My thanks to my colleague for his presentation today. I would ask him if he could talk a bit more about the impacts of this budget on his riding with regard to health care and education. You were just talking about education, but perhaps you could expand further.

Speaker, there are a lot of questions for the Minister of Education. His ministry is responsible for TVO, which has done high-quality programming work for years on public affairs and children’s programming. In the last four years, funding to TVO has been frozen or dropped while inflation has relentlessly driven costs upwards. The budget for content and programming at TVO dropped by well over 10% between 2021 and 2022, and this year’s estimates from the Minister of Education are certainly nothing to be happy about.

I have to ask, why is TVO management trying to starve TVO programming? TVO public affairs programming and children’s programming are literally award winners in this country. And yet, both the ministry and TVO management seem to be committed to slowly—maybe not so slowly—making it more and more difficult for programming to be made here in Ontario. What do they have against high-quality programming being made in this province?

Actually, the Premier does have a choice. He could make a good offer. He could make a difference in the lives of our children and our education workers.

Speaker, the Premier says education workers are little guys, little gals. This government thinks it’s okay for them to have to use food banks. The Premier is acting like a bad boss. When bad bosses disrespect and underpay people for long enough, those people quit; they walk. It won’t be just Friday or next week that parents have to worry about if education workers leave the profession; it’s the future of their kids’ education.

If the Premier won’t rip up his anti-worker legislation for the sake of kids, parents and education workers, will he do it to avoid getting booed in public again for acting like a bad boss?

Interjections.

If the Premier won’t rip up his anti-work legislation for the sake of kids, parents and education workers, will he do it to stop embarrassing his own labour minister?

Speaker, a question to the Premier: This Premier likes to claim that he’s for the little guy, but the littlest people in this province will pay the biggest price if he keeps up his attack on education workers. Our kids count on caring adults in the classroom, and this government is going to drive them out the door permanently. That will mean less support for kids with disabilities, less support for the youngest students and less safe schools. If the Premier won’t rip up his anti-worker legislation for the sake of kids, parents and education workers, will he do it to salvage his so-called brand?

Speaker, to the Premier: Over the last few days, many Ontarians have written to New Democrat MPPs to share stories of the role that education workers play in supporting kids in our schools. The common thread in all of them is that, despite the best efforts of this government to starve our education system of resources, the quality of kids’ education is being protected because of the hard work of education workers and teachers.

At the end of the day, it’s our kids who are going to pay the price if this Premier and his minister don’t get back to the bargaining table. Will the government commit to scrapping Bill 28 and bargaining in good faith today?

Interjections.

My question is to the Premier. But before I ask it, I’ll just assure the Premier that the members of those unions, who are providing our children the support today, want what has been put forward, and any suggestion that their wishes aren’t being represented is simply not accurate.

Speaker, education workers are critical to our schools. They’re the librarians who help our kids develop a love of reading. They’re the educational assistants who go above and beyond to help those children who are dealing with disabilities. They’re the secretaries who keep our schools running. But instead of valuing these workers and paying them a fair wage, listening to what they want and actually meeting them at a fair point, the government is determined to drive them right out of our schools.

Why does the government have such a hard time recognizing the important role education workers play in our schools?