I want to thank the member from Barrie–Innisfil for that question.

Yes, it is difficult now to buy a home in the city of Mississauga. My family immigrated to the city of Mississauga—at the time, it was Port Credit, and then it ended up becoming the city of Mississauga in 1974. My parents paid $15,000 for their home, and today, that same home is worth $1.7 million. Young families cannot afford that. That’s why we have to build more supply.

Supply and demand has always been my thing. I come out of the automotive industry, and we always talk about supply and demand. The more supply you have, the prices do come down.

For young families, I know there’s hope for them as we’re building supply in the city of Mississauga for them to hit our goal of 120,000 homes that we do need in the city of Mississauga for them.

In 1974, we had Port Credit, we had Cooksville, we had Huron Park, and we made it the city of Mississauga, under the region of Peel. Today we are going alone without the region of Peel. It’s like a parent with their children—it’s time for the child to move on, and Mississauga is a grown adult so they have to be on their own—

I think we chose Peel because we looked at the three municipalities therein, Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon—that they would be able to go on their own and be able to sustain what we have right now, with all the services that we have. It’s not going to be easy. That’s why we need three mayors who will be there working constantly to do this. I hope all three mayors will work together and be able to deliver this, and I think they will. But it’s going to take time. I know January 2025 will be the time when all cities will be on their own. I just recommend that they work together and be able to separate and do the right thing for the people of Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon.

Like I said, we have the transition team that will be set up after this bill is passed, if it is passed in the House.

I’ve consulted with my constituents, as well, in Mississauga on this bill, and a high percentage of them are in favour of Mississauga going alone.

As well, I spoke to people in Brampton and Caledon, and having their own city is what they want.

It’s not going to be easy. I’m not saying it will be easy, because there is a transition. But like we said, we guaranteed that the services will remain until 2025 and then every city will be going on their own.

Like I said, I spoke to constituents, and they are happy about this move going forward.

Housing has been an issue in Mississauga. Like I said, if you notice the numbers, when Hazel was there, she was building 12,000 homes a year, and now it has declined since she left office in 2014. We need homes. We need homes for our children, for the future and all these immigrants who are coming to the province of Ontario. We have 450,000 people arriving at our door every year, and these people are going to need homes.

In my speech, I was reading about a family who is leaving Ontario because they cannot find an affordable home in this province.

I look at our own development in Lakeview, where we just did our MZO—that 16,000 new homes will be built in that area. Out of those 16,000 homes, 1,600 will be affordable and attainable homes for the people. I want to thank our minister for putting that bill forward, as well, to pass an MZO for that community—