Today is International Women’s Day. Today, we remember that International Women’s Day was inspired by working women.

Today, we remember that, in 1908, 15,000 women marched through the streets of New York to protest unfair working conditions.

Today, we remember that, in 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire killed 146 workers in 20 minutes. Today, we remember that most of the workers were Italian or Jewish immigrants aged 14 to 23. Today, we remember that these workers were trapped behind locked doors, trapped out of reach of firefighter ladders. Today, we remember these workers died from the fire, these workers die from smoke inhalation, and today we remember that 62 of these workers died by leaping from factory windows to the pavement below. These workers died because the doors were locked to prevent worker theft. These workers died because the doors were locked to prevent union organizers from entering. The 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire killed 146 garment workers in 20 minutes, and from those ashes International Women’s Day was reborn.

Speaker, we are legislators. If we want to truly celebrate International Women’s Day, let us honour the workers who died. Let’s write labour laws that make it easier to join a union. Let’s write labour laws that demand better working conditions, demand better wages and demand better safety.

We are legislators. Let’s truly celebrate International Women’s Day and make life better for Ontario’s workers.

I am from Oshawa. I’m very proud to be from Oshawa, and I was very proud to stand up with the workers and the broader community in calling on this government to stand with us through very, very rocky and uncertain times. This is the Premier who said that the ship has left the dock, and it turns out he was wrong. We knew that he was wrong at the time for not believing in us, but what made the pieces come together that allowed for the kind of investment and, hopefully, long future of automotive in Oshawa was the bargaining units, was the workers and was the quality of work that has been done for so long and—

Interjection: For a century.

Here we have a bill that was recently before this House that said it had to be better than it was before the recovery, and they’ve just slipped in there now “comparable to ... as determined by the minister.” So it’s not just the “comparable” language that bothers me; it is that they’ve taken this from the public sector, where they had people with science backgrounds, like a particular director they snaked it from, and given it to the minister. What does he know that’s more than the folks who have been doing this work for years, and why can’t they explain that? It’s dodging environmental responsibility for no reason except just because it’s easier, I guess—but not in the long run,.

Again, processes that are smoother and faster, done well, is I think what we’re talking about, but this government hasn’t defined a qualified person or individual—is it somebody who has ever even worked in the Ministry of Mines who can sign off on? What assurances do we have that that isn’t going to create problems down the road?

We want to know, who is this qualified person and how do you define it? What makes the minister qualified to do the reclamation and the rehabilitation at the end of a mine? Does this make it faster? Does it make it better? It’s yet to be determined.