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Decentralized Democracy

Laura Smith

  • MPP
  • Member of Provincial Parliament
  • Thornhill
  • Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
  • Ontario
  • Centre Street Square Unit 4 1136 Centre St. Thornhill, ON L4J 3M8
  • tel: 905-731-1178
  • fax: tre Street Sq
  • Laura.Smith@pc.ola.org

  • Government Page
  • Mar/21/23 3:40:00 p.m.
  • Re: Bill 46 

Thank you to the member across for his comments.

This bill is all about removing red tape. We’re focusing on reducing barriers to improve services. This includes a whole-of-government plan, including the elimination of administrative overlaps.

Just as an example, currently, the WSIB is required to create both a five-year strategic plan and an annual business plan spanning three years to come. The strategic plan and the business plan duplicate content for governance and oversight. Requiring the WSIB to submit both is burdensome and a matter of red tape—and yes, those are weeds. So removing, in that circumstance, the five-year strategic plan while keeping the business plan will eliminate red tape and ensure that the WSIB focuses less time on paperwork and more time on helping the workers.

As mentioned, I did work within the system for several years. We were constantly dealing with paper. Papers get lost; people lose them. Those notices were actually sent out to people, and they would lose them; it would never get back to them. They could get into trouble. Eliminating that paperwork will modernize the court system. We do still have a requirement that—people can still ask for paper.

But actually modernizing the system and the justice system is a long time overdue, absolutely.

Following up on what I was talking about earlier, as we continue to modernize regulation, our government is committed to taking action that reduces that red tape. We’re proposing to repeal the five-year strategic plan for WSIB, and we’re focusing and proposing that this be done by providing a five-year strategic—the WSIB, also allowing them to submit a business plan that spans three years or more. This strategic plan, this business plan is not a duplicative—

TPON is utilized, I believe, by all of our not-for-profits and we want to keep them whole. The enterprise Transfer Payment Ontario system, TPON, is used for the end-to-end administration of transfer payments, from application to payment to reporting. Continuing to implement TPON will provide ministries with standardized, streamlined processes to manage and administer their transfer payment programs, resulting in more efficient and effective program delivery at a lower cost to the taxpayer. For transfer payment recipients, this system will provide seamless user experiences, reducing their administrative burden and freeing up more time to deliver key services for the people of Ontario. Through this initiative, there is a concerted focus on bringing all government transfer payments and programs and related IT systems onto TPON and driving an enterprise-wide efficiency and process.

435 words
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