 statements I recognize the member from willowdale thank you very much good morning to you speaker it's my privilege to rise in the house today to recognize the work passion and vision of a great community leader a great friend who grew up in north york john guttsis johnny g is his friend's column is a passionate textile artist who works high and highlights and pays homage to ontario's history as part of the canadian tapestry and texture center johnny g collaborates every day with canadian artists and art professionals who share his vision of bringing canadian stories to the forefront at home and around the world through their work with tapestry johnny g and his colleagues create lasting memorials that connect community members from across canada with each other and to our shared history they remind us all the importance of helping to tell canada's magnificent story through exhibitions and workshops the canadian tapestry and texture center inspires canadians of all ages and works to attract international textile artists to help them develop their skills needed to create beautiful tapestry these works of arts mr speaker can take over 450 hours to complete here in ontario we're lucky to have talented and skilled individuals like johnny g and so this morning speaker i want to congratulate johnny g on his continued success and thank him for supporting ontario's arts community sorry i missed the reveal of your latest piece i'll be sure to be there next time gg must be very proud of you you the man johnny thank you once again i'm going to remind members that we are currently in member statements and i realize people are coming and going and people are catching up with each other please keep the private conversations as low as possible so as to allow the member to make their statement so that i can hear the member member statements the next member is toronto st paul's speaker one of canada's last standing independent children's bookstores mabel's fables an iconic landmark within our mount pleasant village is under attack by this government and the previous government's eglinton cross-town construction delays and by a new predatory landlord who increased rent by 70 percent mabel's fables owner elinor lafave is a woman entrepreneur and the keeper of 32 years of beloved memories created in her small business which doubles as a community second home for everyone who was visited in the bookstores are the vibrant cultural dna of our communities they are a lifeline for local authors elinor and other small businesses fighting for their right to exist are exhausted their family savings physical and mental health depleted in elinor's words three million dollars spent on marketing is misguided this is too late reform the punishing municipal property assessment corporation help us with a refund on property taxes what about rent control for small businesses provide us with mental health workers elinor is terrified of the looming retail apocalypse if this government doesn't stand up for small businesses and i couldn't agree more conservatives three million dollars is a band-aid solution it is a day late and a dollar short in the meantime though speaker we are all going to continue to shop on eglinton and we're going to bring our friends from across ontario to shop drink eat do it all until we drop thank you very much the next statement to member for miss saga east miss saga east cooksville thank you very much uh mr speaker and good morning uh this morning mr speaker i would like to acknowledge and share an announcement that was held in my great writing of miss saga east cooksville on march fifth a new child care center caring for kids opened up to serve our local community in providing high quality licensed child care services cooksville parents have spoken loud and clear that they want to see greater choice and affordability in our child care system mr speaker this grand opening event was an opportunity for us to celebrate the collaborative effort and partnerships that has resulted in the opening of this wonderful center that will offer quality licensed child care for our families i would like to thank caring for kids and the region of peel for your dedication to opening this new center in our community and working alongside our government to make this a reality our government is committed to investing in quality child care and early learning for families caring for kids is a start and will led by example to other areas in the city of miss saga to the vital importance in having high quality licensed child care services thank you very much mr speaker thank you very much the member for kinkston of the islands it's been a while since i've had to sit through the name promise made seal talk from the other side it's been nice and there's a reason we haven't had to hear that orchestrated self-indulgent back padding because well they're having a hard time keeping any promise let's review they set class sizes at 28 then 25 now 23 they introduced mandatory e-learning now there's an opt out they canceled the francophone university now it's being built they destroyed supports for autistic children currently bungling the repair job they vowed to cut children's aid funding by 28 million but with pressure they still have kept the old funding model they plan to stop the transition child benefit for low-income families but thankfully were forced to keep it they've cut funding to public health then they reversed it although it's worth noting speaker that despite covid-19 they have yet to make that permanent reversal permanent the axe promise funding for rape crisis centers faced with outrage partially revoked that cut made invisible license plates denied it for months and now we have the old ones they tried to open the green belt for development twice and you can guess what i'm going to say here backtracked on that too they brought back patronage appointments that had not been used in decades so the premier's previous chief of staff could hand out jobs to his pals and then they were forced to fire them speaker with one failed project after another how can unterrence possibly trust this government to lead in a time of actual crisis between the unaddressed housing crisis the coronavirus pandemic and the climate emergency how can we have faith in a government that has bungled every single one of its decisions next we have the member for northumberland peter borough south thank you mr speaker i'm pleased to speak today to a truly remarkable organization in my riding cornerstone family violence prevention center cornerstone received funding last year from the government of Ontario to build an addition to help expand service delivery and supports for victims of family violence i'm excited to be attending the ribbon cutting on friday to celebrate the opening of the space which will be utilized as a counseling space to deliver one-on-one supports including counseling family court supports and housing support services the space is a softer more comforting place to experience these services and will help to increase cornerstone's capacity enabling 30 percent more people to receive support if needed the space is a welcomed addition to the programs cornerstone offers women and children in northumberland county i would like to thank the truly remarkable staff and board at cornerstone family violence prevention center for their continued work and commitment to ending violence against women i would also like to acknowledge cornerstone's international women's day lunch last week which unfortunately i was unable to attend this year which was a great success in our community and thank everyone who attended in closing mr speaker we know that far too often gender-based violence targets women indigenous women racialized women new canadians and women in rural and northern communities like mine together we must do better mr speaker to end violence against women thank you member for northumberland peter borough south will come to order whoever over on the opposition side is yelling back i don't know who it is come to order we're in member statements order okay stop it member statements the member for scarborough gildewan thank you speaker speaker i rise today in support of our local community legal clinics and to implore this government to stop the cuts to legal aid ontario i've received dozens of letters from my constituents who have access who access services at the scarborough community legal services our local community legal clinic and these letters are from the most vulnerable members of my community from refugees from new canadians odsp recipients and low-income rental tenants the average household income in my writing is below well below the city and the provincial average the message from my constituents is clear they would not be able to afford essential legal assistance had they not been able to receive the services provided by their local community legal aid clinic earlier this week the neither smarter nor stronger report highlighted concerns with the government's proposal to cut services to legal aid ontario including the removal of language referring as well as referrals to low-income clients legal aid should not should focus on the needs of those who need to access justice speaker we should not be cutting services to legal aid we should not be putting this burden on the most vulnerable people in our communities the government needs to look at the bigger picture and ensure fair and equal access to justice and legal services in our community and stop these ridiculous cuts thank you speaker thank you very much the next statement the member for toronto center i want to talk about one of my constituents who is here with us today carlin elijah mcgrail is a playwright who lives in university rosdale he just celebrated his 25th birthday carlin has type one diabetes before his birthday the ohit plus program covered the cost of his insulin and glucose monitoring tests that carlin needs to manage his diabetes but now he's 25 he no longer has any coverage these costs now cost a carlin over 300 a month and that's a lot of money leading up to his birthday carlin reached out to my office with a series of letters he sent me one every single day he talked about his life his goals and he's planned to write a play about the discovery of insulin i learned a lot while reading these letters in one carlin wrote about the scientists who discovered insulin he said the hippocratic oath was clear that it would be wrong to make money of something that would help humankind i agree carlin should not have to pay out of pocket and risk financial uncertainty for the one thing that keeps him alive we need a universal pharmacare program a program where insulin and medications would be available to everyone regardless of their ability to pay i have made copies of carlin's letters and will be giving them to the minister of health i look forward to following up with the minister on this important issue thank you for coming today carlin and i say thank you to the member for university rose deli apologize for getting your writing name wrong member statements the member for mississauga lakeshore thank you speaker a week ago i hosted the first ever blind hockey night at the poor credit arena in mississauga lakeshore it was great to see so many families attend the special event together we raised over six thousand dollars for the canadian national blind hockey team and for the mississauga hockey league play more program which helps supporting hockey families that need financial assistance speaker i want to take this opportunity to thank a few volunteers christina scanny and mark demontus this evening would never have happened without that you and thank you to the minister of seniors and accessibility for joining us along with my colleague from the treasury board arora oak ridges richmond hill and thank you to nicolas canadi and the mississauga steelheads who joined us and donated 500 tickets one for everyone who attended this event and thank you to the peel police for joining us and to park para sport tv for broadcasting this event and thank you to the former toronto maple leaf brad boys for joining us and playing with both team rudy and the national blind team after a trade during the first intermission the blind team won five to four but we all win every time we demonstrate the sports are for everyone and that's what we did wednesday night and thank you to everyone that attended this event the next statement the member for brampton east thank you speaker brampton is the ninth largest city in canada we are one of the fastest growing cities and we are facing a health care emergency the situation is so bad that in our hospital thousands of people are treated in the hallways and a hospital that's already overcrowded and underfunded for 15 years the liberal government made a decision they decided to not invest in our city's health care and since getting elected the conservative government has taken the situation from bad to worse the situation is so dire that the city of brampton has declared a health care crisis the conservatives can't ignore this issue any longer people's lives are at risk now with the threat of COVID-19 spreading across the world including cases here in the gta the regional appeal and the city of brampton people are really worried they are worried about how our health care system that is already suffering from the cuts made by this conservative government going to handle the possibility of this virus spreading here in Ontario and frankly they shouldn't have to worry because the people of Ontario have a fundamental right to public health care that is adequately funded cuts to health care hurt us all especially at times like this that's why we in the NDP will be fighting these cuts and working to make sure that the people of Ontario have access to the health care that they need and deserve thank you speaker member for Hastings Lennox and adding to well thank you mr speaker college in the global challenges of preventing treating and working with COVID-19 we've heard many stories of angst of heartbreak of frustration and of fear today in contrast i'd like to commend the men and women of CFB Trenton and the people of an entire community in region for the collective response when confronted with receiving repatriated citizens from across canada i refer specifically to just under 200 Canadians repatriated from Wuhan china and now just over 200 more from the diamond princess upon their arrival at CFB Trenton the air transport capital of canada they are processed and quarantined by a broad spectrum of health care professionals military personnel and community volunteers not only are they cared for using strict medical protocols but many members of the community then have stepped forward and with books with treats with videos and gifts and more during the entire quarantine period they spend there this outpouring of generosity and concern in my mind truly reflects the caring nature of the bay of 20 communities surrounding the Trenton airbase so to all involved i say thank you for making the best of a difficult situation in the most canadian way thank you very much that concludes our member statements for this morning