This is a petition about raising the ODSP, and it comes from Dr. Sally Palmer, who has collected thousands and thousands of signatures.

In the petition, it points out that under current costs in this affordability crisis, if you’re on ODSP or OW, it is almost impossible to live. It’s almost impossible to pay your rents, impossible to pay your foods.

There has been a call to double ODSP for a long time, and marginal increases are just not enough. I certainly will be signing this petition and giving it to page Simon.

Resuming the debate adjourned on April 16, 2024, on the motion for second reading of the following bill:

Bill 185, An Act to amend various Acts / Projet de loi 185, Loi modifiant diverses lois.

Further debate?

Today, I will be sharing my time with the member for Ottawa South—the amazing member for Ottawa South, actually.

Bill 185, Cutting Red Tape to Build More Homes Act: The government is being a little sneaky because, yes, the Minister of Housing did put forward this bill, but it was under his role as Minister of Legislative Affairs, not as Minister of Housing. This is all they would let the minister get away with, I suppose, after what I hear were some intense cabinet meetings. And the thing is, it is literally so far from an actual housing bill that they cannot even call this a housing bill and propose it by the Minister of Housing. So that’s telling. That is very telling.

The legacy of this government will be how it failed young people, families and newcomers by making the dream of home ownership a nightmare. What a shame. What a wasted opportunity. When I’m out and about in my community, I hear from young people—I also have two young people I call my children—and they’re so disheartened. They’re just so disheartened; some of them leaving Ontario. Yesterday I heard prices of homes in Scotland are a third of what they are in Ontario. It’s such a shame to lose our youth because we can’t get it done.

The province is proposing to study the building code and the changes that would make four-storey buildings easier to build. That’s great. Yet, they refuse to allow fourplexes as of right across Ontario. How does that even make sense? I think cutting red tape should mean skipping these extra steps and implementing provincial zoning standards, not relying on municipalities to do this for you. We’ve proposed to do this with the BUILD bill put forward by my colleague the member from Don Valley East, and what was the government’s response? A bill that is not even enough about housing to be put forward by the Ministry of Housing. Where is the leadership?

Parking minimums in protected major transit station areas are to be prohibited, as well as in areas where minimum densities are required by official plans or provincial policies. So Bill 185 will eliminate parking minimums near major transit stations. Again, this is good. It’s a good thing for densifying these areas. However, the Minister of Housing has still not approved the MTSAs in Toronto. I think he’s getting tired of me asking where these approvals are, but I will not be quiet about it until he approves them. What is the point of the elimination of parking minimums if these areas don’t have approval yet to build? As I have said before: Tick tock, you need a clock, Minister.

Something Bill 185 does do right is to allow 18-storey mass timber construction, which is a step in the right direction, as it will help bring down construction costs and mass timber can store carbon for generations, keeping it out of the atmosphere—more of that, please, and more of removing the requirements to drywall over this cross-laminated timber.

However, changes to the rules around development charges are disappointing. Development charges in municipalities like Toronto have increased much more rapidly than property taxes, unfairly burdening newcomers and young people entering the housing market.

Limiting the rates of increases to these taxes is reasonable. It does not make sense to excessively tax construction of new housing during a housing shortage, yet the province is backtracking to allow this.

The government’s proposed provincial planning statement, coupled with this bill, seems calculated to ensure that the greenbelt sprawl and real estate scandal—still under an RCMP criminal investigation, may I remind you—spreads and expands into a wave of suburban greenfield scandals. I think they could have called it the cutting environmental protections and building more sprawl act. That would be a much more accurate title.

Bill 185 would hinder efforts to speed up housing construction by promoting the wasteful, low-density sprawl that has already caused Ontario’s housing shortage.

Why does the government continue to ignore the advice of experts? They refuse to follow the advice of their own Housing Affordability Task Force as well as this year’s Blueprint for More and Better Housing, which was co-authored by former federal Conservative deputy leader Lisa Raitt.

Time and time again, we hear the same thing: Focus on new housing in cities and communities where there is existing infrastructure to cut housing costs, speed up construction times, reduce carbon pollution and prevent catastrophic loss due to climate threats like wildfire and flooding. Yet with Bill 185, they would effectively wipe out the protective settlement area boundaries and municipal comprehensive review processes that prevent low-density sprawl from destroying what remains of farmland and natural areas.

This government is refusing to take responsibility for building housing in Ontario. They’re at risk of losing federal funding for housing and I don’t think the non-housing housing Bill 185 is going to cut it. They want to pass the buck onto municipalities because they don’t have the courage or foresight to be bold and build housing themselves.

The truth is many of these municipalities are made up of NIMBY councillors and groups. But hey, so is this government, so we really can’t be surprised that they too refuse to act.

Here we are, six years later into this government reign, and we are no longer closer to solving the housing crisis. Bill 185 is not even a housing bill. It does not do enough. This government reverses so much, they seem to only be driving Ontario backwards.

Now we’ll have questions to the members who presented.

I have two universities in my riding: Ontario Tech and another, Trent Durham. The need for more student housing is very clear every time I go on campus, and after the introduction of our bill, I wasn’t surprised to see a quote from the Council of Ontario Universities. I’m going to read it into the record, Speaker, with your permission:

“Exempting universities from provisions in the Planning Act and removing zoning barriers will help expedite the development and construction of much-needed campus housing projects”—and that’s the truth—“as well as help ensure student success.”

Universities like Ontario Tech and Trent Durham are asking us to support these important measures; our bill does that. Can the member opposite from Ottawa South—and he has universities as well—tell us if they can answer the call and vote for this important legislation and help students succeed?

It’s a privilege to stand on the behalf of the fine people from St. Paul’s to speak on this bill with regard to building more housing. Affordable housing is what we’d hope it’s building.

I’d like to ask the member if they feel, from their interpretation of this bill, that it’s actually going to create the real, deep affordable housing that we need in our communities today.

I’d also like to ask the member to reflect on whether or not rent control is something that comes up at the doorstep, day after day, when they’re knocking or on the phone. It’s certainly something that comes up in St. Paul’s.

I’d also like to ask whether or not this bill addresses demovictions and illegal evictions, which are a couple of other things that folks in St. Paul’s are quite disappointed about and are looking to this Conservative government to provide answers, leadership, accountability, so they can feel safe and secure in their homes and not have to worry about being pushed out of St. Paul’s or any other community in Ontario.

I’ll just ask on the bonusing part of it because the member is passionate about that. This House actually approved bonusing measures with respect to the Volkswagen deal, the St. Thomas deal, which was unanimously supported by the House.

What the legislation, of course, contemplates is putting that same type of measure into the authority of the cabinet. It does not give the municipalities the right to automatically bonus. It gives municipalities the right to come to cabinet and seek approval to provide that bonusing, in much the same way it was handled with St. Thomas.

So I’m wondering, with that explanation, if the member would be more inclined to supporting that part of the bill.

I’d like to thank the member from Beaches–East York for her presentation. I think it’s important in this discussion, whenever we’re discussing landlords, that we differentiate between those small landlords, those families who look after their tenants in a kind way. They’re responsive, they treat them like a member of the family and they are fair, as opposed to those corporate, faceless landlords who really try to gouge people.

I believe it was the former Liberal government that brought in vacancy decontrol, which really incentivized these corporate landlords to kick good, long-term tenants out because they knew they could jack up the rent to whatever the market could withstand, and that this Conservative government has really continued that system of exploitation.

To the member from Beaches–East York: Do you have any thoughts about vacancy control?

Thank you very much to the member from London North Centre. I was not here at that time. As you know, I came in in June 2022. I’m happy to consider anything I can to keep people housed—from an equity point of view, from an affordability point of view. We were just evicted from our constituency office. It’s different than a home, but my whole team has experienced what that feels like now and have a lot more empathy in that situation.

But I’m really perplexed that the government isn’t looking at bold and brave measures, as they have been told by their housing task force, as has been mentioned in this House a million times. Our own backyard is looking at provincial lands.

Many cities like New York, Manhattan, they don’t have downtown surface parking lots because they put the parking underneath and they build housing on those. So we are not looking at—I’m looking at the Minister of Housing over there, when he’s going to sign off on the MTSAs, things like that. There are many tools in the tool box we could be—

Thank you.

The Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

I wanted to follow up on the question from the member from London because, as you know, the elimination of rent controls on new purpose-built rental housing actually was a policy of the NDP government back in 1991, when the current Leader of the Opposition was a staff member with the government.

The reason they did that was because the policies of the Liberal government, from 1985 to 1990, were so disastrous that nobody was building rental housing. So the then government, the NDP government, decided that the only way to get people back into building rental housing in the province of Ontario was to eliminate rent controls on new purpose-built housing after 1991. So I’m wondering if the member doesn’t find it somewhat ironic that the NDP now are against their own policy there.

On the MTSAs, if she reads the provincial planning statement, she will see that it is very clear of what the expectations are around major transit station areas—in fact, larger than that. And you will know—it was before your time. The transit-oriented communities were passed before you were there.

But I wonder if she can comment on the irony of the NDP position now on a—

Response? I recognize the member for Ottawa Centre.

Here’s the thing I think we need to remember: People are getting gouged for their rent because there are no controls. It’s been six years since that housing was built, and the reality is, it’s too much for them—

I’m proud to rise this afternoon to speak on Bill 185, the Cutting Red Tape to Build More Homes Act, introduced by the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. I want to thank him and his team, including the associate minister and the parliamentary assistants from Perth–Wellington and Etobicoke–Lakeshore, for all their work on this bill, which will help us towards our goal to build 1.5 million homes by 2031, including 120,000 in Mississauga.

Speaker, the former Liberal government doubled the number of provincial regulations, from 200,000 to 383,000. They added over 10,000 new regulations every year. That is an average of 30 new regulations every single day for 15 years. In 2018, our government inherited the largest red tape burden in Canada. Stakeholders like the Federation of Rental-housing Providers of Ontario warned that red tape was complicating the development process, leading to more delays, higher costs and less affordable housing.

As the other members have said, former Liberal leader Steven Del Duca admitted the housing crisis began eight years ago, under the former Liberal government. But the steps in Bill 185, combined with other actions we have already taken, are expected to save people and businesses $1.2 billion and over 1.5 million hours each year. I’d like to speak about just a few of these this afternoon, beginning with schedule 12, which would amend the Planning Act to help reduce the cost of new homes.

As the minister said, we’re committed to working in partnership with municipalities, not micromanaging or taking a “Queen’s Park knows best” approach. But we also have to recognize, as the Housing Affordability Task Force did, that some municipal leaders will always give in to NIMBY pressures to resist new housing. And no municipal leader in Ontario has resisted new housing more than former mayor Bonnie Crombie. From 2016 to 2021, the population of the GTA grew by about 270,000 people, or 5%, but in Mississauga, we lost about 1,000 people each year under Mayor Crombie.

Eric Lombardi from More Neighbours Toronto said that her record was absolutely ridiculous.

As Oliver Moore wrote in the Globe and Mail, Mississauga was “shrinking because of deliberate municipal policies.”

Earlier this year, Steve Cornwell at the Mississauga News wrote that in 2023, Bonnie Crombie’s last full year as mayor, Mississauga city council approved seven development applications, including 2,000 residential units, but they rejected at least 13 applications, which included about 17,000 units. In other words, under the leadership of Bonnie Crombie, Mississauga rejected about 90% of the housing units proposed last year. As a result, Mississauga hit only 39% of their target and failed to qualify for provincial funding through the Building Faster Fund.

Some of the developments the city rejected include new buildings near the Port Credit GO station, the future Port Credit LRT station and the Mississauga transit bus terminal. One of these was a proposal for a 17-storey building with 148 units of purpose-built rentals just a few hundred metres away from three transit lines, including higher-order transit. The local councillor said this proposal was “the most offensive.” And Speaker, Bonnie Crombie agreed with this. She said it would add “way too much density,” and she asked the builder to come back with a proposal that would “fit.” The city planned for an area of a maximum of three storeys. Again, this is just south of a major interregional transit hub. Nearby, the city rejected a proposal for another 11-storey building with 42 units because, again, it was over three storeys and it included only 37 parking spaces where the city wanted 80.

So, Speaker, again, I want to thank the minister and his team for schedule 12, which would amend section 16 of the Planning Act to eliminate parking requirements for development near transit.

Home builders and homebuyers should be able to decide for themselves based on the market and how much parking is needed in major transit station areas. Minimum parking requirements don’t take into account the personal choice of residents who might prefer to take transit and not own a car, especially right next door to the Hurontario LRT, a MiWay bus terminal and the Port Credit GO station.

I want to take a moment here to thank the Premier and the Minister of Transportation for their announcement yesterday on the historic expansion of GO Transit service on the Lakeshore line and Milton line. ONxpress is planning to run up to 18 trains per hour on the Lakeshore West line. That’s an average of one train every three minutes. It’s no wonder why some residents might not want to pay an extra $100,000 for a parking spot. And Ontarians should be free to make their own choices. This is what Bill 185 would allow, and it could save up to $50 million for a 500-unit development in some municipalities and make it easier to build and to buy new homes near transit. This was recommendation 12(c) of the Housing Affordability Task Force, which Bonnie Crombie opposed as mayor and now supports. In fact, she said that she now supports all recommendations, but as mayor, she supported only 30% of them.

Speaker, I’ll give you another example: schedule 12 of Bill 185, which would amend section 35 of the Planning Act to eliminate municipal restrictions, like limits on the number of bedrooms allowed, to help add new homes, including basement apartments and laneway homes.

But some of the changes in Bill 185 also reflect the advice of the municipal partners, including Mississauga. In particular, I’m glad to see changes to sections 41 and 70 of the Planning Act, which would introduce a new use-it-or-lose-it policy. As the parliamentary assistant said, seven municipalities have reported that work on over 70,000 planned housing units has not been used over the last two years. The changes of schedule 12 will help us get shovels in the ground faster on developments that are ready to proceed.

Speaker, I want to take a moment to talk about schedule 7, which would refocus the Peel Region Transition Board on building homes and making local government more effective, including the transforming of services like land use planning and regional roads from Peel region to lower-tier municipalities. As the minister said, we originally thought dissolution was the best approach, but it’s now clear it would have cost us more taxes in the city of Mississauga. That’s why we are going back to the Peel region.

Speaker, Bonnie Crombie might be okay with that, but it will not help the people of Mississauga. It will increase their taxes.

I want to note that the government is also proposing to update the provincial planning statement to encourage density around transit and through the redevelopment of plazas and shopping malls. Some members will recall that a year ago, a local NIMBY group presented a video at the Mississauga PDC meeting that suggested plaza redevelopment would attract sex traffickers as tenants and become an actual threat to children. Speaker, Bonnie Crombie said that that was a wonderful video.

I want to urge everyone to read our proposal. It is available online at the Environmental Registry. Your submissions have to be in by May 12.

Once again, I just want to thank the minister and his team for this bill today.

I wanted to thank my colleague from Mississauga–Lakeshore for his presentation.

When I talk to some of my constituents about what is proposed in this legislation, they have questions about what to expect in this legislation, because it’s an expansive legislative piece. It covers a lot of areas, land use planning in particular. I know my colleague has a lot of experience in this particular area.

But my question, through you, Speaker, is this: Why is the government consulting and updating the provincial planning statement, and what are the key changes that my constituents and others can expect to see?

I’d like to thank my friend from Mississauga–Lakeshore for the presentation. I have a question that was given to me by Architectural Conservancy Ontario. In particular, they’ve noted that, because of this government’s legislation, 36,000 heritage properties will be at risk. They’ll actually lose their status and protection on January 1, 2025. I wanted to know if the member has any thoughts about the protection of heritage-designated properties and what this government is going to do to help protect their status.

I understand that in Bill 185, the government’s bill around building more homes, developers are no longer required to build parking in a development near transit. I can understand theoretically where that would be a decent thing. In fact, we didn’t necessarily mind that feature of Bill 185.

But listening to some constituents yesterday—or was it yesterday or the day before? When the housing critic, the MPP for University–Rosedale, hosted a bit of a conversation to get feedback from constituents and community members on this bill, we heard folks who said that there may be an ableist lens in that part of the bill. A lot of tenants, a lot of folks who live in apartments, even if they’re near transit, need a PSW to come to their home, and there is no parking, or they need a vehicle in order to get groceries, or they need a vehicle so that family can visit when they come over.

I’m wondering, will there be any minimum at all of parking for these new developments to ensure that folks who need those with cars to support them can have that?

It is now time for questions.

It is now time for further debate.

I want to thank the member for that question. I look at my area of Port Credit and Mississauga–Lakeshore. We have the Clarkson GO train station; we have the Port Credit GO station. Projects have been refused because they weren’t building enough parking for those buildings. By removing that, that will let the market dictate.

Especially today, when we look at people trying to buy homes in our community, you can save $50,000 to $100,000 for a parking spot. We can help these young families buy into these communities and be able to take transit.

If we believe in protecting the environment, like we say we do, getting cars off the road would be your prime issue here. So that’s what we’re trying to do, get more vehicles off the road and get them into transit. That’s why we’re spending $71 billion into transit to get people into transit right across Ontario.

I look at my own riding of Mississauga–Lakeshore. We had the Lakeview Generating Station. It’s 177 acres of land. It was a brownfield—

To be honest, to the member: I saved the Credit River bridge, which was a heritage bridge. We’ve twinned the bridge right now. And I’ll tell you the truth: You do not see the heritage bridge anymore because there’s a bridge in front of it. So, we have to keep heritage, I agree—