I know who I take my direction from: the people of the province of Ontario. That’s where I take my direction from. And when I hear parents tell me that they have kids who have 21 offers on homes and are not even in the game, I know I have to double down and do even more. And do you know who else knows that? All of the Progressive Conservatives who are sitting in this chamber. We are completely focused on one thing: making life more affordable for people in the province of Ontario, building 1.5 million homes so that the next generation of Ontarian families can have the exact same dream that almost every one of us in this chamber have, and that’s the dream of home ownership. It is why millions of people have chosen to come to the province of Ontario—in her own community.

So to the member opposite, I saw very clearly: We will not stop working on behalf of the people of this province, we will not stop building a bigger, better, stronger province of Ontario, even if that means rolling over the radical NDP who simply say no to everything. If it was up to them, we’d be back in 1933, and we won’t let that happen.

So what are we doing? We’re building more homes for people and we’re removing obstacles so that we can get more homes built for people in the province of Ontario. We’re cutting taxes so that the lowest-income earners don’t have to pay taxes to the government. Imagine that they voted against it. I’m building long-term-care homes because, as the Minister of Long-Term Care says, we owe a responsibility to those who helped build this province. They’re against that.

Later on today, we will be bringing a motion forward. The member for Chatham-Kent–Leamington will be bringing a motion forward to call on the federal government to remove the carbon tax from fuel, and we are hoping the NDP will do the right thing and vote with us to put more money back in the people’s pockets. I bet you they won’t, and they’ll continue on a destructive path.

Now, to put it in context, they left the province of Ontario back in 1995 with an $11-billion deficit. What’s that? The equivalent of $25 billion in today’s economy? And what did they accomplish? They actually outpaced the Liberals; they accomplished even less than zero.

He’s talking about jobs and opportunity, yet he and his colleague from Sudbury voted against mines and more opportunity for people.

Their plan is predicated on the fact that somehow there is a secret cache of bureaucrats somewhere who are going to go out and start building homes for the people of the province of Ontario. If they’re there, then I will unleash them, but I have not found this secret cache of people. Because do you know who builds social housing? It is the same people that build rental housing. It is the same people that build the homes that all of us live in.

They say they want to take the profit out of it, but they want to add a tax to it. When we took away development charges on purpose-built rental and the HST, when we said no development charges on social housing, they voted against it.

I want to thank my colleague for the question. Speaker, I want to be very clear: We expect everyone to uphold public health and property standards, especially when it comes to housing the most vulnerable in our communities. All landlords and housing providers have a legal responsibility to provide safe and habitable homes to their tenants. That’s the law.

We’re tackling the issue from both sides. My colleague the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing is creating more opportunities for at-risk people to receive the critical supports they need, and our government has made two of the largest increases to ODSP programs in the program’s history, putting more money into ODSP recipients.

This year, we’re investing $2.1 billion to fund accommodation that meets the needs of adults with developmental disabilities. That’s an increase of nearly half a billion dollars since 2018, when we formed government. Mr. Speaker—

We will stop at nothing to hold those accountable who do not protect the people of this province, especially our most vulnerable. The only problem is, every single initiative that we put forward to provide supports for the people of Ontario the opposition votes against. They’ll come here and ask for things, but when we put bills forward that support Ontarians, especially our most vulnerable, the NDP constantly—

There’s a lot to update this House on in long-term care, which we’ve been doing for the past several years, to be frank: a $10-billion capital plan with a plan to build and redevelop 58,000—and they’re not beds, they’re homes in this province for our amazing seniors.

In fact, Speaker, the member does mention something very important, which is that construction costs have escalated. That’s why we introduced the construction funding subsidy under the leadership of our last Minister of Long-Term Care, which has led to the approval of 11,000 beds for construction in this province.

The member sits next to the independent Liberals, who built 611 net new beds for the better part of a decade. I’m proud to update this House that, under this Premier’s leadership, since 2018, we have completed—or are under construction—18,000 beds in this great province.

There’s more work to be done, but we’re on track. We’re going to take care of our seniors in Ontario.

We acknowledge that seniors need more homes. It is this government that has taken it upon themselves to actually build that capacity and staff it with health human resources. So I encourage the member: Perhaps instead of standing in question period and saying, “The neighbourhood needs this and that,” come to me and show that information to me and let’s work on that because this government has proven, under the leadership of this Premier, that we are building those very beds in this province.

After a decade of neglect under the people who sit next to her, this government has taken it upon themselves to take care of our seniors. They took care of us—

Interjections.

Since we came into office in 2018, we have been focused on building homes for people, and that has included, of course, rental housing. One of the things that we saw, which was the hallmark of the previous Liberal and NDP coalition in this province, was that rental housing starts literally collapsed across the province of Ontario. What we are seeing, of course, is that rental housing starts in the province of Ontario, under our government, are at a 30-year high, and the good news on that is that in the first half of 2023, that pace has increased by over 44%.

One of our biggest challenges in Toronto and across the province has been the supply of rental housing, and we are tackling that head-on. At the same time, we are making significant investments in the Landlord and Tenant Board to ensure that we can get through cases much more quickly, and I thank the Attorney General for that.

We have introduced a number of pieces of legislation to better protect tenants across the province of Ontario, but ultimately, we have to increase that supply so that there are more options for all Ontarians.

Interjections.

To the Premier: Wanda is a senior living at 55 Brownlow with her daughter and granddaughter. As we speak, her and their neighbours are facing demovictions. They’re being told that the city must rush through approving their demovictions because if they fight it, the Ontario Land Tribunal will leave them with nothing. Planners are telling tenants they need to take away their homes today so that this government’s tribunal—one stacked with their buddies, I might add—doesn’t take away their housing tomorrow, all while giving Wanda and her family nowhere else to go.

My question is to the Premier. Will you repeal Bill 23? Will you stop demovictions? Will you bring back rent control? Where is Wanda, where is her family, where are neighbours and tenants across Ontario supposed to go? Will he speak to them? Will the Premier of Ontario speak to the tenants in our gallery today and let them know that their right to housing is a human right that they will respect?

Interjections.

Speaker, look, one of the problems we’re having across the province of Ontario is a lack of supply, and that’s a lack of supply that has been brought on by historic obstacles put in the way by the Liberals and the NDP, right? They say they want to help tenants, yet every bill that we’ve brought in here to protect tenants further and to give them more rights, they have literally stood in their place and voted against. They want to increase taxes on those who want to build affordable homes. It is part of their plan.

So I say to the member very sincerely, if you want to help tenants, help us build more homes. We’re at, this year alone—the first half of this year—a 44% increase over last year in purpose-built rentals across the province of Ontario. We are at a 30-year high, but more needs to be done. You cannot unravel the mess they left this province in in five years. We’re seeing that, right? It is going to take us longer, but if they would help us, we could move even quicker.

This is a member who has voted literally against the very same people that today she is suggesting she wants to support. When we have brought more measures in to protect tenants, that member rose in her place and voted against them. When we reduced taxes so that more purpose-built rentals could be built, that member voted against it. When the Minister of Finance brought in a bill and forced the federal government to remove the HST and PST on purpose-built rentals, they voted against it.

You know what is causing the problems across the province of Ontario? Fifteen years of attitudes like that that put obstacles in the way of the people of the province of Ontario. That is what caused the problem—

Interjections.