It gives me great pleasure to introduce nurse Angela Preocanin—she is the Ontario Nurses’ Association First Vice-President—as well as Erica Woods, also from ONA. Welcome to Queen’s Park, ladies.

Over the last month, seniors, their families, physicians, nurses and health experts have all warned that government Bill 7 will do nothing to stop emergency room closures, nothing to hire or retrain more nurses or to end the crisis in our health care system. An opinion poll in today’s Globe and Mail confirms that a majority of Ontario families agree.

Why is the government plowing ahead with this dangerous plan?

Every measure we put in place, the opposition votes against it—doom and gloom every single day.

But what we’re seeing is a record number of applications to be nurses in colleges and universities across Ontario—25,000 applications right here, post-secondary education in Ontario. And why is that? That’s because of the investments we’re making in long-term care and the Ministry of Health—58,000 new and upgraded beds in long-term care; $40-billion capital investments over 52 projects that will add 3,000 new beds over the next 10 years; new hospitals in Brampton, in Windsor, in Niagara Falls.

Students want to become nurses, and the post-secondary education opportunities right here in Ontario are driving those students to those opportunities.

I have a petition to stop this government’s health care privatization plan. It reads:

“To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“Whereas Ontarians should get health care based on need—not the size” of their wallets;

“Whereas” the Premier and Health Minister “say they’re planning to privatize parts of health care;

“Whereas privatization will bleed nurses, doctors and PSWs out of our public hospitals, making the health care crisis worse;

“Whereas privatization always ends with patients getting a bill;

“Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to immediately stop all plans to further privatize Ontario’s health care system, and fix the crisis in health care by:

“—repealing Bill 124 and recruiting, retaining and respecting doctors, nurses and PSWs with better pay and better working conditions;

“—licensing tens of thousands of internationally educated nurses and other health care professionals already in Ontario, who wait years and pay thousands to have their credentials certified;

“—making education and training free or low-cost for nurses, doctors and other health care professionals;

“—incentivizing doctors and nurses to choose to live and work in northern Ontario;

“—funding hospitals to have enough nurses on every shift, on every ward.”

I couldn’t agree more with this petition. I will affix my signature and send it to the table with page Arushi.