I want to thank the member for that question. As you know, there are stakeholders that agree with Bill 165, because at the end of the day, we have to make homes much cheaper in the province of Ontario—when it would cost an individual house $4,400 here in Mississauga or in Toronto, or $8,000 to $10,000 to hook up gas in northern Ontario.

I know that we are going to transition to electric moving forward, but at this time, we still need natural gas because if everybody today were driving an electric car, with the investments that we are attracting here to the province of Ontario, we would have blackouts here in the province of Ontario. We have to have a combination of natural gas and electricity to move forward in this province and create the jobs that we are attracting here in Ontario for the future.

With all the investment that the Minister of Economic Development is bringing to Ontario—$43 billion of automotive investment with electric vehicles—we are going to need electricity, and right now, if we just kept the electricity that we do have in the system, we would not be able to end up driving electric cars.

So this is what this will do moving forward. This will help us to stabilize the system as we’re moving forward to the next 20 to 30 years down the road. I wish we could get rid of natural gas by 2030, but that will be impossible with what is going on right now across Canada and across Ontario.

We need our nuclear fleet to help, as well as using natural gas to heat our homes at this present time, but we have to do it to combine this together, to move forward as we do move off natural gas moving forward.

I still have a natural gas furnace. I have a natural gas water heater. I have a natural gas barbecue and a natural gas fireplace, and I know that moving forward, we are going to be moving off all this—and a natural gas stove, too, in the kitchen; I forgot about that one. I know, moving forward, we are going to be changing that, but right now is not the time to put this extra cost on the consumers and the new homes that we’re building in a housing crisis that we are having right now in the province of Ontario. This will only cost people more money at the present time, so Bill 165—

I’d like to thank the member from Mississauga–Lakeshore for his presentation.

With Ontario growing at an extremely fast rate, our government has a plan to build 1.5 million new homes, as Ontario’s population is expected to grow by two million people by the end of this decade. Therefore, I’m hoping the member can explain how the Keeping Energy Costs Down Act aligns with that plan.

Thank you to the member for Mississauga–Lakeshore for that great presentation. I was really interested; you mentioned a former colleague of mine, Ed Waitzer, who was also chair of the Ontario Securities Commission, and Aleck Dadson, who I remember as well—I think also a lawyer—who are quite knowledgeable about this. You said that they understood the minister’s reaction to this decision.

At a time of energy transformation, like this is, is this not an important time for all parts of the system to work together, to make sure that we’re going to have a smooth energy transition? I note that the IESO report said that by 2030, we cannot not have gas all over the province, because we’re still relying on it to make sure our system provides enough energy.

Thank you to the member from Mississauga–Lakeshore for his presentation. Less than 24 hours: This is how long it took the minister to announce he would overturn the decision of experts at the OEB to the benefit of Enbridge. Apparently, swift action is reserved for corporations, not, say, underfunded hospitals, affordable housing and cost-of-living issues. With experts, particularly, tripping over themselves to criticize this bill, calling it Orwellian and suggesting it should be named “keep Enbridge profits high act,” how can the government justify ramming this bill through without so much as a nod to comprehensive stakeholder consultations?

I rise today to speak to Bill 165, the Keeping Energy Costs Down Act.

Ontario is in an affordability crisis. Energy costs are high and consumers are struggling to pay their bills. And yet, the Conservatives are bringing forward this legislation that is going to drive energy bills up by forcing nearly four million natural gas consumers to pay costs that the Ontario Energy Board says they shouldn’t have to pay. Not only that; this Conservative government is making the unprecedented move of interfering with a decision of the Ontario Energy Board, an arm’s-length independent regulator.

Conservatives claim that they’re keeping energy costs down, but this legislation is doing the exact opposite and is doing it at great legal risk.

Speaker, when looking at this bill, Bill 165, a big question came to mind, and thanks to the recent investigation by the Narwhal, I believe we have an answer. But before I get to that, I’d like to first ask the most obvious question presented in this legislation: Keeping energy costs down for whom? Not for Ontario consumers. They’ll be forced to pay costs the OEB has ruled they shouldn’t have to pay.

Right now, gas customers’ bills include charges worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year to cover Enbridge’s costs of expanding gas pipelines into new developments. The OEB decided to put a stop to this subsidy because it raises consumers’ energy bills and increases financial risks for the whole gas system.

Bill 165 would allow the government to add $1 billion in costs to the gas bills of nearly four million consumers, costing each an average of more than $300. It would also allow the government to approve a gas pipeline project that the Ontario Energy Board has deemed too expensive, not economically viable or otherwise not in the public interest. This would leave consumers on the hook for costly, uneconomical projects they don’t even benefit from.

Energy lawyer Kent Elson explained this clearly in the Globe and Mail, as he said, “Gas pipelines are paid off over roughly 60 years ... so a pipeline built today will be paid off in the 2080s ... long beyond the point at which fossil fuel use is set to drastically decline. Investments in new gas pipelines today will almost certainly go bad, and Bill 165 forces Ontario’s gas customers to make that bad investment.”

The OEB has a mandate of protecting consumers and making sure they aren’t gouged or silently stolen from. By listening to the experts, this Conservative government had the opportunity to put money back in people’s pockets and finally start addressing the realities of climate change. Instead, at a time when the world needs to move toward renewable energy, they are using their majority to drive up carbon emissions and gas bills and to undermine an independent regulator. This legislation does not keep costs down for Ontario’s consumers.

So then who does it keep them down for? Not for Ontario homebuyers. If we want to make housing more affordable, we need to give people access to sustainable, low-cost energy sources like electric heat pumps that are much cheaper to operate in the long term than gas furnaces. The NDP put forward Bill 172, the Affordable Energy Act, which creates the framework to set up large-scale programs to finance and organize deep home energy retrofits, including installation of heat pumps.

We are in a cost-of-living and climate crisis. A focus on conservation and community-based distribution for renewable energy can substantially cut energy costs down. We have the technology to build a reliable and sustainable energy future in Ontario that does not leave Ontarians with a pricey bill.

The OEB’s decision tried to protect homebuyers by making the costs of natural gas connections visible to them and to developers. They wanted to ensure that the costs of installing a new gas connection would be paid by those who benefit from that choice, and not by consumers who don’t benefit. With Bill 165, Conservatives are ensuring that when a developer chooses to install a gas connection, they are not required to consider the cost consequences to homebuyers and tenants. They aren’t keeping costs down for Ontario’s homebuyers.

Who are they keeping them down for? Not for Ontarian taxpayers. They’re the ones who are going to foot the bill for the high costs of climate change and the damage to highways, bridges, hospital buildings and other infrastructure if we don’t get serious about the clean energy transition. Climate change is already costing us a lot, and it’s going to get so much worse. The Financial Accountability Office estimates that it could add more than $4 billion per year to the cost of maintaining Ontario’s public infrastructure over the rest of the century if we don’t adapt. And the FAO warns that this cost impact estimate should be considered in the lower range since it doesn’t factor in costs incurred by hazards like river flooding and wildfires.

There are already warnings that Canada is at risk of another devastating wildfire season this year. Taxpayers are already paying the price through devastating property damage, health emergencies, and more.

Methane gas, the fossil fuel used in natural gas connections, accounts for one third of Ontario’s carbon emissions. According to Environmental Defence, 19% of Ontario’s greenhouse gas emissions comes from heating our homes and buildings with methane gas. The NDP’s Affordable Energy Act will help us to stop burning it and will give residents and tenants the tools to cut their energy usage and costs. As has been said many times in this House by the NDP, “The cost of doing nothing is billions of dollars higher than the cost of proactively investing in our public infrastructure for climate adaptation.”

Bill 165 does not keep costs down for Ontario’s taxpayers. So keeping energy costs down for whom? Not for young Ontarians.

As this Conservative government’s own energy transition panel observed, the global energy landscape is evolving at an unprecedented pace. To take advantage of the economic opportunities that this change presents, the panel concluded that Ontario should commit to electrification and a clean energy economy by 2050. This includes following the transition panel’s recommendation that the Ontario Energy Board “employ all tools within its existing mandate to implement activities consistent with Ontario’s goals for a clean energy economy and the requirements of the energy transition for Ontario.”

Bill 165 carries economic costs for young Ontarians. It slows our move to a green energy economy and foolishly invests in gas pipelines that are going to become obsolete and present a massive cost to customers as we move away from gas heating.

This is not to mention the broader costs of climate change that young Ontarians will bear the brunt of, from the infrastructure maintenance that I mentioned earlier to mental health distress and health emergencies linked to extreme weather events, negative impacts on air quality and the increase in vector-borne diseases. We know that young people and people in marginalized communities will suffer the most from these effects as the climate crisis creates more instability in housing, food, employment and quality of life.

I tabled the Climate Crisis Health Action Plan Act, which would require the government to ensure that Ontario is prepared to address the current and future health impacts caused by climate change. The cost for young Ontarians and for all of us is simply too high, and Bill 165 is going to drive it higher.

So if not for homebuyers, if not for consumers, if not for taxpayers, if not for young Ontarians, who exactly does this Bill 165 keep energy costs down for?

Speaker, we have a pretty clear answer to that question. The Narwhal reports that hours before the government announced its unprecedented decision to overrule an independent regulator, senior officials from the Premier’s office worried that the OEB’s decision would create a “magnitude” of costs for developers and for Enbridge Gas.

Yes, you heard that right. An independent board of people with expertise and experience and a mandate to protect consumers made a decision to put money back in your pockets, and this Conservative government jumped into action and went to extraordinary lengths to keep energy costs down for a giant gas monopoly.

Hours before the OEB decision was even announced, the Minister of Energy’s chief of staff set up an urgent touchpoint meeting to strategize the government’s response. An official response was drafted, talking points were agreed upon and legislation was brought into the works, all before the OEB’s decision was made public. Staff from the minister’s office even consulted with Enbridge executives for input on the minister’s statement.

The government’s lawyers warned the Premier’s staff that intervening in the OEB’s decision carried legal risks. Their warnings were ignored. This Conservative government was just that determined to overrule an independent regulator and drive up gas bills for Ontario consumers.

At the committee meeting last week, a number of amendments were brought forward by the NDP to protect people from higher bills. Every amendment meant to protect consumers from higher energy prices was defeated by the Conservatives. So even when there were opportunities to include actual measures to keep costs down, this Conservative government voted against them.

Speaker, the Ontario Energy Board did its job. Its decision would protect consumers and the public interest by lowering energy costs and carbon emissions for current and future Ontarians. It is a win for almost everyone. But with Bill 165, the government is interfering with an independent regulator to raise gas bills for Ontarians so that a multi-billion-dollar gas company can make more profit.

This bill is giving the government the power to push energy costs up, and it’s forcing four million natural gas consumers to pay the costs that the Ontario Energy Board would otherwise disallow. This bill enables unprecedented political interference with an independent regulator in order to help a powerful gas monopoly at the expense of consumers. It does exactly the opposite of keeping energy costs down.

When the Liberals were in power, the Conservatives used to criticize their politicization of electricity planning. The Liberals disregarded evidence, disregarded professional independent analysis. The Liberals directed the IESO to write blank cheques for new gas plants and sign hundreds of overpriced private contracts with no OEB hearing to find out if these were a good deal for consumers. As a result, hydro bills skyrocketed.

We’re seeing now this Conservative government do exactly the same thing with the natural gas system. Speaker, this bill should not be titled Keeping Energy Costs Down Act. It actually should be titled “pushing energy costs up act,” because that’s what this bill is doing. It’s a shame that they are pushing energy costs up on behalf of a gas monopoly.

The government still can do the right thing for Ontario’s consumers, for Ontario’s homebuyers, for Ontario’s future generations and not proceed with this bill. This is the wrong direction. I urge this government to keep the interests of the people of this province and not their well-connected insiders before they make this grave mistake.

I want to thank the member for that question.

Yes, we do have to build 1.5 million homes, but we have to keep the cost of these homes down. With interest rates right now at 8%, it’s almost impossible for someone to purchase a home, especially on a condo build when you have to pay—before it’s registered, you have to pay the 8%; otherwise you could probably negotiate a mortgage for 5.45%. On a $500,000 mortgage, that would cost a consumer $4,500 a month. So, putting an extra $4,400 for a condo in the city of Mississauga would only harm and make it unaffordable for people to buy these condos and homes as well.

And moving in rural Ontario at $8,000 or $10,000 to put a natural gas fitting into their home, that would cost them even more. So by doing this, it will reduce the cost of homes being built in Ontario, and we have to do that for the future of this province, for our children and for our grandchildren moving forward.

So, I want to thank you very much for that question.

As you know, natural gas is probably one of the safest ways to heat your home today in the province of Ontario. And, as you know, I look at our cities across Ontario—Mississauga, Toronto, Burlington, Hamilton—most of us are in natural gas. It is a very safe system in place.

As we continue moving forward, I know that we are going to be moving over to electricity, but at this present time, we have to keep our natural gas in the province and keep it safe, as we are doing right now.

Further questions?

It’s now time for further debate.

I want to thank my colleague from Nickel Belt for her question. She’s absolutely right: There is nothing in this bill that actually addresses the affordability crisis.

As I stated at the start, Ontario is in an affordability crisis. Energy costs are high, and consumers, the people in this province, are struggling to pay their bills. So why would the Conservative government, during an affordability crisis, bring forward a piece of legislation that actually drives up energy costs, that actually increases the bills that Ontarians are faced with, and on top of that, making matters worse, is also interfering with an independent regulator’s decision at great legal risk? Thank you.

Questions and comments?

Thank you to my colleague for a very well-put analysis of what this bill does. I fully agree with her; I don’t know why this bill is called Keeping Energy Costs Down Act. It does anything but.

We face an affordability crisis right now. We also face an environmental crisis. Do you see anything in this bill that will help with the affordability crisis? Do you see anything in this bill that would help with the environmental crisis that we are facing?

Thank you to my colleague from Parkdale–High Park for your presentation, focusing on affordability and the Orwellian title of Bill 165.

When the standing committee met to discuss Bill 165, representatives from Unifor, including Samia Hashi and Doug Carter, testified at the committee and they stated that the Ontario Energy Board needs to do a much better job of monitoring gas companies’ investments in infrastructure. They actually stated to the committee, “When gas leaks are not fixed, Ontario families pay three times: They pay through delayed investment in upgrading and maintaining our gas infrastructure; they pay for it through climate change; they pay through the increased risks of major safety incidents.”

Would the member like to comment about how this government is not looking after affordability in this bill and actually could do so by listening to the representatives from Unifor?

I’m wondering if the member did get some emails from pretty much all the constituents and all the municipalities asking them to vote for that bill because that’s what people want. I’ve been meeting with a lot of municipal leaders and what they want is to have natural gas, and they sure are working for even the leave to construct being raised. So I’m wondering if she had reached out to municipalities and if she heard—of course, maybe she’s representing more of a city, but for us in a rural area it’s really important, natural gas. I’m wondering if she did get that kind of response from municipalities.

I listened intently to the member from Parkdale–High Park. She had an eloquent address and a strong argument, and she talked about housing, food and quality of life—important issues to all our communities and all our families.

Food producers in southwestern Ontario need cheap, safe, inexpensive, reliable natural gas to dry grains, to grow fresh fruit and vegetables, to put food with less food miles, grown closer to home and safe and trusted and grown in Ontario year-round. That food is in grocery stores in Parkdale–High Park, in Chatham-Kent–Leamington and throughout our communities. This bill supports just that: housing, food and quality of life. Does she not agree that keeping energy costs down provides safe food, grown closer to home, in her community and mine?

I really appreciated the comments from my colleague the member for Parkdale–High Park. As she pointed out, the ruling by the Ontario Energy Board was made after a year-long process that involved many, many experts, that involved the review of thousands of pages of documents and was all focused on what is in the public interest. And it only took a couple of hours after the ruling came out for the minister to announce that he was going to ignore the OEB decision and go back to the way that things were done previously in this province.

I wondered: What does the member for Parkdale–High Park think about a government that would be so quick to dismiss this incredible body of evidence that resulted in this decision of the OEB?

Before I begin, I want to say that I’m going to share my time with the marvellous member for Beaches–East York.

Speaker, we make laws here in this Legislature, but there are certain laws which cannot be repealed—certain laws in this world, which cannot be repealed, and they must always be obeyed. I’m speaking here of physical law.

One of them is energy conservation. We get a lot of light and energy from the sun, and this brings with it energy that can be turned into heat. Some of that heat gets captured and kept on earth by sort of “floppy” molecules, like carbon dioxide or methane or bigger molecules. That heat doesn’t just go away. Something happens to that heat. That heat affects us.

There’s another kind of unbreakable principle in the world, and some people may not be familiar with it. It’s called the ergodic principle—a very, very powerful idea—but the result is that this energy that we get from the sun, it gets into everything. It heats the air, heats the water. It affects weather extremes, warms the oceans. It’s going to cause the sea level to rise. It causes drought and flooding and it has consequences for ecosystems, and that in turn is going to affect things like insects and disease and famine. It’s going to create mass migration, social conflicts, and war.

This is something that people are expecting. The heat will affect everything. And it has really begun to make everything a lot more expensive. It makes everything a lot more expensive. We have to change how we behave and it’s not something that we’re going to do in 40 years. It’s not something we’re going to do in 30 years or 20 years. Really, it’s the next 10 years that are the most critical.

Les gens vont-ils changer leur façon de vivre, leur façon d’utiliser l’énergie? Ce gouvernement, qui dit se soucier de bâtir des maisons, veut-il sauvegarder notre maison commune?

I think the Ontario Energy Board has faith in people. They have faith that people will care for our common home. The Ontario Energy Board believes that people will move away from burning fossil fuels for heat and switch very soon, because we have to switch soon, to alternatives like heat pumps.

Now, heat pumps have been praised by this government. I think I just heard a minister today praise heat pumps, and I know the energy minister’s house has a heat pump with an electric backup, and so does his parliamentary assistant’s home. There are Ontario government incentives for heat pumps. So it’s no surprise that the Ontario Energy Board believes that Ontarians will respond and understand that this is the direction that we must go to save our common home. And there’s no reason why the government of the day, the ministers, should not believe that as well.

Now, the Ontario Energy Board concluded, after much deliberation, that this change in energy use pretty clearly risks stranded infrastructure, like pipes. Stranded infrastructure means unused infrastructure. And our system of regulated utilities means that all the remaining customers on the system must still pay back the utility for these unused assets, the cost of building these unused assets.

The Ontario Energy Board, which has a duty to protect consumers, said that we should pay for the infrastructure upfront in order to be fair to ratepayers, to protect ratepayers, especially in this time where affordability is so much of a concern for consumers. Now what that means is that there’s no more free natural gas pipeline insulations for housing developers, no more incentives to install natural gas pipelines to service every new residential subdivision.

The Ontario Energy Board decision to pay at least part of that cost upfront will help preserve our common home in the form of a minimum requirement for any reasonable climate strategy. At the very minimum, fossil fuels have to compete on a level playing field with other sources of energy, with all the costs accounted for, so no more perverse incentives where somebody—in particular, a house builder—doesn’t see the cost of putting in natural gas infrastructure and therefore just goes ahead and does it without bothering to think about what the consequences are.

And this, Speaker, is why Bill 165, overturning an independent regulator’s carefully considered decision, fundamentally is wrong. It hurts consumers and it does not help us care for our common home. Thank you.

Thank you. Questions and comments?

Further debate?

I thank my colleague from the Conservatives for that question. First, let me start by saying I did receive many emails on this issue and, by far, the main concern expressed by Ontarians is that this is an unprecedented move by this government interfering with an independent regulator.

Think about what that message sends to anybody who is interested in making investments in this province. They’re going to now move forward knowing that, depending on who has the direct line to the minister’s office, this is the government that is completely controlled by influence rather than the interests of what is good for the people of this province.

Unifor workers have raised the issue that when there is a gas leak, Enbridge has been contracting out that problem so that they can evade the Ontario Energy Board regulations. Think about that. And what happens? It’s the taxpayers, it’s the public who foots the bill. So we have added costs and all Enbridge has is more profit.

Speaker, the government can also listen to their own energy panel, which has said that Ontario must transition to clean, green energy.

My question is to the member from Beaches–East York. When the Liberals were in power, they politicized electricity planning. Liberals disregarded evidence. Liberals disregarded professional independent analysis. The Liberals directed the IESO to write blank cheques for new gas plants and signed hundreds of overpriced private contracts with no OEB hearings to find out if these were a good deal for consumers. As a result, hydro bills skyrocketed. We all remember also the gas plant scandal where hard drives were damaged and deleted and a staffer went to jail, Speaker.

My question to the member is, what lessons did your party learn that you can share with the Conservatives so they can avoid making the same mistakes?

Point of order.