Oxford has a long and proud history of baseball and softball. In fact, Beachville is home to the first documented game of baseball in North America, taking place on June 4, 1838. It was not in Cooperstown, New York, as is commonly believed; it was in Oxford.

One of Canada’s best professional baseball players, Tip O’Neill, started his career playing in Woodstock as well. Called Canada’s Babe Ruth, O’Neill was one of the star players during the early years of the sport. The baseball diamond in Woodstock’s Southside Park is now named after him.

Earlier this month, another chapter of this history was written when Woodstonian Brian Paton was inducted into the Softball Canada Hall of Fame. This honour only adds to his long list of accomplishments, including being a member of the International Softball Congress Hall of Fame and Woodstock Sports Wall of Fame.

Brian started his softball career as a catcher, later becoming an outfielder for the Woodstock Twins and Tornadoes. In 1987, Brian made the jump to Team Canada’s softball team, helping them to win gold four times at the Pan Am Games and three World Cup medals. He remained a member of the team for 17 years, eight of them as team captain. He also played for the Toronto Gators, where he was MVP and the top hitter for the team.

Congratulations, Brian, for being named to the Softball Canada Hall of Fame, and thank you for your contributions to softball in Oxford and Ontario.

I would like to wish my Uncle Ernie a happy birthday, who happens to be the member from Oxford.

Before you really get into that, you have to understand how time allocation—what it is, how it works. To fully understand that, you have to go back a few more steps on how this House actually works.

We’re here this afternoon. A bill was introduced, I believe, on the PAWS Act by the Solicitor General, and it was introduced for first reading. It’s customary that the first reading is—we all agree to first reading. You want it introduced. A couple of times—one, in particular, I know of that the official opposition, when we were third party, voted against first reading, and that was when the Liberal government of the time tried to sell Hydro One—or did sell Hydro One. We were so opposed to that that we voted against first reading. But normally, you allow legislation into the House.

Then, if it’s government legislation, it’s brought forward for second reading, and at second reading, customarily, you have eight hours of debate. That can be shortened or lengthened, but customarily it’s eight hours of debate.

The bill, now that we have a majority government, is passed by the government, obviously, if it’s a government bill, put forward to committee—committee is actually as important or, in some cases, more important than the debate in the Legislature, because committee is when people who are directly impacted by the bill or who have a special interest in the bill normally get to come before the committee and talk about their interest, their expertise to try to impact the bill, to try to change the bill, hopefully, to make it work better. That’s why this place exists: for the government of the day to introduce legislation for the Legislature and the committees to improve it. Although we may disagree philosophically with the reason for the legislation, it is incumbent on us all to try to make it as good as it can be for Ontarians.

So, the bill goes to committee, the committee hears deputations, and then based on those deputations, the committee members can make amendments, which are either accepted or voted down by their fellow committee members. Then the bill goes back to the House for third reading. Again, it will be debated, and third reading debates usually aren’t as long as second, because we’ve already gone through the committee process. So, let’s be realistic: Not much is going to change in the bill at third reading. Bills that we’re really opposed to—we get to make our points; try to make Ontarians understand what’s wrong with the bill, what’s right with the bill; and the government will try to make Ontarians understand why they’re putting forward the bill. Then there’s third reading—the last vote, the third vote, and then the bill goes for royal assent and is proclaimed.

That’s how it’s usually done, and there’s a few changes, but time allocation changes it totally. So, time allocation: The government decides that one or several of the steps aren’t needed, or they don’t want to deal with several of the steps.

This time allocation motion and the amendment to the motion are quite unique, because in my time here—and I’ve been here 12 years—this is the first time I’ve seen three bills in the same time allocation motion and three bills at three completely different stages, and they’re also treated differently. I’ll have to delve a little bit into the details to try to make people understand.

The three bills that are dealt with are Bill 136, more commonly known, to me, as the greenbelt reversal bill. If you will recall, the government tried to help some speculator friends profit in the greenbelt. Public pressure and the Auditor General, the Information and Privacy Commissioner, and Integrity Commissioner raised big concerns, and the government backtracked. That’s Bill 136, the backtrack bill. We understand why the government doesn’t want to hear a lot more about that. The government has got other problems with that, because the RCMP is looking into that.

Bill 150 is also kind of the same type of situation. It’s on urban boundary expansion. Actually, that was a bigger attack on farmland, on open space than the greenbelt legislation. It didn’t receive as much public response, but actually, it was as big an attack, and the government has been forced to backtrack. So they’ve put forward Bill 150, An Act to enact the Official Plan Adjustments Act, 2023 and to amend the Planning Act with respect to remedies. That’s basically—they tried to overreach, and now they’re having to back up.

It’s interesting, for members who are new to this place, or newer: That’s not something that commonly happens, that governments severely overreach and then have to backtrack.

This government is—remember when they severely, severely overreached and tried to use the “notwithstanding” clause?

Interjection: Oh yes.

Remember that? And then a few weeks later, the Men in Black bill came: “This never, ever happened.” Remember? It was rescinded to the day before it was passed, and I remember them all—I’m not sure if the member from Oxford did, but I remember everybody else clapped themselves on the back and they were so proud that they implemented the “notwithstanding” clause to override workers’ rights. They weren’t as happy two weeks later when they had to rescind.

Now, both these bills are the same type, Bills 136 and 150, both the greenbelt and urban boundaries retraction acts: “We’re so sorry. The Premier said he’s sorry.” The one thing he didn’t say is, “I’m not going to do it again.” Because when you look at Bill 154, the other bill in this time allocation motion, it says, “Sorry, not so sorry.” That’s what that is.

This time allocation motion actually is Bill 136, “Sorry, we tried, but the RCMP got involved”; Bill 150, “Sorry, we tried, but the RCMP got involved”; and Bill 154, on Ontario Place, is, “Okay, we’re going to try again, but we’re going to change the law so, hopefully, no one else can get involved after the fact.” That’s what this bill is.

In order to do that, the government has now employed the time allocation motion. But Bill 154, An Act to enact the Recovery Through Growth Act—basically the greenbelt; not the greenbelt, the Ontario Place bill. It has only had 6.5 hours of debate on second reading. It hasn’t passed second reading and hasn’t gone to committee, so what the allocation motion is doing is, it’s going to go to second reading vote; no committee; and then direct to third reading vote, no debate.

The government is so sure—no, they’re not, actually. If they were sure that people were actually in favour of this, they would hold committee hearings about Ontario Place in the city of Toronto, and the hundreds of people, the thousands of people who are in favour of this would come and congratulate the government. But that’s not what they’re doing. They’re shutting it down.

Especially the newer members can say, “Oh, well, you know, it’s close to Christmas. We’re done talking and no one wants to hear this.” Regardless of whether you agree that we should spend $650 million on a parking garage for a private spa, or whether you don’t; whether you agree that it’s a good idea to lease some of the best waterfront public land in the province in the city of Toronto to a private spa company for 95 years, whether you agree or not, there are some things in this bill that should cause everyone, agree or not—and especially the members on the government side, it should cost them some sleep at night.

Because at the end of the day we all know they’re going to vote for this. But there are things in this bill where, and I’ll read—I’m not a lawyer; I’m not a legalese person. But “No remedy,” section 2—oh, I just got a note. Okay. Good note.

So, “No remedy

“(2) Except as otherwise provided under 4, in an order under section 13 or in a regulation ... compensation or damages, including for loss of revenues or loss of profit, are owing or payable to any person and no remedy, including but not limited to a remedy in contract, restitution, tort, misfeasance, bad faith, trust or fiduciary obligation....”

So this bill basically prohibits, under this act, suing the government with respect to anything done under the act, including government misrepresentation, misconduct, misfeasance, bad faith, breach of trust, or breach of fiduciary obligation.

I thought the government was here to make sure that people respected laws, not give yourselves the right to break them or know, with this legislation, that they are going to be broken and you’re trying to stop it from happening—not stop the laws from being broken, but stop from getting caught. Now, I know that most of you—I think that I’m safe to say that all of you did not work so hard to get elected, work so hard to represent your people, to vote for stuff to introduce bad-faith legislation like this. What kind of government puts forward legislation insulating themselves from bad-faith decision-making? Come on.