A Tense Christmas Season at Queens Park

December 2nd, 2024, Toronto, Ontario

A lengthy snowfall swept its way through southern Ontario during the last hours of November, so that when this reporter travelled to Toronto for the December 2 session of Queens Park, it felt like a winter wonderland. Certainly not every part of the city streets elicited a joyous wonder - the sight of a person shriveling up on the sidewalk wrapped around their sleeping bag was common. But entering the parliamentary premises, the bright lights and ornaments shining down in every direction screamed of a holiday spirit, and inside, on the top of the grand central staircase, sat a Christmas Tree.

{One of several decorations, the Christmas Tree sits outside of the Legislative Library}

At 10am, an alarm ringing to a consonant musical interval sounded throughout the legislative building, signaling parliamentarians to enter the chamber. Before long most of the 124 MPP’s were seated and brought to order by the speaker of the house. Shortly into opening member statements the house descended into disarray, as MPP’s began talking amongst themselves, making it difficult to hear some oral remarks from the press gallery. Premier Doug Ford entered the chamber with his Energy minister Stephen Leece, turning his back towards the opposition before eventually taking a seat. After the Lord’s Prayer, a land acknowledgment, and a children’s choir sang ‘O’Canada’ in both languages from the public gallery, question period commenced.

Leader of the Opposition Marit Stiles rose, immediately accusing the government of criminal activity.

“There’s an active investigation going on, and they deleted the evidence!”.

Stiles was referencing what has become known as ‘the greenbelt scandal’, in which the conservative party is accused of colluding with real estate interests during an attempt to develop former environmentally protected areas. Development has since been cancelled, and the RCMP are in the midst of an investigation.

Assistant Minister Will Bouma responded by saying the loss of records was an “inadvertent accident”, and the government is focused on “what is important to the people of Ontario”, listing affordability, housing and infrastructure development.

Characterization as “accidental” provoked a strong reaction from opposition parties, who once again asked the Premier, with an extra might of passion, to explain himself. When Ford did not look up from his phone, and Bouma was set to once again respond, Stiles told the speaker:

“Will he get off his personal device and answer the question: Is this a cover up?”

The questioning eventually transitioned into health care, where an argument largely centered around the validity of statistics arose.

“1 in 5 hospitals had to close their ER in 2024, making it the worst year for emergency care on record” said Stiles, proceeding to cite a report from the Ontario College of Family Physicians which found 2.5 million Ontarians are currently without a family doctor.

Assistant Ministry of Health Anthony Leardi responded confidently by listing several ongoing healthcare goals achieved by his government, among them training some 30,000 nurses, building 2 new medical schools and 15 hospitals in the province. He also rejected the NDP’s statistics as “inaccurate information”.

When Liberal member John Frasor raised the issue, he was immediately heckled by the conservative aisle who pointed to the hypocrisy of a veteran Liberal MPP complaining about healthcare policy when the Kathleen Wynn government supposedly underfunded it for years. Under fire, he proceeded.

“How is it that finding everyone a family doctor doesn't have the same urgency for the premier as booze and bike lanes do”.

Leardi responded by raising a quote from former Liberal Minister of Health George Smitherman, who supposedly said his party “starved the system in order to balance the budget”. Leardi continued, emphasizing that his government is specifically investing in the Northern Ontario school of medicine in Thunder Bay, with the goal of bringing healthcare professionals to the region.

When Minister of Red Tape Reduction Mike Harris moved his forearm up and down gesturing at the liberals record of “slashed” healthcare spending, someone yelled from the opposition - “call your dad”.

On a side note, parliamentary banter illuminates a fascinating psychological phenomenon: conservative members on the same side of the (literal) aisle as the opposition are much less likely to engage in banter than those across the way. Physical proximity seems to have a negative correlation with direct confrontation.

Later on, opposition critic of Northern Development Sol Mamakwa spoke about the need to recognize the history of colonization, and asked Minister of Northern Development and Indigenous Affairs Greg Rickford what the government is doing to search for burial remains on former Indian residential schools.

“There is no question that this was one of the darkest, if not in my view the darkest, chapter in Canadian history”. He said the government is committed to “state of the art support” towards First Nations, including the use of technology to investigate and gather further historical evidence.

The moment Rickford finished speaking, a voice came from above.

"You will never stop our resistance. Our people are sacred. Stop killing our people," shouted a woman from the public gallery, before being escorted out by security.

After a lunch-hour of children’s choirs singing Christmas carols, the house returned to vote on three bills. The first was Bill 221, brought forward by Mamakwa, titled “Day of Reflection for Indian Residential Schools Act”. The bill would amend the employment standards act to create a statutory holiday on September 30 in Ontario.

When voting began, it became clear the bill was divided along partisan lines, ultimately voted down 60-30 by the majoritarian conservatives.

After this, a government bill (# 223) was passed titled “An Act to enact two Acts and to amend various Acts with respect to public safety and the justice system”. To put it simply, this “tough on crime” legislation makes a plethora of adjustments to the criminal code which the conservatives say will make the province safer, covering areas as diverse as closing safe (drug) consumption sites within 200 metres of schools (schedule 4), barring sex offenders from changing their name (schedule 2), and increasing penalties for auto-theft (schedule 8). According to NDP member France Gelinas, the NDP would have voted in favour of the legislation if not for schedule 4.

Lastly, during the daily scrum, this reporter asked Conservative minister Hardeep Singh if his government would support and work with the federal government on building high speed rail, in reference to a proposed line from Quebec City to Toronto.

“I think it's a great idea”, said Singh, explaining that it is his government's prerogative to build better transportation systems. This confirms the potential for bi-partisan support of such a project, crucial in managing complex logistics of its development.