I would like to welcome, from Ontario Place for All, Norm Di Pasquale, Emmy Egulu and Bruce Van Dieten; and from Architectural Conservancy of Ontario Inc., Bill Greaves. Welcome to your House.

To the Premier: Walter Kehm, a prominent landscape architect who designed Trillium and Tommy Thompson Parks, has withdrawn his support from the Ontario Place redevelopment project. Mr. Kehm is speaking out against the Premier’s environmental vandalism at Ontario Place, including the clear-cutting of 800 mature trees and the habitats that they support in order to make way for a government-subsidized private luxury spa.

The Auditor General has already announced an investigation of the Ontario Place scheme, and now Mr. Kehm says the public needs to know the truth about the harm this project will cause. Will the Premier halt his environmental vandalism at Ontario Place?

Mr. Speaker, to the Premier: The plan that you have, there was no environmental assessment, and your plan is actually to clear-cut 800 mature trees and destroy the habitat for 125 bird species and other wildlife. There was no environmental assessment just because this government, just before they announced the call for the Ontario Place redevelopment, made regulatory changes that exempted this project from the Environmental Assessment Act. Did the government make those changes so the public would not know the truth about the environmental vandalism the Premier was planning at Ontario Place?

Interjections.