The previous Liberal government, supported by the NDP, chased 300,000 manufacturing jobs out of our province and brought our auto sector to the brink of collapse. In 2019, Reuters reported that companies planned to spend $300 billion on EVs and none of it was coming to Canada.

Since then, over the last three years, Ontario has attracted $28 billion in new EV investments, creating thousands of good-paying jobs across the province. Unfortunately, the NDP and the Liberals voted against every single item that brought this unprecedented success to Ontario.

By creating the conditions for businesses to succeed, our province is now a global auto manufacturing powerhouse.

Interjections.

It’s quite clear that our plan is working: 300,000 manufacturing jobs left our province for other jurisdictions at a time when those who are running the auto plants were saying that Ontario was the most uncompetitive jurisdiction in North America to build cars, to now, six years later, investing $28 billion into EV platforms, EV battery manufacturing facilities. The world is moving to EVs in Ontario because we have the energy and we’re committed to building the energy infrastructure to support the implementation of electric vehicles.

Now, the NDP energy critic is against all of the investments that we’re making in our nuclear sector, including building small modular reactors at Darlington, leading the world on that front; putting an extra 4.8 gigawatts at Bruce Power; refurbishing the Pickering Nuclear Generating Station. That’s how we’re going to power Ontario well into the future.

As we continue to reduce taxes and reduce fees and reduce the cost of living, the federal government continues to jack it up. On April 1—just a couple of weeks ago, Mr. Speaker—the federal government did it again: a whopping increase of 23% to the federal carbon tax, which is impacting the price at the pumps. It’s impacting the price of home heating for natural gas furnaces, the price at the grocery store. It’s impacting the cost of living in Ontario.

Last week we saw something interesting at the federal Parliament. We actually saw the federal NDP, with Jagmeet, and we saw the Parti Québécois—or, actually, the separatist party—supporting a Conservative motion to encourage Prime Minister Trudeau, who increased the carbon tax, to meet with Premiers right across the country. All of them are opposed to the carbon tax. It’s time to sit down, have that discussion and also scrap the tax.

The people of Ontario are feeling the pinch, but it’s not just the people of Ontario; it’s people right across the country that are getting hammered by this federal carbon tax. Just look at Newfoundland, where the Liberal premier, Andrew Furey, actually pleaded with Prime Minister Trudeau to put the pause on, back on April 1. But since he hasn’t done that, he’s now joined the chorus of Premiers of all stripes, from right across the country, to sit down and have an adult discussion—something the Prime Minister hasn’t done since 2016—with the Premiers, Speaker.

We believe that the Prime Minister should be sitting down with those Premiers. I just wish that the queen of the carbon tax here in Ontario, the Liberal leader, would support us in sitting down and having that mature discussion about axing the tax in Ontario.