Thank you to the member from Toronto Centre. I want to congratulate them on their success in the election.

One thing she said earlier on—she was talking about health care—was, we’re not investing; we’re in fact making a cut. She was talking about the dollars towards—versus the cost of living and the inflation rate being at 8.1%.

Some 27 years ago, Speaker, as you know, the former Conservative government under Mike Harris cut OW and ODSP by 21%.

Then, in 2018-19, they started bragging about the 1.5% increase.

And then this budget is looking at 5%.

With your lived experience of being on social assistance, can you explain what it means when you can’t make ends meet, when you don’t make enough money even to pay for rent, let alone for food or hydro?

Thank you to the member opposite.

It does not meet the current needs that people have. It actually doesn’t come close to meeting the inflation cost and pressures. Someone in my community said to me, “Milk is so expensive right now, and babies need milk.” People on ODSP need the government to recognize that. It does not meet the current need of the affordability crisis that people are facing in this province, and it’s actually forcing them into food bank lines.

In my riding, there has been an over 25% increase in food bank use. When you look at the faces of those individuals, it’s really changing.

There’s a real, desperate need there. If you talk to people who are part of the ODSP coalition, you’ll hear that it needs much more than that.

We, the Ontario Liberals, say 20% immediately, with a review of the basic income pilot so that we can provide adequacy for people who are most vulnerable in this province.

So I do believe that all Ontarians should be able to have a choice in how they live in our society, and our society should accommodate that.

What is very distressing in this situation is that the government creates so many hurdles for people who are on ODSP, even just to access support. During the pandemic, there was a $200 amount that they had access to, but they had to go through their caseworker. So many people contacted my office because those offices were closed, or people were working from home and they were inaccessible. So why would the government put an extra burden on people on ODSP, rather than just distributing the funds to the cases that they know they have on record and have on file?

Absolutely, there is more that can be done to support people with disabilities in this province.

I’d like to thank the member opposite for a very eloquent speech and address to the House. She touched on many very important issues that we obviously addressed during the election. And we won a historic victory.

We also understand—this House, this party and this government understand—that all Ontarians are struggling, not only with inflation but the rising cost of living in all the areas she touched on.

A simple question to the member for Scarborough–Guildwood: Does the opposition not support the historic increase to the ODSP that we are presenting, that will be adjusted, I might add, for inflation in the future?

We often rise in this House and put questions to the government, but sometimes those questions are best coming from our constituents. I want to raise this one from a constituent back home for the member for Scarborough–Guildwood. It’s from Donna Behnke. She’s from Elliot Lake. She writes: “If any of them had a single ethical bone in their body or even the slightest hint of common decency, they would do what is right. Does”—she used “Ford,” but I’ll change it to “Premier”—“not realize some people on ODSP are fighting mental illness? People with cancer, people that had strokes, people that had multiple sclerosis—the list goes on and on. He needs to stop painting everyone with the same paintbrush. The Premier and prior governments always target the poor. You can’t make healthy people by destroying them. They will never be fit to hold a job. But what it will do is push more people to seek out MAID.”

My question to the member is, do you agree with Donna?

I’d like to thank the member from Scarborough–Guildwood for her presentation.

My question is quite simple: What, in their mind, would be an acceptable increase in ODSP and OW?

Speaker, I don’t think I’ve had the opportunity, so congratulations on being re-elected as Speaker. I know all of us here are delighted that you were successful in the chair, and I wish all the best to your contested opponent that didn’t make it.

I want to congratulate the member from Thunder Bay–Superior North for getting elected this session. She mentioned in her speech many very relevant things about the north, and one of the comments she said was that sometimes the north is an afterthought. We’ve heard that a lot from our northern members.

She highlighted that the first working group of injured workers was developed and created in Thunder Bay, and I wondered if she could speak to the challenges of how they get pushed into poverty, into ODSP, and the challenges around finding housing. I know in London it’s really difficult to find affordable, geared-to-income housing, especially when you’re on things like ODSP and OW.

And then the other thing that I hear a lot, and I wonder if it’s a commonality in the north, is about access to doctors. I’m getting, almost daily, constituents saying that Health Care Connect is not working and they cannot get a doctor.

Thank you. I will try to remember all the pieces of that.

Yes, the Thunder Bay injured workers support group is an amazing group of very hard-working activists, and the problems they face are—first of all, if they experience an injury and can’t work anymore, it’s a loss of self; it’s a loss of identity. And then to be told, “No, you haven’t been injured” or “We’re going to deem that you can be a parking lot attendant” after having a good job is extremely demoralizing.

Now, finding a doctor: We know that the waiting list for doctors in Thunder Bay has as many as 2,000 people on each list, so it’s extremely difficult. But in addition to that, the WSIB has created a policy where it does not listen to the doctors of those who have been injured. Instead, it chooses to listen to doctors who never actually meet the people—it’s done over the phone—and they deem that they are not permanently injured. So it is a massive crisis for people who receive permanent injuries on the job, and then if they’re put on ODSP, well, there is no housing.

Social housing lineups are also very, very deep. And frankly, social housing has not been maintained and funded to be maintained for a very long time, and so it’s actually quite dangerous if you wind up living in social housing. It shouldn’t be. We have fantastic co-operative housing in Thunder Bay that should be a model for the entire province, and that is the best place for people with disabilities to live. However, they have a seven-year waiting list.

I thank the member from Hamilton Mountain for this question. It is something that I hear about constantly from constituents in Ottawa West–Nepean.

The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Ottawa is $1,160. Unfortunately, that’s about the amount of ODSP for a single individual. That means you pay the rent and you have no money left over. Ontario Works is even less, which means that you can’t even find a place to live if you collect Ontario Works, let alone have enough money for food and for anything extra.

I have a friend who is living on ODSP, who is not only struggling to make ends meet, but also lives in constant fear that this government is so mean-spirited that they are going to find additional ways to claw more benefits back from him. I think it’s incredibly cruel. I think it’s time that the government actually address poverty by doubling Ontario Works and ODSP rates.