I want to thank my friend from London North Centre for his remarks this morning and for his work, and the member for Sudbury—for their work in making sure that educational opportunities are afforded to people who have interacted with our child protection system.

I wonder if the member could take any of the time now in this exchange to talk a little about any stories—we can leave the names out—of which you’re aware, where people who had interacted with child protection followed Jane’s proud example of using that opportunity to make Ontario a better place. I hear you loud and clear. That’s what we should be doing with the treasury in this province—we should be using it to make sure people can have an opportunity. So tell us about those.

I’m sure my colleague from Ottawa Centre appreciates that. I want to raise something that he raised yesterday—that we both raised yesterday—and that is the independent child advocate. In 2007, the province of Ontario established, as an officer of this Legislature, the child advocate. That child advocate was the voice for children in care, for wards of the crown. He was able to hear their voices that are very hard to hear.

I would like to know the member’s opinion on whether he thinks to it would be a good thing for the government and all of us here to re-establish an independent child advocate so that children who we are responsible for, youth who we are responsible for as the crown, will have a voice and advocacy on their behalf?

Thank you to the member for the question. I want to assure the member that the NDP would never prop up the Liberals, just as we would never prop up any government that was going to undermine the rights of vulnerable children. The NDP has been calling for the reinstatement of the child and youth advocate. That is something that is missing from this bill that there was an opportunity for the government to move ahead with. The NDP has been calling for years for an end of for-profit group homes that exploit loopholes, that take advantage of children, that are abusive to children. We saw that horrendous exposé of what is happening to some of the most marginalized and vulnerable children in a for-profit group system.

Professionals in Ontario such as teachers, physicians, and social workers have an ongoing duty to directly report a child suspected to be in need of protection. These would include children that have been harmed or neglected by parents or caregivers or suspected to be at risk to be exploited and subjected to trafficking.

Bill 188 proposes expanding this responsibility and obligation to apply to enter early childhood education—addition to a number of professionals who share in the responsibility of looking out for children who are at risk of being harmed.

Does the member opposite support adding additional eyes to look out for the best interests of young people?

Thank you, and through you, Speaker, I was just going to add that the measures contained in the Supporting Children’s Futures Act would, if passed, create a safer environment for every child out of home care. We won’t get into the specifics of profit or not-for-profit. It helps every child.

I was going to talk about the Ontario Ombudsman. It’s an important safeguard that provides rights to children of youth in care. Young people in care already have the right to contact the office of the Ombudsman; however, that’s contained in the Ombudsman Act rather than the Child, Youth and Family Services Act. And since children’s aid societies and service providers are governed by and most familiar with the CYFSA, the status quo leaves a potential gap where a youth may not even be aware of their rights.

This bill proposes to entrench details about this right and remove any lack of clarity for the rights with respect to the Ombudsman. Does the member opposite not support giving young people a stronger understanding of this right to the Ombudsman?

I hear the member’s passion in this, and absolutely, we must end for-profit child care. There’s a litany of abuse that’s been happening. There’s the reports that come out about what’s been happening, that these for-profit child care providers are generating profits, that they’re actually making money on this, on the backs of these children, and they call the children “cash cows.” They’re accumulating real estate assets from the taxpayer dollars that are supposed to be going to children’s care.

We need to get the profit out of child care, foster care. We need to make sure that all organizations that are looking after children, that their first and only responsibility is the care for those children, not for generating profits for their owners.

We’re seeing it also with Chartwell, the seniors’ home in Mississauga that’s being shut down. We’ve got 200 seniors being evicted because this company, a real estate investment trust, wants to renovict those seniors so they can make more profit. It’s appalling. The government should not be supporting, either for children’s care or seniors’ care, for-profit corporations.