The ayes are 56; the nays are 32.

The member for Glengarry–Prescott–Russell and parliamentary assistant.

The division bells rang from 1137 to 1142.

On November 23, 2023, Ms. Jones, Dufferin–Caledon, moved third reading of Bill 135, An Act to amend the Connecting Care Act, 2019 with respect to home and community care services and health governance and to make related amendments to other Acts.

On November 27, 2023, Mr. Calandra moved that the question be now put.

All those in favour of the motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the Clerk.

Ms. Jones, Dufferin–Caledon, has moved third reading of Bill 135, An Act to amend the Connecting Care Act, 2019 with respect to home and community care services and health governance and to make related amendments to other Acts.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? I heard some noes.

All those in favour of the motion will please say “aye.”

All those opposed will please say “nay.”

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members. This is another five-minute bell.

Be it resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

Third reading agreed to.

The House recessed from 1147 to 1500.

Report continues in volume B.

I’d like to welcome the grandparents and the parents of our head page today. Our head page is Leo Kemeny–Wodlinger. His grandparents Marika and Robert Kemeny are here with his dad and mom, Jason Wodlinger and Gabrielle Kemeny. Thank you so much for being here today.

Speaker, the member for Burlington is absolutely right: Ontarians are struggling to heat their homes due to rising inflation.

The federal government’s tax break only targets 2.5% of Ontarians, which is absolutely not enough. Our government has launched our Clean Home Heating Initiative program, the CHHI, providing recipients with a grant of up to $4,500 to buy a standard air-source heat pump or a cold-climate air-source heat pump. This program will help save up to $280 yearly on energy bills. On top of that, it would cut their emissions by a third. This past spring, we expanded the program to help even more communities.

Obviously, the best remedy to the problem, as the member for Burlington described, would be to eliminate the carbon tax. I hope that the federal government sees how harmful and ineffective this carbon tax is.

Because of the carbon tax, households heating with natural gas see a $290 yearly increase on their energy bills, while those using propane will spend $250 more annually. Speaker, it’s ridiculous. We are talking about 70% of Ontarian households having to pay an average of $270 in increased costs due to this tax. This is a reason why we increased our rebate. I’m hoping that the federal government finally opens its eyes and joins us in reducing costs for Ontarians.

My question is to the Premier. Speaker, Londoners are facing waits for MRIs that in some cases are nearly 10 times the provincial average. Dawn from London West has waited 18 months for an MRI, well beyond the target 28 days. Tom learned in April of this year that he needs an MRI, and he finally got an appointment for February 2024—again, clearly nowhere near the 28-day target.

Without adequate health care staffing and resources, wait time targets are meaningless, and the result is 11,000 Ontarians who died while waiting on wait-lists for surgeries, MRIs and CAT scans last year. Why is this government more focused on improving profits for insider health care investors than in reducing wait times in Ontario?

I’m going to remind the member opposite that, in fact, since 2018, we have expanded the number of MRI machines that we are funding across Ontario—and that includes communities that have never had an MRI machine in their hospital before. What does that actually mean? I’ll give a very specific example: An emergency room doctor told me, when we announced the MRI for that hospital, that they would no longer have to spend literally hours trying to find access to an MRI machine and then trying to arrange transportation through the paramedic service. We’re bringing care closer to home, and it is making a difference in our communities.

Mr. Speaker, guests from the Canada-Ukraine leadership are with us today, and I want to give special recognition to Roma Dzerowicz, Denny Dzerowicz and Victor Hetmanczuk, who were with us earlier this morning. We announced that Ontario will be the first province to mandate Holodomor education. I want to thank them for their leadership.

I encourage every MPP who is with us after votes to join us—the Holodomor awareness bus is at Queen’s Park, which is very special. I’m pleased to promote this wonderful education led by the Canada-Ukraine Foundation.

Deferred vote on the motion that the question now be put on the motion for third reading of the following bill:

Bill 135, An Act to amend the Connecting Care Act, 2019 with respect to home and community care services and health governance and to make related amendments to other Acts / Projet de loi 135, Loi modifiant la Loi de 2019 pour des soins interconnectés en ce qui concerne les services de soins à domicile et en milieu communautaire et la gouvernance de la santé et apportant des modifications connexes à d’autres lois.