Yes, we actually did, and looking back at the MOMS Act—I see, unbelievably, that I’m running out of time—that legislation had raised flags for people. They were quite concerned. The London Bicycle Café, Ben Cowie—we were having middle-of-the-night phone calls with these advocates, trying to figure out what the amendment should say to fix the problem based on the wording of what the government had put forward, and it was a wild ride. The London Bicycle Café had put out a call: “We’re concerned about the MOMS Act. We need your help, and your stories.” They got hundreds of people to send us pictures of themselves with their dog in the front basket and their groceries in the back and saying, “Please don’t make me illegal,” and everybody remembers those pictures. It was highly effective.

During our clause-by-clause part of committee—like, when we were breaking it down—the government launched a side consultation. I wasn’t even sure that that was allowed or that we were doing our due diligence, but that consultation—it’s continuing. The government is still consulting on e-bike classification, and I want to read something—God, if I had hours. I would take two hours if you let me.

During clause-by-clause, I said, “I will just remind all committee that we are debating these amendments in statute today, but we won’t have a second kick at the can. Once we do this today, we can’t amend it again, so I know that with the consultation and a lot of the community involvement in this bill—if anybody thinks that we can go back and change what’s written in legislation after today, we can’t, so just factor that in when we’ve got thoughtful amendments before us. That’s all. Please pass the amendments that we will never get a second chance to pass and that are needed. Thank you.” And I said that a bunch in different ways.

Anyway, it turns out I was wrong. You can redo legislation. You just have to repeal the whole last chunk and then start over. Not the best use of people’s time, kids. Okay.

I wanted to read so much more of that, but I guess—we have questions. Like, can the government provide more details about its plan for new e-bike regulations? Does this government agree that e-bikes are welcome in our community, that we should be encouraging them without imposing needless red tape? This government removed the definition of power-assisted bicycle. Are they now going to be considered mopeds? We have questions, and we don’t have answers, and I would love it if the government would talk about that.

The government has signalled it intends to use the new regulatory authority in Bill 197 to make new regulations governing e-bikes, but it hasn’t provided details except “the proposed legislation would enable the government to categorize more dangerous e-bikes into distinct classes such as by maximum weight or speed.”

It’s possible these new regulations may continue to allow the use of lighter, lower-speed e-bikes without licences, vehicle plates or insurance, but it isn’t clear. It is not even clear what the government considers to be an e-bike, never mind a dangerous e-bike. So I’m going to say it, and I mean it: This government doesn’t seem to know what it’s doing with respect to e-bikes. You didn’t back with Bill 282, and here we are again. Those e-bike provisions remained unproclaimed. Now they’re being repealed. When we raised concerns of e-bike advocates and made a number of thoughtful amendments that they felt would have fixed it—these are the people who ride them, the people who sell them, the people who make them—the government basically made us feel like, “You have no idea what you’re talking about. We’re right.” And here we are, and we were right and the government was not—

Okay. Speaker, there are other pieces in this bill that I won’t have time to get into, specifically around the Ministry of Transportation enforcement officers. I had submitted four questions on the order paper, written questions, about transportation enforcement officers, regarding speed rules, understaffing, their job descriptions. I asked about a PAVA launcher pilot.

I had raised important issues, because they are stretched too thin. There are 14 transportation enforcement officers with mechanics licences. They cover over 13,000 registered inspection stations—148 TEO officers for the whole province of Ontario. It’s generally not more than 100 working at any one time. You’ve got the Kingston district, which covers from the 115 in the west, close to Ottawa and Pembroke in the east and as far north as Chalk River. It’s served by 17 officers, one officer per 1,000 square kilometres.

I can go on about how thin they are stretched. But this is a government that’s talking about safe roads, and I would encourage them. I mean, has it made a change in here that has been asked for? Sure, but they’ve been asking for a lot more that would make all Ontarians who use our roads and highways feel a lot safer and actually be a lot safer. So I will ask for the government to continue to talk to those who want to keep the rest of us safe.

The other thing is I’m going to assume, because so many ministers were answering my two questions, that the government is indeed talking. But I can’t see that. It’s not in the bill. And when law enforcement, former law enforcement and insurance companies are quoted in articles saying that they are raising this issue with the government, it needs to be fixed and it hasn’t, but they don’t want to go on record, because they don’t want to besmirch the good name of the Ministry of Transportation, this government has a problem that they need to fix and I did not suggest it has been fixed.