“To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

“Whereas, to address the budget for seniors, the Ontario government has proposed to make changes to expand the eligibility of the Guaranteed Annual Income System, GAINS, starting in July 2024, which would see about 100,000 more low-income seniors receive payments for a 50% increase in recipients, and proposing to lower the rate at which the benefit is reduced from 50% to 25%, which means a senior can keep more of their benefit as their private income increases, and proposing to adjust the benefit annually to inflation to continually put more money in the pockets of eligible seniors; and

“Whereas the government of Ontario is investing more than $174 million over two years, starting in 2024-25 to continue the Community Paramedicine for Long-Term Care Program, which leverages the skills of paramedicine to provide additional care for seniors in the comfort of their own homes; and

“Whereas Ontario is continuing to make progress on its plan to build modern, safe and comfortable long-term-care homes for seniors and residents, and through planned investments that total a historic $6.4 billion since 2019, Ontario is on track to build more than 31,000 new and over 28,000 upgraded beds across the province by 2028, and that the government is helping to increase long-term-care capacity in communities across the province by providing development loans and loan guarantees to select non-municipal not-for-profit homes;

“Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to urge all members of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to support the passage of the Ontario budget bill, Bill 85, Building a Stronger Ontario.”

I will affix my signature to this petition.

I want to thank my colleagues for their speeches today.

I’m so proud of this government. You look at looking outside the box—we know that health care cannot be done the same way over and over and over again. We see that with our parents, our grandparents and our kids. We need to do better, and that’s exactly what we’re doing.

Even the announcement last week about 13 common ailments that can be fixed by our pharmacists—that’s great news for anybody, all of our constituents. Regardless of your political stripes, you can’t tell me that that senior is not saying thank you because they can go right down the street and get ear infection or pink eye infection medicine versus having to wait for their doctor.

When it comes to the status quo, we all know—