To the member from Essex: I can absolutely agree that Ontario has excellent educators who are dedicated to student and understand the students’ needs. It’s unfortunate that in the creation of this legislation this government completely ignored the voices of the professionals, of the people who are on the front lines. We see this time and again. We see that this government ignored health care workers when they created Bill 124. We see that they’re ignoring education workers and education staff when they created Bill 98.

What also concerns me, Speaker, is that this could just be a smokescreen for yet another land grab. We’ve seen this happen before, in Bill 23, which is a way to monetize the greenbelt for only certain folks. We see, in Bill 69, the Reducing Inefficiencies Act, the government also grabbing hold of real estate rights. And we see it yet again in Bill 98. This is a government that thinks “father knows best,” and they want to dictate to everyone how they should operate.

We’ve seen in Ontario’s classrooms how educational assistants are provided to schools in a way that makes no sense. First of all, the money that the government gives to school boards for special education, the school board has to also add to that tens of millions of dollars. Frequently educational assistants will often be shared—

In my time as an educator, I remember when we would hear over the PA system a code yellow. A code yellow is when the teachers are meant to lock their doors because there is a threat in the hallway. Then, what every student in those classes would hear is a child being dragged from the school, kicking and screaming and swearing and yelling. It was not that child’s fault. That child was clearly not getting the assistance they needed. However, it affected everyone in the school.

Schools are places where there should be a social worker who can deal with folks. Kids need help, and we need to make sure they get it when and where they need it. Part of that solution is in schools. For this government to wash its hands and to claim that there are going to be services in the community is yet another finger-pointing exercise where this government does not want to fund education properly.

Yesterday, the member from Burlington talked about all of the mental health care workers in school. I would suggest to the associate minister that they talk to their own member, and make sure that they get that clarity of message and actually deliver what they promise.

But the government can also travel and discuss with relevant stakeholders. In fact, we discussed the pre-budget submissions with the government. The Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs travelled the province. We heard from many education stakeholders who talked about the violence in the classroom. They talked about the cuts in funding that have been experienced under this Ford government.

Quite frankly, it’s disturbing to see how this government has turned a blind eye to all of the cuts they have made, all while patting themselves on the back for the shell game of federal funding in the form of child care, as the member from Parkdale–High Park has pointed out. It’s really disturbing that this government has really shortchanged Ontario families and Ontario students. Students are worth it. Education is an investment, not a cost.

But what I want to get into this government’s ear—and I want them to listen to it, and I would hope that they understand, Speaker—is the problem with the funding formula. The funding formula in this province distributes money as if students are the same. It’s a cookie-cutter model whereby they all receive the same amount of money, and then purses of money are given to school boards with the hope that they’re going to be spent on special education. Even if they are spent on a student, there’s no guarantee that they’ll be spent in a developmentally appropriate way. There are no guarantees.

The NDP has long advocated for an overhaul of the funding formula, such that this government does the right thing, is accountable, is responsible and makes sure that that funding gets out the door to that student, who needs it, in a way that is appropriate. That’s on the government.

In terms of mental health funding, OECTA has pointed out that in the 2022-23 GSN documents, they “indicate a $38-million increase in the Mental Health and Well-Being Grant over the previous year’s total,” but that figure, as they state, “is deceptive. In reality, $25 million (or 65%) of this increase is not new funding—the government has simply moved into the GSNs monies that had previously been allocated under Priorities and Partnership Funding....”

Again, we see this government taking credit for other people’s money or pretending old money is new money. It’s a shell game. It’s deceptive. It’s not fair to students. I urge the government to actually listen to the Auditor General and the Financial Accountability Office—

It’s an honour for me to rise and add the voices of the great people of London North Centre to debate on this bill that we have on the floor today, Bill 98, Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act.

The first thing, like the member for Parkdale–High Park, that I would like to focus on is the title itself. The title, Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act, clearly puts students as secondary. They’re not even at the beginning of the title of this bill—and it’s not even about students; it’s about outcomes.

When you take a look at this bill, it’s very clear that the well-being of students in Ontario is not a concern for this government. Had that been a concern for this government, there would have been collaboration. There would have been communication. There would have been consultation with the people who know students best. Those include education staff, parents. But instead, we have not seen any consultation. We’ve seen that this government has bullied forward with this piece of legislation, and there will be consultation after the fact, which makes it a mere exercise for the actual democratic process.

This is also what some would say is a smoke-and-mirrors exercise for a government that refuses to properly fix or fund the education system. It’s hard for people in the province to trust this government. Since 2018, we have seen tremendous attacks and cuts on our schools. In 2018, there was the overt attack on the health and phys ed curriculum. We saw the government set up a snitch line. We saw a bogus consultation process, and we also see a shell game that they have enacted with privatization of education, quite frankly, making sure that private schools had the rapid COVID tests before our publicly funded schools.

So the public is really less likely to trust this government as being the protectors of public education, because they also decided to launch this legislation as a surprise attack on a Sunday.

ETFO correctly points out that this was the second time in two days that ETFO was caught off guard by Ministry of Education announcements, demonstrating clear lack of consideration and respect for education stakeholders. OSSTF’s Karen Littlewood said that this legislation “has very little in terms of supports or resources for students, despite its misleading title.... This legislation seems primarily focused on how school boards operate, and not how on we can better support students and make up for the learning loss experienced during the pandemic.”

This legislation, Speaker, sees students used as pawns.

Mental health shows up a total of four times in this bill, and it’s only in terms of policies and guidelines; it’s not in terms of actually making sure mental health supports are there for our students when and where they need them. Despite the claims of this government, it is not in the bill.

The Ontario Public School Boards Association, in the pre-budget consultations stated, “A continued increase in the number of school-based mental health professionals (social workers, psychologists, guidance councillors, child and youth workers, school mental health workers) to address the significant increase in the number and severity of students requiring support,” yet we don’t see the government funding this properly.

And from the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association, Barb Dobrowolski says, “Since coming to office in 2018, the government’s agenda has been gutted by ideology rather than evidence. Policy decisions have been made with little thought, foresight or genuine consultation with stakeholders and experts, the consequences of which have been to destabilize public services. Enough is enough.”

Barb also goes on to state, “misleading statements that government officials offer in public, like when they claim to be making historic investments in education while conveniently ignoring that funding does not keep up with inflation”—it’s shocking, Speaker. We see this very calculated, very concerted shell game. We hear the government claim that they’re making tremendous investment, but yet we actually see funding going down. We see that students are now receiving $1,200 less per year, per student, because of this government’s cuts.

We heard at the standing committee in the pre-budget consultations that this government is also trying to create a crisis in education. Everyone remembers back when John Snobelen was caught on a hot mike saying that they needed to create a crisis in education, and the same is true now. This bill purports to refocus Ontario’s education system, but we don’t need a refocus. We need to make sure that schools have the resources that they need. In the government’s own materials, they contradict themselves. They state that Ontario is among the top-performing education systems nationally and internationally, and then they go on to say that they want to overhaul the system. It’s disturbing, Speaker.

I also want to return to some of the focuses of this bill, because this bill does seem to focus—or the government will claim this bill focuses on trades and apprenticeships, when it doesn’t get pointed out in the bill frequently or at all, and remind this government that it was the Mike Harris government that ripped trades classes out of schools. They destroyed that program so that grade 7 and grade 8 students would have that experience of working with their hands, of understanding that this was a viable and very rewarding experience, to build, to create. And it was continued by the Liberals, because that was never returned to schools. That is a loss. Expecting students that are going to be exposed to this in high school—it’s too late; it’s too late, Speaker. Students often are faced with a choice. They choose arts or music or trades as one of their electives. It’s incredibly unfortunate.

But also, this government seems to undermine the very nature of what education is itself. I’d like to also consider that in the creation of Bill 98, the Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act, this government has not even abided by the skills that students need in Ontario’s classrooms. We hear a lot about leadership, about collaboration, about communication and critical thinking, and this government has displayed none of those things. They have not communicated. They have not collaborated. They haven’t even shown critical thinking by talking to the very experts in education. Instead, they’re bulldozing forward with their plan.

David Moscrop from TVO says that the government is hoping to “reshape the province’s education plan, gearing it toward ideas that are more reminiscent of plans for an early 20th-century ... factory than a contemporary society.” He also goes on to talk about the immortal poet William Butler Yeats, who is frequently cited in education circles, who stated that education was not the act of filling a bucket, but of lighting a fire. It’s about inspiration. It is about showing students what is possible. It is about igniting curiosity and showing them the skills that they have. As a former educator myself—a teacher librarian, in fact—I could see the difference: When you could get the right book into a student’s hand, it would change their life.

It’s just incredibly shocking that this government is bulldozing ahead with this without any real consultation, any real collaboration. They simply don’t understand what’s necessary.

The members from Niagara Falls and from St. Catharines have talked about the students going hungry because of this government not funding school nutrition programs. We’ve seen it in the London area as well. In London and Middlesex county, there’s a program, the Ontario Student Nutrition Program, which feeds 25,000 students at 89 schools weekly. They’ve seen an overall increase of 900 students and four schools over the previous academic year. Not only that, Danielle Findlay, who’s one of the organizers of the program, pegs the cost of a healthy snack around $2.50 per student. Do you know what the province pays, Speaker? Just 75 cents.

Just to conclude, I want to again, in the brief time I have, return to the words of David Moscrop, who says, “The Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act should be thrown into the wastebin and forgotten, and the government should take its boot off the neck of local school boards. If the government wishes to improve education, it can spend more on teachers and reduce class sizes. That’s a fine way to make space for learning that will pay all sorts of dividends to a free and democratic society.”

Speaker, this ham-handed, lacklustre, ineffective way of addressing the crisis in our education system is shown in Bill 98. We need more mental health care workers in schools. We need to address violence in schools. For heaven’s sake, Speaker, Bill 98 does not mention violence once, and we know it is something that is happening everywhere.

It’s time for this government to put on its big-boy pants, and to do the right thing and fund education properly.

I’d like to thank the member from Thunder Bay–Superior North for her presentation and also speaking to her expertise in the field of education. Myself, I am also a trained educator.

When we hear this government use terms like “back to basics,” it really does betray an ignorance about education itself. When discussing special education learners or, really, education at large, often the analogy is used of animals: You can’t teach a fish to climb a ladder nor can you teach a giraffe to swim. But there is the concept of Gardner’s intelligences, whereby each student learns in very different ways, whether a visual learner, an auditory learner, a kinesthetic learner.

What concern me the most were member’s comments and the government’s discussion about ideological sameness across boards. Is this similar to the notion of disrespecting individual learners and expecting sameness based on ideology rather than reality?

I’d like to thank the member from London West for her comments and for showing how this piece of legislation does not have any focus on student achievement and well-being whatsoever. It comes down to the funding. The member has shown how this government has cut $1,200 per student since 2018 and how the math investment that they would like to pat themselves on the back for amounts to about 50 cents per student. Adding one educator for 6,650 students—that’s one big classroom.

I would like to ask the member, how could this government modify this legislation to actually address student outcomes first and foremost?

I’d like to thank the member from Ottawa West–Nepean for her excellent presentation. I’d like to thank her, as well, for bringing forward the concerns of parents, students, education workers, and trustees from across the province. It’s clear that these voices are not reflected in Bill 98—it’s clear that they were not consulted.

As the member has pointed out, mental health—there are four mentions of it within this legislation, and it only relates to policies and guidelines. There are not any additional resources.

Also, I find it quite concerning, after listening to the member’s presentation, that violence does not appear in this legislation even one time—not even one instance.

My question to the member is, if the government wanted to show legitimate and authentic care for students with special needs, how would they update GSNs in the funding formula?

As a trained educator myself, I have some concerns with Bill 98, because we see Bill 98 as legislation that has been developed without consultation with educators, with trustees, and without consultation with parents or with students. It’s another cart-before-horse exercise, which we’re so familiar with from the Liberals before. They made drastic changes to education without consulting the community.

During the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs pre-budget consultations, the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association—and this is Barb Dobrowolski—said, “Since coming into office in 2018, the government’s agenda has been gutted by ideology rather than evidence. Policy decisions have been made with little thought, foresight or genuine consultation with stakeholders and experts, the consequences of which have been to destabilize public services. Enough is enough.”

The government has reached out and said that they will hold public consultations and allow public input by mid-May. Is this a public relations exercise, or will the government pass amendments to this legislation brought forward by the official opposition?