I move that the House recognize newly elected members of provincial Parliament for their contributions to public service and their communities.

But I’m back, Speaker, to talk a little bit more today and finish off just the last few remarks of my speech. I’m really pleased to have the opportunity to do so, because as it came to a conclusion the other day, I was talking about the flood that we’d had in the community of Bracebridge in 2019, when—I was obviously very fortunate to be the mayor of that community for many years. But I really wanted to talk about how the people in that community performed during such a difficult time, and how they are so representative of the people throughout our riding.

I was saying that we got a lot of good things done during our council times through the term, but then we got to 2019, and very quickly we had some changes with some unfortunate weather late in the season, and saw a flood that was quite devastating for a lot of people. In Bracebridge—it’s a unique community—there’s quite a bit of elevation to it, but also a lot of it, obviously, was built near water. So in portions of the community, things were absolutely fine—you could drive around and it was a regular day—but in portions of the community, things were very far from fine. We have an urbanized area and a lot of rural area in the Bracebridge community. A lot of properties were cut off, and a lot of people were at risk for their personal safety and the safety of their property.

It was amazing, Speaker, because so many people came together. The people who maybe didn’t have so much on the line and lived in parts of the community where everything was fine immediately dropped everything to help those in our community where things were very much not fine. It was an incredibly touching and moving experience, as the leader of a community, to see people come together like that. But this was a persistent event. It had rained after the initial rains that caused the flooding, and it snowed. People were working incredibly hard over what was a weekend—where they had the opportunity to be away from their jobs or their loved ones, to pitch in and lend a hand, but the workweek was coming, and frankly, people were burning out. There’s only so much that a group of volunteers can do, but they refused to quit, and we got some help for them from the military. I want to thank them again for the amazing job that they did.

It was easy to get down when the weather continued to be tough and make this event drag on longer than everyone hoped it would, but you would have these moments of spectacular human kindness from people who wanted to help, from people who wanted to volunteer—and not just from our community, but from other communities. Just when you were at your lowest and feeling like our community was in a perilous place, and people were getting burnt-out and tired, my phone would ring and it would be someone from Peterborough, or it would be someone from Orillia or somebody from Hamilton with a simple question: “How can I help? I’ve got a shovel. I want to sandbag. I want to help. What time do you want me there?”

Boy, it picks you up when you see that kind of good in people, and you know that there are folks out there for whom just simply sitting at home watching the news was enough of a call to action for them to say, “How can I help?” I find those words some of the most powerful words that one individual can speak to another.

As I wrap up my remarks, I just want to say that those folks, the folks in my community who asked that question, “How can I help?”, are the inspiration for me wanting to do this job, the inspiration for me wanting to represent people every day, represent everyone every day—but they’re particularly inspiring. I’ve always found that without volunteers, obviously, our communities would cease to function. We make incredibly important decisions here; I did so in my previous municipal history, but it does not compare, in many ways, to the volume of acts of kindness that happen every day amongst individuals to keep communities whole and really make them what they are.

So I salute everybody who asks another individual or group, “How can I help?” I salute those who volunteer their time to groups to make communities better, organizations better, our society better. It’s what makes Ontario an amazing place. It’s what makes Canada an amazing place.

I’ll conclude my remarks at that today, Mr. Speaker, but I do appreciate the opportunity to celebrate volunteerism, to thank everybody who does take that time to help one another, and to encourage people to take those opportunities, every time they have them, to do so.