Good morning, Mr. Speaker. We’ve got a white sheet of snow outside that makes everything look like nice and clean. It’s a beautiful morning.

I’m glad that the Minister of Energy is here with us this morning, because he actually confirmed something that I’m going to be talking about a little bit later. It’s all good stuff—well, some of it, anyway.

The page who was here, Havana, is from Algoma–Manitoulin. She disappeared. Where did she go? I warned her I was going to be talking about her this morning. She’s going to be here with us and helping us, and I hope that everybody welcomes her. She’s going to follow in the footsteps of her sister Demily, who was a page here, as well, about five, six years ago.

It’s a wonderful experience that the pages have—to be here in the middle of the discussion that we’re going to be having on the fall economic statement, because some of it covers them. It’s always nice to have the hallway chats with the pages. In the beginning, they come in and look around, and it’s a big building and they’re all excited, but then they start listening to the debate, and you can engage discussions with them in the hallway. Let’s not kid ourselves; they are listening. I would encourage everybody to engage with your pages.

Every time that I rise in the House, I always try to bring a perspective from northern Ontario, particularly from the good people of Algoma–Manitoulin, to the floor of the Legislature. No different than I’ve always done, that’s where I’m going to start off with—the shortfalls.

I look at the fall economic statement as an opportunity for this government to indicate to the province as to where they’re going, what their priorities are, what’s important to them—and have they been listening to Ontarians, have they been listening to the concerns of their constituents? I’m sure they’re hearing the same issues that I’m hearing from the good people of Algoma–Manitoulin—such things as, what’s going on in our schools, what’s going on with the economy, what’s going on with our energy prices. That white sheet we see outside that makes everything clean—well, that white sheet is not taking off any of the pressures that people are feeling on their electricity bills or their home heating oil bills.

That’s where I want to start off today. This was an opportunity to help those who are really in need.

The 5% this government has indicated as a historical increase in ODSP really is a pittance when you’re looking at individuals who are paying their rent—anywhere between $1,500 to $2,200—and with the price of food that has gone up.

Let me give you an example, Speaker. I met up with Chief Manitowabi of Wiikwemkoong First Nation, along with many of their councillors. The oil companies are also feeling the impacts of delivery, because when you’re delivering small amounts of oil, it means you’re going to households more often. When we look at the cost of heating—let’s go to last year: the average cost of oil was approximately $1.718. That was just last year, and that was tough—for people to meet the costs and pay their bills. Two years ago, it was half of that cost; 75 cents per litre is what they were paying. Because the higher costs have come in, that means the cost for an average minimum delivery to a home has gone from $500 to $800. When I met up with Chief Manitowabi—actually, I should say Ogimaa Manitowabi—along with many of the community members, we were trying to look at how seniors are going to be able to afford this, how single-income homeowners are going to be able to afford it, how individuals on Ontario Works—and support systems aren’t going to be able to help.

Here are the numbers: In First Nations communities, for a household of one, their monthly income is $390; a household of two is $642; three, $697; four, $756; five, $815; six and above is $844.

As I said earlier, the oil companies are now not delivering less than a minimum of $800 to fill up a little bit more than half of their tank. So the discussions that we had with the oil companies were, “Well, if we reduce the price, that means we reduce the oil,” which means they’re going to have to come more times. The volume is not there; it’s just the cost has gone up.

I wanted to go through that exercise just to explain that these are some of the actual—how are these people going to make ends meet? Seniors have two small pensions coming in—whether they’re on CPP, a little bit of OAS and a little bit of a pension. You’re looking at the cost of food having gone up, prescriptions have gone up, electricity—I want to touch on electricity.

I’m glad that a couple of days ago—actually, I’ve been on the Minister of Energy for quite some time now. This particular file in regard to—

Interruption.

There’s a small sawmill on Manitoulin Island. It’s owned by the Taylor family. Roslyn Taylor is a person I’ve been talking to for a very long time. This issue started with the previous government, so this goes back a long time. I have been talking with numerous Ministers of Energy from this government to try to solve this issue. I want to take you back to looking at some of her energy bills. She has her on-peak, mid-peak, off-peak times for a total of—this particular bill is for the month of June; this is in the summertime. Her actual usage is $2,050.85. Her delivery charges are $3,900. She’s paying $1,900 more in delivery charges than she’s actually paying in usage. This is a small business, and she has about—well, she had about 20 to 25 employees in the sawmill. Here’s another bill; this one was for May, I believe. Her usage was $1,626.09. The delivery cost was $3,666.43—$2,000 more than her actual usage. And there have been more of these. We’re talking about small businesses that are the backbone of many communities across northern Ontario.

In this fall economic statement, this was an opportunity for this government to show this as a priority, because there are a lot of Ontarians—whether you’re in northern Ontario, eastern Ontario or western Ontario, we’re all feeling the pinch. Every community has seniors. Every community has people who are on the verge of living paycheque to paycheque. Some are leaving their cupboards empty in order to pay their rent.

Again, I wanted to highlight those two particular issues that the government failed to address in their fall economic statement.

Doctor recruitment: Again, this is something that is a very big priority for northern Ontario—across this province. This was another opportunity for this government. I’m sure they’ve heard, because I know I’ve walked plenty of times across the way and suggested many ideas—as an opposition, that’s what we’re supposed to do. We’re very effective at our job, being the opposition—to look at the holes, to look at the shortfalls that the government has in their legislation. It’s also our job to propose good ideas, and we have proposed ideas—particularly some of the suggestions that have come out from the Huron Shores family network, where they have proposed how they could address some of their shortfalls by changing the fee model that is there for how they’re paying doctors. Under the RNPGA model that they’re utilizing now, it’s pushing away doctors from coming to the area. Many of the doctors who are being trained out of NOSM are being trained and prepared to come and work under an umbrella of a team, a network, where you have allies you can work with. The RNPGA model doesn’t provide that umbrella, so many of the doctors are forced to go into other areas. There are some doctors who are waiting to see if there’s going to be movement from this government to provide those different models of care that will address—it won’t fix it tomorrow morning, but it will definitely lay the path for many of the northern communities to go down a better path to recruiting and retaining doctors. So we’re still waiting for that to come forward.

I want to give a big shout-out to the Wawa hospital, particularly Ann Fenlon and the community there. They have been amazing at making sure that their emergency room—and so have many of the other hospitals: Thessalon, Sault Ste. Marie, Blind River, Elliot Lake. They have gone over and above doing what they need to do to recruit, making sure they have the doctors in place, and making sure their emergency rooms are not closed. Have they come close? Many times, they have.

I want to give some particular attention to the hospital in Wawa. In order to provide the services they need for their hospital, they have had 27 different locums provide care to that community. Why do they need it?

Well, let’s look at what’s happening in the community of Wawa, in that region. There’s a good problem, actually, that’s happening there—I boasted about having the three latest mines that have opened in Ontario. One of them was Silver Lake—originally, it was Harte Gold, but they’ve been bought out by Silver Lake. Then you have Alamos mine, the Magino mine, the Argonaut mine that has opened up; you also have Wesdome that is part of that region. When you look at that entire area and the amount of employees who are there from the mining sector, it has actually increased the emergency calls by 30%. That’s an important number. You’re looking at an influx of additional patients of roughly about—including if you’re looking at the summertime, because you’ve got people who come for tourism, who go to the parks, who enjoy the fisheries. Believe it or not, people do not wear the proper footwear when they go on the trails. They wear sandals when they should be wearing proper hiking shoes. People have slips and falls. People end up in emergency rooms. You’re looking at an influx of 6,600 additional people who are needing access to the hospital. I say that because the hospital in Wawa used to get funding for six doctors who are there; they’re down to four, soon to be down to three. I put a question to this government last week: Why has this government unilaterally cut their funding, taking away their opportunity to attract more doctors? They’ve increased their need for the emergency room, but they have actually removed the funding that they need in order to attract more doctors. Again, it’s a question that I put to this government, because when you’re looking at the numbers, it doesn’t justify the action.

It’s another shortfall that this government missed in this fall economic statement, to really look at a strong program, because the utilization of locums—Speaker, I don’t know if you know, but they are much more expensive than an actual doctor who provides primary care. Something I just found out is that there are lucrative incentives that, depending on the hospital—because now the hospital is forced to use their hospital budgets to attract locums to cover the needs of their emergency rooms. There’s no additional funding, but to make sure that they can attract them, certain hospitals are paying higher fees for locums than others.

So if I’m a young doctor—because this is the white elephant in the room—coming out of NOSM and looking at paying off my debt, not being provided with the umbrella of networks that I need to provide care, I’m going to look at becoming a locum, because I don’t have to worry about the shifts being imposed on me or covering the hospital. I can basically say, “I’m going to work in Elliot Lake for about 10 days, and then I’m going to take four days off, and then I’m going to go do some coverage in Wawa, and then I’ll take two days off, and then I’m going to take maybe six shifts in Thessalon, and then I’m going to take five days off.” You can do this and get paid very lucrative amounts of fees. Is that the answer we want? Coverage in the emergency room is one thing, but we’ve totally lost primary care.

It was great; this morning, we met with the registered nurses, who are looking for more nurse practitioner-led clinics, which will actually generate that primary care we need in many of these communities.

Why are we continuing to pay more for services that we know if we make the investments in them will actually save us money in the long run? Again, that’s a missed opportunity in this fall economic statement—and it’s not because this government doesn’t have the money. You do have the money. You just need to make it a priority to make the investments that are needed, whether it’s in education, whether it’s—oh, jeez, and I’m going to get to the winter roads as well, because that white sheet of snow needs to be cleared—in health care. But we’re not doing that.

Again, talking about that white sheet of snow: Northern Ontario is going to have plenty of it, and I see you have some here this morning. Road closures are a fact of life in northern Ontario. Unfortunately, in northern Ontario we do not have other modes of transportation. All I have is my car or my truck or my Jeep, and that’s how I get to work; it’s how I get my mom to her appointments; it’s how I get my children to recreation; it’s how the kids get on the bus to go to school. And when those roads are closed, it really doesn’t help our economy either.

Like I said, in a community north of Wawa, there are many mines that are there, and if the parts aren’t getting to the mine, if the products aren’t getting out of the mine, it’s a loss, and people are losing opportunities for working hours and are losing a lot of opportunity with their families.

Again, getting to and from the hospital—because we know we have to travel further for our services, keeping those roads open matters.

I’m glad—I think it’s this evening—that we’re going to be talking about a private member’s bill looking at enhancing the times that are allowed to have those roads cleared. I’m glad that one of the backbenchers from the Conservative government is bringing it forward—because the member from Mushkegowuk–James Bay had this particular bill, which was a lot better than what is being proposed tonight—and we’re going to be having that debate. It’s going to be interesting having the discussion. Finally, a light has lit up with the government side—that there are problems with northern highways, something we’ve known for a very long time, as northern members. But again, there’s nothing in this fall economic statement on that.

Those are just some of the issues I wanted to talk about this morning—and there’s the opioid crisis; we didn’t see that. We didn’t even see the word—not one word in this entire thing on autism.

Speaker, again, it’s a missed opportunity for this government. They have failed to really listen to what the priorities are for individuals in this province.

I look at this government and say, “Take heed of some of the criticism that is coming from this side of the House. You’ve got to do better.”

Thanks to the member.

There’s our world, the bubble that we live in here, and then there’s the real world of people and what they feel out there.

I just finished explaining that when a senior or an individual on OW gets notified that to heat their home this month is going to cost them a minimum of $800—and that will only fill up my heating tank a little bit over half. My income is less than $600. Where am I going to cut? What am I going to do? I won’t be able to pay for the entire cost of the fuel. I’m going to fall behind. I’m going to put it on the credit card, if I have a credit card. How am I going to fill my cupboards? How am I going to light up my house? People are living in poverty.

Again, it comes down to what I talked about. It’s a missed opportunity to really address some of the priorities. It’s not like this government does not have reserves or the money in order to address those shortfalls, whether it’s for seniors and people on OW or ODSP, or people in education, or investments in health care. You need to make it a priority.

When you’re talking about the petroleum tax, that the government has removed 5.7 cents and 5.4 cents on home heating and the gas—really? Do you not think for a moment that petroleum companies will take this as an opportunity and bump their prices so that they are not going to lose on the petroleum prices and the profits that are there? Really? You think that is going to help people? I don’t think it has helped anybody in northern Ontario, when we look at the dramatic prices and how fast they can go up in northern Ontario and how the heck long it takes them to come down. You see price increases in northern Ontario that happen the morning of, and it takes about three months for them to come back down. The 5.7 cents really is not a heck of a lot.

I want to thank the member from Niagara.

It’s about priorities. I started my speech this morning exactly on where their priorities are—and this being an opportunity for this government to tell Ontarians, in their fall economic statement, that this is their priority. Right now, from where I sit—and the member just hit it right on the head of the nail—this government’s priorities are a lot of window dressing. They’re saying the right things to have the bare minimum of impact on individuals, just enough to hit the headlines in the media, but no substance that is going to trickle down to those who are most in need—enough pixie dust to put on a little bit of shine, but really, no substance, no meat to put on the table.

When you look at what’s happening in the greenbelt, we see where the priorities of this government are—it’s for their friends, for the developers. Those are the individuals who are going to benefit from this fall economic statement. Very little do I see that is meeting the needs and the priorities of those—

I want to go back to the member from Carleton. I really like what she just finished off with. I want to ask her a question on behalf of Donna Behnke from Elliot Lake.

You’re planning to raise the annual income for people on ODSP from $200 to $1,000—when will that take effect? Also, it’s great that you’re doing that for some, and you’re also providing additional funding for parents with children. However, there are some single individuals out there who just cannot work. What are you doing for them? What is in this fall economic statement that is available for them? When are you planning on helping those individuals, who need help as well?

Also, the second part of that question that I asked is, what are you going to do for those individuals who don’t have the ability to work? They also need support, and that is not in this fall economic statement. Try not to go off and say there’s pixie dust where there’s not. Those individuals need help, too.

I think you’ve heard loud and clear from all my colleagues during our oppo day where the needs are and where the answers are also located. There are many answers that have been provided to this government, many suggestions that have been provided to this government.

This government continues to force hospitals and long-term-care homes to use agency nurses, which are three times the cost of what we know would work effectively. Give that opportunity for individuals to return to the workforce, to return under good working conditions: Repeal Bill 124 to remove those conditions that are there, but add 10 paid sick days so individuals can go back to work without any worries and care for the people who they work with, but also stay at home when they need to stay at home.

This government has created a self-imposed crisis. We ask ourselves, “Why did they create this crisis?” The simple answer to it is to accept them doing an action. What is that action? A lot of it comes down to privatization of those services. This government can stand in their place and deny it, but you can see it happening in all of the communities. It’s apparent this is your path. It’s in your DNA. There’s no changing it, and you cannot continually stand in this House and continue to deny that.

In Algoma–Manitoulin, a lot of the hospitals are operating their ER departments. Why? Because they have locums. We’re paying high fees for those locums to make sure that our ER—thank goodness that we have the ability, but that’s not the answer, because primary care is being set aside. Patients in their communities are not getting the care that they need. There are nurses—we had an excellent breakfast this morning with registered nurses who have the answers for this government. You need to sit with them, listen, provide them with the opportunity to expand their services. That’s part of the answer.