My question is to the Premier. A recent report by the Ontario Health Coalition noted that funding for private clinics in the province has increased by 200% in the last year and, for private hospitals, it has been increased by 300%. Meanwhile, we have operating rooms in public hospitals across Ontario that are not used because public hospitals don’t have the funding to recruit and retain staff or pay for the surgeries.

Speaker, why is the Premier choosing to cut public health care and give money to private, for-profit care?

We also know that private clinics are receiving more money per surgery from the government than our public hospitals receive. We know that private surgeries are more expensive than public ones. This government’s privatization scheme is making wait times longer, making the staffing crisis worse and costing taxpayers more, not less.

Why doesn’t the Premier drop the expensive, unfair, two-tier privatization attempt and instead properly fund publicly funded, publicly delivered health care in the province of Ontario and respect the nurses that are here today?