Thank you to the member opposite for her time on the budget and protecting a budget that, of course, she would have no choice but to do, as a member of the government.

She talked a lot about the carbon tax, and she failed to mention how Ontario actually got the carbon tax. It was due to her government’s cancelling of cap-and-trade in Ontario, which forced us into the default program, which was the carbon tax.

Also, within the budget, we didn’t see any funding to help people with heat pumps and making sure that they had affordable ways to heat their homes or compensate natural gas consumers for their higher rates that this government is forcing them to do through Bill 165. There’s no plan for low-income consumers who heat their homes with natural gas, oil and propane. Electricity subsidies are increasing to $7.3 billion.

Can the member please state how she actually, truly is helping people when it comes to energy rates?

Questions?

Well, we will never apologize, on this side of the House, as the government, for actually lowering the cost of living for Ontarians by cancelling cap-and-trade, which has lowered their cost of living and energy rates. It was our government that came in and swiftly stabilized electricity rates and since then has been keeping them stable. It’s our government that has actually embraced the fact that we need to diversify our energy needs in order to, again, embrace a clean energy grid.

In fact, we even have the Minister of Energy here, who signed a core agreement for net zero nuclear, something I know the opposition does not support but is the result of our clean energy grid that is an envy around the world.

Just recently, we were able to use the Trillium grant to upgrade the Morgan Russell centre. That is named after Morgan Russell, an officer for South Simcoe police who, unfortunately, we did lose to an incident that happened, which many people are aware of—they went to a home, and they were shot on scene. It’s to commemorate his memory.

It just shows you the need and those positive memories created in our communities, through the community recreation funds, like the one we have in our budget—so that everyone can enjoy their communities more as they grow.

I’m glad to be part of this government. We’re now opening the first new medical school in decades. We’re training more nurses. We’re hiring more nurses. We’re building new hospitals, under the leadership of this government. We’re building more primary health teams. We’re investing in home care. All around, this government is finally fixing the 15 years of mess in our health care system, to finally bring it back to life and put the care back in health care.

I appreciated the member on the other side’s comments. I really appreciate her passion for her community in Barrie–Innisfil. She talked about Lake Simcoe and her love for her community.

Building healthy communities is something that our government has put a lot of effort into. Our government is investing over $200 million with the Community Sport and Recreation Infrastructure Fund. I’m just wondering what kind of impact that fund will be on the people in not only Barrie and Innisfil, but also Ontario as a whole.

I was really glad to hear the member from Barrie–Innisfil talk positively about nurse practitioner-led clinics and the fact that one of those clinics has been funded for the community of Innisfil, in her riding—just for interest, the very first one was created in Sudbury, and we worked really hard to get this up and running. I’m happy for her community.

How can she explain that a community like Capreol has been asking for one more nurse practitioner since 2021, and yet the government has not even had the courtesy to answer them back? They have written a number of times—they have submitted last June. They have sent their budget again last fall. They came to the budget consultation that took place.

I’m happy that her riding will be seeing more. But there are 40,000 people in Nickel Belt without access to primary care. What’s in the budget to help them?

Thank you to the minister for her remarks. I am one of her colleagues a little farther up north, but we also share Lake Simcoe, a priority for us.

The minister was recently in my riding. We were at Awenda Provincial Park, where we were doing a joint announcement with the federal government on park expansion. It’s incredible that, as she said earlier, we haven’t seen an increase in the number of provincial parks in 40 years, and yet, under this government, we’ve seen two new parks and now an expansion.

I was hoping she could tell us a little bit more about the importance of the park expansion and new parks, and what she’s hearing from the public.

Next question?

My constituents, like all of our constituents, were curious to see what in the budget was going to help them, whether it helps them gain access to health care, whether it helps them with the cost of living, whether there was anything in there to help them with finding a place to live. Unfortunately, it’s pretty slim.

I would like to start with the mention in the budget about Highway 69. Highway 69 is the highway that goes from Toronto to Sudbury. For 69 kilometres of it—68, as my friend the MPP from Sudbury will say—we are on a two-lane highway with I don’t know how many million trucks there are on this highway, but many, many.

Every year, I write a letter to the Minister of Transportation to ask, “How is the four-laning of Highway 69 coming along?”

In the budget, it says that they will continue their work on Highway 69. That’s all that’s in the budget.

In 2023, I wrote to the Minister of Transportation and I asked, “How is it coming with the four-laning of Highway 69?” And I got a response: “The ministry is taking the steps necessary to secure the federal and provincial environmental approvals required to complete the highway expansion. Once all the approvals are in place, construction will commence to expand these remaining sections.

“In the interim, the ministry continues....”

This year, I wrote to the Minister of Transportation and asked the same questions I’ve asked every year for the last 17 years that I have been here, and this is the answer I got:

“Thank you for your email regarding the Highway 69 four-lane expansion. I appreciate the opportunity to respond on behalf of the Ministry of Transportation.”

This is Véronique Filion, communications coordinator, north operations, of the Ministry of Transportation, who answered me.

She went on to say, “The ministry is continuing to take the steps necessary to secure ... the federal and provincial environmental approvals required to complete the highway expansion”—the exact same answer I got last year.

She went on to say, “When there is new information, the ministry is committed to sharing the progress with our partners and stakeholders that have shown interest in the continued expansion of Highway 69.” I hope I’m part of this selected group. I can tell you that my constituents sure would like to know.

She went on to say, “The overall Highway 69 expansion project, from Parry Sound to Sudbury, remains a priority for the provincial government and the work has been proceeding using a phased approach.”

It is really hard to tell my constituents that year after year—every time when I ask, “How is it coming with Highway 69?” I get the exact same answer: that they are working on the federal and provincial environmental approval, and nothing has changed. Actually, I think I am going to ask for a danger pay upgrade to my pay, because I have to travel Highway 69 every Sunday night, and then Thursday night when I go back home, because this is a very dangerous highway. I cannot believe that a province as rich as Ontario, a province that has $23 billion in the budget for road construction, comes back and tells us the exact same thing year after year and nothing changes for Highway 69.

I just took a trip across Canada. The minute you hit the frontier between where Ontario ends and Manitoba begins, you have four-lane highway all the way to British Columbia. Coming back from out west, you will go through Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba—they all have four-lane highways. The minute you hit Ontario, you’re on a cow path with a million trucks, with closures pretty much every second day.

If we have snow, I guarantee you there will be closures on northern Ontario highways. It’s really bad—not to mention the number of serious accidents where people get hurt, not to mention the number of serious accidents where people die.

And yet, we have this huge amount—billions of dollars—in the budget, but all we get year after year for Highway 69 is that they are working to secure the federal and provincial environmental approvals. How many decades does it take to get those approvals, so that you can actually build a road? That’s actually going to be my question next year, when I write the exact same letter to the Ministry of Transportation to see if anything will move.

But I want to focus a little bit on health care. In the budget, if you look at how much has been spent in 2023-24, which ended on March 31, versus what’s going to be spent in health care starting on April 1, there’s over a $1-billion cut. There’s a $1-billion cut at the same time as 2.2 million Ontarians do not have access to primary care, and this number will double within the next few years.

The Minister of Health put out a show of interest. They got over $1 billion worth of ask. There are solutions that exist throughout Ontario to make sure that the 2.2 million Ontarians who do not have access to primary care gain access. Even in my riding—I represent small, rural, northern Ontario. We have solutions. The nurse practitioner clinic in Capreol has been asking for one more nurse practitioner since 2021. You figure with a budget of $85 billion, there would be money to help people. There are no physicians, but we have nurse practitioners.

Did they get any money? Absolutely not. They didn’t even get a response to the detailed budgets that they put forward. I take them; I bring them to the Minister of Health. I showed her: “You need to help those people. They have been without a family physician for a very long time. They need access to care.” We have underemployed nurse practitioners right in the city of Greater Sudbury who would love to come and work at the nurse practitioner-led clinic in Capreol, and not a penny goes to help them. We’re not asking for millions of dollars—a couple of hundred thousand dollars, not even a rounding error at the Ministry of Health, but yet no money comes, and we continue to have the problem with 40,000 people in Nickel Belt who do not have access to primary care. There are solutions that come from all over but that are not being funded.

There is money in the budget for more primary care. It will come in a three-year period when there’s 2.2 million people that need help right now, and there’s no guarantee that it will come to rural areas. There’s no guarantee that it will come to northern areas, which deserve equitable access to care. Mind you, there are many people in Toronto also who do not have a primary care provider.

Then, there’s home care. I want to share the story of Tina Senior. Tina has a severely disabled, beautiful little boy named Alex. Alex goes to school. He is J-tube fed, needs to have home care to come and feed him. Just like every other kid, he gets hungry. So Bayshore has the contract to come and feed Alex at school five days a week when the school is in session. They are paid for an hour and a half to come and feed him, because you have to hook up the J-tube, let him get fed, unhook the machine etc. Well, Bayshore comes for 15 minutes, they get him hooked up and then they go. They get paid for an hour and a half, but they get to stay for 15 minutes. Most of the time, the machine will start to beep, beep, beep. Nobody in the school knows how to handle a J-tube feed. They phone the mom.

The mom is an intensive care nurse at our local hospital. The mom is no longer—after 10 years at the intensive care at Health Sciences North, she had to quit her job because home care fails her son so many times a week that—she’s not going to let her son starve. When your children are sick, nothing else matters. When her son needed her, she did what needed to be done, but that means we lost an intensive care nurse at Health Sciences North, and Bayshore gets paid for services they don’t provide. Bayshore is the home care company. That happens all over.

I have Chantale in Capreol. The same thing: a cute little girl, Valérie, who has special needs—the same thing, needs home care. The home care fails her so many times—Chantale worked in home care for many, many years. She had to quit her job to make sure that her child will get the support that they need. Why is it that we continue to pay for-profit home care companies millions of dollars in profit every single year yet we cannot enforce the contract that they have? You’re paid for an hour and a half, why are you only there for 15 minutes? You’re supposed to show up to help Valérie in school. Why is it that you don’t show up? And yet there are no repercussions. It just keeps on—and the mom who has been a very good home care worker for a very long time has to quit her job because the home care system fails her.

Tina has to quit her job as an intensive care nurse because the home care system failed her. And it goes on and on like this, yet we are quite happy to continue to give private, for-profit home care companies billions of dollars in profits, but we can’t pay the PSWs who work home care more than 20 bucks an hour.

Do you know how you fix the problem in home care and long-term care? You make PSW jobs good jobs—75% of them should be full-time jobs, well-paid, with benefits, with sick days, with a pension plan, with holidays, and problem solved. There are many, many very dedicated PSWs even in northern Ontario who would love to do what they do best, care for others, but if they do this, they can’t pay the rent and feed their kids, so they have to find other jobs.

When the hospital puts out one job, they will have hundreds of applicants. When Bayshore puts out one job, they have no applicants. Why? Because Bayshore won’t give you a full-time job, won’t give you benefits, won’t give you decent pay—any of that. We could legislate that tomorrow morning, like we did way back for nurses working in hospitals. None of that is in the budget.

When we look at the Northern Health Travel Grant—the Northern Health Travel Grant is mentioned in the budget and we see right now, for people in my riding and all over the north that have to come to Toronto that you get $100 to pay for your accommodations. If you can find a hotel room in Toronto for $100, please let us know right now, because none of us have been able to find this. It will now be bumped up to $175 a night. I will tell you that for most people on low income, coming to Toronto and having to manage a budget of $175 a night is still impossible. It will mean, for people in northern Ontario, that they will go without care because they haven’t got the money to pay for the transport and to pay for the hotel in order to get equitable access to care. This is wrong. The Northern Health Travel Grant needs to be reviewed. It hasn’t been reviewed in decades—100 bucks made sense in 1983, it does not make any sense in 2024. Do we see a commitment in the budget or money in the budget to do this? Absolutely not.

There are many services that could come to the north. Multiple sclerosis in northern Ontario—northern Ontario has the highest percentage of population with multiple sclerosis, and yet we have no clinic dedicated to multiple sclerosis in northern Ontario. People have to travel to the south in order to do this.

We had the one and only supervised consumption site in Sudbury that has saved many, many lives. Sudbury—like Timmins, like Sault Ste. Marie, like many communities in the north—sees a three-times death rate from opioid overdoses compared to southern Ontario, and yet there was no money in the budget for supervised consumption sites. Our site closed last Friday, and I can assure you that there were many, many people crying.

The member from Sudbury has brought many examples of members in his community that depend on the supervised consumption site to stay alive long enough to wait your turn on the never-ending wait-list for mental health and addiction. In my area, it used to be 12 months to gain access to children’s mental health; we are now at 18 months to gain access to children’s mental health. Do you know how many things go wrong during those 18 months? When your child is sick enough, has been to the hospital many times and been told, “He needs to start mental health therapy. We will put them on the waitlist”—and you phone every week and you are told that you still have 12 months to wait, 11 months to wait? Ten months? That’s wrong. Do we see money in the budget for this? Very, very little.

There’s many more. The ambulance services in Foleyet—Foleyet is a community in the north of my riding, about an hour away from Timmins, an hour away from Chapleau, the two closest hospitals. The DSSAB, which provides ambulance services for the people of Foleyet, doesn’t have enough money to keep all of their sites open. There is a good chance that the site in Foleyet will be closed, which means that, in case of an emergency, when you phone to get an ambulance, the ambulance will have to leave from Timmins and drive for an hour before they get to you in Foleyet. Why is there no money in the budget for the DSSAB?

Things that would be easy to fix: 911 everywhere in Ontario. Did you know, Speaker, that Ontario is the only province that doesn’t have 911 everywhere? We are the only one. Every other province has an agreement with Bell to make sure that 911 is available everywhere. In my riding, there are about six different 1-800 numbers that you have to remember to be able to call. The services will be there, but the 911 won’t. Is there money in the budget to do that little, wee change? No, absolutely not.

There are many, many other things that I would have liked to see. I would have liked to see money in this budget for a French university in Sudbury.

La population francophone parle d’une seule voix : on veut une université francophone à l’Université de Sudbury.

The francophone community speaks with one voice: We want a francophone university in Sudbury, by the University of Sudbury. Is there any money in the budget to make that happen? No, absolutely not.

I could go on. Internet and broadband: I have met with every Internet and broadband provider. None of them want to come in to Nickel Belt because there is no money to be made. It doesn’t matter if you pay for all of their infrastructure, they do not want to set up shop. There is no money to be made. You have to look at another way of moving things forward in northern and rural Ontario, because having a for-profit provider won’t work. You have lots of money available that stays there every year for this.

And it just goes on and on. Cleaning of arsenic leaking into Long Lake in my riding: This has been happening since 2007. Having a stable workforce at the ministry so that we get that done and stop the leaching of arsenic into Long Lake—I could go on and on.

None of that is in the budget, but all of that were priorities that the people of the north wanted to see in the budget.

I want to thank the member and congratulate her on Wendat in her riding. It’s a place I like to frequent a lot with my family for hikes. Now, thanks to the work of this government, in partnership with the federal government—is expanding those park opportunities at Wendat.

This builds on not just expanding our parks, like we have at Wendat, but this budget is actually going to build two new parks: one in Muskoka, which is really exciting—that one, again, is in early stages, but it will be a new operating park—and, of course, we have our first urban provincial park in Uxbridge.

When I was in Uxbridge talking to some high school students, they had some really exciting, bold ideas of what they want to see in their urban park. Just to put it into perspective, this is something that—many people who have gone to New York City have gone to Central Park—is going to be larger than Central Park. So this is not only going to be great for Ontarians, for students, connecting people to nature, but it’s great for their mental health and great for our province.

And do you know what is a big saving in terms of value for money? Getting rid of a carbon tax, cap-and-trade included, full stop.

Like the rest of the world, Ontario continues to face economic uncertainty and pressure due to high interest rates and global instability. These pressures are being felt day to day by Ontario families, yet this government is continuing to work hard and strengthen Ontario. So, Minister, my question is, are you going to stop or are you going to keep going with this budget?

I appreciate the member singing me a song. I’ve never had anybody sing me a song before so thank you for that. It was kind of cool.

I live in northern Ontario so I want you to understand that in all the little communities—I have 33 little communities—you either have no gas station or you have one gas station.

That one gas station sells gas at whatever the market can bear. They don’t give a damn—am I allowed to say that?—they don’t care how much tax, they just sell it at how much they can. On a long weekend, when we have a lot of tourists, you pay over two bucks a litre for gas in many parts of my riding. It was just Easter and the price went up to $1.87 in my riding.

It has to do with regulating the price of gas. Do what many other provinces and states have done: Regulate the price of gas so that you set a cap so they cannot go over this. That would really help the people of northern Ontario.

Quand tu as une population comme Hearst, où plus de 65 % n’ont pas accès aux soins et qu’ils mettent des demandes de l’avant—il y a des façons de régler ça. Il y a des façons de donner l’accès. Ils font des demandes de financement au ministère de la Santé et n’entendent rien en retour.

Ces gens-là ont droit aux soins. C’est un droit fondamental de tous les Ontariens et Ontariennes, même quand tu vis dans le nord de l’Ontario, comme moi et le membre.

Mais je ne veux pas lui donner de faux espoirs : non, il n’y a pas grand-chose dans ce budget-là qui va aider les gens de Hearst.

Questions?

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Through you to the NDP member:

You better watch out, it’s normal to cry,

Life is unaffordable, I’m telling you why:

Carbon tax is coming to town.

I take this opportunity to extend an olive branch to our NDP member. An opportunity and a chance to stand alongside our government and distance themselves from the Liberals, who continue to push higher taxes on Ontarians. With the Liberal carbon tax jumping by a staggering 23%, our government made a decision to extend our own cuts to the tax on gas and fuel to help Ontario families and businesses save hundreds of dollars.

So, through you, Speaker, I ask the member of the opposition: Will they vote to pass our budget and support our government as we make life more affordable for Ontarians?

J’apprécie tout le temps ma collègue de Nickel Belt quand elle fait ses présentations, mais j’aimerais lui poser une question sur la santé parce que, moi, j’ai une communauté de 5 000 personnes à Hearst. Ils viennent encore de perdre un autre médecin.

On était déjà à 50 %. Sur 5 000 de population, on était à 50 %. Là, on apprend qu’il va y avoir un autre médecin qui prend sa retraite. Ça, ça veut dire qu’il va y avoir près de 60 %, 65 %, 70 % de la population qui ne va pas avoir de médecin de famille.

J’ai entendu dans votre allocution que vous dites qu’il y a 2,2 millions de personnes qui n’ont pas de médecin de famille. Moi, je peux vous dire qu’il y en a gros qui viennent de ma région qui sont dans ce 2,2 millions-là.

Mais la question que je veux vous demander : on voit les investissements que le gouvernement fait, mais on voit que rien ne change dans nos régions. J’aimerais savoir si le budget va adresser ces problèmes-là.

Before I ask my question, I want to acknowledge the member from Nickel Belt. We were together on SCOFEA for pre-budget consultations. Thank you for your passion for the communities and thanks to the community for coming forward and talking and sharing their concerns.

I always believe living in the north is living in heaven, but it comes with a price tag. That is why the government is investing approximately $94 million over three years to enhance the health and well-being of Indigenous and northern communities with culturally responsible, safe care tailored to the community needs.

Another thing which the member just talked about was the labour shortage, and that is why we’re helping Indigenous workers in northern Ontario train for rewarding careers in their community by investing $7.3 million through the Skills Development Fund.

So my question to the member is: We’re investing $100 million in SDF. Do you think it is a good investment? Should we continue or should we add more?

Next question?

Thank you so much to the member for Nickel Belt for highlighting all the things that, really, rural and northern Ontario are lacking that we take for granted in other areas of the province.

I also wanted to talk about the vulnerable children that she referred to. In my riding, I have adults with developmental needs, and they live at home with their parents, and their parents are aging, particularly the Rodgers family. I’ve been advocating for the Rodgers family for almost a decade now, to have their son have access to community living so that, as they age, they know that their son has a home that he will be able to flourish in and get the care that he needs.

Can you discuss what community living looks like in your riding in the northern part of Ontario?

It’s a quick question, so I’ll be quick. Madam Speaker, we are investing $1.1 million in funding to Maamwesying North Shore Community Health Services. Along with that, something which is very close to my heart is investment into recreation. Through this budget, we’re investing $200 million in the Community Sport and Recreation Infrastructure Fund. To the member, my question is, what do you think of this investment? Should we continue these investments and do more of them?

We are very fortunate to have some really dedicated workers who work within community living. There’s about eight group homes that exist in Sudbury and Nickel Belt. All of them are always packed to full capacity, and I have many families like the Rodgers, who care for a child with a developmental disability who is now an adult, who is now a 60-year-old adult, and they see themselves as, “We need to prepare for the next phase, when we cannot look after”—and there is no money in the budget to open up new group homes. There is no money in the budget to allow the group homes that exist to put on a few more beds and take on a few more residents. But there are many, many people with developmental handicaps who would love to know that, if their support’s not there, they would have access, but there’s nothing in the budget for that.

I can tell you that, in the community of Cartier, the community hall had to close. They don’t have a place to gather anymore. I have many of the little communities that I serve where the hall where they used to meet together is in such poor shape that they cannot offer recreation anymore. They cannot offer a place for the community to gather.

I hope that this money will be available to them, but I know that the demand will be way bigger than what the budget offers.