—we have barely built, get this, 1,000 new affordable homes. One way we could move that forward is building fourplexes. So I want to ask the Premier to stop blocking new housing and commit to authorizing fourplexes as of right across this province.

Interjections.

I want to welcome to the House today a good friend, Nikos Alexiou from UNICEF. Thank you for being here in your House.

Speaker, that sounds like a lot of excuses.

I should not have to remind this Premier or this minister that legalizing fourplexes was a top recommendation of the government’s own Housing Affordability Task Force. There are a lot of folks right now who are disappointed that this government has not implemented this recommendation, including the Ontario Real Estate Association. It’s just another example of how this government refuses to treat the housing crisis with the urgency that it deserves.

What’s the government’s solution? Well, according to the Minister of the Environment, Conservation and Parks, it’s telling people to go to a for-profit homeless encampment instead.

Can the Premier explain why his government continues to fight the legalization of fourplexes?

The reality is that the government’s new housing bill does nothing to get housing built. It spends as much time reversing this government’s mistakes as it does putting forward any real solutions, and believe me, what it does put forward is very piecemeal.

In contrast, British Columbia’s NDP government has moved swiftly, and they are seeing results. While housing starts are down here in Ontario, they’re up 11% in British Columbia. There are new investments in non-market housing, new protections for tenants.

Why won’t this Premier implement the NDP solutions that have been proven to work in British Columbia?

Interjections.

Last week, the Premier doubled down on preventing new homes from having EV charging infrastructure. The government knows the cost of installing an EV charger during construction is so much cheaper than putting one in later. Drivers say the lack of charging infrastructure is a huge barrier for those who would otherwise own an electric vehicle.

Why has this Premier refused to make it easier for people to buy and charge an electric vehicle in their home?

Back to the Premier: Workers in Oakville are worried. Will you show some leadership, or will you leave them behind like you did with the GM workers in Oshawa?

Good morning, Speaker. This question is for the Premier. After the previous Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing resigned in the midst of a scandal and, of course, this ongoing RCMP criminal investigation, there was a real opportunity for a new minister to actually take the housing crisis seriously. But last week’s bill was weak, it was unambitious, and it lacked the vision that we need to actually get housing built. Among other shortcomings, the bill doesn’t legalize fourplexes and as-of-right, which means they’re going to remain illegal in many, many parts of this province.

A single detached home is out of reach for about 80% of Ontarians, but a fourplex apartment could be an affordable option. So why is the Premier ruling this out?

Today is the National Day of Housing and I want to acknowledge the advocacy of the many people and organizations who are taking action today.

This question is for the Premier. Ontario’s housing crisis has many causes, but I want to focus on three. The first: exclusionary zoning and the outdated planning rules that actually make it illegal to build homes people can afford in the neighbourhoods they want to live in. Ending exclusionary zoning was a top recommendation of the government’s own Housing Affordability Task Force.

So, Speaker, to the Premier: Instead of taking those recommendations, why did he waste a year giving preferential treatment to his greenbelt speculator friends?

The NDP is proposing a massive expansion of affordable and non-market housing. We want to double the current supply so people have homes that they can actually afford to live in. Back to the Premier: When will his government make the necessary investments to build the affordable and non-market homes that this province needs?

This brings me to the third cause: financialization. By ignoring non-market housing and leaving everything to the private sector, we are seeing housing being treated as a commodity, not as a human right. Under this government, we’re seeing more and more rent gouging and unethical evictions. Tenants are being unfairly displaced. We’ve even heard of a tenant in Toronto–St. Paul’s whose landlord raised their rent by $7,000 a month.

Speaker, will the Premier support the NDP’s call to bring back real rent control, or does he think that a landlord should have the right to raise a person’s rent by $7,000 per month?

To the Premier, when will your government implement the solutions that Ontarians are asking for?

Bad-faith evictions have skyrocketed under this government, yet the Landlord and Tenant Board has issued just 13 fines for bad-faith evictions in four years—13 in four years.

To the Premier: Is this because the Premier has stacked the board with his party’s unqualified friends instead of protecting the rights of tenants?

Here is another thing that this government is trying to convince Ontarians of: They’ve put a lot of effort into trying to convince Ontarians that building luxury mansions on expensive sprawl is the solution to our housing crisis. They’re even ordering municipalities to create more sprawl on prime farmland. They’re risking regions’ drinking water.

The truth is that no one out there is buying it. No one thinks that bulldozing species at risk or adding to municipal servicing costs and driving up property taxes is going to get a single affordable home built.

Speaker, my question is to the Premier. How will lower density and more sprawl make housing more affordable to Ontarians?

As rents are reaching all-time highs and corporate landlords are turning record profits, you know who aren’t affected? Those who live in co-operative housing. Co-op residents don’t have to worry about excessive rent increases because co-ops are non-profit. Co-ops are a key solution to solving the affordability crisis for low- and moderate-income households in this province, the people who are feeling the very real effects of this government’s housing crisis. Yet this government’s budget offers absolutely nothing to create more affordable co-op homes.

To the Premier, will he reverse course on his failing housing plan and start investing in co-operative housing to bring some relief to Ontarians who are truly struggling?

Interjections.

They do not seem to even understand history, Speaker. The last time a government made investments in co-op housing in this province, it was an NDP government. We helped build 14,000 co-op homes. And do you know what, Speaker? We readied 17,000 additional homes for construction, and, guess what, the Conservatives came in and they cancelled them all—17,000 affordable places to live, all gone.

But let’s look at the here and the now. If this government still refuses to build more co-op housing, the least they could do is to bring back real rent control for the people of this province.

Speaker, back to the Premier: People need homes they can actually afford to live in. So will he take action by supporting the NDP’s motion today to bring back real rent control?

Interjections.

Again, it feels like this government is living on a different planet than most people in this province, because I can tell you, you get a full-time job in this province right now and you’re at a food bank. You’re at a food bank.

How does this government expect people to get by when they create crater-sized loopholes in the only measures that keep apartments affordable? Go out there and talk with tenants, I beg you. When a tenant leaves a rental unit, there’s no limit to how much that rent can increase for the next tenant. You know what that means? It means double-digit increases. People in Hamilton saw rent increases of 26% between tenants; in Ottawa, 17%; in Toronto, a 29% increase, Speaker. Those are for the same units.

Does the government understand that they have created a system that takes away affordable housing options?

Community Living Essex told us that the wait-list for affordable housing in their region has ballooned to 5,400 people. Last year, the city of London had a wait-list of 6,000. Niagara was reporting numbers of over 9,000 households.

Municipalities are pulling every lever, but they cannot solve this housing crisis alone. Will the Premier commit today to fixing rent control loopholes and making meaningful investments in public housing?