Was the word “autism” in—

No, but I would have asked about it if I’d had a chance.

The mental health piece would have also been a key part. I would have questioned the government on why, given what we know—the latest data—particularly on child mental health and how the pandemic and how isolation affected our youngest citizens, some additional funding would not be allocated to the mental health file.

I do want to thank the minister who’s responsible for mental health.

I know that the member for Toronto–St. Paul’s has also met with the minister to talk about eating disorders and all that that entails, which is very complex.

I recently met, on behalf of Kaitlyn Roth and her family, with the Associate Minister of Mental Health, and we talked openly and honestly about where the money is going and where the money is not going.

I want to advocate for those additional community-based teams in Waterloo region, because we are historically underfunded—nothing like what the member from Kiiwetinoong is facing, but significant nonetheless.

What I want to say about that is that the autism file, in and of itself, is pretty much a perfect example of a government that is not in touch with what’s really happening in Ontario. For some reason, autism rates in Waterloo region are very high, and the fact that we’re losing time, that urgency, that sense of a critical time for a child’s development—to miss that window, to have so many children waiting, and to definitely not see it reflected even as a priority in this piece of legislation is beyond disappointing.

The overall piece, though, that I think is the most shocking for most Ontarians is on the health care file—because you actually have to actively be trying not to pay attention to what’s happening in our hospitals. Maybe you don’t watch the news. Maybe you don’t read the newspaper. Maybe you don’t talk to your family and friends about what’s happening in our hospitals. When you compare the fall economic statement to the Financial Accountability Office’s economic and budget report from October 27, the government will be short approximately $6.2 billion in health, $1 billion in education, and $360 million in colleges and universities through 2024-25, and the health care spending and planned increases fall far short of what is needed to address this crisis.

I’ll just go back to the FAO discussion. The goal of having a Financial Accountability Officer is to help the government—but I guess, in some respects, the government would need to want to be helped or would need to be receptive to looking at some additional information that is not in their own bubble or in their own fairy tale.

The Ford government also stated in this document that they have added 11,700 health care workers since 2020, but we know that 47,000 new health care workers are needed to be hired per year for the next three years to maintain current service levels. And they are stubbornly—there are a few other words to use—attached to Bill 124. This is another example—you are going to lose this in court as well, I might add, because overriding collective bargaining rights is an enshrined right for workers. The impact of Bill 124 on the health care worker population cannot be denied.

Last night, I hosted a town hall in Waterloo on the privatization of health care. We watched a couple of movies around what has happened in Alberta and what has happened in Saskatchewan, and we learned a lot about the formula for increasing privatization; we instinctively know it. One of the classic measures that was embraced by Ralph Klein and then Jason Kenney and that other guy, Moe, is that you essentially starve the system so badly that you revert and you create this narrative that the only way to save health care is by providing private services and outsourcing and contracting out the work that health care workers do. The ground has been set for this exact thing, and doubled down on in the fall economic statement, the mini budget. Bill 124 is wage suppression legislation. It has a demoralizing, disrespectful impact on the people who are working in our health care system, all the way down from the PSWs, all the way up to the medical professionals and analysts and diagnostics. Nurses, in particular, are leaving this province for other jurisdictions where they will be treated with respect.

You cannot open a new hospital that you’re building or opening up a new bed that you have been talking about for some time without the human resources, without the personnel.

This has been a consistent theme by this government—they do not acknowledge the value and importance of the people who are delivering public services. They say they do, but then they introduce legislation like Bill 28, like Bill 124. The fact that you have not repealed this legislation yet is—aside from being stubborn—incredibly irresponsible. I know that you have nurses in your ridings. I know that you have people who have told you first-hand that they will be leaving the system because that 1% wage cap—when inflation is at 6.9% but was as high as 8% earlier this year—is essentially a cut. So you can’t call them heroes; you can’t say you value these people, who are, right now, down the street, at SickKids Hospital. We heard today from one of the doctors that they’re resuscitating three, four children every single day. We heard that from CHEO as well. Imagine the stress of that work, and then imagine having a government that says you’re only worth 1%. The disconnect there is so evident to us.

No Conservative MPP has ever given me a good reason or a good rationale as to why Bill 124 is needed.

I will point out that the evidence on paying people respectfully is very clear. In fact, David Card, a Canadian-American economist who won the 2021 Nobel Prize in economics in recognition of his achievements and contributions to the field of labour economics—he and his colleague Alan Krueger refuted the conventional notion in labour economics that increases in minimum wage led to lower rates of employment in low-paying industries. This has been part of the Conservative narrative for years. I can also say that it was part of the Liberal narrative for years.

You’re going to hear some of the members tout that they’re increasing the minimum wage. But I just want to go down memory lane for a little bit on the minimum wage, because when you look at how past governments have behaved and then you look at how this current government is behaving on the minimum wage, it tells a very different story than the sound bites that we hear.

In Ontario, the minimum wage has bounced between being frozen and corrected. From 1997 to 2003, the minimum wage was at $6.85. Up to 2010, it increased from $6.85 to $10.25. From 2010 to 2014, it was frozen at $10.25—four years, frozen; that was compliments of the Liberals. Then, from 2014 to 2017, it increased moderately, from $11 to $11.60; they really went wild for that three-year period. Premier Wynne announced overnight that it was going to go from $11.60 to $14 in 2018—and then this was followed by a $15 minimum wage, if re-elected, in 2019. Well, that did not happen, obviously.

One of the first things that the Ford government did when they got elected was, they cancelled the $15 increase—and the wage remained at $14 until 2020, when it jumped slightly to $14.25, and then $14.35 in 2021; and finally, $15 on January 1, 2022. So when they tell you how generous they’ve been, it warrants a little history lesson here. One of the first things that they did was cancel the $15 increase, in 2018. It’s true. Some of you weren’t here; some of us were, and it was painful to watch, for certain.

On the education front, I think the government has set up this very tension-filled, acrimonious relationship with the entire education sector. I don’t know if you saw some of the feedback following the repealing of Bill 28, but the players, the characters who are trying to negotiate a fair deal for the lowest-paid education workers in the education sector—I don’t know if you were out with folks the first Friday after we rose, when those CUPE workers walked out. I know that they visited some of the Conservative offices, and they came to my office as well. We called it a supportive rally, and it was really good to talk to some of the caretakers, some of the educational assistants, some of the ECEs. Most of them were women. Most of them had two or three jobs; they were paid that low. It was so good to see parents out there on that line supporting them. Once parents found out how little educational assistants are making in our system, they were shocked, because as you could imagine, these conversations don’t come up at a parent-teacher night. One EA told me that what she was making 12 years ago is less than what she’s making today due to inflation, so she has a second job. She was out there and really trying to—they didn’t even know what was going to happen. It was complete chaos. It completely destabilized this entire sector.

I think that the members who stood in their place on Bill 28 and supported it—I feel like those words are going to come back to haunt some of these members, because there had to be an admission at some point that—and the labour board was very set to rule on this—it was completely out of order for the government to use the “notwithstanding” clause during collective bargaining. It would have been good, when our member from Davenport asked the Premier if he would ever use that again—and of course, we got no answer from him. He said that he actually doesn’t regret it—creating all that chaos, all that pain, and yet he has no regrets. I don’t know what that says about the Premier. I just know that he’s really adamant about not wearing masks for some reason, even though he says that the medical officer of health is advising that everyone wear one in indoor settings. Our caucus has them. I have my mask. It’s not a big deal to wear a mask. It’s not a lot to ask, really, at the end of the day.

The education sector has responded to yesterday’s announcement, and I’m connecting this to the fall economic statement because it’s the same figure—$32.4 billion base, the same as the summer budget, so no recognition that there are increasing health care system needs and drivers within that system. This government and this minister seem very happy to dole out $200, at an overall budget cost of $389 million, but not invest that money into more educational assistants, into more child and youth workers in our system.

This is what we’re hearing—and this is from CTV Kitchener, just from yesterday. They said that the region of Waterloo public health officials are echoing the province’s messaging around masking, but some local teachers—the people who are actually in the classrooms, in the schools—say the directive doesn’t go far enough. They said, “The number of absences that we’re seeing right now is astronomical, and we don’t have enough teachers to cover those absences.” So the failure to fill in our systems right now is outrageous.

If you go back to what the Financial Accountability Officer said—we cannot have a major economic shock in Ontario; otherwise, that razor’s edge that we are on will in fact push us over into a recession. Knowing this and knowing all the lessons that we learned during the pandemic, or that we thought we learned, around the importance of paid sick days so that people don’t have to go to work sick, around the importance of ventilation, around the importance of public health hygiene measures—all of this knowledge you have at your fingertips, because we lived it.

And yet, here we have a piece of legislation that adds not one new penny to health care. The entire health care sector was shocked at this, I have to say. They’re in crisis right now, so they can’t come to the front lawn of Queen’s Park and rally and kick the building, as many protesters have done in the past. They can’t do that, because they are done, and they can’t afford the time or the energy to fight a government that’s so adamant about holding them down to that 1% and around not consulting them.

I go back to process on this. If the fall economic statement had a fair and open process around consultation, around listening to the people who were elected to serve—if that had happened, then this budget would have additional resources for nurses and for doctors and for hospitals, and you could envelope it for sure. It would have money for mental health, and it would have money for autism, because it makes sense to invest in the people you serve. It makes sense to adopt an early intervention process. These are the basic principles of the social determinants of health. And we called on the government to double the ODSP rates.

I did say in my original comments that there was something good in this fall economic statement. I do try to find some of the goodness in some of the initiatives. The one encouraging part was the improvement to ODSP; notably, tying future increases to inflation. So you understand that inflationary costs matter. Why won’t you acknowledge that with the education workers, with the educational assistants, with the ECEs? You’ve said that you’re going to tie future increases to inflation and you’re going to increase allowable earnings from $200 a month to $1,000 a month. However, it does fall very short of doubling ODSP rates and Ontario Works. To their credit, yesterday the media asked the finance minister—they said, “Literally, these are the most vulnerable people in Ontario.”

The money is there. The government says they’re going to run a $12.9-billion deficit, but the Financial Accountability Officer says that they’re running a $100-million surplus at the end of this year, and that’s without the tax revenue changes from the first-quarter finances, which is $5.8 billion. So money is going to come into this place.

You’ve made a decision to put that money down towards debt and not to the pressing issues that are facing our most vulnerable.

The Minister of Finance can’t answer that question—I will answer that question. I could not live on the rates of ODSP that are offered in this province—not when the average rent in Waterloo is $2,200, which is also not rent-controlled.

The media pushed back and said, “How come you’re not addressing the needs of Ontarians in the fall economic statement? Why is this mini budget leaving some of the most vulnerable people out—like not even part of the equation?”

Really, you’ve just said that for those people who are on ODSP who can work—they can actually keep more money.

And it did, actually, especially last year, when the government had given $210 million to businesses that weren’t even in Ontario—do you remember that? Speaker, $210 million is still a lot of money—it doesn’t have a B at the end of it, but it’s still a lot of money. I asked the finance minister at the time: “How come you can go after someone on ODSP, who maybe generates $225—you claw back that $25, but you’re not willing to go after $210 million that went to people who didn’t deserve that small business grant?” The answer was kind of disappointing and shocking. They said, “Well, businesses have been through enough.”

Do you know who goes through a lot every single day? An individual who lives on ODSP in Ontario. Life is not easy for these folks.

I have one person in my riding who has really—this may not change her mind, but she has said that she is seriously considering medically assisted dying because the quality of her life is that poor. You would have heard this before. There are many people in this province whose day-to-day existence is hellish.

The government has the money to acknowledge that those on ODSP are deserving of additional funding. You’re actually acknowledging it, in many respects, because you’re saying, “Well, you can work more.” But there are so many people on ODSP who can’t work; it’s not an option, and also because discrimination out there is quite real against folks who are on ODSP.

I will say something else that’s good: The government is addressing the Ontario Guaranteed Annual Income System for one year. This is the GAINS program, and they’re providing financial support for low-income seniors, who would see their rates increase to $160 per month or $332 per couple. Listen, I’ve already said and I’m on the record as saying that seniors using food banks is up to a shocking percentage in Ontario right now. I do hear from them, because seniors have certain needs, they like to cook certain meals, and you can’t find those meals at the food bank. And they’re mostly women—I do want to say that as well: mostly women.

Finally, the projections for the education spending remain the same from the 2022 budget, despite what you’ve heard. However, the spending gap between the FAO’s projection and the province’s outlook is $400 million in 2022-23, and this increases to $2 billion. I go back to the original funding formula for education in Ontario, which has truly never been, I guess, modernized. It’s never acknowledged. Some of the programs that this ministry has thrown out at the education system, like destreaming—destreaming, in theory, is a great idea, but you have to resource it. You have to fund it so that everybody can be successful.

I don’t know if the Minister of Education spends a lot of time in the public education system, but in my husband’s class, there are 38 students, and the learning levels and the learning gaps that have happened over the last two and a half or three years are profound. There are sometimes three, four levels in one classroom. So you can say that everybody’s equal, but you actually have to say, “But we’re going to give you an equal chance of being successful.”

It’s interesting listening to the remarks and how they are full of a lack of understanding of responsible budgeting, but I want to thank the member opposite for pointing out that our government is handling the finances differently in this province, and thank goodness for that. Ontarians couldn’t afford the continued financial mismanagement of the members opposite. We have made record investments in the province—showing return on those investments that support Ontarians, the programs that are important to us, in creating sustainable communities.

Speaker, why won’t this opposition support these measures to keep costs down and build the labour force this province needs, and all with a responsible and flexible plan?

That’s equity.

That’s equity; that’s right. So to see the education dollars be the same, really, as the summer budget was pretty disappointing.

I want to end on the housing piece, because a lot has been said about the importance of housing. I think that we actually all agree that the value and the importance and the key factor of shelter in an economy cannot be underestimated. But to see the housing starts really costed out and downgraded already, Madam Speaker, is—I mean, I go back to process. Those 444 municipalities that got really shut out of the consultation process—I don’t think that that can be ignored.

Just to go back: Where we are right now is the FAO is forecasting a $100-million surplus this year. That surplus is expected to grow to $8.5 billion in 2027-28. He’s actually projecting surpluses for the foreseeable future.

The formula that the Financial Accountability Officer uses and the finance minister uses—they both consult with various economists, but those formulas are not that different. You look at job creation, you look at revenue through personal tax and corporate tax, and then you look at the expenditures that you’ve already allocated.

And then you have this little thing called the COVID fund, which actually is interesting because it was tucked away in the Ministry of Finance, and then it was sort of scattered out—which I had questions about, where it was being scattered out to. But remember that that COVID funding, originally, the goal of it was to help the province stabilize. Stability is having a very strong health care system with guaranteed resources which acknowledges the importance of paying people a fair wage so that you can actually retain them. And this seems to be the piece that the government is not willing to acknowledge, the importance of retention.

Retention is important not only because going through a hiring process and going through another recruitment process is costly and takes time away from patients, from clients, but you actually lose the expertise. Then what does the government do? The government looks at agency nurses, and those agency nurses don’t have a connection with the unit. They are dropped into a work environment where they don’t have connections, where relationships are not there. All I know is that they’re making sometimes double what our nurses who are on the regular roster in hospitals are making. What is that doing to the entire staffing human resources issue in our health care system? It’s drawing people out to work in the private sector, which the government is also funding at twice the rate.

Imagine if we had a government in Ontario that was truly committed to public health care. Imagine if when they used the word “innovation,” then people would say, “When they’re talking about innovation, they’re actually talking about investing in health care and ensuring that the people in our system are respected, and that the resources are there for children and for seniors in long-term care.” Imagine if innovation meant that for this government. It would be incredibly refreshing.

The government, as I mentioned, for the first time in 14 years—in the last quarter, so much money came into this place through high inflationary costs and through tax revenue that we saw, for the first time in 14 years, a surplus—first time, right? You remember what was going to happen, and that is that the former government had tied ending the operational deficit to our compensation. Of course, that should not be any priority for any of us here in this place, especially given what’s happening in Ontario, but that’s part of the piece of the legislation as well, that MPPs won’t be seeing any raise or any increase or even a third-party independent review of remuneration.

But that didn’t stop the government from—88% of them became parliamentary assistants, which comes sometimes with between a $13,000 and $16,000 increase. That didn’t stop the government from ensuring that their caucus was well cared for. That seems to be the trend. They like to take care of their people, and we try to remind them that we’re elected to take care of Ontarians. Ontario is not Ford Nation; Ontario is Ontario. We’re elected to treat those citizens with respect.

The reason why the fall economic statement, in our opinion, is so irresponsible is that it’s another missed opportunity for this government to acknowledge what’s actually happening outside of this Pink Palace to people in the health care system, in the education system. The move from an environmental perspective around the greenbelt has really galvanized many people in many rural ridings, because nobody is buying this narrative that, because of immigration, we have to build these mansions out on the greenbelt. That’s a misnomer.

Process matters. Denying us the opportunity as the official opposition to do our due diligence through the estimates process is truly something that actually hasn’t happened in this place. You’re in new, unchartered territory. Given Bill 28, you’re obviously comfortable creating chaos, but we are very determined to ensure that we bring the voices of Ontarians to this place each and every day, and to ensure that your budget and your investments actually match the needs of Ontarians.

Don’t take the risk. Don’t gamble with people’s health in Ontario. We can’t afford another economic downturn. If you paid attention to what the Financial Accountability Officer had said, it’s not worth the risk. Let’s make sure that we avoid another economic shock. Let’s try to stabilize.

I’m not sure if we’re even going to get a chance to try to make this piece of legislation better, but we’re certainly going to try. Thank you for your time and your attention today.

We’ll move to questions and answers.

Thank you for the member from Waterloo’s presentation.

Speaker, we know that inflation is at a 40-year record high in Canada. This government understands that families, workers and seniors—especially low-income workers and those on fixed incomes—are feeling the pressure on their household budget, and we also recognize the impact that inflation is having on families. That is why our government proposed to extend the gas tax cut for an additional year to help Ontarians to overcome this challenging time.

Speaker, my question is simple: Why won’t the member opposite support the government’s proposed measures to extend the gas tax cut and keep costs down for the people of Ontario?

I want to thank the member from the other side. I was happy to hear that she agreed with the ODSP element, and she talked about the cost of living and seniors.

Another member talked about the dire need. This legislation, if passed, would cut costs for people across this province and support those on ODSP and fixed incomes, and work to help more Ontario students get into the good-paying skilled trade careers that this province needs. By increasing the monthly earning exemptions on ODSP from $200 to $1,000 per month, we are making significant changes. Why won’t the member from across support the legislation?

Next question?

I want to thank the member from Waterloo for her very informative speech. It didn’t even feel like an hour, because you were so good at explaining exactly what’s happening. You mentioned the troubling trend this government has with all their budgets, really, in terms of really underestimating their revenue and overestimating its deficits.

Would you be able to explain a little bit more in terms of the damage that it does, especially when we look at health care spending, education spending and some of the more dire needs that we have in our province, especially right now?

Well, thank you for mansplaining budgetary processes to me. I had no idea.

We look at the independent officers, at the Auditor General, the Financial Accountability Officer, and we look at their numbers, because they’re not looking at these expenditures through a partisan lens. So we think when the auditor says, “We found that most of the $19.4 billion budgeted contingency funds included in other program expenses in the multi-year fiscal plan for” those three years were not “earmarked for specific purposes”—that is irresponsible budgeting.

Not having a plan for $19.4 billion, when you have a health care crisis, when you’ve acknowledged that the CUPE education workers are the lowest-paid workers and you’re actually driving people out of health care and education, that’s what I would call irresponsible.

This is right from the FAO: “Despite the economic slowdown, the FAO is predicting that ... the province is on course to record multiple budget surpluses.” That’s what the FAO has said. “However, the report said tens of billions in government spending was unallocated, while programs were facing funding gaps.”

Those funding gaps totalled $40 billion. I would call that gap in budgeting priorities as irresponsible and damaging to the people of this province.

“If we’ve learned anything about how the current Ontario government makes budgets, it’s this: Whatever they say the bottom line is initially, the actual number will be very different in the end.” This is very accurate.

“We’ve seen it many times: The government underestimates revenues. It underspends what it budgets. It socks away billions in contingency funds with no plan to spend them.

“Monday’s economic outlook ... from the Ministry of Finance continues that pattern....”

So you’ve done it again. It’s just like Groundhog Day around here. The government is predicting this $12.9-billion deficit. That’s a $15-billion deterioration in the province’s bottom line at a time when inflation is driving revenues sky high. It’s simply not a credible number, and this financial plan is not a credible plan.

I just want to say, when we had over 5,000 seniors die in long-term care—and people were outraged about it because seniors are vulnerable. Well, children are also vulnerable. The story I told this morning around when the hospital says, “We want to keep your son here to monitor his breathing, but we don’t have beds,” that’s terrifying. So we’re genuinely trying to appeal to this Minister of Health to at least acknowledge that there’s a problem, because you will never address a problem if you don’t acknowledge that it exists.

I just want to correct the member from Thornhill. It’s true that ending the clawback from $200 and then allowing people who can work on ODSP to earn $1,000 each month and not claw back—it was a cruel practice. We spent a lot of time advocating for this change. But you still are leaving those who are on ODSP, who cannot work, in legislated poverty. That’s another reason why we can’t support this legislation.

The other reason is the autism file, in and of itself. I know that there’s an active autism coalition in Thornhill. They’ve been advocating for a streamlined process to access those resources, and I spoke about this in my lead. There’s a lot to be said about early intervention. Missing that window for those who are on the autism spectrum is irresponsible and, one might actually say, cruel.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. We’re the host of the greater Toronto airport. We’re the host for everybody. That’s Mississauga–Malton. I just want to say thank you to the residents of Mississauga–Malton for giving me an opportunity so that I can talk on an important bill today.

Madam Speaker, I’m proud to rise in the House today to speak about the wonderful things that this government and all the members on this side are doing to help the people of Ontario through our fall economic statement, which is right here. To all residents of Ontario, take a look at it; read it. It’s a wonderful document. It talks about “Team Prosperity,” what your government is doing, where we are investing, and how, together, we’re going to build a better Ontario.

The fall economic statement helps Ontarians to provide financial relief by reducing taxes, raising earnings and encouraging participation in the workforce. We are making real progress to get Ontario back on track, help people find work and build Ontario’s economy for the future and the world to envy.

From day one, we stood with the workers of this province, and we have made a commitment to build an Ontario for the next generation, and that is what this is doing here, Madam Speaker. That is why we’re making critical investments to help people get better jobs with bigger paycheques and, in doing so, building a better and stronger Ontario and better and stronger communities.

I want to take a special focus on what our government is doing to help address the labour shortage in our province. It’s not a hidden secret. In the last four and a half years, we have seen the government working together with businesses, with the province and hard-working Ontarians, making sure it is economical to do business here. When you reduce the cost of doing business and increase support in increasing the revenue, what happens next? More businesses create jobs, and that is what has happened. We have seen that the number of jobs has gone up, but the number of jobs still pending and not being filled has gone up by around 380,000 people. That’s what we are doing here.

In order to get to the place where we can have those people filling these jobs, we are looking to immigration. And I know, and I noticed that we had a conversation when the Premier stood up and talked about that in the next few years we are going to get approximately 500,000 people coming and choosing Canada as their home. Typically, what happens is, they look for a good place to come, and what could be better than Ontario—something I chose on January 15, 2000. If 60% of those 500,000 come here, that’s about 300,000 people. We always welcome newcomers to our province and have wanted to make sure that Ontario remains competitive on the international stage. That is why what we are doing is celebrating their milestone.

Oh, thinking about milestones, Madam Speaker, I want to talk about my uncle and aunt: Mrs. Raj Bhupinder Kaur Cheema. She got married to my uncle Bhupinder Singh Cheema on November 14, 1964. They just celebrated their 58th wedding anniversary, so I just want to say congratulations. It takes a lot of courage and perseverance to stay together, but you did an amazing job and you raised my cousin very well. So I just wanted to say this to them.

Madam Speaker, talking about finding the skill set, I just want to quickly talk about the OINP program. Since 2020, we have people from 130 countries who have come together and over this period we have been able to support 2,200 different employers in leveraging the Ontario Immigration Nomination Program. By the end of this year, over 40,000 international skilled workers have been nominated through the OINP program, and I just want to give an example of what our government has done and how it has helped. Before our new expression-of-interest system, only 7% of the foreign worker stream were trained in jobs in construction. As we know, we want to build more homes and we want workers in the construction industry. After changing the system, we have seen the improvement in the result and actually the numbers have doubled to 14%. We will continue to work with our economy and the labour market to make these changes so that all these new immigrants who are coming and making Ontario their new home can thrive and raise their families.

We’ve talked about, through Ontario’s Plan to Build, how we are going to help the Ring of Fire, committing approximately $1 billion to support the critical legacy infrastructure, attracting $16 billion in investment by global automakers and suppliers of electrical vehicle batteries right here in Ontario and attracting $2.5 billion in investments to produce clean steel. When we do have these investments coming up, they’re actually creating jobs. To fill those jobs, we need people. I always say, in a simple single system, jobs need people, and people need jobs. When we work together, we give them a hand up, and we make sure the economy grows well. That is why we have seen over many years—the last few years, especially—the revenue growing year by year. Thanks to each and every hard-working Ontarian for contributing.

We actually had a bill, our Working for Workers Act. We want to make sure that new immigrants who are making this country, and Ontario especially, their new home have a job in their own field. That is why we made sure that we brought in the changes to the foreign credentials, so that they don’t have to wait for their licence and they can go ahead and as soon as they arrive they can start working towards their professional licence and can work in their own field.

By an estimate, we’ve noticed that if people work in their field, which, in fact—the last data, which we had in 2016: Only 25% of the people were working in their own field. What that means is, if they were working in their field—for an example, if you take somebody who is an undergraduate in engineering, like me, I was working at about $40,000. If I had had a licence as a professional engineer, the minimum entry salary would have been $70,000 to $75,000. The differential between the two, if you really look at that—you’re basically adding the revenue to the businesses, you are adding the revenue to the families, you’re adding the revenue to the government as well. If you calculate the whole thing, the differential is between $15 billion and $20 billion. And we can collect and use that money to service Ontarians, and that’s what we’re doing now.

For instance, we are providing an additional $40 million in 2023 in new funding in the Skills Development Fund to support our priority infrastructure fund and our youth employment training. Along with that, we’ve provided $4.8 million over two years for dual credits to enhance pathways for high school students like my daughter, who is in high school, so they can go into the skilled trades and early childhood education. Why do we need this? Well, Madam Speaker, we all know we are going to $10 child care, and to do that, we need people who can support that child care education, and we need to make sure our youth are ready and supported.

And we helped more than 52,000 people find a path to employment via Ontario’s integrated employment services system, which began in 2020. Colleagues, if you really look at this, 52,000 people getting a job means 52,000 fewer cheques from the government. This means 52,000 more people paying to the government. That’s what we’re doing. With a special focus on the skilled trades, we are continuing the efforts to make sure that everyone who can work and who wants to work is able to work. That is why we’re making sure we’re making the investments in training more than ever before.

Madam Speaker, we always hear about workers: how we’re supporting the workers, how we’re supporting the minimum wages. One of the things we did was to increase the minimum wage to $15.50, including the workers who are in the hospitality business. At the time when we increased from $12.50 to $15, the raise was about 19%, something which we believe that our workers need our help, and we are always there to help them. That’s how we added 11,700 health care workers, including nurses and personal support workers, as well as 800 internationally educated nurses who have become licensed as nurses in Ontario through government-funded programs.

The statement also mentions our continuous support to the small businesses. Madam Speaker, in 2021 alone, small businesses made up 98.1% of all employer businesses in Canada. They employ 63.8% of the total labour force. Given the fact that the majority of small businesses are concentrated in Ontario, supporting them in offsetting their tax burden is a direct contribution to creating and sustaining job opportunities in Ontario. Under our new program, thousands of businesses will now qualify for the small business corporate tax rate, allowing them to save tens of thousands in taxable income. What do they do with that money? They invest back into their business. By creating more jobs, they bring more people on board and help many more Ontarians to get financial independence.

Besides providing over $675 million in Ontario income tax relief over three years by temporarily allowing eligible businesses to immediately expense up to $1.5 million per year for certain capital investments, the statement also proposes to extend the phase-out range for the small business corporate tax between $10 million and $15 million of taxable capital.

When we look at these things, all these small steps add up to bring bigger results, and that is what we’ve seen in the past few years. We have seen the increase in revenue. Every paycheque not collected is a missed opportunity for a worker and their family to start a better life. That is why we extended the programs that made a real impact on thousands of lives.

For example, we are doubling the Guaranteed Annual Income System—GAINS—payment throughout 2023 and providing more than $40 billion in the next 10 years to improve and increase the space in hospitals and build new health care facilities.

As part of the plan to keep costs down, we are helping and making sure that millions of drivers will be relieved from gasoline tax till 2024. We’re making sure that the 5.7-cents-per-litre discount that was set to expire at the end of 2022 is extended until December 31, 2023.

Madam Speaker, we’ve talked about ODSP recipients in the past, how we are able to help them and support them. Through this statement, we’re going further and making sure that a recipient is allowed to net $200 in monthly pay before their provincial payments are reduced, raising their earnings threshold to $1,000 per month, while also increasing the percentage of support money that’s clawed back. We’re also increasing ODSP core allowances and the maximum monthly amount for assistance for children with severe disabilities by 5%. This way, over 25,000 ODSP recipients will be encouraged to participate in the workforce, which will help the province address the labour shortage and give them financial independence.

Madam Speaker, I just want to quickly talk about our Skills Development Fund. To date, with the $560-million investment that we made in the Skills Development Fund, we are proud to say that, to date, almost over 400,000 people around the province have taken the next step in their careers. That’s what we see when you help workers. When the government comes together and supports workers, workers come together and support our province of Ontario.

We have seen the high uptake and interest from stakeholders and the continued success of the program. I just want to quickly talk about two things in this program. We have seen in the past that about 10% of our Canadian population has some sort of criminal record; some mistake made and already paid back. They’ve already taken steps to rectify it, but the stigma stays with the person. What our government is doing through the SDF, we’re giving a hand up to those people and making sure they have a second career, a second chance to prove themselves. And we have seen the results of this: Prisha, for example, from Etobicoke, who is actually working into a skilled trade and building an amazing career. That’s something we want to continue.

Given the success, we are looking to invest $20 million in 2022-23 to enhance our SDF, with a focus on supporting priority infrastructure projects by hiring, training and retaining those workers, including apprenticeships. The intended outcome of this initiative is to ensure that there is sufficient skilled labour and training resources to meet labour demands from the significant capital investments made across the province.

In October 2022 alone, we have seen the results because of all the efforts we all put together: government and our wonderful workers and Ontarians. We have seen Ontario lead the country in job growth by creating over 42,000 new jobs. As the Minister of Finance said recently, we have also added, as I said earlier, over 11,700 health care workers to Ontario, including nurses and personal support workers to our health care system.

Madam Speaker, on top of our skills development program, we are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in innovative training programs to help people looking for work find good jobs close to home. For an example, our government’s Better Jobs Ontario program is making sure that it’s providing up to $28,000 available for short-duration training programs.

I’ll give you a small example. Before COVID hit, we had over 50 million visitors coming to the greater Toronto airport, and there were approximately between 250 and 300 taxi drivers supporting those visitors. But when the numbers had gone down to about 10 million, there was not a need for those taxi drivers—the people who always worked and made sure they helped those visitors so that they can reach their homes on time or can have a better experience in our province. But because of COVID, they lost their jobs, and that’s where the Better Jobs Ontario program comes in handy.

If you are in a profession where you can’t find a job or you believe the number of jobs has gone down, you can always take a short-duration course and pick up a career in in-demand jobs. Through this, we were able to help many of the residents in Ontario. We’re also making employment services easier and more convenient than ever, so that we are able to help thousands of people get what they need to get into the workforce.

No matter how or where you work, we believe more workers in Ontario should have access to benefits such as health and dental plans, and that is why we are working towards a portable benefit program so that we can help those vulnerable employees, workers, right here in Ontario.

To do this, we actually have a portable benefits advisory panel, which was established in March 2022, to advise the government on the viability, design and implementation of a portable benefits program for Ontario. The panel began consulting with the public and key stakeholders in September 2022, and will provide their final report and recommendations to the government in 2023. This is another way we are helping our workers in the province of Ontario.

Madam Speaker, we are making real progress and changing and supporting the lives of millions of Ontarians, including Ontario workers who stood up during the pandemic and supported our Ontario. We just want to take a moment and thank each and every worker for all your hard work and making sure that we can stand back on our feet, stronger than before COVID. So thank you for that, and as we continue in our mission, we will continue to work hard to make sure that families are at the centre of our focus.

Stronger families create stronger communities, and that’s why our government is making critical investments to help families and build up Ontario for the future. I commend the minister and his PAs for doing an incredible job and making sure that Ontario is the best place in the world to live, work and raise a family.

Madam Speaker, I just want to take a moment and want to commend the whole caucus for coming together, working together so that we can achieve this great success in our province. I look forward to all of you—let’s continue to work together and support our great province. Let’s support this bill.

It’s always a pleasure to listen to my friend from Mississauga–Malton hold forth in this place.

I have a question around recipients of the Ontario Disability Support Program and what the member talked about in this financial update. He noted that it is a good thing that the clawback on income has been expanded to $1,000 a month. But as the member knows well, because we’ve had discussions on this in this place, a requirement to qualify for the Ontario Disability Support Program is a medical note, a certificate, demonstrating that you cannot attain significant attachment to paid employment. You can’t qualify for ODSP unless you have a medical professional—a doctor, generally—proving that to qualify for ODSP. So I’m going to ask the member, what is the government’s vision for people with disabilities who do not have the capacity to get that $1,000 of paid employment income? The income levels that we have on ODSP, the $1,200 a month—are those adequate to live in Mississauga–Malton, Ottawa Centre, or anywhere else in the province of Ontario? I would submit, no. So what is the government’s plan to help people with disabilities who can’t make that $1,000 a month? Moreover, what could the government do to acknowledge the volunteer labour that so many of those persons with disabilities do and the value that brings to our province?

We’ll go to questions.

Madam Speaker, through you to the member for Mississauga–Malton: You often talk about your journey here, from India to Canada, and how proud you are that you were able to build a career, raise a son and a daughter, and take advantage of the opportunities that Ontario provides.

I would like you to share with the Legislature this afternoon what our government is doing, the measures we are putting in place, so that other new Canadians can also pursue a career and perhaps even realize the dream of home ownership.

I noticed that the Ontario government has made a decision to change the definition of affordable housing. Currently, the city of Toronto has a definition of affordable housing that would put a one-bedroom unit at a purchase price of $190,000; that means you could buy that if you were earning about $58,000 a year. Well, now the Ontario government is looking at changing the definition of affordability so that a one-bedroom unit would cost $444,000, requiring a household annual income of at least $130,000, which is really shocking.

What is this government’s plan to build more affordable housing in Ontario?

I want to acknowledge and thank the member opposite for that question. I was listening intently. I thought he was probably going to take the whole 10 minutes asking the question.

Our government wants to make sure that every worker who is able to work, can work, wants to work is on the path of the dignity of a job.

Talking about the re-entry jobs and the ODSP that the member opposite is talking about—we have seen, in 2019, 88% of all the injured workers were able to return to work and earn 100% of their pre-injury wages within one year.

We have increased the ODSP rate by 5%. Through this statement, we’re actually moving further, by increasing the Ontario disability support monthly earnings exemption from $200 to $1,000 per month. This change would encourage as many as 25,000 more individuals to participate in the workforce.

Madam Speaker, our government supports our injured workers and anyone and everyone who is on ODSP. We will continue to focus on creating hope and opportunity for all Ontarians.

I remember when I landed here on January 15, 2000—and even before I landed, my wife came home from the office and said, “We’re going to Canada.” I said, “What’s that?” She said, “That’s the land of opportunities.”

Proudly, 17 years after landing in Canada, I want to say thank you to my extended family and God for giving me an opportunity to become a candidate in 2018. Eighteen years after landing, I became a member of provincial Parliament.

What I’m trying to say to every newcomer is, if you can dream it, with your hard work, with the support of other Ontarians, you can achieve it here. That’s what we do here.

I still remember when I came here, when we bought our first house in Brampton—70 Native Landing in Brampton—we used to go and see it almost every second week to see how far it had gone up.

This government is committed—as we heard this morning from the Associate Minister of Housing, we will continue to support Ontarians, and we will make sure that we will build 1.5 million homes in the next 10 years.

Again, going back to, if you can dream it, through hard work here in Ontario you can achieve it—that is what our government is doing.

When I came here, the first thing I did was, I went back to Sheridan College. I understand the value of education. Back then, we used to start in the morning—by the evening, we would have two or three jobs. Back then, also, in 2000-01, there was a huge labour shortage, something which we are facing now.

Thankfully, we have a government that believes in and understands giving a hand to Ontarians through the SDF program. We are helping Ontarians through Better Jobs Ontario. We are making sure anyone who is looking for a job, who wants to do a job, who is able to do a job—through the small credentials, we will support them.

Along with that, we know that our youth needs a hand, needs help. We know there are going to be over 100,000 jobs in construction alone coming up. That’s why we are investing in the Ontario Youth Apprenticeship Program. I encourage everyone: Reach out to your guidance counsellor. We are actually doing career fairs across the province. We want to tell these youth: Come join the skilled trades and enjoy the benefits.

Regarding the question the member asked, I have a very simple answer: Read this wonderful document you have. There is a lot for our province of Ontario. Together, all of us—

I have a very simple question for the member: Why does your government’s fiscal update not include any new money in the health care budget?

My question to the member is about keeping costs down.

The people of Ontario work hard, and our government understands that taxpayers are under pressure.

Could the member tell us some more about why the proposed plan in this legislation keep costs down while investing in the priorities that matter to the people of Ontario—and also my riding, my constituents of Markham–Unionville—so critical during this time of economic uncertainty?