Highlights of the Key Promises of the Ontario Liberal Platform

TORONTO — Ontario Liberals launched their cost Platform Monday. Here are some key promises:

– Balance the budget for 2026-27, albeit leaving room for “unforeseen circumstances”.

– Build 1.5 million homes in 10 years, work with municipalities to expand zoning options, and restore rent control.

– Establish the Ontario Home Building Corporation to finance and build affordable housing; build 78,000 new social and community homes, 38,000 homes in solidarity housing and 22,000 new homes for indigenous people.

– Raise the minimum wage to $16 an hour in January and then develop regional living wages.

– Provide 10 paid sick days for all workers and study a four-day work week.

– Eliminate the provincial portion of the HST for prepared foods under $20.

– Introduce a one percent surtax on corporate profits above $1 billion.

– Introduce a new tax bracket for Ontarians with taxable income of more than $500,000 per year, taxing at a rate of 15.16 percent.

– Extend child care from $10 a day to after school care.

– Provide free tuition for college early childhood education programs.

– Reload the federal 18-month parental leave program so benefits are not reduced and increase the provincial child care tax credit.

– Reduce the cost of transit travel through the province to $1 through 2024.

– Provide up to $9,500 in rebates on electric vehicle purchases.

– End for-profit long-term care by 2028.

– Increase funding for home care and help an additional 400,000 seniors get home care by 2026.

– Increase Old Age Security by $1,000 per year for eligible seniors.

– Hire 100,000 health workers and train 3,000 new mental health and addiction professionals.

– Clean up the backlog of diagnoses and surgeries with an investment of $1 billion.

– Establish maximum waiting times for surgeries.

– Enroll anyone who does not have an employer benefit plan in a portable benefit plan, including self-employed, gig, and contract workers.

– Invest an additional $3 billion in mental health and addiction services and remove the cap on new Consumer and Treatment Services sites.

– Forgive all student loans for nurses, paramedics, and other healthcare workers on the front lines of COVID-19.

– Reduce carbon and methane pollution by more than 50 percent by 2030, transition to a completely clean energy supply, ban new natural gas plants, and phase out reliance on them.

– Expand the green belt and designate 30 percent of Ontario’s land as protected, up from 10 percent previously.

– Divert and recycle 60% of landfill waste by 2030 and 85% by 2050.

– Eliminate corporate taxes for two years for companies most affected by the pandemic.

– Limit class sizes to 20 students for all grades and hire 10,000 more teachers.

– Double OSAP funding and provide “significantly” more grants, and eliminate interest on provincial student loans.

– Increase disability support payment rates by 20 percent and reintroduce a basic income pilot.

– Use classified ballot papers for upcoming provincial elections and allow municipalities to use them, and explore other changes to voting, such as lowering the voting age.