Founded in 1910, the Royal Canadian Navy has played an important role in the security of our nation. The Royal Canadian Navy has a long tradition of giving Canadian ships names with Canadian connections. During the Second World War, one of those ships, a Canadian-built Flower-class corvette, was named after the town of Oakville.

On November 5, 1941, HMCS Oakville was one of the few Canadian warships to be christened in their namesake town, and the ceremony was one of the largest ceremonies, if not the largest, of a warship in Canada. Thousands of people converged on the town of Oakville to see the corvette-class ship. The mayor adopted the crew and the ship as honorary citizens and stated proudly that the town would never forget the ship.

HMCS Oakville served during the Battle of the Atlantic, the longest continuous battle of the Second World War. On the evening of August 27, 1942, HMCS Oakville was engaged and sank the German U-boat U-94 during an escort mission off the coast of Cuba.

Only a few decades after the war, memory of the town’s famous warship was forgotten. In fact, if not for the efforts of Lieutenant Sean Livingston, a local reservist, author and naval historian, the story of HMCS Oakville would have certainly been lost.

On November 5 of this year, the Oakville Museum will celebrate the history of the warship in an exhibition at the Queen Elizabeth Park Community and Cultural Centre. The display is aptly named Oakville’s Flower and will feature artifacts, displays, historical accounts and photographs of the HMCS Oakville. As we approach Remembrance Day, I encourage everyone to learn more about the history of our ship and remember all the great veterans from the Second World War.

I listened intently to the member opposite. I think it’s quite good that we all agree that we’re in a housing crisis. I think that’s one thing we can all agree on. Maybe we disagree on how we solve the problem.

We know Ontario is growing at a phenomenal pace. Under the previous Liberal government, we had 300,000 manufacturing jobs leave the province. We’re now getting manufacturing jobs back in the province. We are short 400,000 workers in this province right now.

We know over the next decade the population of Ontario is going to expand by at least two million, a lot of those people in the GTA, so we’re going to need homes for those people. We’re going to need homes, whether they’re immigrants, newcomers, young people that want to get in the housing market.

I think Bill 23 is making a major effort to enhance housing affordability in this province. So my question to the member is, would you agree with the member from Toronto–St. Paul’s, who said, “More houses is not necessarily the answer”—that’s in Hansard, here in the House. Do you agree with that quote?

Thank you to the member opposite for your speech. I would beg to differ on the fact—when you mentioned that the government has not encouraged investments in affordable housing and incentives. We’ve put through delayed development charges, for example, in the past and encouraged rental building, which we haven’t seen in the province for decades. I believe last year had the largest increase in rental developments. We need homes. We need large homes, we need affordable homes and we need rentals. It’s really across the spectrum. Having said that, I would beg to differ with you on that point.

My question to you is on the fact that there are so many delays in a lot of the processes with municipal governments. Those delays cost money in the end. Whether it’s the red tape or a lack of decisions made by municipal councils—we do need to speed that up, because I’ve seen condo buildings that have been vacant land for seven, eight years. Imagine holding that land for seven, eight years. When you actually build it, who are those costs going to be borne by in that situation? And do you support that reduction in red tape so we can build faster?