Let’s be clear: That was a forecast in 2022, and that is why our government is investing record amounts into our health care system, including $743 million in this year’s budget over the next three years to address immediate health care staffing needs. That’s on top of the 63,000 new nurses that have registered to work in Ontario since 2018. An additional 80,000 nurses will join the health care workforce by 2028, increasing the number of post-secondary education seats, as well, by 2,000 registered nurses and an extra 1,000 registered practical nurses.

Our government will continue to do what is required to ensure that we have the best publicly funded health care, when and where the people need it.

It’s important to remember where our health care system was when Minister Jones was sworn in as the Minister of Health in 2022. Ontario and the rest of the world was only beginning to recover from the global pandemic, a pandemic that showed the holes in Ontario’s health care system caused by over a decade of neglect by the Liberal government, propped up by the NDP.

Since Minister Jones was sworn in as the Minister of Health, our government has registered a record number of new nurses two years in a row, registering a total of 32,000 nurses in Ontario. Our government recognized that the status quo was no longer working for Ontarians, and that is why, under the leadership of Premier Ford, we have taken action to build a more connected and convenient health care system.

My question is for the Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade, who’s done phenomenal work bringing investment to Windsor-Essex like we’ve never seen before.

The carbon tax affects every single worker in Ontario. It doesn’t matter what sector you work in or how much money you make, the carbon tax is hurting everyone. Workers see it when they go to the pump to fill up their car with gas or when they go to the grocery store to buy food to put on the table for their families.

At the same time, it’s taking money away from business owners who want to invest in their workers. We want our businesses to succeed so we’ll have great-paying jobs. We need them in our country, in our communities all over the province. But we need the Liberals to stop burdening them with the carbon tax.

Can the minister explain how the carbon tax is hurting Ontario’s economy?

When the Liberals keep hiking taxes, they are pushing away entrepreneurs and businesses and stifling innovation. We want businesses to see Ontario as the place where they can succeed, but the Liberals are telling them not to come here, with their carbon tax.

Unfortunately, Bonnie Crombie and the Liberals in this House endorse the Trudeau Liberals’ approach. They want to see the carbon tax hiked every single year, to try to undo the progress we’ve made in Ontario.

We need the Prime Minister to stop listening to his Liberal friends and start listening to the hard-working people of this province.

Can the minister let the Liberals know the risks that accompany their carbon tax?

Speaker, we have been saying this for quite some time: The Liberals don’t realize the importance of leaving the people of Ontario with more money in their pockets. Think of the entrepreneur who wants to undertake a new business venture. That extra dollar in their pocket means being able to bring their ideas to life. It gives them the ability to scale up by hiring new workers and entering new markets. That extra dollar can be the difference in what makes their dream become a reality. That is what the Liberals are trying to take away when they hike taxes at every opportunity they get.

They missed an opportunity to correct course and scrap the carbon tax in their budget last week.

Speaker, we urge them to scrap this terrible tax today.

Look at the previous Liberal government, Speaker. Their high taxes chased out business. It cost us 300,000 manufacturing jobs in the past years. Businesses were looking everywhere but Ontario to invest and expand. Now the federal Liberals are trying to do what they did here in Ontario all over Canada, all over again, with their 17-cent-a-litre carbon tax. And now they’re doubling down on their budget disaster of last week.

We’ve built up Ontario’s global reputation as the best place to do business. We did it by lowering taxes, not by raising taxes.

Scrap the tax today.

This government’s underspending on special education means that children with autism are going without badly needed supports in school. This is not only impacting their learning; it is putting their safety at risk.

More than half of principals in Ontario say they’ve had to ask parents to keep their child with special needs at home because staff shortages are putting their safety in jeopardy.

Why does the Premier not believe that children with autism deserve a safe, high-quality education in Ontario?

First off, we’ve worked very hard to ensure all children are in school for the next three years with stability. Children with special education needs are the ones with the greatest exceptionality, are the ones who need stability in schools, and our party alone stood up and delivered deals with every teacher union, providing some stability in their lives.

We also increased the funding for special education. We’re talking about an increase of nearly $540 million since 2018, $125 million more this year compared to last year—3,500 additional EAs in school boards, as reported by our school board associations.

Mr. Speaker, we know there’s more to do. It’s why in this year’s budget we announced additional funding for additional staffing in addition to supports for co-op education to help ensure these young individuals are able to put their talents to work in the labour market and seek employment and build skills.

We’ll continue to be there every single year to increase funding, staffing and supports for our kids with the most exceptional needs in Ontario.

Stop the clock. Members will please take their seats.

Interjections.

Restart the clock. The next question.

Member for Stormont–Dundas–South Glengarry.

Ma question est pour la ministre de la Santé.

The health care staffing shortage has reached crisis level. The government has the data that shows this, but they are actively hiding that information from the public. The government was elected six years ago, and what have they done, Speaker? They have been disrespectful and harmful to our health care workers.

Is the minister so ashamed of her work on health care that she is hiding the workforce numbers?

So can the minister explain to the people of Ontario why the government is pulling the wool over our eyes?

Interjections.

Interjections.

My question is for the Minister of Energy. Across the nation, Premiers from all political stripes are speaking out against the federal carbon tax and its detrimental impacts on families and businesses. Inflation has already reached devastating levels, resulting in many households not being able to make ends meet.

Every day, I receive emails and phone calls from constituents who are struggling to get by as a result of the carbon tax. I know that’s the case for members all across this great Legislature. The message from the people of Ontario is clear: They feel betrayed and punished for having to pay more at the pumps just to go to work and feed their families. This carbon tax must be scrapped immediately.

Can the minister please tell this House why the carbon tax queen, Bonnie Crombie, and her Liberals must come to their senses and join us in calling for an end to this disastrous tax?

While our government has consistently opposed the carbon tax from the start, the NDP and Bonnie Crombie’s Liberals continue to support further hikes to this punitive measure. That is unacceptable.

Can the minister please explain why Ontarians cannot afford more NDP-Liberal taxes?

I thank the honourable member for the important question. As I said earlier, when we formed government, 75% of the families were waiting with no prospect of support at all. Today, because of the supports and services under the leadership of this Premier, we have increased the funding to more than double, $600 million, and this year, as a result of the budget—which, unfortunately, so far you’ve voted against, and I hope you vote in favour of it when you have the next opportunity, because in the budget there’s an increase of $120 million more to support families. That will help us more with getting tens of thousands of families enrolled in core clinical services, like the member alluded to.

Unlike before, when families had one route to service—IBI—today, they have multiple opportunities through family foundational services, through urgent response, through entry to school and through care-mediated therapy, and tens of thousands of families are accessing these services because of our decisions.

In our most recent budget, which I hope the member and all my colleagues in this House support, we increased funding by $310 million for the sectors who are doing—

Interjection.

The member talked about supportive living. We increased supportive living funding by more than $2.2 billion. Journey to Belonging is our long-term vision, but we’re making the process easier and more streamlined for families so that they can access services and supports digitally, regardless of where they are in the—

My question is to the Minister of Children, Community and Social Services—a busy morning for you. Developmental services remain woefully underfunded in Ontario. In the run-up to the 2024 budget, developmental services organizations across Ontario led the #5ToSurvive campaign, calling for a 5% increase to their base funding to make up years of frozen budgets. The 2% they did receive is totally inadequate.

I wrote two letters to the minister outlining the strain on groups like Community Living Algoma, Community Living Espanola and Community Living Manitoulin. These organizations work tirelessly to serve people with developmental disabilities while working on increasingly tight budgets.

My question to the minister: Why did he ignore the needs of the developmental services sector once again in this budget?

Here’s an example from people in my riding: Karen and Jacques Ribout in my riding were forced to set up their own micro-board to support their daughter Emily through the Passport Program. They work full-time coordinating support for their daughter in making sure that she gets the services she needs. This year, they were informed that they will receive a 0% increase to their Passport funding, putting them behind inflation once again.

Karen and Jacques wrote to my office saying, “This just piles on from previous years of lower-than-inflation increase and even years when 0% increases and cuts were the norm.”

People with developmental services deserve to have the resources to live healthy and full lives. My question again to the minister: Why is this minister refusing to make that a reality for people that are in need in this province?

Premier, I wrote the minister in June of last year on behalf of families like Bethany’s. Her daughter has been waiting for years for autism core services and is still waiting. Bethany tells us that at her daughter’s school there is only one EA for three kids with special needs, and without OAP funding her daughter is falling further and further behind because she cannot get the ABA or the speech therapy she needs.

Under your government, autism services are only getting worse for this family and all the families here today. Premier, why are kids waiting for years for the OAP core funding they need and deserve so they can thrive?

The supplementary question? The member for London–Fanshawe.

Interjections.

Back to the minister: These are the facts. Schools in our riding are facing cuts, because the Conservatives are refusing to properly fund our public school system. We have 15 parents from Kensington school today. Kensington is losing two teachers. They just learned their kids will be in a grade 4/5/6 class. That means a teacher will have to explain and teach three lesson plans each and every day. That is not a recipe for student success, that is a recipe for kids being left behind.

My question is to the minister: Will you commit to more school funding so students in this province, including the kids of these parents who are here today, can succeed in school?

When you ask the people of Ontario if they’re better off now than they were six years ago, the answer is a resounding no. Patients, nurses, doctors, teachers, students—including the autism community—farmers and renters, all dealing with restrictions, slowdowns and cuts to essential services.

But I will tell you who isn’t dealing with cuts. This government has the largest, most expensive cabinet ever. This Premier’s office is also the largest, most expensive Premier’s office in history, doubling in size and salary. If this isn’t the gravy train, I don’t know what is.

Mr. Speaker, can the Premier please explain what exactly his 28 extra staff members, each earning over $100,000 annually, are doing for the people of Ontario?

Interjections.

What exactly is the Premier paying this enormous staff to do?

Thank you.

Interjections.

Start the clock. The next question.

The Premier may reply.

The member for Ottawa South, come to order. The member for Renfrew–Nipissing–Pembroke, come to order.

Start the clock. The supplementary question?

Interjections.

And they chirp over there. They say, “Oh, where’s your plan?” We have a plan, Mr. Speaker. It’s called Powering Ontario’s Growth, investing in our nuclear reactors at Pickering and at Darlington and at Bruce, building small modular reactors in Darlington, investing in our water power—

My question is to the Minister of Education. The Toronto District School Board is facing a $26.5-million budget deficit. This is after $17 million in cuts to programs and services for the upcoming year. The Conservative government has cut $1,347 per student since 2018. The chair of the board has written to the minister, saying programs students rely on are in jeopardy.

Will the minister address the TDSB’s structural deficit to avoid further drastic cuts?

I think the priority of parents in this province is that governments land deals that keep the kids in class, and that’s exactly what the government has done—not a peep from the New Democrats or Liberals who couldn’t do that when they were in government. We signed deals that provided stability.

The first principle of your question is that you’ve got to keep kids in front of their teachers, focused on the basics of education, which is why we hired 7,500 more education workers. It’s why we hired 3,000 more teachers. It’s why we just doubled the funding to build more schools in this province for families in Toronto and the smallest towns and villages of this province.

We are investing more in public education than at any time, but we’re doing it alone. When we brought forth a budget that added billions of investments to publicly funded schools, Liberals opposed that investment. When we hired thousands of additional teachers to help our kids get back on track, you opposed the investment.

But, Mr. Speaker, we’re not going to rely on the opposition to do what’s right, we’re going to continue to go back to basics and demand better for the people of this province.

Get off this ideological aversion to leveraging people with experience and stand up for what’s right: qualified educators in the classrooms of Ontario.

“Wow” is right. It’s a wow. I can’t believe what I just heard the member say. The people are not a little bit—they’re a thousand times better. There are 700,000 people collecting a paycheque who never collected a paycheque under them. There’s $28 billion of investment in the auto and EV sector that under their government—they ran them right out of our province. And wait until tomorrow: one of the largest investments in Canadian history in the auto sector. We’ll be announcing that.

So talk to the hundreds of thousands of people who have a secure job for years to come. Talk to the people who are in the tech sector—over $20 billion of investment. We’ve overtaken Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay area. We’re going 365% faster than that region when it comes to the tech sector.

Talk to the people who are employed with the $3-billion investment in life sciences, who have a stable job. Talk to all the businesses that we reduced $8 billion from—we have never raised a tax on the people or—

Interjections.

Tell the people who are filling up their gas tanks and looking at 17.5 cents more as we reduced gas by 10.7 cents. Talk to the kids behind me about the new schools that they’re seeing built across the province. You closed 600 schools; we’re building $16 billion of schools. Talk to the 12,500 doctors who are now registered right here in Ontario. Talk to the 80,000 nurses. When they were firing nurses, we registered 80,000 nurses.

Mr. Speaker, we have become an economic powerhouse, not just in North America but around the world. We’re going to continue growing Ontario—