The introduction is being completed. It is therefore now time for Question Period. The leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition. Mr. Speaker, to the Premier. I couldn't get an answer yesterday, so I'm going to try again today. The tapes are clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. Who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for a withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election? Mr. Speaker, to the Premier. Thank you very much. I've been very open with the legislature, with the media and with the public about the allegations surrounding the Sudbury by-election. Mr. Speaker, now that the charges have been laid, the matter is before the court and it's before the court under a presumption of innocence, Mr. Speaker. We'll continue to cooperate with the authorities, with any independent investigation, Mr. Speaker, and Pat Cerberra has stepped down from her role. Thank you. Supplementary, the member from Leeds, Grenville. Mr. Speaker, back to the Premier. The tapes are clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. Who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for his withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election? I'm not amused with some of the things I've been hearing and I'll stop it. So you provide yourself with your own discipline and stop now before I do. Premier. Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker. Thank you very much, Speaker. I think as the Premier said earlier, she has been very open to the public, to this legislature and to the media as it relates to the allegations surrounding the Sudbury by-election. Speaker, as we know, this matter now is before the courts and it would be highly inappropriate for any member of this House to engage in any speculation or questioning that would undermine the court proceedings. We should respect that, Speaker, and let the matter be dealt with within the course. Thank you. Thank you. Final supplementary, the member from Wellington-Holton Hills. The tapes are clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. Who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for his withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election? I, Speaker, it's unfortunate that the opposition is continuing to ask questions that should be really be dealt with within the realm of the court of law. Speaker, as you are well aware, we have a rule around subjudice within our standing orders that gives us sufficient guidance in terms of matters that may be before course be not be discussed or dealt with in this House. Speaker, I want to also confirm that this matter will be handled by the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, which is independent and separate from the Ministry of the Attorney General. Thank you. Thank you. New question. The member from Oxford. Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Premier. The tapes are clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. People of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. For the fourth time, who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for his withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election? Attorney General. Attorney General. Thank you very much, Speaker. Again, I say to the Honourable Member, the Premier has been very open to the public and to the legislature and to the media on facts and circumstances relating to the allegations in Sudbury by-election. Now that there are charges laid, this matter falls squarely within the scope of the course. It is highly inappropriate for these questions to be posed or anybody trying to answer any of these questions. These are the matters, these are serious matters, Speaker, that will be dealt with within the Court of Law and on this House of the Side, Speaker, from the government perspective, we respect that independent impartial process and we urge that all members of the House do the same. Thank you. Thank you. Supplementary question. The member from Dupin and Carl. Speaker, my question goes back to the Premier. The tapes are crystal clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ottawa want to hear from the Premier for the fifth time. Who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for his withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election? Speaker, the opposition can continue to ask the same question again and again as much as they wish to do. We on this side of the House are not going to interfere in a court process, Speaker. That is, these are serious allegations, charges that have been laid against individuals. Speaker, we must respect the process and the neutrality and the independence of the process and let a court determine, based on evidence, the outcome not in this House. Thank you. Final supplementary. The member from Simcoe Gray. Mr. Speaker, to the Premier. The tapes are clear and now the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier for the sixth time. Who ordered the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff and top fundraiser to allegedly bribe? Member from Barrie, come to order. Please continue. To allegedly bribe Andrew Olivier with a job in exchange for his withdrawal from seeking the candidacy in the Sudbury by-election. Thank you. And Speaker, for the sixth time, this matter is before the Court of Law. And I think the members from all side of the House, I believe, respect our course and the impartiality and the neutrality of our core system. This matter, Speaker, are resulting in serious charges and allegations are not to be prosecuted in the legislature. It has to be dealt with within the Court of Law. And Speaker, it is a shared responsibility as outlined in our own standing orders that we do not interfere in that process. I urge the members, from all sides again, not to engage in any speculation or cross-examination and let the courts do their job. Thank you. Thank you. New question. The member from Brownlee, go remote. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Premier. The Premier's top aide, Pat Sobera, and her Sudbury power broker, Jerry Lahid, are now facing charges, as we all know, under the Elections Act. These charges stem from the alleged bribery of the Liberal candidate Andrew Olivier in the last year's by-election. Yesterday, the Premier failed to once again answer the main question that hangs over this entire scenario. Did the Premier direct either Ms. Sobera or Mr. Lahid to offer an alleged bribe to Mr. Olivier? I'm going to remind the member, as I did yesterday, that there are ways in which questions can be put without impugning somebody else in terms of the crime. I am going to remind him that if it gets that close again, I'll ask him to withdraw. Premier. Mr. Speaker, and again, I have been very open in this legislature. I've been open in the media and I've been open with the public, Mr. Speaker. And if the member opposite refers to past transcripts, Mr. Speaker, to past answered, he will see that there were many, many questions answered on this issue. And I talked about the process around the Sudbury by-election. Right now, Mr. Speaker, we are dealing with the situation where the matter is before the courts, Mr. Speaker. Under the presumption of innocence, we need to let that process roll out, Mr. Speaker, and we'll continue to cooperate with an independent investigation. Pat Sobera has stepped down from her roles, Mr. Speaker. Thank you. Supplementary. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When Pat Sobera, the Deputy, the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff, called Mr. Olivier, she said she made it clear what the Premier had in mind. She said the Premier wanted to ensure that Mr. Olivier had, quote, a role. And she said, quote, if there were other things that you're particularly interested in that are within her realm to make you a part of, she is more than prepared to do that. End quote. Did the Premier ask Pat Sobera to make that phone call? The member will withdraw. And if he continues in the same vein, I'll pass the question. Withdraw. Withdraw? Thank you. You may reword the question. Did the Premier ask Mr. Sobera to make that phone call, and did she direct Mr. Sobera to offer the alleged private? You just asked the same question I asked you to withdraw from. It's not going to happen. By passing the question, the Premier has an option to respond. Thank you. The Minister of Indigenous Relations, second time. New question. When Jerry Lougheed, the Premier's Sudbury power broker, met with Mr. Olivier, he made it clear who he was working for. He said he had come, quote, on behalf of the Premier. End quote. He said there could be, quote, a reward for quitting the race. And he said, quote, the Premier wants to talk to you. We would like to present to you options in terms of appointments, jobs, whatever. End quote. Did the Premier ask Mr. Lougheed to make this phone call or make this visit? And did she direct him to make this offer? Stop the clock. I've taken the time to make sure that there's an understanding of why I'm not happy with the way in which the question is put, and I'll explain it. I have to insist that members use parliamentary language when asking and answering questions. I accept that this is highly important, and I'm allowing the questions, which I should. But this perceived level of importance does not somehow exempt matters from normal rules of debate. It's not acceptable to make allegations against another member, even if it is done in a clever inference or an insinuation. The listener knows, I know, what is being implied. As it is said, you cannot or directly or indirectly do what you cannot do directly. Standing orders in the rules of debate section 23H page 20 indicates clearly you cannot make that charge. Hard-heating questions are absolutely allowed, and answers are allowed. I know that the members are skillful enough to be able to reword their question to avoid such a breach of the standing orders. The member has done it again. Please avoid impugning somebody in the house for committing a crime. You will have one more attempt. I completed my question, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, thank you for your clarification in this very important matter, and I also find it surprising, given the member opposite who posed the question as a defense counsel, and I know firmly believes in the presumption of innocence to pursue this line of questioning. He also is very well aware as a trial lawyer to know the importance of courts of law, the kind of evidentiary burden that is involved in the court of law, and the neutrality and partiality and the fairness of our judiciary in making those determinations based on evidence. Speaker, I'm sure he recognizes, as everybody else in this house, that this matter is before the courts, and we should respect their jurisdiction and leave that matter in their hands. Thank you. Thank you. Supplementary. Again, to the Premier, Mr. Speaker. Since the Premier doesn't want to tell us about the conversations that she had with Ms. Sobera, that she may or may not have had with Mr. Lawheed, and what they had to do with Mr. Olivier, I'm going to ask a different line of question. In the sworn information filed yesterday, the OPP says sometimes between November 19, 2014, and February 6, 2014, Ms. Sobera did, quote, directly or indirectly give, procure, or promise, or agree to procure an office of employment to induce a person to it, Glenn Tebow, to become a candidate contrary to Section 96.1, Subsection E of the Election Act. What did the Premier authorize, if anything, Pat Sobera to offer Mr. Glenn Tebow to become the Liberal Party's candidate? Thank you very much, Speaker. I think, in member opposite, it knows quite well that this is not the place to cross-examine on a sworn affidavit.  So to reaffirm what you said and to what I've said, Speaker, before, our shared responsibility that this matter, which deals with some very serious allegations, be dealt with in a Court of Law. Speaker, we owe that to Ontarians. We owe that to the accused who are presumed to be innocent in this matter until a determination by a judge. So therefore, Speaker, again, I urge the member opposite who posed the question and all members to respect our judiciary and focus on issues that are important to Ontarians. Thank you. Final supplementary. This is part two, I believe, Mr. Speaker. The OPP alleges that Mr. Lahid and Mr. Sobera, quote, committed the offense knowingly and are thereby guilty of a corrupt practice. And now for the first time, we've learned that one of those charges relate to the now Minister of Energy, Mr. Tebow, and his Liberal Party candidacy. Will the Premier tell us right now what were the 30 pieces of silver that she and Pat Sobera offered to Mr. Tebow to get? The member will withdraw. withdraw. New question. The Leader of the Opposition. Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Premier. In sworn information, the OPP says between November 19, 2014, and February 6, 2015, Pat Sobera did, and I quote, directly or indirectly give, procure, or promise, or agree to procure an Office of Employment to induce a person to wit Glen Tebow to become a candidate contrary to Section 96.1e of the Election Act. Mr. Speaker, this is shocking. My question for the Premier is, did the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff offer the current Minister of Energy an Office in order to induce him to become a candidate? Excuse me, I was quite prepared to deal with what I heard, and someone else has got herself into the mix. The Chief Government whip will come to order, and now the member from the Pete and Carlton will come to order. Premier. Attorney General. Attorney General. Well, Speaker, again, you know, same question has been asked despite what you asked us to consider, Speaker. Again, my response remains the same, because as the Attorney General, I will and the government will remain very respectful of the jurisdiction of our courts. This matter, since the charges have been laid, has now proceeded to the courts, and that it should be dealt with at that level. Speaker, I would reaffirm again that this matter will be handled by the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, and we leave it up to those prosecutors to make the case based on whatever evidence they have available to them, and a judge to make a determination. Thank you. Supplementary. The member from Leeds, Grenville. Yes, Speaker. Back to the Premier, and quite frankly, people want to hear from the Premier. They don't want to hear from the Attorney General. In this one information, the OPP says between November 19th, 2014, and February 6th, 2015, Sorbara did quote, directly or indirectly, give, procure, or promise, or agree to procure an office of employment to induce a person to wit Glen Tebow to become a candidate contrary to Section 93.1E of the Election Act. Speaker, did the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff offer the Minister of Energy an office in order to induce him to become a candidate? Thank you. Thank you very much, Speaker. Once again, the Premier has been very open to Ontarians. She has answered questions of the media, and she has answered questions surrounding these allegations right here in this House. However, Speaker, the Premier is also very mindful of her responsibility in terms of the process, in terms of the presumption of innocence, in terms of allegations being just allegations. The matter is, before the court, that is the most appropriate venue speaker for it to be determined with all the weight around rules of evidence and other procedures. We respect that speaker, and we look forward to having this matter dealt with within the course. Thank you. Thank you. New question, the member from Nickel Belt. My question is for the Premier. To the Greater Sudbury Police Board in 2011, and then again in 2014. Yesterday, Mr. Lawheed was charged with bribery under the Ontario Elections Act. When will the Premier resent Mr. Lawheed's appointment to the Greater Sudbury Police Services Board? Speaker, you know, the opposition can keep asking the same questions again and again and again, Speaker. The answer does not... Thank you. Answer, please. Speaker, the answer remains the same. These are allegations as it relates to a court matter. Speaker, it is only appropriate that it be dealt with within the course. Thank you. Supplementary. Well, Speaker, yesterday Mrs. Sorbara was charged with bribery under the Ontario Elections Act. Yesterday Mr. Lawheed was charged with bribery under the Ontario Elections Act. Yesterday the Premier asked Mrs. Sorbara to step aside. Yesterday the Premier did not ask Mr. Lawheed to step aside. For the people of Sudbury, it seems like a double standard, Speaker. When will the Premier resent Mr. Lawheed's appointment to the Greater Sudbury Police Services Board? Speaker, when it comes to the... It's my understanding, Speaker, when it comes to appointments to the Police Services Board, that's a decision of the board itself, not that of the Premier or the government, Speaker. So there is a process under the Police Services Act that is provided for to deal with matters like this. And it would be highly inappropriate for us to speculate as to how the process is. But I can assure you, Speaker, the Premier does not have the power or the capacity within the legislation to remove somebody from a Police Service Board. Thank you. New question? A member from Kingston in the Islands. Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister responsible for seniors' affairs. Minister, I want to begin by thanking you for visiting my riding of Kingston in the Islands to meet with seniors. On Saturday we had excellent coverage of your visit with Oasis, a non-profit senior supportive living centre. I was also very pleased that you visited the Kingston Seniors Association for their annual general meeting. It was great to see you that you're making time to travel and meet with seniors right across Ontario. And I'm sure that this is providing you with great insight into the unique challenges and opportunities faced by our communities across the province. Your efforts will undoubtedly give you a fresh perspective on what seniors' living means. And I know that there is no replacement for that first-hand experience. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister responsible for seniors' affairs inform the House about her experience meeting with seniors in Kingston and the Islands? Question. Thank you. Minister responsible for seniors. Thank you, Speaker. And I want to begin by thanking the honourable member for her important question. And I just want to thank her, Mr. Speaker, for all of her advocacy on behalf of seniors in her riding. It was amply clear, Mr. Speaker, that the good people of Kingston are very appreciative of the members' work, especially on behalf of the seniors. And, Mr. Speaker, as the member mentioned, I did in fact have the privilege of visiting seniors in Kingston, as well as in Ottawa just last week. In Kingston, I met with two groups who provided key insight into the challenges seniors are facing in Ontario. But, Mr. Speaker, not only did I get an insight into the challenges facing seniors in Ontario, but more importantly, I also got insight into how communities are coming together and taking the initiative to address these challenges. My meeting with OSES, for example, was truly inspirational, where I had lunch with seniors who was so proud to meet with them independently. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister for her answer and for her commitment to improving the lives of seniors in Ontario. I'm very pleased to hear that you're so greatly inspired by the efforts these groups are making. I've been working with these groups as well and share your enthusiasm about their commitment and their energy. And I agree that it is important to foster a sense of community and support between seniors' groups. As you mentioned, you did not just stop in Kingston, but travelled to Ottawa as well. I understand that during your visit you met with leaders of many of Ottawa's elderly person centres and students from the Retirement Home Management Program at Algonquin College. Mr. Speaker, could the minister update this House about her meeting with these different groups in Ottawa? Thank you, minister. Thank you, Speaker. And again, I want to thank the member from Kingston and the Islands for this question. Indeed, I did go to Ottawa as well, where at the Good Companion Senior Centre I met with a number of representatives from the elderly person centre leaders in the area. At the Good Companion Senior Centre, Mr. Speaker, I was very impressed by this one facility, a groundbreaking programme for seniors that's called Senior's Centre Without Walls, where a telephone programme is used to offer recreational, educational and health-based phone seminars for individuals unable to physically access community centres. This, Mr. Speaker, is a great example of using a low-cost, innovative way through the telephone of addressing social isolation, and I came away very impressed, Mr. Speaker, with this programme. I also visited the Algonquin College's ambitious adult day programme for seniors with dementia. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. Did the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff offer the Minister of Energy an office in order to induce him to attend the meeting? Yes, your Excellency. Mr. General? He has spoken about this issue. She has answered questions in the media. She has answered questions in this house. Now that there are charges laid, it's highly inappropriate for anybody to engage in a conversation. That's not appropriate, Speaker. It's the matters before the courts, and it is our shared responsibility that we respect that, in a court of law. Thank you. I would like to direct this to the Premier, please. The Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff has been charged with bribery by the OPP. The people of Ontario want to hear from the Premier. Did the Premier's Deputy Chief of Staff offer the Minister of Energy an office in order to induce him to become a candidate? Thank you. Mr. General? Speaker, the Premier has addressed this question today here in the house, and she has done so with the media. The Premier has been absolutely transparent, but the Premier also respects the court process. This is not the time of the play speaker to engage in any kind of cross-examination. That play is in the court. We should respect that speaker, and I urge again all members to follow the rules that have been outlined in the standing order, as you indicated earlier, where we respect legal proceedings and not prejudice those proceeding whatsoever. Thank you. Thank you. New question, the member from Niagara Falls. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Premier. Yesterday I was back in Niagara to meet with Helen. Helen was in a position by this government. You see, her parents have been married for 70 years, and whenever apart before, they needed long-term care in August. Helen's father, Clarence, is a resident of Shalom Manor in Grinsby, but her mom, Jesse, is at a home in St. Catharines. Clarence and Jesse have never been separated. In their final years after spending a lifetime together and under a completely inadequate couple reunification program, chances are they may never live together again. My question is simple. What will the Premier do today to help Helen reunite her parents and make sure they don't spend another day apart? Mr. Speaker, I know that the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care is sorry. I know that the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care is going to want to speak to this, but I just, I just want to say personally to the member opposite that this is an issue that is extremely important to me personally, and I think to all of us in this House, because we all know we all know couples, whether they're our parents, or whether they're our grandparents, or whether they're our aunts and uncles, we know people have been together for 50, 60 years who need to be together in those years. It's like they have become one unit. And so, Mr. Speaker, we are doing everything we can to make sure that that is the standard, that that is what happens in every situation. And as I say, I know that the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care will want to speak to this specific. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I know that no one in this House today, including the Health Minister would ever want their parents to be separated in two different long-term facilities in different cities after a lifetime together. It is wrong for couples to be separated after spending 70 years together just because they need long-term care. Jesse is 92 and Clarence is 93 years old. They miss each other terribly. They need to be together. They are worried about each other and should not be divorced by a long-term care system. Will the Premier commit today to reunify Jesse and Clarence and give them the dignity and the respect of living together for their final years? Thank you. Minister of Health and Long-Term Care. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This is an extremely important issue. We're talking about people's homes and we're talking about two individuals who should reside in the same home. They shouldn't be separated. In fact, in our long-term care system the highest priority we have for finding a bed for transferring to a different bed is spousal reunification. So there is no other priority that we attach a higher priority to. In fact, we introduced regulations in our long-term care homes act to enable us and enable residents in different homes to be reunified. It should never happen in the first place. I only wish that the member this is the first time hearing of this. I only wish that the member actually had approached me on this. I can't speak to this specific issue but rather than raise it in this form I believe it's an issue that we could have resolved together, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker. It's all about politics. Thank you, Speaker. My question is for the Minister of Economic Development and Growth. We see Ontario's information, communications and technology sector growing rapidly and driving innovation in our economy and when you visit my writing of Kitchener Centre you certainly see evidence of that. Waterloo Region is where the smartphone the blackberry was invented and it's where young entrepreneurs continue to innovate in software and hardware creation and in future technology that will no doubt change the way that we live. This dynamic entrepreneurial environment in conjunction with the GTA has been labeled the Toronto Waterloo Region Technology Corridor with companies such as Google, Shopify, Thalmuc Labs Research and Motion leading the way and thousands, yes thousands of tech startups, these businesses are creating well-paying jobs. Speaker, the Minister was recently in California pitching Ontario. Could he please tell us about the prospects that came out of that trip? Mr. Economic Development and Growth. Well thank you very much Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the member for Kitchener Centre for that question but more so for being such a huge champion of innovation in the ICT sector in her community of Kitchener Waterloo and as I try to respond to that question Mr. Speaker I think about how important it is for us to accomplish our role of passing on a good economy, a thriving economy to the next generation when I look at the fact that Ontario is now second in North America and ICT to California and I look at Chloe, Jerry Phillips granddaughter over here as Jerry's preoccupied with one of my colleagues and I and I say that's what it's all about Mr. Speaker and the young folks here in this audience it's building that next generation economy the fact we're number two in North America the fact we're we're attracting investments from Slack, Square Google, Cisco, Amazon all those great companies, sports well for our economic future Thank you Speaker and I'd like to thank the minister for his answer it's very encouraging to hear that he's actively promoting our most innovative companies and expanding access to global markets when I sit down to hear from tech sector stakeholders in Kitchener Centre especially those who have chosen to locate in our community they always offer a very long list of very interesting reasons as to why they've chosen Waterloo Region and Ontario to hang a shingle I can tell you that my own son who started a high tech company in Kitchener a few years ago he has a subsidiary in Southern California and a sales team in the Pacific Rim but he chooses to keep home base for his company in Ontario for a number of reasons Speaker could the minister please speak about that considering the intense competition on the global scene what makes Ontario an outstanding place to do business especially in the tech sector and what else is this government doing to ensure growth in the sector Speaker the member from Kitchener Centre is bang on we need to continue to help our local companies grow as well we need to help them scale up they're doing extremely well and we're producing some of the best young talented entrepreneurs anywhere in the world today our role now is to help them scale up so they can create huge multinational companies so we need to maintain that global edge by ensuring we have the lowest effective corporate tax rates in North America that helps we need to ensure we have the most generous ROD tax credits in North America which we have which is attracting them and we need to ensure that huge flow of talent coming out of our post secondary institutions that are attracting investments to Ontario and helping these companies scale up continues we're going to continue to work with that through our business growth initiative we're going to continue to drive this economy and we're going to continue to help those young successful entrepreneur scale up to become globally competitive new question the member from needs my question is to the Minister of Energy in the sworn information the OPP says between November 19th 2014 and February 6th 2015 so Rivera did directly or indirectly give procure a promise or agree to procure an office of employment to induce a person to win to become a candidate contrary to section 96.1e of the election act my question minister what were you offered to become a candidate there are two issues that I would share with you first within the ministry responsibilities that's what's supposed to happen when question period is on for the government the second issue is that there is a it's what I spoke of earlier when I responded to someone earlier in that it was a side way to do what I asked not to happen which is to imply somebody was doing something improper if that's if that's the case and I am going to rule on the ministry stuff I'm going to ask the member to re ask the question in a way that does not make an implied allegation so I'll let the member I'll let the member have an attempt to ask that question in a different way my speaker my question what were you promised to become the minister of energy that's I'm not going to permit that question because of the nature which I explained already you're not being helpful the member from leads granville come to order the member from leads granville second time the member from leads granville is warned the member from leads granville is warned the next next question the member from nickel belt the member the minister of finance I don't think he heard me it's the second time member from Davenport come to order new question member from nickel belt sorry the member from granville gore my question is for the premier the OPP alleges that Mr. law he and Mr. committed the offense knowingly and are thereby guilty of a corrupt practice and now for the first time we've learned that one of those charges relate to the offer that Mr. whether or not it was made to Mr. now the minister of energy to become the liberal parties candidate will the premier tell us if she's aware what was offered what the discussions were who made those discussions to Mr. to get him to run for the liberal party thank you very much again the member opposite is a defense council he's been in the courts a lot and I know that he knows the process I know that he knows and understands the concept of presumption of innocence I know that he knows the subjudice rule in the standing orders so I am a bit surprised that he continue on behalf of his party and operatives to ask the same questions which he knows this is not the appropriate place to answer so once again I respectfully ask the members opposite to recognize and respect our shared responsibility and let this matter be dealt with in the course of law thank you speaker thank you supplementary there are certain things that are achieved in the court of justice through the criminal justice system which require proof beyond reasonable doubt there are certain questions that can be answered here in parliament and I stand by that very proudly and we need to get those questions answered here members of parliament in Ottawa made a salary about $167,000 last year MPPs in this house make significantly less but cabinet ministers here in Ontario make about $166,000 which is virtually the same as what MPPs in Ottawa make now whoever discussed with Ms. Sabira the bridging of salary, the gap between Mr. Tebow's MP salary and the MPP salary and whether or not appointed to the cabinet was a part of that discussion that's just an absolutely ridiculous question I think according to the members Matt the member from Sabira took a $1,000 pay cut so that he can serve the people of his riding that's what motivated the member from Sudbury to run so that he can continue to build schools and hospitals in his community so that he can serve his constituents in a manner that is relevant to their lives again we find and I find these lines of questioning highly inappropriate because they impugn motives as you have stated earlier for the course in respect of the jurisdiction thank you my question today is for the minister of northern development and mines it is important for northerners to know that their government is making investments in the north that will encourage job creation and economic activity more and more film and television productions are looking to northern Ontario well known critically acclaimed films sleeping giant and born to be blue were both produced in northern Ontario I understand that the film industry in northern Ontario is a significant source of jobs and plays an important role in the local economy Mr. Speaker can the minister please explain what this government is doing to support job creation in northern Ontario and support northern Ontario's film industry thank you thank you for that question we are proud of the northern Ontario heritage fund corporation for building a film industry in the north Jennifer Jonas producer of the acclaimed film born to be blue to host the screening of the film in my riding of thunder based superior north great opportunity to celebrate the dynamic films being funded through the northern Ontario heritage fund corporation our government is working hard every single day to help strengthen and diversify the northern economy and create good quality jobs for people in the north by supporting the rapidly growing film and television production sector in the north and when film and television productions come to town in any community local hotels restaurants and businesses see increased activity we are seeing film equipment studios being put together full bore studios being put together and local residents are finding opportunities for spots as extras on the set or jobs as crew members so through the northern Ontario heritage fund corporation our government is continuing to work hard to build great economic development momentum in northern Ontario speaker thank you Mr. Speaker it is clear that this government is committed to supporting and growing the film and television industry in northern Ontario this support is critical because for every million dollars of film and television production it ends up generating 21 full time direct and associated jobs I understand that the minister recently made some announcements in northern Ontario on the investments of the government that the government is making through the NOHFC for the television and film industry in the north speaker through you to the minister can the minister please explain how these investments have helped the television and film industry in the north and what this means for the people in northern Ontario thank you minister remember for Barry for the question it really is a tremendous story last year Mr. Speaker film and television production added 1.5 billion dollars to the provincial economy securing Ontario is the number one film and television production center in Canada the third largest by volume in North America behind only California and New York and in this past year alone Mr. Speaker northern Ontario heritage front corporation has invested over 13 million dollars in 23 film projects produced across the north and that means all kinds of communities are benefiting from it and because of the NOHFC's investments in the film industry the north is now home to equipment rental companies film studios casting companies and post production facilities this is allowing for full service production facilities right here in northern Ontario so investments in film and television production are part of our economy plan to build up deliver on our number one priority to grow the economy and to create jobs thank you new question the member from Bramley Gore Malton thank you very much Mr. Speaker and my question is to the premier is the premier aware of what was discussed between Mr. Thibault and Mr. O'Barrell when it came to him running for the liberal government this matters before the course and we respect the jurisdiction of the court and I urge all members to do the same thank you thank you supplementary thank you sir if there was any offer made who made the offer and what did it consist of this matters before the course and it will be highly inappropriate to answer any such questions in this house we ask all members to respect the authority thank you thank you Mr. Speaker and my question is for the Attorney General many Canadians were moved and inspired by the outstanding performance by Gore Downey and the tragically hip during their farewell tour this summer including many from my own riding of Davenport and really from all across Ontario could not get tickets to see this iconic Canadian band perform for the last time in a matter of seconds shows across were sold out with some tickets later appearing on the secondary market at an inflated price Mr. Speaker this is wrong and this left fans frustrated and disappointed I also know that this happens with other concerts and sporting events fans just can't get tickets no matter how hard they try I know that the Attorney General agrees that this is a problem and that our government needs to take action to help fans across Ontario have a fair shake at getting tickets for their favourite events can the Attorney General please tell this House about our government's plan thank you Attorney General thank you very much Speaker I want to thank the member from Davenport for asking a very important question Speaker too many people across Ontario know what it's like to try to get tickets for their favourite band or sports team only to find out the tickets have sold out in seconds and are being resold at an inflated price on the secondary market it personally really bugged me that fans weren't getting a fair shot at buying those tickets and I was really inspired by the MPP from Kingston and the Islands who identified why this is happening scalper bots were buying up huge numbers of tickets in seconds with just a few clicks of a mouse this member Speaker had a great idea that we need to bend scalper bots I would like to thank the member for her hard work Speaker on this issue and for her idea I would like to thank all the fans across Ontario I'm pleased to let this House know Speaker that building on the work of the member from Kingston and the Islands I'm committed to taking action as the Attorney General this spring I will be introducing legislation that would if passed bend scalper bots thank you Mr Speaker I want to thank the Attorney General for his response and I'm pleased to hear that our government is committed to taking action on this issue and building on the work started standing member from Kingston and the Islands I think that everyone in this House would agree that this member had a great idea and I would personally like to thank her for all of her great work so thank you Sophie by bending scalper bots our government is sending a clear message to fans that we believe they deserve a fair shot at buying tickets I know that people in my riding of Davenport will be very happy with this news especially when the next big show comes to town I also know that both the member from Kingston and the Islands and the Attorney General want to increase transparency in the ticket selling industry while I know this will be a difficult task can the Attorney General tell us more about our government's plan to ban scalper bots and the work he will be doing over the coming months thank you very much thank you very much Speaker and again thanks from the member from Davenport for asking this important question and Speaker the member is right this will be a challenging task there is no silver bullet to this problem Speaker but it's also no excuse for inaction over the coming months I will be seeking input from people all across the industry and from fans with targeted consultations we need to hear from primary ticket sellers from artists and venues from consumer protection group law enforcement and most importantly a fans Speaker I'll also be working closely with the MPP from Kingston and the Islands and rely on our expertise and the information that she is gathered as she was developing her private members bill we know Speaker that this problem is now unique to Ontario so we'll also be looking at other jurisdictions who have taken on this fight I'll be reaching out to my counterpart in New York State to discuss the findings of his recent investigation into this issue I'm confident that the legislation we will introduce next spring will transform the ticket selling industry thank you very much Mr. Speaker my question is to the Premier are the allegations as reported in the Sudbury star regarding Mr. Tebow and his candidacy for the Liberal Party true Speaker once again to the member opposite that this member this matter is before the course and it will be highly inappropriate to engage any conversation or speculation on all these matters we should respect the responsibility of the course and let them deal with this matter thank you thank you Mr. Speaker I don't think it's appropriate for the government to tell us what an appropriate question is in this House but I will say to the last the Premier does the Premier think it is appropriate to offer a cabinet position in exchange for a political favour Speaker I don't think there's ever any room or place in this House to engage in speculation either Speaker you relied on standing order rules that clearly outlines the subjudice rule clearly outlines the supremacy of our course and the respect for our course I know the member respects the process and respects the rule and I'm just urging all members as the Attorney General of this province that we should let the matters be heard before the court of law thank you thank you Speaker Speaker my question to the Minister of Education Minister we have a lot to be proud when it comes to students achievements thanks in large part to our great educators and staff our schools are recognized across the country and around the world for excellence in education and this is something we are extremely proud of I understand that November 1st marked the beginning of financial literacy month and now preparing students to be financially literate is essential to student success in a stronger economy Speaker through you to the Minister can you tell us more about the importance of financial literacy and what this means for our students thank you Minister of Education thank you Speaker and I want to thank the member for that really great and timely question as we've just kicked off Financial Literacy Month here in Ontario Mr. Speaker Financial Literacy Month is the perfect opportunity to highlight the importance of this topic the member from Lancaster come to order the member from Hamilton East Tony Creek will withdraw withdraw what? withdrawing withdrawing thank you Minister thank you Speaker yesterday I had a chance to meet Percash and Tom from the Toronto Youth Cabinet it was truly inspiring to hear the stories behind their motivation to broaden access to financial knowledge for all students across the province we spoke about integrating more financial literacy into the grade 10 Careers Curriculum and I'll have more to say about that in the coming days thank you Minister we all have a role in helping our kids learn about financial literacy the member will take his seat I do not entertain points of order unless I know that it is an important issue the Minister of Indigenous Relations is warned carry on thank you Speaker and I'm pleased to hear that students in my writing earlier learning about sound money management responsible financial decision making and planning for the unexpected Minister I couldn't agree more when you say talk when you say talk about the need to prepare our children to be financially literate and effectively contributing citizens in our ever more complex global economy can you please tell us more about what the government is doing to broaden the financial knowledge and skills of our students thank you Minister thank you Speaker we have so many grade 9 students here today with us and for them and for students across the province financial literacy means that having the knowledge and the skills to take responsibility for managing personal finances and most importantly it means participating in society as knowledgeable responsible citizens who can confidently make decisions about where and how to invest their money we all have a role in helping our kids to learn about financial literacy and I'm pleased to hear that students in my writing Mr. Speaker about sound money management responsible financial decision making and planning Mr. Speaker in 2011 our government committed to making financial literacy a part of every student's learning from grades 4 to 12 by way of financial literacy education initiative Mr. Speaker and that means students across grades Mr. Speaker are learning about saving spending and investing thank you Mr. Speaker thank you Mr. Speaker my question is for the Premier in the candidacy of Mr. for the Liberal Party thank you Mr. Speaker as I've stated earlier this matter is before the course and it will be highly inappropriate to answer any questions relating to the matter that will be subject to a court proceeding as we know therefore it's not appropriate for us to engage in this discussion in the House thank you back to the Premier what was Mrs. Sorbara's role in the appointment of Mr. Tebow to cabinet it will be highly inappropriate to answer any questions thank you the member from Durham thank you just a minute Chief Government Whip is warned carry on thank you Speaker my question is for the Minister of Health and Long Term Care Minister in my great riding of Durham we have seen unprecedented investment from our government from the 407 east expansion to go train to Curtis and Bowmanville and most recently $12.8 billion for the refurbishment of Darlington the growth has been tremendous with more new families moving in every day it is very exciting time to serve as MBP for Durham as you recall we have spoken on many occasions about moving forward with expanding the Bowmanville hospital one of my top priorities we have worked closely with Lake Ridge Health Administration the foundation board local businesses as well as countless constituents and stakeholders to further this project we are proud of how far we have come and I thank you and your staff for their support along the way now in spite of all this hard work the entire health coalition is saying that the age of Lake Ridge Health integration will lead to a reduction of health services in both Bowmanville and Port Perry hospitals thank you Minister of Health Long Term Care thank you Mr. Speaker I want to thank the member from Durham he has been an absolute champion of the Bowmanville hospital we have had meetings Mr. Speaker we have had discussions Mr. Speaker but this gives me the opportunity to set the record straight let me be clear the Bowmanville hospital is not closing and they will not experience any reduction in services or cuts there are no plans whatsoever to change the programs or the services and certainly not to close that hospital in fact Mr. Speaker I have received a new proposal for an emergency department at the Bowmanville hospital and I look forward to continuing consultations with Bowmanville and Lake Ridge on the future possibilities for the ER in contrast to what the Ontario Health Coalition is saying the proposed integration of the Scarborough hospital Valley Health System and Lake Ridge will in fact improve and expand services across Scarborough and Durham Minister that's great news I'm glad that we're able to assure residents that the quality of their healthcare in Durham will improve under the integration there has been too much misinformation would you be able to provide some insight to my residents as to how the decision for hospital integration was made thank you Minister well thank you again to the member of Durham for that question these Mr. Speaker these decisions of course were not made lightly they're called a long consultation process there's a panel that was struck that provided recommendations to us earlier this year the Scarborough western panel the advice was also provided by the central east local health integration network and is the resulting work and I want to commend and congratulate the two hospitals and leadership over the past few months in involving their communities to prepare for this next step over the next several months the boards, hospital staff and physicians will continue to work collaboratively to develop the hospital structures required again to improve the delivery and quality of health services to both the Scarborough and the Durham communities Mr. Speaker thank you for your question thank you very much Mr. Speaker we're seeing an unprecedented scenario this question is to the premier we're seeing an unprecedented scenario in this province the amount of scandal that this government is responsible for committing is just outrageous and today is testament to that frustration we know already that it's very clear the elections act that to directly or indirectly gave or procure an inducement to get someone to run is in a contravention of the election act but we want to know from the attorney general or from the premier that under this act is the acceptance of an inducement to office is the acceptance of something in exchange for becoming a candidate is that acceptance a violation of the elections act my question is to the premier is the acceptance in and of itself a violation of the elections act attorney general once again the premier has spoken on this matter she's spoken in this house and she's spoken to the media that these are serious allegations speaker and therefore it is this is not the place to litigate these allegations a court of law speaker is the appropriate venue the member opposite knows that I know speaker the member opposite knows that and I urge all members as I've said throughout the entire question period to respect our own standing order rule speaker to respect our courts and let this matter be dealt with in the court of law thank you thank you supplementary Mr. Speaker the response provided by the attorney general is not in the best interest of the people of Ontario it may be the best interest of the liberal party well from previous experience the orange scandal the results weren't obtained by a court investigation the results getting to the bottom of the truth were obtained here in this legislative assembly the questions in committee there is a strong tradition of getting to the truth of providing justice to the people of Ontario by asking questions in this assembly so my question again is does the attorney general does the premier believe the acceptance of an inducement to an office to a position is that a contravention of the elections act and is the attorney general providing any sort of guidance or legal representation or advice to anyone involved in this circumstance once again the difference in this matter is that there are allegations and there are charges that are laid by the police therefore this matter is squarely within the jurisdiction of the court it will be up to a court to determine whether or not those allegations have been proven in the court of law or not I've also been very clear that this matter is not being dealt by the ministry of the attorney general it's being dealt independently by the public prosecution service of Canada I stated that first thing yesterday morning and I will repeat again that this is not being dealt with matter the persons accused have their own counsel and the prosecution is being handled by the public prosecution service of Canada thank you unless it's a point of order it's over point of order I just want to remind everyone that there is no reception 2.28 at 5 o'clock tonight and please come by thank you there are no deferred votes this house stands recessed until 3 p.m. this afternoon


The logistics operation that we're dealing with here for COVID-19 for the state of California is really evolving into the largest, most complex logistics operation we've ever had to deal with. Even for a state with so much experience in dealing with complex emergencies, California's response to COVID-19 has been unrivaled. Our role is to make sure that that the people who need the PPE to be able to get the state moving again, to be able to get their jobs done and most important to protect the lives of our workers will be job one. Already during this pandemic, California has distributed over 45 million in 95 masks. Over 53 million procedure are surgical masks, more than 4 million face shields, 18 million gloves and over one million gowns and there's more on the way. We're really only in the first few innings of the game. In this COVID-19 world of supply and demand, the demand far outweighs the supply. When we began this event and it really started to scale up quickly at the beginning of March, you know, we were getting kind of deluged by offers of assistance from different companies and individuals who had things to sell. Teams from Cal OES are constantly looking not only for supplies, but also making sure the suppliers are able to supply. Very challenging having to the vet find and vet supplies worldwide. We've seen a lot of challenges like fraud and we've seen bad equipment and we've seen promises not kept. The supply system is so stretched and so difficult. Prices are ranging. The delivery of these schedules are ranging. The quality of the products are all over the map. This has been a learning experience but let me be clear, you know, we hit the ground running and we hit the ground running because of all the previous experience we have. We've had to buy just a tremendous amount of medical equipment to stand up the surge in medical hospitals and this medical capacity. These 2,000 beds that were put into place came by us buying everything from the bed to the IV stand to the necessary medical equipment and to basically establish a hospital where a hospital didn't exist before. When I talk about one team, one fight, this is it. This is the big this is the big show. This is what it's all about. This is what we've always trained you and we're here. For more information on California's response to COVID-19, visit covid19.ca.gov. For all of us at Cal OES, I'm Brian May.


Hi, my name is Joe. I'm here today with Silvio Minkali, the founder of Algorand. Silvio, how are you doing today? I'm doing great, Joe. How about you? Yeah, very well, thank you. How's your conference going? I presume you've been to Paris many times? I've been in Paris many times. It's a special conference. I have lots of energy and I'm very delighted to see how many people participate and care about blockchain. It's a pleasure to see. Fantastic, of course. And Algorand is the blockchain that's known to solve the trial emma. Would you be able to explain to viewers the importance of firstly the trial emma and what it means to solve it? Okay. The trial emma famously stated that no blockchain could be at the same time secure, decentralized and scalable. Now, why is this important? It's important that the trial emma is false because where it to be true? Do you want to sacrifice security? Do you want to sacrifice scalability? No, unless you want to have a blockchain for friends and family only. Or do you want to sacrifice decentralization? If you want to sacrifice decentralization, why to have a blockchain at all? So I think that it's very important to solve it. It requires some more mathematics and the idea that we had to have a cryptographically fair lottery that somehow everybody which has a one-algo has a chance, equal chance to be selected for say a thousand token committee who is in charge of one block. And the next block is a different randomly selected one thousand token committee. And so this is scalable because of a selection takes a microsecond and if you are selected you propagate a proof of being selected. Mathematical very easy and easily checkable and very short proof and together with your opinion about the block and why is this secure because nobody knows in advance who is going to be selected and therefore nobody can corrupt in advance anybody and after and by the way everybody is also secretly selected and only you know that you've been selected when you propagate your winning ticket your proof that you are part of the committee of this block and your opinion about the block. So once it becomes publicly known who you are is too late to corrupt you because whatever yet to say your winning ticket and your opinion about the block is virally propagated through the network and nobody can put this into the bottle no more than the US government or any other government can put back in the bottle a message of virally propagated by say weak leagues. Very good wow okay quite an education for there for us Silvio thank you very much and of course one of the other key things about Algorand that is that it's a proof of stake blockchain now this this year is the year when the world's second biggest blockchain ethereum is supposedly moving from proof of work to proof of stake now Algorand was built specifically on proof of stake firstly why did you build on proof of stake and secondly what does it mean now that ethereum is moving from POW to POS all right a lot to unpack a job but let's do it one by one sure first of all proof of stake is a portfolio of approaches there is a delegated proof of stake there is a bonded proof of stake blah blah blah blah the Algorand version is a pure proof of stake which is really is a very different why did we choose you know pure proof of stake because of two things first of all is green in fact Algorand is the most powerful and sustainable blockchain there is and I think this is a very important in the world and actually our version of proof of stake pure proof of stake is really decentralized because if you ask me delegated proof of stake you select a bunch of people an elite club and you hope that they will remain honest for this foreseeable future I don't want to put you know the chances of having an ecosystem as important and as a big as a as a blockchain to be in the hands you know of the chosen few frankly delegated proof of stake is not good but we are the particular brand of pure proof of stake is point one of your question very good of your question you say we can tell you know it's very logical so you said this is the year that the theorem should launch it I thought it was last year actually if I think better it was the year before actually it was the year before this you know it's very polite but it's very factual and by the way you know I am we don't know what version this is going to be a proof of stake but let's remember that a buterin who made the petroleum says security decentralization and scalability cannot live together currently perhaps is fair to say that somehow scalability has been sacrificed in favor of security what is going to be sacrificed later I don't know but certainly you know if they want to use algorithm protocol then they can have a real free without problem so it's hard for me to comment what they're going to do yeah okay no it's really interesting I mean what would you say is the sentiment or the overall feeling among uh algorithm and other proof of stake blockchains with regards to ethereum's shift over is it something that you're concerned about or you know is it just another day I'll tell you competition is always good okay you don't like competition don't get blockchain because I really believe in democratization and meritocracy I really that's what is going to enable us the best of us to win the world does not need 6000 blockchains but it's not going to be a winner takes it all there is room to collaborate in competition with a few blockchain and by the way when things become a monopoly is never good for the world so we welcome competition makes us better and hopefully we'll make you know our competitors are better too by pushing them to improve themselves all the time fantastic so you mentioned a keyword that collaboration we're here today at paris blockchain week and algorand is one of the key partners um what does it mean for algorand to have you know these to be in such a place as the the former stock exchange to be in communication with institutional partners you know what is the importance of this collaboration now with institutions well I believe that institution the world over a national institution only big financial institutions will benefit tremendously for uh um coming on the blockchain on the public blockchain let's remember people were afraid of the internet which was public says who maintains it everybody uses it so I think that you know the institution we are ready for institution on algorand we have the scale and we by the way we have that technology we never fail to produce a block we never a outage and I think we have we are green we produce a block after a block after a block every 4.4 seconds we are ready and we welcome our institution to bring in and in in this environment like uh the the stock exchange I think we welcome regulation too by the way I think you know good regulations make a better market but the important thing is for regulation to be good and not just a premature or wrong this can actually create damage but fantastic yeah I mean what would you say are the common pain points or the hurdles that you come across in conversation with these institutions is there something that keeps coming up that you're like ah why don't they understand this yet or why is it they keep getting stuck on this point well you know it is um look big institutions are by definition have a lot of inertia yep and so that is in my opinion is not that they don't understand but they do understand but they think they take more time to bring over the entire institution institution don't want to break into whoever goes on the blockchain who doesn't they would like to move together this will take a bit of time but I think that you know they understand now that is a much more secure way to transact yep you can actually um we are geared in Algorand to have all the technology to be compliant with good regulations when they come I believe that clarity is always welcome and and but I think the security the cost of the transaction going down and really the ability to have settlements in seconds with finality rather than in two days should be appreciated by everybody yeah yeah and absolutely okay so let's look forward let's let's consider your vision for the sector I mean we're sat here next to a bear I mean the coin telegraph teddy bear there's it's no sign that we're in a bear market okay it's just a nice emblem yeah that's exactly um what what are you most looking forward to in 2022 2023 well what is going to happen in 2023 first of all we are going to deploy even more and better technology and we are going to even increase our scalability in expectation what is going to come okay I think this is going to be the year in which speculation will disappear and a real world use of the blockchain will start and big institutions um nations and even new institutions that are there really the blockchain and this technology brings into existence okay so we are going to be not anymore of a speculation but actually real use cases okay and in my opinion for this is important that technology ought to be stellar yeah because you know when you hear about how much you know 12 hours a month if the blockchain is down today and my blockchain is for speculation only say who cares I speculate tomorrow yes if the real application healthcare application financial application it better be that the service is always up 24 by 7 in fact every few seconds new block and life continues with prosperity and opportunity for all yeah it feels like we're on that cusp of you know speculation becoming real real life use case right yes um you mentioned institutions there nations is there anything that you'd like to you know let's slip today ah no no no not sleep no I'm a cryptographer okay okay very good fantastic um but I I love the future okay very good I mean um is there anything that gets you really excited in this space you know if we take an even longer term you know 10 years out from now is there something that you're really excited to see come to fruition so I believe ultimately what makes me excited about of this entire field Joe is really the democratization of finance okay so I really think that uh I'm here we are here but I certainly am here with Algorand to make sure that the person on the street the common person on the street as the same as access to the same extremely sophisticated financial tool at a fraction of the actual cost that right now only they lead us that for me is what is going to unlock really opportunities for everybody and and the growth of everybody else because I think we all get sick and tired of the concentration of our wealth and I think the blockchain can actually level the playing field by creating a platform where everybody's welcome is very low cost very secure I think this is a the real excitement excitement for this field there are all kinds of uses I want to I'm say the planet we certainly want to help the planet but this to me is the human centric version of it is the democratization of finance is a really a big win for us yeah it cannot be overstated can it it's that important world concentration and the climate yes of course um is there anything else you'd like to comment today or like to shine a light on chain to everyone and we are working for you very hard and uh we are making a better world join us fantastic great note to finish on thank you so much Sylvia and enjoy the rest of the conference cheers


Welcome! I'm Max and I will present the main results of our paper Doppelgänger Obfuscation exploring the defensive and offensive aspects of hardware camouflaging. Let's begin. The process of engineering typically describes going from a high-level description to a finished product. And the direction back, going from a finished product to a high-level description, typically referred to as reverse engineering. Applying this to hardware, so hardware reverse engineering, typically means taking a chip, opening it up, delaying it, imaging it, stitching those images together to obtain a net list of the chip and then analyzing this net list to gain an understanding of the hardware design. If I now want to protect against reverse engineering, the main tool at hand is obfuscation. With obfuscation, the engineering part is basically unchanged, but the reverse engineering part, going back from the finished product understanding it, becomes insanely difficult. And the goal of obfuscation is to add a tremendous overhead for a reverse engineer. It's important to note though that it only says insanely difficult and not impossible and we will see in a second why. When I talk about obfuscation, you will most likely think about the traditional logic-level obfuscation first, which takes something like this electric pole and obstructs its functionality. So in both cases, the electric pole will distribute the power, but in the picture on the right, it's much harder to make out where the power goes exactly. And if we now take a look at our big picture of hardware reverse engineering, this traditional logic-level obfuscation impedes the understanding of the hardware design. So in other words, the hardware is correctly analyzed, it's correctly laid out, the net list is there, but understanding the functionality of the net list is now much harder because it's much more difficult to comprehend. In this work, however, we are concerned with low-level obfuscation. And here against the example of the electric pole, a low-level obfuscation leaves the thing unchanged on the outside, as the name suggests. The obfuscation is rather applied to the insides of the thing that is obfuscated. And in the example of this power pole it could, for example, route a power line internally to make it unclear where it's going. And if we apply this now to our big picture, the low-level obfuscation will actually impede the recovery of the net list itself. So the analysis of the components of the chip will actually be wrong or incomplete, resulting in a wrong or incomplete net list, and therefore also the understanding may be wrong. This is exactly what we want to achieve with low-level obfuscation. And in our paper we provide the first generic obfuscation scheme that is based on low-level obfuscation as a building block, and we explore both the defensive potential, but also the offensive potential of low-level obfuscation. So let's jump right in. Doppelgänger in a nutshell creates a design that has a visible functionality and also a different hidden functionality. And the visible functionality is the one that a reverse engineer will eventually recover when analyzing the chip, but the hidden functionality is the one that is actually executed. So we create an asymmetry between what a reverse engineer sees and what is actually computed here. And we can do all kinds of interesting stuff with it. Doppelgänger itself is applicable to arbitrary encoding logic. So some logic, as you can see on the right, that depending on some conditions, outputs a specific symbol. This is a very abstract concept that you can apply, for example, to finite state machines that based on some conditions transition to a different state, bus addresses, counters and so on. All of these things are on a high-level encoding logic. And as I already said, it's based on low-level obfuscation and in this case on the building block of camouflage gates with dummy inputs. So let's take a deeper look on those. This is a normal three-input OR gate. And what a reverse engineer would see is that the output Y is the OR over its inputs A, B and C. But if this was now a camouflage gate with a dummy input, it could actually look like this, that it ignores the input B and only computes the OR over inputs A and C. But to a reverse engineer, it still looks like a very normal perfectly fine three-input OR. And for these camouflage gates with dummy inputs, actually scientific and commercial instantiations are available. So we take those as a given building block and work with them. The only requirement that we have for these camouflage gates is that they are indistinguishable from their genuine counterparts in the standard reversing process. And standard is important here. We specifically say that dedicated deobfuscation methods may exist. This is fine. But they must be too expensive to be applied preemptively. So in other words, without any initial suspicion, nobody would use these techniques just for fun because they are way too expensive in terms of time or money. And if this is given for the obfuscated gates at hand, then they can be used to instantiate the doppelganger technique. So let's talk about the core mechanics here. From a workflow point of view, the designer creates a visible functionality, creates a hidden functionality, and then the doppelganger algorithm will output one design that has both of these functionalities combined. And of course, both functionalities cannot be arbitrarily chosen. They have to be close, in a sense, and details on that are given in the paper. So the main mechanic here on how this works in a simplified way is to cleverly select the encodings for the output symbols. Let's make an example. We have the visible functionality, where we want in some case to output the symbol s, whatever s is now. And in the hidden functionality, so the one that is truly executed, we want to output symbol t. So if we achieve this, a reverse engineer will see, oh, this encoder outputs s, but if we execute or run the chip, then it will actually output t in that condition. And what we require now is that the encodings of s and t overlap. And this overlapping is actually quite intuitive. A overlaps B, if A has a one bit, wherever B has a one bit. Or in our case, we could create an encoding like this, where s is encoded in binary 101 and t in 100. And now s overlaps t, because s has a one bit, wherever t has a one bit. The cool thing is now, we can take the term that computes the additional one bit in the s encoding, so the lowest bit of our encoding, and connect this term to a dummy input of a camouflage gate. And now what will happen in the computation is that this term is completely ignored, because it's connected to a dummy input. And the circuitry looks like it's computing the output 101, but it is actually computing the output 100. So the whole circuitry outputs the symbol t instead of the symbol s. And this is the main mechanic here, but it's more precisely explained in the paper. So the core principle here, the main takeaway is that instead of adding new signals or circuitry s is commonly done in obfuscation, we obfuscate by ignoring existing signals. And this is a very important different co-operating. So now that we know how doppelganger works on a very high level, let's have a look at the defensive potential. So let's now actually apply doppelganger and see how well it works. The scenario we chose here is a cryptographic co-processor. So we have a chip where a user sends a key and plaintext and gets some encrypted cipher text out. And the goal is to protect this hardware design against reverse engineering of its exact functionality. The design is built as follows. We have a random number generator. We have an AS module. Of course, we need a mode of operation. So we chose CBC, but this works for other modes, of course, as well. We have a transmitter and a receiver module and some registers for plaintext, key and output. And the whole state machine looks like this. You don't have to read it completely. Let me just guide you through and you only have to remember like the general functionality here. The chip initializes, of course, and then awaits some control. And if the control command says, I will send you a new key, it will receive the key, will generate an IV accordingly and transmit this IV back to the user. And if it receives a plaintext, it will load the plaintext and the previous output and store the X of them for the CBC mode and then encrypt this combined value and send the output back to the user. So the state machine facilitates a whole ASCBC coprocessor in this case. And what we now did to obfuscate is we chose the hidden functionality, our true encryption in CBC mode. And as the visible functionality, we changed the mode of operation. So we want to have this design appear to a reverse engineer as if it would be an encryption in CFB mode, but it's actually an encryption in CBC mode. And the cool thing is that only four signals have to be connected to dummy inputs to achieve the necessary changes in the state machine. You can see the changes here marked in red where we have several state transitions that were modified and also one bus transmission as you can see in the lower right. And with these changes, the doppelganger technique could be applied here and we have the exact desired functionality. The interesting thing is that the change to the design that was necessary to have both of these in place has no observable overhead. We synthesized the design for several different options and you can see here reported on the y-axis the different area in gate equivalences for several different options without any obfuscation. And with our obfuscation, we are still perfectly within the range of normal designs. Same if we only look at the finite state machine or the bus controller, the two central components that actually were affected by the obfuscation. And you can see that we are still for both components in the range that you would normally observe for these designs. So there is no suspicion raised by our obfuscation here as it does not increase the area at all. Now what we also did is to completely randomize the state transition graph for the obfuscation. What you saw in the previous example is something we would call plausible obfuscation. The resulting functionality, the visible functionality in our case, is still plausible. It's just a different mode of operation. But if plausibility is not important or even better if it cannot be verified whether something is plausible or not, we can also fully randomize the state machine here. And you can see that the plausibly obfuscated state machine on the left and the completely randomly obfuscated state machine on the right resemble only or have only very little resemblance. And the one on the right is even missing some states. So a reverse engineer that only would analyze the state machine on the right would not find any reasonable functionality and would even miss some of the states that are truly in the design. At least when focusing on the state machine alone, again making it much more complex to understand the whole design. So let's suppose that there is now actually a mismatch between the analysis results and the observed functionality. So there is maybe some plausibility check possible or some after the analysis, the analyst finds that this simply does not match some test vectors that they tried out. Well, the source of this mismatch is now still completely unknown to the reverse engineer. It could be like an error in the reverse engineering process that are very common. It could be just a mistake that the analyst made. It's not immediately evident that the mismatch is due to obfuscation. So it's completely unknown where this error was introduced. And now let's go one step further and suppose that the analyst actually identifies the mismatch to be due to camouflaging or to obfuscation. The problem is now that the camouflaging technique itself is yet unknown to the analyst. They don't know how these obfuscated gates were actually built. So the first step would be to identify the exact gates that caused the mismatch, understand the camouflaging technique, partially redo the physical analysis to now get the correct net list, then redo the net list reverse engineering, and in the end gain the correct understanding. But our claim is here that this definitely adds a tremendous overhead for reverse engineer, which was exactly the goal of obfuscation. So we conclude that the defensive potential of this low level obfuscation is enormous. But now we want to also take a look at the offensive potential of low level obfuscation, which is in general not done for obfuscation research to also take a look at what an attacker can do with this. And for this we now take the point of view of a malicious designer, which makes sense since doppelganger is a technique that is used in the design stage by the designer. And the goal here is to insert a stealthy yet exploitable hardware trojan into the ASCBC design we just saw. The possible motivations here include like backdoor for covert access or pressure or bribery by a government agency. So we are not talking about script kiddies here, we are really talking about large scale adversaries. What we want to build here is a design where the visible functionality is the Benin crypto core processor with ASCBC and the hidden functionality houses the same core processor, but also an active trojan. So a reverse engineer would only find the Benin core processor, but when executing it, we have an active trojan. And the active trojan will actually be designed in such a smart way that it is not identifiable that easily. So it will stay hidden. The goal here is that a device that has our trojanized chip can actually work correctly or work fine with non trojanized devices, but that an attacker can just from listening on the conversation on the insecure channel extract the key of the conversation. So how is this done? The idea is to perform an algorithm substitution attack to leak the key. So we replace the genuine algorithm with an algorithm that is kind of indistinguishable in the output, but still vulnerable. The first question here is where can data be leaked? But if we take a look at the mode of operation, so in our case, the CBC mode, we see that we select a random initialization vector, which is part of the plane output. And this will exactly be the part where we can leak data. And this is also why it doesn't only have to be CBC, it can basically be any mode of operation here for this specific trojan that has a random IV, which is output. And this actually means that most modes of operation are affected by this trojan. So we could now of course just copy the user key into the IV or use it as the IV. But this would be screaming at the user, since the IV for several encryptions would be the same or would be the key itself. A much smarter way to do this would be to encrypt the user key with some small random value, small here in a sense of like a 32 bit value, and use this value as the IV. It will still look like a random IV, but it's actually depending or dependent on the key now and some random value. And then if we would build a trojan like this, key recovery can actually be done via a known plain text attack. We just as an attacker, listen to some conversation, and then we guess the random value and decrypt the IV with this random value. Then we get a key candidate and use this key candidate to decrypt the cipher text, get some message out, and then see if our known plain text is in there. In that case, we found the candidate. Since we need two decryptions per guess, we have an average complexity of two to the lambda decryptions until we found the key. The really nice thing is that in our design we only have to modify or modify six signals and connect them to dummy inputs of obfuscated gates to implement the whole trojan. And as you can see here in the image, it's actually interesting that it modifies the state machine that belongs to setting a new key and from there transitions over into the state machine part that is used for encryption. So we do not need any additional hardware modules for this trojan. We just need some modification of the state machine and as you can see also of the bus controller. So now how could we detect this trojan? Let's switch sides again and say that we are now someone who wants to analyze this design and wants to see whether trojan is inside. So in this sense, we are maybe customers evaluation labs. You could think that the malicious designer still wants to get some certification for this chip and sends it to a lab or something. Or even in case of military equipment like a government agency or the military that wants to make sure that there is no trojan inside. So since the designer is malicious, there are basically or the documentation cannot be trusted. It's fake or something is not available. We cannot rely on a golden model here. So we basically just have two ways to detect that something is wrong. We can do some functional testing and we can do reverse engineering. If we do functional testing, that does not really help. The design has correct output and it works correctly with non trojanized chips. As all we did was change the IV generation. And not the encryption algorithm itself. But the IV itself still looks random. And it was shown that the IV stream passes statistical tests if lambda is at least 32. So the only chance that we have left here is to detect that the IVs repeat too soon. Because of course the key that is used, the random key that is used to encrypt the user key, it's very small. It's just a 32-bit key. So we expect collisions with a 50% probability after 2 to the lambda half IVs for the same key. So if we chose, for example, lambda equals 64, then we need to check 2 to the 32 IVs on average to get a 50% probability to get the same IV twice. And the crucial thing here is that typical testing is edge case driven. One would not check for IV collisions. One would check specific test vectors. One would check specific corner cases. But one would not exhaustively check for IV collisions for one specific key. So this test that would actually find our very specific trojan is an unreasonable test without any initial suspicion and would therefore most likely not be applied. So the trojanized output remains indistinguishable, not in a math sense indistinguishable, but in a real world testing sense indistinguishable from genuine output. And so we can conclude that our trojan likely remains undetected during functional testing. And since functional testing now does not help the trojan remains invisible, our only chance is reverse engineering of the IC. But by design and by the guarantees of the doppelgänger technique, the reverse engineer will only find the visible functionality where the trojan is not even part of. So the analyst will analyze a netlist that does not have a trojan inside as long as our camouflaging is effective. So by design, all the netlist based trojan detection schemes out there are ineffective. And no suspicion is raised during the standard analysis approaches. So we can conclude no suspicion is raised during reasonable functional testing, no suspicion is raised in the standard reverse engineering process. And this makes the application of further analysis methods that may be able to uncover the camouflaged gates simply unreasonable and too expensive. So the trojan likely remains completely undetected in this case. And we demonstrated that low level obfuscation has an immense offensive potential. Now bear in mind this was of course just a toy example. And there will be valid points how this trojan could be detected with some specialized technique. But again, is this specialized technique so simple and so cheap that it would be applied to every security critical design? And also the question is whether such an analysis for this specific trojan could be generalized to find other trojans where I highly doubt that this is possible. So yes, this specific trojan might even be detectable with very many with very much effort are very dedicated techniques. But the doppelganger obfuscation technique itself could be used to build much more complex trojans. And here the odds of detection are then much lower. So to conclude our paper, we present the first generic technique that utilizes low obfuscation to obfuscate higher level structures. And we obfuscate by ignoring existing logic instead of adding new. The cool thing is here that the designer has control over both the obfuscation input and the obfuscation output. We can control how the visible functionality will look like and how the hidden functionality will look like. This enables obfuscation output that still appears possible. For most traditional schemes, you can see that something was obfuscated. Or at least you'll run some analysis and find, well, this is really overblown could have been simplified. So it is likely obfuscated, which is not possible for the doppelganger technique. But we also demonstrated that such low level obfuscation enables very dangerous trojans. So we believe that our results are highly relevant to the industry, to academics of multiple disciplines, and even to government agencies. And with that, I thank you for your attention.


Today you're Friday with a resin on location at the Toronto Editor Art Exhibition with artist, Rikuno. Hello. Sorry about her. I actually like to sing that song. So we saw Morgan's food and then we looked closely and I said, how are you doing these edges so perfect? How can you do this, man? So this is my series of reigning cows and I layer my resin. I do about three to seven different layers on top of each layer I paint on top of it. Pretty much to give the viewer a 3D flowing kind of feel and then with the edges give it like a nice smooth router feel to it and it just comes out like nice and crisp. So you just use a router on the top going along? Yes. And how doesn't it, it doesn't have to rest on the surface for a router at all? Nope. It looks awesome. And thanks for telling us how you do it. Yeah, for sure. And back to just singing yours. Use a router for your edges. That's Morgan's tip. Oh, thank God that's over.


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