Good morning. Let us pray.

Prayers.

Resuming the debate adjourned on October 3, 2023, on the motion for second reading of the following bill:

Bill 134, An Act to amend the Development Charges Act, 1997 and the St. Thomas-Central Elgin Boundary Adjustment Act, 2023 / Projet de loi 134, Loi modifiant la Loi de 1997 sur les redevances d’aménagement et la Loi de 2023 sur la modification des limites territoriales entre St. Thomas et Central Elgin.

It’s a pleasure to rise to speak to Bill 134, Affordable Homes and Good Jobs Act, and to provide some comments this morning.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a lot of us were up late last night, watching the Manitoba election. On a partisan level, obviously—you win some, you lose some—it was great to see, for us, an NDP majority government, but more importantly, and on a less partisan note, to see Wab Kinew elected as the first First Nations Premier in Canada was inspiring. I was with my friend from Kiiwetinoong and some other folks from that community, and to see the look on their faces and to hear the commentary around the country and know that First Nations people—this really lifted their spirits after truth and reconciliation day, which we recognized on Monday, especially young people across the country. It was very inspiring and great to see. Congratulations to Wab Kinew on his victory.

I’d also like to recognize my friend from University–Rosedale, who has done an excellent job. I enjoy working with her on the housing and municipal affairs portfolio. When the government House leader quotes you often, you know you’re doing a good job as a critic. I think she’s doing an excellent job, so I want to recognize her.

Also, AMO and our municipal partners—I think we don’t recognize enough the hard work they do, especially under the difficult circumstances they’ve been subjected to over the last few years. I’ll be touching on that in my remarks regarding Bill 23 and, historically, what’s been happening with municipalities.

Of course, our stakeholders and all the citizens who have come out over the last year, concerned about the things that this government has been doing around the greenbelt and around land deals—thousands and thousands of people across the province have come out to MPPs’ offices and to the greenbelt itself to express their desire to keep that farmland and that protected land. That played a huge part in causing this government to change course, and I want to thank all of them.

I want to, before commenting on the bill specifically, provide some context. We’ve talked about this many times before. This government and the official opposition have very different views of the housing crisis. We’ve talked a lot about how this government focuses on supply only, and supply rather than demand and the demand that is out there, which is for affordable homes, not for large single-detached homes.

We’ve never seen a situation where more folks own multiple properties. Speculation has become possibly the biggest problem in the housing crisis, next to supply, and that’s something that this government, in our opinion, has really ignored. It’s an ideological difference. This government believes that the way to address the housing crisis is just to remove obstacles; remove regulations, what they call red tape; give developers tax breaks; remove due diligence from the planning process, granting undemocratic powers to mayors. These are all things that say, “We’re going to step back and we’re going to let the market fix the housing crisis.” That’s not a solution, and it has never been a solution in Canada.

The government of Canada and the provincial government used to be in housing, and that’s how we ended up with co-op housing, social housing, public housing. As the official opposition, we’ve been very vocal in saying we need to use all of those tools and we need to—as Councillor Gord Perks in Toronto recently said, the federal government and the provincial government need to get back in the housing game if we’re really going to address the housing crisis,

Secondly, I want to raise that we understand this government wants to slow things down due to the disastrous summer of scandal and housing policy failure, and so this bill, clearly, is an attempt to do that—to slow down, to change the channel from the scandals and the failures of their housing policy. The theme that I think I see in all this is wasted time. If you look at how much time has been wasted, especially over the last year, dealing with scandals, dealing with questionable land deals—this is time that could have been spent addressing the housing crisis. Instead, the government is doing damage control and lurching from one scandal to another.

So while we will be supporting this bill—and I’ll explain why—I must begin by saying that this government has been in power for five years, and it has never been more expensive to rent or own a home. Obviously, given the size and urgency of the housing crisis, the meagre measures contained in this bill won’t do much to make life easier for folks who are struggling to find affordable places to live in Ontario. This government’s failed policies and ill-advised schemes like greenbelt land grabs, strong-mayor powers and governance reviews are not delivering the housing people urgently need; in fact, they’re making things worse. The truth is, people no longer trust this government to address the housing crisis.

Specific to this bill—this bill redefines when an affordable or attainable home is eligible for the exemption from development charges under section 4.1 of the Development Charges Act. The new definition of “affordable” is a home whose rent is no greater than the lesser of 30% of the income of the 60th percentile of renter households and the average market rent; the current definition is 80% of average market rent. So that is an improvement. The new definition of “attainable” is a home for purchase whose price is the lesser of the price that would result in annual accommodation costs that are 30% of the income of the 60th percentile of households and 90% of the average purchase price; the current definition is 80% of average purchase price. So that is an improvement. The act also establishes an affordable residential units bulletin in which the minister shall determine the incomes and corresponding rents and purchase prices to which the term “affordable” shall apply.

Schedule 2 talks about allowing the city of St. Thomas to provide assistance for the new Volkswagen EV battery factory in St. Thomas—which was a bill that we also supported.

So defining affordability based on income, as I mentioned, is an improvement over defining strictly based on market prices—80% of a completely unaffordable market price, though, is still unaffordable.

Housing expert Steve Pomeroy told us that the 60th renter percentile is a realistic benchmark.

Redefining affordability based on income instead of the market for the purposes of a development charge exemption is an incremental improvement over the status quo because, as currently defined, developers might receive an exemption for building affordable homes that are not affordable for most people, and that might have been homes that might have been built anyway, without the exemption.

But there’s still much more the government should be doing to spur the construction of new non-market homes, especially homes that are affordable for low-income households. We’ve talked about this many times in the past. While the NDP supports incentives like development charge exemptions to encourage the construction of purpose-built rental housing, especially affordable homes, the province should be covering these costs, not cash-strapped municipalities that are already struggling after over 25 years of provincial downloads and cuts.

The Ford government shows no indication it intends to keep its promise to make municipalities whole for Bill 23 revenue losses—I’ll talk about that further—and when the NDP asked about this, the Premier said, “The municipalities love spending money.... We don’t have an income problem at the city halls across the province; we have a spending problem. That’s the issue.” That’s the kind of disdain that the Premier and this government have shown toward municipalities—in our opinion, a real disrespect for municipalities across Ontario.

This government is letting developers off the hook from paying their fair share for services that people need, including parks, transit and affordable housing. We believe this government needs to tackle the housing crisis from every angle. That includes real rent control, clamping down on speculation and getting the province back into the business of building homes people can actually afford.

This government has been in power for over half a decade, and we still do not have a clear, coherent housing policy. Over the summer, this government was lurching from one scandal to another, with no clarity of direction or motives. This creates uncertainty for our municipal partners; they’ve been very vocal about that.

Meanwhile, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., just the other week, lowered projections on how many homes will be constructed in Ontario. Canada is short 3.5 million housing units for 2030, and Ontario has the biggest supply gap. This government is not even delivering on the supply side, never mind the affordability issue, which is getting worse and worse.

As I mentioned, it’s tragic, especially over the summer, how much time has been wasted on government scandals, rather than addressing the housing crisis. For over a year, this government has been wasting time enriching their friends instead of focusing on housing. Tearing up the greenbelt was more important to them. This was sold as their big idea to address the housing affordability crisis, and we heard the government leader speak many times about providing affordable homes for immigrants on greenbelt land, which is one of the most ridiculous claims I’ve heard this government or any government ever make.

No one ever believed that this was about affordable homes for immigrants built on the greenbelt, and I take particular exception to some of that language, as someone who, before being elected to this place, ran a settlement agency for almost a decade, serving newcomer families and refugee families. I’ll tell you, none of my clients ever approached me and said, “You know, I’d really like a piece of virgin farmland with no services so I can build a mansion now that I’m here in Canada.” Most of the immigrants I’ve met—and if you look at the stats, most of them who come to Canada—are learning English. They’re finding jobs. They’re often working two or three jobs while they’re going to school. They’re struggling to pay rent. That’s the reality for immigrants, and I really think using them to support an unsupportable housing policy is in bad taste.

It never should have taken a series of scandals from this government for the Premier to attempt to undo the damage he has done. While people are struggling with an affordability crisis, this Premier has wasted people’s time, and after reading both the Integrity Commissioner’s and the Auditor General’s reports, it’s clear tearing up the greenbelt was never about building homes.

CityNews recently had an excellent article that highlighted just how much time this government has wasted with this greenbelt scandal, detailing an incredible timeline. It’s amazing to think that it was almost a year ago, November 4, 2022, when the municipal affairs and housing minister announced via news release that Ontario would remove 7,400 acres in 15 different areas of the greenbelt while adding 9,400 acres elsewhere to build 50,000 homes. It contradicted a pledge directly that he made in 2021 not to open the greenbelt “to any kind of development.”

On November 11, CBC reported that the landowners who stood to benefit from the greenbelt land removals included prominent developers and that one purchase happened as recently as September. Later in November, the minister said that he did not tip off developers ahead of announcing changes to the greenbelt, and the Premier said the same a day later.

Yet, on January 6, Ontario Provincial Police said they were working to determine whether they should investigate the matter. On January 18, Ontario’s Integrity Commissioner and Auditor General both announced that they would conduct separate probes. The Integrity Commissioner launched an investigation into the minister on a complaint from the NDP leader, who asked the commissioner to investigate whether the minister broke the ethics rules around making a public policy decision to further someone’s private interests. And now—this is prior to February—the government is fully embroiled in a scandal and not working to provide housing for the people of Ontario.

Later in February, our leader asked the Integrity Commissioner to issue an opinion on the Premier’s actions surrounding his daughter’s stag-and-doe event ahead of her wedding. The Premier acknowledged that some developers who were friends attended the $150-a-ticket event and media reports say lobbyists and government relations firms were—

Point of order, Speaker.

Thank you, Speaker. And I would remind my friend that the government speakers, whom I listened to intently, provided context going back to 2018. As I mentioned, what we’re establishing is how much time this government has wasted. Rather than addressing the housing crisis, they’ve had to waste time on scandals, and now we have a bill in front of us that doesn’t really build any homes. So we have wasted time and now we’re discussing a bill that doesn’t really contain anything in it that will address the housing crisis. I think it’s very germane. We’re almost there; we’re up to August of this long scandal, but I’ll get there.

On August 25, the Premier, in his first comments since the minister’s chief of staff’s resignation, said he was “confident” nothing criminal took place on the greenbelt, but that RCMP investigation is ongoing.

Now, First Nations, which has been brought up by the government speakers yesterday: On August 28, I think it’s worth pointing out that First Nations chiefs across the province called on the Premier to return land to the greenbelt. As we speak this morning, our leader and a number of our critics are in the media studio talking about urban boundary expansion and the disrespect that’s been shown to First Nations communities with respect to that. The chiefs brought that up on August 28 with respect to the greenbelt scandal and said very clearly that the greenbelt moves the government made were violating the Williams Treaties that were settled with the province and the federal government in 2018.

So here we are today. We just went through September. On September 4, the minister formally resigned his cabinet post. The Premier appointed the government House leader as the new Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing to manage a full-blown crisis, not to build housing—and that’s important; that’s what we’re talking about this morning. It was to manage a crisis. We know what’s happened since, with the resignation of three ministers, multiple staff resigning and a potential RCMP investigation.

Recently, Speaker, in a Globe and Mail article entitled “Ontario Government Had Targeted More Greenbelt Sites Without Public’s Notice”—

Point of order?

Thank you, Speaker. It only took a few minutes to read the bill because there’s not a lot in it. I listened intently to the government speakers yesterday, who wandered all over the political map for a couple of hours. I’ll leave it to the Speaker to determine whether I’m on topic when I discuss issues of why the government is not addressing housing in this bill.

I’ll be talking about the things that the government should be addressing, and one of those things, obviously, was brought up just last week, when the official opposition leader tabled the greenbelt restoration act. It would be great in this bill if the government took the opportunity to do what they promised to do and repealed the greenbelt legislation. The bill that we proposed, which the government could have put in this bill, repealed the Conservatives’ 2022—

Let me talk about someone who’s looking for affordable housing in my riding. I trust that will be acceptable to the Speaker, and maybe make him a little more comfortable for a few minutes and not quite as agitated. I’m going to talk about Tim Gibson, someone from my riding who’s having a really hard time finding affordable housing. The Premier recently stated of the government’s housing policy, “It’s not a little bit better; it’s not 10% better; it’s a thousand times better on all fronts. It’s a thousand times better” since the government took office. That’s the Premier’s words. So while the government continues to stumble from one bad idea to another, people across Ontario still do not have access to affordable housing.

Tim Gibson from my riding in Niagara Centre—60 years old. He lives in Niagara Regional Housing, and he’s lived there for 15 years. He’s on ODSP. He gets $700 a month because of the rent-geared-to-income housing. He went to the Hope Centre food bank recently. I’ve met with food banks in my riding recently; they’re having a real hard time all across Ontario. People from Feed Ontario were here last session telling all members of the Legislature—and I hope many of them took advantage of the opportunity to visit them for their reception—what a difficult time they’re having as this government’s policies fail and people have to choose between rent and food.

He went to the Hope Centre food bank, and all they had left was two cans of spaghetti sauce. So he got a $50 gift card from St. Vincent de Paul society. He was telling me this the other day. He left the grocery store with five items, including a bag of potatoes, a package of hamburger, a package of chicken, a dozen eggs and a tub of margarine. That’s all $50 got him. He wants to speak to the Premier directly to raise his concerns. He knows he’s lucky to have rent geared to income—that’s what he told me—but the housing complex he lives in is tired, and repairs are slow to come, if at all. He worries the place will be shut down for bylaw infractions. Where would all those people go? Even though he’s housed, he worries about being homeless.

Speaker, we hear hundreds of stories from people in my riding and across Ontario on the brink of homelessness. We have food banks that have told us people who used to donate are now the ones who are receiving food, and yet the Premier has the nerve to say things are a thousand times better than ever before.

Tim Gibson, the man I just referenced, wanted to speak to the Premier, so I gave him the Premier’s number. I know the Premier says he likes to give his phone number out, so I hope he speaks to Tim.

Another example: In an article published just the other day in the St. Catharines Standard, titled “‘Perfect Storm of Obstacles’ Impacts Food Programs,” Jessica Stephenson, who is the Niagara Nutrition Partners program manager in Niagara, said, “It’s unprecedented times at the moment. We’re currently experiencing a perfect storm of obstacles that impact how we run our programs. We’re just trying to meet that increase in student population to make sure that all students have access to a healthy meal at all times....

“Niagara Nutrition Partners receives funding from the Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services but the provincial money—it has remained stagnant since 2014 despite inflation and rising population—only covers a portion of the cost, leaving gaps it works to fill through groups such as United Way, helping put ‘buffers in place,’ so” schools can provide meals year-long. Again, Speaker, this Premier thinks that things are a thousand times better on all fronts.

Housing affordability in Niagara: I hope the government House leader doesn’t mind me talking about housing affordability—

In Niagara, we’re seeing people spend upwards of 60% of their take-home income on housing alone. According to Niagara Association of Realtors, the average price of homes sold in August 2023 was $688,754. A modest one-bedroom in Welland, for example, is going for $1,400 a month. A basement one-bedroom apartment in Port Colborne is $1,300. How does someone like Tim, who I mentioned, afford to buy groceries and at the same time pay rent when they’re only getting $700 or $800 a month?

Rents have risen across Ontario over the past 20 years, particularly since 2011. Shortly after this government was elected, they eliminated rent control on new units. There’s no legal limit set on how much landlords can charge in rent for new builds that are occupied for the first time after November of 2018.

We all agree that we need to build more homes, but we keep pointing out that you can’t just look at supply. You have to look at demand. The title of the bill is about housing affordability, but this government refuses to look at the price of homes, at the demand for affordable homes in Ontario. This government seems to keep feeding the demands of speculators while ignoring the demands of Ontarians who just want an affordable place to live.

This government has ignored the advice of its own experts and its own Housing Affordability Task Force by not ending exclusionary zoning. The government is failing to enable missing-middle housing to make it easier for people of all incomes, ages, family sizes and abilities to access affordable housing options in the neighbourhoods and communities they need to live in.

For Niagara Regional Housing, the wait-list for an affordable unit in Thorold, where I live, is eight years. In Welland, you’re waiting from four to eight years; in St. Catharines, eight to 15 years. In Niagara Falls, you could be looking at anywhere from five to 20 years for an affordable housing unit.

We have been calling for a strong public sector role to deliver new affordable and non-market housing that the for-profit sector can’t or won’t deliver. This government has relied almost entirely on the private market to deliver new housing. Their main tools have been deregulation, tax cuts and sacrificing more farmland and natural heritage to urban development. This approach, Speaker, has clearly failed.

Simply putting forward a bill that changes the definition of “affordability,” although it’s an improvement and we appreciate it, will do nothing to build new homes. There are so many more things this government should be doing. Instead, they’ve focused on delivering benefits to well-connected landowners and donors while sacrificing farmland instead of focusing on delivering housing that’s actually affordable and meets the needs of regular Ontarians.

Part of this bill is doing what this government does best, which is shifting cost and responsibility from developers onto municipalities, so we have to talk about municipalities and how they will be affected. There’s still much more the government should be doing to spur the construction of new non-market homes, especially homes that are affordable for low-income households. While we support incentives like development charge exemptions to encourage the construction of purpose-built rental housing, especially affordable homes, the province should be covering these costs, not cash-strapped municipalities that are already struggling after over 25 years of provincial downloads and cuts.

The Ford government shows no indication it intends to keep its promise to make municipalities whole for Bill 23 revenue losses. When I asked about this, the Premier said, and I remember this very vividly from question period, “Municipalities love spending money.... We don’t have an income problem at the city halls across the province; we have a spending problem. That’s the issue.”

Once again, as they’re doing in this bill, they’re shifting responsibility and costs from the province to municipalities. Again, we have another bill that fails to fulfill the government’s promise to make municipalities whole after the financial ruin they caused with Bill 23. There’s nothing to make up for the municipal deficits which will result in service cuts and higher property taxes. AMO has calculated that cities are seeing a $5-billion revenue shortfall from Bill 23. Changing the definition of affordability is not going to address that problem.

The city of Pickering is raising taxes by 2.44% due to Bill 23. Coupled with the region of Durham’s increase of 2.87%, Pickering taxpayers will be paying an additional 5.3% on their bill. The major challenge was the lack of development charges coming into the city as a result of Bill 23, which was the More Homes Built Faster Act.

In Niagara, “the legislation reduces or freezes development charges, the fees municipalities collect from developers and rely on for growth-related services such as roads and infrastructure.

“If the provincial government doesn’t offer some form of compensation,” regional chair Jim “Bradley has said the region would annually have to raise property taxes 11% to cover an estimated $122 million in lost revenue.”

A report by the city of St. Catharines stated, “The proposed reduced fees will shift the financial burden onto existing taxpayers instead of growth paying for growth. This will put significant stress on the city’s budget and planning to accommodate for the lost revenue required for the city’s capital projects.... Further financial risk will be taken by the city due to the downloading of responsibilities, additional studies, programs, staffing and the increased need for long-term debt.”

Although I’m not sure I’ll have a chance to address it today, Speaker, municipalities, on top of this financial stress, are facing the anxiety presented by this government’s tinkering with governance. It’s interesting that one of the first things the government House leader did in taking over the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing was to put the brakes on that, but it would be nice for municipalities if they didn’t have to deal with further confusion and had some idea of how the government plans to deal with those regional governance reviews.

“In Brampton, city council received a staff report in November estimating revenue losses equalling as much as an 80% property tax increase.” And all of these increases, Speaker, are under the guise of helping to create housing in Ontario.

In Guelph, “staff are also recommending eliminating the annual $500,000 transfer to the city’s affordable housing reserve fund to help offset the impacts ... from Bill 23....” So there’s an example directly impacting a city’s affordable housing reserve fund.

In Waterloo, they’ve said that the draft budget contains a proposed tax increase of 5.35% that would add about $75 to the average property tax bill. However, over the next five years, the city stands to lose between $23 million and $31 million in development charges—fees paid by developers to municipalities to offset the cost of new facilities and services.

Waterloo also said, “Between the impacts of record inflation in 2022 and the implementation of Bill 23, local municipalities are projecting significant tax increases.

“Regional government is looking at a hike of ... 9.8%, adding $147 to the average property tax bill.”

“The township of North Dumfries is projecting a 4.8% property tax hike for 2023” as a result of this government’s housing policy on regional governments “in large part due to the expected impacts” from the More Homes Built Faster Act.

Huron-Perth: “Without additional funding from the province to offset this loss of revenue, municipalities will have little option but to put these costs back on the taxpayer. Adding more costs to existing property owners will increase their costs and could negatively impact current homeowners, who may already be struggling with rising interest rates, to keep their current housing affordable.”

In Markham, they’ve said, “City staff members presented a report on the various impacts of the proposed Bill 23 legislative changes. The most alarming revelation was that the changes in Bill 23 could cost the city $136 million in annual revenue, requiring an increase of 50% to 80% on property taxes to maintain existing service levels, equalling an estimated $600 to $1,000 per year to the average homeowner.”

Now, this bill would have been a perfect opportunity, Speaker, for the government to keep their promise to make municipalities whole.

Brampton city council has joined other municipalities in voicing serious concerns over the economic impacts of the provincial government’s Bill 23. The bill is equivalent to an 80% property tax increase over the next 10 years. To put it simply, that bill, Bill 23, shifted a significant financial cost from developers onto already struggling municipalities and that cost would be handed down, obviously, to folks who are struggling to find a home to own or rent.

Now, we’ve talked a little about things that could have been in this bill, and one of the things I’ve heard, actually, from the new minister, the government House leader, when he took over the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing after the scandals through the summer, was that they may be taking up an NDP idea, which is a “use it or lose it” clause for developers.

Folks will remember that this government, in its efforts to blame municipalities for everything that goes wrong in the housing market, put very strict rules on municipalities about the time that it takes to move approvals through municipal planning departments—not a bad thing to require municipalities to do things in a reasonable period of time, but they failed to do the same thing with developers.

So, it was great to hear the minister, when he was attempting to change channels after the scandal, take up a good NDP idea which is to bring in a “use it or lose it” clause for developers. There’s a housing development in Port Colborne, in my riding, that was approved in the 1980s and has yet to break ground. AMO and the big city mayors have all pointed out that there are 1.25 million homes in the approval pipeline that are not being built. The government could have taken advantage of this opportunity, after already speaking about it in the media, to make that part of this bill, but they chose not to. I hope that they move forward and do that in the very near future.

During question period I asked the previous Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing if this government would “stop blaming municipalities, do what is fair and implement a sunset clause of approvals so that developers and builders must build housing in a reasonable period of time after they’ve been approved.” We have yet to hear a commitment from the government, as I’ve mentioned. I hope we hear that soon.

The NDP has put forward amendments in committee to Bill 23. They were rejected unfortunately by this government, and I hope they’re changing their tune now. Our amendment stated, “Section 41 ... (15.4) Subject to and in accordance with the regulations, a municipality may, by bylaw, impose penalties on the owner of the land for failure to substantially commence development within a timely manner after the plans and drawings have been approved under this section.”

Planners, Mr. Speaker, say that if the province could incentivize developers to build what it is already approved, they would be 85% of the way to their goal. Now, we can argue about whether that’s exaggerated—I’m sure the government would say it is—but let’s say it was only 50%. Let’s say by implementing something like this, we could get 50% to our goal, why would the government not move forward to this if it wasn’t because they are afraid of the pushback from their developer friends?

In a CBC article, the chair of the Regional Planning Commissioners of Ontario, Thom Hunt, said, “If the province could incentivize developers to build what is already approved by municipalities, they’d be 85% of the way toward their goal, well ahead of their target. I think the report starts to tell the story that the housing supply challenge isn’t really a land supply or development approval problem.... The bigger problem is, probably, how do you compel a developer to build? How do you increase the rate of construction?”

Unfortunately, we have here another housing bill that fails to include a sunset clause to incentivize developers. Despite the government not taking action, some municipalities are already moving ahead with this plan, because they know that it would work.

In April 2022, Aurora mayor Tom Mrakas stated, “Aurora town council unanimously approved a motion ... to add a sunset clause to all future site-specific zoning bylaw amendments. What this means is that if a development applicant does not satisfy the time frame requirements and obtain a building permit, the development approvals will be revoked and the zoning of the property will return to its original state.”

The statement goes on to say, “With this planning mechanism in place, Aurora can be better positioned to foster appropriate development that will meet the needs of current and future residents when they need it.”

Here’s a simple yet effective mechanism this government could implement today. They could have put it in this bill. Instead, since coming to power they’ve wasted everyone’s time with things like strong-mayor powers, regional reviews and flip-flops on selling the greenbelt. It’s great to hear the new Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing speaking to the media and indicating he may move forward with an NDP idea, and I hope, certainly, that we see that happen. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen in this bill.

Things that we would have loved to see in this bill, Speaker:

—implementing real rent control—we’ve talked about that;

—building truly affordable housing, including non-profit, public, co-op and supportive housing;

—cracking down on greedy land speculation;

—establishing inclusionary zoning to build homes within existing neighbourhoods near transit and other key infrastructure; and

—getting the federal and provincial governments back in the business of building homes that people can actually afford.

When the government says that the official opposition, the NDP, are always saying no, that they don’t have solutions, that’s not true. We’ve proposed solutions continually and we have some solutions that could be implemented right away. It would have been really easy to include some of this stuff—especially the sunset clause that I referred to—in this bill, but the government is not trying to solve the housing crisis; they’re trying to handle a scandal.

AMO released a response to Bill 134, the Affordable Homes and Good Jobs Act. They put out a press release: “At its meeting on September 29, the AMO board considered the recent request made by” the minister “to mayors across Ontario regarding their views on the recommendations of the Housing Affordability Task Force.”

Remember, Speaker, this was the task force that said, “You don’t need to build on the greenbelt. We have enough land within urban boundaries. We don’t need to force urban boundaries to expand. We don’t need MZOs. We have the land we need.”

AMO says, “The minister has requested that all heads of council respond to the request by October 16 or risk financial penalties for their municipality. AMO had previously requested that the ministry extend the deadline to allow mayors to consult with councils; however, the request was not granted.”

So here’s AMO saying, “Look, our members have received your request. We want some time so the mayors can talk to their councils,” and the minister said, “No, no, I’m not going to give you that time.” They can waste all the time they want, but they’re not going to give municipalities time for mayors to even speak to their councils.

“AMO states that at a sector level, municipalities conditionally support all task force recommendations with a few exceptions, provided that the government puts in place”—and here is what AMO wants. It’s not pie in the sky, nothing unreasonable. Here’s what they want:

“—a fair and sustainable funding framework to support infrastructure and growth, that is not unduly subsidized by existing property taxpayers”—we talked about that already;

“—a comprehensive, sequenced implementation plan that gives both developers and municipalities certainty regarding costs and rules to support effective long-term decision-making”—doesn’t sound unreasonable to me;

“—an accountability framework that accurately recognizes the roles and responsibilities of different housing partners and does not hold municipalities accountable for the actions of developers or provincial ministries. Mechanisms must be included to ensure that public investments are tied to outcomes in the public interest;

“—a core focus on non-market housing”—that’s something we’ve talked about for a long time—“which was not within the mandate of the housing affordability task force. A robust non-market housing sector is a critical part of a well-functioning overall housing system and needs to be prioritized by governments”—they’re saying government needs to get back in the game;

“—a public policy review by the Ontario Public Service verifying that each recommendation is feasible, likely to result in increased housing supply and/or affordability and is in the public interest.”

It’s amazing that we don’t have that already.

So the letter identifies top recommendations from the task force for prioritization, as well as three recommendations that AMO objects to on principle.

“AMO has previously stated that the government has chosen its own path in addressing the housing crisis”—that’s AMO, representing 144 municipalities across Ontario. The government haven’t listened to us. They’ve chosen their own path “in addressing the housing crisis in Ontario, despite the advice of municipalities, and will be accountable for its outcomes. AMO has also stated that municipalities will do everything within their power to help the province to achieve its housing targets and outcomes. The AMO board believes that the response outlined in the letter is reflective of this approach.”

So they’re saying, “The government hasn’t listened to us. They’ve gone their own way. But we still want to work with you.” There’s time to change direction. Municipalities want to work with the government, but they can’t blame municipalities for every problem that exists with the affordable housing crisis. They have to work with municipalities, and they have to listen when municipalities come to them.

Bill 63, which the NDP supported, is being renamed Supporting Manufacturing in St. Thomas Act. I want to emphasize, in closing, some of the things I said when originally speaking to Bill 63. As you all know, the opposition supported this bill, and we have to give credit not only to municipal, provincial and federal governments, but, as we pointed out, to unions as well, who went through very difficult times with thousands of their members losing jobs. They went to the bargaining table. So I think we have to give some credit where credit is due to unions like Unifor and the Steelworkers and others who have gone to the bargaining table and worked with the government. This was obviously something that was led by the federal government and with the industry to try to create the conditions to bring some of these jobs back. And this is one area where we all came together in this House and supported that EV battery factory, which will bring back some of the many manufacturing jobs that have been lost in the past.

St. Thomas was one of those areas in Ontario that was devastated when we lost manufacturing jobs, especially in the 1990s. According to Statistics Canada, from the early 2000s to the mid-2010s, the number of employees in manufacturing fell by roughly half a million in Canada, and we’ve seen the long-lasting impact of that first-hand in Niagara. For example, the St. Catharines General Motors plant, at one time, was up to 11,000 or 12,000 manufacturing jobs; now they’re down to a couple of thousand. So it’s great to see the possibility of some of those jobs coming back, and the official opposition was happy to support a bill that helped to make that happen.

To conclude, we will be supporting Bill 134, Affordable Homes and Good Jobs Act. However, this government has been in power for over five years, and we’ve yet to see a comprehensive, transparent housing plan based on facts and evidence. The government continues lurching from one random decision to another, one scandal to another, with no consistency in their direction or their motives. While this government continues to waste everyone’s time, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., as I mentioned, lowered their projections on how many homes will be constructed in Ontario.

People need affordable places to live, but this government’s failed policies are not delivering the housing people urgently need. In fact, they’re making everything worse. People no longer trust this government to fix the housing crisis. Given the size and urgency of the housing crisis, these measures in this bill are meagre measures that won’t do all that much to make life easier for people. Redefining affordable housing by tying it to a person’s income and not the market is an improvement, but this government is still letting developers off the hook from paying their fair share for services that people need, including parks, transit and affordable housing.

As a result of government inaction, more and more folks are struggling to pay their bills and keep a roof over their head, like Tim Gibson, who I mentioned, from my riding. It’s never been more expensive to rent or own a home after five years of Conservative government. We’ve been calling for the government to tackle the housing crisis from every angle to make it easier to buy or rent a place to call home. That includes real rent control. It includes clamping down on speculation and getting the province back into the business of building homes you can actually afford. We will continue to do that work, Speaker.

Point of order, Speaker.

Point of order.

The member from Niagara Centre, we are talking about affordable housing—a reminder to keep on point with that.

Sorry, Madam Speaker. Point of order.

He has a bill in front of him about affordable housing—the definition of affordable housing with respect to St. Thomas. We will continue to interject, and we would ask that the member continue to focus his comments on the bill before him. If he doesn’t, then I would suggest he yield the floor to another member of the caucus who might actually have some comments on the bill before the House.

Question?

I listened intently to the member on his speech, and I didn’t hear very much about Bill 134 until the last couple of minutes when, out of the blue, they announced that they’re going to support the bill, as they did Bill 63.

If you remember when Bill 63 was going through the Legislature here, what tipped the scales in favour of the NDP supporting was the calls they received from union leadership that said, “You’re toast if you don’t support this bill redefining the boundaries around St. Thomas,” because it was integral and of paramount importance to be able to establish an EV battery manufacturing facility in the St. Thomas region. So again, they were taking their marching orders from their stakeholders—not necessarily the people of Ontario—who will support this bill without question.

Bill 134 is so important to people in my riding who do have lower-than-average incomes and pay more as a percentage of their income to pay for housing. Thank you for supporting it. It’s about time you got behind this government’s entire—

The member mentioned the election last night and how that election resulted in an NDP government taking power in Manitoba. I think that makes me feel hopeful.

As the official opposition in Ontario, the NDP and our leader, Marit Stiles, have been trying to get to the housing scandal and fix housing so that people actually have affordable homes.

I want to ask the member: In 2026, when we actually have an NDP government in this province, can you summarize how the NDP government will fix the housing crisis in this province so people can afford homes, and stop tinkering around with the Conservative bills that don’t fix the housing crisis?

Thank you to the member from Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke for that, although what he says is completely false. We were always supporting the EV battery manufacturing plant—

Interjections.

We were always supporting that bill and didn’t receive any calls from unions. I come from Niagara, where we have a General Motors plant, and there was never any doubt that we were going to support manufacturing jobs coming to Ontario.

In terms of the bill and my only addressing the housing in the last couple of minutes, obviously the member wasn’t listening.

I think I spoke as well about just our different approach to housing, which is looking historically, looking at facts and evidence and understanding that the government has to intervene. The marketplace is not going to correct housing just by increasing the supply. Government has to get back into the business of providing housing.

Sorry, maybe you could communicate with me later. I have no idea what you’re referring to; I’m saying that honestly.

But I can tell you that I just talked about sunset clauses on developers, making sure that, as the government House leader himself has proposed to the media—putting a sunset clause on developers so that they start building rather than speculating and sitting on approvals, according to the big city mayors, would create hundreds of thousands of units of housing. That’s something we can do without spending any taxpayer dollars.

But the answer is no, there’s nothing in this bill that will create any housing at all. It changes a definition of what is affordable housing and talks about an EV battery plant in St. Thomas.

We just saw this week people protesting about renovictions and the situation is just horrible, so hopefully one day the government sees the light. It would be a big deal for renters, but it wouldn’t be a big deal for them just to put rent control back.

Thank you to our member for impactful conversation on the government’s bill. This bill is entitled, I believe, the Affordable Homes and Good Jobs Act. It certainly is an improvement that the government is proposing to define affordability based on income as opposed to strictly based on market value.

But the question I have—particularly in St. Paul’s, where rent is soaring—is, why will the Conservative government not commit to real rent control? We have tenants in St. Paul’s who had to leave the community, actually. The rent was $2,500 a month. The landlord proposed $3,500 a month and then they went to $9,500 a month for a two-bedroom condo. This wouldn’t be able to happen if we had real rent control in Ontario.

Can the member discuss why real rent control—

Further questions?

All those in favour of the motion will say “aye.”

All those opposed will say “nay.”

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. This is a 30-minute bell.

The division bells rang from 1008 to 1015.

Pursuant to standing order 49(a), the Speaker interrupted the bells and deemed the debate to be adjourned.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

Thank you to my colleague from Niagara Centre. It’s always a pleasure to hear you speak in the House.

Three times they interrupted you during your speech, even though you were speaking dead on to the bill. They’re always trying to change the subject, or at least change the channel.

Coming from northern Ontario—and you spoke a bit in your discussions on this bill—do you see anything in there that will help us build more affordable, supportive and co-op houses? Because this is what’s lacking in my area. People have nowhere to go. There’s a lack of housing, and plus, we know there are programs that qualify if you have 100,000 in population, yet in northern Ontario, we don’t see very much over 100,000. So can you speak on this, please?

I recognize the member for Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke.

I want to ask the member about the second half of this bill. The member spoke of having General Motors in his region, a fine automotive manufacturer here in the province of Ontario. In my region, we have Stellantis and Ford, other fine automobile manufacturers. This bill talks about Volkswagen and its historic $7-billion investment in the province of Ontario, brought in part through the incredible efforts of the Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade.

I am very excited about that investment and what this bill talks about, because it means, in my riding of Essex, people are going to have good, solid jobs for life, well-paying jobs. And I’m wondering, since the member has General Motors in his riding, is he excited about this bill and that $7-billion investment by Volkswagen? Because it’s going to have great effects in his riding too.

I’ve got here the NDP plan—well, we’ll call it a plan—on what they would like to do to build more affordable and, I believe, non-market rental homes, to the tune of 250,000 homes in the province. Using some basic math, what it costs, roughly, to build a home right now is around $500,000. For 250,000 homes, we’re talking about—what is it? A billion and a quarter, something along those lines? I’m just wondering what taxes you would raise to be able to pay for those homes.