I heard the “députée de Nickel Belt” speak about these unconscionable transactions where some homeowners were required to pay $40,000 for something that really only costs $5,000. That certainly sounds like an unconscionable transaction to me. Were I still practicing law, I would certainly tell my clients, “Don’t pay that. Get that contract set aside under the Unconscionable Transactions Relief Act.”

I’m wondering if the “députée” from Nickel Belt has advised her constituents, “Don’t pay that contract; get it set aside under the Unconscionable Transactions Relief Act”?

Further questions?

Meegwetch to the member from Nickel Belt.

In her presentation she spoke about midwifery, midwives’ services, and I thought about my mom. My mom went to, I think, grade 3 education, but she delivered hundreds and hundreds of babies. That’s before we had doctors, before we had nurses in our communities. It was always a way of life for us to do that.

I’m just wondering if the member could further elaborate on how we can improve the services, the midwifery services. There’s so much we can do. The biggest room in the world is the room for improvement, and I think, does this bill do it?

The member opened up his statement talking about the fence going up at Ontario Place and the 1,500 trees that are scheduled to be cut down. I was just wondering if he could share with us: Has he heard anything from the people of his riding about Ontario Place? I live in northern Ontario, and I can tell you that for the people of northern Ontario, Ontario Place is a place that we all know is there. We’ve all brought our children to come and take in this phenomenal place in southern Ontario that has been very welcoming for generations to people of the north who come and visit the big city in the summer.

What has he heard from the people in his riding about the cutting of 1,500 trees at Ontario Place?

Questions?

Spadina–Fort York.

Thank you to the member opposite for your presentation. Our government is committed to protecting the rights of Ontarians, especially when it comes to consumer rights. One of these consumer rights is the right to review businesses online honestly. Through you, Speaker, to the member from—

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today in this fine House. I stand here and I represent the fine people of St. Catharines and of Niagara. It is my duty to ensure that the voices of the residents of St. Catharines are heard.

We are here today and we are discussing Bill 142, the Better for Consumers, Better for Businesses Act, which is a piece of legislation that promises to enhance consumer protection in Ontario. While there are aspects of this bill that are commendable, there are also areas that require careful scrutiny and potential amendments. Consumer protection and the need for clarity are paramount, especially in these challenging times when many of our constituents are facing financial hardships. Everything is going up in cost, and our residents across the province are definitely facing financial hardships.

The bill aims to repeal the Consumer Protection Act of 2002, consolidating provisions and moving others to regulations. But let’s definitely be clear: The people of Ontario deserve transparency. Shifting provisions to regulations raises questions about accountability and about accessibility. We need to ensure that the regulations are crystal clear, concise and easily accessible to all Ontarians, not buried within bureaucratic language—which often they become.

Our seniors across our province, many of whom reside in Niagara—I believe we are one of the most populated ridings with seniors in St. Catharines—are particularly vulnerable to scams and predatory practices, which is a shame. We have seen incidents where elderly individuals are pressured into contracts for goods and services they don’t need at a price they cannot afford.

A few years ago, my neighbour was leaving to go to work. He was rushing out of his door, ran out into his carport and was confronted by a very nice young fellow who explained to him about how he was selling air conditioners and furnaces. He was explaining the whole practice of what would happen and what a great deal it could be. Of course, the great fellow that my neighbour is asked the young individual, “Listen, I’m on my way to work. For this contract, do you get paid by the amount of contracts you get signed today or the amount of people you talked to?” And the young fellow said to him, “Well, yes, of course. If you sign here, then I can say to my boss that you have agreed to talk to me today.” So, okay, sure enough my neighbour, like I said, being the good fellow he is, signed the contract and away he went to work.

A couple of hours later, his wife was in the kitchen and she heard the ruckus of the removal of her two-year-old air conditioner and she went out—“What are you doing?” “Oh, your husband signed here”—and they were put into a very, very hefty contract that they didn’t agree with. You can imagine the complete panic that they went into because they had to pay this company that was basically ripping out their two-year-old air conditioner and there was no buyer’s remorse that they could go to.

The bill addresses misleading practices and unconscionable acts, but we must ensure that these provisions are strong enough to truly protect our seniors, like my neighbour. We need legislation that stands up for our elderly, ensuring they are not taken advantage of and that their rights are protected.

I could tell you several stories about individuals—seniors—that have come into my office that have liens on their houses because they’ve been taken advantage of by predators—not one water filter did they have, they had three. They were told, “This will be better,” and “This will be better,” and “You need it for the water.”

Madam Speaker, St. Catharines is a vibrant community of small businesses that are the lifeblood of our local economy. These businesses definitely need support and protections to thrive, especially in the face of the larger corporations.

Additionally, our region has seen a significant increase in housing prices that has put a strain on many families and individuals, and we need to ensure that the legislation addresses these local issues as well, providing protections and support where it is most needed.

Madam Speaker—wow, the time went by fast. I didn’t think 10 minutes would go by so fast—the bill introduces new provisions related to the purchase of cost-plus lease to door-to-door sales as I spoke about, areas that have been problematic in the past. While these provisions are a step in the right direction, we definitely have to get it right, right now. We must ensure that they are enforced effectively and that consumers are aware of their rights.

The increased fines for violations are a very welcome change, but again enforcement is key. We need to make sure the enforcement is there. We need to make sure the enforcement is there. We need a system in place that holds businesses accountable for their actions and ensures that consumers are treated fairly and with respect. I’ve got to repeat that because it’s so important: that businesses are accountable for their actions and ensures that consumers are treated fairly and with respect.

Madam Speaker, I’m going to conclude, and in my conclusion, while Bill 142 has the potential to—

I’m reading subsection 95(3) of this act, and it says, “The amount of an administrative penalty shall reflect the purposes of the penalty and shall be the amount prescribed by the minister, which amount shall not exceed $50,000.” Now, of course, that’s $50,000 per infraction, so if you have multiple infractions, your fines could go into the millions of dollars.

My question to the member from Spadina–Fort York is, does he think that millions of dollars in fines and penalties is too severe a penalty, too small of a penalty, or somewhere in-between?

Further questions?

Further debate?

I thank the member from Nickel Belt for the question about Ontario Place. It is really a vital place. It was designed to celebrate this province.

I will say one thing about those 1,500 trees that imminently could be cut down by this government: They came from every provincial park in this province, so some of them came from Nickel Belt. The idea was that for everybody coming from any part of Ontario, this was a place to celebrate this province, and you would recognize the trees at Ontario Place.

These trees have matured over the last 50 years that Ontario Place has been in existence, and so you’ve got a mature forest. You’ve got 125 bird species. You’ve actually got mink and beaver living at Ontario Place—and this is not Nickel Belt; this is downtown Toronto waterfront. This forest, this mature beautiful forest, has to be kept for future generations. That’s why we’re asking the government, don’t cut down those trees. Investigate the deal with Therme, because it seems to be as dirty as some of the deals with the greenbelt.

In my own riding, there have been people demovicted, people illegally renovicted. Thousands and thousands across this province are being renovicted and demovicted. The doubling of the fines—it may be a good talking point, but if they’re never applied, if they’re not actually a deterrent, then they’re not actually protecting consumers.

This is a real concern. Most people—and people watching—probably don’t know the difference between legislation and regulation and even a memo, right? But legislation is a bill, and it becomes law. It’s debated in this Legislature. We have a democratic right to analyze it, to debate it, and then we vote on it here in the Legislature. That’s the democratic process.

A regulation is something that the minister just does. He can make a regulation to implement—and the idea is that this is to actually develop the implementation plan for the bill, for the legislation. But what has been happening over the last—and it’s not just this Conservative government; it’s the previous Liberal government, as well. They keep moving more and more powers into regulation.

This government has taken out sections of the Consumer Protection Act from the act and they’ve put them into regulation, so that the people will never have an opportunity to listen to a debate about those consumer protections and whether they’re good or bad.

Taking pieces of the Consumer Protection Act out of legislation and putting it in regulation actually is a concern to us on this side of the House, and it should be a concern for all consumers in Ontario.

To the member for Ottawa West–Nepean: Is the member aware that in addition to section 60 of this act, which is the first attempt by way of legislation to deal with notices of security interest and having a period of 15 days proposed to have them discharged when a consumer withdraws from a contract or cancels a contract, parallel to that as we debate here today, there’s a window for consultation specifically on what we can do in the here and the now to tackle the bad actors on notices of security interest between now and December 1?

Is she aware of that, and will she participate, to her point of co-operation, in assisting us and finding immediate solutions in the here and the now?

Pardon?

In conclusion, while Bill 142 has the potential to enhance consumer protection in Ontario, there are areas that require further examination and potential amendments. As representatives of the people, here in this House, it is all of our duty to ensure that this legislation truly serves the best interests of Ontarians, protecting them from unfair practices, and ensuring that their rights are upheld. So I do, Madam Speaker.

At this time, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to carefully consider the implications of this bill and to work together to strengthen its provisions. Good things happen when both sides of the House work together. And we can protect our seniors, the most vulnerable in our communities. Make sure that these predators are not driving them out of their homes because they have put in, as I said, air conditioners that were not needed and made them get liens on their house, water filters that—again, thousands and thousands of dollars in liens. They can’t go to the bank and get a loan on their house because they’ve got liens on it from these predators.

So again, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to carefully consider the implications of this bill, and let’s work together to strengthen its provisions. The bill aims to tackle unfair business practices, but we must ensure that it also provides a level playing field for our small businesses, for our seniors and for the communities that we live in.

The problem is that the protection is not retroactive. We can work together to make sure that guidelines are put in place so that seniors are protected for the retroactive part that the predators have already taken advantage of and basically robbed the seniors and residents. Like I said, my good neighbour who works for a living and now has thousands of dollars can’t go retroactive on what this predator has taken from him, from his life savings, actually. So you can imagine the anxiety of these residents in your riding as well. We can work together to make sure all our ridings across Ontario—

Questions?

Keep going.

I am rising today to speak to Bill 142, Better for Consumers, Better for Businesses Act, and I have to say there are certainly things in this act that I really applaud and find interesting.

For example, it adds language barriers as a reason a person may not be able to understand a consumer contract and therefore could get out of that contract. I think that’s a very important provision. Also, it’s an unconscionable act to enter into a contract with a consumer “if the person doing so knows or ought to know that there is no reasonable probability that the consumer will be able to pay the total amount owing under the contract.” That really stands out to me as an important change.

But what is interesting for me—now, I spend a lot of time in a particular seniors residence, a commercially owned seniors residence—I went through the bill, just doing a search looking for the word “seniors” and it actually doesn’t appear anywhere in the bill. Now, maybe that’s fine. We refer to vulnerable people getting taken in by unscrupulous actors, so perhaps it’s fine that it doesn’t mention seniors, but I really worry about seniors.

For example, I’ve seen, in this particular commercial residence, that the contract is not being met in terms of the food service that’s offered and promised. There are supposed to be three highly nutritious meals a day and yet often they are being served hot dogs and wieners, frozen hamburgers—a lot of things that really don’t qualify as nutritious food. So what does a senior do in that circumstance? Who do they go to? They can complain to the home, but things just don’t change. That is something I worry about.

Also, what I’ve seen are increases in rent by 7.5%. Over a couple of years, two rent increases, the cost has gone from $5,000 to $6,000. That’s a very significant increase and, again, I worry: Where does a senior go to complain? There is the seniors’ bill of rights; there’s a phone number you can call, but you will sit on hold forever and you’ll wait forever for somebody to call you back.

In this instance, I’m actually thinking back to the idea of having a seniors’ advocate. I also know that when people reach a certain age, they’re no longer confident about picking up the phone and making a lot of different phone calls to try and figure out who on earth is available to advocate on their behalf. This also brings me back to the idea of the consumer watchdog, so that people are not flipping through their phone books or going to their friends and saying, “Do you have any idea how to address this problem?” If there’s one place they can go and know that they can get good advice, I think that’s very valuable. Knowing that there are all kinds of particulars in the bill, these clauses and so on that might be get-out-of-jail-free clauses—they’re not accessible. They’re not easily accessible to people, so there needs to be a central place.

I want to add to that a comment that, again, when we’re thinking about seniors, what we have seen is the transition of almost every single government service into an online platform. Again, I know many seniors, including my mother who is 96, who is fluent on the computer—

Interjections.

I am looking at the act itself and section 102 describes offences and the penalty for those offences. One of the penalties reads as follows: “An individual who is convicted of an offence mentioned in subsection (1) is liable to a fine of not more than $100,000 or to imprisonment for a term of not more than two years less a day.”

My question to the member is this: Does she think that sending somebody to jail for “two years less a day” is too severe a penalty for contravening this act?

Thank you to the member from St. Catharines.

Further questions?

Further questions?

The member from St. Catharines.

So let’s just be very clear here. What the member from London North Centre was talking about are two very separate items. You’re talking about a notice of security interest, which is, quite frankly, an unscrupulous way of taking advantage of vulnerable people in our society and, absolutely, we’ll agree that there’s a lot of work that needs to be done there. But when we’re talking about legitimate contracts, which is what that 10-day cooling-off period and the ability to exit out of those contracts quicker—these are two very separate things, so let’s just be very clear about that.

I do want to ask the member from St. Catharines a little bit about notices of security interest. We’ve heard about it today and she did mention some folks in her riding that have had these types of things perpetrated against them. I’m certainly of the mindset that we absolutely need to close these loopholes and we absolutely need to do something about this issue. And whether or not she thinks that we should just be going ahead and doing this, or whether we should have a full consultation with other legitimate businesses, might I add—there are legitimate businesses that take part in this as well—to make sure that they have an opportunity to recoup costs if someone doesn’t pay their bills, whether or not she thinks that the consultation is something she thinks we should be doing or whether she thinks we should just go ahead and unilaterally—