Thanks to the member from Kitchener–Conestoga for that question. Now, I wasn’t here in 2018, but the member from Kitchener–Conestoga was, so you’ll remember that one of the first actions of your government was actually to cancel the scheduled increase to the minimum wage, which means that minimum-wage earners in Ontario lost several thousand dollars out of their pockets over the last few years because of where the minimum wage would have been if your government had not come to power compared to what it was. So you know what? A delayed increase to the minimum wage—sure, it’s better than a kick in the pants, but it does not in any way make up for the fact that this government depressed wages of minimum wage earners in Ontario over the last five years.

One of the top issues that my office hears about is tenants who are in positions where their landlord is trying to force them out so that the landlord can increase the rent. One of the most egregious cases that we’ve dealt with is a safety situation where there’s been high turnover because the landlord hasn’t been addressing a safety situation.

What we saw was that in the course of just six months, the rent increased from $1,400 a month for the first tenant to $1,900 for the second tenant to $2,600 a month for the third tenant, and that was all in the course of 2023. So landlords are absolutely using their ability to set the rent at whatever they want in between tenants to jack up rents, and they are doing whatever they can to force people out so they can do that. We need to make sure that renters have protection against that so that they’re paying what the last tenant paid and people in Ontario are actually able to find affordable housing that meets their needs.

What we actually need to do, what a government that actually cared about these kids would do, is fund special education based on the cost of special education rather than constantly underfunding and forcing these kids to go without.