Hello Davenport, 

We’ve come to the end of another eventful week and the end of the legislative session. The House adjourned last night and is scheduled to resume in September. There are of course many things that require the urgent attention of the Legislature, and would justify a summer sitting: to address the second dose rollout of the vaccine, the surgery backlog, enhancing paid sick days and developing a safe schools plan for September, to name a few. 

Since my last newsletter, the horrifying discovery of a mass grave with the bodies of 215 Indigenous children at the site of a former residential school has caused an outpouring of anger and grief and another reckoning with our collective past. We know these graves exist at every residential school, even though they have not all been found. This is nothing short of a crime against humanity. 

On Saturday evening, as news was spreading across the country, I was contacted by some local families who were helping to build the makeshift memorial for the children at steps of Queen’s Park. A small group of five adults and four children were grieving and had their smudging ceremony interrupted by Legislature Assembly security who told them their “demonstration materials” - children’s shoes - could not stay. My daughter and I raced over to Queen’s Park, and with my colleagues MPPs Suze Morrison and Sol Mamakwa remotely reaching out to the Sergeant-at-Arms, we were able to ensure that the shoes stayed put. 

We need to be reminded of these atrocities and this simple action, now replicated at legislatures across the country is an important way to ensure we, as legislators, are not complacent. MPPs Morrison, Mamakwa and I have written to the Speaker about the incident on the grounds and have asked for action to ensure this doesn’t happen again.

In the Legislature, the Ontario NDP Caucus is calling on the Government of Ontario to work with Indigenous communities to use radar technology to investigate all lands and properties formerly associated with residential schools within Ontario. We are also calling for the province to institute an annual Day of Mourning and Remembrance for those who died at residential schools, and for survivors, and to live up to their responsibilities and Treaty obligations. Our provincial and federal governments were both complicit in the horrors of residential ‘schools’ and I am committed to using my position as an MPP to stop these ongoing impacts of colonialism.

Read Indigenous Affairs Critic Sol Mamakwa’s statement. 



Marit

Marit Stiles, MPP
Davenport

Candlelight Vigil Tonight

In this issue:

• Extended school closure announced
• Ministry of Education at Estimates Committee
• Vaccine Update
• Stay at home order expires / Extension of emergency powers
• Clean trains now! New bill tabled to electrify the UPX
• MOMS Act passes
• Celebrating: Pride, Portuguese Heritage Month and more 
• Community updates and events

Ford confirms: Schools will remain closed for the remainder of the school year

After a week of dangling the possibility of a return to in-person learning, Doug Ford and his education minister announced Wednesday that schools would in fact remain closed. Ontario has been closed to in-person learning longer than any other province and on the day of the announcement, we were the only province to announce a continued closure (Manitoba has since announced). 

This extended closure has been really hard on our kids and I know the disappointment is real. 

Parents — often women — have been forced to stay out of the workforce, or do the superhuman juggling act of helping kids with at-home learning while working from home. Education workers are exhausted, especially those with kids of their own at home. 

It didn’t have to be this way. Ford didn’t want to spend the money on smaller class sizes, better ventilation, or in-school testing. He ignored the experts and marched us right into the third wave. He didn’t vaccinate teachers and education workers early enough or quickly enough.

During the Premier’s announcement, he also said that graduation ceremonies (for ALL grades) can be held, in person, if outside. While I know this possibility would be welcome by many, school boards are warning they had insufficient notice, let alone health guidance, to make this work in many cases. 

Ministry of Education at Estimates Committee

This week, in my role as Official Opposition Education Critic, I questioned Minister Lecce about spending in the Ministry of Education over the course of 4 and a half hours. Much of this, I dedicated to the issue of reopening, and what was done (or not done) to make schools safer since the recent closure. You can watch part of my exchange with the minister below. 

A large part of my questioning related to a new report from the independent Financial Accountability Officer, showing that Doug Ford is cutting $800 million from the Ministry of Education budget and setting our public education system up for a decade of cuts.

Vaccine Updates
 

• Effective June 4, 2021 and in alignment with NACI’s recommendation, Ontarians who have received their first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine can choose to either receive a second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, or an mRNA (Pfizer or Moderna) vaccine for their second dose. Both second-dose options available to individuals who received their first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine are safe and provide strong protection against COVID-19 and will count as a completed series. These second dose options will be provided at the recommended 12-week interval.
  Read more here.
   
• Due to an increasing supply of vaccines, the province is inviting individuals aged 70 and over as well as individuals who received their first dose of an mRNA vaccine (Pfizer or Moderna) on or before April 18, 2021, to book an accelerated second dose appointment.
  As of 8:00 a.m. on Monday, June 7, 2021, individuals turning ages 70 and over in 2021, as well as individuals who received their first dose of an mRNA vaccine on or before April 18, 2021, will be eligible to schedule an appointment to receive their second dose of a COVID-19 vaccine at a mass immunization clinic through the provincial booking system and call centre.
  Read more here.
   
• Reminder: People 12 years of age and older are eligible to book a vaccination appointment at City immunization clinics. You can also book by calling the Provincial Vaccine Booking Line at 1-833-943-3900.
   
• We are posting updates about available pop-up and targeted clinics as we hear about them at: maritstiles.ca/pop-ups 

Portuguese-language Vaccine Clinic - Saturday June 5

Davenport-Perth Neighbourhood Community Centre will host a vaccine clinic Saturday targeted at the Portuguese-speaking community:

Davenport-Perth Neighbourhood and Community Health Centre, 1900 Davenport Rd.
Saturday, June 5
10am- 6pm
No appointment necessary
Eligibility: Age 12+ (12 on the date of vaccination)

A team of volunteers from my office dropped 2,000 flyers targeted at the Portuguese-speaking community in Davenport this week. With our vaccination numbers steadily rising, we are working hard to help reach everyone in our community. Thank you volunteers!

COVID-19 & emergency measures updates

• This week, the government’s motion to extend its own emergency powers until December passed in the Legislature. The Opposition NDP is strongly opposed to this anti-democratic move and our caucus voted against it. 
   
• Ontario’s Stay-at-Home order expired on June 2, but all other public health and workplace measures will remain in place province-wide until Ontario enters Step One of the “Roadmap to Reopen”, at which point some restrictions will ease with an initial focus on outdoor settings. Read the "Roadmap."
   
• Ministers and the Premier hinted this week that Step One may happen “a few days earlier” than the suggested June 14 date, but the Chief Medical Officer of Health has noted that public health indicators do not yet warrant it. Cases on average have been declining, but officials are watching for an increase in cases related to the May long-weekend. 
   
• I have been trying to get further information from the government about restrictions on patio service when they are allowed to open, but details are scarce. Local businesses are still in the dark about hours of operation and other restrictions that will impact how much stock they bring in and how many staff they schedule. 
   
• With the expiry of the Stay-at-Home Order, the government is making it easier for people to be kicked out of their homes, as the eviction ban ended on June 2. The NDP has been calling for a moratorium on evictions until after the pandemic, plus tougher protections against illegal evictions, and rent subsidies for households that have lost income due to COVID-19. Read our statement.
   
• Ontario's modelling this week shows the delta variant (formerly referred to by the government as the ‘Indian variant’) is set to take over from the alpha variant, previously known as B.1.1.7. Scientists are urging an expedited second-dose delivery to better protect from this variant, which is up to 50% more transmissible. Read more from CBC News.
   
• Thanks to high levels of vaccination in long-term care homes and improvements in key public health care indicators, Ontario is easing restrictions in order to allow long-term care residents to enjoy more social connections with their loved ones. This is something the Official Opposition has been calling for. The changes take effect Wednesday, June 9.

Clean Trains Now!

For over a decade, residents in the west end have been fighting for an electrified Union-Pearson Express, and against the decision by the former government to put more diesel trains through our communities. We held a clean trains festival, petitioned and demanded action and finally got the Liberal government to promise to electrify the line by 2017. They failed to deliver on that promise.

This week, I was pleased to introduce a new bill with several of my colleagues, the Clean Trains Now Act, to electrify and improve access to the Union Pearson Express. Davenport is a community defined by trains. It’s important that we act on making the transit system cleaner, more affordable and more convenient, with full fare integration.

Read the bill here.

MOMS Act becomes law

The Moving Ontarians More Safely Act (MOMS Act) became law yesterday, with NDP support. As my colleague MPP Jessica Bell has said, “the bill brings necessary regulation to the tow truck industry, does a messy job of regulating e-bikes, and brings in some measures to make our roads safer, including tougher measures for drivers that speed.”

The bill also includes some measures we have been advocating for including requiring dooring incidents be reported to the police, and permitting municipalities to install safety cameras on streetcars to find and fine drivers who drive by a streetcar as riders are exiting.

In response to your suggestions and advocacy from our community and elsewhere, the NDP raised many of these issues in the legislature. You can read the speeches here.

We also introduced many measures to improve the bill, that were unfortunately defeated by the government, including parts of my own “Teach the Reach” bill that would ensure new drivers learn the “Dutch Reach” method of exiting a care to avoid dooring. 

Other amendments we put forward included:

• Expanding the definition of dooring to include collisions caused by dooring. This would ensure the police also report on collisions involving people who swerve into traffic in order to avoid an open door.
• Including our Vulnerable Road Users Law so drivers who injure or kill a pedestrian, cyclist, or road worker while they are breaking the rules of the road face tougher penalties, including being required to listen to victim impact statements, license suspension, and taking a driver re-education course.
• Including MPP Jen French’s Bill 122, which proposes tougher penalties, including fines of up to $50,000 for those who kill or cause serious bodily harm to another while they are breaking the rules of the road.
• Technical improvements to fix the government’s new e-bike rules so the industry can grow.

A month of celebrations!

June is jam-packed with virtual activities to acknowledge some very important communities here in Ontario. It’s Indigenous History Month, which has taken on new urgency, and it is the inaugural Filipino Heritage Month, thanks to a motion passed in the legislature this year by my colleague NDP MPP Doly Begum. It’s also Italian heritage month, a community with deep roots here in Davenport. I look forward to celebrating and acknowledging these communities throughout June.

Pride Month!

It’s PRIDE again! Another year without the marquee events of Toronto Pride, but nonetheless a chance to celebrate our 2SLGBTQ communities and to be unapologetically ourselves. 

We have been proud to work together with the Queer and Trans communities to achieve equal parenting rights (2016), ban conversion therapy (2015) and entrench transgender and gender diverse peoples' rights in the Ontario Human Rights Code (2012). 

But there's much more work to be done, in keeping with the radical, political & liberating roots of pride.

Read the statement from our caucus.

Read the full Pride Toronto schedule, which is already well underway with amazing events. I’m looking forward to participating in the virtual Pride parade on June 27.

Happy Portuguese Heritage Month

As Member of Provincial Parliament for Davenport, I have the honor of representing the largest Portuguese-Canadian community in the country. That community is thriving, and have been taking a lead role in helping our neighbours get through this pandemic. At the same time, our local Portuguese businesses are struggling as this lockdown drags on. This month, make an effort to patronize a Portuguese-owned business, so that our reopening includes the music, culture and food that have come to define our part of Toronto. 

I look forward to celebrating with you throughout this month, especially on Portugal Day, this Thursday, June 10. 

Watch my video message:

More community updates

Nestle Workers Ratify Agreement 

In early May, over 450 workers with Unifor Local 252 at the Nestlé factory on Sterling went on strike to demand better wages and full time jobs. That strike has now been resolved, with 94% of workers voting to ratify the deal that they won, which includes a 33% raise for over 110 workers.

My office worked quickly to get in touch with workers and offer support, and volunteers followed up by hosting two calling campaigns, where community members could call and email management to demand that they bargain fairly with their workers. In the second of these, over 180 emails and phone calls to Nestlé executives as far away as Switzerland were made in just over an hour.

One bargaining team member thanked the community for the intervention, saying that the phone and email campaigns were a huge boost to workers, and meant factory management was hearing from head office in Switzerland about the negative attention that they were receiving. Thanks to all who helped us stand up for these good, local jobs.

Metrolinx Updates on the Greenway component of the Davenport Diamond

On Tuesday, June 1st, staff from my office attended the first virtual presentation and live Q&A for the Davenport Diamond Guideway and Greenway Project. The Greenway Project is the name given to the public realm component of the Davenport Diamond Guideway project. The public realm component is a crucial piece of this project that the community here in Davenport has worked for years to shape and implement. I am happy to see that this is going forward, and while we are still in the early stages of this, I will be working to ensure that the community’s demands for the public realm component are actually implemented, and that there is a clear strategy for maintenance for the Greenway after the project’s completion. 

Overnight Noise at the Davenport Diamond

My office is also aware of another uptick in issues with overnight noise caused by construction on the Davenport Diamond Guideway. We have worked with the community to win reduced construction hours in the past and we are disappointed to hear that loud overnight construction continues to have a negative impact on the lives of residents. My office raised the issue of loud noise at the Construction Liaison Committee this past Monday, May 31st, and have written to Metrolinx to ask them to act to further mitigate this noise.

Stay Safe