My question is to the Premier. Speaker, the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program has been a failure since it was created in 2019. The official poverty line for a single person in Ontario is estimated to be about $27,000, yet the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program income cut-off for a single senior is $22,000, much closer to what experts call the “deep income poverty threshold.”

Wait-lists continue to grow across this province and seniors in Kitchener-Waterloo want to know why this program for low-income seniors does not even meet the basic expectation of serving seniors who are living in poverty.

In Kitchener-Waterloo my office continues to hear from seniors who are eligible and, after receiving the one-time inflation payment from the federal government, are now deemed ineligible after waiting for a whole year. In some cases, they’re ineligible by 30 cents. The flawed design is causing immense stress for seniors in the province of Ontario.

Is the government content—it sounds like they are—with a flawed dental program that leaves Ontario seniors stranded on a wait-list or bumped off, never receiving the care that seniors deserve in this province?