Every parent’s worst nightmare is receiving a phone call that something has happened to your child at school. On May 14, Landyn Ferris’s mother received that phone call. Landyn was left alone at school despite having a seizure disorder and was found unresponsive.

Landyn should have come home safely to his mother that day. We want every child in Ontario to come home safely at the end of the day. But parents of children with special needs are warning that this could happen again if we don’t address the funding shortfall and the lack of resources for special education.

Will the Premier address that gap today and ensure that we are doing everything we can to protect our kids?

Interjections.

We don’t need to wait for the results of the investigation into Landyn’s death to take immediate steps to make children safer in our schools. We could properly invest in special education today and make sure that children have the caring, qualified adults around them that they need to stay safe.

Will this Premier make that commitment today so that no one else receives this awful phone call?

Interjections.

Today, the Algonquin College board of governors is considering a motion to suspend the hairstyling and aesthetics programs for financial reasons. These programs graduate skilled trade workers, mostly women. The hairstyling program is so successful that it has a wait-list of 57 people, enough to open a second class. It is an affordable program that gives students a path to a stable career with a good income. That includes Indigenous students who choose Algonquin College because it welcomes their culture.

Speaker, this program is a success story that is in jeopardy today because of the lack of financial support for post-secondary institutions in Ontario. The member for Ottawa Centre and I wrote to the Minister of Colleges and Universities last Friday asking for more funding to save this program. Will she deliver that today?

I’m very pleased to be able to welcome today, from my constituency office in Ottawa, my executive assistant, Darren Tyrrell, and from my Queen’s Park office, my legislative assistant, Samantha Webber–Gallagher.

Thanks for all the work you do on behalf of Ottawa West–Nepean.

I’m very pleased to be able to welcome my husband, Matt Helleman, and my daughter Mira Pasma-Helleman to the House today.

Thanks so much for coming to spend time with me, guys.

Evicted?

Recently, I attended a seniors’ tea in Ottawa West–Nepean, with over 200 seniors in attendance, and as I made my way around the room chatting with people, I heard the same thing over and over again: “Can you please get the Premier to fix our health care system?”

It was the same at the General Burns community fun day on Saturday as hundreds of residents stopped by my tent. Person after person told me, “Our health care system is broken. What can we do to get the government to actually care?”

But while Ottawa residents are desperate for action, the health minister says that there is no recruitment and retention problem for family doctors; this at a moment when 2.3 million people in Ontario have no family doctor, and every week, my office hears from constituents who are about to lose their family doctor or have already lost their family doctor.

The Premier has also fought in court for two years against your right to know how many nurses and personal support workers we are short in Ontario, saying it would be “economically damaging” to share this information, even as they don’t care how damaging it is to your health.

The government is also paying more to private, for-profit clinics to perform the same surgeries that are being provided for less in our public hospitals, meaning that taxpayer dollars are going to fund profits instead of increasing the number of surgeries, even though our public hospitals have the capacity to do more.

I agree with my constituents. It’s time for the government to stop playing games with our health care system and get to work on fixing it so that you get the health care you deserve.

Every parent knows that without caring, qualified teachers and education workers, there is no education. Yet this government’s cuts to education funding, their refusal to take action on violence and mental health and their contempt for teachers are driving them out of our schools. There are now 46,000 teachers in Ontario who are certified but choosing not to teach, at a moment when our schools have daily staff shortages.

Why isn’t the Minister of Education doing everything he can to reverse this trend and make sure our kids have the caring teachers they need?

The teacher shortage is connected to the rising levels of violence and the mental health crisis in our schools. One teacher from Waterloo wrote to me: “I’m in a K-6 school. This week so far we’ve had a non-verbal student elope and run off campus, three different students trash three different classrooms, one staff member get assaulted by a student, and two class evacuations. And it’s only Wednesday.”

These aren’t just teachers’ working conditions, Speaker; they are students’ learning conditions. So where is the serious plan to tackle violence in schools?

Interjections.

It’s my pleasure to welcome presidents from across the country who are here as part of the Canadian Teachers’ Federation delegation, including the president of the Canadian Teachers’ Federation, Heidi Yetman; Stéphanie Babineau; Jason Schilling; Clint Johnston; Isabel Cotinais, Nathan Martindale; Peter Lagacy; Ryan Lutes; Justin Matchett; Matthew Miller; Andy Doran; Steven Le Sueur; Samantha Becotte; Ted Hupé; Lillian Klausen; as well as, of course, from Ontario, Anne Vinet-Roy, Karen Brown, René Jansen in de Wal and Karen Littlewood. Thank you so much for joining us today.

I’m very pleased to be able to introduce my constituent and friend, Emilie Coyle, who is the executive director of the Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies. I’m so happy to see you this morning, Emilie.

Our schools are experiencing a violence crisis and it is taking a serious toll on teachers. Some 80% of ETFO members have either personally experienced or witnessed violence. Some of these are life-changing injuries, yet the minister’s plan to address violence is to spend 14 cents per day per child on student safety. That’s just not enough when teachers are already going to school in Kevlar and classes are being evacuated daily.

When will we see a serious plan from the Minister of Education to protect children and workers in our schools?

A quarter of elementary schools and a third of secondary schools have daily staff shortages. There are more resignations than retirements in the education system. High-quality education requires a qualified educator, but this minister is doing everything he can to drive them away.

Parents know that teachers and education workers are the backbone of our education system. Why doesn’t the minister think they deserve respect?

I would like to join in welcoming Friends and Advocates of Catholic Education, including Bishop Gerard Bergie, president of the Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario, from his St. Catharines diocese; Michael Bellmore, newly elected president of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association, from the Sudbury Catholic District School Board; René Jansen in de Wal, president of OECTA, from the Toronto Catholic District School Board; and from the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario, executive members Mary Fowler, Carolyn Proulx-Wootton, Mario Spagnuolo, Tamara DuFour, Juan Gairey, Michael Thomas, Sylvia van Campen, Jenn Wallage and Nathan Core.

Thank you so much for being here today.

I have to start by saying that as a parent of three school-aged children in the province of Ontario, that was an incredibly shameful display from our Minister of Education. For a speech that talked a lot about accountability, that is a person who takes zero accountability for what is happening in schools under his watch.

The minister says his philosophy of success is outcomes. Well, let’s talk about his record, the outcomes for students and for schools in the province of Ontario, because what I hear daily from parents, from students, from teachers and education workers, from trustees, is that things have never been so dire in the education system in Ontario.

We have children who are struggling with serious mental health challenges, who are being told that they need to wait for a social worker and aren’t getting to see one until the next school year. These are children who need help immediately, and nine out of 10 school principals say their school doesn’t have the support they need to help children’s mental health. In fact, half of schools have no access to mental health professionals at all, at a time of one of the greatest crises in student mental health in our province’s history.

Children who have special education needs aren’t even being kept safe, let alone being supported in their learning in school. We’ve had multiple children who have eloped from school, who are being put in incredibly dangerous situations. One student who is supposed to have one-on-one support all day long not only escaped from his school, but they didn’t know he was missing for 35 minutes, because his school is so strapped for staff to support children with special education needs that there was not somebody with that student. There was not somebody to pay attention for 35 minutes.

There are students who need support who are spending the entire day with the principal, going around from classroom to classroom, because the principal is the only person left in the school building to keep an eye on this child.

We have students who are experiencing violence on a daily basis, teachers and education workers who are experiencing life-altering injuries because of the level of violence, people who are being sent to school in Kevlar because the Minister of Education is failing to take action on violence in our schools.

We have 5,000 fewer educators in our classrooms than we did when this government came to power. That means larger class sizes for our children who are struggling with their academics coming out of the pandemic, and it also means more challenging working conditions for the teachers that we have left, because they’re trying to juggle a class of 34 or 38 students, some of whom have mental health challenges, some of whom have special education needs, none of whom are getting the supports that they need.

It’s not surprising, under these circumstances, that people are fleeing our education system. We have 46,000 teachers in the province of Ontario who are registered with the Ontario teachers’ college but are choosing not to work in our education system because of this minister and his policies. A quarter of our elementary schools, a third of our secondary schools have daily staff shortages, and the minister wants to talk about qualified teachers? We are so short on teachers that those positions are being filled with unqualified people every single day. Instead of showing teachers any respect for the work that they’re doing, the minister stood up and attacked our hard-working teachers once again. He can’t even show them the tiniest bit of respect for the hard work they do and the conditions that they work under every single day in the province of Ontario. Those are the minister’s outcomes. That is the minister’s record.

Apparently not satisfied with having done that to our education system, not satisfied with having done that to our children—my children, your children, everyone’s children across the province—the minister is cutting funding once again, for the sixth straight year.

To make matters worse, Speaker, he’s not even putting the full amount that he announced towards our kids in education. They announced a nice big number, and then, if you read the small print, it actually says $1.4 billion of that amount is not going to kids in classrooms; it’s going to the government’s priorities. As a result, we have $1,500 less per child in Ontario than if funding had just kept pace with inflation and enrolment growth since 2018.

But even 2018 funding levels wouldn’t be enough right now to address the incredibly serious challenges that we’re experiencing in Ontario. As I mentioned, we have these really high rates of violence, which are making students, teachers and education workers, principals afraid to go to school in some cases. And what’s this government spending on student safety? Fourteen cents per day per child—that’s really going to help address the situation, Speaker. That’s really going to make people feel safe in their schools. But it’s okay, because there’s a security camera that’s going to capture the violence that nobody’s doing anything about.

We have a student mental health crisis, but what’s the government spending on mental health care for students? Twenty-two cents per student per day, and that’s a cut from last year, because even this year’s inadequate funding was 27 cents per child per day. So we already have kids waiting more than a year—kids who have no mental health support whatsoever in their school this year—and the minister thinks that’s such a successful outcome that he’s cutting funding for next year. It’s absolutely crazy-making, Speaker, that we cannot provide supports for our children who are struggling in Ontario.

As a result, while our kids are already not getting the supports they need to learn, to be safe, to be supported, school boards are being forced once again to make cuts this year. They have already cut to the bone. They have already laid off teachers, educational assistants, child and youth workers—the people who help our children learn and keep them safe every day. And now school boards are being told they’re going to need to make even more cuts this year.

We’re seeing school boards cutting incredibly important resources—resource teachers, for one, teachers who support children who have special needs. We’re seeing congregate classes cut. We’re seeing every single school board in the province running a deficit in special education, and now they’re going to have to cut even more supports for our children with special needs.

If this funding had just kept pace with inflation, we would have $3 billion more in our school system than what this government is putting in. At a moment when things are so dire, what would that $3 billion mean? What would $1,500 more per child mean in our education system? Well, every single school that I go to, I ask the principal, “If you could have one thing, what it would be?” And do you know what every single principal responds? More EAs.

For a school of 400 students, $1,500 per student would allow for the hiring of 10 more EAs. These are EAs who are currently running from crisis to crisis with a walkie-talkie trying to figure out which student needs help the most after the crisis has already erupted.

Imagine what a difference it would make for that school, for the levels of violence, for kids who are not having their learning needs supported, if a school had 10 more EAs? It would mean more social workers and mental health nurses so that when a child says, “I need help,” help is there and we’re not making them wait. It would mean more child and youth workers to help supervise lunchrooms and hallways and make sure that we’re actually intervening before things reach a crisis level. It would mean that every child in Ontario would have a better opportunity to go to school safely, to feel safe and supported at school and to receive the high-quality education that I would like to think we all believe children in Ontario deserve, except that the government’s actions demonstrate differently.

So I will conclude with a plea to the other members of the government. We have clearly heard that the Minister of Education is not going to support giving our children the resources and supports that they need for a high-quality education in the province of Ontario, but many of you are parents; many of you are hearing from your constituents what the outcomes of this minister’s policy are.

So stand with parents; stand with kids; stand with the future of Ontario and support this motion today.

It’s been six years now since my constituents paid deposits to Greatwise Developments for new homes, and construction has still not started. A year ago, I raised this issue in the House and the government responded that they were putting bad developers on notice, making them think twice before taking advantage of homebuyers. And yet, while homes are going up all over Ottawa right now, this developer hasn’t even prepared the land to start construction.

Why is the Premier allowing a bad developer to hold homebuyers hostage with no consequences at all?

When will we finally see real action, not just words, from this government to hold bad developers accountable, so families like my constituents finally get a home in Ontario?

I’d also like to say hello and welcome to folks from AEFO, ETFO, the trustee organizations and the Toronto Schools Caregiver Coalition who are joining us online this afternoon to watch the debate on education.

I’d like to join colleagues in welcoming the Ontario Association of Naturopathic Doctors, and in particular, Yousuf Siddiqui, Harsimranjeet Bhatia, Emma Pollon-MacLeod and Natalie Pond. I’m looking forward to our meeting later today. Thank you for being here.

I’m very pleased to be able to rise and present this petition that is signed by many residents of Ottawa, including Kimberly Byars of Ottawa West–Nepean. These constituents raise concerns about the privatization of our health care system and the fact that people across Ottawa and across Ontario are being charged fees for services that should by covered by OHIP, despite the fact that the Premier and the Minister of Health promised that nobody in the province would be required to pay for health care with their credit card.

They are also concerned about the fact that allowing privatized health care bleeds health care workers out of our public system. We don’t have an unlimited source of health care workers to provide nurses and doctors for both a public system and a private system.

So these petitioners are calling on the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to protect our health care system against sale by this government, to actually properly fund our hospitals, to recognize the foreign credentials of nurses and doctors who have been trained outside of Ontario, and also to ensure that everybody in Ontario has 10 paid sick days.

I wholeheartedly support this petition. I will add my name to it and send it to the table with page Liam.

I guess the minister’s math is so basic, Speaker, that he’s never heard of inflation.

The Premier is providing $1,500 less for each child in our schools compared to 2018. This at a time when we have a massive teacher shortage, a problem with violence, a mental health crisis, not enough special education or ESL supports, transportation problems and crumbling schools.

As a parent, on behalf of parents across the province, I want to know, why are you attacking our children’s education?

Interjections.

The Minister of Education would rather talk about anything but what’s happening in our schools right now, because the situation is pretty grim thanks to this government. Schools are turning down the heat to save money, telling teachers to bring in their own supplies. Kids with special needs are being sent home because there’s no one left to look after them. Teens asking for mental health support are waiting over a year to see a social worker.

In the face of all this, the Premier is once again proposing education funding for next year that doesn’t keep pace with inflation or enrolment growth. This is another cut, Speaker.

Why does the Premier not believe that children in Ontario deserve a high-quality education and safe, supportive, fully resourced classrooms?

On April 19, I was very pleased to be able to host the second annual Ottawa West–Nepean Good Neighbour Awards. These awards celebrate the people in our community who brighten and sustain the lives of their neighbours every day in ways big and small. They are all nominated by members of our community.

Some of them, like Shannon, Zoë, Jennifer, Maryam, Rana and Tricia, are amazing volunteers for local community organization like Matthew House; the Caldwell Family Centre; the Nepean, Rideau and Osgoode Community Resource Centre; and the Ottawa Valley Brain Injury Association. They are all doing incredible work supporting newcomers, low-income communities and people with concussions.

Others, like Neil, Leeanne and Paul, show up every day for people in their community, helping with moves, child care, shovelling driveways and lending a helping hand to newcomers and people living with disabilities.

Bill and Jeannie are teachers, sharing their wisdom and life experience with our community. Laura is a school librarian who tirelessly advocates for reading and connects kids with books.

Murray, Joyce, Jayne and Margo are community builders, bringing people together, forging connections and creating social networks that support and sustain one another.

David brightens the lives of his neighbours every single day with a positive message, and Pam supports her neighbours in adopting ecologically sustainable practices.

In a time when there’s so much in the world that can make us feel anxious or concerned, these neighbours remind us that we are always surrounded by goodness and there is always someone there to lend a helping hand. Thank you so much to each one of you for being a good neighbour.

Across Ontario, too many students are not getting high-quality, effective French immersion because of our teacher shortage. There are French immersion classes being filled by teachers who speak no French; others are experiencing turnover of four or five teachers in a single year.

Learning French is important for employment opportunities, for cultural appreciation and mutual understanding between anglophones and francophones. But you can’t learn French if your teacher doesn’t speak French.

When will we actually see serious, long-term solutions, so that every child in Ontario who wants to learn French has the opportunity?

I’d like to welcome back to the House my friend from Ottawa and member of the Ontario Autism Coalition Kate Dudley-Logue.