What a great day in Ontario. I think I speak for all of us in this House when I say we all care about what happens to animals. None of us—it doesn’t matter what political stripe we are—want to see any animal harmed, mistreated, unfed, unwatered, uncared for. This is something that hits us all in our heart, and I want to thank the Solicitor General for making sure this bill came forward. I want to thank the House leader for ensuring that we are having third reading and debate on it. I want to thank the new parliamentary assistant for his work on this bill.

This goes back to when I first was elected in 2018. This was one of my passions, to bring forward an end to animal cruelty in the province of Ontario and of course our amazing country we live in. I did bring forward a private member’s bill, which was passed unanimously by the House at the time, to end puppy mills, to stop them. We all have reasons for running and this was one of the reasons that I wanted to run: to do better.

Growing up in a house with rescued pets—my mom volunteered at the humane society, as did my sister, when I was in school. We’ve always had rescue dogs in our house—oh, my goodness, we could name them all, but there’s numerous of them right now. We have all heard about my pets, Bruce and Edward. Edward is a cat that was found in a backyard, so a feral cat. She hasn’t destroyed too many things, just one stair, but we still love her. And my dog, who has many, many issues—he was given up just because he just had so many medical issues, like allergies. He is at home today, desperately needing a haircut, so when we rise, guess who gets the haircut first? That would be Bruce. He won’t be happy about that. I can’t actually give him a bath myself; he likes to bite my hands, because I’m his mom, not the master. I have to learn how to be the master, but I’m the mom of the house. We certainly love our pets, and I think that goes, as I said, for everybody here.

I’m certainly, certainly proud to be part of this government and part of this Parliament that is going to, hopefully, vote in favour of this bill, the Preventing Unethical Puppy Sales Act. I know there’s many advocates out there who we’ve talked with over the years who have been—and I’m sure they came to committee. I don’t sit on the justice committee, but I’m sure many of them came to the justice committee to share their stories. I want to say thank you to all those people who rescue animals. They spend their money. They spend their time trying to house animals, not just in our own province, our own communities, but across the world. People rescue animals and try to find them their forever home.

And that’s just a reminder, if you’re ever looking for a pet: Make sure it is their forever home, that it’s not just a, “I think, this summer, the kids need a dog.” Well, that’s not the right reason to get a pet. You have to make sure you want to have that. It’s a lifelong commitment and we want to make sure those pets, when you get them, are safe. We want to make sure they were treated well. We want to make sure that they are disease-free, and that’s why it’s important to end puppy mills.

Many of these dogs in puppy mills, as we’ve heard, they’re matted. They do not have a life of their own. They are caged. They’re very matted. Sometimes they don’t get proper food and water—nutrition. They don’t get the love, and that’s what makes a really good pet, that love and that companionship—sociability. And you certainly don’t want to pick up a pet that may not last, because it’s terrible for the pet, but it’s also terrible for the families to have to go through something like that. So ending puppy mills will stop some of these horrible situations from happening.

One thing we’re really proud of is our hotline that we put forward when I was working with Minister Jones as Solicitor General through our PUPS Act. It’s the animal cruelty line. High fines—the highest in Canada. I was very proud of that: the highest in Canada for animal cruelty in our province. And if you ever see an animal in distress, please call the line. It’s 1-833-9-ANIMAL, which is 1-833-9-ANIMAL. We have an icon that we put on our social media, and maybe my staff, if they’re listening, can add that to my social feeds today.

Also, this summer, make sure that we don’t leave our pets in the car. Sometimes, you say, “I’m just running in to get groceries,” “I’m just running in to pick up the kids,” or there’s a baseball tournament or a soccer tournament. Don’t leave your pets in the car when you’re grocery shopping; it’s really hard on them. Just like you wouldn’t leave your kids in the car—but sometimes people need to be reminded of that, which is fairly sad. But don’t leave animals or children in hot vehicles, because it’s against the law. It’s against the law and it’s actually a really terrible act.

Once this legislation is passed, Ontario would become the first jurisdiction in Canada to explicitly include the term “puppy mill” into law. When I first looked at my private member’s bill, you couldn’t see the term “puppy mill” anywhere. It meant different things in different places. I checked in the States, what they had. We have backyard breeders, but the puppy mill was never a defined term, so this legislation is actually going to define it and make it a law. That’s a huge step forward. Because we talk about it, but just because we talk about it, it doesn’t mean it’s actually a law. So this is great.

As I mentioned, I was passionate about animals and the work that we’re doing in the Solicitor General’s office. We have heard horror stories. I know the parliamentary assistant mentioned some stories. I was in committee this morning, so I didn’t hear the minister’s full speech; I just saw him on TV while we were debating in committee. But there are some horror stories—we all know them and we’ve all heard about them—about the treatment of animals in precarious positions.

I think I’ve told the story about my sister’s dog Billie. When my sister—it was a rescue for bulldogs. My sister has a bunch of bulldogs. One is crazy; the other two are pretty good. When she first got Billie, she couldn’t walk on her back legs, because all she had done her whole life was give birth—small cage. She couldn’t walk on her back legs. She recently passed away, just a couple of months ago. She had a good life after, but her start to life was pretty sad. All she did was give birth. As soon as she gave birth, she gave birth again. That dog didn’t get to walk around, didn’t get to feel the grass, had a dirty cage. I’m not sure if she was fed or watered, certainly not loved—but got a lot of love after. But we don’t want to see these types of things happening in society because we can do better in how we think of animals. They’re part of our family now. We need to do better, and I’m very happy that today, we are going to do better with the support of, I’m sure, everybody in this House. I shouldn’t be presumptuous, but I know everybody here has been supportive in the past of helping out animals and telling the stories of their own pets and the work that they do to make sure that their pets are looked after.

We talked about the cruelty inside some of these barns. We heard about malnutrition and starvation. We talked about puppy profiteering. That’s another thing when you’re looking at purchasing a pet: Make sure that the breeder interviews you. Usually, very good breeders ask you to come in and have an interview. Sometimes, they check references.

When I took over ownership of Bruce, I applied. It was actually a friend who found him at a rescue, and we had to apply, even though she knew me very well—talk to my vet, talk to my friends, talk to a couple of people just to see if we would be good puppy parents—he wasn’t really a puppy; he was four—because they want to make sure these animals get forever homes.

For anybody out there who’s looking for a pet, if you’re meeting in a parking lot and you found it online, just be careful, just be cautious. Think of where that pet came from. There are excellent breeders out there, and they do a very good job of making sure that the animals are healthy, they’re vaccinated, they’re cared for.

Once you take ownership of an animal, it is your responsibility to look after that pet, just like you would a kid. You have to make sure that they’re fed, they’re watered, they’re looked after, and they’re loved because I’ll tell you, they’ll love you back even more. The best thing I ever did was get my dog—and I inherited a cat, but that’s because my sister moved into a house and there was a family of cats. I was allergic to cats, and she said, “Take a cat,” and I said, “Oh, I can’t take a cat.” Anyway, I ended up with this cat. I thought it was a boy and got everything ready for this allergy. I knew my allergies were going to go crazy. Then, I get this cat, and it’s a girl. Well, the name stuck, so Edward is a cat, and it’s a girl, and she doesn’t care what her name is. She doesn’t know, but she runs the house right now.

They are great family assets, so let’s pass this bill today. Let’s protect our pets and give them their forever home.

It’s a great question, and congratulations on being a pet owner. I know you would make a great pet mom. I don’t know about who is the master in your house when it comes to the pets, as I’m learning.

We have the Etobicoke Humane Society. I visited the London humane society, which does a really good job. The humane societies do really great work. They have vets coming in. They can actually help with some of the vaccinations in advance to make sure that these pets are in good shape before someone will adopt. They do some homework. They do research. They will also interview people. Just because you’re walking in doesn’t mean you’re going to get a pet, which is great, because we shouldn’t just be giving them away.

I have to give a shout-out to the member from London. Your humane society does an amazing job, so congratulations to that. They’re growing, so donations to the humane society, if anybody is interested.

They do a really great job of incorporating vet and vet tech training into the humane society. So this is a way that vet techs—and I think, with our new legislation about vets, we can use more of the vet tech help to make sure—

My question is actually to the member from Etobicoke–Lakeshore. Her and I have obviously shared the commitment to adopting and raising as our own fur babies those that have come from shelters. I can tell you, we adopted in the 2011 election a five-month-old baby dog that was born without any eyes and was taken back to the Ottawa Humane Society, because nobody wanted to raise her because it was too difficult.

Fast-forward to when I was heritage minister and I went to visit with Todd Smith in Belleville, he took me to their humane society, which was in dire need of an upgrade. He said one thing to me: “Lisa, I don’t want to deal with Joe when you take home a cat or a dog.” Of course, I took home a massive cat that had been abandoned.

The reason I’m asking you this question—it may not necessarily be in the bill, but I think, from one animal lover to another, it seems to me our biggest challenges can often be at the humane societies or at the shelters, who do not have enough support. I’m wondering, in your experience as former PA to this area but also as a pet lover, what your thoughts are in order for us to be better able to serve those shelters.

My question to the Solicitor General: I appreciated the comments that he made in his lead-off. Could he tell us how this law will be enforced and what sort of funds will be allocated to ensure that the desired outcomes actually take place?

We’re going to go to questions.

We’ll move to the next question.

J’ai une question pour le solliciteur général.

Vous savez, moi aussi, dans ma famille, on a une petite chienne, Eevee—l’animal à ma fille—qu’on adore et qui fait partie de la famille, comme tout le monde qui a des animaux qu’on aime tellement.

Ma question est surtout sur le renforcement, qui m’inquiète parce que, vous savez, ma région est très grande, très vaste, sans mentionner les communautés qui sont au Grand Nord. Vous l’avez même mentionné dans vos allocutions que quand les « puppy mills » sont là, ce n’est pas là que les familles vont chercher l’animal. Ils vont aller le chercher à une place qui est beaucoup plus propre et où ça ne paraît pas d’où ils viennent, les animaux. Et avec une région comme la mienne qui est tellement grande, tellement vaste, très souvent, ils vont se cacher—éloignés. C’est sur le renforcement que ma question est, pour comprendre comment on va pouvoir reconnaître mais aussi prendre ce monde-là qui prend avantage des animaux, qui fait souffrir des animaux.

J’aimerais vous entendre là-dessus. Comment peut-on renforcer ça pour protéger ces animaux-là?

And he’s right: Ontario is large. It’s very large. But the purpose of why we’re here today for third reading is to show our government’s absolute commitment in moving forward with animal welfare protection legislation that sets a tone and a standard of animal welfare, and this is exactly the next iteration.

To my colleague, I respect very much the fact that northern Ontario is very large. The answer to his question is that we will continue to move forward incrementally and to build out animal welfare services, just as it started with the Deputy Premier when she was Solicitor General. We are going to continue to build it out.

I want to thank the member for the question. This will be enforced by the animal welfare inspectors, the same way as always. Some of the important provisions that we’re putting in are allowing them to do their jobs.

I want to caution: The members opposite have a tendency to try to poke holes in our bills to find excuses to vote against them. This isn’t a very good bill to vote against. This is the kind of bill that I think the members should be supporting. We’re bringing in minimum fines: $10,000 if you’re operating a puppy mill or facilitating a puppy mill, $25,000 if that results in the death of a puppy. These are tangible tools that we’re giving our animal welfare inspectors and our front-line workers, resources they need to hold these bad actor puppy mills accountable.

So I’d caution the members: Don’t do what you normally do and vote against this just because you’re opposition. This is a good bill. You should vote in favour of it.

One of the important ones is around record-keeping. Bad actor puppy mills won’t have the ability to say, “Oh, I don’t know how old the dog is. I didn’t keep a record of it.” We’ll have record-keeping provisions maintained within, that they have to maintain or else face a fine—the $10,000 fine for having a puppy mill, $25,000 if resulting in a death.

But I want to say that my colleague believes in parliamentary democracy just like I do, just like every member of the PC caucus does. This is a case where we have amendments in the bill through the committee process that are really, really quite strong. That $10,000 for assisting and facilitating a puppy mill was something we didn’t bring forward in second reading, a gap that we knew that we had. We brought the amendment forward, the committee did the right thing, and we hope all members do the right thing by passing the amended bill.

Six years after the Conservatives formed government, Ontario still doesn’t have a strategy to address hate and racism. This is an embarrassment and another failure on this government’s tarnished record.

Not only does Ontario lack a comprehensive anti-hate strategy, but we also have a Premier who evokes racist tropes from behind a government podium. Just last week, without any evidence, the Premier speculated that “immigrants” are behind the shooting at a Jewish girls’ school. It is a shockingly racist comment to scapegoat immigrants for this senseless act. The police who are actually investigating the crime had to distance themselves from the Premier’s comments.

This is the same Premier who blamed COVID-19 on immigrants. He blames Ontario’s housing crisis on international students—the same Premier who vilified Umar Zameer and called for the jailing of this brown, Muslim man who has now been found innocent by the courts.

The Premier has denied the existence of systemic racism and cancelled Ontario’s Anti-Racism Directorate, including its committees on anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism and anti-Indigenous racism. It seems like the Premier could use the directorate’s advice now more than ever before.

Ontario cannot combat racism if this Premier does not recognize that it exists. Naming it is the first step to dismantling its hateful power.

I feel like I have to say this every day in this House. All forms of hate are interconnected and have the same goal: to divide us as people, to make us afraid, to have us not trust each other and to distract us from building stronger communities that actually care for each other. Ontario needs a comprehensive—

I want to use my time this morning to pay tribute to the people in my riding of Simcoe–Grey and across this great province who enrich our communities through their dedication, commitment and generosity. They are our volunteers, Speaker, and the work they do every day in our communities to improve and enrich the lives of so many residents, young and old, goes beyond words.

Next month, the Ontario Volunteer Service Awards will be handed out. Started in 1986, this great program is an opportunity for us to thank and recognize the many, many volunteers who give their time and expertise selflessly, groups such as:

—the Tec-We-Gwill Women’s Institute, founded in 1947;

—the Beaver Valley community outreach, founded in 1982;

—the Lions Club of Wasaga Beach, which recently celebrated 60 years;

—the Collingwood Salvation Army, which recently celebrated 140 years;

—Wasaga Beach Royal Canadian Legion Branch 645, which was just constituted last month;

—the South Georgian Bay Community Health Centre;

—the Clearview Public Library Board; and

—the Stevenson Memorial Hospital Auxiliary.

To all those who will receive an Ontario Volunteer Service Award next month, I want to congratulate you on behalf of the residents of Simcoe–Grey. And to all the many organizations in Simcoe–Grey and the incredibly dedicated volunteers who serve, I want to thank you for your service and for your willingness to help your neighbours and make our communities so much stronger, more resilient and compassionate.

Speaker, if you seek it, you will find unanimous consent to allow members to wear pins in recognition of June being ALS Awareness Month.

You know, here she is: The Deputy Premier is here. She’s the one who had the foresight to bring in the Provincial Animal Welfare Services Act, to see it passed in the Legislature in 2019 and move it forward.

We started at ground zero. We are making incremental progress every day. We have built out a team of very responsible, trained and educated animal welfare inspectors. And the most important thing is that we’ve set a standard, an expectation and a tone that started with the Deputy Premier when she was the Solicitor General, which I continue to do today. We’re going to continue to do just this. Everything that our government has done in public safety sends a message: Public safety matters.

This government is quite famous for talking tough on crime—they’re going to get tough on crime; they don’t want criminals walking the streets—yet this government has so underfunded our court system that at least 124 cases were thrown out in 2022, some of them involving sexual assaults.

This bill is something similar. This is about animal abuse. It’s about puppy mills. The response from the government is to increase the fines, but if there’s nobody to inspect and enforce those fines, then the fines never get laid and the animals continue to be abused.

The report in the media is that the PAWS needs more than the hundred inspectors who are available right now to cover our province. Our province is a million square kilometres, so we need more inspectors. How will this government enforce these increased fines? How will you actually make the animals safe?

Next question?

Third reading debate deemed adjourned.

It’s my pleasure to rise today to highlight the incredible inductees into the Haliburton Highlands Sports Hall of Fame for 2024. Created five years ago, the hall of fame has been a source of local pride and honour. At the induction ceremony, we celebrated the incredible achievements and dedication of our local athletes, coaches and builders, who have made significant contributions to the community.

A total of 10 individuals and two teams received awards across multiple sports, including the Haliburton county Red Wolves becoming the first recipients of the outstanding achievement award. Part of Special Olympics Ontario, the Red Wolves help athletes and supporters connect through sports like bowling, curling and golf.

The Red Wolves bowling team has competed locally, provincially and nationally since it was founded in 1997. I’d like to recognize one of the Red Wolves and a hometown hero of mine, the late Carrie Crego, who was selected to compete at the 2006 national games in Brandon, Manitoba, and brought home a bronze medal in bowling. Thank you, Carrie, for your passion and dedication to our community and for making your hometown of Kinmount proud.

I encourage all of you to stop by the Haliburton Highlands Sports Hall of Fame and visit their website for tributes of each inductee—you can see first-hand how Haliburton county works hard and plays harder.

Residents in Orléans and across Ontario are asking if the convenience of buying a beer at the corner store is really worth $1 billion. The answer, of course, is no. So why the rush?

We have a teacher shortage, Ontario schools need billions in repairs, and this government has cut $1,500 in per-student funding since they were elected in 2018. But there is $1 billion to accelerate corner store beer sales by a year.

Two million Ontarians don’t have a family doctor. Imagine: Not a single person in these combined cities of Ottawa, Windsor, London, Kingston and Guelph have a family doctor, but there is $1 billion to accelerate corner store beer sales by a year.

Instead of cutting education and health care further, perhaps this government will do what they always do, which is just take on more and more debt. Madam Speaker, it’s not what we need.

If this government were to auction off the new liquor licences, it could net nearly $300 million in additional value to taxpayers. This is what the Conservative governments in Alberta and Saskatchewan did, netting a small fortune to fund education and health care.

And since this government is refusing to follow the lead of fiscally conservative governments, I have to ask: Which friend, supporter or crony is going to benefit at the expense of students, teachers, nurses, doctors—at the expense of all of us?

In the end, this government cares little about fiscal responsibility, having increased the debt by over $100 billion under their watch, the largest debt of any subnational jurisdiction in the world. This—

I am pleased to rise this morning to speak about the wave of excitement that washed over Brantford–Brant last Saturday. The Woodman pool opened for the first time this past weekend and welcomed a capacity crowd of swimmers of all ages. The new pool’s opening was eagerly awaited by the Brantford–Brant community, ever since the old pool closed in 2020.

While the pool’s official opening is still slated for June 29, these summer weekends have been too beautiful to waste, and Mayor Kevin Davis has called for the pool to be opened every weekend in June while the finishing touches are being completed.

The pool is part of the newly revamped Woodman Park Community Centre, which keeps Brantford entertained year-round. Once the Woodman project is completed, it will include a community garden, accessible playground equipment, games tables, walking paths and shade structures.

This project represents the great things that we can achieve when all three levels of government work together, as the pool was funded by both the provincial and federal governments alongside the city of Brantford.

I am proud to represent a government that places a high importance on community recreation projects such as this one. By ensuring the people of Ontario have state-of-the-art facilities to enjoy, our government continues to make Ontario the best place to live, work, play and raise a family.

Two new schools are going to be built in west Whitby, thanks to our Minister of Education, the Honourable Stephen Lecce: $30.5 million for an elementary school at Maskell Crescent and Coronation Road, creating 634 student spaces and 49 child care spaces; and $23.4 million for a new elementary school at Cisco Drive and Limoges Street, creating 634 student spaces.

On May 17, the Minister of Education also announced funding for new schools and one school expansion across Oshawa and Clarington, which will result in the creation of 3,155 new student spaces and 98 child care spaces. This was an historic day, as the overall investment was $139.5 million and is the single largest in Durham history.

We are working to ensure Whitby children have access to state-of-the-art schools close to home that give them real-life job skills to succeed in the future. Our government is getting it done once again for hard-working families in the region of Durham.

On Saturday morning I went to the Westin Harbour Castle hotel in Toronto, signed in, went up the elevator and up some stairs to the very top of the building, about 400 feet up, and stepped off the edge. I was, luckily, attached to some fairly strong harnesses at the time, but that doesn’t really make it any less unnerving, because the one thing your body doesn’t want you to do when you’re on the edge of a building is jump off of it, which I did.

I did this to raise awareness of a fundraising campaign for ProAction Cops and Kids, which is an incredible charity that I became aware of in my work as an MPP. ProAction Cops and Kids has five chapters: Toronto, Durham region, Hamilton, Halton and Peel. Essentially, what it does is it allows kids who are under-resourced to connect with police officers who donate their time to run sports programs, baking programs, sailing etc., and ProAction covers all the costs of equipment and facilities. I became involved because I am so incredibly passionate about the idea of community policing and prevention-based policing, which is about building strong relationships between the community and police, particularly children.

A huge thank you to ProAction team members Jean Milligan, Michelle Marchetti and Nicole Benoit—I know you all worked incredibly hard—and to all of the officers and kids who participated in going over the edge with me on Saturday morning.

La Maison Verte est un producteur essentiel pour le reboisement dans le Nord. Elle fournit des millions de semis à nos forêts chaque année.

Malheureusement, elle est gravement menacée par la hausse marquée des prix de production. La Maison Verte fait face à des problèmes de revenus à cause, entre autres, des dépenses liées aux projets pendant la pandémie et à l’augmentation des coûts opérationnels. Les difficultés sont à leur sommet avec la domination de grands fournisseurs comme PRT en Colombie-Britannique, rendant presque impossible pour les petits fournisseurs de faire compétition à ces multinationales.

Monsieur le Président, il est profondément préoccupant que les petites entreprises comme la Maison Verte se fassent avaler par des multinationales d’autres provinces sans protection adéquate de la part de notre gouvernement. Les petits producteurs ne peuvent tout simplement pas survivre.

Depuis l’ouverture de la Maison Verte, le nombre de petits producteurs similaires est passé de 39 à seulement huit dans la province, une diminution alarmante qui nécessite notre attention immédiatement. L’absence des règlements pour protéger les petits fournisseurs est un problème. Par exemple, la Maison Verte fournit de cinq à sept millions de semis à la forêt de Hearst, tandis que les entreprises comme GreenFirst ne fournissent que 800 000 à un prix compétitif.

Monsieur le Président, en réponse à ces défis, nous devons envisager des règlements pour assurer un marché plus équitable. Il est crucial que nous soutenions les petits producteurs comme la Maison Verte pour assurer leur survie et la santé continue de nos forêts et des entreprises d’ici.

J’appelle tous mes collègues à se joindre à moi pour relever ces défis et soutenir nos fournisseurs locaux avec l’urgence qu’ils méritent.