Ms. Lisa MacLeod (Nepean–Carleton): I’m proud today to stand to respond to the Minister of Children and Youth Services on behalf of the Progressive Conservative Party.

We, in the Progressive Conservative Party, are very proud of our progressive past in being the first to introduce legislation and a child advocate in this province under the premiership of Bill Davis. Les Thorne is with us today; he was our first child advocate. I’d like to welcome him—I guess he’s just stepped away.

We also have with us today Judy Findley who, I understand, has taken some 3,000 calls this year on behalf of children; Agnes Samler and Matthew Gigen-Miller who have been tireless advocates and who have met with me and I know with other members of this Legislature. You deserve an awful lot of credit, too, as great advocates for children in this province.

In 2003, this Liberal government promised an independent children’s advocate. Twenty months ago, one year and a half ago, the former Minister of Children and Youth made a promise, and I quote, “The McGuinty government will introduce legislation this spring.”

Now today, three years after they made the first promise and 20 months after the second, we see before us legislation that I won’t kid you may never see royal assent based on the time frame.

But interestingly enough, the announcement comes the same day when the CBC is reporting a leaked copy of the Auditor General’s report detailing improper spending at children’s aid societies across Ontario.

Never before has the need been greater to advocate on behalf of Ontario’s most vulnerable children. Today, I was saddened and disappointed to learn that several executives with children’s aid societies across this province were given vehicles, including two SUVs worth over $50,000 apiece. Sources with residential treatment centres indicate to me that $50,000 would go a long way in the treatment of one troubled youth in a year.

We also learned in this CBC report that one third of cases reviewed revealed that initial visits to Ontario’s at-risk children were delayed by, on average, three weeks.

Someone must protect these children, and it is clear not enough is being done today.On behalf of John Tory and the Progressive Conservative caucus, I want to assure Ontarians that we will take this legislation very seriously. We will study it. We will consult on it, and we will make sure this government gets it right. We will be there every step of the way to ensure funding to children and youth has the appropriate oversights so never again will we have to learn that children’s aid societies have traded kids for cars.

We will be there every step of the way to ensure that we are measuring the effectiveness of programs for our children and youth, so that we are not just blindly throwing money at a problem, hoping it will go away. No, we will be there every step of the way to ensure that our kids come first so that never again will we learn that money meant for our most vulnerable children in this province is being spent on junkets for staff to the Caribbean and China.I assure you the PC Party will be active participants in this legislation on behalf of Ontario’s children.