Remarks in Anishininiimowin. Northern Ontario hospitals have been struggling to keep their emergency room doors open for years now. The program that allows them to hire locum doctors from southern Ontario as a temporary fix is coming to an end. What is this government going to do to make sure our ERs in the north stay open?

Speaker, March 31 is 12 days from now. What is the status of this program?

Interjections.

My question is for the Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade. When it comes to attracting investments, the competition from across the globe is very fierce. Governments are pulling every lever at their disposal to secure investments that create good-paying jobs and strengthen their economies. We know that fostering the conditions for a robust, low-cost business environment is crucial to landing important investments. But unfortunately, we’re playing a bit of tug-of-war with the federal Liberals when it comes to taxes and costs. We’re lowering taxes and cutting costs while the Liberals continue to hike taxes and continue to drive up costs every chance that they get. Their upcoming carbon tax increase on April 1 is just another example of this.

Speaker, can the minister explain to the House how, by lowering costs and cutting taxes, we’re able to secure important investments?

I’ve heard from plenty of businesses, plenty of households in my riding, who are concerned about the increase in the carbon tax, and I’m positive that Liberal and NDP members were hearing the same thing when they were in their ridings last week.

Speaker, can the minister please share with us what he’s hearing about the federal carbon tax?

When it comes to the economy, we have shown the Liberals that lowering taxes is how you create those conditions.

Now, here are some new facts this year, Speaker: In 2023, Ontario attracted 137 foreign direct investments. That brought in $11 billion from outside of the country into Ontario. That has created 12,000 new good-paying jobs right across our province. In fact, a new statistic today: Ontario has the largest number of FDI projects in Canada, and from 2018 to 2023, more jobs were created from foreign direct investment into Ontario than every US state and every Canadian province. That’s what happens when you cut taxes, lower taxes. Scrap the carbon tax.

Speaker, through you to the Minister of Health: Yesterday morning, I was at a rally in Niagara for EMS workers who are members of CUPE 911. They were sounding the alarm about ambulance wait times and code zeros that are happening far too often. They’re telling us that, in Niagara, there are not enough ambulances due to off-load delays and inadequate staffing to the point it is putting the public in danger.

What does the minister have to say to the workers in Niagara EMS who are asking for help and support because they’re working in dangerous situations every day and don’t have the resources or staffing to answer calls on time or do their jobs safely?

The member opposite raises an important issue. There is no doubt that our temporary locum programs have been a very effective tool that we have been able to use, working with Ontario Health, to make sure that emergency departments in northern Ontario, but frankly across many communities in Ontario, have emergency department coverage physicians. I will say, as a result of that program, we have seen no closures in northern Ontario EDs in the last year. Without a doubt, it has been a program that has had value.

We are in active conversations with the Ontario Hospital Association and the Ontario Medical Association to see how we can come forward with a more permanent solution. But I will keep the member updated because it is an important issue.

When we made additions and expansions in the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, when we ensured that we had 60% of those seats set aside for family medicine, that’s 100 additional seats where people are training in northern Ontario. The statistics show that where you train, where you ultimately practise and where you continue to practise are close to where you learn. We know that making those investments in primary care health care teams in northern Ontario at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine is going to make an impact in your communities in northern Ontario and indeed across Ontario.

In terms of wait times and ensuring that ambulances and paramedics can very quickly and effectively get back out onto the road into our communities, we have a number of programs that the member opposite, I hope, is aware of, which of course is the Dedicated Offload Nurses Program, a program that is funded 100% by our government and that ensures that we have a dedicated staff member, whether it is a nurse, a respiratory technologist or a paramedic, who stays with that patient until they can get service in their ED department. That program alone has made significant increases in decreasing the number of wait times.

Supplementary question?

I’m going to caution the member on his use of language. “Baloney” is pretty close to the line—especially before lunch.

Start the clock.

The Minister of Health.

The next question.

Supplementary?

Speaker, I can tell you that those workers don’t feel that this government has been there for them. Joey Durocher reached out to my office in Welland. In January, his knee pain became so unbearable that he had to go on modified duties at work. X-rays showed he had severe arthritis. When he was referred to a clinic, he was told the process would take well over a year. He said, “I don’t understand how people can be expected to suffer through something like this.”

Yesterday, this government had a chance to free up thousands of doctors to see more patients and chose not to. What specifically will this minister do to ensure people like Joey can get timely access to a doctor and the care they desperately need?

At the risk of stating the obvious, expanding primary care multidisciplinary teams by 78 teams in the province of Ontario—three times the amount that we initially committed, because we know that there is need.

We now have, because of investments that our government has made with the Minister of Colleges and Universities, 300 new student paramedics training in the province of Ontario, including in northern Ontario where there is a Learn and Stay program available for them to get their training for free in exchange for staying in communities that are underserved.

We will continue to make these investments while the member opposite, their party, continue to oppose them every time we vote on these investments. But we’re getting the job done, Speaker.

We have had conversations with the federal Minister of Health saying if there is an opportunity, if there is a wedge that is allowing these clinics to happen, then perhaps the member opposite could pick up the phone and call their federal counterparts, because that’s what I’ve been doing. And I’m making the case that if the Canada Health Act allows these for-profits, then we will be shutting them down with the changes to the Canada Health Act and federal government involvement.

When I sent a directive to the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario in August of 2022, less than two months after starting my role as Minister of Health, the CPSO was able to assess, review and ultimately license—when appropriate—the historic highest number of internationally educated primary care physicians in the province of Ontario. So actions do make a difference. We did the same thing with the minister’s directive for the College of Nurses of Ontario. Again, two years running, Speaker, we have had historic high numbers of internationally educated nurses wanting to live, practise in the province of Ontario. Those are concrete changes that we are making to impact people’s lives and increase access to publicly funded health care.

Just for the record, I’m a roast beef guy, so I’ll thank you for that.

My question is to the Minister of Energy. Speaker, the federal carbon tax—

Interjections.

The federal carbon tax makes life more expensive for the people of Ontario. After years of punishing energy costs that are sky high, the Prime Minister announced that he was pausing the carbon tax but only on home heating oil and only for three years.

Families and businesses in my riding of Perth–Wellington that grow the food, that build our province every single month are being punished by this carbon tax. They can’t afford the high taxes of the opposition and the NDP members. Our government understands this, that the carbon tax only takes money out of hard-working people’s pockets. That’s why we fought this ludicrous tax all the way to the Supreme Court, and we will continue to fight it, keep going forward.

Speaker, can the minister please tell this House why the federal government’s selective carbon tax exemption hurts Ontarians?

As families across Ontario continue to struggle with the rising cost of living, our government continues to do everything we can to make life more affordable. But the queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, and the independent Liberals don’t seem to care about the harmful impacts the carbon tax has on the lives of our constituents. We need members on the opposite to work with us. In fact, the member from Kanata–Carleton is the caucus liaison to the Liberal Party of Canada and the federal Liberal caucus, but she refuses to call her federal Liberal colleagues to halt the carbon tax.

Thankfully, our government will continue to act to keep costs down for families in Ontario. Can the minister please share with this House what we are doing?

Sadly, Speaker, I can’t; I can’t answer the question. It’s mind-boggling that the federal government hasn’t realized that they’re hurting the people of Ontario and they’re hurting the people of Canada with this failed policy, the carbon tax.

Sadly as well, we can’t get an answer out of the Ontario Liberal leader as to whether or not she supports the increase to the federal carbon tax in 13 days’ time by a whopping 23%.

Or hold on, Mr. Speaker; maybe I can answer the question as to why Bonnie Crombie, the queen of the carbon tax, is still supporting a federal carbon tax. Every member of her climate change panel is on the record supporting the federal carbon tax, every member—

Interjection.

I know I’m running out of time here, Mr. Speaker, but wait for my—

Mr. Speaker, it’s clear we would scrap the carbon tax, and we fought it all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. What we’re really unclear on is where the queen of the carbon tax, the Ontario Liberal leader, Bonnie Crombie, stands. But it’s pretty clear when you look at the people she has appointed to her advisory panel on climate change.

We talked about the member from the Beaches; how about Kathleen Wynne’s failed environment minister Chris Ballard? He helped design the Liberals’ multi-billion-dollar cap-and-trade program that drove up the cost of groceries and drove up the cost of gasoline.

Cherise Burda: She was excited to be one of the first supporters of the Liberals’ disastrous cap-and-trade program before being voted out by rural voters.

Former McGuinty agriculture minister Carol Mitchell wanted to impose a carbon tax on farmers, and she was the agriculture minister.

Vince Gasparro not only backed the Liberals’ cap-and-trade carbon tax; he pushed to expand it to every province in Canada.

And Kathryn Bakos is on the record saying she believes that you have to tax people as part of a climate change plan. Doug Ford and the PC government do not believe that.

Minister of Health.

Minister of Health.

The Premier promised the people of Ontario that they would never need to use their credit card to access health care in Ontario, yet Eileen Murphy was charged $110 to get a routine Pap test done by an Appletree clinic in Ottawa. Then, the clinic told Eileen that if she wanted test results, she would have to pay another $110.

Why is the Premier allowing health practitioners in Ontario to hold people’s test results hostage for money?

How can the Premier justify this exploitation when we have the solutions we need to provide primary care for everyone within the public health care system?

Interjections.

As I’ve said many times, if individuals believe that they have been inappropriately charged for an OHIP-covered service, they should be accessing protectpublichealthcare.ca. We have a process within the ministry to ensure that OHIP-covered services are insured and that patients cannot be charged for that.

Again, I will remind the member opposite that there is a Canada Health Act issue that needs to be resolved with the federal government, and we are in conversations with them to ensure that that practice does not and cannot continue.

But I’m also going to ask the member opposite, as we expand primary care multidisciplinary teams: Is the member opposite going to support those changes? We have a number of Ottawa-specific organizations that have received primary care expansion announcements: in Ottawa, a nurse practitioner-led clinic people can access, and we are going to have further expansion in Cornwall, in Kingston, in Perth. We have a number of these primary care expansion multidisciplinary teams that will allow people to be connected with primary care multidisciplinary teams, which is what patients and clinicians want.

My question is for the Premier. Recently, a large group of seniors came to my office—they’re from my riding—and they were upset and worried. Their rents keep going up while the living conditions in their building keep getting worse. Their corporate landlord continues to put off regular maintenance until major repairs are unavoidable, allowing them to apply for above-guideline increases every single time. These tenants were one increase away from losing their homes.

Mr. Speaker, the number of LTB applications for above-guideline increases went up 50% between 2020 and 2021 alone. My bill, the Keeping People Housed Act, would create a task force to investigate this predatory practice. Will the Premier vote yes to stopping these bad actors who are costing seniors their homes?

Mr. Speaker, we can’t kick this issue further down the road. Last year, our province saw an unprecedented exodus of young people, people between the ages of 25 and 35. Fifty thousand people left the province last year. This is our skilled labour. Our children, our siblings, our friends are leaving the province in search of something better. The harm isn’t just to communities and families; the harm is to our economy. We are hemorrhaging skilled labour as quickly as we are hemorrhaging affordable units.

Speaker, this government’s failure to protect renters is hurting every single one of us. Again, will the Premier say yes to keeping people housed and no to tenants being gouged by supporting my bill?

I appreciate the opportunity to speak to the AGIs, the above-guideline increases. There have been a number of applications. There is a process for that. The landlord-tenant tribunal, as an independent tribunal, processes those. We have doubled the number of full-time adjudicators so that people can have their hearings. If they have issues with their residents, if they have maintenance issues and that sort of thing, there is a process. There’s the Rental Housing Enforcement Unit. There are avenues where they can have some of their issues addressed, Mr. Speaker. I’ll have more to say in the supplementary.

Now, what is causing grief for tenants is the cost of everything, and the cost of everything is tied to the carbon tax. In 13 days, it’s going up 23%. If they’re worried about people being housed and fed, they need to look at the costs and the things that go into those costs. We would ask that they stand with us to ask the federal government to axe the tax.

My question is for the Minister of Finance. The carbon tax is making life more difficult for Ontarians. The Bank of Canada’s governor has said that the impact of the carbon tax is actually four times greater than his previous estimates. People in my riding of Peterborough–Kawartha tell me that this regressive tax is causing unnecessary harm to their household budgets. It’s raising the price of everything, from filling up their cars to heating their homes.

Speaker, the people of Ontario have had enough of this carbon tax. Our government must continue to stand with them and call on the federal Liberals to eliminate the tax. Can the minister please speak to the damage this carbon tax has and why the federal government must end this regressive measure?

Thank you to the member for that question. Now is not the time for a punitive, costly tax that is making life more unaffordable for the people here and across the country. We saw provincial Liberal members refuse to support a motion to eliminate the carbon tax and make goods more affordable across the province. We heard the Liberal member for Kanata–Carleton say that the vast majority of Ontario households are better off with a carbon price, in spite of all the evidence shown to the contrary.

In fact, the queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, was just interviewed again on CTV; eight times she couldn’t deny the federal carbon tax. She couldn’t deny whether she would support it or not and she doubled down again in her press conference, propping up the federal Liberal government, Mr. Speaker.

The queen of the carbon tax and her members need to pick a side. It’s time for all parties to join us and agree that this federal carbon tax needs to be eliminated.

To respond, once again, the Minister of Finance.

There being no further business this morning, this House stands in recess until 3 p.m.

The House recessed from 1142 to 1500.

Mr. Shamji moved first reading of the following bill:

Bill 175, An Act to amend the Planning Act with respect to official plans and by-laws / Projet de loi 175, Loi visant à modifier la Loi sur l’aménagement du territoire à l’égard des plans officiels et des règlements municipaux.

First reading agreed to.

The official opposition House leader, the member for Timiskaming–Cochrane.

It has been a long-standing practice of this House to allow members to summarize their petitions or read them in full, but not both. My predecessors in this chair have affirmed this on many occasions. For example, on December 7, 2010, at page 4024 of the debates, the Speaker stated as follows:

“When presenting petitions, it is in order to either read the petition or give a brief synopsis of the content. Members may want to give the latter option some consideration if their petition is particularly lengthy or if it contains language that might otherwise not be permitted in debate.”

I return to the member for Nickel Belt to read her petition—or summarize it, if she wishes to do so.

In respect of the matter of certification, members are indeed required by standing order 42(c) to have their petitions certified prior to presenting them in the House, and I would remind all members to please submit their petitions to the table in advance of their preparation.

Has the member certified his petition or not?

Petitions? I recognize the member for Nickel Belt.