My question is for the Associate Minister of Small Business.

Small businesses in the restaurant and foodservice industry are not only vital job creators, but they have an integral role in our economy and in our local communities. Our province would not be the same without restaurateurs who foster job growth, support local agriculture, and put Ontario’s culinary scene on the international map.

That’s why it is shameful that the federal government continues to strain all these small businesses with their costly carbon tax.

Our government knows the carbon tax makes it more challenging for businesses to survive, and we won’t stop fighting until the federal Liberals finally scrap this tax.

Can the associate minister please share with the House what foodservice operators across Ontario are saying about—

The Liberal carbon tax is not only forcing our favourite restaurants to reduce their staff levels or raise prices on customers, but it is also squeezing every penny from the farmers and agricultural producers who supply these small businesses.

Farmers across the province have been speaking out against the federal carbon tax because it is raising their already-high expenses and cutting into their bottom line. It is unacceptable for them to face an additional tax burden from the Liberals, and it is unacceptable that the Liberal members in this House are content to see Ontario farmers and small businesses being taxed more.

Can the associate minister please explain why small and family-run farms, as well as food producers, cannot afford this regressive carbon tax?

It’s a true privilege to welcome Andrew Daher from the city of Windsor. He’s the commissioner of human health services, and he’s visiting us today.

Madame Gélinas moved first reading of the following bill:

Bill 192, An Act to amend the Health Protection and Promotion Act with respect to maximum patient-to-nurse ratios / Projet de loi 192, Loi modifiant la Loi sur la protection et la promotion de la santé en ce qui concerne les ratios patients-personnel infirmier maximaux.

The bill also authorizes the Lieutenant Governor in Council to make regulations adding new classes of provincial parks and specifying the objectives of such parks.

I have a petition for the assembly here with regard to the Landlord and Tenant Board. It was brought to me by my constituent Jenny Song, who has been experiencing problems with small landlords getting justice or access to justice in terms of a bad tenant. In the petition, she summarizes the kind of measures that the Landlord and Tenant Board could take to avoid the unreasonable, unfair and costly delay that she’s experiencing.

I agree with this petition, and I’m going to give it to page Soyul and thank her very much.

Point of order, Speaker.

My question is to the Premier.

Since this government opened the floodgates to profit-driven private health clinics, extra-billing and add-ons are all too common.

My constituent Gerald had a prescribed diagnostic procedure. Afterwards, he was told he had to pay to get a copy of his results. When he questioned it, he was offered a smaller fee to get them online instead of on paper.

Why is this Conservative government allowing extra-billing to happen?

Gerald had the very same procedure before this Conservative government allowed clinics to squeeze patients. And guess what? There was no fee. Did the government hear me? There was no fee. Now this clinic offers membership plans for a monthly fee, a yearly plan, or a one-time record collection fee—all extra fees that are unethical and ought to be illegal.

There’s an affordability crisis across this province. People are struggling to make ends meet.

My question: Will the Premier kill these fees or double down on this disastrous health care privatization agenda?

Interjections.

On Friday, I had the opportunity to meet with leaders from London’s Palestinian community to discuss this petition and the ban on the kaffiyeh in the Legislature. It was one of the most important meetings I have ever attended as they signed this petition.

The kaffiyeh, as they explained, represents the Palestinian people as a powerful cultural item. They spoke about the symbolism of fishing nets, the trade routes, the olive trees, all these vital industries and things that are important to the Palestinian identity.

We also heard how the Palestinian flag was banned in Gaza and the West Bank. As it turns out, Speaker, they also explained how paintings involving white, black, red and green were also banned. They were threatened that these paintings would actually be seized as a result. Since then, the watermelon, because it includes all those colours, has become a powerful symbol for Palestinian identity.

The kaffiyeh represents the Palestinian people’s right to exist, their right to be alive. It represents their identity. I’m thankful, Speaker, that you listened to the advocacy of the official opposition and reversed the kaffiyeh ban on the legislative precinct, because the banning of this cultural item within the people’s House and the legislative precinct had to change. Banning it—

As they were signing this petition, they did ask the question, if the kaffiyeh is not allowed to be worn in the visitors’ gallery, will there be a similar prohibition on people who wear a piece of clothing that has a watermelon on it, for instance? With this kaffiyeh ban they ask that this should be something that is allowed not only in the legislative precinct but also within the visitors’ chamber.

I fully support this petition. I want to thank the Palestinian community for a brilliant meeting. I’ll affix my signature and deliver with it page Liam to the Clerks.

The bill is quite simple. It mandates the maximum number of patients that a nurse could care for. The ratio would be:

—one to one for critical care patients on ventilators;

—two patients to one nurse for critical care patients not on ventilators or people needing very high mental health care;

—three patients to one nurse for specialized care;

—four patients to one nurse for palliative care; and

—five patients to one nurse for rehabilitation care, except on night shift, where it would be seven patients to one nurse for rehab on night shift.

It’s as simple as that. It needs to be done.

Mr. Dowie moved first reading of the following bill:

Bill 193, An Act to amend the Provincial Parks and Conservation Reserves Act, 2006 / Projet de loi 193, Loi modifiant la Loi de 2006 sur les parcs provinciaux et les réserves de conservation.

Well, although the minister tried not to release it to the public, the documents show that 2.9 million Ontarians enjoyed Ontario Place in 2022.

On the weekend, there was also a Jane’s Walk at the science centre. The Ontario Science Centre was one of the first of three built in the world. They develop exhibits that are used in science centres around the world. But this government—and it has been shown by the Auditor General; the Auditor General has said that this government is going to be spending $500 million in tax dollars to build a new science centre that’s half the size, which is more than $300 million more than rejuvenating the existing science centre.

My question: Why are you disrespecting the people in the Flemingdon and Thorncliffe communities? Why are you disrespecting the students at Marc Garneau collegiate? Why are you disrespecting the taxpayers of Ontario by wasting at least $300 million in tax dollars to destroy—

Interjections.

Thank you very much for summarizing your petition.

I would like to thank Nicole Lafrenière from Garson in my riding for these petitions: “Neurological Movement Disorder Clinic in Sudbury.”

Basically, the people have signed this petition because the rate of neurological movement disorders in northern Ontario is the highest in all of our province. It’s actually the highest of many provinces in our country. There are specialized neurological movement disorder clinics that exist in Ontario, but none of them are located in northern Ontario, where the people that have signed their signature come from.

They recognize that in northeastern Ontario, it is Sudbury that is the health care hub for services. So they are asking for such a clinic to be set up in Sudbury so that the many, many patients in northeastern Ontario that have a neurological movement disorder do not have to travel to southern Ontario to gain care, but the care would be available in Sudbury—easier to get to.

I fully support the petition—I would love to have a neurological movement disorder clinic in Sudbury—and I would ask my page Sophie to bring it to the Clerks.

Comme vous savez, monsieur le Président, dans le nord de l’Ontario, nous avons droit à des subventions pour voyager vers le sud de l’Ontario lorsque les soins ne sont pas disponibles. Ça nous permet d’être remboursés pour les hôtels, pour le millage, des choses comme ça. Malheureusement, les fonds qui nous sont disponibles n’ont pas été mis à jour depuis très longtemps. Maintenant, le gouvernement l’a changé : on aura le droit à 175 $ par nuit, plutôt que 100 $ par nuit, et un petit peu plus pour le millage. Mais ça reste quand même que plusieurs, plusieurs familles, surtout des familles avec de jeunes enfants, ne sont pas capables de se rendre à Toronto pour les soins dont ils ont besoin.

Un médecin, un pédiatre de Sault Ste. Marie, est venu me voir pour me parler d’un couple. Le bébé risque de perdre la vue s’ils ne sont pas capables de l’emmener à Toronto et les parents n’ont pas d’argent pour l’emmener à Toronto. On aimerait que le programme soit changé pour que les familles dans le besoin aient droit à des fonds avant le voyage, pas avoir besoin d’attendre le remboursement.

Je suis en faveur de cette pétition. Je vais la signer et je demande à Charlise de l’amener à la table des greffiers.

Presently, we have over 2,700 people in Ontario—that was as of Monday. It could have changed; it changes every week. But as of Monday we had 2,037 people on the wait-list for an organ transplant in Ontario. Unfortunately, every three days one of those 2,037 people will die because there are no organs available to help them.

You know, Speaker, that organ and tissue donation can save up to eight people’s lives and help the lives of 75 more.

If you ask Ontarians, over 90% of us want to be organ donors, but unfortunately only 36% of us have registered. So what the petition wants to do and what the people that have signed the petition want to do is to go to a presumed consent, exactly the same as what Nova Scotia has done in their province, which would make more organs available for people who want to be an organ donor. There would be plenty of opportunity to opt out, all the way to the time of death, where someone from your family will have to guarantee that, yes, you wanted to be an organ donor. For the 2,037 people waiting, that would be a life-changing change.

I fully support this petition, will affix my name to it and ask a very patient page to bring it to the table.

You will remember, Speaker, that in the 1980s, 30,000 Canadians were infected by HIV or hepatitis, and over 8,000 of them died because of a tainted blood transfusion. The royal commission was set in place, led by Justice Krever, and he made recommendations to protect the integrity of our blood production and collection.

Recommendation number 2 of the Krever inquiry was that donors of blood and plasma should not be paid for their donations. In British Columbia and Quebec, they have forbidden the Canadian Blood Services to pay for plasma. Unfortunately, the present government is allowing pay-for-plasma clinics to set up shop in Ontario.

We have lived through what it means when we cannot trust the blood transfusion. We don’t want to live through that again. So those people have signed a petition to make sure that Ontario adopts a voluntary blood donation act to forbid the privatization of blood products collection and the payment for a donation of blood or plasma.

I fully support this petition, Speaker, will affix my name to it and ask Charlise to bring it to the Clerk.

We all know that there is a shortage of PSWs in every part of our health care system. Whether you look at home care, at long-term care—even hospital care, primary care—we have shortages. The reason for that is that our PSWs are often overworked, underpaid and underappreciated, leading to many of them leaving the profession. The lack of PSWs, especially in long-term care and in our home care system, leaves patients to have to go without and the family having to step in.

What they want is they want to make PSW a good job. They want PSWs to be paid a fair wage, to have sick days, pension, benefits, to have vacation days, to have full-time jobs—permanent full-time jobs. I can tell you, Speaker, that when my hospital, Health Sciences North, posts one PSW position, they have hundreds of people apply. Yet the long-term-care homes, the home care cannot recruit and retain PSWs. Why? Because they don’t offer good jobs. A PSW working home care cannot pay the rent and feed their kids. They have to go someplace else, although they are very, very good at what they do. So they want to change this, to make PSW a career that you can raise your family on and make good wages on.

I think this is a good idea. I fully support this petition, will affix my name to it and ask my good page Charlise to bring it to the Clerk.

I have a petition here to support access to spine care in Ontario.

To summarize this petition, essentially, it’s very difficult for people with complex spinal diseases and injuries to get surgery, and that’s because the compensation for the physicians who perform surgery is complex and takes an incredibly long amount of time. Also, the time for surgical rooms to be available is causing a great deal of grief and pain and suffering for people with conditions like scoliosis and other diseases and injuries to the back.

I’ll give it to Aaldrian, and he will take it over. Thanks, Aaldrian.

I love afternoon debate, because you’re all so lively. Hopefully, we can get to some really interesting questions.

But I’m really happy to be able to say a few words about Bill 162, which could be named as well the getting it undone act. Here’s the interesting thing: The most interesting thing I find in this bill is schedule 5, followed by schedule 6.

I’ll go to schedule 5 first. Now, schedule 5 says “Protecting Against Carbon Taxes Act, 2024.” So there would have to be a referendum if there’s going to be a carbon tax, but the Premier of the Conservative government—well, you’ve got your own carbon tax, the industrial carbon tax: $2 billion going up by 23%, I think, next January. You’ve got your own carbon tax. You’re saying to people, “We’re going to prevent it,” but you have one. I don’t really understand how that makes any sense. So are you legislating against yourself? Are you legislating against maybe your future desire to do that again? You’ve already done it.

We hear about the carbon tax all day long in question period, but we don’t hear about the Conservative carbon tax. Next January, it’s going up 23%, the industrial carbon tax. While consumers may not be able to see that on their bills, on their invoices, on their grocery bills, it’s still there. It’s still there. And you guys put it in. You’re trying to pretend that you’re against it, but you’ve done it. How could anybody support a bill that did that?

But here’s really the one that sticks out. The members from up just past Oshawa, up towards that part of the 407 that the province owns? You’re going to do a referendum on tolls—you’re going to ban tolls—but you’re not going to do anything about the road that we own. The tolls—

I understand the other piece of that road, the 407, was something that your government—not your government, but your party sold off some 25 years ago. You sold it off 25 years ago.

Interjections.

Interjection.

Not only did you sell the road for a song—like a song, literally a song. Guess what? They owed us $1 billion, and you said, “That’s okay. Don’t worry about it, folks. Keep it. Keep the $1 billion.” That’s what I call the 407 gravy train. It’s not one that people know well. It’s that gravy train where they said, “Here’s $1 billion for you folks. You know what? You can have it. Don’t worry about what you owe us. And you know what? We’re not going to try to lower tolls on that road.”

If you were so against tolls, like you’re saying in this bill, why would you not do that? I thought you were about the people, saving people money. No. Come on, guys. Speaker, we’re going to ban tolls, but they keep the tolls, and they keep the tolls on the road that they own. Then they forgive $1 billion. Come on. Who are you kidding?

You did freeze licence fees, which is good. And you did finally get around to figuring out the licence plate stuff, which was causing some people some grief, because their Premier made an announcement that you didn’t have to pay anymore, but nobody told anybody that you had to keep registering, until you figured it out some three months later. I have a number of constituents who had received fines because it wasn’t clear. It was communicated once and then not very well at all after that. The government did not spend any time reminding people, “You’ve still got to do it.” You’ve still got to do it today because this bill hasn’t passed. That’s totally unfair to people.

It’s nice to get a good story. I love it when the Premier says, “We’re going to stop doing this, Speaker, because it’s good, and I’m for the people.” But you don’t tell them that they’ve got to keep doing it for three months, and it costs them 500, 600 bucks—if you’re out of province, $1,000. That’s not saving people any money.

The Official Plan Adjustments Act: I don’t know at what stage of doing or undoing this schedule comes in, but it’s certainly part of the doing/undoing that has been the whole scandal around—well, let’s put it this way: the whole scandal around urban boundaries changing for no discernible reason, other than maybe somebody made a donation or somebody knew somebody. Because it does seem like the well-connected insiders do well when it comes to anything that has got to do with land or property—see the 413; see the greenbelt. I think that that’s a fair assessment of that schedule that seems to be undoing a thing that you did that got undone.

I do want to add that it’s really not right that you’re saying you’re going to protect the people from carbon taxes when you have one, or that you’re going to ban tolls when you keep the tolls on the road that you own, and when you forgive $1 billion of the road that you sold for a song. It makes it impossible to support this bill.

I’m trying to run the clock here so I can make sure that I get 10 minutes’ worth of questions, because I know you’re all going to want to have fun. So I might divert a little bit into something different.

I did talk about the 407 gravy train. There’s a greenbelt gravy train. Now there’s a carbon tax gravy train in there. So there’s a lot of gravy going around.

I think, if we wanted to save the taxpayer money, it would have been better for the Premier not to have increased the staff in his office making over $100,000 a year—the Premier’s sunshine staff list—from 16 to 48. It’s now 49 because we’ve added somebody in Ottawa, a new regional minister, a new office in Ottawa. He’s got a six-figure salary too. I don’t know whether we could have addressed something like that in this bill—which is, the Premier’s office should be more modest instead of so bloated; lots of gravy going there.

Here’s the other thing: Now they’re going to spend—so the Conservative candidate that lost in Nepean-Carleton, that candidate just got a six-figure job because he lost. And guess what? They’re going to spend $1.7 million every year to keep him in a job there in Ottawa. Why are they really doing that? Because they want him to run again in Kanata. That’s a lot of taxpayer money.

So, when we talk about protecting the taxpayer, who is going to protect the taxpayer from that? I mean, that’s kind of gross. I think most people would say, “Why would you do that?” Why did the Premier’s office budget for staff—just sunshine staff—go from $3 million to almost $7 million? That’s $4 million. Now, you throw the other $1.7 million on that, you’re getting close to, what, $6 million? And God knows what else.

Really, folks, I’m trying to get to, like, four minutes, because I want the 10 minutes of questions. So, I’ve got all this stuff. If you have any other topics that you want me to discuss, I’ll throw it in. It’s just—anyhow.

I could go back on the toll thing, because the toll thing is hilarious. It’s like, “We’re going to ban tolls, but we’re keeping ours. We’re keeping the tolls on the road that we own. We’re going to keep—but we’re banning them. And by the way, the highway that we sold? Guess what? We’re going to forgive them a billion dollars.” If that’s not a gravy train—I mean, that’s a billion-dollar gravy train: “Here, guys. Forget it. I know you owe us the money. It’s okay. Nobody’s watching.”

Come on. It’s like, you’re not really against tolls; you have them. You’re not really against the carbon tax; you have one. So why are you putting this in the legislation? Are you trying to fool somebody—as I say, pull the wool over their eyes? I don’t know.

Guys, I’m getting down there. I’ve only got 12 seconds left. I’m just going to stand here in silence for 10 seconds.

We took the toll off.

You’re very patient with me, Speaker. Thank you.

I would like to thank Robert Morin, who is from Chelmsford in my riding, for these petitions. The petitions are called “911 Everywhere in Ontario.”

Speaker, we all know that when we face an emergency, what you do is you dial 911 for help. Help is available in northern Ontario. We do have police officers. We do have ambulances. We do have fire departments. What we don’t have is 911. You have to memorize a 1-800 number. There are many of them through my riding—three of them that I have memorized; another that I don’t know, but I have them written in my car. Nobody knows that.

Usually, they find out that 911 is not available when they dial 911. They’ve just been at the scene of an accident or trauma. They dial 911, and you get, “This number is not in service. Please try your call again.” So you dial 911 again, and it’s not. Then, you dial 0. And the lady at the other end says, “No, no, you have to dial 911,” but 911 is not available.

We are the only province that does not have 911 everywhere. It has to change.

I fully support this petition, will affix my name to it and ask my very patient page to bring it to the Clerk.

That concludes the time we have available for petitions.

I’m just not sure which member has the floor at the moment. Maybe the House can inform: Is it the member for Ottawa South or the member for Nepean who currently has the floor? I think it’s the member for Ottawa South.

Okay. I’ll recognize him. Sorry to interrupt.

There we go.

First, on a point of order: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to standing order 7(e), I wish to inform the House that tonight’s evening meeting has been cancelled.

Resuming the debate adjourned on April 25, 2024, on the motion for third reading of the following bill:

Bill 162, An Act to enact the Protecting Against Carbon Taxes Act, 2024 and amend various Acts / Projet de loi 162, Loi édictant la Loi de 2024 sur la protection contre les taxes sur le carbone et modifiant diverses lois.

It was a rather brief overview of this bill, but I would say that I agree with a lot of your opinion as to what was in this bill. When we talk about the pressure that we see right now, whether it be on the cost of living or on our health care system falling apart or schools not being able to meet the needs of students—often students facing barriers—do you see anything in this bill that will help us get that done?

Questions?

Further questions?