A loud thud was heard yesterday across Ontario at 11 a.m. It was the dropping and the introduction of the Ottawa Light Rail Transit Commission report. It was a 650-plus-page document detailing the problems we’ve had with our LRT system. It’s something I have fought for in this place—thanks to residents and community members back home, who I want to thank for their work.

Sometimes, the truth hurts, and it certainly hurts this morning for advocates of public-private partnerships in infrastructure, because Justice William Hourigan, who led this report, said the following: “The P3 model caused or contributed to several of the ongoing difficulties on the project ... the city traditionally had a hands-on leading role in projects, given the lesser role it played under this mode, the city was left in a position where it had limited insight or control over the project.”

P3s are an accident waiting to happen. They will not offer the transparency the public deserves. That is the lesson, I believe, from Ottawa’s LRT failure.

But right now, as I speak, the same P3 consultants and contractors who made a mess out of Ottawa’s LRT are building the Eglinton Crosstown.

I call on this government to read Justice Hourigan’s report, to learn the lessons, to not waste the public money, and to make sure the mess that happened in Ottawa never happens again.

Thank you very much to the member for the question.

Certainly, we’re grateful to the commission, but it’s because of the P3 projects we have that we are able to build subways in the city of Toronto and in York region. It’s the reason we’re building highways—like Highway 3, the Highway 427 extension, the Highway 401 widening, and the Garden City Skyway. It’s the reason why we’ve made such great progress on building hospitals in the province of Ontario—like Niagara, Cortellucci Vaughan, West Lincoln Memorial Hospital, Niagara south, Trillium, Ottawa.

I’ve always said—I’ve been very transparent—we will use the right model for the right project and we will proceed in that way.

Our P3 history in the province of Ontario is a wonderful one. We have brought to life 74 projects since the inception of Infrastructure Ontario. Since our government was elected, we’ve brought 24 projects to market, 15 of which are currently in construction.

We were elected on a strong mandate to build this province, and that’s what we will do.

Again, we were elected on a very strong mandate to invest in infrastructure, which is why we are investing $159 billion over the next 10 years. Last week, we announced our updated P3 project pipeline, which included 39 projects.

During COVID-19, under Premier Ford’s leadership, we developed the rapid build program to build long-term-care homes as quickly as possible, which resulted in 320 additional beds at Lakeridge in a construction period of 13 months. We are taking those learnings through the rapid delivery program, and we’ve announced our first rapid delivery program to build schools in the province of Ontario. This includes five new schools, creating 15,700 student spaces and 1,500 child care spaces.

My question is to the Minister of Infrastructure.

In the coming decades, Ontario’s population is expected to grow by more than six million people. As our population grows, investing in infrastructure is now more important than ever. Clogged roads and gridlocked highways hurt our hard-working families, as they’re stuck in traffic longer than needed. Outdated and antiquated infrastructure drags down our economy and makes us less competitive as a province. Ontario cannot afford to hold this economy back. Now is the time to build.

Can the Minister of Infrastructure please share with the House what our government is doing to build effective and resilient infrastructure for all Ontarians?

Together, let’s build health care networks that better serve our patients and keep our province moving ahead.

Infrastructure investments ensure a stronger economy, better jobs and bigger paycheques for all Ontarians.

Communities like Brampton, Windsor and my region of Durham are all places that have long advocated for infrastructure investments, but, sadly, the previous Liberal government ignored our needs.

Now is the time for our government to act. Now is the time to get shovels in the ground.

Can the Minister of Infrastructure tell the House what critical projects our government is undertaking as we, together, rebuild Ontario?

I want to thank the member for his words today and his tireless advocacy as a survivor and on behalf of the Indian residential school legacy.

Madam Speaker, there’s been a lot of work done here. In my previous chapter, I was personally involved in a number of schools in communities in the Kiiwetinoong riding to either be seriously rehabilitated or replaced. All too often, we found or realized that part of the success in building those schools, part of the success around water, waste water treatment, was electrification, the capacity and the stability of it. I think we can agree on that.

The member opposite had an extraordinary opportunity in his community just a week ago to turn one switch off of diesel generation and another switch on. And his own chief admitted and said in jubilation that this was an extraordinary opportunity for, amongst others, school and water infrastructure.

Does he agree with the proposition that other corridors in northern Ontario, particularly the central part of northern Ontario that are not covered by Watay Power, offer us up an extraordinary opportunity for prosperity, to electrify those communities so that critical infrastructure like water, sewer and schools can—