Withdrawn, Speaker.

For the sake of clarity, the lack of accurate information that was shared in my constituency by members of other political parties unfortunately led to a great deal of confusion when I would be speaking with our hard-working education workers at the doors. So I’m going to speak a little bit about the substantial investments that have been made in our education system, to clear the air and make sure that the cold, hard facts are on the table and that we see all the people in this chamber and those watching understand the substantial amounts of funding that have been allocated, the historic investments, and the rapid increases in that funding for the people of Ontario.

Thanks to the investments, which included major improvements to air quality and ventilation in schools all over the province, we’ve seen that Ontario’s classrooms are truly safe for in-person learning. I think that the Premier and the minister’s goal of ensuring that students stay in class all year we’re seeing has been a reality. We’ve seen students able to learn safely and with the supports that they need.

Now I can’t stress enough, Speaker, that it always is frustrating when I see people from other political parties sometimes mischaracterize or accuse us of an action that may not have actually occurred, but during my time, Speaker, I want to walk through some of our government’s investments in education and why we’re making them.

I want to say, Speaker, I was a little bit baffled when I first read this motion, because I know for a fact that our government has a great track record when it comes to education funding. I know that the Leader of the Opposition previously served as her party’s education critic, so I can only assume that she has some unfinished business on that file or perhaps she’s looking to try to get back at the minister for all the times that he responded to her questions with the facts about what was happening in our funding of the education system.

Now here’s a key fact, Speaker: Our government has increased the Ministry of Education’s investments every single year since we came to office. This includes a $2.3-billion increase in this year’s education funding, to a total of $34.7 billion for 2023-24. I can actually remember when I first became the parliamentary assistant for the education ministry. I remember the then Minister of Education announced when the threshold crossed $30 billion. I remember when we saw for the first time an education funding allocation that crossed $30 billion. I remember that we were commenting about how historic that was, the first government to ever allocate $30 billion, and now we’re at $34.7 billion. I don’t know about you, Speaker, but that sounds like a lot of money ensuring that we’re representing the single largest investment in Ontario’s history in the education system.

This massive investment actually stands for a 27% increase from the education year prior to our government forming office, a 27% increase over the past five years. I’d like to thank this entire House for supporting those investments, especially the members on this side. Unfortunately, we saw members of the opposition vote against those investments in the past. But I’m confident that with the historic amounts being brought onto the table in this 2023 budget, we should see the opposition perhaps come to their senses and support these investments in our local schools.

A 27% increase in education base funding in a five-year period, and yet we still hear from the opposition about cuts—I don’t know. Perhaps it’s a by-product of the discovery math days, but I don’t know where they’re coming to this conclusion, because the facts speak for themselves. We spent billions and billions of new dollars in education to ensure that each and every student is receiving a world-class education system here in the province of Ontario.

And we could look at this a different way. We could look at it on a per-pupil funding basis. Speaker, our government is providing over $13,000 per student, $1,000 more per student than when the previous government was here in this House. Yes, the money we provided to school boards has been going to front-line funding positions. Since 2017-18, we’ve seen that front-line education staffing has increased by roughly 8,000 positions since our government came to office. That includes hundreds of principals and vice-principals, over 900 teachers and 7,000 education workers.

Interjections.

Additionally, it’s not just about the staffing, as much as we know that staffing is very, very important. We saw for many years the former Liberal government—when the NDP held the balance of power, we saw a government that closed hundreds of schools—

Interjection: What?

But our government now is investing $14 billion over 10 years in building new schools. I have to say, this is one of the aspects that I always really enjoyed in my time working with the Minister of Education, visiting different communities across this riding. I remember going to an eastern Ontario visit. I think we announced 11 schools in the space of a week, just going through communities who hadn’t seen meaningful investments in their local education systems under previous governments—and the gratitude and the thankfulness that I saw on the faces of the children and also expressed by those hard-working education workers, who saw that our government was taking infrastructure renewal seriously and building the new schools that were needed in every corner of this riding.

And it’s not just new schools. It’s building new child care spaces for hardworking families. Since 2019, we’ve invested over $2 billion into 100 new schools, 88 additions and 6,410 new licensed child care spaces. These are pretty significant investments, Speaker, and yet we seem to see once again this opposition motion claiming that our government is providing school boards with a so-called inadequate amount of funding—again, billions of dollars in new funding. But of course it’s never enough for the opposition.

The opposition motion also irresponsibly calls upon the Ontario government to provide an undisclosed amount of money to school boards to cover their budget shortfalls. They don’t say how much. They just say, “Give it all. Give the money away. Give it away.” But the amount of money is undisclosed, Speaker, because you can bet the farm that it would be an astronomically high number if we went down that road.

Incentives do matter. If our government was foolish enough to take the NDP’s advice and bail out school boards facing deficits, we would see that frankly, the boards had no reason to act responsibly. Every school board in the province would clamour for more funding, trying to make sure that they spent every red cent to get more funding from the provincial government. But we know that incentives matter, and we are taking a responsible approach.

In a nutshell, the NDP motion completely misdiagnoses the state of education funding in Ontario. It proposes a so-called solution that would, frankly, do more harm than good.

Now, just as an aside, Speaker, I am amazed that the NDP can so completely mischaracterize our government’s record on education funding with this incredibly accusatory tone and then turn around and attempt to take zero accountability for their time in government. Ontario’s first and only NDP government froze salaries for public sector workers; meanwhile, under our education deal, we see workers receiving a cumulative 15.8% raise, after this NDP, when they were in government, froze workers’ salaries. And we’ve seen that they ripped up signed contracts. They not only didn’t act in good faith when they were in negotiations; they ripped up signed contracts and ordered teachers, doctors, nurses and other public servants to work 12 days a year for free. It doesn’t sound like the NDP have a record to stand on, and not surprisingly, we did see that this resulted in some of the worst labour unrest in Ontario’s history.

When I read the motion we’re debating, it reminded me: It’s easy. I remember being in opposition, and it’s easy for the opposition members to criticize. Perhaps some of them haven’t been here that long, but I know others who have been in opposition for a great deal of time and have spent, I think, their entire political careers in opposition—and I think that is more than likely where they will stay. But it’s easy for them in opposition to demand our government hand over undisclosed amounts of additional funding to school boards.

The reality is this governing is far more difficult, because we know that governing entails accountability; it entails responsibility; it entails being good stewards. And when they were given the opportunity to govern, unfortunately, we saw that the NDP made some terrible decisions. Of course, I wish they hadn’t—I’m sure they wish they hadn’t—and I know the people of this province wish that they had not made those decisions. But unfortunately, it seems to be they haven’t learned their lesson. We often hear the opposition members smugly try to tell us, “Well, Bob Rae is a Liberal,” and pretend none of it ever happened. Well, Speaker, it’s the NDP record, and I think they have to stand behind their record.

I would now like to take a little bit of time in the time that I have left—and I know we’re running a little bit close, but I do want to walk through a little bit of this government’s achievements so far on the education file, because I think they’re substantial and important for education workers to understand. Our government strongly supports public education here in the province of Ontario. We know that it has a critically important role to play in the years to come. Ontario is facing the largest shortage of skilled labour in generations.

The Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development recently said it best: “Our government is taking an all-hands-on-deck approach to attract and train the next generation of skilled trades workers for better jobs and bigger paycheques for themselves and their families.” There are currently over 100,000 unfilled skilled trades jobs across the province, and it’s projected that by 2026 approximately one in five job openings in Ontario will be in a skilled-trades-related field.

Ever since our government was first elected, we have taken action to update the province’s curriculum and ensure that it does a better job of reflecting the changing needs of the labour market. For over a decade, we saw previous generations of students lacking math, financial literacy and numeracy skills.

I’m proud to tell this chamber that the government made some incredible progress over the last five years. We have new curriculums that emphasize relevance in today’s job market, with an emphasis on practical life skills, learning more about interest, debt, savings, personal budgeting and price comparisons—things that really matter to people when they’re living in the real world—as well as helping students prepare for the jobs of tomorrow by introducing students to how to apply coding skills, to better understand complex mathematics and how to make predictions.

As we pivot from a failed discovery math program and introduce evidence-based learning and math and STEM curriculum, training will need to be provided to ensure that teachers have the pedagogical training to meet the highest standards. To achieve this, Ontario is providing $30 million to double the number of school math coaches, beginning this September, as well as providing additional staff support—

Interjections.

I do appreciate this opportunity to rise and speak about our government’s record with respect to publicly funded schools—and I recall so vividly at the time the former critic, now the Leader of the Opposition, speaking and using rhetoric, posing the question rhetorically, “Where are all of these staff? Where are all these investments? Where are all these public health nurses? Where are all these EAs and educators and custodians and ventilation upgrades and HEPA filters we invested in?” That’s in the transcript from just six and 12 months ago, and yet here we are today.

For the members opposite, who spent the last two years suggesting the investments don’t exist, the people don’t exist in schools, the ventilation hasn’t been improved, only today to have the chutzpah to come in this House and urge us to reinstate the funding they never believed was in place in our school system—only the NDP could do that with a straight face. Only New Democrats could sit here and actually believe they have the credibility in this Parliament to communicate to the government, who increased the very funding in every single measurement—and now to proclaim the great saviours of public education, when their record is consistent, systematic opposition to the hiring of 8,000 net new staff. That is the NDP record, and a regrettable one, because maybe we disagree with the rate of increase—perhaps the opposition suggests going even further—but to have opposed every single investment, even incrementally, seems to defy the principle of more investment, more staffing, more resources.

Let’s reflect on where we started in 2018 in mental health, as a case study—an issue that I believe every member in this House cares about. The provincial Liberals, under Premier Wynne, were investing, in their election budget, the peak of spending, $18 million in mental health funding for schools. The funding today is at $90 million. It has been increased by 400%. I appreciate and am the first to acknowledge that we have to keep going, because the needs are rising, especially in a post-pandemic world—but the funding has been increased by 400%. It is the highest rate of increase we’ve seen in the federation, including when compared to New Democrats in BC.

Madam Speaker, when we look at areas like capital renewal, we are cognizant of the challenges in many schools in Ontario. There’s a reason why, in the first budget of this government, and reconfirmed in the Minister of Finance’s budget, there is nearly $15 billion in capital investments, so that all of your communities, from the most rural and remote parts of Ontario to the most urban here in Toronto—every one of us and our children—has access to a modern school. That’s an investment in building schools that meet the needs of Ontario, both for the current population and for future immigrant populations, which will come to this province at a quantum of 300,000 per year, every year. We’re going to be ready for that. We are investing in a modern school system. There are a hundred schools under construction today and 200 in the pipeline in this province, because we’re investing, because we recognize there is more need, because we recognize the former Liberals, for all the spending—that itself isn’t a virtue; it’s the outcomes, the measurements. It’s the benchmark of success with taxpayer dollars. They spent a lot and delivered so little for the people of Ontario—600 schools closed, failing outcomes in math and literacy. That isn’t a metric of success.

While I know the member from Waterloo and others feel that the most superior metric is just spending more money—we are doing that, but we also expect accountability from school boards, from unions, from all of us, to step up in the interest of children. The metric of success is our kids’ graduation rates—which, by the way, has been increased from 85% to 89% under our Progressive Conservative government. That’s a metric of success.

Youth employment—connecting young people from the classroom into the labour market—is a critical benchmark. We’re seeing more young people work in the private economy—making better jobs—with the recognition that we have to do more to help ensure they’ve got a high wage that leads them to an affordable home.

When it comes to investment in this budget—this item before the House is germane to the most recent budget, introduced by the Minister of Finance—the overall funding has been increased, yes, by $2.3 billion, but even when you look at baseline funding in education, it’s still up $1.3 billion from last year. I’m sorry; this is not a matter of debate, interpretation or ideological dispositions of left or right. It’s a matter of fact. The funding is up $1.3 billion.

We are following the money—to the member from Waterloo—and it’s going into classrooms in Waterloo region to a higher level than ever before in Ontario history. That’s a good outcome for families in Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge and, frankly, across Ontario.

Madam Speaker, look at the staffing. We have a relatively flat enrolment rate in Ontario. It has gone up and it has gone a bit down over the past four or five years in Ontario, but it has fundamentally been flat—roughly two million kids in the publicly funded school system. Yet when you look at the amount of staff, net staff—not through attrition; no cutesy interpretation. The amount of people working today when compared to 2017—the number is north of 7,000, for education workers.

One of the members from Ottawa spoke passionately about the needs of children with special education needs, those with exceptionalities in our schools. There are 7,000 additional education workers—EAs, custodians, social workers, or child and youth workers. All of these have been hired and funded—not somehow absent provincial investment; not in spite of, but because of our government’s investment.

There are 200 more principals and vice-principals working in our schools. There are roughly 800 front-line educators working within our schools. That is an investment in publicly funded schools. That is an investment to meet the challenge to ensure the next generation of young people are set up for success in our economy, so that they can succeed and dream and be ambitious and be able to own a home and achieve the full partnership of being a Canadian in this country.

Madam Speaker, just on ventilation alone—there is no province in Canada, during the pandemic, that put more investment in ventilation. We have more HEPA filtration in this province—if you aggregate every province and add it up, we still have more: 100,000 HEPA filters. We put $600 million in ventilation upgrades in every single one of your schools—not an exception to the rule. Every school was assessed. Every school was upgraded—the highest standards of MERV 13, which the science said, two years ago, was the best. We didn’t wait until September 2023. Folks, we did this in September 2021 and 2022 and kept it in place in 2023—$600 million in mechanical ventilation. We set a new standard in this country. If a school does not have mechanical ventilation—roughly 20% to 30% of Ontario schools in our respective ridings do not. We set a standard that no one has in this country—I’m not aware of it on the continent—where every classroom, every learning space, every gym, every cafeteria, every place where a child works, congregates, studies would have fitted-for-the-room HEPA filtration. Every kindergarten class, where kids were too young to wear masks, of course—we put two HEPA filters in it, sized to the room, to reduce the risk for those children. We stepped up.

I understand in this House—and the nature of our political system and of our democracy—it’s healthy to oppose. It is also healthy to acknowledge even incremental action that makes a difference in the lives of those we represent. I would expect, when we put 100,000 HEPA filters; $600 million in ventilation; when we hire staff; when we launch a new math strategy to literally, in budget 2023, double the amount of math coaches to emphasize numeracy, to strengthen training of our staff and get in there in those classrooms that need more intervention; when we are the only province in Canada to have a reading assessment strategy recommended by the Ontario Human Rights Commission—I would hope the NDP would be an advocate for us following the advice of the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

Here was one of the recommendations in the Right to Read report. It suggested the former Liberal curriculum did not follow the science of reading. They suggested that children with disabilities—to the member from Ottawa—are disproportionately left behind from the old language curriculum under former Premiers Wynne and McGuinty. The OHRC put out a damning report of that curriculum, saying you need to reform the curriculum and come up with a meaningful, wholesale reading-screening strategy for every child, from kindergarten to grade 2. That is what we did on the day the report was tabled.

Perhaps something counterintuitive: The Ontario Human Rights Commission put out the report on the Right to Read—the government moved immediately to adopt a new language curriculum, which will be in place this coming September. For those who have a face of a perplexed nature—Google. In addition, we also announced $25 million, then, to provide a screening tool. There’s only one province in Canada that’s going to screen every child—kindergarten, senior kindergarten, grade 1 and grade 2—at least once but up to two times a year with a common screening tool, with teacher training, which we’re providing. Over 400,000 kids are going to get this. There’s just no jurisdiction in the nation that’s doing it in nearly as expansive a fashion as Ontario. We’re not doing this to boast. We’re doing this because we recognize, after the pandemic, that literacy rates for young kids have regressed. I acknowledge the challenge. No one is suggesting that Ontario is some island in and of itself, when the entire Western world—the industrialized nations, east and west—have seen regression in fundamental math and reading skills. We’re not immune to that reality. We’re certainly not the worst in the federation, according to EQAO data. But we recognize there’s a problem, so we stepped up with a solution, with the full support of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. Even when we did that, something that perhaps is more ideologically inclusive to other members in the House—even then, we didn’t have a peep of support from any member, any critic. Education, disability—it didn’t matter. Silence. We can’t even recognize when we do the right things, even in a mere narrow or targeted fashion.

I am standing up in this House today with a simple message: The funding is there. The supports are there. The staffing is there. In a most granular way, we are stepping up—from literacy to numeracy to mental health to special education and to staffing.

We’ve heard this line before: “Where are the staff?” I have so many quotes from the member from Davenport—and with a great level of gratitude to a sparring partner for many years. But what I will simply say is, they’re there. Let’s not pretend that we didn’t double the amount of public health nurses. Let’s not pretend that we didn’t hire 7,000 more people. Those are not open to interpretation, colleagues. You can make the argument that you need more, but to hear the rhetoric—

Interjections.