Thank you to the member from Ottawa Centre for his remarks this afternoon. He mentioned, who do we work for? Speaker, in this place, we’re members—the member opposite believes that we’re legislators, which we are. It’s a legislative assembly. They’re harping on the fact that, as a Legislature, we’re taking a policy decision to correct a mistake—very weird line of thought. But we’re legislators, everyone. So we can legislate, great, wow—so ironic.

But my question—he’s referring to the report. I appreciate he read the report. My question is—and I’m going to quote—do you support this finding? “I do not support a zero-year revenue horizon for assessing the economics of small volume gas expansion customers. I do not find the evidentiary record supports this conclusion.” This is from Commissioner Duff, in the report you’re quoting.

When will you allow natural gas expansion to places that don’t have it, to get it?

They’re happy about losing homes, everyone.

When we finally changed governments, this party still did everything they could do to partner with the Liberals to make sure Ontarians lost even more jobs, businesses and homes. And by 2018, Ontarians saw through it all. Look at how many of them are sitting here today, Speaker. Ontarians have said enough is enough. They don’t need the government to give them handouts; they just need a government that believes in them, that believes in their ability to start a family, work in a rewarding job and to start a business.

Speaker, we’re not in the business of taking power away from the people; we’re for the people on this side of the House. And I’m proud that our leader and our Premier has made a point of emphasizing that principle over and over, at every step of his years of service.

And I appreciate that the NDP is finally showing their true colours. They don’t like free enterprise. They don’t like new businesses in Ontario. They don’t like new hospitals or new long-term-care beds. They don’t like new homes. Speaker, they didn’t even like those things under Bob Rae. They didn’t like them when they propped up the Liberal government, and they’re making it crystal clear now, by voting against each and every one of our own government’s initiatives, that they don’t like them now. Speaker—

Interjections.

The NDP wants to take over the business of housing in Ontario. They want to ensure 30% of all new housing—

Interjections.

Or in other words, they want to encroach on free enterprise in this province, one of the most cherished freedoms that we have in this country, to destroy the integrity of the free market and fundamentally to instead replace it with a province where property is publicly owned. Speaker, they’re advocating for the elimination of private property in this province, and do you know what Webster dictionary defines that as? Communism. And the NDP values—he got up and mentioned NDP values. It’s socialism, right here in this House. He just said it in his speech.

The NDP thinks that not only do we need to shut down the free market, but they also say they will just take $15 billion—just $15 billion—of Ontario taxpayers’ money. Housing experts say it is going to cost $100 billion to build 250,000 homes. Who are they going to tax to get that, Speaker? Are they going to tax the hard-working family that puts gas in their car? I know they support the carbon tax federally. Are they going to tax small businesses to meet that?

Speaker, I’d ask the member from London North Centre how many constituents he has who themselves or their families chose to immigrate to Canada because of restrictive socialist policies in countries like the former Soviet Union, Venezuela or China or a number of other countries who have experimented with this disastrous policy throughout recent history. I would also ask those constituents—and, frankly, I’d ask any Ontarian whose family has fled their nation of origin for this very reason—what they think of this bill.

Under the Liberals and NDP, who starved Ontario’s economy for 15 years, thousands of jobs left this province and thousands of people left with them. They came after the auto sector, they came after the energy sector, and now they’re coming after the housing sector. What industry do they want to kill next? Who else do they want to lay off? Thankfully, Ontarians see right through the NDP’s socialist agenda. They’ve seen it before, and many of them even escaped it to come here, Speaker. We won’t let them go through the pain and hurt of that again.

Our government knows that the main reason behind the housing crisis is critically low housing supply, with more than 95% of the homes being built in Ontario by Ontarians employed in the private sector. Many of these private companies build non-profit housing. They work with great housing providers like Habitat for Humanity and build non-profit housing. They take time out of their day to build that, Speaker. They don’t need bureaucrats in downtown Toronto telling them what they need in their community.

Our government increased the Homelessness Prevention Program by an additional $20 million. We now provide $700 million to our service providers for homelessness prevention programs across the province. I know that, locally, my housing service providers appreciated that because they know what is best for their communities. They don’t need bureaucrats. Speaker, we have great bureaucrats that work for us in the civil service, but I don’t know one that builds housing. None of them build housing. Bureaucrats do not build housing. The non-profit sector and the private sector build housing in this province.

Unlike the NDP, our government knows there’s only one taxpayer in Ontario, and at a time when Ontarians are already struggling with the rising cost of living, we will never support increased fees or costly policies that would put more financial strain on hard-working families. We’re fully committed to working with the private sector and the non-profit sector to incentivize getting shovels in the ground faster and allowing families and individuals right across this province to live in the home of their dreams.

Speaker, I am pleased to say that from January to August 2023, this year, we have seen a 3% increase in housing starts from 2022—which was a record in 30 years. This year again, the same months, January to August 2023, we’ve seen a 49% increase in the number of purpose-built rental starts—a 49% increase from the historic increase last year.

We need people to build these homes, Speaker. Apprentice registrations this year have increased by 24%. Our Minister of Education’s making reforms to ensure that young people who want to enter the skilled trades can enter more quickly, because we know that in the construction sector alone, 72,000 new workers are needed by 2027. These are the individuals who will build the homes for our growing population.

The member across the way talked about seniors, whether it’s downsizing or having a home to call their own or staying in the community that they helped build. I have a very good example from my own riding.

There was a development proposed down the street from where I live in the riding for seniors’ retirement living—designed for seniors so they could stay in the community they helped build, move out of their bigger houses, so those houses can go on the market and new families can move into them. Speaker, do you know what happened? NIMBYs prevented that development. They sent it to the Ontario Land Tribunal—one appeal, which held it up for years. It cost the home builder an extra $1 million in costs. The development still hasn’t started because of the extra cost. So these units aren’t on the market for people to stay in their own community, stay where they were, stay where their family is and stay where their grandchildren are.

I was proud to be part of a government that changed that. Our government reformed the Ontario Land Tribunal and the appeals process around that.

Interjections.

Speaker—

Interjections.

In the same spirit, we’ll stop at nothing, on this side of the House, to protect the hard-working people of Ontario who get up in the morning to help build this great province. We’ll continue to work for the hard-working people of Ontario that the NDP socialists don’t want to see rewarded—their job-killing agenda, their killing of the free enterprise that has contributed so much to this great province.

I know members on this side of the House and the majority over there will continue to stand for free enterprise and will continue to work—

Interjections.