Mr. Speaker, our government is unyielding in our commitment to keep kids in the classroom. That is the most important thing we can do. Children have faced perhaps some of the most difficulty in modern history. Their mental and physical health, their social and emotional development, and their academic success are at risk.

The union confirmed yesterday that they’re on a path to a strike, effective this Friday, and so yesterday the government reached out to this specific union with the intent of offering a better deal: 10% over four years, maintaining the best pension and benefits and 131 days of sick leave in this country. That is a reasonable offer, because nothing should come in the way of a child’s right to learn.

It has been so difficult for children, and that’s why we’re standing up. We’re making it clear we will do everything possible to keep kids in the classroom.

Our workers do important work in our schools. We value what they do. It’s why we’re offering them an increase every single year over the course of their program. We said to them yesterday, “Work with us. Rescind your commitment to strike on Friday and bargain to get a deal.” They decided that they’re going to proceed with a strike on Friday, imposing further hardship on children who have faced unprecedented difficulty in this province. This government believes children should be in school, and we will stand up to ensure they remain there, without disruption, right to June.

Mr. Speaker, it’s always a privilege to stand in this place, but I’ll tell you, I wish we were here today talking about something very different. Unfortunately, in this moment, what we are doing, for anybody watching, is we’re debating a motion that this government has put forward to fast-track a deeply anti-democratic, anti-worker and ultimately anti-student bill, legislation, in this place, using all the tools at their disposal on the legislative front, when the government, the members opposite, could be using this time at the bargaining table, actually negotiating a deal, as government should do, with the workers they employ. But no, this is what this government wants to spend their time on. They want to talk about moving legislation through faster again, once again to take away the democratic rights of working people to negotiate the terms and conditions of their work.

They could be at the table. In fact, I would imagine that CUPE right now is probably down at the Sheraton, like they have been for months, with their sleeves rolled up, waiting for this minister to show up one day, but nothing. Instead—and I think what’s really interesting, Mr. Speaker, is that it’s pretty clear that this government has had this legislation cued up for some time. We saw it months and months ago when this government—instead of actually talking about negotiations and sitting down at the bargaining table, this minister and this government decided to threaten those workers, right off the bat, with back-to-work legislation. They’ve been talking about it for months and months and months. Why? Why such a rush? What’s the big rush?

Well, Mr. Speaker, I can tell you why I think they’re rushing through this fast-tracking motion: because this minister and this government want to distract. They want to distract from what’s actually happening in our classrooms. They want to distract from other news, like the fact that this Premier won’t show up at the commission in Ottawa. They want to distract as much as possible. They want to distract from the fact—and I want to remind this government again, because parents in this province will not forget: This government shut down schools for 27 weeks, the worst record in Canada and in most of the world—absolutely terrible—and that could have been avoided, that 100% could have been avoided.

They want to rush this legislation through because they want to distract from the fact that they have squirrelled away billions of dollars that should have been spent in classrooms—$6 billion—that this government chose to sit on, instead of spending it on public education. I want to say that it’s our kids, our students that paid the price for that.

I was in Barrie last week and somebody pulled me aside and said, “Do you know what? I’ve got a kid in kindergarten in a class of 40 kids. Thank you. Thank you for standing up for us.” This government could have reduced class sizes in the middle of that pandemic, and they chose not to. Instead, they were using that opportunity to set the table, let’s say, to undermine workers’ rights, every second of every day. That is what this government wants to do—55,000 education workers in this province—

Interjection.

And do you know what they do? They’re ECEs. They’re educational assistants. They’re the custodians that keep our schools clean. These are the people in our schools who make $39,000 and less, and all they are asking for is a nickel an hour more—a nickel. And will this government give it to them? No, they won’t.

Interjection: No, that’s what they’re offering; they’re only offering a nickel—

Interjection: They don’t want that.

Interjections.

Interjections.

This is a government that likes to talk about working people, Mr. Speaker. But I’ve got news for you: Education workers are working people. Education workers are parents. Parents are working people. And the facts are facts: You are legislating away their collective bargaining rights, and you’re doing it to distract from the significant cuts and undermining of our public education system under this government.

I want to talk for a minute about why I’m so deeply concerned with the fast-tracking of this legislation, because I think we need to talk about what the real costs of this bill are going to mean. Not only is it going to undermine labour peace—I think that goes without saying—and alienate the entire education community, not just the 55,000 workers impacted directly by this legislation, but undermining the morale of education workers all across this province, including teachers and others, and all of that when we’ve already seen how this pandemic impacted our communities, our classrooms, families—all of this is going to impact students.

As New Democrats, we are very focused on what’s going to work for students in classrooms, and we are very focused on how to improve the quality of life for the people who work in those classrooms. I’ll tell you why that matters in the big picture, Mr. Speaker, and why, again, it’s so problematic that this government would want to rush through this legislation. It’s because the early childhood educators, the educational assistants, the administrators, the custodians, the people who care for and nurture our children in our classrooms, the people who keep our schools clean—all of those people deserve our respect, and if we do not respect them and this government fails to pay them a living wage and respect their basic democratic rights, they’re going to leave. That’s what’s already happening. The same crisis that we have seen in our health care system, which is causing emergency rooms to shut down, which is causing a crisis in communities across this province, is hitting our education sector too. There are not going to be educational assistants to support our students with special needs.

We are already in a crisis in terms of early childhood educators. The average number of years that an early childhood educator works in early childhood education? Guess. Three years. Why? Because they’re underappreciated, they’re given no respect by this government, and they’re paid too little.

There’s a fix. It’s simple. You’ve got to show people a bit of respect. That starts with treating them like a union that has the rights of every other union—democratic rights to collective bargaining.

But this government continues to show deep disrespect. Rushing this legislation through means that those folks are not going to have a chance to sit down at a committee and talk about the issues that they have with this legislation. It means that at 5 in the morning, we’re going to be debating this when a lot of people who care about this legislation are going to be getting up and trying to get their kids to school, getting themselves ready to work. So I don’t understand why—

Interjection.