in that moment for neighbours trapped in their homes. They were terrific. Police are the ones who have the responsibility, with the monopoly on the use of force, to keep us safe in moments of significant public duress and safety.

What police officers in Ottawa Centre tell me is that they don’t want to be the first point of response for 60,000 interactions with folks who are chronically homeless. In fact, I hear again and again from our community officers that they feel the province and the city could do a lot more to support them.

I want to talk about some of those community services—because in the budget, with the Homelessness Prevention Program the government announced, the increase of $202 million, we have opportunities for the province to invest—that have been making inroads to deal with those 60,000 interactions and to take our police into a direct public safety response, instead of constant interactions with neighbours who live with trauma and who are homeless.

I want to talk about the Salvation Army in Ottawa, who maintain several vans that are fully equipped to deal with any number of needs homeless neighbours have. It could be a pair of socks, it could be a cup of coffee, it could be a first aid interaction, or it could be a ride to a home or a shelter or a drop-in facility that our city maintains. The cost of that program, which runs from 11 a.m. in the morning to 3 a.m. at night, seven days a week, is around $500,000 a year. I mentioned that the cost of asking our police force in Ottawa to interact 60,000 times a year is $25 million. What the Salvation Army tells me is, for them to staff up with an additional van could be half the cost of the allocation they currently have—$500,000—and what that would make is a meaningful difference in the lives of people who are living and struggling with trauma, and it would also follow the advice of officers I’ve spoken to who want that help.

I also want to note the Somerset West Community Health Centre, who maintain several programs, and I want to name a couple that could benefit from what the government has announced in this budget. They have a crisis outreach program that was operating during the pandemic—and it’s operating now—that doesn’t just deal with situational responses in neighbourhoods. When there’s a homeless neighbour in crisis interacting with a small business or another resident and that person, that business doesn’t feel safe, they can call the Somerset West Community Health Centre. They’re proactive: This outreach program goes into rooming houses, goes into supportive housing, goes into low-rental, and visits neighbours sleeping outside in the street, to get them the support they need, for a cost of $315,000 a year. If we invested another $226,000 a year, what the Somerset West Community Health Centre tells me is, you could employ a full-time nurse practitioner and a dedicated community worker for this program. And I can tell you, those folks would save lives. They would make sure people found out where they could go to get a decent meal at one of our community kitchens. They could connect, perhaps, spiritually, if they’re Indigenous, to some of the fantastic Indigenous cultural organizations we have in our city, or spiritually if they have faith of other kinds. Speaker, $226,000 compared to $25 million is a significant difference.

I also want to say that every time we give someone an opportunity to do something other than end up in a paramedic ambulance, a police cruiser, a jail or a mental health bed in a hospital, we don’t just achieve dignity for the person; we achieve something stupendous for economic circumstances for the province. It is cheaper and it is more efficient for the government to take aspects of this $202 million and its Homelessness Prevention Program and put it into direct community services. I’ve worked already with members of this government to connect them directly to leaders in our community who can put this money to good use.

In the last minute I have, I just want to mention one other thing, and that is the housing allocation that Ottawa has received. What we know is, we have an increase of $800,000 with the Homelessness Prevention Program allocation for our city. We were on track to expect $16 million to $17 million. What that would have done is create 54 units of supportive housing in our city. So, working with organizations like Salus, Options Bytown, Somerset West, Carlington Community Health Centre, Sandy Hill Community Health Centre, I’m pleading to this government to make sure that Ottawa receives a good allocation here, because if we don’t, what we’re going to have are more criminal justice interactions with police first responders, which is not what neighbours are telling me we need to make sure we can give people dignity, give people respect and—let’s hope, for the most part, after the prayer we had this morning—a new lease on life.

Based on that note of housing—thank you very much for raising that—will you support what we’re proposing with the increase in investment in the Homelessness Prevention Program and Indigenous Supportive Housing Program by over $200 million annually? I can tell you for a fact that in my community, York region, this meant a 76% increase. I’ll be meeting with them soon because they said they want to meet with me and talk to me about the great things this is going to do for York region.

I would hope, based on that feedback, and knowing it’s $200 million annually—I would have to say to the opposition member, please support us with this initiative.

To the member from Ottawa Centre: The supply chain of illegal drugs which is reaching the people he spoke about on the street doesn’t come from the street. The supply chain of illegal drugs that is harming people on the street and causing the problems of which the member from Ottawa Centre spoke comes from the supply chain established by organized crime. For example, the RCMP seized 60 bricks of cocaine at the Ambassador Bridge in April of this year. One of the ways you save people on the street is you bust up that supply chain.

So my question to the member from Ottawa Centre is this: Why is he abandoning the people on the street by promoting a “defund the police” policy?

Further questions?

I’ll be honest in my response to what the member has said. I’m not interested in playing culture war games in this place when it comes to community safety, and I would invite the member opposite to consider the same. We can try to play “gotcha” politics in this place by using catchphrases, or we can make the community investments we need to make to keep our community safe. I talked about specific investments we can use to make the community safe. I note the federal Conservative leader was playing similar games in the House of Commons yesterday in question period.

We have to be driven by evidence. We have to be driven by effective solutions that work. The case I was making this morning that I didn’t hear any evidence or response to from that member—I hope I hear it in debate—is, are we making the right investments, are we helping first responders and are we helping neighbours in crisis? Those are the pertinent questions.

Housing, supportive housing, and support for people with mental health and addictions—I heard the associate minister of the government yesterday praise those initiatives, and I’m glad to hear that. I’m glad to hear that, in this place, we’re following the evidence and not the culture wars.

I’m glad the program’s working for your community. Jury’s out for me on whether I’m going to support it. I need to make sure there’s enough money in the bill to support all communities.

We need the government, we need the public to make sure we incentivize and figure out ways to help people get housing. It doesn’t always mean cranes, either. Supportive housing can be repurposing existing rental stock, supportive housing could be wrapping services around places like rooming houses, but we can’t do that on $800,000 a year with the Homelessness Prevention Program, and we can’t do that with the limited resources currently allocated towards public and non-profit housing in this province. We need much, much more.

We’ll now have questions to the member for Ottawa Centre.

Thank you to my friend from Ottawa Centre for his passion for community safety. I wanted to ask him, if there was one thing that was missing in the budget that would really contribute to community safety in Ottawa, what would that thing be?

My question is to the member for Ottawa Centre. Thank you for your speech. I know you very much care about the residents of Ottawa Centre.

My question is focused on housing. When you look at this budget, do you believe this budget adequately addresses the housing affordability crisis that you see in your riding?

It’s always a pleasure and a privilege to take my seat on behalf of the good people of Algoma–Manitoulin, talking to the budget bill this morning. As I’ve always said, I try to bring a northern Ontario lens to the floor of the Legislature, and that’s what I’m going to be doing this morning, talking about particular matters that were not addressed for individuals in my riding of Algoma–Manitoulin.

I want to start with Donna Benke from Elliot Lake, who is an ODSP recipient. Donna is a huge advocate for fairness. She has shared many of her life stories with me, and her struggles that she has. She doesn’t want to wish anything worse for anybody else, but she does want to be seen; she wants to be heard, because as a single individual without children at home, she has not benefited in any way, shape or form from some of the benefits that have come from this government. She wants to be heard and is saying, “What about me? As an individual who is hurt, who cannot work, who cannot supplement my income, why aren’t there any supplements for me?” That’s one of the individuals.

I want to talk about Roslyn Taylor. Roslyn Taylor owns a small sawmill on Manitoulin Island. Roslyn has shared her hydro costs for her small mill with me. She employs about 20 to 25 employees. This has gone on with this government and the previous government—that I brought it to their attention. Her usage fees, on average, range somewhere between $700 to $800. Her delivery fees are always in excess of double what she is utilizing. I’ve worked with the minister—and I actually was with the minister at a reception just a couple of days ago, and I asked him once again, “When will your ministry reach out to Roslyn at Taylor Sawmill?” I wanted to provide him with her direct contact and say, “Hey, what can you do?” The minister, to his credit, indicated to me that it would take some major policy changes in order to address her issues. Okay. Well, that’s why you’re in government: to make those changes. We didn’t see those changes in this budget. Roslyn is still receiving those high costs for her sawmill, and the 25 jobs that she provides for individuals on Manitoulin Island are at stake here. So I’m hoping that, finally, the government will reach out to Roslyn, or Hydro One, and look at some of the savings that they can provide for her so she can continue doing the operation and the work that she enjoys doing.

The other thing that wasn’t addressed in this budget is a serious doctor recruitment and retainment program for rural and northern communities. I didn’t see that in this budget.

I see this government making some investments. I see legislation which is opening up more opportunities for the privatization of certain surgeries in this province. I see this government creating an environment where we’re going to need more agency nurses. I see this government creating, again, an environment where we’re going to be losing a lot of our public service workers—our doctors, our nurses, our PSWs and so on—to going towards the private sector. I see a lot of nurses who were burnt out due to a lot of decisions that were made by this government during the COVID pandemic, which now—these individuals have left and are now reappearing as agency nurses at a much higher cost. I don’t see how they’ve addressed that in the budget. I don’t see how they’ve addressed the need for locums in northern Ontario.

The hospital up in Wawa has been looking to this government and trying to get this government to continue with the locum days that they’ve had there. They’re down another doctor, and they do not have the proper coverage that they had. What is going to happen? The three remaining doctors who are there are going to get burnt out, and they’re going to move on, and they’re going to leave, and then Wawa is going to be left out.

This is the exact position that is happening on the west end of Manitoulin Island and Gore Bay. There are three doctors there: There’s one doctor who is holding down the basic practice that is there; and there’s a husband and wife, but they’re looking to move on because they’re at an age where they need to retire. That has not been addressed. Again, a serious doctor recruitment and retainment program is not addressed in this budget.

I will always give credit where credit is due, and I want to thank the Minister of Transportation, because she has actually responded to the need for a turning lane and investments in highways, particularly on Highway 17, as you turn in off Goulais River into the trading post and also the LCBO that is there. There’s a family, there’s an individual who passed away a few years ago. We’re finally going to make the investments to improve that area and add a turning lane, making it a little bit safer.

There are some investments that went into Manitoulin Island, as well, with those highways, but the resurfacing that was done just last summer—I was out on those highways this summer, and they’re already starting to deteriorate. So there are going to be some major improvements that are going to be needed to be done.

Highway 637 into Killarney is an absolute mess.

There are more investments that need to be done into those areas, and are they on this government’s radar?

Highway 551, Highway 542—again, there are more investments that need to be done in those areas.

Were there home care investments—a real strategy for this government to invest into home care. If we are actually going to prevent and help long-term-care homes, we need to have home care investments, major home care investments, because people want to remain staying in their homes.

In the short time that I had, these are the shortfalls that I’ve identified from a northern Algoma–Manitoulin lens, and unfortunately, this government has failed to meet these needs of Ontarians in the budget.

Further questions?

Speaker, what I’m going to rise in this place and defend all the time is community safety. The member can engage in any number of culture-war statements he wants, but what I’m going to ask him and what I’m going to ask every member in this House is: What does that accomplish by the day’s end? What does that actually accomplish? Will it bring back the lives we’ve lost of first responders? Will it bring back Sergeant Mueller? Will it bring back Carl Reinboth? Will it give people a new lease on life, or is it just about scoring points on Twitter?

I’m not here to score points on Twitter. I’m here to fight for my community. I’m here to make sure that we do right by people living in crisis, and comments like that? It’s just performance. I’m interested in actual solutions. Believe it or not, Speaker, I’ve found that there are times members of this government will do that. I invite this member to talk to those members of this government, because those are people actually engaged in serious work, not games.

I began my life as a community organizer, Speaker, in this city, working with the great Jack Layton to make sure people didn’t freeze to death on the streets of this city and got access through a housing-first program. We convinced a Conservative mayor, Mel Lastman, to invest millions of dollars in a housing program called the Streets to Homes program, that the city currently has, which needs another tranche of reinvestment.

But there are solutions that exist, Speaker. We don’t have to keep throwing money at the problem in ineffective ways and putting people in difficult situations. We can and must do better.

Thank you so much this morning to the member for explaining the real lived lives of people that are on the street. The solutions aren’t simple and they’re not, in some ways, the bumper statements that we’re hearing in the House today, so we need to come together and understand the continuum of supports that we need.

In Hamilton currently, we can tell there are 1,500 people who are homeless, living on the streets, and we have 500 shelter beds. We’ve seen the closure now of three agencies, the kind that you described in Ottawa, that were serving people living on the streets, including Hamilton Mental Health Outreach, that were dealing with people right on the street, serving them where they’ve managed to find some shelter.

And so, can you speak a little bit further to all of our communities, how cutting that kind of service, as you said, is not good for anyone? It lands on municipal taxpayer dollars, and it lands on the police budgets that should be directing their resources elsewhere.

The member from Ottawa Centre asked about specific investments in the budget. The specific investment that I’m referring to is the $13.4 million to continue the Guns, Gangs and Violence Reduction Strategy, which of course, as we know, is the primary way of busting up the drug supply chain, so that the drugs don’t reach people on the street and the people who the member from Ottawa Centre was talking about.

So my question to the member is this: Given that he wants specific investments in the budget to assist the people he spoke about, will he support that specific measure, the $13.4 million to bust up the drug supply chain, or will he be continuing to promote the NDP “defund the police” policy?

Thank you to the member opposite for his contributions. I don’t know what budget you were looking at, but the one I saw had $1 billion for home care investment and moving $569 million of it into this year to try to up-front the home care investments, which we also think are an extremely important part of our Ontario health team strategy: to make sure we move as much care as possible to home and community and out of hospital, leaving the hospitals available to do the work that can only be done in hospitals. So I hope the member will find, if he looks in that bill and also in the Your Health Plan, some of the things he’s looking for.

Thank you to my friend from Algoma–Manitoulin for his comments. He’s very passionate about health care in northern Ontario. What kind of investments are missing in this budget that would help in places like Wawa? And what does the future of health care look like without those investments?

Questions?

I want to thank the member for her comments. Yes, I’ve looked at the budget, but the reality is that these dollars are not coming to northern Ontario and those resources are not coming to northern Ontario, and people at home are waiting days and days and hours for services. People are suffering additional illnesses at home, ending up in emergency rooms, ending up for more treatments and not getting the care that they get at home, which would really mean more savings for us, if they would get that actual care in their homes. A strategy for doctor recruitment and retention and home care specifically targeted for northern Ontario is absolutely required, and it is not present or absolutely identified within the context of this budget.

Right now, a lot of northern Ontario hospitals and communities are relying on locums. Locums are coming in at a much higher cost, which is adding a lot of stress on our health care system. The same thing happens with home care. The bodies are just not there. Why? Because the low-wage policies that this government has discourages people from going into those types of jobs. People have great pride and have consciences and want to take care of their community members, but if these low-wage policies that this government has in place, that we see under the private sector, don’t change, if a strategy does not get developed in order to attract those people and make those investments into those environments, we’re going to continue seeing people suffer across this province.

I hear what the government is saying is, “We’re putting money into this and we’re doing something and we’re making the investments.” But those decisions and that path are not working, and that’s what a lot of hospitals in northern Ontario and care providers are telling this government, but you’re not listening to them.

Thornhill.

We’re working for Ontarians, and I want to demonstrate how this bill will have a direct impact on the people of my riding of Thornhill, as well as the rest of this province, by taking you on another tour. Let’s begin at one of the most famous delis in Thornhill; this is the Centre Street Deli. I believe some of you may be acquainted with the Centre Street Deli because Nana actually brought their very famous smoked meat sandwiches to the Legislature, and they sold out halfway through the event. It was pretty remarkable.

They’re actually located right beside the constituency office. They’re so popular you cannot get a parking spot at lunchtime during certain times of the week in my community. They were founded over 35 years ago. It’s a legacy that was continued by three dedicated employees who purchased from the original owner, and Nana, Ganesh and Kuna now lead the organization.

But despite its popularity, the deli closes every day at 5 p.m. I asked Nana, “Why don’t you keep it open longer?” She advised she would love to keep the restaurant open longer, but unfortunately, she’s unable to for a couple of reasons, including a lack of available staff. It’s a common issue that we hear across this province, which is why our government is enabling an estimated $8 billion in cost savings and support for eligible Ontario employers in 2023, making it easier for these small business people. Almost half of these savings and supports are going directly to small businesses like Nana’s and Centre Street Deli. That includes expanding access to the small business corporate income tax rate by increasing the phase-out range. That would provide Ontario’s small businesses with an additional Ontario income tax relief of $265 million over the next few years.

Our government is expanding the Ontario bridge training program by an additional $3 million in the 2023-24 year to help internationally trained immigrants find employment in their fields and get faster access to training and supports toward a licence or a certificate. More training and employment for immigrants means more staff who can help small businesses, like employers like Nana. With added cost savings measures and tax incentives, Nana will have the tools she needs to run her business effectively.

I’m going to take another tour around the neighbourhood, and I’m going to take everybody to the Holy Trinity Anglican Church, which is one of the oldest churches in my riding. It was actually founded in the 1830s. I’ve been there many times. The Holy Trinity also functions as a homeless shelter with 25 beds as part of Blue Door Shelters. I’ve had the opportunity to volunteer there and help and serve meals and hand out blankets.

Madam Speaker, with this budget, we are investing an additional $202 million each year in the Homelessness Prevention Program and Indigenous Supportive Housing Program to help those experiencing or those at risk of homelessness and those escaping intimate partner violence, which is a huge issue. These investments will support the community organizations delivering supportive housing. Those investments will help Holy Trinity.

Let’s move over to Henderson Avenue, where we’ve got a brand new school. It’s almost finished. I drove by it yesterday. Literally, I’d say it’s got maybe a month more of work to do, and it’s scheduled to open for the students in September. This new school will ensure that more students in Thornhill have better access to education, and I cannot wait to see it in action and up and running. I sat on parent council for over a decade with my local school, and I know how important this school is going to be to the community.

The passage of this bill will allow schools like this one to be best supported and prepare our children. This is because our budget outlines plans to invest $15 billion in capital grants over 10 years to expand and renew schools, and help create 86,000 new child care spaces by December 2026. When I drove by that school the other day, I saw that new child care space to the side. They’re easily recognizable. As somebody who has worked within the system, it was a very joyous moment for me, because I know when you’ve got new kids, you’ve got parents, you’ve got families moving in, it’s good for the community. Improving the education of our children and increasing child care spaces helps our next generation have the best possible foundation for building their lives, and as a mother, I understand how important this is to parents all over Ontario—parents and grandparents. In Thornhill, we call them bubbes and zaydes. It’s all good.

And speaking of that foundation, this budget aims to help close to 27,000 students earn credits towards both their Ontario secondary school diploma and post-secondary degree or certificate. We want to prepare our children for the jobs of the future, and we’re setting them up for success. That includes dual-credit opportunities in health-care-related courses for an additional 1,400 secondary students, which I think is a marvellous incentive. It’s a win-win for all the parties involved. The kids get exposure to this very important sector, and they’re able to gain credits for their future.

Madam Speaker, many parents and grandparents have approached me to talk about the fact that their children and grandchildren cannot study to become doctors close to home, which is why our government’s plan also includes helping more Ontario students become doctors by adding more undergraduate and postgraduate medical training seats right here in Ontario with the new medical schools in Scarborough and Brampton. We need these doctors. This is another great way of ensuring that Ontarians are able to get the health care they need and deserve.

Madam Speaker, let us now drive over to the Improve centre; it’s farther west in my riding, closer to the highway. There’s a not-for-profit called Bata to Batapreneur—also known as b2B. They just graduated 40 students from their business workshop. Giving young adults exposure to creating a plan for business is such an important thing, and our plan includes providing $2 million to the Futurpreneur Canada program, which helps young entrepreneurs grow their skills and achieve their business goals. More students will be able to nurture their interest in business and pursue successful careers in business according to our plan, Madam Speaker. This will not only supports the success of our young professionals, but it will also grow our economy, and I am certain that their businesses—their future businesses, the seeds, these ideas—will provide invaluable contributions to our community. I always talk about Thornhill being a group of self-starters—we start something from nothing—and it’s with that generation, that seed that’s handed out to these students, that allows them to further move in a direction that’s positive to create a small business.

I actually just hired a student that I’m happy to say I graduated from elementary school. He’s got his own landscaping business—that’s what he’s doing this summer—and he’s becoming an initiative for his own future, which is so important.

Okay, the tour is definitely not over. We’re going to keep driving in our e-vehicle, and let’s go over to the west side of Thornhill. Many folks may not know this, but there’s an area that’s home to some top industry manufacturers who are looking to grow and expand right in Vaughan. One of these is none other than the Give and Go bakeries, who make these delicious two-bite brownies. We’re going to be providing an Ontario Made Manufacturing Investment Tax Credit, which will provide a 10% refundable corporate tax credit. We’re going to be providing important initiatives so that they can turn that money and invest back into the workers and innovate and become more competitive, because we don’t want to lose these businesses to the south.

We are caring for our residents and we are creating a stronger Ontario. These are such important things—