Before the session apparently ends, I really did want to take a moment to thank all the people that keep us going here. First of all, I want to thank my caucus, my incredible team here; our House team in particular; and all of the staff in the NDP caucus, the official opposition, who are so essential to helping us hold the government to account, to do the work that we do here and serve the people who we represent.

I really want to thank the hard-working assembly staff, the Clerks and broadcast and recording services and counsel. Let’s give them all a big round of applause. They do extraordinary work every day.

Applause.

I do want to wish everybody in this room a very happy and a very safe and a very productive summer. The work does not stop; that is true. We are going to continue to work hard over the summer to offer real solutions to real people in the province of Ontario—to the real problems that people are facing. I hope everybody, again, has a safe, productive and wonderful summer.

Just consider for a moment, Speaker, how many times this government has let Ontarians down. We are starting this session with another example of that, another policy reversal.

Here’s the thing, though: There are consequences. Because of Bill 124, the privatization of health care and the growth of these for-profit nursing agencies has absolutely exploded. Ontarians want reliable, publicly delivered health care, not a publicly funded revenue stream for private companies.

Back to the Premier: If the government is going to continue backing up the policy train this session, can they make reversing their privatization of health care their next signature policy reversal?

Interjections.

Speaker, the government has had to backtrack on almost all of their major policy decisions because they met with tremendous public opposition: the greenbelt grab, unilateral municipal boundary changes, the dissolution of Peel, licence plates you can’t read, cuts to public health during a pandemic—all bad ideas that we warned you about. At this rate, they’re going to spend more time reversing their own legislation than taking the actions that would make life better for the people of Ontario, the people that they were elected to serve.

Speaker, back to the Premier: How many reversals, how many flip-flops, how many backtracks does he have to be forced to make before he realizes that his insiders-first agenda is failing Ontario?

Interjections.

I want to take, for a moment, the plan to sell off our critical services at ServiceOntario to yet another American big box corporation, like Staples and Walmart. Ontarians are so on to you. They are so on to you, and they can tell that this is another privatization scheme, Speaker, that is going to make corporations richer and not serve the people of this province.

My question is for the Premier: How exactly did Staples get a sole-source contract to open ServiceOntario kiosks?

Speaker, to the Premier: Since the Legislature was last in session, Ontarians want to know, how many government officials, including ministers’ staff and staff in the Premier’s office, have spoken with the RCMP as part of their investigation into the greenbelt scandal?

The greenbelt grab was an $8.3-billion scheme intended only to carve up vital resources in the province of Ontario for wealthy developers with connections to this government. And I will remind everyone in this room again: They are being criminally investigated by the RCMP for that scheme. It has cost this government at least two cabinet ministers. An RCMP investigation, I will remind you again, is under way. And we are still no closer to improving access to affordable housing in this province.

Today in Ontario, housing starts are down from last year, the cost of housing is skyrocketing and rents are worse than ever. Encampments have become the norm in most cities. Will the Premier finally act, support our proposal to build the affordable, non-market housing that people desperately need and bring back real rent control?

Interjections.