I’d like to talk about a group of people from my riding who have inspired me on so many occasions to do more. One of the things that I’ve instilled consistently in my children is, if you can do more, then do it. If you can help someone, then help them. If you can make a difference in someone’s life, then step forward and make that difference.

Four ladies in my riding started something for their adult children, because there wasn’t a social entrepreneurial program for people with Down syndrome. It started in Norma’s backyard as the Down syndrome business group and has grown to its own charity now called Hearts 4 Joy. At present, it’s 16 artisans with varying exceptionalities who come together and create some truly inspiring art. I’m sure all of you have heard of Elf on the Shelf, but did you know about Gnome in Your Home? Maybe you have tiki lights on your deck and you’d like to replace them with hand-painted lanterns that look like stained glass.

On February 10, I had the pleasure of being at their official opening of their new shop in the Charlotte Mews. The new space will allow for a retail outlet for the group to sell their crafts and a great space for the artisans to do their masterpieces.

Norma, Debbie, Sharon and Irene, what you have done for Emilia, Allyson, Derek, Julie, Nicole, Carly, Tyler, Connor, Jessica, Josh, Jory, Luke and Kacee can’t be measured. You inspire everyone who meets you to do more and to be a better person.

One of the things that struck me about this bill is there are portions—the process for EAs, for example; it was first put in place 50 years ago. Whenever we do something that reduces red tape, we’re looking at good government practices and good governance in general. Does it make sense, really, to have something that was put in place 50 years ago? Simple things like technology—we were using a Brownie camera to take pictures of things at that point. We didn’t have the computer technology that we have today. All of those things, to me, make sense, that you can speed up some of those processes.

My question is, how is this legislation going to make lives better for people in Ontario? Because, ultimately, that’s what we’re trying to do, make lives better for the people we represent.

Some of the stuff with the environmental assessment, the processes were put in place 50 years ago. Fifty years ago, we used the IBM 360 computer. It was a four-bit processor. What we have here is a two-bit party that wants one bit of discernible progress, so I’m really confused by this. Could the member from London North Centre please give me an idea of why the NDP loves red tape so much, why they want to keep so much red tape in there and why they don’t want any progress over 50 years?