I beg to inform the House that, pursuant to standing order 9(h), the Clerk has received written notice from the government House leader indicating that a temporary change in the weekly meeting schedule of the House is required, and therefore, the House shall commence at 9 a.m. on Monday, March 4, 2024, for the proceeding of orders of the day.

Tomorrow, March 1, marks Professional Engineers Day. I would like to take this opportunity to recognize and congratulate all professional engineers of Ontario and thank them for their efforts. You are building Ontario for all of us.

I would like to introduce members from the RNAO Ottawa region, who specifically asked me to use first names for the sake of brevity, so here we go: Una, Laura, Genevieve, Monique, Jenna, Laura, Ellen, Jennifer and Lisa, and their honorary member Mahoganie. Welcome to your House.

I’m so pleased to welcome today in the gallery the RNAO and their members. It is wonderful to have them here for their advocacy day. I want to particularly welcome Lhamo Dolkar, president-elect of RNAO, Doris Grinspun, executive director, Rachel Elliott, Michelle Heyer, Sonia Chin, Debra Lefebvre, Katie Hurst, Daria Juüdi-Hope, Shelley Evans, John Edwards, Paul-André Gauthier, Lisa Herlehy, Mackenzie Thiessen, Rob Samulack, Ashley Robinson, Ingrid Daley and also joining them, of course, former member of Parliament for Beaches–East York Matthew Kellway. Welcome to your House.

I’d like to thank the member for Ottawa South for introducing me to the House—Lisa was on your list. I’m here.

Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to introduce a great friend to many people in the chamber, including yourself and of course the table, Jeffrey Kroeker, who was a former staff member of ours in many different Parliaments. He’s sitting up in the gallery. And I’d like to welcome him back to the chamber and thank him for all his hard work while he worked here.

The member for Ottawa South beat me to the punch of the full Ottawa list of RNAO folks so I’m just going to emphasize one guest, and that is Laura Crich. Laura, thank you so much for leading the RNAO in our city. I would be remiss if I didn’t also acknowledge and welcome Hoda and Joanna, who have won a nurse practitioner clinic in Ottawa thanks to your hard work, Laura.

Thanks to all the nurses in this building. We need a lot more of them.

Last month, there was a transformative announcement that was delivered in Windsor and will phase out thousands of truly dreaded trips up the 401 to London—no offence to my colleagues across the aisle.

Thanks to the Minister of Health and the Minister of Children, Community and Social Services, Essex, Kent and Lambton will receive $4.5 million in annual funding to increase our local pediatric health services. More children of our region will get the care that they need for the future, when they need it, and right at home in our own community.

This funding supports a new after-hours pediatric emergency diversion clinic at Met campus, together with increased support for children’s speech-language pathology, physiotherapy and occupational therapy rehabilitation services at the John McGivney Children’s Centre in Sandwich and the Connections early years centre in Walkerville. The Children’s Treatment Centre of Chatham-Kent and Pathways Health Centre for Children in Sarnia are also receiving new support for their services.

In contrast to the past, this government goes beyond the talk and continues to choose to invest. The regional acute care hospital at County Road 42, the repatriation of nurses working in Detroit, support for in vitro fertilization for the first time, new nursing schools based at the University of Windsor, new MRIs, the cardiac catheterization lab and nuclear accelerator at the Windsor Regional Hospital have been taken off the shelf and delivered, now that the years of inaction are over.

I am very pleased to welcome my constituent from London West Janet Hunt, who is the president of the RNAO Middlesex-London chapter and has been educating me and advocating with me since I was first elected in 2013.

I also want to welcome Mackenzie Thiessen and Ryan Chan from RNAO Middlesex-London and—for the great conversation we had this morning at breakfast.

Good morning, colleagues. It is my pleasure to welcome to the Legislature this morning Sofia Avdoulos from my riding of York South–Weston. Have a great day at Queen’s Park.

Good morning. I would like to welcome Drs. Doris Grinspun and Claudette Holloway to Queen’s Park. Thank you so much for your outstanding leadership.

To all of the RNAO nurses, nurse practitioners, nursing students in the House, thank you very, very much for your hard work.

It was also great to see Sharla from the Sickle Cell Awareness Group of Ontario. I’m going to see you guys again next week.

I’d also like to thank Mason Rosen, Nolan Welsh and Allison Burns, who are students who participated in our Ontario Model Parliament program, for their incredible work. May they have a seat in one of these seats one day.

Speaker, I want to welcome my friend Phiona Durrant, from the Aurora Black Community Association; her son Jayden; and board member Bobbie Marshall. Welcome to Queen’s Park. Thank you so much for everything you do in our community, especially the last 28 days. Thank you so much, Phiona.

I just want to welcome my riding executive to the House today: my sister Mary Hogarth, Kathleen Gough, Tim Dobson, Gregory Wowchuk, Simon Nyilassy, Gary Stones, Oleg Zakala and a former employee, Joseph Corazza. They’re all here for lunch today. Welcome to the Legislative Assembly.

This question is for the Premier. Yesterday, while defending his latest plan to stack the judicial appointments committee with insiders and lobbyists, the Premier launched into a tirade about the state of crime in the province. He said, “They’re kicking in doors in the middle of the night, putting guns to people’s heads....”

Given the Premier’s concern about the risk of handguns in violent crime, why did he give a lobbyist for an American handgun manufacturer the power to choose Ontario’s next judges?

Interjections.

Speaker, the tough-on-crime so-called bluster here in the House is not going to change the fact that it’s this government’s failures that have left people without access to justice. Victims of crime are seeing their assailants walk free not because of an insufficiently conservative judge, but because of delays that are the direct result of this Premier’s mishandling and underfunding of our court system.

So, back to the Premier, Speaker: How will appointing a handgun lobbyist to the judicial appointments committee help reduce gun crime?

Interjections.

Speaker, not only are these new patronage appointments former Conservative staffers who lobby their former employers for a living, but one of them registered to lobby after they were appointed to the committee that selects judges. Judges are not meant to be like-minded with any political party and they are not meant to be appointed in the interests of private companies seeking to do business with the government. They are meant to serve the people.

So, Speaker, yes or no—back to the Premier—will these insiders continue to lobby for handgun manufacturers while they are appointing our judges?

Interjections.

I can understand the confusion that the Leader of the Opposition has in terms of how the system works. But, Mr. Speaker, the committee makes recommendations based on those who apply, and I don’t know what else they would have us do, except have people go through and do the interview. Would they prefer the federal system, Mr. Speaker? Would they prefer other systems?

This is a good system. There are good people, smart people, people who are looking for individuals that understand victims’ issues, individuals that understand cultural perspectives, individuals that understand community service. They are vetting candidates for consideration. But the choice is the government’s to make at the end of the day, and so I look forward to an alternate model from the member of the opposition.

Interjections.

That just happens to not be our view. We want our communities safe. We want the bad guys to have a sentence that is appropriate for the crime that they make. They didn’t even support us on reverse onus on bail, for which our Premier drove across this country, and the federal government eventually passed.

I, too, would like to give a very warm welcome to staff members and students who are part of the RNAO who are here today.

A special shout-out to members who live or work in Parkdale–High Park: Sharla Adams, Anlan Yao, Alicia Saunders, Susan McNeil.

I also want to say congratulations and a very warm welcome to president-elect Lhamo Dolkar.

Speaker, thanks for helping me get my squats in today. My Apple Watch has never been happier.

I’m blessed to have many friends in life, and for 40 years, Debra Walker has been one of them, joining us today in the gallery. I’m so thrilled to have her here.

As I look around the room, we see many familiar faces, but I definitely see Kathleen Pikaart. I wanted to welcome her, a registered nurse from my community and on the board of directors for RNAO.

And welcome to any of our neighbours that I can’t see from here.

It gives me great pleasure to welcome two students from the Model Parliament program and residents of London North Centre, Danielle Munang and Noah Debicki. It was great meeting you yesterday. I hope you have a great day.

On behalf of the Minister of Health—there were a few adjectives missed: dedicated, hard-working, tireless—I would love to welcome the executive director of the RNAO, Doris Grinspun, and her colleagues to the Legislature.