I can say this: The provincial government, this government, is steadfast in its commitment to continue to build houses for the people of the province of Ontario. The federal government can either assist us in this motion or they can simply get out of the way. We have made it very clear since 2018 that we needed to build more houses in the province of Ontario. It has also been very clear that the opposition is against this.

What we’re seeing in Ontario is hope and optimism returning to this province for the first time in a long time, Mr. Speaker. Do you know why? Because we’re bringing more jobs back to the province of Ontario. We have more jobs than people to fill those jobs, and we’re asking for over 300,000 people to come to Ontario to help us build a more prosperous Ontario. And do you know what they need? They want to have a home. So we will continue to do that. And I can’t say it more clearly: The federal government and the opposition can either work with us or they can get out of the way so that we can continue to build a better Ontario.

So I say very clearly to the leader of His Majesty’s opposition: Either work with us to build new housing or get out of the way.

Interjections.

I thank my honourable colleague for the very important question.

What we did is, we brought three older legacy programs and combined them into a new program, the Homelessness Prevention Program, to streamline the process so that service managers spend less time on paperwork and more on helping the people of Ontario who need support. We also increased the funding of this program by $25 million annually across the province.

Mr. Speaker, on our side, we’ve been very clear: We’ve said that we are in a housing supply crisis in our province and it hurts our most vulnerable. It hurts everyone across the board. We’re working towards solutions to make sure that we increase the supply across the province.

It’s only the opposition that continuously opposes housing in this province—well, it depends on what time at question period. They’re for housing at some points during question period and—

My question is to the Premier.

In the last year, 50,000 more people left Ontario than have arrived, which is out-migration at a level we have never seen before in this province. Most are young adults aged 25 to 35 who can’t afford to save for a home on the salaries they are making—and that includes demoralized, disrespected London West nurses Nicole Forster and Lindsay Smale.

Instead of standing by as nurses like Nicole and Lindsay leave Ontario for good, will the Premier stop fighting nurses in court over the unconstitutional Bill 124 wage cap and start actually fixing the housing affordability crisis?

There’s a lot in that question.

On the housing side, we have a housing supply action plan which we brought in, starting in 2018, and the opposition is, of course, not in favour of that. We’ve spent weeks talking about how we want to build more homes across the province of Ontario, and then the NDP asks one question at the beginning of question period to suggest we should stop building homes, and then towards the end of question period asks another one if we can build more homes. So I’m not sure what it is that they actually want at this point.

Here’s the thing that we are doing: We are going to build more homes for all of the people of the province of Ontario.

The second part of the question was with respect to health care and health care resources. I can tell you that, because of the extraordinary work of the Minister of Colleges and Universities, we have more people entering the health care field than at any time in our province’s history, and it’s so needed because of the massive amount of investments that we’re making in health care. In long-term care, I need 27,000 additional health care workers. And thanks to the Minister of Colleges and Universities, we’re getting it done.

Thank you very much for the question.

Mr. Speaker, let me be clear once again: There has not been a government in this province for the past 70 years that has provided more protections for tenants than this government has. We protected tenants through Bill 184; we put in various measures to protect tenants. Unfortunately, the opposition voted against every single one of those measures. The rent increase guideline that’s currently set at 2.5%—we maxed it at 2.5%, well below inflation; it would have been over 5% if we hadn’t taken action. Last year, we capped it at 2.1%.

We have continuously said that we are in a housing supply crisis in this province and it affects everyone. The opposition doesn’t seem to understand that. We need to increase supply so that everyone in Ontario has a home that meets their needs and their budgets. They may not care for it. We will, and we will—

Mr. Speaker, last year, in 2022, we had a record number of purpose-built rentals in this province; the year before that, once again, a record number of housing starts—not only just overall, but also for purpose-built rentals.

When it comes to protection for tenants, let me be clear once again: Bill 184—that member was here when we introduced it. It was this member here that put in protection for tenants across the board in this province. What did the opposition do? Vote against it. That’s the same thing for opposition—they’ll continue to talk about one thing, but when it comes to voting, they will vote against it. They’re for housing until we introduce it, and they will vote against it. They’re for protection—they will talk about it—but when it comes to actually putting their name behind it, they will vote against it. That’s not on this side of the House—

Interjections.