My question is to the Minister of Education. Humberside Collegiate in my riding is in desperate need of major repairs. When it rains, the roof leaks, the basement gets flooded, entire sections of the building must be closed off. A classroom ceiling has caved in. These are the conditions that students and teachers are learning and teaching in. It’s also a serious health and safety issue.

Minister, you know the problem very well. You have underfunded school repairs for years. Now, we’ve reached rock bottom. It doesn’t get any worse than this when it comes to building maintenance.

If the images and videos I’ve shared don’t lead the minister to fix the schools, I don’t know what will.

I want the minister to fix the schools. Are you going to fix it?

Interjections.

What I want the minister to do is take the time, go to the school and fix it. You are the Minister of Education; the buck stops with you. Fix it.

I have a petition here titled “Improve Air Quality for Our Children.” It is signed by members of family councils in schools in my riding of Parkdale–High Park.

This petition has a very simple ask: Clean air for our kids. It is asking that the House support and adopt the Improving Air Quality for Our Children Act, 2023, a bill that I have co-sponsored. The bill would require carbon dioxide level monitoring in public schools and licensed child care centres in order to measure and then improve air quality. It is backed by experts, educators and parents, and it will help ensure that kids have the best learning conditions possible.

I’m proud to table this petition, will affix my signature to it and give it to page Woods to bring it to the table.

Speaker, Ontario does not have a rare disease strategy, and that has left people living with rare diseases without access to the supports and services that they need.

The Ministry of Health established a Rare Diseases Working Group in 2016. The group did their work and presented a report to the minister with recommendations for action. That report has been ignored, has been sitting there collecting dust. So this petition is calling on the Legislature to adopt the report and to start implementing the report, as is suggested by a bill that I have tabled titled Rare Disease Strategy Act. We need to implement the recommendations so that people living with rare diseases get the support they need.

This petition is titled “Improve Air Quality for Our Children” and it is signed by parents from a local public school in my riding, Runnymede public school.

Speaker, we know that good, clean air reduces not only the spread of infectious diseases, but it also lowers chronic conditions, the rate of chronic conditions. It helps children learn better. Studies have shown that it improves attendance. It improves test scores.

But right now, in Ontario, there’s no requirement to monitor air quality either in our public schools or in child care centres. Other jurisdictions are doing it, in Canada and in the United States, and it has shown to work well in our efforts to get clean air for kids. And so, this petition is urging the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to require the Minister of Education to pass the private member’s bill that I have co-sponsored called Improving Air Quality for Our Children Act, 2024.

Speaker, we all know that for those who are living with the support of the Ontario Disability Support Program and Ontario Works, the rates for both of these programs are below the poverty line. Essentially, it is legislated poverty. The rates for ODSP have increased by very, very little, certainly not keeping up with inflation, since the rates were deeply cut under the previous Conservative Harris government and the rates for Ontario Works have been frozen. In order to be able to live healthy, dignified lives, the rates for both OW and ODSP must be doubled immediately. So this petition is calling on the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to ensure that the Ford government does just that: Double social assistance rates immediately.

Speaker, everybody in Ontario should get health care services based on our need, not based on the size of the wallet. And right now, parts of our public health care system is being privatized under this government. We know the consequences of privatization of our public health care system. It will not only worsen and weaken the public health system, it will also worsen the staffing crisis that we have. We have many examples and research to show that privatization of health care usually leads to worse health outcomes for the population.

So this petition is urging the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to immediately stop all privatization of—

Ontarians want an independent justice system, judges who are fair. The Conservatives have appointed two former staffers of the Premier’s office on the committee that selects judges, staffers who remain in close communication with the government through their roles as lobbyists.

When asked about it, Premier Ford said he wanted to appoint like-minded judges. And in the face of public pushback, what did the Premier do? He said he’s going to double down, triple down, quadruple down, even quintuple down. This might sound funny, but this is a serious issue. He’s a man on a mission.

Conservatives always talk about how meritocracy is the way to go, but it appears as long as you are with the same mindset as the Premier, you’re good to go. What happened to the fundamental principle of judges being neutral, of the impartiality of the courts? A judge who bows down to political pressure would be in clear breach of their oath of office.

Speaker, this is not only bad for the quality of the justice system but also for the perception of fairness of the courts by the public. People will feel like they’re being judged by Premier Ford, and I think it’s fair to say he’s not a good judge.

I’d like to give a very warm welcome to members of the Ontario Professional Fire Fighters Association, and a special welcome to the fire-fighters from the Toronto Professional Fire Fighters’ Association that I met with this morning: James Wenger, John Blair and John MacLachlan.

Every parent in Ontario wants our children to be able to learn in the best possible conditions. Good air quality is an important factor in the ability to learn well and ensure health and well-being. Addressing air quality in schools and child care centres helps reduce the spread of infectious diseases like COVID, RSV and flu. Good ventilation also protects against pollution and air-quality issues like wildfire smoke. It doesn’t require any behavioural changes on the part of children, teachers, education and child care workers or parents. Studies have also shown improving air quality can boost children’s test scores in math and reading.

While the Ontario government has made investments in ventilation the past few years, the government refused to set any standard for air quality or to require measurement or reporting of air quality. We have no idea what conditions are like in our classrooms and child care facilities.

We can do better. That is why my colleagues and I have tabled the Improving Air Quality for Our Children Act. Its provisions will help improve air quality in all classrooms and congregate spaces in our public schools and in licensed child care facilities. It was developed in consultation with experts in ventilation and air quality, public health experts, education and child care partners, and parents.

I hope that this government will pay attention to this broad coalition of support and do the right thing: adopt this bill to ensure our children have the best and safest learning conditions possible.

Back to the minister: There are too many irregularities with the Ontario Place procurement process that awarded the development rights to Therme. There was no fairness monitor appointed to verify fairness and integrity. There was no public information about what scoring criteria were used, if any, and the government can’t show the scorecards evaluating the bids.

There is no evidence that the government performed due diligence to confirm the source of Therme’s financing, and the entire process—more like lack of process—was overseen by a close friend of the Premier. We’ve seen this before. The government is already under criminal investigation by the RCMP for the greenbelt grab.

Will the Premier cancel the shady Therme deal?

I’d like to thank the member for his question. Don’t get me wrong; capital projects are absolutely important and needed, especially where there are communities that need schools. However, there’s also no money allocated in the budget for school repairs. Now, I can tell you, speaking as a representative from Toronto, we have many schools that are old, over 100 years old. The school repair backlog in this province is at over $16 billion. We have kids who go to school who need to wear a coat in the winter to learn. We have schools where kids can’t drink the water from the fountains because it has lead. We have kids who go to school and can’t use the washrooms because the door locks are broken. This is the state of many, many schools, and we need the government to invest in repairing the infrastructure so that kids are not learning in crumbling schools.

My question is to the member from Don Valley East. In his remarks, when he was talking about education funding, he talked about how this government is not investing enough in the supports that are needed in our schools and for our students, but also mentioned that the government was instead—I believe the word he used was “instead”—investing in infrastructure.

I believe that we need to invest both in infrastructure and in supports. As you know, the school repair backlog is at over $16 billion; under the Liberals, it was at $15 billion.

I’d like to ask the member if he could clarify his comments, and also if he believes that we should be investing in addressing the repair backlog.

The Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

The Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.