I see the member opposite questioning my number. Look it up. Just Google it. We import $10 billion more food than we export.

We also are welcoming 400,000 new people to Ontario every year, and one thing I know about those people—I can guarantee it: They will want to eat. And the most environmental and healthiest way to eat is to eat food that’s grown locally. So we need to maintain our farmland. That’s the purpose of the greenbelt. And yet, this government keeps cutting huge tranches out of the greenbelt. They did it with the 7,400 acres of the original greenbelt scandal. They did it with the expansion of the urban boundaries and they’re doing it with the paving over for the 413.

This government is not only jeopardizing our environment—I speak about this at a time when, again, the city of Toronto is engulfed in smoke, this time from forest fires in Texas—but they’re also jeopardizing our food security in the future. With global warming, it’s going to be more and more difficult to grow food because we are seeing incredible swings in temperatures. We’re seeing all kinds of climate crises around the world and it’s making it more and more difficult for countries to grow food. At the same time, when we are in this environmental crisis, this government is paving over even more farmland than was paved over by the former Liberal government. This bill is of great concern to anybody who cares about the environment and also future food security in the province of Ontario.

I’ve got 45 seconds. I’ll just mention the other thing I’ve got to say: The government is really good at selling their bills. When they brought this one out, they announced that there were going to be no more tolls on Ontario roads and then they didn’t mention that—except the only road that has tolls is the 407, which the Conservatives sold to a private, for-profit, Spanish corporation at the time and sold a 99-year lease. So it’s not just we who are paying those tolls; our children and grandchildren are going to be paying those tolls forever. But they got this blurb out in the media, this message out that, hey, they’re going to remove tolls—except the one that exists.

The other thing this government should be doing, the 407—initially we paid for it and it was our asset. As taxpayers in Ontario, it was our asset. This government sold it off with a 99-year lease and then their tolls are so high that people can’t afford to drive on it, and because they can’t afford to drive on it, the 401 is much more congested. So the 407 was fined $1 billion for increasing congestion, for not having enough vehicles on the road and increasing congestion on other roads. Do you know what this government did? The response is that they waived the billion dollars because they said, “Oh, the taxpayers of Ontario don’t need that billion dollars back.”

You don’t get anything done if you don’t get it right. If you keep having to reverse, then you’re just spinning in circles and you’re not actually accomplishing anything.

That’s what’s been happening with this government’s housing plan. In order to build that 1.5 million homes over 10 years, we need to be starting 15,000 housing units per month in this province. Last month, there were 5,000 started, so only a third of what is needed to achieve that goal. So our housing shortage is exploding under this government because you’re not getting it done.

I would just contrast this with the British Columbia NDP. They are also building 5,000—started 5,000 housing units last month—but they’ve got a third of the population. So their housing starts are three times per capita what ours are in Ontario. The NDP in British Columbia are getting it done, and they’re getting it right.