I just want to acknowledge the member from Nickel Belt. It’s always a pleasure listening to you and listening to the issues that pertain to our health care system.

I just want to talk about the investments made by our government, especially talking about the Weeneebayko Area Health Authority health campus of care, a new culturally appropriate health campus that will include a new hospital and lodge, as well as a new ambulatory care centre on Moose Factory Island. Another example is building a new francophone community health centre to consolidate primary care, nursing, and mental health and addictions services in a modern facility. Another long-term-care project is the Golden Manor project, building 50 new long-term-care beds—and the list goes on.

My question to the member is simple: Do you support these investments, and do you support this throne speech?

Question?

Question?

Debate deemed adjourned.

Let’s be clear: It was the Conservative government that privatized home care and privatized long-term care. And let’s also be clear: We know that under this Conservative government’s watch, 5,000 of our seniors—parents, grandparents, mothers-in-law—have died in long-term care, in for-profit homes. Just last week, Madam Speaker, 40 died—in the last two weeks.

Knowing this, do we feel it’s okay to give medical information of patients—seniors—to long-term-care providers without their consent, which is in Bill 7?

My constituents in Nickel Belt continue to wait for this government to follow through on their commitment to provide affordable child care spaces—parents like Janelle, from Chelmsford in my riding. Janelle has had her child on the registry since April of last year—that’s 16 months ago—but she has yet to find a child care spot. This young woman travels and has applied to 10 different child care centres, yet she is still empty handed, her maternity leave ends in September, and she wants to go back to work, but cannot do that without child care for her baby.

K.G. lives in Hanmer and is a registered nurse. She has two young children on multiple wait-lists. She would accept driving to two different daycares, twice a day, every day so that she can get back to caring for patients as a nurse. Her maternity leave is done. She wants to get back to work, she is very much needed as a nurse, but she cannot go back to work until she finds child care for both of her children.

Yesterday the government stated, “Every job that sits unfilled hurts Ontario’s economy.” I agree, Speaker. But those are just two of the thousands of professional jobs across our province that are unfilled because this government won’t follow through on the commitment to deliver child care to the working parents of Ontario—talk about an easy solution that would help our health care system tremendously.

This past Friday, I joined the honourable member for Leeds–Grenville–Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, with members of the Rural FASD—fetal alcohol spectrum disorder—Support Network, at South Gower Park to hear more about the impact a $500,000 Youth Opportunities Fund grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation will have. The four-year-long grant was awarded in 2022 and is designed to help the organization and its organizational mentor group, Open Doors for Lanark Children and Youth, to expand on their work with individuals with FASD and their caregivers. Individuals diagnosed with FASD experience unique and complex challenges in all stages of life. This investment will go a long way to provide the appropriate support for individuals with FASD and their caregivers.

In addition to improved access to programs and training, the Rural FASD Support Network will be able to expand upon its peer-facilitated support and fellowship, and provide additional forums for people with FASD to share their voice and lived experiences. The network connects individuals with FASD and their caregivers from across Ontario with local FASD-informed service providers and provides evidence-based, researched training. Thanks to the grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation, people with FASD will be able to access those needed supports to achieve their full life potential.

I’m always honoured to rise in this chamber. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the residents of Markham–Thornhill, the most ethnically diverse riding in Canada, for putting their faith and trust in me and re-electing me for a second term.

I want to thank all my re-elected and newly elected colleagues in the House. I would like to especially thank our Premier for his strong leadership in Ontario.

My success wouldn’t have been possible without my wonderful campaign team. I would like to take this opportunity to thank my volunteers, my family, my core team.

Mr. Speaker, when I escaped from fear of persecution and came to Canada as a refugee, I had nothing. I lost almost everything, except for my hopes and dreams to live in this wonderful province, to have peace and harmony. And here I am, a re-elected representative in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, a symbol of democracy. I never thought that one day I would become an MPP and a parliamentary assistant.

I thank my parents for giving me their values, principles and courage to become who I am today. I regret that they are not here, but they are looking at me from above.

As Ontario reopens, we have now started to re-engage with our community. I was happy to attend the 25th anniversary of Vedic Cultural Centre in my riding. I would like to congratulate President Yash Kapur and his team.

In this 43rd Parliament, my goal is to drive on forward and get it done.

It’s an honour to stand and speak today about an important event that happens in Ottawa’s east end: Dapo Day, held the third Saturday in August, and this past Saturday was its 20th anniversary. Twenty years ago, the Agoro family lost their son and brother Dapo Agoro to senseless knife violence. The Dapo Agoro Foundation for Peace was born out of the loss. The Agoro family wanted to not only honour their son and brother Dapo but to be a catalyst for change.

As humans, we all face trauma, adversity and stress on a daily basis, and the ability to recognize and recover is a tool that we all need, both as individuals but also as a community. The Dapo Agoro Foundation is a non-profit organization that promotes non-violent conflict resolution.

This year’s anniversary featured a virtual panel discussion around the road to resilience. The panel explored the definition of all that resilience means, including what it means when someone can be too resilient, and shared personal examples of this resilience. The attendees left with new insights and connections within Ottawa for help and learning.

Sadly, it’s a daily occurrence to read in the news of young men and women being hurt and killed by violence. Nevertheless, this foundation continues to honour Dapo Agoro’s memory by exploring how to build a healthier, stronger community to support our youth and help them navigate their lives.

I just want to talk for a moment this morning; I’m looking forward to speaking a bit about our health care system, because we in Ontario cherish our public health care system. The right to health care for everyone regardless of income or where they live is part of our identity as Canadians. So it’s no surprise Ontarians are reacting to this government’s recent attack on public health care and seniors’ care with growing fear and anxiety.

I want to take the few moments that I have here this morning to speak to something very specific, which is this government’s decision to table a time allocation motion on their government bill, Bill 7, on long-term care. This is the bill that would deny seniors and their families the right to consent to where they want to be sent for long-term care. I wanted to raise that because the government has tabled a time allocation motion that would prevent committee hearings, prevent this bill from going to committee, which means that the people of this province who care about these issues, which are most Ontarians, will not have an opportunity to speak, to present and, frankly, to outline their concerns or arguments around this legislation.

I think it’s really unfortunate. I think that we need to do better here in this place. This government was elected with a majority. They can do whatever they want, pretty much, at this point. I encourage them, please, to provide an opportunity for people to speak to this bill, for experts to come and express their concerns, and maybe we can actually create some good legislation in this place.

I would like to welcome to Queen’s Park Michael Elliot. Mike started in my constituency office in Norwood, banged on probably more doors than I did, the only person in the 2018 campaign—he is now working for the Minister of Health in Saskatchewan. Welcome to Queen’s Park, Mike.

I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge and to introduce Elya Keren-Sagiv, a legislative page from my riding of York Centre. Today is her last day as part of the program. Congratulations and all the best on your journey ahead.

I would like to recognize one of our long-time constituents, triOS College, on celebrating their 30th anniversary this summer.

Speaker, triOS began and are still headquartered in my riding of Mississauga–Streetsville. They began 30 years ago by offering network operating systems training to computer resellers and corporations.

In the 1990s, they expanded into career training of unemployed adults, acquired a five-city chain of career colleges, and became triOS College of Information Technology.

After the dot-com meltdown of 2001, they pivoted from IT to offering business, health care, law, and supply chain programs.

They’ve since expanded to eight campuses in Ontario, plus four more locations in the Maritimes as Eastern College.

In the past two years, they’ve launched an online college and partnered with Sault College and Mohawk College as their GTA training partner.

Speaker, triOS College employs over 700 staff and faculty, trains over 5,000 students daily and has graduated over 60,000 adults into meaningful jobs, including thousands—yes, thousands—of PSWs.

Speaker, triOS has been recognized as one of Canada’s best-managed companies for the past 12 years.

Please recognize their co-founder and CEO, Frank Gerencser, together with his team, John Cruickshank and Massimo Noce, who are in the members’ gallery today. Welcome.

I seek unanimous consent to move a motion to allow an emergency debate on the health care crisis this afternoon during orders of the day.

It’s a great pleasure to have three very special people with me in the members’ gallery today: my wife, Margot Byers; my mother, Mary Byers; and my lovely daughter-in-law, Teresa Silva-Byers. Thank you very much for being here, and welcome.

I’m now going to ask our pages to assemble so that we can thank them.

Our pages are smart, trustworthy and hard-working. They are indispensable to the effective functioning of the chamber. They have cheerfully and efficiently delivered notes, ran errands, transported important documents throughout the precinct, and have made sure that our water glasses are always full. We have been indeed fortunate to have them here during this special summer sitting of the Legislature.

They depart having made many new friends, with a greater understanding of parliamentary democracy and memories that will last a lifetime. Each of them will go home and carry on, resume school in the fall, continue their studies and will, no doubt, contribute to their communities, their province and their country in important ways in the coming years.

We expect great things from all of you. Maybe some of you will someday take your seats in this House as members or work here as staff. We wish you very, very well.

Please join me in thanking and expressing our appreciation to our legislative pages.

Applause.

I’d like to welcome, in the members’ gallery, Erin Ariss from the Ontario Nurses’ Association, vice-president, region 4, and a registered nurse in Ontario, and Nour Alideeb, a government relations specialist. Thank you for being here. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

I’d like to recognize several special guests of mine from the great riding of Windsor–Tecumseh. In the west members’ gallery are my lovely and amazing wife, Mary; my mother, Mary Jo; my exceptional campaign manager and executive assistant, Paul Synnott; and my tremendous, hard-working constituency assistant, Rachel Haddad, who excels in helping people, day in and day out, those in need. Thank you so much for being here, to all my special guests, for their first visit and certainly not the last visit.

I am pleased to have in the gallery my new legislative assistant, Tanner Zelenko; one of Ontario’s top educators, Beth Allison; and the one and only, my wife, Denise Flack. Welcome.

I’d like to introduce and welcome today to the House Jacqueline Pizzimenti, the daughter of a very good friend of mine who just completed her psychology degree and is on her way to Windsor to study and do her master’s in social work. I welcome her to the House—her first opportunity to see the place in action.

Today is the last day for our pages. Daunte Hillen is a page from Hamilton Mountain. I know he’s missing all of his baseball games, but he’s really happy to be here, supporting us.

Thank you, Daunte. Thank you to all the pages. We’ll miss you, again.