Seniors in my riding and seniors all across Ontario are struggling with the rising cost of living, with everyday expenses. I think we were all shocked—and I heard from seniors over the entire weekend—that your government would reduce OHIP-covered eye exams for seniors. I don’t understand, in this climate, when seniors are suffering right across the province, how this government thinks it’s okay to reduce OHIP-covered eye exam funding for seniors. So could the member explain how that helps people in our ridings across Ontario—to treat seniors in this way?

I thank the member for the question. Yes, I certainly enjoyed our visits to various parts of Ontario, be it Kenora on January 9 or Sault Ste. Marie or Sudbury or Peterborough, Windsor, Kingston.

The member talked about choices. Well, I’ll tell you the choices that our government is making. Infrastructure spending—a record of $184.4 billion over 10 years. That’s a choice that will matter not only to this generation but to the next. Record spending in health care—has gone up from $74.9 billion to $81 billion over the next three years, spending $15.3 billion.

Those are the choices that our government made, and I’m very proud to be a part of those choices. And I hope this House supports the bill.

Seniors are a priority for this government in so many ways. You just saw the increase in the GAINS program, which is so successful—another 100,000 low-income seniors will be on that program this year. That is back to supporting seniors. And we’re increasing our health care spending overall, as I mentioned before and I’ll keep mentioning over and over and over again—record health care spending for our seniors. We care about them, their families, and we’ll keep caring about them, because we want to make sure we have the best health care system on the planet, which we will continue to invest in—so those are the supports for seniors that I’m very proud to be a part of this government and support.

Preventive care keeps older Ontarians out of hospitals and emergency rooms. Currently, seniors can access an eye exam every 12 months, but under this government’s new rules, they will have to wait 18 months to get an exam covered by OHIP. This is a move to push seniors into using privatized services that many seniors cannot afford, nor should they have to.

To the Premier: Why is this government jeopardizing seniors’ health by reducing access to OHIP-covered eye care?

A question for the Premier: Another inspection in a for-profit long-term-care home has exposed terrible living conditions for our seniors, this time at Blackadar Continuing Care Centre in my riding, managed by Extendicare. We heard from the daughter of a resident who was distraught with the undignified conditions her mother is living in, including numerous and extended power outages.

Under this government, 5,400 seniors died in long-term care during COVID and the vast majority of these deaths were in for-profit care. Have you learned nothing from this tragedy? Why is this government giving these same for-profit operators multi-decade licences, instead of correcting these substandard care issues through enforcement?