 We'll do member statements. The member for Windsor to come see. Thank you, Speaker. We lost a community champion in Windsor yesterday. Pat Noonan was a social activist, a true warrior right to the end. She was a former nun who left the convent after 20 years because her progressive views conflicted with the teachings of the Catholic Church and women weren't treated as equals. She starred at Windsor's Feminist Movement in 1970, protesting against the statue of a bikini-clad woman being used to sell tires at a gas station. She opened a drop-in center. It became a sanctuary for battered wives. She co-founded the Windsor Feminist Theater, now the longest-running feminist theater in Canada. She was a teacher and a principal. Pat Noonan was married, divorced, and worked in a factory putting chrome on bumpers because she felt she was too insulated from ordinary life. Pat certainly was no ordinary person. An environmentalist, peace activist, and her local voice of social conscience. Three years ago, she was honored by the Council of Canadians as activist of the year. Speaker Powell, the child of the Depression, before she knew the word, she was a feminist because she couldn't accept the fact that her brothers never had to wash the dishes. She had an intense understanding of right and wrong and social responsibility. She was bold, outspoken, always had a shoulder to cry on, and at times was hilariously cheeky. They made a movie about her life a few years ago. It's titled, This Is What a Feminist Sounds Like. Speaker Wee and Windsor and Essex County mourn the loss of Pat Noonan, a role model for us all. For Markham, Florence Hill. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Each summer, Markham welcomed the annual Markham Millican Children's Festival. This is a festival that has become the Ontario largest festival. And it is an event that children and young families wait for all summer long. This festival started because of the vision and the need to bring the affordable local fund to the families in Markham and throughout the York region. As a past chair of the Markham Millican Children's Festival for over 10 years, I am proud to have let the largest children's festival in Ontario. Together with my committee, we crowned up this festival from 500 participants to over 20,000 participants with the help of 300 young volunteers. This event is an opportunity to bring together the residents and family of one of the most ethnically diverse riding in Canada. This year is an important year for the festival because it is the festival comb coming. Finally, it's coming back to the heart of the southeast part of the Markham this August 25th. At the newly opened Anin Community Central Library in the riding of Markham Tonya. Mr. Speaker, this is a true community celebration and I welcome and encourage all members of the legislative assembly to attend this wonderful festival. Thank you. Member Statements, the member for London North Centre. Thank you, Speaker. I think I can speak for the official opposition when I say over here, we're not opposed to a good beer, excepting those who abstain for cultural and or other reasons. While there are many problems with providing subsidies for wealthy multinational beer makers, including substance abuse, addiction, mental health, violence against women and more, today I'm going to solely focus on the manufacture of beer. A fantastic business in my riding, London Brew and Co-op, sourced their ingredients from nearby Ontario farms, have created good jobs, and money flows back into the local Ontario economy. Craft brewers deserve support and recognition from our government, instead of a challenge to lower standards and sell it a loss. If this government stood on the side of Ontario businesses, they would create subsidies for brewers, buying, and farm selling local produce. Instead, we see this government subsidizing multinational corporations, sending money overseas, by offering prime shelf, advertising and promotional space, all of which have an associated value, regardless of claims to the contrary. Craft beer makers across Ontario have responded to this rich get richer insider driven challenge in a more Canadian way, by investing in local communities. Stormstay Brewery in London is donating $1 from certain sales to Innova, the merger of women's community house and sexual assault centre of London. This government challenges brewers to lose money so they can make good on a promise. Why is this Conservative government making life harder for businesses, just so they can save face? Thank you. Member statements? The member for Berry Springwater, Oral Medante. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise to talk about Burles Creek event grounds. They've used this property, the property's been used for over 30 years for cultural entertainment, sports and community events. It's a pride of Simcoe County and people from all over North America come to celebrate and come to enjoy the property and its use. Most recently this past weekend, Mr. Speaker, we had boots and hearts and some 45,000 people attended from all over Canada, every province and territory, over 20 U.S. states and people beyond North America. It's just unbelievable how many people show up and enjoy the grounds. It's a pop-up city of sorts and people bring their trailers, they bring their tents, but it's a very responsible type of event. Most people that drive in are not allowed to drive out. You're there for the weekend, it's very controlled, they check rigorously as people come in and they check rigorously as you leave. But boy, there's a lot of fun to be had. And this year they had Ferris wheels and they had all sorts of things. They had tents to help with the sun and the rain and whatnot and the acts are just second to none. Alan Jackson was a headliner on Saturday night and I can tell you as you looked out over those fields, Mr. Speaker, you couldn't see the end of them. It was like looking out into the ocean and people had fun, good, clean fun and it's such a great, great, that Chattahoochee. There you go. Country and Western, Mr. Speaker. We, it was the seventh edition this past weekend and thank you. Thank you very much. The member for Kitchener Center. Hello, Mr. Speaker. Today I rise to speak about one issue that has been troubling people in Kitchener Center. Though it's not the fault of the Ford government that a promise was made to people on ODSP and OW to increase their payments to 3% and double the amount of money that they're allowed to take home before those payments are taken back, it's the responsibility of a government to run with moral integrity and empathy for those that they are governing. I'm also completely astonished that we're now finding more tropes around people that are poor that are problematic. So for instance, implying that they are manipulating the system, that they're dishonest, that they're uneducated. And so what I'd like to do is introduce a few of the people on ODSP and OW from my riding and Kitchener Center. For Kate, this cut means that she will get $18 more each month while her rent has gone up to $27 and food has increased by 2.5% in Kitchener. Kate works diligently in the community, she supports those that are less fortunate, but I guess this form of compassion means that she will have to do that on an empty stomach. Thank you. Thank you, member statements. The member for Ottawa South. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And I'd like to say a few words about safe injection sites. And I want to start off by saying I was really pleased last week when the Ministry of Health talked about extending the funding for the London safe injection site. It's the right thing to do. I was disappointed when I heard this morning that there's a pause on the other sites in Ontario that are ready to go and that the government wanted to look at evidence on either side. So the evidence is there, safe injection sites save lives. They save sons and daughters' lives. They save mums and dads. They save lives of people who are loved. And our obligation is to try and save lives. Safe injection sites do that by ensuring that if someone has an overdose, they get naloxone right away and treatment right away. You can't cure someone's addiction if they're not alive. So I would urge the Minister to look at the expert evidence from people like Dr. Jeffrey Turnbull in Ottawa who's actually heading up our efforts in Ottawa at the Shepherds of Good Hope. He's the former Chief of Staff at the Ottawa Hospital, former President of the Canadian Medical Association. The evidence is very clear. And I asked the Minister not to delay any longer in opening up those other safe injection sites. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Thank you. Member Statements. The Member for Mississauga Center. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I had the privilege of attending the Cindy Association of North America's Annual Gala. Santa Canada is a nonprofit organization that works to unite Cindy's throughout North America and around the world. The goal of this organization is to preserve the tradition and historic national rights of Cindy people while maintaining strong relationships with other ethnic communities. I was thrilled to see such vibrant and enthusiastic youth participation at Santa Canada. These young people understand the importance of celebrating and preserving their cultural heritage, essential to our great Canadian mosaic. Mr. Speaker, I commend the important work of this organization in supporting new Canadians. My writing of Mississauga Center is home to many members of the Cindy community and I am proud of their many contributions to our city and our province. Lastly, Mr. Speaker, I'd like to take this opportunity to express my heartfelt gratitude to Jim Munir, President of Santa Canada, for his gracious hospitality this past weekend. Thank you. The Member for Kiwetanom. Mr. Speaker, I just want to quickly want to speak about the bringing of the Sir John A. McDonald statue from Victoria to Ontario. I just want to let the House know that I went to residential school and that it's very important to me to express my voice and many survivors like me about this matter. When in 1987, I was quite aware of the strapping that happened and this is 1987 and it's sometimes very difficult to listen to some of the approaches and even especially today when I heard about this, this was happening. What First Nations people didn't hear previously when this House came in was reconciliation and the thrown speech or anything from the Minister of Engineers Affairs. And you know, question I have for me was how was the decision made without any First Nations leadership in Ontario on this decision to bring this statue? Further, the governments also pressed pause on the TRC curriculum writing and how much will it cost for the statue to be brought here? And so, and one of the things I want to say is I want to applaud the City of Victoria for making such a strong statement in favour of reconciliation for our people. When will this government make theirs and when's the humanity in that? Thank you. Member Statements, the Member for Berry and the School. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm honoured to be able to welcome someone that I look up to as a role model and mentor in the legislature today. Peter Van Loon, who's sitting up in the gallery of us today, was elected as Member of Parliament for York, Simcoe in 2004 and has been delivering change for the better ever since. He has dedicated, he's been a dedicated and loyal servant to not only his constituents but for all of Canada. He has always treated his position with respect and with dignity and I applaud him for the work that he has done over the years. He has the best voting record of any MPP in the entire House of Commons having attended 637 out of 639 votes. His dedication to protecting and restoring Lake Simcoe has led to our beautiful Lake being the jewel of our community once again. Peter Van Loon, or PVL as he is commonly known, is a true patriot. He looks up to Sir John A. MacDonald and even has named his son after the leader of our confederation. When he announced his retirement, I know a lot of us in the area were really humbled and saddened to see him go but no, he will always make our country and Ontario a better place. As a minister, he improved our correction system. He enhanced our national security and he played a critical role in expanding Canada's free trade with many countries worldwide. Thank you, honourable Peter Van Loon. Member Statements, the Member for Whitby. Thank you, Speaker. Baseball should be a field of dreams for all who want to be involved in the game and that's why, Speaker, it's so important that a dream comes to fruition to construct a fully accessible diamond in Whitby for all special needs children in Durham to showcase their abilities. What started out, Speaker, as the Whitby Challengers Baseball League with about a dozen players four years ago, has grown into a Durham-wide league and now has more than 70 players from the ages of five to 20 with some exceptions, turning out and playing the game they love. Speaker Challenger Baseball allows children with cognitive or physical disabilities to enjoy the benefits of participation in baseball at a level that is structured to their abilities. Speaker, the town of Whitby has been most accommodating to the needs of Challenger Baseball and best to the credit of Mayor Mitchell and his council, offering the league a parcel of land at Willow Park in a northeast side of the town for its diamond. The diamond project is expected to cost about $350,000 and with the support of town council speaker, a target date for the opening of the baseball diamond is late 2019. Speaker, this diamond will provide the type of opportunity and to help these young men and young women fulfill their aspirations and it's to the credit of all those involved with Whitby Challenger Baseball that this is happening. Thank you, Speaker. Thank you, that concludes our time for our member statements this afternoon. Reports by committees.