I’m honoured to rise in the House as the MPP for Windsor West for a third term. I want to thank my constituents for again placing their trust in me. I want to thank my family. No MPP can effectively do their job without the support of their family. Every one of us in this House can attest to that. Thank you to my campaign team: Farah, Kallie, Robin, Ian, Darlene, Mirna, Brian, Mo, Melanie, Dougie and Joyce, and to every volunteer for all their work supporting me and the people of Windsor West.

I rise today knowing many in my community are struggling to make ends meet. The immense pressure from increasing costs of living and stagnant wages is causing great distress for families in my community.

Everyone in this province deserves a safe, stable place to call home. They deserve access to food and shelter without having to choose between the two or to rely on food banks.

People with disabilities live in legislated poverty, something this government could change, but won’t.

Mental health and addiction struggles are impacting many in my community and across the province as financial pressures escalate.

Our health care system is in crisis and government policy is making it worse. We’re losing our doctors and nurses while this government continues to chip away at public health care.

Seniors deserve the best care, to live with dignity, to choose where they live in the community they want to live in, yet this government is ramming through a bill that strips them of the ability to consent to where they live and receive support, and who has access to their personal information, simply because they accessed hospital care.

My NDP colleagues and I will continue to stand up for the public good rather than private interests, and I will continue to rise in this House to fight for what matters most to my constituents.

Thank you for the question. In fact, our government is aligning our increases—historic increases—of ODSP to inflation. That’s exactly what we’re doing, and we’re taking an all-of-government approach. We’re listening across the board. We are making sure that those who can work are receiving the job readiness programs and the training they need, and for those who cannot work, we are supporting those individuals, those also in financial crises, the municipalities, and making sure that the social service providers have the resources they need. That was exactly what the $1-billion social services relief funding was for.

We are getting the funding to the communities, the people who need it, through the micro-credentialing strategy, the Roadmap to Wellness, the new child care spaces, the Ontario Child Benefit, the dental care for low-income seniors, the CARE tax credit, the LIFT tax credit, the Ontario Jobs Training Tax Credit, the Ontario Energy and Property Tax Credit, and the minimum wage increase. We are continuing to listen, continuing to do what is necessary to support our most vulnerable and to help those who can work get back into the workforce.

I’d like to thank the member from Niagara West for his question, although I think there are a few mistakes in there.

One of the reasons that I became very interested and very engaged in politics was Bill 115—and that was wage-suppression tactics that were by the Liberal government at the time and supported by the Conservatives. That was a direct attack on teachers, a direct attack on workers, and one that the Conservatives really supported.

And you see a parallel: There was Bill 115, which took away the bargaining rights of educators in the education system, and now we have Bill 124, which takes away the bargaining rights of nurses and front-line health care heroes. So, really, it’s old wine in new bottles. We see the same tricks. We see the same sorts of omnibus legislation.

Supporting workers in my riding is something that’s very key, and I find it very concerning that the member would try to paint this brush—we keep hearing about this coalition that never existed. It’s funny how this government is really trying to change history, but it’s really not working.

We don’t see any support from this government for front-line workers; if we did, we would actually see them repeal Bill 124.

I want to turn to the Premier’s comments from March 30, 2020, when he was speaking about Bill 124 and speaking about health care professionals. He said: “If it was up to me, I’d just give them the bank.” Well, it has been two years, and we still see this deliberate wage suppression, this disrespectful Bill 124.

To the second part of the question, in terms of social assistance rates: We know that there was a Conservative government that slashed social assistance rates by 22.5%, and then there were 15 years when the Liberals could have fixed that and they chose to do nothing—so much so that that initial cut was drastic, and yet people are worse off now than they were then. And this government seems to claim that 5% is going to change everything; it’s not. As the member points out, $58 is not going to fix it for people. There are people who have spoken to me who have indicated that they’ve withheld medication, that they are on the brink of losing their home, and that if they’re about to go on the streets, they may choose to take that medication. That is a shocking reality that this government refuses to admit. They should not be patting themselves on the back for 5%; they should be doubling it.

We always from the government that the private sector is going to somehow be the greatest thing since sliced bread—it’s going to be choice; it’s going to be efficient; it’s going to be accurate. And yet, no, as soon as they take over contracts, it ends up costing far more, and people don’t have the care that they need.