Speaker, through you to the Minister of Health: Jane Wigmore, a retired OB/GYN nurse from Port Colborne, reached out to my office concerned about the unacceptable four-month wait for Pap test results. She said, “It is of the utmost importance for women to get their results as soon as possible because the chances of survival depend on early detection so that treatment for diseases like cancer can begin as soon as possible.”

Jane would like to know, is it acceptable to this minister that women in this province are waiting over four months for the results of a Pap test?

I want to thank the thousands of people across Niagara who are signing this “Petition to Save the Welland Hospital Emergency Department.

“To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“Whereas the current Niagara Health system restructuring plan approved by the Ontario Ministry of Health includes removal of the emergency department and associated beds and ambulances service from the Welland hospital site once the Niagara Falls site is complete, creating inequity of hospital and emergency service in the Niagara region and a significant negative impact on hospital and emergency outcomes for the citizens of Welland, Port Colborne and all Niagara;

“Whereas the NHS is already experiencing a 911 crisis in EMS, a shortage of beds and unacceptable off-loading delays in its emergency departments across the region;

“Whereas the population in the Welland hospital catchment area is both aging and growing;

“Whereas the Ontario Legislature passed a motion by Niagara Centre MPP Jeff Burch on April 13, 2022, to include a full emergency department and associated beds in the rebuild of the Welland hospital;

“Therefore, be it resolved that we call on the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to work with the Ontario Ministry of Health and the Niagara Health system to implement motion 47 to maintain the Welland hospital emergency department and adjust its hospital plan accordingly.”

I sign my name and send it to the Clerk through the page.

Thank you to the member from Kitchener–Conestoga for his comments.

He started out his comments by saying that an open-pit mine shouldn’t take 15 years, but a lot of what’s being addressed in this bill is hard rock mining. I’m just learning about all this myself, but from speaking to mining executives and people like my seatmate here, who is very experienced in mining, 15 years was a very reasonable amount of time to open a mine; the communications from your party seem to suggest that it wasn’t.

I’m wondering how, specifically, this bill allows a mine to be open in less than 15 years.