Yes, I think so too.

Quite a bit here—I’ve done my leaked documents, and I’ve made perfectly clear that the environmental damage was overlooked not only in the greenbelt, as the Auditor General said, but in the forced urban boundary expansion. As their own document said, they didn’t take into consideration the environment in any way, in any regard.

Let me just double down on the special prosecutor and make sure that I’m clear. The special prosecutor—let me see what they’re investigating. Maybe the Attorney General, who I saw was here, can help me with this. Really, a prosecutor is most commonly used in Ontario, and they tend to seek out special prosecutors when there’s concern that a possible conflict of interest could emerge if an Ontario prosecutor handled the case. So this is hot enough that it’s taken away from the Attorney General’s office and put in the hands of a special prosecutor.

I’m sure that as this story unfolds, we’ll continue to learn more about the role of the special prosecutor. I’m sure many of us haven’t had occasion—hopefully, we’ll never have occasion—to get a call from a special prosecutor. It’s something that I would not be looking forward to. I understand that the RCMP said they’re going to begin making those phone calls.

As I said, this is—

Again, it is the largest scandal in the province of Ontario. Is it possible that it could be bigger than big? We’re going to see, when we start to hear the results of the investigation by the RCMP and the special prosecutor.

I think I have enough here for three hours, but I only have about 18 minutes left.

The other thing that I want to remark on is that this bill—really, in terms of word count, the word count related to indemnities is the biggest part of this bill. Are we surprised by that? What did we see with this government when it came to the deaths in for-profit long-term-care homes? What did they do? They gave those for-profit homes where deaths occurred—6,000 deaths in the province of Ontario. They made sure that those for-profit homes were indemnified so that families—victims, essentially—were not able to seek redress in the province of Ontario.

I understand there’s a class action lawsuit being launched. I don’t know if it’s registered, but it’s for the families of the people at Orchard Villa. Orchard Villa had the largest proportional death count in the province. That’s the home where they had to call in the army. The reports from that were almost unspeakable. It’s really hard to read that report. Again, the government gave them an indemnity. But that’s not enough. As a parting gift, they gave them an extension, a 30-year contract, to continue to operate more beds, and for longer, in the province.

So it really is special, in Ontario, when you’re a special friend of the Premier. Things just seem to work out really well for you—not so much for the families of all those people who died in long-term care.

Let’s just say the dean of the Osgoode law school described the protections from liability in the bill as “broad”—no kidding.

“Ontario Won’t Compensate Developers after Greenbelt Land Swap Reversal.” Do you know what? Let’s say that: Do the developers need to be compensated—the speculative profiteers? I don’t think so. Do the government ministers who were complicit in this need to be covered? I’ll leave that question to the people of the province of Ontario. Do they deserve to be indemnified for any of their actions and wrongdoing? That’s a question. I’m sure the conversation between the Premier and the developers who lost out would be an interesting one. But really, these indemnities are designed to essentially insulate all those involved in this government’s change in direction.

Here’s an interesting part, because the government has done this before: It not only applies going forward; it applies going backward. That’s the unusual thing about this. This government has done this before. The indemnity they passed was not only for—when a court ruling said that their MZOs were illegal, they passed a bill that said, “Those illegal MZOs that we passed? They’re now legal, and going forward, they’ll be legal.” So they’ve done this before to cover themselves proactively, which is unbelievable to me—that you can go back and say, “Hey, that thing where you broke the law?” The government said, “We’re covered. We didn’t actually break the law, and no one can seek redress.”

Should developers sue and be compensated out of the taxpayers’ pockets? Absolutely not. The people of the province of Ontario have had enough. They’ve paid enough. Municipalities who have incurred costs, who had all kinds of planning documents, planning exercises, years of costs ripped up, deserve to be compensated. People lost money on this—average people. They don’t even know the cost. Taxpayers are going to pay for lawsuits. Taxpayers are going to pay for lost revenue. Taxpayers are going to pay for lost time, lost resources, all because of this government’s failed policy, all because this government tried to enrich their donors without a care. They didn’t give a fig about the people of the province of Ontario, who pay their taxes day in and day out, who are suffering to pay their bills. No, they didn’t care about that, and their indemnity laws make sure that they will not be held accountable.

Finally, let me just say that if this is a whodunit, if in fact a crime has been committed—we talked about their alibi, the cover story, which was housing. We talked about the evidence, which is the Auditor General’s report, the Integrity Commissioner’s report, expert reports, leaked documents, the 7,000 pages that we’re digging through now. That would be the evidence.

If there is a victim in this potential crime, it is the environment and the greenbelt and all that it protects. This has truly been an assault on the environment like no other. Do I need to reiterate that the greenbelt is a protected jewel for a reason? People were so upset about what you did because they care about it. They know its value. They understand its value. The greenbelt includes over two million acres of protected, unprotected, protected land. It includes some of the most valuable agricultural land in the country. People farm the greenbelt. It needs to be known; this is agricultural land.

The greenbelt generates almost $10 million in economic activity. It supports almost 200,000 jobs. It provides $3.2 billion a year in services like flood protection, water purification and stormwater management. It is the area that feeds us, that cleans our water, that protects us from floods, and it was poorly treated by this government—disregarded. I don’t know whether you don’t understand this, whether it just looked like too much profit to grab, whether it was just too hard for you to resist snatching it away, but it is a jewel, and people know it.

I think it’s important to say that the Auditor General, who produces a lot of reports, produced a report in May 2023 that talks about the state of the environment in Ontario. It is not particularly good news. What I want to start by saying is that the Auditor General and the Commissioner of the Environment had this to say—and this needs to be listened to through the lens of what this government tried to do and continues to do when it comes to the greenbelt, environmental protections and wetlands. They had this to say: “It is well worth remembering that protecting, conserving and restoring the environment requires a longer-term perspective. Whatever the politics of the day, elected governments are called upon to hold this longer-term perspective in sight. The actions they take, or fail to take, will be measured in the long run by future generations of Ontarians.” Isn’t that so true? This is our job. We are to be stewards of the environment for future generations in this province. I’m sad to say that this government did not take any of that into consideration.

The State of the Environment report—just a couple of highlights here are that when it comes to wetlands, which is a significant part of the greenbelt, “the natural resources ministry set targets in 2017 to halt the net loss of wetland ... in southern Ontario—where wetland loss has been the greatest.” However, the ministry has not tracked the status of progress in meeting these targets, because the ministry “informed our office in ... 2021 that the targets are no longer in effect.” This government took away targets to protect wetlands in the province. They didn’t want to be held accountable, and they didn’t want to track it. “The province has not met ... Ontario’s Biodiversity Strategy ... to conserve at least 17% of land and water systems through well-connected networks of protected areas.” There’s a lot here on the health of the Great Lakes; microplastics are not being tracked in the province.

I think particularly a thing that I want to mention is poor Lake Simcoe. Lake Simcoe is one of the greatest inland lakes in the province, probably in Canada, and it continues to suffer. It says, “In Lake Simcoe—the largest inland lake in southern Ontario—dissolved oxygen concentrations, which are important for the survival of fish.... Chloride levels in Lake Simcoe—which come largely from road salt use and can be highly toxic to aquatic organisms”—and they result in algae blooms because of overloading of phosphorus. Lake Simcoe is suffering. Lake Simcoe has the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan, one of the best environmental protection plans that I have seen, and this government has done nothing—not moved on that at all.

Finally, I just want to say a few things that she talks about. She goes on and talks about some of the changes that the government has made when it comes to the environment. You amended the Endangered Species Act, so now we have a pay-to-slay act in the province. You made legislative and regulatory changes to limit the work of conservation authorities and their role in reviewing the impacts of development and other activities. This is a good read—a lot of information about why the province of Ontario needs to take the environment more seriously.

Let me just say that in the minister’s speech, he took great pains—and the associate minister also—to say that they’re going to protect the greenbelt. Thank you. But they also said that we’re going to protect the greenbelt while still making lands available for important infrastructure. Further, they said we’re going to protect the greenbelt “without limiting future governments’ ability to add infrastructure.” What are we talking about here? Because I’m not sure, but my guess is we’re talking about the unneeded, $10-billion Highway 413 that cuts through swaths of the greenbelt, cuts through wetlands, cuts through some of the most fertile agricultural land in the province—pretty sure that’s the infrastructure that this government is talking about.

I would say that the government, through the Attorney General, recently announced their intention to seek a judicial review of the federal Impact Assessment Act. It is my contention that that is because this is the infrastructure that they want to ram through, that this judicial review that was under a federal impact assessment is the number one goal of this government. And, taking no lessons from how upset people were about your assault on the greenbelt, you are going to spend taxpayer dollars again, in court.

The Supreme Court had no problem with the federal impact assessments currently under way. Wasting public money re-litigating decisions and making sure that you have your way with the environment at all costs is really I don’t think what the people of the province of Ontario expect from an Attorney General. There are problems with your land tribunal. There are all kinds of problems with people seeking redress and justice in the province, so spending time and taxpayer dollars in court to fight the federal government so that you can build a highway, I would say, is not what the people of the province expect.

We also have a government that is looking to—through their EROs, through posting on the Environmental Registry, the further assault is that you are tabling four proposals that will weaken environmental oversight in the permit system for taking water, waste management and stormwater. These changes mean that the public would lose the right to participate in decisions affecting their health and safety and, worse, public oversight would be offloaded to the very same private company seeking the permit. Just like the gutting of conservation authorities and the weakening of wetland protections, this government is once again looking to enrich special interests while putting our soil and water at risk.

I asked this in the Legislature: Will this government ever, ever listen to the public instead of lobbyists and show that by cancelling these ERO postings? I’ve received so many emails about this. People are upset. They understand what you’re up to, and they’re writing to say, “Please don’t do this.”

I would also like to say, when it comes to the infrastructure and the Attorney General’s seeking of a judicial review, it is not lost on the people of Ontario that this is all about Ontario Place as well: special interests, private deals, a $650-million parking garage for Therme—subject to environmental assessment, but we have the Attorney General working at clearing the path so that Therme can profit from our public lands, from our public waterway, so we can build—what? What is it we’re building there? A luxury—

Interjection: Spa.