My question is to the Premier. There are many landlords across Ontario who owe tenants a lot of money—money in the thousands of dollars. Big landlords regularly ignore the requirements to reduce rents when above-guideline rent increases expire, so tenants everywhere are paying illegal rents.

Will the Premier take steps to ensure landlords follow the law and reduce rents for tenants so they can pay their bills?

My question is to the Minister of Energy. The minister recently said he would respect the city of Thorold’s resolution rejecting the increase of gas-burning power capacity in that city. Toronto city council has twice voted against expansion of gas burning at the Portlands Energy Centre. Will he respect the wishes of Toronto city council to protect the environment, protect ratepayers’ wallets and protect public health by blocking the expansion of gas burning at the Portlands Energy Centre?

Why won’t he respect Toronto city’s council resolution to take the cheaper and environmentally better route to meeting energy needs in this city?

The Toronto Star this morning reported drops in housing starts, with more drops expected, notwithstanding claims made by the government. This is dire news. It’s bad for all. It’s very bad for tenants of corporate landlords who are being mercilessly squeezed.

A constituent wrote to me the other day about the 5.5% rent increase she and others in her building are facing. As she said, “Our salaries are not increasing. Many of the people in our building are on Old Age Security, CPP or on social support.” They can’t afford an increase like that. She noted that units two years ago in that building rented for $1,300 a month and are now going for $2,000 a month.

It is no wonder that tenants—people, generally—trying to deal with the housing crisis are facing those really difficult decisions about having a roof over their head or buying groceries regularly. It’s no wonder that when I go to food banks in my riding at the invitation of those who are running them that I see large numbers of people.

Speaker, we need action on housing. We need a restoration of rent control with the end of that practice of having unlimited rent increases when a tenant moves out, we need a ban on above-guideline increases and we need substantial direct government investment in housing. People are hurting. We need the action now.

I’m pleased to introduce this petition: “Protect the Greenbelt.

“Whereas the government has removed 7,400 acres of land from the greenbelt...;

“Whereas the government Housing Affordability Task Force found there are plenty of spaces to build homes without destroying the greenbelt;

“Whereas the government’s repeated moves to tear up farmland and bulldoze wetlands have never been about housing, but are about making the rich richer...;

“Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to stop all plans to remove protected land from the greenbelt and protect existing farmland and sensitive wetlands.”

I agree with this petition. I signed it and I give it to page Sanskrati for submission.

Speaker, as you know, there are many parts to the housing crisis that people face in this province. I want to talk this morning about the soaring rents that people are facing and the crushing burdens that it places on them. Landlords right now can reset the rents at whatever the market will bear when a person leaves a unit, and that means that they do set those rents as high as they possibly can. What’s the impact? It means that young people can’t move out of their parents’ homes when they want to. It means that parents who have a new baby can’t afford to rent a new unit, because the new units will be far more expensive than the one they’re in. It means that there is a huge incentive for landlords to push out tenants so they can put in place huge rent increases.

Speaker, I call on the government to bring in real rent control, to bring in a system so that rent levels are retained at the point they were set for when a tenant was there and are not increased when someone moves out. The province needs this. People need this. The government needs to act.

Point of order.

Interjections.

Yesterday was an historic victory for Ontario workers. The courts recognized what 800,000 public sector workers and New Democrats have been saying for years: that Bill 124 is unconstitutional. That was affirmed by the courts. This is a hard-fought and long-overdue victory for workers, who deserve a government that will respect this decision and work with them to move forward.

Why won’t the Premier respect the court ruling and stop appealing yet another court loss for this government?

Given yesterday’s ruling, will the government finally admit that Bill 124 has had a negative impact on our health care system?

Under the Liberals, Ontario lost an average of 1,825 hectares of wetlands per year, and the wetlands that do remain have very little, if any, protection.

Now nearly half of southern Ontario’s remaining wetlands are at risk of being lost, with no requirements for wetland evaluation before land use changes.

To the Premier: What does this government have against wetlands? Seriously—what do they have against them?

Again to the Premier: The auditor found that along the Niagara Escarpment there is no environmental monitoring because there are no staff. Reports of violations—includeing high-risk incidents of construction of buildings—have gone unenforced. And nearly all development permit applications have been approved in the past five years, even when they went against the Niagara Escarpment Plan.

Why isn’t the Premier doing anything to protect the Niagara Escarpment?

Today, the auditor found that the province is missing in action on addressing urban flooding risks. There is no coordinated approach, no effort to protect against the loss of green space, and basically nothing to address aging stormwater infrastructure—all while this government strips revenue from municipalities and the effects of climate change are felt more every year.

Why isn’t this government doing more to protect homeowners from the devastating impact of flooding?

To the Premier: Over the weekend, CBC published new information about the amount of protected Pickering farmland owned by the De Gasperis family, who are powerful landowners and PC Party donors. CBC found another 475 acres bought by the De Gasperis family in 2020 for about $24,000 an acre. They own at least 1,775 acres of greenbelt land within the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve. They bought this land cheap because it was protected as farmland in perpetuity.

How much does the Premier suppose an acre of this land would be worth after the Premier removes it from the greenbelt and makes it available for development?

How much speculative profit is the Premier giving his friends and PC donors by removing their Pickering farmland from the greenbelt?

Does the Premier finally understand how corrupt this looks?