We were the first province in the country to bring in job-protected leave when COVID-19 hit the province. When you’re sick, you can stay home, and you can’t be fired for that. Furthermore, we were the first province in the country to bring in paid sick days for workers to stay home, and those businesses get reimbursed up to $200 per day.

Mr. Speaker, we’ll continue having the backs of workers every single day during this pandemic and beyond.

That’s why, during the pandemic, we hired more than a hundred new health and safety inspectors. And I have to remind the opposition members that you voted against that; you voted against raising the total number of health and safety inspectors to the most in provincial history. But guess what? Under the leadership of Premier Ford and our PC government, we got it done.

Thank you for that question. When we talk about incidents like what occurred in Saskatchewan, what we’ve seen in the province of Ontario, we know that we need to do more, and our government has and will continue to do more. The investments that have been made, the $3.8 billion that will be invested over 10 years to build on the Roadmap to Wellness, are the types of investments that will focus and assist, whether it be the mobile intervention crisis teams that are out working each and every day to defuse situations and to provide support to individuals; whether it be the $194 million that was invested during the pandemic to provide emergency funding to help reduce wait-lists and improve capacity for individuals in need of help; whether it be the $31 million that was invested for a 5% across-the-board increase in government-funded youth and children mental health supports. We are continuing to do this work, and including youth wellness hubs that are also providing supports to families and individuals throughout the province. We will continue to do that work.

Mr. Speaker, I’ve attended some of those vigils that take place with moms who have lost their children. I’ve seen the pain that’s caused by the trauma that’s induced as a result of these violent crimes.

Our government is making the investments to build the continuums of care with community-based supports. It is making the investments to ensure that the supports are there for the families as well as for the individuals. We know that many of these investments should be made early on to support children and youth, because by doing that, we provide them hope and we provide them opportunities.

So once again, our government continues to make investments to help the people of the province of Ontario where and when that help—

We’ll continue working for workers every single day. That’s why we increased the number of health and safety inspectors, and since the pandemic hit Ontario, we’ve done more than 100,000 inspections and investigations in workplaces right across this province. It’s why we were the first in Canada to bring in job-protected leave almost on day one, when this pandemic hit. It’s why we were the first province in the country to bring in three paid sick days, and the member opposite is well aware we’ve extended this until the end of March next year.

I can be clear with the members opposite and with all the people of Ontario that we’ll continue to have their backs, we’ll continue to ensure that we protect workers—that they can stay home when they’re sick—and we’ll continue working for workers every day.