I’d like to thank my colleague from Hamilton Mountain for her comments and her concerns about privatization and profitization in our health care system. As well, I would like to thank you for mentioning the importance of publicly funded as well as publicly delivered health care.

Back in March 2022, the Deputy Premier and Health Minister Christine Elliott stated, “We are ... making sure that we can let independent health facilities operate private hospitals.” Then, the minister’s spokespeople jumped in and said, “The use ... of private hospitals and independent health facilities in Ontario is not being expanded or changed.”

My question to the member: Is this an example of the government being accountable or transparent, given that this privatization and profitization is exactly what Bill 60 is doing?

I appreciate the opportunity to interact with the member from Hamilton Mountain. She always brings such clarity to the opposition position on an issue, and that’s what I was hoping to ask her.

Yesterday morning, during question period, we had a very interesting question from one of the opposition members stating that the operating rooms in many hospitals were operating overcapacity. And then yesterday afternoon, we were debating a motion from the opposition stating that the hospitals were under capacity. So I was wondering if the member could help clarify exactly what the position of the opposition is on this issue.

Thank you, Speaker. It’s always great to see you in the chair.

It’s a great honour to rise in the House this morning to speak in support of Bill 60, Your Health Act. I would like to thank the Minister of Health and her team on the work on this bill.

I was proud to join the minister, the Premier and the Prime Minister at AstraZeneca in Mississauga yesterday, where they’re investing $500 million in a major expansion in their Mississauga site, which will become their flagship global clinical research centre, with 500 new jobs right here in Ontario. This is very exciting news for Mississauga.

Just a few kilometres west of AstraZeneca, a new eight-storey parking structure is almost completed, which is the first step towards the complete reconstruction of the Mississauga Hospital. The new hospital will be almost triple the size: 24 storeys, three million square feet, with 1,000 beds—80% in private rooms. This will be the largest and most advanced hospital in the history of Canada.

And on the other side of Mississauga–Lakeshore, two new long-term-care homes, with 632 new beds, will be ready later this year. This is the largest long-term-care building program in Canadian history, including 1,152 new and upgraded beds in Mississauga–Lakeshore alone, more than any other riding in the province of Ontario. So again, I want to thank the Minister of Health and the Minister of Long-Term Care for all their work on these projects.

Speaker, over the last two months, I had the opportunity to travel around the province for pre-budget consultations with the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs. We heard from many stakeholders, including the Ontario Health Association, the Ontario Medical Association and hospital CEOs across Ontario who support Bill 60. They understand that the status quo in health care is not acceptable, and they appreciate all the investments our government is making to eliminate surgical backlogs after the COVID-19 pandemic and to reduce wait times for publicly funded surgeries and procedures.

In Windsor, David Musyj, president and CEO of the Windsor Regional Hospital, told us about the Windsor Surgical Centre, a new community clinic that opened in 2020 that now handles about 6,000 eye surgeries each year. This hospital CEO said that without this community clinic, the wait-list for eye surgery would be 20,000 people. Instead, these 20,000 people got the surgery that they needed when they needed it—and they all paid with their OHIP card, not their credit card. He called this a “massive success,” and I couldn’t agree more. This model has been successful in Ontario and many other provinces, including Quebec and Alberta, and as many members have noted, it was recently expanded in British Columbia under an NDP government.

Some of my friends on the other side defend the status quo, but as our former Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin and the Supreme Court wrote in Chaoulli v. Quebec in 2005, “Access to a waiting list is not access to health care.” As the minister said, that’s why, if passed, Bill 60 would expand community-based clinics to perform 14,000 more OHIP-insured eye surgeries each year across the province, and it would expand knee and hip replacement surgeries in community-based clinics by 2024.

In Windsor, Mr. Musyj also said a few comments for the opposition members, which I’d like to quote briefly: “Whenever Windsor Regional Hospital has asked for help in the last three years” our government has “answered the call. This includes extra funding for hiring close to 500 more front-line clinical staff ... 60 more medicine-surgical beds ... funding for lost revenue, funding to recruit more staff,” funding for “signing bonuses.... Nothing has gone unanswered.”

He said it is true that Ontario has a health care human resources problem, but this hospital CEO said he was “offended” by the members opposite trying to “paint” the problem as “the government not allowing us access to resources or telling us no. That’s not what’s happening.”

As well, he said, “this government delivered on a previous government’s failed promise to provide stage 2 funding to build a new acute care hospital” in Windsor. This is “the first government to actually put money where their mouth is and get this project going.” And Speaker, I know the same is true in Mississauga, Brampton and communities across Ontario.

I don’t have time to list everyone who supports Bill 60, but I do want to thank Karli Farrow, the president of Trillium Health Partners, for joining us at Sheridan College for our pre-budget consultation in Mississauga. We also co-hosted virtual town hall meeting together about the new Mississauga hospital in January.

I’d like to quote from her statement as well: “As one of the largest surgical service providers in Ontario, that also serves one of the most impacted communities due to COVID-19, we’ve been working to address wait times, which have grown due to the pandemic, by focusing on operational efficiencies and hiring more staff.” Bill 60, she said, is “an important step in expanding access to surgical care, for patients in Mississauga and west Toronto.”

Today is International Rare Disease Day, and I want to thank the Canadian Organization for Rare Disorders for their breakfast reception this morning. The patients who joined us know that timely access to diagnostic testing, including MRI and CT imaging, is critical to improve early detection, to improve the length and quality of life for patients with rare conditions and also to reduce pressure on our hospitals. That is why it is so important that Bill 60 would expand access to these tests in community-based clinics to help reduce wait times.

Speaker, this is a personal issue for me. As some members know, I was fortunate to be diagnosed early, with heart valve disease. I had a mechanical valve installed 12 years ago.

I want to take a moment to thank all the members who came to our reception last week and had a stethoscope check. Dr. Janine Eckstein flew in from Saskatchewan, and Dr. David Messika-Zeitoun came from Ottawa. I also want to thank them, and Ellen Ross of Heart Valve Voice, for all their support and for their help drafting my private member’s bill. I hope all members will support Bill 66, as well, later this year.

Returning to Bill 60: I use community-based clinics every month. Because of my mechanical heart valve, I have to be on Coumadin for the rest of my life. So I use LifeLabs clinics on a monthly basis, and I thank them for all the great work they do in the area of Mississauga and across this province of Ontario. Instead of going to the hospital or to my family doctor, which would take up the physician’s time or the hospital’s time, it’s good to have clinics like this in the community to make it easier and faster to access more convenient services, closer to home. This allows our doctors and hospitals to focus on more complex, high-risk cases.

Lastly, it is important to note, Ontarians will always access health care with their OHIP card and not their credit card.

The Prime Minister, when he was asked to comment on Bill 60, said that a certain amount of innovation is good, as long as we abide by the Canada Health Act. Section 12 of the Canada Health Act requires that we provide reasonable access to health care services. But as the Supreme Court of Canada said, “Access to a waiting list is not access to care.”

The status quo might be good enough for the opposition, but it is not good enough for this government.

Bill 60 would help us improve access to care, within our publicly funded system. Again, I want to thank the Minister of Health and her team for all their work on this bill.

I urge all members to support this bill and provide the good health care that Ontario residents deserve and need in this province.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

Good morning. It’s a beautiful day, everyone.

In the heart of Crescent Town resides Health Access Taylor-Massey, a health care centre oriented around community and social services. It’s actually an amazing health care model for all of Ontario. They are a crucial part of the East Toronto Health Partners, who are responsible for providing quality care and resources to the 300,000 people living in east Toronto communities, including my riding of beautiful Beaches–East York.

Health Access Taylor-Massey has helped 75,000 clients in an underserved community, addressing health inequities that have only become more prevalent with the COVID-19 pandemic. Their extraordinary services include family doctor appointments, vaccines, prenatal care, pap tests, cancer test referrals and COVID testing and treatment.

The strain on our health care system is evident with each passing day, with inconsistent wait times and long backlogs for medical services. Our health care system needs some more support to keep up the quality care provided for Ontarians. Neighbourhood-based care models like Health Access Taylor-Massey help alleviate the burden for hospitals. This centre was developed with the dedication and hard work of many of our East Toronto Health Partners, including our ever-energetic Stephen Beckwith, and the input from the Taylor-Massey Residents Wellness Council, where community members were given the opportunity to share their opinions to have a say in the building process, led from the ground up.

We must strive toward accessible health care that prioritizes specific needs, making it easier for residents to find specific care in one place closer to home. I regularly hear from many happy residents who utilize the valuable services of Health Access Taylor-Massey. Thank you to the staff for keeping it running, and keep up the great work. Let’s roll that model out right across Ontario.

In 2018, when our government came to power, I can tell you there was hallway health care; the health care system was broken.

Since 2018, we have 60,000 new nurses, 8,000 new doctors who registered to work here in Ontario. In fact, last year we had over 12,000 new nurses registered and ready to work, and in the colleges and universities there are 30,000 new nurses ready to come on board.

We’re putting—these are staggering numbers—$50 billion into building new hospitals on 50 sites right across this province, focusing on the infrastructure, and we’re going to make sure we have the best health care system anywhere in North America.

Thank you very much, Speaker. It’s a pleasure to see you in the chair; it’s the first time.

It is always an honour to rise in this House to represent and speak on behalf of the good people of my riding, Hamilton West–Ancaster–Dundas. This Bill 60 and the changes that this government is making to our public health care system are of significant concern to the people in my riding. They call to share their hopes and their dreams and—I’ve been hearing so much from my constituents—to ask the question: Why is this government rushing to dismantle our public health care system, our publicly delivered, world-class health care system that has been the envy of the world?

As has been said here, health care is in crisis. We acknowledge that; we recognize it’s in a crisis, but it’s this government’s job to fix that crisis with the solutions they already have before them, not in fact to make it worse. For example, in Hamilton, we have world-class health care facilities. We have Hamilton Health Sciences, we have McMaster Children’s Hospital and we have St. Joseph’s. These are world-class hospitals that are struggling under the underfunding, the lack of funding, the lack of supports they need to be able to continue to deliver the health care the people of Hamilton need. It’s been said many, many times here that the solutions—in fact, it’s been said that you’ve manufactured this crisis, taken hallway health care that was a legacy of the Liberals and doubled down by making it worse by underfunding health care, and by introducing Bill 124, that has created and exacerbated a health care human resource crisis.

It’s a mystery to me why this government would, rather than the easy solutions which are to fund the health care hospitals we have, these world-class hospitals, cut them off and let them have to put people on wait-lists for surgery. Why you wouldn’t make sure they have the adequate funding? Why you wouldn’t make sure that the money you have in contingency funds and $12 billion of unspent money could be going right now to address wait-lists? Why are you not doing that? Why is that not your first choice?

Why are there 12,000 children on a surgery wait-list in the province of Ontario when you could start to address that by making sure these closed operating suites, these unused facilities are open again so that people could start getting the procedures and the surgeries they need to save lives, relieve pain and suffering and the fears of parents who are hoping that their children would get the care they deserve under this government?

I also wonder why you continue to disrespect health care workers, nurses and PSWs and refuse to repeal Bill 124. You continue to underpay them in a time when they are burnt out, stressed and doing the best they can in a system that you have destabilized further. Why are you taking nurses and PSWs back to court on Bill 124 when it’s been shown that this is an unconstitutional bill? Why is that not your first act?

The question really stands: Why are you rushing, rather than looking at the solutions that are before you? Why is your first act, the thing you’re putting all your effort into, to introduce profits into the health care system? It’s been called the profitization of our health care system, and it’s hard to describe it as anything other than that.

We have talked in this House about the proud history of the NDP and Tommy Douglas and our medicare system. All of you know, and all of you have been hearing from your constituents, that that is the pride of Ontario. That’s one of the things we’re so proud of: that people can get access to the health care and the emergency care they need, despite their ability to pay, anywhere in this province. To now go down the road of a two-tier health care system is exactly the wrong, wrong direction and nobody, if they understood what you are doing, would support this. I can only imagine that you are also hearing from your constituents that this is not what they expected and this is not where they want to see you going with their precious health care system.

Rather than taking the steps that you know will help to relieve the burden and will help to improve our publicly delivered health care system, you’re still rushing to introduce privatization without learning the lessons of the past. In this bill, there are absolutely no protections for patients seeking care in private, for-profit, corporatized facilities. It’s not in the bill. All you have to do is to look at the evidence that comes from what already exists in private, independent health facilities.

The report from the Auditor General is invaluable, and I wonder whether the opposite members, the MPPs or the ministers, have taken into account the findings of this value-for-money audit that the Auditor General has put out, because the warnings are there. The recommendations to protect patients both financially and health outcomes are in this report, but nothing has been put into this bill to address that.

Let me just point out some of the highlights—not really highlights; some of the actual dire warnings or recommendations that come from this report that should have been included in this bill but are not there.

I’m just going to start by—it’s interesting reading if you take the time to look at it, but really, the Auditor General said that there is “inadequate and inconsistent monitoring of the quality of outpatient surgeries.” No one is monitoring the results, the outcome of how people fare after they have surgeries or procedures in these independent health care facilities. There’s inadequate monitoring.

There’s also “no regular review and monitoring of funding and billings for outpatient surgeries.” So it’s all fine and dandy for you to say that people won’t have to pay extra—it’s absolutely not the truth, because in Ontario, people already pay extra for these procedures. They pay dearly for these procedures.

In fact, the Auditor General goes on to say that there’s absolutely “no provincial oversight to protect patients against inappropriate charges.” The ministry has not sufficiently reviewed “unusual billing patterns or trends to identify possible issues, such as inappropriate billings or inappropriate rendering of services.” These are the findings that the Auditor General did in 2021, and these problems still exist and are only going to be exacerbated by this bill.

I think the overall conclusion of the Auditor General that speaks to the two protections that people should expect from a government—to protect them financially and to protect their health outcomes—when they’re being driven by this government to private, for-profit clinics, the Auditor General says, clearly, “The ministry does not have a centralized way to measure and report on surgical quality and outcomes for all surgeries being performed in Ontario.” That’s shocking. There’s no oversight in place, and this bill does not put any in place.

The Auditor General also goes on to say that “We found that some patients could be given misleading information as part of sales practices to make a profit.” So the warning is here. This is already happening. The quality of people’s outcomes are not being monitored, and the fact they’re being charged inappropriately and overcharged for fees is not at all being addressed by this government. I would be curious to know what the government is doing to address these recommendations and these findings from the Auditor General.

The Auditor General’s work is invaluable to all of us in this House to do our work. Her work is stellar, and her work is invaluable. She’s an independent officer of this Legislature, and we should be listening to this and using this to make our bills better and to improve our bills. She said, mincing no words, that “the ministry is putting patients at greater financial risk by allowing additional private organizations to provide publicly funded surgeries while also being allowed to charge patients directly for additional uninsured services to make a profit without appropriate oversight mechanisms in place.”

There it is. It’s happening already in this province. You’re putting a bill forward that’s going to double down on this and that has not in any way addressed those concerns.

My question to the government would be, what happens if something goes wrong in one of these private clinics? What is the procedure when there are complications or urgent issues that arise? How will this impact our emergency rooms that are already closing? Have you considered any of this? Because it’s not in the bill, and in the debate that I’ve heard, you don’t address any of the concerns that people have.

So I would just say, despite the despair that we feel that this government is not protecting people when they need health care in this province—that in fact, you’re protecting profits over patients—I just have to end with a quote from Tommy Douglas, because it is the anniversary of his passing. Despite the despair that we feel, I think Tommy’s words would be, "Courage, my friends; ’tis not too late to build a better world.” That’s what we should be aspiring to, not a downward spiral to privatization and lack of services for the people of the province of Ontario.

Thank you very much, Speaker. Thank you to the member opposite as well.

I was reading in Hansard yesterday that the member for Nickel Belt was talking about how, in Health Sciences North in Sudbury, we have 17 surgical units available. Only 14 of those are open; typically, they don’t even run the entire year because they run out of government funding.

I’m curious to understand why the Conservative government thinks that’s a better solution than providing the funding to operate these existing, publicly structured, already-built hospital surgical rooms; that funding them at a lower cost doesn’t make sense, but funding a private clinic where there’s a profit margin that will cost more, ultimately—it’s through the OHIP card, but it still costs the only taxpayer we have. There’s only one taxpayer; we’ll pay more, all of us, as taxpayers. Why is that a better solution than actually funding the hospitals that exist, that could be doing the work with the equipment in facilities that we already have?