TORONTO — The Ontario Liberals released their costed platform Monday. Here are some key promises:
- Balance the budget by 2026-27, though making room for “unforeseen circumstances.”
- Build 1.5 million homes over 10 years, work with municipalities to expand zoning options, and bring back rent control.
- Establish the Ontario Home Building Corporation to finance and build affordable homes; build 78,000 new social and community homes, 38,000 homes in supportive housing and 22,000 new homes for Indigenous people.
- Increase the minimum wage to $16 an hour in January then develop regional living wages.
- Provide 10 paid sick days for all workers and study a four-day work week.
- Remove the provincial portion of the HST from prepared foods under $20.
- Introduce a surtax of one per cent on corporate profit above $1 billion.
- Introduce a new tax bracket for Ontarians with taxable income of over $500,000 per year, taxing at a rate of 15.16 per cent.
- Extend $10-a-day child care to after-school care.
- Provide free tuition for early childhood education college programs.
- Top up the federal 18-month parental leave program so benefits aren’t reduced and increase the provincial child-care tax credit.
- Cut the cost of transit rides across the province to $1 until 2024.
- Provide up to $9,500 in rebates on purchases of electric vehicles.
- End for-profit long-term care by 2028.
- Increase funding for home care and help 400,000 more seniors get home care by 2026.
- Increase Old Age Security by $1,000 per year for eligible seniors.
- Hire 100,000 health-care workers and train 3,000 new mental health and addictions professionals.
- Clear the diagnostic and surgery backlog with a $1-billion investment.
- Establish maximum wait times for surgeries.
- Enroll anyone without an employer benefits plan in a portable benefits plan, including self-employed, gig and contract workers.
- Invest an additional $3 billion in mental health and addictions services and lift the cap on new Consumption and Treatment Services sites.
- Forgive all student loans for nurses, paramedics and other health-care workers on the front-lines of COVID-19.
- Cut carbon and methane pollution by more than 50 per cent by 2030, transition to a fully clean energy supply, ban new natural gas plants and phase out reliance on them.
- Expand the Greenbelt and designate 30 per cent of Ontario land as protected, up from 10 per cent.
- Divert and recycle 60 per cent of waste from landfills by 2030 and 85 per cent by 2050.
- Eliminate corporate taxes for two years for businesses most impacted by the pandemic.
- Cap class sizes at 20 students for all grades and hire 10,000 more teachers.
- Double OSAP funding and give “significantly” more grants, and eliminate interest on provincial student loans.
- Increase disability support payment rates by 20 per cent and reintroduce a basic income pilot.
- Use ranked ballots for the next provincial election, and allow municipalities to use it, and explore other voting changes such as lowering the voting age.