I thank the minister for his kind words, and again congratulate and acknowledge the hard work that he and his ministry did on this bill.

I will remind the minister that, during the pandemic, some of the hardest times we faced here in Ontario, a huge amount of gouging was happening, to the point that the Premier was on television going after—and I’m not going to name that business, in particular. At the time, he announced a consumer protection hotline and encouraged Ontarians to call it. In committee, I heard members again echo that call.

The minister says that the ministry is equipped and capable of doing this, but I will remind the minister that of the 30,000 complaints made to the consumer protection hot line, not a single one resulted in a fine or action. This, without a shadow of a doubt, shows that the ministry is either unable or unwilling to take action when necessary. This type of organization—

If you don’t want to listen to the official opposition, listen to the experts that deputed in hearings. Listen to the experts that have made submissions and continue to go out there and talk to consumer protection experts. They will tell you that this will only strengthen the ministry and provide them an ally to stand up to huge industries when they want to gouge or do other things that our consumers in Ontario do not appreciate and that harm consumers. It’s the right thing to do.

As everyone in the House knows, this legislation was supported by the official opposition at second reading. Though we believe it doesn’t go far enough, it is certainly an improvement over the 2002 act. We have stated this many times, just like I stated it during my presentation today. I have also stated this is, in fact, supportable moving forward.

We hope that the 34 amendments that were tabled, of which one was taken—that this government will take them very seriously and review these during the further consultations of the regulatory phase of this bill because they come from the experts, and they will only strengthen this legislation and improve it further.

Now, the government will probably say that the HCRA is there and they’re another regulatory body that could address that, but if you ask home warranty experts and consumer advocates who are fighting for increased protections under that, they will tell you that what exists under the current HCRA doesn’t go far enough, and they will give you countless examples that you will find in the news of developers cancelling a build and the harm that results for consumers.

It makes sense. We believe that it was a sensible request and, as such, we tabled it as an amendment and, ultimately, the government voted against it for the reasons that are theirs and theirs alone.

I would turn it back, though, simply to say this to the minister: I would consider that with those same prepaid and other cards, it’s not just about the expiry date, but many of them have other built-in mechanisms that, right at the moment that you actually activate it, you lose money right off the top. They tend to decline, administratively, in terms of balance. And, often, there’s money left on those cards that will never get used in some cases, even if you have them with no expiry date. I think that this warrants a further look, and I’m sure it’s something that many consumer protection advocates have asked for and would probably appreciate.

It was an honour to participate in this debate.

First off, I want to acknowledge and congratulate the minister and his ministry for their work on this bill.

I also want to acknowledge the presence of former minister Tim Hudak, who was there as minister for the act that this bill actually repeals and replaces.

I understand that this bill is the culmination of months and years of work, of consultation, and I know that it probably wasn’t easy. When it comes to consumer protection, you have the industry and industry players that have a lot of money and associations and power, and then you have to balance the interests of the consumers, and those who are advocating for them usually are smaller associations, advocates, individuals and academics.

My question is twofold: How did you balance those competing interests, and do you believe that there is a role in government to support those consumer protection groups who are struggling to fight Goliath in this case?