The Green Plan New solutions to old problems. Authorized by the CFO of the GPO 2 THE GREEN PLAN THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN Table of contents CONTENTS The Green Plan Priorities 2 A Caring Society 5 Mental health is health 6 Increase access to publicly funded mental health care 7 Create an accessible system with around-the-clock access 7 Improve access to care for children, youth, and students 7 Treat mental health and addiction as a public health issue 8 Expand support for addiction care 8 Expand care options for people with complex needs 8 Health through a preventative lens 9 Prioritise prevention in our healthcare system 10 Create a robust system of primary care 10 Invest in healthcare workers 10 Support strong hospitals 11 Protect Public Health 11 Fulfill remote and rural healthcare needs 11 Build a more equitable healthcare system 12 Care for elders 13 Build more non-profit long-term care beds 14 Create an accountable, nonprofit long-term care system 14 Improve resident care 14 Prepare for future infectious disease outbreaks 14 Expand options for holistic care 15 Improve home care 15 Expand options to age in place 15 Lifelong learning 16 Improve funding models for education 17 Strengthen in-school learning 17 Make equity a pillar of public education 17 Support children with disabilities 18 Improve access to and equity in post-secondary education 18 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN Truth and Reconciliation 19 Work in partnership with Indigenous communities 20 Address the legacy of colonialism and residential schools 20 Fix the healthcare gap 20 Fund an Indigenous-led housing strategy 21 Support community rights to a healthy environment 21 An equitable Ontario 22 Improve quality of life for people living with a disability 23 Prioritise gender equity 23 Fight to eradicate systemic racism 23 Support and improve rights for 2SLGBTQIA+ communities 24 Address discrimination in our justice system 24 Equity through language access 24 Respect workers and increase economic security 25 Improve workers’ rights and wages 26 Strengthen rights and protections for gig and temp workers 26 Measure economic progress and wellbeing with evidence-based data 26 Implement a Basic Income and end poverty 27 Connected Communities 29 Address the Housing Crisis 30 Build affordable housing & protect our existing affordable supply 31 Create more pathways to ownership 31 Provide security and support for renters 31 Address speculation and corruption in the housing market 32 Take a Housing First approach and end homelessness 32 Expand housing options for people in crisis and transition 32 Strong neighbourhoods 33 Champion smart growth 34 Build infill housing near transit 34 Ensure community consultation is inclusive 34 Strengthen community hubs 36 Create vibrant neighbourhoods 36 Help small neighbourhood businesses recover and thrive 36 Create a new regulatory framework for small business 37 Support local arts and social enterprises 37 Getting from A to B 38 Connect communities with clean, efficient transit options 38 Increase transit connections outside of the GTHA 39 Connect neighbourhoods with people-powered transportation 39 Connect people with better broadband 39 Inclusive and accessible communities 40 Prioritise the implementation of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) 41 Build accessible homes and businesses 41 People-powered government 42 Support and strengthen municipal governments 43 Democratic reform 43 Make politics more inclusive and collaborative 43 Protect voter rights and empower citizens 43 New Climate Economy 45 Real net zero by 2045 46 Phase out fossil fuels 46 Move to renewable, clean energy sources 47 Increase access to electric vehicles and charging infrastructure 47 Make buildings energy efficient 48 Lead by example 48 Support municipalities to be climate leaders 48 Build our New Climate Economy 49 Ensure a just and equitable transition 50 Train today for the jobs of tomorrow 50 Support and grow green businesses 50 Prepare Ontario industries for the new climate economy 51 Make Ontario safe and resilient 51 Protect our natural ecosystems 52 Protect natural spaces 53 Safeguard our source water 53 Use water sustainably 53 Reduce waste 54 Stand strong for environmental justice 54 Strengthen environmental oversight and public consultation 54 Protect biodiversity 55 Strengthen animal welfare rules 55 Help local food systems to thrive 56 Protect farmland 57 Increase access and support for local, nutritious food 57 Support local sustainable farming 57 Invest in the next generation of farmers 57 Make family farming more profitable 58 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 1 The Green Plan The Ontario you want. The Leadership we need. A Message from Mike: In my four years as an MPP in Queen’s Park, I have learned a lot about working together to en￾sure Ontario is ready for the challenges ahead. I’ve also learned that the old-line parties have tried and failed to tackle the issues that matter most. In a province as rich as ours, we should not have a province where a person working fulltime cannot find an affordable place to call home. We should not see patients lingering in hospital corridors waiting for care. We need to be climate leaders for a future that is already here. Ontario Greens have listened and learned from people across our province. Our housing plan has been called a master class in delivering affordable housing solutions with connected com￾munities where we live, work, play, and shop locally. We’re committed to ending the mindless development that is paving over the valuable farm￾land that feeds us and the wetlands that clean our drinking water and protect us from flooding. We will double the Greenbelt by creating a Bluebelt to protect our wetlands, keeping clean water in our rivers and lakes and out of our basements. We are leading the way with Ontario’s first stand-alone policy paper on mental health. We will expand OHIP to include access to more professional services and allow people to get the ser￾vices they need when and where they need them. Successive governments have not prepared us to succeed in the new climate economy. They may see climate change as just another election issue. We know that as the climate goes, so goes the economy and our children’s future. We can’t afford to wait. We need action now. When it comes to climate solutions, I’m proud to say that Ontario Green policy is the gold standard for a new way forward. With plans for more renewable energy, electrification of transit, and pro￾grams like our green home retrofit incentive, we can create thousands of new careers and better jobs, help people save money by saving energy, and protect the people and places we love. Our vision is for the Ontario we all want - caring, connected, and ready for the new climate economy. Thank you, Mike Schreiner Leader, Ontario Greens 2 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 3 1. Homes not highways ° Freeze urban boundaries, build 1.5M homes and provide people with more choices such as triplexes, fourplexes, and walk up apartments. ° Clamp down on speculation because homes are for people, not speculators. ° Invest $1B/year to build 182,000 affordable community rental homes, in￾cluding 60,000 supportive homes over the next decade. 2. Mental health is health ° Increase mental health spending to 10% of our health budget to include mental health care under OHIP ° Increase funding for children’s mental health to reduce wait times to less than 30 days. ° Decriminalise drug use to improve lives, lower costs and treat mental health as a public health issue. 3. New Climate Economy ° Establish a transparent annual carbon budget to reach net zero by 2045. ° Electrify transportation, buildings and industry to crush pollution and lower energy costs. ° Provide up to $15,000 in incentives for homeowners for energy retrofits to help people save money by saving energy. 4. Respect for People ° Repeal Bill 124, pay PSWs, nurses and ECEs a fair wage and hire 33,000 nurses. ° Double the rates for Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP). ° Implement UNDRIP and act on the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. 5. Reinvest in health and education ° Help people age in place with a $1.6B investment in home care. ° Support in-person learning and oppose any move toward mandatory e-learning or hybrid learning models. ° Enhance affordability and access to post-secondary by converting loans to grants for low and middle income post-secondary students. 6. Protect nature ° Permanently protect prime farmland, wetlands and conserve 30% of nature by 2030. ° Provide $1B in funding for Indigenous climate leadership including Indige￾nous protected and conserved areas. ° Make infrastructure climate ready with a $2B adaptation fund for munic￾ipalities. The Green Plan Priorities 4 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 5 A Caring Society Our plan emphasises the connections we all share. It values the quality of life of all Ontarians.” – Mike Schreiner, GPO Leader The past two years have shown us just how much we rely on caring professions in healthcare, education, and social services to get us through. But neglect and half-measures from years of successive governments have strained ser￾vices we rely on every day. Getting help when you need it should not be this hard. Whether you’re a senior citizen waiting two years for a knee replacement or a person with a disability trying to survive off $1169 per month, the system is broken. The pandemic exposed the giant chasms in our healthcare system, leaving our ICUs over￾run and our elders dying alone. Stopping the bleeding will take more than a band-aid. Our vision for Ontario is one that clearly states that mental health is health. Bringing mental health services under OHIP will mean that people can afford and can access the care they need. Our vision puts the dignity of people ahead of private profits or government red tape. If we are going to call nurses, PSWs and educators heroes, then let’s pay them that way. If we want to keep our hospitals stable, then let’s treat ill￾nesses before they become an emergency. We offer solutions to make it easier for our el￾ders to age in place, with dignity and real sup￾port. Solutions that will replace the profit mo￾tive in long-term care, with a real commitment to give each resident the care they need. And after two chaotic years inside and out￾side of the classroom, students and teachers need stability in the school system. We need to properly invest in our education systems – from child care through post secondary. We have a lot of work ahead of us if we want to create a common future that is fair, just and caring. Ontario Greens offer a leadership approach that plans for the future by putting people and the planet above profit. Ontarians care for one another. Our vision for Ontario is one where the government does too. 6 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 7 MENTAL HEALTH IS HEALTH Mental health is such a critical issue that all parties should be talking about. It was a crisis situation before COVID-19, and the pandemic has only made things worse.” – Abhijeet Manay, GPO Deputy Leader Almost half of Ontarians said their mental health has worsened since the pandemic began, and one in four Ontarians is current￾ly seeking help. The greatest barriers peo￾ple face in receiving treatment are access and affordability. But mental health is not a “nice to have,” it is a “need to have.” Decades of neglect from successive governments has led to long wait times and inadequate funding and support. Mental health touches all of our lives, and proper care should be available for everyone. Ontario Greens introduced a comprehensive mental health plan, “Building a More Caring Ontario,” that lays out a strategy to make men￾tal health care more affordable, accessible and comprehensive so anyone in this prov￾ince can get the care they need when they need it. We intend to expand OHIP to include regu￾lated mental health care providers who are presently out of reach for so many Ontarians. We will treat addiction as a mental health is￾sue and expand treatment options for people with complex needs. We will create a mental healthcare system that is affordable, accessi￾ble, comprehensive, and easy to navigate. Increase access to publicly funded mental health care • Make the investments needed to increase mental health spending to 10% of Ontario’s healthcare budget. • Include mental health and addiction care under OHIP by offering services provided by psychotherapists, psychologists, social workers, and other regulated professionals. • Provide an immediate base budget in￾crease of 8% to the community mental health sector to increase access to public￾ly funded care. • Expand access to publicly funded mental health and addiction treatment beds to reduce or eliminate the need for expen￾sive private care. • Fully integrate mental health and ad￾dictions services into expanded Family Health Teams and walk-in clinics to im￾prove early intervention. Include mental health and substance use as part of reg￾ular check-ups. Create an accessible system with around-the-clock access • Make investments to ensure core mental health and addiction services are avail￾able in all regions of Ontario so people can access care where they live. • Establish clear pathways to navigate our mental health care system and trained system navigators to connect people to appropriate treatment and services. • Implement a wait time reduction strategy for mental health services that sets tar￾gets, tracks wait times, and makes the in￾formation available to the public. • Invest in a 3 digit, 24/7 province-wide mental health crisis response line so call￾ers can be diverted from 911 and con￾nected to a more appropriate service. • Invest in the creation and expansion of 24/7 mental health focused mobile crisis response teams, crisis centres, rapid access addiction medicine clinics, and short-term residential beds across the province. Improve access to care for children, youth, and students • Reduce wait times to 30 days or less for children and youth by investing in front￾line mental health care workers. • Invest in expanding services for youth who face service gaps as they age out of the youth system of care. • Make the appropriate investments so stu￾dents can easily connect to community mental health professionals at or near pri￾mary and secondary schools. • Ensure that mental health, wellness and resiliency training are included across the entire education system. Implement a comprehensive curriculum that covers issues such as mental wellness, coping skills, and stress management. • Replicate networks such as the Guelph and Wellington County ACEs Coalition province-wide to increase programming available to prevent the effects of adverse childhood experiences. • Invest in Youth Wellness Hubs province-wide as a one-stop shop for employment, health, education, recreation and housing support. Our goal should be to have at least one in each community across Ontario. • Expand the Centre for Innovation in Cam￾pus Mental Health and increase funding for 8 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 9 peer-to-peer programming, frontline coun￾selling, harm reduction tools, and training to support well-being and resilience. Treat mental health and addiction as a public health issue • Work with the federal government to fast￾track the decriminalisation of drugs and reallocate funding from the justice system to mental health care services. • Establish mental health-focused crisis response teams in communities across Ontario to be deployed when people are experiencing a mental health or sub￾stance related crisis. • Coordinate with public health units to col￾lect and release data on the overdose ep￾idemic, including detailed data on non-fa￾tal and fatal drug poisonings. Expand support for addiction care • Take a Housing First approach and build 60,000 permanent supportive housing spaces with wrap-around services, and dedicate 10% of those homes to people with complex care needs. • Increase the number of consumption and treatment sites throughout the province and expand the availability of harm re￾duction programs, including safe supply. • Integrate paid peer support workers with lived experience into the planning and or￾ganisation of all substance use program￾ming, and create a significant role for people with lived experience as part of the Mental Health and Addictions Centre of Excellence. • Declare the opioid crisis a public health emergency to free up funds and provide focused, coordinated government lead￾ership to combat the crisis. • Expand the distribution of naloxone kits. • Reboot the Ontario Emergency Opioid Task Force to address the urgency and complexity of the drug poisoning crisis. Expand care options for people with complex needs • Define standards of care for common and complex mental health and addiction ser￾vices to be used across the province. • Conduct a needs assessment for acute and community-based mental health and ad￾diction services by region, and make invest￾ments in acute care beds as needed. • Expand specialist community mental health services and acute care capacity for people with eating disorders. • Recognize suicide as a public health prior￾ity and invest in evidence-based preven￾tion strategies that support the individual needs of people, including Indigenous and 2SLGBTQIA+ communities. • Support programs and services that take an intersectional approach to meet the needs of all people, including those with disabilities, the 2SLGBTQIA+ com￾munity, women, Black, Indigenous, and racialized people, and those with hous￾ing insecurity. HEALTH THROUGH A PREVENTATIVE LENS A focus on preventing illness will provide healthy outcomes and quality care at the lowest cost to the public purse. “ – Marlene Spruyt, GPO candidate and retired Medical Officer of Health As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. While other parties wait for every crisis to reach a boiling point, our vision is to try to solve problems at their source. When it comes to healthcare, this means help￾ing people to access healthy food and a place to call home. It’s also about early detection and treatment of illnesses in community clinics rath￾er than the hallway of a hospital. Most impor￾tantly, it’s a plan to respect nurses, PSWs and other healthcare workers to retain these profes￾sionals rather than burning them out. We are now facing a backlog for care, with thousands of people still waiting for health care, support and services. It’s even more challenging for rural, remote and Northern communities, where there were staffing short￾ages even before the pandemic. With surgery backlogs and an understaffed sector, now is the time to expand a publicly funded, publicly delivered healthcare system that is equitable, accessible, and comprehen￾sive – for all Ontarians. 10 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 11 Prioritise prevention in our healthcare system • Partner with the federal government to im￾plement a universal dental care program. • Partner with the federal government to im￾plement a universal pharmacare program. As an interim measure, publicly fund take￾home cancer and rare disease medications. • Increase upstream investments in the so￾cial determinants of health, such as social isolation, housing insecurity, and poverty to prevent substantial, long-term health￾care costs and severe disease. • Support and promote healthy behaviours to prevent disease and reduce risk fac￾tors such as poor nutrition and smoking. These early investments will lead to better long-term health outcomes and reduce stress on the system. • Improve environmental determinants of health by prioritising clean air, clean wa￾ter, and access to healthy local food in all communities. Create a robust system of primary care • Support a publicly funded, publicly deliv￾ered healthcare system and oppose fur￾ther privatisation of care. • Expand access to family health teams in communities across the province and increase opportunities for physicians to join team-based models of care. Include a diverse array of healthcare providers in the teams to ensure a holistic, connected, comprehensive approach to health. • Increase options for primary care, such as community health centres and nurse-prac￾titioner-led clinics, to ensure access to non-urgent 24/7 care. • Improve integration and connectivi￾ty across healthcare service providers through the use of digital data sharing and patient health coordinators. • Improve diagnosis and OHIP-covered care for rare diseases, including but not limited to lyme disease, long-COVID, and chronic pain disorders. • Increase funding for and access to mid￾wives and other community perinatal care services across Ontario. Invest in healthcare workers • Establish a nurse-led task force to make rec￾ommendations on matters related to the recruitment, retention and safety of nurses. • Immediately repeal Bill 124 and the prob￾lematic sections of Bill 106 and allow all healthcare workers to bargain collectively for fair wages. Until then, provide a min￾imum hourly wage of $35 to registered practical nurses and $25 to personal sup￾port workers. • Increase nursing program enrollments by 10% every year for 7 years and the num￾ber of trained nurse practitioners by 50% by 2030 to enable us to meet our target of at least 30,000 additional nurses. • Support certification upgrades for health￾care workers through expanded bridging programs at publicly funded post-sec￾ondary institutions. • Fast-track credential approvals for 15,000 international healthcare workers, including nurses and personal support workers. • Guarantee access to the most appropri￾ate safety equipment in all healthcare fa￾cilities, and use the precautionary princi￾ple when protecting workers. • Provide support for Black and Indige￾nous healthcare workers through great￾er mentorship opportunities, partner￾ships with allies, and equitable human resources processes. Support strong hospitals • Increase year-over-year hospital base op￾erating funding to a minimum of 5%. • Work with the federal government to pro￾vide surge funding to reduce the backlog in surgeries, imaging, and other services. • Invest in new and expanded hospi￾tals as needed to meet demand in high growth areas. • Expand funding to build additional hos￾pice residences and fund all critical costs related to palliative care, including sup￾port for grief and bereavement services. • Increase annual in-home palliative care funding. Protect Public Health • Conduct an independent public inqui￾ry into the Government of Ontario’s re￾sponse to the COVID-19 pandemic that will offer recommendations on preventa￾tive measures to reduce harm in the case of future health crises. • Designate the Chief Medical Officer of Health as an independent officer of the legislature in a watchdog role compara￾ble to that of provincial auditors, with an￾nual publicly available reporting. • Enhance the ability of Public Health On￾tario to carry out its mandate by ensuring robust public health science and labora￾tory support. • Provide adequate and predictable funding to ensure future pandemic preparedness. • Stockpile three months’ supply of person￾al protective equipment for all healthcare facilities in the province. Fulfill remote and rural healthcare needs • Rebalance the healthcare funding formu￾la to ensure better access in rural and re￾mote areas. • Make permanent the 50 community well￾ness nursing positions supporting First Nations communities. • Invest in increasing the number of Indige￾nous-led health clinics. • Expand the roles and scope of nurse prac￾titioners as primary health care providers, especially in areas that lack primary care options. • Use incentives to bring physicians and al￾lied health professionals to Northern and rural communities. • Create opportunities for specialist and subspecialist trainees to undertake elec￾tives and core rotations in the North. 12 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 13 Build a more equitable healthcare system • Immediately strike a task force to devel￾op policies and initiatives that address the adverse effects of racism, homopho￾bia, and transphobia on peoples’ mental health and the barriers they face to ac￾cessing healthcare. • Provide cultural responsiveness training for all healthcare professionals across our system that is trauma-informed and root￾ed in equity and anti-racism. • Increase core funding for communi￾ty-based, grassroots mental and physical health supports in racialized, newcomer, and other communities that have tradi￾tionally been underserved. • Improve the availability of supports and services in other languages, including French and Indigenous languages, and encourage service providers and pro￾grams to reflect the experiences and per￾spectives of the populations they serve. • Mandate and fund the collection and meaningful use of socio-demograph￾ic and race-based data to identify and correct inequities in provided care and health outcomes. • Expand the number of and fully fund wom￾en’s health clinics and abortion clinics in Ontario. CARE FOR ELDERS The government failed to keep long-term care residents safe during the pandemic. A bad situation was made worse by a government that failed to act.” – Carla Johnson, GPO candidate 1 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0262807 2 https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2020/12/26/big-for-profit-long-term-care-companies-paid-out-more-than-170-mil￾lion-to-investors-through-ontarios-deadly-first-wave.html The recent census showed that, in the next few years, one in five people in this country will be over the age of sixty-five. Many of us will live into our eighties. We need to bring support and care into our communities where the majority of people prefer to age in place – enjoying daily life within our homes. In Canada, long-term care residents made up 81% of all reported COVID-19 deaths com￾pared to an average of 38% in other coun￾tries.1 The Toronto Star reported in December 2021 that for-profit long-term care opera￾tors paid nearly $171 million in dividends to shareholders in the first three quarters of 2020 while receiving $138.5 million in pan￾demic funding.2 Those who built this province deserve to age with dignity. Let’s replace the profit motive with a real commitment to give each resident the care they need. We have a plan to improve care in long term care and ensure that our elders are not treat￾ed as just another revenue stream by private investors. We must do better. 14 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 15 Build more non-profit long-term care beds • Build 55,000 long-term care beds by 2033 and at least 96,000 by 2041 to meet growing demand. • Create more Indigenous-led long-term care homes and allocate a portion of the new beds to these homes. Create an accountable, nonprofit long-term care system • Increase base funding for long-term care by 10% • Phase out for-profit long-term care and stop licensing new for-profit homes. • Repeal Bill 218, which shields long-term care owners and operators from liability for negligence. • Reinstate annual comprehensive inspec￾tions of long-term care homes without ad￾vance notice, and ensure homes with infrac￾tions face the legislated consequences. • Transfer regulatory oversight of retirement homes to the Ministry of Long-Term Care. • Create a system of formal oversight for long￾term care Medical Directors working with the Ontario College of Physicians and Sur￾geons and the Ontario Medical Association. Improve resident care • Legislate staffing in long-term care facilities to include a minimum of one nurse prac￾titioner for every 120 residents and a staff composition that includes 20% registered nurses, 25% registered practical nurses, and 55% personal support workers. • Mandate a minimum of four hours of nurs￾ing and personal care per resident per day, including a minimum of 48 minutes of care provided by a registered nurse and 60 minutes provided by a registered practical nurse. • Increase long-term care resident access to allied health professionals, such as di￾eticians, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, and social workers, to a mini￾mum of one hour per day. • Mandate continued professional devel￾opment for staff on geriatric care, practic￾es for caring for residents with dementia, and palliative and end-of-life care. • Fast-track updated staffing plans and en￾sure consistency of care by requiring full￾time personal support workers and nurs￾ing positions. Prepare for future infectious disease outbreaks • Prioritise licence proposals for small, com￾munity-based long-term care homes. • Update design standards to improve out￾break management of infectious diseases. • Stop contracting out food, housekeeping and laundry services. • Recognise that essential caregivers play a critical role in residents’ health and well￾being, and ensure they can safely access their loved ones during prolonged infec￾tious disease emergencies. • Define the respective roles of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Long-Term Care in addressing health emergencies, and ensure the safety of long-term care residents is reflected in any provincial emergency plan. Expand options for holistic care • Better integrate long-term care, home￾care, and caregiver services within the healthcare system to properly provide for the complex needs of residents. • Implement an expanded choice, pa￾tient-centred long-term care framework that focuses on a continuum of care for seniors. • Strengthen obligations for long-term care licensees to respect and recognise resi￾dents’ gender identity, as well as their social, cultural, spiritual, and language care needs. • Amend the Residents’ Bill of Rights to align with the prohibited grounds for discrimina￾tion in the Ontario Human Rights Code. • Amend the Residents’ Bill of Rights by add￾ing the right of residents to have accom￾modations made for themselves and their spouse or life partner so they can continue to live together in long-term care. • Prioritise healthy, quality local food as an im￾portant component of resident wellbeing. Improve home care • Increase funding to home care services by 20% so that people can safely stay in their homes longer. • Create a standard basket of core homecare services that providers must make consis￾tently available across the province. • Shift to entirely nonprofit homecare pro￾viders within the public system. • Provide team coordinators as a single ac￾cess point within family health teams to en￾sure care is consistent with patient needs. • Mandate that personal support workers are paid a minimum of $25 an hour and for their travel time between visits. • Increase high-quality homecare options for those experiencing frailty, dementia, and disability. • Collect meaningful quality indicators to hold homecare organisations account￾able and to promote quality improve￾ments. • Pilot a support program as part of a basic income phase-in for those doing unpaid caregiving in families and communities. Expand options to age in place • Make it easier for seniors to live togeth￾er by streamlining and simplifying the approvals process for cohousing and coliving developments. Repeal laws that would prohibit or create barriers to co￾housing and coliving. • Increase support for community centres and neighbourhood coalitions, which play an important role in encouraging community connections and reducing isolation for elders. • Create incentives for retrofitting homes to make them safer and easier to age in place. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 17 LIFELONG LEARNING After two chaotic years inside and outside of the classroom, students and teachers need the government to bring stability to the school system and get back to high-quality, in-person education.” – Matt Richter, GPO candidate Learning is one of the great joys of living. We should all have access to education and training that suits our abilities and interests. Our lifelong learning curve should not be cut short by unnecessary obstacles. A 21st cen￾tury educational system needs to keep pace with the changes and requirements of a soci￾ety in transition. We need new funding models and clear, af￾fordable pathways to higher education. For the Green Party, building a modern, more equitable education system is a must. Prop￾erly funding our educational support workers and retaining strong and committed teachers is paramount. Investments in education are important for the health, wellbeing, and success of kids and young people now and for the future. 16 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO Improve funding models for education • Establish an independent review of On￾tario’s education funding formula so it adequately reflects student needs, and review the formula every five years. • Ensure the updated formula includes ad￾equate funding for ESL grants, special ed￾ucation assistants, counsellors, and other specific supports to provide equitable ac￾cess to learning and school activities for all students. • Ensure the updated funding formula takes into account the unique needs of remote and rural schools. • Address the repair backlog for Ontario public schools. • Allocate funds to ensure schools are able to comply with the Accessibility for Ontar￾ians with Disabilities Act (AODA). • Provide funding for schools to make energy efficiency and ventilation improvements. • Make funding available so that schools can buy zero emission electric school buses to replace retired diesel buses. Strengthen in-school learning • Support in-person learning and oppose any move toward mandatory e-learning or hybrid learning models. • Cap grades 4 to 8 class sizes to at least 24 students and kindergarten to at least 26 students. • Eliminate the EQAO standardised testing and update the elementary curriculum to reduce prescribed student outcomes. • Increase funding for enhanced outdoor education, greenspace in school yards, and enhanced curriculum content on crit￾ical environmental topics such as food lit￾eracy and climate change. • Implement a province-wide nutritious school lunch program. Make equity a pillar of public education • Address racism in schools with mandato￾ry collection and reporting of race-based data for student, teacher and staff popu￾lations, as well as implementing standard procedures around the reporting of inci￾dents of racism. • Work with school boards to ensure re￾cruitment and retention practices for staff are transparent and reflect the diversity of Ontario’s population and ensure cultural￾ly relevant and responsive programming is included in mandatory staff training. • End streaming in our education system to ensure equity for all students. • Immediately remove all Resource Officers from Ontario schools. • Establish clearly visible all-gender wash￾rooms and update school communications to become more gender inclusive, recog￾nising that gender exists on a spectrum. • Update the curriculum to include in￾formed discussions of anti-Black racism, 2SLGBTQIA+ prejudice, and all forms of discrimination across subject areas. • Restore funding for the Indigenous curricu￾lum program and work with Indigenous ed￾ucators and community leaders to develop a mandatory curriculum on colonialism and residential schools, treaties, and Indigenous histories and experiences. 18 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 19 Support children with disabilities • Address the growing waitlist for Ontario Autism Program (OAP) core services by building the capacity of autism providers, and funding the OAP to bring families into the program as rapidly as possible. • Fund OAP increases every year as inflation and the number of children registered in the program increases. • Establish an ultimate wait time benchmark for diagnosis and access to core services once registered in the program. • Work with the federal Government and other provinces in the development of a National Autism Strategy to develop stan￾dards and a funding model to provide supports and services for autistic people of all ages. • Provide educators multi-discipline train￾ing to help them address student sensory and behavioural issues and adopt teach￾ing strategies that support students with a wide spectrum of accommodation needs. • Build on the work done with the OAP to￾ward a new Ontario Disability Support Program that would provide funding for therapeutic and respite services and sup￾ports for people with all disabilities, be￾ginning with children and youth. Improve access to and equity in post-secondary education • Immediately reverse the Ford govern￾ment’s cuts to OSAP by converting loans to grants for low and middle income stu￾dents and eliminating interest charges on student debt. • Index the base operating grant for On￾tario’s post-secondary institutions to the weighted national average, followed by inflationary increases year to year. • Replace the faulty performance-based university funding model and restore the more stable and equitable enrol￾ment-based funding model. • Ensure consistent and fair labour stan￾dards and working conditions for all fac￾ulty, including contract faculty. Remove wage constraints and pay equal wages for equal work. • Develop province-wide, culturally rel￾evant, trauma-informed and survi￾vor-centric standards for sexual and gen￾der-based violence on post-secondary campuses in consultation with experts, frontline workers, students and survivors. TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION As Leader of the Ontario Greens, I commit to upholding Indigenous rights to self-determination, and to act with real respect for treaty obligations.” – Mike Schreiner, Leader, Green Party of Ontario We need meaningful action toward reconciliation. The government has a legal and moral obli￾gation to work with Indigenous communities – with full partnership, participation, and respect. Reconciliation with Indigenous communities is essential and includes acknowledging the role of traditional knowledge and systems. A key step in this direction will be to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of In￾digenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Our plan seeks to acknowledge the reality of Indigenous people in Ontario, including the understanding that centuries of colonialism and broken promises have made building trust difficult. We want to see the province come to the table with funding for Indigenous-led initiatives in cli￾mate leadership, healthcare and housing. Sarah Chaudhary Canoeing on Biggar Lake 20 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO Work in partnership with Indigenous communities • Implement UNDRIP to ensure equity for Indigenous peoples. • Establish true nation-to-nation relation￾ships with Indigenous peoples. • Recognise First Nations’ right to self-de￾termination and establish a co-manage￾ment stewardship model for the devel￾opment of provincial resources with fair revenue sharing. • Recognise and integrate Indigenous laws and legal traditions in the negotiation and implementation processes involving trea￾ties, land claims, and other constructive agreements. • Support Indigenous land defenders in as￾serting their treaty rights and actions taken to confront threats to their traditional lands. Address the legacy of colonialism and residential schools • Work with the federal government to implement the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. • Make the National Day for Truth and Rec￾onciliation a statutory holiday. • Restore funding for the Indigenous curric￾ulum program and work with Indigenous educators and community leaders to de￾velop a mandatory curriculum on colo￾nialism and residential schools, treaties, and Indigenous histories and experiences. • Work with the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation to identify, collect, and provide copies of all records relevant to the history and legacy of the residential school system in Ontario. • Reform child welfare and protection ser￾vices to address the overrepresentation of Indigenous children in provincial care by ensuring Indigenous communities are served by Indigenous-led providers. Pro￾duce annual reports on the number and proportion of Indigenous children who are in care. Fix the healthcare gap • Work with the federal government and Indigenous communities to identify and close the gap in health outcomes be￾tween Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. • Increase the number of Indigenous pro￾fessionals working in healthcare through training and mentorship opportunities and ensure their retention in Indigenous communities, particularly in northern and remote communities. • Increase the number of Indigenous-led health centres, youth programming, crisis support teams, and support suicide-pre￾vention training. • Provide properly funded Indigenous-led supports for survivors of residential school trauma. • Publish annual progress reports and as￾sess long-term trends and indicators in ar￾eas such as suicide, mental health, chron￾ic diseases, and availability of appropriate health services to ensure equity in access to care. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 21 Fund an Indigenous-led housing strategy • Fund 22,000 Indigenous-owned and op￾erated permanent homes under an Urban and Rural Indigenous Housing Strategy. The strategy and implementation would be led by Indigenous communities to cre￾ate homes for Indigenous peoples living in Ontario. Support community rights to a healthy environment • Work with the federal government to im￾mediately end all boil water advisories. • Work to repair the damage at Grassy Nar￾rows and Wabaseemoong; ° Pursue government commitments to clean up mercury contamination and ensure free, informed and prior consent for Grassy Narrows, Waba￾seemoong communities, and all other Indigenous communities for future in￾dustrial decisions; ° Provide evidence-based assessments in line with the recommendations from the Mercury Disability Board Ex￾pert Panel to ensure fair compensa￾tion is received by those who qualify. • Restore provincial funding for source wa￾ter protection and expand drinking water source protection to Northern, remote and Indigenous communities. • Provide adequate funding and training opportunities for a First Nations Water Authority to own and operate their own water and wastewater utilities to work to￾ward finally ending boil water advisories. • Recognize and provide $1B in fund￾ing for Indigenous-protected and con￾served areas, in which Indigenous governments play the primary role in protecting and conserving ecosystems through Indigenous laws, governance and knowledge systems. 22 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 23 AN EQUITABLE ONTARIO We have a lot of work to do to build the Ontario we want, where your gender or the colour of your skin does not create barriers to the quality of life you want to live.” – Nira Dookeran, GPO candidate We’ve made tremendous strides, but there is still work to be done to make Ontario a place where everyone belongs. Still today, racial￾ized communities, women, 2SLGBTQIA+ in￾dividuals, and people with disabilities face disproportionately more barriers in accessing quality health care, economic opportunities, and within the justice system. Inequity has many faces. It comes in the form of uncon￾scious bias and overt racism, gender based gaps in pay and opportunity, and neglect of those that must deal with physical and neuro￾diverse challenges. Ontario Greens are committed to building a more accessible and equitable Ontario. We have a lot of work ahead of us if we want to create a common future that is fair, just and caring. Improve quality of life for people living with a disability • Double Ontario Disability Support Pro￾gram (ODSP) rates as a first step to im￾plementing a Basic Income, and tie future increases to inflation. • Evaluate and improve the Assistive Devic￾es Program to better meet the needs of those requiring assistive tools, including more up-to-date devices, training, and fewer barriers to access. • Ensure that new affordable housing stock is accessible, and require affordable hous￾ing retrofits to meet the same standards. • Review all Ontario laws for accessibility barriers and ensure that all future funding and policy choices are made through an accessibility lens. • Update, improve and implement the Ac￾cessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act as quickly as possible. Prioritise gender equity • Work with the federal government to en￾sure continued funding for universal ac￾cess to high-quality, $10-a-day childcare in all communities so women have more opportunity to re-enter the workforce. • Provide Early Childcare Educators, more than 95% of whom are women, with a fair wage of at least $25 per hour. • Immediately revoke Bill 124 to allow healthcare workers, including nurses (91% of whom are women), to negotiate fairly for the wage increases they deserve. • Implement the Pay Transparency Act. • Require that public corporations’ boards and executive level positions have an ad￾equate proportion of women represent￾ed, with a goal to achieve gender parity. • Apply a gender-based analysis to all gov￾ernment legislation and programming to advise on how gender equity can be bet￾ter achieved. • Support survivors of gender-based vio￾lence by increasing funding for Sexual As￾sault Centres, emergency shelters, transi￾tional housing, and legal supports. Fight to eradicate systemic racism • Fully fund the Anti-Racism Directorate, re￾versing the recent cuts. • Require anti-racism and anti-oppression training for all public sector employees and legislators. • Require the Ontario Public Service to commit to eliminate racism and discrim￾ination, conduct random external audits, data collection and reporting, and estab￾lish a safe harassment and discrimination reporting system for staff. • Pass the Our London Family Act to change the way we address Islamophobia in Ontario. • Ensure Indigenous communities are served by Indigenous-led child welfare providers to address the overrepresen￾tation of Indigenous children in provin￾cial care. • Address the overrepresentation of Black children in provincial care by the devel￾opment of frameworks to provide cul￾turally appropriate services to Black chil￾dren, youth and families. Identify and address existing standards and structures that continue to harm Black families. 24 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 25 • Provide annual reports on the number and proportion of Black and Indigenous children who are in care, and establish an independent office to investigate claims of unfair treatment by case workers called in to assess a child’s circumstances. Support and improve rights for 2SLGBTQIA+ communities • Create a comprehensive strategy to ensure equitable, inclusive and affirm￾ing access to care and treatment for 2SLGBTQIA+ communities within our healthcare system and long-term care. • Expand and improve access to provin￾cially funded healthcare services for 2SLGBTQIA+ Ontarians, including gen￾der affirming procedures and transition medications. • Dedicate resources and funding to direct￾ly support 2SLGBTQIA+ youth groups. • Mandate standards to have safe, acces￾sible, all-gender washrooms in all public spaces in Ontario. Address discrimination in our justice system • Ban the practice of carding and delete ex￾isting data that has been collected from carding in the past. • Reform the Special Investigation Unit to ensure transparency and justice for ra￾cialised individuals who are victims of vi￾olence and discrimination at the hands of law enforcement. • Acknowledge and commit to address￾ing the disproportionately violent and discriminatory law enforcement ex￾perienced by Indigenous, Black and racialised people. • Decriminalise drug use, expand safe con￾sumption sites, and shift funding from the justice system to healthcare. • Develop a 3 digit dedicated crisis response line and health-focused crisis response teams to respond to mental health and sub￾stance related calls. • Ensure that court mental health workers are available in all regions of Ontario to divert more individuals living with a men￾tal health issue and/or substance use con￾cern out of the justice system and into mental health and addictions services and supports. • Restore adequate funding to Legal Aid by boosting their base budget and develop a long-term, structurally stable funding plan. • Immediately appoint more full-time, qual￾ified, and competent adjudicators to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario to en￾sure timely and effective case hearings. Equity through language access • Ensure that interpreters, translators, or multilingual written materials are avail￾able in publicly funded services. Improve awareness of their availability. • Ensure all government announcements are signed in both ASL and LSQ. • Provide tools for nonprofits to have french language resources. • Create incentives to increase the number of french-speaking individuals in teachers college programs. RESPECT WORKERS AND INCREASE ECONOMIC SECURITY We can’t afford to wait to treat workers with the respect they deserve, including paid sick days and fair wages.” – Syam Chandra, GPO candidate The pandemic has reminded us who keeps our cities running during dark times. De￾cent wages, paid sick days and safe work￾places must be the standard, especially as life is getting less and less affordable for people in Ontario. We can’t afford to wait to treat workers with the respect they deserve, including paid sick days and fair wages. We’re also on the cusp of a major transforma￾tion in the world of work. The rising number of people in the gig economy deserve the same rights and protections as other workers. Ontario Greens believe in treating people with dignity and fairness. This is one reason we support immediate increases in social as￾sistance as the first step towards a Basic In￾come Guarantee that will provide economic security and resilience. 26 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 27 Improve workers’ rights and wages • Increase the floor of the minimum wage each year by $1, starting at $16 in 2022, with a top-up in cities where the cost of living is higher. • Increase the number of provincially-legis￾lated paid sick days from three to ten, and provide small businesses financial sup￾port to fund the program. • Ban employers from requiring a sick note from a medical practitioner when an em￾ployee is ill. • Restore and improve workers’ rights to collective bargaining and immediately re￾peal Bill 124 and the problematic sections of Bill 106. • Provide all workers with full and equal ac￾cess to employment rights and benefits programs like EI, CPP, and WSIB, as well as equal pay for equal work, regardless of whether the employee is permanent, part-time, temporary, or casual. • Immediately end the practice of deeming whereby the Workplace Safety and Insur￾ance Board (WSIB) unfairly cuts benefits for workers. • Review the Pension Benefits Act to ensure 100% coverage of defined benefit pensions by the Pension Benefit Guarantee Fund in an involuntary pension plan wind up. Strengthen rights and protections for gig and temp workers • Implement a “Gig Workers’ Bill of Rights,” including, but not limited to, the following: ° To protect gig workers and end the misclassification of employees, enact a presumption of employee status and the ABC test under the Employ￾ment Standards Act. ° Ensure payment for all hours of work, from app sign-in until sign-out, with a clear and concise breakdown of how pay is calculated. ° Ensure gig workers real wages are not reduced below the minimum wage by compensating for necessary work re￾lated expenses. ° Make gig work count towards Perma￾nent Residency applications. • Close the loopholes that can lead to pre￾carious work, including stricter regula￾tions relating to the temp agency industry. ° Mandate that temp agency workers earn the same as directly hired work￾ers when they do the same work, and that temp workers must become full hired employees after three months. • Develop a program of portable extended health benefits for workers in the gig econ￾omy, retail and hospitality sectors that is tied to the employee even if they were to change employment. Measure economic progress and wellbeing with evidence-based data • Replace the GDP as the key metric of gov￾ernment success with an Index of Wellbe￾ing to better measure societal progress, economic and environmental wellbeing, and people’s quality of life. This system will help to inform government spending and programming. Implement a Basic Income and end poverty • Phase in a Basic Income, with the first step being to double ODSP and OW rates and reduce aggressive clawbacks. ° Eliminate any unnecessary red tape, reporting requirements, and other barriers typically faced by those need￾ing financial support. ° Maintain all existing supplementary supports that are available with cur￾rent income assistance programs. • Include meaningful consultation with people who have lived experience with poverty and existing social assistance programs in the design of all programs and services aimed at client-centred ap￾proaches for reducing poverty. • Annually report disaggregated data on the proportion of the population that ex￾periences chronic homelessness, unmet health needs, food insecurity, lack of liter￾acy, and low-paid work. • Prohibit “payday” lending that takes advantage of those facing financial hardship as a violation of anti-rack￾eteering laws, and work with credit unions to develop a low-cost, small loan alternative to help people get out of debt. 28 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 29 Connected Communities We believe in creating vibrant neighbourhoods where we can live, work and play. It’s time to stop Ontario’s expensive pro-sprawl, anti-climate agenda.” – Mike Schreiner, Leader, Green Party of Ontario Thriving communities are places where there are a mix of homes people can afford near transit, amenities and parks. Unfortunately, the affordability crisis means that finding an affordable home to rent or buy is pushing us further and further away and forcing us into long, soul-crushing com - mutes. It’s also turning homeownership into a pipedream for most Ontarians. Greens have a bold plan that the Toronto Star called a “master class in housing policy,” and it begins with cracking down on land speculators driv - ing up housing prices. Past governments watched the problem get worse, but we have a plan to unlock solutions like triplexes, fourplexes and midrise apart - ments, and to restore protections for renters. We will work with nonprofits to build 182,000 affordable community housing rental homes because everybody deserves a roof over their head. Community is more than a home - it’s the streets, parks, workplaces, schools, and shops that give communities their spirit and iden - tity. Our goal is to build communities where we can access work, services and recreation within 15 minutes of home, because less time commuting means more time for family and friends. It just so happens that building dense, mixed￾use connected communities is also the best thing we can do for the environment, as it cuts down on car pollution and spares our natural areas from more urban sprawl. Our vision is one of bustling main streets, bike lanes, urban gardens, electric buses, conve - nient EV charging spots, walkable streets, and so much more. We’ll also deliver on the urgent needs that rural and Northern communities have been waiting for - like high-speed Internet across rural Ontario and passenger rail service to Northern Ontario. Where we live, work, and play all combine to affect quality of life. Our vision is to create liv - able, affordable and connected communities. And we have a plan to do this that won’t sacri - fice our environment or our health, and won’t create policies that line the pockets of land speculators at the expense of building great housing and communities for people. 30 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 31 ADDRESS THE HOUSING CRISIS We have solutions to make housing more affordable. To create neighbourhoods without paving over nature. And to build for a climate￾friendly future.” – Aneep Dhade, GPO candidate Housing affordability is a real challenge to many people across the province. Housing costs are rising faster than people’s incomes. So many households are spending more than 30% of their income to meet their basic housing needs. The struggle to find affordable housing looks different to residents of Northern communi￾ties, small towns, and rural counties than it does in the GTHA. But wherever you are, it’s a challenge to find a liveable, affordable place to call home. The crisis is province-wide. There are no neighbourhoods in Barrie, Guelph, Hamilton, Kitchener, Peterborough, Ottawa or Thunder Bay where the average one or two-bedroom apartment is affordable for a full-time mini￾mum wage worker. We urgently need to build more well-de￾signed, affordable, purpose-built rental hous￾ing and to repair and maintain the supply we have. We need to adopt a Housing First strat￾egy and work to end homelessness. We need to clamp down on speculation and provide funds that can be reinvested back into afford￾able housing, and we need to create more pathways to home ownership. Our comprehensive housing plan, “Building Livable & Affordable communities,” lays out a strategy for making sure everyone has a safe, affordable and accessible place to call home. Build affordable housing & protect our existing affordable supply • Build 182,000 new permanently affordable community housing rental homes over the next decade, including 60,000 permanent supportive homes. • Mandate inclusionary zoning and require a minimum of 20% affordable units in all housing projects above a certain size. • Create a seed fund for co-operative hous￾ing through direct funding and mortgage support. • Renew 260,000 community housing rent￾al homes over the next decade, in part￾nership with the federal government, un￾der the National Housing Strategy. • Provide nonprofit housing providers with the support and access to capital needed to purchase rental buildings to maintain affordability in perpetuity and explore preemptive right-to-buy for nonprofits. • Partner with nonprofits, co-ops, and com￾munity land trusts to use public land for permanently affordable rental housing and attainable home ownership options through low-cost long-term leases. • Prioritise and speed up the development approval processes for projects led by or in partnership with non-profit housing providers, and provide low-interest loans via a new revolving fund. Create more pathways to ownership • Allow single family dwellings to be divid￾ed into multiple condominium units to create more attainable home ownership opportunities within existing neighbour￾hoods. • End blind bidding to ensure that the home purchase process is transparent. • Make home inspections mandatory, at the seller’s expense, to save new homebuyers money on unexpected repairs. • Consult on and develop a down payment support program to help low and middle income first-time homebuyers. • Develop and support alternative home￾ownership pilot programs such as co￾housing, tiny homes, and rent-to-own to assist low and middle income first-time homebuyers. • Increase incentives and streamline the application process for first-time home￾owners to add affordable rental units to their primary residence to help pay down their mortgage. Provide security and support for renters • Reinstate rent controls on all units to reg￾ulate rental increases year-to-year and implement vacancy control to limit rent increases between tenancies. • Extend financial support to 311,000 Ontario households via the portable hous￾ing benefit. • Establish a clear system for above-guide￾line rent increases that governs which reno￾vations are necessary and can qualify for an increase in rent. • Update and strengthen sections of the Residential Tenancies Act that deal with the state of repair for multi-unit build￾ings to ensure tenants have homes that are safe. • Strengthen rules and penalties for renovictions and bad faith evictions to 32 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 33 keep apartments affordable. • Increase funding for the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB) to hire additional ad￾judicators, add transparency to the ap￾pointment process, and eliminate forced online hearings. This will help address delays so that both landlords and tenants have timely access to justice. Address speculation and corruption in the housing market • Implement a multiple property specula￾tion tax on people and corporations who own more than two houses or condomini￾um units in Ontario. The tax will begin at 20% on the third home and increase with each additional property owned. • Work with municipalities to implement a province-wide vacant homes tax to make it harder to use vacant homes as a lucra￾tive place to park cash. • Implement an anti-flipping tax on quick turnaround sales. • Crack down on money laundering and implement a beneficial ownership regis￾try to avoid the practice of nameless com￾panies trading properties. • Implement a database that tracks pre-construction condo sales. Develop￾ers will be required to collect and report comprehensive information about buy￾ers to provincial tax authorities to en￾sure compliance. • Work with all levels of government and housing experts to develop regulations to ease the financialisation of both our af￾fordable rental housing stock and single family homes. Take a Housing First approach and end homelessness • Restore the goal of ending homelessness in Ontario within ten years. • Resume the homelessness census can￾celled by the Ford government. • Utilise a Housing First model to ensure that stable, permanent housing solutions are the first priority when helping those in need. • Engage communities who have lived experience with homelessness in pro￾gram development, as well as commu￾nities that face disproportionate levels of homelessness, including newcomers and racialized people. Expand housing options for people in crisis and transition • Build 60,000 permanent supportive hous￾ing units over the next decade through in￾novative partnerships with public, private, and non-profit housing organisations. • Deploy temporary and permanent support￾ive modular housing projects on provincial￾ly owned land as quickly as possible. • Increase annual funding for women’s shel￾ters as well as safe and accessible transi￾tional and supportive housing options for women and their families. Increase fund￾ing for culturally appropriate transitional housing. STRONG NEIGHBOURHOODS Urban sprawl is expensive, terrible for the environment, and destroys farmland and wetlands.” – Laura Campbell, GPO candidate We can’t sprawl our way out of the housing crisis. In fact, it will cost us more to do that. Paving over nature costs us more because it increases flooding and takes necessary in￾vestments to replace what nature does for free. It eats up farmland, which is disappear￾ing at an alarming rate. Sprawl also costs us more in taxes, adds to traffic congestion and increases air pollution. And that’s all in addition to the environmental damage sprawl creates. We don’t need to sprawl to meet demand. Ex￾pert data suggests that there is no need to ex￾pand beyond our current growth boundaries right now because we already have enough land set aside for development. What we need instead is smart development that encourages us to use land wisely in order to build vibrant neighbourhoods with a mix of housing types – such as laneway houses, single family homes, triplexes, quadruplexes, walk-ups, condos, and co-ops. An essential part of any community is small business. We want to make it easier for small businesses to succeed. Whether we live in an urban city, a rural ham￾let or somewhere in between, our communi￾ties can have local shops, services and parks that are close by and easy to get to. 34 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO Champion smart growth • Freeze urban boundaries. • Develop a “15-minute” neighbourhood framework that suits a variety of towns and cities across the province by working with municipalities on rezoning. • Reverse the Ford government’s changes to the Growth Plan that encourage sprawl and revise the Growth Plan to promote healthy density. • Require that intensification targets are met with distributed density throughout urbanised areas. Build infill housing near transit • Build 1.5B homes in a variety of innova - tive forms within urban boundaries over the next 10 years. • Update the Planning Act, Provincial Policy Statement and other applicable laws and regulations to expand zoning permissions to allow for triplexes and fourplexes as-of￾right within existing urban boundaries. • Update planning laws to prezone for missing middle and mid-rise housing on transit corridors and main streets. • Require minimum housing densities at transit stations and along transit corridors as part of the Growth Plan and transit funding agreements between the prov - ince and municipalities. • Work with all levels of government to transform appropriate publicly owned land for affordable housing, such as above transit facilities and in transit sta - tion surface parking lots. • Reinstate the provincial brownfield reme - diation fund to support municipalities to safely build affordable housing on previ - ously industrial sites. • Develop a framework that encour - ages the construction of housing on commercial properties, such as aban - doned plazas and warehouses, where safe and appropriate. • End mandatory minimum parking re - quirements for all new developments when they are constructed. Ensure community consultation is inclusive • Work collaboratively with municipalities on a province-wide “Yes, in My Backyard” initiative to raise awareness of the bene - fits of infill housing within existing neigh - bourhoods. • Encourage municipalities to meaning - fully engage with prospective residents, not only current residents, when consult - ing on zoning changes and new devel - opments to ensure all voices are heard during the planning process. • Explore innovative approaches to plan - ning consultation that ensure processes are genuinely inclusive and meaningfully engage all citizens. For example, engag - ing people in community locations that they frequent such as coffee shops or transit stops, or providing childcare to en - sure broader community participation. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 35 36 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 37 Strengthen community hubs • Increase funding for local libraries and ramp up publicity around the important community programming that they offer. • Increase support for community centres and neighbourhood coalitions, which play an important role in encouraging community connections and reducing isolation for elders. • Restore funding, improve communication and outreach, and provide reduced fees for the community use of schools to en￾sure their availability as important hubs in our communities. • Provide free and low-cost community programming in high-needs neighbour￾hoods, including but not limited to cov￾ering costs for free evening, weekend, March break, and summer permits. • Invest in more Youth Wellness Hubs and community centres that offer access to lo￾cal mental health services, spaces for so￾cial interaction, and supports for families. Create vibrant neighbourhoods • Support municipalities to create infill greenspaces so that there is one within a 10 minute walk of all homes by 2030. • Amend zoning rules to allow for small businesses such as corner stores to open within residential neighbourhoods. • Provide start-up funding for communi￾ty-owned healthy food markets and in￾crease support for community gardens through land gifts and organisational sup￾port to eliminate urban food deserts. • Improve the community benefits system for major infrastructure projects to in￾crease the social and economic benefits received by the local community. Help small neighbourhood businesses recover and thrive • Expand the Digital Main Street program to include nonprofit organisations and provide fulfilment platforms that better enable small, local businesses to com￾pete with large online companies. • Develop a small business grant program for Black-owned businesses. • Support the increased staycation tax cred￾it and ensure it includes dining at restau￾rants. • Work with insurance providers to develop an affordable commercial insurance pro￾gram for small businesses • Develop a program to help COVID-affect￾ed small businesses file for bankruptcy in a fair and non-punitive way. • Improve opportunities for small local businesses and nonprofits to win public contracts through targets and by decreas￾ing current financial and informational barriers. • Allow Ontario’s craft spirits, brewers, and wine producers to open independent, off-site stores; allow boutique wine, craft beer and artisan spirit retail outlets; im￾prove the distribution network to work for small businesses; and allow access for hospitality to purchase from these suppli￾ers at a wholesale price of up to 20%. Create a new regulatory framework for small business • Undertake a review of regulations in order to weed out red tape and costs that dispro￾portionately affect small businesses. • Create standardised leases to ensure fair￾ness and transparency and ensure that priority is given to existing tenants when leases are up for renewal. • Create rent control guidelines for year￾over-year increases that apply to all com￾mercial tenants, including new tenants, and implement a mechanism to enforce rules and resolve disputes. Support local arts and social enterprises • Decrease land taxes payable for build￾ings in which below market rent opportu￾nities are available to creative and social enterprises. • Develop a made-in-Ontario social en￾terprise strategy with the nonprofit and cooperative sectors to drive local job creation and support rural, remote, and urban self-reliance. • Create a stabilisation fund for the non￾profit sector to ensure that nonprofits and charities can help rebuild the economy and communities. • Affirm the arms-length operations of, and increase investment in, the Ontario Arts Council and the Ontario Trillium Founda￾tion. • Reinstate support for the Indigenous Cul￾ture Fund. 38 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 39 GETTING FROM A TO B Transportation is the biggest source of pollution in Ontario. Investing in clean transit systems is a priority for Ontario Greens. People need affordable options to get around, and they need relief right now.” – Priyan De Silva, GPO candidate To crush climate pollution, Ontario needs a real plan to decrease the use of fossil fuel vehicles responsible for an enormous share of climate pollution. We can rapidly move to￾wards low carbon transportation options, in￾cluding electric cars, buses, bikes and walking. More highways means more congestion, pe￾riod. We are the only party fully committed to stopping urban sprawl and building livable, affordable, and connected communities so people aren’t forced to spend hours in ex￾pensive, soul-crushing commutes. Regional public transit is a key part of our transportation plan, including the GO and Northlander. Instead of pumping billions of dollars into climate-polluting supersprawler highways like Doug Ford is proposing, we’re committed to building connected communi￾ties where everyone has an affordable way to get around. Our goal is to make it easier for people to choose healthier, lower carbon options for their commutes. This includes dedicating permanent, long-term funding for walking and cycling infrastructure so that our cities and towns are safe to get around. Connect communities with clean, efficient transit options • Stop building new highways. Cancel planned unnecessary highways such as Highway 413, Holland Marsh Highway, and the widening of Highway 417. ° Create dedicated truck lanes on High￾way 407 to reduce congestion and the need for more highways. • Prioritise public transit in all transporta￾tion planning decisions. • Immediately cut transit fares in half for at least three months across all Ontario tran￾sit systems, including municipal, GO and Northland services to help people avoid the soaring costs of gas. • Restore the 50% provincial cost-share for transit operations in order to reduce fare increases for users. • Electrify Ontario’s transit system as quick￾ly as possible, including by adding 4,000 electric and fuel-cell buses by 2030. • Triple the number of dedicated bus lanes by 2025. • Ensure all transportation decisions are evidence-based, without political interfer￾ence, and include consultation with plan￾ning experts throughout the planning process. Increase transit connections outside of the GTHA • Expand all-day, 2-way GO service to leave every 15 minutes during peak periods and every 30 minutes off peak, including weekend service. Offer at least one ex￾press service each way during weekday peak periods. • Establish a clean, affordable, accessible intercity electric bus service to connect all communities across the province, ensur￾ing connections in small, rural communi￾ties and dedicated bus lanes. • Fully fund the Northlander passenger rail service. • Explore on-demand systems for public transit, especially in suburban and rural communities. • Support regional fare integration and seamless travel between transit systems. Connect neighbourhoods with people-powered transportation • Implement Vision Zero to prioritise road safety for pedestrians and cyclists. • Create a fund for municipalities to build protected bike lanes while preserving safety and curb access for seniors and people with disabilities. • Support sharing and rental systems for bikes, e-bikes and low-emission vehicles with incentives geared to income. • Require secure bike parking and e-bike charging to be provided in new and ex￾isting multi-unit buildings, in surface park￾ing lots, and at all government buildings. • Redesign roads to reduce motorists’ speed in areas that are a particular dan￾ger to pedestrians and cyclists, and elimi￾nate hazards such as slip lanes. • Require all new or resurfaced highways to have paved shoulders for safe cycling. Establish commuter cycling networks across Ontario. Connect people with better broadband • Make broadband internet an essential service and roll out high-speed access across the province. • Use regulations to level the playing field for small, local internet service providers. • Support provincial funding for programs to study best practices for teleworking as a cli￾mate-friendly alternative to commuting. 40 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO INCLUSIVE AND ACCESSIBLE COMMUNITIES Ontario Greens support implementation of the AODA in our communities and will continue to advocate for accessible government services for all Ontarians.” – Nicki Ward, GPO candidate Inaction by successive governments has de￾layed implementing the Accessibility for On￾tarians with Disabilities Act (AODA), so unfor￾tunately the original goal of full accessibility by 2025 is likely impossible. Our communities should be built with every￾one in mind, not just folks who are able-bod￾ied. As we modernise the places we live, let’s make our streets, homes, buildings acces￾sible to people with mobility issues so they are no longer cut off from their communities. The beautiful thing about accessibility is that it makes places more enjoyable for everyone. Ontario Greens are fully committed to man￾dating universal design to ensure that all new housing is accessible for all and suitable for aging in place. Our communities need to be accessible and inclusive. They need to work for everyone. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 41 Prioritise the implementation of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) • Implement as much of the AODA as pos￾sible by 2025, and create a clear path for the remaining pieces to be completed as soon as possible thereafter. • Strengthen Accessibility Standards under the AODA to ensure the standards meet the needs of people with disabilities. • Enact comprehensive Education Accessi￾bility and Health Care Accessibility Stan￾dards and strengthen the Employment and Transportation Accessibility Stan￾dards under the AODA. • Revamp the Information and Communi￾cations standards to keep up with rapidly changing technology. • Review and revise the Design of Public Spaces standards. • Substantially strengthen AODA enforce￾ment. Build accessible homes and businesses • Develop new comprehensive Built Envi￾ronment accessibility standards by revis￾ing the building code for new construc￾tion and major renovations. • Ensure that new affordable housing stock is accessible, and require all affordable housing retrofits to meet the same stan￾dards. • Create incentives for retrofitting homes and buildings that make them accessible. • Ensure that design professionals are pro￾vided adequate training in accessibility awareness and inclusive design. • Substantially improve the accessibility of the Ontario Public Service’s workplaces, services and facilities. • Provide clear, in-depth guidelines and deliver more responsive, comprehensive support for AODA implementation to or￾ganisations through free, independent technical advice. 42 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 43 PEOPLE-POWERED GOVERNMENT We are more than just taxpayers. We are individuals, family members, part of our community — we are citizens.” – Bonnie North, GPO candidate Municipalities have been under immense pressure these past few years. Previous governments downloaded many so￾cial costs onto municipalities. With municipal￾ities covering these costs, there is less money for other vital services such as transit, librar￾ies, community centres, parks and municipal building retrofits. We believe the Ontario government needs to be a partner in helping fund these important services. Just over half of eligible voters in Ontario actually turn out to the polls– a sign of the deep cynicism that people have about poli￾tics. Governments have given them so many reasons to be distrustful, from gas plant scan￾dals to the influence of big donors. Many Ontarians have lost faith in our political sys￾tem and simply given up on going to the polls on election day. Many believe that un￾der the present system, their vote doesn’t even count. That’s why Ontario Greens prefer proportion￾al representation voting systems that are truly representative of the electorate. But even under a first past the post system, Greens do politics differently, with a willing￾ness to work across the aisle to get things done and a focus on people over party. Ontario is only as strong as the people that lead it. Encouraging participation in running, voting and all areas of the political system are important pieces of our democracy. Support and strengthen municipal governments • Grant municipalities autonomy to imple￾ment revenue tools to fund critical infra￾structure needs and services. • Provide financial support for municipali￾ties to bolster local infrastructure: ° Provincially fund 50% of shelter and community housing costs while allow￾ing municipalities to maintain man￾agement control. ° Restore the 50% provincial cost-share for transit operations and support electrification plans for all municipal transit systems. ° Create a dedicated $2B per year Climate Adaptation Fund for municipalities. • Increase collaboration and consultation between municipalities and the province. • Assess the use of City Charters as a mech￾anism to empower major Ontario cities, such as Toronto, and prevent inappropri￾ate interference in local democracy by the provincial government. Democratic reform • Create a diverse, randomly selected Citi￾zens Assembly on electoral reform with a mandate to provide binding recommen￾dations on modernising Ontario’s elector￾al system to ensure that every vote counts and the legislature reflects the democrat￾ic will of the people. • Allow municipalities the option to use a ranked ballot voting system for elections. • Create limits for municipal elections whereby no person may contribute more than $1000 to all candidates, combined. • Reduce donation limits for provincial po￾litical parties, candidates, and constituen￾cy associations to $1000 per year. • Restore Auditor General oversight of gov￾ernment advertising. • Require a five year cooling off period be￾fore MPPs and government advisors can register as lobbyists. Make politics more inclusive and collaborative • Make funding available for non-profit or￾ganisations that provide additional train￾ing and mentorship opportunities for women, Black, Indigenous, racialised, and 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals who are consid￾ering running for political office. • Reduce the voting age to 16 years old. • Increase the quality and quantity of local public input in provincial decision-making by creating new channels to give citizens a voice, both through MPPs and ministries. • Allow the introduction of electronic peti￾tions to the Ontario Legislature. Protect voter rights and empower citizens • Make the day of a general election an of￾ficial paid holiday. • Enforce strict accessibility standards at voting stations. • Increase the number of mobile polls at hos￾pitals, seniors’ residences, and for people with accessibility issues which prohibit them from easily leaving their homes. 44 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 45 New Climate Economy We can act now to build a more caring society and a new climate economy. Together, we can transform Ontario from a climate failure into a world leader.” – Mike Schreiner, Leader, Green Party of Ontario We need honest, ambitious climate action now. The path forward is laid out in our ambitious, honest and achievable climate plan, one that relies on bold action - not half-measures - to get us to real net-zero emissions by 2045. Ontario is missing out while the govern - ment doubles down on gas plants and urban sprawl, scraps renewable energy contracts, goes to court over carbon pricing, and snubs cash incentives to make EVs affordable for the average person. If Ontario wants to attract jobs and invest - ment in the trillion dollar clean economy, we need to show that we’re a province that takes climate change seriously. We can create hundreds of thousands of jobs retrofitting our buildings, manufacturing EVs, and creating low-carbon products and technologies. And we’ll take care of our own backyard, preserving nature as our best de - fence against climate change and moving to a zero-waste economy. We can support farmers on the frontlines of the climate crisis. Agriculture must be part of the solutions to the climate crisis. Our plan calls for protections and investments to help local food systems thrive. Our communities and infrastructure were never built to withstand the extreme weather events that are becoming common and more intense with each passing year. We need to support municipalities in adaptation. Work - ing with Indigenous communities, we also need to protect and restore nature, which will reduce climate pollution and help us adapt to extreme weather events. Stopping climate pollution is also an op - portunity to improve our overall health and well-being. Even meeting the comparatively modest federal climate targets would save about 112,081 lives between 2030 and 2050 due to air quality improvements alone. The climate crisis provides an opportunity to embrace a future where we take care of each other and the planet. Ontario has the inno - vative businesses, natural wealth, geography and workforce to take the lead. It’s time to start now. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 47 REAL NET ZERO BY 2045 The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is clear that there must be ‘rapid, deep. and immediate’ cuts to emissions.” - Dianne Saxe, GPO candidate and former Environmental Commissioner of Ontario The transition to a low carbon economy and a net-zero future is laid out in our climate plan, Roadmap to Net Zero. Year after year, scientists tell us that we need to urgently phase out fossil fuels. Govern￾ments make promises about cutting emis￾sions, and then make policy decisions that do the opposite. Greens will get Big Oil out of our wallets for good, and introduce the first Zero Carbon Law that will keep Ontario within our fair share of the world’s total remaining carbon budget. We will end fossil fuel subsidies immediately. We’ll also join other provinces by adopting Zero Emission Vehicle standards and position Ontario at the forefront of the EV revolution, from mining to manufacturing. Incentives for green building retrofits will create good jobs, reduce climate pollution and help people save money by saving energy. Action on climate change needs to be strong and immediate, and it can be an opportunity for Ontario to lead North America in the new climate economy. Phase out fossil fuels • Establish a Fair Share Carbon Budget for Ontario for the rest of this century and incorporate a legal annual reporting re￾quirement on progress and pollution reduction plans. • Cut carbon pollution in half by 2030 and hit real net zero by 2045. Take over administra￾tion of the federal carbon fee system and increase the price by $25 until it reaches $300/tonne in 2032. All carbon fee reve￾nues collected from individuals will be re￾turned to individuals as dividends. • Work with the federal government to establish border carbon adjustments to create a level playing field for Ontario’s low-carbon producers. • Eliminate fossil fuels from electricity gen￾eration the fastest way compatible with our fair share carbon budget, aiming to phase out fossil gas by 2030. • Stop new gas hookups and new fossil fuel infrastructure by 2025. Move to renewable, clean energy sources • Double Ontario’s electricity supply by 2040 and make Ontario’s electricity emis￾sion-free as quickly as possible in order to electrify transportation and buildings with clean energy. • Allow homes and businesses with renew￾ables to earn credits toward energy use for excess energy production. • Electrify everything practicable, including buildings, transport and industrial energy. • Negotiate to buy and/or exchange power with Quebec if both power and transmis￾sion are available at a reasonable price. • Add at least 7500 MW of short- and me￾dium-term storage to help our electrical grid run smoothly. • Don’t build new uranium mines or nu￾clear plants that add to our huge pile of dangerous nuclear waste that has already been in “temporary” storage for 50 years. Shut down the aged Pickering Nuclear Plant as scheduled or earlier if continued operation is unsafe. Increase access to electric vehicles and charging infrastructure • Increase demand for new low-emission ve￾hicles with cash incentives up to $10,000 for buying a fully electric vehicle and $1,000 for an e-bike or used electric vehicle. • Phase out the sale of new gas and diesel passenger vehicles, medium-duty trucks, and buses by 2030. • Require trucks in urban areas to be 50% Zero-Emission Vehicles (ZEV) by 2030, and 100% ZEV by 2040. • Make electric charging infrastructure: ° Increase the number of fast-charging stations on every 400 series highway rest stop. ° By 2023, require all new or re-surfaced parking areas (public and private) to install EV charging. ° Provide a tax incentive for businesses to install charging infrastructure. ° Require existing parking lots and garages (public or private, above ground or below) to install access to EV charging in 25% of spots by 2024, 50% by 2030, and 75% by 2035. ° Amend the building code so that new homes are EV charging ready. • Create EV supply chains to grow jobs and businesses in Ontario (see Build our New Climate Economy for detail). 46 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO 48 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 49 Make buildings energy efficient • Create hundreds of thousands of new jobs by retrofitting 40% of existing homes and workplaces to net-zero (conservation plus heat pump and solar) by 2030 and 100% by 2040 to help people save mon￾ey by saving energy. • Amend the Building Code, so all new commercial and residential buildings are built with the lowest carbon footprint pos￾sible and net zero by 2028. • Provide net-zero retrofit grants for non-profit housing providers, co-ops and low-income households to lower their en￾ergy costs and consumption. • Release the pent-up demand for green retrofits by ensuring owners and tenants have access to low-cost financing and incentives to insulate and electrify their home. This will reduce energy bills and protect Ontarians from international en￾ergy price jumps. • Encourage the use of sustainable and non-toxic building materials, and remove regulatory obstacles to mass timber con￾struction using FSC-certified wood. • Make building-level fossil fuel use trans￾parent through labelling and disclosure. • Establish strong, integrated conservation programs for electricity, gas and water, in￾cluding ensuring that multi-unit buildings improve energy efficiency and install indi￾vidual meters for every unit. Lead by example • Set aggressive GHG targets for provin￾cial government operations, and expand pollution reduction programs to include hospitals, schools, universities, and other public institutions. • Put a strong climate lens on all govern￾ment decisions, including a shadow car￾bon price on capital investments. • Eliminate fossil fuel use in new and ren￾ovated government buildings by 2025, and in all government buildings by 2030. • Require all large public and private or￾ganizations to disclose and reduce their carbon footprint and climate-related financial risks. Support municipalities to be climate leaders • Provide municipalities and practitioners with knowledge, technical expertise, re￾sources, and training via a Green Infra￾structure Support Hub. • Attract private investment into municipal and commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy programs (PACE, also called Local Improvement Charges) with seed capital and a provincial loan-loss guarantee. • Allow municipalities to borrow money to make municipally owned buildings more efficient and pay the loans back out of the savings. • Require all municipalities to adopt plans for reducing corporate and community emissions as far as possible to net-zero by 2045, and give them the authority and tools to implement them, including long￾term, predictable funding. • Restore the 50% provincial cost-share for transit operations and support electrifica￾tion plans for all municipal transit systems. BUILD OUR NEW CLIMATE ECONOMY Climate action is job action. It’s as simple as that.” - Christian Proulx, GPO candidate Ontarians are problem-solvers, not prob￾lem-deniers. The path to a net-zero future is not easy, but it is clear, and Greens are ready to roll up our sleeves and lead the way on cli￾mate action. We can make this happen. We can make choices that build livable communities and a better economy. Choices supporting green innovations that lead to new businesses, ca￾reers and better jobs, and that make it more costly for industries to pollute and more prof￾itable for them to decarbonize. Choices to cover the tuition costs for skilled trades and clean energy so that we can launch a massive green workforce. And choices to give people who need it the most a helping hand as the world makes the transition. Billions of dollars are flowing into the new climate economy. If Ontario wants to at￾tract these jobs and investment, we need to show that we’re a province that takes climate change seriously.We must show strong sup￾port for growing green businesses, including supporting a skilled workforce, research, fi￾nancing, inputs and procurement to help them thrive. 50 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO Ensure a just and equitable transition • Focus at least 25% of the overall benefits of public investments to reduce climate pollution on disadvantaged communities. • Fund a $6B climate bonus for low-income households by adding a 1% climate sur￾charge levy on the province’s top 10% in￾come earners. • Focus conservation subsidies on retrofits that reduce energy use for those unduly affected by the cost of energy, especial￾ly rural, remote, low-income, and Indige￾nous communities. • Redirect the annual $7B taxpayer subsidy for electricity prices to support energy effi￾ciency and climate action, maintaining en￾ergy subsidies only to those in need while also providing free access to upgrades that lower energy costs and consumption. • Conduct a transition census of vulnerable jobs and economic sectors to develop strategies that help workers and business￾es adapt to a new climate economy. Train today for the jobs of tomorrow • Create hundreds of thousands of new jobs by retrofitting 40% of existing homes and workplaces to net zero by 2030, and 100% by 2040. • Modernise the apprenticeship applica￾tion process to provide candidates with an electronic, single-entry access to the apprenticeship application and registra￾tion process. • Reduce the ratio of journeypersons to ap￾prentices to one-to-one. • Increase training opportunities by provid￾ing incentives for businesses that partici￾pate in training and certification programs in job growth areas such as green build￾ing, biomedical technology, renewable energy, and sustainable transportation. • Provide incentives for businesses in￾volved with green retrofits, reforestation, and other forms of green economic activ￾ity to provide Ontario youth with valuable job experience. • Over the 4 years, give 60,000 people the skills and experience to work in the green economy through a year of free college tuition plus a year of guaranteed work when they graduate with targeted recruit￾ment of women, Indigenous people, and racialized communities. Support and grow green businesses • Build on Ontario’s strengths in mining, innovation, financing, and auto manufac￾turing to create a strong electric vehicle manufacturing strategy and electric trans￾portation industry supply chain. • Provide incentives for businesses invest￾ing in energy efficient and low-carbon equipment, buildings, and vehicle fleets. • Starting in 2023, set a minimum and in￾creasing percentage of public procure￾ments of GHG intensive materials that must be low-carbon, providing a market for heavy industries that are transitioning to low-carbon technologies and processes. • Redirect existing business support pro￾grams to help small and medium-sized businesses scale up or transition to the green economy. GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 51 Prepare Ontario industries for the new climate economy • Scale up EV innovation and production through an EV technology innovation fund and a Climate Bank. • Set strict standards for polluting indus￾tries and help them meet their goals via support from low-interest loans, the Ontario Centres of Excellence, collabora￾tion with clean-tech providers, and public procurement. • Fund research, demonstration, and com￾mercialisation of low-carbon industries and low-carbon capital investments in ex￾isting industries through grants and loans. Make Ontario safe and resilient • Plan how to manage the health risks to people, including heat, wildfire smoke, flooding, drought, and insect-borne dis￾eases. • Create a Climate Adaptation Fund fund￾ed by a dedicated adaptation levy to help get the overdue work underway to pre￾pare municipalities, infrastructure, build￾ings, agriculture and forestry to withstand the increased effects of climate change. • Require all large public and private orga￾nizations to evaluate their vulnerability to climate shocks and stresses, and to plan how to manage them. • Integrate climate resilience into land use planning and when designing, sizing and siting infrastructure. • Expand natural infrastructure on private and public lands to increase resilience to climate risks. 52 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 53 PROTECT OUR NATURAL ECOSYSTEMS Let’s protect the places we love by conserving and protecting at least 25% of Ontario by 2025, and 30% by 2030, especially areas of particular importance like wetlands and natural heritage.” - Michelle Angkasa, GPO candidate Ontario’s wetlands, forests and watersheds are just some of the benefits our natural envi￾ronment provides that make Ontario special. These ecosystems are key in keeping our air and water clean and protecting the good soil we depend on to grow our province. Protecting our natural heritage helps pre￾serve biodiversity and directly affects some of our most important economic sectors: tour￾ism, forestry, food, and farming. When it comes to climate change, our natural ecosystems provide our best low cost solutions to maintaining a clean wa￾ter supply and providing flood protection. Now is the time to strengthen protections for the places we love, the natural heritage we celebrate, and the food and water resourc￾es that sustain us. We need to expand the Greenbelt by adding a new Bluebelt that pro￾tects our supply of clean water. Protect natural spaces • Protect at least 25% of lands and water in Ontario by 2025 and 30% by 2030. ° Work with Indigenous communities to establish Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCAs) where Indig￾enous governments have the prima￾ry role in protecting and conserving ecosystems through their laws, gover￾nance and knowledge systems. ° Permanently protect Provincially Sig￾nificant Wetlands, Areas of Natural and Scientific Interest and Provincial Wildlife Areas on Crown land. ° Protect and restore natural areas that sequester carbon and protect bio￾diversity, including grasslands and peatlands, old growth forests, and ecological corridors between protect￾ed areas. • Strengthen and fund the ecological integ￾rity role of Ontario’s public parks system and create five new provincial parks. • Strengthen the Greenbelt Act and make new highways through the Greenbelt illegal. • Reward sustainable forestry and land management practices that protect the Boreal forest. • Enhance urban tree canopy targets and improve legal protection for urban trees. Dedicate 15% of the existing infrastruc￾ture funding for green infrastructure, in￾cluding urban forests. Safeguard our source water • Double the size of the Greenbelt to in￾clude a Bluebelt of protected moraines, river systems, and watersheds that in￾cludes the Paris Galt Moraine, Carruthers Creek, Grand River Watershed, and many other critical bodies of water. • Work with Indigenous Peoples and the federal government to establish Nation￾al Marine Conservation Areas in Hudson and James Bay, and in the Great Lakes. • Implement a plan for cutting phospho￾rus entering Lake Simcoe to 44 tonnes by 2026 and support the creation of a phos￾phorus recycling facility.. • Restore provincial funding for source wa￾ter protection under the Clean Water Act and expand drinking water source pro￾tection to northern, remote and Indige￾nous communities. • Bring back oversight and public consulta￾tion to reduce flooding and protect peo￾ple and the places we love. Mandate veg￾etated setbacks along lakes, rivers, flood plains and drains. Use water sustainably • Fix the Permit to Take Water process ° Stop industrial water extraction and ban bulk removal of water from a watershed. ° Restore municipal regulation of aggre￾gate extraction below the water table. • Add water usage to reporting obligations for large buildings and the public sector. • Incentivise water conservation and reuse, such as greywater systems in households. • Require multi-unit residential and com￾mercial buildings to install water metres. 54 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 55 Reduce waste • Set high recycling and management stan￾dards for printed paper and packaging (Blue Box) materials, and a minimum stan￾dard of 85% for plastic packaging by 2030. • Adopt clear, stringent, and enforceable extended producer responsibility stan￾dards for waste and packaging generat￾ed at workplaces, schools, and in public places - the sectors responsible for the majority of Ontario’s waste. • Expand the federal government’s list of banned single-use plastics to include wa￾ter bottles, coffee cups and other unnec￾essary packaging. • Ensure a broad range of right to repair legislation to extend the life of goods and protect purchasers. • Ban food waste from landfills or incinera￾tors and expand food waste collection to all municipalities across the province. • Set targets to significantly reduce Ontar￾io’s material and consumption footprints and track and report on progress. • Set required minimum use of recycled aggregates in infrastructure projects as well as providing research and education funding to ensure that all reclaimed con￾crete material can be re-engineered and re-used as effectively as possible. Stand strong for environmental justice • Strengthen and uphold the Environmen￾tal Bill of Rights. • Require the Ministry of Environment to develop and report on a strategy to ad￾dress environmental racism. • Establish more strict monitoring and en￾forcement standards for air and water pollution in areas where communities are exposed to potential health risks from multiple industries. Strengthen environmental oversight and public consultation • Restore the Office of the Environmental Commissioner. • Establish and enforce industry sector standards for air and water pollution that protect health. • Restore a robust environmental assess￾ment process and reverse changes that allow for assessments to be “streamlined.” ° Ensure assessments consider climate impacts and climate friendly alterna￾tives to a project as part of the evalua￾tion process. ° Restore automatic environmental as￾sessment of public-sector projects, plans and policies, including timber management on Crown lands and re￾gional assessments. ° Include private sector projects that will have long term environmental im￾pacts, including mining and smelters. • Rapidly repeal all recent changes that lim￾ited Conservation Authorities’ authority and provide stable funding mechanisms so Conservation Authorities can fulfil their mandates, including watershed level pro￾tections. • Reverse changes in Bill 245 that merged all land use planning tribunals, includ￾ing the Environmental Review Board, into the Ontario Land Tribunal, and re￾verse damaging changes to the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal (LPAT). • Uphold the duty to obtain free, prior and informed consent from First Nations and Métis communities regarding decisions that may affect them. Protect biodiversity • Restore the original Endangered Species Act, 2007 and a science-based system for determining species status, recovery, and habitat protection while eliminating ex￾emptions for industry. • Properly fund and support endangered species recovery efforts and habitat stew￾ardship programs. • Cancel the Species at Risk Conservation Fund (aka “Pay to Slay”) that allows busi￾nesses to simply offset their harm to bio￾diversity by paying into the fund. • Protect pollinators by ending the outdoor use of neonicotinoid pesticides. Restore the pesticide advisory committee. • Regulate new outdoor lighting to include dark sky protection. Strengthen animal welfare rules • Ban the breeding, possession, use, and sale of wild exotic animals as pets and implement a more comprehensive licens￾ing system for zoo facilities housing exotic wild animals. • Ban road-side zoos and prohibit inhu￾mane and unsafe animal-visitor interac￾tions as per the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums guidelines. • Enhance animal welfare standards for an￾imal agriculture. Implement more robust regulations and inspections of the hous￾ing, sale, and transport of agricultural ani￾mals and ensure enforcement. • Oppose the use of furs on ornamental, except by First Nations, Métis, and Inuit persons, and where such use is protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. • Repeal all provincial breed-specific legis￾lation. 56 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO | THE GREEN PLAN 57 HELP LOCAL FOOD SYSTEMS TO THRIVE We need to protect farmland that is being paved over at an alarming rate. We have to act now to support farm-to-table agriculture here in Ontario.” - Aneep Dhade, GPO candidate In Ontario, we are losing farmland at an alarm￾ing rate of 175 acres a day, largely to urban sprawl and aggregate mining. We need to provide permanent protections for prime ag￾ricultural land to keep it from being destroyed by urban sprawl, highways, and gravel mining that threatens our groundwater supply. Greens will support farm-to-table agriculture here in Ontario, making it easier for small farms to use the latest technology, access the internet and turn a profit. We’ll also provide support for farmers to adopt more sustain￾able practices so that farming and climate ac￾tion go hand-in-hand. Healthy soil is essential for the health of On￾tario’s farms and food system. It also impacts yield and quality, water and nutrient retention, resilience, biodiversity, and climate change adaptation and mitigation. So we need to support our family farms while they protect this precious resource. Our plan provides solutions that will create better connections between farmers and consumers and build a stronger, healthier regional food system. It’s increasingly expen￾sive for Ontarians to put food on the table, and the current sprawl agenda of paving over the farmland that feeds us does not help this. Protect farmland • Freeze urban boundaries now. • Permanently protect prime farmland from being lost to non-agricultural use, such as urban sprawl, highways, and gravel mining. • Move class 1 and 2 soils from the White￾belt to the Greenbelt. Increase access and support for local, nutritious food • Introduce a nutritious school lunch pro￾gram for the public school system. • Provide start-up funding and land for community-owned healthy food markets, community gardens, and rooftop growing spaces, particularly in urban food deserts. • Set measurable, made-in-Ontario food purchasing targets for all public institutions. • Treat surplus food as a valuable resource. First, use it to feed people, then animals, and never send it to landfill. • Provide tax incentives for local food and beverage manufacturers who purchase inputs grown by local farmers. Support local sustainable farming • Pass the Organic Products Act to regu￾late the use of the term “organic” within Ontario. • Invest in research and innovation that im￾proves the sustainability of how we grow, produce, and distribute our food. • Revise crop insurance programs to sup￾port farming practices that improve soil carbon and soil health. • Incentivise on-farm composting of agricul￾tural waste that results in biogas recovery. • Invest in an Organic Growth Strategy to support transition, small-scale certification, access to organic advisors and capital, expansion of organic research programs, and increased promotion of Ontario’s or￾ganic products. • Ban the routine use of unnecessary antibi￾otics in healthy animals. • Pay farmers for programs that produce, enhance and maintain ecosystem services leading to cleaner water and air, habitat, carbon sequestration and climate resil￾iency on agricultural lands (e.g. ALUS). Invest in the next generation of farmers • Create policies that support the retention of family-owned farms, farming by expe￾rienced farmers among new Canadians, and the succession of farms to a younger generation of farmers. • Provide education and grant opportuni￾ties to encourage students to enter into the agri-food business. • Promote training in specialty programs that focus on sustainable practices and soil-health within agricultural schools. • Continue to enhance the supply manage￾ment system to include more farm prod￾ucts and ensure offsets or grants for those looking to enter the system or with a low￾er ability to produce. 58 THE GREEN PLAN | GREEN PARTY OF ONTARIO • Rebuild agricultural extension programs and hire soil-health focused agronomists. • Purchase available farmland and place it in protected Land Trusts so it can be made available for dramatically lower costs to new farmers who would otherwise not be able to afford farmland. • Advocate for the federal government to restrict farming products from future trade deals. Make family farming more profitable • Ensure the Federal-Provincial-Territorial grocery retailer code of conduct is man￾datory, enforceable, transparent and ben￾efits both customers and farmers. • Increase investments in the Risk Manage￾ment Program to meet or exceed the pre￾vious 85% coverage to improve financial security for farmers. • Establish a food processing infrastruc￾ture fund to support investments by On￾tario-based companies in food process￾ing facilities. • Eliminate property tax penalties for farm￾ers with small-scale, value-added produc￾tion facilities on farm. • Protect farmers against losses for up to ten years as they transition from chemical agriculture to soil-health agriculture. • Shift program dollars from supporting in￾dustrial and intensive animal agriculture to supporting soil health and regenera￾tive agriculture.