I am honoured to rise today to speak about the life-changing work being done by Why Not City Missions and the Why Not Youth Centre in Brantford. Why Not City Missions has provided homeless and at-risk youth in Brantford with a safe and inclusive environment since 2002, and has been a valuable member of the Brantford–Brant community ever since.

I was fortunate enough to attend Why Not’s annual fall gala this past Saturday, where I joined board chair Mike Bosveld and executive director Karen Stewart, as well as Why Not co-founders Charlie and Sue Kopczyk, in celebrating the invaluable work that Why Not continues to do in our community. I was also pleased to learn on Saturday that Why Not reached their yearly campaign goal and raised $1 million to pay down the mortgage and renovation expenses on their girls’ home.

Because of the incredible support from the Brantford–Brant community, Why Not has evolved from a simple curbside coffee and prayer service to a youth centre open seven nights a week, a residential housing program for young men and supportive housing for young at-risk parents and their young children. I am proud to know that our community supports its own to such a great extent and that Why Not City Missions will continue to understand and fulfill the needs of at-risk youth in Brantford–Brant.

I am very pleased to welcome Astrid Krueger, who is joining team Ottawa West–Nepean as an OLIP intern for this next session.

Good morning. I’d like to welcome Steffi Burgi, who is an OLIP intern, starting her session in my office. We’re very excited to have her and look forward to working for the benefit of the people of Ontario.

I want to introduce Sam Demma, who is here with us today. He is the incredible best-selling author of Empty Your Backpack—an inspiring young Canadian. Thank you for joining us in the people’s House.

I want to welcome four constituents from Huntsville today—great community builders as well: Jason, Chantelle, Molly and Madeleine Armstrong. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

Remarks in Anishininiimowin.

I’d like to welcome to the Legislature Chiefs of Ontario director of justice Jackie Lombardi, Anishinabek Nation Regional Deputy Grand Chief Travis Boissoneau and also Amanda Kioke from Attawapiskat. Meegwetch for coming.

It is an absolute pleasure to introduce Mr. Arun Kumar from Sandeep Entertainment and Mr. Sharat Samudrala and Hema Samudrala from CutMirchi Media. Welcome to Queen’s Park.

I’d like to welcome to the Legislature today two constituents from the beautiful community of Wainfleet. We have Alfred and Ann Kiers. Welcome to Ontario’s Legislature.

I’m pleased to advise the House of the recent appointment of a new permanent table officer. Effective October 11, 2023, Julia Douglas has assumed the duties of senior Clerk, table research.

Please join me in welcoming Julia in her new role and responsibilities. Congratulations.

Applause.

Welcome, Dr. Malkin. We are delighted to have you here today.

I would like to introduce my very good friends Bonnie Satten and Charlie Faust, who are visiting from Thunder Bay. Welcome to your House.

I welcome to the House Jessie Saliba, who is also celebrating her 29th birthday today.

At the same time, we’re going to continue focusing, working with our municipal partners to make sure we get shovels in the ground and homes built for the people of the province of Ontario.

I am very proud to welcome to the House artist, musician, cancer survivor, and founder and author of Aggressive Positivity, my friend Limore Twena Zisckind.

My question is for the Minister of Finance. When meeting with local businesses in my riding of Thornhill, I’ve heard time and time again of the pressures the federal carbon tax is putting on our economy and especially on our local commerce.

Starting and growing a business is hard work. All businesses play a vital rote in our province’s economy. While the opposition Liberals and the NDP have no problem with a regressive carbon tax, it’s not fair or right that our businesses are being punished.

Speaker, can the minister please explain what impact a carbon tax has on our economy and our businesses?

I’ll tell the Leader of the Opposition why they can trust us. You can look at the economy, the 700,000 people that are working that weren’t working five years ago. Then you look at the housing starts, record housing starts and rental starts over 30 years. We look at the infrastructure, building the highways and the roads and the bridges and the transit. We’re spending $70 billion on transit, $30 billion on roads. When it comes to MZOs, there’s 234,000 people that have a roof over their head today that wouldn’t have a roof over their heads. There’s 5,000 seniors that can call long-term care home because of the MZOs that were asked by the municipalities to do. There’s 150,000 construction jobs that happened because of those MZOs.

It’s a tool that we aren’t going to stop using. We’re going to continue building homes. The 1.5 million homes, that’s our target. We’re going to continue doing it.

But do you know what I find ironic? No matter if it’s MZOs or OPs or whatever, guess who shows up to all the announcements? The NDP shows up to the announcements, standing beside me when we’re announcing a long-term-care home. This happened numerous times. I find it very ironic they vote against it, but they want to take the kudos when we actually get the long-term-care homes built.

Supplementary question.

Speaker, Ontarians are growing increasingly concerned that this government doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation they’re in.

Back to the Premier: They’re under a criminal RCMP investigation. Apparently, interviews are going to start this week. They’ve appointed a special prosecutor. The Integrity Commissioner and the Auditor General had to do comprehensive probes in order for the public to get a sense of the scale of this government’s dirty deals. This goes so far beyond the greenbelt. We’ve seen a clear pattern of preferential treatment benefiting the private interests of a select few landowners over and over and over again.

Speaker, to the Premier: How can Ontarians trust this government when a mountain of evidence shows they’re only in it for their friends?

To the Premier: Who runs this province? Is it the Premier, or has he outsourced the job to his speculator friends?

Speaker, to the Premier: Why is the Premier’s cabinet sitting on their hands while he is clearly giving preferential treatment to his insider friends?

This question is for the Premier. From official plans to the greenbelt to MZOs, we have a chaotic and speculator-friendly process driven by the Premier and his political staff. When discussing the Cherrywood lands owned by Silvio De Gasperis, Mr. Amato is quoted in these FOI documents saying the government should just do “what they asked for.” At another point, Mr. Amato says the speculator is getting an “unfrozen $3-billion asset.” On another point, he says the process needs to look “as clean as possible.”

If Ontarians can’t trust this government’s testimony under oath, why should anyone believe them at all?

In document after document, we have quotes like “they’re bringing it to the PO,” “in conversation with PO.” And PO, by the way, in case anybody doesn’t already know, is the Premier’s office.

Back to the Premier: If this is how the Premier’s office conducts business, when is the Premier going to come clean about his role in these shady backroom deals?

Where you’ll never be.

Interjections.

Just the opposite, Speaker: We’re not sitting on our hands. In fact, we are getting the job done across the province of Ontario. She talks about minister’s zoning orders. The Premier talked about it: Minister’s zoning orders will ensure that we have the largest long-term-care home in the country built in Mississauga. You know what else it will mean? It will mean the largest hospital in the country in Mississauga.

So, the Leader of the Opposition would like us to close down 600 beds for seniors. She’d like us to stop construction of the largest hospital in the country. She’d like us to put down the shovels on the social housing that is being built within the city of Toronto. She would like us to stop the subways that are being built. She would like us to stop the GO trains that are being built across the province of Ontario. And she would like us to stop building homes for people of the province of Ontario who have one dream. The dream is to come to this province, or if you’re already here, to get out of your parents’ basement so that you can have the same dream as everybody else.

We won’t stop. We’ll get the job done.

Surrounding the Leader of the Opposition are members who vote against housing; they vote against transit and transportation in their riding. It is a caucus that is divided, and the Leader of the Opposition will do anything to distract from the divisions in her own caucus. We will move forward on building a bigger, better, stronger province of Ontario because that’s what the people need, and we won’t let them down.

Speaker, the Gormley lands were never removed from the greenbelt. I know this quite well, because it is in my riding. I actually, begrudgingly, campaigned in two elections to remove the Gormley lands from the greenbelt, because the town of Stouffville is having such a difficult time raising the funds needed with respect to unfunded liabilities with respect to infrastructure, because it is entirely greenbelted. But the Premier, on both occasions, told me it’s not happening and rejected that greenbelt expansion.