Earlier this week, we had dozens of families of children with autism here at Queen’s Park with the autism coalition, who brought stories of the struggles that they face every single day, and they wanted us to listen to those concerns.

Families have been stuck in the vicious cycle of dysfunction of the Ontario Autism Program for years. Parents wait for years to get an invitation, and then keep waiting for their assessment, and then they keep waiting for their funding to be released, and then they wait to access to the programs that the child actually needs. And then, when they find access to that program, sometimes their funding deadline finishes or it starts again. This is the vicious cycle that they go through every single day here in this province. This is the reality.

The program has set a target of registering 8,000—yes, 8,000—children into the program. But the reporting from Global News shows that we have only registered 888. If the program applications were to stop today and there were no new applications, we would need 66 years—66 years—to get through the program wait-list.

Speaker, I cannot even imagine the pain some of these parents are going through. Some of them come to my office, and the tears—I cannot tell you the horrible situations they are going through. I implore this government to take a hard look at the program, invest the funding that’s necessary and make this program—

My question is to the Premier. I have been hearing from Scarborough Southwest constituents—and constituents across Scarborough, actually—who have, non-stop, for the past two days, called and emailed us with stories. And I can assure this Premier and this government that it was not just education workers or union bosses, as they would like to claim or point fingers at to blame.

In fact, it’s parents like Cristina, who is livid with this government’s blatant disregard to protect workers and ensure that her child has the quality support that the child needs in the classroom. It’s parents like Rachel, who is a parent, a volunteer and an educational assistant. It’s parents like Judy, who is a grandma to a kindergarten student and who volunteers at a food bank; she herself has seen education workers who come to those food banks because they do not make enough.

My question is simple: Why is this government and why is this minister ignoring the voices of these parents and so many others across this province?