The short answer, of course, is the smart money is on public transit, but it is also the mechanism by which you are funding that. The public-private partnerships that this government has embraced, just like the Liberals did, are so irresponsible.

I will note that in the fall economic statement there are no details, still to this day, on the estimated costs of Highway 413 or the Bradford Bypass. There is no timeline for frequent all-day, two-way GO rail to Kitchener, to Niagara or to Bowmanville.

Basically, what we have here is a government that is addicted to making announcements about transit—and yet, no follow-through.

Finally, there’s no timeline for the restoration of the Northlander, which we hear a lot about.

And then, a real safety issue: There’s no plan to address threats to northern winter roads due to climate change.

This fall economic statement missed the moment entirely on transit.

The member from Oakville mentions all these people coming into Ontario. You know one of the largest groups is international students, and the colleges and universities are so underfunded—as I said, by 12%—that international students have become a funding vehicle for the post-secondary education sector. They’re charged astronomical fees. They arrive here in Ontario. In Kitchener-Waterloo, there are 12 of them sleeping in a two-bedroom apartment because of affordability.

If the government truly wants to have a respectful relationship with newcomers, you might want to start building some non-market affordable housing so that they don’t have to sleep on the street and don’t have to go to a food bank just to survive their experience here in Ontario.

If I was an investor, I wouldn’t want to lose money here in Ontario.

So small measures are great, but why is this government spending so much time writing to the federal government to do their job for them, when they can actually have mechanisms that can make Ontario more affordable for everybody?

Next question?

It’s always an honour to speak in the House. Today, I wasn’t planning on speaking. I’m surprised that the government doesn’t want to speak to what they claim to be their fantastic political record.

Bill 146, Building a Strong Ontario Together—a great title.

I would agree that the MPP for Waterloo is the best finance critic that we have ever had—and considering that I was once finance critic, even I agree. She brought up a lot of good points.

I’d like to start with a few things that are supportable in this piece of legislation—some particularly for northern Ontario.

Flow-through shares aren’t a new thing. They’ve been around for a while. They actually do encourage exploration and investment. It’s a pretty straightforward concept. Specifically, when you’re in the exploration business, it’s risky, but flow-through shares actually—I don’t know if it lessens the risk, but it does encourage investment. I think people in the mining industry and particularly the exploration industry have been pushing for flow-through shares for a while. I think that’s a supportable part of this legislation that actually will help the mining sector.

Believe it or not, although the Conservative government tries to say that the NDP doesn’t support mining because we didn’t support their last changes to the Mining Act—the reason we didn’t support the last changes to the Mining Act is because what the government is trying to do with the Mining Act is very similar to what they did with the greenbelt changes, because they’re trying to take regulations away and put them in into the political realm.

I’m not trying to disparage the Minister of Mines’s experience in mining—not at all. But when you take the planning out of the actual civil service and put the approvals of those plannings into the political realm, you actually might end up slowing down development instead of speeding it up.

Now, I don’t think the current mining minister believes that, and I respect that, but I think there would be a few developers in this province who are now questioning the help they got from the Ford government, because actually it shone a huge spotlight on some of the problems that the Ford government is creating for those developers. And I hope, I sincerely hope—because no one wants to support good mining projects more than I do. Mining is a huge part of the north, a huge part of my riding, and I hope that the government’s meddling in the approval process doesn’t actually slow down, actually jeopardize the mining sector.

The one thing that the mining sector has done a really great job at, probably better than any other sector, is—and I know this from where I live—100 years ago, mining was incredibly damaging to the environment—it was—and we’re still dealing with those damages in places like where I live, close to Cobalt. We’re still dealing with it, and in other places, like close to the minister’s area, Kamiskotia Lake.

But now, because of strict regulations, because of a very good planning process, mining in Canada has, rightfully so, a very good reputation. Some of the same companies don’t have the same reputation in other areas, but in Canada they do. It’s largely because of a very strict regulatory process, and I sincerely hope that the meddling of the Ford government doesn’t actually hurt the mining sector.

Now, I’ve often heard members say, “Well, it takes way too long to approve a mine and way too much red tape.” I don’t think we have an issue. The length of time it takes to approve a mine—I think we could make changes there to actually add certainty for mining companies, for the investors that when they do things right, there’s an actual timeline that they can—I look at other jurisdictions, like Nunavut, which actually has stricter regulations than the province of Ontario, yet a much quicker approval timeline. I know that because one of the mining companies I talked to, Agnico Eagle, told me that. So it’s not a case of more political meddling; it’s a case of having a better, more stable approval process with timelines.

It’s not that we’re anti-mining, not at all. And it’s not that—mining is going to play a more important role, actually, in the future—as important or more important than it has in the past. I’m just going to say it once more: I’m incredibly concerned that meddling from the government and trying to do things quicker politically is actually going to slow things down and hurt the reputation and hurt the profitability and hurt the long-term viability of the mining sector. So flow-through shares are good, some of the other moves maybe not so much.

It’s often been brought up: the gas tax refund. You know what? I come from a place, northern Ontario—I have one community that has public transportation, the municipality of Temiskaming Shores, and also, they partner with Cobalt. But that’s the only community I have that has any public transportation. Everything else is by car. There is no bus; it’s car. And we are very sensitive to gas prices, 100%. Gas prices are always more expensive in Timiskaming–Cochrane than they are in Toronto. I know that. I know that because I drive it every week.

Actually, it’s kind of around Gravenhurst, and right in there, a little bit north of Barrie, it seems cheaper than anywhere else—lots of times. It’s kind of weird, because they’re always telling us that gas prices are dependent on transportation—how much it costs to transport. That doesn’t make any sense to me at all, because it has nothing really to do with the routes.

Getting back to the gas price or the gas tax reduction, I guess the biggest question we have is, what certainty do we have that the reduction actually gets passed to the gas pump? I don’t know what that certainty is. They will say, “Okay, the law of economics and the law of competition”—I understand that, but I don’t know if you’ve noticed but gas prices in towns seem to follow each other pretty closely. Then, you will drive through the next town, and all of a sudden, they’re different. So what proof does the government have?

The government may be very well-meaning with the gas tax refund or rebate. I’m not questioning that. I’m questioning, how do we know it’s actually getting to the consumer? I don’t know. When I drive, when I do the six hours—depending on traffic; it took me eight hours yesterday. Yesterday is Monday, right?

Thank you to the member from Waterloo, our finance critic, who has shown yet again that she is honestly the best finance critic we’ve had in the province.

My question to you is about the Ontario investment bank. Given that the trust of regular Ontarians in this government is zero—they do not trust this government; they have lost all confidence in this government—if they had a choice to invest their dollars in this bank, they would say, “There’s no way I’m putting my money in that bank.” But they have no choice, so $3 billion of people’s money is going into this bank whether they have trust or not.

The other part is about this private money that’s going into the bank. What private investors hate more than anything is risk, and we have seen a government that went out of their way to de-risk the investment environment for developers. But that scheme has been unveiled.

So my question to you is, do you think that private investors will see this as a de-risk preferential treatment opportunity, or will they also mistrust and be concerned about putting their private dollars into this OIB?

Yes.

I apologize to the member. There is time on the clock, but it is 6 o’clock. I have to interrupt the member because it is private members’ public business.

Second reading debate deemed adjourned.

Ms. Scott moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 138, An Act to amend the Change of Name Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act / Projet de loi 138, Loi modifiant la Loi sur le changement de nom et apportant des modifications corrélatives à une autre loi.

Because I hit Toronto—I have sympathy with people who live in Toronto. Toronto traffic is something, because it took me two hours to get from the 400 to Bay and Edward, where my apartment is. Toronto traffic is something. Normally it takes me six hours, and the difference in gas prices is just phenomenal.

So how do we know? And that is a huge issue.

Now, a couple of minutes, I’ll maybe have—oh, I’m going to have some time when I’m here next time.

The infrastructure bank has always kind of confused me, because federally, the Conservatives’ federal cousins—Mr. Poilievre says that the federal infrastructure bank is a boondoggle and a total waste. Yet, they import it provincially and it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Now, I don’t understand. I don’t understand the concept. Do you want to—I understand the concept; I do. I just don’t understand why you would want to do it. In my business past, I’ve built things—nothing on the scale of government. But you want to build something, a public building, a highway—you talk a lot about highways. The province has the ability to borrow money cheaper or for less—yes, cheaper, I guess—than the private sector in many cases.

For the infrastructure bank to work, you’re going to have to offer a better income for the investors than they can get anywhere else. So when you’re paying the investor, when you’re paying the people who are putting money in your bank more money than they’re getting anywhere else in the market, it’s—

It’s an honour for me to bring this private member’s matter, Bill 138, the Change of Name Amendment Act, along with my colleague, the member from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock.

Speaker, name changes are relatively common in Ontario and often indicate a positive transition in life. It could be a new beginning for an adopted child, or a person, perhaps, who wants to capture a part of their family lineage—regardless, there are a number of reasons that provide an honourable and positive reason for changing your name.

But sadly, there are many bad actors who use the application to hide their identity for the wrong reasons—creating a new world for themselves, unknown to their victims and their community. These convicted offenders could take advantage of this opportunity of a legal name change to distance themselves from crime so very heinous, providing them with a new life, a fresh start—something their victims will never have.

The right to change one’s name shouldn’t be abused. As a community of people who sit within this House, I believe we have a moral obligation to put the rights of those victims first.

Let me give you a bit of background on this bill. In 1988, when Christopher was just 11 years old, he was kidnapped at knifepoint at a Brampton mall, and, after hours of abuse, the abuser killed Christopher and left his body in a field. It was determined through the investigation that the person responsible for the attack, Fredericks, was a repeat sexual offender. From the ashes of that horrific experience, Christopher’s parents rallied to create Christopher’s Law, also known as the Ontario Sex Offender Registry, which came into effect in 2001. This bill is very simple: to ban convicted sex offenders that fall into this registry from having the privilege of making application for a legal name change. They should not get a new chance at life, because that’s something their victims will never have. We have to do everything in our power to protect the lives of our most vulnerable in society: our children, their family members and the supports that keep them whole.

Sexual offences are among the most heinous and degrading forms of violence against children. They have a devastating impact on survivors, who are literally broken, and they live with this trauma for the rest of their lives.

In my past life, I worked on matters under the child protection act and it was very rewarding work. Many files were a happy ending for the children that Ontario supported—placement in a safe and nurturing family environment—and I’m always reflective of this work as positive not only for the children but also as a community. I’m not blind, though, to the trauma some of those children face. As a mother it especially hits home for me. We have to work to protect Ontario’s children.

Speaker, let me be very clear: We currently have very strong laws. Ontarians seeking a legal name change must undergo a criminal record check, and under most circumstances, those who change their names must register these details with the Ontario Gazette, where name changes are published. Yet truthfully, Speaker, most Ontarians do not read the Gazette, let alone know of its existence. While safeguards do exist, they still do not prevent sex offenders from making applications.

It’s also crucial to keep in mind that recidivism amongst offenders remains an ongoing concern. Given the heinous nature of sexual offences, recidivism cannot be ignored, and the highest likelihood of reoffenders is observed amongst those who victimize young boys, with a 15-year recidivism rate of 35%. That means one in three are going to recommit.

Recently, an investigation by a joint task force of police services across Ontario known as Project Limestone has led to the arrest of 10 people for child exploitation. One of the people taken into custody was a repeat offender; one who was out on bail at the time of their arrest. And I also think of Donald Shumey, the 76-year-old man who returned to Canada after spending 20 years in prison after 88 different sexual offence counts. He changed his name as well: David Donald Stryker.

And, like most of us, we think of Karla Homolka, who is now living under the name of Leanne Teale in Quebec. We all remember her, and I will choose not to mention her former husband’s name, because, quite simply, their crimes were so reprehensible that I do not wish to bring his name into the record. My understanding is that Ms. Homolka—or, should I say, Ms. Teale—was at one point volunteering at a school.

This legislation aims to deny these offenders the legal right to change their name. There are no acceptable excuses for those who commit such acts, and our laws and our punishments must be consistently firm in addressing these cases. This legislation has been adopted in other jurisdictions, and these are positive steps that Ontario needs to make.

The right to change one’s name must not be abused. Closing this loophole will strengthen our government’s zero tolerance against sexual offenders on our most vulnerable, and strengthen our position with survivors and their families, putting them first and not the thousands of offenders who have committed the most reprehensible crimes against our most precious citizens.

This bill, if passed, will stop the Karla Homolkas of the world from becoming Leanne Teales. These heinous criminals are the people that this legislation aims to stop. I hope you will support Bill 138, the Change of Name Amendment Act, for the sake of our communities, our children and our children’s children. Thank you.

Pursuant to standing order 100, the member has 12 minutes for her presentation.

Further debate?

It’s always an honour to be able to stand in the House, today to discuss Bill 138, An Act to amend the Change of Name Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act, sponsored by the member from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock and the member from Thornhill.

Just to put it in context, I’d like to read the explanatory note: “The bill amends the Change of Name Act to provide that certain offenders are ineligible to apply to change their name. The offenders who are ineligible are those who are required to comply with Christopher’s Law (Sex Offender Registry), 2000.” The member from Thornhill did a good job of explaining what Christopher’s Law’s role is to register sex offenders.

As a parent, I think I speak on behalf of everyone in this province that I can’t imagine what it’s like for a parent to experience their child being abused, or for the child. And as a party, we, as every other Ontarian, want to make sure that children are protected and that people who have harmed them in any way—that we do our best to make sure that it doesn’t happen again. That is incumbent on us.

We think this bill is supportable. We support it. We support it to actually go to committee and actually make sure that it’s done correctly, that we actually make this bill as good as it can be and that it actually passes. This is an issue, I think, on which we can all agree, but we have to make sure that someone doesn’t get caught up in this who we’re not trying to get caught up. That’s why it should go to committee. The member for Thornhill, I agree: We do have strong legislation in this province, strong legislation that can always be made better. With this bill, I think it is a step forward as long as we make sure that it’s as good as it can be.

I don’t think we need to prolong this debate. We are all on the same page in this one. You have our support. There’s nothing that should be stopping this bill from going to committee and becoming law. I’d like to thank the members for putting it forward. I’d like to thank you, Speaker, for allowing me the time. Those are my remarks.

It’s my pleasure tonight to rise in support of Bill 138, and I want to congratulate my colleagues the MPP from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock and the MPP from Thornhill for bringing this important private member’s bill forward. It’s also my pleasure as the parliamentary assistant to the Ministry of the Attorney General to speak to this matter.

This is a government that is committed to putting the safety and well-being of our citizens and our communities first and foremost. Earlier in this session, we spoke to the need to address bail reform to make sure that a small percentage of our most violent re-offenders are kept off the streets pending trial. This debate tonight is a little bit different, because what we’re discussing is not pre-sentencing issues; what we’re talking about is post-conviction issues. That type of sentencing and carrying through on those types of sentences to make sure that we safeguard our community and specifically those that are most vulnerable in youth and women is a critical, critical issue for us.

We look at the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and it states in section 1 that the charter “guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.” We in Canada are somewhat unique in this. We do not prioritize rights. We don’t stack rights. They live in a continuum, in the balance that we try to strike in making sure that we have a respect for the rights of the individual, and we understand how those rights turn into obligations when we live in a community. So with a right comes an obligation. For example, in our freedom of speech: That freedom of speech is balanced by our obligation to prevent hate crimes, to not speak prejudicially about others and to make sure that the conversations we’re having are productive and discursive.

That same balancing act, Madam Speaker, exists in our Criminal Code as well. While we want to make sure that the rights of the individual charged are respected—that they get a free and impartial trial, that they have the right to a lawyer—that is balanced with the need for us to protect our citizenry and to make sure that, when we’re sentencing, we’re looking at the determinants of a sentence, from rehabilitation to retribution to deterrence. All of these foundational aspects of the sentencing process are grounded in the idea that, if you break the law, you will pay the price, and there’s a balancing to make sure that our citizens and our most vulnerable are protected from criminal conduct or the acts of others that transgress the Criminal Code.

The situation that we’re talking about tonight is really about protecting our most vulnerable. We’re looking at a convict who has been convicted of crimes, of sexual crimes against youth, against women and against other men, to make sure that they must serve the penalty that’s been meted out to them, but also that we balance that so in their post-sentencing world they will be monitored and so that we can most protect those in our society that need that protection.

Christopher’s Law, enacted in 2011, is a strong example of that. An 11-year-old boy was murdered by a convicted sex offender who had a past record and took the life of an 11-year-old, so we created a registry so that we would have a continuous record of those who had committed these most heinous crimes. What we’re doing tonight is trying to close a loophole that would allow a convicted sex offender to walk around Christopher’s Law and to subvert the protections that the government of Canada has put in place to protect the most vulnerable from a sex offender.

We have heard from the earlier speakers tonight of the prevalence of recidivism in this type of offence: as high as 35%, or one in three. If we allow name changes to take place—and we have seen that happen. We have seen it in the example of Karla Homolka. We have seen it in the case of David Donald Shumey from Saskatchewan and also in the case of Adam Budgell, who was convicted on three separate occasions of domestic abuse and rape of his former partners. One of those partners is Jenny Smith from Welland, Ontario. After the conviction of her assailant, she said, “I could sleep at night knowing that once he was released, all any person—a woman, a family member, a friend ... could” do was to “google ‘Adam Budgell’ and he could not escape what he had done.” But Adam did; he changed his name. By changing his name, he sidestepped the important tracking that could be done through Christopher’s Law to prevent, and protect our citizens.

Madam Speaker, this motion, this private members’ bill, will plug that loophole, will make sure that the intent of Christopher’s Law is abided by and will balance the rights of the individual against the collective rights of our citizenry and our communities. On this topic and in this situation, there can be no mistake that the protection and the favour must fall on the side of our citizens and our communities. For that, I will be supporting this very important private members’ bill. Again, I thank the members for their hard work on this.

And I will be sharing my time with MPP Leardi.

Further debate?

The member has two minutes to reply.

The time provided for private members’ public business has expired.

Ms. Scott has moved second reading of Bill 138, An Act to amend the Change of Name Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Second reading agreed to.

All matters relating to private members’ public business having been completed, this House stands adjourned until Wednesday, November 15, 2023, at 9 a.m.

The House adjourned at 1831.

There are a lot of good reasons why people change their names. One of those reasons is tradition; it’s based on tradition. For example, it’s a common tradition that a person getting married might change their name to adopt the family name of their spouse. That’s a very common tradition.

There’s another reason for changing your name, and that’s a very happy reason which I experienced in my 24 years as a lawyer. It’s when a child grows up and doesn’t know who their biological mother or biological father is, but they’re brought up by somebody, and that person becomes a parent figure to them. As time goes by, they decide they want to adopt that person’s family name as a symbol of having been adopted by that person in real life. I think that’s a beautiful thing. I’ve seen that happen myself.

Of course, famous people, especially entertainers, are always changing their name. They change their name probably for promotional reasons. That’s why Destiny Hope Cyrus is Miley Cyrus. Her nickname when she was growing up was Smiley; it was abbreviated to Miley, and that’s why we know her as Miley Cyrus.

But my favourite name change stories come out of ancient history. One of my favourite name change stories is about this fellow named Jacob. Jacob was travelling across the desert with his tribe. At a certain point, he comes across another man who challenges him to a wrestling contest. They begin wrestling out there in the middle of the desert. This man strikes Jacob and renders him incapable of wrestling, so all Jacob can do is continue clinging onto this man and cling and cling. It lasts so long that finally, he forces this man to give him his blessing. It’s only then that Jacob realizes that, in fact, he has been wrestling with God. God changes his name and says, “From now on, we are going to call you Israel,” which in my translation means “he who wrestles with God.” Some of us do that every day.

There’s another great story that comes out of the ancient stories. This one has got to be my favourite. This one is about Saul. He’s riding a donkey on the way to the city of Damascus, which back then was a really big important city, and on his way, he’s blinded by light; he’s blinded by a flash of light. He falls off his donkey, and they have to carry him away and they have to care for him because he’s blind for three days. Over the course of three days, Paul experiences a conversion of sorts, after which he adopts the name “Paul.” And he goes about the rest of his life calling himself Paul. He actually happens to be one of the guys that I’ve read a lot about. He did three incredible tours around the ancient world telling everybody about his experience: how he was knocked off his donkey and blinded and how that changed his perspective on the world. And that’s the story of him.

So it’s really important during this discussion to note that anybody can change their name. You can change your name today. You can ask people to talk to you and address you by whatever name you want. But what this legislation does is this legislation deals with legal name changes—a name change which, for example, might appear on your health card or your tax return or your driver’s licence. We’re really talking about legal name changes here. And the sad reality is that there are some people in our society who change their name for not good reasons. They change their name for bad reasons. They want to change their name because they want to escape the consequences of their own bad behaviour. We should not allow people to do that. We should not allow people to change their name simply to escape the consequences of their own bad behaviour. And that is specifically what this legislation intends to address.

So I congratulate my colleagues for bringing forth this proposal. I want to speak about the member from Thornhill, one of the co-sponsors of this bill. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting her. She was elected at the same time that I was elected to this Legislature, and we sat close to each other in this Legislature, and we’ve had many discussions. I find the member from Thornhill to be a very serious person. She’s professional and intelligent, and I want to let the people of Thornhill know that they have elected an excellent member of provincial Parliament who represents them well in this Legislature.

I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know the member from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock, and what I know about her is that she has had a long and distinguished career in this Legislature. She has been elected and re-elected five times. And when you’ve been elected and re-elected five times, there’s nothing more to be said. The record speaks for itself.

I want to thank the MPP from Timiskaming–Cochrane, the MPP from Simcoe–Grey and the MPP from Essex for their support, along with the co-sponsor, MPP Laura Smith, in moving this bill forward to committee. I also want to thank the partners that have been involved with us in the House today. The 482 Collective, Victim Services of York Region, Ottawa Police Association, Smith Falls Police Association and the Niagara Region Police Association have been in contact and supportive, and of course we’ve had many conversations. And I want to thank—Madam Speaker, I know we’ve worked on bills together to further protect victims of sexual assaults and crimes.

The MPP from Simcoe–Grey articulated it very well. Two lawyers on our side that spoke to this legislation—and I just want to make clear that the legislation affects convicted sexual offenders, people that are charged with sexual abuse against our children, that are under Christopher’s Law. They have violated another human being in a way that has altered that victim’s life forever. This is about not letting them have the ability to hide from their crimes. And as was brought up in the debate, the community does not know. The community is searching for a name that is not publicly out there of someone that has committed this crime—that would be normal. If you were a concerned neighbour, you would go into many search engines and look up the neighbour’s name, but if that convicted criminal has changed their name, that does not help the community be made aware. It protects the offender, and that is what we need to change. That is why other provinces have made these changes, and we have to let victims know that their attacker will not be able to escape and that they are going to be held accountable.

Thank you very much for your co-operation, Madam Speaker, and for the time.