I had a particular interest in the Architects Act, which might not be immediately obvious, but the Architects Act, obviously, governs architects in the province of Ontario, and under the current piece of proposed legislation, it proposes to create new categories within the Architects Act. I think that’s very useful and particularly important in getting us towards our goal of building 1.5 million homes over the next 10 years, and I’m wondering if any of the speakers can comment on the changes to the Architects Act and what those changes might entail.

From the great riding of Essex, I’d like to welcome the greatest constituency assistant in the whole wide world, Mr. Ethan Wuerch. Welcome to your House.

Once again, I thought this was going to be a boring debate about procedure. The procedure that we’re talking about today is how long we should ring bells.

On the question of tolling the bells, we have rules in the procedural book, which is called the standing orders of the Legislative Assembly. The bells are set out in rule 30 of the standing orders, referred to primarily as “deferral of requested division,” and also, under the same rule, the division bells and how long they should be rung. So it’s worth, first of all, explaining what all that means.

For those who are watching these proceedings and might not know the technical language that’s being dealt with before us, the word “division” refers to, of course, a vote, and that, of course, refers to how the parties divide on a vote—not necessarily dividing along, but frequently dividing along, party lines. Any member of this 124-member House may vote in any way they see fit, and that’s called a division. In our common parlance, it’s called a vote.

It’s called a division because that’s archaic language meaning, “How do you divide to one side or the other?” That reminds me of the favourite song where the line goes, “The parting on the left / Is now the parting on the right,” and that’s from The Who, probably one of the greatest rock bands in the history of rock ‘n’ roll.

We do the same thing here. We call for a division, which is a vote, and people part to one side or the other side. In fact, that was the common way of doing it back before, when assemblies such as this did not necessarily meet in one chamber, as we do on a regular basis, but sometimes met, for example, in an open field, where the king would call an assembly and all of the great powers of the land would assemble, together with their knights and retainers, and they would meet in a field. This was sometimes referred to as a “parlement,” which is an old-fashioned word employed to describe that kind of meeting. If there were a vote in the “parlement,” there would be a parting. Some people would part to the left and some would part to the right, and that’s how you would indicate how you were voting. That parting was called a division, and the division, of course, is, just as I said, an old-fashioned way of talking about how you vote.

The method that we are proposing to resolve the issues before us today is to limit the amount of further debate taken on issues that we’ve already debated an awful long time about. I don’t have the exact time allocations in front of me at this very time, but we can actually talk about each of these previous bills that we’ve already discussed and probably look back through the record and determine exactly how long we’ve discussed each bill.

The three bills were already read into the record. I was personally in this House when we debated all three of those bills. I can tell you that with regard to the greenbelt, I think we’ve had an exhaustively long discussion about that. In fact, it has actually occupied the time and attention of many members of this House, and of course, we don’t need to beat that dead horse anymore. I would imagine that members of this House would be very, very much in favour of limiting any further discussion on that bill, which we’ve already discussed at incredible length. I mean, I can’t imagine any other topic that we’ve discussed more than that. Certainly, the opposition has discussed it a lot as well. So I don’t see any reason for us to really draw that out anymore. There’s other business we need to get along to.

Similarly, on the Planning Act legislation, the same could be said. We’ve beaten that dead horse so much that it’s not to be beaten anymore. I would imagine that members of the opposition would be in a hurry to get that done, right? You would imagine they’d be in a hurry to get those pieces of legislation finalized since they’ve talked so much about it. I do want to go over how much we’ve talked about that in relation to the housing crisis, and so it’s worthy to simply go through the Hansard and see how many times the opposition has talked about the housing crisis.

I can tell you that I’ve had a brief opportunity to go through the number of times that the Leader of the Opposition has referred to the housing crisis. She referred to it most recently on November 29—that is of this year, of course—then again on November 28 of this year. Again, on November 22 of this year, she did so twice—in fact, three times. The Leader of the Opposition talked about a housing crisis again on October 24 a minimum of three times, perhaps even four times. She talked about it at length on October 23, when she delivered lengthy comments to this chamber with regard to that issue. I’m going through the comments now, and it looks like the comments take up at least three and a half pages of Hansard. Again, the Leader of the Opposition delivered a lengthy speech about the housing crisis on October 3 and—just going through the material that I have before me—took up more than four pages of Hansard records with regard to those comments. Again, on September 25, and then again on April 24—on the same date, April 24, she gave a lengthy dissertation on the housing crisis. On March 27, again, she spoke to the housing crisis, then again on March 1.

Going back to last year: On November 17, she made reference to the housing crisis. On September 7, she gave a lengthy address to this assembly of over two pages in length in the Hansard, again on the same topic, being the housing crisis. She also gave a lengthy address to this House on August 11 on the same topic, being the housing crisis.

If indeed we are to take the comments of the Leader of the Opposition at their face value, then we would imagine that the Leader of the Opposition believes that there is a housing crisis in Ontario. One would conclude that she wishes that we would proceed with as much expedition as possible, and therefore, it makes perfect sense that we do so with regard to Bill 136 and Bill 150 and Bill 154, all of which intend to deal with the housing crisis. And the faster that we can get that passed, the better we can tackle the housing crisis, of which the Leader of the Opposition has spoken of so often and at length in this assembly.

I, myself, had the opportunity to be at St. Clair College on Friday of last week, and I had the good fortune of speaking with approximately 75 students at St. Clair College. They appeared to range from the ages of 18 to 19 or 20 or 21. We had a good two-hour discussion. Of course, as is my style, I did not talk during the entire two hours; I invited them to talk to me for the entire two-hour period.

Madam Speaker, let me tell you what these young people at St. Clair College were concerned about. They were concerned about housing and, most specifically, they were concerned about their ability to purchase housing. That, I suppose, would give credence to the Leader of the Opposition and many other members of this assembly, all of whom agree that housing in the province of Ontario has become very expensive and we need to do what we can in order to put that housing back into an attainable situation so that young people, like my friends at St. Clair College, who I spoke to on Friday, can attain and purchase those houses. These young people were in a training course, and their training course was the police foundations course, and they were particularly interested in policing issues and associated issues such as that. But I can tell you, during the entire two-hour discussion, the topic that dominated the discussion was their ability to purchase houses. That was the number one topic, and so, as it is linked to these statutes or the bills that are before us today, the proposal that the bells should be rung for five minutes so that we can expedite the hearing of these bills and pass them into legislation is quite apropos, I would say.

Let’s talk about what these young people at St. Clair College told me on Friday, because, of course, it is directly related to our topic of discussion. They were interested in getting into the housing market. Some of them will graduate from their program and they will get employment and they will start at what I consider to be a very favourable salary, probably with a nice benefits package and a pension to go with it. If they land employment within the policing sector—and, of course, in order to do that, they’ll be greatly aided by other legislation that has already been passed in this Legislature by this government, and that was legislation that provided that people who are seeking employment in the policing field would be able to do so and would be able to do so faster, as long as they could fulfill certain requirements.

One of the other measures that has been taken by this government is to provide enhanced options for people to get into police colleges by waiving the tuition that applies to that college. I’m sure that’s going to be very attractive to those young people I spoke to on Friday at St. Clair College. That’s going to get them into their employment faster; that’s going to get them into a good-paying job faster. And hopefully if we can resolve the amount of supply available in the housing market by increasing the supply by a dramatic point, then those people, like these young people from St. Clair College, will be able to afford that attainable housing which all of us really want to provide.

One of the bills that’s before us is Bill 154, the New Deal for Toronto Act, and I can see that that has received a certain amount of comment since it’s been introduced into this chamber. Now, the New Deal for Toronto Act is certainly an interesting situation. It’s got certain proposals in it. One of those proposals is to return the Don Valley Parkway and also the Gardiner to the jurisdiction of the province of Ontario.

I suppose some people would look at that and ask themselves why that needs to be done or whether or not that’s a good idea or a bad idea. I suppose some people might look at that situation and say that they would like the province of Ontario, perhaps, to take over those highways because of certain reasons related to the number of people who travel into the city of Toronto on a daily basis from the surrounding areas. That is certainly something that members of this assembly know a lot about because the majority of the members of this assembly must travel into the city of Toronto in order to be at this assembly at any given time. I myself have travelled along both of those expressways. They’re no mystery to me, and I’m sure they’re no mystery to many members of this House.

The question is to what extent these are being used by people who don’t reside in the city of Toronto. I suppose there are traffic counts that could tell you the amount of traffic that’s on either one of those. Then you could extrapolate that data and determine how many people are entering the city from the exterior based on the number of people who actually reside in Toronto and also based on statistics which might suggest how many people residing in the city of Toronto actually own automobiles. Then you would have to make an educated analysis of all that data and decide whether or not the amount of traffic travelling along those auto routes is actually traffic that emanates from within the city or emanates from without the city or at the exterior of the city.

I would think that if we had done such an analysis, it would be pretty simple. It would probably demonstrate without any shadow of a doubt that those two auto routes are carrying a considerable amount of traffic that emanates from outside the city of Toronto and for people who are travelling into the city for various reasons, such as employment. That might be used as one justification for saying that the route in question might preferably be operated and maintained by the province of Ontario.

On the opposite side, of course, you could have reasons for not doing so as well, but the whole deal is exactly that: It’s a package deal. There’s give and take in any package deal, and I think that the give and take in this particular package deal is probably something that ought to be very good, not only for the city of Toronto but for the people of Ontario as well, because we want to keep Ontario moving and in order to keep Ontario moving, we have to have the routes that we’re talking about.

So that would be part of the reason why we would want to expedite the New Deal for Toronto Act, which is Bill 154.

Now, I’d like to refer to the amendment to the amendment, which is to change the ringing of the bells from five minutes to 60 minutes. I’m not quite sure why the member from Timiskaming–Cochrane wanted to change that from five minutes to 60 minutes. The debate that we’re going to have on the amendment and then the amendment to the amendment and perhaps even the main body of the motion itself will probably last longer than 60 minutes, so any member who needs to get to this assembly probably has plenty of time to get here, as long as they’re notified that we’re having this debate right now.

I would imagine that each of the parties represented in the chamber is already notifying their members that there could be a potential vote this afternoon, so it, of course, is probably redundant to ring the bells for 60 minutes. In fact, I would suspect that if we had to do so, there would be a lot of standing around. But I’m not entirely committed to not ringing the bells for extended periods of time. I can understand why members might need to have that bell rung for longer than five minutes or for perhaps five minutes. I haven’t heard quite yet an explanation as to why, but perhaps I’ll hear an explanation during this lengthy debate about why we should ring the bells that long. Perhaps I’ll be persuaded during this debate that the bells should be rung longer. I’m not a person who can’t be persuaded. Some people have persuaded me to do things that I thought I would not do. That’s pretty reasonable and fair, to talk about that.

With regard to Bill 150, which is the planning statute law, that is, of course, an issue that we’ve talked about already at length in this Legislature. It’s been the topic of conversation for quite some time, and there’s been a long, long debate about that. I think that people have had plenty of time to say what they wanted to say and get it on the record. If you were in favour of that bill, you could have stood in this House and you could have given a 20-minute speech and let the members of this assembly know how you felt about it.

I had the opportunity to do that myself. I spoke to the planning statute act, which is, at this stage, only a bill. I had my own opportunity to do that and spoke to it for quite some time. During my remarks on that particular bill, I explained the process of an official plan and how official plans are adopted and passed in the province of Ontario. During the course of that discussion, I explained how official plans are the official and basic planning document of any given municipality and that the municipalities themselves go through a very long process with regard to passing their official plans and that during that very long process there’s also a public consultation stage. During the public consultation stage, people are invited not only to send in their comments but at the same time may actually personally attend public planning meetings to give their views at a public planning meeting. That, of course, demonstrates that the opportunity to take a look at planning already has gone through a considerable public consultation process at the municipal stage, which is not to say that it can’t go through another consultation process at other stages or at other levels, but I’m just pointing out that the official plans have already been through a public consultation stage.

Therein official plans are adopted or passed by their own municipal council and then passed up to what is the higher authorizing authority for official plans. In certain circumstances, the higher authorization authority is a regional form of government. It could be a county; it could be a regional municipality. In some circumstances, for other, smaller municipalities, the authorization body is actually the province of Ontario. Those are the two situations that could apply under Bill 150.

As I’ve said, we’ve had a considerable amount of discussion and debate on Bill 150 already, and if the housing crisis, as it has been described, is to be dealt with, it might be a good idea to do it expeditiously and in particular with relation to these three bills that are before us.

I’m not sure, with regard to Bill 136, what more could be said. As I said, Bill 136 had already been the topic of a considerable amount of discussion, and I don’t see any further reason why we would be extending discussion on that any further. I think that all members of this House had more than one more opportunity to speak to that particular bill, and those opportunities were definitely used, and I think that members of this House used them very well.

To speak to the greater issue of housing: I had been talking about the approximately 75 young people that I had been having the honour of speaking with last Friday. Their main concern was getting into the housing market, and one can understand that concern because many of those people were at the age when they were going to get their first job in the relatively near future and start earning money. Perhaps some of them have already started doing that, and perhaps some of them have already managed to save a considerable amount of money and perhaps save up for a down payment.

Of course, in this housing market, to get a down payment is somewhat of a challenge. The typical down payment, if you want to avoid the CMHC financing rules, has something to do with a 20% down payment of the purchase price. If we take a very modest home in the current market and in the current atmosphere that we have today, you might find that a modest starting home might be in the neighbourhood of $500,000. Now, that of course depends on where you are in the province of Ontario, so that’s a somewhat unilateral figure that I’m choosing. If you wanted to put a down payment on a $500,000 starter home, you would need to put a down payment of $100,000 if you wanted to avoid CMHC financing rules.

That was a common thing to do when housing prices were not as high as they are today. Even with regard to today’s housing market, attempting to put down a down payment of 20% in order to avoid the CMHC’s financing rules would be a challenge for many people, because saving up $100,000, even if you have a good-paying job, is not easy to do. It might take you several years. It might take many years for some people. Still, it’s a good goal. It’s a good goal for people to have in mind, and it’s a goal that I know several people have achieved in the past.

One of our goals as a government is to make sure that in the future, going forward, the opportunities that were afforded to those of us in the past who were able to buy houses and get into the housing market are also opportunities that will be afforded to others going forward into the future, and that includes those young people I was speaking to on Friday at St. Clair College in the police foundations course.

Now, there are other rules that can apply. If you don’t attempt to get out of the CMHC financing rules, you can also put 10% down, and 10% down on a $500,000 home is $50,000. That’s a more obtainable objective—certainly more obtainable than $100,000—and that might be the objective that most people are going to try to get to these days. Of course, even if you put the 10% down at $50,000, you would then have to deal with CMHC financing, and that might entail certain conditions that you have to comply with in order to get the mortgage.

I can speak to the issue of many people attempting to deal with the down payment by, I’ll say, reverting to various methods so that they can perhaps get into the housing market earlier, and that’s what these three bills are talking about: 136, 150 and 154. All of these bills have to do with getting housing into the market and increasing the housing supply, so that by increasing the housing supply, the price of attainable housing can move downward.

One of the other things that has forced up the cost of housing supply in the province of Ontario is the increase in interest rates. Now, there was a certain point not that long ago when interest rates had gotten to a point that was so low, nobody believed they could go any lower, and perhaps the people who believed that they could not go any lower were correct, because it appears that they’re not. In fact, interest rates have now started to head in the opposite direction. Interest rates have started to increase and go up. It’s not surprising for a first-time homebuyer to now be seeking to finance a mortgage at perhaps a 5% or 6% or even 7% interest rate. Of course, interest rates are challenging, and all through life we face all sorts of challenges.

I’m about to propose a challenge to the House today, and so I will do so: I move the adjournment of the debate.

I thank the member from Humber River–Black Creek for his thoughtful comments during this debate.

I want to ask the member, with regard to prepaid cards—prepaid cards are a very common consumer purchase and, of course, they’re given frequently as gifts to other people. Sometimes, even during this season, prepaid cards become a very popular and very common purchase.

This particular bill suggests that, if passed, there shall be no expiries on prepaid cards anymore, and they shall be treated always as having no expiry date. I invite the member to offer his views and comments with regard to that proposal.